Admin Application 2022

[Tetsu]

Hello DRG members, it’s finally that time again, the most ruthless yet satisfying job on this forum, admin application. As you have all heard about the sudden departure of our beloved headmaster, Alucard, who has reigned on the throne for 6 years but due to unforeseen circumstances he had to abdicate from it. And also, a year or so back, our returning champion, Codeskull too had taken the plunge off this position as well. So, we wish them both best of luck in the real world.

And here we are, only two surviving members left, Emi who will be our new headmistress, and me, Tetsu is left with filling up some big shoes. Therefore, we are not opening one but TWO admin positions this time around

Now on to matters, as you know recently there were some unforeseen circumstances that our community has faced while we are slowly getting back on track to be more active in hosting games. As such, some of these matters were missed by the team however, were hopefully handled but are yet to be resolved. Therefore, the applications are highly important. Since the applicants are applying for the role of an admin, do ensure your application reflects the position.

Now we are looking for a driven admin who is able to take our community to a new height. Someone who is empathetic yet firm when it comes to resolving matters and making decisions. As well as help out with site and discord maintenance

To sign up we just need a few details from you

1) Name

2) Age (applications are preferably 18 years and above)

3) How much time are you willing to spend being an admin

4) What skill set will you bring to the table as an admin?

5) What would you implement into the DRG community if you had a chance (anything from the site to discord and in between)

6) How will you resolve a conflict if it arises when you’re online at the same time?

7) How do you plan on reviving the mini-trials so that players waiting are interested in them again? (optional)

Happy applying!

PS: Application will last for TWO weeks

[SmolOverlord]

Name: Smol
Age: 21
How much time are you willing to spend being an admin?: roughly 0 hours
What skill set will you bring to the table as an admin?: i was admin before and i was really good i swear
What would you implement into the DRG community?: another 2005
How will you resolve a conflict?: eat the perpetrators
How do you plan on reviving the mini-trials?: what's a mini trial?

in all seriousness good luck all applicants become admin do it you could genuinly make such a positive change to the site??? it's well worth applying trust. i just had to post this for another 2005 meme have a lovely day and year everybody bye

[Ame]

SPOILER: Click to show

{1) Name}My pseudonym is Taka, and has been for over 2 years now.

SPOILER: Click to show

{2) Age}As of writing (10/9/22), I am 18 years old.

SPOILER: Click to show

{3) How much time are you willing to spend being an admin}As much time as is needed. Although as a baseline, at least 1-2 hours per week.

SPOILER: Click to show

{4) What skill set will you bring to the table as an admin?}A fair and active voice of reason, who is willing to fill the role required as the team needs it. Willing to crunch when necessary, and keep up to date on any goings-on, while ensuring that the community is well-informed and up to date on where the admin team is at with any new decisions, as well as any events, i.e. DDD, Toasty Day, or DRG's Birthday.

SPOILER: Click to show

{5) What would you implement into the DRG community if you had a chance:}One of the main things I would implement is The Beginners Guide to DRG.

As it stands, DRG is largely beginner unfriendly, not because of any cultural reasons, but just that DRG is a rather confusing community, and there is a steep learning curve to overcome. While this is not an individual effort, rather a team project with several other DRG members, old and new alike, I am responsible for large sections of what has been written, as well as the creation of the project, and most of the vision behind it. Alas, it would be in bad faith to talk about it without the help of the other people, most notably SpellCraft for her help writing, editing, and revising to date.

Another one is the Achievement Revitalisation Project.

As of March 2021, and time of writing, there are 86 achievements in DRG. They are all ranging in difficulty and complexity and were originally seen as a badge of honour for completion. However. The last time anyone applied for an achievement was May 2021. Over a year ago, and a measly 2 months after their launch. As a member of the initial team achievements, and the one in control of the documents, this, does hurt my ego. And so, I would like to revitalise the project. Recategorising, changing/tweaking achievements as we see fit, as well as the creation of new achievements, and a more optimised system of tracking them, and additionally, an incentive for actively doing the achievements. While I cannot take full credibility for the proposed idea, that much belongs to Toasty, I do promise that I would do my best to contribute all that I can to seeing this idea to fruition.

