User voting out of hand
Quote from pinebenj on 2018/04/12, 15:21For instance, an elder could be allowed to propose a user once a month, a master once every two months, and a designer once every three or four months. This way, if someone doesn't write up a convincing justification, they risk their proposal being wasted and have to wait several months to propose again. This is essentially reiterating what alley said.
I think something like this makes sense and is not too hard to implement either.
Quote from Camerissan on 2018/04/12, 16:40I have tried to abstain when voting especially if i have not known the person or do not want to look like a total B**** but when i do this the voting system pokes me to vote again even though it is set at abstain and i feel bullied into giving a plus or negative.
Ok, let me fix that. Once someone abstained and pressed "submit", they should not be reminded again.
Quote from psiber on 2018/04/12, 22:00So to explain better, to be able to see who suggested rank up, and for what reason.
I am not convinced on the "who". Already since the start of the server we have people teaming up against each other. Be that for getting builders for a project or whatever other (much more stupid) reason. If we make it transparent who proposed, the ranking becomes dependent on who proposed in stead of who IS proposed.
Quote from LukeCreative on 2018/04/12, 23:10I have another oddball idea, and that's totally okay if this gets shot down. For at least Elder proposals, and possibly Master ranks, reverse the process and have the user that wants to be promoted write their own proposal and reasons and have the others vote on it accordingly. Future Masters/Elders should be able to make their own case, and in most cases it shows that they're serious about obtaining said rank. I feel if we did this, we should make it at least 4-6 months at those ranks before they can propose themselves.
We did not do that from the start and kept everything confidential for a reason - right or wrong. The worry that I had when I came up with the system was that I wanted to avoid that people go around and try to manipulate the vote. If someone knows he's up for a vote and then does not get it, there will be bad blood. People who voted yes will say so, and sooner or later the people who voted no (specially for elder rank) will become transparent.
I already now have the issue that people talk to me that they think someone who is on the list should not make it. I have no doubt that this happens also between players. Now imagine the person who is up for vote starts asking for people to vote for them...
It will create suspicions and bad blood. I prefer people to be nominated by someone else. I rather make that process more involved/limited.
My thoughts are mostly aligend with those of @stephdeg expressed above.
Personally, I vetoed several promotions when I saw absolutely nothing abot the player, that could justify the promotion - no builds, no interesting items in shop, nothing visible whatsoever.
So yes, there should be explanation on why the user should be promoted - convincing and based upon facts, not just because the one offering a candidate to promote wishes to see that player at higher rank.
Something like that.
Quote from uncovery on 2018/04/12, 23:38Quote from LukeCreative on 2018/04/12, 23:10I have another oddball idea, and that's totally okay if this gets shot down. For at least Elder proposals, and possibly Master ranks, reverse the process and have the user that wants to be promoted write their own proposal and reasons and have the others vote on it accordingly. Future Masters/Elders should be able to make their own case, and in most cases it shows that they're serious about obtaining said rank. I feel if we did this, we should make it at least 4-6 months at those ranks before they can propose themselves.
We did not do that from the start and kept everything confidential for a reason - right or wrong. The worry that I had when I came up with the system was that I wanted to avoid that people go around and try to manipulate the vote. If someone knows he's up for a vote and then does not get it, there will be bad blood. People who voted yes will say so, and sooner or later the people who voted no (specially for elder rank) will become transparent.
I already now have the issue that people talk to me that they think someone who is on the list should not make it. I have no doubt that this happens also between players. Now imagine the person who is up for vote starts asking for people to vote for them...
It will create suspicions and bad blood. I prefer people to be nominated by someone else. I rather make that process more involved/limited.
I agree with that. Last thing we want is people starting campaigning for a promotion.. but as I said earlier, including a free text is one step towards enabling people to "sign" their proposal.
Someone may has brought this up and if i am repeating, forgive me. How often can a person move up. Maybe every 6 months?
