Hurry and get your tickets for the MEGA Lottery! The one and only Mallets' Extraordinary Grandiose Amazing Lottery!
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Ok, it's not really amazing, grandiose, or extraordinary. Well unless you win, then you may think so. But what I'm aiming to host is a very simple (weekly) lottery for folks to play. It'll be a simple lottery where folks can purchase a low cost ticket, which could pay off in a big prize! Just as with any gambling, the fun is in the odds. Spend a little, and you could earn big. Of course you could walk away with nothing (which is usually the case). But that's the way gambling goes. And that's the excitement. Betting against the odds! Betting that you'll be the winner!
Below I hope to lay out each aspect of how the lottery will work. I hope to keep the rules and explanation simple... but thorough. The MEGA Lottery will take shape over the first couple of weeks, so things may change and develop over time. But in trying to keep the MEGA Lottery simple from the outset, hopefully there will not be much need for change.
MEGA Lottery BasicsThe MEGA Lottery will actually consist of two separate lotteries... a
1,000 gold Lottery and a
5,000 gold Lottery. These are the prices for the tickets of each lottery (1K & 5K). The MEGA Lottery is weekly (meaning drawings take place once a week, on Sunday). Each lottery will have a separate drawing. The prize for each lottery will consist of 90% of the ticket sale totals for each corresponding lottery. Meaning, if 20 tickets total are purchased for the 1K Lottery, the prize would be 18K. If the 5K Lottery only sold 12 tickets, it's prize would be 54k (90% of 60K, the total in ticket sales). The 10% will be a commission fee kept by myself (Mallets).
If only 5 (or less) tickets are sold in a particular lottery, no commission will be kept. Meaning the prize will be 100% of the total ticket sales. If I'm not doing much work, no need to keep any commission. Of note, if the 5K Lottery only sales 3 tickets, then no commission. But if the same week, the 1K Lottery sales 8 tickets, a 10% commission will be kept from it. The lotteries are considered separate in most aspects.
As long as at least 2 ticket are purchased in a lottery, the event will precede. If only 1 ticket is purchased for a particular lottery, then the money for the ticket purchased will be returned.
Players can only purchase 1 ticket for each lottery (one ticket for the 1K, and then one ticket for the 5K).In the Marketplace, players can buy a set of Stones for 1,000 gold to purchase a 1K ticket. Players can buy a Straw Hat for 5,000 gold for a 5K ticket.
Tickets must be purchased from Mallets to be entered for the drawing (don't be scammed).------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lottery Dates & Times
First off, the MEGA Lottery is a weekly lottery. Meaning the drawing for the winner of each lottery is held once a week. Drawing for each lottery (the 1K & 5K) will be held at the same time. However, each drawing is separate. Meaning there is a separate number pulled for each contest.
Drawings will take place on Sunday mornings (US, Central Time). The time may very for each player seeing that players live all over the world. I live in the US. So it may be evening or late at night for many players.
Important note: I'm an adult (I'm 30). I can have a lot going on in life. I do love playing video games. And I really love cRPG (and Warband). But being an adult, and loving many other things in life, I can't always promise that the drawings will take place on Sunday mornings. They may take place Sunday evenings or nights. Sometime Sunday, at my first available chance, I will draw the winner of each lottery (which 90% of the time is Sunday mornings, between 9am-12noon US Central Time). If for some reason I'm out of town for Sunday, then the drawing will take place Saturday night or Monday morning. However, if this is the case, the community will be forewarned.
Anyone's main character can play the MEGA Lottery. And the reason why it must be your main character is because you'll have to purchase your tickets through the Marketplace in cRPG (below is a description on how to purchase tickets). It also must be your main character, because the Marketplace is the only way I can give someone their prize winnings.
As mentioned, there will be two separate lotteries... a 1K Lottery... and a 5K Lottery. Tickets for the 1K Lottery will cost 1,000 gold. Tickets for the 5K Lottery will cost 5,000 gold.
To purchase, players must go onto the Marketplace in cRPG. To purchase a 1K ticket, you must buy Stones from Mallets (me). To buy a ticket to the 5K Lottery, you must buy a Straw Hat from Mallets (me). Once you purchase a ticket (Stones or Straw Hat)... your name will be recorded here on the forums (for myself, you, and everyone to see).
The purchasing of tickets will be cut off just before the drawing (Sunday morning). Before the drawing, I'll take down all the available tickets (Stones & Straw Hats). Tickets won't be back up for purchase until after the drawing has taken place and a winner announce. Then the tickets (Stones & Straw Hats) will be placed back on the Marketplace.
Also, seeing that I can only put up 10 items on the Marketplace for free... they'll only be 5 of each available ticket at a time (5 for the 1K, 5 for the 5K). I'll try to check the Marketplace throughout the day. Once a ticket is purchased, another will be put back up. If you find no tickets up, I apologize. Please be patient. And please check again in the near future. Hopefully I'll be able to keep tickets up for folks.
IMPORTANT: Players are only allowed to purchase 1 ticket per lottery. Meaning you can only buy one 1K ticket and one 5K ticket. This is done to keep things simple for now. The rule may change in the future. But for now, let's keep things simple. Please do not purchase multiple tickets per lottery. It will be a headache to have to return money to folks. And if it becomes to big of a headache, money may not be returned. It's your responsibility to purchase only 1 ticket per lottery.
VERY, VERY IMPORTANT: You must purchase these items (Stones or Straw Hat) from me... Mallets. Do not purchase these items from other players (players may try to scam you on this). Please look at the names of the sellers (you can see them with Advanced View). If an item is not purchase from me (Mallets), you are not buying a ticket. Your name will not be entered in the drawing. And no money will be refund to you by myself or the MEGA Lottery. You are responsible for making sure you purchase the proper Stones or Straw Hat.
