Regarding the Revision of the Prohibited Activities and Account Penalty Policy

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Gmasotti

I'll probably get banned from the forums for "impersonating SE staff". :rolleyes::rolleyes::rolleyes:

---

I've been loosely following this thread since the changes were announced. If anything it is a slight relief that the thread is still active and hasn't been shut down, so there might be a sliver of hope that SE is inclined to lean on the side of civil discourse being an important function of any society. This is their platform, and of course as such it is within their right to regulate as they see fit, but there should be a clear line between what is considered harassment and genuine public discourse.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LalaRu

Whole thread feels like "omg I cannot continue to play borderline with by bad behavior and walk away with it fine anymore, this must be fixed!".

---

You were never allowed to be that way against someone, im just saying.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Tiraelina

If the sky is falling now, it was falling before too. They could do any of this in the old system if they so desired for the exact same reasons. Except SE isn't in the business of banning their income over trivialities.

Real world politics don't belong in a game either. I wouldn't think twice about reporting it.

---

Have you even read the new ToS ?

When did you see someone getting banned for this

Quote:

---

""Nuisance behaviour" means speech or behaviour that hurts others or obstructs game play, but which is not classified as harassment. Even if it was not the intention, a penalty may be imposed if the end result was that another person was hurt or obstructed."
Below is a non-exhaustive list of examples of nuisance behaviour:
・Expressions that significantly lack consideration for another person
・Expressions that unilaterally reject another person's opinion
・Expressions that compel a playing style

---

"Expression" it is black on white written they dont mean being aggressive against someone, simple asking someone to use aoe could results in your account being banned, that is in the tos, clear.
Have you seen someone getting banned or warned for leaving the duty or getting dsc?

Quote:

---

◆Obstruction of play
"Obstruction of play" means all behaviour in general that obstructs another person's game play. Below is a non-exhaustive list of examples of obstruction of play:
・Intentional leaving or disconnection
This means obstructing another person's game play by intentionally leaving the game or disconnecting from the server.

・Other obstruction of play
This means all other behaviour that deliberately obstructs another person's game play by some means.

---

If they were banning for this kind of "behaviour" then i am a politician running for the presidency in the south Samoa.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nedkel

Have you even read the new ToS ?

When did you see someone getting banned for this

---

Isn't that the point here in the context of GM's properly enforcing rules? You're the one suggesting the GM's are running unhinged. If they were, they could've been banning for whatever they pleased, or did you miss that your account can be terminated for anything since the game released?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nedkel

"Expression" it is black on white written they dont mean being aggressive against someone, simple asking someone to use aoe could results in your account being banned, that is in the tos, clear.
Have you seen someone getting banned or warned for leaving the duty or getting dsc?

---

Except it isn't saying that in the slightest. Compel a playing style is beating someone over the head with self-imposed hunt rules or the Dark Devices situation. Ignorance over your own behaviour isn't an excuse either in majority of online games. If it looks hostile to an outside observer, it's going to be taken as hostile.

Leaving the game is not leaving a duty, it never says duty for one. It's walking away from the game and leaving it open or disconnecting because you don't like the dungeon or whatever else being passive aggressive instead of just leaving the duty and letting everyone else move on. Holding everyone hostage to kick you or leave/abandon the duty entirely. If your internet is constantly getting knocked offline for longer than a few minutes to make it look intentional from the GM's standpoint, you're not in a position to drag everyone down with you and need to fix it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Tiraelina

Isn't that the point here in the context of GM's properly enforcing rules? You're the one suggesting the GM's are running unhinged. If they were, they could've been banning for whatever they pleased, or did you miss that your account can be terminated for anything since the game released?



Except it isn't saying that in the slightest. Compel a playing style is beating someone over the head with self-imposed hunt rules or the Dark Devices situation. Ignorance over your own behaviour isn't an excuse either in majority of online games. If it looks hostile to an outside observer, it's going to be taken as hostile.

Leaving the game is not leaving a duty, it never says duty for one. It's walking away from the game and leaving it open or disconnecting because you don't like the dungeon or whatever else being passive aggressive instead of just leaving the duty and letting everyone else move on. Holding everyone hostage to kick you or leave/abandon the duty entirely. If your internet is constantly getting knocked offline for longer than a few minutes to make it look intentional from the GM's standpoint, you're not in a position to drag everyone down with you and need to fix it.

---

http://support.na.square-enix.com/ru...2&tag=users_en
Show me the point in which it says a player could be banned or warned for the stuff i have wrote above, because im probably blind.
There is a profanity thing, and the Disruption point, and about harassing which are not the same things.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Freyt

The irony is palpable.

On one side you have everyone simply trying to promote good values and free speech, with clear and succinct rules. I for one wouldn't mind harsher rules and harsher penalties, just as long as it's clear what is and isn't against the rules, and promotes truth and good behavior, rather than emotions and politically correct behavior.

On the other side you have people who make their point by arguing in the exact manner that the new rules say not to do, by rejecting others opinions completely with no reasoning, by accusing the other side of wrongdoing for simply have a different opinion than themselves, and even using aggressive language to try and force their point.

And ironically, the side that is against the new rules are against the rules that state the other side shouldn't behave like this, despite that if it were enforced here and now that it would completely eliminate their side. A few would remain to be sure. There are respectable posters on any side of any disagreement, but their voice would quickly be drowned out without the many disrespectful posters to back them up.

