Anet Moderators

Anet should have moderators spread around major outposts and all pvp locations and look in to all the stuff they don't want to happen such as spamming, not using the trade channel, offensive language, inappropriate conversations, leeching in the pvp arenas and abusing the game in any number of other ways. i understand it would be difficult at first but after a while people will be used to it and lean away from these activities.

/signed

And moderators don't have to be there 24/7 because most players will get scared when random bans or other punishments will become common. It would increase the fun factor greatly and maybe mean more game sells when people hear about moderating.

/Not signed


Think it thru.
How many people would they need?
Who would ensure the standards of these Mods?
Who would be these Mods?

Would you want a secret army of superior players holding your fate?

Where would the line be? Sometimes I talk in general(All) and then go to reply to something in team or even trade, but forget to switch channels.
....***Pwned 24hr Temp ban Reason: INCORRECT USE OF CHAT FEATURES!***.......

offensive language
There is already a chat filter, people should learn to use it.

trade channel
Where has it be regulated/ruled or defined that ALL trade MUST be done in the trade channel?
So far the trade feature appears to be useful only to centralise traders efforts, not as a requirment

spamming
Spam filters.

inappropriate conversations
To what requirments and standards? I consider very little to be inappropriate.
At the e-wake for Steve Irwin people were mocking him. I believe its still there given right to be able to.
Often I hear players mocking Anet and GW for alot of things, Moderators for such a business might consider this inappropriate conversations.

But if only they added a tab to turn off the All chat function, perhaps that would solve alot of problems..

And there would be no need for in-game mods if Anet added a Image capture function. So you could record such inappropriate behaviour, and pass it on to support staff that could investigate such matters, with out having countless mods spread over countless districts burning up resources.

Yeah, since it is so needed, it's a bad idea?

Mercy.

Press printscreen sometime. It doesn't appear to be working well enough.

Manpower issues would be a problem, but as long as ANET has enough people to make us think they could be in the district we are in then fear will keep people in line when the mods aren't there. Say make the mods noticable by players unless they take action.

Though I would suggest that the mods can only preform limited action on the spot, and that the large actions (which would include any bans longer than a few hours) would have to be approved by the current moderaation system.

As much as I pity the person who'd get the job, there are a couple things here which can be done automatically.

• Automatically report all messages that have been repeated 10 or more times over 5 minuites to Anet with a timestamp, name and location. Messages will then be read through manually every now and then, and abusive behaviour can be rooted out.
• Automatically report all messages containing abusive words, true it's easy to bypass the word filter for this, but unless made public people don't know which words are filtered or not and rooting out is easier.

Being reported to either point wouldn't be sufficent for a ban, but if you're caught repetedly (say 15-20 times over 2-3 days) breaking the rules an hour ban might be in order. The ban time can increase as your number of offenses increase to prevent further annoyances of other players.

And please, don't think I support big brother. I'm against anything that invades my privacy, but these are the simplest ways I could think of at the moment

lol I hope you noticed the sarcasm.

Working the post of a few ideas raised from the previous posts.

My main issue is that 3 of the 5 OP's suggested offences aren't in fact currently against policies.
spamming, Trade channel restrictions, Offensive language, Inappropriate conversations, leeching in the pvp arenas and abusing the game in many undefinded manners.

Spamming, Trade channel activities, leeching in pvp.
As counter productive and painful as they are, they will never seem to warrant a banning. Spam filters were added. Same with trade filters. Now you want secret police to force players to obey non-definded rules?

Offensive language.
I can swear in four different languages. I am unsure if Anet allows foul language or if its forbidden, let see them know what I'm saying in all four texts . They do have a language filter, but I'm sure its level of restrictions is adjustable by the account user. Personal choice, and freedom to choose is a wonderful thing.

Inappropriate conversations and abusing the game.
By who's definition? The secret police of superior players given the power to ban accounts.... I see no misuse forecasted.

leeching in the pvp arenas
You do realise that would require a moderator on every arena, have you considered that. Or perhaps these Mods are to be granted 'extra access powers', Or should they just take a players word for it upon returning to the staging area. Perhaps with some kind of prt scr proof, but wait how can you prove they were leeching from a still image. Your right we need a dev or mod holding our hand in ever arena to stop the scourge of leeching!

