rubycity_ooc | Mod Announcement

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Mod Announcement

Hi there folks!

We'd like to come to you with a proposal to make a change in the activity check guidelines. Don't panic! This is by no means something that will happen, only what might happen if it's met with general approval by the game's players.

Up until now, the activity checks have required either a thread of fifteen comments total, or a log/post with fifteen comments total within it.

Double activity has either been one thread of thirty comments, two threads with fifteen comments, a log/post with thirty comments, or two logs/posts with fifteen comments.

What we are proposing is as follows:

1. Two posts/logs with at least one comment
2. One post/log with at least one comment plus a thread of ten (10) comments total
3. Two threads with fifteen (15) comments overall [To clarify, this is fifteen comments total, we're not going to suddenly ask for thirty!]

Double activity would then be:

1. Three posts/logs with at least one comment
2. Two posts/logs with at least one comment plus a thread of ten (10) comments total OR one post/log with two threads of at least fifteen (15) comments overall.
3. Twenty five (25) comments total spread over two to four threads.

As stated previously, this is not a certain change, and we're bringing this to you before we consider implementing it so that we can answer your questions, hear your concerns, and if it's shown that this isn't going to work, the proposal won't go any further and the activity check guidelines will remain as they are! If there's a good amount of discussion both ways, the decision may be put to a poll, which will be posted using one of the moderator's paid accounts.

Please keep all discussion in this post polite, and if you have a question which you think we may not see, please indicate in the subject line of your comment! Anon is enabled so that everyone feels free to say what's on their mind, but be aware that if this is abused we will withdraw anon commenting.

Thank you for your attention!
The RC Mods.

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I'd prefer activity remain the same. One of the most appealing things about Ruby City to me has been the ease of making activity. While the new guidelines are still pretty light compared to some other games and I'm sure I could make it with very little difficulty... well, very little's not the same as none, and I'm lazy.

So, not a big deal, and I'll definitely stick around either way, but I'd prefer the existing guidelines.

I like the new activity guidelines. They don't require any more volume than the existing guidelines and they would encourage people to tag out/spread out their CR, if only a little bit -- and it does so without upping the actual number of comments, with the exception of those who choose to stick to comments rather than post.

Just to clarify, I'm assuming that all of the comment counts are still the total number of comments between both/all characters involved in the thread, not just the character belonging to the player in question?

While I largely support the idea of giving people more of an incentive toward tagging out and posting more often, my biggest issue with this is mostly related to the existing player base.

As of recently, the game has broken circa 150 characters, and that would be one more piece of activity required out of all of them. If a person, for example, has been around for some time, and has a number of characters in the game adequate to their own roleplaying ability/speed and their free time, due to the game's slow, easily paced environment, they will suddenly be faced with a situation that's quite pressing. It could be hard to bump up activity on all their characters, due to either time restraints or just being used to a game with more lenient AC.

In my opinion, this would force quite some people with multiple characters, or even any other players, since all of us are affected by these changes, to have to rethink the amount of characters they desire to keep in the game, if they're not able to adjust to the new activity check due to whatever restraints they may have that were the first reason they apped to a more quiet, lenient game. New applicants that come from ATP that have been recently accepted/made reservations may have considered the game due to the fact it's laid back with AC while still having quite the number of characters in which to have a good amount of CR with!

I understand the concern with people who are not active at all beyond the one sample they provide each month, even I have been guilty of that occasionally, but I believe the best way to handle that would not be to raise the activity check , and instead, perhaps, a monthly HMD in which their fellow players can politely criticize them on their inactivity/character sitting.

I do see, though, where the mods may be coming from. Increased AC generally should mean increased activity, or so one would think. Personally, I think it's quite the contrary, since the people who are well established in the game for quite some time, with their number of characters, will possibly have a hard time adjusting to the new check with the multitude of characters they may have. Another of the reasons the "easy", or so to say, AC, was/is excellent, is because if a player has multiple characters, and has not been feeling one of their voices very actively, it's easy to make activity check regardless, and leave the character a bit in the back burner while not forcing the mun to take a hiatus for the character.

I'm pretty sure I'm making close to no sense by now, but in the end I'd just like to conclude that, while in theory, the bigger AC seems to point toward a better game, it'd actually possibly force a lot of people that have been here precisely due to it being a slow game for quite a while to consider the characters they currently have in game.

Thanks for reading!

I'm for it, I think it's something that would help the game and is in line with other things the mods have done to try and up the quality of the game like adjusting the application format and becoming more strict in regards to approving and denying applications.

It's not that much more per character to do, so for even a game with a slower speed reputation I think it's quite doable.

I think these are good changes. In a way, they might even be easier to handle (in my point of view, at least), since a player won't need to worry about a single, specific thread hitting 15. With an overall of 15 for two threads, it allows for a more relaxed drive, even if they're maintaining more than one thread at a time. I'm not sure, but I assume most players have more than one thread a month, so...
Plus, with the other option of two threads or logs with a single comment, it drives for the creation of more plots, more posts, making meeting ac standards easier and the development of cr hitting new levels, giving Ruby City a new push.

Overall, seems like a good change. It's still pretty relaxed, while also inspiring more player activity. Pretty good!

I can see it going both ways.

