No personal loot pool? Poll

[girtsn]

It fits the definition (source http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/gamble )

gamble
Pronunciation: /ˈgamb(ə)l/
verb
play games of chance for money;

However for legal reasons, it's not good for anyone related to this game if definition is applied.
Yes, I know it's possible to be in game and not spend anything. But same way it's possible to enter a casino and do something else.
Also how it's applied in US
http://definitions.uslegal.com/g/gambling/

Umm..... no.

I have massive respect for the inputs you make to player knowledge, but this one is not correct.

P.S. https://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/forums/showthread.php?228452-Notes-reading-the-EU-Terms-of-Use

 

[Shadowsong]

It fits the definition (source http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/gamble )


However for legal reasons, it's not good for anyone related to this game if definition is applied.
Yes, I know it's possible to be in game and not spend anything. But same way it's possible to enter a casino and do something else.
Also how it's applied in US
http://definitions.uslegal.com/g/gambling/

Certainly many will agree that it is gambling. I do not, and that was the basis of my response. We do not ALL agree that it is gambling.

Yes, you can enter a casino and do something else, but generally that will not bring a return. In EU, it is possible to gain monetary return without wagering a single cent. It is possible to completely avoid chance in EU, which is not to say it will be easy.

 

[girtsn]

I guess the reference is to something like fapping. Yes fapping is not gambling - though a profession of bringing drinks to players for a cost in a casino isn't as well, same with prostitution
However fapping is also not one of the 4 main professions (hunting, mining, crafting and owning a virtual property). The only exception could be sweat gathering. All of the main professions do match the definition I gave. And if a casino also sells drinks, I guess it's still a gambling institution.
To make my argument stronger, what would it help if MA was asked to shut down all activities that look like gambling? Who would pay the sweat gatherer?

Yes, you can enter a casino and do something else, but generally that will not bring a return. In EU, it is possible to gain monetary return without wagering a single cent. It is possible to completely avoid chance in EU, which is not to say it will be easy.

 

[Serica]

It fits the definition (source http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/gamble ) .. play games of chance for money; ...

This would only be true if loot returned was a random amount (ie chance). MA have never (to my knowledge) said anything like that.
Indeed they have always implied there are factors, to some extent within the players' control, that affect the calculation of loot. So far, those factors include (at least): player skills, and player efficiency.
I've never seen EU as gambling, tho I agree that many players choose to play it as tho it was, choosing high risk strategies in the hopes of high returns. Some will succeed in that, but sadly, many don't .. which does little for the game's reputation in the long term, imho.
I look forward to more of these Developer Notes being issued.

 

[girtsn]

The definition applies because most players enter the game for a chance to use money to win money. How MA organizes the winnings, is out of question. The only thing that matters is that the rules of the game are not fully known (i.e. uncontrollable) by majority of players.

This would only be true if loot returned was a random amount (ie chance). MA have never (to my knowledge) said anything like that.

 

[Spawn]

Wouldn't a gambler believe in pure luck and less on long term returns? I mean, it would be pretty stupid to walk into a Casino and be called a gambler when you know the fruit machine eats 13% of your 500$ and you want to enjoy the evening for 65$ without expecting to hit the jackpot on every roll. I find the logic is reversed somehow. Player knows he pays a 10% tax and plans for that, gets called a gambler...

My brother had a gambling addiction in real life (slot machines). He was convinced that if he had lost, that the machine would be full and pay him back the money he lost, so he inserted more money to see that also disappear. So the idea of personal lootpools is very much like your favorite slotmachine that will pay you back once it's full. It's also the reason that he didnt want to buy a landarea with me as an investment, because he was afraid he might get addicted again.

 

[girtsn]

• Sorry for your brother.
• The slot machines generally have a payback of >=97% (but have no MU naturally) - so provided you sit alone on a machine long enough and within the lifespan of the machine and it's not broken, you will get that percentage as return. http://www.slotsgeek.com/slots/payout-percentage/
• There is nothing personal about the return, for example a case when someone has won a huge amount on the machine which emptied the 3% or so.

