saveyourselves | MOD ANNOUNCEMENT

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MOD ANNOUNCEMENT

As many of you are aware, there has been a recent incident involving ourselves and a few players. We wish to address this matter here.

Firstly, we apologize not only for our delay in speaking on this, but for our own behavior during this. We do take fault for having been too inflexible on the matter which started everything. All of us are to blame for this inflexibility and we all take responsibility for it; not just one mod is fully to blame for anything which happened. The plot the player desired should not have been dealt with in the way that it was. Our reasoning had been that we had not seen evidence that the plot had been set in stone, we had not been given reason why change was necessary to reconcile the plots, and that the details behind this plot/what was needed to occur to bring it to fruition were not brought to us. We offered one compromise, it was not taken, and we should have been more flexible about offering further compromises. We are, again, sorry for that inflexibility on our end.

Secondly, to prevent any risk of this sort of situation ever happening again, we are discussing a frankly overdue new system of accounting for, organizing, and simplifying coordination between planned plots, both meta and player. Details on it will be coming soon.

And thirdly, the mod with the most concerns voiced about her has been issued a warning, and will be taking far less of a stance involving plot-related issues for the time being. We will monitor her behavior to ensure a repeat of this kind of situation does not occur again and, should it, she will be dealt with. In line with those concerns, while she will still be involved in plotting and whatever issues may come to us, the other mods will have far greater a say, and will be considered the figures of authority where directly addressing player concerns and needs is concerned.

However, what we stand firm about is that ganging up on a person while refusing their own comfort is not permissible. The mod in question had become extremely uncomfortable having so many people, including one not in the game, on her all at once while she was not feeling well. This was the reason warnings were issued. We do, however, concede to having been too impulsive in issuing warnings to all involved, and once more, we do apologize to the parties who had been warned without having acted severely enough to warrant a warning. All but one of the warnings has been lifted.

Finally, not all the mods are experienced mods, and even the more experienced mods will acknowledge they can always use some help. So please, we ask that if any of you have any suggestions on how we might improve to come and tell us.

Thank you and, once again, we all apologize for our respective parts in this situation.

Comments to this post are enabled. At request, they have been unscreened. If you have left a screened comment and would like it unscreened, please indicate so! As per the suggestion of Guin, if you would prefer to leave us a screened comment, please do so on the Mod Contact post.

We will make a second post addressing those concerns, resolutions, and invitation of a second round of feedback as soon as we're able.

UPDATE - 5/3:

The StE modteam is currently planning to come together as a group and discuss all the issues brought to them on this post. Linda and Guin will be present while we are all on to continue discussion as a full team in order to ensure that all points and issues are thoroughly addressed.

This discussion will be happening as soon as possible - but coordinating schedules has proven difficult, so please bear with us.

This post will be edited accordingly once the discussion's day and time have been set.

UPDATE - 5/3:

The discussion will begin Sunday, May 4th, 5:00 P.M. CDT/3:00 P.M. PST.

UPDATE - 5/4:

The discussion has begun and is underway; it's proven to be more intensive than anticipated and hasn't yet ended, but will resume tomorrow and continue until concluded.

In the meantime, screencaps of the discussion thus far are posted at Linda's public Plurk; further updates will be made on this post and the linked Plurk, including the date, once set, of the second post.

UPDATE - 5/5:

Discussion has now concluded - we're sorry for having been quiet for so long!

Formal address of the points brought to this post as well as a second OOC post and a mod apps announcement will be coming by the end of tomorrow - Tuesday, 5/6.

- THE STE MODS: Anduin, Blue, Mini, and Olga

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Batty did not include us in that plurk to make Olga feel cornered. She included us for the purpose of accountability, both the mods' and her own. At the time she did not trust any member of the mod team would treat her fairly and wanted witnesses to ensure the mods she contacted would act reasonably, and she also wanted the pressure of having witnesses to keep herself from saying something she'd regret.

I know I personally have requested to have a moderator present during a discussion with another player not because I wanted to feel like I had a mod on my side, but because I did not trust myself to remain level-headed without having that sort of accountability hanging over me. Part of Batty's reason for including us was the same.

However, I understand that Olga was not in a good place to handle a mod complaint at the time, and I understand why the situation made her feel cornered. I offer the above as an explanation, but I acknowledge my part in upsetting her and making her feel like she was being ganged up on, and I would like to extend an apology to Olga for my role in making her feel uncomfortable.

I appreciate the attempt the mods are making at amends with this post, but I feel like the main issue here has not been addressed: that is, Batty felt she was not treated fairly in regards to the plot issue. A player had a problem and addressed it through the proper channels at every stage, and not only did she have her original concern (being treated unfairly) brushed off, but she was given a warning (for which she has not received an apology) for voicing it in the first place.

