What does this suggestion change/add/remove:
This suggestion changes the following;
[Removals]
- Remove the O5 Council, Alpha-1, and their Assistants (outside of events/SSL)
- Remove the Ethics Committee, Omega-1, and their Assistants (outside of events/SSL. Ethics could possibly be reintroduced in the future in a different form.)
[Department Expansions]
- Expansion of the Security Department to include a whitelisted security task force (Like an MTF, but under Security) dedicated to the protection of Site Administration, and executing their will, acting as their combative arm.
- Expansion of Internal Affairs to include more trusted jobs with more powerful arrest and investigative authority site-wide. This could possibly include a more combative job, like the “SWAT” of I.A.
- Possible expansion of Site Administration to include jobs such as Zone Managers or Deputy/Co-Site Director (Just an idea, somewhat questionable in use)
- IA and/or DEA pick up infoleak suppression as a duty, possibly some kind of shared thing to encourage RP between the two
Has something similar been suggested before? If so, why is your suggestion different?:
Site Command being removed has not been suggested before outside of mess hall, that I know of.
Possible Positives of the suggestion (At least 2):
> Significantly reduced drama and ego battles within the community
> Less potential rule breaks
> Improved roleplay environment
> Reduced amount of excess, unnecessary job bloat (Less of a player split, and two less MTFs)
> Removes the overlap issues and frustrations between Site Command, ISD, Site Administration, IA, and the rest of the community.
> Provides opportunities for other departments to expand or be created, such as Security, or Nu-7/E-11.
> Prevention of ISD wars, which go so bad when left unchecked that UK SC made an OOC agreement that heavily limits what can be done.
> Makes sense in RP - why would O5-1/2/3/4, three ECMs and the ECC all be stationed at a containment site [EDIT: Added later]
Possible Negatives of the suggestion:
> All of the work done regarding Ethics, O5, and Alpha/Omega-1 will be removed.
> Members in Site Command and Alpha/Omega-1 will lose their positions (Though can be transferred to other positions of their choosing at the discretion of the roleplay leaders)
> This is a major change, and can cause a temporary destabilization within the community as they adapt to it and figure out the new environment that would come as a result.
> Significant reduction in combative jobs, which may (or may not) cause an imbalance between the Foundation and GOIs/SCPs
Based on the Positives & Negatives, why should this suggestion be accepted:
(Note: Things mentioned here do not account for every single site command member who’s ever existed or does exist in the community. Some ISD/SC have done relatively well in their positions, but that does not account for the majority. This is not intended to be a disrespectful or personal jab at anyone.)
For one, Site Command simply does not contribute enough of value to the community to make up for the issues caused. While the idea of the O5 Council, Alpha-1, Ethics Committee and Omega-1 are all very cool ideas and work well within the SCP Wiki and have a lot of roleplay potential, that isn’t how things have worked out in this server. These groups contribute nearly nothing to the roleplay environment of the community and have only taken away from groups such as Site Administration. Not to mention the amount of drama, toxicity, and egos that come from and are often caused by all four of these groups who constantly fight for who’s right, wrong, and who has the most power/authority over others. Site Command and ISD have only caused frustration, community divide, and problems. Even certain past ISD commanding officers have stated they would rather have someone toxic who doesn’t roleplay over someone bad at combat. The priorities of these groups are not in line with the communities best interest, and this has been proven over the past two and a half years where players outside of Site Command and ISDs friend groups express their frustrations with their near limitless power and their nonsensical use of it. It doesn’t make sense in any lore, and it doesn’t make sense for the community to continue having Site Command in the way that they are implemented currently in the server to essentially be two major powers who do the same exact thing and fight each other on a daily basis.
Overall, having these groups have only caused toxicity and frustrations in the long run. The Site Command/Administration rework only helped in the short run until the point of that rework was forgotten, and Site Command still stepped on and overshadowed Site Administration on many subjects, involving themselves directly in site affairs more often than they ever should have.
There have been countless incidents relating to toxicity, power abuse, server rule breaking (often not addressed when staff are aware) and similar, that often significantly affect server health for other factions/departments/etc. These issues come naturally when you introduce two major powers with minimal restriction on what their expectations are. Even if Server Leadership manages to weed out every bad apple of Site Command/ISD, the mere nature of these groups will continue to encourage more unsavory individuals to work themselves into these positions again and again. [EDIT: Specific incidents have been removed as to not potentially cause drama, but there was previously an actual list of various incidents over time, so while I won't include them, rest assured that there are plenty.]
Frequently (Predictably) Asked Questions:
“How would this be implemented in roleplay, and what would happen to these roles?”
