Abuse of the TOS. Loophole regarding griefing/trolling. Needs a solution.

[Diggles]

You seem to be confused as the stalking example was with a person outside of their house in a car IRL ... that is what they were talking about reporting, not the person in game.

Nope. The person I was replying to was clearly suggesting that "stalking" in the GAME is not only against the ToS (which it is), but also illegal (dubious at best and would never actually be prosecuted).

According to my state's law, it doesn't require active harassment, but observation, monitoring, and surveillance. And does not even have to be done physically, but can be done electronically through electronic messages and other eletronic medium. Apparently my state is in the 21st century on this.

So not only are these people breaking TOS, but they are breaking actual state laws.

So my advice to the OP, keep recordings of this. SE may not take the evidence but your state will. Your state can subpoena SE for the owners' information of any characters involved and prosectute them.

This isn't some silly fun, stalking is serious. Royalbeef, this is not something to play around with, and the only reason I can see you defending this, is if you've done this to RPers or others in the past. I recommend you stop. You can face serious penalties.

Uh oh, just realized she's probably going to accuse ME of stalking now. The cops should be kicking down my door any second.

[Kuroka]

...so you call it harresment if they do that, but if RP ppl stand mid limsa spamming the chat or even half blocking event sides cause "muh rp has to be in /say" i am supposed to ignore it yes? suuurreee...

[Kaethra]

/fc so you call it harresment if they do that, but if RP ppl stand mid limsa spamming the chat or even half blocking event sides cause "muh rp has to be in /say" i am supposed to ignore it yes? suuurreee...

Your justification for following people around in obscure areas to pop fireworks is because a few trolls spammed your chat?

[Mavrias]

Quick question: are you RPing in say? Or are you doing whispers or party chat? I'm asking because some people find RP in public channels to be uncomfortable which might be whats leading to your issue.

[GothicDolly]

Quick question: are you RPing in say? Or are you doing whispers or party chat? I'm asking because some people find RP in public channels to be uncomfortable which might be whats leading to your issue.

No worries, I am okay with answering! I said absolutely nothing in say chat while I was roleplaying, I didn't even emote. The only thing that made me a target was the fact I had my RP icon active. For people who don't like RPers, that is more than enough.

I feel like everyone in this thread needs to read this, please:


I believe, if a gang of trolls are stacking on top of you to the point you have difficulty even targeting your actual friend? They are affecting my gameplay. If the trolls are being so obnoxious that my friend abruptly logs -off- and I am left without my rp buddy, it's not fair. I was left without being able to do what makes -me- happy when playing the game, and that was writing with a friend. The trolls knew that. It's what they wanted. I went that entire day feeling crappy because my hobby was ridiculed. Attacked to the point I couldn't even engage in it with who I wanted. Could I have moved to an entirely different location on the world map? Yes. Could I have taken my roleplay private (housing)? Yes. But why should I, the person literally doing nothing but having my RP icon on, roleplaying in a whisper channel, be the one to move? It's just not right. I wanted to roleplay in the Quicksand environment. My story literally took place there. Do I just hide away in my apartment with friends and pretend like it's the Quicksand? That's just an insane thought to me.


For those of you with the "It's just a game. Get over it. It's not that serious" mentality, it's simply the principle of the situation. A decent human being does not purposely spite people like this.
I mean, of course my friend left. It's embarrassing to deal with these things as a writer. Slightly unrelated example but-->Do you know how bizarre it is to "ignore" a random person dancing on the table you're sitting at just because they -know- you're trying to write there? Wearing a frog outfit? While you're trying your hardest to be serious and in character? It's a public space sure, but no matter what you say--it's wrong on a empathetic level. Wrong. That's the blunt truth, just wrong.

Yes, the trolls broke the TOS, they disrupted how another player (me) chose to enjoy the game. That's the blunt truth. No amount of "it's just a game" will change the fact that these people were in the wrong and affected how I wanted to indulge in said game. And the situation I was in could have still been successfully orchestrated without the trolls having to say a -word-. Nothing to report them for. No emotes, no insults to point a gm towards, just the trolls knowing their presence is more than enough. Arguably hard to prove malicious intent even if malicious intent was clear. That's what you call a loophole in the rules.

[Seryne]

I feel you, OP. I have a dude that lives next door to me in game that follows me around everywhere being generally annoying, even recruiting people from his FC to do so alongside him because he's that mature of an individual. This started last year and I reported him for it multiple times but am hit with the "Just blacklist him." from the GMs even though I have. Would be cool if blacklisting people made them invisible for you so I don't have to see him anymore but I doubt they'll ever do something like this.

[GothicDolly]

I feel you, OP. I have a dude that lives next door to me in game that follows me around everywhere being generally annoying, even recruiting people from his FC to do so alongside him because he's that mature of an individual. This started last year and I reported him for it multiple times but am hit with the "Just blacklist him." from the GMs even though I have. Would be cool if blacklisting people made them invisible for you so I don't have to see him anymore but I doubt they'll ever do something like this.

