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

[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.

[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?

[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.

[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]

Yeah a few of you keep saying this, but like I said: How?

At the moment all I can think of is removing that option completely.

This will leave the player with 4 options.

1 - Leave duty and take the penalty.
2 - Be more comparative with the party.
3 - Sit/Stand and do nothing.
4 - Fake DC.

No.3 They can kick him with AFK option.
No.4 They can kick him with the offline option.

At least this prevents people from abusing the system and kicking players that did absolutely nothing wrong.

Though like I said before, I have never seen anyone abusing it personally. But this topic keeps coming up on the forums.

[Rokke]

Yeah a few of you keep saying this, but like I said: How?

Any suggestions on what they could change to make the system more fair than now? Because I cannot personally think of a way to fix it to be more fair than it is now and I've thought about it a lot and SE has a whole staff that can brain storm this....if there was a more fair way to design the system don't you think they would have done it after 4 years?

Honestly I think they should just list "difference in playstyle" as an option. If GMs already accept it as a valid reason to kick, might as well add it in.

[Miste]

At the moment all I can think of is removing that option completely.

This will leave the player with 4 options.

1 - Leaving duty and taking the penalty.
2 - Be more comparative with the party.
3 - Sit/Stand and do nothing.
4 - Fake DC.

You see this as more fair? I don't. I see more problems with this especially since #2 you mention....if people cannot kick the person there is no reason to be more cooperative if they don't feel like it. Trolls will likely take advantage of being immune to being kicked from groups. They can play however they want and not get kicked just to troll and end up making the 3 other people in the group waste their game time.

A DPS that just auto attacks, a healer who doesn't heal, a tank who doesn't tank? Can't kick them! I guess you are okay with taking a 30 minute lockout to your personal play time due to someone else trolling or playing so incompetently that you cannot complete the duty even if you tried?? I am not. Also one person trolling makes three other people have to leave and requeue with one of them getting a penalty to boot. Sounds ridiculous.

One person wasting three other player's game time............and nothing you can do about it except "not play the game" by AFKing or fake d/cing or leaving the duty and getting 30 min penalty and not being able to complete what you wanted/needed to complete. Doesn't sound fair or a good idea to me.

Oh, and before you say "it's okay to kick a troll", if the person trolling doesn't openly admit to trolling then under your new rules of not being able to vote kick for "differing play styles" it means if you kick them without knowing you will get punished if he reports you. SE cannot punish the troll without some kind of proof in chat logs that the trolling was intentional.

The way the system is now isn't perfect because it is impossible to make it perfect, but the system now how it is negatively affects the least amount of players. Again majority > minority. Three people is more than one and I asked for a way to make the system "more fair" than it is now. Letting one player cause three others to have to get 30 min lockouts and/or having to requeue and wait in line again is not fair.

Honestly I think they should just list "difference in playstyle" as an option. If GMs already accept it as a valid reason to kick, might as well add it in.

I mean yeah they could I suppose, but I am okay that it isn't there as a visual option in-game personally. I mean I don't want to promote kicking people for that reason, it is just a reason that has to be used sometimes if there is a clash in opinions and people are not willing to compromise when it is necessary.

[enthauptet]

The worst part IMO about the vote kick is even if you vote no chances are the other 2 people are together. I have this happen to me a lot of the times where a party member is fine but 2 people I got queued into with decide to vote them out. There is no way to beat their vote even if there is no reason...

[TaleraRistain]

They need to adjust it to be a majority of the total party number. 2 people should not decide for a group of 4 that they want to remove someone, especially not so then they can just abandon the last person without any penalty. It should be 3 yes votes and at least 5 in a party of 8.