remove the assistant cap

[TheRex9001]

Bottom post of the previous page:

Ok, so what we've all agreed on is to poll on this topic, we'll then read over all your responses. There are 2 polls, one which is a yes/no/idc and one which is written. This poll will run for a week, then we'll take all that feedback and come to a decision, the forums aren't the only picture and we felt it was important to mainly focus on the people in the game. This does however mean that a remove/keep on the assistant cap verdict will wait for the moment.

[Super Aggro Crag]

where's the poll

[WineAllWine]

where's the poll

On the servers

[Cobby]

The assistant cap being polled in the way that it is seems like its the only option to tackle the root issue compared to a simple pop cap which at least from a "can you do it" aspect is definitely on the table seems a bit strange.

Naturally the poll will be implied as a "this or nothing", especially w people who dont know what options are actually available because they dont interact w the config. I think having the written portion doesnt absolve the sin of spotting the data to make it look like people are agreeing with the solution, and not just the problem that caused the action in the first place. People don't know what they don't know so there needs to be prompting of other solutions you COULD take.

The fact this option even exists is pretty nutty to me anyways considering theres not a single bit of malice involved with wanting to play assistant if the jobs you DO want are filled, and the cap just doesn't care about your other prefs. Either you play the jobs available that the rest of the server didnt want or dont play at all, when you simply dont enjoy the remaining jobs is such a weird idea to champion. There IS nuance to the career assistant issue, and this config setup simply does not approach that AT ALL.

At some point admins will have to acknowledge that they want to micro how these people play (which is fine imo for people who just use the assistant role to career cause havoc or antag hunt mind you), so I dont really get the mental gymnastics to satisfy feeling confident enough to police the behavior when all that was changed was what role they (had to) signed up for. "Well because youre a medical doctor instead of a greyshirt I can now note/ban you for your behavior since you had a REAL job to do" is a bit of a silly mentality because you had full capability to ban them prior, and I dont really get why we needed this change to break that mental hurdle for the admins apart from the fact they couldn't seem to cross it otherwise, nor do I really see any other reason why the config was necessary had this mental hurdle not exist. There's a problem here that wont be fixed by any config change regardless of the outcome of the poll.

[TheRex9001]

The assistant cap being polled in the way that it is seems like its the only option to tackle the root issue compared to a simple pop cap which at least from a "can you do it" aspect is definitely on the table seems a bit strange.

Naturally the poll will be implied as a "this or nothing", especially w people who dont know what options are actually available because they dont interact w the config. I think having the written portion doesnt absolve the sin of spotting the data to make it look like people are agreeing with the solution, and not just the problem that caused the action in the first place. People don't know what they don't know so there needs to be prompting of other solutions you COULD take.

Really I only polled on the assistant cap in specific because we can in theory add anything to the config, the assistant cap wasn't something explored before and adding every config option to a poll would be overwhelming and not give very good data imho. We can take the solution of adding 12 to every job and leaving the cap, we can have the pop cap and assistant cap, we can have neither, etc.

[Cobby]

Of course, I guess I would have expected an (single) option that expresses you like the spirit of the change, just not the change itself. To me that would make the poll more "fair" I guess for those that simply dont know what options are available, without being expected to explain that in the free text and have the result adjusted post poll.

If the results of the poll are binding, as in you had the expectation to follow the multi-choice results, I think I would take issue with the idea that the discussion comes to a close under the pretense that people wanted THIS specifically simply without understanding that the poll was presented in a way that doesnt give people a fair option (on the multi choice which i presume matters more anyways than the free text).