My brother had a gambling addiction in real life (slot machines). He was convinced that if he had lost, that the machine would be full and pay him back the money he lost, so he inserted more money to see that also disappear. So the idea of personal lootpools is very much like your favorite slotmachine that will pay you back once it's full. It's also the reason that he didnt want to buy a landarea with me as an investment, because he was afraid he might get addicted again.

 

[Serica]

The definition applies because most players enter the game for a chance to use money to win money. How MA organizes the winnings, is out of question. The only thing that matters is that the rules of the game are not fully known (i.e. uncontrollable) by majority of players.

Dear me, under that definition ('most players enter the game for a chance to use money to win money'), any business venture must be included as gambling.

On the other hand, the rules in gambling games (eg poker) are certainly fully known by most players. They just dont know what the turn of the next card will be.

And yet governments seem to be able to distinguish between activities associated with risk (oh, say investing in the stock market, or starting up a new business .. both risky, yet not defined as gambling), with betting on games of chance (gambling). Even tho you can play the stockmarket like gambling too, if you're willing to, and have sufficiently deep pockets to cover your losses.

Just because the players do not know the specific formula MA uses to calculate their loot in a dynamical system does not mean that calculation is random.

How do you get a handle on a dynamical system? Studying system dynamics.

 

[girtsn]

Khm. Well depends of if you define business venture/stock market as a game and if you can or can't control the rules, doesn't it (the keyword was uncontrollable in my previous quote which you missed). Just a quote from the US site above which does not place the word "game" in the definition.

A person engages in gambling if he stakes or risks something of value upon the outcome of a contest of chance or a future contingent event not under his control or influence, upon an agreement or understanding that he or someone else will receive something of value in the event of a certain outcome.

It should be clear most of the players of EU can not influence (even more, we don't even know) the rules of the game. And EU is a game, at least no problem there. So, they are in fact gambling based on US definition above.

Dear me, under that definition ('most players enter the game for a chance to use money to win money'), any business venture must be included as gambling.
Just because the players do not know the specific formula MA uses to calculate their loot in a dynamical system does not mean that calculation is random.

 

[Shadowsong]

I guess the reference is to something like fapping. Yes fapping is not gambling - though a profession of bringing drinks to players for a cost in a casino isn't as well, same with prostitution
However fapping is also not one of the 4 main professions (hunting, mining, crafting and owning a virtual property). The only exception could be sweat gathering. All of the main professions do match the definition I gave. And if a casino also sells drinks, I guess it's still a gambling institution.
To make my argument stronger, what would it help if MA was asked to shut down all activities that look like gambling? Who would pay the sweat gatherer?

I am not trying to dissuade anyone from a belief that EU is gambling. I am saying I do not share that belief.

If I purchase a quad, and start a taxi service, that is a business venture, albeit with risks. If I use my money to buy miniscule amounts of resources, and sell larger amounts for profit, that is a business venture. There are many such ventures available in EU, and MA does classify them as professions, correctly.

In RL there are no guarantees that hunting, mining or manufacturing will return profit - many people fail, that does not make it gambling. A similar situation exists in EU.

 

[girtsn]

I'm not trying to "convert" you either Just some thoughts in and there.

In RL there are no guarantees that hunting, mining or manufacturing will return profit - many people fail, that does not make it gambling. A similar situation exists in EU.
The compare misses entity representing analogue of MA in the RL professions you described (i.e. no gambling organizer unit).
If I purchase a quad, and start a taxi service, that is a business venture, albeit with risks. If I use my money to buy miniscule amounts of resources, and sell larger amounts for profit, that is a business venture. There are many such ventures available in EU, and MA does classify them as professions, correctly.
I would say they all depend on the main professions, so would go down as soon as somone says the main professions are gambling and must be shut down.