In general, I'm not opposed to requiring 2 instances of activity. I can see where it might help prod people into tagging around more. And in all honesty, my greatest trouble with AC here has been having several threads, none of which reached the required 15 comments. I know I can't be the only one who's gotten 2-3 threads to 10-12 comments only to have them die. And that is frustrating as all hell.

But I also like things the way they are. It's not really any more lax (in fact, I think it's more difficult than the proposed changes) but it is simple. Which is a big plus for me. There aren't a lot of combinations and choices, and that is what makes it the better option for me, personally.

My other major concern with the proposed activity is its non-uniform-ness. Sorry, I can't think of a proper word just at this moment.

I think while it might promote tagging around/posting more often, it might not help promote quality cr building. I mean, theoretically, you could make two short posts, make one comment on each and be set without anything really going anywhere. I guess I just feel like it could create more content, but also generate more laziness. Particularly if it's a problem with people barely scraping by on AC.

As someone who survives primarily by tagging around rather than posting, it strikes me as very unbalanced. Sort of like asking people who post for 4 tags while asking people who tag for twice that. I just feel, personally, that there should be a little more uniformity there instead of posts basically being weighted 3x higher than comments.

I understand that the idea is probably that posts are generally longer than tags, but that definitely isn't always the case. And for that reason, if the important factor here is having the activity spread out, I'd be more in favor of weighting the posts themselves as tags and keeping the standard 15 comments across 2 posts.

As was said before, it's a two-way-situation - I think

lifewithoutrest voiced basically the same concerns as I would have with this.

To me, it sounds a little like it would do very little to prevent thread-dropping - I don't have to finish the threads on my post, I don't have to finish a thread once I reach the minimum amount of tags, which is not the way things ought to be in RP. And I say that as someone who is very guilty of thread-dropping.

In the same vein, the game has a couple very dedicated backtaggers, who also do not benefit in the slightest from the changes, as finished threads from the previous month don't count, either.

TL;DR: the changes are all the same to me, I could do nicely with the old version, I'd do just as nicely with the new one. There might be issues, but issues will be there either way, because there are always issues with AC.

HOWEVER, what I'd be proposing is a sort of... reward system for doing your activity, finishing threads (both current and backtagged ones), logging/posting, building CR, tagging new people, etc. Some games, like KoL, already have such a thing. Threads/posts get a point-value, and a certain number of points gets you stuff. Now, we're not a plot heavy game, so plot-participation would probably not be on our list, but hear me out.

What we do have are characters that open their own shops, miss things from home, need certain things to fully use their powers - why not tie receiving some of these to activity? One of the great things about RC is the ease with which you can add new locations/options to the setting, but why not tie some of it to activity? This could motivate people to tag out more, finish their threads, post more... All while AC stays as low as it is, so for those who don't have the time/drive to put up with all of this tag-work, nothing changes, while those who always do a lot more than required actually get more out of it.

The big problem with that one would be that... we have like 150 characters and I wouldn't want a mod to have to keep track of all that. I wouldn't want to be the one to do it, either. My suggestion would be that players keep track of their points in their character's journal. THAT would be entirely optional, though - so those who are like "no, my character doesn't need stuff from home/new things/a horse" can opt out, while those who have characters that would kill to get their apple tree back ~~/shot~~ could ... you know... keep track. Of their activity and stuff. That sentence got away from me.

There could still be 'trinket from home giveaway events' like on Christmas and the likes, but... idk, I think this could make people do more quality things instead of just realizing they're one thread short to make AC and just tagging someone until the bare minimum is hit.

There'd need to be a set list of point-values for things (and some might have to be negotiated with the mods, due to special cases), but... yeah. THOUGHTS?

I prefer how it is now to the changes. I feel like this is a lot of people's second or third game, one of the more relaxing slow with easy ac and making AC more demanding might make it hard for those people. I have a few friends joining because of the lax AC.

You know...this might actually solve some problems I have sometimes when trying to answer for the activity checks. I'm a little concerned with how easy it will be implement but...yeah. I think this could work to the advantage of other players. The combo of posts made and a 10-count thread in another post would make my life easier when I can't get in a lot of work done for one of my characters in a particular month, certainly. I say go for it. This could end up being a lot more fun for people who fret about not being able to post a lot in Ruby City.

As a relatively new player, I don't feel I have much experience with these kinds of things to tell. However what I have noticed is that in Ruby City people seem to be very open with tagging, and even if threads themselves don't reach 15 comments each, people tend to accumulate multiple threads that would add up to over 15 through the course of the month.

I don't feel that the new AC would require much more activity than people are already getting. I used to worry about not getting enough AC with Katherine because of AC requirements at other games, but I find that in RC people seem to like tagging around and accumulating 10-15 comments as stated would not be difficult at all.

While I'll have to admit I'd been shocked at first by the first impression of "twice the activity" after some thinking I don't feel like it would be much more work. I rather like the flexibility it gives you.

Most points pro and con I might have mentioned have already been brought up more eloquently, however, there's one more thing I'd like to bring up.

With the option of two posts/logs with one comment each, it seems to me like there's a chance of getting more posts without necessarily getting more interaction. I dunno about encouraging the number of posts... It's not so much that we have too few posts in the game, there are always plenty of recent posts to tag. The problem's more that posts go unnoticed, especially when there is a sudden influx of posts. It's not a big issue at RC, but I feel like it's something to keep an eye on if the new AC system is implemented. People won't have more time to tag out, so with the comments spread out across a greater number of posts more posts than now might go ignored.

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