In-game Username: Tia_Zoh
Discord username: tiazoh
Characters you play: Lenore Thorne, The Willow Of Gentleness
On average, how many hours do you expect to admin per week: 8-12
Days you are available to admin on: I have a rotating schedule, but I will have consistent availability to admin before 11am PST and after 8pm of the same
How old are you? 22
Do you have any SS14 experience outside of Wizard’s Den servers, or any SS13 experience? I have become very familiar with the SS14 fork Frontier Station, and have occasionally played on various forks in playtest.
I have relatively low and not much recent SS13 experience, having played by my estimate more than 50 and less than 120 hours, most of which from when I was a teenager.
Do you have prior administration experience (SS13/SS14 experience preferred, please also post a way for us to verify this)?
Have you ever been banned from any SS14 or SS13 servers?
What are you primarily interested in doing as an admin? mostly in-game rules enforcement and out of game rule enforcement, answering and looking into ahelps. The main reason I would like to be on the admin team is simply to help lift the burden a bit from the current team, and I think I would find something like that to be simple to do, and maybe even a bit enjoyable in the case of reviewing replays and logs.
What are you least interested in doing as an admin? holding in-game events and performing round interventions (unloosing an accidental singuloose at 5 minutes into a shift, as a random example) are not something that I feel that I would be particularly eager to do, as I feel that I’d dislike affecting a round, and would prefer to defer that role to someone else if possible in that instance.
Detail Questions
What role do you think game admins serve on our servers?
wizard’s den admins serve mainly to answer Ahelps and be aware of possible rule violations as they observe the round and look at logs, to issue warnings and consequence to players. In uncommon situations they may also have to intervene on a round in the case of disruptive bugs or the like.
Why do you want to become an administrator for SS14?
I mentioned it previously not realizing this would be asked later in the application, but I just want to help support the community in whatever way I can.
How do you feel about the current roleplay status on the servers?
I mainly play on wizard’s den lizard, so I feel like I have a very narrow scope of what wizden roleplay has to offer. I have enjoyed my time one Salamander however, and think it’s in a good state. Lizard is lizard and I don’t feel like there’s much roleplay most rounds unless I really go out of my way to fish for someone actually looking to have that sort of experience, but I feel like that’s likely due to the server culture on lizard rather than a statement about the overall status of wizden roleplay.
Other than banning problematic players, what admin actions do you believe have the biggest positive impact?
I think admins helping new players that Ahelp questions or confusions does a lot to help grow the community. You’re a lot more likely to come back after a positive experience learning (and making a mistake)
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 feel like the majority of my bad experiences have been with either 1. Security ruining the shift by being overzealous or outright not following space law or server rules, or ironically, 2. Bored players self-antagging and making warden shifts a headache to play through.
I think I’d definitely keep an eye on who is going through the warden’s care and try to identify why, since a lot of behavior doesn’t get reported due to it being handled via in-game sentences.
Have you ever had a good experience with the game or a game admin? If so, what was it?
I’ve made a lot of new friends through SS14, and it’s been nice to see the game and community grow over the past couple years. A lot of my most fond SS14 experiences are probably teaching new players stuff, going around and mentoring them as they shadow me for the shift. I feel like the best part of the experience when you first play is being totally clueless, and I enjoy telling them just enough that they aren’t completely lost, but also letting them marvel at how bad things can get, from bad to worse to detonation countdown.
Scenario Questions
Scenario 1
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. There are three players who decided to observe the round instead of join it orbiting you. Two of them are encouraging you to “do something funny”.
I’d probably chatter with them as we observe, but I’d ignore any prompting to do things. I’ve expressed earlier my feelings about interacting directly with a round while I am in an observer role as admin.
Scenario 2
This scenario takes place on LRP. The Head of Security has decided to coup the Captain. The Head of Personnel agrees with the Head of Security and has taken up arms in case it is necessary to aid in effecting the arrest of the Captain. The Captain is hiding with the Quartermaster in the cargo shuttle to avoid the Clown who has stolen the captains saber as a non-antag. There are five people named in this scenario. Please describe what actions, if any, you would take in relation to each, and why.
in the case of the HoS, I would first look into their reasoning for the coup, sending them a message via Ahelp chat, asking also if there was a majority vote among command to depose the captain. If their reasoning is not sufficient or they failed to take proper steps to handle the demotion in-game, I would consider a temporary role ban for command and security.
For the captain I would have to determine what they did to cause the HoS and HoP, and potentially more command staff, to decide to remove them as captain. I’d use the Ahelp chat to ask the captain what happened.
I would also ask the HoP the same questions to determine what was happening, why they were willing to attempt to demote captain, and why they felt that it needed to be violent. While they don’t seem to be an instigator here, and I lack context on why the captain is being demoted, I’d be less likely to penalize the HoP, though I may issue a warning if the HoS’s reasoning is lacking.
For the QM I would ask them the same things I’ve been asking the other command staff involved, figuring out of there was a vote. They otherwise need no additional involvement from how I see the scenario.
The clown obviously seems hostile towards the captain, if they need to hide from them, and stole captain’s equipment. I’d likely ask them why they did that and issue a warning.
Scenario 3
You are ahelping a player about an issue. The player has no prior noted issues. A few days earlier, an admin had told you that this type of situation should result in a temporary ban for a first offense, and you are confident that this situation is not substantially different from the type that admin was describing. During the ahelp, another admin pings you on Discord with a link to the ongoing ahelp and tells you to just indefinitely ban them and make them appeal. Excluding trialmins and headmins, all admins are equally “ranked”. A headmin is not currently available.
I would first ask the second admin why and bring up what I was taught prior, try to understand their reasoning for telling me to appeal ban and why the first admin had told me what they did.
If I can’t really come to an understanding as to what I ought to do with Admin 2, I would issue a temporary ban as I was initially informed, as I’d likely make the judgement call that an appeal ban on a first offense seems a bit extreme, and make sure that I communicate my reasoning to Admin 2 as to why I didn’t go with their advice.