Anonymizing BIdders in Auctioneer

  • Problems in status quo:


    In most old or one-sided universes, items in auctioneer are monopolized by a single or a very few top ranking players, usually with extremely low prices. This often happens because the top players bully and threaten low ranking players who bid against them. This way, the top ranking bidders can scare away their competitors and easily dominate the auctioneer. This is definitely not what an auctioneer should look like. Top players should win the bid through resource advantage but not military advantage.



    Solution:


    The root cause of what is happening in the auctioneer is the fact that bidders' names are shown. If one can bid without showing his/her nickname on the auctioneer, bullying and threatening won't happen. I recommend the game development team to consider anonymizing bidders.


    Of course, some top players may want to show their nickname in bids, probably to show their determination of winning the bid or simply to show off. In this case, the development team may consider creating a checkbox in options so that players can choose to show or hide their nickname in bids.

  • What if I go in a bidding war with an anonymous player and it turns out that I made my alliance member/buddy... lose a ludicrous amount of resources because of my greed for a specific item? If a player has try-harded and gotten himself the status and respect from others in the auction house it is well earned and shouldn't be bothered.

    There cannot be peace without first, a great suffering. The greater the suffering, the greater the peace.

  • What if I go in a bidding war with an anonymous player and it turns out that I made my alliance member/buddy... lose a ludicrous amount of resources because of my greed for a specific item? If a player has try-harded and gotten himself the status and respect from others in the auction house it is well earned and shouldn't be bothered.

    Yes, you got a point. And that is exactly why I recommend a self-selected option for show/hide nickname in bidding. Normally, I assume top ranking players would like to show their names to avoid the situation you mentioned, while low rank players would like to hide their names to protect themselves from bullying and threatening. In general, it will make the auctioneer much more efficient as a market. However, some top ranking players would definitely hate this because they will lose some "free" items.


    In real world acution, a bidder is allowed to bid anonymously, or designate a proxy to bid on behalf of him/her. In Ogame, of course we are binded by the multi-account rule, so anonymizing bidder is the only way out.

  • I think this one needs a referendum of some sort haha. I for example by outbidding/bullying some low level players teach them not to waste their resources on auctions witch belong to the big boys. Low players should be more concerned about their planet, fleet development and not trying their luck on auction houses. The "anonymous" sign wont stop me from taking the item I want. This would mostly benefit the players witch have pissed someone off and are getting targeted and their growth slowed.

    There cannot be peace without first, a great suffering. The greater the suffering, the greater the peace.

  • I think this one needs a referendum of some sort haha. I for example by outbidding/bullying some low level players teach them not to waste their resources on auctions witch belong to the big boys. Low players should be more concerned about their planet, fleet development and not trying their luck on auction houses. The "anonymous" sign wont stop me from taking the item I want. This would mostly benefit the players witch have pissed someone off and are getting targeted and their growth slowed.

    As I stated in the original post, top players can always outbid low ranking players because they have more resource. It is totally legitimate and should be encouraged as it demonstrates what the real meaning of auction is. Bullying the low ranking players and prohibiting them from bidding, on the other hand, is an unrighteous manner.

    If this suggestion is taken, no doubt the big boys will still win the most of the biddings, but with much higher costs (which should be much closer to the true value of the items). Low ranking players won't benefit much from it, but at least they can participate auctions without too much worry. I'm not trying to be the Robin Hood in this, but will be glad to see a more efficient auction system.

  • There is no such thing as a higher cost when there is a bidding duel between a low rank and a top rank player. Low rank player will feel too confident with his anonymous tag and end up losing even more resources due to unnecessary confidence. The top rank player wont even notice the cost of the item at the end of the day. This would be a waste of time for ogame team witch should spend their scripting power in fighting against botters not tampering with the auction house.

    There cannot be peace without first, a great suffering. The greater the suffering, the greater the peace.

  • There is no such thing as a higher cost when there is a bidding duel between a low rank and a top rank player. Low rank player will feel too confident with his anonymous tag and end up losing even more resources due to unnecessary confidence. The top rank player wont even notice the cost of the item at the end of the day. This would be a waste of time for ogame team witch should spend their scripting power in fighting against botters not tampering with the auction house.

    This suggestion is for eliminating unfair bullying and threatening that commonly happens in auctioneer. It's not for granting low rank players any privilege to win the bids. Low rank players should smart enough to foresee possible loss if competing with top rank players (that's also why top rank players would be very likely to show their names), and yet if they decide to do so anyway, they should be protected from bullying.


    The "higher cost" resulting from this change may not be noticable for top rank players as you said. But I think it's actually a good thing for the implementation of this suggestion because top rank players wouldn't be too hard to accept the change.


    To my understanding, this change won't give the development team too much burden. But at the end of the day, it will be their call, not ours, to decide if this is worth doing.

  • There are bullies out there that smash low ranks with rips, when they are outbid for a measly 2k spent on auction.

    You do not have to bid big to win at auction some are small and the price is you outbid and win, you will pay for it.


    So yes I agree there should be an option to turn off your nick in auction.


    There's nothing like bidding on an item and a few minutes after auction is complete the low rank finds he/she won a booster for 2k metal and the next minute find the bidder they outbid in auction is attacking with 100 rips per planet, destroying all there def over a 2k booster.


    How bitter and selfish these bullies are, and there is so many of them out there that do this to low ranks that can not def or fight back.


    So yes I agree they should be able to disable there nick from showing so they can bid on a simple item to help there growth without any retaliation for it.


    This will also help to prevent noobs from quitting so early in the game as well.

  • Guys it's like an ebay auction, you miss you miss, but if someone bullies or threatens you, screenshot the message and report to GO via ticket...

    But if someone smashes you for outbidding that's just ridiculous.


    On the other hand the joy of outbidding your nemesis, love it :D

    Here's from Cygnus anonymized by me , but good few different people got to have chances and I'd say the items are distributed quite evenly. I think i've seen a stomt or another thread where person said they don't get a chance, but you do have to be there watch it for the last 5 mins, you cannot expect not to be outbid.


    I think this one needs a referendum of some sort haha. I for example by outbidding/bullying some low level players teach them not to waste their resources on auctions witch belong to the big boys. Low players should be more concerned about their planet, fleet development and not trying their luck on auction houses. The "anonymous" sign wont stop me from taking the item I want. This would mostly benefit the players witch have pissed someone off and are getting targeted and their growth slowed.

    Well, I agree with "teaching by outbidding" or perhaps mentoring, I cannot condone bullying and I am sure many others will agree on that, I sincerely doubt you came to Ogame and aced it right at the start...

    It's a game feature If it was intended for high players only then it would be available to high ranked players only. And say the 20% or 30% booster or a detroid or newtron can change ones development quite early in game.

    Don't be cocky and choose your words wiser next time.

  • reviving this one...


    Bids should definitely be anonumys because of two reasons:


    1. BULLYING. Which means they become a free shop for multi billion point accounts and they just get bigger and bigger. There are many unis today (thanks to graveyard) where there is one player with huge amount of points, billions, compared to others with few hundred thousand. I've seen in a couple of unis that everyone is scared to bid against them and they get all the items for 1000 resources.


    As soon as you bid probes start to fly and they will squash you like a fly. Yes, it's absurd, but that's how some people play. A lot of them actually.


    2. They reveal your activity and online patterns.

    .