Staffing Guidelines
Staff Rules
0. Training
It is important that new staff go through the rules with someone in training, rather than having someone read the rules alone; that way if they don’t understand something that is part of the rules questions can be answered regarding misunderstandings. (doing so removes the need for precedents because staff should know how to apply the rules to different scenarios).
There are two kinds of training a new staff member receives: event, and moderation. Event training is given to eventmins or moderators that wish to learn how to run, and run, events.
0.1 Moderation Training
Moderation training is fulfilled by a Head Admin (Headmin). Headmins are expected to teach potential moderators:
- How to use common staffing verbs, such as, but not limited to: Aghost, Jump-To-Area, View-Variables, Create-Command-Report, Spawn-Panel, Player-Panel, etc.
- Where to find the rules, interpretations of rules, Headmin rulings, etc., including asking the potential moderator to read and understand the rules in full themself.
- How to conduct themselves to fellow staff members, including maintaining positive relationships, refraining from holding grudges, harassing, consistently slighting, etc., fellow staff members
- How to conduct themselves in-game and reflect the staff team. This usually involves being respectful, refraining from forming negative relationships, and following the rules that they will hope to uphold.
- How to conduct themselves on the discord, through following the discord rules and maintaining positive relationships with staff and community members.
- How to conduct themselves within tickets, through clearly explaining problems and solutions to players, and clearly explaining punishment(s) and appeal time(s), etc.
- How to handle the misconduct of another staff member, through reporting it to a Headmin or a staff member one rank above the staff member who committed an infraction
- It is also expected that Headmin provide information regarding hierarchy, staff punishment, appeal times, ban types, holistic punishment, etc.
0.2 Event Training
Event training is fulfilled by a Head Event Admin (Head Eventmin) or by a Head Admin (Headmin) in their interim. Head Eventmins are expected to teach potential eventmins:
- How to use common eventing verbs, such as, but not limited to: Spawn, Spawn-Panel, Storyteller-Panel, Dynamic-Panel, Create-Command-Report, Create/Launch-Supplypod, Trigger-Event, Set-Security-Level, etc.
- Where to find the rules, interpretations of rules, Headmin rulings, etc., including asking the potential Eventmin to read and understand the rules in full themself.
- How to conduct themselves to fellow staff members, including maintaining positive relationships, refraining from holding grudges, harassing, consistently slighting, etc., fellow staff members
- How to conduct themselves in-game and reflect the staff team. This usually involves being respectful, refraining from forming negative relationships, and following the rules that they will hope to uphold.
- How to conduct themselves on the discord, through following the discord rules and maintaining positive relationships with staff and community members.
- It is also expected that Head Eventmin provide information regarding hierarchy, staff punishment, appeal times, ban types, holistic punishment, etc.
1. Responsibility & Power
As staff, the consequences of your actions fall completely upon you, and you alone; you will be held accountable for whatever consequences arise due to your actions. Examples of this are: handing out antagonistic roles, spawning in hazardous creatures or entities (such as xenomorphs or vines), leaving an event that you started, etc.
Although these things can or can not necessarily incur in breaking this rule depending on context, if they cause problems, you will be blamed for them, and suffer the appropriate consequences. Adminbus is only fun if other people are having fun. Staff are expected to act as game masters and refrain from doing things solely for their own enjoyment. Please make sure to coordinate any actions you make that could affect the round with the rest of staff. It helps to avoid problems and take care of them if they happen.
1.1 Power use
- You may not, under any circumstances, var-edit (variable edit via View-Variables) items for yourself or others in-round in a way that would provide an advantage (including quality-of-life) to you or others, unless such is in response to a ticket where you, yourself are uninvolved, and the var-edit does not circumvent intentional game design, the server rules, or the fun and enjoyment of other players.
- You may not, without special permission, spawn significantly round-impacting antagonists (heretic, wizard, or any antagonists currently not in rotation);
- You must not remain adminned (and must de-admin/deadmin) while you are playing in-round as a member of Command, Security, or as an Antagonist. If you are the only available moderator, this rule may be circumvented.
- You must avoid misrepresenting information or input on the punishment of other players where bias is evident. If you dislike a player, you are expected to avoid contact with them from a moderation standpoint.
