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Mafia Season Six | Review Thread | Snatching Defeat from the Jaws of Victory

Karkador

Banned
Hey everyone.

I subbed into this Season mid-way, and I have a fair amount of comments to make about player activity and such, as a player in a game. But hold that thought for now, because I want to talk about Community Rules and Player Conduct.

As of Season 6, these are the only rules concerning player conduct that I can find in a typical rulelist post in our games:

1. All site-wide rules are also applicable here. Please do not tarnish this community.
5. Do not refer or discuss to player activity in other forum threads or life in general beyond the game.
6. The player list includes the preferred personal pronoun of each player. Please try to use the correct pronoun.
7. Please be nice to your fellow players. Mafia can be a tense experience, and occasionally aggressive play is useful, but remember this is game and that everyone should have fun.
8. Treat this game as a commitment. Remember that other players' fun is dependent on your participation; this game only works if you remain reasonably active.

Short version:
I think it's become clear that these rules aren't enough of a guideline (for the players or the game runners) to keep player conduct in order. I'm not necessarily looking to impose new rules; but I want the existing rules (including those we have left unwritten) to be clearly defined and enforced, so that everybody is clear on what's expected in these games.


Long version:

I'm gonna preface this by stating the obvious - this is a game community unlike many others on NeoGAF. We aren't tied to a particular fandom or subculture like a lot of other Off-Topic Communities, so there's a high potential for different personalities to come around here and play together. I think this is a good thing that keeps things fresh for a game that is inherently social, and I have personally enjoyed interacting with all sorts of people.

With that said, there will inevitably be personality clashes; Mafia itself is a game that some might say "ends friendships". That's usually said as a joke, but still - it's a hostile situation that we willingly sign up for. I'd compare it to boxing - you're willingly putting yourself into a ring to hit and get hit, but there are safety regulations to make sure people don't get seriously injured, or play unfairly.

I've been involved in this community since our first game. I've watched people go through game after game and get along and become friends. I've also seen (and personally experienced) people not get along, using underhanded tactics to get under the skin, get personal, fling insults, and disrespect others.

I think most of us here (if not, everyone) is enough of an adult, and enough of a decent Mafia player, to recognize that we don't need to be jerks to play this game, and that there is no good reason to ruin the game for other people by being jerks towards them.

I understand that in the pressure of the game, people lose sight of things, maybe stop seeing things straight, and become irrational. That's part of the game, by design. But it's also why we need a stronger and more specific set of guidelines for people to refer to when those occasions get to be beyond what is appropriate for the game.


So what should the guidelines be? I think that's up for discussion, but for starters:

  • Personal, real-life details are not up for debate, and are not relevant to the game. This has to be re-stated and expanded to specify matters of gender and preferred pronouns.
    • Your personal politics in this matter aren't important here. If you can't afford a fellow player the benefit of trusting and respecting their real-life identity, their real-life schedule and priorities, then you're denying them the necessary baseline of honesty they need to play this pretend game about lying. In other words, you are making it impossible for them to play.
    • Because pronoun mistakes can easily be abused, it has to be watched more carefully. That's the reality, and it should be enforced. I understand that we have a rule barring us from editing posts, but that rule should be realistically encouraging more careful posting, not less. I honestly wonder what you're up to in your mafia games that you can't even point at people correctly.
  • Overtly trash-talking players (telling them they suck, calling them idiots, etc.) is not necessary to play the game, and you're brushing up against NeoGAF's own TOS by acting like this. If you are intent on being hostile, and if Mafia is 'supposed to have insults', this honestly might be the wrong community for you.
  • Moderators, you can't drag your feet on addressing these issues in your games. Encourage players to contact you if there are problems. Be active in your games to get situations under control. Modkill players and/or report them to GAF mods if there's a problem. The rules should be there for you and your players to know when someone has stepped out of line.

Feel free to add to that, as it definitely needs to cover more bases. I'll probably come back to it and add, too.


I'll stop this post here, but this should hopefully be an ongoing conversation in this thread.
 

squidyj

Member
I feel like outer gafia spec threads are actually just the worst. With some form archival on discord I would prefer that spec threads take place on there just because it works to promote much more conversation.
 

RetroMG

Member
I have a lot of thoughts, but I'm holding off until more people have spoken. Good discussion so far.

I will point that I haven't actually tested the archival feature for the new bot yet. I'll make a point to do it within the next day or two.
 

roytheone

Member
On prenouns: I agree we should be harsher on this. Of course, mistakes can be made so if someone accidentally does it wrong once that should be a warning and not a direct removal, but with repeat offenses action should be taken. However, that also means we should make a differentiation between people wanting to be called them/they etc and people that have no preference. Right now both are indicated as [-], which is already kinda weird and confusing. If we are going to be more strict on correct prenoun use, this has to be made more clear.

Discord VS spec chat. I personally like discord more. However, I don't know how many people that want to spectate don't want to use discord. If that are many, we should use OG.

