Remove Need for Character Sheet Approval

In my time on GP, I have never not accepted a submitted character sheet. Even if the sheet wasn't finished yet or there were mistakes, it was always good to already have the sheet in the game, I think.

I don't really see anything bad that could happen from just allowing sheets to be submitted to a game without needing GM approval. However, it would speed up the process, which I think would be an upside.

I would suggest that players can submit character sheets to games and they are automatically accepted rather than pending for GM approval. GMs can always remove the sheet again if necessary for whatever reason

Heh. I thought I was being slack in always approving sheets without reading them.

It's reassuring to know I'm not the only one.

This would remove a pointless (in my opinion and experience) step and delay, and some confusion.

We should, then, also change it from 'Submit a Character' to 'Add a Character'.

The term 'Approve' also implies that I have looked at --and approve of-- the sheet, which is never the case since I almost always expect players to create characters collaboratively, so I assume the sheets are mostly empty when 'submitted'.

Even with completed characters, most GMs I have seen expect the player to edit and correct the sheet rather than submitting another.

In the (rare?) case where another character is called for, the player can always withdraw and 'submit' another. It would be nice if the GM could see the array of completed characters to pick from, but we could keep the 'Submit for Approval' option for such cases? That way a player could submit a few --like they can now-- the GM can look at them and approve the one they like.

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One potential downside is that the player can easily remove and replace their sheet without the GM knowing (if they don't see the email) or approving. But I don't see much of a problem with this.

Maybe make it a toggle? I'll see myself out. 🤣

Ribbing Adam aside, I see your points and say I have a similar experience, and have over time adopted similar habits as you describe. And yet, for some reason, I'm not 100% sold on removing this step. Not really opposed either, just not very enthusiastic about it. As is often the case, my opinion may shift.

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It's a change that I think we all agree with, but as it's a change to existing functionality then it might be worth taking to the community first. Maybe some GMs read and reject character sheets?

As always (and I did say 'option' above:), allowing the user to choose is the way to go.

In this case I don't even see it hitting against Adam's hate of option clutter. It would merely be 'Require Approval' toggle in the Game Details Screen, right next to 'Number of Character Sheets per Player'.

If we leave it on by default then it won't even interfere with anyone's existing workflow.

If this is removed, it could still possibly ask for approval in some other cases:
1. Submitting a character when you're already at the character limit for a game
2. Submitting a character that's using a sheet that's not on the allowed list

Nope. I've lost the will here.

Bowl's original suggestion was basically...

"Yo, Adam! See this line of code?"

"Change that '$isGM' to 'true'.

Oh, and while you're in there, rip out the pointless email notifying the GM. Yeah? Sound."

I would be happy with ripping out the approval step.

I still want to get emails, though, else the player would need to tell us they have added a character we need to look at, which they don't always do.

I consider any email I receive from GP (except password recovery, I guess) spam 😄 But since the email account I used for my account is an old one that is overflowing with spam anyway, I don't have a problem with it as is.

I meant the emails telling me that I've just submitted a character.

There is one of those?

I can't believe I am saying this, but bowl is right, that is spam! :)

Obviously get rid of that.

Haha yeah I used to get those back when I still made character sheets for NPCs, and I was like, "yeah thanks for the heads up."

Of course now I use the NPC tag almost exclusively.

Yeah. It's better now as it's only when I submit player handouts and GM notes sheets.

But I still have that pavlovian moment of joy when I see a new mail from GP, followed by pangs of disappointment when I realise that I caused the email.

Remember that the logic should be 'don't send an email to the user who submitted a character' not 'don't send an email if a GM submits a character' since there can now be more than one GM, so it might not be them.