- You must avoid handling the tickets of players you dislike or like. Consistent deviation in punishment toward specific players is grounds for administrative action.
- You must not, under any circumstance, handle, or attempt to handle, a ticket that involves yourself. Regardless of if the ticket is not warranting punishment, it is strictly forbidden to take tickets that are:
- Regarding yourself;
- Regarding a situation you were personally involved in;
- Regarding a person (or persons) that you have interacted with significantly through the course of the round.
- The above is not exhaustive, and staff members are expected to use due diligence when handling tickets. If you believe you could be involved, there is almost no circumstance where you should neglect to hand the ticket to another staff member.
1.2 Duties of Care
- You must report issues of Server Safety to the wider staff team.
- You must ensure you respect the Server Safety rules.
- You must ensure that you handle sensitive situations with care, and avoid causing unnecessary stress or harm to both staff and players
- You must ensure that sensitive and private information remains confidential; this includes all staff conversations, and all messages or media posted in staff channels.
2. Respect
As a member of staff, you are expected to be respectful. You are expected to speak respectfully when discussing important matters, you are expected to respect the words and decisions of other staff members, and you are expected to act in respect to your own rank and role. As a part of the staff team, we are all expected to be able to speak cordially with one another, regardless of the circumstances; arguing, fighting, acting snide, aggressive, malicious, or otherwise speaking maliciously when interacting with other members of staff is grounds for administrative action.
However, converse opinions, and debates are welcome. SPLURT prides itself in having a varied staff team with varied opinions, and small disagreements are encouraged. Staff members are permitted to present opposing opinions, alternative explanations, etc., regardless of the circumstances.
2.1 Administrative Conduct
- You must not defame, bully, harass, or libel players, either privately or publically, through any medium.
- You must not shame players regarding their preferences or server playtime.
- You must ensure that you provide players appropriate information, whether this regard punishment, appeal procedures, or general help queries. Laziness is not an excuse to fail to perform your duties.
- You must avoid 'dog-piling' in staff channels. Dog-piling is when multiple people 'dog' (talk negatively of) a single person, even if all the involved persons are not necessarily fully-informed.
- Avoid personally insulting players in staff channels. This avoids tension if they become a staff member in the future, and reflects better on you as a person.
- Avoid using your administrative tools to seek out and then use information that, while 'harmless', may be considered sensitive. For example, ERP logs of a player.
- Avoid discussing sensitive information found through your access to logs unless necessary.
3. Civility
As a member of staff, you are expected to behave accordingly, both in and out of tickets! This should be needless to say, however, handling tickets carelessly, in any way, completely violates this rule; For example speaking rudely to ahelpers/players, ignoring or otherwise leaving tickets unanswered, acting dismissively towards ahelpers'/players’ issues, or otherwise disrespecting the very players we are meant to serve all violate this rule. If you do not wish to handle tickets, you must de-admin yourself.
This rule also covers your attitude towards the community as a whole, along with individual players; incessantly insulting the playerbase, the community, specific players, etcetera, thusly violates this rule. As a staff member, we expect you to have interest in your duties, and look for the best for our station, since you represent us as a whole when you’re either on station or in our discord.
- SPLURT does not moderate the interpersonal relationships of staff members, unless this would constitute a violation of Server Safety rules.
3.1 Malice
- You must not increase a punishment in response to a player making a complaint, contest of punishment, or for discussing their punishment.
- You must not bait a player into breaking the rules, including through IC actions.
- You must not unduly discuss the punishments of other players, especially if said punishment is not public
4. Maintenance & Activity
SPLURT is a community dedicated to erotic roleplay, and staff members are expected to help maintain an ideal roleplay environment. This means you should refrain from actively disrupt the round and its environment through your intervention. Try and keep your interventions within our roleplay standards and the general mood of the round. Generally, be a game master, and make it less-than-obvious you are interfering with the round.
Each round is different and its environment and mood can vary, especially with different storytellers and for planned events, but it is important to avoid the round to have a sudden change of pace that disrupts its natural flow.
Additionally, staff members are expected to be present and active to perform their duties. This ensures that there is no loose power laying around.
4.1 Intervention
- Avoid spawning antagonists that are unable to spawn on the current storyteller, especially as non-event staff.
