The Decline of SS and TW is real

[Pressure]

It's a shame that we have to see this thread, especially created by Slum nonetheless

I don't care if this game's actually dying, if you think it's dying, or any of that. It's fun to log on and chat with friends and play competitively on the weekends and I will continue to do that for as long as I can. I respect the shit out of the people who put their time in to make this game run, and I respect the players who still care because it makes it fun. Fuck the haters, really hope we see another TWL (or more)! I'll try to lend a helping hand in any way that I can in a month when I'm back home.

[Demonic]

i think that project of merging zones collapsed for a vast number of reasons, including things such as arguments about who would be acting as the leader of the new zone and which players would end up being the staff members; which public arena would be used and what settings would remain as the default ones, and the issue of having about 50 different websites and forums for one zone would seem rather silly as well. there was also the problem between subgame and asss compatibility which would mean that zones such as Hockey Zone could not be merged into ours.

nevertheless i think it the only reason this failed was because people love to have power, even if it is in a dead zone, and would rather sink with their sinking ship rather than ask for help.

Afraid power was never even discussed, never got that far. Correct on subgame/ASSS so that rules out half the zones. Ones such as EG etc talks where ongoing, and we had agreement with 1 of their sysops but the other failed to come back to us after "considering" the options. In terms of staff powers, no reason to change how it works with a merge, their sysops remain sysops etc etc, take control of their own arena's, just hosted within 1 zone instead of 2 so options for events are available to all to increase numbers.

That said, all my time is spent with my children so I have pretty much retired anyways and until I find a capable replacement, pretty much all decisions are being run by beasty/MM and have done for some time, so its upto them if they wish to reignite this or not. My main aim was to completely remove that stupid buy system from pub, things such as epidemic is stupid (and whoever thought it was a good idea needs shooting imo). Fortunately, I think that's finally being looked at properly now so hoping this will move soon.

[Turban]

that sums it up fairly well, and i only mentioned the power struggle because of something that i had heard from the staff members in EG.

pride was another major contibutor in the collapse of that grand plan. some of these zones would want to have their public map to be the main one, and running leagues would have been a mess. not the most fun thing to coordinate, and certainly would not have been healthy for the zone.

i still think staff, or whoever was responsible at that time, did a stupid decision by declining the offer from Rapidshare several years ago. they wanted to buy the game and its rights, and had a lot to offer, but perhaps i don't know all the details.

[Ephemeral]

...so I have pretty much retired anyways and until I find a capable replacement, pretty much all decisions are being run by beasty/MM and have done for some time, so its upto them if they wish to reignite this or not...

Demonic,M_M,Beasty,
There we go, the true problem perfectly described.
Why does the true empowerment of the zone have to be passed like this? Demonic, M_M and Beasty are all fine people and have the zone's best interest in mind. But there are lots or people who fit that description. Where do leadership skills come into the picture? What gives Demonic the power to choose whomever she wants as opposed to getting the entire communities input? What check and balance is there to prevent favoritism when blessing someone new in this critical position? How are these any new potential candidates vetted? Just being well liked? Just being mature? Just have the time to do it? What prevents someone from holding onto the position far too long and when they are no longer able to be effective?

Come on Demonic/Beasty/M_M... lets fix this once and for all. Put aside this 'good ol' boy' system of running this zone and lets get something in place that allows these positions to be filled by the best, most active and capable people. Make these positions responsible for performing and not like some kind of royalty position that gets handed from one generation to another via who likes whom. It could be that the zone wants M_M/beasty in these positions, but who the fuck knows? Currently the zone does not really have any say in who gets these leadership positions.

This is exactly why there is resentment, lack of confidence, and a generally poor attitude towards 'staff'. Council failed because it did not change this (although there was a half-hearted lip service given to it). The answer is obvious and simple. Make a simple hierarchy with elected positions. No 'councils' or groups. A leader of the zone and then 3-4 positions directly underneath.

Zone Leader
Director of Pub
Director of Leagues
Director of Events
Director of Development

Each of these positions are elected positions for a term of service. People can hold the position and be re-elected if the population feels they are doing a good job. Each position should deliver a list of things they want to achieve in their term and this is how the population can measure their success/failure. If real-life issues prevent a person from doing their job then a special election can be held to temporary fill the position until the next election period.

