Servers going down. Running some system stuff. Posting about Community Relations

[schild]

So I made a post in a thread on AoC the other night and I was pretty doped up on Percocet, but it seems clear enough, here: http://forums.ageofconan.com/showthread.php?t=23460

Basically, tl;dr, I hate the idea of volunteer moderators. It's a huge example of amateur hour and even moreso, shows they don't give a flying fuck about the forums. And since they decided to shut down the thread because QUESTIONING THE BANHAMMER GETS THE BANHAMMER (fucking bush league morons), I've decided to make a thread about it here. EQ and UO notwithstanding, is anyone else as disgusted about the idea of random fuckwits having any sort of power in any official forum?

I wouldn't have made this thread here if a mod there hadn't posted this:

Moderation is never a topic for open discussion on the forums. Please respect the forum rules and guidelines.
http://forums-us.ageofconan.com/anno...nt.php?f=8&a=1

Moderation

Moderation is not ever a topic for open forum. If you have any questions or feedback on moderation it should be addressed to the community manager or the specific moderator via private message.

* Do not post threads questioning moderation. Such threads will be removed
* If a topic is closed or removed do not, under any circumstances, re-post the same topic or material. If you have any questions as to why a thread was closed or removed please contact the moderator via private message.


Both the volunteer moderators and the paid moderators go through extensive training, and are monitored by the Community team to ensure balanced moderation.

*closed*

What total bollocks. I think I'm going to fight some Funcom people at the next convention I go to. My fists, their face, be there, 3PM. You'll pay for the whole seat but only need the edge.

[schild]

http://forums.ageofconan.com/search.php?searchid=437523

Fuck, the paid moderators on AoC are terrible. I wouldn't let this Oberwesel fuck moderate f13 for free.

[Ironwood]

Deep breaths.  Count to 10.

[Falconeer]

Uncalled for, but for some strange reasons I seriously love you both. The crazy videogame guy from Arizona and the Zod from Scotland (welcome back).

On topic, I hate the fact that I can't read the US forums, so most of those links and most of what's happening about Age of Conan is not available to Europeans. Could you people linking to US boards please quote here as much as possible in the future? Only if it's not too much trouble.

[tmp]

Funcom has always used volunteer moderators for their AO forums if i recall right. They have years long practice in squashing this sort of insurgency.

[Ratman_tf]

Raging against MMOG companies is so 90's. 

[Kirth]

I'm not really a fan of official forums.

[Signe]

I don't much like official forums and try to avoid them when I can.  Having said that, the AoC official forums have fuck tons of nasty win.  You can hardly read one thread without several explosions of wordy yet completely unintelligible forum PvP.   I'm still trying to avoid the place, but I could become addicted.  It brings back the old days of TRYING to get banned from official boards.  Good times.  Remember those days, Schildy?  It makes me misty-eyed with nostalgia.  I rarely bother personally attacking moderators, but in this case I'll make an exception.  They are horrible, Horrible, HORRIBLE!  If you were to meet one in person, I'm absolutely convinced his breath would smell like ass. 

[Kirth]

Servers are back up, resource nodes now appear on the map for me as different shapes (well the did until i zoned). Interesting note, all resource nodes spawn at 0% after a server restart.

[Signe]

Maps are mostly fucked.  Sometimes things appear on them, sometimes they don't, sometimes they freeze, sometimes they turn blue.  My map has obviously demented and has some sort of strange sekret life of it's own.

[Kirth]

this is a gem, really. read it if you want your brain to ooze out your ear.

http://forums.ageofconan.com/showthread.php?t=34299


 

[Falconeer]

Euros can't read it. Can you quote bits of it?

