Author Topic: Change to Mentor position  (Read 30353 times)

Peri

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #30: March 11, 2011, 02:26:32 PM »
I have seen several games that a had a forum board specifically for new players to ask questions. Not the "helpline" one that we have now that is a generic help board, but a dedicated "Newbie Corner" kind of thing. Perhaps we could do that, including giving new players a link to that board in their IG welcome message. That would hopefully give newer players a way to ask questions about things, and maybe get a quicker response, due to the wider player-base they could access on the forums rather than their realm.

I think we had this discussion once on irc. I remember that several advocated that the whole mentoring process should be more ooc, to give newcomers more informations and allow them to stay.

Personally, I still believe in the other way around. Mentors IC are a great idea Tom had, and having the whole tutorial done by players in a player to player way greatly gives to newcomers the feeling of battlemaster. Certainly ooc aspects are touched as well but one thing is putting an ooc note to an ic mentor message, another one is sending newcomers to the forum.

Clearly the biggest downside of my argument is that having a bad mentor is more or less equivalent to having a very bad game start. This certainly does not help increasing the number of players.

cheers,

Indirik

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #31: March 11, 2011, 04:46:26 PM »
Having someone right in your realm, that is easily accessible in-game, who is dedicated to helping *you*, is a very good idea.

While I'm tossing out these various ideas, I'm not excluding the other ideas as well. It almost sounds like some people are getting the impression that if I state one idea, that I don't like the others. That's not the case. I think there are several things that could/should be done to improve mentorship and the new player experience. These can all be done together, some individually by themselves.

  • Remove the Mentor subclass.
  • Make mentoring an option selectable by any character in the realm that has been playing the game for more than 6 months. (Too long? Maybe 3 months? Anyway, more than 30 days.)
  • Allow rulers to appoint official mentors for the realm.
  • Create a Newbie Corner (probably with a different name...) on the forum dedicated to basic game play questions, geared specifically at new players. All new players should get an IG message to go there and ask questions.
  • Mentors who receive too many bad reviews from the students should be removed from the Mentor program.
  • Some way to encourage more mentor/student communications. Maybe put the Mentor/Student channel options at the top of the Messages screen, possibly highlighted in a separate colored box, with some explanatory text directing the to ask questions of their mentors? Also, put a link to the forum Newbie Corner there, too.
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Ays

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #32: March 11, 2011, 11:58:58 PM »
  • Remove the Mentor subclass.
  • Make mentoring an option selectable by any character in the realm that has been playing the game for more than 6 months. (Too long? Maybe 3 months? Anyway, more than 30 days.)
  • Allow rulers to appoint official mentors for the realm.
  • Create a Newbie Corner (probably with a different name...) on the forum dedicated to basic game play questions, geared specifically at new players. All new players should get an IG message to go there and ask questions.
  • Mentors who receive too many bad reviews from the students should be removed from the Mentor program.
  • Some way to encourage more mentor/student communications. Maybe put the Mentor/Student channel options at the top of the Messages screen, possibly highlighted in a separate colored box, with some explanatory text directing the to ask questions of their mentors? Also, put a link to the forum Newbie Corner there, too.


Sweetness!   You are right.  It is not a complete list,  but it is brilliant start.   

Now, let us talk about mentor lessons.  A complete mentor session now includes over six letters, even without student questions.   
Would we still need the structured list of lessons?  And, if so, how to support mentors in that task?

If this format is still deemed necessary, mentor lesson resources/tools would be a positive change.   I see three options:
  • Post resources in a mentor-only part of the forum  -- which opens the forum to other private group sections.   A private forum section provide a place for mentors to post/share solid information, without undermining the mentor/student experience.   Such a mentor forum would also allow realms easy consistent/approved mentor lessons.
  • Provide a clear mentor section on wiki.  Some realms already attempted to use wiki to standardize realm mentor lessons.
  • Bake standard lessons into the game as templates.
   

How big of change in mentoring do we want? 







egamma

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #33: March 12, 2011, 12:27:05 AM »
Sweetness!   You are right.  It is not a complete list,  but it is brilliant start.   

Now, let us talk about mentor lessons.  A complete mentor session now includes over six letters, even without student questions.   
Would we still need the structured list of lessons?  And, if so, how to support mentors in that task?

If this format is still deemed necessary, mentor lesson resources/tools would be a positive change.   I see three options:
  • Post resources in a mentor-only part of the forum  -- which opens the forum to other private group sections.   A private forum section provide a place for mentors to post/share solid information, without undermining the mentor/student experience.   Such a mentor forum would also allow realms easy consistent/approved mentor lessons.
  • Provide a clear mentor section on wiki.  Some realms already attempted to use wiki to standardize realm mentor lessons.
  • Bake standard lessons into the game as templates.
   

How big of change in mentoring do we want?

There are already hidden forums--for example, look below my name on the left. So the functionality is already available.

