I'd say one of the worst parts of being on staff is the stress of making sure you're doing your best to do what's right for the ECC community. One of the best, is meeting and getting to help so many new people. I would have never talked to as many people as I have if not for being staff, and many friends I made on the server would have been strangers had I not been promoted. The biggest surprise when I became staff was how scared of everything I was, lol. I was scared of upper staff, I was scared of doing stuff wrong, I was scared of Andrew, but as I spent more time on staff, I realized everyone I was scared of is super nice, doing stuff wrong is a part of being on staff, and that staff is really a huge family, with Andrew at the top, as our weird, drunken uncle .
I would say the best part of being staff is being on the team with all the other amazing staffers, it’s like one big (slightly weird and crazy) family. I would say there’s no “worst” part, however I do think some users take us for granted, they yell at us for “not doing anything” but then yell at us for enforcing the rules! I would say everyone needs to remember that just because we’re blue or red, doesn’t mean we’re not humans who want to enjoy the game too!
Best part definitely is the camaderie and the friends I’ve made along the way, as well as the general satisfaction of having been able to give back to the community. Worst part is definitely letting people down if you fuck up, lol. Honestly I don’t mind more trolly users, keeps it interesting I will say that for years as a kid I idolized staff and was encapsulated by the mysteries it held but... it really is just a chill group enforcing the rules n shit.
The best parts; The friends I have made along the way, and simply being able to help the community that I have known for years now. There isn't necessarily a worst part, there are good days and bad days, some days are simply more stressful, but thats what the team is there for, not only do we all help the server but there is a lot of support within the staff team.
When doing applications, why do you ask about how we made the money since half the time, people give bs answers anyway Also, when getting a new town, why do we need to link all previous towns that we own as well?
Personally, just because I'm nosy. Previous town apps are so we can make sure you're filing correctly, sometimes rules can be a bit wonky, and rules change, someone may think a rule that used to exist still does, and they accidentally charge themselves too much/too little. It's just a quick little precaution to make sure everything's good
We work incredibly hard to find ways to get people to want to stick around. Like a lot of the events work is done by staff behind the scenes and a lot of program ideas get tossed around with the hopes of just trying to make everything more enjoyable for ya'll. What we do in global, especially the higher up you get, becomes less and less what the majority of our jobs are lol. Best part of staff is definitely the friends you make. I have always referred to the staff team as a dysfunctional family. We all love each other and, just like any family, there are problems but in the end, staff makes you fairly close with each other. Worst part of staff... Idk I'm an easily distracted person so I will admit to sometimes being annoyed if I'm in the middle of something, someone needs help, and then 10min later I'm flying in circles cause I legit forgot what I was doing before lol. But overall, its enjoyable to help people understand and work to make the server better . Also I'm gonna go with things that surprised me when I got back on staff cause the first time was the beginning of 2013 and I don't remember a lot of how I felt then. Returning to staff, theres been a giant number of surprises just due to how much the server has changed since I was staff before. It was an adjustment at first but its been really fun. Still shocked whenever I realize I've been back on staff like... I think 8 months lol.
Is there some sort of staff wiki on how to complete certain applications such as setting a town warp or portal?
Yes there is, there are guidelines and tutorials on how to do pretty much everything, very well written and informative to help us.
Yep, each rank (minus SA/CO) comes with detailed guidelines on how to do all work associated with the rank and an explanation of any commands inherited.
Best parts are being helpful in a community I love, and being apart of the staff family. Some of the staff are my closest friends now. Worst parts are when it comes to muting/banning someone; I still get a bit anxious and shaky when it comes to typing out the commands, player names, and reasons One of the things that surprised me when I became staff was just how chill everyone else on staff was. I'd only talked to a few of the staff members beforehand, and was a bit nervous about being around the rest! Another thing that surprised me was the whole anxious thing lol I was constantly worried about whether I was doing things right or not.
Yeah my first two weeks on staff were spent reading, and rereading the guidelines. We have structure for everything we do so we make sure we are all in unison and working together.
Do different levels of staff "report" to each other, or do they just talk to the SA+ team for instructions and questions?
It depends on the situation. There is for sure a rank hierarchy that is respected, but by and large yes, the SA+ team is the group to go to for a lot of scenarios. There are still many situations where a mod should go to an smod/GA or some other hierarchy ascension though, and it never hurts to ask your peers for advice either. Additionally, when you get promoted to smod, it's expected that a mod could perhaps ask you for some guidance. Same with smod -> GA, promotions in general come with a certain expectation of experience.
@EtherealSquid i remember you joined staff a couple months after you joined ECC. How long were you not a staff member on ECC? And how long have you been one?
We all talk to each other, but I view it as the SA+ team are my bosses, but I often go to Smods, and GAs with questions, but if they cant answer it then I'll go to the SAs, but other times I take it straight to the SA team. Its largely based on what the question is, and who the appropriate party is.
I joined the server on Christmas 2018, got mod on Feb 2nd 2019 and have been staff ever since, so a little over a month not staff, 1 year 4 months (almost) as staff. My rank timeline would be: Joined 12/25/18 -> Moderator 2/2/19 -> SMod 2/23/19 -> GA 4/13/19 -> SA 3/2/20
For any staff member, how much time a day do you get to play and how much time do you spend working as staff? EDIT: Clarification, What % of time do you get to just play without having to work on forums or other staff obligations.
Those are... effectively the same thing. If I'm logged in I'm always on call for staff stuff. Plus it kinda depends on whats going on that day how much I get to accomplish 'player stuff'. I'd say maybe 25%-50% of my time online is me just getting to do player stuff which mostly just means the servers been kinda quiet for a bit.
As a GA and below I never really thought about it as a work/play split. Application processing / LWCs / etc only take a few minutes unless you really let the queue build up, so after that it’s mostly just chat moderation, and I did/do that passively while working on whatever my personal project for the day was. Especially as a GA, I would log on, spend about 10min dealing with applications, and then play like normal. Staff are required to be on-server a certain amount of time each week, but as long as work/moderation is getting done we don’t mandate that explicitly x amount of that time be spent doing “staff work”
