Direction Guidelines

Overview & Welcome

Hello! Welcome to the team, where we professionally wyci things. We’ve got a LOT on our plate, as the pseudo development team sans developers. Below you’ll read about our positions, what we do, and what we don’t do! You will find best practices, what to expect, and how we can do better in the future. This will be an evolving and public document; we strive to work with the people in all capacities.

Important Note!

We know your time is valuable. We'll make sure roadmap plans are clear, easy to understand, and broken down into manageable tasks. You can choose what you want to work on. Your contributions are what make Delta V special, and we appreciate every bit of effort you put in!

Code of Conduct

• Always treat fellow players, staff members, and developers with kindness and consideration. Respect their opinions, even if they differ from your own. Refrain from using offensive language, personal attacks, or any form of discrimination.
• Collaborate effectively with others, both OOC and in Discord. Be willing to compromise and work together towards common goals. Support your fellow player and server staff, and always prioritize the well-being of the community as a whole.
• Maintain an approachable demeanor, encouraging players to reach out and share their thoughts and concerns. Listen actively to others, show empathy, and respond with respect. Foster a positive and inclusive environment where everyone feels comfortable expressing themselves.
• When participating in discussions, ensure that they remain respectful and constructive. Ask for clarification and purpose when someone posts something vague or unclear. Encourage participants to provide evidence, sources, and examples to support their arguments.

Job Requirements

• You understand the intricacies of the game. This knowledge enables you to make informed decisions, solve problems creatively, and lend an expert opinion.
• You possess excellent communication skills through writing. You excel at explaining complex concepts clearly and concisely, making it easier for others to understand and engage with the game.
• You are passionate about the game and appreciate the balance between action-packed moments and immersive roleplay opportunities that Delta V seeks to offer.
• You are an active member of the Delta V community, regularly contributing to productive discussions.

Content Management

One of the Direction’s main goals is to oversee the curation of content for the Delta-V community. To accomplish this, Direction operates in a Proactive and a Reactive manner. Proactively, they create the Roadmap to indicate what Direction would like to see developed. Reactively, they curate the content submitted to ensure it meets the mission of Delta V. Direction should keep up with the development of these features and offer feedback along the way. Direction guidance ensures that Roadmap content will be developed to the best quality possible and reduce the number of changes that need to be made after the content is presented for official review.

The Roadmap

The Roadmap operates over a few stages.  Concepts on the Roadmap will be selected by the Direction team privately, and the ideas will be established to some level of certainty before being opened to community feedback. Concepts may be highly specific, or rather broad, as long as they have a solid final goal that Direction can guide contributors towards.

Discovery - Curators spend time in Discord channels, forums, and in-game, paying attention to what players are discussing, what they enjoy, and what challenges they face. They monitor dedicated feedback channels, collate suggestions, and identify recurring themes or requests. For more details, refer to Community Management

Conceptualization - Through Discovery, rank Concepts by the following metrics. This is done privately in the #roadmap-development forum, with each Concept having the relevant tags as to its status.

• Content Impact - Is the content aligned with the Mission of Delta V?
• Technical Feasibility - What technical skills are needed to complete this project?
• How can it be broken up into constituent groups?
• Community Interest - Is the community interested in this specific idea? Is this something they would take kindly to?
• Direction Priority - How necessary does the direction team believe this is? Are there external pressures pushing for this?

Requirement Gathering - After ranking of Concepts, the Curators should itemize out the following Requirements, with as much detail as possible:

• What does this Concept seek to do?
• What problems does it address?
• What should it do?

Solution Design - Curators should then iterate on the Requirements gathered, and develop the Solution Design. For every requirement:

• Determine what could be done to resolve this requirement.
• Itemize these into Tasks, as granular as possible. Are sprites needed? Add a task for a specific sprite.

Publication - At this stage, Direction will share the Solution Design with the public, contained within the global Roadmap. The processes for gathering community feedback are outlined in the Community Management Guidelines. Direction should use this feedback to flesh out Roadmap ideas and finalize them for contributors who wish to begin development.

GitHub PR Review

All gameplay content will be processed through the Delta-V Github. Reviewing suggested content involves examining current Pull Requests (“PRs”) and providing feedback through Github. Content review should always involve as many members of Direction as possible, but if only one or two choose to comment on a piece of content, their opinion holds the same weight as the entire team. If the rest of the team comes to a different decision at a later time, content can always be reverted. Maintainers have final authority when it comes to the fitness of the PR in terms of code quality and potential bugs or other mechanical concerns. Maintainers and Curators will ensure that Direction is reviewing items that fall within the purview of Direction

• We don’t want to review things that our voice is not relevant to! Does it meaningfully affect game design, balance, or roleplay? If not, we can let them know we are not needed to approve it.
• Minor bug fixes, obvious simple tweaks, and so forth do not require official review

What do you look for in a review?

