Deck Knight
Blast Off At The Speed Of Light! That's Right!
*approved in conjunction with Birkal
Policy Review: CAP Mission Discussion
Recently a lot of changes have been proposed for the CAP Forum. The most central of these is in regards to the mission of the CAP Forum, especially in how it relates to an all CAP metagame.
I support and endorse a fully functional, tiered, and analyzed CAP metagame. The new forums facilitate this need and will be critical in expanding the CAP base to active users who may not be familiar with the mainline CAP creation process. Ultimately we want CAP to be a vibrant, active, creative project that rewards members for participation, good ideas, and hard work.
Recent proposals have made drastic pronouncements about the future of CAP which deviate from that mission. These changes deserve a full hearing among both the mods and the policy committee, and changes to our mission should be done in the CAP tradition: openly, transparently, and as democratically as possible while maintaining the highest quality standards.
This Policy Review will be to discuss the original mission of CAP, the proposed changes to it, and to weigh the pros and cons of any such changes.
Here is the current mission statement featured on Smogon: http://www.smogon.com/cap/mission_statement
The bullet points are listed below for convenience:
To bring each bullet point into a single thought, CAP is:
I would add two more based on how CAP is operated at every level, from new user to how the mods interact:
Meritocratic because we happily praise and elevate newcomers who bring substance and intelligence into each project.
Cohesive because the project can only function when there is a mutual, broad respect for peers, moderators, and new members.
What I want to focus on is how we apply the descriptor "Competitive-Minded."
The traditional definition we have used to define "competitive Pokemon" is the Smogon OU metagame. In other words, "competitive" is not Pokemon who have a combination of stats, ability, and typing that make them suitable for OU play, it is testing and analyzing concepts built into a Pokemon to test their effects on competitive tiers.
The new change being discussed relevant to this is the change to create CAP Pokemon specifically for the CAP metagame. While there have been threads suggesting full approval of all changes, this has not entirely been the case, and in order for us to move forward and keep true to CAP's mission, these changes must be discussed with the people who will be responsible for monitoring them.
A lesser change is the abolishing of the Topic Leader. While there have been many changes to the position and reforms are warranted, the Topic Leader has always been an exemplary form of meritocracy. People who have made solid contributions and show a capacity for leadership have been rewarded with a large role in shaping each new project.
I bring this up for discussion because CAP 3 will be the first CAP without such a leader chosen among CAP's peer users, at least as currently proposed. This has been discussed at length and I agree that the previous model for selecting a topic leader has outlived its usefulness. The position itself also needs changes, but I do not feel the complete abolition is the way to go. I will make my own proposal in a subsequent thread, I list it here because it directly ties in the meritocratic element of CAP's mission.
I realize this has dragged on quite a bit, so let me get to the heart of the issue. The questions this Policy Review should address are:
What is CAP's Competitive Mission?
How do we fulfill that mission in our process?
It is my assertion that CAP cannot detach itself from competitive Pokemon. I believe that a competitive BW tier must be chosen for playtest in every CAP project in order to gather data relevant to actual competitive Pokemon. BW CAP already has no less than 12 new threats that skew tier data away from any given BW metagame. The bias this puts on the metagame makes creation of CAP Pokemon solely for the CAP Metagame untenable to CAP's mission. (This occurred historically at the time of the first CAP 3, Pyroak, whose playtesting metagame was skewed by the existence of Syclant and Revenankh.)
It does not, however, preclude concepts that allow for the existence of CAP Pokemon in discussion of how one would compare the effects of a given CAP on a competitive BW metagame. What I would suggest, then, is that instead of a hard, fast rule about making CAP Pokemon with the CAP metagame in mind, we instead focus each CAP project on an existing competitive tier, and allow for concepts that keep the CAP Metagame in mind.
In summary, I want the PRC to discuss ways we can keep the Competitive mission of CAP as outlined in our mission statement in line with the values of Flexibility and Meritocracy, while maintaining the Broad-Based appeal the CAP Metagame is going to bring to our forum.
- - - - -
After discussion, a Ballot has been created.
Ballot:
The CAP Mission Statement will remain unchanged from its present form and current understanding of competitive Pokemon as the OU metagame of the most current generation of Pokemon.
YES
NO
The CAP Mission statement at present allows only for OU concepts to be submitted. It is the consensus of the Policy Review Committee that creating for other metagames will be discussed separately at a later date, following the completion of CAP 3.
YES
NO
This ballot will be open for the next 48 hours (from 03/28/2012, 7:00 PM EST), at which time this thread will close.
Policy Review: CAP Mission Discussion
Recently a lot of changes have been proposed for the CAP Forum. The most central of these is in regards to the mission of the CAP Forum, especially in how it relates to an all CAP metagame.
