Make the Executive Officer the ship's second in command.

[Boggle08]

I concur with butterrobber. XO has always felt like a directionless role that competes with the OM in terms of functionality to me. This new XO feels like it was designed to not disrupt the current chain of command at all, and to minimize OOC administrative headache by putting it in such a confined, non-executive condition.

Uselessness begets lack of interest begets lack of feedback begets lack of change.

[NothingNew]

6 hours ago, NG+7 Gael said:

I'm not disagreeing with the statistics, but I think that the statistics don't tell the full story.

Well, even if we're going by the statistics, seeing as the second-most played species for this role at roughly 1/6th of humans the past year were Unathi, followed by IPCs (125 altogether) - It's not an insignificant amount, especially when contrasted with the fact that only two Skrell played within the past year.

[SilverSZ]

Let me preface my post with some information I consider important to my opinions on the suggested changes.

I voted "yes" on the poll to make XO a 2IC. I don't play XO, but I do play Command often. Primarily Head of Security.

When I voted for the change. I didn't really care if species restrictions changed or such, as mentioned, I don't play XO in it's current state as I don't think it's an interesting role and didn't have plans to do so.

However, if I was presented at the time of that vote with the option of the now proposed changes, or no changes. I would vote for no changes. As I really think what's proposed is a complete step backwards from what I wanted to see out of this. I wanted the establishment of the XO as a true 2IC. They would have higher authority than the other heads, second only to the captain. If there was no captain present, the XO would by default be the acting captain until a Captain was present. I wanted some extra detail to the command hierarchy, an extra clear line of succession to the captain rather than always having to deal with a vote and I feel the lack of responsibilities XO currently has makes it perfect for this role. As Head of Security in a crisis situation I do not want to be made acting captain. I have enough to deal with, most often, and I think the XO is often the Head in the best position to take it, relatively duty free and positioned close to the bridge most often.

So the proposed changes by Arrow are just... everything I really didn't want to see. The XO doesn't gain any authority unless the Captain says so, the XO now cannot become acting captain unless "Absolutely necessary" which is funny to think that in some cases, the species restricted second in command will have no option but to appoint a Tajaran, IPC, Unathi etc acting captain, unless we decide to bar non-humans and skrell from being acting captain. If the XO is expected to be the one to advise an acting captain, why shouldn't they just take the position themselves? In a crisis situation the person most directly related to it, like a CMO with a disease or HoS dealing with an active threat are likely busy on the ground of their departments or ship dealing with the issue directly, doesn't it make more sense for the experienced, relatively less busy candidate with basic knowledge of all departments, something key for the coordination of people in an emergency, just take the spot as captain instead? The XO is meant to inform an acting captain about the special things they and only captains know but... why should they do that with an acting captain who hasn't met hiring standards for said secrets and may be a Tajara, IPC, Unathi etc and not just take the acting captaincy themselves? Going back to the point prior, I do not have time when dealing with a security situation as HoS to hear about the self-destruct.

I'd like to echo what people have already said. This feels like the worst of both outcomes, XO really in my perception of the changes just gains a headset and access, things they can already be granted very easily or even just get if needed at the cost of losing a big chunk of species variety + potentially oversight of service which just gives them even less to do. As someone who did want change, even at the cost of losing non-skrell Xeno XO as an option. I just feel disappointed and unsatisfied with what is presented.

Ideally, I would like if a new proposal was put forward that made the XO into a real 2IC and created a new Captain - XO - Heads chain of command. But even barring that. I'd rather the whole idea of changing it was thrown away and we kept the status quo than have this change happen. As mentioned before, if I had known this would be the implementation, I would have voted no.

[YourDaddy117]

(To preface this I had written about half of this before it sort of deleted itself because of funny forum reasons, so excuse me if my candor might seem harsher or my points slightly rushed since I'm annoyed at the website and trying to articulate my points the same way as before.)

There's been a lot of good replies to this thread already and many of the points I'll be making have already been made no doubt, but I still want to give my 2 cents here point by point as an active Command player.
 

8 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

Executive Officer's may tune in to other department channels in order to collaborate and ensure better intradepartmental functionality, however, they only hold authority over the department's head of staff when carrying out tasks assinged by the (acting) captain. Additionally, the Executive Officer does not hold elevated authority in matters that are not designated by the Captain.

In the absence of a Captain, should a situation arrive, it is the duty of the Executive Officer to help establish a new Acting Captain and assist them in seeing it resolved.

Quite bluntly all that is actually changed by this is giving XO less authority than they currently have or changing nothing. The XO in-game as it currently stands is already often treated as the word of the Captain by most of Command and is often expected to take up the slack for a department that needs coordination (of course this only often extends to the departments the XO actually has radio access to). The implication of 2IC is that you are the "Second in Command". That means that if the XO is becoming the actual Executive Officer, the person who takes charge when the Commanding Officer (the 1IC) is absent or unable to perform their duties. From what I can gather this isn't really the case and instead it seems like the XO is becoming little more than a strange outside advisor to Command while also acting as a radio-operator/ glorified Bridge Crewman. I have more to say on that, but if you want a TL;DR there it is.

Let's look at the Recitals:

8 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

Recital 1:

To ensure the efficient handling of non-standard situations the (acting) captain should delegate tasks to the XO to allow them to focus on the ongoing situation. The XO should coordinate closely with the (acting) captain and ensure that the (acting) captain is able to efficiently resolve an ongoing non-standard situation. As such the XO is expected to carry out any order given to them by the (acting) captain to the best of their abilities. The (acting) captain may also give broad orders to the XO, which the XO is expected to carry out with the interests of the (acting) captain in mind.