[Nerf]

ok sometimes u think about it that this is a game not irl if its irl then it wold b different but its jst a game, second of all, think about axactly wat it is we're trying to acomplish? vs wat it is u WANT it to be... in otehr words dont post on the forum say "goonheim steeals RPs/ganks u or" w/e it is than unles you have EVIDENCE (aka power to the ppl) b/c thats whats important.day 1, goonehim made a guild was already on conan since than do u think such a system culd be evil? culd it otherwise happan that way? only reasson ppl complan about it is b/c liek i said this is NOT irl but sometimes u might think irl is actualy the game we are the bigest guild and we have the most items and the most pvp... let me put it at u this way in a way that does not get confused you can understand it ... ok u sa in all of YOU guy reading this... playeng the game...even playing any other game, goons are tHE BEST we are THE BEST at warcraft we even killed ILLIDAN did u ididnt think so? also we have THE BESt in EVE online spaceships... we have the BEST in every online mmo game waht makes u think that it will be any kind of difference for the conan game i think secretly, u know that there is NO DIFFERENACE between.them or any other ones it is inevitible aka just like the borg on star track says "the future is inevitable.." lemme say a story to ilustrate i use to be in school not nemore b/c of my asthma but thats another thing neways this one guy in school knowed i liked this girl an he didant want me to be in a situation where she also like/knew about me.. so about that i cant rally say its wrong becuz ppl are always gonna be playing with u just messin with ur thoughts, etc, ur feelings and what not but i decide just liek i said in the begining "ok what it is it that im trying to acomplish? vs WHAT U WANT TO BE (important)" and i decided i must figh this guy at the scool of course i was not messin around wit him he started with me after all by trying to get in a ways of it so i went to their face and i ask him nicely he gave me attitude soooo i think u know what comes next! hehe aight j/k i will spare some of thedetails (wana keep this post rated pg LOL) but basicaly we fought eachotehr and i prety much lost (he was biggar than me) but i later told that girl about it i said i did it for you babe and she said that i was really hot and cute and she had acrush on me but that she was too old for me but otherwise she would have totally gone out with me plus she had something to do so i was liek aight dun wanna get in ur way ....aaanyway that proves he point u have to think rlly hard about not jus what u think but what you do an i think u kids posting this thing about conan is an example, video game.

[schild]

Is he dead yet? Tell me he's dead. She? Whatever. Just die.

[Signe]

I couldn't wrap my head around the bit where he said "I use to be in school".  I find that concept unpossible.

[Der Helm]

Is that one of the moderators ?

[schild]

Hahahahahaha ziiiiiiiiing.

[Hawkbit]

Just another piece of the puzzle in how FC's going to screw this up. 

The thread Schild posted in should not have been closed.  It wasn't about a specific instance of moderation, but across the whole topic.  It really should have been left open for discussion. 

Maybe that Tardweasel guy over there is a volunteer mod, showing their true colors already. 

[Signe]

I don't think it's closed anymore.  I think it's deleted. 

If I were the AoC Official Forums, I'd kill myself.  And I'd take the mods with me.

Oh, it's not deleted.  It just gives me a "not found" message sometimes.  Sheesh.  Sort yourselves out, Funcom!

[Furiously]

You know - I was reading the hellgate forums a few weeks ago, and there was a topic on "Why are the Asia servers still running version .7 when we are at 1.3?"

They closed the thread with the comment, "This is not relevant to the US and EU servers so we are closing this thread."

Monkeys everywhere are allowed at keyboards. Just fucking answer the question, or say, "Hey, our lawyers won't let us comment."

I see bad things for AOC and free moderators given how...popular the game is looking to be.

[Sir T]

Volunteer monitors, bad press releases and customer service, idiot official forums and arbitrary deletions and locking...

These people remind me of CCP more and more 

[Merusk]

So is it that the EU hasn't had their version of the AOL 'volunteer' lawsuit, that there's laws protecting the companies from such lawsuits there, or that the volunteers will well and truly be volunteers able to login and moderate whenever they feel like it and not on a schedule that's allowing Funcom to go down this route?

[tmp]

Is that one of the moderators ?

It's a goon from what i could gather. I'm guessing he already got his SA forums access revoked at this point.

(that said, goons as volunteer moderators...  )

[stu]

You'll pay for the whole seat but only need the edge.

I lol'd

Is that one of the moderators ?

I found a vid of his job interview: NSFW: Language & Drug Use

Really, though, it's a shame Funcom spent five years making this game and then shorted themselves and gamers with a lack of sunshine and communication.

[Kirth]

Hey if you want to be a mod for those fourms....

Funcom is looking for additional volunteer forum moderators for our official Age of Conan English forums. The details are as follows:

Recruitment

Do you want to help build and ensure the well being of the Age of Conan community?

