4 replies to this topic

[TopDawg]

I feel sort of bad starting a new thread for this, but this isn't about the election of said members, moreso how a council should be structured (and admittedly I wanted more visibility for the post, but the other thread also isn't a discussion on the nature of what a council should be - only who should be on it).

Do I think a council can work? I think it's going to take a lot of hard work from the community. I think the burden is unequally laid upon the community, but PGI also has work to do incorporating the feedback and the council into the development process. But in short, it can work if both parties are committed to it; PGI and the community.

Personally I think 5 is far too few, and I think 9 is still too little. The bigger it gets, the more unruly, to some degree; but at the same time the more people that are on it, the more viewpoints that can be heard and amalgamated. Also personally, I think direct democracy via votes (in lieu of a council system) is not a good way to do it either. Often times people simply don't know what's best for the game (and that can include developers).

The point, more or less, is to identify problems, issues, and concerns that people have and then work out solutions to them; and then communicate them clearly and effectively to PGI; who then report back to the council on its feasibility, and perhaps offer some alternate avenues to pursue if necessary (something a Community Manager might be responsible for, but for obvious reasons seems like a conflict of interest in this case).

What do I think the council should consist of? Personally, I think for every major subset, there should be two people on it (I like pairs, it helps split up the work and results in a sounding board to each other, in which they can then (hopefully) come to an agreement). Another poster in one of the other threads brought up the point of foreign language speakers, and players from different regions. They should also be included (although honestly, other than 'I wish our pings were lower, can we expect more server options?' I don't know the extent to which that discussion could go), perhaps one for each language, and then for those regions not represented afterwards.

Again though, the council should be collecting player grievances, and then collecting possible solutions to those problems. Then they have the arduous task of sifting and sorting through it all in order to make it coherent and presentable. Then, they present it. While to some degree they will need to communicate in private (as per outlined below), I greatly believe in transparency and keeping people in the loop. That means showing to the community exactly what you're showing to PGI for consideration (the final copy, no need to see the sausage being made - and kind of defeats the purpose in this case).

I believe it was on the Star Citizen forums, but someone (I think it was Sandpit) suggested having a forum section for the council (I believe he meant private), which I think is a great idea. I also think that there should be some way for the council members to collect feedback for their specific area; while creating a bunch of forum sections may not be elegant, it would help to direct and channel the specialized feedback.

I know that the current council-to-be is tasked with ECM. I don't know if that's the smartest thing to start with (but it is a start), but as I've said elsewhere it's extremely important to realize that all of these systems in game exist in a system that necessarily includes all of them. Changing almost anything will affect something else, either directly or indirectly.

So then to me, it would be the council's task to collect and combine all the problems (or at least as many as is possible on a single pass) and then start formulating/using the ideas posted as possible solutions. Quite honestly, I view this as something the devs/community manager themselves should already be doing, but I'm not one to necessarily look a gift horse in the mouth, either.

As for a specific makeup, you could for instance: have 2 people for Light Mechs, 2 people for Medium Mechs, 2 people for Heavy Mechs, and 2 people for Assault Mechs (that's 8 people total so far). You could then even go on to differentiate 2 people for IS in general, 2 people for Clan in general (although this may be somewhat unnecessary). You could then have one for each of the languages that has a subforum here, meaning 10 more people (if every nationality needs a representative - I have no idea the kinds of numbers playing anymore, or from which regions/languages). Alternatively, rather than actually being on the council they could translate the grievances for the council (if bloat becomes an issue); obviously any and all would have to be bilingual or really good at Google Translate. Also, you should have 2 from PUGs, 2 from Groups, and 2 from Units/CW (they are probably close enough to be the same thing really). You might even go as far as to have 2 new players and 2 closed beta players (the new players would be especially helpful for nailing down new player concerns).

There's going to be a lot of data/feedback coming in to collate, and having more people to help take that on is only going to make it more manageable. It's a delicate balance though for sure, without becoming too unruly to effectively manage and do what was set out to begin with. With all said and done, this puts the council anywhere from 18-28 people (8+4+10+6 or 8+~4+6). Personally, I mentioned 15 in another thread and while I still don't think that's too bad a number, it seems like ~20 might be the sweet spot in order to represent the myriad of views a community has.

It's important to note though that having a specific subset to focus on (i.e. Lights, Heavies, PUG, or Clans) is moreso geared for collecting the data and feedback from players. It doesn't excuse or prevent people from commenting on the 'big picture', as it were (i.e. ECM following the current example). And again to reiterate (I can't stress this enough), just about every single system in game (ECM, Ghost Heat, Hardpoints, Weapons, etc) is all interconnected, and changing one inherently changes another; either directly or indirectly.

In addition to all this, the community itself could vote on what topics at large to handle next, which could then go to the council to set it up/start it up and get the process going again (this could be the community mails that PGI is capable of sending out - put something like 'You talked, we listened. Now's the time for you the community to pick the next topic to be tackled.'). Of course, these are merely my suggestions, but for what it's worth I have been in leadership positions for my gaming group for the last 10 years, so I have at least some experience organizing and directing efforts.