 

[Nisha]

It fits the definition (source http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/gamble )


However for legal reasons, it's not good for anyone related to this game if definition is applied.
Yes, I know it's possible to be in game and not spend anything. But same way it's possible to enter a casino and do something else.
Also how it's applied in US
http://definitions.uslegal.com/g/gambling/

Thanks for the link.

But as I said in my post above, the way the game is designed and played shifts it probably just enough to argue that there is no gambling in the legal sense.

E. g. you do not bet on the outcome of a contest or an event. This would be something like: I bet that the mob I am about to kill falls to the left when I'm through, and you win, if that actually happens.

You can also argue about the phrase "something of value", if you just receive some pixel which represent tokens in a virtual game world. - However, I think that by now in most countries virtual items/goods of that kind would be seen the same way as real items/goods.

A lot of the game play is expressly excluded in this definition: "Gambling does not include bona fide business transactions valid under the law of contracts, such as the purchase or sale at a future date of securities or commodities, contracts of indemnity or guaranty and life, health or accident insurance." - This is probably one of the reasons, why the economy is so heavily stressed in the official descriptions of the game.

Hunting, mining and crafting are game activities that serve two purposes. One is acquiring material or items that allow you to participate in that virtual economy, the other is developing your avatar (which is also part of the official game description). These two purposes do not fit the definition of gambling.

And now that I think about it: Gambling laws might just be the very reason why MA cannot have personal loot pools. How can a company keep track of and document cash input for the only reason of monitoring a future cash return and steer clear of gambling laws at the same time?

 

[Satans]

we all agree that Entropia Universe is a gambling game.

Only Mind Dark pretend it is not.

Of course... A casino where you can have an influence on your returns though.

MA is just like Russia.. They believe that they never invaded europe.

 

[girtsn]

As long as you properly redefine Europe, it's true.

MA is just like Russia.. They believe that they never invaded europe.

 

[SpikeBlack]

It's the expected value for me. What I asked was what the person that disagrees with the community established conclusion, what were their own findings in regards to average returns.

Well mine have flattened off at 80%

As for the OP, for me it means that someone spending a little has exactly the same chances as someone spending a lot over the same time frame.

It also means that everyone is equal under the loot system no matter how much you deposit / spend or skill level.

 

[Ace Flyster]

I think this thread should get an award for asking and providing the most definitions lol, most of which are unrelated to the OP topic

Rgds

Ace

 

[girtsn]

What scares the shit out of me is knowing that if someone would send a complaint to the anti-gambling institutions of US about EU. IMHO, if they had even the slightest interest in looking into it, the first thing to do would be shutting it down (US territory) and investigate the matters. Knowing there's quite a few US players, the impact would be quite bad.

Thanks for the link.
E. g. you do not bet on the outcome of a contest or an event. This would be something like: I bet that the mob I am about to kill falls to the left when I'm through, and you win, if that actually happens.
Participating in events like robot event, you do.
You can also argue about the phrase "something of value", if you just receive some pixel which represent tokens in a virtual game world. - However, I think that by now in most countries virtual items/goods of that kind would be seen the same way as real items/goods.
Knowing PED is linked to USD by the rules of game, this is a very easy one to ignore.
A lot of the game play is expressly excluded in this definition: "Gambling does not include bona fide business transactions valid under the law of contracts, such as the purchase or sale at a future date of securities or commodities, contracts of indemnity or guaranty and life, health or accident insurance." - This is probably one of the reasons, why the economy is so heavily stressed in the official descriptions of the game.
Hmm I see nothing applying.
Hunting, mining and crafting are game activities that serve two purposes. One is acquiring material or items that allow you to participate in that virtual economy, the other is developing your avatar (which is also part of the official game description). These two purposes do not fit the definition of gambling.
And that would ignore the primary purpose, get some PEDs out of it.
And now that I think about it: Gambling laws might just be the very reason why MA cannot have personal loot pools. How can a company keep track of and document cash input for the only reason of monitoring a future cash return and steer clear of gambling laws at the same time?
I'm guessing the only answer that would make them safe is that their official income is not the game mechanics (e.g. not gambling organizer). Lets think like this. People buy stock (guaranteed by TT), and MA then reinvests the money for them. As the users chose to lose some peds / win some peds from each other during the year according to rules, those are authorized transactions. The money is actually invested in stock (guess some USD related market for obvious reasons). This is where the actual profit/losses comes from. So if MA gets 120% profit, the total TT return is the return lowered by their margin (say 10%). The current base TT return is 90%. Since it's bad years for stock, they have little random ATHs and uberitems to drop at us.
Also, here is a statement from MA (found in ToA) regulating the in-game actions:

