[Updated] Player held contest rules
Player Contest Rules Clarification We’ve received feedback from Moderators and the communities on multiple Howrse games requesting clarification of the rules for player hosted contests and giveaways, specifically with offering horses as prizes. Addendum: We've reviewed the rule about offering horses as prizes and have decided to allow you to offer a horse as a prize again. Current rules We allow players to host contests and giveaways according to the following rules:
Review of rules Some players want to offer horses as prizes and would like to know if this is allowed. We reviewed contests held on each version, and we identified the following: On some versions, it has not been allowed for horses to be used as prizes; since the game does not include a tool for gifting horses. Selling a horse to a player costs them a fee to gain their prize. This falls within the Item and Pass Trafficking rules that are not allowed. As a compromise, we will allow players to offer horses as prizes so long as the cost of the horse is the minimum amount that can be set - 500e. Since this is also considered a private agreement between players, we will not support these transactions. Contests are entered at your own risk and it is up to the contest holders to deliver the promised prizes. In addition to the contest rules mentioned above, we have added the following: - You can offer a horse as a prize provided the cost does not exceed 500 Equus. - The horse offered as a prize can have Black Market items. - Contest holders can ask but not require that participants re-post their contest banners. Last Updated: January 31, 2024 Regards, The Howrse Team |
Ok let’s see a way to gift horses then. We can donate them to ow how about expanding that to other players?
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We can donate them to ow how about expanding that to other players? Yeah, and pillOw is hosting a Cake contest right now and the top prize is a Pastry Divine. So Admin can give away horses as prizes but players can't? Obviously if they can give away a horse as a prize, it's possible to give horses for free. Let the players be able to give horses for free too!
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By Retired breeder, 27th October 2020 00:35:30
can we have horses as a prize but reserve sale them to some one? it does not make scence
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can we have horses as a prize but reserve sale them to some one? it does not make scence No, it says prizes have to be free, and because horses are 500e, thats a price for the prize. Best to stick with BMI's or stuff you can donate to friends
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can we have horses as a prize but reserve sale them to some one? it does not make scence It's against the rules right now, but this used to be allowed. Send a note to Contact Us if you think this is unfair or if you want a feature to gift horses in game! (I agree, this rule doesn't make much sense at all  )
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juniper
Yes, but is admins can do it players should be allowed to do it. This change to rules ruined my Christmas give away. Now I can't host my give away.
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*jsniper
Typo
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juniper Yes, but is admins can do it players should be allowed to do it. This change to rules ruined my Christmas give away. Now I can't host my give away. I'm not saying it shouldn't be allowed, I was simply stating its not allowed,therefore is against the rules. I personally would love a horse gifting mechanism
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I really wish Gifting horses will be an option in the future
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We should totally be allowed to gift horses! Admins can, why not the players?
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We should totally be allowed to gift horses! Admins can, why not the players? It's possible they want to limit scamming I agree that we should be able to give horses away, but I think we should also be able to trade horses too. Like a player offers a horse up for another horse, another player offers their horse for the first horse, and the player who set up the trade can accept or deny the offer.
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It's possible they want to limit scamming I agree that we should be able to give horses away, but I think we should also be able to trade horses too. Like a player offers a horse up for another horse, another player offers their horse for the first horse, and the player who set up the trade can accept or deny the offer. I've thought about the scamming thing too. I think it's likely that if Howrse creates a horse gifting system, they'll limit it like they do with item gifts or with the item exchanges. Like maybe you can only gift three horses per week or something. There was one response from Contact Us that randomly brought up horse trading, even though the player that had messaged them had not mentioned it in her message. It made me think that maybe the Howrse team is developing a trading/gifting system. The person who received that response posted it a couple pages back I think, if you want to check it out. I wouldn't mind a trading system if it incorporated a gifting system! And I could see how it would benefit a lot of players.
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If you specifically say in your giveaway that in order to get the horse you have to pay 500e would it still be wrong after all if they did not agree they would not enter. Also if there is an option to sell your horse in direct/reserved sales for 500e why does it matter why or who you sell your horse to? If we are not allowed to sell horses as part of a giveaway shouldn't the minimum price to sell your horse be higher than 500e?I don't know anyone who would sell their horse for 500e in those types of sales the horse would just be put up for auction.
