What's the ratio of staff to regular players on your games? Do you think that's a good number, or would you prefer something different?

Our ratio is 67 members (not all 67 of them are active, mind you >>; ) with seven admin, one mod. Now, the reason for so many administrators is because of how the original site was designed, so under normal circumstances I wouldn't have that many on a forum. I feel you don't need a lot of admins or mods unless your forum is super active, which mine is definitely not right now. However, I don't care what the ratio is, so long as everyone is pulling their weight.

It's something like 1:10 at AG. We've got two admin for twentysomething members, with no moderators or the like. Spiv and I don't have any problems managing the site. We're a good team, the members help out with questions and the like when we're not around, and ultimately, we have no need for extra staff.

I LOVE running a site with someone I know and am good friends with IRL. Any issues that come up we can work out in person, and since we've been friends since high school and have been roleplaying for nearly that long, we don't get upset with each other (unless it's for good reason, haha). There's no need to divide tasks since we share a brain. It's really an ideal situation. Of course, we're both overachievers in different ways when it comes to our site, so it's probably not a situation that would work with most RPs. But I like it. :pink:

My site has 77 members, two admins and two global mods.

My ratio currently stands at about 1:6, or one staff member for every 6 members. Sooner or later it'll be higher, but it's a relatively good amount per staff member right now.

Currently, we have around 30 unique members (90%+ are active); of which, 2 are admins, and 5 are mods. So that's, what, 1:3? Someone who remembers how to do math can correct me on that if I'm wrong.

I have conflicting opinions about whether I think it's a good number or not. I mean, to me the ratio looks bad. But I am partial to the mods we have; I like having a little pool to get input from before I make decisions.

One of the reasons we have so many mods is that originally we modded everyone who became a professor. It's what the original owner did, and I just kind of followed her lead for a while. Granted, we stopped that practice because it was just giving us loads of inactive staff members. >_<

Haha I'm kind of in the same boat. The original site that I took over from after it was deleted had a set up where there were 10 admins and no mods. So, in the past couple of years, I've been trying to get rid of all the influence from the original site by no longer promoting new admins when one steps down, and pushing away from the need to have so many. It's hard though - people get used to one method, and when you try to change it, they get upset or flustered. That, and all of the people who are admining for me I've known since the original site, even as far back as the one before that, which was abandoned when someone hacked it. So... it's hard to just say "Goodbye" even if you think that you have too many.

We have about seventeen members and one admin (me). It seems like more than I'd be willing to handle, but I've had up to thirty members with just me. I've run four sites with just me, actually (not at the same time - only two at once). We're not pumping so it's not really too difficult.

I don't think there's any formula for the correct number of staff to have per members. Some people like to and are able to handle a million members all by themselves, whereas some people like to work in groups of ten with one member each. It comes down to each site and the preferences of the members and staff, really.

My sites staff has fluctuated a bit. It's been around on and off for the last.. five or so years? And the staff team has barely changed.

When it opened we had three admins and.. three or four mods. Granted, I was young and totally didn't realize I didn't need that many. But over the years it has been pretty active, and we've stayed steady at about 2 admins / 3 mods and 20~ members.

Right now we have two admins, two mods and not many members. We just opened to members of the forum way back when, so it's at about 4 or 5 maybe? I've never been good with counting these things xP
The reason that we have quite a few mods is because of when it first opened. The mods are basically all the same people as back then. You can't really reopen the site and say 'okay we don't need you anymore'. At some point we will have 3 admins because the original second admin will be coming back. I can't deal with running a site on my own. I'll do all the coding, figuring things out and everything but if I don't have a second opinion on every little detail I sit and stare blankly and nothing gets done.
Same witht he mods; I need them to help with updates because I don't always have time to do it myself. I also enver keep up with everyone elses threads like I should, so they watch out for rule breakers and the like too. But we also have specific jobs for the mods, so they're not overflowing with extra work that the admins could do.

Well, I haven't actually hired many staffers up until the more current rpgs I have run and I am VERY picky about who I make an admin. I rarely ever make a site with another person other than brainstorming and writing the info up myself but when people prove themselves dedicated I will promote them to admin.. but that is besides the point.

My current site has 1 admin, 2 mods with admin access for accepting characters, 2 regular mods and 26 members. That makes it a 5:26 so roughly 1:5. :)

Right now, I have about nine staff members with about 85-100+ members signing on daily. So, a 1:10 ratio basically. Currently we are handling the site very well and smoothly. Claims are updated regularly, applications are accepted promptly, and questions are answered as quickly as possible.