As others have brought up, I like the idea of having to write up a justification if you nominate someone. However, I do not like the idea of giving elders more voting power. I think that might cause even more of popularity contest problem, because people would be trying to appeal to the in-crowd (elders and masters). If you do have a strong feeling about why a person should not be promoted though, you should be able to argue your case. A possible solution would be to have promotions/nominations at a few set points throughout the year, and have a cap on the number of people who can be promoted at these points. It would make it feel more like ranking up through winning a contest.
Quote from uncovery on 2018/04/12, 23:38
We did not do that from the start and kept everything confidential for a reason - right or wrong. The worry that I had when I came up with the system was that I wanted to avoid that people go around and try to manipulate the vote. If someone knows he's up for a vote and then does not get it, there will be bad blood. People who voted yes will say so, and sooner or later the people who voted no (specially for elder rank) will become transparent.
I already now have the issue that people talk to me that they think someone who is on the list should not make it. I have no doubt that this happens also between players. Now imagine the person who is up for vote starts asking for people to vote for them...
It will create suspicions and bad blood. I prefer people to be nominated by someone else. I rather make that process more involved/limited.
Unfortunately, I think this is already a problem in the current voting system, but it would be much worse if people were to nominate themselves. I haven't witnessed anyone campaigning to be voted up yet even though they sometimes know when they are being considered, but I have definitely seen that people openly talk about voting and will run smear campaigns if they have personal vendettas. Some people are going to gossip, even if it is below the dignity of their rank, but I don't think there is really a way to regulate behavior on that. And I don't think it is ever avoidable so long as we have a voting procedure. I think showing who put someone up for promotion does give a little more voting confidence, though, it might be rendered unnecessary by the overwhelming support we are seeing for writing up a blurp about why you nominated someone.
I get that, I didn't think this entirely through from that point of view when putting that up there. It was just a quick thought.
I talked to my husband about this and what he thinks. He gave this: "Unless someone is abusing the voting system don't worry. Ask around if you want information on someone up for vote if you do not know anything about them. Be honest if you are asked. You have one vote per rank up, make it count."
As for what I say: As more people get ranked up, the more they will be able to rank up others. So as people rank up, more will follow. That is the way wheel turns. The way it is going, eventually, everyone will make Master or even Elder, then we will have no use for ranks. Red is such a pretty color. So be sure to vote every time and make it count.
For the record, I have never put my daughter up for vote. I believe that she must earn it and not have it given to her. I do thank those that put her, KimiJean, up for vote, and to those that voted yes. I do believe that she earned it but did not feel right listing her due to being her mom.
Quote from lilroc17 on 2018/04/13, 03:33Someone may has brought this up and if i am repeating, forgive me. How often can a person move up. Maybe every 6 months?
There is a promotion freeze after the last one. I think it lasts 2 months currently. We could stretch that for higher ranks.
I really think that it should be stretched. Maybe at least 2 for Architects, 4 for Designers 6 for Masters and somewhere between 6-12 for Elders. That means at minimum, you'd have to be on for a year and a half before you could even be considered elder. Because currently the rate can be as fast as 8 months.
I really like Luke's time frame for those. It encourages people to do great work and keep up participation at a more constant rate rather than tackling short term but impressive projects that can lead to multiple promotions in the short time frame we have currently.
I think those times are reasonable.
Further, to the comments that giving elders more power: it's exactly what we are doing when we make promotions more special. Anyhow the goal is not to give simply elders more power but to make the power scale between the ranks steeper. That means that also all ranks below elder have more power than the ranks below them - compared to the current status.
I totally understand what you're saying. I think it doesn't necessarily have to be just the amount of power between the ranks, but rather how the ranks are presented and what is needed to attain a rank in the first place that make it special. There isn't entirely a clear definition of what someone deserves a promotion for. And that's fine, but as long as someone specifies their reasoning in the proposal that certainly should help some. I personally would be more satisfied knowing that I just got recognized for doing awesome work (and why), any perks are just a bonus.
Maybe there's just something I'm not seeing.
Luke I think everyone agrees with you on that one anyhow, and the changes I just made to the system pretty much reflect that (see the blog)
What I will do in as well is add the promotion reasons to people's user pages
I love it! This is perfect!