Geekyhobo's Admin Application

[geekyhobo]

In-game Username: geekyhobo
Discord username: geekyhobo
Characters you play: Bodie Larocque
On average, how many hours do you expect to admin per week: 20hrs - 30hrs Depending on weekday commitments
Days you are available to admin on: Monday through Sunday every week. Mon - Fri from 3 pm EST to 12 pm EST, and Sat-Sun 10 am - 12 am, But also varying times outside the ones listed, throughout the week

Are you at least 18 years old? Yes 20

How long have you been playing SS13 or SS14? About 2 years ago I found SS13, but never really got into the game. I found SS14 around ~April of 2023 and have been playing ever since then. I have ~260 Hrs in game.

Do you have prior administration experience (SS13/SS14 experience preferred, please also post a way for us to verify this)? No way to verify this, but a couple of years ago I was an admin for a small Minecraft factions server. I was an admin for about a year before we decided to shut down due to server costs and a dwindling player count. It was a good experience working with a community, as well as working with a team to enforce server rules, while also running the day to day of the behind the scenes of the server.

Have you been banned from our game servers or SS13 servers before? Yes, Twice, Once with about ~15 hours of in-game time for Antag rolling which resulted in a 72hr Ban I believe. And a second time about a week later for 12Hrs for placing a HV Grill in maintenance as a non-antag.

About these two bans, I would like to point out my immaturity and how I learned from them which spawned this Reddit post. https://www.reddit.com/r/ss14/comments/12qypa8/20hrs_in_the_game_and_just_a_singular_round_and/  

At the very beginning of my playtime on the Wizden servers, I started my playtime off well, I RP’ed gained role time, and was generally excited to play in engineering. But as you can see in that Reddit post I immaturity slowly pulled me away from what was exciting and drew me in as a new player. I became so fixated on the fact that I felt like I needed to play Antagonist roles that I started to just hop servers in the hope that I could roll Antag that round. This led to my first ban for Antag Rolling. After the first ban, I stopped hopping servers but I was unfortunately not off the shitter mindset. This led me to only join rounds as a passenger trying to still get late-join Antagonists, and if I did not get it, I would try and just be a crappy player. This led to me setting up several eclectic HV grills in maintenance. Once I was approached by the admin I realized what the severity of my actions had caused. The one thing the admin specifically said that struck home with me was that I had affected other people's rounds by causing them to die in maintenance and then no one found their body effectively ending their rounds. From that point on I started to come back to what I joined the game for in the first place: the role-playing experience. It then became a priority for me to try and make other people's rounds better.

Answer the following questions in detail, so we can get a better idea of how you'd approach adminning.

What role do you think game admins serve on our servers?
Admins exist to preserve the integrity of the server's RP while also dealing with people who are negatively affecting others' experiences. That being said, Admins are also charged with fostering the community and welcoming feel that SS14 has, in-game, on the discord forums, etc. This means helping new players with questions they may have while also sometimes keeping rounds light and funny with themed IC Centcom shenanigans.

How do you feel about the current roleplay status on the server?
RP right now on the LRP servers is especially pretty lackluster, but it has its moments. I took the time to observe 4ish rounds on Lizard for an entire afternoon. I saw some poor shifts where it was people just messing about with little intention to RP. However, I also saw a great shift in which people were still alive enjoying RP, and having a great time. This combined with the fact that LRP servers tend to have higher player counts on the weekends, means that there is a lot of good RP done on the weekends as opposed to the weekdays. I believe this is due to the fact that admins are more available during the weekends and thus the respective quality and upheld standards of the command staff are higher. I have not played much to any MRP, but from what I've heard the MRP status on Salamander is great for those who enjoy the more in-depth and player-made story side of the game. 

Why do you want to become an administrator for SS14?
SS14 has become a sort of second family for me. The community welcomed me with open arms when I first started and I wish that I can provide that same feeling of community and inclusivity that SS14 brought to me. Admins are the first line of defense for the community and I believe that by becoming an administrator I could uphold the standard that we have today. While also  
Secondly, I have just seen a lot of problematic situations on Lizard that have gone (as far as I know) unhandled, especially with command. In my opinion, the statement “as a command staff you are held to a higher standard of play” is not being enforced enough. 

Other than banning problematic players, what admin actions do you believe have the biggest positive impact?
I think the place where admins have the most impact is when they just nudge people in the right direction. In many situations, I think players sometimes just get a bit carried away when it comes to what they have decided to do for a shift. SS14 is a passionate game for people, and when either something they're working on or something that they are invested in is threatened by another player, sometimes that may be the tipping point for them. This sometimes causes them to lash out. As admins, you have no idea what someone might be going through outside of the game. But by providing small guidance or fixing problems for players. You might be able to have a positive impact not just in the game, but beyond the game as well.

