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Message: <blockquote data-quote="covaithe" data-source="post: 5700055" data-attributes="member: 46559">Background:  The current system of character approvals is broken.  Despite heroic work by a small handful of inhumanly persistent individuals, the queue is getting farther and farther backed up, and more and more people are having to wait for approvals before getting XP awards.  That sucks.  Some good work happened in <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/living-4th-edition/306469-discussion-shifting-some-load-off-judges.html" target="_blank">this thread</a>, but nothing ever came of it.  I've been thinking about it off and on ever since, and I think I've stumbled across a solution.  It turns out that Wikia has a simple permissions system built in.  There are four categories:<ol> <li data-xf-list-type="ol"> Founder:  the person who created the wiki in the first place.  I think this is L4W Facilitator, but it might be Fragsie.  This person can do anything; in particular they can add and remove people from the other security groups.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol"> Bureaucrats:  These are admins, but they can also make new admins.  </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol"> Admins:  Can protect pages so that they can only be edited by other admins.  They can also "semi-protect" pages, so that you can only edit them if you've logged in to Wikia.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ol"> Everyone else.</li> </ol>So here's what I suggest.  I think it's close to being ready for proposal, but I thought I'd ask for some feedback first.<ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> Judges be given the bureaucrat status</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> Create a position called "senior reviewer".  These people be given admin status.  Judges can add senior reviewers as they see fit, though they are encouraged to discuss it with other judges first.  Senior reviewers are encouraged to suggest candidates.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> Here's the big one:  Characters require two approvals, at least one of which must be from a senior reviewer.  The other can be from anyone.  No judge required.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> Make a wiki page called Approved_Characters or some such.  It's locked; only admins (i.e. senior reviewers and judges) can edit it.  For each approved character, it should contain the character's name, a link to the sheet, and the level they were approved at.  You are approved if and only if your character is on this page.  The rest is just tracking the review process.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> Make a wiki page called Review_Requests or some such.  It's semi-protected; anyone who is logged in to Wikia can edit it.  It contains two sections:  "Needs senior review", and "Needs two reviews".  In order to submit a character for review, what you do is edit this page and add a link to your character sheet to the bottom of the "Needs two reviews" section.  No need to email anyone; people who care to be notified of new review requests can subscribe to this page.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> When someone who isn't a senior reviewer wants to help with reviews, what they do is look at the first character sheet link in the "Needs two reviews" section that isn't waiting for a response to comments and review it.  If it needs changes, describe them on the character sheet as we do now, and on the Review_Requests page, note that you requested changes.  E.g. add "Changes requested by covaithe" after the link.  If the character sheet doesn't need changes, move it to the bottom of the "Needs senior review" section.</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> When a senior reviewer has time to do reviews, they look at whoever's at the top of the "Needs senior review" queue.  If they don't approve, they proceed as described above.  If the do approve, they take that character off of the queue and edit the Approved_Characters page.  </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> When a reviewer asks you to make changes to your page, they will edit the page.  That will send you an email notification (assuming you've subscribed to your character sheet page).  You make the changes, then edit the Review_Requests page and remove the "Changes requested by covaithe" bit, and maybe put "fixed" there instead or something.  </li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> Un-sticky the old official approved characters thread and let it die</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul"> Update the charter and the new player docs to reflect all this</li> </ul>I think this improves things in a couple of ways.  It makes the queue publicly visible, so people can easily see where they stand in the queue.  It makes it possible to have character reviews without judge involvement, but still keep the idea that at least one of the reviews is from someone trusted.  It greatly reduces the role of email in the approval process; so less "I'm not sure if the judges got my request" posts.  What do you guys think?  I'm especially interested in opinions from people who are currently active in reviewing characters.  Does this work for you?</blockquote>

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