Forum Auction End-times
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Perhaps this should be in "Suggestions", but this seemed the safest spot.
I don't like that the auction that just closed ended with several of us, me included, trying to make a last-second bid-by-post. It was a distinctly anti-immersive experience, completely taking me out of a fantasy RP mindset (much more so than, say, posting on a forum generally).
My suggestion is as follows: don't set auction end times down to the minute. Instead, set it for a specific day, say, but leave the exact closing time a mystery. I think that should suffice to remove most of the incentive for last-second posts (no one will know the "last second"!)
After all, presumably our characters are actually writing their bids on a paper somewhere. What are we all doing, furiously scribbling over each other as the "timer" runs down? ;)
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Hiring scribes and runners to deliver last minute messages, employing a city sending, etc etc. It is a magical world, I'm sure immersion can be worked up if you're creative.
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I am sure if the world was perfect we would have a better way.
But for now we have a sense of time, a sense of urgency and so forth.
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i once saw a post someplace, that any forum auction would end 24 rl hours after the last bid, that way it wouldnt penalize those who may not live in one time zone, or the other
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I appologise for any loss of immersion that any felt. Having been at acutions, myself, and bidded on housing and online autions that have end dates, there is a sense of scrabbling to bid before the final deadline. There is a rush that, to be honest, I wanted to generate.
I understand the Time Zone issue but, frankly, this system works, mostly, and is much better than the dire IG autions that used to occur.
You could always make an eBay style offer IG with the Auction Organiser where you put in a secret maximum bid and offer, say, 200g over and above the last bid. Its not fool proof, but if you are in an aukward Time Zone, I'm sure an Auctioneer will be happy to adopt a solution for you. As Moloch said, be Creative! @Moloch:
Hiring scribes and runners to deliver last minute messages, employing a city sending, etc etc. It is a magical world, I'm sure immersion can be worked up if you're creative.