An election system like this would restore faith and confidence in these positions and the zone in general. Even you guys (Demonic/M_M/Beasty) would have to admit that you would be better able to do your jobs at times if you knew that the population had elected you into them as opposed to having just been 'gifted' them. Again who knows, maybe the population would elect you guys. But the point here is to get rid of the bullshit 'passing of the power' in this dumbass way that has negatively impacted the zone for years. It only takes you three guys coming together and making a selfless decision. Putting together an election process is simple and straight forward (no negative votes for God's sake, 1 person gets one vote for each position). Announce the election period, develop the basic job descriptions (I'll write them if needed), have candidates submit their visions, and then count the votes. Its not rocket science.

The only real decisions that need to be made is the length of the terms. 1 year sounds reasonable but perhaps other have some ideas. But come on, step up and take advantage of this opportunity to finally make a substantial improvement to the zone.
Eph

[Turban]

i'm afraid there would be some issues with an election if we were to have one, and it might not be the perfect solution at this point in time.

it is running the risk of halting the zone progress in terms of improvements, or even turning tye tides for the worse, depending on who gets elected to the position.

our zone is split to three different demographics. we have far too many trolls, all of who are rowdy and want to see this zone fail. we have those who are indifferent and simply want to have fun, which represents the majority of our players, and then the select few who actually care about the well-being of this zone. i'm not entirely sure if that would be worth the risk, even if it meant the return of faith and trust to some of our players.

however, i think there should be some other way of picking a new leader than the current one. oh well.

[Demonic]

Demonic,M_M,Beasty,
There we go, the true problem perfectly described.
Why does the true empowerment of the zone have to be passed like this? Demonic, M_M and Beasty are all fine people and have the zone's best interest in mind. But there are lots or people who fit that description. Where do leadership skills come into the picture? What gives Demonic the power to choose whomever she wants as opposed to getting the entire communities input? What check and balance is there to prevent favoritism when blessing someone new in this critical position? How are these any new potential candidates vetted? Just being well liked? Just being mature? Just have the time to do it? What prevents someone from holding onto the position far too long and when they are no longer able to be effective?

Come on Demonic/Beasty/M_M... lets fix this once and for all. Put aside this 'good ol' boy' system of running this zone and lets get something in place that allows these positions to be filled by the best, most active and capable people. Make these positions responsible for performing and not like some kind of royalty position that gets handed from one generation to another via who likes whom. It could be that the zone wants M_M/beasty in these positions, but who the fuck knows? Currently the zone does not really have any say in who gets these leadership positions.

This is exactly why there is resentment, lack of confidence, and a generally poor attitude towards 'staff'. Council failed because it did not change this (although there was a half-hearted lip service given to it). The answer is obvious and simple. Make a simple hierarchy with elected positions. No 'councils' or groups. A leader of the zone and then 3-4 positions directly underneath.

Zone Leader
Director of Pub
Director of Leagues
Director of Events
Director of Development

Each of these positions are elected positions for a term of service. People can hold the position and be re-elected if the population feels they are doing a good job. Each position should deliver a list of things they want to achieve in their term and this is how the population can measure their success/failure. If real-life issues prevent a person from doing their job then a special election can be held to temporary fill the position until the next election period.

An election system like this would restore faith and confidence in these positions and the zone in general. Even you guys (Demonic/M_M/Beasty) would have to admit that you would be better able to do your jobs at times if you knew that the population had elected you into them as opposed to having just been 'gifted' them. Again who knows, maybe the population would elect you guys. But the point here is to get rid of the bullshit 'passing of the power' in this dumbass way that has negatively impacted the zone for years. It only takes you three guys coming together and making a selfless decision. Putting together an election process is simple and straight forward (no negative votes for God's sake, 1 person gets one vote for each position). Announce the election period, develop the basic job descriptions (I'll write them if needed), have candidates submit their visions, and then count the votes. Its not rocket science.

