Icy Veins Christmas Contest! (33 replies to this topic)

During the Christmas period, we will be holding a screenshot contest with awesome prizes! There will be 3 categories: Feast of Winter Veil, Best Scenery, and Best Action Shot. For each category, the prizes will be as follows:

• First place
  • 1 Collector's Edition of Mists of Pandaria, signed by the developers
  • 1 mount and 1 pet from the Blizzard Store
  • 6 months of free Premium Access on Ask Mr. Robot
  • 6 months of free Voice Server from TypeFrag
  • 3 month of free Premium Access to Curse network (including the client for your addons)
• Second place
  • 1 Standard Edition of Mists of Pandaria
  • 1 mount and 1 pet from the Blizzard Store
  • 3 months of free Premium Access on Ask Mr. Robot
  • 3 months of free Voice Server from TypeFrag
  • 3 month of free Premium Access to Curse network
• Third place
  • 1 mount and 1 pet from the Blizzard Store
  • 3 months of free Premium Access on Ask Mr. Robot
  • 3 months of free Voice Server from TypeFrag
  • 3 month of free Premium Access to Curse network

Guidelines

All submissions need to feature your character in a setting that matches the category that you are entering.

• For Feast of Winter Veil, the screenshots need be related to the theme of the world event of the same name.
• For Best Scenery, you must take a screenshot that features your character and any place in the World of Warcraft, instanced or not.
• For Best Action Shot, the screenshot must feature your character in combat, or in the process of performing some class or role specific task.

We will judge based on your character's appearance (transmogrification is not required, but it is certainly allowed), the landscape/background you chose, and how the two mesh together.

Entering the Contest

To submit your screenshot, you need send us an e-mail that will contain the screenshot and a link to the armory profile of the character in the screenshot. You can make more than one submission, but remember that we will judge quality, not quantity. The e-mail addresses for submitting are:

• Feast of Winter Veil: winter-veil@icy-veins.com;
• Best Scenery: scenery@icy-veins.com;
• Best Action Shot: action-shot@icy-veins.com.

You are not allowed to use any software to modify the screenshots. We advise you to set your settings to the maximum your computer can handle, for the purpose of the screenshot. Also, make sure to set your screenshot quality properly: http://www.wowwiki.com/Changing_the_screenshot_format.

We will not divulge the e-mail addresses that you will use to submit your screenshots. We will also never use them to send you unsolicited messages, except if you win the contest, of course.

Timeline

You can start submitting screenshots as soon as you read this message. The submissions will close on the 31st of December at 23:59 GMT.

From the 1st to the 4th of January, the judges will decide on the 10 best screenshots for each category.

On the 4th of January, we will announce the screenshots that made it to the final round. We will add them to specific albums on our Facebook page, where everyone will be able to like them. On the 11th of January, at 21:59 GMT, the winning screenshots for each category will be those that will have received the most likes. Basically, 1 like equals 1 vote.

Finally, we will contact the winners and we will make sure that they get their prizes.

Eligibility

The contest is open to anyone over 13. We will cover the shipping costs, if any.

More on the Prizes

The main prizes are the Mists of Pandaria Collector's Editions, which are all signed by the developers. These priceless editions are a present from the North America Community team at Blizzard, and we thank them heartily for giving us a chance to organise such a nice contest.

The licenses in all the Mists of Pandaria editions are US-only, which means that they can only be used to upgrade a US account. If you have a US account that is already upgraded to Mists of Pandaria, you can upgrade it again to the Collector's Edition (to get the in-game goodies), and you can ask Customer Support to refund you a Mists of Pandaria key. European players, shall they win a Collector's Edition, will not be able to benefit from the in-game goodies or a Collector's Edition Mists of Pandaria key. They will, however, still be able to enjoy the remaining contents of the box.

The mounts and pets from the Blizzard Store will be provided by us, as we usually do in our weekly giveaways. Winners will choose 1 mount and 1 pet from the Blizzard Store, and we will oblige.

Ask Mr. Robot, our partner for everything pertaining to stat priorities, gems, reforging, and best-in-slot, will be offering free access to their premium features. More information on their website.

TypeFrag, one of the best voice server rental services out there, will be offering free access to their services for the winners. They will be able to choose the voice server they prefer: Teamspeak, Ventrilo, or Mumble. The size of the server (10 slots or 25 slots) will depend on whether the guild of the winner is raiding 10-man or 25-man.