Again this is essentially already what the XO does. Both for the real Captain and whoever Command votes on to be acting Captain. Nothing is being changed other than an expectation that the XO is not to take any power or authority of their own. Which is a bit problematic, but more on that later.
 

9 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

Recital 2:

To ensure that the acting captain is informed about all relevant options in a non-standard situation, the XO should inform the acting captain about the existence and operation of restricted-knowledge-ship-systems that might be relevant to the current situation. If required, the XO should also advise the acting captain about the capabilities other departments might have that are relevant to the current situation.

OOC Consideration: The XO should enable the (acting) captain to implement their solution to a problem and ensure that whoever is the acting captain can use all the tools available.

9 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

Recital 3:

To ensure that the XO can carry out the delegated tasks, they require sufficient authority to see them carried out by the relevant departments and their heads of staff. As such the XO also receives the same radio channels and access levels as the captain.

OOC Consideration: The XO should avoid overriding other heads of staff, but may need to directly step in, when carrying out the orders/wishes of the (acting) captain.

Once again outside of the additional channel access the XO is not doing anything other than they usually do.
 

9 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

Recital 4:

To ensure that the orders / wishes of the (acting) captain are carried out, the XO holds authority over the department heads. This authority only extends to the orders / wishes of the acting captain and not the personal ambitions/goals of the XO. If the XO informs a department head that they are carrying out orders/tasks by the (acting) captain, the department head is expected to comply fully without undue delay. Any questions about the validity of said orders should be brought up with the (acting) captain and possibly human resources after they have been carried out.

This is where it starts getting confusing. Perhaps I'm misunderstanding, but it seems as though the Executive Officer only functions to relay the wishes of the (acting) Captain. They have "authority" but that authority extends to telling the HOS/Sec, for example, what the Captain wants them to do. Something the Captain can just do because we all have Command channel access. Now I understand delegation is important and that's the idea, but so far the only actual authority the XO has is being the messenger for the acting Captain instead of just being the acting Captain.

 

9 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

Recital 5:

Should a non-standard operation occur and the ship lacking a (acting) captain, the XO should ensure that the head of staff with the most knowledge about the situation is appointed as acting captain. (For example the Chief Medical officer in case of a disease outbreak) The XO should ensure that the appointed head of staff can focus on the situation at hand, by assisting the acting captain with tasks outside of their normal expertise. The XO should not become acting captain unless absolutely required.

This reinforces the issue of why the Executive Officer should just be the one who takes the role of acting Captain. During an intense situation where Command actually holds a vote for acting Captain (it's usually a security one let's be honest) they are choosing a acting Captain so someone can pick up the slack while they focus in on their actual jobs. As HOS I don't want to have the additional pressure of being Captain while dealing with a merc hostage crisis or any other security situation, so if we're being practical I'm just going to hand off everything to the XO. In function the XO is just going to become the acting Captain because the actual acting Captain is too busy to BE Captain.
 

9 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

Recital 6:

To ensure that newly promoted captains have a sufficient understanding of all aspects involved in commanding their assigned installation, they are required to serve as XO. In order to gain that experience, they are encouraged to observe the day-to-day operations of all departments in their assigned installations. When observing the day-to-day operations of a department the XO should not interfere with the operation of the department. The XO is not expected to know how to perform the tasks in a department or even train in how to perform said tasks. However the XO is expected to know, what tasks a department is carrying out and the general capabilities of a department.

What is the point of this when XO's for all intents and purposes has no real authority? You are using a role that has no actual say beyond relaying the Captain's orders and advising the Captain to train future Captains. It's paradoxical. You're essentially given the same expectations as a Captain without any of the responsibility outside of extreme circumstances making it useless for preparing to be a Captain both IC and OOC. I agree that the role should be used as training wheels before the jump to Captain, but that's only if the Executive Officer actually has authority like a real XO would as an actual 2IC.

 

9 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

Q1: If the same hiring standards that are applied to the captain, are applied to the XO, what will happen to the existing xeno XOs?
A1: They can be reassigned to another head of staff role. For example, Operations Manager.

Q2: Will there be another poll about xeno XOs?
A2: No. If a change gives the XO additional capabilities, it is logical that the job qualifications/requirements will also be updated accordingly. (Especially if they are supposed to become the trusted advisor of the acting captain)

I agree it would be logical to assume that XO would be under the same scrutiny and hiring practices as Captain if it has equivalent expectations and functions. The problem is that it has all of the expectations without anything to justify it. Your job is just to be the messenger and I guess vote for which Head of Staff gets to be your boss? Which by the way completely nullifies the vetting process because even if YOU as the XO cannot be a Xeno there's nothing stopping the acting Captain from being one, who by extension will have all the responsibilities of the Captain. The role you're supposed to be training for by doing nothing but speaking for the Captain and advising the acting Captain. I don't want to turn this into a discussion about Xeno Command staff because that's an entirely separate topic, but I do want to highlight that with this change there's no real excuse for the restriction outside of the fact the role is supposed to be "training for being Captain", something I've already highlighted the problem of.


This? To be quite honest with you it's kind of meaningless. I can tell you from the experience of someone who plays regularly as Command I have consistently, key word consistently, seen more xenos/IPC in the XO slot than I have Humans for awhile now. Pulling up stats for the total counts means nothing when we're talking about long standing characters. But again we're getting a little off track here so I'm just going to leave this part by saying that if XO is going to be inaccessible to Xeno characters like Captain then it needs to have the same amount of power, which this version of it does not seem to have at all. 