The Automated responses do seem like a good idea. But fall short on 2 areas.
1) The issues addressed are not considered ban-able offences!

2) The nature of messages isn't considered. LFG Mo/Me Mission.
In a over crowded district sometimes excessive post is the only way to organise. And as for the abusive would that include whispers and teams, what about alliance and guild chat? I know my aussie guild uses a few words like a ! (punctuation mark).

And the grand question, Who would these mods be? General players; selected for there dedication to GW, there fan-boy(sic) love for Anet. The leetest players in PvP?
Or perhaps paided staff? Which the costs would appear in the next chapters somehow.

And if we are going to insist on bans, how about we insist on bans for actions that are currently considered prohibited by Anet and GW rules and restrictions.

It depends on who the Moderators are. If they're official Anet staff moderating under supervisor and direction at the actual Anet headquarters, then yeah I say YES. If they recruit regular gamers, then NO. AOL did this when they started and they had people they didn't know going around as Guides. There was always cases of Guides "TOSing" people for uncalled for reasons. This can easily build an ego and sense of power in people, many of whom would abuse it. Whether it's kicking people for no real reason or going around as a vigilante directed by a sort of internet road rage and emotion.

1) Anet will have to design a very clear and precice code of conduct for the moderators where the moderators will have to sign and will be accessible by everyone. The fact that this code of conduct is added will require an amendment to the EULA where;

becomes an issue to be dealt with. When this amendment is made, moderators will become obsolite, as the support website will be flooded with player screenshots of others not using the trade channel, or using profane language for example. Following onto number 2....

2) Spamming, Foul Language, and not using the trade channel does not abuse the EULA, especially where there is already a solution to these three problems. The moderators will have no basis at all to warn or send bans to anyone who performs any of these actions - and of course, these three are easily arguable by the player if he or she wishes to argue the case, and will just result in the further stockpiling of support tickets that Anet would recieve.

3) Anet will have to "hire" their moderators and then monitor their efforts every so often. The moderators will be put under the pressure of the gaming public. Any screw-up they make will hit all of the forums in minutes, and will cause stress to Anet. (Personally I have enough time reading through redundant posts, just to make sure noone takes them seriously)

Having moderators is the worst solution against these things in which the OP has outlined as "problems"

First lets get some facts straight ...

Read the ROC 5 and also read section 4 (j) of the user agreement. I don’t mind the, “oops i got it in the wrong channel,” and have even done it in the past myself but i believe it is the constant spamming of sell/buy info in the ALL channel that annoys me and yes, it says that is a breach of conduct.

What you find appropriate is irrelevant ... what the game rating is set to and I DO believe and correct me if I’m wrong by all means, but this is a TEEN rating game (meaning 12+ and above, like it says on the box) so the language IMHO is “G” Rated including all parts of the game’s contents. This would include user chat (again read User agreement 4(j))

Yes and by default it is set to ON …. But this doesn’t stop ppl trying to get around it and BTW that is also a breach of the user agreement 4(j)

Seems to be a common thread here??? Did you do any research before typing this at all??? I did.

hmmmmmm … I have done a lot of moderating in a lot of different places from bulletin boards to chat programs and forums and never have I ever banned or restricted anyone for a one-off mistake … unless it was a obvious major breach of conduct and the user knew EXACTLY what he was doing, not a innocent mistake.

Not as many as u think … moderators rely on YOU, the ppl to report areas of problems and then they confirm or deny the existence of it
I believe it would be players who do this job in their spare time for the enjoyment of helping ppl …. This could also include bug reporting and helping with issues of where to find and set options in the game options (something like tech issues also)
And lastly I believe that if you got nothing to hide, who cares who is watching???

