As a player who's never been reported, why aren't behavior penalties ever forgiven?

[SaberMaxwell]

No I'm not, please read my post following the one you quoted.

Yes, you kind of are. You acknowledge what was said, but your point I'll quote has nothing to do with that.

That being said, my point still stands that if you (the general "you") find yourself getting multiple strikes, then maybe it's time to assess your online behavior.

What does this have to do with reports being forgiven over time? I'll digress a bit: on the FFXIV Official Forums, it's a two-strike policy before you're permabanned. Some survive to three, most are permabanned at two. I know several people who, with three to four years between bans, got permabanned. Maybe they should assess why they got reported so much...all of two times over four years.

Not everybody's a perfect angel as you purport to be. People make mistakes. Mistakes shouldn't be held on some permanent record.

As an aside, why did you split your post like that? You got a pretty cheap "gotcha" moment out of it I guess but it still cost you three of your allotted 20 posts per day.

[xbamfo]

I don't even think there should even be some sort of strike system, you should only be permanently banned for the most egregious of offenses. This is an mmorpg where you are potentially putting thousands of hours of your life, and thousands upon thousands of dollars into your account. You shouldn't lose it all because you hurt someones "feewings" at some point in what could be several years.
People go out of their way, and take the time out of their day for some petty "revenge" with the line of thinking 'we don't need those kind of people in OUR game". You see it all the time in these threads. When they report you, they report you with the goal of getting you banned, and to them, preferably permanently.

Couldn't have added on any better myself. These people never think about the fact that this is someone's hobby and they've likely spent hundreds of dollars on it. Have so much progress. Friends. Communities. Maybe the majority of other people in the game love them and you just happen to get offended. No. They want to rip all of that away from them. And over what... They said one off color joke? Or perceived that way? It's ridiculous. They don't even realize just what villains they are being.

Does that mean that everyone should be able to act however they like? Of course not. I have reported two people in a single instance. But that was it. And they were being **egregiously** bad and being both harassing and targeted to myself and my SO. And I mean actual harassment, not what most people declare random negative comments as.
They were being explicitly racist, refusing to help in the final boss of the run because they were mad over something, sent us nasty tells even after we'd left the dungeon. Repeated, elongated barrage of just being terrible. Those people... yeah we could do without them in our game xD.
But that's incredibly rare. That is a single instance in all my years of playing. Nothing else has even come close. I won't even fault you for straight up not believing me that this happened because it is, and was, far fetched. It was amazing just how nasty those two were. But that happened.... Only once.

And others (especially those i've seen in the forums) seem to treat anyone who so much as responds with "kys" as a meaner version of "screw you buddy" as this level of terrible. It's amazing.

[Nix]

Yes, you kind of are. You acknowledge what was said, but your point I'll quote has nothing to do with that.



What does this have to do with reports being forgiven over time? I'll digress a bit: on the FFXIV Official Forums, it's a two-strike policy before you're permabanned. Some survive to three, most are permabanned at two. I know several people who, with three to four years between bans, got permabanned. Maybe they should assess why they got reported so much...all of two times over four years.

Not everybody's a perfect angel as you purport to be. People make mistakes. Mistakes shouldn't be held on some permanent record.

As an aside, why did you split your post like that? You got a pretty cheap "gotcha" moment out of it I guess but it still cost you three of your allotted 20 posts per day.

I rarely post, and do so while I'm at work generally and don't move back to edit previous posts. I don't really care about post count, and I don't care for "cheap gotcha moments" either. If you saw it as such, that's entirely on you, sorry.

As for my stance on infractions, as per my post: I am not totally against infractions being removed after x_amount of time. I'm not sure how differently I can word that to say that I agree with you when you say that people can change and past mistakes shouldn't be held against them.

My point, however, still stands when i say that if you're getting multiple strikes, then you need to assess your behavior. It's not about being "a perfect angel"; I never purported to be as such. Sure, people make mistakes, I've made plenty and I'll be the first to admit it. But at the same time, I learned from them and I expect others to be able to do the same.

[SturmChurro]

Couldn't have added on any better myself. These people never think about the fact that this is someone's hobby and they've likely spent hundreds of dollars on it. Have so much progress. Friends. Communities. Maybe the majority of other people in the game love them and you just happen to get offended. No. They want to rip all of that away from them. And over what... They said one off color joke? Or perceived that way? It's ridiculous. They don't even realize just what villains they are being.

