Alright, there's a lot here to take in, so please forgive me and let me know if I skip any major points. Though I am head moderator, I can't and won't be speaking for the other moderators with concerns to the way they play their characters within the game; such concerns should instead be directed to them (and me, with regards to mine) directly, in our individual HMD threads, as they are there for that purpose. I understand that you placed them all here for the sake of not being repetitious, but I believe it would be better for all parties involved if you would do so on those concerns, if only so you can be more specific with the characterization/demonstration concerns and suggestions you have.
For my own IC activity, I will reiterate that my recent participation in game has been significantly lowered due to several hiatuses taken over the past couple months (as I mentioned in my own HMD thread); because of this, I had limited both the number of threads I took on, as well as the scope of my active CR, so that I would not be overexerting myself, or leaving others hanging. This was additionally taken as a precautionary measure, so as to give myself time to accomplish what moderating duties would be necessary during this time as well, be they the scheduled sort (applications, plotting, etc) or unscheduled sort (everything else). Maybe this was a mistake in judgment, but I felt it would be unfair to engage in new CR with new players during a period in which I knew I would not be able to resolve threads in a timely manner. While I have explained my reasons, and what steps I will soon be taking to help correct this, it is true that my activity has been poor these past two months.
However, the same cannot be said for the rest of my team, and I feel that your criticisms are skewed—perhaps by an unintended confirmation bias, or abstract standards—and factually false. You mention that the only member of the mod team you see tagging around is Nita—but the fact of the matter is, Nita is the most visible player among the mod team simply because she is literally the most active player in the game this month by a mile, and it seems a little unfair to criticize the mod team for not meeting her pace when next to no one in the playerbase on the whole comes close to that same marker, either.
I don't normally like calculating or publishing figures like this, but considering the misconception and false conclusions drawn here, I feel it might be necessary. When I say Nita is the most active "by a mile," I mean that in terms of comment count, out of eighty-plus players in game, there is only one single player in the entire game who has posted enough comments just to surpass her halfway marker. As she recently introduced a new character with a very comment-heavy first post, this sort of number skew is understandable, but I hardly think it's fair—to either the moderators or the rest of the playerbase—to say that the moderators have to be more than twice as active as everyone else in the game as a standard.
As you may be aware, Leah has been on a full hiatus for a significant portion of this month, and thus not available to tag around. However, Gabbie and Sara both have been very active in participation in-game, and I feel have been providing an excellent example; Gabbie's in the top ten of most active players, and Sara's in the top twenty, in terms of total comment counts across both communities. These high rankings exist, even while Gabbie is currently midway through a full hiatus that would exempt her from Activity Check and its standards, and Sara is devoting much of what free time she could be using for tagging to instead organize and put together the upcoming modplot. Considering these factors, they're doing far more than I would expect from any given player to consider them active.
Furthermore, on average, and excluding characters that have not tagged any network posts in August, the average number of separate network posts a single character has tagged is currently at three. Gabbie's most active character, Felicia, has tagged into seven entries; Sara's only character, Eddie, has tagged into six. These numbers are higher than the character average. Additionally, Gabbie's roster has tagged into a cumulative 15 entries, which, when compared to the activity of other players with multiple characters, has her tied for second place for highest number of entries-tagged, behind—once again—Nita, who has on my last count 17. Two posts isn't a lot, discrepancy-wise, and considering they would sometimes tag the same entries as one another, I have to admit it seems strange to me that were someone looking to measure the activity of the mod team, that they would notice the one and not the other.
I could go into activity in logs, as well, but this is already getting long in just this one point, and the numbers there illustrate a very similar pattern—as I'm sure would looking into backtags for posts made in July. These new threads also vary between old CR and new, and I know they all work hard to ensure that they do what they can to foster new CR and tag new players. Due to my recent hiatuses, as mentioned above, I have dialed back on similar measures in order to better divide my time between the game's IC field and the OOC moderator aspects, but this should be corrected soon. If you have further concerns about any given moderator's activity in terms of play, or of character balance, such concerns should be directed to the individual in question, or even to the activity concerns post. (This, of course, also applies to any concerns you may have towards a player's activity, rather than a moderator's.)
If there's specific CR you're seeking for yourself, I do really recommend talking to the player you want this CR with directly. It may be that, despite a given player's otherwise high activity, they seem less active in comparison to someone else simply because they might not have CR with you, or with your close CR at the time. It's unfortunate, but even when branching out and tagging new people, it's next to impossible to have CR with everyone in game, and it can be difficult to downright impossible to know if someone you don't have CR with does specifically want CR with you, but hasn't communicated that desire to you directly.