---

But doesn't the fact that nothing will happen to them even though they're breaking the new rules kinda vindicate their assertion that people are overreacting?

Like here, check this out: I unilaterally reject your opinion that these rule changes are a bad thing, because I don't think they in fact are.

If you believe what I just said violates the new TOS, you can report me if you want, I guess, but I guarantee you nothing is going to come of it, because the mods aren't robots compelled to follow the rules as written without context, nor are they foaming at the mouth to ban people with little provocation.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nedkel

http://support.na.square-enix.com/ru...2&tag=users_en
Show me the point in which it says a player could be banned or warned for the stuff i have wrote above, because im probably blind.
There is a profanity thing, and the Disruption point, and about harassing which are not the same things.

---

What you wrote above isn't really prohibited in the revised rule either.

Simply asking someone to use aoe abilities is not the same thing as making expressions that compel a play style. Continuously berating someone for not using aoe abilities or threatening to vote kick them if they won't would be such an expression that compels a play style.

And yes, the rule says the intent does not matter if the result is still that the other person gets hurt, but there is a fine line between asking politely to use aoe and even explaining why they should and just complaining about it continuously throughout a run and being a nuisance. That's why SE would still have to make the determination and it is not a guarantee that they would take the side of the reporter.

Similarly, SE would have to make a determination if a player was genuinely disconnected or it was intentional behavior that obstructs other's game. I do hope that SE would be extra careful in making this determination.

That said, leaving a duty is not prohibited. You are already penalized for leaving a duty with certain exceptions, so there is no other action needed from SE.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LalaRu

Whole thread feels like "omg I cannot continue to play borderline with by bad behavior and walk away with it fine anymore, this must be fixed!".

---

This is not what's happening in this thread.
It's about people being legitimatly worried that what they think is an appropriate behavior might not be under the new policies, because of a lack of a clear definition in what SE think is acceptable and what they think isn't.

SE is basically asking a worldwide community with different cultures and tolerences to "be nice", without even telling us what does that even mean. There is no worldwide standards about what is "being nice".
If I go to a restaurant, is it acceptable not to leave a tip if the service was good? In my country, yes. In the US, no.
In FFXIV, is it acceptable to tell a Tank "You should use your skills to maintain aggro, because the group is getting attacked"? Before this policy change, yes. After the changes, the rules are so vague that it might very well be no, but we actually don't know for sure. (Edit: Actually, when you think about it, if the way the community acted before was acceptable, Square Enix wouldn't have made this change while saying, in short: "you can't moderate yourself so we are getting involved now".)

And given the precedents regarding how this company enforce their policy in some of their services, or even in the industry as a whole (someone gave the legit example of Heroes of the Storm where you could be banned for picking a hero other people didn't like), it is legitimate to be worried.

It's sad to see people like you interpreting our request as "you just want to troll and get away with it", when we actually want the exact opposite.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Tiraelina

Isn't that the point here in the context of GM's properly enforcing rules? You're the one suggesting the GM's are running unhinged.

---

GMs will run how Square Enix told them to. And we don't know how harsh Square Enix wants to be in order to impose a "friendly environment".

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Tiraelina

If they were, they could've been banning for whatever they pleased, or did you miss that your account can be terminated for anything since the game released?

---

What you refer to are legal terms.
An active enforced policy -the thing this thread is about- is not that.

Same topic on the Japanese forum

9 replies and 9000 views compared to this thread's 1300+ replies and 87000 views

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Vnolan

Same topic on the Japanese forum

9 replies and 9000 views compared to this thread's 1300+ replies and 87000 views

---

That being said, western cultures do tend to be less trusting of authority in general, (which in my personal opinion is a good thing) . Everybody here knows of when GMs mess up, like when a GM banned someone off the forums, because the GM thought a Lightning gif was a gif of the player irl.

Many people like to know exactly what they are signing up for, leaving rules vague leaves room for doubt, where we would have to blindly trust that the GMs know what they are doing.
And many of us just can't put our trust in stuff like that. Not when we hear so many horror stories from other people and other games.

I have been playing this game for around 5 years, without any warnings, and the vagueness of the rules leaves me a bit uneasy. Maybe I won't get any warnings, but my friends who talk a bit more roughly might.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Emstidor

But doesn't the fact that nothing will happen to them even though they're breaking the new rules kinda vindicate their assertion that people are overreacting?

Like here, check this out: I unilaterally reject your opinion that these rule changes are a bad thing, because I don't think they in fact are.

If you believe what I just said violates the new TOS, you can report me if you want, I guess, but I guarantee you nothing is going to come of it, because the mods aren't robots compelled to follow the rules as written without context, nor are they foaming at the mouth to ban people with little provocation.

---

Literally this whole entire discussion has been about selective moderation being the biggest concern. On the flip side to all of this for a forum mod to NOT moderate this particular thread too heavily no matter the rules would earn them at least some of my respect. Discussion of these rules is a fairly big deal, and no one should want to be seen stifling such a conversation.

I'm not in the habit of reporting people regardless. You'd know that if you understood the point I was trying to make, that many of us on my side of the argument are trying to protect players like you from unfair judgement. ("but if it's unfair you recognize it's not against the rules?" or something like that I'm sure might be your next response, I'm not gonna bother replying to that if it is. Arguments like that aren't clever, they're just tiresome.)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by NessaWyvern

That being said, western cultures do tend to be less trusting of authority in general, (which in my personal opinion is a good thing) . Everybody here knows of when GMs mess up, like when a GM banned someone off the forums, because the GM thought a Lightning gif was a gif of the player irl.