The only real decisions that need to be made is the length of the terms. 1 year sounds reasonable but perhaps other have some ideas. But come on, step up and take advantage of this opportunity to finally make a substantial improvement to the zone.
Eph

What a lot of assumptions and rubbish. As turban said, voting is not the option. I also have never stated I was picking a replacement from current staffers either, as that would be the easy thing to do, and would have done it ages ago tbh.
Elections would need to be available to all, and becomes a "who's my buddy" system rather than actually who is capable to do the job in hand. MM/Beasty are fully capable of running this zone, as I said they have been for some time, so we can make sure the person is right - afterall wouldn't want another "EG staffer" promoted to sysop would you?

As for TW council, you talk like you ran TW council's goals - I don't from memory, correct me if i'm wrong, remember you actually accepting to be on council. The players failed the idea of a council, due to lack of support, why on earth do you think this would be any different? Anyways, I have a few people in mind who I think would be capable of handling the sysop position, some who will actually do something rather then writing an essay on everything that's wrong but not contribute towards anything. Who better to stop the trolls then a.. well you get the idea.

[Ephemeral]

What a lot of assumptions and rubbish. As turban said, voting is not the option. I also have never stated I was picking a replacement from current staffers either, as that would be the easy thing to do, and would have done it ages ago tbh.
Elections would need to be available to all, and becomes a "who's my buddy" system rather than actually who is capable to do the job in hand. MM/Beasty are fully capable of running this zone, as I said they have been for some time, so we can make sure the person is right - afterall wouldn't want another "EG staffer" promoted to sysop would you?

As for TW council, you talk like you ran TW council's goals - I don't from memory, correct me if i'm wrong, remember you actually accepting to be on council. The players failed the idea of a council, due to lack of support, why on earth do you think this would be any different? Anyways, I have a few people in mind who I think would be capable of handling the sysop position, some who will actually do something rather then writing an essay on everything that's wrong but not contribute towards anything. Who better to stop the trolls then a.. well you get the idea.

Elections are not perfect. But what is the ‘message’ that is being sent by not having them? Simple. The message screams to the population “WE DO NOT TRUST YOU TO MAKE DECISIONS FOR THE ZONE” and “YOU ARE TOO STUPID TO DO THE RIGHT THING” and “WE KNOW BETTER THEN YOU DO WHAT IS BEST FOR THE ZONE”.

And we wonder why people don’t like staff? We wonder why there is push back on so many things? We wonder why so many good people don’t bother trying to help the zone or have burned out? DOH.

Turb, you are currently in a position of power so of course you are saying ‘gee, let’s just keep thing the way they are’. But the improvements that you can strong arm will only go so far before you hit the brick wall and burn out too. There is one small window of opportunity to fix this and it is closing fast. Demonic needs to move on and her hand picking a person is simply carries on the standard operating procedure; one that has proven to often be ineffective.

Is it possible that some dumbasses will run in an election? Certainly. Is it possible some dumbass is actually elected? Possible but not likely. So what? The dumbass will fail and is replaced. Simply allow a for a special election or ‘vote of confidence’ to occur if this is such an overwhelming concern.

Or we can just stay the course of endless ‘ideas’ that have no resource allocation behind them. Implement a bunch more half-assed shit with no one being held responsible when they fail. How fucking stupid do we have to be to be suggesting more of the same and expecting different results? The zone needs this kind of sweeping change, not more of the same shit it has been exposed to for the last 10 years.
Eph

Edit; Yes, I promoted the Council idea and was interested in running until it became clear that it was going to ‘run along the side of’ the existing staff instead of replacing it. Yes, there was lip service given to replacing it but you did not have the balls to make a clean cut over. And the reason that people 'write essays' is because there is no other way. And fuck you, I contributed a lot to this zone over the years. Using the failed Council as an excuse for not considering this is lame. Council was an awful implementation of what should have been done and was doomed as soon as the decision was to only commit to it half assed. Negative votes? Come on. Leadership via group decisions? How is that anything like what I am suggesting? Get real.

[Demonic]

Elections are not perfect. But what is the ‘message’ that is being sent by not having them? Simple. The message screams to the population “WE DO NOT TRUST YOU TO MAKE DECISIONS FOR THE ZONE” and “YOU ARE TOO STUPID TO DO THE RIGHT THING” and “WE KNOW BETTER THE YOU DO WHAT IS BEST FOR THE ZONE”.

