If you aren't affiliated with these groups: [ Zanza, Nightowls, Feare ] good luck having your application approved. I find Ol'West application far more suitable to find candidates than the generic questions found on iClassic's GP application. Looks very bland as well. Take a look at the difference:

• Ol'West: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...5AVVQ/viewform


• iClassic:
http://graalonlineclassic.com/gpapp.php  

Posted by Xenice

On a server like this - I'm sure there's plenty of inappropriate things happening. When I used to be on Ol'West, we used to get 1-2 reports every half an hour or so which isn't a lot. I can understand staff members on smaller servers getting quite bored, but not on a server with more than 4000 players. I don't really see boredom as the key issue in this case.

It might just be that they're new to being a moderator, like what Jarace said previously. However, if a GP finds their job 'boring' then they shouldn't be a GP. They applied to maintain a friendly environment and to enforce server rules, not to have the best time of their lives.

Oh there are plenty of reports, but most of them don't actually lead to any sort of disciplinary action from the responding GP, so when someone is actually caught in the act of doing something that warrants a warning or ban, it can be quite satisfying to take action against them.

I should clarify that there certainly are some people who I would assume enjoy the job or are at least not bored to tears by it, but it really isn't for everyone. You're correct in saying that people who find the job boring shouldn't be GPs in the first place, but the thing is, many people apply for the job not even realizing that they might not enjoy it, so there are probably a few people on the team at any given time who fit this description.  

Posted by Bryan*

If you aren't affiliated with these groups: [ Zanza, Nightowls, Feare ] good luck having your application approved. I find Ol'West application far more suitable to find candidates than the generic questions found on iClassic's GP application. Looks very bland as well. Take a look at the difference:

• Ol'West: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...5AVVQ/viewform


• iClassic:
http://graalonlineclassic.com/gpapp.php

I think that everyone has an equal chance, regardless of what guild they're in. It's obvious that by being in those guilds, the people hiring are more likely to know your personality and who you are(if you're in the same guild). But that doesn't mean they're more likely to get in. They have to write an application like everyone else - and have an equal chance of getting rejected. I'm not a fan of recommendations though. This is my opinion. I could be completely wrong. XD

But I do agree about the applications though. But if it works for iClassic, why not. I think it would be better if the situational questions were asked in an interview; the person is more likely to have to think on the spot.  

Posted by Bryan*

If you aren't affiliated with these groups: [ Zanza, Nightowls, Feare ]

This is something I've been saying for quite a while, or at least specific to Zanza and Feare. There's no denying that the GP sector of staff has been a hot potato between that group of players. NightOwls is something that I think came after many of these staff became friends.

Wasn't Nathan also in Zanza? And then who was the GP Admin before him, Aster Feare? Speaking on Nathan though, I've mentioned a few times on these forums that a GP previously showed me my account history. The reason she did that was because she offered to put in "a good word" for me to Nathan. He listened, looked into my account, and told her my account history was too beat up to be hired. That was the whole reason behind her showing it to me. Again, there's something really bizarre about a staff member breaking a rule to explain to me why I'm not eligible to be staff…

Isn't that a bad way to be selecting GPs though? Taking suggestions from current GPs on the fly like that just seems like a horrible way to create a culture of passing power around between friends.  

Posted by Thallen

This is something I've been saying for quite a while, or at least specific to Zanza and Feare. There's no denying that the GP sector of staff has been a hot potato between that group of players. NightOwls is something that I think came after many of these staff became friends.

Wasn't Nathan also in Zanza? And then who was the GP Admin before him, Aster Feare? Speaking on Nathan though, I've mentioned a few times on these forums that a GP previously showed me my account history. The reason she did that was because she offered to put in "a good word" for me to Nathan. He listened, looked into my account, and told her my account history was too beat up to be hired. That was the whole reason behind her showing it to me. Again, there's something really bizarre about a staff member breaking a rule to explain to me why I'm not eligible to be staff…

Isn't that a bad way to be selecting GPs though? Taking suggestions from current GPs on the fly like that just seems like a horrible way to create a culture of passing power around between friends.

