Using activity level as as criteria

[krutten]

I could use some help figuring out how to use activity level as a criteria. Under Add New Criteria, I see I can choose Activity Level. If I choose Points as the Type, that would be about the same as if I chose Points(Total) instead of Activity level... correct?

So if I choose Activity Level, I assume I need to choose Value as the Type. Is that a percentage then? And if so, does that mean the person would need to be at least that set percent active in the level they are already in to meet the criteria?

What I am trying to do is figure out a way to promote a person to a given usergroup based on their total points, but requiring them to maintain a given activity level to STAY in that group, otherwise they would be demoted back down to the level they were at. Ideas? Suggestions?

 

[Fillip H.]

I believe the Points vs Value setting automatically corrects itself if you attempt to use Points, as only Values is a valid input for this setting

Also, I don't believe Activity Level will have the desired effect for you - Activity Level is a constant, once they have reached, say Level 5, they will stay there forever.
It's only meant to serve as a measurement of total forum activity, not relative activity (which is what you're requesting).

I can't say I can think of a way to implement your request with the current feature set, I think your best bet would be to try to use the "Days Since Last Post" - make it "< 1" to promote and ">= 1" to demote.
That being said, I'm unsure how those criteria work in conjunction with posts - I don't think criteria are checked outside of posting or performing some other forum action, which would defeat the purpose of this specific criteria...

 

[krutten]

So this may be a stupid question, but how is activity level any different than total points?

 

[Fillip H.]

It's not a stupid question at all
The main difference is that you can set, say, an Achievement for getting Activity Level 10. But nobody knows how many points that is - not even myself (and I made the thing!).
A less used difference is that if you integrate vBActivity with a shop mod, it will deduct from the Total Points field (dbtech_vbactivity_points in the user table if you harbour thoughts of integration with a shop mod ) and thus create a situation where someone can be broke as a rat, but still have OVER 9000 in Activity Level

 

[krutten]

So that brings me to my next question... I've been looking at this post to try to determine what is a reasonable target activity level for my criteria. But using myself as an example, the formula doesn't play out ... if I continue the calculations as were started in that thread, I would only need 500 points to be at Level 25, which is where I am listed in the vbActivity statistics. But my actual point total is 6971. So I guess I'm not really grasping the "activity level" concept...

 

[Fillip H.]

The activity level is calculated using an exponential formula where each activity level requires the previous levels' amount of points + (some mathsy stuff here I forgot).

The amount of points needed is static, though, so someone with approx. 4k Points will be approx Lv15 and 50% towards Lv16

 

[krutten]

Slowly making sense... abstract is not my strong suit. Thanks