Is it time to do away with a "permanent" record?

[Alhanelem]

The punishments don't fit the offenses.

You get the same penalty for a curse word as running a bot, and both are lifetime bans for a second transgression.

That's asinine. Always has been, always will be.

It's really not asinine and never will be.

You don't get penalized for casually tossing out an F bomb once in a while. You only get penalized if you're reported to a GM for harassment, and usually that only leads to action if you're jumping through hoops to harass them after they blacklist you (which is what GMs will tell you to do first).

People have a potty mouth in game all the time, that by itself doesn't rise to the level of punishment unless its habitual or you're actively harassing a particular person. Getting banned in game for anything other than illegal activity / RMT type stuff is not easy at all, unlike here on the forums where you can get banned for breathing the wrong way. Point is, they don't just casually ban people from the game, because that's not conducive to making money. If you actually get a punishment for poor behavior in chat, it is not going to be you just saying "____ you-" it's going to be a lot more than that.

Because of that, if you actually get banned for it, well, you probably deserve it.

[Soraii]

Regardless how filthy your mouth is, nothing rises to the level of Banned for Life for it.

The game has a filter specifically for swears. That in of itself nullifies the ability to ban for it. If you don't like it, turn your filter on. Don't ban for life.

[Alhanelem]

Regardless how filthy your mouth is, nothing rises to the level of Banned for Life for it.

The game has a filter specifically for swears. That in of itself nullifies the ability to ban for it. If you don't like it, turn your filter on. Don't ban for life.

Like I said, they don't ban you just for cursing. You can, however, be banned for harassment.

Also, the existence of a chat filter is NOT an excuse to flame up a storm. Chat filters don't catch everything and are easily c.ir.cu-mv3nt3d. Therefore, the existence of ac urse filter does not nullify banning people for abusive chat, and you don't make the rules anyway. They can b an people for whatever the hell they want to, it's a privately run service and what they say goes.

[GlobalVariable]

I highly doubt people are banned because of a few bad words in yell (unless they really do cross the line).

You don't get penalized for casually tossing out an F bomb once in a while.

I have seen multiple people get banned for swearing. One close friend perma-banned for swearing. He got reported once for allegedly bad bazaar shouts (someone took offense to advertising signed items "too often") and then for swearing Was told this was his 3rd strike and now its permanent. Other people were swearing too, but nobody was mad at them to report them. Squeaky wheel gets the grease. He wasn't harassing anybody. I was there.

This mentality of "well if it happened you deserved it" is pretty absurd. I do think perma-bans have their place though. I just think the criteria ought to be stricter for it. I also think perma banned players shouldn't be able to just bounce right back like they often do.. I have met numerous perma banned players who in no time flat have a new account and are back at cap building REMA again while cheating their rear ends off, again. Its infuriating.

[Alhanelem]

I have seen multiple people get banned for swearing. One close friend perma-banned for swearing. He got reported once for allegedly bad bazaar shouts (someone took offense to advertising signed items "too often") and then for swearing Was told this was his 3rd strike and now its permanent. Other people were swearing too, but nobody was mad at them to report them. Squeaky wheel gets the grease. He wasn't harassing anybody. I was there.

I've cursed up a storm at times and never gotten so much as a warning. That said, where you do it matters. Linkshells and tells are considered private chat and generally aren't looked at except for harassment accusations. But cursing in a public channel (i.e. say/shout/yell) is more of a problem.

This mentality of "well if it happened you deserved it" is pretty absurd.

Not EVERY case of protesting a ban is unreasonable, but the vast majority of them are justified. I've worked in the game industry and have had stints helping out with both game and forum moderation on more than one title. Very close to everyone who gets punished doesn't have a case for getting unbanned. Especially in cases of cheating, one look at their data and you know. And in League of Legends, which is notorious for issuing punishments for rude behavior, whenever you get punished for it when you log in the next several times it shows you a chat log of what you said. I have run afoul of temp chat bans in that game and let me tell you, even in cases where I didn't feel like I didn't do anything wrong, when I review the log I iended up thinking "Well, I guess I wasn't exactly a beacon of positvity there...."
(Also certain shorthand like KYS and things like the R word can get you an automatic penalty by the system)

It is very rare that people complaining about punishments have a leg to stand on. I'm banned from the FFXIV forums (R word). Do I feel like it was harsh? Definitely- I am against *permanent* bans in most cases - But did I deserve to be punished? Probably. Even though I was expressing how I thought an idea was bad, mocking disabilities is never acceptable and I myself usually speak out against it- so today I"m actually really surprised I said that.

