The State of Ban Requests/Missed Ahelps

[PKPenguin321]

As promised in my candidacy thread, I proposed the concept of Missed Ahelps as a sort of replacement for ban requests up to my fellow headmins pretty much as soon as I was able to. My main reasoning behind it was to provide a way for users to reach out should their ahelps fall through the system (which, while rare, does happen). After some brainstorming, my guy Ausops proposed something else that I think accomplishes what my main goal behind Missed Ahelps without bringing about the inherent drama-stirring flaws that having a public "Please ban this guy" board can bring about.

Ban requests/Missed ahelps is not going to be a board as proposed. The new plan is to have the IRC bot that forwards ahelps to the IRC channel when there are no admins online also log any ahelps that are not replied to and store them. This means that to push a missed ahelp to the admins, you will still have to have ahelped in the first place. You cannot complain about grief after the fact like you could with ban requests.

Making a missed adminhelp will give the player an in-game link to a wiki page (that is not yet created) telling them what to do next. This will involve a guide on getting into IRC (most likely on #supportbus) and asking around, while making it clear that you have already made an ahelp and that it was missed. An admin should try to get into private contact with you over IRC PMs and it will be handled from there. Supposedly this is already a practice, but the addition of a prompt in-game will allow any player to be aware of how to get help even if their ahelp wasn't received initially instead of just players that are already IRC-savvy. The addition of actually logging missed ahelps so we can check that you did in fact have an initial ahelp will also aid in preventing using this system as a pseudo-ban requests method.

Your ahelp can still be denied. If you ahelp about the clown killing you, nobody replies, you take it all the way up demanding that the clown be banned, and it turns out that the clown was just a traitor, tough luck. It's encouraged to try to avoid these kinds of situations by ahelping first, seeing if whoever griefed you was actually griefing or had a good reason later, and if it was really grief, then take it to IRC. This will be better covered in the wiki page once we try to put this in place.

I'm putting this here for feedback on this system, and to apologize to anybody who voted for me because they wanted a public drama board. My goal with it was really just to help players who are griefed with no consolation, and I feel this system would accomplish that without the need for a Missed Ahelps board. Thanks for reading.

[oranges]

It's even less functional than pming the headmins, it requires infrastructure that doesn't exist, and uses irc, which half our players can't use without significant assistance.

Just make all missed adminhelp forum threads require photographic evidence of the ahelp being sent and delete any thread that doesn't have one, without right of appeal or warning.

That prevents metacomplaints involving behaviour of someoen across time and people making rage complaints after the fact.

[PKPenguin321]

It's even less functional than pming the headmins, it requires infrastructure that doesn't exist, and uses irc, which half our players can't use without significant assistance.

You know when you adminwho and it gives the message about adminhelps being forwarded to IRC? There will be a link there (that hopefully can also be shown after an adminhelp) that links to a wiki guide on how to get into IRC to ask for help (a mibbit link and what to enter into the boxes).

Just make all missed adminhelp forum threads require photographic evidence of the ahelp being sent and delete any thread that doesn't have one, without right of appeal or warning.

This was the original plan, but the other headmins (mainly ausops) were solidly against it, hence the compromise.

[oranges]

the compromise is worse, this thread should just be titled

"Ausops and Joan torpoedoed this idea because they did not like it", at least then it would be more honest.

[danno]

"Ausops and Joan torpoedoed this idea because it's a very bad idea" would be most honest

[oranges]

"Ausops and Joan torpoedoed this idea because it's a very bad idea" would be most honest

that's an opinion not a fact.

[oranges]

kor's metagang is torpedoing the thread too.

really makes you think

[dannnnnnnnnnnnnno]

People will say anything, worse than that they'll believe anything. If I hate an admin socially, offering him insight to your vast knowledge of historical moments in administration lib is a surefire way to let him know that your mom is better than her mom.

The former Headmins were so empowered as a figure that the other admins looked up to them.

Working as Judges, running a task force with the game admins and a successful spriting and coding business on the side. Can you imagine?

You into gaming, my man? Of course you are. Sitting in your triforce-den with your big titty asian GF. Of course you are gaming, and capturing it ALL on podcast. Super Metroid, Rufio from Hook, Gak, and of course, my homeboy MC Chris! Roll one up homie! No help for you, as Danno stuffs a rag in your mouth God there's so much blood brisco the way everything feels inside you know for sure you're in no better shape than Ragu straight marinara put me on pasta you think as you design yo blow yourself up

help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me help me

When one visits #lorebus, it floods your mind with every divergent reality that has ever spun out of control and castoff from the original. If we couldn't stay on track with one timeline, life would be chaos. But in maintaining out status quo, we are murdering every alternate reality except our own. We have killed thousands just to continue to live.

[factoryman942]

should've put it in the hut really

Feel like going through IRC isn't the best, but I guess if the other heads are giving public forums a nono it's the only easy way to do it

[PKPenguin321]

should've put it in the hut really

Feel like going through IRC isn't the best, but I guess if the other heads are giving public forums a nono it's the only easy way to do it

I put it here to gather more feedback, none of this is really set in stone.

Now that you all mention it, maybe forum PMs could work better. The problem with that is it requires a forum account while IRC doesn't.

[danno]

I fail to see what this actually achieves

[PKPenguin321]

I fail to see what this actually achieves

If you've ever read a story in the "stories of rage, tears, regret" thread that ended with ahelping to silence, you'll see why I wanted this.

[Sweaterkittens]

No one likes having literal hours of their time wasted or ruined by griefers or people being shitty, then having zero recourse because no admins were available or they didn't answer. Having a system that's a little more robust than just PM'ing a headmin will be really nice, and it'll help the other administrators take some of the burden.

And the worst case scenario? It doesn't work well and we get rid of it. Seriously, I don't understand this aggressive doomsaying. It's not going to make anything worse, it's just an attempt to make things better, and if it doesn't work we go back to how things have been.

[PKPenguin321]

And honestly, with the proposed compromise it's less of a "system" and more of a message that links you to a guide to PMing admins when you ahelp

[ThanatosRa]

Soooo a Ban Requests that isn't shit? Okay.

[Qbopper]

I was never STAUNCHLY opposed to missed ahelps/ban requests, but I was never on board either.

I still feel that way - we'll see how it goes

[Haevacht]

If the other two headmins have disagreed, you need to stop.

Ban requests is an abhorrent mess anyway, no matter what name you give it.

[PKPenguin321]

If the other two headmins have disagreed, you need to stop.

Ban requests is an abhorrent mess anyway, no matter what name you give it.

It's significantly different at this point, and I suggest you actually read what's being proposed beyond the first 5 words of the thread subject

[peoplearestrange]

I'm honestly not sure how well this can be implemented. While I understand there needs to be away to deal with ahelps missed and when admins are not online (the wee hours), this seems overly complicated and unlikely, again, to make admins want to sift through logs and reams of text. Particularly when so many ahelps these days are in anger or purely IC issues.

We're at a difficult point here, ban requests doesnt really work as a concept because it allows people to jump on the band wagon of someone they simply dont like. It also leads to the shitty situation where if you pick and choose enough logs you can make pretty much anyone a bad guy. And as seen in our past, having everyone paranoid to do anything actually creates a really stale gaming environment and very little emergent or roleplay comes about in that fearful environment.

Now I'm not trying to poopoo the idea, as there's obviously a need to do something. Im just not sure I can offer any good solutions right now.

[Qbopper]

PAS summed up my issues more eloquently than I could

It's not that I'm opposed, I just dunno if this is the best way about it