A proposed solution to end credit spammers once and for all

[Mithros]

Where are you getting the idea of a lone person? Every mention of this I have used the plural form. It wouldn't be ONE person. It'd be many. If only just for the fact that some servers are active 24/7 and need people from different timezones.

 

I'm not sure where you're getting the idea of a single person, but its wrong.

 

You are giving one person the power.

 

Okay, so you are giving that power to 50 people or a hundred people or everyone that plays the game, but each person has all the power they need to silence someone.

 

They don't require the approval of anyone else to execute their actions.

 

You want one person to be able to decide "Hey, I am going to silence that player" for review by someone else later. Possibly much later.

 

That there are other individuals given the same power doesn't matter. One person has all the power they need.

 

One person.

 

That is your idea. Why is it so hard for you to understand it all of a sudden?

[Jrr_hypernova]

I'm sorry but did someone really say that give gamers the abillty to police an mmo was a good idea? Sure it might get rid of the gold scammers but going from every gaming forum ever it would unleash an evil so terrible and unfathomable that Cthulhu itself would run crying back to its mother and the world would plunge into ten thousand years of darkness with the dead walking fire falling from the sky and dogs and cats being friends.

[DurdensWrath]

You are giving one person the power.

 

Okay, so you are giving that power to 50 people or a hundred people or everyone that plays the game, but each person has all the power they need to silence someone.

 

They don't require the approval of anyone else to execute their actions.

 

You want one person to be able to decide "Hey, I am going to silence that player" for review by someone else later. Possibly much later.

 

That there are other individuals given the same power doesn't matter. One person has all the power they need.

 

One person.

 

That is your idea. Why is it so hard for you to understand it all of a sudden?

 

EVE taught me all I needed to know about players having power.

[Zaina]

You are giving one person the power.

 

Okay, so you are giving that power to 50 people or a hundred people or everyone that plays the game, but each person has all the power they need to silence someone.

 

They don't require the approval of anyone else to execute their actions.

 

You want one person to be able to decide "Hey, I am going to silence that player" for review by someone else later. Possibly much later.

 

That there are other individuals given the same power doesn't matter. One person has all the power they need.

 

One person.

 

That is your idea. Why is it so hard for you to understand it all of a sudden?

 

 

I mean, are we talking hypotheticals? Sure. That one person totally could go and mute everyone on the fleet for six hours. But...why? With all those requirements, they've got so much to lose. And for what? Muting everyone for six hours? And the command is reversible anyways. Not like one of the other Wardens couldn't undo it. It isn't like the effect would be drastic or lasting.

[Mithros]

I mean, are we talking hypotheticals? Sure. That one person totally could go and mute everyone on the fleet for six hours. But...why?

 

I covered this earlier.

 

Maybe they have decided to quit.

 

Maybe they are tired of the "Jawa game" or someone's political and/or religious rantings.

 

Maybe they are drunk and think it's funny.

 

Maybe they just had a bad day.

 

With all those requirements, they've got so much to lose. And for what?

 

So much to lose? What? Banned from the game?

Again, look at what I just said.

 

Someone just went through a 12 pack and a fifth after their car got repossessed and you expect them to be overly concerned about being banned because they decided to silence someone that was ticking them off?

 

Muting everyone for six hours? And the command is reversible anyways. Not like one of the other Wardens couldn't undo it. It isn't like the effect would be drastic or lasting.

 

I covered the "reversible" aspect in an earlier post, too.

That just creates more opportunity for someone to decide that they are going to abuse their power precisely because you plan to give them the means to cover their behinds and call it a "mistake".

 

You get silenced for an hour because someone thought that you were LFGing a little too frequently and see how drastically that impacts your fun.

 

And the silencer? They get to say "I accidentally did that. Didn't realize it until later so I went back and un-silenced them and apologized".

Doesn't matter that they fully intended it and the apology was just so many words that meant nothing, all that matters is that the person reviewing this will see that they "corrected their mistake" and call it good.

 

And how would one of these other "wardens" (assuming that another one was even on at the time) know that you needed it reversed? You couldn't tell them... You have been silenced.

 

And without them being able to go back into the chat log they probably won't be able to see why you were silenced.

Should they go around unsilencing everyone that jumps around in front of them? That someone else says "they got silenced and need it undone"?

 

Because if so, what's the point? A gold seller could have someone come along and say "My friend got silenced. Can you fix it for them?".

And that is assuming that these "wardens" are somehow marked so that players can pick them out from regular players.

Edited January 24, 2015 by Mithros

[Zaina]

I covered this earlier.

 

Maybe they have decided to quit.

 

Maybe they are tired of the "Jawa game" or someone's political and/or religious rantings.

 

Maybe they are drunk and think it's funny.

 

Maybe they just had a bad day.

 

 

 

So much to lose? What? Banned from the game?

Again, look at what I just said.

 

Someone just went through a 12 pack and a fifth after their car got repossessed and you expect them to be overly concerned about being banned because they decided to silence someone that was ticking them off?

 

 

 

I covered the "reversible" aspect in an earlier post, too.

That just creates more opportunity for someone to decide that they are going to abuse their power precisely because you plan to give them the means to cover their behinds and call it a "mistake".

 

You get silenced for an hour because someone thought that you were LFGing a little too frequently and see how drastically that impacts your fun.

 

And the silencer? They get to say "I accidentally did that. Didn't realize it until later so I went back and un-silenced them and apologized".

Doesn't matter that they fully intended it and the apology was just so many words that meant nothing, all that matters is that the person reviewing this will see that they "corrected their mistake" and call it good.

