How Do I Headwiz?

[SparklesTheClown]

@Nein That's actually a problem I've noticed. The fact that staff in many games seem to have very vague positions in which they're doing tons of stuff all at once. I feel as if there are a lot of relatively harmless tasks that could be handled by low level helpers, and very few games employ some sort of helpers system. Most massive MUDs understand that you can't handle a game with hundreds of people with just a core staff base, I don't understand why MUSHes don't seem to get that most of the time.

@Arkandel said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@HelloProject The best piece of advice I have is unfortunately not actionable.

Have a thick skin.

That's it. But it's not something you can do, it's just ... developed over time. I hope for the sake of anyone staffing at all, let alone running a game, that they have it because it's an often thankless job and an endless grind which starts at 100% inspiration and creativity but ends up being 10% of that (... if you're lucky) and 90% work, maintenance, and handling people.

One thing I've noticed about a lot of places, is that the places aren't really made with the amount of work it would take to maintain such a place. Like, making incredibly long apps even though that would obviously be a huge workload if you got a ton of players, or straight up lacking a firm advancement policy, so you end up with a fuckload of jobs that all have to be handled somewhat differently, with no real guide to look at for how to handle any given one.

I'm not saying that you can entirely eliminate work, but just, from my general observations, people seem very prone to adding more work than necessary rather than designing things to the best of their ability to minimize work where ever it's actually possible to do so. MCM for example, even though I like their current app in theory, in practice this app seems like it adds a hell of a lot more and emotional labor for staff than the old one.

[Arkandel]

@HelloProject said in How Do I Headwiz?:

One thing I've noticed about a lot of places, is that the places aren't really made with the amount of work it would take to maintain such a place. Like, making incredibly long apps even though that would obviously be a huge workload if you got a ton of players, or straight up lacking a firm advancement policy, so you end up with a fuckload of jobs that all have to be handled somewhat differently, with no real guide to look at for how to handle any given one.

Ever since some friendly neighborhood coders made it easy(..ier) to run certain kinds of MU* we've seen a lot of them showing up, that's true, and some barely had any effort put in them at all. It's as if the ones responsible genuinely felt the real hurdles were figuring out where to host it and how to pick a city to run it (San Francisco... or maybe New York?!?). Or there is very little thought put into basic systems - an easy one is deciding characters will get <X> XPs per week but they haven't crunched the numbers to see what that means in terms of advancement, or to ensure they'll end up getting the kind of game they seem to want to this way. Or they take it for granted there'll be STs to pick up the slack because they had friends who totally promised they'd come and run stuff, but they never made arrangements for it or actually put a framework in place for these plots to occur.

I'm not saying that you can entirely eliminate work, but just, from my general observations, people seem very prone to adding more work than necessary rather than designing things to the best of their ability to minimize work where ever it's actually possible to do so. MCM for example, even though I like their current app in theory, in practice this app seems like it adds a hell of a lot more and emotional labor for staff than the old one.

It does. The sad thing, which I've literally never seen averted, is that the higher up you are in the staff hierarchy the smaller the chance you can actually play the very game you're pouring all that work into. You just can't; either there's never enough time to or the chance for conflicts of interest is too high.

So if you are going to do this then staffing itself had better be fun enough for you to keep doing it. You might have 'a character' but that character can never be or do what other PCs get to. It'll always be the headwiz's alt, never Bob or Jane.

[surreality]

@HelloProject said in How Do I Headwiz?:

One thing I've noticed about a lot of places, is that the places aren't really made with the amount of work it would take to maintain such a place. Like, making incredibly long apps even though that would obviously be a huge workload if you got a ton of players, or straight up lacking a firm advancement policy, so you end up with a fuckload of jobs that all have to be handled somewhat differently, with no real guide to look at for how to handle any given one.

That you're even looking at this is a good sign. A lot of folks look at 'what is ideal to get a ton of data' and then don't have a firm plan to effectively handle that data and process it in a quick and reasonable way.

I know that's one of the things I've been poking. While I have stuck my project on the shelf for a while, 'cause life, I've been prodding at things like that for upwards of 2 years now. It's still not close to where I want it on those points.

