Your Opinion About Donation Servers

[Scribbles]

Here is what I think about Donation Servers :3

• Sometimes Overpowered Donations
• More "DIS SERVER STOLDED MY [insert currency Here]. AN I DONATED [insert ridiculous amount of money][currency]

...
It's mostly because of the second one. That's pretty much my own .001 cents about it.
It's just annoying to me.

What do ya'll think (the ya'll is because of boredom)[/list]

[Lucia Blanche]

I think people b**** about donations too much.

[A92FL0163]

"Great! Unlike your other server, in this server, your fat wallet won't help you!" - You

[LemonCrosswalk]

I hate hate hate 90% of donation servers. I understand having to donate to keep larger servers alive, but most donation servers are for overpowered items and the majority of the money doesn't go back to the server. Although, it's obvious that people that don't pay to be overpowered hate donation servers. The one that donate love them. If you don't like it and don't want to pay to be competitive, change servers where it isn't a problem.

[Xarale]

I don't mind servers in general that have a donation system, as I understand that there is some honest admins out there who actually do require donation money for their servers.  Like many others though, I tend to dislike donation servers that give players a huge advantage over others for donating.

[jTynne]

I don't mind them (as someone who has donated to servers in the past, after running a server that could be considered a donation server, AND after running a server that wasn't at all considered a donation server) so long as they adhere to the following:

1. The administrator in charge of the donations PAYS FOR THE SERVER. Sorry, Euphorian, supporting your drug addiction does not count.

2. The server expenses are transparent; Meaning they're known throughout the community.

3. The administration does something POSITIVE with the excess donations. Servers such as AnimaRO/AnthemRO have donated to charities (Child's Play) in the past and my former server was able to donate $500 to the American Red Cross with excess donations after a holiday sale.

4. The donation items can also be obtained by members through other means apart from donating if they're not able to do so. A voting center, ad credit system or similar does justice.

So long as the server's fun and there are players, I'll more than happily donate if I don't feel like I'm wasting money, whether for "over powered" items or for something as simple as a disguised non-statted headgear.

In regards to being on the administration side, however, I've run two vastly different servers in the past; SerenityRO and ElysiumRO. On SerenityRO you could purchase quite a few items that gave the advantage of instant gratification however non-donors could also get these same items in the economy, through voting or by helping out with tasks I posted revolving around coding/etc. With that system in place it worked effectively for two and a half years.

On the other hand, on ElysiumRO, donors had no advantage other than instantly being able to obtain small donation perks such as disguised non-statted headgears, etc. Because of this the server only lasted for two months since donations were not enough to cover the expenses of the server by a long-shot.

Ultimately, it's a case-by-case thing in my opinion. Some server owners are not good stewards with their donations and thus it reflects poorly upon the entire server, whereas others take care of business and do exactly what they say they're going to do. And as far as the strength of donation items/advantage they give, again, so long as normal players have "access" to them, I see no problem, especially if all it takes is a month or two of voting to get the same rewards.

I'd love to see where this thread goes though! I know so many people have so many differing thoughts on the matter.

[Scribbles]

3. The administration does something POSITIVE with the excess donations. Servers such as AnimaRO/AnthemRO have donated to charities (Child's Play) in the past and my former server was able to donate $500 to the American Red Cross with excess donations after a holiday sale.

Awws, How Sweet

[Jebus]

The server im playing isnt that well populated so all the money the server owner gets goes to server maintance and he still use some of his own pocket for the server.

Also the items you get isnt very overpowered, you only get stuff that is temporary like exp rate 100% for 30 min etc. So yea this kind of thing i dont mind.

[Noble Gas]

.

[Broken Moon]

Seeing broken donation gear really kills my mood for playing on a server - so much to the point that the first thing I do whenever I take a look at another server's page is checking their donation page.

It might be alright if said broken items can also be obtainable through a quest or something like that, unless that quest is completely impossible. Even so, it really annoys me to see +10 everything with a slot and ten thousand DEF on a 99/70 server. Seriosly... what.