[dendydoom]

The assistant cap being polled in the way that it is seems like its the only option to tackle the root issue compared to a simple pop cap which at least from a "can you do it" aspect is definitely on the table seems a bit strange.

the narrative here that this is an either/or decision where rectifying the "problem" of manuel culture drift is via a top-heavy decision like cap the entire job or cap the entire population count is strange and i've felt that way since the discussion first started on the admin side. i don't like either of these solutions at all and would rather have neither of them.

if there's any talk of a "band-aid" solution here (not saying you're implying this at all, but i've seen the phrase used) then anything where headmins make a huge, dramatic sweeping change to the server is one of them. culture shifts on any server as old players stop turning up and new players come in to take their spot. the only actionable way to steer that shift into aligning with your vision for the servers is to log into them and admin them to your vision.

we've had a lot of fantastic terms but the role of headmin unfortunately seems to burn people out of wanting to log into the server and play or admin - and that's not a jab or anything at anyone, i experienced the same feeling when i was in the role. but it is the only constructive way to carefully negotiate this sort of situation where the issue is centered around what players want from the game and are vying for control of the space to see their version of the game come to fruition. there is not some magic variable where the game is perfect around x amount of players or assistants. it is one tiny variable among countless others that we're hopelessly using like some sort of divining rod to find the answer. all that needs to happen is someone with the authority to say "this is how the game should be played on this server" needs to come in and set some precedents around that behaviour which admins can feel supported in enforcing and players can look at to understand the expectations. i am hoping that this term having 3 very active participants on the servers will do something to change this.

otherwise what you inevitably end up with is this sort of situation where players are saying "there's a problem" and game masters/headmins (who only have a second hand retelling of the "problem" to go by) try to create some elaborate high-level scheme that will restratify all of society when really all anyone needs to do is spend a busy weekend on the server banning people who are annoying and giving positive notes recognizing people who are a value add to the server.

[Super Aggro Crag]

where's the poll

On the servers

ok i submitted my answer

[Cobby]

things

Yeah I dont necessarily think a pop cap is the smoking gun to this issue either, I think the final paragraph of my last last post summed up the root of the issue and arguably the real solution to this which seems to be easier said than done: ban the problem.

Id also not necessarily want to have the poll include Yes/No/Pop cap instead options, it should just say Yes/No/Not the right approach to the problem or something. I'm afraid the poll is going to be seen as an acceptance of the configuration when the poll doesnt allow for the nuance (within the multiple choice which I think is going to be used as the deciding factor) because there IS a ton of buttons (including the banhammer) at the teams disposal, and I think the poll suggests that not liking the cap means youre fine with the status quo surrounding the issue, and I dont think that its an accurate reflection of what "you" should want out of a poll like that if youre trying to fairly gauge if the solution is working and well-received.

I dont think I used the term bandaid but I think it applies here. My understanding of the situation, limited as it might be, suggests that the heart of the issue is stemming from either admins not being present or admins not being confident enough to get people to tone down persistent* behavior. The assistant cap doesnt actually fix the idea that players are being career nuisances, nor would a pop cap, so I think that definition does fit here for both .

* Persistent needs to include feeling comfortable telling people who are doing something disruptive to knock it off if the server has just had to deal with it back2back, even if its that particular individuals first time within the day or whatever. We ran into this issue pre-manuel where even if you wanted to ask people to tone down chain murderbone, it didnt actually fix the issue if you had several people rotating culling the station effectively making it back to back to back to back... Next youre gonna tell me that the behavior is so disruptive people want an even more roleplay serv-

[TheRex9001]

Again, yeah the poll misses a lot of nuance, I'll take your feedback in mind for any future ones I do, its the first time I've ever written a poll so bound to be some mistakes.

[Timberpoes]

As an aside, the Manuel pop cap wasn't removed by the headmins. It was removed by the ops team due to losing the old Manuel configs.

In my opinion, it should be put back on.

Some people are pissing themselves about pop counts so much I think they are losing sight of what matters; curating the best SS13 experiences. Pop counts aren't the indicator of a server's quality and we shouldn't sacrifice quality for pop. Realistically our version of MRP caps out at 60 pop because the gameplay isn't incredibly different from LRP and at the capped player count it offers the peak balance between chaos, player freedom and a shift pacing to promote roleplay.

