Post by Papi on Apr 3, 2017 14:45:14 GMT -5
Hello all, Shadic here (in case you couldn't tell),
For once I am going to put my sarcasm and my humorous side away to talk about a serious topic. Where is everybody? Well, to avoid rambling, a majority of the site left, including at least two mods from what I can tell. In this thread I am going to discuss: why they left, counterarguments against leaving, ways this whole thing could have been handled better, and possible solutions. There is still time to save this site from death, but it just has to be done properly. Hopefully I can get my message across in a way that will be beneficial to everybody, including myself. At the end of the day, I do not want all of the time and effort I put into this site to go to waste, and I feel like a lot of people are the same way.
Why did everybody leave?
What possibly could have happened to kill a young site so quickly?
I am not an expert, far from it, but I have heard from a number of people as to why they have left this site. One thing that most, if not all, people who have left said is that this site's admin was abusing his power. They claim he was metagaming, godmodding, whatever the case may be, but they were fed up with it.
I believe the best example of this can be the recent 'South City Politics' story that has been going on lately. The admin claimed his character was stronger than her character sheet let on and that she also was wearing armor for the entirety of the thread despite not mentioning it until it conveniently saved her life. Later on in the thread, he made the character, who he proclaimed was dead, survive and escape.
From there, a couple of mods got into a slight argument with the admin about whether or not rules were being broken. Being (mostly) a bystander, I am not quite sure what the result was of this argument, which could have been handled better, but the outcome seemingly favored the admin's argument over the mods'. To me, this is what finally pushed a mod and a few other members to finally jump ship, leaving this site to either go to another or just stop completely.
In short, the people who left felt like the admin was abusing his power in more than one instance (I, personally, only know of one instance, which is why I cannot give more examples) and left because of it. Any exterior motives are beyond my knowledge or the site's control.
Keep in mind, I am neither confirming nor denying this, I am just reiterating what I heard as an explanation.
Where did they go?
Some went to other site(s) [which I will not share here] while others simply left.
Why shouldn't they have left?
Do I think the people who did leave were justified in their reasoning?
Having the site's head admin breaking his own rules, if that is true, is certainly justified. If people like me, who are just simple members of the site, have to abide by the rules, then the head admin should as well. It is logical. I am not disagreeing with that.
The main reason, and the only one I can think of, as to why the admin broke the rules is because he is overwhelmed. He has single-handedly taken on the task of transferring as much from the old site as he possibly can while also trying to create a story arc and roleplay on the site for himself. He needs some help fine-tuning the site, especially since it is still so new.
However, I do not believe they handled the situation properly. Which, of course, brings me to my final point of discussion.
What should they have done?
Leaving, to me, is a last ditch effort. The only time I would leave a situation is if I run all my other options dry. Some of the people who did leave, as far as I know, did not express their discontent with the head admin in question. Being passive never accomplishes anything, and that is what has happened here.
At the same time, others did express their discontent, which is what they should have done. There is little to be said in defense of the admin for those cases, given that they expressed their discontent in a professional (or at least a serious) manner. If he could not see that something was severely flawed, that is 100% on him.
What can be done to save the site?
Retooling. This site needs major retooling, including reworked rules, combat systems, new mods and potentially even co-admins. Checks and balances need to be put in place to prevent another rule-breaking incident from taking place since that seems to be a key reason for abandonment.
I am going to break down who our mods are/were and reasons why new mods are necessary:
As we can see, none of our mods are active, leaving all work to our admin (who people are unhappy with). Somebody who can take some of the load off the admin would be beneficial to everybody. I recommend giving each mod their own role that they can specialize in, as well as letting them take care of general mod things (adding PL to people's profiles, checking threads for viability, etc).
Something along the lines of this:
Then, on top of that^, a major site decision (i.e. a rule change) must have 5/6 approval. If an admin/mod is breaking the rules, the other 5 must decide on the consequence.
Remember, these are simply suggestions. None of this must be taken into consideration or all of it can, whichever works best.
I created this thread to explain the current state of the site and maybe even provide some necessary closure if it comes to that. As I said earlier, I am no expert, but I do believe this site can be saved.
For once I am going to put my sarcasm and my humorous side away to talk about a serious topic. Where is everybody? Well, to avoid rambling, a majority of the site left, including at least two mods from what I can tell. In this thread I am going to discuss: why they left, counterarguments against leaving, ways this whole thing could have been handled better, and possible solutions. There is still time to save this site from death, but it just has to be done properly. Hopefully I can get my message across in a way that will be beneficial to everybody, including myself. At the end of the day, I do not want all of the time and effort I put into this site to go to waste, and I feel like a lot of people are the same way.
