/tg/Station 13

by **Hulkamania** » Mon Aug 26, 2019 11:44 pm #510560

WWE Intercontinental Heavyweight Champion

Yes spacemen, I'm running for a second term. I'm happy that I've been able to do what I have so far, but I'm not quite done yet. There's no guarantee I'll get re-elected, but if I do there's a number of things I have in mind for the next six months.

Escalation Policy

Ooh it's back again, but I've made a lot of progress in this regard! Over the course of the last term I made an escalation policy based on the feedback of the community and their likes and dislikes about our current one. It's received a fair amount of feedback but most of it has been fairly small-scale so far, requiring only a few wording tweaks here and there. I held off on posting it in a public policy discussion thread at the end of the term in case the soon-to-be arriving new headmins disagreed with its content, but I would like to continue to refine it until its implementation.

Parts of it would change a handful of things in regards to how people are used to playing the game and would receive some backlash along those lines, but to that I say by trying to accommodate to a mentality of "this is always how its been" we are missing out on the potential of how it could be.

Speaking of Policy..

Policy Discussions

Last term was pretty hectic, we had a number of major events that come up, as I'm sure the future term will, and the forums suffered for it. I'm as much to blame as any other headmin about it, but policy discussion was always something I wanted to touch on more. A large goal for me would be to be more active in policy threads and leave less ambiguity for the game. There's always going to be weird niche cases and strange instances that pop up, and adding clarity is always a good thing where it arises.

Some of this is plain personal fault and I'm willing to admit that. Part of this is also that it's difficult to post in a thread as a headmin without people accepting it as law. If I just wanted to throw an opinion in, my fancy yellow name makes it carry a lot more weight. All I can say for certain on this front is that if I was elected again, I would make this a top priority.

Things like policy discussion take time and some energy, which is why I would propose..

Ban Appeals

Giving more power to the administrators. Currently our ban appeal system is run such that any no-longer-an-admin appeals fall under the purview of the headmin team to resolve, increasing workload in a subtle but consistent way. Additionally a ban appeal that has been sitting for over the preferred allotted time (a week) has little to do other than wait for the banning admin to resolve it via constant pinging, or for a headmin to step in and resolve it for them. My proposal is that any thread that has been sitting unresolved for more than that time, and any thread where the banning admin is no longer available, be open to anyone on the administrative team.

Head Admins would still have the opportunity to overturn and weigh in on any ban appeal, however this would reduce the need to worry about these extra cases. This also reduces the feeling of head admin burnout that has so consistently plagued people in the position.

Community Meetings

There isn't much to be said here for myself, however I see the meetings as a valuable tool for speaking with the player base as a whole and would like to continue to see them performed. Having only one or two per term is totally acceptable, the server really doesn't need more than that with the rate that things happen around here.

Personal Remarks

I think I bring a certain level headedness to the table when discussions are particularly heated or controversial, and would like to continue to do so for the upcoming term. People are very passionate about this game and when people get heated up about something they care about discussions can devolve very quickly. Having a steady voice in the mix is something that's valuable in instances like that.

A side thing I want to examine is Silicon Policy as a whole. It's rather messy and complex and is always a source of confusion amongst players old and new. It's a pastime of mine to join debates around silicon policy so I would like to examine it. Escalation takes priority in this regard, but it's still something that's not out of consideration. My current inkling would be to cut down on the rule as much as possible, it's so much of a slog to read through right now it creates a lot of confusion.

Finally, having a holdover headmin can be valuable. Someone who already has experience in the position eases the transition between the two. The previous headmins are typically around the discord still which is valuable, but having a member directly in headminbus even more so. Especially early in the term when the new heads are getting acquainted with things, it can be a bit intimidating to carve out exactly where your place is among the rest of the community and having someone with experience in that regard is highly beneficial.

Should I not be re-elected, I wouldn't be too broken up about it, at the least maybe someone can pilfer some ideas of mine and improve things in their own way.

-H.H.

by **Nervere** » Mon Aug 26, 2019 11:47 pm #510562

Hulkamania wrote:My proposal is that any thread that has been sitting unresolved for more than that time, and any thread where the banning admin is no longer available, be open to anyone on the administrative team.

This is stupid. As someone who is the reason you're proposing this in the first place, the admin should be held accountable or it should simply be handled by headmins >>after<< the banning admin is spoken to.
I had a lot of IRL stuff that meant my free time was limited and I didn't have good opportunity to respond to ban appeals like I should've, but this solution doesn't fix anything and will just make the banning admin mad.
It's more fair to the players banned and the banning admin if this is kept informal and the one-week rule is more stringently enforced.

This entire thread has no substance at all. I'm disappointed.
I would not expect such an empty and meaningless platform from a fellow headmin.
I elaborated on this here: viewtopic.php?p=510641#p510641

by **PKPenguin321** » Mon Aug 26, 2019 11:51 pm #510565

cool dude

by **lmwevil** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 12:02 am #510571

hi hulk, pretty goodmin, don't even need to read his thread, genuinely cares but also bodyslams me so get lost

by **Hulkamania** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 12:12 am #510578

Nervere wrote:
Hulkamania wrote:My proposal is that any thread that has been sitting unresolved for more than that time, and any thread where the banning admin is no longer available, be open to anyone on the administrative team.

