RPG Town Hall Chat

In order for any online community to thrive, it must grow, which means retaining new users. As a moderator, you play a huge role in converting a first-time contributor into a recurring one. What actions will you take to nurture our new users?

My question: What do you see as the biggest problem at the moment for RPG Stack Exchange and how will you tackle/deal with it

So, I've got a question for us all. One of the big problems was the "physics question" category. How would you have dealt with those slew of questions?

@waxeagle you are already moderator of two other, growing sites on the Stack Exchange network: Gardening and Christianity. Why do you believe adding a third, RPG, will not be overburdening yourself?

@DForck42 You were a mod on Literature.Stackexchange which failed. What did you learn from this that you can apply to this site? This applies to other candidates that have had similar situations.

Please describe your moderation style in a rpg game mechanical term

"-1 votes" are anonymous and discourage new users. Agree/Disagree? If you agree, what would you counteract/fix this?

Do you feel like a representative percentage of the community participates in your site's meta? Based on that, how strongly do you think feedback presented on meta should factor into your decision making as a moderator?

Jeff Atwood, co-creator of Stack Exchange, suggested that this platform isn't a perfect fit for all communities. Personally, I see some clear differences between this community and the IT-related communities, such as Stack Overflow. What differences do you see and how would you work to adapt our policies (and possibly suggest technology improvements?) to improve the "fit"?

When you see a question with major issues (poorly-written, argumentative, etc.), what tool do you reach for first?

How would you deal with a user who produced a steady stream of valuable answers, but tends to generate a large number of arguments/flags from comments?

Two highly respected members of the community get in a comment war on a question. They both flag each other's comments and are cussing and it is clear that this is beyond a heated argument. What do you do, what don't you do?

It seems that there is a focus on reputation not equivalent to it's true function related to the community rather than the individual. How will you emphasize the community aspect as opposed to the individual aspect- or do you see that as a problem?

(related to casperOne's earlier question) Your site has relatively low traffic compared to most other graduated sites on the network, though it also has an excellent answered rate. In light of this, do you feel like your site is experiencing any growing pains, and is there any aspect of how the site is currently run that you feel negatively impacts continued growth?

As a moderator what do you consider your special attack and special weakness, so to speak; how do you counter the latter?

How often do you expect to be able to do moderation stuff for RPG Stack Exchange?

You have now entered the RPG Stack Exchange Town Hall Chat

What would you do if you had real life circumstances prevent you from accessing the site for any extended period of time? (Say, over a week)

Final thoughts from our brave candidate party?

The function of .SE sites tends not to foster community in a lot of cases because of the focus on answer the questions, rather than learning about each other through conversation. Someone asked earlier about promotion- but do you have any specific ideas in terms of helping to build the community around RPG.SE?

@DForck42 The avatars of @CRoss, @BrianBallsunStanton, and @waxeagle all show men with nice beards. Do you have a beard, and if not - if elected will you grow one?

One of the things that moderators on smaller SE 2.0 sites play a key role in that moderators on larger sites don't is promotion. With RPG being classified as one of the "smaller" sites, how do you envision your role in growing the site, and what are your current specific strategies, if any?

@those of you who aren't current moderators. Becoming a moderator means you have chat mod powers across all SE chatrooms. Will you use this power for good or ill?

What will you do when you come across a question that has been edited to ask something completely different than the answers are answering?

A group of six enter this land, waiting for questions: @AceCalhoon, @BrianBallsun-Stanton, @CRoss, @DForck42, @Jadasc, @waxeagle

Time ticks on forwards, and so our quest comes to a close. As mentioned, the proceedings from this journey should turn up in a dedicated digest Meta post sometime in the near future. Keep yourself alert for its arrival. Candidates are free to continue any answers which were not yet finished.

What is your preferred bribery currency/medium/foodstuff?

There is no initiative order; feel free to ask your question(s) unprompted. Do be mindful of whether or not candidates have answered previous questions - if they get bogged down, let them have some respite. Beyond that, feel free to jump in at any time.

...great, you tempt me to rewrite my opening words as a cliche dungeon entry description

Like politics ...