Many people like to know exactly what they are signing up for, leaving rules vague leaves room for doubt, where we would have to blindly trust that the GMs know what they are doing.
And many of us just can't put our trust in stuff like that. Not when we hear so many horror stories from other people and other games.

I have been playing this game for around 5 years, without any warnings, and the vagueness of the rules leaves me a bit uneasy. Maybe I won't get any warnings, but my friends who talk a bit more roughly might.

---

I have a feeling that Japanese aren't left wanting of ways to express themselves. We can indulge in talking about violence, something 99% of people don't want, while sex is completely off limits, something everybody wants. I'm not about to ask for censorship of violence, but it does feel a bit backwards.

Trying to change the rules to avoid conflict is something I cannot agree with. Some would say the goal of having no conflict is desirable, and that the methods are what is wrong; and I disagree, attempting to remove conflict is abhorrent in itself.

At its worst its a symptom of a deeper problem; that some people are fundamentally incompatible with each other's company, through a combination of temperaments and worldviews. Trying to keep them from expressing this in any form just leads to passive aggression, which leads to a long period of frustration rather than going their separate ways as soon as possible; and chances are, it will still end like that, just that the lack of overt conflict has delayed it so long that its gotten in the way of fun for up to YEARS.

Conflict on a more constructive level can bring two closer together. Rivalry is the archetypal form of this, and when tapped for a united purpose, the two push each other to do harder, and become closer just by knowing that they've made each other better. There's also an odd psychological quirk (specifically in men and boys) where if they get into a fight with each other, and make up afterwards, they become closer than before. Not to mention, much of how people bond is by pushing their boundaries, finding out if you're close enough that they can do certain things they won't let others do with them; it helps both people open up. True friendships are formed this way.

We have to accept that, as people try to become closer, they will inevitably come into conflict; either by not knowing the other person well enough, or finding that they're incompatible. And in many case, they will only find these two factors because they came into conflict. People walk blindly into relationships; everyone is different, so anything you assumed would work for one person is likely to make another person hate you with a passion. I'm not sure that putting bear traps in a dark room to punish people for a misstep is really going to be all that productive; there's way too many socially awkward people who have no idea what they're doing who are far too likely to get stung by this.

Both the block button, and possibility of just agreeing to go their separate ways were fit for purpose for preventing the kind of behaviour SE hopes to curb with the new policy. Booting people who the people they have offended have already stopped listening to them is saying that because they have caused a negative experience, they have no place to even ATTEMPT to make amends; not because they've been ostracised, but because they've been executed.

I reject the premise that people should be banned for bad SOCIAL behaviour that many of the people defending the new policy hold. Social behaviour needs to be dealt with by the community, not the "state" or the game masters. What game masters need to be concerned about is if people are cheating, that the game is broken for someone, and other things of a primarily mechanical nature.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LunaProtege

I reject the premise that people should be banned for bad SOCIAL behaviour that many of the people defending the new policy hold. Social behaviour needs to be dealt with by the community, not the "state" or the game masters. What game masters need to be concerned about is if people are cheating, that the game is broken for someone, and other things of a primarily mechanical nature.

---

That is possible in RL because there are consequences for bad social behavior.

It's not possible for the community to deal with bad social behavior in an online environment, because there are no consequences and nothing can be enforced by the community. Thus the only option in an online environment is for the controllers of that environment to step in and take action if there are bad social behavior issues.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kaedan

That is possible in RL because there are consequences for bad social behavior.

It's not possible for the community to deal with bad social behavior in an online environment, because there are no consequences and nothing can be enforced by the community. Thus the only option in an online environment is for the controllers of that environment to step in and take action if there are bad social behavior issues.

---

There is a way for the community to police itself in the online environment; for one, the block button, that's a tool placed into the hands of the players, with that you effectively remove that player's influence from your play. Things may be different in a game like Rust where its full loot PvP; but that can be policed just by joining together to fight in PvP against them. And that kind of play is the appeal of such games.

They can also spread the reputation of certain players, so that anybody that doesn't want to associate with that behaviour can give them a wide berth, and those that do can take a beeline to them. Even the worst case scenario of people clearing out the company chests, can be made impossible without active interference from GMs just by denying them access to the chest; either never give them permission, or if they aren't in the FC after, spread their reputation so that nobody will ever let them have access to their company chest. The company chest isn't even a social behaviour issue so much as a theft issue, and yet you can still police it yourself.

Social ostracization is the ONLY appropriate punishment for bad social behaviour; and social ostracization is something you can do in ANY social environment, and its actually EASIER to do in an online environment than in real life.

What other punishment are you going to suggest? Forced blacklisting? That people aren't allowed to decide for themselves if they want to associate with someone or not?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nedkel

http://support.na.square-enix.com/ru...2&tag=users_en
Show me the point in which it says a player could be banned or warned for the stuff i have wrote above, because im probably blind.
There is a profanity thing, and the Disruption point, and about harassing which are not the same things.

---

Quote:

---

SQUARE ENIX MAY SUSPEND, TERMINATE, MODIFY, OR DELETE FFXIV SERVICE ACCOUNTS, CHARACTERS, VIRTUAL GOODS, OR THE SERVICE ALTOGETHER, AT ANY TIME FOR ANY REASON OR FOR NO REASON, WITH OR WITHOUT NOTICE OR LIABILITY TO YOU.