Why did everybody leave?
What possibly could have happened to kill a young site so quickly?
I am not an expert, far from it, but I have heard from a number of people as to why they have left this site. One thing that most, if not all, people who have left said is that this site's admin was abusing his power. They claim he was metagaming, godmodding, whatever the case may be, but they were fed up with it.
I believe the best example of this can be the recent 'South City Politics' story that has been going on lately. The admin claimed his character was stronger than her character sheet let on and that she also was wearing armor for the entirety of the thread despite not mentioning it until it conveniently saved her life. Later on in the thread, he made the character, who he proclaimed was dead, survive and escape.
From there, a couple of mods got into a slight argument with the admin about whether or not rules were being broken. Being (mostly) a bystander, I am not quite sure what the result was of this argument, which could have been handled better, but the outcome seemingly favored the admin's argument over the mods'. To me, this is what finally pushed a mod and a few other members to finally jump ship, leaving this site to either go to another or just stop completely.
In short, the people who left felt like the admin was abusing his power in more than one instance (I, personally, only know of one instance, which is why I cannot give more examples) and left because of it. Any exterior motives are beyond my knowledge or the site's control.
Keep in mind, I am neither confirming nor denying this, I am just reiterating what I heard as an explanation.
Where did they go?
Some went to other site(s) [which I will not share here] while others simply left.
Why shouldn't they have left?
Do I think the people who did leave were justified in their reasoning?
Having the site's head admin breaking his own rules, if that is true, is certainly justified. If people like me, who are just simple members of the site, have to abide by the rules, then the head admin should as well. It is logical. I am not disagreeing with that.
The main reason, and the only one I can think of, as to why the admin broke the rules is because he is overwhelmed. He has single-handedly taken on the task of transferring as much from the old site as he possibly can while also trying to create a story arc and roleplay on the site for himself. He needs some help fine-tuning the site, especially since it is still so new.
However, I do not believe they handled the situation properly. Which, of course, brings me to my final point of discussion.
What should they have done?
Leaving, to me, is a last ditch effort. The only time I would leave a situation is if I run all my other options dry. Some of the people who did leave, as far as I know, did not express their discontent with the head admin in question. Being passive never accomplishes anything, and that is what has happened here.
At the same time, others did express their discontent, which is what they should have done. There is little to be said in defense of the admin for those cases, given that they expressed their discontent in a professional (or at least a serious) manner. If he could not see that something was severely flawed, that is 100% on him.
What can be done to save the site?
Retooling. This site needs major retooling, including reworked rules, combat systems, new mods and potentially even co-admins. Checks and balances need to be put in place to prevent another rule-breaking incident from taking place since that seems to be a key reason for abandonment.
I am going to break down who our mods are/were and reasons why new mods are necessary:
- Therandomfox - inactive
- Derpy - active
- Judas - inactive
- Kyoma - seemingly active (maybe still inactive)
As we can see, none of our mods are active, leaving all work to our admin (who people are unhappy with). Somebody who can take some of the load off the admin would be beneficial to everybody. I recommend giving each mod their own role that they can specialize in, as well as letting them take care of general mod things (adding PL to people's profiles, checking threads for viability, etc).
Something along the lines of this:
- Head Admin - All-Around, potentially even just for important rules, mod conflicts, etc
- Mod 1 - All-Around
- Mod 2 - New Characters/Techniques
- Mod 3 - New Characters/Techniques
- Mod 4 - Personal Matters (thread conflicts, chat conflicts, mod conflicts, etc.)
- Mod 5 - Personal Matters
Then, on top of that^, a major site decision (i.e. a rule change) must have 5/6 approval. If an admin/mod is breaking the rules, the other 5 must decide on the consequence.
Remember, these are simply suggestions. None of this must be taken into consideration or all of it can, whichever works best.
I created this thread to explain the current state of the site and maybe even provide some necessary closure if it comes to that. As I said earlier, I am no expert, but I do believe this site can be saved.
tl;dr Admin possibly broke some rules, people got mad and left, site needs retooling/reworking to be saved.
BB Contact me ASAP, preferably through chatango, but a site PM would work, too. I am more than willing to take necessary actions to save this site.
BB Contact me ASAP, preferably through chatango, but a site PM would work, too. I am more than willing to take necessary actions to save this site.
*NOTE: IF I FORGOT ANYTHING; PLEASE REPLY AND TELL ME WHAT TO ADD. THANK YOU IN ADVANCE.*
