Balance Forum Rules [Updated 3/7/12]

Well, giving them time to post objections and opinions as they currently do (not as a vote, but as a voice). I'm just worried that if we're somehow fast-tracking the balance process, that we'd be potentially cutting out that opportunity.

We have the entirety of stage two to object to your decision. Even without the 5 days between your votes and the thread ending, that's still plenty of time. Remember, if at any time 2 of you decide not to change the card, it's not changed. Even if it's long after you decided to change it. Not only that, but ideally, you guys should be voicing your opinions long before you actually vote for them, giving us even more time to convince you otherwise if need be, or decide not to waste our time arguing if we agree with you.

Right, I probably should've read the quote in context. But fast-tracking the 'thread' I was interpreting that as meaning the entire process, where that's obviously not what was being suggested.

Yeah, some of that time will definitely remain.

Speeding up I can see happen between stages 1 and 2 if everyone's unanimous. The wait at the end is staying, though.

Is there any reason to close threads without votes? It seems like, if a councilman notices a thread hasn't had any votes and discussion has more or less stopped, they should vote, not end the thread.

That way does make more sense. I just don't think Serith thought of that.

I have removed the part about a thread ending if there are no votes.

The part about needing a majority for change still exists - if a thread's votes are tied, it will default to no change.

Nacho Wrote: Well I know it was like that before you came along, and that's what I've been going on this whole time. I'm still not entirely sure why we even need a first phase. All it does is slow down the process. If the Balance Council doesn't want a card changed, they have a perfectly good opportunity to do that while voting for changes, by voting "no change". Something like a 5 day waiting period before votes can begin with no phase one would be a lot simpler.

(10-19-2011 12:23 AM)Blue_Elite Wrote:  Not that this is the right thread to debate this in but I think it works nicely as a fail-safe. Basically it's 2 chances to say a card shouldn't be changed. Like in this case where 1 council member is pro change and the other two are undecided. The first phase is a "oh shi-itake mushrooms I better figure out where I stand on this" to the undecided party.
If we discussed changes one thread at a time I'd agree there's no point in the delay, but the council are human with lives of their own and it's easy to lose track of things when there are 10 active threads going on at any time.

That would only make even the slightest bit of sense if council members couldn't change their votes, and even then it wouldn't make much. Councilmen have infinity chances to say a card shouldn't be changed, or at the very least one chance per moment they have access to a computer with an internet connection. Assuming a reasonable amount of time before votes start (it wouldn't even need to be required- our councilmen are notoriously slow to vote for anything) and a reasonable amount of time after they've ended but before the thread closes, that gives 2 reasonable amounts of time for undecided councilmen to decide on something, and a decided one to decide on something else. That's twice as much time as is reasonable.

Stage 1 seems to be little more than an artifact of balance forums past. We had it before, so we'll have it now, even though it's no longer relevant to the balance process.

The amount of time they have becomes finite once the first vote has been cast. After that point, if the other members of the council get distracted or otherwise are prevented from voting before that time is up, the change (or no change) goes through with the lack of input from the other council members.

If we changed the system to require a vote from all 3 members before a thread can end, then you could make the system have only 1 stage without concern. Though you'd still have a pseudo "2nd stage" in that once all the votes are cast, if there is disagreement the thread would continue to persist until said disagreement (or discussion about it) had resolved.

Really, there should probably be a requirement for all council members to vote anyway; even if just to say they're indifferent and will leave the decision up to the other members.

(10-19-2011 01:57 PM)Blue_Elite Wrote:  Really, there should probably be a requirement for all council members to vote anyway; even if just to say they're indifferent and will leave the decision up to the other members.

I agree with this. I think every council member should let everyone know where they stand on a change and get a chance to state their arguments if they have any.

And I also agree with combining the two phases.

(10-19-2011 01:57 PM)Blue_Elite Wrote:  The amount of time they have becomes finite once the first vote has been cast. After that point, if the other members of the council get distracted or otherwise are prevented from voting before that time is up, the change (or no change) goes through with the lack of input from the other council members

Finite but quite long. 5 days before votes can be cast and 5 days between the last vote and a thread closing is a minimum of 10 days for those other two members to have their opinions heard. Probably closer to 19 or 20, since I don't really expect the current council to vote for anything at 5 days on the dot (it took 13 days for Metal Babble's first vote to come in).

I'd be fine with 2 councilmen needing to have had voted for a thread to close, which just about guarantees the thread stays open long enough for everyone to be heard, but at the same time allows for a single member to be lazy/not really care, but three seems like too much of a bottle neck. I don't want to have to keep coming back to a thread every 5 days going "masa, you need to vote" and "Squirm, this one requires your vote to end".

(10-19-2011 02:29 PM)Bubbleman Wrote:  

(10-19-2011 01:57 PM)Blue_Elite Wrote:  Really, there should probably be a requirement for all council members to vote anyway; even if just to say they're indifferent and will leave the decision up to the other members.

I agree with this. I think every council member should let everyone know where they stand on a change and get a chance to state their arguments if they have any.

I like the idea behind this, but wonder whether forcing them all to vote will just be needless beaurocracy (re Nacho's comments about having to bump for the last vote). Maybe require all three to have posted in the thread but not necessarily with a vote? Or at least that as a stepping stone before requiring a full three votes for everything.

Needing all 3 to post their opinion I'm fine with. That's really something they should be doing anyway.

How about, after the first vote the other two members have to make a post before thread closes? That way we know that they've seen what the other council member has voted for, they know that if they do nothing that's the change that is going to happen, and they are OK with that.

I'm worried about bottlenecks/needing to bump too, but I do like requiring at least two votes to move on.

Need two votes to finish, and the third memberhas to have at least posted (this can be overridden by another member, but will be a deliberate decision rather than an automatic "5 days = thread closed" assumption)?

Ya that should be fine. Again the main concern is that "time flies" and 5 days can end up passing very suddenly. The main idea is to avoid, "I forgot to vote", or "I forgot this thread existed," etc.

Really the major thing is that council members don't feel like they missed the boat (I use quotation marks way too much) and then are debating if they want to still vote after a thread is "over" or just let it slide.

So are we going to do this? 5 days until votes are allowed, thread ends after 5 days without a vote assuming there's a majority for any one choice and all 3 have posted at some point during the thread, and no more stage one?

I like the two stage system, mostly due to thread titles. But I suppose I can change the title as soon as a suggestion is generally accepted as a nerf or boost being necessary.

5 days minimum before -and- after? So a minimum of 10 days? That's quite a long time.