I support and endorse a fully functional, tiered, and analyzed CAP metagame. The new forums facilitate this need and will be critical in expanding the CAP base to active users who may not be familiar with the mainline CAP creation process. Ultimately we want CAP to be a vibrant, active, creative project that rewards members for participation, good ideas, and hard work.
Recent proposals have made drastic pronouncements about the future of CAP which deviate from that mission. These changes deserve a full hearing among both the mods and the policy committee, and changes to our mission should be done in the CAP tradition: openly, transparently, and as democratically as possible while maintaining the highest quality standards.
This Policy Review will be to discuss the original mission of CAP, the proposed changes to it, and to weigh the pros and cons of any such changes.
Here is the current mission statement featured on Smogon: http://www.smogon.com/cap/mission_statement
The bullet points are listed below for convenience:
- The CAP project is community-based, and very democratic.
- The CAP project involves people with various talents and interests—metagame battlers, in-gamers, artists, spriters, writers, etc.
- The CAP project inspires various interesting discussions about Pokémon, the spirit and mechanics of the game, and most importantly, in-depth analysis of the current competitive metagame.
- The CAP project is an ever-evolving project.
- The CAP project is open to anyone interested in learning more about the underlying fundamentals of competitive Pokémon.
To bring each bullet point into a single thought, CAP is:
- Democratic
- Broad-Based
- Competitive-Minded
- Flexible
- Inviting
I would add two more based on how CAP is operated at every level, from new user to how the mods interact:
- Meritocratic
- Cohesive
Meritocratic because we happily praise and elevate newcomers who bring substance and intelligence into each project.
Cohesive because the project can only function when there is a mutual, broad respect for peers, moderators, and new members.
What I want to focus on is how we apply the descriptor "Competitive-Minded."
The traditional definition we have used to define "competitive Pokemon" is the Smogon OU metagame. In other words, "competitive" is not Pokemon who have a combination of stats, ability, and typing that make them suitable for OU play, it is testing and analyzing concepts built into a Pokemon to test their effects on competitive tiers.
The new change being discussed relevant to this is the change to create CAP Pokemon specifically for the CAP metagame. While there have been threads suggesting full approval of all changes, this has not entirely been the case, and in order for us to move forward and keep true to CAP's mission, these changes must be discussed with the people who will be responsible for monitoring them.
A lesser change is the abolishing of the Topic Leader. While there have been many changes to the position and reforms are warranted, the Topic Leader has always been an exemplary form of meritocracy. People who have made solid contributions and show a capacity for leadership have been rewarded with a large role in shaping each new project.
I bring this up for discussion because CAP 3 will be the first CAP without such a leader chosen among CAP's peer users, at least as currently proposed. This has been discussed at length and I agree that the previous model for selecting a topic leader has outlived its usefulness. The position itself also needs changes, but I do not feel the complete abolition is the way to go. I will make my own proposal in a subsequent thread, I list it here because it directly ties in the meritocratic element of CAP's mission.
I realize this has dragged on quite a bit, so let me get to the heart of the issue. The questions this Policy Review should address are:
What is CAP's Competitive Mission?
How do we fulfill that mission in our process?
It is my assertion that CAP cannot detach itself from competitive Pokemon. I believe that a competitive BW tier must be chosen for playtest in every CAP project in order to gather data relevant to actual competitive Pokemon. BW CAP already has no less than 12 new threats that skew tier data away from any given BW metagame. The bias this puts on the metagame makes creation of CAP Pokemon solely for the CAP Metagame untenable to CAP's mission. (This occurred historically at the time of the first CAP 3, Pyroak, whose playtesting metagame was skewed by the existence of Syclant and Revenankh.)
It does not, however, preclude concepts that allow for the existence of CAP Pokemon in discussion of how one would compare the effects of a given CAP on a competitive BW metagame. What I would suggest, then, is that instead of a hard, fast rule about making CAP Pokemon with the CAP metagame in mind, we instead focus each CAP project on an existing competitive tier, and allow for concepts that keep the CAP Metagame in mind.
In summary, I want the PRC to discuss ways we can keep the Competitive mission of CAP as outlined in our mission statement in line with the values of Flexibility and Meritocracy, while maintaining the Broad-Based appeal the CAP Metagame is going to bring to our forum.
- - - - -
After discussion, a Ballot has been created.
Ballot:
The CAP Mission Statement will remain unchanged from its present form and current understanding of competitive Pokemon as the OU metagame of the most current generation of Pokemon.
YES
NO
The CAP Mission statement at present allows only for OU concepts to be submitted. It is the consensus of the Policy Review Committee that creating for other metagames will be discussed separately at a later date, following the completion of CAP 3.
YES
NO
This ballot will be open for the next 48 hours (from 03/28/2012, 7:00 PM EST), at which time this thread will close.