Admin Note Policy and Transparency

[Sollessa]

So first off, I'm unsure if this is the correct sub-forum but at the heart of this thread will be a change of server policy that I think will make the server better so here goes.

To get started, let me state how we go about admin notes for those who might not be aware.  The basic idea is that when an admin sees a player do something wrong, be it an invalid murder or just poor behavior, and they message you about it they will usually leave a note on your account that other admins can see that describes what happened.  It could be as simple as "Player killed some guy when he wasn't an antag, corrected behavior and issued a warning" or as complex as they like.  From the little I know they are usually at least a few sentences that describe what the player did wrong and the steps that were taken to rectify the problem.  These notes are kept a secret and can only be viewed by admins. 

Now let me talk about Colonial Marines.  The basic principle is the same on CM, they see bad behavior, they correct it and make a note about it and how they handled it.  The large difference is visibility.  At any point if a player wanted to know about their notes all they could ahelp and the admin will show them their notes.  

Now, for a third example of how I've seen it done, let me talk about Bad Deathclaw, the Fallout server.  Once again, the basic principle is the same except the big difference is there is a button in the OOC tab at the top right where you can just click the button and it'll pop up your admin notes, making it so that the player can view them whenever they want and see the names of the admins that left the notes so they know who to address questions to.

Now, onto the problem.  The last time I asked an admin, that I will not name unless asked by another admin, about what my notes were I was told that I was not allowed to know.  They said that it was for admin use only and they were afraid that if players were able to view their own notes then the admins would be less likely to leave notes when they see players doing bad things.  As much I can respect that thought I still disagree that it should be a barrier to players being able to know what they might have done wrong.  I've been told different things in the past about my own notes but I've never been able to get a straight answer.  Imagine, if you will, you were on trial before a judge.  They had evidence against you but you and/or your lawyer weren't allowed to know what that evidence was and you would be judged by that evidence alone.  I want to be able to know what I have done wrong in the past to eliminate that behavior for good.  I want to know problems that admins have had with how I play so I can do a better job of trying to protect that behavior.  Having something explained to me is never as effective as when I can just read it myself.  

My proposal should be obvious by this point.  I suggest that we adopt one of the two systems in use by our sister servers of Bad Deathclaw or Colonial Marines.  Either notes are something that the player can view whenever they want or they are something that we can just ask an admin to give to us if we feel we want to know what they are.  Honestly, I doubt that the policy will change but I wanted to make a public statement on why I think they should change where others would be able to offer their own ideas and make the server better.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Something else that I wanted to address that is closely related to this but I don't think was worth it's own thread was the new policy on ban discussion on discord.  I was fine with the old policy where active bans weren't to be discussed in the public discord because, honestly, that just wasn't the place for players to be discussing it with various staff members.  The new policy though on no discussion of bans, past or present, is troubling to me.  To me it signals a desire to shut down conversations about punitive measures that have been taken in the past and the reasons for which they were applied.  If people aren't allowed to discuss what they might have done wrong in the past for others to read then how are they to know where the lines are drawn.  The server rules aren't perfect and there are some grey areas in them, mainly in the self-defense area.  I've seen players brutally kill antags in self-defense with no repercussions but then I've seen other situations that were vastly different.  Obviously, I won't go into details for the reasons stated above.  The lessons of past examples is invaluable, it allows players to share what is bannable behavior with actual in-game experiences and past admin actions.  I know the ban appeal forum is there for everyone to read but it feels like it's not enough.  Forums can feel dead and slow while the discord is a free forum for fast dialogue and expression that no forum will ever be able to match.  I suggest that this new policy is reversed and we return to the previous policy where only current bans can't be discussed.

If you've gotten to this point, thank you for reading.

[Spacemanspark]

 

[Sollessa]

It's been 4 years Spark, I also feel I was a bit more...verbose about my reasoning besides "This can't possibly go wrong."  It's not like it's infeasible.

[Spacemanspark]

We've had this talk a few more times since then. While I might not have given my reasoning for wanting it at the time, several other players and staff expressed their distaste for it, and have since.

I'm inclined to agree with them now, four years later.

[Sollessa]

The heart of the matter, to me, is that it doesn't help the player for them to be kept secret, it only helps the admins.  If you make it so that the player can read their own notes whenever they want then they have a complete record of times where they did something that they should not have.  It also removes some ambiguity from when people like myself have had applications declined due to note history but then when I inquired I wasn't told what the problem was, only that it existed.  Being judged publicly based on private information is a problem.  It would also be nice, assuming what the admin I spoke to a while ago said, that if some admins leave positive notes to be able to see things that impressed admins about how people played.

