Whoa! Strong words! ^^

But Saint is right. Back in the day when I was a server regular promotion denials were very rare and builds weren't judged that thoroughly. It was a simple matter of "not griefer, built something on the server -> builder", "kept coming back to the server and was nice" -> advbuilder and so on.
Not everybody has the same skills but everybody (mostly) puts effort into what they build.

The true reason why we had ranks in the first place was a) they were hard-coded with the respective names in MC# b) I wanted to introduce a hierarchy of INCREASED SAFETY. Let me elaborate - initially the ranks were not meant as signs of your e-peen and were not even that much about administrative powers - I wanted them purely for an increasing sense of SECURITY for the people. Main = grief fest, builder maps = less chance of griefing but still potentially prone to it, advbuilder maps = even less chance to be griefed. It wasn't that much about the quality of the builds themselves.

I had to introduce various requirements under community pressure BUT truth be told initially the ranks were like SpA points - you spend time on our server, have fun and are nice, you get promoted and in turn your builds are more and more secure (by granting you some administrative commands too) and hence you get more attached to the server.

Like SaintK said - in SpA there are few rules and our leaders rarely give out "direct orders" - if they do it's because in the end someone HAS to have the final say so the community doesn't fall apart completely - democracies don't work well on the Internet.

It's the same with Minecraft - I am not anybody's boss, I'm just the guy who manages the servers and tries to provide a nice gameplay experience through adjusting the technical side of things. If I give out ranks to people it's not meant as a direct reward or anything - it just means that I trust them NOT TO FUCK UP - if I didn't know better I'd gladly give everybody access to everything but then the server would fall apart. If I have to make final decisions I weigh them against the impact they will have on the server.

Yes, I am pushed by the community in certain directions but the more I think about it, the less positive I am towards the decisions I made due to peer pressure. It's not that the ideas are bad or somebody is stupid etc. - it's just that server communities always form their own rules, set up their own virtual hierarchy and there are people who like being "above" others - it's just how humans work. Hence many suggestions indirectly reinforce the layering of our community into ranks of various degrees of perceived prestige - which shouldn't be the case.

One of the mistakes I made, in my opinion, is the introduction of that many ranks (a community suggestion :-\). The problem is again with the distinction between how they work ADMINISTRATIVELY and SOCIALLY. On one hand I wanted various ranks because we have 32.000 unique users now and for SECURITY reasons it would be dumb to i.e. only have ONE builder rank, where everybody is equal - griefers would slip through the cracks, builds would get destroyed, accusations thrown and disaster would strike. From a social perspective this is how it should be done however, to make people realize that they are all equal (unless they are not nice - then they get banned :-P). Then, from a social perspective it would be best to just have ONE admin rank - these would be people that help me run the server on the in-game side. But from an administrative perspective this is again not feasible since there are SO many different commands and many of them affect the server configuration itself - you can't give them to people just like that, since they might accidentally "abuse" them simply by making mistakes but with catastrophic results on the server-side.

I don't quite know how to solve the problem BUT when/if fragmer finally introduces block tracking, which would increase server security IMMENSELY, we might try an experiment with just the three ranks as outlined above and everybody being pretty much demoted to the same level - then we'd see how many people would quit our server simply over "losing their precious rank", since these are exactly the kind of guys we don't want.

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War does not determine who is right - only who is left. - Bertrand Russell

I understand you need the ranking for structure, I am not saying you shouldn't have any ranks. I'm only saying the ranks should be given only judged by how trustworthy someone seems to be, how responsible they seem to be, and how much effort they put in the game. The actual build result is not even a question. If i would choose too, I'd be an admin in minecraft, even if i won't build. That is cause i trust myself. Same goes for all other SpA members regardless of what they build. They'd get highest rank assigned just for joining the game in the first place. It's all based on trust, not on skills or anything like that.

It's *not* SpA's nature, and we'll do anything to keep it out of SpA. The community will only accept the game and it's players if it's done in the way we choose to run our community, a non-competitive fun environment.

Out of curiousity, if such a change was to be made, by promoting people irrespective of their building talent, how would you go about ensuring stable build quality in themed zones such as City Builds? At the moment, City Build zones hold a high quality due to being accessible to people with good creativeness. If restrictions were abolished, what steps would you take to stop themed zones from becoming like guest zones?