On the amount of games in season 7: I think it is a good idea to have fewer games. However, that will mean we will probably have a bunch of players that will not get in a game. If that is the case, we should probably start season 7.5 relatively quickly, and not necessarily wait until a main season game is done like we do now. Another idea is to have a "delayed" main season game, maybe the one that just missed running immediately, and run that one like 3 weeks after the start of the other games.

Other point: I actually really liked that Scrafty made the final day in BB unlimited in time. Final days require a lot of effort, often players have to look back at a lot of posts to be sure they are making the correct decision. So if those days are only 24 hours/48 hours long, and one of the players is coincidentally a bit busy then, that could severely impact the game. For that reason i think they should never be 24 hours and always longer.
 

CzarTim

Member
yeah, and I imagine Harry Potter, ac, and Star Wars were pretty big draws too

on the amount if newcomers: you guys realize that asides from those first few hours when everyone was re-signing, a newcomer would have to know about the thread to find it? Contrast to maybe the season 4 recruitment, where we were using the sign up thread as the main thread already (somewhat), meaning that the thread was on page 1 more

That's the main issue imo. If we're not on page 1 for a decent or more lengthy amount of time, newcomers won't really see the thread.

Maybe we should look into when most of the newcomers each season signed up, but I imagine it's pretty front loaded, which will always happen, but can probably be addressed to minimize that issue

I wasn't really aware we changed how we approached recruitment threads. Though I'm wondering if discord and out-of-site communication is causing less chatting and thus less bumping. We should def. encourage people to, in a non-spammy way, use the recruitment thread more once it's up.

[*]Moderators, you can't drag your feet on addressing these issues in your games. Encourage players to contact you if there are problems. Be active in your games to get situations under control. Modkill players and/or report them to GAF mods if there's a problem. The rules should be there for you and your players to know when someone has stepped out of line.

I think this is the main problem. It REALLY sucks feeling like you need to chastise / babysit grown-ups playing an internet game. And since we don't want to discourage people from signing up, it leads to passive responses. In the heat of the moment it's sometimes hard to tell if your anger as a moderator is just stress from the game not going as you hoped or justified from rule breaking. Sometimes it's clear cut, too, but it often feels like a modkill isn't fully justified which causes more minor offences as there isn't any real punishment.

I'm actually wondering if we need a surrogate like 'ModBot' or something. Not necessarily a new account, but someone from the mod team who to step in and inform the offending party of the punishment with the preface that it's a decision from the mod team and not an individual thing.
 

Ourobolus

Banned
I'm actually wondering if we need a surrogate like 'ModBot' or something. Not necessarily a new account, but someone from the mod team who to step in and inform the offending party of the punishment with the preface that it's a decision from the mod team and not an individual thing.

Well Retro is the GAFia Dad. He should do it.

"CzarTim, I just want to let you know that we aren't mad. We're just really disappointed."
 

RetroMG

Member
Well Retro is the GAFia Dad. He should do it.

"CzarTim, I just want to let you know that we aren't mad. We're just really disappointed."

If that's who I need to be now, I can do that. I've *already* been doing it to some extent. Just as long as it doesn't become an issue once I become a real dad.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Just a side note, I've been experimenting with Discord logging and it doesn't work quite how a rational human would expect logging to work. (More like it forwards messages to another channel.) That's not to say that moving discussion to Discord can't work - Discord logs can be transferred by hand, it's just kind of a pain to do, and I'm researching better options.

If the community really wants discussion on Discord, we can make it happen. It's just not going to be as easy as I thought it would be an hour ago.
 

CzarTim

Member
22-30 players: main season game. Must be approved and advertised through the existing channels. Complexity is allowed, but the game should be recognisably Mafia (ie. Of Gods and Men would be fine, Volcano Island stretches the definition a bit)

15-21 players: mid season game. Must be approved through existing channels, but advertised in the main thread whenever the gamerunner wants except for during main season recruitment. People can sign up/drop out as they please, and once the game is full* the usual confirmations happen and game starts.

*Note: to avoid re-introducing an earlier issue, there should be a minimum sign up time (1 week? Less?), after which we use priority as we have done in the past.

8-14 players: mini game. Not necessarily Mafia. No approval required due to the short run time. Advertising is done same as with mid season games. Can be advertised alongside main season but timetabling should be taken into consideration.
I think this is okay, but it'd require more people to make smaller games. Seems like most people make games with 20+ players.
Well Retro is the GAFia Dad. He should do it.

"CzarTim, I just want to let you know that we aren't mad. We're just really disappointed."
I don't think it always needs to be the same person just that the decision is made by the mod team.

Also stop hacking into my PMs.
 

Fireblend

Banned
I skipped this season because I was getting a little burnt out (I think I'd played every season/midseason since Cthulhu), so I can't comment much on this latest round, but I generally agree with what other people are saying. I'm skeptical we're ever going to recruit as many people as the community did when I myself started playing in S3, so at some point we're going to have to focus on keeping the players we already know rather than find new ones, which is mostly done by making sure we're all playing comfortably, and having fun, and I think some of the "better behavior" proposals would contribute towards that goal.

