Sure man, it's a loophole by your interpretation of the rules, but not by the actual rules. If it was meant to be official owner only, the rules would say that.

 

Loophole or not, I have added or been added to towns to protect towns from being claimed due to extended absence or illness. Many times it has been to help out a friend or family member that is being deployed and has no idea if they will be able to login in the time required.
I see no reason that they need to pay a fee to protect the property they rightfully paid for.

 

It's not a loophole. It's by design. Town claims are only meant to enable towns that would otherwise be sitting dormant to see a second life. If there are active owners, the town isn't sitting dormant (or is at least doing so by choice). These systems weren't created with the intention of being able to steal stuff from active players.

In fact, administration generally makes the claim process intentionally more difficult because people usually don't come back after someone legally steals their stuff.

 

I think that you’re mis-interpreting what a loophole is.
Say for example the rules state that drinking filtered water is illegal. A loophole would be drinking sugar water. Its technically not “filtered water” but youre bypassing the rules and drinking something with water in it. Loopholes are designed to bypass ambiguous rules whereas the rule for town claims is pretty clear cut. Its not a “loophole” to add someone to a town to make sure your stuff doesnt get stolen. You’re framing the argument as “its not in the rules so therefore it should be against the rules” which is honestly dumb. If someone wants to protect their assets that theyve spent months collecting from being taken while they’re inactive, good. Having been a GA where there have been cases of someones town being claimed and then they come back was honestly heartbreaking to see, and adding another owner prevents that.
There is a certain level of risk associated with adding someone to an owner of a town unless a strict agreement is in place. If the original owner goes away, who is to say that the next owner won’t demolish the town?
Its a protective measure that prevents people from losing their shit. Everyone understands that losing their stuff is a risk that can happen if they go inactive, but on the chance they come back they have the ability to not start over from scratch while whoever claimed their stuff benefits from their inactivity.

 

Outside of being rude and attacking those (with astonishingly horrid grammar) who genuinely think this is a bad idea by calling us “old heads” cause “they scared of change,” lets point this out:
Here’s the quote on claims from the wiki:

You’ll note that the language specifically states “This applies to…Anyone in the "Owners" section of /rg info <townname> command.”
Also note that this does not differentiate between people who were added just for the town to not be claimed and those added to legitimately build and grow the town. Going back to my point that its not a loophole due to the fact that the rules very clearly state that anyone on the owners list needs to be inactive for a town to be claimed.
It must make you pretty upset (unless you’ve actually bothered to read the wiki about it) to learn that original owners don’t need to be on the owners list to need to be inactive for a town to be claimed.
The language of the wiki, as Nicit stated, is meant to be written as it is. Us “oldheads” have builds that we would much rather be able to come back to instead of them being raided. Some of us don’t have the funds to make it an unclaimable town and aren’t active enough to generate that much, we just have friends that we trust to not go inactive and that can take care of a town in our absence.
On that note about language, the wiki says “certain circumstances” not “a given right to those on ECC to claim any town they want.” People put hard work into their towns and into protecting them for the future and I’m sorry that you feel that you should put in less effort then anyone who put in the actual effort years ago. It shouldn’t just be given to whoever wants it and those who want to claim a town should work for it, it is a hardcore economy server after all.

 

Sure, maybe you pull more money out, but how many people will quit when they try to come back and no longer have their towns, builds, and items? This type of change is atrocious for user retention.

 

I like how you first say user retention would be boosted by it but then say how user retention actually doesn't exist. Really screams that the concept of player retention is something you don't know.
This point of yours makes absolutely 0 sense. "i have said a dozen times now they can log in or hand over ownership to the new owner until they return and then have it returned to them and this would actually boost user retention cause those who log in to prevent the town claim would see the changes to ECC and potentially want to return"
So this is incredibly confusing. You're saying that if someone gives their town to another user then gets it back is 1. something you said before and 2. would boost player retention. Your entire point is that players who are inactive should have their towns be able ti be claimed. Theoretically, if someone claims a town, they most likely won't be giving it back. You're leaning more towards the complete opposite of your suggestion, where someone can give ownership of a town to someone to hold onto the town and remain the owner until they hopefully return from their inactivity. +1 logic for that one!
Your 2nd point there also is a good point, people who are added to an owners list of a town can boost user retention by taking over a town and taking care of it just by being added, then the original owner can have their town back. Thanks for finally seeing the light.
I'm not sure what metrics the staff team uses for player retention, but someone leaving and logging back in isnt a marker of player retention. Either way, making the process for someone to lose their town would probably hurt player retention as someone logging back in to see what they worked hard for gone would most likely make them leave.
This leads me to your other point.

This pretty much is an "actual counter argument." ECC, like minecraft in general, faces a need to have a high player retention rate. More pissed off players = lower playercount = less satisfaction/money = dead server. Those players who were once inactive and come back provide a boost to playercount, which otherwise could be lost if those players can't access what they lost.
If you want to continue to scream "my idea is best for the economy," think about how truly achievable it actually is.
The cost of making a town "unclaimable" is 4mil ecd + 1000nstars (or about 2mil in today's market rate). Your average town owner doesn't have 6mil believe it or not. If you do, that's great, but most players don't. If they do, however, that money is better spent in building the town or enhancing it, which also helps the economy.
Take my example, I was inactive for a while and came back. I'm currently building up a town and probably have spent close to 1.5mil in building it or putting materials into it. I didn't hit the 6 months inactivity, but if someone claimed my town, I would've quit, hence why I made a contract with someone who was heavily active to be on the owners list solely so my town couldnt be claimed. The price is too high for the average user, hence why it is considered a "premium" that. rich players can accomplish. More or less, this doesn't help the economy at all because the price is a premium that most players who go inactive and lose their towns can't really afford to pay. The last unclaimable town app was filed in July of 2022. That's basically a year ago that no one has filed this app and with the playercounts of these days, the most you would get is the already rich users with a low chance of inactivity making sure that their towns don't get claimed, not the average player who goes inactive.
Besides, you don't offer actual evidence that implementing this suggestion would lead to any "real" benefit because again, the last app was filed a year ago and the server has been fine with the current system for the many years that this rule has been in place.
Tldr: Your points counter eachother and make no sense and this suggestion won't do anything special to change that because the average inactive townowner most likely can't afford the high cost of it and would probably leave if their town got claimed, thus hurting player rentention and the server anyways.