Does that mean that everyone should be able to act however they like? Of course not. I have reported two people in a single instance. But that was it. And they were being **egregiously** bad and being both harassing and targeted to myself and my SO. And I mean actual harassment, not what most people declare random negative comments as.
They were being explicitly racist, refusing to help in the final boss of the run because they were mad over something, sent us nasty tells even after we'd left the dungeon. Repeated, elongated barrage of just being terrible. Those people... yeah we could do without them in our game xD.
But that's incredibly rare. That is a single instance in all my years of playing. Nothing else has even come close. I won't even fault you for straight up not believing me that this happened because it is, and was, far fetched. It was amazing just how nasty those two were. But that happened.... Only once.

And others (especially those i've seen in the forums) seem to treat anyone who so much as responds with "kys" as a meaner version of "screw you buddy" as this level of terrible. It's amazing.

That's what I meant by egregious, and I totally believe you. I have seen people like that, they go out of their way to continue to harass another. They are who are actually worthy of the permanent bans or some serious time-out. I am not even against temporary bans (suspensions), I just don't think a slew of very minor "offenses" over the course of potentially years should, or could, lead to a full on ban. People shouldn't potentially lose their account because they accidentally cussed in-game or made a joke to a friend, or tried to RP in a particular way, and some random third party takes offense. For that matter people take 'offense' at such minor things. Luckily the GM's probably really don't act on a lot of it, I think there are a lot more reports that get thrown out than actually get taken action on, but I wouldn't risk it. It all depends on the particular GM at the time, and remember - there is no appeal process. All actions taken against you are final.

[Nedkel]

The reporting system makes it so you do have to think twice about saying something critical of another player - and I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing. No one is going to get reported for saying "hi hi! how are you doing?" at the start of a run. No one is going to get reported for saying, "I'm sorry I got myself killed, that was my fault" when they fail a mechanic. Or for saying, "If you get the mark above your head, go to the back to avoid popping the cages. The adds here hit really hard." No one is going to get reported for telling another player they think their glam is cute. Rather, if someone is silly enough to report you over social niceties or explaining mechanics, the GMs won't actually add the strike.

There was a story a week or so ago for someone who got reported to a GM because of "elitism" because they had advertised a learning party in PF, a SAM asked to join, and they told the SAM "sure!" But the SAM apparently did not understand how party finder worked, and expected a party invite personally... and reported the person when they didn't get it. The GM who responded re-read the chat and went "You know what? Nevermind. Have a nice day."

There is definitely fuzzy line over what people will bother to report, and what GMs will take as a serious report, but the line is a lot deeper than most people realize. Be kind, and you have little to worry about.

No, it only gives paranoia from using chat, and because of that it is empty and full of RMT.
Compare zone chat to zone chat in WoW and here, its like a heaven and earth difference. People there are talking to each other, here they are talking in their own FC and only there.
Even black desert online chat is more alive than FFXIV.
The RP scene is completely dead on my server, people only use emotes to interact with each other, never write anything in "say" or so.

[Kaethra]

Its pretty bad. Here's a quote from the actual rules section:

Offensive expression
"Offensive expression" means an expression in general that inflicts emotional distress by being offensive to another person. Offensive expression may include:

・Aggressive expressions such as violent language/slander/insult/threat.
・Expressions that provoke or belittle another person, such as excessive criticism, negation/ridicule
・Expressions that significantly lack consideration for another person
・Expressions that unilaterally reject another person's opinion
・Expressions that any reasonable person would find offensive
・Expressions that compel a playing style
・Expressions that attempt to unilaterally exclude someone from the game or content/community, etc.
(Except when in accordance with rules set by an administrator such as a Free Company Master)
・Expressions that contravene public order and morals
・Other expressions that are offensive to another person

https://support.na.square-enix.com/f...6&id=5382&la=1


Any of that can get someone a strike. And if its interpreted in even general ways. Things such as telling an offtank to pick up an add, or reminding a tank to use their tank stance could get you a strike if the person feels they were belittled, or compelled to play 'in a certain way'. Or heck, if they feel embarrassed and want a bit of revenge.

The way some of this is written almost makes me feel like if you get into an argument over something ingame. Go ahead and report them first. If you can get your ticket in before they do you may not receive a strike. These rules a way too broad.

When I run groups with friends. And someone is causing us issues, maybe they're new, maybe they're off their game, whatever. We don't even talk to them. We talk to each other on discord and see if we want to boot them. Trying to correct, educate, or remind them of mechanics isn't worth a strike. And we just vote kick them without a word if we decide that they are impeding the run. Thankfully they can't use our discord as evidence of why we kicked them, so no actual rule is broken as far as SE is concerned.

