I would give that job to the Dev Admin... in my view on how things go down, the manager communicates with the admins to make sure everything is running fine, if there is a problem relating to the bureaucracy of the server, he should handle it. Nothing else. The fact that Storm lends a hand and occasionally makes stuff isn't a handicap it is a perk. Everyone likes to assume him as the owner of a playermade world, which he isn't he is the manager of an existing server...

A basic business model on a server would work out well if people were being paid to do their jobs; Managers could targets for different team leaders, who then go on and set targets to their subordinates in order to achieve the target set by the manager. It sounds basic and it sounds fair, but in reality nobody gets paid at all, so where is the motivation to work like that?

There isn't one. The idea of being motivated to make a server better b/c you use the stuff you dev...it doesn't really work out b/c they're working more than playing. Or at least they should be.

@ zip. But if the dev admin isn't working the team towards a goal that solves the servers problems, the only person with the ability to fix that is the manager.

Taking cheap shots at storm isn't going to help anything. I can understand why everyone is at his neck but you have to realize his position. We can find much better ways to solve these issues then "Manager waves his wand and says bye bye to all problems" anyway.

The fact anyone can even say Storm has been doing a decent job sounds appalling. Classic has been deteriorating for years from what I hav eseen, and was just about getting worse than ever. I'm not sure who there is to blame for Classic's stagnation but obviously some people still think he's doing a job.

The Staff team is already slow as it is, so yes, Storm is doing a bad job atm. Dev Team has very little developers who even stay on task. (Quite Frankly, I haven't seen one other person than Thor and WD making something as a team rather than their own ****.). DC has been doing a great job with GC Dev lately when he came back. Ranger is keeping FAQ team in line. GC team can manage, and Half the GP team makes an average log in of 2 minutes per week.

@Clel: It's not that we want to take cheap shots at Storm. We want a manager who can actually MANAGE. If he can even keep all the staff teams in check, then that would be fine too. But he hasn't. This server won't see much progress if we don't either make it apparent that Storm needs to get off his ass and start getting more active, or that we just need a new manager who can brief the server on a good basis.

Storm hasn't done much of anything that we all suggested was of a manager.

Personal views on each division?

GP is in a fine place, could be a couple more, but thats a double edged sword.
Stryker should fire the blatantly inactive ones though.(Eillen?)

FAQ is doing extremely well, I like where its headed, I like where Ranger is taking it, and I'm saying that on a basis of being the previous FAQ Admin back when they did a lot more. He has a lot of good guys under him(FAQs helping off tag!)

GC is declining heavily.
Night is becoming less active(dont really blame him)
Ticket economy has exploded and become awful.
Events participation has gotten even worse, probably due to the above reason.
So GC has basically turned into 2.5 active GCs who are CTF junkies because they have to, noone else wants to play anything else, because theres no ticket incentive any longer.
I'm working on it, but its an uphill battle.
Also needs to do some firing though.

Dev Team intially was doing well, but I see them starting to wear down.
It's an overwhelming task they have at hand, so I can see where its coming from. As long as Thor keeps trying at 100%, things will get better, but if Thor loses his motivation, I honestly don't know who else is remotely qualified compared to him.

I can agree with DC here.

I attempted to reset GP times today to really see where everyone is at. I suppose the command was changed since it wasn't working at all.

The GPs do need to be more active. I've told the ones I've seen that. The ones I haven't seen, well, I hope they're reading this.

Don't really need times to see the clearly inactive ones to be honest.

StrykerTFFD
Mighty,
Deophite18
ILENplanes7
EclipsedAngel
02illusionco
Crimson2005

i bolded the inactive ones, obviously.

Maybe, but I need to see everyone's level of activity.

I can agree with Stryker here.

Not sure why the development team changed a perfectly working stafftime system...

No, neither. My point is that yes- Graal is run by a corporation. However, the way they handle things is very atypical to the way almost every other corporation does. They have a history of listening to players in certain situations, and disregarding them in others. It's hit or miss as far as that goes. What I'm trying to say is if you look at the bigger picture decision wise there doesn't seem to be a lot of rhyme or reason to the decision making process. So to say that player input is futile no matter what is wrong- it might make a huge difference, might not- there's no telling

I can agree with Terazel here.

I can agree with Joshie here.

I can agree with bell, who agreed with DC.

I can agree with maximus here.

I can agree with Mystic here.

Apparently the GP is case sensitive now in the command. :/

So just to clarify here. The next higher overriding authority to initiate a change in management for the server would be PWA. And that's not going to happen because PWA is acknowledging that everything is fine and dandy with the server, and that the current management is sufficient? Despite all of the player input stating otherwise?

Sure, it's not a democracy nor a tyranny since neither condition is stated in stone to be the status quo, but the facts have to be faced sooner or later. The problems are recognized and stated, the next step is remediation. What's the remediation? The answer from management has been too broad, and as stated by the current Manager himself, he's seeing the input here as a list of problems to remedy but it's a two-way street. Players should have their say and be let in on the overall plan for remediation so they know what to expect.

