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Tentative Suggestion

Postby Mojave » 07/12/2015 8:03 AM

I figured this would be the best place to post this suggestion, since Member Suggestions and all. :)

I have noticed that real life seems to be throwing more curve balls recently for the leadership team, and thus there's less energy and time to be expended into Evelon. Now this is perfectly fine, it's just a roleplay website after all, not the center of the universe. Also, I am very obviously not a member of the leadership team, so I have no clue what's going on behind the scenes, and how responsibilities are already handed out. However, I feel that there's ways to break the responsibilities down further, thus diminishing workloads. Now before I continue, I want to be as crystal clear as possible about something. I am not in any way/shape/fashion/form trying to cause a similar fiasco to the Daemon incident. I am not trying to publicly bash anyone. I do not want anyone demoted. I do not want any adverse consequences of this suggestion. So please keep an open mind and keep reading. :)

So where is this coming from? Honestly, it's been on my mind for months but I was reluctant to rock the boat for many reasons. But I really feel that this will help and so I'm posting it publicly so everyone else can contribute as well.

Okay, Mojave, get to the bleeding point, yeah? Well I was talking to my fiance who is the founder/admin of his own forum website for his Battlefield 4 gaming team about my concerns about too much responsibility on too few people. We discussed how his website is organized and how responsibilities are delegated and how the chain of command is set up for his mil-sim (military simulation) and I applied that structure to Evelon.

Here's what I came up with. Feel free to make suggestions, set the record straight if you're a mod/modmin/etc. All input is encouraged, so long as it's positive and friendly. Again, I am not attacking anyone or insinuating that someone needs to be demoted. (That also means re-assigning jobs is NOT a demotion.)

ADMIN/FOUNDER (Baal)
The Admin's primary job is to ensure the website is functioning as efficiently as possible. Ultimately, all final decisions on suggestions and disciplinary actions are hers. Any artwork that she would like to remain in control of are naturally hers.

MODMIN (Kyrit, Shrewdberry, Krypto)
The main job of the modmin is to handle all primary jobs that Baal herself cannot perform due to her RL responsibilities and to be her advisers in matters pertaining to the forums. Primary jobs would be website maintenance, event planning, rule enforcement if it escalates above Global Mod, and disciplinary actions. Any artwork done by the modmin should be taken on voluntarily but only if it can be done without affecting primary responsibilities.

GLOBAL MODS (Kodai, ToxicShadow, Crow, Thunder)
The primary responsibility of the Global Mods is to run secondary features of the forums. These responsibilities involve running marketplace shops, keeping records updated, enforcing rules, posting updates, and sending out offspring from the Nursery.

SITE ARTISTS (Silverin, Krypto)
The primary role of the site artist is to handle any and all needs for artwork. These responsibilities should not, however, become extensive to the point the artist feels over loaded. If this happens, projects should be organized by priority and higher priority should be completed before lower priority.

Again, this suggestion is to reduce workloads and stress, nothing more. On my fiance's website, each leader has one primary role, at least one assistant who has dedicated roles to help them, and may help other leaders if their own responsibilities allow. If the job is extensive enough, some of those assistants have assistants. This could be determined by individual leaders if they need an assistant, but should not be turned down for any other reason than the leader's responsibilities are easily managed.

So, what does anyone/everyone think? o3o; Again, my intention was not to upset anyone, I just like how efficiently his website runs and how everything gets done smoothly and any bumps in the road are quickly dealt with. But his website is a mil-sim and he is a Marine, so he may just be rubbing off on me. xD;

EDIT:
By the way, assistants wouldn't necessarily have to have the same access rights as actual leadership. Everything can be pre-prepared and handed to a mod/modmin/admin to be posted if that is preferred. The point isn't so we have tons more colored names running around, but to help the site function without backlog, projects being postponed/forgotten/etc, and to reduce stress on the existing leadership.
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Re: Tentative Suggestion

Postby Jaykobell » 07/12/2015 11:54 AM

I think there are good ideas here, because it does remain a fact we gradually get too busy for smaller things.

I think sending out babies from the Nursery wouldn't be that much of a problem, but the thing is that it would be a real hassle for the mods to do it. They would have to get codes while just asking the artist who did your litter is a lot faster and easier for everyone. Still, if crow and the others would consider it, we could try and see how it goes.

As far as responsibilities go... Kyrit is in charge of the Marketplace, Kreepy is in charge of website maintenance and behind the scene stuff (coding, etc.), and I'm in charge of Kuhnas. We do small jobs here and there, like I handle the Kuhna trade notes. Until recently I also handled the Licenses, but this has since been passed on to crow.