Have you ever had a negative experience in the game or with a game admin? If so what, if anything, would you do to prevent other players from experiencing this?
I would not say that I have ever had a bad experience with any game admins, but I would like to point out the inconsistency between admins when it comes to how verbose they are when responding to A-Helps. Admins can be pretty intimidating to new players so when a new player asks a question, and all they get back is a quick “yes”, or “no” I feel like sometimes that can leave questions still unanswered. If I were to suggest a way to fix this, I think that just being more verbal in answers and providing relevant information, also and where to find help. IE a new player A-helps with how the AME works, I would respond with a detailed explanation and then tell them to seek out a Senior engineer or the CE to assist them IC, thus preserving the RP situation.

Have you ever had a good experience with the game or a game admin? If so, what was it?
I think the best experience I had with an admin was when I was banned for placing the HV grills in maintenance tunnels. The admin first approached me and asked me what I thought about placing Hv Grills in maintenance and how would I feel If I was dead for an entire round. It was a thought-provoking and good engagement for me as a player. By the end of the conversation, I understood what I had done wrong, and why it was wrong, and although I was banned for 72 hours, I was okay with it because I understood the severity of my actions. Because I had such a good interaction with that admin it made me come back to the game as a better player which is what I believe admin interactions are supposed to do for players that break rules.

The following are scenarios, respond with how you would handle each as an administrator. Respond with the assumption that you are an administrator with full access to the admin tools and that you have all the knowledge needed to use these tools. Respond in detail, explain the reasons behind the decisions you make, and describe any assumptions you are making. When you need to make an assumption, it is preferred for you to describe how differences in the assumption would affect your actions.

It is the start of the round. There are 60 players on the server. The game mode is traitors, traitors have not been selected yet. A chaplain prays to you "Give me a task my lord".
The chaplain has an altar for a reason and I wouldn't want to neglect that fact. Thus in order to encourage fun RP for them and others, I think some sort of fun and nondestructive task would be applicable here. Giving them an RGBee plushie and telling them they need to spread the colors of the rainbow to the station would be something that I might give them. 

You see a clown using crayon to write on the floor in front of security. The clown writings are negative things about security, like "shitsec". A secoff tells the clown that they're being arrested for vandalism, stuns them, and cuffs them. Before the secoff is able to get the clown into the brig, a passenger slips the secoff, causing them to lose their baton, then uses the baton to stun another secoff that comes to help as the clown runs away. The passenger escapes through disposals.
From this current situation as an admin, there is no reason for me to intervene. However, it would be something to monitor. As security, they have to respect the rules of escalation and they are also held to a higher standard of play. If the Secoff says on the radio. “Kos the Clown, and Passenger” then this might become a case of over escalation as opposed to a warranted Aos on the clown for evading arrest, and an Aos on the passenger. Still, even if the secoff said to Kos them, I would wait to see how the command staff of security and the station respond. Throughout my time in game, the Hos has always been one of the most important and well-played roles. Therefore I would assume the Hos would question the Kos order and would most likely step in to change it to an Aos order. However if not I might message the Hos in an attempt to not blow this up into a bigger issue of overescalation by the Secoff. I think as an admin you should really stay out of the RP situation in order to allow natural gameplay to progress.

You log in to handle an ahelp that came in while nobody was online about "self-antag" activity. The player being reported as self-antagging was being a problem and could be considered acting outside of the rules, but they are no longer online and cannot be contacted about their behavior. While outside of the rules, the infractions are minor and would not normally result in more than a warning in most cases.
As per what I have described above, The first thing I would do is contact and engage in a conversation with the player who put in the A-help. By starting that conversation and getting their point of view of what they believe went wrong I would be able to build a picture of what happened. This combined with the logs would allow me to create closure with the reporting player, While also allowing me to leave a note on the offending player's account. Because the offending player is offline (and their actions don't necessarily warrant an appeal ban) and a conversation cannot be had with them there is not much that I could do then just make a note. By leaving a note, if this player continues to act outside of the rules it would allow myself or another admin to see the history and develop a proper punishment for that player depending on the severity of the next offense.

Thank you for your consideration of my application.

[Chief_Engineer]

Thank you for applying. We've decided to not accept this application, but you're free to apply again in the future.