Hi everyone! We are pleased to announce the results of the March 2018 “Spring Break Edition” of the General Staff Meeting. The public portion is available on YouTube here.
For those planning ahead, our next (still unnamed) GSM will be April 14, 2018 at 7pm UTC, with the topic submission cutoff at 7pm UTC on April 12. Please double check what time this is for you as many countries will be switching to or from Daylight Saving Time over the next few weeks.
Staffing update
As many of you know, hntredtie has stepped down from the Moderator position to focus on his academic work. We are grateful to hnt and thank him for all of the contributions he has made to the server, and we wish him the best in his future endeavors.
We are pleased to report that megascatterbomb will be joining the staff ranks as a Trial Moderator – congratulations and welcome aboard to Mega! (We did identify and offer the position to a second candidate, who declined the offer.)
Transit hubs are permitted at all ranks
We define a transit hub (loosely) as a structure, or set of structures connected via pedestrian walkways, that either (a) permit passengers to change between local (intra-city) and regional (inter-city) transit, (b) is a stop or station for four or more lines, or (c) is a stop or station served by two or more agencies or companies.
We are now permitting unincorporated towns (those that have not yet reached Councillor) to build transit hubs. Previously, there was a rule where towns had to be Councillor or higher to build transit hubs, but that was never posted on the Rules page.
Please note that this is not a free-for-all and transit hubs and stations must be realistic and built in existing towns. We will keep an eye on new developments and may revisit this rule at a later date if we find unrealistic hubs being built, or hubs being built in the middle of nowhere. Hubs constructed outside of cities may be removed on sight.
Additionally, this does not change the Mayor requirement for editing MRT stations. If you wish to incorporate the MRT Station as part of your transit hub, you must wait until your town reaches the Mayor rank.
Claims must now have substantial development to remain
In the Construction Rules, we are changing “Claimed areas that have not been built on after two weeks will become unclaimed” to “Claimed areas that have not been built upon significantly after two weeks will become unclaimed”. This rule change is effective immediately.
This means that MRT stations, islands, random land patches, etc must have more than just a simple road or path in order to have the land claim honored. We expect to see a little more effort to secure a land claim (usually a few buildings will do).
Please ask a staff member if you’d like assistance with determining land parcel claim status, and whether a development counts as substantial — any staff member can check when a specific block was placed (just ask for a block check), and admins can check a broader range or roll back all edits made to an area.
Clarification of expectations on funded events
Effective immediately, all grant proposals MUST include a detailed budget for ALL income and expenses. This means hosts must disclose their full payout scheme, plus any registration fees, corporate sponsorships, or other sources of money that may come from other players directly, and any other expenses (like booking fees to pay to venue owners).
To be clear, events are permitted to get funding from sources other than server grants, but we need to know how these monies will be used. We will require a financial report at the end of the event before money will be distributed. Events that fail to follow these guidelines may have their funding revoked.
Existing events that have submitted a grant proposal do not need to resubmit unless they will be changing their finances. We will fund already-approved events according to the terms originally proposed.
Smaller announcements
- A proposal to include landmarks as a part of Premier city reviews has been denied. We already require an “epic” landmark for Governor-ranked cities. If there are landmarks or other features that Premier candidates would like us to know about when conducting our review, there is a space on the form to indicate it, and these notes are read aloud before the review process starts.
- A proposal to allow Members and Citizens to use fireworks has been denied for security reasons. We will improve signage in Central Park to point to the Welcome Center and warp hall to assist these players’ mobility around the server.
- A full rendering of the New World dynmap will be scheduled for the end of April or start of May, when the number of active players is expected to drop. We will announce the dates in April once they are determined, as New World dynmap renders do take three or four days to complete.
- The beta server is currently whitelisted to staff only, and will be opened to the general population in a few weeks. We are testing the Citizens and DiscordSRV plugins and would love your feedback.
- Frumple will be setting up an OpenTTD server for MRT members. Details will be announced in Discord. He is currently seeking opinions on game settings as well as any mods to install. If you have experience in OpenTTD and would like to make any recommendations, please send these to Frumple via Discord PM or direct email.
Roads
We received two road proposals, both of which have been approved:
- A230 Phase 3 by Kel5, which will extend the A230 to EN18.
- B431 by sesese9, which will connect the A4 to P21/V19.
Property auctions
We received three proposals for asset auctions:
- The town of Izumo has been transferred to ModernArt. Although Modern has a history of abandoning towns, this was his first town that he founded himself, so we are happy to give it back to him.
- The airline of Yair, previously owned by Technological99, has been transferred to woorich999.
- Ben Rail and the MRT Phone Network were requested by LithiumMirnuriX, but both have been denied because Lithium did not give a detailed reason why he wanted them.
Premier City Reviews
Kessler has become the ninth city to reach the rank of Premier, and we are delighted to honor lalaboy for his work on the city. Lala was not present to give an acceptance speech, but we will post it here as soon as one is written.
Activity Reviews
A few cities and towns had activity reviews due to actions at previous GSMs:
- The town at V21, which has been requested by a few players, is now open for general auction. Aldranster50, the mayor of the town at V22, has failed to expand northward enough to justify an automatic claim, so we will permit anyone to request V21 at the next GSM. Please send your proposals to staff@.
- The city of Mason City (C12) has been transferred to AlfiePops as hnt has not done any work on it since receiving it at a previous GSM.
- As hnt is departing the server in addition to stepping down from the Moderator role, the city of Whitechapel (A10-A12) will be receiving a new caretaker. We are in the process of identifying who this will be.
That’s all for now – thanks all!
<3,
Chief (on behalf of the rest of the staff)