This is stupid. As someone who is the reason you're proposing this in the first place, the admin should be held accountable or it should simply be handled by headmins >>after<< the banning admin is spoken to.
I had a lot of IRL stuff that meant my free time was limited and I didn't have good opportunity to respond to ban appeals like I should've, but this solution doesn't fix anything and will just make the banning admin mad.
It's more fair to the players banned and the banning admin if this is kept informal and the one-week rule is more stringently enforced.

This really isn't the reason for it, and I'm willing to talk with the other heads about what they think. The idea would be that the original banning admin would be able to overturn it in the first place. But in your specific case, I can't "strictly enforce the one week rule" because you were equally on my level in terms to power structure. If the banning administrator is unable to reach a conclusion or is unable to react to a thread, there's no reason another administrator can't step in and look at it objectively as the original banning admin would as well. They are given a week grace period and are still allowed to step in after that time.

I don't think this is something that would NEED to be enforced frequently as this is something that rarely comes up, most administrators are prompt about replying to their ban appeals, but in the case where one isn't able, having additional oversight doesn't mean the player is getting a raw deal. It would still be up to the headmins to resolve the thread giving them the final oversight of the overhead team to begin with.

Throughout the last term, apart from the most controversial of subjects, I would reckon that I resolved most of the ban appeals personally. 90% of the cases were open and shut and required little-to-no input on my part, there's no reason why another admin couldn't make a similar judgment as an outside observer. The only difference between me and them is that my name is yellow, and my yellow name would still be double checking their work anyway.

by **wubli** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 12:19 am #510584

best boy and somehow isn't even near being burnt out
as a fellow headmin i'm positive he'd do great if he were to go for a second term, it was a total pleasure to work with him

by **Plapatin** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 12:27 am #510588

if you don't vote for morto, vote for hulk. i love this man

by **lmwevil** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 12:28 am #510589

as a more serious post he's actually by and far the most fucking insane man for not only not being burned out, but somehow even more passionate than ever. i have nooooooooo idea how he's done this but if he survives term 2 without burning out he'll be the first headmin to ever do that. good approach to issues, can chat shit like a motherfucker and generally has a good view about things. (but he's also texan and his accent makes me sexually insecure)

edit: also is capable of admitting he was wrong and apologizing, a good trait to be humble

by **Ty the Smonk** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 12:30 am #510592

I like hulk, I've only ever seen him be a good guy so I don't really have any reason to dislike him.

by **Farquaar** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 12:52 am #510602

Hulk has my full support. Hands-down one of the bestmins: level-headed, dedicated, and one of the greatest wrestlers the federation has ever seen.

by **Whoneedspacee** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 1:39 am #510619

Not gonna say the previous candidates were necessarily bad but this dude blows them out of the water.

Total respect for players so I have total respect for him, literally never had a bad experience with him.

He has my vote just for his stance on being an actual player headmin, and not forcing the server to become mega roleplay oriented or mega gameplay oriented, moreso letting the majority of players decide which direction they want the server to go.

I do have a question in regards to felinids though, you mentioned that you'd like a yes/no vote but I personally am searching some form of a more permanent solution to this issue since it seems to be brought up literally every 6 months, do you think we'll every have a conclusive answer as to what will happen to the race, and do you have anything in mind that could possibly bridge the gap between these two divided groups?

by **Nervere** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 3:23 am #510641

I'm going to address your platform, or lack thereof.

Policy Discussions - How is this a stance? Yes, policy discussions went unanswered at times and that sucks. Saying you'll answer them more often is not revolutionary.

Ban Appeals - I already addressed why this is shit, but to your reply - Inactive admins not answering their ban appeals and then being able to overrule when another admin takes care of their appeal is nonsensical.
If an admin is not around enough to answer their appeal, and you want other admins to overrule them, why can that admin suddenly come back to overrule it? That will create a great deal of conflict and only serves to not hold inactive admins responsible for their own bans.

Community Meetings - This also isn't a stance on anything. Yes, I started community meetings a year ago, but saying you want to continue them is nothing new. I feel like you're using this as filler so your thread isn't barren.

You've been a headmin for 6 months, Hulk, I'm disappointed in you.
These aren't policy stances. You're basically saying you'll do the status quo and nothing but that. You're not bringing any fresh ideas to the table.
Why should any /tg/ player who genuinely wants to see change vote for you when your entire platform thread is filler nonsense?

by **SpacePrius** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 3:30 am #510642

I'll be honest, I agree on nervere that this doesn't have much substance, and this is coming from a guy who unironically wrote his candidacy announcement on the toilet in 15 minutes with no expectation of victory.

by **Whoneedspacee** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 4:13 am #510649

It’s not like the ban appeals shit isn’t stuff to run on, it promises to at least try out solutions for ban appeals taking ages, which I haven’t seen at all.

To me it just seems like nervere skimmed this anyways since he doesn’t address some things that were said in the personal remarks, that would be important to the dicussion of having a platform.

