For those interested.

Well, after a couple of testing I can confirm the calculations changed somehow without notice, right during/after the payout issue of two days ago.
I started mining here around August 2, invited two more friends and a neighbour who contributed both small rigs and rentals, we shared computers, internet connection and also placed bets, jokingly, to see who among us would be the first to get an S3.

For an estimate of payouts we were using a modification of the formula suggested by ckolivas in bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=104251.0, to great success all the time up until two days ago. Quoting him:


The aforementioned formula plus other stats-math worked amazingly great –we were predicting our payouts per desired time lapse with very good accuracy. We felt confident and started renting to add up, and it was amazing. Together we ended up contributing ~100 Th/s to the pool.

Long story short, if you go to bitcoinwisdom/bitcoin/difficulty and put 1000Gh/s you get 0.02109 as per current diff daily payout.
Theoretically, if you rent for the same price per Th/s and have 100% efficiency, you get around 12,5% because of the bonus, plus a slight difference in the PPS value BAN uses (higher), minus fees (network tx + 2~3%rental). As everybody knows this is not written on stone, but it worked great for us as an estimate with the addition of some stat calcs.
Even s0br suggested having a look at that site.

Renting at less of that price implied better, calculated profit. Even renting at 0.0233 (@ current diff) proved to be slightly profitable.
As we felt comfortable, we left the system working without checking/tweaking all the time and that's when the loss happened.

The aforementioned method does not apply anymore. Even renting at the theoretical price now implies a loss, and that happened out of the blue as we were investing the money to rent around ~100Th/s together.

One of the testings mentioned was a simple one. Use an empty wallet address, transfer some btc to the rental site, rent a rig at a specific price, do the math, wait the final payout @BAN, do the math.
We tried different amounts. For instance in one test we tried 0.152 btc, we expected by our working calcs 0.179 btc at a specific price, the worker was 99.98% efficiency on ireland server (great one), however we've got 0.132 btc final. Lost ~0.02 btc. That's a 13%!
No problem, it was a test. Imagine the loss with bigger amounts.

I would like to stress that the problem is not the profitabilty but the lack of communication or warning that the calcs are about to get tweaked or changed. That's in my opinion an important point to build up confidence. I'd like to mine without being worried the pool changing the "math/payout rules" all the time without notice.

We are so grateful with both the original proposal and ways of the pool's admins. I understand there are risks involved, me and teammates accepted that. We are all "beta testers" here and it sounded great to me, but we cannot afford another big loss as the last one was.

So I have to say "hasta luego!", from the unusually warm winter of Southern Hemisphere.

Have fun and good luck with your upcoming projects everyone.

Thank you MinerFTW, yeah I've just downloaded it to try to connect to #bitaffnet today, but indeed it hasn't good reviews.
I guess it's a cookie thing in my browser tho. Will give limechat a try as well.
Best.

I will, thank you very much.

Thanks Phwner, it says:

[17:19] == Usermode change: +i
[17:19] -syn- Web gateway connections are currently blocked due to abuse. Sorry for any inconvenience!
[17:19] == (Banned)
[17:19] == ERROR: Closing Link: gateway/web/freenode/session (Disconnected by services)
[17:19] == Disconnected from server: Connection to IRC server lost.

i'm trying on Chrome as usual. Tried also Firefox browser and Colloquy app, same results.
But yesterday and earlier today it was ok. I was reading your jokes there, haha!

Hi, sorry for interrupting, since earlier today I started to get banned on irc via webchat, I guess my ip got blocked somehow.
I'm not well experienced with IRC. Please advice how could I get authorised back. I've tried different usernames to no avail.
It was out of the blue, I was just reading. Logged out, couldn't log back in.
Appreciated!

I'm taking it slowly, in my case will see if it's just some delayed payout.
I have rented a couple rigs, thus it's easier for me to check rental price vs payout, that's the reason I can give you the 7% figure. So far it's been somewhat profitable to add some rental, with the benefit I can do the math and calcs were always very close to reality by less than 2% error.
Will wait a bit then, I still guess it's a payout delay or some stuck btc somewhere.

Yes, I am. 7% less.

Fellas there were saying before that they couldn't contact him. I guess there is the same mood about this subject as here. More fun chat though.  

It's #bitaffnet I was reading it a few hours ago, right now I couldn't connect though. I guess it's a connection issue on my side.

