Referred By

With the 'referred by' extension to OnTime, players can be rewarded for referring their friends to the server, but they will only receive the reward after the new player has been on the server for a configurable amount of time.

The configuration and setup of the feature gives the administrator the ability to reward groups of players differently, for example a reward for a referral by a server donor can be greater than the reward issued to just some average player. Rewards can also be set up in tiers so a minimal reward can be given right away for a referral, but then a larger reward issued after the new player has been on for much longer. (a 'reward set')

Also, referral rewards can be defined such that they are only issued after a player has successfully referred a certain number of different players.

The 'referred' player can also receive a reward as incentive for executing the 'referred by' command.

Only one referral reward set will be issued per new player, but a player can be credited for making any number of referrals. A player can never refer themselves.

If the MySQL storage option of player data is used for OnTime, the number of referrals made by a player will be counted and stored, and the name of the person that referred a player will also be maintained.

Setup

Permissions

In order to make and receive 'referred by' rewards a player or group must have the 'ontime.referredby.enable' permission.

Configuration (/ontime/config.yml)

In order for the 'referred by' functions to be active on the server, it must be enabled:

To prevent long time players from suddenly claiming they were referred by someone else, a max time can be set, such that if the player has more than that many hours played on the server, a 'recommended by' request will be denied. Setting this parameter to -1 will disable the function, and all players can claim they were referred.

Reward Setup

Basic Referral Reward

Example 1: Define a referral reward of 100 coins to be issued to the referring (source) player, once the referred (target) player has been on the server for one hour.

1. Define a reward of 100 coins.

2. Make that reward a referral reward

3. Done!

Target Player Reward

Example 2: Define a reward of 50 coins to be given to the target player, to be issued at the same time as the referring player gets the reward above.

1. Define reward of 50 coins

2. Make that reward a referral (target) reward

3. Done!

Exclusive Referral Reward

1. Define a reward of 20 diamonds

2. Make that reward a referral reward

3. Make that reward 'exclusive' to the 'donor' group.

4. Done!

Referral Count Reward

(Note: This reward type requires use of MySQL option for player data storage for OnTime.)

Example 4: Define a group change to VIP reward, issued to a referral source only after that player has successfully referred a certain number of other players.

1. Define a reward of group change to VIP group.

2. Make this a referral reward that requires 5 referrals, before it is issued.

(alternatively: ' /ontime rewards refer 3 count=5')

3. Done!

(Note that the rewardID (3) above assumes you did the other examples. The actual rewardID can be found using the "/ontime reward list" command.) 3. Done!

Making it Happen

When the new player joins the server, they simply need to execute the 'referred by' command.

If the player had entered the following instead:

There is no EdgeCraft record of a player named edge
Did you mean one of the following?
Edge209     fredgeMan

Undoing a Referral

If you need to rollback a player's referral status, such that they can again issue a 'referred by' command, this can easily be done with the command:

Where 'playerName' is the player you would again like to be able to issue a 'referred by' command.

If this command is executed after a 'referred by' command is done but before the player has reached the total OnTime needed to issue the rewards, the rewards will be cancelled. If the player has already reached that total OnTime required and rewards have been issued and/or scheduled for the 'referral source' the rewards cannot be stopped or undone.
This command can be executed from the console or in game, and requires the 'ontime.referred.admin' permission node.

Seeing a Player's Referrals

You can see the names of all of the players referred by a specified player using the following command:

This feature requires that MYSQL be used to maintain the OnTime data.

Behind the Scenes

• After a new player has issued the 'referred by' command, 'referred by' rewards will be scheduled for that player. So if you execute the '/ontime <playerName>' command for that new player, you will see listed for them these rewards. This does not mean they will receive the reward, but the plugin is using the same mechanism to track their playing time to know when to issue the reward later to the referring player. Once the new player reaches the target playing time, a reward will then be scheduled for the referring player, and would show up for that player when '/ontime <playerName>' is executed.
• Once a new player has been 'successfully referred' by another player, meaning the referring player has received at least one reward, the new player will be given the 'permission string' of 'ontime.referredby.success'. This string will appear in the permission plugin's configuration for that new player. It is this permission sting that prevents the player from issuing additional 'referred by' commands.