A Community Assessment

Discussion in 'Community Discussion' started by CadenMann, Jul 13, 2015.

  1. Tell me about it... #LivesInFlorida
    bitemenow15 likes this.
  2. One question to all who think 5 minutes mute is not enough on the 1st offense from a troll:

    If a troll gets muted for five (5) minutes on 1st offense and
    if that time is doubled on every following offense,
    how many times it can troll
    if it lives 100 years?

    Good night from Europe, have fun :)
    607 likes this.
  3. WHAT?!? Not Math!!!
  4. Assuming the troll lives for exactly 100 years after joining the server and time to troll and be remuted is negligable (which is a bit unrealistic, but makes the problem simpler and does not end up changing the accuracy, as shown eventually below):

    100 years = 36,525 days = 876,600 hours = 52,596,000 minutes

    We can define the problem as the sum of a geometric series where the nth term is defined as 5*2^(n-1),

    Then we have this:
    52,596,000 = 5*(1-2^n)/(1-2)
    10,519,199 = 2^n

    Doing a logarithm calculation, the troll could troll 23 times before he or she died (assuming my calculations are correct).

    EDIT: To further the calculation, if the troll does troll 23 times, then they spend the following time banned:

    5*(1-2^23)/(1-2) = 41,943,035

    That leaves the troll 52,596,000-41,943,035 = 10,652,965 minutes (or a bit over 20 years) for the actual trolling.

    Now, back on topic. :)
    607, FDNY21, Silken_thread and 3 others like this.
  5. I'm not on that side of the spectrum. The trolling and stuff done by staff members was getting abusive and way out of hand before it came to a halt.

    IMO the staff hosting events practically everyday that are better than anything a regular player can do as grinded community interaction to a halt. Outposts are also all focusing on political stuff, which is great, but there's too much of it and it almost always causes drama when under the wrong leadership (which it currently mostly is). I'd write more here, but I've been down this road too many times with multiple staff members and I can't be bothered walking it again. Unless I work up the energy to write multiple paragraphs on this, which I might by tomorrow. We'll see.
    607 and Deadmaster98 like this.
  6. I think Olaf was onto something. The "decline" may be nostalgia.
    I'm pretty new to emc still. Joined around Halloween 2014. I came from a non-mc server though where I was a very active member and a mod for years (7 years I think? dunno, time flies). I went through the lifecycle of a server that started out with a few 100 people on each day/night to a peak of 12,000 members at once online. There was a point during that life cycle where I couldn't have been happier with that place. I loved certain members, the conversations, the fun, the games, and the contests. Eventually, some of my favorite people drifted away. The server began to become a victim of its own success, and was eventually bought by GameStop. That was its death knell, not just for me, but in activity overall. But I digress.... Before that happened, I felt like the community had somewhat disintegrated. The trolling got much worse the bigger the server got. The mods (myself included) were stretched way too thin and thus stressed out of their minds and not having any fun. The leadership was reacting to the changing quantity and age ranges of players, and it seemed like we had different rules and mod guidelines every other month. Clarifications of rules started coming out monthly, older members complained about "babying", etc. This thread is like deja vu for me lol.
    What some folks miss is the excitement of the server startup. What others miss is the smaller community or an older community. Some will miss certain key members or groups of friends who are no longer active or less active. That is all nostalgia.
    Servers change. A critical time in their lifecycle is when they are getting more and more successful. Assuming EMC won't sell itself out to GameSlop and becoming a pay-to-play scam, there are opportunities here. Challenges, yes, but also opportunities. Don't just mourn and drown in days gone by. Look at what is here now, and make it great all over again :)
    Or more simply said - Put up or shut up dears lol <3 Happy gaming! Hit me up if you want to go mining, hunting, or build something ridiculous :D

    P.S. Keph, you were absolutely the victim in that mess, and we do not blame the victim. I feel better for writing that down in a forum actually :)
  7. I don't even try to keep up with who's a mod at this point. It feels like everyday five new people have a green name. I remember when there was a big post announcing the new two mods. Now it feels like everyone is a mod but you.
    hashhog3000 and TechNinja_42 like this.
  8. I think that the thread has strayed from the original purpose. From my perspective, it looks as if this has turned into a Bash-the-staff-palooza. I think that this was not Caden's original intent. I get that these are your opinions, but try to keep the staff bashing at a minimum, because I believe that was not the purpose of this thread.
  9. I could not have put that into words any better.
    Even though I have no clue of your age, race, or looks, you are basically a virtual brother to me with all the times you've put those damn [SERVER] signs under my /home. =P