Plus, the more members on a council not only increases the viewpoints/lessens individual work, it helps to dilute the power one person has, which seems to be a lot of people's concerns (and rightly so) when talk of assembling a council is even mentioned. It should go without say that the people elected/appointed to the council will make or break it (at least from the community side, the side we have control over). In my opinion, the more differing views the better, as it will force them to work together/come together and find solutions that benefit as many people as possible while being healthy for the game as a whole.

Phew, lol, and cheers!

[TheCaptainJZ]

Some good ideas there. I suggest 2 groups. Let's call them the Task Force and the Study Group.

Task Force: [5-15] individuals selected by the community which are known to be thoughful, well-behaved, fair, and considerate of other people's opinions/positions. Ideally, the most unbiased people we can find (though that's probably impossible but I think you get the gist of what I mean). These people need to be motivated to achieve what they think is the best for the game and playerbase as a whole and must be willing to compromise (not like Congress gridlock!)

Study group [15-30] individuals representing all major voices in the community. Casual players, competitive players, everyone. Perhaps a random sampling. However, they must all understand the mechanics of the game like how to play and how things work, even if they don't have all the specifics like how many meters the adv sensor module helps against ECM. I would rule out any players below a certain activity threshold as well as brand new players. There should be some newish (say 1-3 months) players for their perspective. Mainly, this study group is to collect experiences from the playerbase. Anyone not in the group can also forward their thoughts to one of them. I'm not sure these people should be nominated or if they should be (sort of) randomly picked. Perhaps those not in the Task Force that were nominated could be in this group as well as volunteers that fill in the missing areas.

No matter how this works, I think the council or whatever we call it should be formed in response to only this ECM issue and disbanded afterwards. If this concept proves fruitful, we can try again at a later date with another issue. I don't want a permanent council for the issues you described.

[TheCaptainJZ]

Some additional things:
It's actually a good thing that our scope on this is limited to adjusting ECM only and those that interact directly with ECM like BAP. Comprehensive solutions are often very elegant but they would be too much work. We need to prove this concept first, so having a smaller scale is far better and is more likely to be successful. Honestly, it would have been easier to start with the issue of 3PV. There is pretty widespread consensus on that.

[Bishop Steiner]

Great post, important things to consider.

Instead of laborious rewriting what I have already said to this effect, will cut and paste several comments to this very subject:

This is a one time, one problem, olive branch from Russ. I don't think a player council is needed, tbh, or even what he had in mind. (Could be wrong). The problem is, if we want to have a chance to legitimately change the issue of ECM, we need to provide a clear Mission Statement to Russ. Not the rabble of a 1000 voices all clamoring for their little bit of the pie.

Not everybody will be happy whatever the results, but we need to have individuals willing to compile and streamline, then present "consensus" opinion. Not persons interested in simply pushing their own view of ECM. This is best done by a small committee of players. In fact, if anything, simply for the sake of sounding better, perhaps calling it a 1 time, Temporary Advisory Committee would help, lol. I dislike the sound of Player Council, TBH.

And if it works, it might open up more successful interaction between us and PGI on future balance issues. But then we do need to be careful, as it could easily become a bully pulpit. Which is why, if it works, and if we do it again in the future, the community needs to agree on bylaws regarding it, such as limits of terms, etc. Aka, IMO, if such a Committee was formed as needed for critical problem areas, it could be very helpful. BUT, to keep it from becoming an agenda and a political thing, only allow each person to act as a representative once or maybe twice. Thus, they have no long term "power base" and it might make people think twice about joining it, and wait til a problem they do feel strongly about comes up to want to join it.

Mind you, some of the bigger units, could still game that, but it is up to us, as a community to watch and police that.

[TopDawg]

Thanks for the responses and feedback! Committee typically implies a time sensitive process, addressing a specific thing. In this context it seems much more accurate to what might emerge then.

And yeah I mean any system is going to be open to 'gaming the system' or loopholes; it can be hard to foresee, account for, and even correct them once you've become aware of their existence.

I guess what I envision, condensed down into a kind of overview (which goes a little bit against the fiber of my being :Þ; stuff's complex and complicated and rarely that simple to fix/address!), is:

• Some body (a council, committee, task force, etc) puts together all the necessary information regarding all of the mechanics involved with some feature/function/system/subset. This is simply a descriptor of the game and its mechanics and is not open to interpretation; it is what it is and nothing else.
  
• Having collected/collated/amalgamated grievances regarding the issue, they are then laid out to the community so that the community can then come up with solutions to solve these problems. It's important to note and distinguish what are actual problems, and what may be misunderstandings with the functioning of the game. This is far easier said than done, and no game will ever be able to make everyone happy.
  
• The community then takes this data and formulates their own ideas and solutions to the problem(s), be it in that thread or in another (and preferably 'complete' ones and 'specific' ones - this will help when working within a somewhat unknown scope).
  
• The body then collects/collates/amalgamates the possible solutions into concise, well explained, well designed solutions.
  
• The solutions are then brought before the community, in all their 'fancified' writing glory, and then voted on by the community.
  
• Once there is a chosen path, whatever the finalized method actually is, this exact same solution, with the exact same wording, is then presented to PGI for evaluation.
  
• Then the process repeats as it is refined/reiterated upon.

At least, that would be more or less my process anyway. And again, I honestly feel like this lies within the realm of the developer's/designer's/community manager's job(s), but good changes are good changes, regardless of where they come from.

Hope this helps to elucidate any points that may have been confusing or not well stated.