The last one is reviving the Questions Megathread.

As far as I can tell, the thread was for the skill-based system, which has long since been abandoned. However, players will always have questions, and while the Beginners Guide may answer a lot of questions, players will always have questions, whether experienced or new. Perhaps it is to do with the ruling of accomplices, which is always a contentious subject. Perhaps it has to do with game-specific mechanics, in which an official ruling could be made. I propose that the FAQ section is also added to the Beginners Guide, while the Megathread gets moved out of the 'News and Updates' section, and into the 'Info Centre' section, which gets far more traffic. Having increased clarity and creating a culture of asking and responding to questions on a timely basis, between the Admin Team and the Player base at large will give DRG the opportunity to remain relevant, even far after our times on DRG come to an end.

As a minor focus, but a quality of life thing, the shop is in disrepair.

It's as I said. The shop is hardly used, and as of writing, the last edit to what was in the Monomono Machine was the Seventh of September, 2021. Over a year ago. To make things worse, (sorry to everyone who has been sneaking this, if anyone even has been), the 25% discount, which I believe started for DRG's 8th Birthday, is still ongoing. To be frank, the shop is unloved, and is in need to have at least hype behind it. I don't believe it was so much as mentioned with the ending of Game 101. This may be because this was the responsibility of Former Admin Codeskull, but it is still there all the same. Although around a month ago a new trophy was added, I'm yet to see anyone with it, or as much as talking about the Monomono Machine's rolls.

SPOILER: Click to show

{6) How will you resolve a conflict if it arises when you’re online at the same time?}Ideally, a pinch of prevention is better than a pound of cure, so ideally, trying to stamp out potentially aggravating or otherwise toxic behaviour is incredibly important in preventing these conflicts from occurring ;at all, however, they will still occur eventually.

For the record, conflict is never a simple thing to deal with, and as an admin, being impartial is incredibly important in quarrels among players. Everyone always believes that they are, in fact, innocent beyond a shadow of a doubt, and the other party is a big stupid idiot. But that cannot be true always. Reaching out to parties, either privately after the fact and talking to them, or making a public showing of the conflict and convincing the parties of where the other side is at, and how they got there may relieve some tension, but is not enough to solve the problem. While using the Muzzled role/Policing posts may be necessary, abusing it is a sure-fire way to lose the trust of the players.

To deal with and resolve conflict, the immediate response is, as it will always be, damage control; to ensure things do not get worse than they already are by trying to diffuse both sides by way of reason and calm but stern conversation, but this will only fix this issue temporarily, unless the root issue is tackled, it will flare up again, which we have seen happen historically, and even quite recently too. Learning about what actually is causing these problems and talking it through with the involved parties in a calm, professional manner is how to truly resolve conflict, ensuring there are no misunderstandings or bad blood between players. Between trying to ensure the situations don't arise to begin with, and when they do, appropriate handling of them, should resolve almost all conflict that occurs on DRG.

SPOILER: Click to show

{7) How do you plan on reviving the mini-trials so that players waiting are interested in them again?}The biggest problem that mini-trials are currently facing is scale. They're too big; they often require too much dedication from both players and hosts to be sustainable. Yes, the big flashy trials of old. 28, 29, and 53 all come to mind as legendary mini-trials, and there are countless others if I search for them, but they're simply too big to be feasible. If you take the Nerdy Barista/Codeskull approach, smaller scale, generally less complicated trials, hosts would be more incline to try and host, and players wouldn't feel as threatened by the time requirements and would be more likely to sign up.

Ultimately, mini-trials were a fun way of passing time in between down periods of main games, such as nightly or just, in between games. But they were double purpose, as they were an experimental place for hosts to try out mechanics, they would be interested in maybe using in main games. That simply doesn't feel like the vibe of mini-trials anymore, each trying to be gimmicky and unique, while requiring a large time investment for everyone involved. By reducing that burden all round, ideally mini-trials may have a rejuvenation.

There is also the angle of increasing the monocoin reward, for hosts and players, however (aside from a few notable exceptions) there isn't really anything super attractive in the shop for most players and increasing the already low reward from minis wouldn't do much for motivation/willingness to participate.

