The New Professionals Program!
Proudly introducing the all-new, the all-improved, the all-awesome... Professionals Program!
Hey guys - Kintaii here again to talk to you all about the grand return of the Professionals Program! With our new focus on smoothing out and rethinking the balancing behind Anarchy Online, we realize that having a constant, consistant stream of communication with our playerbase is invaluable - This process would only be viable if it weren't for all of our players weighing in their opinions, and every bit of feedback we can receive is valuable.
In the hopes of easing the flow of communication between the player base and the development team, we here at the AO head office have decided that it's time to see the Professionals Program return to its former glory. To that end, we're happy to announce the new Professionals Program and how you can get involved!
Do you know someone who you think exemplifies their profession in Anarchy Online? Someone who knows their profession backwards, forwards, and inbetween? Someone who can clearly and reliably talk about their chosen profession, introduce new players to the ins-and-outs of life on Rubi-Ka, and offer valuable feedback to the developers? Well, here's your chance to get them into the spotlight!
Here's how this works: Each profession in game will receive two Professionals slots - These individuals will be chosen by you, the players, to receive greater access to chat with and discuss any issues they feel relevant to their profession and the game at large. In addition, the Professionals will also receive unparalleled access to our Bug Hunters staff on Testlive to aid in testing new content, as well as receiving special sneak-previews to upcoming content and ideas. In return, we simply ask for an active presence on the forums and the ability to communicate with ourselves and the players.
The Process:
To be nominated for the Professionals position, a player must meet the following requirements: You must be a paying member of Anarchy Online with at least six months subscribed, have one character above level 175, and you must have an active presence on the Anarchy Online forums. Players may submit a nominee for a Professional to the following email address: nominations@anarchy-online.com - When writing this email, please use the following format:
(Subject) [PROFESSION] Professional Nomination - [CHARACTERFORUMNAME]
(Body) [LINK TO THE CHARACTER'S PROFILE ON THE AO FORUMS]
So if someone wanted to nominate Macrosun as the new Keeper Professional, the submitted email would look like the following:
(Subject) Keeper Professional Nomination - Macrosun
(Body) http://forums.anarchy-online.com/member.php?u=664289
THE EMAIL MUST BE FORMATTED AS ABOVE. If your email is NOT in the proper format, the nomination will be discarded and not counted. No exceptions. Please do not include any additional information within the email - The body should contain *nothing* but the requested link.
Once a player has received a certain number of nominations, they will be contacted by Funcom personnel asking if they wish to proceed with the process - If they agree, they will be placed in a list of potential candidates for their profession. If a player has been approved as a nominee for multiple professions (IE: someone reaching the nomination requirements for both Engineer and Shade Professionals), the player will be asked to choose which one they wish to run for.
Once this list of final nominees has been compiled, a thread will be posted in the corresponding Profession forum allowing players to vote for their favourite. The two players with the highest votes after one week will be the Professionals for that profession.
There are, of course, a series of rules, guidelines, provisions, ect. ect. that come along with all of this, but these will be discussed with the individuals who have received an official nomination. The important thing is to know that the power for who stays and who goes is in the hands of you, our players.
Every three months we will hold a vote within the individual Profession forums where the players may choose to vote one (or both) of their Professionals out of the position. Should a Professional be given a "vote of no confidence" by the player base, they will be replaced with the next-highest runner-up from the previous election (IE: whomever came in third place in the last election).
Every nine months, the process will restart with a new round of nominations and voting - All current Professionals still in good standing (and who wish to have a chance to continue with the program) will automatically be placed into the voting roster with the rest of the nominees.
And there you have it! The new Professionals Program starts here and now, and I can't wait to see the results! More information will be posted in this thread as time goes on (including a more complete/definitive rules list), so keep your eyes peeled and stay tuned true believers!
Originally Posted by Technogen