Easy matters. It matters for players and it matters for staff.

[SparklesTheClown]

@Arkandel said in How Do I Headwiz?:

So if you are going to do this then staffing itself had better be fun enough for you to keep doing it. You might have 'a character' but that character can never be or do what other PCs get to. It'll always be the headwiz's alt, never Bob or Jane.

I actually am making this with GMing in mind, because my vision for the game will make it impossible for me to have the player experience I'm trying to craft. So that's something I accepted pretty early on.

If anything, I'll probably just play the nerd from Sailor Moon, or Mr. Popo. I ultimately plan to focus on villain NPCs so that people have shit to do, and run plot. If I do play a straight up character, I'll probably just make them the sum of the game's average stats or something, but I still won't be able to play the game properly in a fair way, so when it comes to having a PC, support characters are probably what I'll have to stick to. I don't know, we'll see, because it's not something I want to decide on right away, and without transparency and discussion (when I'm even at that point).

[Coin]

@Arkandel said in How Do I Headwiz?:

So if you are going to do this then staffing itself had better be fun enough for you to keep doing it. You might have 'a character' but that character can never be or do what other PCs get to. It'll always be the headwiz's alt, never Bob or Jane.

At the very least, make sure that wshen you create a character, it's one that you can be content playing at the lower tier of the character's sphere / context.

Make a werewolf who cares about his neighborhood andlittle else; make a vampire who has his own vendettas and doesn't really have an interest in court politics; make a Mage who's really more into the small Mysteries and not in fighting big battles against the Abyss. It will limit what you can do in some respects, but it's just as easy to include people (and even easier to include just the people you actually want to RP with) this way, and it doesn't generate conflict of interest.

Another great thing to do is make a character who has a very specific niche, and then make that niche valuable in a peripheral way to the plot you're running. Many people will wail about Conflict of Interest, but it really isn't. If my character specializes in Maeljin lore, and I'm running a sphere-wide Maeljin plot, then having my NPCs refer the active characters to my PC is just good sense and a way for me to play my character, contribute to the plot, but leave the spotlight on other people.

A third thing you can do is divorce the plots your character is involved in from the setting in some way. Many people run plots outside the city the game in general is set in, etc. You can be awesome and even run stuff for yourself and your friends without destabilizing the local structure or having people wail Conflict of Interest.

It bears mentioning that I come from a culture where Conflict of Interest is viewed much less strictly, and in my experience, often led to much less drama than the strict, overbearing paranoia I've found in MUs, where everyone is super worried about whether or not one person's alt is helping their other alt.

[Paris]

For both players and staff: Try to more often say yes instead of no.

Be willing to go out of your comfort zone. Obviously not in cases of abuse or that will bork theme, but be willing to deal with whatever weird shit will come up.

Find a reason to go to the thing. Find a reason to make the thing work.

Accept that some people are determined to interpret everything you say or do as the worst thing ever. Accept that they will try to get others to agree because there is validation in being chronically aggrieved. Accept that you don't need to engage or argue: if you are not actually doing what they say you are, it should blow over.

Log things. I need to do more of that.

If you don't intend to do jobs, don't take on a role that requires you to do jobs. If you do, do them before you roleplay. Do them first, not last. Do them for everyone, not just your friends. Do them in a timely manner. Do them even of you don't like who submitted them. Make sure your staff keeps on them. Get admins who like to do them. (I have quit games because staffers chronically refused to do jobs in a timely manner- it should not take a month and a half to answer a yes or no question, or approve a prp, especially if similar jobs get rushed through for friends of staff.) If one slips through the cracks, apologise and then do it asap.

Basically, you will have to slog through stuff other than roleplay, and if you hate that shit to the point where you actively avoid it (whether it's jobs, dealing with players, plots, whatever), make sure your admins are doing it.

When you fuck up, or when your staff does, rectify it and acknowledge it. Conversely, don't dick over your staff if they don't deserve it. If you really like a staffer but they shit on players, or they are really good at a thing but they shit on players, drop them from staff. If you need to create elaborate rules to mitigate that staffer's issues, they don't belong there, either. Yes, it's your game, but enabling abuse is shitty.

