>I didn't avoid CF because Valg came off as the text-based
>version of an owner/manager I once had who sold out after
>punching an employee. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, as
>text doesn't always convey warmth or humor as intended.

I know there are some that will disagree with me, and I don't want to turn this thread into one about Valg, but I thought he was very approachable and great to bounce ideas off of as a heroimm.

>1. First and most important, do exit interviews so you can
>improve the hero-imm experience.

Not a bad idea, although generally people write their comments in their deletion thread.

>2. Allow no-void triggers so hero-imms can work on their area
>while putting in their hours. I set up triggers to alert me
>when something happened while I was in another window, but
>things were so slow I tended to void.

I haven't heard anything recommending against making these triggers...not that I'm smart enough to set one up for myself.

>3. The mentoring I had was good (M, you were a dear!) but I
>might suggest using something like Google Wave (or even just
>Google Docs) to make collaboration more powerful. I use the
>latter with my students all the time.

Invites plz I use rememberthemilk.com to help me with my area writing, and could see using that with others on projects.

>4. Create a RAD area development tool. Yes, it is an
>investment in resources, and a poorly designed area editing
>tool would need to be revisited whenever area formats or flags
>get changed, but a well-designed tool could be updated as
>easily as updating a config file. This is done anyway in the
>form of the CF area documentation.

There is an aspect that I feel is neglected when people discuss heroimm areas. True, they do demonstrate that you have dedication/multitaskability/etc. But they also teach you a lot of things about CF that you need to know as an Imm in order to run quests that don't go horribly awry or be able to give informed answers to questions about gameplay features on the Forum/Newbie Channel. These are things that sometimes you can only really figure out after finally getting the ####ing locks on the doors in you area to work after the 5th try and figuring out what you had been doing wrong all the other times you thought you had it fixed. I think any tool that would make area development significantly easier would probably allow someone to gloss over these details and lead to people advancing without having the necessary knowledge to stand alone at higher levels. I don't think we're really hurting for more/better areas.