Gambling activities are expressly forbidden in the Entropia Universe.

So, you may not do gambling by the agreement. This is a bit funny. This means, that you should not play the game if you intend to win some money. Quite safe.

 

[jetsina]

oh... the fine line between what should be considered gambling and what shouldn't. The discussion is also somewhat off-topic, isn't it? Still, very interesting.
In my opinion it is only the mu of ressources in the game which prevent a classification of gambling, and enable one of 'professions' - albeit risky ones - to win over.
It is the conversion of time and peds into materials which have an additional market value in game which makes clicking away NOT a gambling exercise. None of the gambling systems I know of contain an element of mu for what you receive.
The gaining of skills, which also have mu, must also be considered, especially if gaining them either raises your absolute tt returns, or the relative returns due to the possibility of being able to avoid buying items with higher mu on them in order to go about your 'business'.

A slightly crazy point to show exactly where I stand is the following:
IF lotteries (drawing 6 numbers out of 49, for example) had a payout of 90 %, and did not allocate a goodish percentage of the 'income pool' towards the main jackpot payment (which each individual only has a low chance of cracking), and could be played every minute of the day and not just weekly or so....... THEN I would maybe play that lottery full-time... BECAUSE, although the operator takes its share, knowledge of other players' typical behaviour would give me an edge that would actually allow me to EXPECT a profit over time if I chose my 6 numbers (or sets of them) carefully.
Analysis of past data (of payouts made to all, lottery for lottery) would also allow me to prove that my time and money was being spent on a business expectation of profit, and thus I would argue that I was not gambling.

Unfortunately, real lotteries have terribly low payout percentages and you would actually have to have LUCK to generate a profit over a reasonable period of time, but considering my example:

I think EU conforms to this model - raw average payout approx. 90% and I believe there is the possibility of intelligent and skill-based playing, such that the profit that can be made DUE to using opportunities BETTER than the average player, that outperforms the 'take' the operator pulls out on average.

Back to the thread topic - I would prefer personal pools based at approx. 90% of tt spend returned, as I believe the player base would be higher and turnover overall for EU would be higher that way - solid but slowly leaking bathtubs which people enjoy bathing in rather than fragile ones which suddenly burst for ppl now and again, throw them out onto the floor, and discourage them from ever having a bath in another EU environment ever again!

 

[mrproper]

My brother had a gambling addiction in real life (slot machines). He was convinced that if he had lost, that the machine would be full and pay him back the money he lost, so he inserted more money to see that also disappear. So the idea of personal lootpools is very much like your favorite slotmachine that will pay you back once it's full. It's also the reason that he didnt want to buy a landarea with me as an investment, because he was afraid he might get addicted again.

That's not what I said. What I said is a gambler would not play 1000 times on the slot machine and expect to get MORE back than what he inserted, but instead an average disitribution based on the payout percentage tested and certified by state authorities for the specific device.

Thus if I lose my money in the slot machine, I do expect next time to be better, but only by a chance based on distribution of payout, eg, the distribution between current payout and average payout. Yes, I would expect to get more money back next time, no I don't expect to get the "missing" money back. New money, new chances, new payout.