Silv does do primarily only art things, and she has been working on a number of exciting things for the forums. Kodai has been doing little, however, and we have recently been talking to her about that. I know you said your post isn't to demote anybody, and I'm not saying this to insinuate that your post motivated this at all; it's been... an issue for a long time, hahah. While she does do stats, we've been considering giving that ability to Thunder, since she was previously trained for tournaments. Her and crow were also very, very lightly considering trying to work out the system over again since battling is literally non-existent right now. So we're currently considering moving Kodai to the status of an artist only.

Hmm, what else... Admittedly, what you put up there is roughly how things are already handled. Though, if you have any suggestions on small things that could possibly be handed out to the mods, I'd be willing to hear it.
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Re: Tentative Suggestion

Postby Kyrit » 07/12/2015 1:47 PM

As Shrewd said, almost all of your suggestions are actually how things already work, for the most part. We modmins do each do some 'small' things here and there, but we've already started deligating things out to the mods left and right. Before hiring Toxic, we even went ahead and started a thread where we listed out what jobs are happening where, and who was doing them. During this we deligated out a lot more work to the mods. I'll show you the Marketplace section for example. I am still the main authority in charge of the Marketplace, but a not of the smaller tasks are done by Crow now instead of myself.

I'm happy to say that with the exception of Kodai (which as Shrewd stated, we're talking with her), all of our mods have been incredibly active in discussing what duties they can take on to help out.

Your suggestions are nice, but essentially this is something we're already working on. Though I do want to stress that we shouldn't delegate too much to our mods, because they have times when they get incredibly busy too (Thunder and Crow are still in school like myself, for example). But yeah. We're working on it. =)
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Re: Tentative Suggestion

Postby Mojave » 07/12/2015 4:53 PM

Well I'm glad my suggestion wasn't too much different than how things already are! xD But the main change I'm throwing out there is the assistants. No need to make their names green/purple/whatever or create a new level of authority. The effect would kinda be like the Winter Wrap Up episode of MLP- ModMins are Twilight and make sure the entire site works and everything is coordinated. The Global Mods and Site Artists are the team leaders and make sure their specific teams are doing their part. Assistants are the workers and do the more menial work to prevent backlog.

For the nursery:
The artist that makes the baby sending the code makes sense in theory, but it's not a top priority so sometimes things are left in Nursery for extended periods of time. My suggestion is a single, dedicated assistant that runs the Nursery and possibly the Hall of Records threads (since they're more a quality of life service and not a necessity). After the babies are made by the artist, she could either send the codes to this assistant or post the babies herself. But that would be the extent of her work here. Members would message the dedicated assistant who would send all offspring out within 24-48 hours and then remove the family from the Nursery post. The assistant can then add the offspring to the appropriate Hall of Records and send the ownership info to the records keeping mod(s). For Kuhnas, I don't think the assistant should have access to the roller since they're a volunteer and just helping out. But if you're okay with the assistant having access to it, he/she would also need the codes so they can manage that entire process. Otherwise, kuhnas could be posted in the Nursery just like the other breedables so the assistant can get the URL and send it out. If spoilers are a concern, the kits could be posted as links instead, like on the custom pet list.

For the Marketplace:
I completely agree it should be managed by a modmin and Kyrit does an excellent job. And thanks btw for posting the layout of responsibilities. For this area, I feel it can be too much of a workload since you don't always have time for the smaller task of sending the codes out and an assistant could really help. My suggestion is you remain in charge of restocks, but if you get busy with other projects/responsibilities/RL you could delegate the actual restock to your assistant by messaging him/her the date/time and quantity of the restocks. The assistant's main job, however, would be sending codes for all non-custom shops (Toys and Trinkets, Birthday Boutique, Seasonal Specialties, and pre-made pets from Evo-Lux and Metamorphose) within 24-48 hours of the order being placed. Since custom/modified pets from Metamorphose, Khimera Industries, Evo-Lux, and Tiger Scintilla are completed by the artist, I don't necessarily want to add a middle-man to this process. However, the assistant could be responsible for sending out finished codes on a regular basis, or just if the artist needs/wants the assistant to do it.

Records and KS Subtraction:
I do however like the current structure on records keeping and ks subtraction. If, however, those mods see fit to re-assign, more rigidly assign who records what, or seek (an) assistant(s) to help with efficiency, I'd totally support that too.

