I feel I should weigh in on this dicussion before the thread gets out of hand. It's a long post, but it's chock full of advisory goodness.
I did not know that! How exactly does that work? Using team chat you type your message as normal with an "@" before it? or "@sgt Mcawesome" at the end? Just curious.
That's a very cool feature! I've been playing for a relatively long time and did not know about that. Thanks for the info.
I think this has already been mentioned, but remember guys. If you are using this method, only the admins will see the message. Best practice would be for the admin to send you a private message acknowledging your "admin alert", but if the admin is busy already he may not take the time to acknowledge it.
And I mention this because, I want to make sure that everybody is aware of the existence of admin chat. e's and pubs may not see it, but a lot of times there will be plenty of discussion behind the scenes when an offense occurs.
e's, a general rule of thumb here: if the admins on the server have been actively handling the situations, don't issue a warning. Chances are they caught it and are discussing it in admin chat. (IE, Has the player been warned before? Is somebody preparing to issue a ban? Etc.) A common mantra around here that creeps up again and again is "Admining is not a race." We want our admins to make sure they do things right, good communication among the admins is a key part of doing things right, and sometimes good communication takes a bit of time.
If, after some time, an admin hasn't addressed the issue, go ahead and use the method described above to send a message to admin chat. The admins on the server may have just missed the offense or they may have been afk for a minute to grab a drink or something.
While we don't mind e's helping out at all, we also need to make sure that problems are properly handled by those with the official authority on the server. For that matter, I've even seen regulars on some of our servers issue unofficial warnings and alert problem players to our rules. Really, the only time an e should be issuing a warning is if there are no admins on the servers or if the admins aren't addressing any problems on the servers. (And leadership does take notice of those admins who don't do their job.)
For all of our admins, if you're in a server and an e is issuing warnings before you, please politely psay them to thank them for their assistance, but to also let them know that you are present and handling the server.
Admins have our own explicit guidelines about how warn players. As for =(e)= and pub players, the only guidelines to follow are those in the general rules: be respectful, watch your own language, don't badmouth eGO, don't mess with the admins, etc. If you decide to remind someone of a rule, just don't break the rules in the process!
More than anything else, the #1 thing that non-admins can do to help is just lead by example. Follow the rules and politely help others understand them if they are confused. Have fun and make it fun for everyone else. If you do that much on your own, chances are good that you'll have an =(eG)= of your own in time... and then the whole game changes.
Of course, everything I've said is trumped by whatever an eGO+ says.
Very well put, Jack.
Again, there is nothing wrong with e's helping on the servers. We just want to make sure that you all don't step on the eG's and eGO's toes while doing it. Ultimately, the ones with admin are the ones responsible for the server.
Just remember, if you do need to warn for something, please follow Scrappy's guidelines. He hit the nail on the head with how to warn properly.