Legal Disclaimer: This contest is NOT official, nor officially endorsed by Sony Online Entertainment - although it is being hosted on the offical EverQuest forums, it is being held at their "sufferance". I have received assurances that participation in this contest will not automatically result in disciplanary actions taken against contestants, however, all posts and their respective contents will still be subjected to SOE's standard forum guidelines. I apologize in advance for these restrictions. Also note that I, Mary Poppins, take no responsibility for any of the contents in this thread other than my own posts and, per our agreement of suffereance, cannot be held legally accountable for any inappropriate conduct carried out by other members of the forum community. CHALLENGE: Carve an EQ themed pumpkin for Halloween and post it in this thread. DURATION: Submissions for this forum challenge are open as of this post and will be open until October 31st, 2012 at 11:59pm HST. No late submissions will be accepted. RULES: Before submitting an entry, please review SOE's standard Official Rules for Forum Challanges. (Since this contest is not being run by SOE, strict adherance to these rules will not be enforced by me. However, I cannot stop SOE from punishing contestants who blatantly disregard their standard contest or forum rules.) Other things to consider: - You are permitted to submit as many submissions as you want, however, only your highest scoring entry will be considered. - The pumpkin carving has to have been done by you. However, since it is impossible for me to know who actually did the work, you can probably easily get around this stipulation as long as you aren't stupid and brag about it or something. - Please avoid stretching out the page when submitting your images. This WILL result in point deductions if not immediately corrected, because it totally irritates me when people do this. - I know this sounds stupid, but there is a very real need to stipulate that your entry has to be an actual pumpkin that is carved. Other fruit do not count, nor do fake pumpkins or processed pumpkin products. JUDGING CRITERIA: All entries will be examined and scored by an impartial judge based on three seperate criterial. The maximum score possible is 25 points, based on the following: - Skill (1-10 points): Basically, if I look at your carving and can't figure out how you did that, you get the full 10 points. If I can understand how you did it, but couldn't do it myself, you get 9 points. If, with great effort, I could do what you did, you get 8 points. If I could do what you did with minimal effort, you get 7 points. If you are worse than me... then that's pretty lame. I'm expecting everyone to get at least 8 points from this section. - Corrilation to EverQuest (1-5 points): Clear and obvious connection to EQ will get you the full 5 points. A connection with a logical explanation will be worth 4 points. Establishing a weak/questionable connection after an explanation will be worth 3 points. If I don't believe your explanation at all, you get 2 points. If you don't even bother trying to relate it to EQ, you get 1 point. - Bonus Points (1-10 points): Up to 10 bonus points can be awarded to entries who contain additional attributes that I find amusing. Alluding to something inappropriate is one example that would earn a good amount of bonus points (if you can sneak it past the mods - entries that get caught and/or censored will not receive bonus points), but is not the only way to earn them. Anything that sets your entry apart will be considered for additional credit, and you can PM me an explanation if posting one openly would get you in trouble. ** Bonus points are seperate from the other two criteria, such as how good your piece looks, therefore it is posible to get a fairly decent score with a lousy carving that doesn't have anything to do with EQ if it has a certain "it" factor. Similarly, submitting an awesome professional-looking EQ themed carving that has no other "gimmick" will result in only 15 points. Please keep this in mind when entering the contest - the "best" looking carving might not win, as looks/skill only account for 10 of the 25 total possible points. Submitting an entry that scores high in all three categories gives you the best chance at victory. SUBMISSION: Submissions should be posted as a response to this thread. When posting your submission, the following information is required: - Title of the Image: - Forum Handle: - Character Name: - Server: - Guild: - Image with Description: REWARDS: There will be three (3) formal awards for the entries that receive the most points. Final scores for all entries will not be made public. The winner and top two losers will be notified via PM on how they can claim their prizes. - Grand Champion: 3000 Station Cash - First Loser: 2000 Station Cash - Second Loser: 1000 Station Cash - All Participants: A personalized Private Message of thanks for participating CARVING TIPS: Here are a few important things to remember when carving a pumpkin: 1. The first step is to get a pumpkin and find the proper tools. 2. Before you start carving your pumpkin, you'll want to draft a design on what you want your pumpkin to look like. 3. Now it's time to start hacking at the pumpkin. Cut the top off on an angle so that whenyou replace it, it doesn't fall through. 4. Next is the gutting of the pumpkin, which can sometimes be messy! 5. Tape the design to the pumpkin and trace it by poking little holes through it. 6. The last step is to cut out the pattern and to place a candle inside the pumpkin to create an eerie glow. 7. Don't forget eye holes if you plan on wearing it on your head. QUESTIONS? Go ahead and ask. I'll try to answer them as best as possible, but I'm lazy so it might take a while and the response might not be very helpful.