[Dinarzad]

"You did something bad, stop doing that."
"Oh, okay what did I do?"
"You don't need to know what, just stop doing it."

Not being able to see your own notes leads to confusion and bewilderment.  It's curbing another avenue for problem players to recognize a downward spiral and any chance for them to right that behavior.  It focuses solely on the punishment for doing something wrong rather then giving that player a chance to self correct.
The inability to talk about bans on discord in addition to not being able to see what you've been doing wrong, it's stacking the deck as much as possible into preventing a problem player from correcting his behavior BEFORE it comes to a head and requires a ban, instead of taking the "Ounce of Prevention" we've opted for multiple pounds of "Cure", it's ultimate more work to deal with all those ban appeals from people who had an oopsie then to give those people a means of self-correction before administrative intervention is needed. It's giving people the tools to solve their own problem before Admins have to.

In addition, if a player has access to their own notes, they run out of excuses for continued misbehavior real fast. A player can't claim they didn't know something was a problem, when they had full access to see those notes and see that it WAS a problem, they could have seen it at any time and didn't care and continued to break rules and tow lines anyway, which helps lead to more open and shut cases, it's a more telling sign of someone's attitude as a player and whether or not they're any good for the server.

[WingedYordle]

I also agree. As I know some GAs like to stretch the truth then what actually happen. Seeing notes would at least have players peace of mind knowing correct information is being displayed for all GAs. This goes same for GAs who reads on those players notes, no more biased information.

[farie82]

I am all for this. I've let this know a few times before but I think that transparency is required. Especially in these times.

I know this won't happen anytime soon. Also due to the promises made to previous admins and current ones about the notes being a secret.

Maybe something to work towards? A private old notes record and a new public one? Where the old one will become read only and the new one public and the one where new admins write to.

[Tayswift]

Notes are an internal tool used to track various things that need to persist across players, not just warnings and bans, such as good things ("this player did a good job in this event; consider picking them for RP heavy event roles in the future") or iffy things that might not be an issue but should be thought about in the future ("this player seems to quit early a lot. Look into further if you also notice this pattern"). It would be very limiting to make them be public, since we would be facing a note appeal any time anything negative appeared. This increases bureaucracy for no good reason at all and changes the way notes would be used.

Any time a note becomes consequential, you'll know about it anyways, and can dispute it then. For example, an admin might cite previous occurrences of an issue in banning someone. It's not really that big of a deal. If you're not a player who's had repeated problems with following the rules, your notes are going to be extremely boring at best.

You don't need to be worried about an invisible "downward spiral", because you will know it's happening due to repeated warnings from admins. We are not here to discipline you or turn you into a better person or parent you. We're just here to try to make sure people are following the rules, and if we don't tell you what rules you're breaking, then what's the point? To have a "gotcha!" moment as we surprise ban you forever? Almost everyone gets a 2nd chance after a ban here, anyways.

If you believe an admin has warned you in mistake, we've got plenty of examples of admin complaints where an incorrect warning has been rescinded (and the corresponding note also revised/removed). I would be in favor of an optional private admin complaints forum. Not everyone is comfortable complaining about staff publicly.

35 minutes ago, Dinarzad said:

"You did something bad, stop doing that."
"Oh, okay what did I do?"
"You don't need to know what, just stop doing it."

I'm not sure which admin said this to you, but if you have logs of this, please file an admin complaint. It's my personal experience that admins generally try to explain what rule you broke, especially if you're new. If this sort of thing is happening, it's a reason to file an admin complaint and let that admin know they aren't being detailed enough, not a reason to change the notes system.

[WingedYordle]

Be nice to see those compliments too. 

[Sikroth]

Why is it a problem if a player has access to positive notes, or to notes about things that aren't outright an issue but could evolve into one? Surely, some people will complain about their notes. I can see the concern over "more bureaucracy" having some merit, at least. But what Solessa said stands, even more so now. Knowing *what* wrong you've done, or even *if* you're doing something wrong, could be useful to adjust your playstyle or behaviour. Not everyone who breaks a rule is a shitter who wants to make things awful for everyone.