I'm pretty sure this thread and the vote associated with it was something that I missed as part of my little break period awhile ago, so I can't speak for any of that with confidence. What I can say is that this implementation of XO seems overall kind of pointless when the current iteration works just fine and meshes well enough with how Command does things. That said I actually would like to see a version of XO that has real 2IC powers because I think that can be done well, however this just isn't it. As I've stated multiple times in this meandering reply all this serves to do is turn the XO into a telephone-operator with no real authority who is both expected to tell Command what to do, but only under the guidance of the rest of Command. The role would be a meaningless nothingburger that exists outside of everything. XO in its current state has far more power and serves its intended function far better than this does, despite essentially still being HOP in its current state. Really in my mind the easiest way to fix this is just make the XO a proper Second-in-Command. When there's no Captain then the XO takes over and is acting Captain, with Command having to vote between eachother if there's no XO. That way everything else is pretty easily justified and actually makes sense.

2nd TL;DR: Make the XO a proper 2IC by giving them acting Captain when there's no Captain. Otherwise everything else is just pointless and all that's being done is reducing the XO to a glorified Bridge Crewman.

[RustingWithYou]

A lot of things are here, so I'll go through it point by point.

Quote

To ensure that the orders / wishes of the (acting) captain are carried out, the XO holds authority over the department heads. This authority only extends to the orders / wishes of the acting captain and not the personal ambitions/goals of the XO. If the XO informs a department head that they are carrying out orders/tasks by the (acting) captain, the department head is expected to comply fully without undue delay. Any questions about the validity of said orders should be brought up with the (acting) captain and possibly human resources after they have been carried out.

So the XO is second-in-command, when there's a captain, and when there's not a captain telling them to do something they're equal to the rest of command. How is this different from current implementation? Heads of staff are already expected to follow the captain's orders, and cooperate with someone if they're acting on the captain's orders. "The XO holds authority over the department heads, when they're carrying out the captain's orders and not on their own" isn't a second in command, that's the status quo as it currently is.

Quote

Should a non-standard operation occur and the ship lacking a (acting) captain, the XO should ensure that the head of staff with the most knowledge about the situation is appointed as acting captain. (For example the Chief Medical officer in case of a disease outbreak) The XO should ensure that the appointed head of staff can focus on the situation at hand, by assisting the acting captain with tasks outside of their normal expertise. The XO should not become acting captain unless absolutely required.

So the XO has more power, and for that reason is species-restricted. I'm fine with that even if it would kill most of the active XO characters I see around, but looking at this doesn't seem to make sense.

-XO is second in command, SCC is le racist and won't hire non-Skrell aliens in a position with that much power

-XO, despite being second in command, is explicitly told to avoid being acting captain and to appoint whichever head of staff is best suited, regardless of species.

-So alien with XO power = not fine, XO giving alien captain power = fine? I'm confused as to the logic behind this. 

My other question would be more on the lore side of things as to what the IC justification/response for the SCC firing/demoting a bunch of its executive officers would be.

Quote

To ensure the efficient handling of non-standard situations the (acting) captain should delegate tasks to the XO to allow them to focus on the ongoing situation. The XO should coordinate closely with the (acting) captain and ensure that the (acting) captain is able to efficiently resolve an ongoing non-standard situation. As such the XO is expected to carry out any order given to them by the (acting) captain to the best of their abilities. The (acting) captain may also give broad orders to the XO, which the XO is expected to carry out with the interests of the (acting) captain in mind.

There's nothing objectionable in this but there's also nothing new in this. This is what the XO and captain should be doing already.

This implementation feels like an attempt to implement the suggestion while still keeping the people who don't want 2IC XO happy, but just winds up giving XO, if anything, less authority than it has now. "Authority only when acting on the captain's orders" doesn't really mean anything as that's the general assumption as to any time the captain gives a head of staff an order. 

If we want XO as second in command, we should commit to it fully. If we don't want XO as second in command, we should keep things as they are. Trying to do this weird half-measure thing doesn't fix any of the problems with XO as a job - basically being BC+, not having anything to really do a lot of the time due to the lack of a department to really manage - and exacerbates many of them by stripping away a lot of the role's actual stuff to do.

We don't need an entire job and command whitelist for "captain's all access errand boy".

[OolongCow]

3 hours ago, NothingNew said:

Well, even if we're going by the statistics, seeing as the second-most played species for this role at roughly 1/6th of humans the past year were Unathi, followed by IPCs (125 altogether) - It's not an insignificant amount, especially when contrasted with the fact that only two Skrell played within the past year.

Not two Skrell. Two ROUNDS of Skrell XO. In all of that time someone only readied up with a Skrell XO twice, which is tantamount to admitting that there are 0 Skrell XO characters people actually kept playing.

[Arrow768]

I do not see much point in continuing the part of the discussion regarding xeno XOs as it was opened by certain people stating how xeno XOs make up most of the characters, which was then quickly disproved.

Now the claim is that they didn’t mean all XOs but only „well established“ XOs. (Without defining what „well established“ means)

I could now get and post the number of rounds grouped by character.

But I don’t see the point in that, as I am sure the same people will shift the goalposts again. (Most likely by re-defining „well established“)

 

Another quite common theme in this thread is that the XO at the moment has some sort of authority and this policy reduces that.