All the current staff in Feare joined after they became staff. That's how it is with the current roster of Zanza, too.

This is another thing I've said before and I doubt anyone will bother to read it this time, either.

I've received suggestions from GPs but it doesn't change the process whatsoever from not being suggested. So far none of their suggestions have been hired.  

Posted by Jarace

All the current staff in Feare joined after they became staff. That's how it is with the current roster of Zanza, too.

Why is that though? It seems strange to me that the guilds Bryan mentioned exist as half staff, half regular players. You don't think there's a certain bias given towards the players in these guilds?

Overall, the point I'm making is that it feels like some weird culture exists in both the GP and GFX departments that is preventing a lot of people on the outside from getting hired. I can name a lot of specific examples. I also think iClassic lacks staff who actually care about what they're doing, and instead just do it for the benefits offered with the position. Not many people seem enthusiastic with actually helping people or trying to improve the game. Rufus was someone who never had that problem, and even you (Jarace) seem to strive to do that. TD is another helpful GP.

There are plenty of GPs I can name that don't even seem half as helpful though, and it's confusing because there are people willing to do their job but they just aren't being considered. I hate to be calling out names, but I wonder what someone like Iron, Za Ichi, Andromeda, or Zelatko's staff day actually consists of. I can PM these people and almost never get a reply. Someone can be health hacking a 40 streak in a spar room and people can be reporting them, you can PM a GP, and still nothing. At that point, the players are basically doing the GP's job anyway. It feels like their entire job as a GP is waiting for reports to come to them, like naughty PMs or a mean word in a status. It's just confusing to me because I know for a fact that certain people apply, with well-written applications, willing to do a better job than that.  

Posted by Thallen

Why is that though? It seems strange to me that the guilds Bryan mentioned exist as half staff, half regular players. You don't think there's a certain bias given towards the players in these guilds?

Overall, the point I'm making is that it feels like some weird culture exists in both the GP and GFX departments that is preventing a lot of people on the outside from getting hired. I can name a lot of specific examples. I also think iClassic lacks staff who actually care about what they're doing, and instead just do it for the benefits offered with the position. Not many people seem enthusiastic with actually helping people or trying to improve the game. Rufus was someone who never had that problem, and even you (Jarace) seem to strive to do that.

There are plenty of GPs I can name that don't even seem half as helpful as you though, and it's confusing because there are people willing to be that helpful but they just aren't being given the chance to do it. I hate to be calling out names, but I wonder what someone like Iron, Za Ichi, or Zelatko's staff day actually consist of. I can PM these people and almost never get a reply. Someone can be health hacking a 40 streak in a spar room and people can be reporting them, you can PM a GP, and still nothing. At that point, the players are basically doing the GP's job anyway. It's just confusing to me because I know for a fact certain people apply, with well-written applications, willing to do a better job than that.

Staff meet other staff on the staff team and become friends there, it doesn't seem so weird to me.

In turn, if you have friends on the staff team you are a part of, you're probably going to stay for longer since it's something else you have in common with them.

This is how we end up with guilds that appear that way with a method of hiring like this.

As for the applications, I can't really give you a blanket answer. Even if you gave me a specific person, I can't disclose why they were not hired.  

Posted by Bryan*

If you aren't affiliated with these groups: [ Zanza, Nightowls, Feare ] good luck having your application approved. I find Ol'West application far more suitable to find candidates than the generic questions found on iClassic's GP application. Looks very bland as well. Take a look at the difference:

• Ol'West: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...5AVVQ/viewform


• iClassic:
http://graalonlineclassic.com/gpapp.php

Any staff in Nightowls joined after they were hired as staff. Being in the guild doesn't give anyone a higher advantage over other players. The only exception of someone being in Nightowls before they were hired is Slacky.