• Fits our MRP Standard - Keeps the balance between action and roleplay, no overpowered stuff or things that break the fun. We want things to make sense to our setting.
• Fits our Design Ethos - Delta-V is a server founded in analogue design. We want this to be displayed in all the PRs we merge, such that it fits cohesively in the mechanical narrative of the game.

Direction may discuss the merits of the content internally, but any final decisions must be communicated to the content author through Github. Typical decisions include:

• Approving for merge
• Test merging
• Requesting changes
• Denying the content

Deadlines

Directions is a volunteer team. Direction approval is still a requirement for a large portion of new content. In order to prevent bottlenecks and an overall stagnation in new content, deadlines will be enforced for PR Review. Deadlines should be relative to the size of the PR.

• Small PRs should be subject to 1-2 days of consideration.
• Major PRs may need as many as 1-2 weeks to reach an actionable conclusion.

Deadlines should be established relative to whenever the PR is “finalized.” If changes are requested by Direction, the deadline should be extended to the proper amount of time after those changes are implemented by the author.

If Direction does not come to a conclusion by the end of the deadline, the PR is to be automatically merged. The intent of this policy is to prevent PRs from sitting unattended for large quantities of time due to Direction inactivity.

Test Merging

• Direction’s goal of facilitating change should not be stifled by concerns over the unknown implications of permanently merging any PR. As such, the team is encouraged to temporarily merge PRs whose merits need to be tested. The content can easily be reverted if it is deemed unnecessary.
• Test merges should be for short periods of time (24 - 48 hours), and should be supervised by members of Direction to gather information on the quality of the merge. Direction members are authorized to manipulate rounds in accordance with Event Management Guidelines in order to test new content.
• If Direction members cannot adequately monitor test merges, you may not test merges. A test merge unmonitored provides no actual data for Direction to base decisions on.
• Additionally in line with Community Management Policy, players should be able to view the current test merges at all times, and be made aware of the general fact that Delta-V uses test merges to analyze content.
• Some test merge content can be reported on by the community, and feedback can be collected according to Community Management Policy.

Community Management

Through Community Management, Direction interacts with the community of Delta V. Our mission is done to serve them, and we work to encourage their assistance in upholding this mission. It is our responsibility to act responsibly and with respect. Curators listen to what players love (and don't love) about Delta V. They:

Gather Feedback - Curators actively seek out feedback from players through various channels such as surveys, polls, and direct communication. This feedback is essential for identifying areas of improvement and making informed decisions about the future of Delta V. Recording Feedback is just as critical, talk to the team and bring up problem items!

Solve Problems - When players encounter issues or concerns, curators are there to help. They provide guidance, troubleshoot problems, and escalate issues to the appropriate team members for resolution.

Use Communication Channels

• Announcements - The announcements channel is used to share important updates, server news, event information, and roadmap changes. Announcements must be carefully coordinated with the rest of the team to ensure consistency and accuracy.
• Polls and Surveys - Polls and surveys are conducted to gather community feedback on specific topics, gauge interest in potential features, and involve players in decision-making processes. Curators recognize that polls and surveys can also yield uneducated opinions, so they work closely with the team to ensure that questions are clearly worded and unbiased.
• Public Forums - Open forums provide a platform for Direction to speak directly to the community about upcoming changes and get community buy-in for specific ideas. These forums allow for more focused discussions and enable the team to gather valuable insights and feedback.
• Changelog - The in-game changelog can also be used to share important information with players. Many of our players do not use or check Discord, and elaborating on new features, and bug fixes can be helpful.
• GitHub - By leveraging GitHub issues and pull requests, maintainers, contributors, and Curators can collaborate effectively, share ideas, and discuss changes.

The roadmap on GitHub plays a crucial role in this communication process. It provides a transparent and accessible overview of the project's goals, priorities, and planned features. By regularly updating the roadmap, Curators can keep contributors informed about where efforts are needed and help align their efforts with the overall mission.