With regards to your concerns towards "mod controlled villains" — characters played by moderators that are not specifically plot NPCs are meant to be judged and treated like any other character in the game, rather than as some special class ranking higher than the rest of the game. We still write applications, we still have to meet activity standards; we have to have our character plots approved, and scheduled, just like everyone else. While we can sometimes participate in moderator-run plots, our characters cannot reveal information that we as mods would know, discover any information that another player character had not already revealed, or otherwise do anything that would take a pivotal role or a spotlight in a plot or event meant for everybody. C&C isn't our personal sandbox; it's a game for all of its members. While I don't believe you're asking for, for instance, the Green Goblin to become the biggest bad in all of C&C, I felt it might be useful to clarify that when we play our characters, we play them as players, not moderators.
Since you do have specific concerns about how these characters are being played, I recommend you take those concerns to them directly, if you haven't already. I'm none of the players in question, so I unfortunately cannot answer such matters as in-depth as they would with regards to canon and in-game development, but every character is different, and exhibits different traits of personality and motives in different ways. The exposure of a "villainous root" is a tricky thing to judge by, I would say, because there really is no single trait that defines a character as a villain, and even in the case of someone actively engaging in amoral behavior, not every villain is a Gargamel or a Joker or a Rita Repulsa for their canon. In serial media especially, where there are multiple "villains" with different angles, by their nature even the most bombastic of villains would go through phases of higher and lower visibility. I am not as familiar with the canon materials as their respective players, but all the ones under discussion are ones that in their various canons do and have successfully worked to disguise their natures for periods of time, or even subdue them entirely. Brian, from what I'm aware, goes through most of the first season of Dexter before being discovered as a killer. Norman Osborn has his history as the Green Goblin, but he also manages to be made the director of a United States federal law-enforcement agency, and holds that position for a significant amount of time. Edward Nygma, in the aftermath of other canon events, becomes a reformed member of society and opens a legal detective agency, and winds up working with Batman as well as other card-carrying heroes numerous times during that period to solve crimes or locate criminals.
Again, I'm sure they would discuss your specific concerns in more depth, if you wish to address them directly. If you have, though—as with any concern with someone's playing, and where direct communication hasn't seemed to brought about a resolution—please feel free to talk to me (or another moderator, as you like) about the matter further.
With regards to City Hall: "control" of City Hall was, as you indicate being aware, brought about by a player plot that went through the channels of plot scheduling and approving, as would any plot that affects the nature of the game narrative. If a character starts up a business, it's expected that people would contact the player of that character in order to use their business for plotting purposes; if characters start up a clinic, it's expected people will communicate with the players of those characters to use that clinic for plotting. It's polite, to let other people involved know when something may affect their character, and opening those channels of communication would keep everyone up-to-date as to goings-on, player plots, or what have you. The same has and would be true when, for instance, player characters have/had major involvement with the City's police force, prison system, schools, or so on, regardless of whether I or any other moderator had characters participating in such venues.
I can definitely understand that it can be daunting for a player on the outset, trying to get involved into a character or player group that is already established. Wanting a turn, so to say, at an in-game title or position can definitely be both appealing and frustrating, if feeling uncertain as to how to go about attaining it. But as a moderator, it can be difficult trying to strike a balance of fairness: it wouldn't be right, if the players or characters involved in such an institution were deliberately trying to keep new players/characters out and allowing such behavior to go unchecked, but it also wouldn't be fair to, for instance, eject the players or characters who have worked to build such a thing for the reason that they've been there too long. But, in the end, I feel that our game is a community, and foremost in that is the need for communication. Absolutely, if what attempts have been made to communicate with players (or moderators acting as players) involved with that institution have failed, then something would need to be changed, or an intervention taken, and I would be glad to help make things right.
As a token of disclosure, I do play a character with very limited involvement in this arena, and am OOCly friends with a number of its players; above that, though, I am still a moderator, and I do not choose the sides of my CR or my friends simply based on that criteria. That involvement and those feelings are ones I will put to the side, such that I can look at a situation more objectively, and determine the best and most fair course of action based on the evidence I find and is presented to me. If you are, or someone you know is seeking CR or involvement in this venue, as always I do of course recommend communicating with those players directly, either through IC or OOC methods. If it's some form of plotting regarding that venue, the plotting post is available, and we do and will offer advice through that channel if there is some specific or even unspecific goal you have in mind, but are uncertain as to how to get there.