---

My apologies about this rather long post, if there are any issues or questions, please let me know and I will address them to the best of my ability. I hope you consider my application, and good luck to the other applicants, in particular SmolOverlord.

[⋆⋅ Sage ⋅⋆]

1) Name: Sage/Lys
2) Age: 22
3) How much time are you willing to spend being an admin? As much as necessary. I'm on discord all the time on my days off, and check it frequently when I'm at work. So idk... how to quantify time... like 30 hours a week in the EST timezone? I can be around to give roles, solve disputes, make announcements, etc. as long as I get a ping.

4) What skill set will you bring to the table as an admin? I'm friendly and welcoming to new faces, know basically every active member, and I have good conflict resolution skills if problems arise. I'm also a good writer in case announcements/guides need to be written up. I can also make art.

5) What would you implement into the DRG community if you had a chance (anything from the site to discord and in between) Well, for just small/silly stuff, I think it would be cool to have a Starboard on our discord. I think our discord could also have a channel for introductions where new members can send a message introducing themselves, like what we have on the site, but the discord is more active. More fun things like DDD, minigames, and Jackbox/gaming nights would be cool too. Basically, keeping the site fun and exciting to draw in new members and keep ahold of our older ones. I also think it’s time to add a new staff role: Coder (name subject to change) who can help with bbcode stuff on site, cause god knows we need it and we don’t have a specific staff role for it yet.
6) How will you resolve a conflict if it arises when you’re online at the same time? Firstly, I would de-escalate the conflict so that it doesn't become huge and just something for other members to spectate on. Tell the people to take a few mins to cool off and then DM me their sides of the story. Then I can talk to the people involved either one on one or together to try and find a resolution. I believe I can be fair and impartial, keeping in mind that I would not tolerate any bullying.
7) How do you plan on reviving the mini-trials so that players waiting are interested in them again? An idea that I've had for a little bit would be for the mini host to come up with a few different themes/ideas and then let people with the Mini role vote on which they would want to participate in. That way, there's a bit of time to generate hype for the upcoming Mini and the players will actually be excited about the theme.

[Misaki]

Name: Satori (AKA Queen Savage McSavage)

Age: Ancient (30)

How much time are you willing to spend being an admin? I am constantly online almost the whole day everyday so ill dedicate as much time as needed. My timezone is GMT+8.

What skill set will you bring to the table as an admin? I have been a member of site since Aug 2, 2014 and have played in almost every game since Game 19 so I come with 8 yrs worth of experience playing and hosting DRG games and know every nook and cranny of the site and it's community like the back of my head. I also have the added benefit of knowing the admins personally so it's much easier for me to work with them. I am also a highly skilled kidnapper recruiter.

What would you implement into the DRG community if you had a chance?

Operation Make DRG Great Again (The DRG Kidnapping Recruitment and Revitalization Program)

DRG is an active and close knit community with just enough people for a 16 player game. But the reality is that at some point, All of us will get older which means they'll spend more time with RL stuff and much lesser time with DRG and there will come a time to call it quits and retire (Even I admit I won't be here forever). I also notice that we aren't getting as much new members constantly and if this trend continues, the site as whole will slowly die out. That is why I feel it is vitally important that we start preparing for the next generation of DRG right now by finding fresh new blood to join the site so that DRG will still continue to thrive long after most of us are gone.

Now how are we going to achieve this? First we shall revamp and expand our Affiliate Program. Second we will assemble a task force of dedicated kidnappers recruiters who will go around different online communities (Specifically Forum Mafia sites, murder mystery and Dangan Ronpa fan sites and discord servers) advertising and scouting for new members to join the site. These recruiters must not only know how to make ads on other sites but also possess social and persuasion skills and be able to engage with the community and form relationships with it's members to establish rapport and build trust with them. They may even participate in their games or other events out of courtesy.

Discourse Migration

Another program to help revitalize DRG is to migrate the site from Proboards to Discourse. What is Discourse you ask? Well Discourse is a 100% open source discussion platform built for the next decade of the Internet.