 

[Nisha]

What scares the shit out of me is knowing that if someone would send a complaint to the anti-gambling institutions of US about EU. IMHO, if they had even the slightest interest in looking into it, the first thing to do would be shutting it down (US territory) and investigate the matters. Knowing there's quite a few US players, the impact would be quite bad.

If your link you provided describes current American law, I do not really think so. That is what I was trying to explain in my post.

E. g. you do not bet on the outcome of a contest or an event. This would be something like: I bet that the mob I am about to kill falls to the left when I'm through, and you win, if that actually happens.
Participating in events like robot event, you do.

I can certainly see your point here. But to determine whether this is illegal gambling would involve determining whether using the ammo/melee decay can be considered placing a bet in the legal sense and whether a single event like this is enough to investigate the game for gambling.

You can also argue about the phrase "something of value", if you just receive some pixel which represent tokens in a virtual game world. - However, I think that by now in most countries virtual items/goods of that kind would be seen the same way as real items/goods.
Knowing PED is linked to USD by the rules of game, this is a very easy one to ignore.

I do not ignore it. But the way the game is designed all the financial aspects of the game are tied to the economy aspect, not to gaming. If it is done carefully, all transactions are defined as business transactions and these are not subject to gambling laws.

A lot of the game play is expressly excluded in this definition: "Gambling does not include bona fide business transactions valid under the law of contracts, such as the purchase or sale at a future date of securities or commodities, contracts of indemnity or guaranty and life, health or accident insurance." - This is probably one of the reasons, why the economy is so heavily stressed in the official descriptions of the game.
Hmm I see nothing applying.

It is the difference between seeing the game as gambling (buying ammo/probes and use them for trying to get a big payback) and seeing the game as playing in a virtual world and a virtual economy (buying probes/ammo is doing business with MA to participate in the game and hunting/mining is a way of acquiring items to do business with other players and to develop your avatar's skills). - The second point of view has very little if nothing to do with gambling, and I assume that all companies involved here will argue that the game was designed for that type of game (or something similar).

Hunting, mining and crafting are game activities that serve two purposes. One is acquiring material or items that allow you to participate in that virtual economy, the other is developing your avatar (which is also part of the official game description). These two purposes do not fit the definition of gambling.
And that would ignore the primary purpose, get some PEDs out of it.

It is your personal choice to see it that way and to play that game this way. It still does not make the game an online casino or an illegal gambling site. The game is advertised as a game of exploration (which is not gambling) and trading/investment activities (which is not gambling), and I am quite sure that the companies providing the game have lots of evidence that the game is designed to be just that.

And now that I think about it: Gambling laws might just be the very reason why MA cannot have personal loot pools. How can a company keep track of and document cash input for the only reason of monitoring a future cash return and steer clear of gambling laws at the same time?
I'm guessing the only answer that would make them safe is that their official income is not the game mechanics (e.g. not gambling organizer). Lets think like this. People buy stock (guaranteed by TT), and MA then reinvests the money for them. As the users chose to lose some peds / win some peds from each other during the year according to rules, those are authorized transactions. The money is actually invested in stock (guess some USD related market for obvious reasons). This is where the actual profit/losses comes from. So if MA gets 120% profit, the total TT return is the return lowered by their margin (say 10%). The base TT return is 90%. Since it's bad years for stock, they have little random ATHs and uberitems to drop at us.

Not necessarily. Ofc they can expect the players to pay for playing the game. Just because there are no subscription fees does not mean they are not entitled to receive money from you as a player (this is probably the point where decay and auction fees become part of the equation).


This is all a matter of perspective and definition. What I am saying is that just because you can approach this game in a way that looks like gambling (I throw money in and hope to get a substantial amount back from the system) it does not mean that the game fits the legal definition of gambling. And chances are that demanding to have a personal loot pool or to know a certain return percentage is counterproductive, and it will never happen, just because these features would make the game a game of chance according to legal definitions.