Staff Organization
From FiranMUX
FiranMUX staff is hierarchical, organized by both rank and functional area. At the top of the hierarchy are Adam and Steph, the Chief Wizards, who share ultimate control of the game. Staff is divided into Wizards and Player Helpers. Wizards are organized into Areas such as Theme and Code.
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Rank
Rank is important on Firan staff so that people know what is expected of them at every level and so that staff can resolve issues and make decisions effectively. Player policy requires that appeals flow up the chain of command one rank at a time. This prevents the Chief Wizards from having to deal with every minor problem.
Pseudo-Staff
There are a couple positions that have staff-like roles but aren't considered ranked staff on Firan.
Faction Heads (sometimes "FHs") are elected (OOC) positions for each of the eight clans. Faction Heads organize their factions, send out newsletters about upcoming and past events, and run tinyplots for their folks.
Clan Leaders are high-ranking (IC) Feature characters with a lot of responsibility. We expect them to act much like Faction Heads, using the position of trust we've given them to create role-playing for the players in their clan and other clans.
Wiki Wardens are players whom we trust with ability to edit these web pages. If you have created interesting Firan-related content, we may approach you to serve as an editor for that content, hosted on the FiranWiki.
Player Helpers
The Player Helpers -- often called PHers -- are players whom we have entrusted with authority and power to help us run the game. They are often our first line of defense against the barrage of player requests that flood our system every year (the wizard staff completed almost 12,000 @requests in 2006, and that does not include the help given by the player helpers).
Player Helpers greet guests, handle mundane requests, answer questions on the Help channel, orient new players, and generally do as much as they can without needing a lot of coded privileges. The Wizard staff has given them a handful of coded powers, however, and their ability to help players increases all the time. Player Helpers are the lowest rank in the hierarchy, reporting up to all wizards.
Wizards
The TinyMUX server and its cousins call its privileged accounts "wizards," hearkening back to the day when people used the servers to build dungeons and fantasy games. Today the Wizard rank still imparts special permissions on the game and some of their powers might even seem magical to a player. Wizards have the authority and coded power to examine or change any object or player on the game, move around the game freely, and change the game's code and text files. In terms of coded power, all Wizard ranks are equal, though authority increases with rank.
The lowest wizard rank is Honorary Wizard. These are usually semi-retired wizards who have earned a permanent place on the staff, or sometimes especially helpful and clever people we trust with wizard powers.
Generally new wizards start at the lowest wizard rank: Trainee (often called Builders). Trainees are named after colors with the world Builder attached to their name. For example, "BlueBuilder" and "HeliotropeBuilder" were Trainees on Firan. After much deliberation about candidates, the wizard staff will approach certain Player Helpers and ask them to be wizards. If they accept, we give them a new Trainee character and spam the hell out of them. Trainees have two or three months to get used to life as a wizard and show us what they can do. If they do well, we "give them their name" (let them rename themselves) and promote them to Junior Wizard.
Junior Wizards are the work horses of Firan, doing the bulk of the daily work. Juniors are expected to have active task reports every week and be a positive presence on the game. Each Junior is assigned to an Area but are encouraged to work on all kinds of tasks dependent of functional area. Juniors report to Full Wizards.
Full Wizard is a retronym. Originally the rank name was just Wizard. Full Wizards are staff members who have earned a spot of permanence on the team. They are selected for their achievements and hard work and ability to get along with others. Full Wizards report to Seniors.
Senior Wizard is the highest rank a staffer may achieve. Years ago, there was but one Senior Wizard position who served as the proxy for the Chiefs while they were on vacation or otherwise disposed. Today, there are as many as a half dozen Senior Wizards, each with responsibilities and most of the decision-making authority over one or more Areas. Seniors are selected for their philosophical alignment with the Chiefs, their maturity and responsibility, broad and deep knowledge of the game, leadership ability, and proactive initiative.
The highest rank on the game is Chief Wizard, held only by Adam and Steph. A Chief Wizard is a player's last appeal and their decisions are final and absolute. The Chiefs determine the overall direction and strategy for the game and its success falls on their shoulders.
Mentorship
To ensure that staff members have the training they need, each wizard is assigned a mentor, a wizard of usually higher rank and longer experience. Mentors teach their wards ("mentees") and help them become the best staffer they can be.
Areas
Once upon a time, the Chief Wizards expected every wizard to strive to be proficient in everything: code, theme, GMing, dealing with players, and so on. Their hope was that broad staff knowledge prevented bottlenecks, and that proved true. As the game grew, however, there was too much work for staff to do efficiently without specialization. The Chiefs divided the staff into a handful of Areas and assigned managers and assistant managers to each one. Eventually, those manager spots became the Senior and Assistant Senior ranks, though in some cases wizards of lower or higher rank manage areas.
Staff
The Staff area manages the organizational health of the wizards and player helpers, monitors and reports workload, prioritizes and shuffles work and staff resources as necessary, increases staff morale, and provides education for staff.
Theme
The Theme area maintains the integrity of the game's thematic material (canon). It monitors and reacts to IC social activity, generates large-scale plots, creates back-history as needed to support role-playing, and writes new characters.
IC Player Management
Closely associated with the Theme area, the In-Character Player Management (ICPM) area is responsible for providing the best role-playing experience possible for the players. The area runs tinyplots, runs ("GMs") special events, and rules on in-character matters.
OOC Player Management
The Out-of-Character Player Management (OOCPM) area is responsible for providing the best RL community possible for the players. The area handles player discipline and inactivity problems, communicates with players about game matters, and organizes RL social events like FiranCon.
Code
The Code area provides support for all hardware and software systems that run the game, including the network and physical server, the operating system and system administration, the game server and other critical applications (web, email, file access), and softcoded game systems. This area not only writes and fixes code, but also makes everything else go.
Information
The Information area is responsible for providing best-in-class documentation and communication channels for players and staff. They maintain the web (wiki), web forums, Yahoo! Groups, email communications, help and news files, and bulletin boards.
Building
The Building area creates and maintains all the rooms, exits, and objects on the game, and updates characters.