- Avoid triggering events that make the round needlessly unfun or unfair for players, such as a supermatter surge early into the round.
- TBD
4.2 Activity
- Staff members should ensure that they remain active while not on leave.
- A member of staff can be considered inactive if they do not log onto the SPLURT game server at least once within the last 30 days.
- Inactivity is grounds for demotion or removal.
- Staff members are expected to be active on the discord server, including taking discord and age verification tickets.
- Special circumstances may change the above. You are advised to speak to your head (Headmin, or Head Eventmin) if you have any queries about your activity.
5. Integrity
As a member of staff, you are expected to maintain the privacy and safety of all community members, and the community itself. Which is to say, you are expected to keep all information you discover as a staff member private, regardless of the circumstances. For example, sharing other players' Ckeys, notes, personal information, etcetera, is utterly against this rule; as is sharing the details of any tickets, contents of staff channels, etcetera, you might come across, in OR outside the server and discord. You may come across agevetting situations, you are REQUIRED to keep personal information about users to the utmost respect deserved, violation of which WILL see you punished by staffers and Discord TOS for privacy violation.
Likewise, you should not perform any actions that could endanger our community (Server Safety violations). Examples of such actions are violating Discord or Byond’s terms of service, inciting drama or competition between servers, knowingly allowing underage players into the community, etc.
5.1 Accountability & Transparency
- SPLURT has made moves to become more transparent. This includes revealing bans to the public (redacted for privacy) and revealing staff guidelines (this page) to the public.
- You must not misrepresent the truth, deceive, or lie to other staff members, especially with malicious intent and where the situation regards the punishment of another person (player or staff).
- This includes taking appropriate accountability for actions you, yourself are responsible for.
- This includes not attempting to displace blame onto other players or staff.
- You must hold other staff members accountable for their actions. Intentionally failing to report the misconduct of another staff member can lead to you being accountable for the same offense, at the same severity.
- You must not form cliques with fellow staff members or players, where you discuss sensitive information (defined prior) or discuss fellow staff members or players; or where you plot against, construe misdeeds of, or otherwise target or discuss fellow staff members or players. Put simply, don't be a bad actor.
- You must not lie or withhold the punishments of members of staff unless an Administrator or above has agreed to keep the punishment private.
- This chiefly applies to staff complaints. Punishments do not need to be publicized, only disclosed to the complainant.
6. Enforcement
Your duty as a member of staff is to ensure the following of our server’s rules and standards. It’s important that you have a good understanding of our rules made for players to follow, so in case you have any questions about any of our rules, it is your responsibility to ask the rest of staff before enacting the rules. This rule covers staff responsibilities such as applying proper punishments for rule breaks, properly handling tickets related to rulebreaks, acting on any situations you notice break the rules, etc.
We do not aim to be always surveilling everyone’s actions in the server, and we typically wait for smaller issues to be adminhelped, even if we notice something. Unless something is a repeat behavior, it can be good moderation to let players roleplay in the fashion they wish to do so. Essentially, if it’s not broken, don’t fix it.
However, it is still your responsibility to act upon situations that diminish our server’s enjoyment and experience. Any situations that are visibly wrong and causing notable issues should be handled by staff. This does not extend to inconveniences or minor issues experienced by players, which while you may assist with, can also be marked as IC issues.
6.1 Application of Rules & Enforcement
- You are expected to know the rules that you are enforcing. This does not necessarily imply that we expect every staff member to know every nuance, but it does state that if you are punishing a player, you must know and be able to cite the rule you are using to do so. Failure to do this can result in nullification and/or administrative action.
- You are allowed and expected to use your professional judgement, especially if you rise above the rank of Game Moderator. If rules are vague, you should apply them in a manner that is most intuitive to you and the wider staff team.
- You should additionally seek to remedy gaps or ambiguity within the rules by informing the wider staff team or the person(s) responsible for amending the rule(s) in question.
7. Consequences
The consequences for breaking staff rules, and other forms of guidelines, vary greatly depending on the severity of the offense; furthermore, the punishment to be given is ultimately decided by the responsible head (Headmin, or Head Eventmin).
Whilst they may choose to include other staff members in the process, this is not necessary. The current punishment system in place is the black mark system, explained in the black mark document.
