Community Meeting 28/04/2021

[flugs]

I’ll probably be present, don’t listen to @blobvis 2.0!

 

[blobvis 2.0]

I know mod flugs

 

[Kelson]

very cool good job

 

[Kenty]

that ain't dababy, das my baby

 

[amir]

lay down on the bed and do the cry baby

 

[Tyla Jai]

Community Meeting Summary​

Hello,

So the Community Meeting has concluded, it was a fairly decent turnout with over 50 members turning up to listen. There were some completely valid questions and concerns raised and I feel we have managed to respond to them effectively. I have recorded the entire meeting but nobody wants to listen to that so have provided a summary of all key questions and answers.

Why was there a metagaming crackdown announced but people haven’t been getting same bans as MegaLollis?
Collier responded to this question. This is something which happened a long time ago, a crackdown only means we are looking into it more often, it doesn't mean increased ban times. For somebody who plays the server frequently even a short ban can be quite a long time for them.

Targeting through ARs has become more common recently, what could we do to stop this?
Collier responded to this question. Our staff team is competent enough to recognise two individuals having 'beef' and are able to tailor the punishments accordingly and decide if the user should be punished.

Reverting 1.2 Discrimination Changes
People don't want to come on the server and have racial slurs used against them. The rule was intended to facilitate a safe environment for people of any ethnic background to play on the server. We made the rule very clear in the meeting. You aren't going to get banned for calling somebody a retard in-character but you need to respect a request from somebody telling you to stop in LOOC.

Why are TinySlayer and Ayjay allowed to minge around but players cannot?
TinySlayer responded by stating he tries to add to the variety of roleplay with the exception of what he describes as 'counter-minge' scenarios, but he can't speak for other developers. Fredy explained that the standards apply to all players. However, they are Developers/Owners, not players.

How far are developers with small suggestions that got accepted, but never implemented?
Fredy responded by explaining we get suggestions daily but our development team is not big enough to implement them all. There are six pages of suggestions but we are not able to do all of them. TinySlayer said he only accepts suggestions he actually intends on completing. I said that some older developers have made mistakes by setting dates which could not be met. Ethan said a lot of suggestions were accepted because they are 'good ideas', it doesn't mean they are guaranteed to be completed but is treated more of a pool for developers to pick out good ideas to work on next.

How does it make sense for TinySlayer to say "I will develop whatever I want, and if players don't like it then they don't have to play it"
Even for Developers, unfortunately we don't have enough money to make them work on stuff full time. They work on what they want and I can't ask for much more then that as we don't pay them a full time salary.

Evocity when?
We won't switch back to Evocity as it is a bad map and whenever we do the server dies. It's better to work on a new version of Paralake. Evocity is also a terrible map for new players as you need a car to get around, whereas in Paralake we have a monorail system.

Are you going to give us more information for upcoming updates, e.g. Paralake V5?
We don't think this is a good idea. It is better to be surprised than know something is coming and a deadline is missed. We have seen this in the past when Ayjay went through the suggestions and put dates on them but many months/years later they have still not happened. Not putting dates on suggestions gives developers flexibility and time to do what they want to do.

What is planned to make the server a role-play server again and not a base-defence server?
We wanted to encourage more criminal role-play similar to the org war we had running but we cannot babysit every org and tell them who and how they can fight etc. It would be beneficial to have some suggestions from the community.

What are your thoughts on allowing communication banned individuals access to help chat and what do you look for to unban them?
This has been made and is due to be released in a future update. In order for us to unban somebody this is discussed in admin meetings, we are generally looking for signs of improvement, community contributions, improved behaviour, having a clean record since (i.e. no further incidents of toxicity or rule breaks in general).

What's been done to help new players better understand the server and functions since I have seen players teaching new arrivals the basics. Why don't they know about the starter packs and rewards?
New Players are told about the new reward system for joining discord, steam and forums. There is also a help page dedicated to this. The developers are also working on a mission system which will walk new players through the game and different mechanics.