---

You will find this language in almost every online service. They don't get abused for good reason.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Fyce

GMs will run how Square Enix told them to. And we don't know how harsh Square Enix wants to be in order to impose a "friendly environment".

What you refer to are legal terms.
An active enforced policy -the thing this thread is about- is not that.

---

Terms that are referenced by name in what everyone is losing their mind over. These rules are not for disagreements and criticism that isn't coated in profanity and abuse.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LunaProtege

-Snip-

---

While I do agree on the principle, there are bigger repercussions to take into account here. It doesn't just affect two individuals having a dispute. It impacts the community as a whole. And if able to run free, it will deteriorate. Simply because of anonymity and the lack of actual consequences. Negative behaviors tends to win under the circumstances that allow them to grow.

In your last paragraph, you suggest some kind of anarchy where Square Enix shouldn't control anything regarding social interactions. Unfortunatly, in a lot of instances where no social control is present, especially in video games where anonymity is provided, it very often lead to what some people would call a "toxic wasteland". Even when appropriate tools are provided for the community to deal with it (without being able to abuse these tools). This kind of anarchy is objectively not desirable as it negatively impacts a majority of people who do not want to see or experience this rampant toxicity. (It's also not desirable for Square Enix themselves on a business side.)
You know what would happen without any social control: pure chaos where the best course of action is actually to turn off all kind of communication. Otherwise you wouldn't be able to play without being insulted or trolled all the time. And even if you were able to endure it, most people wouldn't and it would escalates to the point where playing with random people would be the worst experience ever.

In short, letting negative behaviors run free of consequences is generaly a very bad idea in this context. And no, the "blocking" feature would definitly not be enough. What you'd need is a whitelist, not a blacklist. And a whitelist that filters absolutly everything without exception.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Tiraelina

You will find this language in almost every online service. They don't get abused for good reason.

Terms that are referenced by name in what everyone is losing their mind over. These rules are not for disagreements and criticism that isn't coated in profanity and abuse.

---

I already made a post about that, but I will repeat myself for the sake of it.

What you quoted are legal terms. They are different from an actively enforced policy. Everyone knows that.
Of course Square Enix doesn't tell their GM "you can ban whoever you want whenever you want for no reason, it's in our ToS". But that doesn't prevent them from enforcing a strict active policy. Which is why a lot of people in this thread aere asking Square Enix to clarify how strict their policy actually is in order to know exactly what's off-limits and what's not so we can compel to it.

In short, saying "they don't abuse their ToS to ban everyone on a whim, so they won't enforce their new policy" cannot be more wrong. They can do both: not abuse their ToS, but have a strict policy.


Edit: as I won't make another post just for that:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Freyt

It looks like you have a lot of opinions, and I'm not about to debate about every single one of them. Just think about this: Why on earth would you ever want to turn a video game into something resembling reality?

---

You probably misunderstood me, because I never said nor implied that a video game should be turned into something resembling reality.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Fyce

In your last paragraph, you suggest some kind of anarchy where Square Enix shouldn't control anything regarding social interactions. Unfortunatly, in a lot of instances where no social control is present, especially in video games where anonymity is provided, it very often lead to what some people would call a "toxic wasteland".

---

It looks like you have a lot of opinions, and I'm not about to debate about every single one of them. Just think about this: Why on earth would you ever want to turn a video game into something resembling reality?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Fyce

-snip-

---

I want to point out, what we have in games like FFXIV isn't true anonymity; its Psudonymity, you have an alias, but the reputation of that alias is still a very important thing to manage in the game. If you've ruined that alias's reputation, it becomes costly to undertake any possible action of clearing it; a literal cost in some cases, as changing name and switching to another server can run you up $40. Starting a new character from scratch can take months.

I'm not sure exactly how people are dismissing social ostracization as not being a consequence. Being unable to join raids because nobody will give you the time of day is a consequence. People kicking you from dungeons the moment they see your name is a consequence. Not being able to play the game outside of solo content because everyone on the server has blacklisted you is a consequence.

I will admit that the "Toxic Wasteland" scenario happens more often than it really should. But let's be honest, how often has this been the result of all the people who avoid such behaviours leaving the game rather than foster the better side of the community? How often is it that people who know about the toxicity just block all the people doing it and get on with playing the game? The community gets the reputation of being toxic, not so much because the majority is toxic, but because players end up thinking that the first impression is everything, when the reality is that the toxicity they see when the join is only the quarantine zone; and rather than taking up the challenge of cleaning out the swamp of messages before them and making it to dry land, they just surrender to making someone else do it for them.

That idea of a whitelist is probably a bit far, but I do have a better idea; instead of having immediate access to hearing "general channels" and end up getting a face full of it from the opposite side of the game, they instead make the players have to unlock cross area communication slowly, so that they only hear a few people to blacklist at a time. For example, if they can only hear someone 30ft around them at first, they'll rarely find anyone to blacklist; but then they find someone with their own speech channel, and chance are, if they like the person offering, then the channel will also be filled with people with similar temperaments.

