How do people level up? When does it happen? We have 2 processes:
- Contests. People win contest and get upgraded. The problem here is that contests take forever. People need time to build things, and I need a lot of time to close the contests since it’s quite some work for me. I do not want to stop making contests, but having this as a primary way of upgrading people is dysfunctional in my opinion.
- Recommendations: I get recommendations from Elders regarding users who are showing potential for upgrades. I accumulate those for some time and then occasionally (I guess about 2-3x a year) go through the list and do upgrades. The issue here is also some delays and insecurity. The submitters do not know when there will be a followup and it becomes a bit of a guessing game for people when what happens.
What do I want instead?
I would like to have a process that is more regular, regulated and possibly automated. In an ideal world, there would be an interface on the website for the high ranked users where they can submit proposals and other members can support or decline this. Once there is sufficient support by all members of a certain level, the user level upgrade is executed automatically. The process would of course be completely secret so that we do not get into vote-buying/rigging or that users of a level are not pestered for votes to be given to other users.
How could this work?
User A is being proposed for promotion by user B. User B would need to be of some (higher) user level to be able to put someone forward for this proposal. People of various levels can support this. Depending on the level of the supporting users, the support can be stronger or weaker (measured in a point system). Higher level users can also veto such promotions. Once a certain amount of points are reached, the user get’s automatically promoted.
Please give input if you think this might work, what your concerns are and so on.
I like the idea. I think it would be a good idea to make it so only Arch. or Designer and up can recommend people given that Settler and Citizen are automatic levels. Maybe also have it so that Masters and up are the only voters, or it could happen where many Archs. get together to recommend each other and level each other up. I also think the keeping it secret so only the higher levels can vote and see who has been recommended. It would be very annoying having users know they are up for vote and begging and pestering players about it.(It will probably still happen with people asking if they have been recommended or not) All in all I think this could be a very good system and would mean a little less work for you, which is always good.
I would imagine that lower level/same level votes are more symbolical than really able to make a change. Since the process would be completely secret (nobody knows who voted and what), anybody can claim they voted + for someone, but actually did not. If the person failed to get promoted, it could always be a veto from another, more senior player. This should put only little pressure on the actual voters. Somehow I wonder if we can transform the Karma system into this.
Good idea – that makes the upgrading more effective and interesting.
We could transform the Karma system into this, if we say that up to certain amount of points (e.g 12 points) people are ready/allowed to be upgraded.
Karma would have more importance and it will be something like a filter.
The system should need the element of recommendations (that is secret for every grade) and the element of a certain amount of karma (that allows to be promoted).
My concerns are similar to pagreifers. This is my proposition on the principles of the new system:
– I dont think settlers/citizens shouldnt have any form or way to affect the promotions, since it doesnt really require pretty much anything to become those.
– Masters and up should be the only ones who can recommend people and in case of someone becoming an elder we would still use the old system.
– After a settler/citizen has been recommended for promotion, only architect and up could vote/support it and see who’s being recommended.
– If an architect is recommended for promotion, he or other architects shouldnt be able to see or affect it and so on. So its always on the hands of the higher-ranked completely.
– Maybe no-one but unc should see how well-supported someone is for promotions, only if someone is or isnt and according to the rules mentioned above.
– Any and all asking and pestering people regarding promotions should not be allowed and should be punishable. Maybe mute/jail-level of punishment first 2-3 times, and ban if it just goes on and on. Also answering to that kind of stuff, whether someone is or isnt voted for or supported x much, should be as punishable.
– I have always thought that contests isnt the ideal upgrade system, due to its nature of being that one build or one time. I think promotions should require consistency.
I have no clue on how to make something like this happen, but I think that if it is doable, then we should do it. It would be very good to make the upgrade system more effective and work well, and also lower the workload of unc.
Yeah, this is pretty much how I envisioned it. It is definitely feasible, and would most likely be web-based.
Yeah, pretty much just like this sounds like a greta way to proceed.
The elders only being able to elect elders unanimously has worked brilliantly historically.
Settlers / Citizens effectively being voteless helps prevent somebody joining with 10 friends just to rank up.
I think that asking for a rank up / recommendation directly and persistently needs to have defined, clear cut punishments.
Masters and up controlling nominations process is extreme, designers and up should be able to nominate I feel.
Throw out designers then,barely any even get on as is and not often.
Exactly what I thought. There are way too few active designers and way too many active architects. We do have pretty nice core of active masters and elders tho.
I could see architects going on to be designers to put this into effect tho for their votes. But even then, it will take master/elder votes the most to make that changehappen.
exactly as I was thinking. There would inevitably be more designers. I love the idea of being able to recognize great members of the community. I agree with the architect level being the minimum to have a vote. It shows a definite commitment and love for this server. (not that settlers and citizens don’t love it too, I know they do, but those levels are automatic is all)
I feel this would be a great for the server.
Great job Unc.
I think it would be a good idea but you may still end up with more settlers and citizens and its also mostly based on an honor system to keep others from just recommending a friend of theirs for promotion just because they want their friend to be able to do such and such command or something like that so there needs to be something to keep them from making recommendations just for no reason like the person has to have been on for a while like a year at least or after a certain period of time they can be recommended for promotion and the higher the longer the time limit between promotion recommendations or something
Something that would help to keep people from spamming the recommendations for their lower level friends would be a requirement of, say, 3 recommendations from different users of the same person before that person can actually be voted on being upgraded. That would keep from one person being able to upgrade their friends while maintaining minimal effort from you. It would also still require actual talent to get promoted, since multiple people would have to recommend you before your upgrade can be voted on and decided.
