oh boy, this is gonna be a doozy, so so many concerns brought up, where to begin
1. Lack of active moderators
I'm just going to be real about this one, this has bothered me for a good while. Never really bothered piping up about the fact that we didn't have any truly active mods just because it became easy enough for me to shadow-run everything without it, as we've joked about far too many times on the discord. If we are going to get anywhere, we definitely need to have an active mod team, rather than what I believe is now just ZT and my seemingly wide reach.
2. Substitution Rules
These rules really are not that complicated. There's a couple things here or there that need to be clarified better, namely the definition of a chance clause, but otherwise it's just 9 rules to keep substitutions from being too powerful.
3. Lack of Organization
I agree wholeheartedly and it's an effort I began a week or so ago to start reorganizing the data in ASB, mostly just trying to compile information and keep the Handbook up-to-date, because rulings always seem to elude the main source of rulings.
This is what I'm going to say is ASB's biggest problem, the fact that all of our rulings information are based loosely on which experienced member is around at the time to find the right thread/conversation.
4. Rebuilding/Rebranding ASB
Never thought about it this way, but it would make sense that having the name Deck Knight associated with us for long has stained our reputation. It's something I didn't really notice until I began branching into other communities, but that indeed is something that has stuck with us. A fresh start to escape that would help us a lot. Here's some bits and pieces about a potential reboot that need to be considered:
Flavor - Quite frankly, flavor in ASB is about 99% dead, it's only real remnant is in how Deck decided what moves would have combo tech. It's something we
may be able to keep with us, but I don't know yet.
Progression - This is something we need to find a gentle balance between. We do not need starting players slugging through molasses to become relevant, but we also do not want to completely axe the feeling of progression. And more importantly, we need to do a better job of providing quality end-game material to keep our users interested, which leads into---
Content - The core content of ASB, battles/gyms/tourneys, are fine as is. Might need to tweak our gym arena balancing system, but that's a trivial task. As for the rest of ASB, all of what we have called "Roleplays," need to be pruned through individually and either reworked, rebalanced, or effectively removed. None of them remain up-to-date at all times, not too many of them feel like quality content for parties to be involved in, with a slight exception to Battle Hall.
Details to be worked out as I figure out what direction this conversation is leading us in, but I figured I'd share the insights I've gathered from having to take most of everything underneath me.
5. Automated Reffing
No BS, this is a rather pointless topic point. There has a been a
reffing calculator since before I even joined ASB. It is simply just faster for me to type out the calcs that I already have in my head into ASBot or any other standard calculator to get the number I'm after. For new players an automated calculator, such as what we already have, is fantastic. But it serves little purpose for experienced players who have no doubt committed the most important formula in the game to memory.
Yes, we could upgrade the reffing calculator, or I could upgrade ASBot to have an automated calculator within it, but that is just
far more work than its worth.
6. Commitment
Frosty's point about the level of commitment to ASB is staggeringly accurate, and I have to admit that I am definitely a part of the problem there. I've been wavering off lately just because a lot of ASB has become a chore for me. With wavering activity levels, I got stuck picking up slack that would've otherwise crashed, and I get tasked with handling a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff, which drains the amount of time I feel like putting into the system. This is relevant, trust me.
- ASB players fall into one of three categories: avid battler, avid ref, lurker. The problems in ASB always rise the hardest when the avid refs finally burn the fuck out from not having people available to referee their own battles. (Me and Toon always joked that us finding a ref for things would literally be the hardest thing ever)
- Going back to my point about the content earlier, we need to provide more worthwhile and achieveable goals if we are going to keep the interest of our players. Thinking back on it, it's hilariously absurd to me that it's taken Frosty and Emma each about 5-6 years to get their 18th gym badge, and until about 2 months ago, the reward wasn't even close to worth it.
- Management of each facet of ASB needs to have a fallback system that properly divides the work throughout the "upper eschelon" of the commnity
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Overall Thoughts
- ASB needs to be reconstructed and reorganized. I want our community to thrive, and a part of that definitely needs to be shaking the paltry reputation that we have. Not to mention, there's a number of issues that the current arrangement of ASB does not address.
- ASB
needs to have active leadership members that are accurately appointed as active leadership. There's no reason to have people shadow-running things
- I
will not do the work on revamping ASB alone, hear that now. There's a laundry list of things that need to be done, and I'll be damned if I try tackling all of ASB's problems alone again.
- ASB does indeed need an updated beginner's guide, but that can come after we decide what direction we are taking ASB.