RP Skill

[James]

It appears we have stumbled upon a little predicament, dear friends.

As many of you are aware, the little RP Skill counter is an indicator of what others think about your roleplaying abilities and literacy. Staff members (that is, Administrators and Mods, not professors/shopkeepers) can raise or lower a person's RP Skill by one point for exceptionally good posts, or horrible ones, respectively. It is intended to be fairly scarce.

It was a new concept on the old TWOM around the time that it closed, and the rule was that staff could use it on all other members (so long as it wasn't abused), but not on each other. As a result, all staff members had 0 (neutral) RP Skill.

But as you may have already realised, this raises a few problems. What about members who are promoted to staff, do we remove their existing RP skill or just 'freeze' it?

What about staff's other characters? Most if not all of us have characters other than the one that has our rank attached to it. Are we not allowed to raise/lower their RP Skill either? (obviously not our OWN characters, but could I raise/lower one of Lizzie's other characters, for example). Some of us have some 'secret' accounts that we dont want attributed to being moderators - and having 0 roleplay skill constantly could well give them away.

Maybe we should allow staff to exalt each other's main accounts, too? (excluding mine of course, since this is strictly an admin account with no characters)

I'm not quite sure what we should make the rules here. I figure the fairest way is to just put it out there to the members.

Discuss, let me know what you think should be done.

[Lizzie Porter]

Ok that was surprising that you used my name as an example.... I think this is a good discussion topic. Lets hear all the comments.

[James]

I just picked a staff member

[Jaden Aerins]

Yeah I noticed that as well. Personally, I don't care either way. My RP Skill doesn't concern me as long as I'm having fun and not pissing people off because I'm terrible or something ((Galen hint hint)) But, I'm under the impression that some of the Admins or Mods ((not pointing fingers)) will not administer RP Skill the same for other Admins and Mods as they do for members.

As I'm sure you are aware, we mods and admin are friends for the most part and I can see how in the eyes of some members they may believe that if a Mod has high RP Skill level they may think it is the biased opinion of a friend.

Again, I don't care either way but just pointing out an issue we may have further on in the future if we do begin to award RP Skill to each other.

[James]

Just something I'm gonna point out - if we do allow staff to modify each other's RP Skill, I'll watch it closely, and I think we're responsible enough to not abuse the system...

RP Skill can only be handed out for specific posts, rather than just liking a person or their character.

[Lizzie Porter]

I totally agree with what Jaden has said and yet I also agree with James we need to remember that even if we are friends we need to realize that we are not on this site by ourselves, we are on this site with others and they are watching us even if we don't really see it, they are looking to see what we do.

[Jaden Aerins]

I'm aware of that. And I'm not saying that any of us would. I am simply stating what some of the member's might see. Not all of our member's know whether we are responsible, but I'm pretty sure they know we are at least civil with one another. This may lead to suspicion among the members. That's all I'm saying.

[Laura Kehoe]

Honestly I don't really care if a mod has a high rp skill or not...It's just a rating. And besides I can't really see any of you guys bothering to give each other karma just for the sake of it. I can't speak for everyone else but if I saw that Jaden had a really high rp skill rating I'm not going to think 'oh my god, the mods are scamming the rp skill just because she's a mod' and I doubt many other people will think that either. At the end of the day it's just a little rating and if it is still at 0 it doesn't mean that you are a bad rper...it could just mean that a mod hasn't read some of your better posts. There are plently of very good posts that aren't read by mods just like there are loads of bad ones that aren't read.

I don't think too many people are too concerned over what their rp skill is, unless it is -5 or something...If a mod makes a very good post then it shouldn't be ignored just because they're a mod..they have a right for their skills to be recognised too.

I have an idea though if you are afraid that people will think you's are only awarding points cause you's are friends...why don't you post a thread for 'rp skill'? have it locked except for staff members then when someone awards rp skill to a member they can post the member and copy and paste their post. Or just the reason if it has been for a number of good posts..

((Sorry for the very long post ))

[Águila Johnson]

Perhaps I missed something, but why not make it an option. Members/Mods can have the RP skill simply on a char to char basis, or have it as a cumulative total of all of their characters.

Or is that even possible...

[Hilary Rodham]

RP Skill should be everyone's opinion rather than just the staff's in my personal opinion. I like to raise someone's karma when they have worked hard on a post. However, we all know how this works so I will cut the yadi-yada.

However, RP skill was most certainly abused on twom (i would know) in both good and bad. Here is what I will suggest.

I believe we should have karma thread. It could contain the person whom desearves the karma, their age, reasoning for karma, and a url for the staff to check it out. That seems like the fairest way to me.

[Hélène Rose]

I think I agree with Hilary and Laura. But I have a question. Why even have RP Skill? I mean, if some people get unhappy feelings, why even have it? I'm not saying this becuase I believe it, but I just want to know! An RP thread sounds good.

[James]

Karma was definitely abused when all members were able to use it, on the old twom.

I dont like the idea of a "RP Skill" thread. Its meant to be a small thing - if you make a good post and it gets noticed, hey, lucky you! If you dont, too bad.

I'd like to keep it relatively simple.

[Águila Johnson]

hm, well. How about the staff only can adjust karma/rp skill, but everyone can have their input. or if not a thread, how about a 'character'/account only for the skill/karma where we can PM them to have our input. of course a method of regulating this would have to be conceived, but...?

[James]

That kind of negates the 'simple' idea.

Its not meant to be entirely accurate. If you get noticed, you get noticed, just like with the old karma. I dont want to give us more 'work', when we already do a lot of sorting.

I'm more interested in your ideas as to who can use RP Skill, and who it can be used on, as I said in the original post.

[Hélène Rose]

Well, just why not close up the whole thing?


Just a thought.