I like this a lot. I always felt like the current system was a bit messy for you.
Everyone else has very good ideas and input. The only thing i’d add is maybe an elder or at least 2 masters have to approve to “seal the deal” on archs or designer promotions. No more than one elder veto and no less than 2 elder approvals for designer to master. And the usual no elder vetoes for master to elder. And the ban of anyone who vetos kidcodiwise to arch-owner proposal. That one is nonnegotiable.
A very strict “no campaigning” policy should be put into place to keep it fair and so the high ranks aren’t being begged for approval.
Support.
Now, one thing though. what if someone doesn’t WANT to be upgraded. What then
?
Never had the issue. I guess if someone REALLY does not want to have any responsibility they could ask to be demoted.
A “keeping tabs” system would be very beneficial, and I think we could stretch it one step further- It could help the higher-ups to keep tabs on a particularly helpful and friendly player so they get rewarded -not just for a single notable event- but their behavior in general. It could ALSO be used to keep “high level” notes on problem players- a bit of an offline private message board, if you will.
Cool idea, even though i am just a citizen ill do my best, but i may not be promoted of how much i try though.
It would be nice to have all of his automation but you should probably limit the promotions so that you can keep it special. If some gets promoted every day, then when the promotion comes around to me, it will actually mean something. It wouldnt feel like I did anything if there were a lot of promotions. I know this may make me sound like the meanest person ever, but in real life I keep compliments scarce. That way when I do compliment someone, they know I’m not just saying it to be nice but I really mean it.
I typed that wrong. Did you see my mistake?
You are right, but automation does not mean there will be someone promoted every day. It’s more a question how many votes you need to be promoted. There will be more promotions in the beginning since we have to “catch up” but otherwise, we have to fine-tune it.
The involvement of karma sounds like a good idea. This would give it a greater purpose. Maybe a combination between a few ideas of here.
See i would like that too, but people could just ask other people on the server to give them karma. Maybe if you get 12+ karma you could be elligable for masters/elders to decide if they think you are ready for a rank up. I think that majority vote should be 2/3 of the masters/elders.
yes, your idea sounds more reliant then just collecting karma to get promoted. i can see how only collecting karma would be abused :]
Don’t understand me wrong, I didn’t mean an automatic lvl up with karma. I meant something similar to riedis and epics suggestions.
Also, repeatedly asking of karma shouldbe punishable if it is used as rankinghelp, so there’sa solution to tgis problem.
1 more vote for this idea.
I second the idea as promotions are really far and few between. This could work, given the right precautions. I suggest a weighting system, say a vote from an elder would be worth much more weighted versus, say a settler. That way, lower levels still have power, just not as much to spam the vote.
whatever make things easier on you unc! ^_^
I think this sounds like a great idea and I like the guidelines suggested by Estebanismo. I haven’t been on much with school but I love the server and know that whatever is decided will ultimately benefit everyone.
dont get me wrong all these ideas sound wonderful but honestly i just try to help out people just because i want to be helpful which is why if anyone needs food or anything to get them started i give it to them because i would want someone to do the same for me if i ever needed help or had to start over also a lot of yall have helped me out with some stuff like when i lose my weapons due to lava or something like that yall help me get them back or at least as close to what i had before and anyone that ever needs help building things i am willing to help just because i would hope someone would help me too
so while a karma system would be good you would have people clamoring to help people just for karma points to raise them to the next level though im not naming any names or anything mostly because the fine people of uncovery thats on here already wouldnt do that or at least i hope not its just you have to think of the ways people could abuse each system and make sure to pick the one that people cant abuse the most to have a more secure system
…Waiting patiently…
The easiest way to make citizens and settlers feel included (thus making it much easier to say “you can’t beg”) is to set up a recommendation system for them as well. If you created an honorary title from having an extensive number of recs in that, or even simply had it viewable by the ranking regime, it may make it easier to decide who to look at for promotion. I.E. ‘a bunch of people have voted for John Smith, perhaps i should keep an eye on him’. Not everyone plays at the same time of day/week which can make viable contributions and potential leaders harder to notice. Some version of this concept coupled with some of the above suggestions for automation could create positive change.
A decent idea, but it doesn’t really remove the problem, and I don’t think there’s much to be done about it anyways.
For example typically when I’m online there are 1-4 players on in addition to myself. They are usually sleeping_owl and/or riedi73 and 0-2 newish settlers who i’ve not heard of before. It is hard for us europeans/asians/australians to be online the same time the americans are. When I’m up and have a chance to play it’s pretty much late night or early morning in america, thus practically no-one is online except for summers.
My point is that the ones that are online at weird hours compared to ‘the masses’ are at a disadvantage in many regards. But that’s what we’ll have to live with. There is actually one upside to it too, usually less players -> less lag. I’m not complaining in the spirit of ‘I’ll never get promoted’, I’m just saying.
But as I said, decent idea tho, it might even things up a little bit.
This sounds like a very fine idea over all. My main concern would be if we did integrate Karma into this deal it would be easy to abuse. My concerns have been brought up and addressed in another comment thread and so I am in support of this idea. If it doesn’t work well then we can always just get rid of it and little harm done.
I have same kind of concerns about the current Karma-system, but obviously it would have to be altered a bit for these ideas to work properly. I’m sure unc will think of all kinds of abusement factors before these changes come to effect. :)