It sucks. I'd rather a newbie not get wrapped up in a kick like that. But we don't have a choice. Its either get the run done, or get a strike. Strikes aren't worth educating newbies. This is wrong, but SE made it this way.

[KageTokage]

If there's anywhere that SE seriously needs to take cues from other MMOs, it's how they enforce their ToS.

Permanent strikes coupled with a vague ToS that makes it sound like virtually anything can be considered offensive just makes people not want to speak, plus when you do actually get a strike they won't tell you any details about why you got it.

[Lunavi]

How many times I've actually received warnings? None. But I've had an instance where a GM did get talk to me and it took some rather serious convincing to show that the other person was being overly sensitive. The other person didn't help their case by being a flailing idiot the whole time either, but I've still almost gotten in trouble over incredibly minor stuff because people get needlessly offended.
Like it or not, some people are fragile snowflakes and I don't want to get banned from the game because I happen to get unlucky too many times.
An amount of time to pass by without problems should get rid of previous infractions. This would get rid of that possibility.

Doesn't this experience of yours show that the GMs are not trigger happy but rather look into it than being too quickly to ban and give out warnings? I only hear about people having the idea of GMs being like that, but most who thinks so has actually not gotten into any problems with GMs over things that were clearly not against ToS. There is, however, worth noting that there is a problem with what some consider a huge enough offense to warrant a report than others, but a lot of the stories I have heard of people who claims to have been unrightfully warned has been them saying a slur they didn't think about as a slur or were overly offensive or talked openly in chat about using forbidden mods in an inflammatory manner. Note that I say warned as people VERY rarely gets permanent bans for single offenses unless it is very severe.

[xbamfo]

Doesn't this experience of yours show that the GMs are not trigger happy but rather look into it than being too quickly to ban and give out warnings?

Nope. This experience of mine shows that that particular gm was barely not trigger happy enough to hit me with a strike over something minor. I don't even remember what it was as this was back in early Heavensward. And honestly I probably would have gotten it if the other person was not continually making an ass of themselves, as I was immediately portrayed as the bad guy.

And now apparently it seems like the ToS has gotten even stricter since back then. Yikes.

[Kaethra]

I'm going to reiterate some of this.

・Expressions that unilaterally reject another person's opinion

Can anyone honestly tell me that this doesn't include having a different opinion? Maybe it doesn't include having a slightly different opinion. But lets say I think Paladins are the best tanks, and you say I'm wrong and that Warriors are hands down better. Is that now a bannable offense? I really really want to say it isn't. But if the argument gets heated between two individuals that both think (know in their own minds) then someone is likely to get a strike. I don't think that should happen. I mean people get out of line sometimes and all is needed is a cooldown period in most cases.

But the problem there is, now that the rules can be weaponized... over an event that never would call in rules before, someone may simply use them against someone, and why not? That's the way the rule is written. If you 'think' someone disagrees with you for the sake of disagreeing, then by the rules they are trying to emotionally hurt you. They should be punished for that!

・Expressions that any reasonable person would find offensive

I've seen 'any reasonable person' used in reference before, and its always been an issue for me. Who's a reasonable person? In an ideal world, we shouldn't need to ask this question. But an ideal world doesn't allow atrocity to become commonplace. I don't want to get into real world politics here. But lets just say I come from a culture who thought doing really horrible things to people was not only reasonable, but righteous. Thankfully that has changed over centuries but what is 'reasonable' in society changes frequently. I don't like the wording. Its too ambiguous. And too put it simply, SE is not apart of the same culture as I am. So we're already not seeing eye to eye on this one.

・Expressions that compel a playing style

How do I know telling someone to put on tank stance when they forget doesn't fall under this? Again I shouldn't even be asking this question. But this statement is far too vague to give me confidence. It could very well mean I can't tell someone they have to play their class a certain way. But where does that stop? Again I feel this is up to GM interpretation.

Previous TOS's have never gone this far. Usually its don't insult one another, don't be hateful to one another, and don't harass one another. But now it seems like the rules say, don't appear mean to each other. The idea I gather is they don't want us to emotionally distress each other. I mean I think many here would agree these rules are emotionally distressing alot of people who don't know if their words in chat is going to get them a strike or not.

I'm sorry but everything under the 'Nuisance' section outside of impeding gameplay, needs to go. I like many of you don't have a clue what half of those even mean.