I also don't understand at all the point behind banning discussion on past, expired bans. I really would like to see some sort of reasoning for it. What is the thought process behind this? Why is it an issue to discuss what actions can result in a ban? I understand not discussing current bans, if only because it can lead to pointless arguments, salt and other nasty stuff, but as long as it's in a civilized manner I fail to see an issue with discussing past bans.

[Tayswift]

It's a problem in the example I gave because it's nice to have the flexibility of noting that someone is good at RP without giving them the expectation that they will be chosen for an event in the future. The crux of everything I'm talking about is that things are different when they're being observed.

If you do something wrong, we tell you. That's the first order of business. We never just note a rule break, and then don't tell you about it. Like I said, the primary role of admins is to try to create an environment where people are following the rules. If we don't tell you that you broke a rule, then that's completely counter to our purpose. The note is a thing we will often write down after the fact just for record keeping. It's helpful to other admins in recognizing a recurring issue. We are not here to secretly test your reading comprehension and then ambush you with the banhammer when you don't follow the rules.

As for things that we aren't sure about, the whole point of that is not giving it away or potentially falsely accusing a player. Some issues don't surface from a single incident, but are a pattern across multiple incidents. If someone with bad intentions sees "this player may be trying to do x", then they will either A. get mad and make a note appeal because they weren't actually trying to do x or B. they were trying to do x and change it up to be sneakier in the future. It's much better to, for example in the case of antag fishing, just warn the player once you have enough evidence.

[Dinarzad]

1 hour ago, Tayswift said:

I'm not sure which admin said this to you, but if you have logs of this, please file an admin complaint

My apologies, that was not intended to be an example of a message I received, mostly meant as a display of what not being told notes can cause confusion wise, albeit with an admitted bit of exaggeration to be somewhat funny.

As for the rest of the post, no admins are not here to parent or discipline anyone. But neither do you HAVE to. Just providing access to notes offers a chance for SELF-Correction.  No parenting needed, it's a chance to see a big ol' list of fuck ups you're making, or even a list of positive things you do, that can be encouragement to keep doing those things.

It's merely giving the player information on their behavior, and then them making an informed choice of actions from there. It provides self-correction opportunities which would lower the workload of admins, even if only by a fraction.

Edited August 8, 2019 by Dinarzad

[necaladun]

Thank you for posting this, as there has been a lot of misinformation floating around here that needs to be cleared up.

First of all, i have heard that asking for your notes will result in a permaban. This is utterly untrue.

Notes may have information to do with suspected ban evasion, metagaming, antag fishing, etc. We require these to be secret to properly do our jobs. We will not be showing these.

Other notes may not be written in a manner that we want the player to see, eg, "acted like a complete fuckwit as a captain.", or just "i have a bad feeling about this guy".

I prefer admins leave blunt and honest notes about things rather than having to phrase it in a way that won't look bad when its posted on reddit.

There are plenty of times we have shown notes to players. With at least 100k notes, determining whether or not to show players is done on a need to know basis. Even if we do show some, its entirerly our word that you're seeing them all. Same as for those other servers.

We're also clearly not showing you everything said about you on the staff discord, host chat, or when we talked about you when ive met up irl with admins.

I'm sure players won't dilvuge everything theyve ever said about admins to other players, friends, etc. 

Comparing this to the evidence in a criminal case or the like is insane. No one here is getting imprisoned. No one is on trial where notes are evidence to if they did or didn't commit a crime.  Notes don't contain some smoking gun or evidence of a one armed man who actually committed the crime. If you get banned for breaking the rules then you either did it or not. If you didnt, post in an appeal that you didn't and we'll go log diving.

Being warned or banned is purely at admin discretion. If you've ever been warned not to do something that's against the rules, you could have been banned. If you got a temp ban it could have been perma.

If youve been pmd by an admin before and been told not to do (x) then its likely in a note. All the admin pms are also in the logs, as are all the attacks and says and mes etc.

 

We don't like people discussing their bans because they lie, or leave out vital information (eg, people saying they were banned for powergaming, and leaving out thar they told the admin to fuck off and ban them already). Having to constantly correct people requires us to constantly monitor the discord. Thats a pretty big waste of time. We have better things to do, and discussion of bans has rarely been productive at all. 

If you want to discuss a ban, past or present, then you can message an admin. 

2 hours ago, Dinarzad said:

"You did something bad, stop doing that."
"Oh, okay what did I do?"
"You don't need to know what, just stop doing it."