About switching the seasons structure, I don't oppose the measure but I'm not sure how that's going to make any issue better, maybe I'm missing some conversation and I'm not sure what the issues that's supposed to alleviate are. Personally, I don't think I'd be affected by the change at all so if the higher powers want to try it I say go for it.

Thanks to everyone who's chiming in and commenting. Again I don't feel like I have much to offer since I only hung out on Discord this season and there wasn't much mafia discussion there, nor was I very active on the spec thread.

I've already mentioned on the main season thread I'm ready to play again; just tell me where to sign.
 

CzarTim

Member
There's also just this fundamental flaw with the season format in that it starts at specific times and if you miss the train you either have to replace in (which isn't always fun) or wait sometimes months before a mid-season game starts. It's frustrating because sometimes the start dates are rough, but a week or two later would be fine (this happened to me last season with Love Boat.) I'm not sure how to handle that, but it's something to think about.

I also think we need to do a better job of indicating if a game has mechanics or not. Especially for mid-season games. If your game has a mechanic I feel like it should be properly explained on the signup post.

I also kind of think the Crab Scale should be replaced with something else. It's trying to scale things that shouldn't be on the same scale. We have:

Openness -- Open, Semi-Open, Closed
Bastard -- Normal (moderator NEVER lies), Semi-Normal (moderator may or may not slightly lie (godfather, miller, switcher, etc.)), Bastard (moderator can lie about anything)
Mechanics -- None, Slight (Archer), Major (Gods & Men / Any map game), Extreme (Volcano Island, Harry Potter)

Since games can be any number of those, it makes more sense to separate the categories.
 

roytheone

Member
There's also just this fundamental flaw with the season format in that it starts at specific times and if you miss the train you either have to replace in (which isn't always fun) or wait sometimes months before a mid-season game starts. It's frustrating because sometimes the start dates are rough, but a week or two later would be fine (this happened to me last season with Love Boat.) I'm not sure how to handle that, but it's something to think about.

I also think we need to do a better job of indicating if a game has mechanics or not. Especially for mid-season games. If your game has a mechanic I feel like it should be properly explained on the signup post.

I also kind of think the Crab Scale should be replaced with something else. It's trying to scale things that shouldn't be on the same scale. We have:

Openness -- Open, Semi-Open, Closed
Bastard -- Normal (moderator NEVER lies), Semi-Normal (moderator may or may not slightly lie (godfather, miller, switcher, etc.)), Bastard (moderator can lie about anything)
Mechanics -- None, Slight (Archer), Major (Gods & Men / Any map game), Extreme (Volcano Island, Harry Potter)

Since games can be any number of those, it makes more sense to separate the categories.

Having one of the season games start delayed actually works to fix this problem.
 

Sophia

Member
I don't have much to say myself about this season other than a commentary on activity levels. I was a replacement on Danny Phantom and that game was going fairly slow until I showed up.

I would like to see at the very least a "One post per 24 hours" rule being enforced instead of the current "One post per day phase" rule. Given the nature of Mafia as a game, I don't think that's an unreasonable request for players. Mafia teams thrive on inactivity, and when a lot of players are inactive, it becomes easy for them to just shoot down the line at the most active player they can get away killing. This results in a pretty boring game for everyone, be they spectators or players.

Also

Number of player slots for the game: TBD, Currently 20
People who have been told about, consulted, or hinted information about your set-up: Crimson (co-mod), Retro, Ynnny
Theme: Persona
Do you need an Outer Gafia game planning board? Already got one
Game Category: A 7 on the Crab Scale.
 

cabot

Member
More mini games I am for. They serve as a good breezy way to play mafia and you can usually go a little crazy, from matrix games all the way to ONUW and weird outliers.

In my opinion they should run on a regular basis since they don't require a lot of players, if we have a large replacement list, it could be something for them to do.


I also am trying for a scheduled live mafia on discord every week or two weeks depending on how demand is. Just need to dot the i's and cross the t's for making moderating a game as smooth and as quick as possible.
 
I wasn't really aware we changed how we approached recruitment threads. Though I'm wondering if discord and out-of-site communication is causing less chatting and thus less bumping. We should def. encourage people to, in a non-spammy way, use the recruitment thread more once it's up.
.

No, we haven't really changed it

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1222990

That was our season 6 main thread and sign up thread. But if the main thread is always dead, even during the sign up portion, then the thread doesn't stay on the main page

I compared it to season 4 because even when we were taking sign ups, when we killed the season 3 thread, the majority of our discussion moved to the sign up thread that would become the season 4 thread

If that's who I need to be now, I can do that. I've *already* been doing it to some extent. Just as long as it doesn't become an issue once I become a real dad.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Just a side note, I've been experimenting with Discord logging and it doesn't work quite how a rational human would expect logging to work. (More like it forwards messages to another channel.) That's not to say that moving discussion to Discord can't work - Discord logs can be transferred by hand, it's just kind of a pain to do, and I'm researching better options.