If, however, you have gone through the routes of communication and been rebuffed—your comment reads to me as though you are in a stage prior to this, but I may be wrong—then absolutely, please talk to us about it. If the players involved are in fact engaging in behaviors that run counter to the objectives of the game, then appropriate action would be taken. As far as I am aware, the players in question have all stated publicly that they are open to new CR, as well as plotting, especially in regards to City Hall. Additionally, they have recently been taking steps in-game to provide IC "ins" to City Hall—the job fair this month, for instance. However, as I mentioned before with regards to myself, even if someone is open to new CR, or plotting, it can sometimes be difficult to know if a specific someone wishes to pursue those things with them if those desires aren't clearly expressed in the first place. Players involved may not be presenting themselves as open directly to the involvement a specific individual may want simply because they haven't been made aware of the interest in the first place.
no subject
For my own IC activity, I will reiterate that my recent participation in game has been significantly lowered due to several hiatuses taken over the past couple months (as I mentioned in my own HMD thread); because of this, I had limited both the number of threads I took on, as well as the scope of my active CR, so that I would not be overexerting myself, or leaving others hanging. This was additionally taken as a precautionary measure, so as to give myself time to accomplish what moderating duties would be necessary during this time as well, be they the scheduled sort (applications, plotting, etc) or unscheduled sort (everything else). Maybe this was a mistake in judgment, but I felt it would be unfair to engage in new CR with new players during a period in which I knew I would not be able to resolve threads in a timely manner. While I have explained my reasons, and what steps I will soon be taking to help correct this, it is true that my activity has been poor these past two months.
However, the same cannot be said for the rest of my team, and I feel that your criticisms are skewed—perhaps by an unintended confirmation bias, or abstract standards—and factually false. You mention that the only member of the mod team you see tagging around is Nita—but the fact of the matter is, Nita is the most visible player among the mod team simply because she is literally the most active player in the game this month by a mile, and it seems a little unfair to criticize the mod team for not meeting her pace when next to no one in the playerbase on the whole comes close to that same marker, either.
I don't normally like calculating or publishing figures like this, but considering the misconception and false conclusions drawn here, I feel it might be necessary. When I say Nita is the most active "by a mile," I mean that in terms of comment count, out of eighty-plus players in game, there is only one single player in the entire game who has posted enough comments just to surpass her halfway marker. As she recently introduced a new character with a very comment-heavy first post, this sort of number skew is understandable, but I hardly think it's fair—to either the moderators or the rest of the playerbase—to say that the moderators have to be more than twice as active as everyone else in the game as a standard.
As you may be aware, Leah has been on a full hiatus for a significant portion of this month, and thus not available to tag around. However, Gabbie and Sara both have been very active in participation in-game, and I feel have been providing an excellent example; Gabbie's in the top ten of most active players, and Sara's in the top twenty, in terms of total comment counts across both communities. These high rankings exist, even while Gabbie is currently midway through a full hiatus that would exempt her from Activity Check and its standards, and Sara is devoting much of what free time she could be using for tagging to instead organize and put together the upcoming modplot. Considering these factors, they're doing far more than I would expect from any given player to consider them active.
Furthermore, on average, and excluding characters that have not tagged any network posts in August, the average number of separate network posts a single character has tagged is currently at three. Gabbie's most active character, Felicia, has tagged into seven entries; Sara's only character, Eddie, has tagged into six. These numbers are higher than the character average. Additionally, Gabbie's roster has tagged into a cumulative 15 entries, which, when compared to the activity of other players with multiple characters, has her tied for second place for highest number of entries-tagged, behind—once again—Nita, who has on my last count 17. Two posts isn't a lot, discrepancy-wise, and considering they would sometimes tag the same entries as one another, I have to admit it seems strange to me that were someone looking to measure the activity of the mod team, that they would notice the one and not the other.
I could go into activity in logs, as well, but this is already getting long in just this one point, and the numbers there illustrate a very similar pattern—as I'm sure would looking into backtags for posts made in July. These new threads also vary between old CR and new, and I know they all work hard to ensure that they do what they can to foster new CR and tag new players. Due to my recent hiatuses, as mentioned above, I have dialed back on similar measures in order to better divide my time between the game's IC field and the OOC moderator aspects, but this should be corrected soon. If you have further concerns about any given moderator's activity in terms of play, or of character balance, such concerns should be directed to the individual in question, or even to the activity concerns post. (This, of course, also applies to any concerns you may have towards a player's activity, rather than a moderator's.)
If there's specific CR you're seeking for yourself, I do really recommend talking to the player you want this CR with directly. It may be that, despite a given player's otherwise high activity, they seem less active in comparison to someone else simply because they might not have CR with you, or with your close CR at the time. It's unfortunate, but even when branching out and tagging new people, it's next to impossible to have CR with everyone in game, and it can be difficult to downright impossible to know if someone you don't have CR with does specifically want CR with you, but hasn't communicated that desire to you directly.
With regards to your concerns towards "mod controlled villains" — characters played by moderators that are not specifically plot NPCs are meant to be judged and treated like any other character in the game, rather than as some special class ranking higher than the rest of the game. We still write applications, we still have to meet activity standards; we have to have our character plots approved, and scheduled, just like everyone else. While we can sometimes participate in moderator-run plots, our characters cannot reveal information that we as mods would know, discover any information that another player character had not already revealed, or otherwise do anything that would take a pivotal role or a spotlight in a plot or event meant for everybody. C&C isn't our personal sandbox; it's a game for all of its members. While I don't believe you're asking for, for instance, the Green Goblin to become the biggest bad in all of C&C, I felt it might be useful to clarify that when we play our characters, we play them as players, not moderators.