I’d also recommend hulk do what morto is doing and post his responses to the discussion threads since he’s responded to pretty much all of them.

Definitely think nervere jumped the gun on this one at least, and no I don’t think it’s fair to keep a player unanswered for over a week because “i was gone.”

by **Hulkamania** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 4:16 am #510651

My platform is that I'll continue to deliver on whatever I've already delivered on, yes, and that i've pointed out where points I've been weak.

Any specific questions are fully addressable in the debate threads on how I feel about any given subject, and I mentioned that i'm going to continue to push through escalation, and work on Silicon Policy if the opportunity arises.

/tg/ isn't really some place where you can put in massive amounts of change on the fly as a single headmin, and going into it with the plan to enact a massive upheaval has never worked. Nothing you did in specific, Nervere, was changing anything in your last previous two terms either. You did a lot of work on the operations front and I give you large props for that, but as far as actually enacting policy the biggest change was an update to the Discord permissions which was some tweaks here and there.

Anything else you accomplished was accomplished as part of a team because that's what a headmin group does, you keep the peace, you enact policy as issues arise, you rule on difficult appeals, and you act when you need to. Trying to lay out a massive agenda never works in a format like this because it's likely you won't even get to act on things if the other two disagree, or have different priorities. Being a headmin is often a reactive position, and trying to predict what new drama will pop up is utterly pointless.

My last platform was highly minimal as well and more than a few people have named me as being a positive influence on the community. If I don't get voted in then they don't want me back, that's their right.

by **lmwevil** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 4:21 am #510654

I think Hulk is right on this, realistically one headmin cannot enact drastic change.

also besides things being WAY too serious (not actually hulk's fault) he and the other headmins have had a fine term overall.

honestly it feels realistic what he puts out, and more of the same from him is more of a solid and reliable thing. can't see a downside.

also nerv take a breather you seem stressed, please stop tearing this family apart

by **Coconutwarrior97** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 7:03 am #510702

I've always seen Hulk as very levelheaded in adminbus. From what I've observed its incredibly hard to enact decisive change because of differing time zones, opinions, real life stuff coming up (Because face it this is a videogame and there are plenty of times when real life will have to come first) and having to deal with whatever drama pops up at that point in time which ends up diverting your attention. All that tends to result in headmins taking awhile to come to a consensus (though the ban appeal changes sound like they'll be a good shot at speeding things up in general and I like that). What I look for in a headmin is someone who is levelheaded, listens, and at their core has an understanding of how we should be enforcing rules/handling new policy issues, which in my opinion really revolves around keeping things fun and fair for everyone. Hulk fits the bill in that regard, he's got my vote.

by **Arianya** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 7:44 am #510711

Nervere wrote:
Hulkamania wrote:My proposal is that any thread that has been sitting unresolved for more than that time, and any thread where the banning admin is no longer available, be open to anyone on the administrative team.

This is stupid. As someone who is the reason you're proposing this in the first place, the admin should be held accountable or it should simply be handled by headmins >>after<< the banning admin is spoken to.
I had a lot of IRL stuff that meant my free time was limited and I didn't have good opportunity to respond to ban appeals like I should've, but this solution doesn't fix anything and will just make the banning admin mad.
It's more fair to the players banned and the banning admin if this is kept informal and the one-week rule is more stringently enforced.

Not to start an argument in someone else's candidate thread, but you have nearly 6000 messages in discord in this month (even very active in discord users are sitting closer to 4k in the same time period). You also ran a community meeting with all the time that consists of. And if by some weird twist of IRL stuff this was non-indicative of the free time you had, why not ask a fellow headmin to take them over rather then let them sit for a month?

I have my own thoughts on the proposed policy which I'll post about later but it seems real weird to take a general policy and make it about yourself in this candidacy thread, especially when your reasoning is fairly flimsy.

by **Reeeee** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 8:17 am #510717

In fairness, I tried to dug up old thread to what this man is actually talking about when is talking about nothing in this.
Seems fair to see what he's about, last time I memed too hard to pay attention.
Deleted, so yeah...
I have intuited and recalled shit. Ban me.

Most of the shit I said about Morto applies here but not to repeat my offense of wall.txt;
It's a page long rant about liking his shit and the man, and all the positives mentioned here at this thread before me are factual to me with one minor difference, different timezones and servers apparently, never really talked that much to the man directly.
Copy paste following x200 so you get the same result with less Tl;Dr to brainwash you to believe I did write a page of praise;
"Hulk good. Hulk real human bean."
He deserves it.

But;
You just don't seem that invested in continuity tbh, you seem to lack enthusiasm for it, this is more of "hey let me stay I was cool right" than "i think i can really help by doing this" platform and if that was it, I would be more for this.

But rules lawyering just to rules lawyer. (as I see it)
If those mystifying rules nobody is allowed to see are good, someone else (collective effort) will implement it when everyone (rational consensus) agrees to it, I don't think we need specifically *you* for these changes to happen. (Whatever they are.) It's not like you gonna get ignored, no way. And Morto already agreed to test these rules for feedback and improvement, taking the more rational approach than forcibly implementing them on playerbase because "muh platform needs a buzzword promise".
So that's bad.

