As for deleting entire topics without notification or provocation, mods don't do that (or at least shouldn't), so I have no idea what's going on there.

Well, mine was and I'm still waiting to know the reason.

If you have a double post that you want taken care of, I'd say your best bet is to just PM a mod.

I thought it was one of the duties of mods to delete double posts on their own (without us pointing them out). Many of the double posts I noticed (some I mentioned above) are not even mine and are/were still there for such a long time.

I had to use the search function to find the topics to which you referred.

Umm, aren't the mods supposed to know the forums inside out? Or atleast have an idea which topic is where. XP The 'Other games on Amaranthia' forum seems pretty ignored.

Although that is a no-no too, I am not taking the time right now to edit the posts and delete one.

Yeah, I know you'll are too busy hence I suggested appointing another one (maybe one of the guilded members). Most of the mods here are very inactive and most of the time its just aisling doing all the work. Seems like she's overburdened, hence the omissions/blunders. XP

Don't get me wrong, just trying to help.

I remember your topic, talking about why people would wanna buy the strategy guide if BFG offered one of amaranth's for free, right? It definitely wasn't worthy of deletion IMO (even shaz posted in it, as I recall), so it's either a gimmick in the system or someone's deletion, neither of which is less worrisome than the other.

As for your perception on mod duty, well, if we wanted to know the site inside out (we're capable of knowing roughly what should go into which forum, not what is in which forum) and keep track of every single post on the site (this includes forum, collegium, cottages, game pages, blog etc), we'd probably have to hire half the population and have 100 hours a day to go through everything XD ok, a slight exaggeration, but only a slight one*. We can't be everywhere, all the time. When we see multiposting, sure, we'll merge them, but it's not like we have a double-posting alert complete with sirens wailing and ambulances waiting whenever a double-post is made (I wish XD).

No, actually I don't do all the work, cause now I can only sneak on Amaranthia between my RL work time, so I gotta do everything fast, and before my boss catches on XD Wait, does that mean I'm responsible for the omissions/blunders? Oh fazzle, I'm opting for early retirement. Obviously I'm getting too old for the job XD


*When I first started out and was still young and naive, I once tried to go through all the cottage comments. I stopped after the first 300 cottages about a month later. And that was while I was in London with high speed broadband. I can't even think about going through them now (with all the shiny backgrounds and custom cursors and big big pictures) with snail-paced Malaysian-style broadband. No fooling.

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No matter how many mods there are, it's pretty impossible to keep track of every post and every comment on every forum and section of the site. We'd have to live here 24 hours a day.

Wow, seriously?! Haven't you guys ever been to a larger forum? XD The one's that have like hundreds of members online all the time, posting away all over place, but they also have mods for every forum/section of the site to keep things in order. Usually at least one of the mods is online to take necessary actions. So, my point was why not do the same i.e. a mod per section? I agree about the collegium and cottages issue but for forums, I think it'd work. It would certainly ease the workload of the current mods and prevent such mishaps... but I see that's it's pointless "debating" with you'll about this so... yeah

Hmm... does anyone find it a bit strange that only the "controversial" topics are vanishing? Mine could affect the sales of the SG at that time XP (why would any sane person buy it when they see an equally good but free one made by the creators of the game itself, right? Especially when it's available from the day the game was released XD) while KTC's topic about black spiderman was getting a little too hot to handle XD Hmm...

@latys- if this were true every walkthrough on am Would have been deleted

Ow, this looks like a serious problem.
@latyss: i think it's too much for mods do that. I mean we only have about 10 or so, but there are so many treads and forum here. I know that mod have a duty to clean some multi or double posting, but please understand that they have their own life. So if i see double posting in thread, i'd try to pm a mod to clear them, because i think it will help than they must participating all the forums.
Other games on amaranthia forum may be looked ignored to you by those mods, maybe caused they don't know about those games and of course they won't interfere too much.

If more mods are needed I would be happy to volunteer

@Paralel: Cool! XD *thumbs up* I knew there'd be some capable members interested in moderating

@theone: lol none of those walkthroughs were available the day game was out (unlike the strategy guide) AND they're written by the players themselves. This strategy guide thing is a new trend, earlier games didn't have them.

@shadowshed: Haven't you heard the saying "many hands make light work"? As you may have noticed, out the six (current) mods namely Abby, Aisling, Argoyle, Kinnison, Pandaba, Tiniponi; at least half of them are not that active.

Btw, stumbled upon yet another double quadruple post in the OGoA forum posted around 40 hrs ago --
http://www.amaranthia.com/modules/new ... id=293422#forumpost293422

Our existing mods are quite "capable members". And I'm sure there would be a LOT of people "interested" in moderating, but we have a few prerequisites that must be met when we look for new mods. Of our six moderators, only one is currently not active. Just because the others aren't here when you are, or you don't see them doing stuff, please don't assume that they're not around. "not that active" is a subjective term.

