Damage Assessment: In Progress

[pirate-mod.livejournal.com]

Poll time guys, as if you didn’t see it coming.

Taking into consideration the criticism surrounding the applications process, we would like to introduce to you a new template. FEAR NOT, it won’t take hold for this app week at all (even if some of you would like it to, our apologies we feel the change would be too sudden for the community as a whole). We are however opening a poll for the entire community to vote on whether they want this template or not. The poll at this time has no closing date yet to accommodate the time of year and current hiatuses. Based on the results, if it is accepted we would be implementing it AFTER the January event (ie. Jan. 20). Two points to note:

This system will:
1) No longer ask for addendums. It is pass/fail.
2) Have all applications answered within the same week.

There, now here’s the big bad puppy.


[name/nick]:
[LJ name]: [your PERSONAL LJ - we ask for the character LJ when you are approved.]
[other characters played]: [name :: series :: LJ username]
[e-mail]:
[AIM/messenger]:

[series]:
[character]:
[character history/background]:
[character personality]:
[character abilities]:
[canon chronology]: [from which point of the timeline are you picking this char? make sure to have this reflect on the rest of your application]

[journal post]: [for first time applicants only.]
[rp sample 1]:
[rp sample 2]: [on neither sample are you to focus on length. We only ask that you present the character in two different situations, so that we may have a well-rounded impression of him/her]

Second item of most import. Seeing how the PR aspect of this mod team was handled yesterday, we would like to know what do you, the community, prefer:

A) For your mods to remain a faceless entity?
Pros – There would be a sense of uniform consistency, because despite each mod’s personal way of expressing their ideas, it would all be translated into one single language through the entity of deus_ex_machina_mod (no this isn’t a real LJ name… yet) There would also be less potential for player bias when interacting with a moderator’s character.
Cons – The entire community is completely unaware of what you do. A good example would be me, this is Bon mod drafting up your morning dose of administrative duty. In no way does this mean only Bon mod worked on the entire concept behind the post. No one ever reads my manuscripts though, tear.

B) For your mods to be out in the open and completely individual?
Pros - More approachable individuals with a personal flare for how they handle things. As always mods must confer before sanctioning certain acts, but some players just communicate better with specific mods. Quote: Ruxi is a beautiful mod who has set forth an excellent example of what the other mods should be.
Cons - Modshopping, when players hit up specific mods because they think they can get their way faster with one or the other. An individual may also unfortunately be the bearer of bad news (that was in fact conceived by the team as whole) to a player. Quote: Ruxi is a god damned tyrant who monopolizes the PR aspect of moderation. Wtf mate?

CLARIFICATION: This does NOT mean application verdicts will be signed by specific mods. Two or more mods are required to reach a verdict, and sometimes as much as five to six of us must confer on one application for whatever reason. However, any applicant is still free to contact any of the six mods (or all of them) regarding a verdict. This poll would determine if that applicant can contact any or all six (as we do now) or if they'll have to post to a berryfloss thread about it.

[Poll #1104239]

Comments

[ruxi.livejournal.com]

...methinks, Bonnie-lass, we really need to discuss the apparent issue of example-makin' and copyrights, eh?

[bitingnightmare.livejournal.com]

- for ugly Edited footnote.

[floating-bamboo.livejournal.com]

I like the extra rp example thing, and the canon chronology, but history and abilities can be a bit hard to do, since not all canon characters actually have a history explained, or have one but it might later change in case the series are still running. Likewise with abilities, in my opinion.

...it can also end up in a tl;dr fest of no tomorrow if people are to write all that... since some people have a tendency to write essays of doom. /guilty of this.

Rabu-rabu for all the hard work <3

[bitingnightmare.livejournal.com]

I've read of some cases where players have written pages upon pages of text for an RP application. However in this case, I think quality has an edge over quantity.

[sundowned.livejournal.com]

Why not only ask for the history/abilities/personality when there is no wiki? That way you don't get tons of td;lr apps, and since most people would state pretty much everything that can be found in the wiki/wiki equivelant, it sort of makes sense to avoid the c&p tendancies? I don't know, but for larger fandoms, it just makes sense to me that if the information is already out there, if it's needed, it might as well be linked to.

Though huge love for canon chronology, since that's always an important thing to keep in mind, and the two samples thing sounds good to me. ♥

[carnality.livejournal.com]

Seconded.

[bluegrave.livejournal.com]

Speaking totally frankly; I really like the way the mods do things now. You have a bit of both going on and it's really nice to both know your mods and not know which mod approved or denied the app.

