I still think forum competitions is one of the best routes for getting the word out about Era-Go in-game and increasing active members. I explained it here:

Quote Originally Posted by Ren View Post
Competitions
Just saw the new Competitions forum and thought I'd throw some ideas out there. I'd really like to see some competitive forum events, not on the forums themselves, but in-game. For example: A thread announcing a 2-vs-2 spar MPX Gun only tournament hosted with a prize of 5k gralats for the winners. Now anyone can participate in this forum competition, but they gotta sign up to Era-Go first to post their participation for the event. Rules and requirements can be determined by the host.

I've seen other players who host their own events do this with success, and I think this would be a nice project for the Moderation Team to host and Forum Managers to oversee on a weekly or bi-weekly basis to promote forum activity, as these competitions can be hosted on a host's house template. What I like about the idea is that it's completely flexible and requires little maintenance besides planning and collaboration, from races, to sparring, or anything else a host can think of. If enough effort is put into this, there can even be a information kiosk NPC in-game that displays upcoming forum competitions with directions on how to sign up. Ultimately this will create:

  • More forum activity from players looking to sign up, and will likely feel more comfortable interacting in discussions.
  • More engagement from the Moderation Team.
  • Fun for players to compete in-game for various competitions.

Finally, I'd like to see varying amounts of gralats as the exclusive prize for these competitions, to keep them unique and separated from the regular admin hosted events. This will make a fun opportunity as another alternative to make money, and the gralats can easily be added from a high staff.
https://www.era-go.com/forum/showthr...or-Improvement

To elaborate, the idea is to get members to be genuinely interested to join on their own for the content and competitions, not for free items. These forum-exclusive events would be different from the free event coin sign-up, since players would now have to compete for a prize like in-game events, and we know there's a lot of players who enjoy competing in PvP environments.

The best part is the competitions themselves can be flexible: 2-v-2 spar tournament, MPX Gun only singles tournament, races, etc.. For the bigger (or any) forum competitions, there can be minimum forum post requirements before someone can sign-up. Moderation before and during the competitions will be crucial here, but could be a good opportunity for monitoring forum activity.

With regular competitions, players who signed up for them will keep checking the forums for any new forum events that catches their attention. This may eventually get them more engaged with the Era-Go community, instead of the "sign=up for ec then disappear" method.

There's some other competition ideas in this thread too: https://www.era-go.com/forum/showthr...on-Forum-Ideas

Personally, I'd be happy with gralats only as prizes, to keep it separated from in-game events.

For advertising, an NPC or two placed somewhere around Start Park or similar hot-spots with a lot of player activity will gain some attention, along with information on any current or upcoming forum competitions. Naturally, players will trust the site more since it would be supported in-game.


Those are just a few options, and there are others. Just a matter of choosing which direction the forum should go.