At the moment the XO has exactly the same authority over departments under a different head of staff that every head of staff has: absolutely zero.

Currently other department heads are well within their rights to tell the XO to take a long walk and come back with orders by the (acting) captain if they try to tell them to do something.

With the reg change that completely changes. Heads of staff are expected to comply without undue delay with the orders of the XO as soon as they Mutter the magic words: „I am currently carrying out the orders of the acting captain“.

The recitals specifically mention the ability of the acting captain to delegate tasks to the xo without spelling out every detail of it. (For example it can be a „run the ship while I go on a away mission / …“

And with that the XO is effectively in command of the ship.

I believe it also needs to be pointed out that there is no requirement, that such orders need to be stated in public or on the command channel for them to be valid. -> if a xo comes up to a head of staff and tells them to do something (because they are carrying out the orders or wishes of the acting captain) the head of staff is expected to execute them without undue delay. (And yes, trying to check with the captain if those are actually their wishes is undue delay)

Edited April 5 by Arrow768
Spelling is hard on a small phone jeyboard

[Arrow768]

3 hours ago, YourDaddy117 said:

Make the XO a proper 2IC by giving them acting Captain when there's no Captain. Otherwise everything else is just pointless and all that's being done is reducing the XO to a glorified Bridge Crewman.

Who do you think is the most qualified individual to take acting captainship (as required in recital 5) when someone starts shooting up the ship and there is only a CMO, RD and XO.

Let me give you a hint: it’s not the CMO and the RD as they don’t (need to) have any knowledge about the capabilities of the security department. (And with that the XO satisfies the „unless absolutely required“ condition that needs to be met for them to take acting captainship)

[Captain Gecko]

Honestly this just sounds like bloat more than anything. Given the choice between making a Captain or an XO, most people would choose Captain anyways with this current proposal, since they have the same restrictions and expectations, but the new XO gets much less autonomy and authority than the actual Captain.

Why would anyone choose to play an XO at this point?

Merely controlling the bridge can be fun, but it's in no way worth a command WL, and doesn't come up that often (Look at how many times the Horizon moved since we arrived in Konyang, for instance)

Another issue is that we are all assuming that there IS a Captain around. If there isn't a Captain onboard, which is how it is on 80-90% of the XO rounds I've played, where does the new XO gets their authority? They don't have the excuse of carrying out an absent Captain's order. That, and no, we don't elect acting Captains unless we have actual emergencies.

And that "I'm carrying the Captain's order" authority boost doesn't change a thing. XOs already do that, and people play along with it.

Even then, this acting captain thing is useless with the new XO. If an RD or a CMO is promoted to acting Captainship... Only to return to their department to focus on their field and leave the Captain work to the XO, why would anyone even get acting Captainship in the first place? From experience, Acting Captains are often members of Command that DON'T have their hands full so that they can focus on organising things...

Edited April 5 by Captain Gecko

[Peppermint]

16 minutes ago, Arrow768 said:

I do not see much point in continuing the part of the discussion regarding xeno XOs as it was opened by certain people stating how xeno XOs make up most of the characters, which was then quickly disproved.

Now the claim is that they didn’t mean all XOs but only „well established“ XOs. (Without defining what „well established“ means)

I could now get and post the number of rounds grouped by character.

But I don’t see the point in that, as I am sure the same people will shift the goalposts again. (Most likely by re-defining „well established“)

 

Another quite common theme in this thread is that the XO at the moment has some sort of authority and this policy reduces that.

At the moment the XO has exactly the same authority over departments under a different head of staff: absolutely zero.

Currently other department heads are well within their rights to tell the XO to take a long walk and come back with orders by the (acting) captain if they try to tell them to do something.

With the reg change that completely changes. Heads of staff are expected to comply without undue delay with the orders of the XO as soon as they Mutter the magic words: „I am currently carrying out the orders of the acting captain“.

The recitals specifically mention the ability of the acting captain to delegate tasks to the xo without spelling out every detail of it. (For example it can be a „run the ship while I go on a away mission / …“

And with that the XO is effectively in command of the ship.

I believe it also needs to be pointed out that there is no requirement, that such orders need to be stated in public or on the command channel for them to be valid. -> if a xo comes up to a head of staff and tells them to do something (because they are carrying out the orders or wishes of the acting captain) the head of staff is expected to execute them without undue delay. (And yes, trying to check with the captain if those are actually their wishes is undue delay)

I don't think the xeno species thing is too big of a deal. I'd have liked IPCs included as I think it would have been fun, interesting, and just a nice change to allow them. That said, it was a possibility we'd be going for human/skrell and whilst I think it's a shame and a little dull, it's not the end of the world and it was expected.

However speaking for myself, it feels like these changes don't really alter very much. Nukes are so rarely used. Like, maybe three, four times in as many years I've played have I seen one. So giving the XO access to them is kind of something that isn't going to make too much difference. The thing more is that when there's no Captain, the XO is unchanged. It'll be doing the same thing, other than advising any acting Captains how to operate which I think is probably going to be quite rare.

Now, when there are captains, we already have it that orders coming via the captain to the XO to the rest of the ship should be followed. It may be that I'm not understanding properly as it could very well shift RP and I'm excited about it any way - I don't think it'll be as bad as a lot of people are making out. That said, I'm curious as to what the reasons were for the XO not to be a second in command at all times, under their own power? As that's what I thought I was voting for at the time, though I'd imagine it's a gameplay consideration for other heads? If it is, I think it's a shame, as the WL can already be removed and if someone wants to trample people, they could just select captain any way.

