[Suggestion] A Resolution to Kick Wars and Misuse of Power in Novice Network

Hey everyone.

This will have to be a multi-parter due to thread limits, so bare with me.

I spend a lot of time in the Novice Network, despite its negative connotations given by the community. Some of the mentors have been incredibly helpful in my journey as a humble sprout, and I think it's a great resource for those who are just getting into the game when they need some extra assistance. Even when assistance is not needed, most of the players there are incredibly friendly and have made for some great company in the more mundane and monotonous parts of my gameplay experience.

However, unfortunately not everything is as great as it was at first. I'm from Jenova on the Aether data centre, and there's been some recurring issues the last few days involving mentors mis-using their power to kick players (including other mentors) out of personal bias, abusing their ability to travel between worlds to avoid punishment for their own behaviours. The "kick wars", as NN has taken to calling them, have been a main source of disruption over the last week, with over a dozen players being kicked for falsified reasons with very vague wording such as "creating discord" and "personal harassment" with little to no evidence of the reasoning for kicking.

This sort of behaviour has become enough of a problem that the active members of the novice network have taken to creating linkshells for discussions rather than using the network itself, as it seems every time someone wants to try and talk about something, they're immediately kicked from the network by the same group of people that has been policing the chat. Some further discussion has been happening between some of the people who have been targets of these mass-kicks, and I believe we have come to a reasonable set of suggested changes for the betterment of the Novice Network as a whole.

Suggestion 1 - Manual Opt-In for Mentors

While this is mostly to provide a better supporting base for the second suggestion, I believe the option to opt-in to the network for mentors rather than being forced into the network would help to reduce clutter and deflate artificial values. Very few mentors within the logged in mentor list, at least within Jenova, are actually active within the network contributing to the conversations or helping other players. I've also seen comments from other mentors saying that they would rather stay out of the network and focus on their own things, and while that does directly contradict the purpose and goals of a mentor, this change would help remove the unnecessary amount of mentors who simply see the status as a badge of popularity or a method of boasting rather than actually using the status to help others.

Suggestion 2 - A Vote-Based Kick System

A large portion of the kick wars that occur on Jenova stem from the fact that you only require a single person to remove someone else from the network, whether it be 3 hours for a mentor or only 30 minutes for a sprout. Having a vote-based kicking system would mean that mentors who have been active in the chat would be able to all contribute to a collective vote on whether or not the player in question should be temporarily removed from the network, reducing the potential for false-kicks and abuse of power as votes can be declined if they are illegitimately done.

As implemented by Suggestion 1, a reduced number of mentors in the Novice Network would filter out everyone who does not intend to use their mentor status correctly, preventing them from interfering with the voting process. Alternatively, the number of votes required could be determined by the number of active mentors in the chat therefore only allowing those who are contributing to vote on the kick itself, or it could be limited to a small amount such as 3 or 5 votes to establish a strike-like system.

Another major part of this is that it holds all people who voted yes or no within the kick accountable for their actions rather than allowing a single individual to have control over the situation. The group of kick-bots within Jenova contains about 3 or 4 members, so if all were to vote simultaneously somehow, each person involved in the vote would be held accountable if reported to a GM via the in-game help desk in the instance it was a misuse of power or an unfair kick. If it was the opposite, on the other hand, and a group of players were actively protecting a player who was being disruptive or causing complications within the network, those mentors protecting the player that was violating rules could also be penalised for contributing to the disruption.

Suggestion 3 - Removal of Cross-World Kicks

A primary method the kick-bots have been using to avoid punishment is by using the ability to visit other worlds to issue kicks, then instantly travelling to another world to avoid being kicked themselves. This has been the main continuing force behind the mass-kicks as mentors abusing their kick privileges have been able to world-hop instantly after issuing a kick to avoid the punishment entirely, with there only been one instance where someone who was maliciously kicking others from the Novice Network was able to be kicked because they were caught in a queue to transfer back to their own homeworld. Removal of the ability to perform moderation actions on a world other than your own would contribute greatly to the reduction in malicious activity due to the fact it would prevent people from collaborating to orchestrate mass-kicks in the same fashion as the ones that have been happening on Jenova, wherein they were entirely comprised of mentors from other homeworlds (namely Cactuar and Siren).

Suggestion 4 - False Punishment Recovery System

One of the suggestions made by one of the mentors affected by these mass-kicks suggested that there should be some form of vote-based system that allows a user to return to the network earlier than normal if their kick was done falsely or as an abusive act of power. This could be implemented in a similar way or as an alternative to Suggestion 2, allowing for active mentors to collectively vote on re-inviting somebody to the network after they were inappropriately removed. As is with the second suggestion, this system would also come with a greater degree of accountability when GMs handle reports of these instances, as all mentors involved with re-inviting the user would be held responsible for the invitation and thus can be punished accordingly if the re-invitation was done out of malice, or the opposite where the person/group who issued the initial kick would be punished if the re-invitation was proven to be legitimate.

