Staff Project: Helper Re-work!

[Ryan]

Hello everyone,

As the title suggests, we're currently looking at re-vamping the helper rank to make it, well.. for the lack of a better phrase 'more useful'. Let's be honest, as it stands now the rank isn't much. Many many many years ago it was stripped down to the bare minimum and essentially given no requirement to have, hold or get other then not being a total ass. Yes, I know. It's almost a crime it's taken this long to do, but here we are.

So. We're going to be looking at making some changes to implement, in order to make things a little easier for everyone. Basically, what we will do, is have a discussion thread (This one here), after which we will gather all the half decent ideas together and poll them. Of course they will require approval from the big reds, but this at least gives us something to start with. So please, feel free to post suggestions for what the rank should involve, the requirements to obtain the rank and the requirements to keep the rank.

As it stands now, the rank has;
Access to ::helpyell (::hy)
Access to the ::next command
A cool icon and a forum colour.
And absolutely no requirements to hold the rank. Which is pretty obvious, based on the activity of the older helpers, which was essentially 0.

So, the staff team have already collected a few different ideas which I will post here for everyone to look at;
A new ::xteleto command that has restrictions in order for it not to be abused. (It won't be the same as a normal mods ::xteleto command)
A better yell timer, similar to that of a staff member, which will make it easier to help out on yell if needed.
Helpers will be shown on the ::staff list.
::Next command, absolutely needs to be sorted out
A new help center, which will have its own teleport command. It will be very similar to the help center in the past.
Potentially giving the helpers a small XP buff, as a sort of reward for the work they will be doing.

Any new ideas, or discussions on the ideas above are more then welcome.

Thanks,

Ryan.

[Empty]

I don't really like the idea of helpers not having a yell timer personally.
Reasoning for this is that it'd allow similiar yelltimer abuse as some of the mods have done in the past/still continue to do to this day.
And with questions on yell most of the times the whole active (non-afk) community gathers the correct information on yell even if the initial "helper" can not fit the whole thing in one yell.

But what I would like to see is that helpers get instantly promoted to sergeants (3 bananas) to allow them to kick some abusive/harassing players from the help channel, even for half an hour.
This happens more often than it should and then at a later date those players will be spoken to by moderators and not even receive a warning for their criminal offenses...

Also from what I remember from my days as helper we did NOT have access to ::next command, I might be wrong on that one or it might have been fixed after my time, unsure of that still.
But what I do remember is staff asking on ::Hy:
"Did you handle this help request from x"
Which indicates that we could not close the already handled help requests and that caused some inconvenience.

The xp-boost is also very weird to me as helpers tend to not use up the same amount of time as moderators to help those in need,
maximum duration of a complete help request up to date is probably 30 seconds, as it's usually just a question of "how do I get to lava dragons"
And the answer from helpers being "::wiki is your answer to everything". Very sad but also very true.

What also should be changed in the same rework is that in a perfect world nobody I.E staff, helpers need to see who enters the skilling center through the yellow portal at the starter tent as that can be abused easily and it gets very spammy and irritating at times.

Thats it for now.
Thank you for reading......

Yours truly.
Antonio!!!!!

[Fungamer]

I don't really like the idea of helpers not having a yell timer personally.
Reasoning for this is that it'd allow similiar yelltimer abuse as some of the mods have done in the past/still continue to do to this day.
And with questions on yell most of the times the whole active (non-afk) community gathers the correct information on yell even if the initial "helper" can not fit the whole thing in one yell.

A reduced/better yell timer is not a timer of 0. As it stands, any player can literally buy or donate his way into having a lower yell timer than a helper by getting a honor account. Also, if yell timer abuse happened and still happens by mods, Ryan would love to hear about it. IMO we should stop being afraid to add stuff that could be abused and be more concerned with promoting those who wont abuse it.

But what I would like to see is that helpers get instantly promoted to sergeants (3 bananas) to allow them to kick some abusive/harassing players from the help channel, even for half an hour.
This happens more often than it should and then at a later date those players will be spoken to by moderators and not even receive a warning for their criminal offenses...

Support, helpers should be allowed to kick people out of pkh cc. Also its such a buggy mess rn so that should be looked at as well.

The xp-boost is also very weird to me as helpers tend to not use up the same amount of time as moderators to help those in need,
maximum duration of a complete help request up to date is probably 30 seconds, as it's usually just a question of "how do I get to lava dragons"
And the answer from helpers being "::wiki is your answer to everything". Very sad but also very true.

