Codebase co-operation

[Qustinnus]

hello

if any of you were to become headmin, would you have any specific ideas on how you would interact with the coders and maintainers? Is there anything that you feel like is going wrong between the two parties?

As a good example (That I personally care for the most), do you think something should change about the way configs are handled? A lot of important variables/systems that define how almost everything in the codebase is set up, are in the config. The most extreme examples of this are movement speed and dynamic. As coders we have to balance everything on the codebase around whatever values are set in the config, and cannot change the game in ways we think is better/worse without a headmin term that is pro-active in wanting to help with this. Do you think coders should have more control over what values are in the config, or do you think configs should be allowed to be removed/changed by coders if they think it's for the betterment of the game?

[iamgoofball]

oranges is my boss

[Timberpoes]

I'm an active Maintainer so - More of the same really when it comes to code and interacting with the coding side of the community.

Also bias calling but let maintainers mess with balance-related configs more. A lot of game balance stuff is held in config and maintainers are constantly dealing with game balance concepts. If nothing else, I would like to create a whitelist of config values that trusted maintainers were authorised to change and tweak - Anything entirely in the realm of game balance such as global move speed.

Although I remember a number of Manuel shifts a great many months back where we fucked with the global movement speed from VV as part of a series of tests. So I guess I can see WHY they're in the config since they can be set on a per-server basis. Despite that, I feel that interfacing with the Maintainer team to genuinely unlock balance-related config entries for messing around would benefit the codebase and the servers in general.

This is something I would absolutely be open for and as a Maintainer-Headmin I would like to set up a system to bridge that gap. I highly respect the approach of the current Headmin team where they allowed Mothblocks autonomy over Dynamic config as part of the Dynamic 2021 development, tests and rollout and I would be highly receptive to similar co-operative efforts going forwards.

[Gogodapogostick]

If I were to become headmin, I would make sure to run most config changes by the codebase (assuming they are balance or content config adjustments) to make sure that they are both reasonable and realistic changes for the playerbase. I do not feel like there is any major ill-will between the administration and the codebase currently.

As for what is currently handled in config (movement speed and dynamic values in this case), I feel as though they are fine staying in the config as they are now. It will encourage codebase to administration cooperation and communication, which I feel is important for keeping a managed and peaceful relationship between the two parties. I think if the head admins and coders/maintainers interact more, it can only really lead to positive interactions between the two and fair changes for the players. Of course, the headmins of this term (myself included if I win) can allow more config to go into the codebase or open it up to coders more if they feel it is necessary or helpful to the server.

Edit: added more to second paragraph

[Coconutwarrior97]

I think I've been pretty open to collaborating with coders this term, inviting several maintainers to policy-bus to discuss dynamic, and offering code bounties to coders (if you can count that as collaboration, really we just threw an antag token at coders who would implement minor changes we thought would be nice).

Coders simply by nature of their position are more familiar with balance/mechanics than headmins are, and I am always open to their suggestions, and working with them.

[RaveRadbury]

As far as I know Mothblocks was allowed to tweak dynamic 2021 because he worked around the config, not because he was allowed access to it.

dynamic 2021's tm had a completely separate config file for the sake of making playtesting significantly easier and non-destructive
but
i asked for explicit permission to do that from headmins

As I learned during this term, the config is easily accessible during the round.

Additionally, I have a lot of time and availability to work with coders, this includes handing out debugger. I hope to be able to help with test merges soon.

In general, and as far as admin-coder relations go, I think it is the job of admins to ease players into new code changes while also acting as someone that frustrated players can vent to when they are unhappy with what's been changed. Good coders are a precious resource, and I think it is a shame that we have seen some of them run off by the community.

If oranges were to recommend that part(s) of the config be turned over to to maintainers/coders, I would take his recommendation under great consideration and likely defer to it.