Contest of Mayors

Contest of Mayors are offered a very similar mixture of both high- and regular-value Plumbob Points assignments. This ensures there’s a good variety of assignments to pick and choose from, depending on individual preferences or strategy.

Each different type of assignment that is offered to each mayor during each Contest (e.g. production in factories or commercial buildings; upgrading residential zones; collecting Keys etc.) has a slightly randomised nature. Otherwise, if the list of available assignments for each contest were the same for all mayors it could get posted online as each contest started, and give some mayors an unfair strategical advantage - as they’d know exactly which assignments would be coming up and plan accordingly.

There are no items or building upgrades in the game that have exactly the same complexity values, so there may be a slight variance in the Plumbob Point rewards for each assignment. For example: 'Corn' production takes 54 minutes yet 'Flour' takes only 27 minutes (in addition to differing amounts of ingredients needed) so to give the same Plumbob Point reward for each would be unfair.

Although this may result in slight fluctuations to the potential Plumbob Points each mayor could earn each week, the maximum potential Plumbob Points available are still well within the same range and any slight differences will rarely affect a chance of promotion or prize at the end of each contest. Ultimately, as long as you are active in the Contests and are completing the maximum Plumbob Point assignments available to you, there is always a strong chance to obtain the highest prizes and positions in the leaderboards.

Each time you complete, fail or cancel an assignment a new one is added in its place, so make sure to check the new ones regularly so as not to miss out on any possible high-value Plumbob Point chances!

I encountered similar problem once I reached City League....I'm currently 40k+ points behind leader despite focusing only on highest point challenges.  With 30 challenges available, the leader has over 60k points which averages out to at least 2k points per challenge for the leader.  I've only seen 2-3 challenges with those kind of points available.

I've been trying to think of this from an alternative perspective.  I've had weeks that it looks like, "What's the point" and I have had weeks that are pretty good opportunities.

I originally thought, as many have voiced, that it should be fair across the board.  Everyone should have the same valued assignments.  However, if everyone had the same valued assignments the final score would be a whole list of all the same score because everyone would only do the highest assignments, but if you tie assignments into something else that guarantees a variety then you have a wide ranging variety of scores.   I get that, but people want a contest not a randomized luck fest.

I've tried to make sense of exactly how things are being done.  I had a theory for a while that the next assignment may be tied to the assignment you just did.  Previously I chose mostly mid-range assignments 800-1500 and always got mid ranged assignments in return.  This week I was just going to play around with it and do a variety of all different  assignments including low valued assignments and see what I get in return.  

I thought I was onto something when the first assignment I did was only worth 320 and the next assignment I got was worth 5000.  I did the 5000 and then got a 2000.  I do the 2000 then got 800, so decided to mix it up again.  I did a 580 assignment and got an 1400 in return.  I did a 400 assignment and got a 380 in return.  I do a 1080 and get a 1420 in return.

There does not appear to be any rhyme or reason to it.  Although the complete random way I went about doing this week's contest does have me currently in first with 4 assignments and 2 days to go and the average across the 16 assignments I've already done is just over 2000 per assignment.

Make of it what you will, but I will continue doing the contests even during the weeks that I have no chance if it will gain me one extra gold key that I would have never gotten otherwise.  Those are just the weeks that I will not concentrate as hard on it, but do the bare minimum to get a gold key.

The only thing I really have to gripe about this contest now is that I really wish they didn't add a 4th currency item.  Platinum keys?  Really?  Sure add more things you can put in your city and give keys as rewards, I'm all for that, but I really don't think we needed a 4th currency.  Simoleans, SimCash, Gold Keys and now Platinum keys.  UGH!  I would have preferred just an increasing number of a gold keys and have all the newer buildings cost more.

Yeah I was thinking maybe there's some trick to getting such insanely large scores, how can anyone be so lucky as to continuously get so many high value tasks in 1 league?

The task values seem totally random though, no trick that i'm aware of.

I have 300 gold keys, 50+ epic buildings, and millions of simoleons, I couldn't care less about winning any of those, I just wanted the new currency. But even that doesn't seem achievable even with the maximum amount of time and effort.

Check out these 2 snapshots, one from last night, and one from this morning. The current leader "AZ City" jumped more than 14,000 to #1, 5,000 above the previous insane score (last night he wasn't in the top7). These scores are insane, and they aren't even finalised... I have 2 tasks left, and i'm currently working on the biggest, 1280 points...

 Edit: My final score: 47,060 - the current leader scored 50% higher (69,150) - 2d2h remaining, might score higher.

I don't disagree with your logic Bustynutz. But what I think folks are upset about, and I include myself here, is that there are significant investments made in these challenges by way of time, speed-up tokens, SimCash and perhaps even real monetary currency for little in return. If there's no chance or at least little luck in receiving higher point values for assignments then these challenges become pointless.

All that would be required to fix this is a little creativity and some transparency on EA's part. Why not tie point values into your population, Epic buildings, or some other form of mechanism that exists to reward those that have already invested significantly in this game by giving them an opportunity to receive Platinum keys. There are plenty of options ... but like with Trade HQ there seems to be very little interest by EA to make some fundamental changes to a broken system. I won't give up any hope that the contest will be fixed anytime soon.

How come when it mostly matters in the season contest I only get averages of 1800 points as I got in the Sub, Town and the City all averages where at over 2k yet I only had the average of 1800 and used all 5 gold tickets to be cheated on getting the final building. I want that building and I want it NOW. I not be cheated by the game dropping me score of 1600. So I want that building and not going to be cheated out of it. 2 more chances before it ends. As I read somewhere not get them again. Not fair when it matters the most to be in rank 2 then at the final to end up at no 11. 

This remains me me when I was 6 years old used to go to the picture every week and never missed my ice cream during the enter view. But one day mum was gone somewhere and I was with her friends and her friends had not the 6 pennies for the ice cream as I was used to my ice cream after all mum was poor but always made sure I had this treat. When I did not get it it was the worst day of my life I never forget the pain of disappointment I could not stop 😭 now I feel the excite same feeling not getting that last building I feel very very cheated even when I wasted 5 gold tickets and only got 5 left. Am I always going to be cheated out of that building by the game dropping me low scoring task when it really matters.  I remember the film too it was a Disney film called 101 dolmantions 

Let me correct you. City League gives you 30 assignments to complete. So 2,000 for each assignment; that gives 60,000 points.

Now your league 1st ranker has some seriously good luck. There is no rhythm or order to these tasks, anything and everything will come up. In the 4th week(week before previous week) I was in the city league and was furiously battling it out. Huge Vu tasks were coming up for like 2,000 points or so and my Simcash also finished at a rapid pace. Suddenly extremely poor tasks started coming for like 1400 points. I trudged on and got 51,000 points after finishing all 30 of them. Then I used up my 5 golden tickets in the hopes of getting something better. 1200 point tasks came up. 5 of them. All 5 of them. That is pathetic, golden tickets are rare to come by and then this happens. But I was still optimistic as I was in 10th position. And guess what? Someone surpassed me by 270 points. A measly 270 points. I was completely crushed, as I had put a lot of effort into it. I was out of cash, Vu items, Omega items and even simoleans. I waited it out the previous week, just stayed within rank 50, as I was completely bored. Also got some help from GTHQ; was able to buy a few Vu items from there(don't know how the hell that happened).

This week the force was strong with me and surprisingly I came first. So yes my friend, the COM is entirely bonkers. But sometimes lady luck does smile.