Regarding this weekends events

[colesie]

I think you all see where I'm going with this.

May your rein be long and glorious.

[sabinati]

That being said I find it very interesting that Travian (an example used frequently on this forum) has ONE moderator per every 22,000 users. By the END of a server they have 1 moderator per the 1,500-2,500 users that are left. I have rarely seen multiple moderators assigned to an entire server which frankly has about 50X the posting volume that I see on our Salem forums.

what? where are you getting this info?

forum.travian.us has 25k total members with 1 or more posts, and 8 admins and 11 moderators

forum.travian.com has 25k total members with 1 or more posts, and 12 moderators

forum.travian.de has 36k total members (can't get postcount info without logging in), and 9 admins and 12 moderators

[jwhitehorn]

what? where are you getting this info?

forum.travian.us has 25k total members with 1 or more posts, and 8 admins and 11 moderators

forum.travian.com has 25k total members with 1 or more posts, and 12 moderators

forum.travian.de has 36k total members (can't get postcount info without logging in), and 9 admins and 12 moderators

I was using "active users" not "active forum posters". The fact that Salem forces a person to register as a user on the forum prior to loading the game causes a HUGE mixup in the figures. I guess we could try to look to see how many Salem forum accounts have made a single post and use that number but instead I just took total player base of Travian since I knew that was 140,000 on travian.us (when I played). Doesn't suprise me that only 25K of them posted.

So to work out the math.

140K player base / 12 moderators = 9,333 players per moderator. Meaning if we used that formula we would need .5 or ONE HALF of one moderator.

If you want to use active forum posters that = 2,083 players per moderator so 2.5 moderators would be needed here.

That also assumes that EVERY Salem player has made a post which we know not to be true.

I don't think the right answer would be to put our heads in the sand and argue about if they do or do not have infinitely less moderators for per players. I think the better focus would be to ask what they do differently and if we can do it too.

Chief PeePooKaKa
MM Tribe

[staxjax]

Fortunately for them, the developers of Travian do not specialize in permadeath and forum drama.

[Ikpeip]

Gentlemen,

(Foreword: I don't have any specific issues with the current moderators, but feel there is a significant perception problem in terms of objectivity and equal application of forum rules)

This is the New World. Perhaps our forum moderators, or some portion of the forum moderators, should be elected to give the common man a voice. For better or worse, the moderators currently seem to be limited to HnH aristocracy.

There are some details on implementation (method of voting, frequency of elections, and how to ensure the elected are judiciously carrying out their duties) which would remain to be worked out. Here are two high-level suggestions:
-TotalyMoo would still need to appoint a hand-picked skeleton crew of moderators in case the elected representatives fail in their duties. Likewise, retain the right to remove moderators before the end of their term if they are found to abuse their power or fail to carry out their responsibilities.
-Initially carried out by poll on the forums, voting could eventually be integrated into the game proper, with ballots cast in Boston (prevention of widespread alt-abuse a concern to still address)

No moderation without representation!

Faithfully,

-Paul the Paymaster

[jwhitehorn]

Fortunately for them, the developers of Travian do not specialize in permadeath and forum drama.

The analogy was ideal due to the fact that in Travian if you are catapulted to 0 pop it is essentially a permadeath. After a specific amount of time the moderators will even remove a 0 pop village who hangs on for no other reason but to keep his square. Also as a result the forum drama is very comparable as well. Once again I see more effort placed on excuses on why it is different and less ideas to replicate and mimic.

I like Paul's idea. A voting system and even a mod rotation seems very fitting for a player elected mod base. Even if you get an abusive mod the community can feel like his term is only so long and periods of time and forum prosperity can even be measured by who was in Mod office at the time!

Chief PeePooKaKa
MM Tribe

[MagicManICT]

how about you give me one instance of your Hearth Secret and we will see if it changes your game . Again this is probably in the realm of perspective but I can assure you that alerting players to things that would end in either the destruction or their character or their town is game changing for at least that killer and killee.