If the community really wants discussion on Discord, we can make it happen. It's just not going to be as easy as I thought it would be an hour ago.

Discord is used for chatting, it's not meant to act as a forum. I'm open to any method you find, but I sorta doubt discord can be forced into acting as a forum. That's not a knock on it, it's good at what it does.
 
More mini games I am for. They serve as a good breezy way to play mafia and you can usually go a little crazy, from matrix games all the way to ONUW and weird outliers.

In my opinion they should run on a regular basis since they don't require a lot of players, if we have a large replacement list, it could be something for them to do.


I also am trying for a scheduled live mafia on discord every week or two weeks depending on how demand is. Just need to dot the i's and cross the t's for making moderating a game as smooth and as quick as possible.

Mini games are a pretty good proposal too. Gives me an idea.

I just generally think that activity issues often come from the burn out of 6 week games. And for newcomers, shorter games where you have to keep track of say 9 to 15 other people is a much better way to get people into the community.

The main reason mid season games sometimes have problems with newer players is that those games are almost all veterans.

I'm guessing (pulling this out of my ass) that a format with 3 or 4 16 (let's work with that number for now) player games would be a much better introduction to the community. Other mafia communities make new players play in their own forum for one or two games: iirc, mafia universe does a 9 player matrix.

Now, I think that's bullshit; when I was new, I sorta copied a bunch of the styles from the games I had read up to that point. Also, segregating new players is just stupid. But I would definitely say a smaller introduction to a more limited pool of players could work

Personally, the easiest game to date for me to get into and start playing was Cthulhu, and looking back, a big reason why was probably because 10 (10??) players were already gone when I subbed in, so it was easier for me to keep track of the remaining players. Cthulhu was the first game I read through, so yeah, I paid attention, but I'm pretty sure I would've been horribly lost during day 1, and cthulhu's day 1 was active too.

I'm thinking we could possible, for whenever we do sign ups, have games that are much lower on the player count, say 14-20, but have more of them too.
 
I personally didn't like the fact we had such long day/night phases this season. Considering how our community tends to be more active at the end of the day, there was really no need to have 96/72 hour phases unless it benefited the mods. I know for me, it felt that the day dragged on for no real reason.

On the topic of newer players, maybe we could try to make sure that a popular themed game is running whenever we do recruiting again. Another thing that I've been thinking about is that maybe we should also run more slower paced games for newbies because the whole throw people into the fire doesn't work for a whole lot of new players. And then ones that do make it take a little bit to get into the flow of the game. I feel that a large portion of the community has come from earlier seasons so their first games had a larger proportion of new players as compared to new players in the later seasons, so there was no need to worry about past meta along with getting caught up with a game that is a lot faster than they thought it would be. I'm saying this as someone that isn't one of the new players so I don't really know how accurate it is, but I do feel like we sometimes miss out on people due to a rough start.
 

Ty4on

Member
I personally didn't like the fact we had such long day/night phases this season. Considering how our community tends to be more active at the end of the day, there was really no need to have 96/72 hour phases unless it benefited the mods. I know for me, it felt that the day dragged on for no real reason.

On the topic of newer players, maybe we could try to make sure that a popular themed game is running whenever we do recruiting again. Another thing that I've been thinking about is that maybe we should also run more slower paced games for newbies because the whole throw people into the fire doesn't work for a whole lot of new players. And then ones that do make it take a little bit to get into the flow of the game.
What do you mean by slower? Less players or players that are less active (perhaps with a posting restriction like max 50/100 posts per day)?
 

Sorian

Banned
There's also just this fundamental flaw with the season format in that it starts at specific times and if you miss the train you either have to replace in (which isn't always fun) or wait sometimes months before a mid-season game starts. It's frustrating because sometimes the start dates are rough, but a week or two later would be fine (this happened to me last season with Love Boat.) I'm not sure how to handle that, but it's something to think about.

I also think we need to do a better job of indicating if a game has mechanics or not. Especially for mid-season games. If your game has a mechanic I feel like it should be properly explained on the signup post.

I also kind of think the Crab Scale should be replaced with something else. It's trying to scale things that shouldn't be on the same scale. We have:

Openness -- Open, Semi-Open, Closed
Bastard -- Normal (moderator NEVER lies), Semi-Normal (moderator may or may not slightly lie (godfather, miller, switcher, etc.)), Bastard (moderator can lie about anything)
Mechanics -- None, Slight (Archer), Major (Gods & Men / Any map game), Extreme (Volcano Island, Harry Potter)

Since games can be any number of those, it makes more sense to separate the categories.

I don't like making the distinction of normal vs. semi-normal because the second you say normal, you've prevented a decent fake claim (miller) and the second you say semi-normal, everyone is assuming godfather asap.
 
What do you mean by slower? Less players or players that are less active (perhaps with a posting restriction like max 50/100 posts per day)?

Fewer players/posts could be one, longer days could be another. Just throwing ideas around really, I haven't been a mod but I've just heard from different games throughout the seasons that new get overwhelmed in the beginning. Not sure how viable a game it would be since you would need some more of the regular players to join also, but maybe Matrix6 game could be an option. Of course, the new players would ultimately be willing to put themselves in such a situation. But if not we should really stress how active these games are and how much work/time it'll involve.
 