Essentially, The Administrator would decide that leaving the O5 Council and Ethics Committee permanently assigned to a site such as 65 was far too dangerous to be reasonable, and went against the Foundations expectations of personnel of their class. So, they’re re-positioned to Site-01 with the rest of the council. These roles would then serve as a position for Game Masters to use for events, or for Server Leadership to use when assigning a new Site Director or intervening in roleplay situations when necessary.
“What are the main benefits of this suggestion besides whats mentioned in the reasoning?”
Besides what’s posted, removal of O5, Ethics, and everything associated opens up alot of room for opportunity. Floor 3 and Ethics Wing could be repurposed or removed entirely in favor of other sectors in the map that other groups could benefit from. There would also be a reduction in models for these roles unless NL decides to keep them for events. This would also remove many roles, including many combative roles, from the server which opens up room for other departments to expand or be created without bloating the server. (Such as expanding Security, Internal Affairs, giving room for E&TS, RAISA, etc.)
“Could these roles ever come back?”
Depending on what NL wants if they accepted this suggestion, I’m sure they could. But they would have to be much more strictly chosen based on their roleplay capabilities and how kind they are to others, and not who’s friend they are, their combat skills, or what documents they created. Other implementations of O5, for example, could include solely being a Forum/Discord role given to heavily trusted players who are excellent at roleplay and respect with maybe one O5 job slot that can only be used when authorized by Server Leadership for specific events/scenarios. The EC specifically has a lot of potential to be reworked into something else that wouldn't be nearly as susceptible to these sorts of issues.
“What about the people who hold these positions already?”
I definitely can understand that some of these people, especially those in Site Command or ISD COs, have worked long and hard for their positions. The prospect of that work being stripped from them like this wouldn’t feel good. One idea for this process is to allow all people in these positions to hold their roles until they choose where they want to go or resign, however the roles would be locked and unable to be obtained by anyone in the future. So if there’s four O5 now and two choose to resign or transfer, there would only be two O5 remaining until they resign. In return, O5 and Ethics would lose their power over site policy and would not be able to edit it further without permission from Site Administration once there’s less than three Site Command from each group remaining. They would continue to hold their power in roleplay to initiate different RP until their role dissolves. During this process, members of SC and ISD can transfer to other departments such as other MTFs, Junior CL4 roles (or Senior CL4 roles for ISD CO and SC+), DEA Senior Agent, IA, etc.
This suggestion changes the following;
[Removals]
- Remove the O5 Council, Alpha-1, and their Assistants (outside of events/SSL)
- Remove the Ethics Committee, Omega-1, and their Assistants (outside of events/SSL. Ethics could possibly be reintroduced in the future in a different form.)
[Department Expansions]
- Expansion of the Security Department to include a whitelisted security task force (Like an MTF, but under Security) dedicated to the protection of Site Administration, and executing their will, acting as their combative arm.
- Expansion of Internal Affairs to include more trusted jobs with more powerful arrest and investigative authority site-wide. This could possibly include a more combative job, like the “SWAT” of I.A.
- Possible expansion of Site Administration to include jobs such as Zone Managers or Deputy/Co-Site Director (Just an idea, somewhat questionable in use)
- IA and/or DEA pick up infoleak suppression as a duty, possibly some kind of shared thing to encourage RP between the two
Has something similar been suggested before? If so, why is your suggestion different?:
Site Command being removed has not been suggested before outside of mess hall, that I know of.
Possible Positives of the suggestion (At least 2):
> Significantly reduced drama and ego battles within the community
> Less potential rule breaks
> Improved roleplay environment
> Reduced amount of excess, unnecessary job bloat (Less of a player split, and two less MTFs)
> Removes the overlap issues and frustrations between Site Command, ISD, Site Administration, IA, and the rest of the community.
> Provides opportunities for other departments to expand or be created, such as Security, or Nu-7/E-11.
> Prevention of ISD wars, which go so bad when left unchecked that UK SC made an OOC agreement that heavily limits what can be done.
> Makes sense in RP - why would O5-1/2/3/4, three ECMs and the ECC all be stationed at a containment site [EDIT: Added later]
Possible Negatives of the suggestion:
> All of the work done regarding Ethics, O5, and Alpha/Omega-1 will be removed.
> Members in Site Command and Alpha/Omega-1 will lose their positions (Though can be transferred to other positions of their choosing at the discretion of the roleplay leaders)
> This is a major change, and can cause a temporary destabilization within the community as they adapt to it and figure out the new environment that would come as a result.