Perhaps these cop-out answers are exactly because the rank doesn't mean anything anymore. The wiki is a huge convenience, but if this really is a big issue, there's a simple solution to it: Don't promote people to helper if they only provide "lazy help".

What also should be changed in the same rework is that in a perfect world nobody I.E staff, helpers need to see who enters the skilling center through the yellow portal at the starter tent as that can be abused easily and it gets very spammy and irritating at times.

Great idea.

[Raj]

What also should be changed in the same rework is that in a perfect world nobody I.E staff, helpers need to see who enters the skilling center through the yellow portal at the starter tent as that can be abused easily and it gets very spammy and irritating at times.

Great idea.

This was already modified at some point to only show that message for accounts which are new

[The underdog]

Imagine spamming the ::skilling portal with account names for staff to appreciate, couldn't be me.

Anyways,
Kick from help cc would be nice.
No separate helpcenter please.

Can't we just make a rank specifically for Juntow instead of adjusting helper rank?

[Big boy iron]

Ability to have basic access to behind the scenes forums work for helping with the following:

more behinds the scenes access on the forums, to help administrators and moderators with things like verifying an email linked to an account,to help speed up issues with lost account recovery, weather people forget names/ passwords anything, if a server support can see a email linked to an account, essentially they can verify the person making a recovery or having any basic account issue is the authentic owner and then can direct ping admins for them to reset whatever needs to be reset once they see the simple stuffs been verified, to speed up the process of recovery of names, passwords or pins.

ability to remove responses on the forums posts if theirs excessive vulgarity or anything deemed as spam.

if pkhonor does not have the following, perhaps a ticket system linked to server supports, a ::ticket command ingame for emergency a player can use, and it ping a server support, for them to deal with that emergency.



as for ingame: theirs not much you can add, i like the idea of the xtele to, in a slightly more confined system, and shortened yells, specifically for support/maintaining yell integratory

all i can really think about would be a ::ticket command, that would alert a support member online someone's made a emergency ticket.

[Juntow]

Yooooo this is fire!

As it currently stands the helper rank could definitely do with some changes, although these changes may not sit well with the entire community as of right now, i do however see us slowly adjusting to them in the near future... with a few minor twinks of course.

I do like the idea of a ::xteleto option being re-implented onto the helpers much needed upgrade of an arsenal. I can't begin to explain the amount of times I had to run to point A, B or C just in order to help a player out who got lost on their way through either The Abyss, Catacombs or wherever else it may be, so yes a xteleto feature would definitely be nice, but with limited restrictions of course.

A lessend yell timer similar to what the current staff team now has is something I see not being too useful as it doesn't really fit the agenda of "helping people", i instead see it as more of a luxury, especially seeing as how we have numerous of other ways players can reach out in order to get assistance, but even so it doesn't mean that im fully against it.. matter fact I'm willing to give this my partial support just to see how it goes.

The ability to kick/timeout players from Help cc could definitely come in useful especially during times when neither moderators nor admins are present and we're met with a spammer or some minor dispute between players in the cc that could easily be resolved with a timeout despite numerous of warnings.

I do want to say though... if this revamp does passes through and the helper rank is able to see a brighter light of day that it once saw back in its prime, then I would love it if the players who are deciding to go for this rank to keep in mind (This also applies to me) these changes would be nice to have but dont let it be the sole reason you go for the rank, but instead let your reason be one of serving a purpose in the community, because at the end of the day its not about what you can gain by having the rank, but more so what you can do by having it, don't let it define who you are.

[Iron vok]

Fixing the kicking from Help CC is a whole can of worms that needs to be sorted out anyways. Currently, the only way to get someone out of help cc is a full blown mute of the acc. I'd love to see this fixed.

Yell timer should not be lessened, but allowing 2 yells within the same time-span. Most questions can be answered in full with 2 lines of ::yell. Anything deeper should be from PM's.

Help request ::next definitely still works. It's just that nobody uses that function aside from muted players that want to talk shit to staff members.

PMs should be closer to moderator PMs where the player's private doesn't need to be 'on' to receive a message from helpers (i know i know... see the next one)

Helpers should have to go thru more of a trial and not be handed out to just 'helpful' players, but they should also be trustworthy players.