This is complete bullshit. That has never been said in any banning or warning. If im wrong, please let me know so i can tear the admin a new one.

This is a perfect example of why we dont want people discussing bans. Because many people lack the maturity to discuss this properly without resorting to reductive reasoning, or in this case, absolute lies.

 

[Dinarzad]

22 minutes ago, necaladun said:

This is complete bullshit. That has never been said in any banning or warning. If im wrong, please let me know so i can tear the admin a new one.

This is a perfect example of why we dont want people discussing bans. Because many people lack the maturity to discuss this properly without resorting to reductive reasoning, or in this case, absolute lies.

Again.
It was never intended to be a verbatim quote of an actual incident. It was an exaggeration used to illustrate a point of view people have on not being able to see their notes and to be mildly funny.
I am sorry if my attempt at humor has backfired that horribly, it wasn't intended to BE an actual example.

But that reaction in and of itself, from multiple admins is a reason why so many people feel they're walking on eggshells.  I made one comment that I DIDN'T carefully spend minutes crafting and that got misconstrued and it was immediately jumped upon and, in this case, got me called a liar.
Is it really that hard to believe after that kind of reaction people get concerned what gets put into their notes and would like a chance to correct it?

 

[TyOmaha]

Intentions or not, that's a big false accusation. The context of the quote takes place in a conversation, which implies direct PMs with an administrator.  It doesn't visualize what you wanted to; as you said. Thank you for clarifying though.

It is not a comment you have to spend minutes "carefully crafting". It is not that hard to not misrepresent something to that degree. If you misconstruct a point, and your point is taken in the misconstructed way, it is entirely your own fault. People cannot read into your mind to see what you really meant, only what you portrayed. You portrayed your real point poorly, and it came across as a different point entirely. The portrayed point in this case is completely false and is equal to a lie, minus the intent. At the end of the day, the portrayed point, not the real point in your head, was responded to.

Exaggeration in arguments is a fallacy (flaw). You shouldn't include these when you are having a serious discussion. It discredits you and your proposition.

Edited August 8, 2019 by Ty Omaha

[Dinarzad]

15 minutes ago, Ty Omaha said:

Intentions or not, that's a big false accusation. The context of the quote takes place in a conversation, which implies direct PMs with an administrator.  It doesn't visualize what you wanted to; as you said. Thank you for clarifying though.

It is not a comment you have to spend minutes "carefully crafting". It is not that hard to not misrepresent something to that degree. If you misconstruct a point, and your point is taken in the misconstructed way, it is entirely your own fault. People cannot read into your mind to see what you really meant, only what you portrayed. You portrayed your real point poorly, and it came across as a different point entirely. The portrayed point in this case is completely false and is equal to a lie, minus the intent. At the end of the day, the portrayed point, not the real point in your head, was responded to.

Exaggeration in arguments is a fallacy (flaw). You shouldn't include these when you are having a serious discussion. It discredits you and your proposition.

No, if it wasn't an accusation it simply put, is not an accusation.  It was unintentionally misleading, perhaps, but it was never an accusation. It was interpreted as one but that doesn't change what it is.  You can also misinterpret factual evidence and data, that doesn't change what a fact is or the data itself, it means the interpretation was flawed or the fact was presented erroneously (Which I have admitted to) it does not suddenly change what the fact was to fit that flawed interpretation.

And none of this addresses my point, it serves to prove it even more. Everything said was reduced and boiled down to one single snippet, one "Sound bite" of my post that was easy to jump on. The exact same thing that Necaladun was just talking out against. One admitted error in my post and nothing else I said is addressed or referred to or evidently seems to even matter and you want to tell me that "You don't have to spend minutes carefully crafting a post"?  Apparently I do need to, because in one fuck up in said post, and nothing else I have to say is going to be addressed and it's additionally gotten me called a liar, when a lie was never the intent. So yes. I apparently do need to be particularly precise and careful with my wording, since my wording is going to be picked apart and subject to semantics, instead of the point itself, even now that it's been clarified.

This is again, exactly the point people have when they say they feel like they're walking on eggshells when dealing with administration.  You have not acknowledged the point itself, you have instead fixated on a single error that was already addressed, dodged the issue that was being raised and doubled down on focus on me and how I failed to portray my argument properly (Which is already acknowledged and even apologized for at this point.) Instead of addressing the concern, you have chided me for making a mistake. So the mistake in presenting the argument negates the argument altogether, which is itself, a fallacy.