Regardless, attempting any change is a step forward imo.

[Arrow768]

20 minutes ago, Peppermint said:

Now, when there are captains, we already have it that orders coming via the captain to the XO to the rest of the ship should be followed.

This is not covered by extension regulations and heads of staff are well within their rights to tell the „service and bridge head of staff“ (XO) to bugger off if they come to them with (captain) orders. (Unless they have a signed and stamped from with them or until the captain verified those orders somehow)

 

20 minutes ago, Peppermint said:

That said, I'm curious as to what the reasons were for the XO not to be a second in command at all times, under their own power?

If a player wants to play a role that is in complete control of the ship, we have that role already: captain.

adding another role like that would be duplication, as such the XO has been geared towards a playstyle where you work with whoever is in command.

29 minutes ago, Captain Gecko said:

Another issue is that we are all assuming that there IS a Captain around. If there isn't a Captain onboard, which is how it is on 80-90% of the XO rounds I've played, where does the new XO gets their authority? They don't have the excuse of carrying out an avsent Captain's order. That, and no, we don't elect acting Captains unless we have actual emergencies.

If someone wants to be in command in that 80-90% of the rounds, they can play captain.

Edited April 5 by Arrow768

[Dreamix]

41 minutes ago, Arrow768 said:

If a player wants to play a role that is in complete control of the ship, we have that role already: captain.

adding another role like that would be duplication, as such the XO has been geared towards a playstyle where you work with whoever is in command.

Why was this not communicated before the vote?
Why was it not communicated what people are actually voting for? Both the duties and expectations of 2ICXO, their authority, and also the species restrictions.

 

On 16/02/2023 at 09:41, Dreamix said:

(...) It should be 2IC plain and simple. Not second-in-succession, but actually second-in-command. (...)

When I voted for 2ICXO, I assumed this, over a year ago. I assumed that it would be actually 2ICXO, second-in-command. I would never imagine it would be "2IC but not actually" or "2IC but expected to promote 3IC to 1IC".

I imagine a lot players did the same, or assumed that non-human non-skrell species could still be XO. Or any other assumption cause back then a lot of people were theorizing and discussing how it would look like.

This should all have been communicated BEFORE the vote, so people know what they are actually voting for.

Edited April 5 by Dreamix

[greenjoe]

1 minute ago, Dreamix said:

Why was this not communicated before the vote?
Why was it not communicated what people are actually voting for? Both the duties and expectations of 2ICXO, their authority, and also the species restrictions.

 

When I voted for 2ICXO, I assumed this, over a year ago. I assumed that it would be actually 2ICXO, second-in-command. I would never imagine it would be "2IC but not actually" or "2IC but expected to promote 3IC to 1IC".

I imagine a lot players did the same, or assumed that non-human non-skrell species could still be XO. Or any other assumption cause back then a lot of people were theorizing and discussing how it would look like.

This should all have been communicated BEFORE the vote, so people know what they are actually voting for.

All of this, and the fact that it has been a YEAR since the vote makes this all rather ridiculous 

[Noble Row]

48 minutes ago, Arrow768 said:

adding another role like that would be duplication, as such the XO has been geared towards a playstyle where you work with whoever is in command.

This isn't what second in command means and is a misinturpretation of what people voted for a YEAR ago. Second in command is to be in command when the primary individual is either absent or too occupied to fulfill the duty at the time.

You've made a secretary with access to the self destruct button.

[GeneralCamo]

The easy way to fix this, so the XO is in proper 2IC, is not to make them encouraged to promote different acting captain. They should be acting Captain by default unless either they waive this for whatever reason (if they feel the CMO is better for the duty for whatever reason), or a captain-level decision by the rest of command vetoes this.

In that case I can completely understand the species restriction and it is within the spirit of the vote. But as it is now, I do not understand either.

Edited April 5 by GeneralCamo

[Captain Gecko]

1 hour ago, Arrow768 said:

If someone wants to be in command in that 80-90% of the rounds, they can play captain.

And by that point you expect people to just make an extra character for these 20-10% of games when there IS a Captain? This is like making a merchant character, this is a bonus, a gimmick, not an actual character to play. This is exactly my issue.

There is ZERO icentive to play the new XO, absolutely no reasons. If you want to play with the bridge, just become BC at this point. If you want to actually have authority you're better off being the actual Captain. Honestly even the Head of Service had more reasons to exist than this.

Assuming there isn't a second vote WITH all of the information at hand now (and I REALLY advise we do one considering the backlash), I don't expect this new XO to played much if at all in its current state.

[Arrow768]

52 minutes ago, Captain Gecko said:

And by that point you expect people to just make an extra character for these 20-10% of games when there IS a Captain? This is like making a merchant character, this is a bonus, a gimmick, not an actual character to play. This is exactly my issue

No I don’t expect people who want to be the person in command to make a character for those „10-20% of games when there is a captain present“. That is not purpose of the XO.

To re-iterate it again: If someone wants to be the captain in „80-90% of the rounds“, they can make a captain character. We don’t need a XO for that.

I expect people who wish to play a character that works together with the person in command to make/use a XO character. And I do expect some of the people who are planning to make a new captain character to make use of the XO Position for a time (to introduce their char to the setting).

I also expect people who want to be in command of the ship to make a captain character.

[Shimmer]

2 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

do not see much point in continuing the part of the discussion regarding xeno XOs as it was opened by certain people stating how xeno XOs make up most of the characters, which was then quickly disproved.

