UC Deck of the Year

[Mike Ratledge]

All good ideas, and doable with a bit of work. Showing the results pictorial style I like a lot, frankly. It's adding a layer of complexity that worries me and just how much use would it get outside the first month of the Year or so.

Food for thought, and we usually have been good at implementing things that augment and or amplify what we are doing. Once we get past the prize selection process let's open a new thread (I feel like I hijacked sinjin's thread - with help of course).

[tdubben]

I think we could leverage PlayingCardDB and create a User named "DoTY2015". Have one or multiple people maintain it by adding decks released in 2015 to it's "Collection". That way everyone can view at least the tucks in a single pane view. A lot of decks also show the courts and pips once you click on the deck. This also might encourage people to post pictures of cards where they are missing photos.

Just a thought...Sorry Mike, I'll wait for the new thread to expand on this idea

[Slavich]

I think we could leverage PlayingCardDB and create a User named "DoTY2015". Have one or multiple people maintain it by adding decks released in 2015 to it's "Collection". That way everyone can view at least the tucks in a single pane view. A lot of decks also show the courts and pips once you click on the deck. This also might encourage people to post pictures of cards where they are missing photos.

Just a thought...Sorry Mike, I'll wait for the new thread to expand on this idea

+1
Not a bad idea

[ecNate]

I like the idea of using PCDB, you can also cross embed images from there here if needed as well. In addition, remember that you can rename decks within your collection. This means we could prefix the title of the deck WITHIN THIS PRIVATE COLLECTION with the category it is a nominated for (should nominations be used in the future) and then have all related decks grouped together automatically.

I haven't closely followed this thread, so apologies if I missed this, but....

I also have concerns about voting for a popular deck vs true favorite. I'll admit it swayed my votes a bit. For instance I really liked the Highland Fauna courts for being dark and different, but given I assumed that vote wouldn't matter much and would just hurt me for the prizes that became the tie breaker and went with Origins which was equally good in my view, but different and more accessible/popular. I also can't help but notice we have a vastly underused polling system in phpbb here. I also liked the concept of nominations, but the method used at PCF was a bit cumbersome, manual and thus low participation.

Proposal - have everybody submit their TRUE favorites in each of the categories as was done this year. The top 10 decks would then be entered as options for a phpbb poll thread to determine the winner and related discussion. All voting is handled through this system. For prize entries people could simply get a point for each category submission and another for a vote. A randomizer program could then select the winners.

The current method of accurately picking what will be the final winners of the categories was interesting, but I think resulted in more decks missing out. However, I do think all the winners were generally the proper ones, but skewed in their favor with a greater margin than actually would have existed otherwise.

[chach]

I agree with Nate, unless some form of randomization is introduced to select "winners" for the prizes, you will have more people voting based on what the populous likes as opposed to their own true likes.

And I really like the idea of submitting votes and then voting again on those that received the most submissions. It would be like the style of voting we have here in the US with regards to primaries and then the final runoff. I believe such a system would definitely benefit next year's awards while also maintaining anonymity of how people voted.

[DragonSoul]

I also have concerns about voting for a popular deck vs true favorite. I'll admit it swayed my votes a bit. For instance I really liked the Highland Fauna courts for being dark and different, but given I assumed that vote wouldn't matter much and would just hurt me for the prizes that became the tie breaker and went with Origins which was equally good in my view, but different and more accessible/popular.

That was in the back of my mind as well when considering my votes but, in the end I purposely went the opposite way in one of the categories even though I knew it would cost me votes. I was very torn about Best Ace of Spades. I think Grotesque's is beautiful and exceptionally well done and one of my favorites. But, I knew it would get votes whereas I didn't think Steampunk Goggles would get much love. I just felt like I had to give them a vote in recognition of their clock Ace because it was pretty darn clever.

Of course, my nature is such that I would have liked to have seen everybody win an award! (o.k. not everybody but there were many great decks last year.

[sinjin7]

I thing we need to build a section of the boards dedicated to DOTY - Sticky posts for results each year, Hall of fame to showcase winning decks, competition discussion and suggestion box etc...

I think this is a fantastic idea! We definitely need a section of the forum called the United Cardists Hall of Fame. This way, there is a convenient location where we can see which decks were winners of our Deck of the Year contests as the years go by and see how the playing card industry has evolved over time. Honestly, I'm having a hard time remembering who were the winners from last year's contest. A UC Hall of Fame would definitely solve this issue.

[ecNate]

I thing we need to build a section of the boards dedicated to DOTY - Sticky posts for results each year, Hall of fame to showcase winning decks, competition discussion and suggestion box etc...

I think this is a fantastic idea! We definitely need a section of the forum called the United Cardists Hall of Fame. This way, there is a convenient location where we can see which decks were winners of our Deck of the Year contests as the years go by and see how the playing card industry has evolved over time. Honestly, I'm having a hard time remembering who were the winners from last year's contest. A UC Hall of Fame would definitely solve this issue.

While I like the idea, I fear it's just one other thing for somebody to maintain, but since that won't be me...yeah, let's do it! Seriously though, that could be pretty cool.

For my part I did update all the entries in PCDB for the 1st place winners to list the award(s) received. That actually took longer than I was expecting (many winners were comprised of 6 or more entries, but at least Origins took multiple awards). If somebody else wants to do the same for 2nd/3rd place, feel free to use my template from any winning entry.