While these sorts of ideas are rather simple in its premise, I think they could help a lot for the stability and peace of the Novice Network by preventing bad actors from single-handedly causing chaos and removing people en masse, allowing both mentors and sprouts to have a safer and more enjoyable experience where everyone can talk and help each other improve at the game.

It's surprising to me that SQEX hasn't implemented any kind of system that prevents this kind of abuse in the Network, despite how long it's been since its inception.

Here's hoping that Endwalker comes with some changes to the Novice Network and mentorship, both systems could use reworks.

the only real solution is to not use it. you can find pretty much all the info you need by googling it anyways.

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Originally Posted by DrWho2010

the only real solution is to not use it. you can find pretty much all the info you need by googling it anyways.

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while this is a simple, obvious solution: just avoid the framework of the issue in total it's kind of annoying to transfer back to homeworld as a mentor, help someone and mention how five people just got kicked only to get kicked myself by some dude who just world hopped his alt and say i harassed him. i quite enjoy the social aspect and helping sprouts when i can but i wasn't even there for five minutes. wild.

The best suggestion is removing the mentor system altogether, but I appreciate any attempts to salvage it. I just don't think there is any way to actually salvage it without a large amount of oversight by SE (including NN). At the very least, the rewards associated with mentorship should be removed from it specifically, and an alternative means of attaining them made, along with the removal or change of the mentor crown - as that can be seen as a reward or status symbol as well.

a resolution would be to remove mount awards etc from it altogether.

if you want to help someone, then you would and be doing it because you want to, not because you want the reward at the end.

problem...solved.

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Originally Posted by Kes13a

a resolution would be to remove mount awards etc from it altogether.

if you want to help someone, then you would and be doing it because you want to, not because you want the reward at the end.

problem...solved.

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Agreed. For example, I have been told that Asmongold apparently wants to become a mentor specifically for the mount reward. I'm sure if this is true, this will encourage even more players to follow suit. It's unfortunate, that the removal of mentor specific rewards may be one of the few ways to cut down on this sort of behavior: players joining for the rewards specifically and not necessarily to help players. I doubt this would fully solve this specific problem though, as many players would still likely abuse their kick powers in the NN, and use it as a personal chat channel.

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Originally Posted by SturmChurro

Agreed. For example, I have been told that Asmongold apparently wants to become a mentor specifically for the mount reward. I'm sure, if this is true, this will encourage even more players to follow suit. It's unfortunate, that the removal of mentor specific rewards may be one of the few ways to cut down on this sort of behavior: players joining for the rewards specifically and not necessarily to help players. I doubt this would fully solve this specific problem though, as many players would still likely abuse their kick powers in the NN, and use it as a personal chat channel.

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judging by the way some mentors act, its obvious their intention of joining certainly wasnt out of a feeling of being helpful.

I mean I understand that SE would want to reward helpful people... but what has happened is obviously not their originally desired end result, and the main reason I can think of are the faster queue times and the mount . remove at least the mount, and I am positive you would start seeing a lot less interest from people obviously not suited to be a mentor at all.

what killed the whole mentor thing for me was seeing a known bot crafter with a mentor tag. after that, I realized how empty the whole process was. so now, I just helps if someone has a question, or seems to be struggling in a dungeon run. I dont need a special tag to do that. as for the mount... well, I have a ton I dont use now lol

I've got friends on a few servers, and while Hyperion is a bit of a ... *cough* show.... I feel much better about it any time I go visiting another server and see just what tiny empire folks are trying to run there.

It says a lot about how forgiving people are that "bro" was allowed to go that long without enough reports to draw the ire of the GM's.

On the other hand, on another server, there's a person who has about 20 alts so that they can get kicked on every single one of them and not miss a single line in the rant they are doing every minute they are able to be logged in. After multiple bans from SE, just makes new accounts and keeps on going... some folks don't die easily.

Objective Solutions:

-Remove material reward from the mentor system. Anyone in progress can continue but it's no longer part of the mentor system.

-Remove crown. Substitute with watering can, big tree, etc.

-Implement stricter NN chat rules. First three that come to mind: No politics, No Religion, No spoilers. Keep off-topic discussions to minimum and make assisting sprouts/returners a priority over that.


Personal solutions:

-Avoid NN and join a FC. There are multiple FCs out there that have the same or higher number of people in them, they have people who really do love explaining and assisting sprouts/returners and best of all, there are FCs that will uphold the three chat rules I listed above.

-Join/Make Linkshell that does what the NN does but better.

My first experience with NN was bad which lead into my first experience with a FC being bad.

I solved it by...

/nastatus off

and creating a private FC.