Require a minimal ::timeplayed, with access to a helper LOA thread on forums. Be more lenient on it. "I don't feel like playing for a few weeks" is much better than someone who just fucks off for 6 months and returns still being a helper.

::xteleto command is essential to be able to fully help some times. Seeing what the player asking for help is doing, is important to fully help them figure out what the problem is.

To combat helpers being dickheads, log helper commands separately and have a 'helper manager' (mod? senior mod? juntow ?) review them weekly. Or at least have access if someone posts a ::report of a helper abusing their powers.

Exp boost isn't essential. And seeing as less would be required from helpers, less than what mods get is negligible. The neat icon has been enough for most helpers.

Helpers being shown in ::staff would be really nice, as most players know the command ::staff even if they've never been on pkhonor before. Easier access to pm them helps immensely.

A help zone would likely never be used if helpers had access to some form of ::tele

Helpers should not have any access to account information, or any form of logs. There should, however, be an easily accessed post of important ::threads that Dj and Jayden have accumulated, for the automated recovery of accounts, and other copy-pasta replies that the Admins currently use.

Just my thoughts on this.

[Jumping bug]

So, the staff team have already collected a few different ideas which I will post here for everyone to look at;
A new ::xteleto command that has restrictions in order for it not to be abused. (It won't be the same as a normal mods ::xteleto command)
A better yell timer, similar to that of a staff member, which will make it easier to help out on yell if needed.
Helpers will be shown on the ::staff list.
::Next command, absolutely needs to be sorted out
A new help center, which will have its own teleport command. It will be very similar to the help center in the past.
Potentially giving the helpers a small XP buff, as a sort of reward for the work they will be doing.

- What sort of restrictions would they have with ::xteleto?

- 100% they should have a improved yell timer or better yet as Vok suggested, a timer per 2 yells seems more fitting.

- 100% They should be on the ::Staff list

- I honestly greatly miss the helpcenters of Pkhonors past. Bringing one of them back or even a new ::helpcenter location would be really neat. I would suggest having some sort of passtime there though. I remember a lot of people eager to help would sit at the ::Helpcenters to wait for new players to come asking for help, including myself when I became bored. The Pkhonor help cc is fantastic when it comes to receiving a quick answer for help but sometimes when you get really frustrated or need help with something a little more complex or difficult, its nice to have a face to face in-game with someone who can explain something to you.

One thing I felt that would have made the ::Helpcenter of the past better was some sort of passtime while you were waiting for someone to come asking for help. So if a ::helpcenter is reintroduced, I would suggest adding a npc or npc's there or some sort of thing players can engage in while they wait.

I'm not sure if a "leaderboard" is a word I like in this suggestion but that's essentially what I'm suggesting. I think it might be neat to have a accessible list of who's been at the ::helpcenter the most and how long. I also suggest making this area a non-afkable area. Meaning the time spent there won't count once you go afk, just automatically log people out once they are afk, or auto tele people home if they go afk. It would be helpful to see which players are actively engaged in helping players and how much time they've spent into it. This may also help make finding the right people fit for being helper a lot easier.

- 100% agree to the xp buff for helpers. If they're spending their time on pkh helping others, they deserve extra xp to make up for the time they missed out on.

- I do think that helpers login activity should be considered like it is for staff members but not as much because they have less duties than staff members.

-If a player does ::Help and no staff members or helpers are online, I feel like it would be helpful if an alert went to discord. Plenty of people still access discord when they aren't online and can easily hop on if they see somebody is in need of help.

But what I would like to see is that helpers get instantly promoted to sergeants (3 bananas) to allow them to kick some abusive/harassing players from the help channel, even for half an hour.
This happens more often than it should and then at a later date those players will be spoken to by moderators and not even receive a warning for their criminal offenses...

100% Agree.

[Iron vok]

more behinds the scenes access on the forums, to help administrators and moderators with things like verifying an email linked to an account,to help speed up issues with lost account recovery, weather people forget names/ passwords anything, if a server support can see a email linked to an account, essentially they can verify the person making a recovery or having any basic account issue is the authentic owner and then can direct ping admins for them to reset whatever needs to be reset once they see the simple stuffs been verified, to speed up the process of recovery of names, passwords or pins.

This should never happen, and thankfully it never will. The rest of the post, however, decent idea. Help ticket system linked back to discord would be a nice touch for all staff. As long as it's hard to abuse.

There's a reason mods don't have access to personal information regarding account details. No one needs it aside from the recovery admin.