The mods' role is NOT to scrutinize every thread in every forum looking for things that need to be fixed. If you notice something that needs to be fixed and it bothers you, please PM one of the mods explaining what's wrong and give them a link so they can check it out. They are all volunteers and we do not expect them to spend every available hour here.

This forum is MUCH smaller than the ones you're using as examples - we don't have hundreds of members online all the time posting all over the place - and unless the mods tell us they're overwhelmed and can't keep up, we have no reason to appoint extras.


I checked the thread you linked to and didn't see any double, triple or quadruple posts. So I must assume one of the mods has taken care of it.

Mods will leave a post in the thread when locking or moving them, or will PM the creator. They will also PM the creator if a thread is deleted for any reason. Members will PM a mod if they see something that needs a mod's attention.

Issue settled, no?

Yeah, I took care of it. Just a case of multiple postings of the same message probably caused by slow internet connection (as in, the poster got impatient and clicked the "Submit" button one time too many). Does that need a message?

no

I was just pointing out that the issue for which this topic was raised was resolved back on the first page, and that all members of the forum need to play a part in keeping the forum working smoothly.

Our existing mods are quite "capable members". And I'm sure there would be a LOT of people "interested" in moderating, but we have a few prerequisites that must be met when we look for new mods.

I never said they were incapable lol, just said that they were busy. What I meant was if someone new was to be appointed, he/she would have to be capable. Don't take things the wrong way XD

Of our six moderators, only one is currently not active. Just because the others aren't here when you are, or you don't see them doing stuff, please don't assume that they're not around. "not that active" is a subjective term.

Are you saying that the other mods moderate ALL the forums? I've been here for a while now and I'm pretty sure they neither visit nor moderate HG and OGoA regularly. It's usually just aisling and sometimes Argoyle... Pandaba drops by now and then (mostly for her games). These sections may not seem that important in context with say Aveyond forums but these too are part of the site and needs to be "tidy" XD

This forum is MUCH smaller than the ones you're using as examples

I know lol but aisling and argoyle sure made it sound that way with their exaggerations XP

Mods will leave a post in the thread when locking or moving them, or will PM the creator. They will also PM the creator if a thread is deleted for any reason. Members will PM a mod if they see something that needs a mod's attention.

Issue settled, no?

Not exactly, it still doesn't answer my query about who deleted my thread and why. Is it too much trouble for the person responsible to PM me the reason?

Actuallly the answer to your problem is on the first page. Threads get deleted at times due to database error

@latyss: i think amanda won't just pick a mod that easily. I mean, we even need a thousand gp to be guilded. And i believe for being a mod, we need to be really active and do things right.
And actually i don't know what's the problem for a mod to not visit the site properly, or maybe they in when we're not here,
but i think a mod doesn't need to post something if they just want to clean up or check things fast,
so don't blame them too much, because they have their own life.
because if shaz said that this site is not that big, i think it doesn't necessary to have many mods if you found they being inactive.

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Actually, if you read again, I said we'd need a lot of moderators IF we were going by your definition of mod duties. While you believe that "the mods [are] supposed to know the forums inside out", shaz did mention that "The mods' role is NOT to scrutinize every thread in every forum looking for things that need to be fixed", hence the difference in number of mods needed. This issue is now not about non-communication, but expectation gap.

As for your topic, I'm as anxious about an answer as you are. The answer about how it was deleted could be the difference between a few isolated incidences, or a site-wide crash just waiting to happen (thank goodness for daily site backups).

The mods do what they can when they can, but we don't catch everything that happens right away, even though we are more than happy to take care of it.

Think of it this way:

If you saw a crime or car accident occur, and there were no police around at the time, would you just say, "Where are the police? How come they aren't here fixing it? Well, I'm not gonna do anything, because they should be here taking care of it." No, you'd call the police and they'd come and do their job.

It's the same with the mods. We patrol, but if we miss something, just let us know, and we'll come with our sirens blaring.

Honestly, I don't know what happened to your topic. I saw it, thought it was not very appropriate and considered deleting it. Maybe Amanda read it afterwards and also didn't think it was appropriate.

Just as I thought, I knew it was too much of a coincidence that only controversial topics get eaten up by some "database glitch" -_-

May I ask why you (and probably Amanda) thought it was inappropriate? You can PM me if you want to do it in private.

I didn't say that IS what happened. And I don't believe that happened in KTC's case. "Controversial" topics usually end up locked, only when they've gone too far, with a comment by the admin who locked them. They don't just get deleted.

With YOUR topic ... several people spent a lot of time preparing the strategy guide. We'd like to be compensated for it. We didn't know BFG were going to do that. If people think they need a strategy guide and are happy to pay for one, we don't really want them to change their mind because they happen to come across a post like that That is why I considered deleting it.

Fair enough So my thread could actually affect sales of the guide here...didn't mean to, sorry XD You'll should take this up with BFG... I'm pretty sure many more ppl (me included) would have bought it had they not seen it on BFG's blog (its so prominently mentioned on the game page itself!). Anyway, thanks for clarifying.