Now the claim is that they didn’t mean all XOs but only „well established“ XOs. (Without defining what „well established“ means)

I could now get and post the number of rounds grouped by character.

But I don’t see the point in that, as I am sure the same people will shift the goalposts again. (Most likely by re-defining „well established“)

 

One third (if we are being pedantic, 3/10ths) of all XO rounds were played by xenos, to be precise an almost even 50/50 split between Unathi and IPCs. This restriction puts one third of what active xeno XO staff out of commission, and puts the role squarely and solely into the hands of humans. And humans, emphasis on the humans, because as your own statistics have shown, skrell XOs were outplayed by G1s, an IPC subtype.

I am almost certain, and only would be with statistics, that the proportional amount of xeno players, especially unathi and IPC, do not come to a 1/3rd of all total humans played. Humans are the most common, the most banal and the default players resort to. What people are pointing out, is proportionally, xeno XOs are more represented than those respective xeno species are. Giving the illusion that they're more played.

 

But I'll set this aside- whether or not xeno XOs are being sacrificed matters only in so much as what they're being sacrificed for.

 

2 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

This is not covered by extension regulations and heads of staff are well within their rights to tell the „service and bridge head of staff“ (XO) to bugger off if they come to them with (captain) orders. (Unless they have a signed and stamped from with them or until the captain verified those orders somehow)

Standard procedures, 1.1: "During standard operation, all Departmental Heads of Staff are equal, under the command of the Captain present onboard the vessel. Should a department find itself lacking a Head of Staff, the Captain is able to either assume direct supervision of the department or otherwise appoint a senior crew member to fill the missing role.

During non-standard operation, a specific Departmental Head of Staff may be elevated above others, should the crisis situation fall under the responsibility of their department. At that point, other departments should act in a supporting role."

 

The captain already has the inherent ability to give any member of command explicit authority above others, should the situation call for it. While this specific regulation specifies that this happens when something falls under the purview of a certain department, this shows that the precedent for a captain to elevate other members of command above their peers exists. And that they are ought to follow the word of said command member.

This new provision doesn't in any way empower the XO, this simply puts emphasis on another standard procedure, which is the very first one, being that the Captain might as well be god and their word is law. If a Captain orders an XO elevated above other members of command as part of delegation or for any reason, those very same members of command are required to play ball. Them telling the XO to bugger off would be essentially telling 'I am not obeying a Captain's order placing you above me.'

 

3 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

With the reg change that completely changes. Heads of staff are expected to comply without undue delay with the orders of the XO as soon as they Mutter the magic words: „I am currently carrying out the orders of the acting captain“.

The recitals specifically mention the ability of the acting captain to delegate tasks to the xo without spelling out every detail of it. (For example it can be a „run the ship while I go on a away mission / …“

And with that the XO is effectively in command of the ship.

Again, Captain's Authority, if a captain orders the XO to be in charge of the ship, and elevates them above others, even without this new provision a head of staff going 'I'm not listening to you stinky' is disobeying a clear and direct order / guideline set by the captain. This is already how command operates, nothing here changes.

This furthermore assumes so much bad faith on part of most whitelist holders, that they're petty enough to penny pinch what regulations mean and argue them in the middle of a situation until the Captain threatens them with suspension. How is questioning a captain about whether an XO has their blessing any different now than it was before? Are we placing the expectation on the captain to punish command members that do this? Does this become a whitelist issue? Is disobeying a captain going 'XO has command to handle this situation, obey them.' not already a whitelist issue??

 

3 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

Let me give you a hint: it’s not the CMO and the RD as they don’t (need to) have any knowledge about the capabilities of the security department. (And with that the XO satisfies the „unless absolutely required“ condition that needs to be met for them to take acting captainship)

When people are given the prompt 'unless absolutely required', what this put them through isn't to go into a detailed Sherlock Holmes floaty words with all the considerations coming about and 'oh am i allowed am i not', the words unless absolutely required are tantamount to saying avoid this at all costs.

You've not said 'Unless the XO is most qualified to handle the situation', or 'In cases where others are less qualified to handle the situation', you've said 'unless absolutely required', implying there is no other alternative and that the XO has to take charge.

In the example you provided, I, and I am willing to bet most other players, would've elevated the Research Director to acting Captain. That's the intuitive, gut response to the words 'unless absolutely required'.

 

2 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

If a player wants to play a role that is in complete control of the ship, we have that role already: captain.

adding another role like that would be duplication, as such the XO has been geared towards a playstyle where you work with whoever is in command.

This is the main argument people are making against 2iC even being a thing. Because this is literally what second in command means, that they either have an enhanced level of authority above others, or are second in line of command succession should the first in command be incapacitated.

If you wanted to avoid the issue of duplicate roles, you should've pointed this out to the playerbase a year ago. This is not what the community voted on, the XO does not have the authority to give orders when the 1iC isn't present.

 

26 minutes ago, Arrow768 said:

I expect people who wish to play a character that works together with the person in command to make/use a XO character. And I do expect some of the people who are planning to make a new captain character to make use of the XO Position for a time (to introduce their char to the setting).

I think, ultimately, this is a thing people are missing that I find really funny.

 

This doesn't just not make the XO not second in command, this does something far, far worse.

 

Quote

To ensure that newly promoted captains have a sufficient understanding of all aspects involved in commanding their assigned installation, they are required to serve as XO. In order to gain that experience, they are encouraged to observe the day-to-day operations of all departments in their assigned installations. When observing the day-to-day operations of a department the XO should not interfere with the operation of the department. The XO is not expected to know how to perform the tasks in a department or even train in how to perform said tasks. However the XO is expected to know, what tasks a department is carrying out and the general capabilities of a department.