The themed zones can still very well exist. People with high effort but low quality will also understand their shortcomings and understand that those sections are not meant for them. It's a complete different discussion from the entire rank system.

It's not completely different, because every single server map is defined by the rank limitations set in place. It is a very big part of your proposal.

Saint saying it would be up to the individual to say, I can't build in here this is too good for me I'll stay in these other maps and have some fun.

As in be responsible.

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Huge quote, small comment.

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Breasts

I'd say - huge quote USELESS comment. Not exactly the thing we want to have here, TBH...

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War does not determine who is right - only who is left. - Bertrand Russell

I just like to feel included...

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Breasts

Well fuck me, I was thinking about proposing more or less the exact same thing. My idea for a rank distribution would be like this:

guest: awarded on first join. Can build on main only
newbie: awarded after reading and somehow confirming the rules, kinda like the trader-rank in SMP. Has access to lava, water and a very limited cuboid (say 1024). Can build on 1 of 3 newbie-maps. This would, I think, satisfy most casual players that play for a day.
Builder: Awarded after having played 15 hours on the server without incident. Same commands as current mason. Can build on the builder-maps
Advbuilder: Awarded after building a very nice build on one of the builder maps. Same as current mason. Only difference between this and Builder is access to advbuilder-maps. The ONLY rank that is earned by building.

Op: same as current Op
SupOp: same as current SupOp with the ability to appoint Ops AND SupOps

I dont see why we should have a trustee rank just to show ingame who has FTP-access and hasn't. New Ops/SupOps can be promoted by vote/recommedation among the current SupOps.

edit:// Just to clarify, I was one of those annoying snots who pushed for the advbuilder-split in mason/architect/mod. But looking back it clearly isnt working as expected.

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"Um ... I'm just wondering if it's okay if I hold you down against your will for a little bit?"

Why not try for the old 5 rank system?

Guest- For new guys
Builder- New guys who proved they can build and aren't griefers
Advbuilder- Guys who can build nicely
Op- Guys who can moderate, grief patrol and check builds.
SupOp- Guys who can help by loading levels, big issues and op duties.

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[22:07] <@FBB2> +Ollieboy: %d+Pandorum%f: So Ollie when shall we have sex again?
[22:07] <@Xesdra_> fail
[22:07] <@FBB2> +Ollieboy: Noo the say failed me
[22:08] <@FBB1> +Pandorum: LOL

I see where you're coming from, but I personally like the prestige and competition that forms from the rankings. I love being able to lord over builders (in my mind) and submitting to OPs. Its like I have a place in the server, (and a very unique one with only 14 members), but I earned it. I can say that I earned where I am by not only being able to build something really neat, but also by being social with everyone on the server. I would hate to have my 100 hours of fun spent and networking be on equal level as a guy who built something miniscule in 2 hours.

The caste system that is currently implemented is also what made me strive to do better. After being promoted to builder I disovered the builder worlds and wanted to put something in them to match their skill and commitment, and got mason from it. Then I wanted to exceed all of that and got architect from it. Would I have built the same things with the same detail without a possible reward? No. Not even close. Assuming the average jump from guest to builder is like 3 hours played, and the average jump from builder to mod (including the inbetween stages) is closer to 100 hours, if we put in only those 3 stages, what incentive is there to stay on the server after being promoted to builder? There's just no way that would work.

You could also say that you want the new builder level to be more like mason builds. Then you expect guests who have little to none experience in building something truly legitimate to work 6-10 hours for a mason build before being recognized at all? I'd leave that server fast were I a guest.

The incentive system works because people love to think to themselves "If i just do this one more thing, I can get the reward...". This is why the lottery works. If you make that "one more thing" to 100 hours of sticking around without any further incentive, only the dedicated would truly do it.

As for competition, I thrived on it as a builder. I saw Nessy as my competition (even though he probably didn't see me as the same) because when building my first arch attempt, his creation of the boss in WoW (forget the name) was looming over me the whole time, and then in the contest he beat me. Nessy's work challenged me to build something as impressive as the rubik's cube not because I thought to myself "I can do that too!" but because I took the human need to be better and was able to apply it to the situation, giving me a lot more motivation and ambition.

