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srwug_alphanews2013-03-27 07:45 pm
srwuga_mods) wrote in srwug_alphanews2013-03-27 07:45 pm
Entry tags:
Official criticism post - response to input
Thank you for everyone who participated in our criticism gathering post. Thanks to your input, we know what to do in order to make UG@ grow into a better game. Following is the collated list of all the concerns, each followed by the official mod response, sometimes taking the form or being supported by a statement on what changes are we going to implement into the game:
Concern: Continuity lockdown - if a character is dropped, another player who joins with the same character has to follow the old one's continuity. Apping into existing canons/picking up dropped characters is too hard, especially for new people.
Mod response:
It is not the case that the new incarnation of a character has to follow the old one's continuity. We had three different Nanoha players, each one bringing their own CR. We also had two Kouji Kabutos - the first one running with Shin Mazinger plot, but after he was dropped the new one was running with Mazinkaiser instead, and all the old events did not count as canon anymore.
What are we going to do about it:
Add a section to the wiki that lists our canons and says, in non-specific terms, where we are in each canon plot-wise. This will hopefully make it less intimidating for new players to app into an existing canon.
Concern: There should be an option to app a character without their plot/events.
Mod response:
It is an option already, either by app'ing a character but not their missions (Coop) or a post-canon character (Roger Smith).
Concern: Overabundance of AIM missions. Look for alternatives?
Mod response:
Switching from AIM to IRC for example will solve nothing. All that changes is we change software we use into something, admittedly, more difficult to set up. The core of the issue remains unchanged. The only alternative is doing more events as logs and not as real time missions.
Unfortunately, combat-heavy encounters will continue to be run as missions, as logs progress too slowly and more often than not, a mission has immediate consequences that characters would probably want to react to. Waiting for a week or more until a log is resolved in such a situation would grind the game to a halt.
What are we going to do about it:
Stress out the difference between log events and mission events on the application page, and let players know that both formats are available for their suggested event list.
Concern: Get rid of missions altogether.
Mod response:
Missions are an important part and one of the core elements of the game.
Concern: Player biases - active sabotage/bashing of canons you are not fond of.
Mod response:
We do not tolerate bullying in the game - BUT we must know that such bullying exists in the first place if we are to do anything about it. We cannot take any action if we are not aware something wrong is happening.
What are we going to do about it:
Set up a post for gathering complaints. A game-wide HMD of sorts. It will have screened comments, so if there is a problem with another player, you will have an option to instantly and anonymously let the mod team know even if no one is online at the moment.
Concern: We need higher app standards.
Mod response:
Agreed. During the course of the game, we had several apps approved that really shouldn't be accepted. We can only admit our mistakes and try harder in the future.
What are we going to do about it:
Analyze apps more closely, especially OCs. Make a testrun (in the "sample post" section) obligatory for OCs.
Concern: We need clear guidelines on what is and what isn't appable.
Mod response:
There are two main criteria on judging whether a canon is appable to UG@ or not.
1: Is it mecha-themed enough. That means obviously any giant robot shows or franchises pass, but there are also canons outside this category that fit the criteria. We as mods ask ourselves a question "would this look out of place in a SRW game?", and if the answer is no, then the canon passes.
2: Does it fit the setting. UG@ is a game that takes place on a post-apocalyptic, but still partially civilized Earth, with a technology level roughly equal to that of various Gundam shows. The player characters travel together around the world on a giant vessel, and engage enemies in mecha battles. Some canons are not compatible with this premise, even if they have giant robots.
Concern: We need a mechanism for constructive criticism.
What are we going to do about it:
We will set up a game-wide HMD, in the form of the aforementioned post with screened replies. We will also encourage players to set up their own HMDs, but this is not mandatory.
Concern: The mods are overworked.
Mod response:
This is just a temporary situation that results from semester finals and RL situations hitting the mod team all at once.
What are we going to do about it:
We may increase the mod team's size by one, a mod for administrative work. But it has to be a reliable person.
Concern: Mods are not acting profesionally.
Mod response:
This complaint is too generic to give it a specific response. When problems with a mod's behaviour arise, we deal with them appropriately, and try not to repeat the problematic situation anymore. Sometimes we make mistakes, like everyone, but we try to learn from them and move on.
Concern: The wiki system is hard to manage and navigate.
Mod response:
This is not an issue with the wiki format itself, but rather our layout being confusing and our information being outdated.
What are we going to do about it:
Expect a significant rewriting of the wiki in the near future. Useless sections will disappear and new ones will be added in their place. Others will be updated. The whole thing will be made more clear and easier to navigate.
Concern: We need better-maintained information about the world/setting.