The biggest problem is that this isn't something that just cropped up.

a major part of the problem of attracting new players to the server is definitely lack of content. as an FAQ i deal with new players the most and most commonly people say "well what else is there to do?" and i am at a loss of what to say, i tell them about the various other activities, (which are few), and they have the general feeling "oh...okay *logoff*".

Too true.

We need something to do in between events. Hopefully the card game will help fill the void, but that can't be the only thing. Hopefully the devs have a plan for something, but who knows.

If only there were not 4 NPC's that were useful.

If only someone could go through design a simplistic card game AI and allow all NPC characters to play with certain difficulty factors on them.

Say everyone challenges the Tyhm NPC in the bank, then Tyhm's NPC would gain AI levels and his difficulty would rise and he would have a slight edge in drawing better cards/making little to no mistakes.

Then when you beat an NPC with relativley the same level as you or slightly higher you'd get "experience" based on the level disparity(Card Points?) that you could take and buy booster packs with.

Pretty clever.

I assume its possible by checking numbers (if side=1, lay card w/ 3 next to it) and stuff like that. But a script to make it play an entire game like a human (conserving mp, playing it safe, etc) would be excessively tough. Or at least I think it might be. The card game script takes 21 pages in wordpad, though obviously most of it repeats (for the 9 spots).

If someone could do it w/in a reasonable amount of time, that'd be pretty sweet. But if this is possible...idk.

I'd think basically you could do it with play strategies like aggresive/defensive/conservative...

Aggresive-
Priority:
Look through the 9 spots, find where you can cause most damage--Is there a tie for damage caused? Use the card that has the least vulnerability on the exposed spots.

Maybe in the future, but for v1 no.
As glad said, the card game as it is, is pretty extensive scripting, 1.3K lines of code with just the table, 2.2K with all systems. For battling NPCs, that would be a ton more code on top of whats there already, plus modifying the existing code. Would set the game back realistically several months, provided full motivation through it to the end, and I put off all my 100 other things people want me to dev.

I can look into it for a v2 card release, however theres a lot of variables to consider, such as people farming points off NPCs and abusing something somehow. For now, players will be able to battle each other for card points, when someone is defeated, they will not be worth points, or diminshed points based on how long they were last defeated, for an indetermined amount of time.
Of course, an opposing player will be notfied about this players status of point worth before a game starts.

I have never said everything is fine and dandy. I have just been around long enough to know that simply replacing the manager is not going to solve the problem. I have also listened to the players and read these forums. For many years actually, long before I was a PWA.

Many of you either individually or in groups have for the most part had an ulterior motive for your demands as to who should replace Storm and or Thor. Some of you in the past and present have even been perfectly willing to lie in order to attain those motives. Some of you are just sheep agreeing with what someone else wants so you can be included in the conversation. I honestly don't think that any of you understand how destructive a rash decision on a management change can be to a server.

I fully expect someone to now say that anything is better than what we have now but are you sure about that? Would Classic being non existent be preferable to what there is now? Would going invisible and spending the next 2 or 3 years also be preferable?

Maybe you should all rethink your motives, stop dwelling on the past and come up with some constructive suggestions that could truly turn Classic around. Rome wasn't built in a day and Classic won't be either. From what I've seen and been informed of. Those that actually have good suggestions, have been saying them privately so they don't become involved in the flame wars themselves.

Nobody can be sure about the future, obviously, but you're also assuming that removing the manager would be destructive. So this doesn't really point out anything.


Why would replacing the manager cause these things to happen immediately? If you didn't mean it as immediately, you must think Storm is doing something worthwhile to prevent the server from going in that direction in the future, which it seems the majority agrees isn't the case.


I'd call getting rid of a manager that obviously quite a few have issues working for, constructive.


So you're saying you're just dismissing all of this thread as a "flame war" and not something that's informative, accurate in some cases, and reflective of player opinions? There are useful posts, it's not all garbage.


Just as a note, all of this was typed purely out of lack of understanding of things said, not out of anger or other emotions that most people ALWAYS assume drives everything.

Thanks for pointing some of what Bell said out, Kat. I am also confused as to why she started going off a dismissive tangent.

So what's the remediation? You've addressed that you've been around to recognize the problem. What can fix it, in your experienced opinion? Not being sarcastic, being serious here if you can imagine that.

Indeed some of you people are, and still are and still in place and still actively manipulating behind the proverbial curtain. But does that dismiss that there are issues to be addressed and fixed? What's the quickest way to resolve the current (and let's face it, it is) perils?

Where did you pull this speculation from? If you're referring to what I said earlier in this thread, I specifically stated that the potential is with the server itself. Classic in its root meaning is already gone, it's time to face the facts. The hypothesis of cleaning the slate and starting from scratch with the server would be akin to, say, jumpstarting a popular TV/movie franchise from the 80s (the specific word for it escapes me at the moment, but think Transformers for example).

