Rules and Expectations for Award Nominators

Ant Rules and Expectations

Overview This document is to serve as a code of conduct for members of the Pulsus Award Nomination Team (ANT). Members of the ANT are expected to follow this document when modding and discussing with the community. Award Nominators (AN’s) are senior members of the community with more responsibility than the average player, and as such should conduct themselves with that in mind. If an AN fails to follow this document, they may be removed from the ANT team.

Expectations These are guidelines relating to communication with the community and general self conduct for ANs. As ANs are the primary figures in creating and modding, they must be held to a higher standard than the average player. Failing to comply with these may result in the ANs removal. Act with the intent to improve the community and game. Always try to understand any potential consequences from your actions. Do not exploit or abuse existing systems. Members must follow the awarding criteria. In addition, they must not abuse scripting, the pulse system, or other similar systems that could significantly alter the game. Be civil, within and outside the game. As the face of creating and modding, ANs should always act with maturity and respect. Acting excessively antagonistically, negatively, and in other similar manners may result in an AN's removal. Mod regularly. The ANT is a modding team. As such, ANs should seek to improve the quality of levels and help improve the creating abilities of prospective creators. Be approachable. ANs are experienced creators and modders with a thorough understanding of level quality. They should give an impression that they are able to easily share that knowledge with other players. However, this doesn’t mean ANs have to respond to every request. Promote variety and creativity. Creative stagnation is the bane of innovation. ANs should be open minded to new styles and methods, and be strict about promoting generic and uninspired levels. They should also nominate levels from many different creators, rather than just a few. ANs must not participate in paid creating, modding, or commissions. Keep improving. The creating and modding scene is always changing and growing. ANs should grow along with it, deepening their understanding and learning as much as they can. Ask questions and keep an open mind. Have fun! While being an AN gives you more responsibilities than the average player, Pulsus is still a game. Enjoy what you’re doing, be passionate, and don’t beat yourself up. This should be a hobby, not a job.

Awarding Procedure For a level to be ranked, 2 nominations are required by 2 ANs. This entails an in depth mod of the level, polishing any problems that each AN sees. In addition, after the 2 nominations the other ANs must check it as well. If every AN finds no unrankable problems, it may be ranked. If there are no unrankable problems but an AN has a suggestion, that AN may make the suggestion, however it is expected that the level will be ranked regardless of the creator’s response to the suggestion. In the case that an AN finds a level unrankable after 2 nominations, that member must discuss their reasoning with the rest of the ANT team. If the majority (over one half) of the members deem it unrankable, then the level’s nominations will be reset and will require 2 more nominations. Levels that have mods suggested or nominations by ANs will be modded and ranked before any other level (and will be listed in the WIP section of the master queue). If there are no WIP levels, then the other pending levels will be modded to put levels in WIP. If an AN wishes for their level to be ranked, they must undergo a special ranking procedure. The creator may not nominate their own level, though they may reject it if they do not wish it to be ranked any longer. In addition, the level will require 3 nominations instead of 2. After the 3 nominations, standard ranking procedure applies.

Statuses Every member of the ANT is expected to maintain their own spreadsheet that features mod statuses for every level in the ANT queue. This spreadsheet should feature a row for every level in the master queue, as well as a status column that indicates how far along the ranking process the level is. These statuses should include if a level has been checked yet, modded, nominated, ranked, or rejected. This can be used as an example: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1rpk0xuETTWSsCli6xXOw3EV2X7738JQRE0CuIHrcOVw/edit#gid=0. It’s necessary that these statuses be maintained. It is also necessary that the order of the levels are exactly the same as the master queue. The master queue will be used to see which levels have been rejected, which ones are going through the modding process, and which ones have enough nominations to be ranked. The easiest way to make sure everything is in the right order is to have your first cell be =IMPORTRANGE("https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1tL5lKM4squxaQOV-4IEwONYbA8I1cya7LzkMzAPhfFk/edit#gid=869582348", "Responses!B1:H") This function will spit out all of the level information from the master queue into your spreadsheet, so all you have to do is maintain the status column. In the case that there are 2 entries of the same level in the master queue, both entries must have the same status at all times. There’s not a feasible way to make sure there aren’t duplicates and deleting these duplicates may mess up other queues and cause worse logistic problems. Therefore, to keep things simple, please make duplicate statuses the same. Please note that this is a temporary system. It’s flawed and will be reworked sometime in the future using different programs. However, this is the best solution there is for now, so please bear with it.

Activity Requirement Every month, the ANT as a team is expected to rank at least 4 levels. In addition, every member of the ANT is required to nominate at least 3 levels. If a member fails to meet this requirement, they will be warned. If they are warned for 2 months in a row or 3 months in a year, they will be kicked from the ANT team. In the case a member must take an extended (2 weeks or more) leave of absence due to any reason, they are not required to meet that month's activity requirement.

Nomination Levels with unrankable issues cannot be ranked. This will be determined by mainly the awarding criteria, as well as personal subjectivity relating to structure, representation, gameplay, etc. If an AN contributed to the making of a level, they may not nominate it. The level in its entirety must be checked by all ANs before it can be ranked. Levels must not be nominated or ranked without full confidence. If an AN is unsure of something, they must discuss it with the ANT team or the creator to clarify. Levels must not be nominated by an AN that cannot reasonably judge it. ANs have a wide range in skill in gameplay, creating, and modding. Because of this, if an AN is deemed to have insufficient skill to mod a level, a Lead Award Nominator may reject their ability to nominate the level. Nominations must be done with the creator's consent. A level should not be ranked without the creator wishing or knowing it to be.

Nomination Resets In the case a level's nominations are reset as per the ranking procedure, the ANT team must give the creator thorough reasoning for the reset. This should be followed by a mod that addresses every reason the nominations were reset. After the mod, the level should be in a rankable state, however it will still require 2 new nominations. If the creator themselves wishes for a nomination reset, any ANs must revoke their nominations.