Artwork:
This is the biggest responsibility and there's no easy way to break this up since the art is the heart and soul of Evelon. So obviously only the best will do. However, there are users who are constantly becoming better with recoloring, which is what a good portion of the artwork breaks down into. Especially seasonal specialties, where there aren't any new species, just new sub species with different edits, colors, etc. I understand if this is a long-term goal, but ideally, there would be dedicated artists responsible for single demands. For example: Site artists would work on customs and any major projects that affect the entire site. Breeding artists would solely be responsible for making offspring, EXCEPT their own. Another artist would have to do their litters.This would prevent anyone breeding and doing their own babies while ignoring other breedings that were completed before their own. Seasonal/Other artists would create pets and add them to a bank that the modmins could pick and choose from for the holidays, events, etc. The bank could also be drawn on by Morey, Vance, or even Alonia. However, Seasonal/Other artists would not necessarily be given a purple name since these pets could also be user submitted instead of having dedicated artists. This would cut down on work for the leadership team and site/breeding artists. However, if this was implemented I would totally support quality requirements and edit limits. Lastly, I said earlier that Site Artists would mainly be team leaders as well. Perhaps there could even be assistant .psd artists who are just in charge of making the basic .psd with layers, shading, highlights, and smooth line art. This would include turning rough sketches (of complete pets or just add-ons) into fully prepared files for someone else to (re)color. .PSD artists could also help with customs with tons of edits, add-ons, pose changes, etc.

Again, the whole purpose of my suggestions are to help with the workload and not to offend~ ^^ But I appreciate the feedback thus far. Also, if other members have suggestions, I encourage your feedback as well! :D

EDIT:
I forgot a couple other suggestions while trying to word the .psd artist explanation. xD; Also if it would help with the workload, there could be shop artists that are responsible for making the pets ordered in Khimera Industries, Metamorphose, and the Tiger Scintilla. The main Marketplace assistant(s) could also be in control of Evo-Lux to evolve an de-evolve pets and send them out.
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Re: Tentative Suggestion

Postby ToxicShadow » 07/12/2015 6:06 PM

Okay, I'm only a GM, but I figured I would post what little bit I can.

First off, I will say that I feel that, right now, we're still all getting situated and breaking tasks up among the team accordingly. We're already trying to make more things efficient and getting things done that need to be done.

Additionally, I sort of view GMs as the same thing you are calling "assistants." Generally, I feel we're around to do things to take workloads off of the Admin and Modmins. And, as I said, we're in the process of working out who does what and trying to get things out for everyone. No, really, we are. I suppose, in a way, your suggestions kind of came at a weird time, because we're already tying to make things  more efficient, and you just didn't know it yet and haven't been able to see it. xD;

In my opinion, having an artist send a message to an assistant to send out an pet, for example, is practically the same thing as grabbing one of the premade messages and then pasting in the pets' urls and sending it to the user that is supposed to receive it. It takes, what, a minute more? So I feel having an "assistant," in that area, is a tad bit redundant.

Artwork is a whole different thing that I am not going to into, since I'm still not familiar with the break down. However, I DO know that Baal is particular about letting users have access to art things and actually making art, because of certain standards and what not.

The only really feasible thing I feel you suggested that could be done, at least at the moment, would be allowing any of the staff (or other assigned staff) to roll for Kuhnas and/or having any staff (or other assigned staff) be able to send out pets. I think, once the artists put the babies in the nursery, there codes ARE actually right there, so any staff could just grab them to send them out. I don't know how much more efficient that would be.

My only other suggestion in this area would be to have a thread (or just post right in the Nursery) where users post which pets are going where from which breedings, instead of messaging any staff. That way, any staff can see the posts and send out pets? Then we'd just mark down a "Processed," note in those posts to show that they have been sent out. That way, whichever staff happens to be available to do it, can do it, without having to wait on a specific staff member.

As for the Khimera Industries, I believe we just assigned a specific primary artist to that area already and their fall back, if they feel they don't have the time to do it, is to pass it to another available artist.  Tiger Scintilla orders are typically completed by whichever artist made that Kuhna revamp originally. In the case for customs, they are essentially all claimed on a case by case basis on who wants to do them or who is available to do them.
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Re: Tentative Suggestion

Postby Mojave » 07/12/2015 6:58 PM

I recognize the Global Moderators are basically assistants to the Modmins and I have noticed the reassigning of responsibilities. o3o But the GMs are also busy with school, work, infants, etc on top of the Evelon workload. I figured if the GMs had assistants as well, it would reduce workload even further, give everyone a chance to breathe/relax at times, and not have to worry about some things that are just lower priority than the position's main jobs. Of course I fully expected that everyone would still help out if they had free time as well. xD; I just didn't think I needed to say that since leadership is a team effort lol. My bad for not clarifying this!