Posted by Thallen

Why is that though? It seems strange to me that the guilds Bryan mentioned exist as half staff, half regular players. You don't think there's a certain bias given towards the players in these guilds?

Overall, the point I'm making is that it feels like some weird culture exists in both the GP and GFX departments that is preventing a lot of people on the outside from getting hired. I can name a lot of specific examples. I also think iClassic lacks staff who actually care about what they're doing, and instead just do it for the benefits offered with the position. Not many people seem enthusiastic with actually helping people or trying to improve the game. Rufus was someone who never had that problem, and even you (Jarace) seem to strive to do that. TD is another helpful GP.

There are plenty of GPs I can name that don't even seem half as helpful though, and it's confusing because there are people willing to do their job but they just aren't being considered. I hate to be calling out names, but I wonder what someone like Iron, Za Ichi, Andromeda, or Zelatko's staff day actually consists of. I can PM these people and almost never get a reply. Someone can be health hacking a 40 streak in a spar room and people can be reporting them, you can PM a GP, and still nothing. At that point, the players are basically doing the GP's job anyway. It feels like their entire job as a GP is waiting for reports to come to them, like naughty PMs or a mean word in a status. It's just confusing to me because I know for a fact that certain people apply, with well-written applications, willing to do a better job than that.

I don't think that there is a "weird culture" among staff as your see it. We're all a bunch of a random players who've developed friendships with each other

Players apply for the position unaware of what they could possibly benefit from it besides those who intend to do it for the title. So I'd have to disagree that majority of the staff do it for benefits, not discounting the possibility that there could be someone who harbours an ulterior motive.  

Posted by Thallen

There are plenty of GPs I can name that don't even seem half as helpful though, and it's confusing because there are people willing to do their job but they just aren't being considered. I hate to be calling out names, but I wonder what someone like Iron, Za Ichi, Andromeda, or Zelatko's staff day actually consists of. I can PM these people and almost never get a reply. Someone can be health hacking a 40 streak in a spar room and people can be reporting them, you can PM a GP, and still nothing. At that point, the players are basically doing the GP's job anyway. It feels like their entire job as a GP is waiting for reports to come to them, like naughty PMs or a mean word in a status. It's just confusing to me because I know for a fact that certain people apply, with well-written applications, willing to do a better job than that.

This is without a doubt an issue which quite a few individuals have with the staff team and I would absolutely agree that there can be work put into it and I can say without a doubt there will be, but you also have to understand not all GPs are able to be online at every hour, every day etc and when they are, there are quite a lot of things to be doing so as a player it may seem very frustrating that a GP appears to be ignoring your pm when you tell them there is someone boosting spars or anything like that. The thing about this is there are ALWAYS other things going on at the same time that usually the GP is already doing and trying to take care of that your PM about someone boosting spars just isn't as high priority as you may see it as. I can understand why it may be awfully frustrating for you as an avid sparrer to see an individual just totally cheat one of the things you enjoy about the game and get away with it for quite an extended period of time. These things do get dealt with and we really try to deal with them but the thing is there are also always a lot of other things going on.

As per hiring, the reason our application is the way it is is because by reading it we can tell how much effort the person put into it, how mentally mature they are, and how literate they are. If a person puts effort into the application then if we asked them "where is snowtown" they'd probably be able to easily answer that one too even if they didn't know in the past, that said every person we've hired recently was at very least familiar with the map and had played the game for enough time to understand how it worked and if not, was totally capable of learning it without much effort. The thing about hiring which is always pretty unrecognized is that we're looking for presentable people that are capable of making the right decisions and aren't too biased to any certain category of the game when it comes to policing. This means that we probably won't hire someone if they specifically want to focus an audience like graal babies or whatever. A lot of people say "I'd love to make the game better just hire me already" but unfortunately it just isn't that easy. There really is a procedure to hiring people which includes evaluating how a player acts in the game, what the player does in the game, personality, maturity, how much they care about getting hired and the game, public image, their past etc. It's a long tedious list. No matter how much you may think we're not hiring, we are and are always trying to. The issue is, we simply cant just hire someone because they tell us they'll do a good job.