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By Retired breeder, 19th December 2020 20:55:01
Maybe they can set it up similar to the Secret Santa. Where the horse is taken from the "Gifters" account and then who ever wins "receives" it. That way the "gifter" can not back out. Then there is no risk of fraud
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Please correct me if I'm wrong, but couldn't this issue be solved if players offering horses as a prize specified in their post that the horse would cost x amount of equus? Like for example someone saying "The grand prize of this giveaway is the ability to buy a fully blupped skiller from the host for only 500e"
In my mind that makes sense as a solution, but I don't know if that makes sense to others/the admins and mods
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Follow up to my previous message: I see that for once the Howrse team is not operating on technicalities, which is kind of annoying since they've historically been so into them. In this situation, so long as it's explicitly stated that there's still a fee, I can't see why it wouldn't be allowed. It leaves sole liability for the transaction on the players. And the fact they say that they clarified this rule back in 2018 because too many people complained about not receiving their prize is quite fishy, considering it's just as easy for someone to flake out on gifting a BMI to a giveaway winner.
I can't remember their username, but a page back (from september) someone posted about how it's obvious that the reason BMI giveaways are allowed, but not horse giveaways, is that most BMIs are acquired by passes (especially through TC, HOP, GF) and passes are often bought. Truthfully I can remember very money-motivated moves being made by the Howrse team since 2014, and it's very disappointing
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I completely agree with the above posts - if a player wants to host a contest/giveaway and offer a horse as a prize, and they clearly state that the prize has a fee (for example, "a unicorn for 500 equus"), and the participants in the contest read this and still decide to enter, then horse giveaways should be allowed. The "transaction" has been agreed on by both parties (the host and the winner); anyone who does not want to pay the minimum fee does not have to participate in the giveaway. The other participants who did not win do not have to spend any equus - the only thing it may cost them is perhaps some of their time, but this goes for BMI giveaways as well, as those can also take a little bit of time to enter. And if by chance the winner decides they don't want the horse, they can opt to reject the reserved sale - there is nothing forcing them to buy the horse. The choice is completely up to the participants/winners.
In essence, there is nothing differentiating a horse giveaway from horse ordering or other reserved sales that happen due to the use of forums or private messaging. I've said it before and I'll say it again - this rule makes no sense. It very much seems like a rule that Howrse came up with and then had to backtrack to try and offer reasons to support it.
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I completely agree with the above posts - if a player wants to host a contest/giveaway and offer a horse as a prize, and they clearly state that the prize has a fee (for example, "a unicorn for 500 equus"), and the participants in the contest read this and still decide to enter, then horse giveaways should be allowed. The "transaction" has been agreed on by both parties (the host and the winner); anyone who does not want to pay the minimum fee does not have to participate in the giveaway. The other participants who did not win do not have to spend any equus - the only thing it may cost them is perhaps some of their time, but this goes for BMI giveaways as well, as those can also take a little bit of time to enter. And if by chance the winner decides they don't want the horse, they can opt to reject the reserved sale - there is nothing forcing them to buy the horse. The choice is completely up to the participants/winners. In essence, there is nothing differentiating a horse giveaway from horse ordering or other reserved sales that happen due to the use of forums or private messaging. I've said it before and I'll say it again - this rule makes no sense. It very much seems like a rule that Howrse came up with and then had to backtrack to try and offer reasons to support it. This. 
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For everyone above talking about a 'fee' for a giveaway prize:
Giveaway prizes must inherently be free. Requiring a 'fee', no matter how small, in order to get a horse as a prize means the giveaway is no longer a giveaway. That's why horses cannot be prizes as giveaways, because you are requiring the winners to pay for their prize(s) if they win a horse. It doesn't matter how small the fee is. It doesn't matter whether or not the winners agree to and/or are willing to pay the fee. It doesn't matter that they agree to the chance of paying a fee when they enter the giveaway. It's the principle; if it's a *giveaway*, all prizes must be *free*. Completely. That's why, under the current system, horses are not allowed as giveaway prizes.