First off, I really like you're judging criteria! Props for organizing this. Secondly, darn you! I told myself I wasn't going to be carving any pumpkins this year. Now I have the itch to do one. /twitch
It's only unfair and biased for you. I'm perfectly capable of being an impartial judge for the other 99.9% of the EQ playerbase.
-Title of the Image: I <3 EQ -Forum Handle: RekMMO -Character Name: Berserker -Server: Bristlebane -Guild: N/A -Image with Description: I actually grew the four smaller pumpkins. I wanted to do a timelapse from the seed being planted to the pumpkin being carved. But it turns out I don't have much of a green thumb and they came out tiny. Maybe I'll do better next year. As far as the carving goes, I ran out of time and decided to keep it simple by doing the EQ logo.
Great. One entry submitted less than an hour before the deadline. Now I can't keep the prizes. You suck, Rek.
Okay, it's past midnight here, so the contest is officially closed. I'd like to thank everyone who submitted a carving. I know how hard it is to do make those stupid things, so this annual forum contest is one of the few that actually requires quite a bit of work (and talent) to participate in. This year's entries were all very good, so I'm sure I am going to have my work cut out in trying to determine a winner. To ensure I give fair and careful consideration to each carving, I will postpone judgment until I wake up tomorrow morning so that I can be well rested and in a clear state of mind while meticulously assigning scores according to the specified criteria. Once all the entries have been scored, I will post the final results in this thread and send PM's to the submitters of the top 3 entries with instructions on how to claim their prizes. Thank you for your patience.
After thoroughly examining all of the submitted carvings, I have unbiasedly allocated a fair numerical score for each entry. The official results of the Not-Quite-Official 2012 Pumpkin Carving Forum Contest are as follows: GRAND CHAMPION: RekMMO for his "I <3 EQ" carving. FIRST AND SECOND LOSERS: There are no losers - everyone is a winner in this contest. Like, literally - Rek submitted the only entry so there really is no one left that I can call a loser... other than Ishtass (but if I did that I'd have to give him the SC prizes). BOOBY PRIZE** WINNERS: Jerus, Cakvala (for "liking" my original post), and Ishtass (for being the only person other than Rek and myself to post in this thread). I'd give Ellyra one too, but she is an actual SOE employee and is therefore ineligible to receive prizes according to their own contest rules. Sorry. ** Even I have no idea what the booby prizes are, so let me know when you find out. All winners, please keep an eye out for a PM from me containing the details on how to claim your prizes. This year's contest was highly successful (for me, since I get to keep the 1st and 2nd loser SC prizes), so I'd like to thank the one guy who entered, the three people who liked my post, and even Ishtass for finally transferring his Iksar off my server. If I am to have any chance at being allowed to run another forum contest, I'm also obligated to suck up and thank Piestro and the rest of the CR staff for any assistance that I may or may not have received.
No problem. I gladly take any chance I can get to say "boobies", "honkers", or "ta-tas" on this forum.
Boobies are nice, the prizes i mean, mhm. I got a vampire ornament pack, haven't looked at what it is in claim yet though.
I never even seen this post or I would have carved one lol love holloween and EQ. it was nice of you to organize this as well
It's all part of SOE's ongoing conspiracy to keep me down. I've taken the issue up with Piestro, but he's ignoring me at the moment.
well, far to late for the contest, and hey I nearly missed the new forums altogether - but I am itching with curiosity - who the hell did you transmogiphy into Mary Poppins of all people a spoonful of sugar does not make a snake god
It's complicated. I've put in an official request for a name change, but apparently the dirty halfling is too amused and refuses to change it.