Event Management

Events that Rock: Curators design exciting in-game events that encourage awesome roleplay. An event is loosely defined as “taking an action that influences the game as an observer”. Spawning in a spider, or working to establish a custom Syndicate objective would be an event! They, by design, are to give opportunities to spice up regular shifts, providing players with unique roleplay scenarios, which they can react to naturally.

Event Rules

• Events must be reported. Be robust in your event reporting, especially when giving usually unobtainable items. Be descriptive and attach images or screenshots whenever possible.
  • This serves to show what actions an admin/curator committed during the round and have a space for criticism if needed, to help people improve in their work. Do not be afraid to document your events, even if it didn’t go properly to plan or was a disaster. We’re not here to shame you, we’re all in this together!
• Events must meet or exceed our MRP Standard. LRP, or NRP events such as “wangvasion” have no place outside of Garbage Day/express Head Game Administrator permission.
• Unless given express permission by a Project Manager or the Game Director, do NOT run Non-Natural Zombies, Deathsquad, or Non–evac borne ERT, CBURN etc. Administrators may deploy ERT, CBURN, and similar forces in exception of this policy, but only on the evacuation shuttle, and only after request from the station.
• Events are for everyone’s enjoyment, not just your own.
• Do not run events that are designed to interact with one person in particular, especially your own character.
• Events can and will fail, let them. Be it a syndicate dropping event characters dead, bombing or stealing shuttles, command arresting event characters, let it happen.
• The event should fit within the established lore of the game.
• Unless your created role has a vital part to the event, let your created ghost roles be taken by someone else, not for yourself. You’re here to provide fun scenarios for players, not for yourself.
• Do not make ghost roles that are overpowered, or that are intended to be “the protagonist” of the shift. It’s lame to see such things, we want to empower players to tell the story.
• Feel free to spawn, test things/ideas or doing silly shenanigans in your admin room.
• Spawning in a bunch of ghost roles to do a gag, build some ship/station, play poker or etc., that generally have NO impact on the current shift, is acceptable.
• Don’t spawn things that could affect glimmer, make people traitor objectives or some other round ending entities.
• Remember to be cooperative with other staff! Work, plan together to make certain dumb ideas into functional, fun things!
• Don’t spawn in a super synth for players. There are some midis that can cause a complete crash.
• Outside of Events, attempt to influence the round as little as possible.
• Fellow ghosts might try to pressure you to do something funny! Just remember, you probably shouldn’t, unless it meets our Event Guidelines!  

Events fall into three broad categories, each with different qualifications and actions required. All events must be reported in the #events channel.

Low Impact

• Events in this category may be at Curator discretion, in moderation.
• By nature, they do not impact the round in any meaningful way and potentially could be mistaken as an in-game event, rather than a curator spawned one in.
  • Curators  have leeway to run nigh unlimited amounts of Low Impact events when Glimmer reaches 900+, including some Medium Impact events. Make items sapient, shrink things, make things strange. Keep your actions within the lore of the game. Feel free to ping the Game Director for additional questions.

Examples include:

• Responding to certain faxes as CC.
• Making CC announcements regarding non specific advice.
• Spawning, or modifying a spider during a vent critters event
• Making something that normally isn't sentient, sentient when the glimmer is abnormally high.
• Making fun, in-world announcements as non CC about certain things.
• Answering prayers ( what item was given, if it was actually given).

Medium Impact

• Events in this category may be run at Curator discretion in moderation, but should be approved by a Curator first.
• Take note to not overwhelm the station! If the round has particularly active traitors, don’t make it worse for Security!
• Medium Impact events may interfere with the crew, but should generally not provide the opportunity to derail the station, or round remove players.
• Medium Impact events should be planned out in advance. Write out an event plan, with requirements, objectives, goals, etc.

High Impact

• Provide at least a 4 hour notice before it starts. Additionally, notify the Patreon Event Notifications channel.
• The type of round will heavily influence the feasibility of this category of event. You may have to force extended or survival in the pre-round lobby.
• Use “setgamepreset” to do so. Once the round has started, run “setgamepreset secret” to fix it for future rounds.
• High Impact events WILL interfere with the crew, and must be planned in advance. Write out an event plan, with requirements, objectives, goals, etc.
• High Impact events should be carefully examined to ensure they meet or exceed our MRP standards.

Do not run these events solo.  You should be working together with a team of Curators(at least 2-3 minimum).  Ask for help in #events, or ping @Curator

Examples include:

• Hellshift
• Rimworld Events
• AI Malfunction
• Central Command Inspections
• Furtive Fugitives - dV Event Plan