The prize for each lottery will consist of 90% of the ticket sale totals for each corresponding lottery. Meaning, if 20 tickets total are purchased for the 1K Lottery, the prize would be 18K. If the 5K Lottery only sold 12 tickets, it's prize would be 54k (90% of 60K, the total in ticket sales). The 10% will be a commission fee kept by myself (Mallets).
If only 5 (or less) tickets are sold in a particular lottery, no commission will be kept. Meaning the prize will be 100% of the total ticket sales. If I'm not doing much work, no need to keep any commission. Of note, if the 5K Lottery only sales 3 tickets, then no commission for me. But if the same week, the 1K Lottery sales 8 tickets, a 10% commission will be kept from the 1K Lottery only.
As long as at least 2 ticket are purchased in a lottery, the event will precede. If only 1 ticket is purchased for a particular lottery, then the money for the ticket purchased will be returned.
Once someone purchases a ticket, their name is written here on the forums with a set of numbers. The first person to purchase a ticket will get the numbers 1-10 beside their name. The second ticket purchaser will get 11-20. The third 21-30. And so on.
Come Sunday mornings when the drawings take place... I'll run a random number generator program, to determine the winner (first for the 1K lottery, then for the 5K). The number that comes up will be the winner. The winners... and the amount they've won... will be immediately posted here, in this topic on the forums.
If 8 tickets are purchased, the number generator will be set from 1-80. The reason I give folks 10 numbers, instead of 1, 2, 3, etc., is to give the number generator a better chance to throw out random numbers. The percentages for winning are still the same for each player.
Once you've been announced here on the forums... you (the winner) will need to go into the Marketplace. You'll need to put up a "Crown of Flowers" up for sale in the Marketplace (Crown of Flowers is a helmet, purchased for 3 gold). Now this is the important part. You'll need to put it up for the amount you've won. Meaning if you've won 27K gold... you'll need to put a "Crown of Flowers" up for sale for 27K gold.
I'll check the Marketplace daily looking for the winner. Please be patient with this. The winner will get his/her gold. But as an example... if the winner waits till Tuesday at midnight to post their Crown of Flowers... I get swamped at work on Wednesday, have a dinner date until late night, then swamped at work again Thursday... I may not see them till Thursday night. This is very unlikely, but is a possibility.
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Why Take A Commission
I'm sure the question will arise... "You're doing this just to make money?". Well the answer to that is "No... and yes". In truth, "No", I'm not doing this to make money. I'm putting on this lottery because I think it'll be fun for players to gamble at a chance to win big. However, if I'm taking away time from playing cRPG, to put in the work to makes this lottery happen... I won't mind making a buck or two (if I was playing in cRPG, I'd be making money). Also, the fact that I'm making a little will be motivation to keep things going. If this thing takes off, and I'm writing down 50+ names a week... that can be taxing... and may would make me want to stop doing it. But with the motivation that I'm making a little... hopefully it'll help keep me going for a while.
"Why am I qualified to run this?" maybe the wrong question. What makes one qualified to run a fake lottery in a video game community... well who the hell knows. But let me tell little about myself... and hopefully somewhat justify myself being able to properly run this lottery.
I'm an adult. Truly... I'm not 18 saying this (nothing wrong with being 18). But I'm 30. I don't have kids, never been married. Love many things in life. Video games happen to be one of them. Making stupid long post in video game forums is another one (why I enjoy this, I'll never know). I'm a high school soccer head coach. So I run and mediated real world events. This simple video game lottery shouldn't be too much for me. I really enjoy Mound & Blade and Warband. The combat is by far the best of any game ever (why game makers are copying this is beyond me)! I really enjoy cRPG. It seems to be a nice little community here. I've found tons of friendly help in the "Beginner's" section. I saw a lottery titled "5k Lottery" here in the "Events" section of the forums. It appeared that folks were excited about it. But then the guy who was running it seemed to have disappeared out nowhere (from what I gathered from the post in that topic). So with that idea... here I am. Since I really enjoy Warband, cRPG, and it's community... I thought I'd try to give back.
Also... as a qualification... I took the time to think up and write all this crap up!!!
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Disclaimers
First off, as mentioned above... you must buy tickets from me (Mallets). Myself nor the MEGA Lottery are responsible for you ignorance.
Secondly, rules & regulations are subject to change. However, they will never be changed mid-week. Rule changes will be posted and clearly stated at what date they take effect (usually the following week).
The MEGA Lottery could one day end. And it could be in the near future. I have a life outside of cRPG... and that life is subject to change. However, I'll never just leave you guys high-and-dry. I'll announce my retirement to you folks. And it shouldn't be a problem to just play out the last week of drawings come the next Sunday. However, if this is an issue (where I can't make it to Sunday)... I'll refund the money to any tickets already purchased.
And if I have to retire, and if this lottery is a success... hopefully someone will take it over. Or hopefully I can pass it along to some other responsible adult in the community.
If I happen to die suddenly in real life... then sorry... I guess Ill disappear on you guys! As long as I don't get killed by some guy on horseback with a crossbow... I'm cool with!
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Closing StatementWell hopefully that about sums it all up. I'll definitely adjust and update this post (rules & important info) as need be. And there will be several post below which will contain important info... such as a list of ticket purchasers, future changes, past winners, etc.. Hopefully you guys (the community) find this fun. If not, no big deal. If folks don't play, I'll get the picture fairly quickly. And that's just as fine with me. I really just want to give some folks a chance at something that could be fun.