[stopwatcher.livejournal.com]

I will be assigning the serial numbers. Please form an orderly line to the left.

That application is hot.

[virtuosic]

Personally, I like histories, backgrounds and personalities in apps. Those are usually the most important things about characters. However, as someone mentioned above, certain characters may not have in depth/long histories. I think in cases like that, maybe the 2 RP samples would be most necessary, otherwise it's just too long and... kind of redundant? Only because the history/background/personality would be there. I think the chronology is also important, considering I try to decide this before applying, but usually end up doing it after I've been approved. >____>;;

[ruxi.livejournal.com]

I think that our main concern on this one was what floating_bamboo brought above - not making up your own info, but... fanon bias, in a way? Character personality + history is what we could use as a substitute for Wiki.

The question now being considered, of course, is whether Wiki (and by wiki, I mean any moderately consistent source of info) shouldn't be allowed as input, where applicable.

[undertaker-ted.livejournal.com]

I like the new app form, makes a lot more sense.

I voted for knowing who judged, more from the perspective of getting in touch with those individuals about any questions that might be had on the app process. That said, I think that maintaining the generic Mod account is important for other aspects.

[13-year-captain.livejournal.com]

I like everything about the new app. However, a bit of a suggestion? And I'm certain it's been heard before:
Many of us play our characters in multiple venues. When that is the case, perhaps instead of two rp samples, we could do with one and a link to previous rp with the pup on other journals?

[juicebox-woes.livejournal.com]

I v. much like the new app form, and I think it's v. easy to simply go "Suzy is a kind girl who has a bit of a temper, and she has a hard time being honest with her feelings. For a more in-dept personality analysis go here - LINK " if you are apping for a character who's got a complex personality for which there is a large wiki.

I am all for individual mods, I mean Christ the mods are people too. I will admit feeling as though there are only a couple who i can go to, but that's mostly just because I don't know the others, and they have a tendancy to not be online when I am.

I think the 2 RP samples is a WONDERFUL idea, because it does round out the character and give a lot more insight into their personality.

All in all, good job modlings, and thank you for trying to make Poly a wonderful place to play in.

[mollypocket.livejournal.com]

I love the smell of Poll in the morning.

completely unrelated.

[shit-stings.livejournal.com]

LOL You threw me off so bad with that icon, because I'm on Budd!account, and I was like, "WHUTWHUT did I say something?"

>>

[dresden4hire.livejournal.com]

I really like this new application process, except for the lack of linking to a character history that's an outside source. But, I haven't experienced the frustration of not being able to find any character resources on the net.

I'm definitely all for individual mods though. And not just because Ruxi's posts make me LOLZ, I swear. I've really only dealt with two mods, but that's not because I don't like the others, but just because those two have always been on when I needed a mod so there's been no need to find another. If necessary, I would have no problem going to any mods. Please don't go faceless, that would ruin the personal touch that you get here, and I think that's one of the best aspects of this place. You guys are wonderfully approachable.

[cat-contractor.livejournal.com]

Overall, I think it's a great new system. However, I agree with what some of the others have been saying about how a wiki link could substitute for the background info/abilities. I think the personality section would be useful, though. It can at least tell the mods that the applicant knows about and is considering nuances of personality that they might not be able to show during the samples themselves. Some characters are very complex and it's hard to show that in a few paragraphs.

But as has been said, some characters also *don't* have complex personalities, so I would assume and hope that applications will be judged on the quality of the RP samples, not the amount of other info given. (Ie. people won't be rejected for only being able to write a sentence or two on personality, as long as they're portraying it accurately?) And in either case, an impartial link to back up opinion would be helpful if it exists.

Anyway, I commend you all for putting such effort into making Poly even better than before. ♥♥

[magelet.livejournal.com]

On the app, I love longer apps! We'll get less spontaneous, serial apping that's for sure :D For the rp samples, can the mods present 5 or 6 scenarios as part of the app and allow the players to choose 2 of them to write? I know some people have a hard time choosing what kind of RP sample to write and a lot of those "Oh wow, where am I?" tags don't help. And if it's something like a choose 2 out of 6 there's a higher chance of uniformity? Or a choose one out of six, the other be up to your imagination.

On the mods, I like my mods where I can see them and out in the open!

[tinyvampiregod.livejournal.com]

The app is great.