[Mike Ratledge]

I think we could leverage PlayingCardDB and create a User named "DoTY2015".
...
Just a thought...Sorry Mike, I'll wait for the new thread to expand on this idea

+10

I love this one!

I also love the "Hall of Fame" that shows pix of the winners of each category.

[volantangel]

I also have concerns about voting for a popular deck vs true favorite. I'll admit it swayed my votes a bit. For instance I really liked the Highland Fauna courts for being dark and different, but given I assumed that vote wouldn't matter much and would just hurt me for the prizes that became the tie breaker and went with Origins which was equally good in my view, but different and more accessible/popular. I also can't help but notice we have a vastly underused polling system in phpbb here. I also liked the concept of nominations, but the method used at PCF was a bit cumbersome, manual and thus low participation.

Proposal - have everybody submit their TRUE favorites in each of the categories as was done this year. The top 10 decks would then be entered as options for a phpbb poll thread to determine the winner and related discussion. All voting is handled through this system. For prize entries people could simply get a point for each category submission and another for a vote. A randomizer program could then select the winners.

The current method of accurately picking what will be the final winners of the categories was interesting, but I think resulted in more decks missing out. However, I do think all the winners were generally the proper ones, but skewed in their favor with a greater margin than actually would have existed otherwise.

Just a quote from our moderators section where we had this discussion before, with the figures updated.

like i mentioned previously i dont think people would truly vote for what others would guess, perhaps like some have mentioned before, when it really comes down to the wire where you cant decide, perhaps choosing something more popular would play a part. Would there be some thats out to game the system, sure, but i think they are in the minority.

So far we have 17 categories, and 120 different decks have been nominated thus far across the board. Almost every new vote i get, i would have to add a new tab for a new deck. That to me isnt a sign of people gaming the system. Amongst others, glitch, starlight, DB microsoft have all had votes/vote to their name, while they are not likely to win an award, its a sign of people voting with their hearts.

I would say not to worry about people gaming the system and vote for what you really feel, that would make the system more fair wouldnt it ? =)

Plus theres a reason why popular decks are popular right?

I think that yes there might have been degree of people being swayed to vote for the more popular decks, but i dont think would change the result by a large margin, honestly if you look at the spreadsheet, it clearly isnt one that is being gamed by the people. 120 different decks were voted, and these smaller decks were not just voted in by a particular few, but rather mostly just one or two per person gradually adding up to this number.

I feel that if done this way, it encourages participation and gets you more involved in the proceedings, and adds an extra fun element, heck its not even the easier option

[sinjin7]

Well, all the prizes are now spoken for and I think the prize selection process went very smoothly. I thought it was an awesome contest this year, and I have a feeling its going to be even better next year. Personally, I liked the format of both the voting of decks as well as the way the prizes were distributed, so I think only minor tweaking is necessary instead of a complete overhaul of the contest. I thought it was great how even towards the end, people still had a hard time selecting prizes because there were so many great options. It speaks to the quality of the prizes from top to bottom.

[nECr0MaNCeD]

Well, all the prizes are now spoken for and I think the prize selection process went very smoothly. I thought it was an awesome contest this year, and I have a feeling its going to be even better next year. Personally, I liked the format of both the voting of decks as well as the way the prizes were distributed, so I think only minor tweaking is necessary instead of a complete overhaul of the contest. I thought it was great how even towards the end, people still had a hard time selecting prizes because there were so many great options. It speaks to the quality of the prizes from top to bottom.

Couldn't have said it better myself. If anyone noticed there was a fair amount of surprise on the part of more than one person as to the choices being made. There were just as many people who voiced their approval of choices as well as a little good-natured "grumbling" that a tier was picked. All that boils down to a phenomenal cache of prizes and happy people.

[Cbkimble]

This was my first year for the awards and I'm glad I was involved. I enjoyed the entire process from voting to donating to winning. I'm looking forward to next year. Again, I'd like to thank Kai for his excellent job managing this monster and everyone who voted and donated prizes. This just wouldn't be as much fun without all involved.

[tdubben]

I'm fairly new to collecting and this has been an absolute blast. Even though I didn't win this year, I really enjoyed the challenge trying to make informed voting choices. I spent a lot of time looking up decks that I had never seen before, which was really dangerous for my wallet. The whole contest was well thought out and managed. I'm really looking forward to this again next year. I already have a DoTY 2015 spreadsheet I hope to offer up a nice prize to the pool next year to show my appreciation to all of those that make this possible. Thanks again to everyone for making this a fun community!

[Mike Ratledge]

Great comments folks. We could not do it without Kai, he puts it together, gathers the prizes, tallies it all up, etc

Fantastic job, and fun for all!

[dazzleguts]

...I'll admit it swayed my votes a bit. For instance I really liked the Highland Fauna courts for being dark and different, but given I assumed that vote wouldn't matter much and would just hurt me for the prizes that became the tie breaker and went with Origins which was equally good in my view, but different and more accessible/popular...

I would have been right there with you on the Pernowka deck Nate, but I didn't have it out when I was looking at the decks of the year. Sigh.

That's one problem with a large collection - it's easy to overlook something.

[sinjin7]

I'm very happy to report that I received Chach's Tier 21 prize today. All the decks were very carefully packed and arrived in perfect condition. Thanks again to Chach for offering this awesome prize package and for shipping it out to me so quickly!