[Toaster Oven]

Hey all.

Normally I'm not one to complain about things like this, I tend to be a pretty passive guy when it comes to almost anything..

However.

I feel we should enforce staff disrespect more. I recently played a few maps alongside bryanbrr and we encountered quite the range of hooligans that were dead set on causing issues not only for the staff, but for those who were on the server itself. Constant pissing and moaning about slays, revenge rdm for reports, and endless flaming of staff.

I normally could not care less if someone makes a complaint to me or if someone gets triggered and dms me ASAB 27 times. I have pretty thick skin and normally just go along with it just to kind of appease everyone and not alienate the staff from our community. That said, I think I can draw the line of causing issues for the whole server, namely those who are not a part of our community (yet) or those who are just trying to have a pleasant evening playing on their favorite server. I feel it doesn't bode well to have this sort of stuff tolerated as it can give the appearance of us running a clown show.

I have also seen exploitation of the warning system, which is normally dissuades those who flame/troll/be a dick, resulting in people just quick saying as many slurs as they can before they have to leave, or just borderline flaming just to kind of teeter on the edge of what us as staff can reasonably warn for.

I don't see issue with the systems we have in place, they seem to be well designed to handle such things. Recently, I have seen much more of an uptick in overall staff dislike, (Which can mostly just be chalked up to "haha admins more like badmins" or "ASAB" or someone just wanting to go along with the meme), and it makes it hard to make the tough decisions which of course always get picked up as evidence for the staff being bad or whatever. It makes it hard to do our job and keep our community thriving.

I am not proposing one single solution to this, but rather asking upon yall to share your input and see if there is something we can do to help remedy the current state on the server.

[§bKiwi The Fruit]

So, I personally feel like there's a huge disconnect between the staff members and the rest of the community. There's so much that goes on behind the scenes that staff members don't talk about, and I feel as though that lack of transparency is making the community sort of iffy on many of the staff decisions. On the other hand, I see regulars and donors and just average people who play refusing to give staff the benefit of the doubt. They're so quick to rally behind somebody being "unfairly banned" without even taking the time to hear staff's point of view on it. I feel like staff needs to make more of an effort to not seem so "untouchable," but at the same time, us who aren't staff need to realize that staff can't let us know about everything that is going on all the time. They're busy bees who work hard to keep the community fun and safe. We're all normal human beings that make mistakes, and that's just that. At least this is my viewpoint on it.

[Toaster Oven]

So, I personally feel like there's a huge disconnect between the staff members and the rest of the community. There's so much that goes on behind the scenes that staff members don't talk about, and I feel as though that lack of transparency is making the community sort of iffy on many of the staff decisions. On the other hand, I see regulars and donors and just average people who play refusing to give staff the benefit of the doubt. They're so quick to rally behind somebody being "unfairly banned" without even taking the time to hear staff's point of view on it. I feel like staff needs to make more of an effort to not seem so "untouchable," but at the same time, us who aren't staff need to realize that staff can't let us know about everything that is going on all the time. They're busy bees who work hard to keep the community fun and safe. We're all normal human beings that make mistakes, and that's just that. At least this is my viewpoint on it.

I agree, I feel the disconnect only widens every time some random dude flips out for getting slain for prop killing.

It's a hard gap to bridge sometimes. I try to make myself as lowly as possible because I hate the idea of feeling like I'm better than someone just because my rank is blue. We're all people and think the entire human aspect is discounted when staff aren't at the very minimum transparent with the community.

EDIT: Bryan made some good points. I haven't really seen someone get too mad over transparency, but I have seen many upset players over mistakes (or what they think are mistakes) with slays and warns. That's inherent to the system as many others have brought out. I think the problem lies within staff unintentionally feeding into the trollers oftentimes.

[Battons]

I can't speak for anyone else but I've already personally been warning people who dare to use asab or disrespect while im on server which runs the risks of temp bans and at this point im so worn down I don't really care if they think its a "joke."

[Toaster Oven]

I can't speak for anyone else but I've already personally been warning people who dare to use asab or disrespect while im on server which runs the risks of temp bans and at this point im so worn down I don't really care if they think its a "joke."

I can understand that I suppose. The entire ASAB meme in my opinion isn’t the issue, but more a result of the issue. (Also just people drawing parallels to ACAB used in the recent POC movement) It’s almost like the fact that the saying has caught on really emphasizes the disconnect between the staff and the community as Kiwi said.

[KaptainLes]

When putting in my Application for staff, some regular members of the community told me not to do it because of the constant hate and disrespect. They also said that they never would never become staff themselves because they want to "Enjoy the game without harassment". And it definitely made me reconsider my application for a bit.

[§bKiwi The Fruit]

When putting in my Application for staff, some regular members of the community told me not to do it because of the constant hate and disrespect. They also said that they never would never become staff themselves because they want to "Enjoy the game without harassment". And it definitely made me reconsider my application for a bit.

This is definitely the same experience I had when I first applied. People don't understand what staff does behind the scenes. This includes myself obviously haha

[bryanbrr]

So, I personally feel like there's a huge disconnect between the staff members and the rest of the community. There's so much that goes on behind the scenes that staff members don't talk about, and I feel as though that lack of transparency is making the community sort of iffy on many of the staff decisions.

I kind of disagree with this statement. I, of course, am open to always hear the other side and could very well be wrong but, it seems to me that the community thinks we don’t communicate with them based off of wrongful bans. Is that correct? I agree that we make mistakes, it happens, and usually it is a result of making decisions too fast without the proper evidence/clarification, I’m kind of confused on how the community thinks we aren’t transparent about these things. If we make a mistake we own it and we tell the server whenever something happens. Please let me know on what you think we are transparent about.

[VolfVoss]

Upon deciding to join the staff team the thought never crossed my mind that everyone would respect me and fellow staff members, nor the idea that we would be liked by all. We are enforcers, naturally people who have issues with authority in any degree will try as they might to thwart what we are doing. 

Pertaining to the "disconnect" between staff and community,  that will always be present in some degree due to information necessity.  We have staff chat discords for discussion the general public isn't privy to because it's unnecessary information for them.  If a member of the community has an inquiry they're more than welcome to ask specific staff about it or bring it to forums for better clarification.  

This is my perspective on the situation.  I pose no resolution because you can't please everyone and this is the internet.

[B0T.ikillyou]

I can say that in TTT, Disrespect in general can get a bit crazy sometimes. Not just specifically towards staff members.
We really don't have as big of a problem with PH with this since we always act on player/staff disrespect incidents with no exceptions. I am not saying we strike down everyone that questions staff in this case but more for the disrespect. We treat it all the same.
I think the trolling/toxicity issues in TTT is where most of the issues come from.
The problem with attempting to fix the issue though is you need to have everyone take care of the toxicity together. If you have one staff member that is addressing toxicity, that staff member will become a target for all the trolls on the server.

Staff disconnect is always going to be a thing because how staff in any community handles situations. You are always going to have the players that question bans. Especially when it comes to someone they are close to or are friends with. This is why we have checks in place for bans like unban requests and a staff abuse sections. Typically in PH, most bans that players see they understand. We have had the occasional disagreement but staff is just enforcing the rules. Bans have reasons and evidence behind them and it would be hard to explain bans to people in server. It can disrupt gameplay. Which is why we have other means for people to ask about them. Asking about them in the server generally doesn't achieve much. Another scenario here is the players that question bans to stir up others or to troll in the server. In my opinion if people are worried about specific bans they need to bring them to light. As Kiwi did say mistakes can be made. We are all human.


-B0T