And we wonder why people don’t like staff? We wonder why there is push back on so many things? We wonder why so many good people don’t bother trying to help the zone or have burned out? DOH.

Turb, you are currently in a position of power so of course you are saying ‘gee, let’s just keep thing the way they are’. But the improvements that you can strong arm will only go so far before you hit the brick wall and burn out too. There is one small window of opportunity to fix this and it is closing fast. Demonic needs to move on and her hand picking a person is simply carries on the standard operating procedure; one that has proven to often be ineffective.

Is it possible that some dumbasses will run in an election? Certainly. Is it possible some dumbass is actually elected? Possible but not likely. So what? The dumbass will fail and is replaced. Simply allow a for a special election or ‘vote of confidence’ to occur if this is such an overwhelming concern.

Or we can just stay the course of endless ‘ideas’ that have no resource allocation behind them. Implement a bunch more half-assed shit with no one being held responsible when they fail. How fucking stupid do we have to be to be suggesting more of the same and expecting different results? The zone needs this kind of sweeping change, not more of the same shit it has been exposed to for the last 10 years.
Eph

Edit; Yes, I promoted the Council idea and was interested in running until it became clear that it was going to ‘run along the side of’ the existing staff instead of replacing it. Yes, there was lip service given to replacing it but you did not have the balls to make a clean cut over. And the reason that people 'write essays' is because there is no other way. And fuck you, I contributed a lot to this zone over the years.

Haven't said you haven't contributed, yet you seem to be under the impression the likes of MM/me plenty of other staffers who have contributed consistently for over 15/16 years are now clueless and devoid of idea's, when you have no experience of actually running a zone or all the elements yourself. Think about how council will run, one of the most important aspects of sysop etc is experience, knowing how to fix things when things go wrong, knowing what elements change what in pub and even how to peer a zone. There are only 2 people in this zone who know properly how to check and fix bans for players, and as sysop - my role is technical not player, not staff management. With your what would be constant swapping and changing of staff based on players, there would be zero consistency, zero knowledge and tbh would completely destroy the zone. OFC you might get lucky and get someone like Wark who actually has a brain and knows a lot of the staff elements, but there is no guarantee of that.

A lot of your idea's over the years I have agreed with, but their is a big difference between contributing an idea, then actually going out developing that idea and implementing it. The dev in this zone work tirelessly, and rarely get the credit they deserve, but as staff I suppose those positions should be put up for a vote as well.

I need to recruit someone who is strong in the technical aspects of the zone, or at least a quick learner on that side - as that's the knowledge gap that will appear. Do you know someone with that knowledge eph, in zone security, how zone ipblocks works outside of bang, how to setup a cross zone peering if the zone does manage to find a merger? Or would you prefer that this was lost, and if the opportunity did arise take a gamble on the fact hopefully someone can guess or figure it out.

Since you have no idea what my role as sysop is/was - I find it amusing that you think you would have a better idea who to pick to replace me then I would. I also find it amusing that you think you can label on these elements on "leadership" when you don't know how the leadership of this zone works beyond player x is sysop therefore they must run this zone. I had no interest in power, therefore I had no access to donation money, I rarely dabbled in pub settings (except the occasional fix when people didn't know how to fix something) and I don't get involved in staff recruitment so perhaps that clears some elements up.

[Turban]

speaking from my perspective, i have little to no power to directly influence any major decision in this zone.

i was put to this position mostly against my own will through some silly private vote which involved six people - five TWL operators and a sysop. it hardly felt official, and still doesn't to be honest. not to forget that it was way too rushed. they really did not give me an option, aside from declining the offer, but no one else wanted anything to do with leadership and responsibility. i feel like i was thrown under the bus as a temporary resource, but no regrets. it had to be done, and i'm someone who almost always agrees to help given the circumstances. it was an easy way out, but probably not the right call at that time.

nevertheless, i don't care about that all that much in truth. i know its not healthy to do this, and i will step down the moment someone capable enough is willing to take over. i'm not sure who that someone is, but if its the right person i can continue to support behind the curtains.

short-ish rant.