This incident has pretty much guaranteed that players cannot feel comfortable bringing issues to the mods privately. It's clear by all the sock accounts in this post, and even I feel like I'm risking my position in the game by posting this from an account that has my name attached. After this, you need to have a public by default mod contact means available, because many players no longer feel like they can trust the mod team to be reasonable without public eyes on them to hold them accountable for what they do.

I know it sucks to be scrutinized so heavily, but if you lose trust, you have to earn it back, and increased transparency is one way to start.

+1 to most of what you're saying, but asserting that anonymous communities have no value ever when in fact that was the main way most of us even figured out this was consistent issue with the mods is kind of obtuse.

I personally don't like them since things tend to be skewed and you can't verify a source if it's anonymous so you might have old players who dropped causing problems and gods know what else, but that's just my personal opinion. I can totally see why people would find them useful, but mods should really not go on there if they want to remain level-headed and fair when a situation arrives. I probably should have just said "as a mod" and not "as a mod and a player".

Though it isn't a good thing if a player has to find out about something going on in their game from an anonymous source.

The whining about being "ganged up on" while "refusing their own comfort" (what??) is childish, inaccurate, and inappropriate here. Olga was not the only mod invited to that plurk; the plurk was to Anduin as well. Not the players' fault if Anduin wasn't around to respond, or didn't choose to.

In addition, Olga had NO obligation to engage in a discussion in that plurk while she wasn't feeling well. She started engaging in a conversation BEFORE mentioning that she had a migraine. The players in that plurk were conscientious of that, and when Olga did (finally) put the conversation on hold until the next day, the others involved gracefully accepted that.

Things Olga could have done differently:

- waited until she was feeling better to respond
- responded briefly just to acknowledge that she saw the plurk, and waited until she was feeling better to delve into a conversation
- gotten hold of Anduin, the other mod invited to the plurk, so that she would have some backup
- worked with Batty to find a venue (such as a private plurk with two mods, Batty, and one other player) that both of them were comfortable with

She CHOSE to engage immediately and alone.

I've seen the plurk in question. There were a lot of people there, yes - maybe too many, but Batty did explain her reasoning for inviting them. Olga waited until her second to last reply in the plurk to say that she didn't appreciate "being ganged up [on] by all of you as I was." If she had truly felt uncomfortable, she should have said so right at the beginning. She should have told Batty right away if she felt it was inappropriate to have someone not in the game involved in the plurk. She should have worked with Batty to find a venue that everyone was comfortable with, where no one felt "ganged up on" or alone. Instead, she took part in the conversation when by her own account she had a migraine. She insisted on sharing the whole matter with her comods, including Mini, despite Batty's attempts to explain to her that she felt uncomfortable having Mini involved in the discussion. She waited to voice her own discomfort at being "ganged up on" until after she had already begun discussing in-depth.

Everything else aside, this accusation and the resulting PMs and ban warnings are bullshit. The PM sent to those players involved in the plurk said, among other things, that "It is unacceptable to ambush and gang up on another person" (my emphasis). THIS DID NOT HAPPEN. There were no attacks. There was no ambushing. This was a plurk, not a knife to Olga's throat, and she had no obligation to say anything more there than "hey, I see this. Batty, let's talk tomorrow."

The transcripts of the plurk and resulting PMs aren't mine to share, but I would highly encourage anyone involved in the game to seek them out and read them for themselves, in order to get an unbiased picture of what happened.

You definitely do have to slog through a lot of shit on anon comms; I can understand not wanting to look through them because they're essentially the gossip mags of the RP world and it can be kind of stressful sometimes. It just seemed a bit strange to me to offer not going there as advice in this particular scenario, considering it was a big part in alerting players to this problem and kind of directly goes against what you're saying.

But yeah, it's not a good thing when a player has to find out about issue going on in their game from an anonymous source - that's the point. If it's getting that bad, then it's a major red flag that might have gone ignored because it's very easy to think "it's just me" otherwise. As you said, you had no idea there was even a problem.

Yeah, I see your point. My own bias against them makes it hard to see that they can be useful sometimes. Sorry if I sounded contradictory or like I was shaming the people who went to the anon comms. I honestly didn't mean to.

The old adage is generally 'go to the mods', and that's generally what I want to do right off the bat. However, having seen the ban-threatening PMs they have sent players for bringing up issues (which, might I add, contain language that in my humble opinion slants pretty heavily in an almost bullying direction), an immense amount of doubt starts arising. I can't go to a private mod venue and fully trust that I won't have my fun in a game outright threatened for complaining at the drop of a hat; and where else am I supposed to go, if I want to get feedback from anywhere that isn't potentially hostile mods or my immediate plurk friend circle?

