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Requesting Reviewers

FrostJaeger

Chief Parakeet
Banned Member
@Wes, I’d like to ask that the rule granting submitters the ability to request a new NTSE reviewer be removed, as the rule currently...
  • Places a great amount of pressure on NTSE reviewers by putting them in a situation where they either have to give in to the demands of the submitter - or risk being replaced by another reviewer that will go ahead and approve the submission, regardless of whether or not it’s overpowered/rule-breaking/etc.
  • Allows for powergamers to exploit the NTSE system by complaining, threatening, and whining their way into getting their overpowered/rule-breaking/etc. submissions approved - because if a reviewer says “no” to them, they can simply have that reviewer be replaced with someone who will say “yes.”
 
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Currently, that rule isn't even documented. I would like it if you could propose a real rule about it, here.
 
Okay, then make a counter-rule with the intention of putting it on the wiki, please? If your rule works, we can remove the post you linked.
 
I feel it should be fine to state as you're posting the original submission if there's anyone you don't want reviewing it. That way it can't be abused in terms of selecting your reviewer specifically and also there's no "giving in" because its stated up front not after involvement.
 
Let's face it, there are some folks I don't want reviewing my stuff. I get incensed around certain folks. I don't believe it's necessary for us to ever request a new reviewer. However, reviewers should have the option to "tag out" and leave a particularly annoying submission to someone who engages better with the submitter, or has a fresh set of eyes to make sure it works right.
 
i think it allows people to be biased against certain people they dont want reviewing their stuff, Or biased that they want a certain person reviewing it. They should be able to ask but it should be a courtesy not an enforced rule.
Let's face it, there are some folks I don't want reviewing my stuff. I get incensed around certain folks. I don't believe it's necessary for us to ever request a new reviewer. However, reviewers should have the option to "tag out" and leave a particularly annoying submission to someone who engages better with the submitter, or has a fresh set of eyes to make sure it works right.
This is the main reason why I don't think a submitter should be able to wave who they get; the NTSE mods are the ones who should be having to step out. Submitters are and should be willing to work with people that they don't agree with. And trust me; I would know because I have submitted to the NTSE and still been civil despite in the past being very discontent with how things were handled.

Communication is literally all we need and submitters who can't communicate shouldn't get to go "lol don't give me X because they can't give me a fair approval" or whatever. This is exactly how we allow people to slander the credibility of the NTSE. What we should allow - as was pointed out - is for an NTSE mod to hand it over to someone who both agrees to take it and that they think has some sort of better reason to view it (for example, there's various members of the NTSE who specialize in certain parts of it like personnel-scale things or ships due to their own submission history). If we're worried about bias, then there's a bigger problem out the door that needs to be brought to staff as a formal complaint. No NTSE member should be incapable of handling someone's submission but it is perfectly understandable if they lack the time or believe another NTSE member would better understand something.

Call me silly but when the NTSE tends to run without giving people crybaby powers or generalization tools to force change on submissions, it runs far better; the drama in the NTSE around "biased moderators" is purely because there's people who refuse to act mature and if that is the case then they need to be identified and approached to either remove them from the NTSE or to put punishments in place for their attitudes.

NTSE doesn't have to be bad but if kids wanna throw candy in the shop, they're going to get lollypop'd.
 
We clarified in the OP that there are people in the NTSE who may be biased towards saying "yes" or "no" depending on who's posting. There's nothing wrong in my opinion with requesting politely as a creator to not have a specific NTSE beforehand if you perceive biases in their reviews.

Perhaps simply informing that person privately. It can be petty and childish behaviour when the reviewer doesn't respond for weeks even after two or three pokes, which is one reason why we can have long dry periods of articles dragging through approval. They should know to hand over submissions at that point but for some reason a few don't care.

I imagine it sort of like how player's rights should stop GMs forcing you to twist your characters, it's a measure to stop abuse of power by one individual. The worst is when someone does their review and somehow keeps finding problems after corrections because those problems were missed in the initial review. Sometimes it may feel like intentionally only reporting one problem at a time to kill submissions by wearing down the submitter.

