Is the vote kick system improperly implemented for how it's actually being used?

[Kerii]

I have only been kicked from a group one time, that I can remember, in the four years I've played. However, I have kicked a lot of people, and I've left a lot of groups in lieu of drama. Honestly, you are likely the problem if it happens often enough that you notice. However, I do think the dialogue box should be changed to reflect the intent of the vote kick system more clearly.

Vote dismiss is intended to help parties resolve disputes without GM interaction.
Select reason for dismissal:
Offline
Playstyle Differences

For the second option I think there should be a text entry box to include a brief description of your reason. "Player is uncooperative", "Player is being abusive", "Player is preventing progress on the objective". Then that message should be added to the chatlog when the vote passes.

[Player Name] has been dismissed for [Reason Given]

I don't think this is a perfect solution, but it's better than what we have now. Players shouldn't have to hunt down old forum posts from GMs to clarify how this feature should work.

Addendum:
I was referring to this GM post specifically. It is also the basis for my suggestion.
http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...=1#post2358628

[SuperZay]

In 80% cases it's used not for these few legal reasons listed so no, it's not working as intended. Also 'injustified voteckick' warning is misleading because reports actually do nothing.

[Miste]

Also 'injustified voteckick' warning is misleading because reports actually do nothing.

How do you know reporting does nothing? If there is some kind of action taken SE won't tell you because they don't release that kind of information.

[Eli85]

Vote kick systems should really punish unfair kicks much more severely than they do (i.e., lengthy account suspensions if GMs determine it was unjustified); but I won't go too far down that path today.

What I would really, truly, like to see is a change to majority is required to kick players from the group. In a 4-player dungeon, as we all know, only two players are required to vote yes for the kick. It would be really nice to see it increased to three, otherwise it fails.

[pacifist0rz]

4 man dungeons should require all 3 players to vote yes in order to pass a kick. When you queue with a friend and get paired with another group of two, the team that initiates the kick wins, and the other team has to start back over at the beginning of the dungeon. So if you are in a situation where you suspect a kick, your best bet is to kick first, which is absolutely horrible design.

[SuperZay]

How do you know reporting does nothing? If there is some kind of action taken SE won't tell you because they don't release that kind of information.

I know because many people reported other people after votekicked then told them in /tell they are reported if on the same server (you see such stories in FC chat sometimes). They were not approached by GMs and got no any warning after being reported.

[Miste]

I know because many people reported other people after votekicked then told them in /tell they are reported if on the same server (you see such stories in FC chat sometimes). They were not approached by GMs and got no any warning after being reported.

For one, don't ever send tells or message the player you are reporting. It's bad form to threaten them no matter what they did. You are supposed to report then blacklist. The GMs will even tell you not to initiate any communication with the player.

Two, what were the reasons they got kicked? Was it for something actually punishable? Or was it just different play styles and two people unfortunately wanted them gone?

Three, how do you know the person you reported it was their first offense? SE isn't going to ban people for one misstep. It would be very bad for business. They may just put a silent warning on the account and if the person gets reported again then they may take a different action.

Four, how do you know they were not approached by GMs? You are going by the word of someone you reported and you also sent them tells to ASK if they got reprimanded? I mean they could easily lie and if they really were unjustly kicking people for no reason then likely lying wouldn't be much of a stretch for them. Not to mention I mean you did report them so they likely wouldn't be in a friendly mood to just tell you the details would they?

[Kerii]

I see a lot of people screaming "vote kick abuse!", but the LGM post actually commented on that, so I'll include it here.

In general, abuse of the vote dismiss feature is considered to be a grief tactics violation, which falls under section 3.2 in the Final Fantasy XIV User Agreement. However, it is only after a GM investigation that it can be determined to be a violation of the rules.

In layman's terms, unless there is clear proof that you were kicked for malicious reasons, it will probably be considered valid. I also agree with Miste on the point that behaving in an uncivil way before or after your report is only going to harm your claim. When the GMs decide that your complaint is a "player dispute" they will not act until they receive enough unrelated reports to justify action.

[Yeol]

I have close to 7,000 duties on my main alone not counting my 5 fully leveled alts and I can say that people are rarely kicked in duty finder in my experience unless they AFK or DC. I would venture to say those who see a lot more kicks may in fact be the ones initiating the kicks or are talking about party finder and duties like clears for deltascape and the like where people join who have no clears or who are seriously under performing.

Agreed.

Even if you end up with a pre-made group in DF. They have no good reason to kick you.

I personally think kicking for different playstyle should not be allowed. It is getting abused a lot. SE should look into their policy and update it.

[Miste]

I personally think kicking for different playstyle should not be allowed. It is getting abused a lot. SE should look into their policy and update it.

Update it to what though?

If they don't allow kicks for different play styles I don't think you realize what would happen....you would get punished for removing any player even if one single player was forcing their play style on 3 others who didn't want it.

Like the tank situation I mentioned. The tank wants to speed run and pulls multiple groups. The healer feels stressed and doesn't like it so they ask them to just do single pulls please and the two DPS agree with healer. The tank ignores this and continues to multipull.

They can't kick the tank because it would be a differing play styles issue so if they do they'll all get punished for abusing the system. What now? Vote abandon and force everyone to requeue and wait even longer due to one person who didn't want to compromise in group content? Doesn't seem fair.