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hey, just wanted to respond on one point to J_Cheever_Loophole's post...I actually wasn't hinting at a subscription but at the need for us to build out our gaming platform in some other ways before we loop back and look at the draft engine (which is a pretty substantial effort).

Make us all feel better though and rule out subscription. Say the sweet words! Milk those corporate people instead!

all righty, I'll respond to that and with enough detail that you'll know I'm not just blowing smoke.

we have no plans to go subscription and i don't think it's a very good business model for games like this. in addition, there's lots of interest on the corporate side in reaching folks like you guys here...movie lovers and movie tastemakers.

the #1 reason people go see a movie is that their friends tell them they should go see a particular movie...so reaching the people who talk to their friends about what movies look good is a pretty good audience to reach. also, we can't get big enough/get enough people playing to build a business if we go subscription...would keep the # of people playing relatively small.

having said all that, we need to make some things happen on the tech side and grow the user base of Moguls quite a lot to make all that work.

dpilot4226 wrote:

numbersix_99 wrote:

I think the salary cap will show its true colours outside of the summer season. Then you'll see why draft is better.

From the context of your post I think you meant that salary-cap is better. If that is waht you meant, I agree with you completely. I enjoy the draft method but I can't say that it's fairer.

~D

Is the draft any more fair in fantasy baseball, football, or basketball leagues? Is it fair that the Portland Trailblazers are going to get Greg Oden in this years NBA draft? No. But it is part of the intrigue and excitement of the game. Plus if you lose you can always blame a poor draft position

The poll that is attached to this thread hasn't gotten much attention; I guess since not many people have voted in it. But, now that it's been around for a couple months, I think it's worth noting what it shows us: only 16% of those who voted want to play the salary cap model and only the salary cap model. I suppose we can assume that they just didn't care for the draft and couldn't care less if it disappears for good. Perhaps these were the people who complained of its unfairness before the change.

Twice as many of the voters want the draft and only the draft; and couldn't, ostensibly, care less if the salary cap disappeared.

In addition, over half of all voters would play under both models.

It's not really an overwhelming endorsement for either version of the game, but drafting certainly receives more preference than the salary cap. I would propose that this preference is that of the moguls who have been with FM from or near the beginning, those that login often, scour the boards, and devote a lot of time to winning the game; in short, diehards and film fanatics.

Whatever the poll and these assumptions lead you to conclude, the bottom line is that FM has now assumed the task of making itself a successful business. As such, they've changed the game to make it more accessible to casual web surfers and people who want to play games but tremble when they hear the word "draft." Drafting requires them to clear time in their busy schedules, when the salary cap allows them to pick & choose films as they please without having to synchronize schedules with opponents. Short 3 month seasons also make people more likely to join a game, when a 4 or 5 month season would just seem like a lot of time out of a year.

Anyway, these all seem to be good changes towards making FM a prosperous advertising site. With the FM adverts I've seen at sites such as IMDB, Facebook, and Screenhead (amongst others, I'm sure), traffic and participation should increase significantly.

Maybe, once FM starts reaping the benefits of this increase, we will begin seeing some of the changes, or retro-fittings, for which some of us have been asking.

In the meantime, the members of the ultimate moguls league that I primarily play in are not likely to stick around FM. We developed a year long season, divided into 3 four month games, that incorporates the Over/Under as a fifth category, and holds 3 snake-style drafts in which the order is determined by the previous game's final rankings. With the new truncated season lengths and FM's inability to remove the salary cap limitation, we are finding it very difficult to play this style of game. We track much of the game on our own now, with ever-decreasing input from the FM site. Furthermore, those of us who won the previous game got stuck with films that won't realize their full potential because FM ends the season on July 31.

We will probably not open a new league for the next season, opting instead to extend our summer game into August some. We will continue visiting FM to play the Over/Under, which may be all FM really wants anyway: people logging in regularly regardless of intent. But we won't be new visitors, discovering and enjoying the quick & easy fun of the Over/Under game. We will be dissatisfied customers who would really like to to be spending more time at FM, but would rather play their own game instead.

Good luck in making the site a success FM. I hope we will be seeing more changes soon!

Eldr1tch wrote:

dpilot4226 wrote:

numbersix_99 wrote:

I think the salary cap will show its true colours outside of the summer season. Then you'll see why draft is better.

From the context of your post I think you meant that salary-cap is better. If that is waht you meant, I agree with you completely. I enjoy the draft method but I can't say that it's fairer.