If you get to stay, I ain't gonna be mad, imma be really happy for you and for myself and I don't see any real problems raising from the fact you change rules for me (apart from community fracturing over it since "I HATE CHANGE" people existing, that's really not a personal problem, I love OOC salt) but votes gonna go to man with Mentors suggested and more moderate approach.

Best of luck, hope you get it!

by **skoglol** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 9:10 am #510727

If nervore doesnt like him, he must be doing something right. Go Hulk!

Hulkamania wrote:Part of this is also that it's difficult to post in a thread as a headmin without people accepting it as law. If I just wanted to throw an opinion in, my fancy yellow name makes it carry a lot more weight.

I think this is a good point, and I hadn't considered it before now. A bit of restructuring of how policy discussions get their final rulings would probably be in order, as previous rulings some times seem to be based on just an opinion thrown in from a headmin. Get it done if you can, no reason you can't lay the groundwork in the current term.

by **Arathian** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 2:31 pm #510777

Hulk, in this term, most candidates and most admins seem to think there has been a general failure of following up ban appeals and responding in policy discussion threads.

Do you agree with that? Do you think you are responsible, to an extend, for it? How would you improve on that aspect if you were re-elected as headmin?

Another question.

Nervere went on a rant about a complete failure of the headmin team to communicate with oranges. To the point where he said he believes we should have a complete break with Oranges and do away with the headmin/coder seperation rules.

Oranges is important and is the code owner. Do you think Nervere's opinion is correct? Do you think there is a way to establish a better communication and mutual understanding with Oranges? Do you feel that you, personally, can come to a mutual understanding with the code team?

This post was deleted by Gigapuddi420 on Tue Aug 27, 2019 5:47 pm.
Reason: this ain't worth shitting a thread up over.
View this post

by **Arianya** » Tue Aug 27, 2019 10:10 pm #510877

While I enjoy quoting things point by point, I think it'd be a bit tough to read since your proposals are a bit wordy so -

Policy Discussion

While I certainly agree that it can be frustrating at times that yellow names can't really post without giving a final verdict, there is some merit to this in that it helps keep the "headmin policy" clear - there's no "well I heard hulk say x was fine" "yeah but headmin2 and headmin3 said it was bad" etc etc.

To add on to this, you mention wanting to be more active in policy discussion - generally rulings in policy discussion have required a vote since they are in function new rules going forward - in the (unlikely) instance that your fellow headmins are busy or lazy or just incapable for whatever reason, what would be your plan to remain "more active"? I ask less as a gotcha and more because a pro-active attitude won't mean much if the team doesn't mesh well.

Ban Appeals

Generally I'm of the opinion that admins touching other admins bans is largely just a can of worms. The advantage (and disadvantage) in equal measure of having a team of 40+ admins is that we have a lot of people with different views of the community, gameplay, and so on. Which is why we have headmins as the "ultimate decider" who settle these disputes.

My concern is that by nature, if Admin A's ban got ruled on by Admin B, and Admin A objected, you would end up having to make a headmin ruling anyway to resolve the impasse between the two, and inevitably you'll cheese off one of them with your ruling. In general if an admin is failing to respond in a timely manner to their bans, I think it's a bit more germane to focus on "why is this admin inactive in ban appeals" then the ban appeal itself - answering ban appeals in a timely manner is one of our expectations of an admin and so failing that should atleast be cause for concern, if not action.

As I've mentioned elsewhere, retired admin bans make up a pretty small fraction of headmin work, so I don't think you particularly gain much by delegating them (and introduce potential issues), but there's not much value in belabouring it.

Community Meetings

No real comment here. (I'm not personally fond of them, but I'm also not running so that's kinda moot)

Silicon Policy

This is obviously a bit of a footnote so there's not much for me to comment on here, but just a general note that you should be careful that in the pursuit of readability you don't harm player comprehension of the expectations relating to Silicons - the Silicon Policy page reached the point its at today partly out of necessity, so I guess this is just a general "be careful".

by **Hulkamania** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 1:10 am #510916

Arathian wrote:Hulk, in this term, most candidates and most admins seem to think there has been a general failure of following up ban appeals and responding in policy discussion threads.

Do you agree with that? Do you think you are responsible, to an extend, for it? How would you improve on that aspect if you were re-elected as headmin?

I personally spent a lot of time doing ban appeals this previous term. I would generally check on them as soon as I got home from work (or at work if it was a slow day) and do any needed log diving myself. I'm not the only one who resolved appeals of course, it's more of just a "I will continue to do this thing that I am already doing." Naturally I would very much hope the other heads would join in on that, but if they have priorities elsewhere, I can at least promise to continue to clean up ban appeals.

To answer your question and Arianya's about Policy Discussions and how I would change it moving forward, I didn't push nearly as hard as I could have in headmin-bus about it. I brought up policy threads on more than one occasion, but I wasn't as proactive as I could've been about it. I really have no problems badgering people to vote on something, I've done it before, I just didn't realize how much other drama was causing me to lose sight of that.