    This is the kind of staff members that I think we need in the Empire. Those that:
    1. Leave a good impression on the community.
    2. Will laugh at a joke, and play the game rather than be there just to enforce the rules.
    3. Can and are willing to interact with the community in the way a family might, rather than an enforcer.
    4. Be serious and strict at time while yet doing all of the points above.
  10. Last time we introduce new staff was about month ago. Who are almost out of training by this point and prior from that was last April and then November of last year. So are we promoting someone everyday? Not really maybe in your eyes cause you check-in every so often on the forums or in-game so seems like it. Also yes, We did have fewer mods in the past because honestly that's all we really needed but nowadays it's entirely different now because we have such wide variety of players from different countries around the world it would be more stressful to have less mods now. Another thing If you have notice in-game most of of us are on somewhat of a rotation schedule to fill times that mods were less active in the past for example "1am-8am Emc time".The way krysyy has it setup up now is perfect because at any time of the day at least 2-3 mods could be online compared to maybe one or none in the past.
    607, Silken_thread, PenguinDJ and 4 others like this.

  11. I really am a nice person, I promise. I just like colorful language XD
  12. This has to be a recent change. I have noticed but never really paid attention. When I first started playing in January there was almost never a mod on after 2am-ish until about 7-9am sometimes not until around noon. It's nice to have someone "available" during those times, thanks kryssy :D

    Edit: It's always the same people that are complaining about how the server isn't as good as it used to be. Every time you get responses from staff and people that ACTUALLY play(most of you that complain about the decline of the server are rarely ever on for any extended period of time, besides the forums maybe, from what I have seen) Yet the same things keep getting brought up and almost without exclusion the problem is always the same: you aren't happy and you are projecting that on EMC. The complaints I keep seeing resurface, not just in this thread but the countless ones I have seen in the few months I have played here are generally completely off base about the current state of EMC and the state of EMC in past times. To top it off its a handful of less than a dozen people that go on the same rants every time.
    crystaldragon13 and ShelLuser like this.
  13. In general, yes, but not in this case. Caden, Hash and Olaf are pretty active players. Just ran into Caden 10min. ago on smp1 ;)

    And well, I didn't really pick up Caden's post as a complaint. It's more like sharing his opinion on the whole thing, and well; we can agree or disagree ;)

    Well, I can say that this is not something exclusive to EMC either. When I came to EMC my previous MC home had the same kind of threads and complaints. And although I don't keep track (I only play on 1 MC server and don't bother with others) I do keep hearing stories that some players "over there" even look back to the 1.7 period (last year) ;)

    Different players, different opinions but also different backgrounds. I can very well imagine that things look different if you've been on for, say, half a year or if you've been here for 2 years or so.
    607, Gawadrolt and cadenman2002 like this.
  14. I couldn't have agreed more.

    I think that some people are taking this thread rather as a complaint, or even a staff-bashing and finger-pointing thread. This is simply me voicing my opinion and receiving the opinions of other players like myself.

    I quote one of my favorite French expressions of all time:

    "A chacun son burger!" or "To each their own burger". It may sounds stupid, but try replacing the word burger with the word opinion. =P
  15. I deleted my long, highly opinionated post, because I realized that I used an awful lot of strong, dangerous words when I could've used a few milder ones. I may have given a disclaimer, but that's not excuse for expressing my opinions as aggressively as I did.

    Yes, it disappoints me when I have no idea who the new staff members are, or, even worse, when I have known one or two of them to act the part of the stereotypical "noob" in past situations. Yes, I definitely prefer seeing well-known members promoted to a Moderator position. But when I really think about it, that is not a huge problem for EMC. I may have a tendency to have less respect for the new Moderators; so be it. Let them earn my respect with time, just as the others had to as normal players. I'll let them have that chance to prove that yes, they can be as worthy as Alex or Rainbow were when they first were promoted. It's not ideal, but it can work.
    My opinions on the Newsletter (essentially saying it did more harm than good) are fully revoked, ironically because the Newsletter just came out and reminded me just how much simpler it was to have the Newsletter as a hub for all recent events rather than hopping from front page post to front page post. I still wish staff promotions had their own post, but meh, you have to choose your battles, and that is a rather minor thing.