Echoing what's already been said, the fact that we've been driven to having to unearth most of these issues in an anoncomm in the first place really does not speak well for the climate of communication in-game.

I personally didn't have a clue what was going on until today, and honestly I probably wouldn't have cared to know if it weren't for the vague talk about "an incident" and "treating the mods like people" (I thought that one was actually about Fran.)

But when it's gotten to the point where people are using sock accounts for fear of banning/getting their plots rejected and there's quite a bit of serious talk about making a clone game... that's alarming.

After reading everything over (and not just anon gossip!), I'm going to add my vote to the "Mini should be removed from the modteam" pile, for the sake of the stability of the game. And the other commenters here have good points, so please try and take them to heart!

Edited 2014-05-02 19:26 (UTC)

At the time she did not trust any member of the mod team would treat her fairly and wanted witnesses to ensure the mods she contacted would act reasonably, and she also wanted the pressure of having witnesses to keep herself from saying something she'd regret.

You know, I agree that the mods pretty much fucked the dog in every possible area here, but this was stupid, and it was triply stupid that Batty brought in someone who isn't even in the game. The plurk got leaked to the public at large anyway, and that could have happened even without extra uninvolved witnesses, so the excuse of needing you there as witnesses to prove something is obviously ridiculous -- the screencaps did a better job of proving what happened than your word would anyway. And I don't even feel like the second reason needs to be addressed. Batty is an adult and she needs to be accountable for her own actions just like the mods do. If she's incapable of handling discussions without having a posse of people to hold her hand, she's not mature enough to be in this game, period.

Basically, bottom line is that the mods handled this horribly, but you guys (and Batty in particular) aren't exactly smelling like roses here, and to be honest while I appreciate that you had the balls to apologize, I'd like to see other people involved do the same, Batty in particular. The way I see it, the mods made an initial fuckup by being inflexible, you guys overreacted to that fuckup, and the mods in turn overreacted to your overreaction. Are the mods probably more at fault? Sure, and they also have more responsibility by virtue of being mods, but the fact remains that the situation probably could have been resolved quietly had there not been the overreaction on your parts. The mods would have still fucked up part one, but it wouldn't have exploded into an incident which has frankly killed (maybe temporarily, maybe not) the game's OOC atmosphere for everyone, including completely uninvolved parties like myself.

Seems pretty much right. IDK about suspension vs. dropping Mini as a mod, myself, but either way the mod team probably needs an addition if nothing else.

It'd also be nice to see that AC issue addressed, of course, whether it's as bad as people are making it seem or not or whatever.

On the one hand I'd almost be glad it managed to escalate to this level, purely because seeing the full extent to which this mod team is apparently capable of overreacting is an eye-opener that could have potentially happened further down the road with another misstep anyway, and might as well be nipped on the bud now. But on the other hand you guys' and Batty's conduct has been far from stellar either. Input from everyone in the party in the open where it can he openly discussed would be good to have, and I am particularly interested in what Batty's say might be in all of this.

Either way, you should all try to consider these factors in the future before bringing friends into private plurks for moral support again.

So there's been a lot of call for Mini to resign, but I'm not so sure.

First of all, I would like to know Mini's reason for not moving her death drop thing. I would actually like to see what exactly happened in those conversations in general, or at least hear some explanation of it from the other side. I may be outing myself here since I've mentioned this before, but to be blunt, her refusal to move that death seems so bizarrely unnecessary that I have to wonder if there's something we're missing. All we see of that initial complaint is the aftermath: namely, that the people who were throwing the party were upset. Mini should come forward and explain her motivations. If they're stupid, then fine, I agree we should axe her, but right now as far as I know we have zero explanation at all, and that means our picture is incomplete.

Secondly, since the crux of the problem that pushed this from 'annoying' to 'abjectly horrible' was the PMs, I'd like to know who wrote them up. Whichever mod that was is the one who should be cut from the modteam. If it was Mini, then again, she should be cut, but I don't see any evidence just now that it was. If anything, I would think that it'd be Olga, right? Since she was the offended party. I'd also like to see the mods explain who exactly was responsible for that piece of work.

The plurk got leaked to the public at large anyway, and that could have happened even without extra uninvolved witnesses

I'm not sure whether your complaint is that Batty should not have included witnesses at all or whether only the ex-player specifically should not have been included. Could you please clarify?