Arathian wrote:
Nervere went on a rant about a complete failure of the headmin team to communicate with oranges. To the point where he said he believes we should have a complete break with Oranges and do away with the headmin/coder seperation rules.

Oranges is important and is the code owner. Do you think Nervere's opinion is correct? Do you think there is a way to establish a better communication and mutual understanding with Oranges? Do you feel that you, personally, can come to a mutual understanding with the code team?

I actually can point to more than one instance of oranges operating with the headmin team last term, and I don't think he's completely to blame. He does carry a naturally blunt and abrasive nature about him, which in turn causes people to interact with him poorly further degrading the relations. I personally believe I have a decent enough relationship with him that if further issues came up he would be willing to speak to me or the rest of the team about it. Oftentimes players or admins don't agree with the direction that he or the coding team is taking certain things, but I'm not here to try to police every unpopular decision they make.

People on the server get angry when something big is changed, and oftentimes it takes them quite a while to mellow out and adapt to it. Sometimes anger is just a natural part of the evolution of the game. That being said if something major happened that was just a total breach of boundaries, the story would be different.

Arianya wrote: Generally I'm of the opinion that admins touching other admins bans is largely just a can of worms. The advantage (and disadvantage) in equal measure of having a team of 40+ admins is that we have a lot of people with different views of the community, gameplay, and so on. Which is why we have headmins as the "ultimate decider" who settle these disputes.

My concern is that by nature, if Admin A's ban got ruled on by Admin B, and Admin A objected, you would end up having to make a headmin ruling anyway to resolve the impasse between the two, and inevitably you'll cheese off one of them with your ruling. In general if an admin is failing to respond in a timely manner to their bans, I think it's a bit more germane to focus on "why is this admin inactive in ban appeals" then the ban appeal itself - answering ban appeals in a timely manner is one of our expectations of an admin and so failing that should atleast be cause for concern, if not action.

As I've mentioned elsewhere, retired admin bans make up a pretty small fraction of headmin work, so I don't think you particularly gain much by delegating them (and introduce potential issues), but there's not much value in belabouring it.

I've mentioned above some of my reasoning for this, but I'll get into it a bit more. The week long thing I really don't anticipate being very much of a factor either, the vast majority of ban appeals are handled by the banning admin very promptly. In the outlier cases though, I really don't see why a banning admin wouldn't trust another administrator to review their ban.

In fact, sometimes players can see the banning administrator reviewing their ban as being an insurmountable obstacle, why would a banning administrator want to overturn me when they're the one who did it? Of course our admins are more mature than that and are fully capable of reviewing something objectively, oftentimes they do overturn their bans if they believe it was too harsh or evidence they didn't consider comes to light. But as it stands, having another person touch base on a ban appeal other than the banning admin isn't going to be something players would dislike, and I would reckon many would prefer it.

As for butting heads, it's sort of the banning admins fault for not at least making a post in the appeal saying they were looking into it or asking questions. If an admins appeals are consistently going well over the time to the point where another administrator or headmin is stepping in, that's grounds for them to be spoken with as it currently stand. Under my proposal if a studious admin was constantly resolving someone elses appeals, it makes it even easier for someone to spot where a conversation may need to be had.

I will specify with the caveat that I am 100% willing to admit when I'm in the wrong in a scenario, I did it frequently last term and I don't anticipate I'd stop. If popular opinion amongst the administration or the headmin team as a whole is that this idea is a poor one, I would cede to that and let it go.

Arianya wrote:
This is obviously a bit of a footnote so there's not much for me to comment on here, but just a general note that you should be careful that in the pursuit of readability you don't harm player comprehension of the expectations relating to Silicons - the Silicon Policy page reached the point its at today partly out of necessity, so I guess this is just a general "be careful".

There's certainly a reason I didn't want to start here and why I'm not as confident about it as other policies that may come up. It's always been a veeerrrry tricky subject to navigate and I didn't have any concrete enough ideas right now to fix it, but as I did this last term with escalation I'm at least willing to snoop around and see where people are unhappy, where people are satisfied, and put those together to form an action plan.

by **ThanatosRa** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 1:20 am #510919

From a forum dreg and hut dweller standpoint I find myself still in support of Hulk.

by **Nervere** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 2:55 am #510935

Hulkamania wrote:I actually can point to more than one instance of oranges operating with the headmin team last term, and I don't think he's completely to blame. He does carry a naturally blunt and abrasive nature about him, which in turn causes people to interact with him poorly further degrading the relations. I personally believe I have a decent enough relationship with him that if further issues came up he would be willing to speak to me or the rest of the team about it. Oftentimes players or admins don't agree with the direction that he or the coding team is taking certain things, but I'm not here to try to police every unpopular decision they make.

This is so weak-willed it's hilarious, and it's a microcosm of Hulkamania as a headmin.
Oranges is a not an open-minded person. He's not someone who changes his mind easily, and he is not cooperative unless he's the one approaching us on a subject. In other words, it's only when he has something to gain.
By letting oranges go on, unrestricted, not opposing his coding changes unless it affects you directly, you're signalling that you're going to bend over and be complacent.

