Cantr II Discussion Forum

Why can't the Cantrian community vote on who we actually trust on taking care of our matters? (Sure, even if everybody thought someone should be in some department it doesn't mean the person would Have To join, it's up to their own decision. But ordinary people should have a chance to voice their opinion.) By reading the posts on the forums, it's easy to see which people are immature and/or have a tendency to pick fights. And also the people who work on departments should be ACTIVE. Most of them are sleepers, some don't even play the game anymore. How are you supposed to stay aware of what's going on in the game if you don't personally play it?

I've gotten the impression many people apply for the staff but it's very rare you hear of somebody actually getting accepted. Because the departments are full. Full of sleepers, I say. It seems that people who join are soon doomed to lose interest. Maybe because they see the ugly reality behind the scenes, all the bureucrasies and serial cheaters and stress. And the endless whining of players asking for changes and action. ...Which I'm doing here right now. Well if you are an active staff member reading this and you know you've done the best you can, I apologize, this message is not directed to you nor against you. It's directed to my fellow masses, all you people out there who wish you could help the game somehow but can't figure out a way. And it's against the sleepers in the staff. If you can't handle your job, give room to someone who can.

I don't feel like mentioning names but if there's a PD member who tells a player "do this or I'll lock your account / delete your character / any other threat" over shady reasons they should be seriously ashamed of themselves. If there's a case where a player is asked to stop cooperating with their characters or doing some acute breach of the rules then ok, that's legitimate but otherwise under no circumstances should you say that, not even as a joke. The player should know why they are asked to do something, so that there wouldn't be misunderstandings. If the player thinks there's been a case they are forced to do something unfairly, then something has clearly gone wrong.

The same goes with locking someone's account over personal grudge. A "you're annoying me" is not a valid reason for locking someone's account. Only serious breaching or destruptive behaviour that affects the world around is. (Hurting other characters, jamming machinery, starting loads of projects, notebombing, flooding, verbal obscenities, moving vehicles.) And no, I have no training. I am not and have never been in PD. It's common sense that says how things should be handled.

I hope PD-members still report their actions to each other... At least then if someone was going solo and using their status to gain advantage over others, it can be noticed when they're trying to keep it secret.

How about locking someone's account permanently, leaving them no chance but to watch their characters dying slowly, with nothing you can do? Two weeks and they are gone, no matter if they had food for years. All the hard work ruined in this slow execution based on a secret trial with no attourney. When someone gets banned, no matter how terrible a breacher they are, they should clearly be told what they're accused off, what evidence there is to back up the charges and so on. If someone is repeatedly cheating with some of their characters, ok, why not give a heart attack or a lightning from the skies to bring an end to these lives? Why do innocent characters have to suffer? And all the secrecy sure makes it easy to believe in the conspiracy theories.

Ok, that's enough for PD. How about RD then? What I've heard is rather awful. The younger members can create new additions but they stay gathering dust on the imaginary shelf because they need to be approved by the older members, who are mostly asleep. And a change can be overruled by the bigshot just because he has a bad day. And what I've heard is the internal communication doesn't quite work.

As for the tailoring subdepartment, they have three members and I heard it's full. As far as I see, they're all inactive. One was active when she got in, but then all the whining of "why do the descriptions sound so clumsy and confusing" made her depressed and she stopped doing stuff. It's not like it was her fault, those descriptions were written ages ago... but they could be changed now to make them more clear. Anyway, at least I appriciate all the new additions there and would be very happy to see more. Don't give up people, there will always be criticism but it's not personal! Don't get so upset about it. ...And everybody wants to be the tailor. Why can't there be more places? There's a loooooooooooong topic of clothing suggestions, I'm sure there's plenty of things to process for several people. It's not like it was a nomination for a lifetime.

Generally for all departments, I think people should step aside when they feel they don't have time or energy to keep working anymore. Give room to new people. Ok, training new ones takes time and somebody to do it, but it shouldn't be that hard. Write manuals or something, of how things work. People who resign from the staff should have a chance to return easily when they feel like they're ready again, without long processed, after all, they have already received the training and have experience. But having inactive names squatting on the lists is bad.

I think I've said about everything on my mind for this time.

I don't think voting would work. Most departments just aren't known enough for most people to have any constructive opinions on the candidates, while others (PD mainly) are too controversial - no offense to anybody, but I feel there's far more anger towards the PD than can be justified by anything I've heard specifics about, let alone seen proved.

