Toxicity in group content

[TrixxieTriss]

Trixx, I respect you very much, and we usually agree.

 

This is an aside, but there is an entirely valid argument for using Defense mods on a Sorc if you play level-capped PVE content. You wind up with the same Power and HP, but you get an extra 2000-2500 Defense. Yeah, I know you are talking about PVP, but the average player doesn't have two sets of gear; they wear the same for both PVP and PVE.

 

Me, I avoid the issue by avoiding PVP entirely :D

 

I was only using it as an example of how you can get really toxic response when you are being friendly and trying to help. I’ve pretty much given up helping randoms these days because I get more toxic responses than positive.

[TrixxieTriss]

As far as Toxicity in chat / groups.

Player population has spiked lately because of Steam, and over the last few months because of Covid.

 

It's difficult to say if the percentage of players being toxic has increased at all.

 

Plus...based on this thread...my definition of "TOXIC" is far different than what most people are talking about here.

The forum filters would not let me use any examples even if I wanted to.

 

The thing that annoys me most are the trolls.

They're not there to talk, just to spam chat with stupidity and try to pick fights.

They get ignored.

 

A legacy wide ignore would be wonderful!

From BOTH sides.

some random toon is worthy of getting ignored, that PLAYER and all his/her alts gets ignored.

and I only have to ignore them once...automatically applied to all of MY toons.

 

That's my wish.

 

Totally agree.

[BRKMSN]

1. Report harassment.

2. Learn how to ignore.*

 

 

*By this, I don't mean "use an ignore feature." I mean learn how to actually ignore people. Don't keep reading their garbage if it bothers you. The only thing that really bothers people is what they allow to do so.

 

For those of you that drive, you probably have no idea how many people have spoken ill of you, thrown an obscene gesture your way or have been enraged beyond reason. Why is this? Because you don't follow up on every driver that shared the road with you. In other words, you managed successfully to ignore people in the real world. It's really not as difficult as you think to apply that to a gaming community.

[Darev]

1. Report harassment.

2. Learn how to ignore.*

 

 

*By this, I don't mean "use an ignore feature." I mean learn how to actually ignore people. Don't keep reading their garbage if it bothers you. The only thing that really bothers people is what they allow to do so.

 

For those of you that drive, you probably have no idea how many people have spoken ill of you, thrown an obscene gesture your way or have been enraged beyond reason. Why is this? Because you don't follow up on every driver that shared the road with you. In other words, you managed successfully to ignore people in the real world. It's really not as difficult as you think to apply that to a gaming community.

 

I don't know...some of the stuff I happen to catch in gen chat, to me, is the equivalent of a large SUV right in front of me, blocking my view of everything else around me, suddenly doing a brake check.

 

Some things you can't help but see.

 

Those get reported and ignored.

Edited August 15, 2020 by Darev

[BellumEstBellum]

Unless they are harassing you directly, I'd say just ignore it. There is an ignore function too, just block the silly teenagers, IMO just pay attention to the game and ignore gen chat.

[MingusPho]

Just to reiterate, by toxic I mean players who maliciously sabotage the experience for others. One small example: you're in a gf fp and the second something goes wrong one player verbally berates another unnecessarily name calling, casting blame and such, then before you know it the group has disbanded. I wasn't really talking about the people spewing racist, sexist, lewd, political views in gen chat, especially since there are no moderators and we have an ignore function.

[BRKMSN]

Just to reiterate, by toxic I mean players who maliciously sabotage the experience for others. One small example: you're in a gf fp and the second something goes wrong one player verbally berates another unnecessarily name calling, casting blame and such, then before you know it the group has disbanded. I wasn't really talking about the people spewing racist, sexist, lewd, political views in gen chat, especially since there are no moderators and we have an ignore function.

Best to use vote kick in that situation and continue with a comp or replacement. But those incidents do suck. Some people are just jerks. PUG life and all ...

[Khaleijo]

Just to reiterate, by toxic I mean players who maliciously sabotage the experience for others. One small example: you're in a gf fp and the second something goes wrong one player verbally berates another unnecessarily name calling, casting blame and such, then before you know it the group has disbanded. I wasn't really talking about the people spewing racist, sexist, lewd, political views in gen chat, especially since there are no moderators and we have an ignore function.

 

While I do agree that an experience like that isn't fun at all, in general that is part of the risk of running with random strangers. Through the GF people with widely varying, age, backgrounds and reasons come together in a group and not always are they able to find a compromise that fits all. Some might want a fast run, other the scenic route, some are experienced, some aren't, others only think they are. Some are patient others quick to anger, just like in RL.

Maliciously sabotage as you call it, to a degree is depending of the point of view. Especially as a tank I often feel like being sabotaged, almost as often though speaking up about it, it turns out the other player simply doesn't know better. So communication too is important, you can't call people toxic just because they can't read your mind. At the same time not all players react well to others telling them things. And again, different backgrounds, not everyone has the same upbringing, so choice of words and tone might mean different things too.

You also never know what kind of situation the person behind the screen is in, under time or emotional pressure and so on. Sure it's not the best idea to PUG in that situation but who are we to decide how people play the game and why, we don't pay their subscription. Though of course we neither are forced to keep playing with them, there is the kick vote, the ignore and if that isn't enough you can leave a group yourself. And if they are really bad, throwing nothing but insults around you also can write a support ticket.

 

Especially in this case you describe, I'd put the player in question on my in-game ignore list, because I wouldn't want to play with him or her again at all, so by /ignore I avoid to get him/her put into my group again. (As a side note it is rather amusing to then see or rather hear about notorious players ranting on gen chat for how long they wait for GF invites.)

