We are looking for applicants for those who wish to run temporary container crews.  If you are interested, please mail squishy with a quick rundown of who you are, what names you are best known by, what names you use on irc, what time are you mostly on irc and any previous hand or CL experience you have.

We are more than likely going ahead with container crews to ensure that there are new jobs at all times.  We will start reducing the number of container crews down once we can maintain a constant 24/7 job coverage.

What is a container crew?

It is a crew run by volunteers who house and train users until such time that the other crews in the game can take them in as part of the family.  Each container crew will be allowed to have 1 sponsor from each existing family to be in their crew so that they can show the rops to new associates they draft in, and, when their leader auths future spaces, the sponsor and associates can integrate into the new family.

Being in a container crew has its down sides, there is a strict 0 tolerance policy.  If you don't play by the rules, you are killed.  This will negate most advantaged of being in a family that can not be killed.  Container crews are for people who actually need a place to start over, not a place to lay low.

When the game reaches a point where there are enough spaces for all new members and there is 24/7 job coverage not including the container crews, we will start reintegrating the containers back into the other crews, or, they may wish to seek auth and stay up (or suicide, to be discussed later)

Since they are unkillable, any disputes concerning the container crews upper structure should be settled by Squishy, Bunny, or DeadlySin.

Sponsors from other crews that reside in the container crew should wear their original crew tags in their profile so that members know who they are getting into bed with.

Being in a container crew means you can not get promoted to mademan.  If you are a member of one, it is important that you start grooming yourself to be ready for your sponsor to vouch for you in your shared future family, or, whatever crewleader you plan on going to next.

Container crews may last a week, may last a month.  They may dissolve and go into another family, they may receive auth and stay up.  They may be shot when their time is over by people they piss off, we don't know how it will end up.  We are offering 2 different type of compensation packages. The first is A) which you will get when the time is over, it is based upon how many days you stayed up, and if you will be re-integrating into the game with your character (minus the unkillable status of course).  The second is B) which is larger, but is for those who up front say they will be suicide their character and will not be integrating that character back into the game, this method is also paid out depending on how long you are up.

In 48 hours, I will look at the sponsor coverage on https://www.mafiareturns.com/news/rebuild.php and if it is still lacking, we will go ahead with the container crews.

No account age or rank requirements.

"How often are we at 24/7 job coverage? "

Enough that I have let my personal bills pile up to keep advertising on, which is why we saw a bump in user numbers recently. However, when there are blocks of hours, or, half a day at a time where there simply is no one there to man the job board... I have to decide what is more important, keeping the game up and active, or, find a better way to get players into crews.

If there is no coverage on the job board for hours/half days at a time... would mailing be much better?  If a sponsor isnt online to click ASSOC at the top of their screen when there is a new member waiting for them... Wouldnt them not being online to click the blinking mail icon result in the same?

"Specifically the ability for a new person to find a suitable leader themselves by making first contact?"

This has proven in the past to result in incredibly horrible results.  We simply can't afford to be throwing thousands of dollars away to advertising if it results in poor results. If we did push "making first contact yourself", it will end up being a "send a introduction mail to 13 leaders and hope one of them gets back to me while im still online for the next 45 minutes".  I don't think we want to go that direction, and likewise, I don't think a member wants to wait half a day with all their eggs in one basket for a reply that may never come, or may be a flat out no.

"Once you hit a certain point you don't want anymore as it is time consuming getting these people up to speed and you only have so much time so you have to limit the amount of new blood in your crew or you're going to be pulled in every direction all the time "

This is why we have sponsors, a paid position from the crewleader.  If you try to do everything by yourself without delegating any tasks, you will drown as a CL.  You have an entire crew of people who want to work to benefit the family, why not utilize it in positions that are specifically coded for that very purpose.

"I know there are plenty that only allow so many new blood in their crew until they turn jobs off cause after that point it's just wasting your money if you don't want to accept these as you're at the maximum you're willing to take. "

This is the ideal thing to do, if you no longer want to take in new members, then turn the job board off and no longer take in new members.  If you have the reputation that gets you people mailing to for invites, great, no harm no foul.  However, when hours at a time, or half days at time go buy and those new members who have never played before that we paid a pretty hefty advertising cost come to the game...and hit a brick wall...  It's just wasting potential new users, so lets not deny them the ability to take the easy way into a crew for the first time.  Any experienced user can bypass it easy, what we are looking at preserving is new users who need a way to get into communication with a user who is online, active, ready, and willing to take in a new member.  Not a blind "figure out that i need to mass mail 30 upper structures and hope one gets back to me before i lose interest in the first 15 minutes" at 20 bucks a pop.

"Job boards to me just breeds click monkeys that don't want to speak or take part in the RP aspect. "

Thats exactly what they are designed to do, catch the users who on their first 5 minutes in the game, don't know how to craft a perfect mail to the right people worded the right way.  Thats more of 2nd account thing.  2nd accounts, btw, never happen when the first one leaves.

I am not trying to be a negative nancy here, I'm really not, but this is a last ditch effort leaving the control in the CLs hands as a whole - before we have to go and use new methods, like make an auto join feature which allows new members to automatically join any crew that wants to accept them - bypassing most of the things that cause users to leave because there was lack of any human contact. We have looked at the data and there is a "magic window" that, if a user has human contact during that time, the chances of that new user becoming an actual player dramatically increases. The longer that time goes without human interaction, the less likely that user comes back, leaving before they get hooked.

We were gearing up with potential candidates in case we had to launch container crews.  However, the existing leaders were able to step up their game and get 24/7 job coverage, so we are keeping the names and apps of those who applied for future use when we need to set up container crews.