The Funcom Volunteer Forum Moderation Program is looking for individuals with excellent communication skills who are active in the Age of Conan community. These individuals would be entrusted with the moderation and well being of the Age of Conan community.

If you are interested in volunteering your time to joining the Funcom Volunteer Forum Moderation Program as a moderator. Then please read the information below on the requirements and send in your application via Private Message to The Voice of Crom.


Requirements

An applicant for a moderator position on a Funcom forum has to meet the following requirements:

    * Good English Skills (no matter what language the preferred forum will be)
    * Good skills in the preferred forum’s language (English, German, French, Spanish…)
    * Active member on a Funcom forum for at least 2 months
    * Active player of the game (where applicable)
    * No infractions in any of the Funcom forums
    * Some experience in moderating forums
    * Organization skills


Application

Please include “Volunteer Forum Moderation – Application” as the subject of your message. All other subject lines will be void and will be discarded.

Copy and paste the information below as the body of your message. Then please fill out the application and submit it to forum user King Moderator.

Quote:

----------------BEGIN-VOLUNTEER-APPLICATION----------------

Game: Which game forum would you like to moderate?
Language: Which languages do you speak and want to moderate in?

Name: Your real name.
Forum Handle: Your name on the Funcom forum you want to help moderate.
Age: Your date of birth.
Country of origin: Where you live and which time zone.
Online hours: The hours you tend to be around on the forums.

Past experiences:
Have you had any training on specific experience with moderation or community work in the past?

Additional comments:
If there were anything else you would like us to know about you that we didn’t cover in the other paragraphs.



-----------------END-VOLUNTEER-APPLICATION-----------------

Contacts

If you have any questions about the program then please contact us by sending a private message to King Moderator

[schild]

Volunteers suck. If they paid me, I would go through there with a wrecking ball, gut it and turn it into the best forum on the planet.

[Lt.Dan]

WHAT U WANT TO BE (important)

I lol'd in the wrong thread.

[shiznitz]

Funcom hire Themis pronto! That Savant guy is a genius.

What?

[bhodikhan]

Volunteers suck. If they paid me, I would go through there with a wrecking ball, gut it and turn it into the best forum on the planet.

So what's stopping you here? 

[tazelbain]

Signe. 

[Signe]

What?

[sam, an eggplant]

Volunteers suck. If they paid me, I would go through there with a wrecking ball, gut it and turn it into the best forum on the planet.

So what you're saying is you want a job as a community rep?

Well shit, if Tweety could do it...

[Lum]

Well shit, if Tweety could do it...

Yes, clearly, she had no prior experience or job skills at all, and did a horrible job that anyone could have done better. Like, say, you.

I was very confused when I thought schild was the OP and followed the "bearforce1" video link in his sig. That was... not very right at all.   

[Lantyssa]

I was very confused when I thought schild was the OP and followed the "bearforce1" video link in his sig. That was... not very right at all.   

I hurt myself laughing.

[Soukyan]

IIRC, AO had a volunteer program in-game called ARK (Advisors of Rubi-Ka). They were not GMs or moderators per se, but they were there to serve as a sort of "tour guide" to new players should they need assistance in-game or have questions.

I realize this is not the same as a forum moderator, but it seemed to work well in that volunteer situation. Asking people to volunteer for a position that requires making judgment calls based upon dubious guidelines while also juggling moral and ethical frames is probably a bad idea, BUT I ask you, how many forums on the Internet have good signal to noise? I tend to avoid official game forums so I cannot speak from experience, but from the times I have taken a peek, I see that WoW forums, VNBoards (where DAoC had the "official" forums - thank goodness for Palomides.net), FoH forums all seemed to be cess pools with tons of noise and very little useful information. But that could just be me.

The point is that AoC boards are full of spit and vitriol for varying reasons - PvP trash talk, complaints, etc. My guess (as I am not playing the game although I wish I could) is that there are a lot of bugs and issues right now and people are clamoring to get answers, give feedback, complain and scream and the volunteers just are not equipped to deal with that because they probably aren't allowed to come right out and say, "Yes, FunCom realizes that system is broken and wants you to hang around for a while until they fix it. Have a nice day."