 

And how would one of these other "wardens" (assuming that another one was even on at the time) know that you needed it reversed? You couldn't tell them... You have been silenced.

 

And without them being able to go back into the chat log they probably won't be able to see why you were silenced.

Should they go around unsilencing everyone that jumps around in front of them? That someone else says "they got silenced and need it undone"?

 

Because if so, what's the point? A gold seller could have someone come along and say "My friend got silenced. Can you fix it for them?".

And that is assuming that these "wardens" are somehow marked so that players can pick them out from regular players.

 

You're grasping at air, with your argument about the WHY they'd do it. Sure, it can happen. But how likely is it? Not very. Is it worth entirely tossing away a system to fix a problem based off of a very unlikely scenario? Well, no.

 

As far as other Wardens being able to unsilence, I'd imagine there would be some kind of system in place where they can see why/who and the logs. Another check/balance. The people chosen are chosen specifically for their unlikeliness to mute people based of being tired of the Jawa thing/religious debates/whatever. Again, they aren't handing this out to just anyone.

[AdrianDmitruk]

EVE taught me all I needed to know about players having power.

 

Ironically, EVE also taught me all I needed to know to solve SWTOR's gold spammer issues.

 

I played EVE at the time CCP changed the report spam functionality to the "report ISK spammer" they have now (or at least, had at the time I last played the game). For a modest few code changes, SWTOR could almost wipe out credit spammers.

 

Let's compare the Report Spam functionality of SWTOR and EVE Online:

 

SWTOR EVE

 

X______X__ Sends an automated ticket to report the spam

_______X__ Automatically places the reported spammer on ignore

_______X__ Automatically removes the reported spammer's previous messages from your chat window(s)

_______X__ Always accessible from a single right-click menu (SWTOR's report, and ignore, is sometimes buried in a submenu)

X_________ Leaves an annoying "Your report has been sent" popup that you must close before continuing gameplay

 

Gee, I wonder which game's report mechanism is more efficient and effective? I watched gold spam in EVE fall faster than the contraband casino's payout after the nerf LOL. The day EVE patched in the improved and current report functionality was pretty much the day the community launched a holy war against the spammers and they fell silent within a week. The gameplay barrier to reporting spam was lowered so far that community participation in outing the spammers soared overnight. Contrast to the clunky spam reporting UI we have, and the low efficacy of its results.

 

I could play EVE for months on end without ever having to see a gold spammer in local. (Note: In EVE various forms of ingame market scams are explicitly permitted--so stuff like GTN scams was simply not reportable--but the actual real-market-trading credit seller spam fell off a cliff and I practically never had to deal with it again after that patch, and if I did, it was all gone in less than a second.)

 

Note how powerful EVE's report ISK spam function is. It literally gives the player the power to forcibly remove spam from the client long before a CSR or gamemaster ever has to lay eyes upon the ticket. Thus credit spammers can't scroll off LFG, trade, or other legit forms of fleet chat that might interest you. But neither does the function lend itself to abuse, as the instantaneous, automatic actions initiated by the report happen client side, before the offender is actually processed.

 

I.E. were I to file a frivolous spam report there, your chat messages would be removed from my client's chat window, but you would not be silenced by my report (afaik); rather a GM would get to my ticket, and either determine no action was necessary, or take action against me.

 

I just shake my head at people who say "lol just report and ignore," for they don't realize just exactly how helpless we are against spammers here compared to other MMOs that take the problem more seriously. Also, if SWTOR adopted an EVE-like reporting tool, the idea of Wardens would be redundant (everyone would essentially become their own Warden as it would be easy to keep your personal chat clean), and we wouldn't have to worry about players misusing the report function beyond what already exists. It'd be win-win.

Edited January 24, 2015 by AdrianDmitruk

[Mithros]

You're grasping at air, with your argument about the WHY they'd do it. Sure, it can happen. But how likely is it? Not very. Is it worth entirely tossing away a system to fix a problem based off of a very unlikely scenario? Well, no.

 

But there are, in my opinion and that of others, better systems available.

 

Systems that don't give one player the power to alter the experiences of other players.

 

It doesn't matter if any of my scenarios happen every day, it only matters if they happen once.

 

One time; One rogue "warden" and the game has to do damage control.

 

 

But I am done here.

 

I am repeating what I have said because you can;t seem to remember anything past two posts, and the arguments are made.

 

Not just by me, but by others as well.

 

Yeah, we want better ways to deal with credit sellers, but this ain't it.

[Nigredo]

It's silly, surely some people would abuse it. No question about that. The only effective solution is active GM's that would be online 24/7. (IMO they should be there from the very beginning of the game launch tho...)

 

Riiiiight cause this company's first order of business was to reduce the staff to damn near nothing upon launch.. and they have been ice skating up hill ever since..

[Zaina]

But there are, in my opinion and that of others, better systems available.

 

Systems that don't give one player the power to alter the experiences of other players.

 

It doesn't matter if any of my scenarios happen every day, it only matters if they happen once.

 

One time; One rogue "warden" and the game has to do damage control.

 

 

But I am done here.

 

I am repeating what I have said because you can;t seem to remember anything past two posts, and the arguments are made.

 

Not just by me, but by others as well.

 

Yeah, we want better ways to deal with credit sellers, but this ain't it.

 

Sure, it isn't the most amazing best idea ever since sliced bread. But it's certainly the most practical. It worked in SWG, it isn't like its a whole new thing that's innovative and never been done before.

 

It has both been done AND worked before.

 

Others do agree with you, but there are also plenty that think this is a great idea that have posted too.

 

It's very little risk for a lot of return, and I don't understand what about that you can't seem to grasp.