This is unsurprising, as this term I've found no support from you in addressing his design choices.
You might think - "Why does it matter? We're admins." It's because coding changes affect policy and how we enforce things.
Cobbychem is a recent example of this. Shitty, untested feature being forced upon the players, and as a result we have to strongly reconsider player escalation and, due to harmful healing chemicals, silicon policy.
We weren't warned about this, we weren't asked for input. It got merged, and you're just content to let /tg/'s policy enforcement and gameplay go to shit because you don't want to stand up to oranges.

I don't know how you can be so blind to how the game's code itself affects admin interactions and policy.
At this point, it seems like a vote for Hulkamania is a vote for complacency. More status-quo bullshit, more pushing the "absolute separation" meme.

by **lmwevil** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 3:53 am #510950

Nervere wrote:snip

holy shit you look really petty right now Nerv, I get you want him to not get the role and that you have a dislike for him but for a standing headmin you can voice your complaints without attacking his character.

"you're signalling that you're going to bend over and be complacent." he has shown when he acts he does act, but he considers his actions before screaming at people like coders saying 'this is shitty' and instead having dialog.

"In other words, it's only when he has something to gain." - It's nice to see how much you 'respect' the codebase we're attached to, all these lashings and jabs make it hard to actually accept your point when you look like a petulant child who's mad his cornflakes don't have milk.

also on the codebase thing: we're admins, we handle admin things, if you want to influence code so much, go code and become a maintainer, there's ABSOLUTE separation as a meme and it will return to that if you keep up this 'us or them' mentality

by **Nervere** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 3:55 am #510953

I'm not going to sugar-coat my opinion.
What /tg/ needs is someone who will stand up for the players and administration when coders start violating their boundaries.
Hulkamania is not the right person for that job, and his responses in this thread demonstrate this.

by **Hulkamania** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 4:00 am #510955

I don't think I ever said I bought into "absolute separation" entirely, I said that oranges and I have had more than one productive dialogue and we get along pretty well. I think your general inkling to jump immediately to calling his ideas shit is probably why you and he have a poor relationship overall. When I spoke to him about speaking with us before making code changes that would conflict with policy he did so and has continued to do so. When I brought up concerns with certain things regarding the code, changes have been made on more than once occasion surrounding it.

Perhaps the fact that even when he's abrasive I treat the fact the he puts in the work that he does with respect is why I can continue to have an ongoing relationship with him and hold my unique viewpoints. If I was weak willed I wouldn't take the time to continue to explain these things to you and would jump to vitriolic mudslinging as you have been in this very thread. It's totally acceptable to take in all the information for a situation and approach it calmly, it doesn't mean you're bending over and letting something happen. I seem to recall standing pretty firmly that the stench mechanic should be removed after the vote ran on it, I just didn't resort to screaming my head off about it. Just because we handle business differently doesn't mean I can't take care of what I need to, friendo.

by **wubli** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 4:11 am #510960

Nervere wrote:I'm not going to sugar-coat my opinion.
What /tg/ needs is someone who will stand up for the players and administration when coders start violating their boundaries.
Hulkamania is not the right person for that job, and his responses in this thread demonstrate this.

bro you spend 6 months with him and only just now you are saying that he's not the right person for the job? couldn't you have called him out before, so you could have a more productive team?
i don't see you holding any of the other candidates to these standards nor spending so much time arguing on their threads. we could argue about the fact that you can expect more of him because he's a headmin already, but he's not even the only person running who's been a headmin before.

Nervere wrote:It got merged, and you're just content to let /tg/'s policy enforcement and gameplay go to shit because you don't want to stand up to oranges.

are you aware you are still in charge and you can do something about this, but you're pinning it on hulk's possible rerun?

by **Hulkamania** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 4:20 am #510964

It's worth noting that one of my apparent shortcomings is that my platform is not enough to run on, but I have seen no criticism from Nervere about Shadowflame as of yet, who is not only a player (generally something most people thing makes someone unqualified) but is running on a single policy platform.

This seems much more like a personal grudge than it does one of any real substance. The fact that so many people have spoken out against your arguments made and you've dug your heels down in deeper just to criticize me further doesn't really do you any favors either. You never brought up any of these concerns with me throughout our entire term we've shared, and if you had I'd have been happy to bring them up with you at the time. I've been nothing but open to talking to people who have an issue with me in one way or another and just about all of them and I have come to an understanding.

by **cynic716** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 5:22 am #510996

Nervere wrote:I'm not going to sugar-coat my opinion.
What /tg/ needs is someone who will stand up for the players and administration when coders start violating their boundaries.
Hulkamania is not the right person for that job, and his responses in this thread demonstrate this.

Bro your idea of "standing up to the coders" is just calling oranges a worthless retard over admin-chatter any time you don't like a PR.
Maybe the coders not communicating comes from you throwing tantrums like a fucking child any time they make a change you personally don't like.

Btw, great leadership skills bud, shitting on your co community leader in his re-election thread because he isn't addressing issues in the way YOU want. And don't give me that "muh criticism" shit because we both know the way you're doing it is extremely shitty and mean-spirited.

by **Nervere** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 5:27 am #510999

wubli wrote:bro you spend 6 months with him and only just now you are saying that he's not the right person for the job? couldn't you have called him out before, so you could have a more productive team?
i don't see you holding any of the other candidates to these standards nor spending so much time arguing on their threads. we could argue about the fact that you can expect more of him because he's a headmin already, but he's not even the only person running who's been a headmin before.

