Administration problems in the URPG

Administration problems in the URPG​

Problem #1: People, who aren’t officials, or moderators, are left in the dark a majority of the time.

This is a problem because we don’t know what’s happening with are concerns, we don’t even know if it’s being discussed or not half of the time. I just found out today that the problem with TED’s tourney battle, was actually being discussed. Yet all we get to see is this locked thread.
The URPG could be planning to shut down, and we’d all be completely clueless, for all we know. That’s a bit extreme, but still an example.
In my opinion it would be nice to be able to see what’s going on in the URPG, because everyone who plays devote at least some of their free time to it, and therefore deserves to know.

Solution: We should be able to see the mod forums, but not have the ability to post, that way we know what’s happening, and flaming/spamming threads of important nature will not be done. This is completely possible according to Misty.

“iamnotyou11 (10:59:00 PM):Is it possible to make a board
iamnotyou11 (10:59:05 PM):that everyone can see
iamnotyou11 (10:59:07 PM):but only certain people
iamnotyou11 (10:59:09 PM):can post
Slowking50 (10:59:14 PM):yes”

Problem #2: Officials have power, which isn’t specified, which allows them to do anything unless a moderator overrules them. Also, people should not be punished for things that were not in the rules, unless obvious cases of intentional abuse.
The problem with this is that, they can do it, and then be overruled. It should be, ask before they can do since it takes time to get something overruled and sometimes it’s only a matter of importance for that certain time.

Solution: Specify the rules of officials of the URPG, list all the things they have the power to do and be ‘slightly’ specific, not completely specific, as it would take way to much effort to compile the rules, and would be unrealistic. If it’s not listed THEY CAN’T DO IT and must first be discussed with moderators, not ‘a’ moderator, moderators. It would at least be better than no rules at all. Also, to punish someone, it should be clearly listed as them breaking a rule, and they should have to check to see if it’s a rule before punishing, this includes moderators. Exceptions being cases that were clearly intentional abuse.
IE. When some members lost money, from previous 1hkos. Even this is debatable as punishable, since they were never told to stop, simply punished.

An example of when people should have not been punished is here. The Park had been running for quite some time, and just taking back Pokemon, was completely unfair. It was never in the rules, therefore rules should have been changed, but Pokemon should not have been taken back.

These were decided by officials as well as moderators, so doesn’t show the power of officials, but are still good examples.

The park was a fault on the creators for not noticing that it was too easy to get high leveled story Pokemon; the normal members should NOT be punished.

Edit:
Concerning problem #1, I think that things that discuss specific members should remain unviewable, but everything else, viewable, unless for a reason similar to the discussion of specific members. I do understand completely that seeing things on Bans/Promotions/Etc. shouldn't be for everyone's eyes, since it's not related to them whatsoever.

 

You go girl!

 

Feel free to ask me about stuff that's going on in the mod boards. I don't think you need to be able to see them. We discuss bans/promotions there, and those should not be public. I do think that the (first bit of it) second idea has some merit to it. I'm not seeing the point. When have officials overstepped their authority?

 

What are the officials authority? They can't overstep their authority if their authority isn't written anywhere.

 

I don't have a problem with revealing the mod boards, except some of the information or opinions there are sensitive. For example, why certain people were denied promotions. I do think more topics presented in the mod boards should be made in the Trainer's Court instead, though.

If you want to see the board, just log in as me. Pass is ouazoa09wo. Just don't do anything stupid. -_~

Officials are people that can be trusted to not abuse power, while still keeping order in the URPG. Can you cite a time in which a single official was abusive in power?

 

Near, your main point is quite unclear.

You went from one issue about officials hiding information from the commoners - to another of how unfair officials could be at times. How will your plan text of forcing all URPG (including officials) to be under a written law be the solvency for both of the problems you listed?

Also like Pidge said, your argument about abusive officials might be extremely persuasive... but it has no factual evidence that you presented. The two incidents you provided were to recall "products" that were created out of a flawed system in URPG. In the real world, a product that might unintentionally cause harm to a consumer because of manufacture flaws will always be immediately recalled once acknowledged.

Why?

1. For the safety and health of the consumer.
2. To protect the reliability between the manufacturer and the consumer.

So just like irl recalls, URPG officials had to do these recalls once the problems were discovered. The recalls were not to purposely abuse power and be unfair to the commoners of URPG, but to provide the greatest amount of general welfare and utilitarianism. Sorry if you lost all your prized earnings while the problems existed, but this was for the best to maintain fairness in URPG.