Mod response:
One of the pages that we plan to add into the wiki is that of the world's description - what is the state of each general continent (including colonies and other space-based locations), what organisations are there and what is their relation to White Chalice.
What are we going to do about it:
In addition to post-mission reports, we will write general reports that say what is happening in the game world. Even if they contain only information on White Chalice's current location and confirmation that some in-character conflicts are still ongoing, it should help giving players a better view on the current situation.
Concern: The game is too dark, there should be options to prevent bad canon events from happening.
Mod response:
The game was originally planned to be much more grim than it is now. The setting was supposed to be very post-apocalyptic, with very little civilization remaining. Liberties were taken as the original view left very few canons compatible and thus appable into the game.
It is true that Super Robot Wars titles sometimes have options to prevent bad events and character deaths from happening. But this happens sometimes, not all the time - it is the same in UG@. Whether a bad event in a canon can be avoided or not is also a matter of this canon's players' opinion. If they want a specific outcome and another player wants to meddle into the event and change it significantly without their permission, that is not "fixing" a canon. That is hogging the spotlight, and is not tolerated. Journal RP is a collaborative experience, not an exercise in one-upmanship.
Concern: We have too many tiny canons, player-wise.
Mod response:
This is not a problem as it is now. Even with a sizeable number of canons with only one character each, our collective plots progress smoothly and are being integrated well. This may become a problem if we experience a flood of one-person canons, but that is not the case yet.
Concern: Content guidelines for what happens in game. Rape/sexual activity in particular.
Mod response:
In general, if you think your content is controversial, put it behind a cut and include a permission post for people who do not want to deal with it. When in doubt, contact the mods for their opinion.
What are we going to do about it:
We are issuing a ban on the following - rape scenes, explicitly sexual relationships between underaged (preteen) characters, romantic or any kind of sexual relationships between an underaged and an older character. These may be mentioned if they are important part of a character's backstory, but they may not be roleplayed in the game.
Concern: In apps, it'd be better to have basic outlines of events rather than a set event list.
Mod response:
Applications include only a suggested event list. The description of events can be brief and vague rather than specific. It may even change in time as the canon evolves.
However, for OCs we still need a specific event list. This is because since they are fully made-up by the player, we have no idea what to expect and what to run in the canon unless it is all explicitly stated.
Concern: Canons are not balanced in terms of power level.
Mod response:
This concern has two facets - power level in terms of combat ability, and political strength/presence in the setting.
In terms of combat power, the issue is simple. Regardless of their unit's "power level", a player's actions are generally effective. This works in both ways, in that a "weak" unit may be able to achieve more than you'd expect fighting stronger ones, but also a high-power mecha won't automatically curbstomp units from a weaker canon, especially named aces and bosses. What affects a unit's performance in combat is how the player describes their action. Actions that are written to be smart, tactical, or just plain cool will be more effective than a boring spam of finishing attacks.
As for political strength and the ability to affect the setting, remember that the game is shared between many, many canons. That means all organisations have generally less power and influence than in their respective shows, because there is more factions (including various monsters of the week) that have to share the sphere of influence between each other. As a rule of the thumb, factions which were with the game since the start tend towards having larger presence, because the game world was created assuming they were there, and they had more time to establish themselves in the setting. There is still vague "empty space" left in a lot of places on Earth to give new factions room - they do not appear out of nowhere, we simply pretend they were always there, as it was the case with the Mortal Engines cities.
Concern: Too many world-building canons, especially those introduced after the game's start.
Mod response:
See above - most of the setting was constructed with canons we knew or expected to be in the game around UG@'s opening. Because of that, these setting elements cannot just go away even if their canons were dropped long ago, as it is the case with Code Geass. However, major parts of the setting were left vague and undescribed on purpose, to give other canons room to grow into. Remember the point of some canons not being app'able into the game - if their introduction means new setting elements appear, elements that were too large and setting-defining to pretend they were always there, they were just not important enough, then the canon cannot be a part of the game. There are ways around this, such as introducing a canon as an alternate universe thing that arrived to UG@'s world through some sort of dimensional rift. Such is the case with Metroid and Battletech.
Also do note, we have a policy of not letting original canons affect the overall setting too much, at least not on a global scale.
Concern: Original enemies do not have enough of a presence in the game.
Mod response:
Steps are being taken to remedy this. But keep in mind that the Inspectors' presence is not supposed to be as strong as our first year antagonists, the Adventus, even if their machines are individually stronger.
To sum up, here is a list of changes we are going to implement:
-The wiki will be significantly rewritten to be more informative, especially for new and potential players.
-Set up a HMD post, to gather input and complaints of all kinds.
-Change the application page to point out differences between mission events and event logs.
-Make testruns obligatory for OCs.