There are a lot of things to be doing when online as a GP and they are all evenly important and all need to be taken care of. When I'm on for example and I see a few people doing things such as trying to solicit nude images, that isn't something to be taken lightly on a 10+ game and from the perspective of a player of the average player base who is generally a bit younger than the individuals who browse the forums, It's a bigger deal than a speed hacker. Unfortunately there is a lot of stupid nonsense like that which goes on and we always do need more GPs to help take care of that who are able to clearly see and understand the audience of the game and the goal of the game and are able to think in that mindset when making decisions as a GP. This is just one thing required as a GP and I've mentioned the tedious hiring process in the above paragraph of hiring someone but this definitely is a big one. If you think you or your friend could be a GP and want to give it a shot, we honestly really do want as many applicants as possible because we always need to hire more people as there are never enough.  

Fair reply Dread, and like I said it's not as if I'm saying the entire GP team is garbage or something because Jarace, TD, and yourself have personally replied to my issues several times. Again though, the reason I have to hawk you guys down is because my experiences with some others haven't been as responsive and helpful.

About this:

Posted by Dread

The thing about hiring which is always pretty unrecognized is that we're looking for presentable people that are capable of making the right decisions and aren't too biased to any certain category of the game when it comes to policing.

I'm not sure what bias you mean though. Do you mean if someone has a lot of experience towering, they would be biased in favor of players who tower? If that's what you're saying, I'm sure that applies to any staff member who has a group of friends from any part of the game.

I think any GP should know how to handle harassment issues and things of that nature, but what the GP team seems to be lacking are players with levels of understanding in gameplay areas. For example, I've been banned before for standing in a doorway at a tower and using the full duration of my blink (screenshot). It's kind of demeaning to have to explain to someone (who probably has very little towering experience) that what I'm doing is a gameplay mechanic and not some manipulation of lag.

Why don't you guys actively seek out players who have a grasp of specialty areas (like spars and towers) and have them police there? I'm sure towerers would be much more comfortable having someone like an Areo or Kosiris (purely examples) determing if what they're doing is against the rules compared to someone like Electron or Iron (no offense to them). The same goes for sparring. Fulgore was actually hired for the purpose but had to resign because he lost access to his laptop. You think it would bring bias, but I think it would bring experience and actual changes to those areas that are often affected by cheating. It's natural, because those players actually care about the areas of the game they're policing.  

This is why you have to take it upon yourself to gather a list of staff for you to contact, adding both their player and staff accounts to your friends list.

My list:
1. TD
2. Jarace
3. Dread
4. Owl

They respond to my PMs and have even asked someone else to hop on their staff account when they couldn't (which is why you add their player account).  

Posted by Thallen

I'm not sure what bias you mean though. Do you mean if someone has a lot of experience towering, they would be biased in favor of players who tower? If that's what you're saying, I'm sure that applies to any staff member who has some group of friends.

I can absolutely understand why this seem like what we may be thinking but I want it to be very clear that we're not going to judge someone for playing the game or think they are biased simply because they may enjoy something more than other factors of the game. Everyone's got their niche. What I mean though is that there have been individuals in the past who apply and its very clear that they have a specific agenda as a GP and its also clear that as I previously stated, they only care about one part of the game while not respecting the other parts. This absolutely isn't to be mistaken for players who just like sparring, towering etc. But in our "screening" process or in the application its self, It's very easy to figure out if the player wants to just improve one part of the game or the entirety. We need GPs who want to improve the entirety of the game. An example of this would be maybe someones in one of those military guilds. We probably won't hire them if we are pretty convinced they will make it their main priority to absolutely stalk their opposing military guild.

Posted by Thallen

Why don't you guys actively seek out players who do have a grasp of specialty areas (like spars and towers) and have them police there?