Some notable of features of Discourse include:

-Auto updating threads so you don't need to refresh the page constantly

-An automatic dice roll and votecount plugin

-Wiki posts that can be collaboratively edited by other members.

-Customizable member badges that could be applied to our achievement system.

-A summarize topic feature.

-And many other OoL features.

You may learn more about Discourse features here

It is important to note that Discourse is a paid subscription and the cheapest plan costs $100/mo to maintain. While none of this is really necessary, I feel that the site as a whole is in need of an upgrade to have it in line with the current times and is worth the $100/mo maintenance fee if we have enough people willing to donate money for it and we should also give incentive for people who donated like giving them a custom title, name colors and the like.

Game Submission Queue and Approval Thread

When hosts submit their games for approval. They will apply by PMing any admin with the following format.

Game Host(s):
Game Name:
Estimated Start Date:
Game Theme/Setting: (Just a brief description)
Game Size: (Max player cap)
Game Type: (Standard, Special, etc)
Game Length: (How many rounds will it last)
Nighty length: (Number of actions per night)
Action processing speed: (How many hrs between actions are they processed)
Plot/Lore: (Yes/No)
(If yes) Plot/Lore Difficulty: (Easy, Medium, Hard, Despair)
Puzzles: (Yes/No)
(If yes) Puzzle Difficulty: (Easy, Medium, Hard, Despair)
Trial System: (Standard, Emi’s system, Custom)
Trial Length:
Graveyard: (Yes/No)

Once the game has been reviewed and approved by the admins. These forms will be made public for all to see. This is so players will know what to expect from a game in advance and prepare accordingly.

Annual DRG Awards

A yearly event held at the end of each year celebrating the achievements of DRG members throughout the year. Awards will be given for various categories such as DRG Member of the Year, DRG Admin of the Year, Best Spotless Performance, Best Blackened Performance, Best Murder Plan, Game of the Year, Best Host Performance, etc.

If ever I'm not chosen to become admin. I hope the new admin team would at least consider my proposals stated above.

How will you resolve a conflict if it arises when you’re online at the same time? If there's a conflict between two or more members. I will first tell them to calm down and take their arguments to private DMs. If neither side backs down after repeated warnings, they will be temporarily suspended from the server for a certain amount of time depending on the severity and seriousness of the issue. I will also personally consult with the parties involved if necessary to understand the situation better or delegate the task to another admin or mod.

In addition. If I were to overstep my authority or behave inappropriately just once. I will take full responsibility for my actions and resign immediately from my post.

[Hansbulla]

Nom de Guerre)

I am known by many names: Caution Slayer, Flamer Lion, The Toxic Axe; but you? You may call me Vinny.

---

Age)

2 decades

---

Time Sink)

~2 hours a day, extended by my mobile vigil that stands upon the western hemisphere

---

Skill Set)

I code da pizza. I’ve worked with websites and the html and css stuff that bbcode is all about. I can probably help with backend things or supplement my current programmeringgting knowledge to do so.
For the bureaucracy, I’ve done moderation before. I’m fine with being pestered to fix or do something, and I don’t get fazed enough to step away. I also can be relentless if the others need a break.

---

Implementations)

I think the sidebar needs some updates. The game rules threads probably should be reposted under the current administrator accounts and not Yosuke’s as to not confuse new users with who they ask for game questions. Mini-Trial stats can be linked better on the proper board (more below later) and the seasonal game information could be moved away from the permanent-info-sidebar. The Fresh Site Schdule (fix the thread title) needs some love in our heart of convenient navigation links. Less bloat, more value is the name of the game.
The Mini-Trial board should see some restructuring like the main games’, especially since new players are seemingly directed to them. The game information and statistics can be placed in their own section, and the old games can be archived in a sub-board so the current one is further distinguished for newbie eyes.
The News & Updates board is also in need of reorganization with its contents being mainly admin applications and anniversary cake contests. Those can be grouped into their own sub-boards and the miscellaneous announcements left on the main.
The Job, Competitions, and Website sub-boards in the General board have become redundant with the introduction of an entire advertising board for the latter and the applications and competitions being held in the above News & Updates. Less bloat for the soul.
The Suggestions board should be kept up to date with archival. Let’s keep the graveyard of ideas in pristine order so that people want to use it in the future.
With the forum changes, the Discord getting-started links can be refurbished as well as the #graveyard channel properly set to #post-game-discussion, and the player-statistics are in dire need of a single hopeful update since the channel was created. It’s also convenient to link the achievements thread from the website.
A few more miscellaneous things can be done, like informing new users they can have their first SHSL Title on the forum (and giving them it to begin with), running the achievements system and spreadsheets, and vaporizing the admin permissions on the forum from retired admins (don’t want to confuse newer players with people they shouldn’t go to for administrative help).
Combating spam threads by disabling guests while preserving the advertisement angle is feasible. Proboards global accounts make it simple to register a forum account, so members from advertising forums can easily make one on ours to post on the appropriate boards. Much easier to nuke bot accounts than bot guests.