I think a mentors forum would be nice, and an "ask a question" section where it's understood that people can ask a "stupid" question and not get made fun of--make sure it's policed harshly for sarcastic replies.

There are already many excellent mentor areas on the wiki. =Iit would be nice to gather all of them, update them (some may not have up to date tax/estate information), and store them in either or both of the forums suggested.

songqu88@gmail.com

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #34: March 12, 2011, 02:00:44 AM »
I'm not seeing anything below your name on the left.  ???

If we are going to set up a special place for mentor-student interaction, what would we do about who gets to post there and view?

Indirik

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #35: March 12, 2011, 03:17:26 AM »
The forum should not take the place of the wiki. The forum is for discussions. The wiki is for storing information. If for no other reason than information on the forums cannot easily be changed. So the best thing to do with community created mentor lessons is create/store them on the wiki, and link them from the forums.
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Indirik

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #36: March 12, 2011, 03:20:18 AM »
Also, I don't think we would be able to create any kind of forum or board where only mentors could post. That would require tom to continually be changing forum permissions. Also, it would restrict non-mentors from contributing. And new students from asking questions. :)
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egamma

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #37: March 12, 2011, 05:59:59 AM »
@Artemesia: then look at Indirik, it should say "Dev Team" below his name. I see "Testers" below mine.

@Indirik: Then I propose that we gather links to all wiki mentor sources in one forum, and work to update/merge/improve those documents on the wiki.

Ays

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #38: March 12, 2011, 12:59:30 PM »
The forum is for discussions. The wiki is for storing information.

You are right.   Can we do a both?

As egamma said, the links on wiki need gathered and updated.  It is a huge thankless task.  Let's use the forum for discussion and wiki for information.

As part of our discussions, rulers shall elect official mentors. From this group, form a Mentor Commission to collaborate/write mentor lessons based on the set topics.  The commission would be temporary organization and would use a private forum section for discussions and collaboration. The result would posted on wiki. 

This proposal allows strong players to update/write mentor lessons, rewards these players by being on a commission, encourages more forum use, keeps wiki as information, and provides all new players with updated quality information. 

Mentors would refer students to wiki for general information, the forum for discussions, and support players with realm/individual help.   Game knowledge would come from a balanced combination of fellow players (mentors), wiki, and the forum.

In turn, the new wiki page would cite the contributing mentors and encourage new players to become a student to learn more.  When updates are needed a new team of mentors from the 'official realm' list can be called upon to work in the forum.


Foundation

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #40: March 12, 2011, 05:40:04 PM »
Awesome work, Egamma, and thus we shall begin the update/redesign of tutorials and other stuff on the wiki.  Some of it is hopelessly out of date, but there are LOTs of great articles written on the wiki as well.
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Igelfeld

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #41: March 12, 2011, 07:26:38 PM »
Back when I first came back to the game I had a job where I sat at a computer for endless hours of time, made me a damn good mentor and gave me lots of time to work on materials. Here is the general link to everything I did:

http://wiki.battlemaster.org/wiki/Igelfeld_Family/Von_Igelfeld_family_Memoirs

One thing unique to the way I taught my students was the inclusion of social reputation, I think this is perhaps the most important aspect of teaching new players and is not necessarily addressed in the way we currently do things, this is basically what I said:

http://wiki.battlemaster.org/wiki/Igelfeld_Family/Von_Igelfeld_family_Memoirs/The_Wisdom_of_Moritz/Reputation
http://wiki.battlemaster.org/wiki/Igelfeld_Family/Von_Igelfeld_family_Memoirs/The_Wisdom_of_Moritz/Socialization_and_Etiquette

This was fun to write and a very amoral look at how battlemaster works. Moritz is really the only noble I have who lived this out fully, and he is King so I guess it works.

Moritz Von Igelfeld - King of Asylon
Moria Von Igelfeld - Viscountess of Lanston
Ulrich Von Igelfeld - Knight of Remton, Dark Isle Colonist

Foundation

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #42: March 12, 2011, 07:36:40 PM »
I like these very much. :)  It was fun to play with your chars, though we only had limited interaction. ;)
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Igelfeld

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #43: March 13, 2011, 02:06:19 AM »
I like these very much. :)  It was fun to play with your chars, though we only had limited interaction. ;)

Thanks, I do try and sometimes I have more time on my hands than others, and if you want to get more interaction with my characters I will here shamelessly plug Asylon. As King I do a lot of RPing and letter writing as it is a very small realm and I want to keep it interesting, we have a solid player base in the realm as well of good active players.
Moritz Von Igelfeld - King of Asylon
Moria Von Igelfeld - Viscountess of Lanston
Ulrich Von Igelfeld - Knight of Remton, Dark Isle Colonist

Foundation

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Re: Change to Mentor position
« Reply #44: March 13, 2011, 02:19:34 AM »
Yep, Gladia Olivaw was actually in Asylon the same time as you.  Though I chose to leave and you stayed. ;)

But, good job with the realm, hope things go well with it. :D
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