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Roles, Rights, and Responsibilities of Faction Managers.

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Hey Star Army,

Behind every active faction there's usually a person or small group of people who maintain its articles and basically manage its day-to-day business. This faction manager is the central point of contact for GMs who want to know if their plot ideas make sense in the context of that faction.

Lately due to a personal disagreement much of the site leadership has been involved in a dialogue about what rights a faction manager does or doesn't have, and we've concluded that it's not exactly clear at this point.

For reference, here are the currently listed responsibilities of a faction manager:

Responsibilities
Responsibilities of the Faction Manager include:
  • Overseeing consistency and continuity within his designated faction
  • Approving factional characters
  • Final authority controlling NPCs of the faction
  • Recruiting and approving factional plot Game Masters.
  • Ensuring factional compliance with the Military Buildup Limitations
  • Roleplaying the leadership and other NPCs of his faction as necessary
  • Designating an assistant and/or backup FM who can run his faction should the FM become indisposed
Faction Managers do not necessarily have the ability to approve articles (that falls to staff of New Technologies and Setting Elements). However, all articles must be approved by the appropriate faction manager before the NTSE staff can approve them.
​
What's not clear is what the "powers" of a faction manager really are, and that's what we hope to clarify in this thread. @Kyle has helpfully made a proposal for FM rights. It's my feeling since some of these will affect everyone, we need transparency and input from all users before we move forward.

In particular, I'm concerned with a balance. I don't want to see FMs as lords up in the castle looking down on player peasants. Building a faction is hard work and those creations should be respected, but making a collection of wiki articles doesn't necessarily qualify someone as a leader or site staff member. Anytime we give site members power over other site members, that needs scrutiny and careful consideration. Regular players should be empowered too, but obviously not to the point they can wreck a whole faction on their own.

So I'm asking your opinions:
  1. Should faction managers have the ability to keep their faction's tech or species from being used out of the faction? Even when it goes against the actual roleplay canon?
  2. Should faction managers have the right to remove underperforming game masters from their faction? Or is that the staff/admin's job?
  3. Should faction managers be able to make RP threads non-canon or retcon if they feel their faction wasn't played right? If so, how would we protect against abuse of this right?
  4. Can FMs "faction ban" a player? If so, for what reasons?
  5. Should GMs need to ask an FM before they use their faction's, or another faction's assets?
  6. Is it a problem if an FM is also a GM?
NOTE: This is an important discussion that will affect the site's future, so any non-constructive posts or posters may be removed from the thread.
 
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Requiring a certain amount of activity is not smart. Encouraging it is one thing. But being a good GM and being a good FM are two entirely different things. FM is a management position not a position based on involvement. You could very easily manage without much activity. Especially since there are hundreds of ways to get in touch with people outside of the forums. As long as the FM is fulfilling their duties of properly managing the faction. While sure everyone would want an active FM, if they're doing their job what's the matter with letting them do the job the way they're comfortable doing it?
 
FM is a management position not a position based on involvement
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I completely disagree. I think FM should be editing the wiki all the time, adding new parts to their faction, writing news posts, creating events, and basically keeping the faction maintained and exciting. For example, look at @Nashoba and @Kyle and how they are always expanding their factions' depth with new articles, language stuff, and commissioning art. They are great examples of what an FM should be.
 
That's only one way to be an FM though Wes. While yes it's ideal that the FM be doing stuff. But if a faction is growing in plots and on the wiki and gaining new things and expanding. Doesn't that mean whatever is being done is working? "If it ain't broke don't fix it" would apply here. Just because doing things one way works doesn't mean that's the only way that works, and it doesn't mean that'll always work. Just like in companies. Some have the management really involved with the workers, some have the management just making sure nothing goes wrong. Both models produce results.
 