The caste system is fine, and the competition is fine, so whats the issue? They say power corrupts, and its pretty true. Even as an architect, not even too high up there, I see most guest complaints as petty just because I know what its like to build a 50k+ block structure and then I see them whining that 5 of their blocks got deleted? That things they don't understand happen and they yell and cry and moan (like every single main wipe 'OMG I SPENT SO LONG ON THAT WTF'). That they want their horrible maze to be rated again because they added one more section, and insist you solve it without cheating? These things are understandably ignored, but the result is that I get a "I'm better than them" attitude that I have to check myself for. THAT is the issue, not anything else. The competitive and active community (yes, even the drama) coupled with the rewards just out of reach is what lured me to stay in this server, and I'd not like to give any of those up.

Although I don't have the backing of experience here, I don't think the ranking system is to blame, I'm pretty certain it's a contagious competitive attitude that has spread amongst players, not for any paticular reason, from my point of view this has slowly escalated, and to be honest I think it's just a phase.

The current rank system is a functional hierachy, and sadly, being human that's just what we need. I personally think the mod rank is very effective against griefers, as their main focus is dealing with them. I think the builder ranks should be a challenge, it's what makes them so desirable, you've been set a standard, time to pull out the stops and enjoy building to impress, get denied, try again sometime, the chase is the most fun. When you hit that standard, it feels good, you've achieved, say what you want about it being trivial, you've put your mind into it, and it came through for you. It's not so much about competition, it can exist, but that's not the main focus. I hate all this begging people do, what's the point in not earning it? It's this attitude that needs to be corrected, the rank system is fine I think, and I am convincing people that it's not all one big race, it's not falling on deaf ears.

People, with good reason, are kicking up a fuss about these iffy promos, but they're not all that frequent, but they're damaging. I've seen people give it a good shot, but they just miss the mark, they start from scratch, with out creeching about it. Then you get these people with lazy unimaginative builds, pestering everyone with a coloured name in chat, until one with relaxed standards comes and promotes them without asking for anyone else's opinion, that's just not fair.

This is my opinion, and it could well be wrong after frying my brain from 9 hours of soild mutliplane animating, but blaming it on the rank system is lazy, as you can see the community has took things into their own hands and it's progressively working. Dodgey architect promos wont slip through the net so easily anymore, promos are scrutinised without hoslility or harshness. Second or third opinions have been insisted compulsery and it is working. The drama on here isn't nothing much to worry about, (SpA being some sort of non-idiotic breed of forum that I've never came across before) what we refer to be 'drama' is pretty civil and purposeful. It's in our nature, and it's all part of the experience, if anything it makes things a little more interesting, having a wrong to right, rather than an ideal eventless community, this is the real deal.

This.

...Then again, I sort of like this new rank system now, I wouldn't want Balls to be the same rank as me xD.

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Youtube Channel

You don't lord it over anyone that's the point
Self improvement? You know where you consistently improve on what you have already done not what everyone around you is doing.
That not what SpA is about at all, THAT is not the only issue and the way that you know that is that the community, the one that runs all of this stuff, is telling you that that is not the only issue. The ranks are not rewards or signs of prestige they are access rights and that is all.

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So it all boils down to:
"People build for promotions"
rather than:
"People build for fun and earn promotions along the way"

I'm serious when I say over my time at SpA, I've only seen a few people say:
"Anyone wanna check out my cool build?"
instead of:
"Can an op come check my build for promo?"

This stuff ain't part of the game and I know people are gonna say "Oh, it doesn't matter to you, you're a Super Op" but if you're serious about promotions try MW2 or something, which revolves around levels. This game is about building for fun, not getting to the highest rank.

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[22:07] <@FBB2> +Ollieboy: %d+Pandorum%f: So Ollie when shall we have sex again?
[22:07] <@Xesdra_> fail
[22:07] <@FBB2> +Ollieboy: Noo the say failed me
[22:08] <@FBB1> +Pandorum: LOL

I think this needs to be rectified, this idea that promos are a requirement, rather than something granted to you. Though I have to say when I was a guest I made a spaceship, thats was pretty builder worthy, people of various ranks came over and said they liked it and put in a elevator, then zoned it I think. Even fragmer was on and said it was a cool ship, didn't ask for a promo, didn't get one. Next day I built a big robot, with a laser cannon, couple of mason- were watching me, and when it was finished, they called over I think a couple of mods and an op, it got zoned, and the laser beam turned to lava, didn't ask for a promo, didn't get one. I didn't even think of asking. Later on another guest saw the robot, and attempted a pretty poor copy of it, they asked for builder for about 15minutes and they got it, at that point I had to show the original, I had to see if I could get one at that point.