At the end of the day, the submitter is actually adding to the universe and the NTSE isn't. NTSE play a vital role but making sure that content creators have defence against that rare but observed bias I think is worth considering at some level. If it was my choice, submissions would be randomly assigned to reviewers.

So yeah, Madi and Dufrain have a point for sure. That being said, special dispensation to certain submissions by the submitter's buddy on the NTSE is personally what I consider the real issue with the system right now. Something perhaps that warrants another thread like this one given I see it all the time. There are definitely "biased moderators", quashing those opinions is rather uncompassionate given it's casting aside concerns off the cuff.
 
PLayers really shouldn't be able to request different NTSE mods. I pretty much agree with what Legix is saying.

And @Ethereal I understand your thoughts about just not wanting some people on yoru stuff. But if you have that little confidence in them, you should be gathering evidence and taking it to Wes to have them removed from the NTSE, if there actions aren't enough that you feel they should be removed, then you should still see them as qualified to handle your submission fairly. They might not be your preferred choice, but if they handle it fairly then it's all good. (And there shouldn't really be arguments if both people are being fair.). If you and the person tend to have trouble communicating because misunderstandings, find someone you trust to be fair to mediate or 'translate'.
 
I feel it should be fine to state as you're posting the original submission if there's anyone you don't want reviewing it. That way it can't be abused in terms of selecting your reviewer specifically and also there's no "giving in" because its stated up front not after involvement.
That allows for you to eliminate every reviewer but the one you want reviewing your stuff.
 
I feel like it would be nice to be able to note any greivences with a particular reviewer and state a preference, but that does not need to be followed.

Unfortunately that opens a path for an NTSE mod to openly abuse a player. On the other hand, I believe the NTSE is expected to be more professional than that.

For example, while I would rather @Alex Hart not review my submissions because we get heated around each other and it could get nasty, I do respect that his physics checks are often on par with or superior to my own and he has a very logical mindset that works very well with most reviews.

Thusly, while my greivance is publicly known, he does not have to honor it, and I will do my best to work with him.
 
Giving a little leeway is a slippery slope, Ethereal.

What if one isn’t enough for some people? What if they think two are against them? Three? Five? Everyone on the team except one person? Are we going to keep giving them ground until they say “I get to request my own submitter?”

You say everything with such good intentions, Ethereal, but so is the road to hell. This is why I prefer objective rules. If you can’t enforce them and can’t stick to them and make sure they’ll never change, don’t make them.

You say, Madi, that this is to ensure submitters aren’t abused. But this isn’t a rule that protects the submitter. This is a rule that protects the reviewer. Abuse can be a two way street; as a person in power can abuse their authority, so can a mob of hecklers cause a person in authority to break. And so can a person abuse rules meant to protect them as a way to cause stress to the reviewer.

If something must be done then why aren’t we doing it in the NTSE? Because this rule being discussed right now has caused the NTSE to become so loose, we’re effectively trying to sieve salt out of sea water. I can’t leverage power anymore. When I have to get ugly and roar at the submitter for something I just get bitched at and a new submitter is requested. I don’t have power anymore. I might as well as be some yes man, if submitters are willing to listen to people not involved with the submission over the person reviewing this submission.

The NTSE is broken as hell because of this rule, and it’s not on our end. Call me harsh, call me the villain behind your closed doors and private servers. To that I say every villain has a reason to be a villain.
 
I wont go as far as to say that this rule is what ruined the NTSE, cause this rule was made because the NTSE was already ruined. But honestly the allowance for a submitter to request a new reviewer is just dodging the issue. If there are reviewers that are breaking NTSE rules or acting bad, the solution is not changing reviewers, it's having that reviewer removed from his position. Reviewing is a position of power designed to maintain the balance of the setting. You're supposed to be objective and fair with -everyone-. Even if it's someone you don't get along with outside of the NTSE, when it's in the NTSE you're supposed to be fair. I know there are human limits, but if we think there's enough problems that submitters shoudl be allowed to change or request reviewers, then what needs ot be done is evaluate the NTSE and see if they're actually up to par. And if they -are- performing right, then tell the submitters to suck it up.
 