In my opinion, having an artist send a message to an assistant to send out an pet, for example, is practically the same thing as grabbing one of the premade messages and then pasting in the pets' urls and sending it to the user that is supposed to receive it. It takes, what, a minute more? So I feel having an "assistant," in that area, is a tad bit redundant.

I'm assuming this is referring to the marketplace? o3o If it's redundant by no means am I suggesting it. But for the Nursery, the artist could just post the image in the nursery, the assistant takes care of the rest. The artist wouldn't have to worry about coming back and sending codes then updating the Nursery post and then adding the family to the Hall of records. She can just keep focusing on the more important tasks she still has lined up. Even if sending pets just takes a minute, it still sometimes doesn't get done for a week or so, and for many different (and valid) reasons. Getting an assistant to copy the URL, paste it into an official PM, and send the pet on it's way to it's new home is a small task, but at the rate everyone breeds now, it adds up. Especially if that assistant is sending the codes for all breedables and updating all the HoR. This isn't a job that someone needs to have a green name for (you were able to edit threads without having a green name for a long time) nor does the person need to have access to anything else. I do however, like your idea of the public thread for users to post which pet is going where so anyone (I still recommend an assistant) can take care of it and then there's no need for messages to be sent to the modmins, gms, etc.

I also know Baal is very restrictive on art access. However it seems there are a LOT of projects going on behind the scenes. Between all the kuhna modifications, the war (even if it is slow), the Origin species (if it hasn't been scrapped), seasonal pets, customs, breeding, and I don't know what else, that's a LOT of art projects and it doesn't seem to be organized. Now it may be organized and I'm just not privvy to that information. That's fine, feel free to set me straight. ^^; But there are people on the site (mostly GMs now) who have practice recreating Baal's images to do breeding predicts. Why not let them do basic things like lineart, shading/highlighting, etc? Or break it down so someone does the lineart and let the site artists split shading and then coloring? Again, I'm not criticizing nor am I trying to be mean, but Baal is busy with RL just like everyone else and can't manage all the parts to the artwork like I imagine she would like. o3o If the workload isn't going to be diminished (put some projects on hold until other projects are 100% done), why not share the work? If not to the general populace of Evelon then among yourselves? Keep the same quality standards, that's a given. Even let Baal see some examples of your work and decide. But it just seems like this workload is pushing on a breaking point. :/ And with everyone having nervous breakdowns, health problems, and other issues in RL, it just seems like the healthier option than running anyone into the ground or maintaining a ton of responsibility. Also, breaking up the art work so there are separate artists for everything was a long-term goal to be determined as Baal can be convinced to trust other artists. Sorry if it seemed like that was an immediate request! xD; I'm a firm believer in quality over quantity and I certainly wouldn't want to see the artwork suffer just to get it out faster.

As for my timing, I am horrible at this and need someone to teach me this skill. xD; I have noticed certain jobs are being handed to the GMs. But I remember years ago when it was discussed distributing responsibilities differently, the general response was a resounding NOPE. And that it felt like nobody wanted to share the load out of pride. Now that was years ago, and maybe I've fallen out of sync with everyone more than I thought. But sometimes it just feels like this is still the general attitude; that nobody wants to relinquish an ounce of power because they enjoy having control, and that's just not healthy. :/ Again, I could be completely wrong, and I apologize to the entire leadership staff if I've misinterpreted anything and come to that conclusion out of my own silliness~ ^^;
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Postby Kyrit » 07/13/2015 3:36 AM

It's 2 am and I got like.. 4-5 hours of sleep last night, but going to try to break down some parts and reply to them at least.

@ assistants;
The thing about having non-mod members assist with work is that historically, it just hasn't worked (with the exception of Toxic obviously, which is why she's on the team now). We've tried having normal users do things like keep directories of zoo pens, wishlists, ect up to date and it always worked for maybe a month or so before the user would fall behind/stop doing the work. If within the next few months it seems like we're starting to fall behind on a lot of work due to staff getting bogged down with life I'm more than open to expanding our staff, but yeah. Getting help in the past has always been kinda rocky, unless we offered users keystones such as one time I had users help catch records up.

There's also the case of how, as Toxic mentioned, sometimes it's just as quick to send the pets yourself as it'd take to ask an assistant to send them out. In the case of seasonal specialties for example, within my template for that holiday I always have all the codes put in already, which means just quickly removing any that aren't needed for a pm. As such, all it requires is quickly seeing that Crow's already subtracted the KS and recorded the order and then it takes me perhaps 10 seconds to send out the order. It'd take me the same amount of time, or longer, to make out a list of what needs to be sent out. This obviously didn't happen this past Easter, but it will for the future ones since this was a recent decision (within this month). Sending pets out doesn't take me any time at all. It's all the record work that does, which Crow has happily taken on now.