-Ban the following content from the game: rape, sexual relationships between minors, romantic/sexual relationships between a minor and an older character.
These changes are going to be implemented over the course of the next few days. The change in rules (the last two points, about testruns and sexual content ban) are effective immediately, even before the pages with their respective rulings get updated.
Concern: Continuity lockdown - if a character is dropped, another player who joins with the same character has to follow the old one's continuity. Apping into existing canons/picking up dropped characters is too hard, especially for new people.
Mod response:
It is not the case that the new incarnation of a character has to follow the old one's continuity. We had three different Nanoha players, each one bringing their own CR. We also had two Kouji Kabutos - the first one running with Shin Mazinger plot, but after he was dropped the new one was running with Mazinkaiser instead, and all the old events did not count as canon anymore.
What are we going to do about it:
Add a section to the wiki that lists our canons and says, in non-specific terms, where we are in each canon plot-wise. This will hopefully make it less intimidating for new players to app into an existing canon.
Concern: There should be an option to app a character without their plot/events.
Mod response:
It is an option already, either by app'ing a character but not their missions (Coop) or a post-canon character (Roger Smith).
Concern: Overabundance of AIM missions. Look for alternatives?
Mod response:
Switching from AIM to IRC for example will solve nothing. All that changes is we change software we use into something, admittedly, more difficult to set up. The core of the issue remains unchanged. The only alternative is doing more events as logs and not as real time missions.
Unfortunately, combat-heavy encounters will continue to be run as missions, as logs progress too slowly and more often than not, a mission has immediate consequences that characters would probably want to react to. Waiting for a week or more until a log is resolved in such a situation would grind the game to a halt.
What are we going to do about it:
Stress out the difference between log events and mission events on the application page, and let players know that both formats are available for their suggested event list.
Concern: Get rid of missions altogether.
Mod response:
Missions are an important part and one of the core elements of the game.
Concern: Player biases - active sabotage/bashing of canons you are not fond of.
Mod response:
We do not tolerate bullying in the game - BUT we must know that such bullying exists in the first place if we are to do anything about it. We cannot take any action if we are not aware something wrong is happening.
What are we going to do about it:
Set up a post for gathering complaints. A game-wide HMD of sorts. It will have screened comments, so if there is a problem with another player, you will have an option to instantly and anonymously let the mod team know even if no one is online at the moment.
Concern: We need higher app standards.
Mod response:
Agreed. During the course of the game, we had several apps approved that really shouldn't be accepted. We can only admit our mistakes and try harder in the future.
What are we going to do about it:
Analyze apps more closely, especially OCs. Make a testrun (in the "sample post" section) obligatory for OCs.
Concern: We need clear guidelines on what is and what isn't appable.
Mod response:
There are two main criteria on judging whether a canon is appable to UG@ or not.
1: Is it mecha-themed enough. That means obviously any giant robot shows or franchises pass, but there are also canons outside this category that fit the criteria. We as mods ask ourselves a question "would this look out of place in a SRW game?", and if the answer is no, then the canon passes.
2: Does it fit the setting. UG@ is a game that takes place on a post-apocalyptic, but still partially civilized Earth, with a technology level roughly equal to that of various Gundam shows. The player characters travel together around the world on a giant vessel, and engage enemies in mecha battles. Some canons are not compatible with this premise, even if they have giant robots.
Concern: We need a mechanism for constructive criticism.
What are we going to do about it:
We will set up a game-wide HMD, in the form of the aforementioned post with screened replies. We will also encourage players to set up their own HMDs, but this is not mandatory.
Concern: The mods are overworked.
Mod response:
This is just a temporary situation that results from semester finals and RL situations hitting the mod team all at once.
What are we going to do about it:
We may increase the mod team's size by one, a mod for administrative work. But it has to be a reliable person.
Concern: Mods are not acting profesionally.
Mod response:
This complaint is too generic to give it a specific response. When problems with a mod's behaviour arise, we deal with them appropriately, and try not to repeat the problematic situation anymore. Sometimes we make mistakes, like everyone, but we try to learn from them and move on.
Concern: The wiki system is hard to manage and navigate.
Mod response:
This is not an issue with the wiki format itself, but rather our layout being confusing and our information being outdated.
What are we going to do about it:
Expect a significant rewriting of the wiki in the near future. Useless sections will disappear and new ones will be added in their place. Others will be updated. The whole thing will be made more clear and easier to navigate.
Concern: We need better-maintained information about the world/setting.
Mod response:
One of the pages that we plan to add into the wiki is that of the world's description - what is the state of each general continent (including colonies and other space-based locations), what organisations are there and what is their relation to White Chalice.
What are we going to do about it:
In addition to post-mission reports, we will write general reports that say what is happening in the game world. Even if they contain only information on White Chalice's current location and confirmation that some in-character conflicts are still ongoing, it should help giving players a better view on the current situation.