CzarTim

Member
I don't like making the distinction of normal vs. semi-normal because the second you say normal, you've prevented a decent fake claim (miller) and the second you say semi-normal, everyone is assuming godfather asap.
That's why I said "may or may not" as it gives mods the opportunity to simply say it's semi normal to give scum the out.
 
I don't like making the distinction of normal vs. semi-normal because the second you say normal, you've prevented a decent fake claim (miller) and the second you say semi-normal, everyone is assuming godfather asap.

So would bastard/not bastard work?
 
Vanilla - Normal - Bastard

Vanilla for overly vanilla games where all information is accurate, normal would be the standard for most games where godfathers/millers are a possibility, bastard is anything could happen.

That way Normal doesn't create expectations or rule out claims, and would be the expectation for most games, but mods can distinguish if their game is overly vanilla or overly bastard if they need to.
 

CzarTim

Member
Vanilla - Normal - Bastard

Vanilla for overly vanilla games where all information is accurate, normal would be the standard for most games where godfathers/millers are a possibility, bastard is anything could happen.

That way Normal doesn't create expectations or rule out claims, and would be the expectation for most games, but mods can distinguish if their game is overly vanilla or overly bastard if they need to.
That is much better!
 
Number of player slots for the game: 28
People who have been told about, consulted, or hinted information about your set-up: Roytheone
Theme: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Do you need an Outer Gafia game planning board? No, already got one!
Game Category: (click link for the scale) 7-8. Not entirely sure.

It is ready for review by overseers when you guys are ready!

Number of player slots for the game: TBD, Currently 20
People who have been told about, consulted, or hinted information about your set-up: Crimson (co-mod), Retro
Theme: Persona
Do you need an Outer Gafia game planning board? Already got one
Game Category: A 7 on the Crab Scale.

got you both at second post :>
 
It is ready for review by overseers when you guys are ready!

I've lit the bat signal and some overseers will hopefully come to review your game soon, Jaianpan!

The point being that I think activity has gradually gone down since season 3.

I think it's worth trying to calculate posts per player and maybe also trying to see how much very active players skew the numbers. Batman as an example wasn't a very active game, but the post count was 3500.

I think you're right, activity has definitely been on the decline since Season 3. I can analyze the posts per player statistics without the high posters, but .... you know, back in Season 4, I actually did the player roster allocating high posters into the three different games to make sure that each game has a 'chatty one' but I was reprimanded about it later because it skewed the true RNG of player distribution.

So we only kept that new joiners get highest priority and that everyone is slotted into the games they prefer.


The consequences for misgendering seem a little too harsh IMO. You can't edit in Mafia. People make typos all the time (especially on mobile). I would think that no one is deliberately misgendering out of spite.

But I haven't read Bloodborne and we are an inclusive community, so if we agree that being replaced for misgendering is a rule for future games, then I'll follow it.

boo, i think you hit a fair point there. typos and mistakes are pretty human, and i certainly would be disappointed if there is someone in our community that keeps misgendering out of spite. but unfortunately in bloodborne, it kept on happening, and by a few different players.

however, there were also a number of players that apologized and corrected themselves and so, i think if the player show immediate rectification of their behaviour, it should not be an instant replacement....
 
((lots of awesome stuff in this post))

Short version:
I think it's become clear that these rules aren't enough of a guideline (for the players or the game runners) to keep player conduct in order. I'm not necessarily looking to impose new rules; but I want the existing rules (including those we have left unwritten) to be clearly defined and enforced, so that everybody is clear on what's expected in these games.

Proposed new guideline:

  • Personal, real-life details are not up for debate, and are not relevant to the game. This has to be re-stated and expanded to specify matters of gender and preferred pronouns.
    • Your personal politics in this matter aren't important here. If you can't afford a fellow player the benefit of trusting and respecting their real-life identity, their real-life schedule and priorities, then you're denying them the necessary baseline of honesty they need to play this pretend game about lying. In other words, you are making it impossible for them to play.
    • Because pronoun mistakes can easily be abused, it has to be watched more carefully. That's the reality, and it should be enforced. I understand that we have a rule barring us from editing posts, but that rule should be realistically encouraging more careful posting, not less. I honestly wonder what you're up to in your mafia games that you can't even point at people correctly.
  • Overtly trash-talking players (telling them they suck, calling them idiots, etc.) is not necessary to play the game, and you're brushing up against NeoGAF's own TOS by acting like this. If you are intent on being hostile, and if Mafia is 'supposed to have insults', this honestly might be the wrong community for you.
  • Moderators, you can't drag your feet on addressing these issues in your games. Encourage players to contact you if there are problems. Be active in your games to get situations under control. Modkill players and/or report them to GAF mods if there's a problem. The rules should be there for you and your players to know when someone has stepped out of line.