> Significant reduction in combative jobs, which may (or may not) cause an imbalance between the Foundation and GOIs/SCPs
Based on the Positives & Negatives, why should this suggestion be accepted:
(Note: Things mentioned here do not account for every single site command member who’s ever existed or does exist in the community. Some ISD/SC have done relatively well in their positions, but that does not account for the majority. This is not intended to be a disrespectful or personal jab at anyone.)
For one, Site Command simply does not contribute enough of value to the community to make up for the issues caused. While the idea of the O5 Council, Alpha-1, Ethics Committee and Omega-1 are all very cool ideas and work well within the SCP Wiki and have a lot of roleplay potential, that isn’t how things have worked out in this server. These groups contribute nearly nothing to the roleplay environment of the community and have only taken away from groups such as Site Administration. Not to mention the amount of drama, toxicity, and egos that come from and are often caused by all four of these groups who constantly fight for who’s right, wrong, and who has the most power/authority over others. Site Command and ISD have only caused frustration, community divide, and problems. Even certain past ISD commanding officers have stated they would rather have someone toxic who doesn’t roleplay over someone bad at combat. The priorities of these groups are not in line with the communities best interest, and this has been proven over the past two and a half years where players outside of Site Command and ISDs friend groups express their frustrations with their near limitless power and their nonsensical use of it. It doesn’t make sense in any lore, and it doesn’t make sense for the community to continue having Site Command in the way that they are implemented currently in the server to essentially be two major powers who do the same exact thing and fight each other on a daily basis.
Overall, having these groups have only caused toxicity and frustrations in the long run. The Site Command/Administration rework only helped in the short run until the point of that rework was forgotten, and Site Command still stepped on and overshadowed Site Administration on many subjects, involving themselves directly in site affairs more often than they ever should have.
There have been countless incidents relating to toxicity, power abuse, server rule breaking (often not addressed when staff are aware) and similar, that often significantly affect server health for other factions/departments/etc. These issues come naturally when you introduce two major powers with minimal restriction on what their expectations are. Even if Server Leadership manages to weed out every bad apple of Site Command/ISD, the mere nature of these groups will continue to encourage more unsavory individuals to work themselves into these positions again and again. [EDIT: Specific incidents have been removed as to not potentially cause drama, but there was previously an actual list of various incidents over time, so while I won't include them, rest assured that there are plenty.]
Frequently (Predictably) Asked Questions:
“How would this be implemented in roleplay, and what would happen to these roles?”
Essentially, The Administrator would decide that leaving the O5 Council and Ethics Committee permanently assigned to a site such as 65 was far too dangerous to be reasonable, and went against the Foundations expectations of personnel of their class. So, they’re re-positioned to Site-01 with the rest of the council. These roles would then serve as a position for Game Masters to use for events, or for Server Leadership to use when assigning a new Site Director or intervening in roleplay situations when necessary.
“What are the main benefits of this suggestion besides whats mentioned in the reasoning?”
Besides what’s posted, removal of O5, Ethics, and everything associated opens up alot of room for opportunity. Floor 3 and Ethics Wing could be repurposed or removed entirely in favor of other sectors in the map that other groups could benefit from. There would also be a reduction in models for these roles unless NL decides to keep them for events. This would also remove many roles, including many combative roles, from the server which opens up room for other departments to expand or be created without bloating the server. (Such as expanding Security, Internal Affairs, giving room for E&TS, RAISA, etc.)
“Could these roles ever come back?”
Depending on what NL wants if they accepted this suggestion, I’m sure they could. But they would have to be much more strictly chosen based on their roleplay capabilities and how kind they are to others, and not who’s friend they are, their combat skills, or what documents they created. Other implementations of O5, for example, could include solely being a Forum/Discord role given to heavily trusted players who are excellent at roleplay and respect with maybe one O5 job slot that can only be used when authorized by Server Leadership for specific events/scenarios. The EC specifically has a lot of potential to be reworked into something else that wouldn't be nearly as susceptible to these sorts of issues.
“What about the people who hold these positions already?”
I definitely can understand that some of these people, especially those in Site Command or ISD COs, have worked long and hard for their positions. The prospect of that work being stripped from them like this wouldn’t feel good. One idea for this process is to allow all people in these positions to hold their roles until they choose where they want to go or resign, however the roles would be locked and unable to be obtained by anyone in the future. So if there’s four O5 now and two choose to resign or transfer, there would only be two O5 remaining until they resign. In return, O5 and Ethics would lose their power over site policy and would not be able to edit it further without permission from Site Administration once there’s less than three Site Command from each group remaining. They would continue to hold their power in roleplay to initiate different RP until their role dissolves. During this process, members of SC and ISD can transfer to other departments such as other MTFs, Junior CL4 roles (or Senior CL4 roles for ISD CO and SC+), DEA Senior Agent, IA, etc.
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