[massa]

Some people are pissing themselves about pop counts so much I think they are losing sight of what matters; curating the best SS13 experiences. Pop counts aren't the indicator of a server's quality

no way you just said this with a straight face over the hemorrhaging body of /tg/

[Timberpoes]

I think part of the reason we're perceived as losing more of our pop, is because we're chasing pop. For the past 5+ years I've been here, we haven't been about chasing pop. We've instead carved our niche and players came here because we offered the best SS13 regardless of pop. The best events, the best admins, the best gameplay, the most modern codebase.

Instead of making sure our gameplay quality and experience is in the Goldilocks Zone of SS13 perfection, I feel we're now more than ever caught up in chasing our own white whale of doing anything we can to attract more pop. In the pursuit of trying to make everyone play here, we're losing sight of why anyone would want to play here.

The Manuel pop cap was part of that equation. It protected roleplay by understanding that roleplay works on a bell curve.

At minimum pops, roleplay can appear all but dead as there's nobody to roleplay with and everyone has to break character just to keep the shift running, power flowing etc.
At maximum pops, roleplay can appear all but dead because there are too many people to interact with. When everyone demands 2 minutes of your time, there just isn't enough shift length to meaningfully interact. There's too much going on and the roleplay sphere suffers for it because our rules on roleplay are still very conservative. We allow gameplay realities to supercede roleplay. This was always balanced by configuring Manuel such that said gameplay realities were much rarer rather than existing as the norm.

Somewhere in the middle exists that perfect roleplay zone. Enough people to roleplay with, but few enough that you can put more time into each interaction.

And historically, we've found the healthy balance of player count to preserving roleplay sits around 60 pop.

Capping assistants we never going to fix or address this issue.

[TheBibleMelts]

why didn't the pop cap just get out back on when we got configs back. weird to undo a known policy just because we lost the folder it was enforced in temporarily.

[NoxVS]

Even if the assistant cap doesn’t really solve the problem population is causing I still really like it. My only real problem with it is when it gets down to the point where the essential jobs are taken and it’s either play psychologist or botanist or something you have no interest in or don’t know (nor want to know) how to play

[Stabbystab]

I fear it might turn new players away from the game cause back when I was new all I played was assistant to get the grip on the game since nothing was required of me as that role, if I have to compete for that role with 20 other people then I might have just never played, and I figure some others would be the same

[Stabbystab]

Even “newbie” jobs can turn interns off. It’s all fun trying to learn jani until everyone starts screaming at you to clean blood during a blood demon wiz round. Or cult round when your suddenly expected to know how to make holy melons. Cargo might be decent for new players only because it’s high job slot quantity would allow players who know what they are doing to actual mange cargo without the intern getting yelled at for not turning in a bounty fast enough. Assistant is best for new players to learn and limiting it might outright hurt new players experiences.

[Cobby]

From the code side I dont think there is really any sort of "newbie" job, but there are "veteran" jobs and those tend to be hour locked anyways particularly heads and AI.

If you need a tutorial for arrow keys and stuff yeahhhhh ok assistant is good for that because theres no job associated. Assistant is also good for learning a map I guess (dont new players get a GPS?). Assistant is NOT good for a genuine newbie because it explicitly doesnt provide you a job or goal. It does not give you a goal to understand how to progress in the game or what people are ACTUALLY doing, nor is there any sort of NEED to interact with people as assistant since no job is built w the expectation you would want an assistant to help you, so I think it isnt really fair to call it a newbie job on that end. It doesnt paint a fair picture of what youre actually supposed to do in the game for fun if you dont want to jump headfirst into RP, and I think that may actually turn people off from the game entirely since you're just thrusted in and are told to make your own fun when you have no idea what tools are available to do that.

Cargo or Botanist or Chef I think are good avenues for newbie roles. You dont have a big ask of you, if you fail then the station isnt on fire, and all of these offer avenues to understand the social aspect of the game (maybe not botany unless you have a verbal chef).