As I said, I am disappointed. Hulk is a sitting headmin and I expect more from him than this barren, filler platform.
The only other candidate with headmin experience is Sticky, and he's a joke for reasons I outlined here: viewtopic.php?p=510451#p510451.

wubli wrote:are you aware you are still in charge and you can do something about this, but you're pinning it on hulk's possible rerun?

Headmins do not touch hot-button topics while elections are going, and this is no different. It has become a political issue so we should not be touching it. Once election time comes, it's too late.

Hulkamania wrote:It's worth noting that one of my apparent shortcomings is that my platform is not enough to run on, but I have seen no criticism from Nervere about Shadowflame as of yet, who is not only a player (generally something most people thing makes someone unqualified) but is running on a single policy platform.

I haven't read all the threads yet. I plan on responding to all of them at some point, Shadowflame's single-issue thread isn't a priority.
My lack of a response (yet) to Shadowflame's thread is not an excuse for your thread not having any content.
I've prioritized responding to your thread because you're a sitting headmin and people voting for you is a lot likely (and worrying!) than people voting for Shadowflame.

Cynic716 wrote:shitting on your co community leader in his re-election thread because he isn't addressing issues in the way YOU want

I'm not going to pretend I like his ideas because we're both headmins.
If anything, it's my responsibility as a headmin to point out a shitty candidate when I see one - to do otherwise would do the community a disservice.

by **cynic716** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 5:30 am #511001

Nervere, you haven't addressed any of my points. BTW, you aren't conducting yourself in a way that's good for the community, you're being a child.

by **Nervere** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 5:33 am #511002

This thread is about Hulkamania, not me. I'm not going to respond to ad-hom ("throwing tantrums like a fucking child"), and I'm not going to derail this thread into a discussion about myself.

by **Shadowflame909** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 5:57 am #511005

Hulkamania wrote:It's worth noting that one of my apparent shortcomings is that my platform is not enough to run on, but I have seen no criticism from Nervere about Shadowflame as of yet, who is not only a player (generally something most people thing makes someone unqualified) but is running on a single policy platform.

It's a really big platform though

A 4 year solution in the making.

by **Hulkamania** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 6:05 am #511006

As has been said, your ineffectiveness in communicating with the coding team does not mean that my method is invalid. If you think the only way to get them to listen to you is to put hard sanctions on them and insult them within admin channels, that's your prerogative. If you have any questions you can feel free to ask them and I'll address them as I have the other ones.

I don't want this thread to be about Nervere, but it is important to understand where the criticisms are coming from and I believe that to be what everyone else posting in the thread is attempting to frame. If you specifically want to know my stance on the new chems, of course i'm not a fan. We've got the kill and clone meme running around and people making one-shot-kill mixes with minimal amounts of drugs. Do I think that's an issue? Absolutely. Do I think the coders are ALSO aware that it's an issue? Again, absolutely.

When you're in the middle of a massive overhaul of how a system of the game works, it's going to take more than just a few PR's to work out all the kinks. If the chem system was still completely broken after a month or two had passed then it WOULD be time to have a serious conversation about it, but bemoaning the issue and the people behind it on discord without offering serviceable solutions or indicating that you even understand that there's a good faith effort being made to make it a good system is discrediting all the work that's gone into it thus far.

by **Reeeee** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 9:08 am #511028

Hulkamania wrote:cobbychems overhaul

A rational approach to issue that's not an issue yet.
Not taking a stance.
The right approach, in my honest opinion.

Keep talking, I may yet like you more than Morto.

by **Stickymayhem** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 6:56 pm #511146

No doubt in your competence Hulk, but I haven't really felt your presence this term other than as part of the triumvirate. Were there any pet policies or changes that really were your design and implementation? Did you ever get anything done that one or both of the headmins didn't like?

And do you think your own platform is fundamentally conservative? If so, what makes you more of the same is the right solution? If not, where are you pushing the boundaries?

No traps or anything honest.

by **PKPenguin321** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 6:58 pm #511148

Stickymayhem wrote:No doubt in your competence Hulk, but I haven't really felt your presence this term other than as part of the triumvirate.

"When you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all."

by **deedubya** » Wed Aug 28, 2019 11:44 pm #511225

PKPenguin321 wrote:
Stickymayhem wrote:No doubt in your competence Hulk, but I haven't really felt your presence this term other than as part of the triumvirate.

"When you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all."

This. No news is good news in my eyes here.

by **John_Gobbel** » Thu Aug 29, 2019 12:20 am #511230

Hulk has been the most solid and reliable person I've seen on the admin team, and the fact that he's been responding to the dogged criticism (really muckracking) in this thread with rational, measured responses makes it even more so. While people seem to think that Hulk doesn't have a lot of substance for his platform, he's the type of guy who will work with others to institute change if people bring up ideas to him to do so. Hulk doesn't talk down to people, he keeps his cool, and despite not being as active as an admin in game he gets along with the playerbase incredibly.