[Ephemeral]

Demonic,
Leadership skills and having zone permissions are NOT the same thing. The zone permissions you describe do take intelligence and experience to handle properly. But why are these tied so explicitly to the zone leadership? Does a CEO or President of a company have the knowledge to rebuild a server? Or know how to do every other job in the company? Of course not.

The zone still needs people who can code, people who can ban, people who can host events. But what does this have to do with leadership skills? Are you saying that we cannot have a leader who can simply trust these kinds of tasks to others? Will these other people simply amok and simply not listen to the leaders? Wtf?

This is a part of the existing culture that needs to change. This bit of tying the zone permissions with the leadership positions is simply wrong. It means that you end up having to find an even rarer person, one who can ‘do it all’.

Look, I don’t mean to come down on your contributions or those of Beasty or M_M. I am trying to offer improvements. As you well know it takes huge amounts of time to do this shit. By requiring a single person to have both leadership skills AND intimate knowledge of every task in the zone greatly reduces the pool of possible people to only a few. Good leaders don’t need to know every single command or have ban powers. They need good people around them.

So consider separating the two, allow for delegating. Allow those with leadership skills to fill positions that require it, keep those who experience is need to do the daily zone permissions tasks. So if this means that the person who runs 'Director of Pub' does not need to have any zone permissions; they have others who will handle these kinds of tasks.
Eph

[Demonic]

Demonic,
Leadership skills and having zone permissions are NOT the same thing. The zone permissions you describe do take intelligence and experience to handle properly. But why are these ties so explicitly to the zone leadership? Does a CEO or President of a company have the knowledge to rebuild a server? Or know how to do every other job in the company? Of course not.

The zone still needs people who can code, people who can ban, people who can host events. But what does this have to do with leadership skills? Are you saying that we cannot have a leader who can simply trust these kinds of tasks to others? Will these other people simply amok and simply not listen to the leaders? Wtf?

This is a part of the existin culture that needs to change. This bit of tying the zone permissions with the leadership positions is simply wrong. It means that you end up having to find an even rare person, one who can ‘do it all’.

Look, I don’t mean to come down on your contributions or those of Beasty or M_M. I am trying to offer improvements. As you well know it takes huge amounts of time to do this shit. By requiring a single person to have both leadership skills AND intimate knowledge of every task in the zone greatly reduces the pool of possible people to only a few. Good leaders don’t need to know every single commend or have ban powers. They need good people around them.

So consider separating the two, allow for delegating. Allow those with leadership skills to fill positions that require it, keep those who experience is need to do the daily zone permissions tasks.
Eph

And as I have said - I might technically be in a leadership role as in "sysop" but I don't get involved really on the leadership side - technical only, and leadership if I must. Therefore surely this is a moot point as that's the role that needs replacing? When MM/Beasty decide to hang up their boots, by all means have this discussion on replacements as they give the main leadership to the zone. Generally I just get the fun of shouldering the blame for everything, a lot more visible publically perhaps.

[roxxkatt]

the rats are all fighting over the last charcoals of their sinking ship

[Ephemeral]

No value in assigning ‘blame’, plus IMO you have always been very responsive and open to suggestions when I talked to you. There are others who appear to not like you but who cares, that is common when you are a leader.

Leadership is a lot about ‘selling’ and communications. This is the area which needs the most improvement. The current job(s) are simply too large and this (‘selling’ and communications ) is what falls off the plate and doesn’t get done. This is why everyone burns out. They pour huge amounts of time into this stuff only to fail because they can’t/don’t sell it to the players.

Turb has been doing his best to actually communicate and sell. He surrounded himself with some good folks who made sure the daily tasks of running the league were handled. This left him with some time to get on the forums and communicate what TWL was doing.

This is lacking in the running of the entire zone. You, Beasty, and M_M are too busy trying to ‘do it all’ and simply do not have the time to do much selling or communicating. The result? A kind of detachment were the players don’t feel they have any influence and/or that you aren’t doing your jobs. We end up with other people doing dumb shit like the ?buy system as you guys are distracted by handling everything else.
So again, it only makes sense to me to deconstruct the current system of zone permissions with leadership positions.
Eph

[Vatican Assassin]

Ephemeral slowly but surely positioning himself to become chancellor and dissolve the senate.

[Jerome Scuggs]

vati recycle ur glass and plastics, not my jokes