This makes Executive Officer a learner role, described ICly as the position captains take before taking the proper mantle of captainship. This makes the XO the role people are expected to play before going for captain. If anything this makes them feel like they have the least amount of authority and are only ever playable when there is a captain to delegate tasks and missions for them.

 

This is not what people wanted. People didn't want XO to become the captain's learner role when they wanted a 2iC.

And for a learner role no one asked for, we are retconning, reassigning, or outright pushing out 1/3rd of all XO rounds played since the vote was put into action.

[Mr.Popper]

Arrow makes a good point that XO being de facto captain most rounds would be redundant, and I can imagine that was the main consideration for limiting the role like this. However, it's still an underwhelming implementation as others have pointed out and discards the main advantage of a second in command; quick and easy succession instead of committee discussion during an emergency. The solution as I see it is rather than making XO de facto captain in the absence of one, ie. most rounds, they only assume command in crisises where an acting captain would have been elected under current regs. This accomplishes the main goal of simplifying the chain of command while also preventing role redundancy, as unlike the captain the XO's authority would only extend past the bridge during emergencies. Note that they should still be in charge of the bridge- in the event Horizon encounters another ship, there needs to be a designated guy in charge of that and XO is the ideal pick given their control over passengers and the service they receive. 

TL;DR: XO should automatically become acting captain in emergencies, but in normal circumstances without a captain they should only have authority over the bridge and service.

 

Also, unrelated but I strongly believe XO should retain their current duties leading service and managing personnel. It's a valuable position for rp and makes the XO a lifeline between the general populace and an ivory tower captain.

[N8-Toe]

I'm going to reiterate what others said. the whole "The XO doesn't take acting command, but makes a head (who can be an alien!) acting captain" makes no sense. Again why have this XO with the same requirements as Captain, educated in matters on the ship, plop one of the rando heads into the hot seat?

 

Also I dont get this idea that the HoS should be acting captain in a security emergency, CE during major damage. I play head alot, I play HoS, I play CE, i play CMO. I really, really do not want to be acting captain during an emergency when I'm busy. XO is the natural fit for acting captain as the XO is on the bridge, and minding the greater situation with less subordinates of their own. If I'm juggling a hostage situation as HoS, or a massive fire/breach as CE. I dont have time to manage the other issues that come with captainship.

[Arrow768]

8 hours ago, Shimmer said:

11 hours ago, Arrow768 said:

This is not covered by extension regulations and heads of staff are well within their rights to tell the „service and bridge head of staff“ (XO) to bugger off if they come to them with (captain) orders. (Unless they have a signed and stamped from with them or until the captain verified those orders somehow)

Standard procedures, 1.1: "During standard operation, all Departmental Heads of Staff are equal, under the command of the Captain present onboard the vessel. Should a department find itself lacking a Head of Staff, the Captain is able to either assume direct supervision of the department or otherwise appoint a senior crew member to fill the missing role.

During non-standard operation, a specific Departmental Head of Staff may be elevated above others, should the crisis situation fall under the responsibility of their department. At that point, other departments should act in a supporting role."

It is impressive how hard you are trying to misinterpret things.
My statement was made in regard to this:

Quote

Now, when there are captains, we already have it that orders coming via the captain to the XO to the rest of the ship should be followed.

You are trying to imply here that if a XO approaches a head of staff and claims that they got an order from the captain to pass along to the head of staff, that XO is somehow the acting captain.

I do not see how you can interpret my response (where I point out that we do not have a regulation that would force heads of staff to comply with XOs orders that were given by a captain to the XO if the XO has no solid documentation of those orders) in a way where this is somehow covered by a the acting captainship regulation.
It simply does not apply here, as a captain giving a XO an order to pass along requires that there is already a (acting) captain, so by definition the ship cannot be without an acting captain.

As it takes some quite impressive mental gymnastics to come to your conclusion, I believe you are arguing in bad faith and do not see any point in continuing this argument with you. (And I have stopped reading your post at that point)

Edited April 5 by Arrow768
wording

[Butterrobber202]

19 minutes ago, Arrow768 said:

snipped for space, its the post right above this one.

I think, despite the disagreements being had by both sides, the general outcry does indicate some adjustment to this policy's implementation should be considered.

Personally, the clearest resolution to me that resolves most of the non-Xeno related issues is changing the wording of Recital 4 and 5 to be a bit more firm. This is just an example suggestion:

4

Quote

The XO holds authority over the department heads and should be considered the second highest authority on the ship under the Captain. The XO's authority extends to the general direction of other command members to facilitate the current goals of the Horizon and resolve active situations. If the XO gives a department head orders in line with this, the department head is expected to comply fully without undue delay. Any questions about the validity of said orders should be brought up with the (acting) captain and possibly human resources after they have been carried out.

OOC Consideration: The XO should not step into / override the department heads when that is not absolutely required.

OOC Consideration: The department heads should by default comply with the orders given to them by the XO and only question them after the fact (if at all).

Bolded the parts I changed for 4.

5

Quote

 Should a non-standard operation occur and the ship lacking a (acting) captain, the XO should and encouraged to take up the mantle of acting captain. If the non-standard operation requires in-depth experience to resolve, then the appropriate departmental head can be appointed instead. The XO should ensure that the appointed head of staff can focus on the situation at hand, by assisting the acting captain with tasks outside of their normal expertise.