Wes said:
I completely disagree. I think FM should be editing the wiki all the time, adding new parts to their faction, writing news posts, creating events, and basically keeping the faction maintained and exciting. For example, look at @Nashoba and @Kyle and how they are always expanding their factions' depth with new articles, language stuff, and commissioning art. They are great examples of what an FM should be.
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What I wonder is why it matters whether they create a lot of stuff and are very active. Being or not being the FM doesn't make anyone any less capable of making content. If they aren't the FM they need to wait for approval but you want approval either way. If you aren't looking for FM approval you should be looking for the approval/enthusiasm/interest of the actual players of the faction so you don't find out later your idea was useless. Someone wanting to create new content still has the issue of getting a form of "approval" even if he is FM. If GMs don't bother acknowledging/incorporating new content it might as well not exist.

If content creators are going to not want to create content unless they command the faction then I question how meaningful their desires and contributions are. If someone can't handle needing to get FM approval how will he handle getting NTSE approval or players being initially disinterested in his creations?

The way I see it all a FM needs to do is administrate and be reasonable and impartial. A FM not making things doesn't necessarily mean the site is missing out on lots of new content. I wouldn't elect a FM because he promises content on the condition of being elected. He can prove his potential by making stuff regardless of his status. How do we know the prospective FMs that want to make a ton of stuff won't get booty blistered if it isn't well received by their playerbase or that they won't burn out or simply say they'll make things and never follow through or do so in a lousy way just to halfheartedly fulfill a promise?
 
Since i'm getting complaints about defending Kokuten, while stating that an FM should be active, I feel like I should probably explain myself in more detail.

If an FM has -legitimate- reason to not be capable of running a plot as an FM, but is still capable of keeping up the rest of their duties, then I see no reason that we should force them to do plots.

However, for the FM's who don't have legitimate reasons, should at least put an effort in trying to bring life to their factions. If they can't even do that, then I don't believe they should be FM's.

People like Kokuten and Aendri have so much going on in their lives that, in the case of Kokuten they can't do anything about, or the case of Aendri, he can barely get on for more then about an hour or two a night, and even then most of his time is dedicated to doing things for the Elysians and/or his job as a character approver, that I don't think we should uphold them to the standards that we do FM's that have more free time on their hands.

I don't know the situation of the other FM's, I don't claim to, but if they don't have a legitimate reason to not be running a plot, then I think they should be.
 
The issues with Kokuten and Aendri are one's I feel should be made exceptions to. Kokuten is serving in the Navy and can't be online all the time, and he shouldn't be punished for it. The man still maintains a minor presence on the board and occastionally pops into the IRC, I also see him every few weeks on Steam (since you are actually able to log into Steam on a Navy ship). Aendri, while not in the military, does have his own problems that he needs to worry about including multiple jobs 'and' school, does this mean he isn't committed to the Elysians? Hardly, it just means that he is furthering his education and - like Kokuten - shouldn't be punished for doing so.

Now, one thing I want to address as it seems a few on our forums are getting the wrong idea: you do not need to be an Fm or a Gm to make content for a faction, you also don't need to be a player within said faction, of course the FM's would prefer it - it is not a requirement, nor should it actually 'be' a requirement. As I came from a Star Wars RP forum, I have learned that even people outside of a faction can come up with some very good idea's for another faction.

Thus! Do not be afraid to create tech for a faction if you are not an FM or a Gm or even a player, just make sure you ask whether or not the tech would be permitted as some of us FM's actually have a list of tech we won't allow. In the past fifteen years of roleplaying on multiple sites, includinga few that had factions and tech submissions, I have often been amazed at what a non-faction player can come up with for a faction =)
 
I disagree with the concept of forcing a FM to also GM a plot in their faction. For a couple of reasons. One They might find themselves more comfortable with one form of management then the other. There might be time restraints on the FM and giving the time they put into their faction, they might not have the time/energy to devote to a plot. They might be a crappy GM but are about to manage the behind the scenes of the faction level better then the active on stage management the GMs have.

Therefore I would suggest encouraging them to be one, but if they are not able, want to, or can't, then we should not force people who are still bringing a lot to the site, to do more then they are able.
 
Well the way I see it and what I meant to say before is I'd like to see prospective faction creators/FMs at least create a plot and co-GM it while having someone they can trust do the main GMing to start.
 
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