Feel free to add to that, as it definitely needs to cover more bases. I'll probably come back to it and add, too.


I'll stop this post here, but this should hopefully be an ongoing conversation in this thread.

great post. i really like the proposed new guideline too <3

On prenouns: I agree we should be harsher on this. Of course, mistakes can be made so if someone accidentally does it wrong once that should be a warning and not a direct removal, but with repeat offenses action should be taken. However, that also means we should make a differentiation between people wanting to be called them/they etc and people that have no preference. Right now both are indicated as [-], which is already kinda weird and confusing. If we are going to be more strict on correct prenoun use, this has to be made more clear.

fair. i think we can implement this, clarity helps everyone!

I think this is the main problem. It REALLY sucks feeling like you need to chastise / babysit grown-ups playing an internet game. And since we don't want to discourage people from signing up, it leads to passive responses. In the heat of the moment it's sometimes hard to tell if your anger as a moderator is just stress from the game not going as you hoped or justified from rule breaking. Sometimes it's clear cut, too, but it often feels like a modkill isn't fully justified which causes more minor offences as there isn't any real punishment.

I'm actually wondering if we need a surrogate like 'ModBot' or something. Not necessarily a new account, but someone from the mod team who to step in and inform the offending party of the punishment with the preface that it's a decision from the mod team and not an individual thing.

i think we shouldnt involve a NeoGAF mod per se... but yes, game runners should be on point and pull people aside if they are toeing the lines. it's not a nice job, being the bad cop. everyone wants to be cool and likeable, but part of a moderator's job is to be involved in the games they are running. Like CzarTim says, passive responses wont cut it. Moderators are expected to be proactive and hands on.

I skipped this season because I was getting a little burnt out (I think I'd played every season/midseason since Cthulhu), so I can't comment much on this latest round, but I generally agree with what other people are saying. I'm skeptical we're ever going to recruit as many people as the community did when I myself started playing in S3, so at some point we're going to have to focus on keeping the players we already know rather than find new ones, which is mostly done by making sure we're all playing comfortably, and having fun, and I think some of the "better behavior" proposals would contribute towards that goal.

I've already mentioned on the main season thread I'm ready to play again; just tell me where to sign.

Eventually, we'll hit that mark and yep, agree.

I don't have much to say myself about this season other than a commentary on activity levels. I was a replacement on Danny Phantom and that game was going fairly slow until I showed up.

I would like to see at the very least a "One post per 24 hours" rule being enforced instead of the current "One post per day phase" rule. Given the nature of Mafia as a game, I don't think that's an unreasonable request for players. Mafia teams thrive on inactivity, and when a lot of players are inactive, it becomes easy for them to just shoot down the line at the most active player they can get away killing. This results in a pretty boring game for everyone, be they spectators or players.

We can change our expectations, sure, but enforcing it is hard. Because the moderators' tool is basically: 1) PM the inactive person 2) Failing to incite activity from said person, modkill 3) Replace ......

Replacements dont just grow on trees, unfortunately :3

But I do agree that inactivity just results in a pretty boring game for everyone .___.

I personally didn't like the fact we had such long day/night phases this season. Considering how our community tends to be more active at the end of the day, there was really no need to have 96/72 hour phases unless it benefited the mods. I know for me, it felt that the day dragged on for no real reason.

On the topic of newer players, maybe we could try to make sure that a popular themed game is running whenever we do recruiting again.

Both fair points. The phases were designed that way in the beginning by Crab to keep the weeks steady (day ends and night ends happen at the same time each week) but we can look into making the phases shorter if that's where the community wants to head.

We can also reserve the more 'mainstream' themes for main recruitment drives. Yep.

Vanilla - Normal - Bastard

Vanilla for overly vanilla games where all information is accurate, normal would be the standard for most games where godfathers/millers are a possibility, bastard is anything could happen.

That way Normal doesn't create expectations or rule out claims, and would be the expectation for most games, but mods can distinguish if their game is overly vanilla or overly bastard if they need to.

Simple and effective :>
 

Sophia

Member
We can change our expectations, sure, but enforcing it is hard. Because the moderators' tool is basically: 1) PM the inactive person 2) Failing to incite activity from said person, modkill 3) Replace ......

Replacements dont just grow on trees, unfortunately :3

But I do agree that inactivity just results in a pretty boring game for everyone .___.

Yeah, I'm not sure what could be done to enforce it. I just know that subbing into Danny Phantom on Day 2 and being the prime target for mafia because nobody else was really active sucked. I knew it was going to happen because I went hardcore townie there, and I can't fault the mafia team for taking the logical shot there, but....
 
Also

Number of player slots for the game: TBD, Currently 20
People who have been told about, consulted, or hinted information about your set-up: Crimson (co-mod), Retro, Ynnny
Theme: Persona
Do you need an Outer Gafia game planning board? Already got one
Game Category: A 7 on the Crab Scale.

When is this aimed to run?
 
Additional data!