Staff Hierarchy
The current staff hierarchy is as follows:
Staff Complaints & Appealing
A staff complaint is different from an adminhelp about a player who also happens to be a staff member. All members of staff can be noted or banned in accordance to the rules. A staff complaint refers solely to a complaint on the conduct, behavior, actions, or acumen of a staff member.
1. Complaint Handling
Staff complaints are distinct from a contested punishment. A player must make any complaint clear by stating that they are making a complaint against a staff member (or staff members) and must specify who in particular.
Complaints against a Game Moderator or Trial Game Moderator may be handled by an Administrator.
Complaints against Eventmins or Trial Eventmins may be handled by the Head Eventmin.
Complaints against Administrators or the Head Eventmin may be handled by a Head Admin.
Complaints against Maintainers should be raised to Mosley.
Complaints against Head Admins must be brought to another Head Admin. If there is a simultaneous complaint against both Head Admins, then the complaint must be brought to Mosley.
Complaints against Mosley should be made to the general staff team.
2. Complaint Process
When a complaint is made, a complainant should be encouraged to provide their complaint in full. The involved staff member may only do two things at this stage:
- Ping a person who may handle the complaint (see above);
- Ask the complainer to state their complaint.
It is forbidden to begin to argue or debate the complaint without acknowledgement that the complaint is being handled by a person able to handle the complaint.
When an appropriate person acknowledges the complaint, they must:
- Ask the involved staff member for their side of things;
- Compare this with the complainant's account;
- Consider whether the complaint is valid by assessing our above staff rules and, if yes, continue to step 4. If no, skip to step 6.
- Assess the impact and intent behind the staff member's actions;
- Decide an appropriate punishment for the staff member and apply the punishment, convening with other persons of the same rank if necessary;
- Reveal the outcome of the complaint and how this outcome was achieved to the complainant before closing the ticket.
Appropriate outcomes to a staff complaint involve:
- No action. The staff member either hasn't done anything wrong or is receiving a verbal warning.
- Black marks. The staff member is issued warnings through the black mark system.
- Demotion. The staff member is found to have committed grave misconduct and is demoted.
- Dismissal. The staff member is found to have committed gross misconduct and is immediately dismissed.
3. Punishment Contestation
Any note or ban may be appealed. Verbal warnings that did not result in an admin remark may not be appealed.
Players have a right to appeal the:
- Severity of a note;
- Length of a ban;
- Severity of a punishment (note vs. ban);
- Removal of Permissions (mentorship);
- and The grounds of punishment (whether a punishment should have been issued at all).
If a player is contesting a punishment or ban, they should do so before their ban or note expires, or within 30 days (whichever comes first).
The staff member who issued a punishment is the first person to handle a contest of punishment. They should re-review the situation, their reasons for punishment, input from other staff (if any), the actions of the player, and any other relevant information. They should then review the player's grounds for contesting the punishment before deciding to either stay (deny) or grant (accept) the contest.
A granted contest of punishment leads to:
- The note or ban being removed entirely;
- The severity of the note being lowered;
- The ban being exchanged for a note;
- The length or type of the ban being lowered;
- or The permissions taken being reinstated.
A stayed contest of punishment leads to:
- No further action.
4. Appeals Process
Players and staff members have the right to appeal any decisions made by a member of staff. SPLURT uses a linear, vertical appeal system. Appeals follow a simple process:
- You may appeal to one member of staff above the rank of the staff member who took the appealed action.
- If you are unhappy with the decision of the person who you appealed to the second time, you may repeat the first step.
- Appeals may only be made to one member of staff per rank (Game Moderator, Administrator, Head Admin).
- An appeal cannot mention a staff member by name, and the rank role must be pinged. For example, instead of pinging @toastewoofs for a complaint, you must ping @Administrator.
This means that if you appeal the decision of a Trial Game Moderator, you may appeal a total of four times (including the original appeal to the initial member of staff) before a final decision is made.
- You may not appeal to another member of staff of the same rank at any stage of appeal
- You may not attempt to appeal to a specific member of staff
- If you are appealing a decision made by a Head Admin, you have one mode of appeal to the second presiding Head Admin.
- Mosley is not involved in the appeals process.