Do you really not see why that kind of behavior makes people nervous to bring up any issues or anything that might be even vaguely controversial, let alone to make sure their notes are accurate?  If this were a situation occuring in-game and going onto my notes, I would have no way of knowing the remark was misinterpreted, I would be unable to correct it and future admins would be working off erroneous information. This is what people mean, this is an example in motion of that entire argument.

[Medi]

Why not meet in the middle here and have a private means of transparency via a request system here on the forums?

The idea is that if a player wants information regarding their notes over a specific incident or such, they can make a private request that can only be viewed via admins here on the forums and be given to them confidentially and selectively. To this degree, the administration can retain a degree of control as to what information and how much of it is released to the public (or just outright deny the request if its sensitive enough) while giving players at least the platform to make potential requests. 

I foresee this having more benefits then not and takes out any sense of urgency in the matter.

Edited August 8, 2019 by Medi

[necaladun]

11 minutes ago, Medi said:

Why not meet in the middle here and have a private means of transparency via a request system here on the forums

I've done this multiple times for people in the past when people have requested them, and have no issue doing so in the future if needed. 

However, this requires us to look over them, decide how necessary each thing is, edit out details we don't want, etc etc. Then we also might need to explain context - different admins have very different styles. Kyet writes entire essays in notes. Other admins are a lot more blunt. If I say a guy is being a bit of an asshole, that's nowhere near as serious as if someone like dumbdumn says they're an asshole (in which case they'd likely be worse than hitler). 

Other parts of context are how long ago the note was, and how experienced a player they were at the time. A byond account created today with 20mins on the server will get a warning for toolboxing an SSD. A player with over 1000 hours toolboxing an SSD would be very unlikely to get the same treatment.

Unless there's a good reason to do this (such as a person disputing a warning in an admin complaint), then this really isn't worth our time, nor is something we want to generally encourage because of the waste of time. Some actual 'need to know' is needed, and there's no reason to set up a whole request system for this when a simple PM on discord can suffice. A vast number of our notes are simply "new player, attacked SSD, warned to read the rules." - simply a statement of the direct facts. When a ban comes up saying someone has been warned of something in the past, I have never seen a case where they haven't been warned in the past. 

In the end, warnings really are a courtesy, not a right. You are not entitled to be warned X number of times before being banned for breaking the rules. When we say someone has notes showing they've been warned in the past, it's to point out that they should know it is against the rules because they've been told so in the past. If I warn you not to attack an SSD, and it turns out I PM'd the wrong person entirely, you've still been warned, and thus should know it's against the rules. 

Perhaps we shouldn't warn people quite so often. They shouldn't need to see their notes for "a chance to self correct" if we've had to warn them repeatedly. The warnings should suffice, and be taken seriously. If you're forgetting how often you've been warned about something then there really is a problem. If you're getting repeatedly bwoinked and warned not to do something by admins, then that's a downward spiral.

Additionally, if people are really concerned, they can also just keep notes themselves of whenever they're PM'd, or keep the logs of every byond session. I've looked into methods where we could have a 'public notes' where warnings etc are put down that players can review, but I don't think it's really worth the time and effort for something that is only an issue to a fraction of 1% of players.

@Dinarzad making exaggerated "jokes" that portray the admins in a poor light, in a serious post about an issue is quite disrespectful to the people who have attempted to discuss this seriously and maturely, and insulting to the admins.

Of course it got jumped on - we need to jump on misinformation that makes us look incredibly unfair ASAP before people run wild with it. Your wording isn't being "picked apart and subject to semantics". I called it outright bullshit, which is what it is. 

I don't want to derail this discussion with a back-and-forth about how you were "misinterpreted", so I'll leave you with one courtesy, which is a review of all your notes as it's very easy to do in your case. You have 0.

 

 

[BryanR]

@Dinarzad

Allow me to take your statement point by point then.

5 hours ago, Dinarzad said:

Not being able to see your own notes leads to confusion and bewilderment.  It's curbing another avenue for problem players to recognize a downward spiral and any chance for them to right that behavior.  It focuses solely on the punishment for doing something wrong rather then giving that player a chance to self correct.

Players are well aware when we warn them since we get confirmation that they understand the warning, any of you who have been warned know we expect a reply. There shouldn't be any bewilderment or confusion about notes unless the player forgets the warning in which case maybe they should write it down since we will almost always note it in their file if we do warn them.