Officials know what they are doing and can be trusted, that's why they're instated to high positions of authority in the first place. Reiterating, you have no factual support of an abusive official. And if the case of one existed, HKim would obviously launch an investigation or just boot them off the "board of directors" anyways.

URPG is in no need of a Magna Carta.

 

Hey pidge, didn't you aproove a thread that got me infracted. Damn, that's pretty responsible.

I lost my ref license for being rude to the battlers, yet ST is just as rude, if not ruder then myself.

Officials are positions above referees, therefore why is ST still an official. Shouldn't officials have to be more respectful than refs? Other then the fact that mods get along with him why In the world is he still an official. If you deny he's rude, then you know you're lying.

Feng, those examples don't relate, the example with the eggs HARM people, where the example with the national park help people. One person got a porygon easily and you didn't, it's not a big deal, you had the option of using the park yourself and didn't.

Also I proprosed that officials had rules to follow of what they were allowed to do, not that we need more strict rules, we just simply shouldn't be punished for rules that haven't been written or said anywhere, which is exactly what happened in the two examples I gave.


Also some St stuff: Proof1 Proof2 Proof3

 

I approved a tournament that I had no idea would be considered mocking a person. Instead: a satire on how tournaments are approved. However, it was interpreted by discretion as the former rather than the latter. I asked if you cared about being infracted afterward, because I would fight to get said infraction removed, but you said you didn't care.

ST is quite a complicated person. ST never singles people out. He calls everyone 'dipshits' at the same time. Additionally, he has the aura of a cranky person that makes his comments seem just hilarious to me. However, I suppose other people that don't know him can interpret his messages incorrectly, but he never goes out of his way to tell a single person he dislikes them. However, he did say you specifically blow. This is perhaps questionable behavior.

 

Understandable.

But you also disallow FFA ideas, which is pretty stupid. Honestly, you didn't allow me to ref a random legends FFA, when it's actually been done before, and no one has said anything about it.

ST also disallows FFA rules.

It's pretty illogical to disallow a FFA rule, unless it's being abused for fast cash, and considering Auto-Taunt isn't banned, then NO free for all rules should be banned.

Just because an official thinks something is stupid, doesn't mean it should be stopped, unless there's a good reason behind it. An FFA isn't all to important. It's just something to do for fun once in a while.

 

There are good, logical reasons behind those rejections.

Look, I'm interested in game design and theory. There are some rules that should never be used. Random Pokemon is one because then you aren't even really playing URPG. These Pokemon aren't in your stats. Using Pokemon you don't actually own is usually reserved to tournaments, and even then, some of us have a mentality that we should stay away from those kind of tournaments (Battle Factory, Dream Tournament).

Randomness is another thing that should be avoided, especially when it can greatly affect a player's ability to win or lose. Why should a player be able to dominate or be put out of the running for winning by plain chance or 'luck'? Granted, FFAs already have some element of this, but you don't want exacerbate it anymore.

Also, I would very much like to ban Auto-Taunt in normal FFAs.

Lastly, there's plenty of creative room for making FFA rules with those limitations in mind. FFA rules can get pretty ridiculous at times, be glad you can make them up at all.

 

Yes, random pokemon add another thing to the luck factor, but considering really weak basics have won ffas, would make the actual pokemon used a minor detail. People choosing not to attack you plays the largest role in ffas, or teaming and hoping you arnt backstabbed. Your moves don't really effect what place you get either, sub is the only move that will help you a whole lot.

Also as I said ffas are for fun, and using random mons, which are things you don't usually use, is fun. Especially if they're legends.

It's your opinion that random Pokemon is a bad, but that doesn't give you the right to ban random Pokemon ffas, because that's just plain out stupid. If anyone were to ban them if would have to be Ataro or Leman, and I'm pretty sure Ataro ref's random Pokemon ffas once in a while. I may be wrong about this though.

 

We're not here to talk about what rules are fine or not for FFA's. We're talking about whether it's an abuse of power for me to tell you that you can't have a certain rule. When you think of abuse, does this kind of thing really come to mind? Me telling you that you can't use a rule for a reason I believe to be logical is an abuse of power? I was just doing what I believed to be right. There was no personal gain or harm. You weren't even punished or anything like that. Even if it is abuse, your overall argument is shaky if this is the only case in which officials may not be trusted. And if you believe an official is doing something wrong, the best solution is contacting a different and/or multiple officials or mods about the situation.