It does of course, occur to me that they've already taken the general channels out of FFXIV already it seems; so right now, all you have to deal with is "Yell" and "Shout", which are limited to only one map anyways... And currently, the maps people frequent are fairly spread out, so you're not going to be swamped with mass yell/shout unless there's a new patch, and everyone is waiting by the starting gate for a specific type of new content... Like what happened with Blue Mage, where everyone gathered in Limsa beside where the quest giver would show up.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Fyce

I already made a post about that, but I will repeat myself for the sake of it.

What you quoted are legal terms. They are different from an actively enforced policy. Everyone knows that.
Of course Square Enix doesn't tell their GM "you can ban whoever you want whenever you want for no reason, it's in our ToS". But that doesn't prevent them from enforcing a strict active policy. Which is why a lot of people in this thread aere asking Square Enix to clarify how strict their policy actually is in order to know exactly what's off-limits and what's not so we can compel to it.

In short, saying "they don't abuse their ToS to ban everyone on a whim, so they won't enforce their new policy" cannot be more wrong. They can do both: not abuse their ToS, but have a strict policy.

---

Quote:

---

Although the “SQUARE ENIX ACCOUNT TERMS OF USE,” “FINAL FANTASY® XIV User Agreement,” and “FINAL FANTASY ® XIV Materials Usage License” have not been changed, we strongly encourage players to take this opportunity to review and become familiarized with them.

---

Quote:

---

In Final Fantasy XIV, obstructive behaviour that has an adverse impact on other users' game play and on service operation is prohibited. Such behaviour violates the Final Fantasy XIV User Agreement and Square Enix Account Terms of Use, and may violate other Square Enix policies or terms of use, including the Final Fantasy XIV Forum Guidelines.

---

Quote:

---

In the event of confirmation of prohibited behaviour (a violation) under the Final Fantasy XIV User Agreement or Square Enix Account Terms of Use, a penalty appropriate to the violation will be applied to the Final Fantasy XIV service account.

---

That's why they specifically point it out in the main article and the two new articles? Because it's just "passive and harmless"? Both of them are extensions of it for enforcing it, but I guess everyone knew that, right?

I didn't say they won't enforce the new policy. I said it's not going to be as abusable as everyone is drawing up ridiculous examples over, including yourself. They are not going to be the disagreement police. You will not get banned for politely (Actually polite without insulting them) asking someone to start using something in a dungeon. The idea is even more insane when we have a mentor system and channels in place.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by NessaWyvern

Many people like to know exactly what they are signing up for, leaving rules vague leaves room for doubt, where we would have to blindly trust that the GMs know what they are doing.
And many of us just can't put our trust in stuff like that. Not when we hear so many horror stories from other people and other games.

I have been playing this game for around 5 years, without any warnings, and the vagueness of the rules leaves me a bit uneasy. Maybe I won't get any warnings, but my friends who talk a bit more roughly might.

---

I do believe that SE designs those rules to be vague, so the community wouldn't split hairs about the details whenever something was withing acceptable levels or stepped outside it.
By doing so, they hope that the players decide 'not to push it' when it comes to situations that possibly comes in conflict with their new ruling.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Vnolan

Same topic on the Japanese forum

9 replies and 9000 views compared to this thread's 1300+ replies and 87000 views

---

And this, as much as the actual language barrier, may be why the Japanese playerbase actually get their opinions heard.

From translations given earlier in the thread, it seems that they stated the same concerns - they just (I assume) haven't spun off into pages of hyperbole about how we'll all get banned for saying minor things and causing unintended offence (which I must repeat, yet again, does not automatically mean action is taken against you).

There might be some good points in this thread that the Japanese players haven't raised - but I pity the SE employee who has to read through the whole conversation to find them. Even if they try to read everything, actual concerns are going to get lost in the noise.


(The number of views goes hand-in-hand with the number of posts though. Repeat visits get counted each time.)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LunaProtege

Social ostracization is the ONLY appropriate punishment for bad social behaviour; and social ostracization is something you can do in ANY social environment, and its actually EASIER to do in an online environment than in real life.

What other punishment are you going to suggest? Forced blacklisting? That people aren't allowed to decide for themselves if they want to associate with someone or not?

---

1) Simply ignoring/blacklisting someone only helps AFTER the fact, and only helps for verbal offenses. It also doesn't punish the offender.

2) Social shaming/ostracism doesn't work in an MMO, especially in FF14 since we have giant data centers and the ability to move servers. It's also generally against the ToS of 99.9% of games to name and shame. Interestingly, it used to work a decade ago because populations were small enough.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kaedan

1) Simply ignoring/blacklisting someone only helps AFTER the fact, and only helps for verbal offenses. It also doesn't punish the offender.

2) Social shaming/ostracism doesn't work in an MMO, especially in FF14 since we have giant data centers and the ability to move servers. It's also generally against the ToS of 99.9% of games to name and shame. Interestingly, it used to work a decade ago because populations were small enough.

---

Expect 1 thing
I agree if you verbal abuse or name shame or in gameplay shame a person should be banned... however out of 100 case only 2 ppl are banned over those things or harassment the other 98 are typically ppl just not liking what the other person is talking about that isn't mature enough 2 blacklist...

For example if your in a spot rping any dark and some dude rides up and stands there 4 45mind then reports after he harasses them calling them edgy etc and when you report that type of harassment the gms don't do a thing.. this is just a fact ive been through it over 15 times.. or if you talk about certain manga genes a person can say that genric is insult and you get in trouble that i know for a fact my first char back in reborn was named bloom theyaoiangel and got enforced unfairly over to name change....

