Denied Remove Site Command and ISD

This suggestion has been denied and will not receive development.
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Sep 16, 2023
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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.
 
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you are forgetting that site administration would get much more power if this passed, along with getting what is basically their own ISD, they would have the exact same ego and power trips.
SA would also be a single, unified entity with larger numbers than four people, and would act as a group as they currently do. When compared to two tiny groups of 4 people with near infinite power individually to do whatever they want causes constant war and ego trips on a scale much larger than if you just had a single administrative group.

Its objectively better to have one large administrative group than two tiny groups with infinite power and no clear goal other than to just be powerful.
 
SC/ISD should have a lot less impact on the server as they shouldn't be involved in every little thing that happens in site and is something that should be looked into it with more detail by SL/NL.
The suggestion just seems like a complain on ISD/SC and show that you have not much understanding of how the factions work and how they are intended to work in the server.

Vast majority of the suggestion is based on "Why it should be accepted" and the most important section in which you should explain the changes is poorly explained in terms of what you want to be added.

The idea behind the suggestion is good, but the way it's explained could be improved.
 
Sep 16, 2023
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SC/ISD should have a lot less impact on the server as they shouldn't be involved in every little thing that happens in site and is something that should be looked into it with more detail by SL/NL.
The suggestion just seems like a complain on ISD/SC and show that you have not much understanding of how the factions work and how they are intended to work in the server.

Vast majority of the suggestion is based on "Why it should be accepted" and the most important section in which you should explain the changes is poorly explained in terms of what you want to be added.

The idea behind the suggestion is good, but the way it's explained could be improved.
While some parts of the how are vague, this is partially on purpose (at least on my end), as this is something that would need a lot of work to plan out and carry out, and while I generally don't trust Content Team's ability to read, they and most of current (UK at least) SL do generally do well when it comes to coming up with the finer details and implementations. It's something that would need to be planned carefully and implemented even more so, so I'd rather CT/SL/NL with all of the knowledge have a lot of input on that. Some parts of it are also either in-progress or something that is likely to be the topic of a whole other suggestion, e.g. an IA rework is currently in progress, and an EC/SA/etc. rework is worth a whole suggestion of its own.
 

Aura_

Well-known Member
Jul 3, 2022
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I feel like half of the problems you listed can be solved with a more cohesive and comprehensive method of removing Members of SC and EC. Fixing the very top easily trickles down into fixing ISD as we all very well know that there have been previous members who not only contributed greatly, but also kept a tight leash on the behavior of their respective ISD.


Remove the people known to be absolutely deplorable that should have been removed Day 1 they were outed. Let people who aren't incredibly toxic to a community take over and the rest fixes slowly.

Not gonna name names, but if you know, you know.
 
I feel like half of the problems you listed can be solved with a more cohesive and comprehensive method of removing Members of SC and EC. Fixing the very top easily trickles down into fixing ISD as we all very well know that there have been previous members who not only contributed greatly, but also kept a tight leash on the behavior of their respective ISD.


Remove the people known to be absolutely deplorable that should have been removed Day 1 they were outed. Let people who aren't incredibly toxic to a community take over and the rest fixes slowly.

Not gonna name names, but if you know, you know.
And what method of removing members of O5 and Ethics would you propose that's actually viable and could happen?

Like you said there's been good SC, but they don't make up the majority. There's even been good -1s and Chairmen/women who had the power to remove Site Command below them and cared to make sure their department was good quality. And some of those people have been in their positions for months, yet nothing changed in the long run. We still get terrible people in SC positions, and the only people who can remove site command is site command. They are the living version of the meme "We have investigated ourselves and discovered no wrongdoing".

Server Leadership/SL are the only ones who can also remove SC, and typically require an entire group conversation. And most people in SC are either friends with SL/SSL members or are SSL themselves, and won't be nearly as easily held accountable unless they do something absolutely deplorable. Network Leadership only remove people from their positions if they do something truly degenerate that cannot be defended or hidden.
 
Jul 1, 2022
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To have a better way to remove the people in power if SC were removed there could be elections for senior members of site administration every 6 months or so, it wouldn't make sense to do it for O5 or ethics coz of their CL5 secret stuff but for site administration it could work. The people who would vote would probably be anyone in a position that has to be obtained (like anything that has to have some sort of barrier to it like even IA agents are included but things like chefs etc are not to try to stop alt accounts participating but can't be fixed completely)
 
- Support

The main points made by this suggestion is that the removal of SC will mitigate ego issues, but overlooks the fact that ego issues occur across this entire playerbase with the main difference being that SC actually hold power and position IC which places CL5 issues at the centre of gossip.
Attempting to resolve this by removing SC will simply redistribute these same ego issues into other departments while simultaneously removing the CL5 departments that are best suited to dealing with them.