Also I think it bears repeating: The existence of a curse filter is NOT a license to curse all you want. The logic "if you dont want to see cursing turn the filter on" is flawed for multiple reasons:
1) it is easily circumvented
2) Allowing curse words doesn't necessarily mean you want to see it all the time or that you tolerate all rude behavior- Even though many of us use certain words in casual conversation with each other it doesn't mean we're okay with seeing them used in an abusive context.
3) filter or not, rules are rules.

[Pixela]

I've cursed up a storm at times and never gotten so much as a warning. That said, where you do it matters. Linkshells and tells are considered private chat and generally aren't looked at except for harassment accusations. But cursing in a public channel (i.e. say/shout/yell) is more of a problem.

I should not need to point this out, it seems I do.

Whether action is taken or not is purely based on the GM that deals with you and their own personal ideology, if they are in a good mood then you get a little warning. If not, you get a ban. It's not different then a police officer, the leniency is purely based on their mood / character.

You can curse a million times, and someone else can wait till you log off and do the same thing and get banned just fine.

Ultimately, the point is that there should not be a one ban for all and 2 bans = perma.

They simply need to do away with perma ban for anything but serious violations, this 2 bans and you're gone forever is idiotic.

Years ago I reported a person for stealing monsters from my train as I was mass AoE killing (casting dia on yellow monsters), purely because they kept telling me in say how angry they were and calling me names. I thought it would be funny to send them to jail. I did not think that would result in them getting banned, turned out according to their friend that they not only got banned but a permanent ban due to it being the 2nd offense.

[Alhanelem]

Whether action is taken or not is purely based on the GM that deals with you and their own personal ideology, if they are in a good mood then you get a little warning. If not, you get a ban. It's not different then a police officer, the leniency is purely based on their mood / character.

I mean, what's your point? All GMs are trained to follow the rules, but rules can b e interpreted differently by different people, this is true in the court systems etc. as well. None of th em are obligated to be a nice guy or give you leniency, and you should behave on the assumption that you will get none.

Ultimately, the rules that in place are the rules that are in place, and everyone does or should know them. If you agree to the rules and don't follow them, you absolutely should face the perscribed consequences.

[GlobalVariable]

Not EVERY case of protesting a ban is unreasonable, but the vast majority of them are justified.

Yeah, it's just the automatic assumption that I find absurd. Happens offline too - part of human nature I guess. Human brains seem to be wired for absurdity everywhere from pattern recognition (pareidolia) to presumed deserving whatever you get (just world fallacy). 99 of 100 can have "earned" their ban but guy 100 has to deal with "well you must have done it". I think it is a bad argument to put forth when we're discussing what warrants what kind of punishment, because we aren't disagreeing that you do deserve a punishment if you did the deed, you know? That's where my comment about it being absurd came from.

As far as the rest.. it happens, and my take is that they care about it once others complain enough - which may or may not have anything to do with you being a big bad rulebreaker. From a managerial stand point this does make sense. Why waste time moderating chat nobody cared about right? but I'd prefer the strictest consequences be held for the worst offenses.

[Alhanelem]

Yeah, it's just the automatic assumption that I find absurd.

If you think it's absurd you've never done moderation for a game studio.

From hacking a game to peices to spouting antisemetic tripe to every player they encounter- bans are rarely made in error. Yet literally everyone feigns innocence when caught.

As I said before, I've gotten chat restricted in league, I've been banned from the FFXIV forums. Does that make me a terrible person? No, but it does mean I made mistakes, mistakes that I learned from.

I generally don't believe in permanent bans- The majority of people who get punished don't offend again in computer game land and so its not normally necessary anyway. But the rules need to exist as do the punishments.

[Zehira]

I've been banned from the FFXIV forums. Does that make me a terrible person? No, but it does mean I made mistakes, mistakes that I learned from.

Yeah, I haven't forgotten about that. You have challenged thousands of people from the FFXIV forums during beta and after that. I am banned from there too. I believe politics are what pushed us to accept them.

Since I can't access to the FFXIV forums, I think it's not fair for people who are still living in Vana'diel still can't access to this forums.