 

I feel as if this thread would get more love if Near hadn't been the one to post it.

I agree with the point that the public should know what's going on (not promotions/bans). That was one of the biggest problems for me back when the mods weren't really active and announcements just came out of the blue. It's also a reason why I don't mind telling people what's going on in the boards (not promotions/bans) even if it is "leaking." What's the point of all the secrecy? Do we really need to hide that BW is being discussed?

 

Actually, the point of this has gotten off topic, and I can't say I'm not partly to blame.

Whether or not officials have or have not abused their power is mostly irrelevant, other then the fact that if they haven't then it's not an issue that needs to be solved quickly, but it still needs to be solved. Either:
A. Rules need to be put in place so officials can't continue to abuse their power, or B. Rules need to be put in place so officials can't abuse their power in the future.

Either way rules should be put in place. Just with the case of B it wouldn't be a priority.

Also earlier you said, "Instead: a satire on how tournaments are approved," in response to my comment on approving the tourney that got me an infraction. Clearly this means you think that rules should be put in place for approving tourneys? or that tourneys should need more than one approval?

 

Just wondering, what are you trying to prevent? What kind of heinous act could an official possibly do? Do you believe any of the current officials would do anything like that? Also, do you realize they're almost the same thing as moderators, except without the ability to edit, delete, and move posts and/or threads.

With your last part, you couldn't be any more correct. I think it has been resolved, though, or it was never a problem due to miscommunication.

 

This is the most important statement here. You're saying that whether or not they have abused power is irrelevant because they need to be prevented from doing so, and the only way that we can do so is put forward a set of rules so they know what they are and aren't supposed to do. The problems with this are that A) officials rarely do anything that be constituted as abuse of power B) when they do, they are aware that they are stepping outside of the bounds of propriety C) in the rare instances that this has happened, the official has been penalized.

When abuse occurs, it is not because the official does not know that something is sketchy. In every single past instance (including those you have referenced), the official has been aware of the risk and has acted regardless.

How, then, does the existence of explicit rules change anything? Being an official is an honor system. If they do anything dishonorable, they are punished. You suggest that members need to know "the rules" before they are punished. The rules of URPG, as it is based on an honor system, are as such: Do not abuse the trust we place in you. Common sense extends this to: Do not take quick and easy ways to make money. Do not take advantages of "loopholes" when it is obvious that doing so goes against the URPG honor code. As a URPG member, it is your duty to point out these loopholes and abuses; officials and mods may not have necessarily noticed them.

Pretty idealistic system. For a reason.

You are proposing a set of rules. So, you are suggesting "written law." Written law exists for the purpose of delineating what cannot be done and how someone is punished for it. It does not exist so that people will not do wrong (because the existence of a code of laws does not completely deter "abuse"--see the 7.3 million people currently registered in the American corrections system). It exists so that when they do wrong, A) they can be punished justly (as opposed to moderated punishments based on bribes and favors and political position) and B) the people must acknowledge that the criminal is punished within the bounds of whatever social contract theory their government adopts. Once a system of rules exist, no one can be punished for something that isn't in the rules unless we add a (

Your concern is that officials have opportunity to abuse their powers. Your argument is that if there is a written list of laws, they will be unable to abuse their powers. This is... not the case. It just means that the obvious lines for what is and what is not okay (which all officials are aware of) will be written down. So... the people who still do things they shouldn't be doing will still do them and will still get punished; they just won't be able to say, "Oh, I didn't know." ...But the thing is, the URPG already operates on the assumption that they know--and they do know.

Now, when we look at the two systems individually, this is what we have. Honor system, people do things wrong, people get caught, people get punished based on what they've done and how much damage it's done. The damage is also rectified to the best of URPG's abilities--any products of the failure are removed, any people affected by collateral are compensated.

Once a system of rules exist, no one can be punished for something that isn't already in the rules unless we add a "anything else that we find unfair" clause--even if it's obviously not okay, and just isn't mentioned. You want rules so that users who do things unaware of whether or not they're wrong can't be punished for things that aren't stated explicitly. You also want rules so that officials make sure it's okay for them to do whatever they're doing before they do it. But... you stated that listing every single thing doesn't work. Which, again, leaves us with the "anything else that we find unfair" clause. URPG, again, operates on the assumption that people ought to be doing non-abusive things, and punishes when the opposite occurs.