OOC Consideration: The XO should assist the (acting) captain in carrying out their vision. That can include taking effective command of on-ship-operations while the (acting) captain goes on an away mission.

Bolded the parts I changed again for 5.

 

I think with these modifications, these changes become more in-line with the general expectations the server had when they voted to make the XO 2IC.

Edited April 5 by Butterrobber202
quote box fix

[Shimmer]

11 minutes ago, Arrow768 said:

(where I point out that we do not have a regulation that would force heads of staff to comply with XOs orders that were given by a captain to the XO if the XO has no solid documentation of those orders)

Under what circumstances would such a document even be needed, this new provision or not.

The Captain doesn't communicate by way of carrier pigeon and letters, if she decides to empower an XO, all it takes is :c Executive Officer is acting on my behalf regarding X, with my authority.

Any scenario that you brought up, where a head of staff flat out ignores the XO under this simple circumstance, quite literally stands in violation of a captain's order.

What issue does this provision seek to address? That other heads of staff should be obeying an XO if she says 'i am acting on the captains behalf'? This is already a thing, most command players will assume good will coming from another, and not needlessly badger or be a nuisance to them especially when confirmation is really easy to achieve.

 

I an interpreting everything as it is written. And this doesn't change anything. Or introduce anything new to the table. Which you call bad faith.

 

And you use this accusation of bad faith to not engage with any of my other points. I am not going to ascribe anything here, I just want to bring attention to this flat out refusal to engage with anything I said or others said bar what you cherry pick.

 

Zero transparency about this for a whole year. What little communication we have do not address the concerns people are having, but rather call players bad faith actors who should be ignored or be silent.

 

Absolutely hysterical.

[Arrow768]

28 minutes ago, Shimmer said:

Under what circumstances would such a document even be needed, this new provision or not.

The Captain doesn't communicate by way of carrier pigeon and letters, if she decides to empower an XO, all it takes is :c Executive Officer is acting on my behalf regarding X, with my authority.

Any scenario that you brought up, where a head of staff flat out ignores the XO under this simple circumstance, quite literally stands in violation of a captain's order.

What issue does this provision seek to address? That other heads of staff should be obeying an XO if she says 'i am acting on the captains behalf'? This is already a thing, most command players will assume good will coming from another, and not needlessly badger or be a nuisance to them especially when confirmation is really easy to achieve.

 

I an interpreting everything as it is written. And this doesn't change anything. Or introduce anything new to the table. Which you call bad faith.

 

And you use this accusation of bad faith to not engage with any of my other points. I am not going to ascribe anything here, I just want to bring attention to this flat out refusal to engage with anything I said or others said bar what you cherry pick.

 

Zero transparency about this for a whole year. What little communication we have do not address the concerns people are having, but rather call players bad faith actors who should be ignored or be silent.

 

Absolutely hysterical.

You are again choosing to ignore a key part of what I wrote in the initial response.
And then you wonder why I choose not to waste my time on individuals such as yourself, who try to intentionally misinterpret things I write.

There is absolutely no point in continuing this discussion at this time.
My interest to discuss these changes has been severely hampered when people started coming up with alternative facts and then continued to perform mental gymnastics to create a narrative that just isnt there.

After a brief discussion with the rest of the present head staff we will proceed as follows:

• The changes will be implemented as described in my original post.
  • There might be some IC news/events to accompany the implementation.
  • There might be additional changes to other directives or regulations to support the new XO reg
• After sufficient time (as determined by the headmins/devs) these changes will be reviewed and possibly altered.
  • This will be a private review process at first.
  • We might open up this (or another) topic at that time to get input from the larger community.

[Arrow768]

I have re-read parts of this thread, and I would like to point out a few things:

On 05/04/2024 at 03:19, Faye <3 said:

as well, I think the attitude of “we will not discuss this further” and “well that’s the result, if you want to discuss it go make a new post” is really rather insulting and flippant, given the sheer amount of time passed between the vote and the result, and the extremely negative stipulation introduced.

There were two things that have been shot down when that claim was made: (see this post)

• Xeno XOs with any sort of elevated power
• Another vote regarding the 2IC XO.

Everything else was up for (a reasonable) debate.

Some things mentioned in this topic are answered/addressed quite easily, those are the things I got to first.
(Large) Posts that raise larger issues generally take more time to answer, so that is something where I have to take the time to think about the issue presented and then create a reply that properly represents my thoughts on those matters. (In some cases, I also have to check in with the rest of the people involved in creating the directive; Especially if this is something that wasn't discussed already)
This is time I usually do not have during the week, so I left (most of) those for later.
However, I do not have infinite time, so when it became obvious that certain people engaged in this discussion have no interest in an actual productive discussion, any effort put into a discussion like that is wasted.
As such, the discussion has been ended prematurely.

I also noticed that I never posted the results of the poll.
A total of 134 ckeys voted for an option that wasn't "I dont care".
Out of those 107 votes, 94 (70%) were for the change and 40(30%) against.
(When removing inactive ckeys the ratio sinks to ~63%; depends how "inactive" is defined)
As usual, it needs to be pointed out that the polls are opinion polls to gauge the opinion of the larger player base about a specific topic but are not binding.

If someone has questions (about the planned implementation) or is interested in a reasonable discussion, I am available via Discord DM.
(If I do not reply, there is a good chance I just didn't see the message / forgot about it; Feel free to just message me again after a while.)

The creation of additional topics on the forum about the 2IC XO is not wanted.