I think the only people who should have been in the plurk were people directly involved in the incident. I know for a fact that the person not in the game wouldn't qualify, because that's obvious. I don't know enough about the plots in question or the discussion before that plurk to know who would and would not be directly involved.

I will say this much: 'moral support' is not sufficient justification for someone to be included in a discussion plurk of a matter like that. Neither is the desire to have witnesses. This is the internet, and even if it had literally only been Batty by herself with the mods in that plurk, she would have had hard evidence of any misconduct on the part of the mods, because the discussion is text on a page that can be pastebinned or screencapped -- which is exactly what ended up happening anyway.

I'm not really the sort of guy who goes around handing out his fuckin' opinion to just anyone. I'm not like Walter, who flies off the handle the second someone says something he disagrees with.

But yeah, man, I guess now's a good time to really speak up, huh? Now or never or what-have-you. And, uh, I have to agree with almost everything said here already. I'm sure the earlier out-of-character post and the PMs were a real, honest-to-good mistake on the part of the mods -- probably made in the heat of the moment. But the way it was it was handled?

Very un-Dude.

And yeah, I think all this stuff that's written here is all pretty fuckin' vague, man. Like, there were a couple of times reading this thing where I was like what exactly's going on here? Maybe you're trying to avoid mentioning specifics because you don't wanna create more drama for the, uh, involved parties, but that's what this game needs, man. Specifics. The whole vague thing just kinda sets people off. And when people are already pissed off, there's no use pissing them off any more than you have already. Tell us who got warned, what you're going to do to fix this little problem of yours, and, uh, how you're going to prevent it from happening in the future. Maybe consider opening up mod apps, too.

That's all people want, man.

I'm pretty sure you guys are gonna clarify things in your next post so I don't want to waste my time repeating what everyone else's said already. Just know that I'm pretty much in agreement here.

I hope you guys take it fuckin' easy before you write anything else and come back to all this with a level head.

Maybe smoke a J first, too.

Yeah, maybe the mods made a mis-step, but the "Moral Support" angle is just flat-out not cool, there were what, 3-4 people on Batty's side, including someone who wasn't even the game, to Olga and (theoretically, since he never actually showed) Anduin. That still means you guys outnumbered the mods you were trying to discuss, and with Batty bringing in so many people to "make sure she didn't say something stupid" or "having witnesses", much less people who were outside the game already as-is, is not cool. You're bringing in someone who cannot be unbiased, and wouldn't know (and has no reason to know) the finer details on either side. It's cheerleading, plain and simple, and even if the mods clearly overreacted to the idea of being ganged up on, that doesn't make what happened cool.

Man I said this wasn't cool like three times in this post

BASICALLY two wrongs don't make a right, etc. Just because the Mods are objectively worse off here doesn't mean that you guys didn't fuck up.

e: Also whoops I called Anduin a dude here, that's my bad. Meant to say she.

Edited 2014-05-02 20:50 (UTC)

I knew it was an issue from some past wank, but this is definite proof that you guys really, really need to work on your inter-mod communication. Because the original explanation given for prioritizing Mini over a previously approved plot initially came from some mods being unaware of important information about what's going on in game.

That's a really bad thing, and the fact that it's given as an explanation for issues in game as much as it is is even worse, because it shows me that you guys really haven't done anything to fix this issue, if it's not just an excuse.

Ban threats were very much out of line, and I'm glad you've come to recognize us, but it's very bad form to apologize with the "but you drove us to this" caveat in it. Do I think that many people, including one not in game, needed to be there? Not necessarily, but this is hardly an offense worth a warning. Furthermore, the fact that including two mods means you only get one shouldn't be something to blame the players for. That's on Anduin. While I understand that her schedule may not line up perfectly with Olga's and it's ridiculous to expect her to be around 24/7, the fact of the matter is that she never seems to be around. I've been in this game for a good chunk of its existence(though I did join after the Desu/Robyn fiasco) and I've literally never seen Anduin do anything.

So, while Batty and co. are probably aware of the fact that Anduin rarely does anything, that should not be something to hold on them. They tried to include her anyway, so their aim was certainly not to "gang up" on anyone. In fact, upon discovering that Olga didn't feel well they actively encouraged her to leave and come back when she felt better. They stated multiple times that they were fine with waiting and with Olga passing on info to the mods they were complaining about but would rather not talk to directly, which I think is 100% more cooperative and reasonable than the mods were being with this particular matter.