I trust the staff to know who's active and mature on the forums, and use that in their decisions.

If I recall correctly, PD does keep logs and oversee each other.

Apathy is a problem, and there should be a procedure for inactive staff to be removed. But overall I think the current system is working as well as can be expected; looking on the forums, most of the people who behave like they would make good staff are already staff or working towards it.

Funny that you should say that, going as far as creating a second forum account trying to prove that your double Cantr account was controlled by another person. Staging a cry of help from an imaginary player who finds his account locked with no explanation is likely to raise some suspicions towards the professionalism of PD, especially when the truth was never brought to public.

I am one staff member that has been inactive quite a bit and I am sorry for that. But when I am active I try my hardest to do as much as I can for Cantr. And I think that goes for a lot of the other members who go inactive.

Nobody who plays this game is entitled to fair treatment by the staff. But it would be nice if they would just admit that they break the rules, that they abuse their posistions, that they are hypocritical, and they're favoritists and only selectivly enforce the rules, aswell as help there friends cheat.

I don't mind unfair play in this game, but it does piss me off that they deny it.

SekoETC wrote:Why can't the Cantrian community vote on who we actually trust on taking care of our matters?

What advantage do you see in having the staff selected by the Cantrian community as a whole? I think the people that currently select staff have just as good or better judgement, and some of the things considered when someone applies aren't meant to be public (i.e. PD history). Wouldn't voting turn it into a popularity contest?

By reading the posts on the forums, it's easy to see which people are immature and/or have a tendency to pick fights.

Yes, that's frequently taken into consideration. I can't speak for others, but I read almost everything on this forum, even if I don't post constantly.

And also the people who work on departments should be ACTIVE. Most of them are sleepers, some don't even play the game anymore. How are you supposed to stay aware of what's going on in the game if you don't personally play it?

I agree that staff members should be active. But what do you suggest doing when they aren't? Just boot them off staff? Our staff members are all volunteers, and I think they do more work than people seem to believe. Are they no longer allowed to have real lives? And I'm not aware of anyone on staff that no longer plays the game. As soon as someone's account is gone, their name is removed from the Department page, isn't it?

I've gotten the impression many people apply for the staff but it's very rare you hear of somebody actually getting accepted. Because the departments are full.

People are not rejected for no reason, and if an applicant is obviously a good potential member of a department that needs more staff, they will be hired. And yes, some departments are "full." There are more good RD applicants than is necessary (or possible) to hire and train right now, and I believe there's a waiting list of potential members. The majority of applications recently have been to the LD, where, indeed, in some languages the current translations are adequate, making it unnecessary for another translator to be hired.

Full of sleepers, I say. It seems that people who join are soon doomed to lose interest. Maybe because they see the ugly reality behind the scenes, all the bureucrasies and serial cheaters and stress. And the endless whining of players asking for changes and action. ...Which I'm doing here right now.

Maybe I'm blind, but I don't see the "ugly reality behind the scenes." Maybe it's because I'm not in the RD or PD.

It's directed to my fellow masses, all you people out there who wish you could help the game somehow but can't figure out a way. And it's against the sleepers in the staff. If you can't handle your job, give room to someone who can.

If you want to help out, go on and apply for staff, though it is entirely possible to help out without being on staff (you can help on the forum by answering questions, help on the wiki, advertise, etc.). The MD needs more staff, especially to advertise in other languages. But no one will be hired in any department if they are for any reason unqualified. As for the "sleepers," it's not about "making room." The departments you seem to have the most problems with, the PD and RD, involve extensive training and require a good deal of trust. Someone has to train the new members, and we are selective in who is hired.

I don't feel like mentioning names but if there's a PD member who tells a player "do this or I'll lock your account / delete your character / any other threat" over shady reasons they should be seriously ashamed of themselves. If there's a case where a player is asked to stop cooperating with their characters or doing some acute breach of the rules then ok, that's legitimate but otherwise under no circumstances should you say that, not even as a joke. The player should know why they are asked to do something, so that there wouldn't be misunderstandings. If the player thinks there's been a case they are forced to do something unfairly, then something has clearly gone wrong.

The same goes with locking someone's account over personal grudge. A "you're annoying me" is not a valid reason for locking someone's account. Only serious breaching or destruptive behaviour that affects the world around is. (Hurting other characters, jamming machinery, starting loads of projects, notebombing, flooding, verbal obscenities, moving vehicles.) And no, I have no training. I am not and have never been in PD. It's common sense that says how things should be handled.