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Originally Posted by ICountFrom0

On the other hand, on another server, there's a person who has about 20 alts so that they can get kicked on every single one of them and not miss a single line in the rant they are doing every minute they are able to be logged in. After multiple bans from SE, just makes new accounts and keeps on going... some folks don't die easily.

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I'm REALLY curious as to just what this rant is about.

I would also like to see the mentor crown replaced with a watering can; it would thematically fit better and look like less of a bragging status too.

That said, it would be nice if some people didn't treat every single mentor as a bad person; I've gotten some weird insults tossed my way when I was just being friendly and helping some people in Mentor Roulette before, presumably because of stereotypes, and it's kind of unfair. There are plenty of nice mentors out there too, so not all of them should be reacted to negatively.

I thought the thread was about NN. Why are we bringing up the rewards? Both these things aren't connected in this case.

As for the crown, I don't think changing the icon would change much. As I've said before in another thread, people would still go after the icon even if it was a measly M. Also, getting rid of the whole system isn't really the answer. I've seen the system do way more good than bad. Anyone saying otherwise is probably extremely biased or was extremely unlucky with the state of NN and mentors in their world or data center.

In addition to what's been said, I'd also consider an optional World Chat. It's obvious some people just like having a general chat and use NN for that purpose, even the new players like it and want back in just so they can continue to chat with the friends they've made there.

Obviously it would need some moderating and rules and wouldn't be everyone's cup of tea, but if it was there for those who enjoyed it, it might reduce some of the general off-topic clutter from NN.

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Originally Posted by Kes13a

a resolution would be to remove mount awards etc from it altogether.

if you want to help someone, then you would and be doing it because you want to, not because you want the reward at the end.

problem...solved.

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Tired of hearing this honestly. There's nothing wrong with giving rewards to people.

You guys forget that this is a VIDEO GAME. Nobody here is obligated to do anything, mentor or not.

You people take this whole system far too seriously. Far more seriously than even square does, and that's kind of sad.

It does only address one of the issues, but the NN is opt-in. I have never set foot in NN in my 6 years of playing and have had mentor for 4.

NN should be deleted. It serves no purpose in this game that you couldn't get just from asking in shout, FC, party, hell even /say (there's so many people playing someone is bound to see your question in /s). Every single time I've poked my head into that dumpster fire that is NN it's just Mentors arguing.

Haven't had a problem myself

Go off king

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Originally Posted by SenorPatty

-Implement stricter NN chat rules. First three that come to mind: No politics, No Religion, No spoilers. Keep off-topic discussions to minimum and make assisting sprouts/returners a priority over that.

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I'm with you on the politics and religion. It's something that's led me to leave NN and /gquit a few times. While I do see a lot of off-topic discussion I don't think I've ever seen a sprout question get ignored because of it.

I have seen people spoon-feeding a few folks that were treating NN like their own personal wiki for very basic stuff. I'm fine with the occasional bit of laziness but beyond that they need to be taught how to look this stuff up themselves. OTOH I wasn't super surprised that one of those folks fell for one of the phishing scams.

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Originally Posted by SenorPatty

-Remove material reward from the mentor system. Anyone in progress can continue but it's no longer part of the mentor system.

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IMO this would go a long way to cleaning out the ones giving Mentors a bad name. While it's a nice gesture it has backfired horribly. Just move the mount to a different chore not tied to mentorship along with transferring credit for current progress. Maybe MSQ Roulette :D (I kid). Any roulette with "join in progress" enabled that isn't exclusively level cap instances like Expert and 80 should cover the queue filling role of the current Mentor Roulette.

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Originally Posted by SenorPatty

-Remove crown. Substitute with watering can, big tree, etc.

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Like somebody else pointed out any special icon is going to be attractive regardless its form. While there are some legitimate use cases for it to be on outside of Mentor Roulette I think adding something that can be toggled in your player search info ("Open to Combat/Crafting/PvP/etc. DM's") would cover that need.

I think we could learn a lot by going through and noticing what worlds folks play on that they have trouble on.

Hyperion is ... well, burnt out... loud, but helpful.

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Originally Posted by AlejandroElGrande

We can talk about banning players with sordid histories of abuse/harassments/botting elsewhere as many of the questions I have asked herein can be applied to non-mentors and abuse taking place outside the NN. But zooming in on the NN, in particular? Really. The answer ain't rocket science. Do the right thing, SQEX, and remove NN privileges from people, mentors or otherwise, who have histories of abusing the network. Period. It's really that simple.

2/2

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I've seen the crown stripped from the worst of the worst more then once.

You are doing your part and reporting every time it happens, right?
Two and three reports per day isn't too often if they just keep doing it.

Are just remove it completely instead create a channel that is alway in slowmode maybe a box that pop ups and dont let some player have control of it just let all view it as a q/A box..
Many new players wont even get in tbh because its invite in.