For people that aren't that bad but still potentially annoying I keep an offline list, to remember their names and decide from occasion to occasion if I'm in the mood to put up with them or not. Though I certainly wouldn't take them into a group that a build myself.

On the other hand though for me part of the appeal of the GF is that you have to deal with strangers and find a compromise one way or another, and usually that works out well enough. Real toxicity is rare from my experience, though maybe I'm just thick skinned.

To avoid that completely the key is to find like minded players you have fun with, either by putting nice people on your friend list and asking to group up together again or joining the right guild for you.

After all, it's not like you have to use the GF alone, you also can build a group on your own via chat and then use the GF for the rewards. Wording clearly what you are looking for you minimize the chance of 'toxic' players from the start.

[Sarova]

Sounds boring.

Most of the stories are solo content and most of the class stories are still interesting & can take various routes. Most solo content is not boring to me.** I know many players can't/won't do anything in SWTOR unless they are in a group & avoid all solo content altogether which I find really odd but that's down to personal preference. Unlike you, I won't mock them for it I BUT I find grouping even with real life friends exhausting sometimes. SWTOR for me is about my personal preference and I'll play how I WANT TO ENJOY THE GAME. I don't need to be part of a fake-friends group or real-life friends group to enjoy the game.

 

As others have alluded to in this thread, I've found when I have grouped that it's obvious some who only group for everything (including for simple heroics) don't seem to learn their class abilities (even not knowing that some class abilities require a specific weapon/weapons to use that ability), gearing/stat requirements or basic surviveability and rely on others to tell them what to do all the time or worse carry them (and quite often res them). I think soloing (class stories at the very least) allows you to learn the basics of your class, yet people want to (and do) skip all that completely. That's what is very frustrating to me (example - I grouped with people who didn't know they had a self heal), by all means group for everything if you want but learn your class & specialism.

 

I also know that some like following a group-grind-to-75 technique, skipping all solo story content & just killing groups of fast spawning mobs to 70/75 (a real life friend wanted me to do that with them, my reply was **** the hell off & advertise on the fleet) or a boost-70-grind-to-75-and-skip-to-end-game-for-Ops/ranked/MM FPs/etc with guild or randoms. That holds no interest for me but I would not accuse those who do that as boring.

 

Completely agree about the not pvp'ing thing you replied to

Game life is much better w/o it..

 

"Use the orb"

"They're getting all the orbs...go try to stop it"

"you know..the orbs in the middle of the..."

"oh...you just want to fight and not actually WIN...ok"

Thank you.

Unranked seems to be one of two scenarios since the changes:

1. Full of ranked-expertise pre-mades who have completed the ranked weekly and are in unranked to farm for kills and/or film their complete dominance over the other team OR

2. The team you're usually matched with consists of players who have absolutely no idea how the warzone works or the strategy and think certain parts of the map are the equivalent of a boss they have to take down (usually "mid").

 

Unranked was never brillant, however with the addition of "must win" for quests and the "15 min leave debuff" but no Warzone selection/rejection queue option, I'm far better off without unranked PvP any more unless they make massive alterations, for which I'm not holding my breath.

 

 

**some of kotfe/kotet/Iokath on the 50th and later alt I'm running it on can be bit tedious (looking at you Kaliyo chapter, visions in the dark chapter, walker chapters and Iokath) but grouping would not make any of those any better.

[MingusPho]

Maliciously sabotage as you call it, to a degree is depending of the point of view. Especially as a tank I often feel like being sabotaged, almost as often though speaking up about it, it turns out the other player simply doesn't know better. So communication too is important, you can't call people toxic just because they can't read your mind. At the same time not all players react well to others telling them things. And again, different backgrounds, not everyone has the same upbringing, so choice of words and tone might mean different things too.

You also never know what kind of situation the person behind the screen is in, under time or emotional pressure and so on. Sure it's not the best idea to PUG in that situation but who are we to decide how people play the game and why, we don't pay their subscription. Though of course we neither are forced to keep playing with them, there is the kick vote, the ignore and if that isn't enough you can leave a group yourself. And if they are really bad, throwing nothing but insults around you also can write a support ticket.

 

 

Here's what I mean. Say the group wipes on a first run at a boss known to be challenging. Said toxic player immediately resorts to explicative laced finger pointing and name calling because it has to be somebody's fault. That's malicious. You don't get to the root of a problem by instantly initiating blame and using curse words and insults.

 

Vote kick, yeah that happens although I like to be fair and give them time to play nice before I initiate. I explain, ask questions, and observe first.As for ignore, I use that as soon as I'm no longer grouped with them everytime.

 

I'm not one to normally open my mouth unless it's to say yes, no, thanks, brb, sorry, or tyfg. If I do explain something I usually ask if anyone is new first. If I see something critical I just explain it without any flavor text.

 

You are right there are a lot of different people playing under different constraints but there are certain levels of common decency, courtesy, and social etiquette that should be basic behavior, not just in a game but in real life.

[DarkTergon]

but there are certain levels of common decency, courtesy, and social etiquette that should be basic behavior, not just in a game but in real life.

 

Unfortunately, due to the fact everyone is hiding behind a screen, and don't have consequences for their behaviour some <redacted> people act the way they do. A legacy wide ignore feature is the only real option, if you could ignore their whole legacy, on your whole legacy , it would help, you'd never have to deal with that person again.

[haziqroslis]

Use the ignore function enough and you'll eventually get them all.

[MingusPho]

Unfortunately, due to the fact everyone is hiding behind a screen, and don't have consequences for their behaviour some <redacted> people act the way they do. A legacy wide ignore feature is the only real option, if you could ignore their whole legacy, on your whole legacy , it would help, you'd never have to deal with that person again.

 

Yeah I think you're right. That's pretty much the only solution at this point. Maybe we'll get that in the 10 year anniversary uodate.