Games run each season (including mid-season games):


  • Season 1 - 1 game
  • Season 2 - 2 games
  • Season 3 - 7 games
  • Season 4 - 7 games (8 if you count Werewolf 1)
  • Season 5 - 9 games
  • Season 6 - 3 games (so far)

    Total: 29 games (30 if you count Werewolf 1)

maybe running 9 games in one season contributed to the burnt out levels in our player base?
 

cabot

Member
Additional data!

Games run each season (including mid-season games):


  • Season 1 - 1 game
  • Season 2 - 2 games
  • Season 3 - 7 games
  • Season 4 - 7 games (8 if you count Werewolf 1)
  • Season 5 - 9 games
  • Season 6 - 3 games (so far)

    Total: 29 games (30 if you count Werewolf 1)

maybe running 9 games in one season contributed to the burnt out levels in our player base?

What's the periods of time between sign up and review thread launches for each season?

I remember s5 being quite long.
 

Palmer_v1

Member
Hey everyone.

I subbed into this Season mid-way, and I have a fair amount of comments to make about player activity and such, as a player in a game. But hold that thought for now, because I want to talk about Community Rules and Player Conduct.

As of Season 6, these are the only rules concerning player conduct that I can find in a typical rulelist post in our games:



Short version:
I think it's become clear that these rules aren't enough of a guideline (for the players or the game runners) to keep player conduct in order. I'm not necessarily looking to impose new rules; but I want the existing rules (including those we have left unwritten) to be clearly defined and enforced, so that everybody is clear on what's expected in these games.


Long version:

I'm gonna preface this by stating the obvious - this is a game community unlike many others on NeoGAF. We aren't tied to a particular fandom or subculture like a lot of other Off-Topic Communities, so there's a high potential for different personalities to come around here and play together. I think this is a good thing that keeps things fresh for a game that is inherently social, and I have personally enjoyed interacting with all sorts of people.

With that said, there will inevitably be personality clashes; Mafia itself is a game that some might say "ends friendships". That's usually said as a joke, but still - it's a hostile situation that we willingly sign up for. I'd compare it to boxing - you're willingly putting yourself into a ring to hit and get hit, but there are safety regulations to make sure people don't get seriously injured, or play unfairly.

I've been involved in this community since our first game. I've watched people go through game after game and get along and become friends. I've also seen (and personally experienced) people not get along, using underhanded tactics to get under the skin, get personal, fling insults, and disrespect others.

I think most of us here (if not, everyone) is enough of an adult, and enough of a decent Mafia player, to recognize that we don't need to be jerks to play this game, and that there is no good reason to ruin the game for other people by being jerks towards them.

I understand that in the pressure of the game, people lose sight of things, maybe stop seeing things straight, and become irrational. That's part of the game, by design. But it's also why we need a stronger and more specific set of guidelines for people to refer to when those occasions get to be beyond what is appropriate for the game.


So what should the guidelines be? I think that's up for discussion, but for starters:

  • Personal, real-life details are not up for debate, and are not relevant to the game. This has to be re-stated and expanded to specify matters of gender and preferred pronouns.
    • Your personal politics in this matter aren't important here. If you can't afford a fellow player the benefit of trusting and respecting their real-life identity, their real-life schedule and priorities, then you're denying them the necessary baseline of honesty they need to play this pretend game about lying. In other words, you are making it impossible for them to play.
    • Because pronoun mistakes can easily be abused, it has to be watched more carefully. That's the reality, and it should be enforced. I understand that we have a rule barring us from editing posts, but that rule should be realistically encouraging more careful posting, not less. I honestly wonder what you're up to in your mafia games that you can't even point at people correctly.
  • Overtly trash-talking players (telling them they suck, calling them idiots, etc.) is not necessary to play the game, and you're brushing up against NeoGAF's own TOS by acting like this. If you are intent on being hostile, and if Mafia is 'supposed to have insults', this honestly might be the wrong community for you.
  • Moderators, you can't drag your feet on addressing these issues in your games. Encourage players to contact you if there are problems. Be active in your games to get situations under control. Modkill players and/or report them to GAF mods if there's a problem. The rules should be there for you and your players to know when someone has stepped out of line.

Feel free to add to that, as it definitely needs to cover more bases. I'll probably come back to it and add, too.


I'll stop this post here, but this should hopefully be an ongoing conversation in this thread.

I agree that Moderators should be faster to crack down on problems, though I disagree on what actual problems are.

Tengentially related, but I've been meaning to ask if our no edit policy is really needed? What exactly is our intent with this rule?
 
I agree that Moderators should be faster to crack down on problems, though I disagree on what actual problems are.

Tengentially related, but I've been meaning to ask if our no edit policy is really needed? What exactly is our intent with this rule?

so players can quote back and have 100% absolute faith that the other player hasn't altered anything, including wording and connotations etc?

... what do you think are the actual problems, o palmer ser?
 

RetroMG

Member
so players can quote back and have 100% absolute faith that the other player hasn't altered anything, including wording and connotations etc?

This. I agree that I hate the no-edit rule, but I think the games would be an even bigger mess without it.
If an intrepid gamerunner wants to test a game where editing is allowed, be my guest, but I suspect that if we allow it for every game, it will eventually cause major problems.
 