Same goes for players: even if they are good at some things, running things, if they are regularly shitting ooc on players, show them the door. Yes, even if they are adept at skirting just under the rules. You are allowed to remove ooc drama from your game.

Lastly, no one forces you to take any and all players on your game. It's your game.

[SparklesTheClown]

I had to leave a staff team before a game even properly opened, because a staffer absolutely hated and openly admitted to bias against OCs, but no one wanted to fire this person. I found it unacceptable.

[Arkandel]

@Coin I was actually talking about this with a friend recently but one thing is... the definition of what conflict of interest entails tends to be pretty damn fluid, and sometimes downright unfair. I've seen staff (not just headwiz) being complained about because they ran plot for their friends, even if it wasn't metaplot or gave those PCs any particular advantage that a normal ST couldn't convey.

And the funny thing is the ways around it are just as baffling to me. For instance running those same plots as your alt - using the exact same commands - sometimes mitigates such complaints when really, all that changes is which tab you're typing from.

Anyway, that's why having a thick skin is so important though since otherwise it's easy to be worn down from being nagged at while genuinely trying to just help people have some fun, and having others go "well, why are THEY having more fun than ME?". However I'd still rely on trusted outsiders I can go to for an objective sanity check because there is always the chance I might be doing something borderline unethical and not realize it - wholesale assuming players are just being whiny bitches about it is probably going too far.

[Coin]

@Arkandel said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@Coin I was actually talking about this with a friend recently but one thing is... the definition of what conflict of interest entails tends to be pretty damn fluid, and sometimes downright unfair. I've seen staff (not just headwiz) being complained about because they ran plot for their friends, even if it wasn't metaplot or gave those PCs any particular advantage that a normal ST couldn't convey.

And the funny thing is the ways around it are just as baffling to me. For instance running those same plots as your alt - using the exact same commands - sometimes mitigates such complaints when really, all that changes is which tab you're typing from.

Anyway, that's why having a thick skin is so important though since otherwise it's easy to be worn down from being nagged at while genuinely trying to just help people have some fun, and having others go "well, why are THEY having more fun than ME?". However I'd still rely on trusted outsiders I can go to for an objective sanity check because there is always the chance I might be doing something borderline unethical and not realize it - wholesale assuming players are just being whiny bitches about it is probably going too far.

Don't get me started on the whole "it's okay to run it from your player bit but not your staff alt because CoI" or "the xp goes to the bit you ran it from".

What-ever.

I am more and more in favor of XP being a player thing and having players distribute the XP among whatever alts they have as they see fit, logistics and logic be damned.

[SparklesTheClown]

@Coin said in How Do I Headwiz?:

I am more and more in favor of XP being a player thing and having players distribute the XP among whatever alts they have as they see fit, logistics and logic be damned.

Since I'm using what is essentially an alternative to XP that I don't even fully grasp yet, I'm not sure if this will be possible. But if it is, I'll certainly keep this idea in mind.

[Coin]

@HelloProject said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@Coin said in How Do I Headwiz?:

I am more and more in favor of XP being a player thing and having players distribute the XP among whatever alts they have as they see fit, logistics and logic be damned.

Since I'm using what is essentially an alternative to XP that I don't even fully grasp yet, I'm not sure if this will be possible. But if it is, I'll certainly keep this idea in mind.

Unless the alternative you're using is so alien as to not be dependent on points in general, it's very simple: any time a character would gain XP, give it to the player instead and let them spend it on whichever alt they want.

[surreality]

@Coin said in How Do I Headwiz?:

I am more and more in favor of XP being a player thing and having players distribute the XP among whatever alts they have as they see fit, logistics and logic be damned.

I it when the ideas I want to run with that everyone initially decries as totally the end of the world and clearly I am just a stupid idiot person get more than me behind being willing to try them.

[SparklesTheClown]

@Coin Look at the DICE system thread. There are points but it's very possible that it can't be applied in the way that you're saying, so it very well could be too alien, despite using points. We'll see, though.