So how does a system of rules alter anything? You have a more explicit list, but there's still that honor system. So, we have things that you're not supposed to do, but we don't know what those things are. You're essentially left with the same system and more paperwork.

And the sad thing about this post is that I agree that there are problems, but I can't agree with a thing you said about those problems.

 

Listen Pidge, I'm not trying to single out any official or call out a specific act of rule infraction. I am simply saying that there is no reason why we shouldn't create more concrete rules for what officials can and can't do, and the guidelines for approving things.

Pidge, what I was saying in regards to the ffa rule approving was that it felt more like you were saying you didn't think my idea for an ffa was very good. I don't think that is a sensible reason to disallow the rule, though. Maybe next time, you could personally IM me and explain a bit more about why you are disallowing it so everyone is clear on the situation and nobody feels like anything unfair is going on.

Edit: @Katie

"Your concern is that officials have opportunity to abuse their powers. Your argument is that if there is a written list of laws, they will be unable to abuse their powers. This is... not the case. It just means that the obvious lines for what is and what is not okay (which all officials are aware of) will be written down. So... the people who still do things they shouldn't be doing will still do them and will still get punished; they just won't be able to say, "Oh, I didn't know." ...But the thing is, the URPG already operates on the assumption that they know--and they do know.

Now, when we look at the two systems individually, this is what we have. Honor system, people do things wrong, people get caught, people get punished based on what they've done and how much damage it's done. The damage is also rectified to the best of URPG's abilities--any products of the failure are removed, any people affected by collateral are compensated.
"
Or more specifically the part in bold.

This is something that needs to be changed, assuming someone knows they're doing something wrong is completely unreasonable. Just because you see it as wrong, doesn't mean someone else will too. They shouldn't be punished, simply warned, just like how the infraction and ban system of BMG work. You do it once, you get a warning, you do it again after you know it's wrong, then you get banned.

In both my examples, especially the one concerning the park, it was very likely they didn't know they were doing anything wrong at all.

I asked Harry something a while ago about if double battles end in one turn it counts as a 1hko, he said no but it would be abuse. So if I hadn't asked, and had done it, I would have been punished? For something that might or might not have been abuse, since they still take 2 attacks, not simply one like 1hkos. It's debatable about whether it's abuse or not, so I asked, but a newer member, may have simply done it without asking. They would have been punished for something they didn't know was abuse?

Edit2: Also I think that Problem two should have been separated into two different problems, since they aren't completely related.

 

i like how you ignored my post

also failing to see where somebody was punished before being warned

 

No need to respond to a post that agrees with me.

And both examples I gave had no warnings, Park + 1HKO cash taken back.

 

My point was that this is status quo, and that it's status quo because the fundamentals of the system are more attractive ideologically and more effective pragmatically.

In the instance of the recall of Pokémon... That was not punishment: that was damage control. So, moot point. The people who took direct advantage of the situation lost their positions of responsibility; the users who profited accidentally from the broken system only lost their benefits. It's not punishment; it's righting what got off kilter. Same goes for the OHKO revocation.

As to the instance of Double Battle OHKOs.... Your example proves my point. This is why we have the honor system, as opposed to a full-on set of rules. Under the honor system, if the intent were to spam for money, it's going to be treated as abuse. That'd be fairly obvious based upon the number of battles fought and the Pokémon sent, especially if the members are older. If it's not for the purpose of getting quick money, and just happened, it won't be treated as abuse.

Now, imagine that we have a set of rules. No new members read the rules all the way through. Most of them don't ask a lot of questions, either. They just bumble about until they get yelled at to go read the rules. Say a few new members get some random referee and does six bajillion double battles that end in one turn because they suck at battling and one of them only has basics. If we have a set of rules that says, "You cannot do 1HKO double battles, under penalty of _______." Now, regardless of intent, all people involved will be punished. Perhaps the more experienced member took advantage of the situation; perhaps the referee wanted quick cash. Doesn't matter--if we have rules, we can't alter them or let people by. They're set rules, and they have to be administered. Under the honor system, if someone doesn't know the rules and are declared abusive, they'll lose their benefits, but they won't be directly punished.

And yeah, you interwove two separate points to prove the same idea.... Didn't work, and made me have to write an obnoxiously long post to dismantle your argument.