Goonhub
It’s been a while since the last town hall, so the admin team has decided to host one on May 21st, 8pm UTC (4pm EST). We plan to run for about 5 hours with a 30 minute break in the middle so we can get some snacks and whatnot.
The Town Hall will essentially be a ‘public Q&A’ of sorts. We’ll create a channel on our Discord and answer questions posted to this forum thread, with room for follow-up questions if the person who asked the questions wants to do so. Afterwards, we’ll put the channel in the public Discord archive and share our answers to the questions in this forum thread. This will all be publicly viewable.
Further details are listed below. We’ve had a couple town halls before, but this time around, we’re doing things a little differently, so read closely.
Before the Town Hall/Question Guidelines
If you want to ask us a question for the town hall, put it in this forum thread. Unlike previous town halls, we will not have a Discord channel for asking questions. We want to have a reasonable expectation of how many questions we’re going to be answering so we know how much time we can give to each one and make sure we have time to prepare for any of the more “difficult” questions.
Please ask a maximum of 2 questions. Questions can be about pretty much anything related to the game, admin team, or community. Development direction, miscellaneous admin stuff, sprites, rules, game mechanics—whatever.
While there’s no hard rules with respect to questions, here’s some pointers-
You should also mention whether you plan on attending the town hall live, and post your Discord handle if so— we want to make sure you can ask follow-up questions if you want, without wasting time if you don’t plan to. “Maybe” is fine here.
This thread will be locked 48 hours before the town hall starts so we have some time to prepare and don’t get flooded with new questions minutes before the town hall starts.
Please do not make off-topic posts or start arguments—these posts will be deleted.
During the Town Hall
As previously stated, when town hall starts, we’ll create a brand new text channel for it; we’re not gonna hijack #ss13-discussion or a voice channel or anything like that. Everyone can view it, but only admins and people given time for follow-ups can type in it. You’re welcome to discuss the town hall in other channels.
Not every single admin is going to be around for the entire town hall, since we’re spread out across a variety of time zones, but we’ll try to make it if we can. Some admins will still be around moderating the servers and answering ahelps.
In previous years, we answered questions in the order they were asked, but this time around, we may do something different. We currently plan to answer more important questions first and group questions by topic, but the specifics will vary.
Questions will be pinned in the order they’re answered for bookkeeping, and to allow people to jump to questions. This will stop if we run out of pin space; regardless, all the questions and a summary of answers will be posted on the forums after the town hall concludes.
During the town hall, we may start with pre-written responses; we’ll also add to these, and respond to follow-up questions should there be any.
The way that follow-ups work is this:
When we get to your question, we assign you the “Talking Stick” Discord role. This allows you to talk in the town hall channel.
You can then take some time to ask follow-up questions which we’ll answer live. Exact time will vary depending on question volume, but 5 minutes is a fine estimate.
Please keep follow-up questions concise- it’s fine to ask mostly unrelated questions as long as they’re fairly simple. Dumping 2 paragraphs on us during follow-up time will create…. issues.
After the Town Hall
Once town hall is wrapped up, we’ll archive the channel and put it in the public-viewable Discord archive. You might want to stick around; there are often some informal after-parties.
Some time after the town hall, we’ll put a general summary of the town hall questions and answers in this forum thread. It will still be locked—if you’d like to discuss any answers on the forums, feel free to make a separate thread.
See you then!
The Town Hall will essentially be a ‘public Q&A’ of sorts. We’ll create a channel on our Discord and answer questions posted to this forum thread, with room for follow-up questions if the person who asked the questions wants to do so. Afterwards, we’ll put the channel in the public Discord archive and share our answers to the questions in this forum thread. This will all be publicly viewable.
Further details are listed below. We’ve had a couple town halls before, but this time around, we’re doing things a little differently, so read closely.
Before the Town Hall/Question Guidelines
If you want to ask us a question for the town hall, put it in this forum thread. Unlike previous town halls, we will not have a Discord channel for asking questions. We want to have a reasonable expectation of how many questions we’re going to be answering so we know how much time we can give to each one and make sure we have time to prepare for any of the more “difficult” questions.
Please ask a maximum of 2 questions. Questions can be about pretty much anything related to the game, admin team, or community. Development direction, miscellaneous admin stuff, sprites, rules, game mechanics—whatever.
While there’s no hard rules with respect to questions, here’s some pointers-
- Don’t ask meme questions with no substance at all. Silly questions like “Hat or beret?” are alright (this is a silly game), but things like ‘are floor cluwnes real’ or ‘how do I make meth’ are just wasting time.
- Don’t ask things which are specific to one or two people. The idea is that answers are useful, or at least interesting, to the whole community. For example, instead of “why did you ban me”, try “what is the admin team’s general approach to moderation?”; instead of “what do you think about my pull request”, ask “how are pull requests approved?”
- Avoid phrasing your question as “‘are there any plans for [feature]” (pathology, matsci, mining, more azones, etc etc etc etc). We get a lot of these questions every town hall, and the honest answer is that most things aren’t planned in advance! Instead, try asking for the thoughts on the matter, e.g. “what are the devs’ issues with [game system]”, “how would you like to see [map/job/mechanic] improved”, etc.
- Don’t repeat questions! Skim the thread to check that someone hasn’t already asked your question.
You should also mention whether you plan on attending the town hall live, and post your Discord handle if so— we want to make sure you can ask follow-up questions if you want, without wasting time if you don’t plan to. “Maybe” is fine here.
This thread will be locked 48 hours before the town hall starts so we have some time to prepare and don’t get flooded with new questions minutes before the town hall starts.
Please do not make off-topic posts or start arguments—these posts will be deleted.
During the Town Hall
As previously stated, when town hall starts, we’ll create a brand new text channel for it; we’re not gonna hijack #ss13-discussion or a voice channel or anything like that. Everyone can view it, but only admins and people given time for follow-ups can type in it. You’re welcome to discuss the town hall in other channels.
Not every single admin is going to be around for the entire town hall, since we’re spread out across a variety of time zones, but we’ll try to make it if we can. Some admins will still be around moderating the servers and answering ahelps.
In previous years, we answered questions in the order they were asked, but this time around, we may do something different. We currently plan to answer more important questions first and group questions by topic, but the specifics will vary.
Questions will be pinned in the order they’re answered for bookkeeping, and to allow people to jump to questions. This will stop if we run out of pin space; regardless, all the questions and a summary of answers will be posted on the forums after the town hall concludes.
During the town hall, we may start with pre-written responses; we’ll also add to these, and respond to follow-up questions should there be any.
The way that follow-ups work is this:
When we get to your question, we assign you the “Talking Stick” Discord role. This allows you to talk in the town hall channel.
You can then take some time to ask follow-up questions which we’ll answer live. Exact time will vary depending on question volume, but 5 minutes is a fine estimate.
Please keep follow-up questions concise- it’s fine to ask mostly unrelated questions as long as they’re fairly simple. Dumping 2 paragraphs on us during follow-up time will create…. issues.
After the Town Hall
Once town hall is wrapped up, we’ll archive the channel and put it in the public-viewable Discord archive. You might want to stick around; there are often some informal after-parties.
Some time after the town hall, we’ll put a general summary of the town hall questions and answers in this forum thread. It will still be locked—if you’d like to discuss any answers on the forums, feel free to make a separate thread.
See you then!