Ppl who rlly think this will just punish bad behavior has no idea the reality of it you assume thats the case most likely for you being like everyone else over all

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Iscah

From translations given earlier in the thread, it seems that they stated the same concerns - they just (I assume) haven't spun off into pages of hyperbole about how we'll all get banned for saying minor things and causing unintended offence (which I must repeat, yet again, does not automatically mean action is taken against you).

---

Of course we won't all be banned or punished for minor stuff.

But given how the new rules are worded it will be almost impossible not to break some of them at some point, unwittingly or not.
If you then get punished for that rulebreaking depends first of all on if someone reports you, and then on the subjective judgement of a GM. Subjective, because objectively a break of the rules is a break of the rules.

That the rules are worded such that many people, as evidenced by discussions here, are still not quite sure what some of the rules actually mean does not exactly improve anything.

SE could just have replaced all the text of the new rules with "Don't do anything bad" without anything really changing.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kaedan

1) Simply ignoring/blacklisting someone only helps AFTER the fact, and only helps for verbal offenses. It also doesn't punish the offender.

---

The problem with that statement is that people don't tend to find isolated incidents truly damaging. If someone starts making things hard for someone, and they're immediately blocked, the person on the receiving end will have forgotten about it by the next day… The things that people genuinely find infuriating with every fibre of their being is when it takes place over a period of months or years. So if you block them on day one, it never gets to the point where it really effects you.

Its also not really worth punishing someone for an isolated incident, because if they do it only once, the purpose of a punishment (correcting behaviour) becomes meaningless.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LunaProtege

The problem with that statement is that people don't tend to find isolated incidents truly damaging. If someone starts making things hard for someone, and they're immediately blocked, they'll have forgotten about it by the next day… The things that people genuinely find infuriating with every fibre of their being is when it takes place over a period of months or years. So if you block them on day one, it never gets to the point where it really effects you.

Its also not really worth punishing someone for an isolated incident, because if they do it only happens once, the purpose of a punishment (correcting behaviour) becomes meaningless.

---

That only covers part of what I said. Remember, blacklisting only helps with verbal, not other forms of in-game harassment.

And frankly, if the offender is doing it to one person, they are doing it to others as well, so yes, punishment is deserved and the troll simply moves on to his next victim (if he doesn't continue with non-verbal forms of harassment).

Well this won't be abused, not at all, never has in any circumstance. Nope. Perfectly fine.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Foxclon

We are striving to create a comfortable environment for our players, so that, if they do experience a negative incident, we are able to assist them as much as possible (and, if necessary, get involved in the situation). Please understand that these changes were necessary in order for us to achieve that goal.

---

You are not.
You are creating an environment in which people will be afraid to talk to strangers, because someone, somewhere might find something offensive and some GM that is in a foul mood can ban me for literally anything I say.

I'm always for being polite and constructive, after all I don't want to be insulted in a leisure time activity, so I make every effort not to insult anyone myself.
BUT: keep in mind that servers are mixed populations from all kinds of countries.
EG: Stuff that is okay to say in Germany, may be super offensive to state in Japan. How am I supposed to know that?

These rules are so vague, they don't provide safe guidelines, they provide GMs with a "carte blanche".

No, I don't agree with you and I do not understand how this is "necessary".

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Kaedan

That only covers part of what I said. Remember, blacklisting only helps with verbal, not other forms of in-game harassment.

And frankly, if the offender is doing it to one person, they are doing it to others as well, so yes, punishment is deserved and the troll simply moves on to his next victim (if he doesn't continue with non-verbal forms of harassment).

---

You're going to have to be more specific on what you mean by "non-verbal" harassment. Because as far as I'm concerned, the way FFXIV is built, there's very little one can do to interact other than use words. Even emotes are little more than glorified text unless you're zoomed right in to purposefully view it.

Maybe you mean not being a team player in dungeons and raids? Assuming blacklisted people can't be matched with you in dungeons, then you can blacklist them and you've only lost however much time that they've not been helpful, probably 5 mins, worst case maybe 30 mins.

Maybe you mean the Company Chest, which you can prevent theft from by simply not giving random recruits who haven't been vetted for character access to it.

If the "non-verbal harassment" is literally just them doing emotes or gestures, then the simplest solution is to make blacklisted people invisible to you, and you invisible to them. That way, they're reduced to zero points of contact.

As for someone doing it with multiple people; in that case they may require some form of disincentive, but the increasing number of people that they cannot play with will itself serve as an eventual comeuppance. Imagine them entering Duty Finder, and even though they're a Tank, they find that their estimated waiting time is "until the end of time".

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by LunaProtege

There is a way for the community to police itself in the online environment; for one, the block button, that's a tool placed into the hands of the players, with that you effectively remove that player's influence from your play. Things may be different in a game like Rust where its full loot PvP; but that can be policed just by joining together to fight in PvP against them. And that kind of play is the appeal of such games.

They can also spread the reputation of certain players, so that anybody that doesn't want to associate with that behaviour can give them a wide berth, and those that do can take a beeline to them. Even the worst case scenario of people clearing out the company chests, can be made impossible without active interference from GMs just by denying them access to the chest; either never give them permission, or if they aren't in the FC after, spread their reputation so that nobody will ever let them have access to their company chest. The company chest isn't even a social behaviour issue so much as a theft issue, and yet you can still police it yourself.