Receiving multiple warnings from the administration team should be a clear indicator of a player's downward spiral and be enough for them to think "Hey, maybe I should change my behavior and improve myself so I stop being warned by the staff and I don't get banned." Having access to their notes privately isn't going to help this unless you're speaking that it can jog their memory of past transgressions, at that point I refer you to the fact that if their memory is that poor about this maybe they should be keeping their own set of notes.

Notes are not focused solely on punishment, it is a way for us to share information with each other regarding either administrative actions taken against the player or if we want to say something positive for other administrators to consider. All players are given ample opportunity to self-correct considering its incredible rare for first offenses to be banned, usually requiring individuals to make multiple offenses at the time or show an utter disregard for playing nice with others and following the rules.

5 hours ago, Dinarzad said:

The inability to talk about bans on discord in addition to not being able to see what you've been doing wrong, it's stacking the deck as much as possible into preventing a problem player from correcting his behavior BEFORE it comes to a head and requires a ban, instead of taking the "Ounce of Prevention" we've opted for multiple pounds of "Cure

The inability to talk about bans publicly is mainly because individuals 9 out of 10 times will salt about their bans. They'll complain that the staff was too harsh or that they didn't do it and that the staff has an ax to grind against them. There really isn't much constructive to be gained about talking about a ban to the general public since they'll likely not know about the situation and only receive a story, more often than not, spun to make the individual complaining look like a victim and to rally support against badmins. Allowing players to do so and then just banning the individuals who do those actions really doesn't change anything, since the individuals who want to talk about their bans publicly are usually the ones who want to salt about it and the ones who don't realize "Hey, I fucked up and I really don't want to draw attention to this fuck up of mine." I know I personally wouldn't want to talk publicly about a ban if I ever received one since it isn't exactly something to write home about. As for stacking the deck, there are staff available to speak to them regarding their behavior if they honestly want to change, there's absolutely nothing preventing anyone from contacting us and asking "Hey, what can I do to be a better part of this community?"

Saying that being able to see notes and discuss bans will suddenly have the community policing itself and take a weight off our shoulders as prevention instead of cure hasn't taken into account the variables of friends and, cliques people of like minded nature who will not only agree with the individual that the administrator is wrong but will also reinforce the bad behavior, hell it happens even without the discussion of bans and notes being made available and nothing will really change that aspect.

As for players who have been banned for oopsies so to speak, if its just a singular oopsie incident there really isn't a lot of work involved in the appeal process, it only becomes an issue when multiple oopsies have occurred. At that point there really isn't an excuse for them not taking the opportunity to change their behavior if they've been banned/warned multiple times over the same oopsie or just general oopsies with multiple rule breaks.

5 hours ago, Dinarzad said:

In addition, if a player has access to their own notes, they run out of excuses for continued misbehavior real fast. A player can't claim they didn't know something was a problem, when they had full access to see those notes and see that it WAS a problem, they could have seen it at any time and didn't care and continued to break rules and tow lines anyway, which helps lead to more open and shut cases, it's a more telling sign of someone's attitude as a player and whether or not they're any good for the server.

Once again, nothing is stopping the player from remembering or taking note of their own warnings. They don't need access to administrative notes regarding this. Its very clear to us if an individual doesn't remember or doesn't care, the latter usually from multiple notes over a steady period of time The excuse of, I don't remember, is rather flimsy to begin with since it is a rather memorable moment to have an administrator contact you. I remember when I was contacted THE VERY FIRST TIME over something that didn't mesh with the rules over a year ago. Not only do I remember the administrator that contacted me I remember the conversation we had as well as the contents of it and let me tell you, my memory can be quite awful, I'd forget my own birthday if it didn't actually serve a purpose.

The only way I can think of players forgetting multiple times we've contacted them, which usually is the case before it leads to a ban, is if they've grown accustomed to it and simply don't care. That or they're living in a 30 First Dates scenario where they relive the same day over and over again because of memory issues. If I can remember something from well over a year ago, it really isn't a stretch to think the average person can remember a MONTH ago.

As for individuals who say "Well Bryan, what about notes from several months ago? From half a year ago? A year ago? Am I expected to remember that?" Usually no, those don't get taken into consideration if there's a large block of time between notes or when your last note is from a long time ago. Its when players start accumulating a good amount of notes after that long period of time we'll start referencing that since it either indicates A) That person stopped playing for the block of time and that's why there're no notes or B) They've burned themselves out and stopped caring.

