Modding Best Practices: One Player's View
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gorckat Mafia Scum
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Modding Best Practices: One Player's View
There is a surprising amount of variation among mods in the way common, reoccurring actions and events are handled. I've played enough games to see a range of good through bad ways of handling each of the events I'm going to look at.
In each case, I describe what I consider to be the "ideal" method of handling the event/action. Since I've never modded, any criticism is welcomed and encouraged, if only to help me understand why some people do things less than "ideal".
In a few of these cases, I've considered asking a mod how they do things at sign-up and /in-ing or not based on the answer.
Discuss.-
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gorckat Mafia Scum
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That revives the age old debate of whether lurking is a valid (or acceptable for the health of the metagame) strategy. If a mod will confirm that a prod was sent and when they are looking for replacement players, then it should be deducible when a player is lurking.Yaw wrote:If a player picks up the PM and doesn't respond to it or post, though...within about 24 hours of that happening, the mod really has to make a decision if this constitutes a choice on the part of the player to lurk, or a choice not to play at all (requiring replacement). I'm not convinced that if it's the former, the mod needs to tell the players, as it would be mod confirmation that the player has chosen to lurk as a strategy. That said, I'm not sure how to get around that entirely.
If they meet players that far, then let us handle the dirty work or /outing players that don't want to play
I've done that, but in cases where a roleblocker exists, it may matter who does the kill. I've sent "X is killing Y" when expecting to get blocked and its been accepted.Andycyca wrote:I always ask the mod whether I can send a "Just in case" NK choice.-
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gorckat Mafia Scum
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The one game that comes to mind with the mod editing answers to questions into posts in ABR's Mini 486 (iirc). I recall looking back to see the answer to a question or three that was asked, but couldn't remember who asked it, so I had a bitch of a time finding the answers.Norinel wrote:To extend a few of your points... what do people think about the mod editting player posts ever, to answer questions in the special mod formatting, or fix obviously mistaken tags?
Quoting the question when posting the answer would be the ideal. 1) It puts the info in the mod's "stream" when other players look back and 2) It makes it easier to see quickly who asked it (versus having to go back to the post, scrolling up nad maybe paging back to find the query).-
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gorckat Mafia Scum
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I could probably restate this point as:Flay wrote:# This is the only one I disagree with. I'll usually acknowledge that I've seen a request for a prod, but it's between me and the player whether or not they're lurking or have disappeared. Even pro-town roles have reasons for doing this at times, so it's not playing favorites to the scum. I don't understand your second paragraph here; if the player doesn't post and I say that they've picked up their prod, then the player is 'outed' as lurking. I generally prod on MY schedule, not the players, so I may be misunderstanding your intention here.
Acknowledge a player has been prodded when requested. Announce when a player is being replaced. Everything in-between is for the town to deal with.-
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gorckat Mafia Scum
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Necro'd for goodness:
Mr. Flay wrote:Mods that don't have aNot Votingcolumn of their VCs make mecrazy- I can't usually hold all the game's players in my head at once unless it's endgame, so it makes it much more likely that lurkers fall off my radar, and it's a royal pain to follow up on if I have do a Vote Count for them while backup modding.-
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gorckat Mafia Scum
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I just did #3.Rishi wrote:Hmm. Old thread that got dragged up. But I'm glad so many people agree on 1! I definitely think that vote counts should be in their own post.
I agree on all counts except maybe 3. That does create extra work. I think the fact that the mod picked up the PM should be proof enough that the mod has read the night action.-
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gorckat Mafia Scum
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Meatworld:farside22 wrote:5 is one of those things I think players need to ask. I will prod players and acknowledge that I prodded the player, but i think saying the player picked up the prod and didn't respond isn't something a mod should state unless asked.
A) John's in the bathroom...no way he could have responded to your point
B) John hasn't spoken up at all in like 5 minutes, stupid lurker...vote:John
Online, I enjoy/prefer:
Player: Hey, where's John?
Mod: Prodding John
Mod: (24 hours later) He was in the bathroom and said he's back now/He's not coming out so I'm gonna replace him.
over:
Player: Hey, where's John?
Mod: Prodding John
Player: (72 hours later) hey...whatver happened to John?
Mod: He was in the bathroom and said he's back now/He's not coming out so I'm gonna replace him.
Partly because I favor 2-3 week deadlines, those 48 hours make a difference. Even without rigid deadlines, those 48 hours may have been wasted debating whether lollipops are scummy than jawbreakers when some guy has been lurking in front of everyone while they assumed the mod was on it.-
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gorckat Mafia Scum
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That's similar to my draft rule- deadline hits at X, but until I post the lynch and lock the thread then no one is dead. Votes/unvotes after X will not be counted.Yosarian2 wrote:
(nods) That's a good idea. The alternate idea is just to state in your rules that the deadline dosn't actually happen until the mod comes into the thread and announces end-of-day, like "Deadline will be at some time after 8:00 PM tommorow, whenever the mod is avalable to lock the thread". The ambiguaty should be eliminated, though; having one or the other, and having everyone know which one, is probably best.I think that for deadlines it is a good practice to have a rule stating something to the effect of "Votes and unvotes that accur after the deadline will not be counted." that way if can't be there to lock the thread at the specific deadline time the players will realize that while they can still post since the thread is unlocked, who will be lynched has been determined.-
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gorckat Mafia Scum
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Few things suck worse as a vanilla townie than checking a thread/watched topics every day not knowing when night will end.Lawrencelot wrote:3)<snip>For example, if the night is not deadlined you can wait until you got their night action.
Ergo, nights should be publicly deadlined, after which it follows a simple pressing of "Quote" and typing ofKill/Investigate/Protect/Roleblock/Spoon: Playershould be done.
In the case of a QT being used, there should still be some sort of agreed upon way of communicating to the mod the info he'll need and a mod confirmation that it was in fact read.-
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gorckat Mafia Scum
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This has come up in other threads, but I now formally add it to my Best Practices (actual editing in to original post to happen later tonight):gorckat wrote:In a few of these cases, I've considered asking a mod how they do things at sign-up and /in-ing or not based on the answer.
Post your ruleset in the signup thread and ask players to read it before "/in" so there are no conflicts once a game starts.
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