Agreed. I personally feel like revamping the blacklist feature to this degree would solve so many problems. Not even just for me but the entire FFXIV community. You know that saying "out of sight out of mind"? In my opinion, that saying holds a lot of merit. It's not an unheard of feature, Second Life comes to mind--where you can make players you blacklist invisible. Both sides would be happy with such a feature implemented on FFXIV. The trolls don't get reported, and the roleplayers don't have to see the trolls. Heck, the trolls could continue to be right in my character's face--I wouldn't care. Because I wouldn't be able to see them. Then my writing buddy(s) could do the same and we can continue undisturbed.

The question is if FFXIV as a game could make this already established feature...work in its engine? I plan to make a thread suggesting its implementation--at some point. If done right? It could only improve the game for everyone. The most difficult part would just be getting this idea to the higher ups. And again, this isn't some indie game where the devs are all huddled up in a Discord. So for all I know--my attempts will be fruitless. But I will try.

[Granyala]

Having played many years on WoWs RP server I encountered the "OMG RP, lets trash it!" attitude more than once.

The only real solution is to RP in private, at least use private channels.

I can kinda understand people being annoyed too, if you spam half a book into the /say chat. Not everyone is interested in your personal stories.
Form a party, use /p or use one of them link shells and enjoy your RP silence, because no one will bother to disturb two seemingly AFK characters. Also, you can enjoy the freedom that comes with privacy, not having to worry of writing sth. offensive (more relevant for erotic roleplay or role play arguments containing insults etc).
You can even fake the /afk tag via game options.

[Saidosha]

Friend of mine more or less got chased out of FFXI because there was a guy who wanted her to be his girlfriend but she turned him down. He'd tell spam, make alts to get around it, tell lies to friends to get them to harass her, would follow her around to different zones and try to ruin EXP parties she was in, and basically do anything and everything he could to be a jerk. Contacting a GM just defaulted to them saying to blacklist him, ignorant of the extremes he continuously went to to make her game life hell.

Observing this experience pretty much solidified that behaviors in games are never policed to the extent they truly should be. The whole, "It's just a game!" line is certainly easy to hide behind, but as others have touched on, the elements of cyberbullying and cyberstalking are real. Said guy above also took to bombarding her livejournal when that was more of a thing, which obviously didn't help her overall disposition. To say no harm can ever comes to the person on the other end of the screen is incredibly bereft of empathy and quite laden with ignorance.

That said, it's not exactly a secret that RPers have and continue to be a marginalized lot within the MMO community. Some of it is because some people just don't get it. Some think it's a waste of time because it doesn't translate to statistical improvements to their character. Combat systems very rarely favor the concept of flavoring encounters in such a way, either. Finally, you'll get that group that thinks it's just fun to crash the party and be a nuisance, which isn't terribly far removed from people who think highbies ganking lowbies in PvP is A-OK. Just because a game technically allows something doesn't make it just. The relative lack of teeth to the blacklist option across so many MMOs also tends to send the message that the hosts care more about the money the offending party brings than meting out the proper restrictions or paying GMs to adequately investigate. It's also pretty telling seeing other players push that solution is to more or less just run and hide. Go to another zone. Take it to tells or party chat. Basically, do everything but be visible when they're doing nothing wrong. It feels pretty analogous to the whole "Did you see that dress she was wearing?" sort of victim blaming when time and time again it's the jerks and trolls not getting put in their place, and oftentimes (indirectly) encouraged.

I further imagine the above is quick to trigger those who love to play the snowflake card or eagerly go into some slippery slope strawman about how everyone can find everything offensive so may as well just ban everybody. Deep down, we know that's not what this about. We know people crap on RP. We know people turn a blind eye because they don't personally care. Still doesn't mean ruining a form of well-meaning entertainment is acceptable. I could say "you" could blacklist people who make giant text dumps in say. I could say "you" could filter out emotes so you don't see them in your log. I could say "you" could turn off certain sounds if you find them annoying. But that would certainly be inconvenient, wouldn't it? Hmm...

[Gula]

I further imagine the above is quick to trigger those who love to play the snowflake card or eagerly go into some slippery slope strawman about how everyone can find everything offensive so may as well just ban everybody. Deep down, we know that's not what this about. We know people crap on RP. We know people turn a blind eye because they don't personally care. Still doesn't mean ruining a form of well-meaning entertainment is acceptable. I could say "you" could blacklist people who make giant text dumps in say. I could say "you" could filter out emotes so you don't see them in your log. I could say "you" could turn off certain sounds if you find them annoying. But that would certainly be inconvenient, wouldn't it? Hmm...

Apparently role players in a role playing game aren't real people.