Giving them the opportunity to look at their notes and saying "Well, you didn't look at your notes you had ample opportunity to change." well, they're not going to change regardless if they have their notes available to them. People who want to change will change regardless if they have access to their notes because they realize they've done wrong and they want to become a positive force for the community, to share in the fun and the laughs and are usually genuinely upset that their actions have impacted others in a negative way. People aren't going to magically want to start bettering themselves because they can see our notes and be reminded of their poor behavior at that time and making them public to everyone would just end up with players looking at other players notes and being shamed, even if they are good players now and had issues in the past, something There are people who will use it intentionally to shame or will bring it up in conversation not with the intention to do so but ultimately leading to that same outcome, something that I am vehemently against.

After addressing these points I'll leave you with some others.

• There are notes that as stated before aren't administrative actions taken against the player but opinions of the administrative staff regarding behavior that may potentially be detrimental to the community or a potential rule break. Nothing is gained from players knowing these observations and it very much can be used to say "Hey, the administrative staff hates me! LOOK I HAVE PROOF! BADMIN SAID X ABOUT ME!" which is only a negative for us because then it makes us out to be the enemy.
• There are notes that contain information about other players, things that players have said to us that we don't wish to divulge because it can open up the floor to other players not trusting the individual or ostracizing the individual completely because they ran to Staff to "tattle" on them. Nothing productive will come of this and the fallout from these actions would just create more work for us and ruin the game for those people who actively help and try to keep the server a good place for others by bringing these things to our attention.
• It can place a barrier between the staff and the player base as some players are friends with staff and we have to do our duty as staff before being your friend. Nobody likes seeing something unflattering being said about them and it could negatively impact the relationships we have with those individuals in the community which would eventually end up in there being a divide.
• As Necaladun pointed out, we'd have players requesting alterations or removal of notes which could very well increase our workload since we'd have to investigate the legitimacy of the note itself on a case by case basis.

[Xyd]

I'm in favor of note transparency, however...

I'm not an admin. And I'm not so sure I'd have that stance if the shoe was on the other foot. I can see where admins are coming from. I can see how certain players may view their notes, take a disliking to what is there, and take issue/hold a grudge against the admin who issued that note. That's a problem.

While CM/Other servers do have different policies, it doesn't mean their policies are the correct method. Maybe it works for them, but there is no real basis to judge how it affects them from a staff point of view. I'm very much trying to look at this from both sides, and I can see reasoning for both.

To use a recent scenario in which a player had to correct a mistake on their notes going through the admin complaint process, situations like those seem to be rare but this is only because the player was concerned that their note was an unfair representation of their behavior that round and took visible action to correct it. Turns out they were right to be concerned and the note got corrected. I feel like this is why we should have at least limited transparency in some form, because there could be many more examples of this. Notes are being cast off as somewhat 'insequential' to players by staff. I feel that is unfair because notes seem to play a vital role in judging that player's behavior in ban appeals etc, so it makes sense that a player would like to know what it is they are being judged on. The staff response of "Well, you received X amount of warnings and should be self-aware of your behavior as a perfectly good indication of where your notes are" is a good point, but doesn't solve the issue of misrepresentation here.

I'm rather conflicted on the whole note issue cause I can see the many problems of having them transparent from a staff pov.

• Some players will hold a grudge against staff for it.
• Some players may take issue with legitimate notes (being salty) and cause excessive workload for staff and create a backlog
• And then the other concerns raised by Bryan which are all good points

 

On the other hand...

• There may be (and has already been proven, is) situations when a player feels that an admin note/warning misrepresents them as a player and will be used unfairly against them in an appeal.
• Notes are important to how an admin (especially new admins dealing with players they've not dealt with before but have extensive note history) forms an opinion on that player in the appeal process. A player being completely ignorant of the judgement being laid upon them is essentially at the mercy of staff.
• Players who have displayed corrective behavior but their notes do not display this and/or portrays them in a completely different light is going to be a lingering issue for them moving forward

So there is valid concerns here from both sides. I do honestly feel that some of the player concerns are being cast aside too quickly with the rebuttal of, "Well, here's why that wouldn't work..." And it is fair. Good points on both sides, but understanding the player concern here is key and why some feel transparency is wanted.

I personally don't think a player should have access to their notes at the drop of a hat or request. No. Nip that in the bud there. Despite the policy of other servers, I can see this being an issue here on Para.