    As for the first, much less controversial post (located here) that focuses more on how we CAN help rejuvenate the community (because while I do think some of it is due to nostalgia, there are some things that can be improved) all of that still goes. :)

    I rarely express my opinions in such a strong way, and the players I see expressing similar opinions always seem to vary depending on the thread; this is the first time I've seen Caden do it, and Olaf doesn't do it very often, either.
    I consider myself to be quite active, thank you very much. :)
    If the same things keep being brought up by multiple people, then clearly they are significant problems that need to be address. And I don't think we're "projecting" them onto EMC, like irritable toddlers vomiting their carrots all of their mothers out of spite. People post their issues and worries because they hope for a discussion that will lead to a possible solution. I have not seen countless threads popping up, and those that do pop up tend to actually have different issues, even if the issues sometimes follow a similar theme.
    607, ShelLuser and Deadmaster98 like this.
  16. I wasn't referring to caden or hash for that matter neither of them are in those dozen people that post the same thing every time someone says (which is not what this post started as may I interject) that emc used to be a better community than it is now. This thread started as " I'm bored" and some still inconclusive expression about recent staff.

    Edit: nostalgia, I agree. Nostalgia and personal projection seem to be the key motivators of the: I miss the justinguy era.

    Second edit: Where is jkjkjk? He knows exactly what I am talking about and is an encyclopedia of links to old threads of sillyness.
    hashhog3000 and cadenman2002 like this.
  17. On the contrary to me being "bored", I am actually the exact opposite. What I am trying to get at with this thread is as follows:

    I want the Empire to be a wonderful place. I want everyone to be happy, the Staff to be interactive with the community and strict with rule-breakers and, overall, everyone to feel like a family.

    I am definitely not bored. Right now is one of the most exciting times in my EMC life (allow me to say, I have had lots of exciting moments. This thread is based upon me giving what you might call "constructive feedback" to the Empire, based upon my humble opinions. I love the Empire (and will never stop loving it (at least not any time soon)) and I am trying my best to make it a better place.

    P.S: I like the way you voice your opinions. =P
    607, Deadmaster98 and Gawadrolt like this.
  18. Well, I might as well crawl out of the murky swamp of forgotten members to post in this thread.
    I've been around the server since early 2012, and I started drifting from the community around the end of 2013, though that was more of a personal disinterest in Minecraft. It took me a long time to get back into it, and by the time I did, it was long too late for me to come back to EMC. By 2014, I would say the community changed. No one is to blame for that, and nobody should expect a community to be stagnant. But, despite that, I did my best to lurk the forums and try to keep track of the place. I couldn't really integrate myself back into the community at this point, and therefore I don't really have much of a perspective on the alleged issues (I mean, I don't recognize any of the new staff but I don't expect most of the staff to recognize me either). Reading through the thread, I think it's important that people examine how much of the issue comes from the problems in the Empire, and how many of the problems may come from personal disputes. I know I have my problems with EMC, but that's very likely because of my drift from the evolving community. It's good to know where your problems with it are.
    Anyway, I said my part. Let's hope it isn't textual rubbish.
  19. I am sorry to say krysyy, i see afk staff all the time in SMP6, again sorry, but there are afk staff out there
    Gawadrolt likes this.

  20. Come play with us!!! the forum community is not representative of all the communities in EMC. If I had to generalize I would say that the forums are most expressive of about five "groups" or communities: Forum warriors, smp4 forum warriors, smp8 forum warriors, LLO and POC lol. There are DOZENS of small and large communities over ten different smps. You can find a place that will fit. If you were disinterested in the community when you came back maybe a bit of advice: while looking for a "community" turn town chat off, that will annoy you very quickly, start pms with the supporters and if none of those conversations interest you(you will likely get dragged off before you get to the non supporters on an adventure or tour) move to the supporters. Start on any smp but remember, if nothing interests you, there are nine other smps. :D

    I haven't seen this whole staff not being interactive thing honestly. Aikar came out to fnm recently and has been on somewhat regularly in the past month. Simon keeps grabbing people to come kill him in the pvp arena, samsimx hosted a fnm last friday and there were MULTIPLE staff there. The last mob arena I went to there were FOUR staff there. Highlancer54 has been bugging around smp7 a little more lately. Dramanya is almost always(when I am on anyways) running around and manchildie. I think I started a random pm with effinbatman(fairly certain it was effinbatman) not too long ago about a fair warning when it came to certain political ramblings with certain Emc political extremists lol, that one had me laughing for a while. It has been a little while but Simon came and saw a bunch of my builds and well... lets say he is critical but he stuck around for a while and had a harry potter match with a player named "something"magic.

    Point being, staff have been pretty active with the community in my perspective. ESPECIALLY lately.

    Edit: mrwhosmagic it was on the tip of my tongue.... err fingers? earlier.
    607 and crystaldragon13 like this.