On DD we are 3 admins right now, and 1 mod - and there's more than 80 characters (not 80 individual members though)... I think it works fine as it is right now :)

In Finland RPG's usually have a lot fewer moderators and other staff, than you seem to have :) I'm and admin in my own RPG, and I moderate the forum all by myself. There's 24 members at this time, but normally member amount is 30. And this organization has worked really well ^___^
I once had two moderators, but they really hadn't anything to do. It seems, that I have had great members :D

On my forum we currently have 28 members with one administrator (me) and one global mod. Maybe it's not the greatest ratio, but honestly, I don't think many more is really necessary. The member base is still small enough that we can handle it with the staff as is. Once I get about 35 members I'll be looking to pick and new admin or mod.

I think the number of staff required really depends on the site. Some sites tend to need the extra authority to help them run smoothly, and others don't. It's really just a subjective thing.

Erm, we have about 40 members, 25-30 active, and 9 members of staff.

Creator, Head Admin, Admin/Head Artist, Admin, Tech Admin, Tech Mod x 2 (with ACP access to site, wiki and board), global mods x 2. The admin is also a mod for his race.

We have it that way because we all have different skills. technically thats five admins and four mods then. We won't be taking on more staff for a long time. Its a good ratio as there are always at least two members of staff at the board over 24 hours. Due to time zones (three staff are brits, one is in Oz, one Canada and four all over the US, east, west and central) we are rarely on at the same time and I don't think members feel ganged up on by admins. :D

I have to say that those who have posted before me are a little high. I have 50 members and 3 staff, including myself. I should have had two but I needed more advertising and the girl grew on me :p

Here's an excerpt from an interesting read that discusses this issue:

Here's the article: http://www.rpgsonline.net/resources/?p=20

The opinions are a bit elitist but I have to say they make some great points. Maybe you'll find something of use. Use what you like, leave what you don't. I know I did.

Also, to go off on another rant regarding this topic, make sure the people you have a staff are QUALITY. Nothings worse than having a bunch of people that are nothing more than a title. Someone of staff should try and be on whenever possible and shouldn't be too busy to make time for the site. All staff need to work equally to succeed. So don't make people staff to encourage membership. It's just bad.

I think that keeping the staff at a minimum is best. Usually a ratio of 1 staff to every 10 members works well, but it depends on how good the members are and if your staff is good at doing their jobs. If they don't do their job, then they don't deserve to be staff.

Blue Bloods,
I have to agree, I don't think a huge number of staff is necessary. Another rp board I am on has 6 staff for around 350 registered members, and that's always been plenty. As long as staff are pulling their weight, I don't think having a lot of them really benefits the forum. As a member, if there were more than 5 or 6 staff anywhere, I think it'd make me feel a bit . . .surrounded.

Just to let you all know, I am still here and reading. :pink: Thanks for everyone's input!

Having actually researched this particular area before, I've come across the most frequent ratios online in socio-statistics class. I've found that the most common staff-member ratio is as follows.

Below 100 Members: 1:29
100-1000 Members: 1:50'ish
1000+ Members: 1-205

Now this can't be completely accurate since this was an averaged list compiled by taking fifty sites of each kind and finding the mean between staff-member ratios. The greatest difference I saw was in 1000+ members, due to the fact that some sites we searched had actually 100,000+ members, destabilizing the list to a certain degree.

Over at my site, it's about 1:11. I started out with just me, but as it got more active, I did a search and chose someone to be a mod. I'm pretty comfortable with just myself as the admin and one other mod, but I may promote someone else to mod status if a lot more people join. I don't think there's a need for a lot of staff as long as you don't have a ton of people that don't follow rules, and as long as you have everything organized well.

I have been on many forums and depending on what the site was about or how people used the staff it differed.

One site was a ratio of 1:2 and that went horribly as well everyone was being staff more then anything. Having too much staff takes away the duty of staff members but for example on other sites I have been the ratio was 1:6 and it was extremely well done.

Depends how and what is the job of the staff. Many sites don't just have admin and mod. So depending if you count graphic staff, review staff and stuff.

That article made me want to shit in my mouth. Different RPs vary in needs - giving arbitrary numbers is completely moronic. If you have a freeform RP, yeah, minimal staff needs. If you have one with a GM system, you need more. One size does not fit all, people.

Anyways, moving on. On Tohea I had about... ehh... 15 total staff for around 10k accounts, and to be blunt, I haven't a single goddamn idea how many of those were exactly active. On my newer site, the active/total user ratio is a good bit higher. Out of the 270 or so current members, there are about 10 staff. There's always room for a few more if the RRT slows down, but I try to keep as few staff as possible.