Can you explain what PERP is about and what keeps players?
Each player is different so we can't give one answer for this. This is a question we would love to put in the next community survey.

Regarding communication bans, do you find them effective?
Yes, they have been very effective. It removes toxic players from the community without the need to remove them from the server. Not only do they make the server appear better for new players but has also helped to reform some individuals.

Are house locations going to be further away in V5? There are police involved in every situation.
Paralake V5 will be the final major version of the map, with further updates to it being smaller but more frequent. We have more police in service than we used to back in Evocity, we used to have 5 whereas now we have 10 (or more). The issue is more that we have a lot of police.

Will we have a V5 progress update?
We don't want to give much away about the new map.

XQuality worked on a completely custom animation set, replacing standards Half-Life ones. They were adjusted so it would prevent headglitches. Any updates on this?
XQuality is not currently working on the server as he makes his own indie games. It was never released as it was a huge project and was nowhere near completion.

How about we go through different version of Paralake instead of Evocity?
All NPC positions would have to be re-done as they weren't saved, developers have better things to be doing right now.

Why is Ayjay inactive?
He is taking a break after doing a lot of work on V5.

Are more legal ways of making money being worked on, e.g. farming?
It isn't being worked on as far as we know, StephenPuffs was working on a farming update a long time ago but we aren't sure how far he got with this.

Why aren't the community being asked if they want rule changes e.g. the flanking/raiding change?
We will look at having these voted on in-game through the computer vote system.

Why are updates PD-focused?
There have been quite a lot of criminals updates too e.g. chem table, organisations. There are more plans for organisations. The next update(s) should not be police focused.

Will the fishing rod limit be raised to 5 for VIP?
No it is fine as it is, otherwise make suggestion.

Implement play-time restrictions to stop people playing 10 hours a day?

Can we add more TDM Vehicles?
We have enough cars, the ones which were not added were done so for a reason.

Can the old clothing decals be added back?
The new customization system does not allow this due to code differences. We could do something similar in the future but not right now.

Is introducing car trading possible or not possible?
We aren't introducing car trading, it is a money sink that we want to keep.

Are the developers aware of Hammer++
Yes, but chose not to use it as it doesn't work well for GMOD.

What is being done to stop people coming on to just raid?
This is part of the gamemode and not really seen as a problem but if you have suggestions then feel free to make them.

What is your favourite thing about PERP?
Tyla (Elite RTU Pursuits), Fredy (Development), Samuel (GDPR Requests), Bolli (Noclip), Ethan (Community Stuff)

Will we ever stop using TDM?
No! There isn't a better vehicle system out there worth switching to.

What about more community games?
We want to do community games nights. A lot of toxicity is because the community doesn't really talk to each-other outside of their orgs or action requests, this is a great idea.

Ford Raptor for normal players?
We will not make this for normal players as we want to keep it as a reward for becoming staff.

Are drugs too profitable?
We will look at changing the balance of drugs but we aren't too sure how they will change at this time.

Have you found a YouTuber to advertise PERP?
We have had a detailed look but haven't found anyone suitable except for one who already makes PERP Videos but refused to put our community name in his video title or description. If you have any ideas then let us know. We have introduced the Content Creator system though.

What about a Moonshine System?

Have you fixed the issue where you have too many items in storage?
No just don't have 400 guns in storage.

New Player Survey
We talked a bit about the New Player Survey and how there have been some very interesting results which will help us tailor our experience to new players.

From looking at these statistics, we can see.

• Most players join through their friends, we could look at introducing rewards for friend referrals in future.
• The majority of players want to get involved in the community but more work could be done.
• Too many new players have not understood game mechanics, to work on this we are introducing the Mission System and will make improvements to the help pages wherever suggested.
• Nearly all new players that have completed the survey have enjoyed their experience so far.
• Most players know how to ask for help if they need it but this could do with some more work.

Cheers
Tyla