Concern: The game is too dark, there should be options to prevent bad canon events from happening.
Mod response:
The game was originally planned to be much more grim than it is now. The setting was supposed to be very post-apocalyptic, with very little civilization remaining. Liberties were taken as the original view left very few canons compatible and thus appable into the game.
It is true that Super Robot Wars titles sometimes have options to prevent bad events and character deaths from happening. But this happens sometimes, not all the time - it is the same in UG@. Whether a bad event in a canon can be avoided or not is also a matter of this canon's players' opinion. If they want a specific outcome and another player wants to meddle into the event and change it significantly without their permission, that is not "fixing" a canon. That is hogging the spotlight, and is not tolerated. Journal RP is a collaborative experience, not an exercise in one-upmanship.
Concern: We have too many tiny canons, player-wise.
Mod response:
This is not a problem as it is now. Even with a sizeable number of canons with only one character each, our collective plots progress smoothly and are being integrated well. This may become a problem if we experience a flood of one-person canons, but that is not the case yet.
Concern: Content guidelines for what happens in game. Rape/sexual activity in particular.
Mod response:
In general, if you think your content is controversial, put it behind a cut and include a permission post for people who do not want to deal with it. When in doubt, contact the mods for their opinion.
What are we going to do about it:
We are issuing a ban on the following - rape scenes, explicitly sexual relationships between underaged (preteen) characters, romantic or any kind of sexual relationships between an underaged and an older character. These may be mentioned if they are important part of a character's backstory, but they may not be roleplayed in the game.
Concern: In apps, it'd be better to have basic outlines of events rather than a set event list.
Mod response:
Applications include only a suggested event list. The description of events can be brief and vague rather than specific. It may even change in time as the canon evolves.
However, for OCs we still need a specific event list. This is because since they are fully made-up by the player, we have no idea what to expect and what to run in the canon unless it is all explicitly stated.
Concern: Canons are not balanced in terms of power level.
Mod response:
This concern has two facets - power level in terms of combat ability, and political strength/presence in the setting.
In terms of combat power, the issue is simple. Regardless of their unit's "power level", a player's actions are generally effective. This works in both ways, in that a "weak" unit may be able to achieve more than you'd expect fighting stronger ones, but also a high-power mecha won't automatically curbstomp units from a weaker canon, especially named aces and bosses. What affects a unit's performance in combat is how the player describes their action. Actions that are written to be smart, tactical, or just plain cool will be more effective than a boring spam of finishing attacks.
As for political strength and the ability to affect the setting, remember that the game is shared between many, many canons. That means all organisations have generally less power and influence than in their respective shows, because there is more factions (including various monsters of the week) that have to share the sphere of influence between each other. As a rule of the thumb, factions which were with the game since the start tend towards having larger presence, because the game world was created assuming they were there, and they had more time to establish themselves in the setting. There is still vague "empty space" left in a lot of places on Earth to give new factions room - they do not appear out of nowhere, we simply pretend they were always there, as it was the case with the Mortal Engines cities.
Concern: Too many world-building canons, especially those introduced after the game's start.
Mod response:
See above - most of the setting was constructed with canons we knew or expected to be in the game around UG@'s opening. Because of that, these setting elements cannot just go away even if their canons were dropped long ago, as it is the case with Code Geass. However, major parts of the setting were left vague and undescribed on purpose, to give other canons room to grow into. Remember the point of some canons not being app'able into the game - if their introduction means new setting elements appear, elements that were too large and setting-defining to pretend they were always there, they were just not important enough, then the canon cannot be a part of the game. There are ways around this, such as introducing a canon as an alternate universe thing that arrived to UG@'s world through some sort of dimensional rift. Such is the case with Metroid and Battletech.
Also do note, we have a policy of not letting original canons affect the overall setting too much, at least not on a global scale.
Concern: Original enemies do not have enough of a presence in the game.
Mod response:
Steps are being taken to remedy this. But keep in mind that the Inspectors' presence is not supposed to be as strong as our first year antagonists, the Adventus, even if their machines are individually stronger.
To sum up, here is a list of changes we are going to implement:
-The wiki will be significantly rewritten to be more informative, especially for new and potential players.
-Set up a HMD post, to gather input and complaints of all kinds.
-Change the application page to point out differences between mission events and event logs.
-Make testruns obligatory for OCs.
-Ban the following content from the game: rape, sexual relationships between minors, romantic/sexual relationships between a minor and an older character.
These changes are going to be implemented over the course of the next few days. The change in rules (the last two points, about testruns and sexual content ban) are effective immediately, even before the pages with their respective rulings get updated.