Since you do have specific concerns about how these characters are being played, I recommend you take those concerns to them directly, if you haven't already. I'm none of the players in question, so I unfortunately cannot answer such matters as in-depth as they would with regards to canon and in-game development, but every character is different, and exhibits different traits of personality and motives in different ways. The exposure of a "villainous root" is a tricky thing to judge by, I would say, because there really is no single trait that defines a character as a villain, and even in the case of someone actively engaging in amoral behavior, not every villain is a Gargamel or a Joker or a Rita Repulsa for their canon. In serial media especially, where there are multiple "villains" with different angles, by their nature even the most bombastic of villains would go through phases of higher and lower visibility. I am not as familiar with the canon materials as their respective players, but all the ones under discussion are ones that in their various canons do and have successfully worked to disguise their natures for periods of time, or even subdue them entirely. Brian, from what I'm aware, goes through most of the first season of Dexter before being discovered as a killer. Norman Osborn has his history as the Green Goblin, but he also manages to be made the director of a United States federal law-enforcement agency, and holds that position for a significant amount of time. Edward Nygma, in the aftermath of other canon events, becomes a reformed member of society and opens a legal detective agency, and winds up working with Batman as well as other card-carrying heroes numerous times during that period to solve crimes or locate criminals.
Again, I'm sure they would discuss your specific concerns in more depth, if you wish to address them directly. If you have, though—as with any concern with someone's playing, and where direct communication hasn't seemed to brought about a resolution—please feel free to talk to me (or another moderator, as you like) about the matter further.
With regards to City Hall: "control" of City Hall was, as you indicate being aware, brought about by a player plot that went through the channels of plot scheduling and approving, as would any plot that affects the nature of the game narrative. If a character starts up a business, it's expected that people would contact the player of that character in order to use their business for plotting purposes; if characters start up a clinic, it's expected people will communicate with the players of those characters to use that clinic for plotting. It's polite, to let other people involved know when something may affect their character, and opening those channels of communication would keep everyone up-to-date as to goings-on, player plots, or what have you. The same has and would be true when, for instance, player characters have/had major involvement with the City's police force, prison system, schools, or so on, regardless of whether I or any other moderator had characters participating in such venues.
I can definitely understand that it can be daunting for a player on the outset, trying to get involved into a character or player group that is already established. Wanting a turn, so to say, at an in-game title or position can definitely be both appealing and frustrating, if feeling uncertain as to how to go about attaining it. But as a moderator, it can be difficult trying to strike a balance of fairness: it wouldn't be right, if the players or characters involved in such an institution were deliberately trying to keep new players/characters out and allowing such behavior to go unchecked, but it also wouldn't be fair to, for instance, eject the players or characters who have worked to build such a thing for the reason that they've been there too long. But, in the end, I feel that our game is a community, and foremost in that is the need for communication. Absolutely, if what attempts have been made to communicate with players (or moderators acting as players) involved with that institution have failed, then something would need to be changed, or an intervention taken, and I would be glad to help make things right.
As a token of disclosure, I do play a character with very limited involvement in this arena, and am OOCly friends with a number of its players; above that, though, I am still a moderator, and I do not choose the sides of my CR or my friends simply based on that criteria. That involvement and those feelings are ones I will put to the side, such that I can look at a situation more objectively, and determine the best and most fair course of action based on the evidence I find and is presented to me. If you are, or someone you know is seeking CR or involvement in this venue, as always I do of course recommend communicating with those players directly, either through IC or OOC methods. If it's some form of plotting regarding that venue, the plotting post is available, and we do and will offer advice through that channel if there is some specific or even unspecific goal you have in mind, but are uncertain as to how to get there.
If, however, you have gone through the routes of communication and been rebuffed—your comment reads to me as though you are in a stage prior to this, but I may be wrong—then absolutely, please talk to us about it. If the players involved are in fact engaging in behaviors that run counter to the objectives of the game, then appropriate action would be taken. As far as I am aware, the players in question have all stated publicly that they are open to new CR, as well as plotting, especially in regards to City Hall. Additionally, they have recently been taking steps in-game to provide IC "ins" to City Hall—the job fair this month, for instance. However, as I mentioned before with regards to myself, even if someone is open to new CR, or plotting, it can sometimes be difficult to know if a specific someone wishes to pursue those things with them if those desires aren't clearly expressed in the first place. Players involved may not be presenting themselves as open directly to the involvement a specific individual may want simply because they haven't been made aware of the interest in the first place.