If egotistical players are allowed to promote into SC and get to the CO's level in ISD then this is a failure of staff and the players in CL5 to filter such people out of SC and ISD and not a failure of the role. The biggest contributor to this particular point is CL5s not having the balls to issue strikes and removals against themselves and their relevant ISD branch as they have grown to become friends over time - and this exact circumstance occurs in all departments and regiments in the game and removing SC will not change this. In fact it has occurred dozens of times that SC have correctly used their position to remove regiment COMs and department directors for this exact reason

I do however 100% agree that it makes no sense for O5-1 or the ECC to be stationed at Site-65. I have said in the past that it would make more sense both lore-wise and logic-wise for the O5 and EC to be directly integrated within Site Admin, with there being just 2 or 3 council and committee members that work directly with the Site Director.

If an ISD conflict occurs without a relevant RP reason and escalates to the point that it disrupts Site-wide RP then it is a failure of the CL5 players and/or staff to issue relevant strikes and removals to the people who instigated it and not a reoccuring circumstances that is destined to happen just because ISD exists. Murder hoboing and RDMing should be met with warns, bans, strikes and demotions/removals - the fact that these punishments are not being issued is the root cause of the problem, not the competitive environment amongst ISD.

It's also the case that having O5 and EC jobs available gives players something to aim for who want to promote through departments and get themselves into a position that they feel has impact in the community - and that by removing these positions not only is there less of an incentive to make a positive difference but the time-frame in which players can reach end-game content is made a lot smaller which means people will become disinterested faster, damaging retention.

The removal of Assistants is also completely unjustified. Not only are Assistants not the target of your accusations regarding ego issues but if there were no council or committe members on site that it does make sense that an Assistant would be assigned to the site to represent them.

I also do not believe your claim that removing SC will improve the RP environment is at all accurate, having members of the O5 and EC present to stimulate RP through dangerous and non-routine testing/investigations is a relevant part of the game RP. It is also the case that a lot of inspiration for GM events and GM storylines comes from SC. Further to that, having SC available gives a very convenient liaison for GMs to work with when they run events as SC can give directives to the players to ensure that an appropriate RP response to the event is put in order.
 
- Support

The main points made by this suggestion is that the removal of SC will mitigate ego issues, but overlooks the fact that ego issues occur across this entire playerbase with the main difference being that SC actually hold power and position IC which places CL5 issues at the centre of gossip.
Attempting to resolve this by removing SC will simply redistribute these same ego issues into other departments while simultaneously removing the CL5 departments that are best suited to dealing with them.

If egotistical players are allowed to promote into SC and get to the CO's level in ISD then this is a failure of staff and the players in CL5 to filter such people out of SC and ISD and not a failure of the role. The biggest contributor to this particular point is CL5s not having the balls to issue strikes and removals against themselves and their relevant ISD branch as they have grown to become friends over time - and this exact circumstance occurs in all departments and regiments in the game and removing SC will not change this. In fact it has occurred dozens of times that SC have correctly used their position to remove regiment COMs and department directors for this exact reason

I do however 100% agree that it makes no sense for O5-1 or the ECC to be stationed at Site-65. I have said in the past that it would make more sense both lore-wise and logic-wise for the O5 and EC to be directly integrated within Site Admin, with there being just 2 or 3 council and committee members that work directly with the Site Director.

If an ISD conflict occurs without a relevant RP reason and escalates to the point that it disrupts Site-wide RP then it is a failure of the CL5 players and/or staff to issue relevant strikes and removals to the people who instigated it and not a reoccuring circumstances that is destined to happen just because ISD exists. Murder hoboing and RDMing should be met with warns, bans, strikes and demotions/removals - the fact that these punishments are not being issued is the root cause of the problem, not the competitive environment amongst ISD.

It's also the case that having O5 and EC jobs available gives players something to aim for who want to promote through departments and get themselves into a position that they feel has impact in the community - and that by removing these positions not only is there less of an incentive to make a positive difference but the time-frame in which players can reach end-game content is made a lot smaller which means people will become disinterested faster, damaging retention.

The removal of Assistants is also completely unjustified. Not only are Assistants not the target of your accusations regarding ego issues but if there were no council or committe members on site that it does make sense that an Assistant would be assigned to the site to represent them.

I also do not believe your claim that removing SC will improve the RP environment is at all accurate, having members of the O5 and EC present to stimulate RP through dangerous and non-routine testing/investigations is a relevant part of the game RP. It is also the case that a lot of inspiration for GM events and GM storylines comes from SC. Further to that, having SC available gives a very convenient liaison for GMs to work with when they run events as SC can give directives to the players to ensure that an appropriate RP response to the event is put in order.
Thats cool and all but ethics don't have orange suits.
 
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Mar 20, 2022
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+Support

I've been fortunate enough to be Chairman and O5-1 on UK so I feel I got a bit of a unique perspective here.

Site Command's purpose is to be the creators of roleplay and be the guiding hand of Site matters. But where does that leave Site Administration?

Site Admin needs a facelift to mimic the Site Command setup, this should include SA assistants being added and allowing people to transfer into it.

Whilst I do agree to some extent that SC can be good when it had good players, it doesn't solve the fundamental issues. A1/O1 encroach on other department duties religiously and sometimes through no fault of their own.


To those saying "Nah it won't happen", don't be so sure. If I were you use this chance to express your opinion.