Another donation-related thing I hate is the "VIP" system, pretty common on Brazilian servers (in fact, so common that so far I have never seen one of them without something like that). Basically, for one month you get access to a room with cheaper resets, a full stylist (non-donors get only 4 palettes or so, wtf), and a thousand of other helpful private server NPCs and @commands (such as @storage). I have even played on a server in the past that sold MvP cards on its VIP room. For 20 zeny. Yeah.

[lrellok]

Since all servers have costs, and thus need to support those costs somehow, i will presume that the following definition applies to the term Donation Server; "A server where donations are rewarded with some form of in game item or other advantage, which is made easier to acquire by donating then it might be had one not donated."

In general, any server where there are items you can get by donating, i leave immediately.  To me, a game is about he skill and dedication of the player.  If i am dealing with a person wearing a Valk helm or a Zealotos mask, this is someone i need to respect, because they put the hours in to get those things.  if you can simply buy them, then they loose all meaning, they are just things, and those who work for them no longer get the credit they deserve for that. 

I think Donation servers create the impression that one can buy ones way to the top, substituting money for skill, and generally damages the RO community as a whole.  As much as we need more professional GM's we need more professional players sometimes to. 

[SilverStream~]

I agree with almost all the things Justin said, except instead of charities which sometimes take a long time before reaching their goal of 25 million dollars(example), I'd prefer to use the money to expand the ro server's website, ingame(adding more zones to reduce lag and downtime when something goes wrong in a zone) and perhaps other useful or fun things that go towards making the server better or more fun.

The excess can be used to hire scripters or programmers and adding new custom content, for example instead of just going by gravity's updates, adding a "episode 13.2.X", that has it's own world that goes towards the server, or is the server headquarters.

One server that was running in 05 we had been thinking about making a "gm headquarters", where players could ingame write support tickets, and find information on monsters and other things.  The project turned out too complicated and big for us though, and we let it fade away.

However I also like this thread, very good to share opinions on this.  Nice idea scribbles.

[Scribbles]

Hurray! My lack of sleep actually helped X3

I agree with almost all the things Justin said, except instead of charities which sometimes take a long time before reaching their goal of 25 million dollars(example), I'd prefer to use the money to expand the ro server's website, ingame(adding more zones to reduce lag and downtime when something goes wrong in a zone) and perhaps other useful or fun things that go towards making the server better or more fun.

The excess can be used to hire scripters or programmers and adding new custom content, for example instead of just going by gravity's updates, adding a "episode 13.2.X", that has it's own world that goes towards the server, or is the server headquarters.

One server that was running in 05 we had been thinking about making a "gm headquarters", where players could ingame write support tickets, and find information on monsters and other things.  The project turned out too complicated and big for us though, and we let it fade away.

However I also like this thread, very good to share opinions on this.  Nice idea scribbles.

From what I've heard and seen (a few times) some servers won't even take the time to do anything like what is quoted above. They'll just spend more time on getting their  instant gratification. One time a server owner told the players that he spent the donation money on a pair of expensive shoes ._."
(Zappos is expensive, but they get to your house in like, 2 days!) Then there are the servers who promises that you get some item(s) in return for your expensive donation, but they never deliver...
Oh well

[SilverStream~]

Haha, I once read this part on a server scam done as an experiment lol.

The "new server" opened a donations page, with a 400$ item, the only donation item available.  Being ridiculous expensive and overpowered(+70 to all stats and 50% demihuman reduction) there were only two people who got it.

The week after the server "shut down" haha.  I found that so hilarious lol.  Big promises to custom items, having a "huge" gm team made up by different gm accounts controlled by one person and other fun things.
Want easy money?  Start a server with donations.  Run it on your own dedicated computer.

[Descent]

Personally, I think the whole "donate to be a god" scheme is ridiculous, and I completely despise "donation only" gear.

However, as a competitive player, I also see those servers as a challenge, since "donation" gear tends to make players lazy, depending on the price.

I also don't like the servers that are OBVIOUSLY in it for money, because most of the time, the money doesn't even go to the server, it goes to the Admin to fuel drug habits/new cars, etc. Any server that makes THAT much duping their players isn't worth supporting.

Also, most donation gear is obtainable in-game after a player is tired of it, making it rather easy to even-up the odds with some hard earned Zeny.