I personally think wiki-linking sucks. If the mods are going to have to take the time to read the applications, the least applicants can do is write it all out for them. People have whined about how long it takes to get their apps aproved, well, putting all the info down in your own words will certainly shorten the amount of time the mods will have to take to get through the thing.

[eyefloss.livejournal.com]

It was kind of unnecessary for you to vote yes with all of your RP accounts, though.

[redex.livejournal.com]

I really like the clarity of the new app, although the second roleplay makes me wince. I'm one of those people who have made a tradition of "Oh, where am I?" and I'm sure that has to get tiring after a while. As a repeat apper, I'd prefer to take only one of the two roleplays and do the journal post instead. But all in all, very clean and not too much info or not too little. ♥ I agree with comments above that canon info could be made up for various smaller fandoms, and this would also contribute to tl;dr in the apping process. Considering Tetora, you could write essays on MPD Psycho. But there are very few and/or no resources for this fandom, and certainly nothing reliable, so I'd rather write up my own paragraph or two than just chuck you to the crappy wiki page. The happy medium seems to me to be that if you have authors present their own interpretation alongside links to canon interpretation.

Although I like that none of the mods are singled out as seemingly doing all the work, or garnering all the attention, I tend to stumble upon them rather than know who they are up front. I'm sure if I did some digging I could find contact info for all of you, but I still don't know who you are. Then again, I'm not sure if it would affect my playing, knowing that so-and-so's mun is a mod and perhaps I should be nice to them or perhaps I should be careful around their characters or whatever. Aaand I've just talked myself into a corner. (But I think I'd still like to know.)

[ruxi.livejournal.com]

We do provide a contact list here (http://berryfloss.livejournal.com/6807.html), or in the POLYchromatic userprofile - but yes, it only documents us as individuals / moderators, not players.

We've kind of always avoided formally listing our characters, so people don't feel compelled to treat them in any certain way in RP.

Do you think we should?

[journal-jyanai.livejournal.com]

... As much as long apps are still kadjf, as someone who's spent the last few weeks debating if one paragraph on wikipedia and a really badly-written fan site profile count as enough canon, this is nice. orz (Although I'll probably be a total hypocrite later and gripe when I'm back to apping popular canons, but that's the whiny, entitled player in me)

Annnd, I prefer my mods as being human? Having the individual journals, while I hate to throw the word around, because I do trust that every mod is selected in trust, gives a sense of accountability? And I think it makes it easier to communicate knowing who's on the other side of the line and how much they likely know about a situation. Of course, there will always be mod-shopping, but that's why communication on the mods' part is so important and, as far as I've seen, the Poly mods do communicate well between each other.

[mendaa.livejournal.com]

Being one who has applied for a canon character using an original character form (which looks to be roughly the same thing as the newly presented form), I'd like to say that it really works. At least it does for me. The issue of applying for characters with little readily available information is entirely dealt with in a very fair manner, and I think seeing each players' interpretation of his/her character through not only RP samples, but a short written bio as well will also help the moderators truly assess the characterization.

[gaulish.livejournal.com]

I really think that Personality/Background info is a necessity when creating an application and I'm glad to see it! If by anyone picks up a character from an obscure fandom, it won't be so hard to scramble for a wiki and wikis just...lack information and aren't always dependable. Of course I'm rehashing the same thing everyone ELSE has said. Canon chronologically <3 that's always a big concern if someone picks up a character from MY fandom.

Though I think that...one RP sample is FINE, personally, since you're asking for abilities/personality/BACKGROUND. But that's just me. Also, if you're going to go with two, you might want to say what desired length you'd like to have -- like at least 250 words minimum, for example.

And I like to add I like how you guys handle the approval/rejection system where you don't know which mod is which. :/ I don't see that as a bad thing, really. No one could accuse you of grudges or some such.

[dark-passenger.livejournal.com]

As much as I'd like to complain about not wanting to write such an enormous app, it's for the better.

The way I see it is, if a player is forced to write all of that information and portray the character strongly in two samples, we're less likely to get very ooc players accepted. At least I can hope, right?

Anyway, I vote yes.

[twinpistols.livejournal.com]

I like the application, especially the ability/personalities/background, as I had trouble finding sufficient info for Matako. The only part I disagree on is the two samples as I feel I can get my point across in one, but then again, that's just me. She's had a number of appearances for one arc of Gintama, but information on Wiki (and the rest of the internet) was lacking and I had to back that up with episode summaries. If I had this, I think I could have written up something that explained her more. However, if there is enough info on the person (ie. you're apping a lead character from a popular series), I don't feel that a ability/personalities/background section is needed.