I hope PD-members still report their actions to each other... At least then if someone was going solo and using their status to gain advantage over others, it can be noticed when they're trying to keep it secret.

How about locking someone's account permanently, leaving them no chance but to watch their characters dying slowly, with nothing you can do? Two weeks and they are gone, no matter if they had food for years. All the hard work ruined in this slow execution based on a secret trial with no attourney. When someone gets banned, no matter how terrible a breacher they are, they should clearly be told what they're accused off, what evidence there is to back up the charges and so on. If someone is repeatedly cheating with some of their characters, ok, why not give a heart attack or a lightning from the skies to bring an end to these lives? Why do innocent characters have to suffer? And all the secrecy sure makes it easy to believe in the conspiracy theories.

You don't offer any proof of these things happening, and I find it difficult to believe in these "conspiracy theories." I am confidant in the professionalism of the PD. So to avoid "secrecy," what do you suggest? Should the PD report everything they do publicly? That would not work. And as far as I know, PD members do indeed report and discuss their actions to each other.

As for the tailoring subdepartment, they have three members and I heard it's full. As far as I see, they're all inactive. [. . .] And everybody wants to be the tailor. Why can't there be more places? There's a loooooooooooong topic of clothing suggestions, I'm sure there's plenty of things to process for several people. It's not like it was a nomination for a lifetime.

I'm not aware of any recent applications for the tailor position that were declined. If any were declined, it would have been for a good reason.

Generally for all departments, I think people should step aside when they feel they don't have time or energy to keep working anymore. Give room to new people. Ok, training new ones takes time and somebody to do it, but it shouldn't be that hard. Write manuals or something, of how things work. People who resign from the staff should have a chance to return easily when they feel like they're ready again, without long processed, after all, they have already received the training and have experience. But having inactive names squatting on the lists is bad.

I think I've already addressed the "make room" and "training" issues. . . . As far as I've seen, people that have resigned from staff are indeed allowed to return easily.

And Colonel, I don't think it's necessary at all for you to apologize. I think it goes without saying that you and most staff members try their hardest. Being a staff member doesn't involve giving up your real life.

Schme, I'll admit it when I see it, but I have yet to see proof.

Sarah wrote:
Schme, I'll admit it when I see it, but I have yet to see proof.

That's exactly what I mean. Someone on the inside, with all the proof the could possibly want, denying it.

Perhaps it is unfair of me to accuse you personally of any such things, maybe you are just so very very trusting as to never suspect such unfair advantage being taking. I cannot know.

However, you know very well that I am incapable of proving anything.


You, however, are.

Here is how you can create your own proof of how it is entirely possible.

Use you're posistion on the staff to help your own characters (or one, or several, or whatever) gain unfair benefits, break the rules and avoid discipline, and help your none staff friends do the same.

If you are capable of doing it without be caught, you will see how it is very possible.

Now, neither you nor I can prove that it is widespread among the staff, but it's really not hard to see.

But asking me to provide proof is not at all fair.

It's like something happened in the news (you wouldn't have heard of it) no long ago around Ontario. I won't tell the whole story, because some of it is distasteful.

This women, her son was in a pennitentiary, right, some guards don't want him to a report a crime, so they kill him (illegally) and say that they did not.

So she, this poor (in the literal sense) women, goes to the Prison officials of the corrections departement, who have all the resources and money and everything, and asks them to bring the murderers to justice.

Them, (and they admitted to this) they've got a bunch of files on the happening, and her son and his death. A big folder full. Autopsies, what he was up to, his relationship with those guards, and so on, all written down. It's in a folder. Not only that, but they've got a huge budget for criminal investigations, detectives of every kind, morticians, psychologists, all that stuff.

And so the officials say to her "Tell you what. You prove that they killed your son, and we'll be right on them." How can she do that? She's got no money. But her and her lawyer decide to try, so they ask for the files on her son. "No," they say," We can't give you the folders. We don't legally have to do that for ten years. The only way you can make us give them to you before that is if you prove your son was murdered by those guards. Do that, and we'll give it to you."

And that's how it went. Not a damn thing she can do. How she supposed to do anything, eh?


That's like what your asking, accept you don't have any money or morticians in your employ.

Not fair to ask me to do that.

Sarah wrote:I'm not aware of any recent applications for the tailor position that were declined. If any were declined, it would have been for a good reason.