I'd absolutely love if we could just conjure up a bunch of players from many categories on the team but unfortunately, we kind of get what we're given. You could argue that some people DO apply that are perhaps very good at towering etc but as mentioned previously, we have an in-depth screening process and It just isn't as simple as it may sound. This can be kind of annoying but I can vouch that it definitely works and our GPs stand out to a higher caliber than they really would be without the picky hiring process which we have. We very much so avoid a lot of conflicts that could potentially happen without a system in place like this. Unfortunately, this usually isn't something that's too noticeable unless you are actually on the team and actively involved with the potential problems that are going on which we tend to try to keep discreet. I really don't want to go out of my way and just start harassing a bunch of people to apply and that really isn't the model we're trying to lead here. We want people to WANT to work here and care about working here and improving the experience of the game for ALL players. If they would like to work here they need to apply.

Edit: Also wanna make clear, we may try hard to avoid problems etc but obviously we aren't perfect and we're aware of that and we actively try to solve said problems.  

Posted by Thallen

Why is that though? It seems strange to me that the guilds Bryan mentioned exist as half staff, half regular players. You don't think there's a certain bias given towards the players in these guilds?

Typically when you get hired you start talking to the other admins and become friends, and then eventually you just start getting recruited to their guilds.

Posted by Thallen

Why don't you guys actively seek out players who have a grasp of specialty areas (like spars and towers) and have them police there? I'm sure towerers would be much more comfortable having someone like an Areo or Kosiris (purely examples) determing if what they're doing is against the rules compared to someone like Electron or Iron (no offense to them). The same goes for sparring. Fulgore was actually hired for the purpose but had to resign because he lost access to his laptop. You think it would bring bias, but I think it would bring experience and actual changes to those areas that are often affected by cheating. It's natural, because those players actually care about the areas of the game they're policing.

I think this would be helpful, but I think the main reason there aren't GPs "dedicated" to patrolling a certain aspect of gameplay is because it would just be such a restricting position and, frankly, they would probably get bored quickly. The number of reports for inappropriate language/behavior, bad statuses/names, and harassment via PMs outnumbers hacking/speeding reports 5:1, in my opinion. In addition to that, many reports for hacking/cheating/speeding/etc. end up being false. So if there were people who, for example, would focus on reports that had to deal with sparring, then they would probably make two-three bans an hour max, when they could checking other reports. While it's a good idea, IMO it would be unproductive and the person would probably get bored very quickly, and it's better to just hire a person as a GP so they could patrol everything in Graal.  

I would apply but I have a long ban history (7) despite having collegiate/work experiences that qualify to be a GP. If having a ban history defines our "maturity" and/or "in-game knowledge", then it's probably why majority of us don't apply.

I personally dislike it when GP's go inactive for x amount of days because within those days, they could have prevented a hacker or someone being vulgar to other players. It's like the "10 hours per week" doesn't really apply anymore to the position. If the GPA were to have a defined system of accountability for every member on that team, then things would be far different. If you honestly can't be online everyday and do your duties, step down from your position. It doesn't matter if you have a "life", you applied to prevent things from escalating in the game.  

Posted by Bryan*

I would apply but I have a long ban history (7) despite having collegiate/work experiences that qualify to be a GP. If having a ban history defines our "maturity" and/or "in-game knowledge", then it's probably why majority of us don't apply.

I personally dislike it when GP's go inactive for x amount of days because within those days, they could have prevented a hacker or someone being vulgar to other players. It's like the "10 hours per week" doesn't really apply anymore to the position. If the GPA were to have a defined system of accountability for every member on that team, then things would be far different. If you honestly can't be online everyday and do your duties, step down from your position. It doesn't matter if you have a "life", you applied to prevent things from escalating in the game.

I don't see anything wrong with being inactive for a few days once every few months. We all have our lives outside the games and may have occasions where we are exceptionally busy or simply can't access our laptops. E.g. Vacation, major exams. If it is a consistent inactivity however then yeah, that would seem pretty unacceptable