---

Conflict Resolution)

My approach to defusals is to conversate. Unless the escalation matches twitter, there’s always time to talk without warnings and mutes. My goal is to lessen personal harm and keep community members civil. If it comes to breaking points, warnings are a sign that containment is necessary. Taking things to private messages won’t be my suggestion, and if an obstinate party continues past all warnings, we have mutes as an absolute sign to step away. I don’t believe a member should be removed from the server unless their actions go beyond severity. The recipients can later settle that business with me when they’re ready to resume normal activity.

[Maria]

Name

Maria/Starling

Age

20

How much time are you willing to spend being an admin?

Most of my free time (which is a lot these days). With university coming up for me soon, this time may slightly decrease, but nothing can really keep me away from discord or the site for too long.

What skill set will you bring to the table as an admin?

I am a welcoming person to all people in the community and I'm always happy to explain something if need be. I do everything in my power to avoid bias and I can stay calm under pressure and in hectic conversations. If something needs to be taken up, I'm also happy to go out of my way to learn new skills that can be applied to the site. I'm also an okay-ish editor if any pictures need to be amended or made don't look at my old stuff, i'm better than that, i pinky promise

What would you implement into the DRG community if you had a chance?

Multiple Main Games

With more people joining the site, the sign ups for main games fill up very quickly, with the current main game (Game 102) having all positions filled in 3 hours. The previous system had the two main games posting their sign ups around the same time, allowing players to view the premise of each game before deciding which one they wanted to join. After this happened, if there was enough slots remaining, people could join both games, but had to wait 24 hours after the time that they posted their sign up in the first game. However, we could also consider the possibility of running the main games at different times, with Game B posting sign ups a few weeks or so later than Game A (e.g. after the first trial of game A). Doing this allows people who missed out on Game A to still take part in a main game and not have to wait months in order to play again. I believe we could present the option for more people to take the place for someone who is inactive to make the games more engaging, which also assists the problem of someone joining in a main game after missing sign ups. This also gives people a chance who missed out on the signs up to take part in a Main Game, even if it is later on - people typically tend to be more active when they first start playing, so this will bring some energy back in the presence of the inactive person.

Discord Events

During the Main Games, activity in the server can be slow, with the exception of the main game chat which most people not involved don't pay attention to. It would be nice to try and revive this and keep the discord active during this time in the form of small game nights and friendly competitions, whether this be in the form of playing video games together (League, Phasmophobia, Overwatch), or more interactive games (Tabletop Simulator, Jackbox, Codenames). I think it would also be nice to host nights where we can watch things together, whether this be anime, movies, or other things. If not together and we struggle to find away around the screensharing system (which a lot of streaming sites have unfortunately), it would be nice for people to watch in their free time and then report back on a designated date. I guess like a book club but not books because who reads these days?

How will you resolve a conflict if it arises when you’re online at the same time?

The most important thing is to keep a clear head and see all parties as equal, removing any bias. I would politely ask for all parties to take the conversation to DMs and step away from the screen for a bit to cool down. If it's something they are truly upset about and feel that they need to get staff involved, I would be more than happy to listen to their problems or immediately find someone who can if I'm not currently available. Waving around threats of muting and banning should be a last resort and should be reserved for a direct violation of site/discord rules and discord TOS.