Sophia

Member
As someone who is a compulsive editor of posts, please keep the no edit rule. Otherwise people would be constantly questioning what I post. :p

Plus, not allowing editing forces people to commit to their votes.
 

Ty4on

Member
I agree that Moderators should be faster to crack down on problems, though I disagree on what actual problems are.

Tengentially related, but I've been meaning to ask if our no edit policy is really needed? What exactly is our intent with this rule?
So you can't cover your tracks. It gives you the power alter your words. Tons of bad deductions in Danny Phantom I wanted to fix/remove.

I also feel like edit tags on posts could cause a lot of unnecessary WIFOM because you have no idea what the original post looked like.

Coping from Mafia Universe's rule regarding it:
You are not allowed to edit or delete your in-game posts, even if you believe it to be an innocent action (fixing a typo, for example). Post edits and deletions can be used to send unauthorized private messages and cheat. (Also avoid links to Google Drive, Dropbox or other dynamic content, given that documents uploaded here are "live" and can be edited at any time.)
I hadn't thought about hidden messages, but I can see how that can be exploited. Either tell someone in a night only gossip to check the thread at exactly ??:?? or post when someone is sleeping at night or afk and edit out what you don't want them to see when they wake up. In the latter you could effectively create a gossip.

Edit: (heh)
As someone who is a compulsive editor of posts, please keep the no edit rule. Otherwise people would be constantly questioning what I post. :p

Plus, not allowing editing forces people to commit to their votes.
Imagine if a big chunk of my DP posts had an edit tag :p

I meant to add that we have an exception it moderators give a player consent. That shouldn't be used a lot (maybe just modkill someone quoting a PM), but is there if we need it.
 
As someone who is a compulsive editor of posts, please keep the no edit rule. Otherwise people would be constantly questioning what I post. :p

Plus, not allowing editing forces people to commit to their votes.

Last edited by Sophia; Today at 03:49 PM


I wouldn't mind making the "no editing" a bit more lax. Posts have edited timestamps anyway, so if something is edited before the next comment is posted, or within a few minutes, I don't really that being overly harmful.

Obviously people shouldn't be editing posts from hours or days ago, but then the timestamp would give that away anyway and it would be pretty obvious that they're trying to cover something up. Which just leads to metagaming.
 

Palmer_v1

Member
so players can quote back and have 100% absolute faith that the other player hasn't altered anything, including wording and connotations etc?

... what do you think are the actual problems, o palmer ser?

This. I agree that I hate the no-edit rule, but I think the games would be an even bigger mess without it.
If an intrepid gamerunner wants to test a game where editing is allowed, be my guest, but I suspect that if we allow it for every game, it will eventually cause major problems.

You don't think we can trust people not to cheat with the editing? If we changed the rule to allow for editing of typos only. Can't change the content of your post.

I know I'm not the only one who does this anyway, within the 60 second grace period before edit timestamps start to appear.

As for actual problems, I think curbing inactivity and game dropping is #1 by a large margin. Then, possibly related, and counter to Karkador's general point, instead of wasting our time pandering, I think people just need to be a lot less whiney. Play the fucking game and realize that nobody here is actually trying to hurt your feelings.
 

Ty4on

Member
I wouldn't mind making the "no editing" a bit more lax. Posts have edited timestamps anyway, so if something is edited before the next comment is posted, or within a few minutes, I don't really that being overly harmful.

Obviously people shouldn't be editing posts from hours or days ago, but then the timestamp would give that away anyway and it would be pretty obvious that they're trying to cover something up. Which just leads to metagaming.
What problem does editing posts really fix? I'm taking about bad behavior here, not broken formats.

We also couldn't have had AB's amazing breadcrumb from DR with a lax edit policy ;_;
 
What problem does editing posts really fix? I'm taking about bad behavior here, not broken formats.

We also couldn't have had AB's amazing breadcrumb from DR with a lax edit policy ;_;

Mostly just fixing typos/wording/broken votes/"broken" image quote tags. A lot of people already do that anyway.
 

Sophia

Member
I wouldn't mind making the "no editing" a bit more lax. Posts have edited timestamps anyway, so if something is edited before the next comment is posted, or within a few minutes, I don't really that being overly harmful.

Obviously people shouldn't be editing posts from hours or days ago, but then the timestamp would give that away anyway and it would be pretty obvious that they're trying to cover something up. Which just leads to metagaming.

I worry about the scenario where say.... someone comes in and does.

Vote: CrimsonFist

And then decides two minutes later that they don't want it, but nobody has posted yet. So they edit out their vote.

What problem does editing posts really fix? I'm taking about bad behavior here, not broken formats.

We also couldn't have had AB's amazing breadcrumb from DR with a lax edit policy ;_;

And then there's scenarios where people stealthy edit out breadcrumbs and.... yeah.

I could see a concession being made if edit histories were available, but they're not. It's just easier and safer to disallow editing entirely.
 
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