Social ostracization is the ONLY appropriate punishment for bad social behaviour; and social ostracization is something you can do in ANY social environment, and its actually EASIER to do in an online environment than in real life.

What other punishment are you going to suggest? Forced blacklisting? That people aren't allowed to decide for themselves if they want to associate with someone or not?

---

If any of that worked we wouldn't have the tightening of the current rules in the first place. People seem to forget this. The players DON'T police themselves as a whole, mostly cause you run into the big issue when issues happen, the whole " Not my problem." And noone acts. Too many times I've seen people get into issues and everyone just watches like it's a car wreck and do nothing.

"As this change in course requires changes to our fundamental policies, and such a change would be difficult to reverse, we spent considerable time carefully reviewing its potential impact."


Based on this quote from the announcement now is the only time in which we have to make our concerns known in hopes of real change before new rules are implemented.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Anselmet

I find your use of scumlord offensive. Please look forward to your ban.

---

Helluuuuuuuuuuuuu

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MistakeNot

Of course we won't all be banned or punished for minor stuff.

But given how the new rules are worded it will be almost impossible not to break some of them at some point, unwittingly or not.
If you then get punished for that rulebreaking depends first of all on if someone reports you, and then on the subjective judgement of a GM. Subjective, because objectively a break of the rules is a break of the rules.

That the rules are worded such that many people, as evidenced by discussions here, are still not quite sure what some of the rules actually mean does not exactly improve anything.

SE could just have replaced all the text of the new rules with "Don't do anything bad" without anything really changing.

---

So, if people see issues with the rules, they should make a simple post outlining those issues. Not extreme examples, claims that SE are deliberately out to ban us all (or at least not care if their GMs do), and umpteen posts with nothing to add except “this post would get you banned according to rules X, Y and Z, lol”.

If the forum, collectively, wants their actual concerns made visible to the devs, then the subdued Japanese approach is going to be massively more successful than this torrent of hyperbole with a few repeated concerns mixed in.


And you can say “of course we won’t be banned” but I’ve been trying to say that all along, and yet people keep misreading the rules and claiming that it says we’ll be punished for anything that someone claims offended them, even if we didn’t mean to offend.

Yes, it could be clarified to sound less ominous, but it still doesn’t say what people are interpreting it as.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Iscah

So, if people see issues with the rules, they should make a simple post outlining those issues. Not extreme examples, claims that SE are deliberately out to ban us all (or at least not care if their GMs do), and umpteen posts with nothing to add except “this post would get you banned according to rules X, Y and Z, lol”.

If the forum, collectively, wants their actual concerns made visible to the devs, then the subdued Japanese approach is going to be massively more successful than this torrent of hyperbole with a few repeated concerns mixed in.


And you can say “of course we won’t be banned” but I’ve been trying to say that all along, and yet people keep misreading the rules and claiming that it says we’ll be punished for anything that someone claims offended them, even if we didn’t mean to offend.

Yes, it could be clarified to sound less ominous, but it still doesn’t say what people are interpreting it as.

---

I truly hope you are correct. However at this point I (and likely most others on my side of the argument) will not calm down, until we receive clarification from Square Enix. Nothing else will cut it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Insertcoins

If any of that worked we wouldn't have the tightening of the current rules in the first place. People seem to forget this. The players DON'T police themselves as a whole, mostly cause you run into the big issue when issues happen, the whole " Not my problem." And noone acts. Too many times I've seen people get into issues and everyone just watches like it's a car wreck and do nothing.

---

The way I see it, the way you're describing it doesn't go far enough to describe what's going on. People refuse to help themselves even when it happens to them; instead they feign helplessness and run to an authority figure, and ask THEM to do something about it, as if they're entitled to their assistance even when they can solve their own problems.

I suppose FFXIV doesn't have to be the one that chooses not to indulge this kind of learned helplessness, but it would be nice if there was any games that took the stance of "help yourself" rather than letting people indulge in "my problems are not my problem".

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Iscah

And you can say “of course we won’t be banned” but I’ve been trying to say that all along, and yet people keep misreading the rules and claiming that it says we’ll be punished for anything that someone claims offended them, even if we didn’t mean to offend.

---

The rules do say that we can be punished for just that. If we will be punished or not depends on if someone reports it, and on if a GM thinks it is serious enough or not - and we do not know what the GMs will base their judgements on.

Honestly at this point this seems less a way of communicating with game staff and more a place where everyone runs around like headless chickens in a panic.

I kind of wish there was a forum for panicking, what if's, and debate then a separate forum for questions.

The big worries I've seen are that:

1) GMs could use ambiguous phrasing in the rules to abuse authority and punish players for minor or non-existent offenses.

2) There is no means to appeal in such incidents/it could be done casually.

3) The GMs might be people who are more interested in controlling others than maintaining a fun, healthy community with varied individuals.

4) People might break rules by accident due to ambiguous phrasing.

Four relatively straightforward points. They're not unreasonable and there's no cause to think SE would have a problem addressing them... if they weren't being drowned out. We don't need to keep repeating fears and hypotheticals over and over if they fall under these umbrellas.

Frankly, this game is a luxury. Players are being given the privilege of helping shape not just their own experience, but the experiences of other players. People could have cried "censorship" for SE not allowing players to use mods of their game to push explicit content. It's not. This is their creation. It's a T rated MMO. What one player does can affect the experience of another player on many levels. This might mean mechanics and it might mean forcing players to see or interact with things that make them deeply uncomfortable, didn't sign on for, and weren't warned about.