~D

Is the draft any more fair in fantasy baseball, football, or basketball leagues? Is it fair that the Portland Trailblazers are going to get Greg Oden in this years NBA draft? No. But it is part of the intrigue and excitement of the game. Plus if you lose you can always blame a poor draft position

You really can't compare the two. When the Trailblazers draft Oden, they do not get him for life, he can be traded. In FM movies cannot be traded, and even if they could be, why would anybody want to? Another point that needs to be made is that your analogy begs the question. What is the point of each of these endeavors? The point of FM is to play a game with other movie lovers that attempts to show that your unique combination of skill and luck in predicting the real world performance of movies, or in other words to win the game. The point of drafting a player into professional sports is in part to win games, but only to the extent that winning games helps the owners to make money. Professional sports is a business, lest we all forget, and the point of business is to make money. So the analogy breaks down for a couple of reasons, and helps to show why in a game that we play for fun on the internet is better if it is more fair.

~D

All of these points are mute. People loved the draft and to take it away without much reason was silly and stupid. Basically, FM said we don't care about the people that have been here from the beginning. We want new membership and the best way to do that is to make the game easier and less time consuming. It is that simple.

I am all for introducing new games and new ways to play the game. I think that the cap method is a great community game and, just like Box office only leagues are to the mogul leagues, it could be a great introductory game. My problem comes when you don't give people the option to do things as they always have. When Schick introduces a new razor (probably with 20 blades by the time we are all said and done) they don't immediately take all the predecessors off the market. They market it and if the product is truly better the customer decides. You took that out of our hands here.

In my previous posts I flew off the handle a little bit and for that I apologize but that doesn't mean that I was wrong. FM handled this piss pourly. Why should you force your customer to care about fairness. I think it is great you gave us the option for a fairer game. However, If you think the new game is more fair and ultimately better than the existing draft method let the customer decide don't give us no choice in the matter. The lack of choice is what has made everyone upset. Now you are stuck b/c you don't have the time to fix it or, even more infuriating, don't want to fix it.

What you did doesn't make a lot of long term business sense. You alienated many of your exisiting fan base for the possibility of new players. Wouldn't you want to try and keep all of your old fans and grow new fans? Maybe if you explained why this was an either/or proposition instead of an and/in addition to proposition I could see your point of view, but until then count me amongst the disgruntled. I am also contimplating going offline for at least the holiday season if not the fall.

Thank you for introducing me to this great game. It has been fun... Good luck.

helfy: In your post you used a word that helps to explain why we seem to be talking at cross purposes here. That word is customers you talk about Schick customers and marketing but we are not customers here at fantasy moguls. We are users, we get this service for free and then complain when it doesn't perfectly fit our wants and desires.

I understand what you are saying about how the abrupt transition caught us all off guard and we weren't made aware of what was in the works before it happened. But, ultimately I think that the game has not changed oh-so-drastically that people ought to leave and never come back. In fact, since the customers of Fantasy Moguls are the corporate sponsors, maybe we should not blame FM for trying to give their customers what they want. In a while it would seem that we will get the option to play the draft back and maybe even with it our ability to play custom length and time seasons. I think that as a user rather than a customer we should be grateful for the game they are giving us for free.

~D

Dp: Don't talk down to me first of all. Second of all, right now we are the reason that FM can get "customers" the over all user base and expanding user base is who they have to cater too. You seem to think my opinion of switching completely the gaming models without a chance to use the old model is out of line. Why?

Without users this is just an email address. Therefore, why not keep the ones you have while increasing the ones you don't have with new games like the cap model. That is all I am saying. All fantasy leagues have a draft model available to their "users", fair or unfair, why can't a fantasy league for movies follow the same format?

I believe it is you that needs to bone up on your readings and realize that the concensus for membership sites is you treat your "users" as your customers to drive corporate advertising and sponsorship. I believe FM is doing that. All I asked was why drop the old game completely. It, seemingly, unnecessarily shook FM base "users," alienating many of them and some to the point of leaving. It was just wrong of them to do what they did with no explanation (other than they thought it was better model) and no warning.

Now with that being said I am not going to lose sleep over it. I just feel a little cheated is all.

Thanks for sticking up for FM Dp they needed ya on their team b/c they don't have a whole lot of the old guard left.