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♕DisneyQueen♕, I've tried creating "Surprise Sales" where there is no mention of a "giveaway." Instead, I was offering to sell a unicorn for 500 equus, and interested people could sign up, and I would randomly select one of them to sell the unicorn too. No where was the word "giveaway" mentioned. This was still flagged as a giveaway.
Howrse seems to be against any generosity when it comes to actual horses, despite the fact that it's a /horse/ game. If Howrse would simply create a system to allow horses to be given for free, then everybody wins and could be happy, but it has been years since this issue arose, and yet we still don't have such a system.
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♕DisneyQueen♕, I've tried creating "Surprise Sales" where there is no mention of a "giveaway." Instead, I was offering to sell a unicorn for 500 equus, and interested people could sign up, and I would randomly select one of them to sell the unicorn too. No where was the word "giveaway" mentioned. This was still flagged as a giveaway. Howrse seems to be against any generosity when it comes to actual horses, despite the fact that it's a /horse/ game. If Howrse would simply create a system to allow horses to be given for free, then everybody wins and could be happy, but it has been years since this issue arose, and yet we still don't have such a system. In that case, I would assume the problem is that not everyone can take part. There's a chance players will be able to buy a discounted unicorn, but no guarantee, and I can see players complaining if they're not the recipient of this 'discount'. It's not a giveaway, but Howrse tends to lump giveaways and contests together. And this doesn't detract from my original statement that for *giveaways*, which everyone was talking about above my original post, the prizes must be 100% free, no fees attached. Has anyone considered that they just don't want free horses to be a feature of the game? I'm not saying whether or not it *should* be, but this has been a topic of discussion ever since the rules were revamped and reemphasized a few years ago. I haven't heard any news about them even considering the feature. They could be worried that it would allow for scamming (i.e. promising to 'trade' one free horse for another and then one player doesn't receive the horse they were promised) or encourage players to make multiple accounts so that they can send horses to one main account.
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By Retired breeder, 22nd December 2020 17:57:17
I'm curious to know if Howrse would have a problem with a barn sale type giveaway. Perhaps participants could enter like any other player held contest, and then a drawing of 5 players would occur and those 5 players, in order of being drawn, would be able to make an offer on a selection of horses that the host prepared, horses that would be of some sort of value, and players could offer up 500e for it.
While giveaways are great for BMIs and other items, horse rewards would be much better off as some sort of speed auction or something, where the first offer is granted and the horse is sold to the first bidder for a low price? |
While giveaways are great for BMIs and other items, horse rewards would be much better off as some sort of speed auction or something, where the first offer is granted and the horse is sold to the first bidder for a low price? Is this not a form of a giveaway? The first person who "bids" would get the horse for a very low price (probably 500e). In fact a normal giveaway would be more fair to the players because everybody would have the same chance to buy the horse not just the first person to see it.
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Like I said in my earlier post if it is possible to sell a horse in reserved sales why are there restrictions about how and why you sell your horse? In the end the horse is still being sold. As for horses as prizes in a "giveaway" or "contest" the player hosting could say that the horse is not the prize but the "winner" would get a discount on a horse of their choice out of a small group set aside by the host instead of the horse being listed specifically as the prize.
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Is this not a form of a giveaway? The first person who "bids" would get the horse for a very low price (probably 500e). In fact a normal giveaway would be more fair to the players because everybody would have the same chance to buy the horse not just the first person to see it. No, it’s not a giveaway, because it’s not a free item. It’s a ‘deal’, not something tangible that can be given away immediately. It requires a purchase of a horse to be usable, and ergo or not a free item. A coupon or discount is not tangible, so that’s not something you can give away in the game, as far as I’m aware. All giveaway prizes need to be real, tangible things. In addition, they must be completely free, with no strings attached and no purchase necessary in order to get or use them. Players who want to sell horses to other players for very cheap can simply put them in the sales at a low price and sell them that way. There’s no reason to label it as a giveaway, since it’s not a giveaway according to the definition of the word itself. Autobuy doesn’t pick horses up for at least 30 seconds, so they can tell people when they’ll be releasing horses for cheap and do it that way. Or players can reserve horses for other players for very cheap and give them cheap horses that way. But again, this would not be considered a giveaway as a giveaway prize needs to be completely free.
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