@surreality said in How Do I Headwiz?:

I it when the ideas I want to run with that everyone initially decries as totally the end of the world and clearly I am just a stupid idiot person get more than me behind being willing to try them.

I am all about being progressive and trying new things. I've always been resistant to some of the regressive perspectives that people have, even back on WORA.

[tragedyjones]

Fuck if I know, dude. Just enjoy what you do.

[surreality]

@HelloProject When I'm less bleary-headed and whatnot, I can pass along info on how I was going to do it, though really... @Coin more or less covered it. There was a small trickle of 'daily XP' people would get on their charbit (0.1xp/day in a system with similar costs to CoD, so around 36.5xp/year per PC bit unique to that PC bit, which is definitely a trickle), but anything earned through activity (plot participation, random 'everybody gets XP for a holiday', contributing neat new content for everyone on the game to use, etc.) would go to a core player bit for the player, to distribute as they choose. Could be saved up to spend on a new character later, etc., too.

[SparklesTheClown]

@surreality I basically went into this project with zero intention of using XP at all. My intent was always to entirely replace XP with something else. I highly recommend reading the DICE system and seeing how what you want to do would apply to that.

[surreality]

@HelloProject I'm writing up my own system, but I'll take a look there and see if there's anything I can suggest.

There are alternate systems, too -- things like 'luck points' or 'karma points'/etc. that don't necessarily apply to character advancement, but allow for rerolls or temporary perks, and so on, in a variety of systems. I'd want to handle that the same way, too, so it's equally relevant there, in case it's relevant in your case.

(I am still in a mental place of 'I want to do a thing with that! ...now how to think on how to do--<flail, note it down, will pick at it later>' on any specifics on that. )

OH. Speaking of. This is actually relevant generally: if you are going through a hell of a time RL for whatever reason, step away.

No, really. (Still learning this one the hard way; stopped playing beginning of the year, paused on the project earlier this month.)

If the game is open, find someone you trust to maintain and keep in touch enough but not too much.

If it isn't yet, remember that it isn't a race, and you being in a good headspace is more important than deadlines you get to set for yourself anyway.

[Ganymede]

@HelloProject said in How Do I Headwiz?:

I basically went into this project with zero intention of using XP at all. My intent was always to entirely replace XP with something else. I highly recommend reading the DICE system and seeing how what you want to do would apply to that.

The DICE System doesn't really eliminate XP at all, from what I read. It simply eliminates the idea of advancement without doing anything. Instead, the DICE System seems to permit improvement when you spend Time to do so, which is sort of how I envision handling XP in my system. (To wit: spend X Time, get 1 XP.) And I like how the DICE System makes you choose between character advancement and developing character assets.

[SparklesTheClown]

@Ganymede said in How Do I Headwiz?:

@HelloProject said in How Do I Headwiz?:

I basically went into this project with zero intention of using XP at all. My intent was always to entirely replace XP with something else. I highly recommend reading the DICE system and seeing how what you want to do would apply to that.

The DICE System doesn't really eliminate XP at all, from what I read. It simply eliminates the idea of advancement without doing anything. Instead, the DICE System seems to permit improvement when you spend Time to do so, which is sort of how I envision handling XP in my system. (To wit: spend X Time, get 1 XP.) And I like how the DICE System makes you choose between character advancement and developing character assets.

Then that does kind of bring up a good question.

Is there a way to eliminate XP? Should I even try? People have seen my game thread and my concept, is the elimination of XP an endeavour worth pursuing, or should I just try to refine XP to work in a way that's not shitty?

[Arkandel]

@HelloProject said in How Do I Headwiz?:

Is there a way to eliminate XP? Should I even try? People have seen my game thread and my concept, is the elimination of XP an endeavour worth pursuing, or should I just try to refine XP to work in a way that's not shitty?

The question to the first question is always yes. You'll find the answer to almost all of those questions is the same; yes.

The catch is there's also always going to be a tradeoff and, you guessed it, the person who gets to decide whether that tradeoff is worth it is you.

Game design is largely a matter of picking your poisons.