I would think a better method for this would be opening a dispute (as has been done in the past and seems to work nicely) on a warning/unfavourable bwoink they've received in-game and create a process to see what note, if any, has been added to their record as a result of that warning. It seems notes being shared in this process is already a thing, and that could be expanded upon further by allowing, and making it aware to players, that they can dispute a note that they may feel is unfair because after all, notes don't provide full context and lets be honest, from a staff pov,  you are making judgements/forming opinions on notes without full context in mind. 

Is that entirely fair? No, but its the system we have and it isn't a perfect system, and I think efforts should be made to improve it to lessen the staff/player divide and give players more room to maneuver in situations like these. Again I don't think notes should be open to players completely, but I do think a cemented process of what a player can do and making them aware of their options when they receive warnings/bwoinks and opening up a process for them to discuss it.

I don't think we should open the floodgates to having players dispute past notes that are long gone, because that just opens up the hellgates.

Edited August 8, 2019 by Xyd

[Ralta]

There's a lot of information here and I'm not going to respond to everything mentioned. Instead, here's my two cents, plain and simple:
 

• All typical notes should be made public. The player can see when a note when it's made and the content it contains. Same goes for all historic notes.
• In specific situations, hidden notes can be created by Admins which players are not privy to.
  • This should only be information like:
    • "Possible metacomming with X, keep an eye on them"
    • "Same IP as known troublemaker Y".
  • In other words, notes for Admins to keep an eye on players, or make note of issues for which evidence might be dubious or circumstantial.

I appreciate there are historic notes that might fall under the second category which would be visible to players, but I don't think that's the end of the world. Yes, players will question notes at first. But if you make it clear you are adding a note to their account because of X, Y and Z at the time you make it, they will be aware of it and argue it at the time instead of pester about it later.

[Cazdon]

While I don't have anything to say regarding notes, I am somewhat upset by the change to no longer discuss bans on the discord, period. I understand the reasoning, however. 

Is there a place for discussing bans? I read through the appeals regularly to try and catch the many grey areas and edge cases that come up. I find it useful to discuss what behavior might be against the rules and using examples was often a way I formed my opinions.

[Landerlow]

I will keep this brief.


At one side, you have the administration team, who manage the server, police the rules, and keep tabs on various things. And on the other side, you have the regular players.

 

Some things should not be divulged to regular players. 

In most situations, it is necessary to have notes/internal actions kept a secret, both to make sure admins can do their job without fear of immediate reprisal and to keep the integrity of the server and the staff constant. This is not to say that admins aren't reprimanded when they do something wrong, though. But if notes were made public, well, there would be a plethora of complaints/flaming/etc about notes, and this would not be beneficial for the admin team and for the players alike. 

If notes were made public, admins would have to walk eggshells every second they take any action in-game, because god forbid a player does not agree with a certain note or punishment. This could result in staff members 'hesitating' to take certain actions at certain points in time, because they may feel like they do not have enough justification for a certain action, in case a player sees the note made of it. (The action in question can be a ban, or a note for deeper investigation, etc). This, in turn (the 'hesitating to take action' part), could lead to moderation that is too soft, and it will only make experiences worse for the admins and players. 

Less moderation/staff actions = more rulebreaking = more negative experiences for players = decrease in server reputation = bad. This is crude, I know, but you get the gist of it. 

I know this is 'just a game', but think of it this way: Let's say the police/intelligence agency made their 'intel' public, that would be a VERY bad idea, for multiple reasons. So would the idea of making notes public.

 

The thing is, if you don't do anything wrong, you have nothing to be afraid of. And even *if* you have a note or two, it doesn't automatically put you on a black list or whatever. Hell, even I have notes. (I put Sarin in pizzas around when I just started playing and I got one ban because I said a slur when I just started here) Do I mind the notes? No, why should I? I just play the game, stick to the rules, and enjoy the time I spend on the server. 

And if you really, *really* must know something about notes/an action taken against you, you can always PM a head of staff for more info, in private. 

Edited August 8, 2019 by Landerlow

[Da Dman234]

I don't think I'm quite understanding this fully, so people want basic/situational notes that aren't sensitive, but basically that just means the notes from every time an admin has spoken to and given people a warning? I always thought it was pretty clear that when we have to talk to people it's noted, and not to repeat that behavior. What exactly would be the point of having that information? Sorry if I've missed it if it's already been stated