I do see it's either all or nothing as Meta says. People have always stretched and abused the slightest leeway, no matter what side they fall on. In this case it's best we rule on the side less biased - the reviewers. I agree with you all and you can discount my statement supporting the submitters, I was mainly playing devil's advocate from my experience. I hope it showed that point of view.

I imagine many of us support Syaoran's view, additionally I can envision the majority of complaints go generally unnoticed in the grand scheme of things. Reported upwards to be forgotten amidst so many other things. I can testify to this to some extent myself as a moderator where you either act in the moment or the issue is forgotten only to resurface worse.

If those responsible for managing this community had a static central and unbiased place where complaints were registered I think this could help a lot. To see who is actually objectively causing the most unrest. I would be happy to set one up.
 
I do see it's either all or nothing as Meta says. People have always stretched and abused the slightest leeway, no matter what side they fall on. In this case it's best we rule on the side less biased - the reviewers. I agree with you all and you can discount my statement supporting the submitters, I was mainly playing devil's advocate from my experience. I hope it showed that point of view.

I imagine many of us support Syaoran's view, additionally I can envision the majority of complaints go generally unnoticed in the grand scheme of things. Reported upwards to be forgotten amidst so many other things. I can testify to this to some extent myself as a moderator where you either act in the moment or the issue is forgotten only to resurface worse.

If those responsible for managing this community had a static central and unbiased place where complaints were registered I think this could help a lot. To see who is actually objectively causing the most unrest. I would be happy to set one up.
I don't think we need a glorified hate-pit; we have a report system and an open staff as is. Giving people a board to validate bad blood and talking on the grounds of "unbiased complain sharing" will only invite arguments. If you have a problem with an NTSE member that's legit, report it. If Wes or staff isn't acting on it then it's because the report isn't substantial or fails to meet an actual report-worthy statement; trust me as someone who has been told this before after making reports.

This community doesn't need more toxic outlets - even one that seems initially good - to continue pursuing drama instead of acting mature and following the process that exists and has existed for handling problems. And we do not have a myriad of reports or anything preventing it from being handled; if someone isn't being dealt with, it's because there's not a substantial reason to deal with them.

Edit: TBH I think what we really need to do to fix 99% of the problem is force people to be held accountable when they decide to ass-rip and intentionally plan out ways to argue with the NTSE and the like in private channels. This happens but because it's "not part of the main Discord", we basically have it so people have a very large Discord with members actively discussing plans to hinder or attack people. This mentality was one that grew up in roots of members months ago and has been needing to get weeded out; this is the main reason we have problems now. People plan and hate on the NTSE in bubbles of "totally non-biased friends" and it just escalates into this idea that any NTSE decision is a slight to their entire being.
 
I don't think we need a specific place to voice complaints -yet-. There is a possibility we might need one if things continue down the path they are, but I think it'd be much better if people just reported things -properly-. Many times I see people wait until they themselves are acting out before they try to call foul on someone, or they put their complaint in the topic itself. This is why I try to give advice to people on how to 'file' a proper complaint. Because while I do think there are a lot of unheard complaints, I think the majority of them (not all) go unheard, because they're not presentable, either getting lost in the middle of a thread where an argument is going on, or are so filled with slander and biased statements that it's hard to extra what is actually legitimate complaint from personal grudge.

People just need to PM a complaint to staff, before they themselves break a rule, and they need to do so in an objective way, and preferably give links that show the infractions the person has commited. Not the all too common accusation without evidence that is all over SARP these days. Doesn't matter who they are, no one wants to go through like 14 years worth forums, or even months of week. Seriously I wouldn't even want to dig through a 3 page topic to try to find the one time someone said something offensive.

As for handling the submitters, honestly staff, you guys just need to 'spank' them. I have seen only a few examples of this but they work marvelously when done. NTSE or Staff stepping into a topic and going "You are acting like a jerk, so your submission has been rejected" period. That works -wonders-. Being able to submit content might be listed in the 'rights' but it is actually a privileged that can be revoked. Submitters are given too much room to act out with little to no consequence. That needs to change.
 
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