Game changing for one player and changing the landscape of the whole game are a quite a bit different in scale.

Also, don't mind giving out my HS as I don't have a claim. I just wander around and sometimes drop a camp for a few days at a time. It's amazing how I've not logged in for a week and left bear pelts lying on drying racks and they were never touched. In another instance at another location, I left just a couple of rabbit pelts out overnight and they disappeared....

edit: just read Paul's (Ikpeip) post and it's not a half-bad idea if it can be done right. All actions of moderators have to be approved by Paradox, anyway, and mods don't get any access to in-game actions.

[sabinati]

what? where are you getting this info?

forum.travian.us has 25k total members with 1 or more posts, and 8 admins and 11 moderators

forum.travian.com has 25k total members with 1 or more posts, and 12 moderators

forum.travian.de has 36k total members (can't get postcount info without logging in), and 9 admins and 12 moderators

I was using "active users" not "active forum posters". The fact that Salem forces a person to register as a user on the forum prior to loading the game causes a HUGE mixup in the figures. I guess we could try to look to see how many Salem forum accounts have made a single post and use that number but instead I just took total player base of Travian since I knew that was 140,000 on travian.us (when I played). Doesn't suprise me that only 25K of them posted.

So to work out the math.

140K player base / 12 moderators = 9,333 players per moderator. Meaning if we used that formula we would need .5 or ONE HALF of one moderator.

If you want to use active forum posters that = 2,083 players per moderator so 2.5 moderators would be needed here.

That also assumes that EVERY Salem player has made a post which we know not to be true.

I don't think the right answer would be to put our heads in the sand and argue about if they do or do not have infinitely less moderators for per players. I think the better focus would be to ask what they do differently and if we can do it too.

Chief PeePooKaKa
MM Tribe

Active users isn't a good metric. Forum users with >1 post isn't really either. If you look at active forum posters it's closer to 3k. The vast majority of posters is in the 1-2 post category.

This post was sponsored by Sabinati for Mod 2012. Permabans we can believe in.

[darnokpl]

This is the New World. Perhaps our forum moderators, or some portion of the forum moderators, should be elected to give the common man a voice.

I like this, please let's make voting.

[TotalyMoo]

This is the New World. Perhaps our forum moderators, or some portion of the forum moderators, should be elected to give the common man a voice. For better or worse, the moderators currently seem to be limited to HnH aristocracy.

There are some details on implementation (method of voting, frequency of elections, and how to ensure the elected are judiciously carrying out their duties) which would remain to be worked out. Here are two high-level suggestions:
-TotalyMoo would still need to appoint a hand-picked skeleton crew of moderators in case the elected representatives fail in their duties. Likewise, retain the right to remove moderators before the end of their term if they are found to abuse their power or fail to carry out their responsibilities.
-Initially carried out by poll on the forums, voting could eventually be integrated into the game proper, with ballots cast in Boston (prevention of widespread alt-abuse a concern to still address)

No moderation without representation!

Interesting concept. I have to say that "No Moderation without Representation" made me smile.

We have a few potential problems with this, though they can be solved by considering me a benevolent dictator. Mods get access to a bunch of more sensitive information, mod forums and super-secret-omg-devforums. They are hidden for a reason so an elected moderator would need to be someone with a decent sense of integrity. Can of course be solved by having me be the final judge after the elections (as MM said, all mods have to be approved by PDX).

There's also the problem of the actual learning period to be a mod. Even if the person has modding experience beforehand there's a time of adjustment to get to know the rules, the forum and the systems.

Actually, wouldn't it be a better idea to simply have a community representative like they do in EVE with the CSM -- but for forum matters?

As for the ratio of mods to forumites we are at an extreme right now. But that is simply in preparation of the playerbase growing. I set up the team of five global moderators to have us prepared for the eventual onslaught of open beta.