I have been attending Gen Con since 1990.  My husband has attended since 1982 approximately.   I find it outrageous that we always end up with crap housing slots when we register immediately for our badges.   Your system might seem "fair" but there is absolutely no reward for loyalty to the people who made this convention so popular.   You don't even bring in any big name stars anymore yet your prices go up constantly and you block out rooms for your staff at all the closest hotels.  
go back to a first come first serve system or have it based off badge ID or whoever registered their badges first.  That would truly be fair.
 

Feel better?

Hmmm....where did I put suburbaknght’s annual housing lottery sucks thread...

Oh! Here it is: https://www.gencon.com/forums/43-travel-housing-and-dining-2019/topics/14514-annual-make-housing-fair-discussion-summary

Can we *not* have this discussion now?

Good luck everyone!  Keep in mind that downtown rooms open up throughout the year.  You can score a downtown room later in the year by watching the housing portal.  I scored 2 of them last year that way by just checking into the portal frequently.

Yep, that.

And, I cannot understand how anyone around that long could advocate for "first come, first serve" with a straight face.  Do they not remember spamming that portal the minute it went live and the ensuing frustration and complaints? (aka the scheduled DDOS attack on their server)
 

Prices should be allowed to float until supply and demand is in balance.  Currently, it operates like a Soviet-era bread line -- a limited supply of artificially cheap bread and too many people standing in line for it.

Meanwhile, there is a separate negotiation taking place between Gen Con, Indy, and these hotels as pertains to the rooms in-block, which Gen Con has an incentive to keep costs down for.  It is the reason the Convention moved to this city, after all.

Don't worry, the Soviets aren't about to take over...

For the record, my wife and I got timeslots that preclude downtown hotels on the first pass.  We’ll keep our eyes out and keep checking the portal until we either get a DT hotel or decide it is no longer worth our time to keep checking the portal.  Regardless, we’ll go to Gen Con and I’m sure we’ll have a great time...and I’m sure you will as well, otherwise you wouldn’t keep coming back.

Firstly, going to a seniority system would automatically lock out any newcomers to the convention. This is a really shitty business model for anyone wanting to grow. Any friends you invite to come will be automated to the bottom of a huge list? That's not very enticing. Why would they come? What is the draw for a new generation of gamers if they can't have the same chance as everyone else? At least in the dash-and-grab model, anyone with an internet connection was fighting with each other, so you would be competing anyway. Then there are options like the VIG badge, with seniority systems in place that allow for people who go often, and go every year, to get early access to housing. Maybe you should go for the VIG lottery if attendance and a downtown stay is a make-or-break deal. 

Secondly, you can't have a convention without staff to run it. Consider hiring people to do a job (for free) for hundreds of thousands of people, and have them commute in every day? Wouldn't fly. Those people make YOUR convention happen. They rightfully should have a place at a nearby hotel. Please don't shit on the people here to help you have a good time. 

Third, every time i've not scored a downtown hotel i've managed to trade for one down the line. They are available. People drop rooms. Companies book too many for their volunteers. Keep an eye on the facebook group and forums, and you can likely get a room before July. It takes effort, and that's annoying, but I've picked up rooms and suites like this a lot. 

And lastly, it's really no use complaining about wanting things like they used to be. The fact of the matter is that Gen Con has changed. Gen Con has grown. You can't expect it to be the same, even if YOU personally haven't grown or changed, the convention has. You have to adapt and grow with it, or you're just going to be mad about it forever. It was really nice being able to have my personal pick of hotels. I used to make lists of my top choices, now I'm just happy to get something at all.  Reminiscing about how it used to be when it was small isn't helpful or relevant. It's not that way any more. 

Been attending no misses since 1984. Might be a bit much to ask for premium housing,
though it would be nice to get some kind of perk. Hell, I'd settle for a cheap pin, lol.
 

Another con I attend gives away enamel pins for years of attendance. It's kind of a cool badge of honour. 

If they reduced the number of available badges to just 20,000, downtown housing wouldn’t be an issue.  To make it fair as to who gets to buy badges first, they could set up some sort of randomized lottery system...

Another 30+ year attendee here. The problem with putting me near the front of the line is that the company currently running Gencon has no record of who attended back in 1984. What you would have would be some sort of priority system going back to the early 2000s, and then just taking people's word on it that they were attending before that?

It would also be rather problematic for all attendees if the people running the show weren't housed near the show. Man, we'd like this particular event to run as scheduled, but the event staff are housed at the airport. So instead of having some of the attendees take more time to get to the con, we have the entire con impacted. Shorter staff hours, booths staffed for less time, event staff less available when we need them. It's like asking a store owner and delivery people take the bus to their store so they can free up nearby parking spaces.

Reducing the amount Badges is a terrible idea. No one in the city will welcome a decision to eliminate 30,000 or so visitors and their money even if Gencon wanted to toss said money away. 

Maybe they could open the housing portal first for people who attended the previous year.  That way the regulars would be rewarded with a better chance at a downtown room, and staying further out your first time would become a rite of passage for the noobs, or a slight penalty for those with a spotty attendance record.