Its that time again. We all thank and truly cherish the time and effort you put into our sims. As roleplayers, leads, staff and any other capacity you contribute to our sims. Recent stepdowns across all sims and budding creations of new sims have led us to believe we once again need to slice and dice responsibilities and bring in new faces. *slips on Uncle Sam mask* We want YOU!

First, lets all thank those who have stepped down. Fae and Kahlen’s absence has truly been felt and we will appreciate the dedication and patience they have shown over the years. The time you guys have put into making DE what it is today is truly valued and we hope you enjoy your much deserved break from administration.

With change comes opportunity as we look to see who might be able to fill their shoes we have decided to revamp our staffing model and put emphasis on what makes DE so special. Community. Stories. Roleplay.

After much thought on the topic, there really is an overwhelming disparity in responsibilities between the various roles, as well as a whole lot of ambiguity. What does it really mean to be a moderator? A mentor? A story weaver? Read on and find out!

We will be standardizing security abilities across all roles mentioned above. If you’re already considered staff, the least you should be able to do is protect your community from griefers so why separate you out? Lets focus on other talents you bring to our community. You will no longer see ‘security’ listed on the help pages, instead everyone listed there will be able to help with security as well.

You spoke and we listened. It’s hard to keep track of what you can do to help even once you have been assigned a role. Now each role is now defined with tangible and trackable tasks; for example, mentors will be responsible for hosting orientations and messaging 10 new players a week if applicable. Executing and tracking these tasks has been streamlined and made super easy with special web portals and notifications that will roll out with the new staff HUD.

In addition to the new systems and re-organization of roles, I’ve also outlined the “Focus Areas” that each GM and Admin will be assigned to head up this year. We also will be opening some of these focus areas to those who simply like to take on more responsibility or work their way up the ladder.

2015 Alterscape Staff Requirements

• Excellent communication skills
• Professional attitude
• Maintain regular presence on sim (at least 3-4 times a week)
• Genuine desire to help the community
• Protect communities from griefers using the Alterscape Security HUD
• At the minimum, ability to listen to voice chat and attend bi-monthly staff meetings

2015 Alterscape Staff Roles

Admins

Responsible for assistance with estate banning, region restarts, object returns in role-play area, player registrations, and abuse reports lodged against staff. Admins maintain regular contact with Nadir for important issues and help facilitate communication between leaders. Each admin is also assigned a focus area for the year and is responsible for achieving the goals associated to it.

As Nadir’s proxy, admins must maintain near-flawless public relations with the community.

GMs

These will become our community managers. Responsible for assistance with object returns, group notices, ooc abuse reports, and facilitating the setup of events. Each GM is also assigned a focus area in the community and works closely with group leaders to drive RP stories from brainstorming to implementation.

GMs will access the Alterscape Moderator Dashboard via the Staff HUD and have access to investigate OOC-related abuse cases. GMs will identify habitual rule breaking and may recommend admins to issue long-term bans.

Moderators

Responsible for mediation of role-play related issues and abuse reports submitted by players. Like all staff members, they should also be a friendly point of help for players.

Moderators will access the Alterscape Moderator Dashboard via the Staff HUD. The HUD will display the number of open RP-related abuse cases.

Mentors

Responsible for maintaining bi-weekly or monthly orientations, organizing RP-related workshops when needed, the first point of contact for live help, and communicating with new players using the Mentor Dashboard on a weekly basis. They are to help players get immersed in stories and scenes so new players keep coming back. It’s important to understand that mentors will not teach RP 101, but instead offer answers and guidance to those with questions, or at the most, host workshops for best practices.

Mentors will access the Alterscape Moderator Dashboard via the Staff HUD. The HUD will display the number of players they still need to contact (10 a week that’s automatically assigned by the system). There must be an orientation scheduled on the calendar within the next two weeks at all times (the system will enforce it), and the HUD will offer quick access to a handy transcript that can be used to run the oreintation.

Story Weavers

Responsible for brainstorming ideas and collaborating with faction and business leaders to facilitate sim-wide stories arcs. Weavers must design stories that have a start and finish date, and series of articles/events that displays the story’s progression, and responsible for posting a thread about it in the Story Arc forum. The thread will have links to articles and any reference knowledge so new and existing users can find ways to get their own characters involved.

Weavers will have quick access to the Current Story Arc subforum through the Security HUD. The HUD will also display the number of open story arcs in progress (basically, count of threads on the subforum that aren’t closed). The goal is to host at least one active story at all times. Arcs include ideas like dangerous weather, politics, outbreaks, to serial events.

2015 Alterscape Focus Areas

Factions/Groups

• Faction proposals w/ 2-day turnaround from player submission to posting on forums, followed by 5-day review cycle from community feedback to final decision.
• Maintain faction level (roster capacity) and group charters via Admin Dashboard so the faction webpage is up-to-date.
• Monitor faction rosters and make sure lead is active
• Facilitate monthly faction updates via forums.

Businesses Groups

• Official business proposals w/ 2-day turnaround from player submission to posting on forums, followed by a maximum 5-day review cycle from community feedback to final decision
• Private business rental proposals w/ 3-day turnaround from player submission, community notice via proposal forums, to unlocking the rental box w/ the final decision. The goal here is to expedite players who are paying for businesses and eager to provide RP opportunities to the community
• Maintain group charters via Admin Dashboard so the job opportunity webpage is up-to-date
• Monitor business lead presence via Admin Dashboard
• Facilitate events by sending out group notices and encouraging leaders to organize events and posting them to the website calendar

New Player Experience

• Discover creative ways of enhancing new players’ experience via orientation formats, designing workshop transcripts, and ice-breaker activities
• Lead mentors by ensuring biweekly orientations are scheduled on the events calendar and hosted by different mentors w/ timezones in mind
• Identify critical flaws that inhibit new users and report back to management

Events

• Discover creative ways of bringing the community together via monthly OOC events
• Responsible for events decor and must display exceptional taste in design.
• Organize photography to be posted in Flickr
• Responsible for organizing seasonal IC/OOC events (ie. Halloween, Christmas, etc.)
• Organize bi-monthly contests w/ prizes (sponsored by sim)

Stories/Plots

• Manage “weavers”
• Manage the Story Arc subforum and close stories that have been completed and ensuring current ones are being updated.
• Ensure events and articles related to story arcs are promoted in the community.

Digital Media

• Responsible for the news site as Editor
• Maintain homepage highlights on a weekly basis
• Discover creative ways of highlighting quality articles, photos on Flickr, and other art in the community (ie. group notices, contest, posters, etc.)

Do any of these things interest you. Perhaps you would love to help with story weaving as well as be a RP Leader? Are there other areas in the sim you feel could you some extra focus? Are you still unsure what some of these focuses might entail? Whatever sort of interest you hold just fill out this survey to be contacted and invited to upcoming meetings. If you currently are staff and want to more responsibility, let us know through this as well!

Become Staff!!