I'll admit my mason builds purpose was for a promotion, but I would have built it anyway, to say "hey! look what I did!" and to try out the funky design I had in mind. After being a builder for some time, I did want to rank up, half the enjoyment I have in game is helping others with cuboids, water/lava, and griefers, and I felt I could do this better as a mason. My mod promo came as a surprise, and I'm glad I gained it without asking, now I'm not sure if I care promotions about anymore, I pretty much can do everything I wanted to do as a mod.

I do hear people just ask for a review, a lot of them, I mean often the ones who ask for a promo don't deserve one anyway. At the end of the day I've had a lot of fun on here, and I've not done anything that wasn't intended to benefit my enjoyment, Stop_signs had a lot of fun on here, he's found his enjoyment in the challenge and competition, and has earned it too.

It's all propaganda, see the new ops and mods come from the age of the "ask for promo". Some of the older supops & trustees will probably promote for a good build on sight. (Although, I do admit this is becoming alarmingly rare)

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[22:07] <@FBB2> +Ollieboy: %d+Pandorum%f: So Ollie when shall we have sex again?
[22:07] <@Xesdra_> fail
[22:07] <@FBB2> +Ollieboy: Noo the say failed me
[22:08] <@FBB1> +Pandorum: LOL

I'm going to stick my tail here even though I don't really play Minecraft: wouldn't it make sense to just add a rule according to which people who ASK (in any way, explicitly more so) for a promotion do not get one regardless of the build? You could also have everybody who has the power to promote make an understanding, that the first build which would normally be worthy of a specific promotion be..umm..overlooked. Then you could sit and wait and see if the person turns into a little bitching brat, or continues to build, for fun.

The bottom-line of what I'm trying to say is that giving any kind of superior status to a person simply for playing one game or another better is a very, very bad ideea and this will lead to a rotten environment. If you really must have some form of ranking in order to create access for different stuff, then make sure you rank those people by skill and personality. Remember, it only takes a handful of assholes to ruin the fun for everybody else.

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Comfortably Numb

I think this age will pass, it's just the current attitude and atmosphere. Well this can stop and it is, people who beg shouldn't get promotions, while the more reserved should be prioritised, how do we know someone is even after a promotion? I know some masons who have been on for like forever, but their begging has hindered them, and stopped them being promoted.
To be honest, if it wasn't for bad supop+ promos, I'd say the drama would never have snowballed. This multiple opinions system is working real nice, especially for us mods who pretty much running everything through our mod chat, almost making us an efficient anti-griefing and fair promotion unit. If supops+ and a few others humbled themselves alittle, and asked for a couple more opinions there'd be pretty much no drama at all.

Giving people rights for just being skilled is indeed a bad idea.
Here at SpA we're admins because we were are regular visitors of the SpA servers, have good morals and are generally just a fun, social bunch of people.
A good deal of the SpA members don't particularly shine at any one game (I'm part of this good deal) nor do they need to.
If we were to give admin rights exclusively to skilled players I have a feeling our ranks would be filled with self-centered elitist pricks.
You don't need to be skilled to make good decisions as an admin.
So frankly, I find the current Minecraft promotion and rank system incredibly flawed.

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'Belgium, a country with many homos also have a pedophile party as far as i know.' - Violetblood

Mod/Op/SupOp isnt gotten through building skills but through being active, nice and responsible. Self-centered pricks get a warning and, if they dont improve, kicked back to whatever rank they were before.

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"Um ... I'm just wondering if it's okay if I hold you down against your will for a little bit?"

Ah, thank you for clearing that up for me. I might try Minecraft soon, but I'm yet to install it.
So the ranks like Architect are just for bragging rights or do they actually get admin powers?