Hulk will be my first pick for the next election barring some crazy revelation from another candidate.

by **tinodrima7020** » Thu Aug 29, 2019 6:23 am #511313

Literally the only decent choice running.

Edit: And plapatin and jcll

by **wesoda25** » Thu Aug 29, 2019 6:46 am #511316

Having a barren headmin thread isn't necessarily a bad thing. Hulks claim to glory is escalation, it always was. Thats the matter he cares about (not to say he doesn't care about others), and the one he actually managed to change. I suppose I can't really comment on his actions as headmin, Nerv was privy to much of what we couldn't see.

That being said, your positions on Ban Appeals and Policy Threads are wack. Your current term isn't even over, and yet just glancing over ban appeals I can see one appeal that hasnt been even responded to yet, for an entire week. And there are policy threads that have been open for ages. If you are promising more timely responses, why don't you actually show us that you'll do it. To me, it looks like just another empty campaign promise.

by **lmwevil** » Thu Aug 29, 2019 7:10 am #511322

wesoda25 wrote:Having a barren headmin thread isn't necessarily a bad thing. Hulks claim to glory is escalation, it always was. Thats the matter he cares about (not to say he doesn't care about others), and the one he actually managed to change. I suppose I can't really comment on his actions as headmin, Nerv was privy to much of what we couldn't see.

That being said, your positions on Ban Appeals and Policy Threads are wack. Your current term isn't even over, and yet just glancing over ban appeals I can see one appeal that hasnt been even responded to yet, for an entire week. And there are policy threads that have been open for ages. If you are promising more timely responses, why don't you actually show us that you'll do it. To me, it looks like just another empty campaign promise.

to white knight for the admemes for a moment, i've garnered it's from poor cooperation of one of the headmins so they can't get any votes completed and thus rulings. i could be utterly wrong but i think that's the case

by **Pomf123** » Thu Aug 29, 2019 11:27 pm #511456

obligatory pomf post

by **ThanatosRa** » Fri Aug 30, 2019 12:46 am #511472

Nervere... Dude I actually like you. But dang man.
Hulk has been nothing but solid and yes I buy his talking points. In my observation from outside and on the forum it seems like Hulk takes his time and approaches problems carefully. Honestly if I ever wanted to Admin I'd emulate his approach.

Also holy shit Hulk do you have management experience?

by **Hulkamania** » Fri Aug 30, 2019 7:40 am #511563

Also holy shit Hulk do you have management experience?

Yes, I have some management experience.

Were there any pet policies or changes that really were your design and implementation?

Some minor modifications to forum rules were all things that I typed up, and if you look at anything on the policy forum that I responded to, it's because I had a particular interest in the subject beyond just wanting to cast a vote on it. Obviously escalation falls into this category, it was mostly created on my own while seeking feedback from other admins and players. If re-elected I'd continue to tweak it and hopefully bring it about into the server proper, first posting it in the public forum as opposed to the admin one.

Did you ever get anything done that one or both of the headmins didn't like?

I think for the most part all the big decisions we made were mostly unanimous, barring a few special cases. There was definitely some disagreement at times, but for the most part if I came forward wanting to implement something/handle a situation a certain way/tweak something it was well received with the other headmins.

And do you think your own platform is fundamentally conservative? If so, what makes you more of the same is the right solution? If not, where are you pushing the boundaries?

For the most part, yes my platform is fairly conservative. Again, the escalation changes do have a couple of specific tweaks which could in theory change a few things in a big way, and I don't think everybody would be happy with it at first. There's also the potential for it to totally fall apart, but I don't really think that would be the case.

For the most part stillness is a fairly good thing in a position like this, because ultimately it's fueled by what the playerbase wants. If the playerbase has no issues with a particular ruling, policy, precedent, or other administrative matter there's not much reason to change it. Coders are around to keep the game fresh and full of new content, all we as head admins have to do is make sure people are playing nicely in the sandbox and that we foster a community that's as inclusive to the culture that we attract as it can be.

Players and admins are remarkably good (read: will scream about) at letting you know when something really just isn't working, at that point it's just a matter of responding to it.

Another word about the lack of platform, beyond what I've already stated regarding "you don't know what you can do without the other headmins and knowing how they operate." I really don't see it as being absurd to set reasonable and reachable goals. You don't NEED to enact grand sweeping changes to the server with every term, and if every single term the headmin team came around and totally turned policy around willy nilly, the consistency would be gone which is what brings players back to begin with. They know what to expect, so they return. Small but consistent changes are much more important in a long term setting, with the occasional big one being made along the way.

by **ThanatosRa** » Fri Aug 30, 2019 10:36 am #511572

Dang man it feels like your corporate trained manipulimean management skills for good.

by **SealCure** » Fri Aug 30, 2019 5:20 pm #511598

As someone who came in during the ssethtide, what I've seen of Hulk on the forums and in community meetings has shown me that he approaches things very logically and has a calm attitude in his dealings with both admins and the playerbase. Another 6 months of Hulk can only be a good thing