osuka's votecounter + modtools

[Psyche]

i suggest a page-topper as the next "modtool"
people traditionally like their votecounts near the top of a thread
my library donbot has an implementation of a bot that can interact with the site using posts and the like. not sure if it still works.

[Random Nurse]

Auto-votecounter + page-topper = far more seamless games

I'd be open to demo'ing any of that in the current game I'm modding to see how it works.

[JacksonVirgo]

Honestly, having a page-topper sounds fairly dangerous to have easily accessible.

[Random Nurse]

Honestly, having a page-topper sounds fairly dangerous to have easily accessible.

How so?

[JacksonVirgo]

Honestly, having a page-topper sounds fairly dangerous to have easily accessible.

How so?

Because there would be no restrictions as to who can use it.

[Random Nurse]

Honestly, having a page-topper sounds fairly dangerous to have easily accessible.

How so?

Because there would be no restrictions as to who can use it.

Could it be limited to just game mods per site rules?

[JacksonVirgo]

Honestly, having a page-topper sounds fairly dangerous to have easily accessible.

How so?

Because there would be no restrictions as to who can use it.

Could it be limited to just game mods per site rules?

I am slightly exaggerating the danger in my head, I am aware but it still makes me uncomfortable.
And there's no way to limit it that can't just be removed from the code to abuse it, as it's client-side and not on a designated server or anything.

[Psyche]

a pagetopper has been hosted in this subforum before, made no problems
in the end, mods seem perfectly able to discourage and act against spam
we probably don't automate account creation though

[osuka]

we should never automate account creation or batch posting. matter of fact i chose not to automate posting because:
- it gives the moderator a chance to verify everything
- it avoids mistakes, including posting on the wrong thread
- it reduces risk by only making unauthenticated requests

[osuka]

i think a page top isn't even that big of a deal, honestly - i usually just iso the mod if i'm looking for a vc. do you guys not do that?

[Psyche]

i dont mod a lot. but i feel like ive seen tons of moderator scummies handed based in part on consistent votecount posts. people seem to value it a lot. but i don't feel strongly

[Random Nurse]

I for one immensely value an auto-VC at the top of every page.

Keeps things crisp, current.

[osuka]

i think auto posting is genuinely too dangerous to have out in the wild. we have to consider that post requests (including authentication) might put a lot more strain into the server than a typical unauthenticated get request

[JacksonVirgo]

I agree with Osuka, it shouldn't be made imo

[RH9]

i think a page top isn't even that big of a deal, honestly - i usually just iso the mod if i'm looking for a vc. do you guys not do that?

I agree with this.
Honestly, I care more about the timeliness of the VC more than its position.

[Psyche]

yeah but like...i've had a pagetopper out for years now. even a full-on multi-threaded site scraper. there's been no apocalypse.

[osuka]

let’s see what the admins have to say - if there is an actual phpbb api?l, i’d be much more comfortable shipping the pagetopper since we’d be able to talk about things like rate limiting and api key revocation in case shit goes sideways

[JacksonVirgo]

let’s see what the admins have to say - if there is an actual phpbb api?l, i’d be much more comfortable shipping the pagetopper since we’d be able to talk about things like rate limiting and api key revocation in case shit goes sideways

Yeah I'd only be comfortable if we had a backend doing it but having a backend is not sustainable unless it's directly in the site itself.

[yessiree]

echo what others have said about pagetopper, I don't think a centralized backend solution is a good idea. Having to manage user credentials and auth cookies sounds like a security disaster waiting to happen

I also don't think a client side solution by itself is gonna work either. Since for it to work properly, the program needs to run 24/7. I don't think anyone keeps their computer on 24/7. Realistically we design a client side pagetopper and teach people how to deploy it to a hosting service (like heroku) but maybe that's a topic for another time

[Psyche]

A side issue with client-side approaches to votecounting if "client-side" means that the votecount is generated automatically for each mafiascum user to view is that it sidesteps moderator validation in a way that we probably don't want.
So given prioritization of moderator validation, the browser extension or other implementation should probably be mod-focused -- make them easy to prepare/post, rather than easy for players to quickly peek at.
i honestly hate that. even in the best case scenario it's a worse experience than what mafia universe achieves.
but i don't see a clean way to address the issue while players still make votes by typing usernames into posts -- imo a good moderator counts typo votes

[yessiree]

im pretty sure "client side" just means code is ran on the browser client and not in some deployed backend service that is always running. It's meant to be used by the moderator only, and not by the players
and the tool should just help collect votes and present it for the mod to post in the thread, whenever they need to generate a VC

[Psyche]

sure. still a bit dissatisfied with that sort of UX

[JacksonVirgo]

echo what others have said about pagetopper, I don't think a centralized backend solution is a good idea. Having to manage user credentials and auth cookies sounds like a security disaster waiting to happen

Auth isn't the issue as you can use a service like Clerk to manage the entire thing for you (for web technologies anyway, for that specific example)

[JacksonVirgo]

I'd be okay with expanding on my mafia engine servers (which rn is a discord bot + attached site) if you wanted a reliable backend for anything.

[yessiree]

echo what others have said about pagetopper, I don't think a centralized backend solution is a good idea. Having to manage user credentials and auth cookies sounds like a security disaster waiting to happen

Auth isn't the issue as you can use a service like Clerk to manage the entire thing for you (for web technologies anyway, for that specific example)

Can Clerk manage third party auth credentials? (I'm talking about logging in to ms and storing the session cookie)