I'd write more but on mobile lol
 
Sep 22, 2023
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I feel like half of the problems you listed can be solved with a more cohesive and comprehensive method of removing Members of SC and EC. Fixing the very top easily trickles down into fixing ISD as we all very well know that there have been previous members who not only contributed greatly, but also kept a tight leash on the behavior of their respective ISD.


Remove the people known to be absolutely deplorable that should have been removed Day 1 they were outed. Let people who aren't incredibly toxic to a community take over and the rest fixes slowly.

Not gonna name names, but if you know, you know.
Good in theory, but uh.... never happens in reality. People that are known problems are allowed to stay in their roles, regardless of the amount of complaints made against them. People that were removed on good reason get to come back and immediately get their jobs back. It simply isn't something that's going to happen, or at least, I don't trust that it will.
 
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Merrick Travolta

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-Support

The bias for me exists. I'm an A1 player and as such have a skewed view. my problems with this suggestion goes as follows (I'm very tired and didn't full absorb the post's energy so if I forget all the detail in it, I'm sorry)

  • Removal of SC would cause a huge power vacuum. Yes you could implement RAISA or expand SA but this then creates a few issues.
    • The O5 council and Ethics Committee are the most known thing in the SCP universe. I personally had never heard of RAISA till I joined here. O5 and EC are clear goals for what is the "Top tier position to go for"
    • Yes, They have egos and all that, The two sides are supposed to be in at least a low level state of opposition For example, O5 give research a less than ethical project, the Committee then gives Internal Affairs the ability to investigate it.
    • The players behind SC, I can't vouch for USA. But in UK. All those in the CL5 positions have atleast in my opinion. Done exempellary job in what they're supposed to do. Create RP, Delegate that RP and lead it when it's required. Not a single one of them is undeserving of the position, In this current context, these RP leaders would be Pushed/made to resign or take a different position in a department they didn't choose or in the case of RAISA, would be thrust into a new department where they're working together in an unknown field. (I'm unsure if SC shares this opinion, from the few I've spoken to, No. But I feel like voicing it anyway)
    • The roleplay created by Site command tends to (I don't know if this is a shared opinion) give me quite the dopamine rush. I was recently handed a small thing by a Committee member and while yes it may sound cringe. I was damn well excited to be working on it because it was site command giving the orders.

  • Internal.. security... department, Yes. a main pain point for some foundation personnel, Here's my problems with their removal.
    • First the obvious. ISD is a total of 50 combatives. Including 22 CO's (if filled) where would they move? the other two remaining regiments have no chance to accommodate that many CO's, If you created another MTF to try and accomodate this. It'd create a question of "Who steps down".
    • Now. The rest of the members. They could easily move to another regiment however. Unless they have a deep experience with another MTF (I know some ISD do, I personally never made it into NCO as NU-7). If I were to be made to move to NU-7 or E-11. I'd be stuck having to relearn the usual operating procedure for this and personally, It would suck.
    • I'm unaware of O1's squadrons & routine. But I can comment on A1's squadrons. we have two (I'm hoping to make it 3 at some point) squadrons. Both serving unique purposes and opportunities for departments to RP with and fills a player's power fantasy, one of these is directly involved with research and medical and allows
  • Now to address two of the major issues brought up by people when ISD is named dropped, ISD conflicts and ISD attitude/behaviour
    • ISD conflicts are supposed to be a rare event. We (Atleast on UK) have had a problem with too many happening recently and to my knowledge, both commanders and CO teams are actively working to avoid this happening at all costs.
    • ISD attitude is a complex issue to tackle. ISD are the servants of the (supposibly) Highest figureheads in the foundation. They don't serve you, They don't serve Department leads. They serve site command site command alone. in their eyes, you are worthless and replaceable. It's yes. Just a issue of ISD's existence. However. Speaking in server context. ISD players have a tough job balancing being the "Scary force" they're supposed to be. When I think of ISD I think of the idea that if I'm seeing their presence build in my office. Shit is about to go down. But do not mistake this to be a free pass to be toxic. Anything like that can and should be reported to a CO of that regiment.
I would bring my comments about assistants, But I have never held an assistant role, Don't plan on it. But They serve a purpose within the site and again. would make more stress for other players to work for a position only to have it removed.

This suggestion is good, I'm glad the players involved were able to cause this much debate. But I just can't support it.
 
-support
In theory, this is a good suggestion, however, SA is not in a position to become the final all-powerful say in things on site. SA would need to undergo a complete rework for this to be even remotely viable. There would also need to be an intermediate position between department leadership and SA which currently does not exist. While SA is not needed for SC in its current form, SC are much better with former SA experience, there would be no "SA" experience possible, you would just go from department leader to site command, which isn't exactly a good thing.

With how the server works, all that removing SC does is turn SA into a single branch of SC, imagine O5 if ethics didn't exist, it's a recipe for disaster.

Also you just can't just get rid of the main jobs of probably around 150+ people over both servers, it's just going to result in a bunch of people leaving the community.

From an RP standpoint it is stupid they are on site, yes, from a gameplay standpoint they are to engrained into the server to just remove.
 
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