That's because there are no applications - there is no way of applying to that position through the staff hiring page. Try clicking the link, it leads to a text: "Something went wrong with the application - please try again." So how would you apply? By email of course but since the word is the department is full, why burden them with an application when help is apparently not wanted? Besides, how would you know what to say in that application when there's no form or a list of what's required. What else could you write besides "hello, I'm a long term player with too much free time and a will to help." That's what everybody says.

I may not be the most active resources member, but I keep up with whats going on and ad my 2 cents to the discussions that seem feasible. I used to be RD head but I knew that I didn't have enough time to devote to it between college and two jobs, so I stepped down. I don't think RD is quite the horror you've described. New members often have interesting ideas and input for things we design and I have modified things based on their suggestions. I also disagree with elections for staff, as choice by committee seems to work well. The application link not working must be a fairly recent error because I've seen many application forms, some are very well written and deserve discussion, while others may be from people who don't quite understand cantr fully yet. I don't really know where this is going but I didn't want to leave RD mute to these claims.

While abuse of staff powers has indubitably happened at some point, I by no means think it is as rampant as you seem to believe. As far as RD goes, it is true that newer members do not have the same powers that the older members have (one of which is making changes to the database without senior staff approval), and that some of the older members sleep more then they ought to (*pokes Anthony until he wakes up*). On the other hand, the suggestions of newer members is often heard, and if reasonable, are accepted into the database. In fact, a number of the things regarding the newest radios came from me (such as the ability to use gold wires as well as platinum, and the addition of three radios, one with rare wires, one with vacuum tubes, and one with both).

Active staff members do contribute, even if only in the form of discussion and not actual implementation. That is worth something, even if the masses fail to recognize it as such. And as far as RD goes, I hope that the newer members can continue to stick with it through long comatose periods from those people who do have the full power to help improve things. *runs off to get Talapus a big stick for poking*

Overall....players will complain about PD. People will cheat, get caught, and have hard feelings for it, probably even scrounge up a few friends to man the protest rally. That is the way of the world. There will likely be corrupt PD members and they will eventually be caught and dismissed. But it is a human system after all. We all make mistakes from time to time and we can't see eye to eye with even a narrow majority of the players at any point in time.

I don't know where this post is going....are there sleepers in staff? Yes. Is this a catastrophe? Depends on the department and situation as Sarah said. For the most part, a good chunk of staff is honest and dedicated and wants to make this the best game possible, even if they don't have any authority to be able to do anything about it. And last I checked...I am not getting paid.

Blah blah blah....ignore me and continue with whatever mundane sort of tangent you want to take this discussion of on. I'll be taking bets in a dimly lit backroom of the Suggestions forum. 2:1 odds that it continues on a "PD unfairly scrutinizes every move I make because I have been caught cheating 5 times" flavor.

Wow. A conspiracy? I'm not sure about that, although I did see some strange lights hovering above East Kol that the staff has all denied ever happened...

I'm sure "unfair" things happen, although unfair is of course a matter of perspective. All of my characters at the moment seem to be doing quite well considering their newness (and mine) to Cantr, and a couple are well on their way to some very interesting accomplishments. A couple others are turning out to be fairly normal characters, not necessarily uninteresting but doing nothing amazing either. At least one annoys me to no end. That's the breaks.

As for OOC stuff, suggestions and the like, I've seen nothing less that what I expected, and actually much more. The staff that's "awake" responds quickly to suggestions, and even respectfully unless badgered to death. Even when someone like me chimes in with things that have been hashed over and decided long ago, I've been met with polite and respectful comments.

I think this is a good example of the "you get what you pay for" idea being completely wrong. I think this is one of the best things I've seen around lately and the required cost is, um, nonexistent. I am open-minded though, and as soon as I see any sign of favoritism or unfair advantages on a scale that truly interferes with my enjoyment, I for one plan to ask for double my money back. Until then I'll be watching those tapes trying to spot the PD member on the grassy knoll...

Yeah... being on staff hasn't improved my opinions of many things really.. but don't victimise the RD for one or two people's inactivity...

No voting, because many of Polish players don't like me because I trying to fight with illegal IM cliques. And I'm rather active staff member. I think that only GAC and GAB should decide who is in Staff.

Forum activity has almost no relation to activity as a staff member, if anything, it may well be inverse...

I'm a forum whore, and I'd be the first to admit that I haven't been pulling much weight in terms of my position on the Cantr staff, at least in terms of getting the 'zine out on time (sorry Sarah )

And people do (and have) stepped down when they no longer have the time