SE is allowed to have some rules here. If the rules are so strict that they ruin the game for a significant number of players, that's a wrecked game. Other games out there will receive business SE could have had.

This game includes stuff like assassination, prostitution, drugs, insanity, the works. You can run around in some pretty damn skimpy glamours. We can be fairly edgy already. Extreme restrictions don't make sense here.

Relax guys. Things haven't gotten bad at this stage and SE was reluctant to do these rules at all. This isn't the end of Eorzea. Bahamut has been and gone already lol.

Frankly it's baffling how those who criticize us for our differing views somehow think that GM's are just not at all cut from the same cloth. GM's don't come from some holy land where they've only learned to think the way you do, at the very least a certain amount of division is likely to exist that at least somewhat reflects our differences here.

At this point it's obvious that they either will not give us any communication regarding this, or they're deliberating how best to approach this. If we've waited all this time for "we'll do our best not to disappoint!" then I have to say it sure took a hell of a long time to try to give us any reassurances. So there's at least a decent chance that some amount of revisions will come along the way, even if it's only a clarification or two.

I love XIV. I respect Yoshida and the devs. I respect the position that GM's hold.

There's a certain atmosphere that projects "the closest we are to any staff of XIV is the GM's", but this simply isn't true.

Yoshida talks to us all the time through Live letters.

The Devs bring us stories and other content.

The GM's only communicate to us if we've been bad. (I haven't, so I've had zero communication with them)

The GM's are the furthest away from us. This isn't a criticism, I think it might actually be the correct choice generally speaking. Players don't want to have an oppressive big brother watching their every move, as is demonstrated within this very thread. At the same time no one should be expecting the same kind of relationship that players have with anyone else associated.

I respect their position, but have no reason to have any feelings one way or the other over the individual that holds the position. When you tell me to trust that individual, I simply cannot. It's not distrust I feel either, but a lack of faith in the rules that bind us.

If a GM were to walk up to you and simply say to you "I hold authority to ban you if you behave incorrectly or hurt anyone's feelings", you would naturally feel uncomfortable, no? They may have the greatest of intentions, but it's not that individual that we have no faith in.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MistakeNot

The rules do say that we can be punished for just that. If we will be punished or not depends on if someone reports it, and on if a GM thinks it is serious enough or not - and we do not know what the GMs will base their judgements on.

---

That's also what I've been saying, and yes, that much can be a genuine concern. But that can be covered by saying "this wording is unclear, and I feel like it could be too easily abused. Can it be rewritten to be more clear, and are there additional checks and balances to make sure this isn't left to one person's decision?"

What we've had in this discussion over and over is people reading it like it's an absolute fact that anyone can get you banned just by claiming to be offended, because (they have interpreted the rules to mean) SE will immediately take their side.

That fear seems to be driving a lot of this debate - a scenario that isn't even what the rules indicate, and is unlikely to be the intent behind the wording, even if it could be interpreted that way.

And then the debate and the negativity gets aimed towards SE for something they didn't actually say.

The rules do need discussion, but instead people are discussing a caricature of the rules, and it's drowning out the actual debate.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Freyt

If a GM were to walk up to you and simply say to you "I hold authority to ban you if you behave incorrectly or hurt anyone's feelings", you would naturally feel uncomfortable, no? They may have the greatest of intentions, but it's not that individual that we have no faith in.

---

I feel like that's an unfair analogy, because an individual person coming up and saying that to you is a lot more threatening than having those rules (even poorly) laid out in a document like this.

Consider the real-world equivalent. I'm fortunate to be in a country where the police are largely "good", and I have no fear or concern that as a whole they will not act responsibly and keep law and order. But if a policeman came up to me and said "I hold authority to arrest you if you do anything I deem a threat" then I would feel threatened - not because they have the power to do so (because of course they all do, and it would be written in law) but because that particular person decided to make a point of it in an ominous way.



I guess I feel like the "bad GM" argument relies on so many hypotheticals. A GM who would rather take the side of the petty complainer than the unaware "offender". A lack of supervision or review that means this GM can give out these unfair warnings or bans, and not have to worry about being disciplined for them.

I also find it hard to believe that the GMs wouldn't have a more detailed and clear-cut version of rules and procedures that they have to follow, that would set out the circumstances where giving a punishment (not necessarily a ban) to an "unaware" offender is appropriate.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Wolf_Heartnet

The guy in the video who uses the term SJW says the he thinks ffxiv is a good game in his previous videos. You rejecting his opinion means that you don't accept ffxiv is a good game. I hope you can see the problem in your argument.

---

...That's not how things work. Like, at all. You can disagree with someone on one thing and agree with them on another and even then, if they reject everything that person says, they could agree with another person who says FFXIV is a good game therefore, think FFXIV is a good game. I hope you can see the problem in your argument.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by StarRosie

...That's not how things work. Like, at all. You can disagree with someone on one thing and agree with them on another and even then, if they reject everything that person says, they could agree with another person who says FFXIV is a good game therefore, think FFXIV is a good game. I hope you can see the problem in your argument.

---

This person disagrees with anyone who uses the term SJW. The wording suggests that it doesn't matter what he says, he uses SJW so the opinion is rejected no matter what. It's not a matter of disagreeing this one time. It's a matter of complete dismissal of opinion based on the fact that this person uses the term and not a rejection of opinion based on the argument itself.