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'Belgium, a country with many homos also have a pedophile party as far as i know.' - Violetblood

Architects can promote, which, I have to agree with your logic, is a major flaw, but yeah, it's the only example of pure administrative rights being chucked out for building skills, mod+ is just based on personality. (Assuming kicking rights is just an anti-grief tool and not a pure administrative thing)

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[22:07] <@FBB2> +Ollieboy: %d+Pandorum%f: So Ollie when shall we have sex again?
[22:07] <@Xesdra_> fail
[22:07] <@FBB2> +Ollieboy: Noo the say failed me
[22:08] <@FBB1> +Pandorum: LOL

Ok im not jumping in here to give a suggestion, im here to rage well not really but im kinda pissed. Junco, Ive heard a lot from you because you are on the foums a lot and POST a lot. Thats awesome. But youve been on here for probably not even half as long as some of the supops on this server and i hate listening to you (and some other mods or new ops) complain about bad promotes on OUR end. I mean, i try not to promote a brat, or promote a pice of shit to builder but lim has told us time and time again how he wants this server to run. We try to help him achieve his goal by giving rather easy promotes(ecspetially for builder and mason) And then promoting the GOOD people (like yourselves and others) to a rank of power so as to help us achieve our goal of a laid back, easy going community.

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Not in cruelty. Not in wrath. The Reaper came today; an Angel visited this gray path, and took the cube away.

I post on this forum alot because, I'm pretty fed up of other forums, just image boards of profanity regardless of the forums subject, and total context bound lexis, I know this part of the forum's all about minecraft, but it's acessible, I don't really belong anywhere else on the internet, I run a large group on dA and that's about it, I wouldn't have time indulge in much else.

SomethingAmazing I choose my words carefuly, use words like 'I think' and mention that my time on here is short so I could be wrong, I never say ahh THIS IS shit. Besides it's not just me who believes or agrees with what I say, I'm just more inclined to post about it, if what I say is bothers you, you don't have to take notice of it. At the moment the games still quite addictive for me, and in time I'll probably be much less present on the forums.

I'm not even bothered what people think, I enjoy posting on these forums, I am going to start being more reserved, but what's being discussed at the moment is quite relevant to what I have to say.

Edit: corrected a profound amount of typos

And that's the problem. We were being told to also be a lot more harsh with promos to increase builder+'s exclusivity. When we promo a less capable guest, we get an absolute shitstorm on how crappy mods are. Yet when we (Mods and ops) question the same type of promo done by supops+, we get another shitstorm on how we need to make the server friendly and laid back and give easy promos and ham & eggs shit. This is the rock and the hard place I mentioned a while ago. So what is it to be? You tell me and I'll stick to it. In the meantime dont go shifting the blame onto mods because they're less experienced than you, that's just a load of bull.

EDIT: And i'd like to apologise to twitch for furthering the derailing of this thread

Personally whenever i promote i check the online time, and how the building is looking(too see if they at least put some effort in making that building, for example making a 10x10x10 brick house is hardly putting some effort in building it.) And last but not least how they are behaving, which is sometimes hard when they are guests, since that would mean that they haven't been on the server for a very long time. Therefore making it harder to see how they behave. But for builder and especially mason+ it gets easier for at least me too see who have right attitude.

As it is now, mason/mod/architect should somehow be merged and/or have the same kind of power and the only difference is the name color/prefix. And maybe a renaming of the maps, or some kind that will define that superhuge builds on this map, big builds on this map and so on.(some kind of relevant name, so that people with common sense would know what to build in which map)

What i think is that builder should essentially be for anyone that doesn't grief or makes the server a place that wouldn't be fun to stay on. But i still think that you need to build something to get it since, building something makes people get to know the guy a bit more(This can sometimes be hard with 64 player online). So whenever i am looking at someones building for promotion and i see that it is almost enough, i usually try to talk with them a bit, preferably by whispering to them and suggest some improvements.(To see if they are made out of the right wood so to say.)

The fun for me in MC is made up with about 70% helping people, 30% building some shitty building, since whenever i feel like building something, there always seems to be someone needing help with something.

(Feel free to just tell me if you think i did something wrong, no one is flawless)
Turned out to be quite a long post...
Please excuse any misspellings and sentences that seems out of place, since English is not my primary language

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"Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving."

You can't claim that all supop+ need to be more humble. a lot of us help around and such. =( Big reason we probably don't help *as much* is because only mods can red mod chat, and only op's can read op chat. ect, ect. Like only I can read Trustess chat as opposed to trustee chat. -.- Which is driving me freakin' nuts!! Also: you guys seem to get to everything before we(I) do.
Back in the day I NEVER asked for a promotion, I just hung around 'cause it was fun. ^w^ I love Spa Freebuild.=)

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"This war is about colours. If you wear the wrong ones, you are going to be killed." ஜஜ۩۞۩ஜஜ۩۞۩ஜ
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