I've tried to be supportive of the mods, because while you're an extremely flawed team I enjoy this game a lot and would certainly like to see you do better. I'd like to believe you can do better. We've seen a few improvements in response to criticism, but the biggest issues within the mod team never seem to be addressed. I've had the most communication with Blue as a mod, because honestly? She's the only one who ever really felt approachable and available, even if she certainly has other faults as a mod. As before stated, I've never seen Anduin do anything modly. I've seen Olga do echoes and apps occasionally, but it feels like a pretty large amount of the time it's Mini. While I understand that mod duties aren't always noticeable, it is important to try and have some sort of visible presence in the game, because it makes players feel a lot more like you're worth approaching. Mini I definitely see around but she seems to be very selective with who she'll interact, which isn't what a mod should be. She doesn't have to be everyone's friend, but she should seem available for discussion. She should also seem like someone you can have a discussion with without getting condescending, aggressively worded responses like she's often prone to. I agree with everyone who says she seems to nitpick whatever people are saying and jump to the worst possible conclusions from it.

1/4 for mods I feel comfortable talking to is a really bad sign, in my opinion.

I have nothing useful to add to the actual topic of the post but I just have to say this

You, sir, are a gentleman and a scholar.

Four to two or even four to one isn't that bad. You're making it seem like it was fifteen on one. They acknowledged that Olga wasn't feeling well, and one even outright said, and I quote:

"with Batty's permission i'm stepping in-- feel free to respond to this tomorrow when you're feeling much better."

Thanks, man. Really appreciate the vote of confidence.

I will concede that including an ex-player may not have been the best choice, when current players' voices hold more weight.

However, I respectfully disagree that Batty should have handled that plurk alone. She already had reason to suspect that this game's authority figures would not treat her fairly, and was in fact bringing that very concern to an authority figure about another authority figure. She did not feel safe being alone in a mod space at that time, and we felt that was a legitimate concern.

In that situation, it is perfectly natural to want witnesses to the conversation. Witnesses are used as a way to hold all parties involved accountable for their actions. This happens in real life all the time, and I see no reason why RP should be treated differently.

Not devaluing that Olga made a mistake sticking around, because, really, she did. Mods stand on the worst side of this and I'm not going to say they aren't, but I think you're underestimating a four to two or a four to one convo, Anon. Especially in a decently fast-communicating social media like Plurk, it's very easy to feel like you're being overwhelmed and cornered in that sort of situation. And it's even worse if you're suffering some sort of headache/migraine issue like Olga was at the time.

I consider myself someone to who socializing comes fairly easily, and if I was being talked to like that four to one, I would have bailed in a heartbeat. Olga absolutely should have bailed, yes, but that doesn't make bringing in "moral support" of three other people one who, again, wasn't even involved in the game and absolutely should -not- have been involved in an active discussion with mods right.

Edited 2014-05-02 21:27 (UTC)

First of all, as I said: in real life, witnesses are sometimes used to corroborate a story. That isn't needed in a plurk, because hard evidence can be easily obtained through a screencap or pastebin. Everything that is said is recorded by definition because it's being written down.

Second of all, you weren't acting as witnesses. If you were witnesses, you would have been silent during the discussion, and then maybe after it happened you would have offered your view on what happened. You and the other 'witnesses' were not watching silently. You were actively participating in the discussion, and at least one of you (apparently the person not in the game) was getting pointlessly aggressive.

And finally: Batty is an adult, and this was, in the grand scheme of things, a relatively minor disagreement about a plot in an RP game. The idea that she is not capable of 'handling' a discussion of that nature or that she does not 'feel safe' is ridiculous. A requirement of being a player in an RP game is having the emotional maturity to deal with problems in a way that does not needlessly escalate a situation. I don't really think any rational observer can look at what happened and argue that bringing in 'witnesses' did not escalate the situation. To be honest, had I been a mod in that situation, I would have been pretty annoyed myself to have been bitched at by someone who isn't even in the game. Did Olga overreact horribly? Obviously, but she wouldn't have had anything to overreact to in the first place if Batty had just put on her big girl panties and realized that she was not actually 'unsafe' going in alone in a discussion about RP games on the internet. If the discussion had still gone sour and Olga rudely blew her off, she could have taken screencaps of the plurk and made them public -- you know, exactly like what ended up actually happening anyway.

And look, obviously everyone slips up and makes stupid decisions sometimes, and that's fine. It was a tense situation. And I would absolutely accept Batty or anyone else saying, it was a tense situation due to the initial mod misconduct and the choices made were not ideal or something of that nature. But if you're arguing that bringing those people in was actually the optimal choice after all, that is frankly pretty worrying, and does not bode well for future conflicts you all may be involved in.

Hey. I've been a mod. I am not underestimating how fast plurk and such move. That plurk? Was civil. No one ganged up on anyone. You are coming across as a white knight who is trying to distract and take away from actual discussion by adding to the, "but they started it" bits.

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

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