Recently there have been some staff members that have either been getting bored with the work they are doing, or are unable to work appropriately with other staff members.
Some have retired, some have been removed from staff and one has even been community banned as a result. I would like to point out that I am targeting the ex-staff members and making it very clear that we will never tolerate this kind of behavior.
Unfortunately, when it comes down to it, this is the sad reality of any online gaming community. There is no legal obligation for staff to perform and act correctly, they are all volunteers. We entrust a lot of power and authority in the staff team, intending for it to be used to benifet the community. Sadly some staff will decide that they are leaving, or bored of the community. Due to the nature of the internet and anonymity, they elect to destroy whatever they can in an attempt to bring everyone and everything down with them.
Here is a brief overview of recent incidents:
Wasteland
Over the past few weeks and months, Lucky B33f and I have been discussing at lengths about issues with Wasteland Staff abusing the powers that we have given them, to quite severe extents. In a recent patch we removed 90% of the 'fun' admin tools, this is purely due to the fact that no appropriate resolution could be made between the wasteland staff after multiple interventions to reduce the abuse of power. As a result of this YaMum the Administrator was removed from staff, Baden retired, and Unit Retired.
“As a result of this... Baden retired...” grammatically the “this” being “no appropriate resolution ... to reduce the abuse of power”
I resigned for reasons other than those that Red lumped me into. Mainly due to the underwhelming support of staff in game, the abrogation of responsibility by senior staff for the deteriorating state of the server and subsequent finger pointing to lay blame for lessening player numbers at the feet of game staff.
The “multiple interventions” you speak about elude me. I remember staff loadouts being mentioned twice in the short period I was on staff. Once, when I arrived, by Unit who explained that they are available and then again in a team discussion with Beef who asked our opinion on their use. No decision was made to preclude us from using them.
In the last week and a half before I resigned, Beef said in “Slack” that he wanted to assess something and asked the staff either to not play or play under an alias and to not use our “powers” during that time. I have no idea what he was doing or his conclusions based on this assessment.
Lucky B33f and I both identified multiple players receiving abuse from YaMum while under an alias.
Additionally YaMum was responsible for the introduction of over 350 admin kits to the game and the utilization of player markers to gain an unfair advantage more than 200 time. For a comparison of kits between other staff, see the below numbers.
Admin kits allow staff to spawn in items for them to use on either event or for general gameplay, we normally allow this as staff are usually unable to spend the same amount of time playing the game and building up their arsenal due to staffing work.
“We usually allow this”. My understanding was clearly that it was not usual but in fact always allowed. As is evidenced by the fact that Yamum used it for more than 3 years. If it was not allowed why did it take so long for senior admin to act on the “illegal behaviour”? If it was allowed but its use was a problem for other players - ban the kits not the staff member using an allowed item.
Please note these results were recorded on December 19th.
Admin Kits since Dec 1st
Yamum 48
Unit 12
James 1
Excel 0
Baden 10
Total 71
Admin Kits since forever
Yamum 320
Unit 22
James 38
Excel 49
Total 487
So to clarify, Yamum plays daily he used the kits 320 times for a period in excess of 3 years! 108 times a year, once every 3 to 4 days!
It doesn’t sound so excessive until you compare it with Unit, who more recently played a few times a month, James who plays once or twice a week (based solely on my own observation), Excel who I have never seen on Wasteland and me.
Because it was omitted from the second part of the analysis above I can tell you I used 10 kits “since” forever. Once, the day I became a moderator to see what it entitled me to (losing the high end gear I had at the time) and the remaining 9 times over a one to 2 day period to see if it added to my experience. It didn’t and I reverted to not using it.
Obvious in his omission from the list is Dak who, like Yamum, plays daily and is an excellent administrator. Who might also have provided a clearer comparison to Yamum in use of loadouts and Zeus.
Straygaming’s concern about diminishing numbers on the server is well founded. As a player I was most concerned that the server I played on was stable and fair. For what it’s worth I would advise staff to look outwardly to what other servers are doing right. I’ve been playing on other Wasteland servers with 80 players at a time and none of the jets are flying backwards, my character doesn’t suddenly crash and there is always someone from admin there to help.
I played 6000 hours+ on Strayagaming, I think I was well know by the people playing Wasteland and relatively unknown by people on Slack and the SG website. Most of the people I played with would have no idea who the senior staff are and no idea how they play the game, they have concerns about changes made to the game by people they don’t know.
In conclusion to Red’s post: I was NOT bored in my role as moderator, I think I worked appropriately and well with other staff members, I have no intention of “destroying” anything.
I am targeting the ex-staff members and making it very clear that we will never tolerate this kind of behavior.
Since you don’t actually state what the behaviour is, I will remain alert and try to curb any intolerable behaviour.
FBI’s dramatic analysis, supported as always by James, should follow shortly.
