New Reporting System

edited October 2018 in Common Grounds
New Reporting System
 This new system is intended to allow every player a voice and encourage more discussion amongst the player base to come to an agreement on achieving a more enjoyable game experience. 
 Any player will be able to put up a report once a month. The report can be about anything whether it is PvP, PvE, QoL, Economy, Library, Family system, whatever.
 The system works in two stages. The first stage is primarily for discussion and development.  This report will look like our current envoy reports do now, with a problem statement and up to 3 solutions. At this point, there will be two voting options per solution - Support, and Support with Changes, and in order to comment on this report, you must vote first. Once you've voted, you can then comment and even suggest changes. Once this reaches a threshold (yet to be determined, but it'll be low), it'll advance to stage two. If it doesn't reach the threshold within 30 days, it'll be deleted.
 Stage two will start with giving the original author a chance to edit it, add more information, adjust the solutions and include solutions suggested in Stage 1. Once that's done, the report will be back up for all players to vote on the solutions and comment. The voting for this stage will consist 'Approve', 'Approve with changes', 'Abstain', and 'Reject.' You'll need to vote in order to comment. At this point, comments made can be turned into solutions by the author, and players will be able to vote on that solution as well. Once this second stage reaches a second, higher threshold, you'll be guaranteed an admin response within 30 days. If it doesn't reach this threshold within a fresh 30 days, it'll be deleted. 
 As this is a strictly OOC medium, player involvement will not be through their characters, but through their registration. Votes and comments will be anonymous to the rest of the player base. This is to allow people to focus on the issue and the arguments rather than who is making them. Comments will likely be limited to 1/day/report, so players should take their time to really express their points. You can change your vote at anytime, with your last vote being the one that counts.
 In regards to the thresholds - votes and comments on any report will count towards the threshold. The first stage threshold is lower and exists in hopes that it encourages players to reach out and discuss issues and come to some common ground for the betterment of the game. 
 The admin have the final say and a response doesn't mean it will be implemented. There are further considerations to be made beyond player votes, such as what the required effort and time to implement would be and we have to keep that in mind. It's quite possible that we love what's being proposed but just don't have the time to implement it.
 Players found to be abusing this new system will have their ability to put up reports, vote or comment removed if we deem it necessary. 
 We will have a help file that can help guide what we think makes a good report and what kind of information to include. 
 We know this system isn't perfect, there are a few downsides that could crop up. We're willing to work through those and improve upon or change this system at any given time to make it better. 
Let us know your thoughts and concerns below.
 

Comments

  • ShaddusShaddus , the Leper Messiah Outside your window.
    Love it, and I plan on using this excessively >.>

    1. Is a person's skill level and/or experience with a skillset, or even whether they have the skill or not, going to add any weight to their vote or credence to their report?

    2. Envoy reports often received "Solution 4's" which may or may not have kept with the report's intent. I realise that you aren't able to see the future, but do you forsee this happening often? Or do you feel like the admin overseeing this may try to stick to a "yes or no" judgement on reports.

    3. Just to make sure we understand, only one character per registration is able to submit a report?

    Everiine said: The reason population is low isn't because there are too many orgs. It's because so many facets of the game are outright broken and protected by those who benefit from it being that way. An overabundance of gimmicks (including game-breaking ones), artifacts that destroy any concept of balance, blatant pay-to-win features, and an obsession with convenience that makes few things actually worthwhile all contribute to the game's sad decline.
  • Shaddus said:
    Love it, and I plan on using this excessively >.>

    1. Is a person's skill level and/or experience with a skillset, or even whether they have the skill or not, going to add any weight to their vote or credence to their report?

    2. Envoy reports often received "Solution 4's" which may or may not have kept with the report's intent. I realise that you aren't able to see the future, but do you forsee this happening often? Or do you feel like the admin overseeing this may try to stick to a "yes or no" judgement on reports.

    3. Just to make sure we understand, only one character per registration is able to submit a report?

      1) This is part of why we're making the system more anonymous, so we can focus on the report and the skill rather than who said it. Our hope is that experience and knowledge win out over partisanship by implementing it this way.

     2)  We'll have to see. I think it goes back to the 'other considerations' that may not necessarily be known to the players. What I will say is that I'll do my best to explain why we're going with a solution 4 at the very least.

     3) Correct.
  • Only problem I can see happening is less populated Cities potentially have less chance for their votes or reports to get proper support, you still wind up with something of a popularity contest, otherwise I like everything else about it. 
  • I like it, just the voting part I don't quite understand. 

    1. Will we be able to vote on as many reports as we like, as often as we like - so the vote is solely on the merits of each individual report? Or are we helping to prioritise the most desired changes - so voting is going to be more about which changes we personally benefit from the most/want to see first?

    2. Does a 'reject' vote count negatively towards either threshold? So a player rejecting a proposal cancels out the vote of another player approving the proposal? 

    3. Is there any weighting on votes - will some players count for more (if they are more active, if they have more reports that they have previously had approved, if they have higher combat rankings, etc)?

    Not sure if this is decided yet, of course. Just curious!
  • I like it, just the voting part I don't quite understand. 

    1. Will we be able to vote on as many reports as we like, as often as we like - so the vote is solely on the merits of each individual report? Or are we helping to prioritise the most desired changes - so voting is going to be more about which changes we personally benefit from the most/want to see first?

    2. Does a 'reject' vote count negatively towards either threshold? So a player rejecting a proposal cancels out the vote of another player approving the proposal? 

    3. Is there any weighting on votes - will some players count for more (if they are more active, if they have more reports that they have previously had approved, if they have higher combat rankings, etc)?

    Not sure if this is decided yet, of course. Just curious!
    1) Players will be able to vote on every report.

    2) No, every vote will count towards the threshold. This was discussed and it was decided that the most impartial way to go about it was to have every action count towards the threshold. 

    3) The only consideration we really thought of was to have a minimum play time in order to vote. A major part of the goal here is more inclusion, so we think it's best to make votes equal here.

    @Tambador - that is one of the concerns, but again, we're hoping to encourage more cross-org communication to help achieve more engaging gameplay all around. 
  • Awesome, sounds good to me! Thanks @Orael.
  • Because it's unclear, are you saying that people will be reporting under their registered email?
  • I'm not sure what you're asking.

    It's per registration, there is an email associated with each registration, but that won't be public knowledge or really play any part. All it means is you can't put up a report, then jump onto alts to vote for it. 
  • Please oh please make it that the players need a certain amount of playtime in the last x time to be able to vote
  • @Orael If we couldn't get an equal number of envoys to agree and get past city/class biases  do we think we can get the whole player base to do better? It'll be the haves and have-nots again, IMO
  • It's kind of a Catch-22, isn't it? If we base development on player input, we're accused of tilting development to popular opinion or tyranny by majority. If we don't base development on player input, we get accused of not listening to players and/or being out of touch and/or being biased by picking one area over another. (Some player recently told me I shouldn't ask players to help brainstorm because it means I'm not doing my job!)

    Anyway, I imagine we could tweak the system in the future based on how things progress--like if one org is being neglected, maybe we simply ask for reports to help that org for the next month. I think we should at least initiate the new system to see how it works before throwing our hands up in despair.
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  • @Estarra Your answer is exactly what I was looking for. If it gets unbalanced the Admins will ensure it gets balanced :D
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