P.S. One more thing to add... I am sure FM's membership is going up but how come most of the posts still come from the same old users. Hmmmmmmmmmm? Something to ponder.

helfy91782 wrote:

Dp: Don't talk down to me first of all. Second of all, right now we are the reason that FM can get "customers" the over all user base and expanding user base is who they have to cater too. You seem to think my opinion of switching completely the gaming models without a chance to use the old model is out of line. Why?

Without users this is just an email address. Therefore, why not keep the ones you have while increasing the ones you don't have with new games like the cap model. That is all I am saying. All fantasy leagues have a draft model available to their "users", fair or unfair, why can't a fantasy league for movies follow the same format?

I believe it is you that needs to bone up on your readings and realize that the concensus for membership sites is you treat your "users" as your customers to drive corporate advertising and sponsorship. I believe FM is doing that. All I asked was why drop the old game completely. It, seemingly, unnecessarily shook FM base "users," alienating many of them and some to the point of leaving. It was just wrong of them to do what they did with no explanation (other than they thought it was better model) and no warning.

Now with that being said I am not going to lose sleep over it. I just feel a little cheated is all.

Thanks for sticking up for FM Dp they needed ya on their team b/c they don't have a whole lot of the old guard left.

P.S. One more thing to add... I am sure FM's membership is going up but how come most of the posts still come from the same old users. Hmmmmmmmmmm? Something to ponder.

Helfy: First, let me say that I am sorry to come off as talking down to you.
Secondly, if I didn't make myself clear in the last post, I understand completely where you are coming from as far as the format change goes. It was a complete change in the way the game is played with no warning or explanation as to what the changes were going to be or to why these changes were being made. Even now, there has been little explanation as to why these changes had to take the place of rather than be a supplement to the previous game.
Luckily for those of us who would still like the option of playing the draft model, there have been signs of FM bringing it back. It is unfortunate that FM was not able (or maybe not willing) to give us this option all along or at least add the previous system back in sooner than now, as this has only served to alienate a portion of the users (such as yourself).
I do understand what you are saying about FM treating us like customers in order to reach the corporate sponsors, however, I am glad that they are continuing to offer this game for free rather than charging a subscription fee, and I for one am still enjoying the game and learning the strategies for doing well at it (I hope).
Again, I am sorry for offending you, and I hope that you will continue to take part in our game while FM works to bring back your preffered version. Those of us who like to take part in the forums also tend to be the ones who miss the draft style, so that may be the answer to your question. I find the forum posting to be another fun and thought provoking aspect of the site that is separate from the game. I hope you stick around and continue to add your imput to our growing community (there are a few new posters who pop up and begin to contribute here).

~D

to respond to the factual question raised by you guys, helfy91782 and dpilot4226:

this spring, we had to build a new set of site and game code for a variety of reasons. as the computer geeks in here know, that means that any existing code (eg, the draft engine) on different platforms may or may not be compatible--not, in this case, which may help provide more background to my earlier post about development and the need to make some tough choices about priorities and resources. I'd love to buy all three pairs of shoes that I tried on the other day, but unfortunately I had to pick one pair and make sure it was within my budget! you know what I mean.

You really can't compare the two. When the Trailblazers draft Oden, they do not get him for life, he can be traded. In FM movies cannot be traded, and even if they could be, why would anybody want to? Another point that needs to be made is that your analogy begs the question. What is the point of each of these endeavors? The point of FM is to play a game with other movie lovers that attempts to show that your unique combination of skill and luck in predicting the real world performance of movies, or in other words to win the game. The point of drafting a player into professional sports is in part to win games, but only to the extent that winning games helps the owners to make money. Professional sports is a business, lest we all forget, and the point of business is to make money. So the analogy breaks down for a couple of reasons, and helps to show why in a game that we play for fun on the internet is better if it is more fair.

~D

Hey D, I certainly get that there are holes in the analogy. I was simply making the point that the draft can still be fun, even if it is not as "fair" as the salary cap method.

Eldr1tch wrote:

Hey D, I certainly get that there are holes in the analogy. I was simply making the point that the draft can still be fun, even if it is not as "fair" as the salary cap method.

Hey, I totally agree with you there. The draft version can be a lot of fun, and I'm looking forward to the day when I can have a draft league or 2 with my friends, but until then I am content with the salary cap version.

~D

Salary cap gives more flexibility, but the draft was fun and suspenseful. I'd do both.

pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease bring back the draft!

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