Judges

Your screenshots will be judged by:

• some of our moderators: Peelyon, MadMonk, and Auracle;
• Mr. Robot, your gear optimization guru;
• Chris Hanel from The Daily Blink, the famous World of Warcraft Webcomic;
• chaud, who brings you news every day on MMO-Champion;
• Noelani and Ironyca, who run WoW Roleplay Gear, a fantastic resource for transmogrification;
• David Grampa, CEO and Founder of TypeFrag;
• RM, Guild Master of Inner Sanctum (EU-Silvermoon);
• Michael Oglesby, who made (and continues to make) this website so easy to navigate;
• Jamie Syke, who designed our logo;
• Dawn Moore and Anne Stickney from WoW Insider;
• Zastaph, Guild Master of Fury on EU-Shadowsong, a good friend of ours;
• Arielle, from The Inconspicuous Bear, the go-to site for Guardian Druids.

The judges have been listed in the order in which they have replied to us. We may add a few more names, as we are still expecting answers.

If we happen to receive hundreds and hundreds of submissions, Vlad and I will trim them down to a reasonable number before passing them onto the judges.

Conclusion

We have been doing weekly giveaways for more than a year now, but this is the first time that we organise something of this magnitude, and with such prizes. Please be indulgent, we will probably not get everything right, this time.

If you notice anything wrong with the rules of the contest or the timeline, please let your opinion be known!

This will be FUN! ...the prizes are amazing (you guys always go above and beyond) , but more than that, it gives those of us who are returning to our groove in Azeroth something FUN to focus on, AS WELL as something to integrate into our guilds personal challenges to get people motivated to play for FUN again! I know ive been away for a few months, but you know me, ive always been about promoting having FUN in this game, and getting too serious with the daily grind can burn even hard core Wowzers like me out in a hurry. THIS gives me, and many more im sure, something fun to focus on for the next couple weeks , to stretch our creativity to its limits and just HAVE FUN! <3 ~Nyxx

Curse gave us premium keys, so we will be able to reward our winners with 3-month premium access to Curse I edited the message accordingly.

Damien, on 15 December 2012 - 02:07 AM, said:

lucky you

Good luck to everyone! Looking forward to some original screenshots and some awesome transmogs!

Yeah good luck to all, keep those pics coming

Let the games begin.

Awesome contest!

Niice.

So. I'm assuming so, but it is only one screenshot per person per catagory?

QuantumQuasars, on 18 December 2012 - 07:35 PM, said:

Nope you can enter as much as you like, but keep this in mind!

Damien, on 15 December 2012 - 01:13 AM, said:

Like I said, for me (personally) I'm looking for really good original screenshots!  So come up with some great ideas!

Oh man. Herpy derpy. I missed that bit, sorry.  

Is there a preference to send them all in one e-mail per catagory or are sep. ones ok?
(My last question, I swear!)

I would prefer one mail per screenshot. It makes it easier for us We won't discard mails with several screenshots, though

Darn, if it werent for that character in the shot rule, id be a shoe in. I've got some amazing screenshots, but unfortunately all landscape without my char in it. Oh well, I can just take some more with him in it.

Also, for the best scenery/action shot, do you want those to be christmas themed as well? Also, does it have to be my main, or just a character? I've got a few great ideas that I could do, but need other raced for it, so I would probably just roll a new lvl 1 if its within the rules. Thanks for awesome contest!

Gabeco, on 18 December 2012 - 11:38 PM, said:

Hehe I'm in the same boat. Working on re-doing some of my favs though!

Gabeco, on 18 December 2012 - 11:38 PM, said:

The scenery/action shot screenshots do not need to be Christmas-themed. They can be anything. It doesn't need to be your main, it can be anything! Of course, if you're in level 10-looking gear (and it doesn't somehow go with the rest of your image), it's probably going to put you at a disadvantage.

Good luck, and feel free to ask any more questions you may have!

Great googly moogly!!  awesome!!!

Just bombed you with a ton of entries! hope you enjoy

Gabeco, on 20 December 2012 - 03:39 AM, said:

We certainly do enjoy the submissions, but it would be unfair to the other participants if we gave you an opinion on the screenshots you submitted

Are you allowed to photoshop a screenshot? Like can you add a caption to it? WAY excited about this btw!!!! =D

Keladria, on 21 December 2012 - 05:32 AM, said:

We decided not to accept photoshopping or modifications of any kind, because if we did, it would have been hard to draw a limit