That’s the vibe I’m getting too.
Now I feel like I have to go an add gems to everything because 14 to 125 is a really massive difference? One will show up in trending and one won’t.
6 Likes
I noticed this as well. The live rank compared to test rank often shows a huge difference which does not make any sense to me at all. The screenshot below is from a story that uses gem choices.
My story without gem choices often trends in the 60s-100s on the live rank, but because the story doesn’t have any gems, it tends to trend high (100-140) *Which I’m not complaining, but the post is saying that stories without gem choices will still have a chance to rank high, but that’s a bit questionable considering the difference in the ranks.
4 Likes
For me it’s the opposite. If we’d be living by this “test rank already”, I’d be trending lower. Even though I have gem options by the end of the every chapter (support author option). 
5 Likes
This is interesting. 
I wonder how easy it will remain for the authors who decide to not add in any gem choices to rank higher.
My test rang is pretty lower than live, and I have gems added.
For everyone who’s test rank is lower than their live rank, I’m so sorry.
Your rank shouldn’t be lowered for not including gem choices! It’s so frustrating to see this.
1 Like
Ranks just updated with this new system and I am very disappointed. 
2 Likes
Did you have many selected?
I’m curious to know how the support the author option is going to go as more and more people actually see gem choices.
My stories with gems rank much better than what they did before, but both of those have top up points options.
Congratulations on making it even harder for us small authors to be trending 
16 Likes
I thought it was good or at least enough, but apparently, I was mistaken. Demotivating.
1 Like
Right!
2 Likes
@Melani3 @Liz I’d check twice if the algorithm is working correctly now, because it seems to be really buggy
Some stories with 0 gem choices went up drastically while others dropped badly even if the gem retention is huge for current conditions (15-17%). If that is rewarding for people with gem choices inside, it clearly fails and we have no idea how to even have control over it since we do everything we can to make this damaged system less harmful for us but right now it is just random and making us anxious.
For example, my story has 17% gem retention and it just dropped, 200 places down even if it was doing well on tests for a week. At this point I have no idea what to do.
5 Likes
How did you calculate the percentage of your gem retention?
I divided gem amount per reads amount, like 1000 reads and 100 purchased gems gives 10%
1 Like
The ranking system doesn’t make sense to me. In my case, the ranking actually works in my favor for whatever reason it may be, because I know how many gems have been spent on one of the stories and I can tell that it’s not even close to 1% over the total reads I have got, yet I am somehow trending #3 in the genre I put it in?
1 Like
Maybe its still more than the number of gems of the others in the genre? I’m not sure how this system really works.
They explained the payments, but not so much the ranking.
Dear God… I guess writing and reading aren’t for fun anymore. It’s about money and competition. 
I imagine it will be even harder for smaller authors with no fanbase to get on top. This is so demotivating.
6 Likes
Right? It’s hard enough being a small author and the main reason I don’t read featured stories is bc I cannot STAND gem choices. Now they’re forcing people to incorporate them to rank up. Really makes me wanna give up writing on here. 
2 Likes
Okay, I might regret saying some of this because I’m not really in the right mind but anyway-
Community writers are community readers too and I’m sure a lot will agree with me if I say we have the same feelings towards gem choices. You see, not all people can afford buying gems or sacrificing a lot of passes to fish gems from features stories.
To be honest, this doesn’t feel true to me. Instead of feeling in control, I feel like I’m about to be forced to do something to my story. Putting gems—I’ve always been against them as a community writer who is also a reader, though I understand its purpose. My dream of letting people freely experience a fantasy world without having to spend money from the real world is ruined.
If you really are so ecstatic about helping the authors, let them be free and let them want to do their best to rise up to the ranks with their talent and hard work alone. Trust your authors that they can find a way to add gem choices without worrying about driving readers away. Your community authors are creative enough for that.
Imagine this just becomes an app to fish for money, adding gems everywhere they see fit, though unreasonable, instead of sharing talents and fantasies. Forgive me if I seem to pessimistic about it.
What I just hope is that you should listen to your community first or else you might lose decency soon 
you’re a big company though, so I see that hardly happening soon.
It doesn’t, really. To be frank right now, if you so care about your community in general, you would see how bad this new system is. I might get bashed, but from what I see, this is just for money and not for the authors. Maybe if you want effective author-focused updates, you can also think about the readers because readers are a part of an authors’ career.
I honestly don’t know what I’m writing but I hope you get my point.
13 Likes
I hope this says something :'(( I’d love to be more frank about everything, but I’m afraid I might get bashed instead of my opinions getting accepted. Plus, I might just get biased or something, so-
2 Likes