@ Artwork;
As you mentioned, this is the hardest one to touch. Letting users do things like add-on sketches would be fine, as would pet sketches (if said user was Baal approved for such), but not just anyone can do the 'basic' psd layers (shading, highlights, ect as you mentioned). In some cases even Silv's lineart/shading hasn't been accepted by Baal and had to be redone (the Original pose Kuhna for example). So far the only other user that does entire PSDs is Silv, and even then there's a lot of talk between her and Baal with a lot of tweaks that goes in to every pet.

As far as a bank of pets goes, we actually do have that sort of system. Any time a mod/artist/ect makes a pet, they toss it in the bank and later on we decide what to do with it. I'm not sure on letting normal users make pets, since that would mean making the files accessible to more people (which Baal hasn't wanted in the past). We do have a suggestion area for if people want to give us ideas and sketches though. Users just tend to not give any suggestions.

@ litters;
To my knowledge, no one specifically overlooks breedings that are waiting on offspring to do their own litter. Some do seem to get skipped, but that's often because one mod/artist has claimed that litter and hasn't had the chance to make the babies yet, so no one else touches that litter. I do feel as though we need to rework our litter claim system though, as sometimes we claim a room when it first starts because we're excited to make babies for them, but then when the room finishes the person that claimed it might be busy and thus the room ends up sitting for 2 weeks untouched while rooms all around it are getting their litters. So I certainly do think we need to rework it a bit, but no one skips rooms to do their own litters.

@ nursery;
Since the chance in system, usually if you see a litter sitting around in there for a long while it's not the staff's fault. I've had plenty of cases where I've grown a litter and don't get a pm from both breeders for a week or so. If users do think we're a bit too slow with sending them out though, I don't mind Toxic's idea of a thread where users post in to claim their litter. Could even just be made a function of the nursery itself if users wanted that sort of system.

@ behind the scenes;
Things like the Origin pets are still ongoing, but yeah. It is a lot of behind the scenes work. Krypto's been working on an incredibly large project behind the scenes for a while now that's starting to get close to being done, which has taken up quite a bit of our resources to make happen. These projects are all organized, though there have been a lot of things that took a seat on the backburner to make sure we focused on the large project. There is structure, just yeah. We can't always show users that structure and keep projects a secret at the same time.

I've probably missed a few points somewhere since I'm tired and there's a lot of text to read. But yeah. I can promise we've been working on restructuring who does what work on the team, which is why within the past year we have hired Crow, Thunder, and Toxic. And I can also promise that powers have been relinquished by people like myself and Shrewd, like with how a majority of the Marketplace (which is known as being my baby) work is being done by Crow.
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Re: Tentative Suggestion

Postby Silverin » 07/14/2015 5:02 AM

Fallowing up what everyone has said about the art. The thing takes a long time. There are a lot of changes going on right now and I have quite a few projects on the go or put to the side for the moment so that larger projects can get done. With Kuhnas the files are huge and there are a lot of them. I have to make sure every edit for every Kuhna is compatible with every other base as well as across the original and gen lines. If other staff members do edits or markings they pretty much have to redo some things to make them compatible for other lines as well. To give you an idea... there are over 30 files for Kuhna and Lakundra.  Thats a lot of shifting around to make things match.

I have been working on them for a while now. I don't always have time due to real life. While most things are done by now (some are not) I am still working out kinks and my own mistakes.

As for new species and or revamps. Yes there is quite a bit of communication between me and Baal. While my shading and line work has improved most of my stuff gets rejected. I have only really had one or two things done right from the sketch and even then I probably made a bunch of sketched behind the scenes before I was happy with one enough to even show Baal. Even after that the pet often goes back and forth between us and or Baal finishes it off. I think I have only really had two or three things that I did entirely on my own and one of them I fixed up on my own because I was not satisfied with it.

A lot of this work will not show up right away. Its mostly behind the scenes stuff and will not show up until other things are set up.

As other staff have said pretty much anyone on the staff can make event pets/normal pet colors. We have asked for suggestions and maybe about four people participated in that more consistently, it also became rather hard to keep track of. So instead I did a thing to find out people's preferred pets and took that route instead, taking ideas from the previous topic from time to time. Made it easier to pick event pet species knowing what folks prefered.

There is not much other folks can do aside from make suggestions in coloration and such. Possibly edits as well.
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