Rome wasn't built in a day, but Classic also hasn't improved in dare I say close to half a decade. I don't see where you keep going off on motives and past and flame wars. It's a problem being addressed. Those that have good suggestions might want to speak up instead of keeping it private and hidden so that others may benefit from the flow of good ideas.

And also, the whole dwelling on the past thing is a big part of the problem. The server needs to draw in new people, not just merely retain what's left. I think you need to dial back on the tinfoil hat speculations, Bell, I don't think anybody's out to attack anyone here. Do try to be objective and contemplative. :)

First let me start off by saying I am completely ignorant to the situation on Classic. I haven't actively played classic in quite awhile. However I also haven't noticed anyone actually stating specific problems (and solutions) with the current classic management. What is so wrong with him? Why is removing him the only option? Is he inactive? If so, has anyone managed to contact him to find a reason as to why? Instead of putting forth effort to uproot the manager, why not focus on planning new extended game content for the server? Like a new town, new events, something that'll attract more sparrers and pkers.

Rarely does new management learn from the mistakes of past management. Thus the same mistakes are repeated until the new management finally understands the old management, unfortunately by that time it's too late and a new management is already under way.
One of many reasons why servers progress slowly.

Oh no, the manager is online more now. Problem is, over the last four years, nothing significant to help the server has been released. Is it completely his fault? No. But it is his job (by some people's definition) to push the dev team to complete useful stuff in a timely manner. He didn't push them, nor was the stuff they were working on very useful. Therefor classic is in a pretty bad state content, playercount, and excitement wise. Is removing the manager the best solution? Perhaps. Perhaps not. The dev team is the key to fixing the server right now; maybe a different manager could push them to be more productive. Its hard to know because its all speculation and theory.

Thanks for the tips though.

@glad: the development team isn't the ONLY team responsible for restoring the server. in my opinion all 4 divisions are needed for different purposes, they all fill a certain role that needs to be fulfilled in order for a server to survive and prosper. development may be the key, however without the other teams doing the job effectively the entire thing is prone to collapsing

FAQ's cant answer questions about quests we don't have. GP's can jail people if no hackers come to our server. GC's cant host 24/7 b/c ppl don't stay online b/c theres nothing to do.

No, the dev team isn't the only team responsible. But they start everything.

too true

ya ranger ur completely wrong all other staff positions are useless if the dev team can't get anything going.

I can agree with what yump said

Yes, the other divisions lose their role a lot if the dev team fails at releasing content. Besides GC anyway.

How it stands, FAQ only really have a handle of people answering questions since there are a lot less newbies and a lot less content compared to 4 years previous. Ranger is doing a good thing from what I see, by trying to get his team on focusing on the community aspect of the server, though I never asked him the specific details on what that entails.

GP is rendered nearly useless, and kind of hurts the server as well if they try to be of too much use. Since we have a low playercount, there isn't much to police, and being that the population as of current is a bit more vulgar and profane than other server's populations, if you try to overpolice, a few of classic's community members end up being jailed or banned, and that brings the community down more than them dropping f-bombs would. It's why GP is so lax on the rules as it is. I doubt Stryker wants to harm the community.

GC on the other hand, has a different part in this.
For the past four years, they have been completely frontmanning the server while the Dev Team had its problems, setbacks, and admin changes that further complicated development.
After 4 years though, the overuse of GC to keep the server alive is causing the demise of GC.
Tickets are nearly useless, there's so many.
The events get a little less appealing every time.
The drive to play events continues to drop.
People dont want to play a 'mario party' server forever, and they won't, its showing now, and it will continue to show.

I can agree with Gladius and DC here.

The initial idea for GC was the compliment the server with extra activities. It has long since been repurposed to the point where it is essentially keeping the server alive. I admit I was not pleased with the end result, but it wasn't fault on the GC end.

Dev might be in the spotlight, but it seems to me that a lot of it has to do with purpose and direction. Someone needs to make the call on that, get with the staff divisions to see if a direction/goal is feasible (technically and socially), and roll with it. A huge success factor of past development was taking in player input. Not 100%, but at least a large portion of it.

I've talked with thor today and it seems he does have a lot of projects going right now. Some I've heard of, others I hadn't. The issue is that most of them are partially complete but obviously not finished; lack of manpower is an issue.

Yes, they are working on "content" for in between events. Yes, they are reworking some of the old levels. Yes, they are adding new areas. Yes, it is taking a while. Now I don't know how effective most of this stuff is going to be b/c I haven't seen them. But what I do know is that there is a general plan in place, judging from the pms. Is it exactly what players are asking for? Not from what I remember (these pms were about 12 hours ago and I don't remember all the details,) but then again there was never a consensus by the community on what exact content they wanted.

So, yeah. Things are being worked on. Hopefully they will help. Hopefully they will be finished. Hopefully classic will still be alive by that time. Hopefully.