Good morning mates! (my time zone)
Sweet dreams mates! (a quarter Earth turn backwards)

It's around UTC 9:00 AM as I type this.
In about 12 hr, difficulty will increase an estimated 20% as per bitcoinwisdom (bitcoinwisdom.com/bitcoin/difficulty). This will happen in the middle of the 24 hr 50% bonus window s0br so kindly and spontaneously offered to miners.

As everybody reading this thread is aware of, during the last 36 hours there's been 37 mg of bitter conversations, a pinch of frustration, two grams of doubt, more than five chopps of beer, and loads of different kinds of endogenous opioid inhibitory neuropeptides pouring into our veins (endorphines).
Hashrate was directly proportional to heart rates, ladies didn't want to even talk to us with that mood we had at the forum, and mining shares were late. Et caetera.

And i personally just kind of don't want to read once again the saddening arguments I've already read after my sunny day out yesterday, when the aforementioned diff change takes place later today and sensitive souls start asking questions about how much, when and why.

All of that –in my opinion– happened mainly because of a bit of noisy/lack of communication between "we, the miners" (lol) and Masta OP et al.

That being said I would kindly propose to everyone here the following:

1. Go get a beer.
2. Smile to your mascot or closer beloved one.
3. Get serious and think about that today we'll really need clear and timely information about the plans for the next stage, regarding future bonus, PPS unit value after the new diff change, and other possible modifications to the reward system I can't even imagine could take place.

That's it.
English is not my main language. I hope to have been understood.
Let's focus today in avoiding arguments and please s0br/adaryian keep us informed in advance about how mining here will be after the big jump in btc difficulty.

I think this could help to keep up the great atmosphere I mentioned weeks ago in one of my first posts.

Thanks a lot for reading this, mates!
Cheers.
Ron.

LOL, Chopps look terribly wrong on my cellphone!
Kind of ok on the laptop screen though.

Btw, 90% of expected amount on wallet now. We're a team of four, I haven't mined today but my teammates did. However I've started noticing a decay last night.
I think today will be the first time since joining Moarrr The Boar Network weeks ago that we lose some btc.
As the trading motto goes, never risk money you couldn't afford to lose.

No complaining here, that's what risk means imho.

Please publish the updated PPS unit value. That would be reeeally appreciated.

(... third chopp Aurel!)

           _.._..,_,_                 _.._..,_,_
         (              )             (              )
          ]~,"-.-~~[               ]~,"-.-~~[
       .=])' (;     ([             .=])' (;     ([
       |  ]:: '        [            |  ]:: '        [
       '=]): .)     ([             '=]): .)     ([
          |:: '        |               |:: '        |
          ~~----~~                ~~----~~

You're going too fast Aurel!
(something's wrong with my second chopp, lol)

           _.._..,_,_
         (              )
          ]~,"-.-~~[
       .=])' (;     ([
       |  ]:: '        [
       '=]): .)     ([
          |:: '        |
          ~~----~~
Credit goes to Paul Martin Howard ascii art.

Well, if what I've got into my wallet is all the payout, I could slowly get transformed into a tiny green troll –just ~40% of pending & expected.
Anyway, no worries I've just arrived and I'm an optimistic person. Will wait a bit and read all the missed posts in the meantime.

... and get a beer.

WHOOOAA!!
I was out enjoying a sunny day in the middle of the Southern Hemisphere winter, got to the old pub Moarrr The Boar to hang out with mates there to find out everybody is spread on the floor, broken chairs, shattered mirror, beer all over, ladies gone.
Holy Shangai! (Peter Sellers' quote).

I guess I've missed the fun.
 

I'm a webdev part time, those php and css errors most probably mean they're working on the front/back end, which indeed are in charge of giving us the info at our respective dashboards and connecting with the database. Just imho, tho.
I'd wait a bit more. I like the thriller movie kind of clima around here.
Alien (the first movie) sort of thing.

It's the "pre-difficulty-increase-by-17%" anxiety social syndrome.

Eeeeexactly, mate! I totally agree with you.
I'm certain some sort of explanation/fix is on its way.

Yeah, you're right. Probably it's not in connection with blockfinding then. I'm a bit guessing here.
I'm not mining right now, the unpaid shares did go down and then up without apparent connection with shares being credited though.

Aurel, please notice I've just updated my post.