My question is, how does one know if the information isn't enough? Will we be told or will we be rejected for not having enough information, even if our sample(s) are top notch?

As for mods, I prefer to know who's who. Sure, it'll create mod shopping but let's say a mod had acted way out of line with player? Said player does not know who it was and doesn't feel comfortable saying "one of yall did this but I don't know who!" so they don't report the ill behavior. Said mod gets away with the abuse. If the person could say "Well Mod A did this and here's an example of he/she doing so..." I think it would solve a lot of issues that may come up.

Here I end this tl;dr comment.

[ninja-mod.livejournal.com]

Well, a good idea would be to do as follows: provide the info section of the template (personality, background / history, abilities), but give people the opportunity to produce an alternative information source, if they have one.

If what they provide is subpar... personally, I'd say they should be asked to fill in the info part of the template. Sounds fair to me.

[timediver-mk1.livejournal.com]

Using this type of form is much superior in multiple ways. 1st, it provides more quality. 2nd, people may think twice about apping a character just because of a fancy they had that day.

In other words, thumbs up.

[pitselly.livejournal.com]

I, uh, like it a lot? But second the idea that if there's busloads of information (for example, Bleach!fandom or Naruto!fandom or HP!fandom) then they could just link or c/p&credit. For supertiny fandoms like the ones I'm in, haaaa , you could have the option of someone else in the fandom validating the information/writing some of it. Or something. Then again, I loved the old (the one we're currently using, not the first) app style, too, 'cause then I could look through the apps 24/7 and I tend to really stalk those pages, yo. And even though you guys had lots of time you never seemed to make anyone wait too long, so... like, would a hybrid be impossible?

And I like the individual mods, even though it may cause mod-shopping or mod-hatred and other bad things that make the world cry. The game just seems to run smoother with individual mods and it’s more... nice, I guess? Though sometimes I cannot understand what Ruxi's trying to say because of the extremely idiosyncratic way that she words things... of course, when I do understand them, I lol a lot, so it's probably, uh, just me |D;;; and I like how they look, they’re pretty

[tatooine.livejournal.com]

I like idea a lot, but think it could be slightly streamlined. For me, at least, it's easiest to integrate history/personality into one segment, because what the caracter does in a series shapes and is shaped by their personality! Um. So the only thing I'd change is combining "history/background and personality" into "history/personality."

And maybe a page somewhere with guidelines? When I was writing my app, I browsed through all the other apps that were up, looking to see what got an app in and what didn't -- general length, dialogue vs. internal monologuing, action vs. introspection, etc. If there was something like "GENERALLY SPEAKING, APPS ARE 300 WORDS+ oh and here's a variety of apps done in different styles that we totally loved," that would give people an idea of what they're trying to reach? Or is this idea silly? Ah well.

♥

[negakat.livejournal.com]

Look at me not using an RP account. Again. ಠ_ಠ

I really like this application, save the second RP sample. I wish this had been my application for Hamel, since I'm sure you guys noticed the lack of information on the internet of his canon. Others have stated the pros and cons to this, so I won't go telling them again hur. If anything, this application, for me, would help me decide by the end of it if I really want to app the character or not. Like I said, the only thing I dislike is the second RP sample, but that's just me as I tend to get burned out after one sample.

As for the mods, I really like seeing you guys as individuals. twinpistols brought up a good point, and I agree with that. If I ever need anything, I like being able to go to a mod I know isn't busy.

[inyourbusiness.livejournal.com]

:ooo

A question: Does this mean if we want to apply for a canon character--very canon--but there's not much known on them other than what they look like, or their name, and maybe allusions to their personalities by others, will this new application allow for fair judgment on these characters? Particularly if we disclaim ahead of time what IS known, and then advise of what we've done ourselves?

[pirate-mod.livejournal.com]

A disclaimer is definitely necessary. Because the canon background information would be minimal, we'd be checking the application for consistency to a certain extent. The first example that comes to my mind is..

Char A is a lawyer in the United States, circa 2007, all we know about her is that she takes her job very seriously and has a sense of fairness and justice that she applies not only to her job but also to her daily life. To flesh out Char A's background with the scenario that she cheated on her BAR exam seems inconsistent with the fact that she's an upstanding citizen for justice. However, you as an applicant (and creative mind!) could try and formulate a scenario that convinces a reader as to why Char A would cheat on the BAR.