Is there any way to self censor specific word strains?

[Transient_Shadow]

I think you can guess why. Gold bots. I find them absolutely abhorrent! If there is a way to block specific words in chat please let me know! If not then we truly need such a feature! Not only would it allow players to ignore profanity and other terms they take issue with but it would also allow us to gain a moments peace from those thrice accursed gold spammers!

I mean who the devil buys their stuff any how? I can earn plenty of gill in game just through bottany!

[InjaTheNinja]

Unfortunately, the Powers That Be have yet to bless us with any kind of filter to silence the constant noise of spammers. Maybe they don't see it as an issue since they're not getting in the way of legitimate customers from playing, or maybe they don't know how to make such a feature work. Either way, they must make a killing from people desperate to get the gil needed to buy a house the moment a new ward opens.

[Enkidoh]

SE tried a word filter for blocking tells in FFXI to stop RMT tells back around 2009... and it worked... for about a week. Then the RMT companies figured out what words were being blocked, and simply adjusted the messages they were sending out (usually by using creative wording in the tells, such as website addresses using substitution ciphers to avoid blocking web addresses. Then the RMT returned with a vengeance.

As much as I hate RMT and are annoyed by their constant spam (or was - I haven't gotten an RMT tell on Balmung since Heavensward launched) , a word filter does not work because no matter what SE does the companies will always be trying to overcome SE's attempts at blocking them. It's a zero sum game that SE simply cannot win I'm afraid.

Really, SE needs to make the penalties for those who actually buy this ill-gotten gil far harsher than what they are (such as, blacklisting the player's real life identity from ever playing the game again) as a deterrent to try and kill their actual business. Because RMT would have no reason to exist if no one actually bought their gil in the first place.

[Niwashi]

... RMT companies figured out what words were being blocked, and simply adjusted the messages ...

Server side filtering has that issue, that it turns into a race between how fast the RMT companies can change their messages versus how fast SE can change their filters. It would still work if SE would keep updating, but it sounds like their last attempt assumed they could just put it in once and leave it that way, which as you said doesn't work past the first week or so without updates.

Client side filtering, on the other hand, where players can choose what they don't want to see, is far harder for RMT companies to work around, because they don't know what's being filtered. It can be different for every player. (The downside, of course, is that it puts the effort of maintaining it onto the player, but I'd still rather do that than have a constant bombardment of RMT spam.)

Neither type of filtering can get rid of all spam. Only banning the bots sending it would do that. But either type of filtering can get rid of the vast majority of it if the filters are properly maintained.

[Jpec07]

Allowing users to define their own censors would be huge. While I agree with the posters that have said that sweeping lists of words to block won't do anyone any good, allowing users to filter or censor strings that they themselves define would be an excellent addition.

Imagine an interface where you can add a string to a list. You can determine whether it's case-sensitive, whether non-breaking spaces or space characters should be considered, whether to simply censor the string with asterisks, whether to hide the message it contains altogether, and whether or not to blacklist the person who says it (obviously, the capacity limit on the blacklist would need to be greatly expanded). It would be a small project that would add a bit of customization that would allow users to make the game a safe place for themselves.

Say for instance a user has been sexually assaulted, so any mention of sexual violence, or even of sex in general, triggers severe anxiety in them. With this system, they could then add specific words and phrases to their own filters, which would shield them from discussion that would otherwise cause them upset. It would enable them to enjoy the game more and be socially active, at no cost to anyone else.

This would also help users be able to combat RMT spam on their own, and potentially even export their chat filters for others to use (and SE could even conceivably use the crowd-sourced filters as a default option in the game).