The idea is not to keep ppl in fear … its to encourage ppl to do the right thing and like I said there is no need for that many … as the players are the eyes and ears of the program … as long as there is an easy place to find a person to report these issues to (maybe a “Help Outpost” available from a NPC in Ascalon, Shing Jea, Kaieng, Guildhall, and the PVP area somewhere

Myself … I would rather have a person moderating me anyday then a Program that THINKS it knows what I doing

The cheapest and easiest way is to use the ppl that know the program FOR FREE … yes volunteers … yes the gamers. However, the challenge is to pick the right ppl and moderate them continuously. I’m sure that ANET would be a lot different to AOL in this case as this is their livelihood and understand the consequences of not doing it properly

So in closing, if it was done correctly and with the right ppl it would be a much better place to be. The benefits outweigh the few little whines of the few.

proof.. nazis
they deleted my post here

omg...hows about we get started(flamers START YOUR ENGINES cause here i go!)

yeah if you read it, it says and i quote(literally)

im not gonna quote section 4j, its long, but says more of the same.did i miss the part about the buy/sell info.o wait nope its not there. it says spam or flood in regard to ANY message.

next,

ACTUALLY anet says and i quote(again literally)

and if you read that purty little box it says "ESRB rating T for Teen ***game experience may change during online play***do you have any IDEA why they put that there?

and NEXT,

we HAVE those moderators viper its called the support team who are a mere email away. everyone here is talking about moderators actually WATCHING what we do. not simply governing it in the 3rd person

im pretty sure they wouldnt leave their game in the hands of completely untrained and unknown people. and how reliable would these people be?? not just abusing their power but perhaps completely ignoring it. And what if THEY do something wrong? just a few quirks in the system.


did these quotes answer your question by any chance? and im not sure you completely did all of your research.granted i prolly missed a few things myself(which IM SURE youll be happy to point out soon) however im not gonna flame every poster here.


NOW onto MY thoughts lol. sorry guys its ALMOST over. I actually dont like the idea of moderators in every place. Cause if it works the way the OP suggested it WOULD take a LOT of people. what 33 mission areas times god knows how many districts PLUS major cities and other mission-like areas. that is a LOT of people that would need to be hired. cause im pretty sure it wouldnt be simple gamers.(granted they may be gamers at first but im pretty sure they would HIRE them and pay them some ammount of money if not have them work at the A-Net headquarters or w/e) beacause shifts would have to be made. I've had a ton of friends that have been falsely accused and banned by A-net before and i have a feeling adding in moderators could make the situation worse.(granted it COULD make it better)
SECOND(and last) im almost positive that A-Net will NEVER implement GMs into the game. because most of the problems we have addressed here,spam,obsinity,etc., they have taken messures to fix already ie. chat filters,spam blockers,etc. as well as opened the support line to gamers with questions/reports. this was their cheap solution and im pretty sure they will stick to them.

ta da now im done!(have i won the longest post award yet?)(i hope some people(read:viper) get to read this before the admins delete my poor really long post)

Viper1769.

Perhap you should re-read 4 (j) of the user agreement.
It does not mention the trade channel at all.

The original posters comment was about not using the Trade chat, that isn't defined. No where is it said to trade an item it most only be done in the trade chat. I can trade in the general (all) and alliance and guild if I want and it perfectly fine!

Spamming is noted, but hey we have spam filters in place.
And which spamming is wrong
WTS Noob rod of Noobness!
LFG Mo/Me Mission
Where is _______ located?

I disagree with the inappropriate language section since there is already a language filter, but I also rarely swear in All (general). But then again its a social thing. My country men have a habit of using some language that others deem inappropriate.
So perhaps moderators would have a vaild point here, but the original post suggested Mods in every outpost and Arena! Which isn't required.
Just report such behaviour like you can now.

As for the game rating, The PEGI system(Pan Europe system) is a voluntary system in which the ratings are carried out by members of the game industry itself.
Naturally they would want to sell more copies of a game. I don't think GW is 12+, But that's a personal opinion. But the rating isn't an imposed system. By there own information games rated 12+ are checked after the rating has been granted.

And it's the game that is rated 12+ not the actions of people playing. Thats what moderation is about.

I take you expert moderation opinion into account when you've moderated a online game. untill then its just your experience; which is lacking basis to the matter.

Whoa its amazing how you just suggested the currecnt reporting process and player support process, but included a second step; Moderators.

Any person can screen cap and send in a report, there is already a /bug command. There is even the new tech overlay that assists in helping with the tech side, press Shift-F10 ingame to see what I mean.
Moderators would just be players who run to mommy complaining!

Anet would not give volunteer players kick rights, reason: abuse!
Then you'll need a Moderator to moderate the moderators.
And if there paid staff, thats raises the cost of running the game.

There are already systems in place, and ways that Anet deals with these problems. Ie the filters, there not perfect but hey they helped.
Moderators won't stop all the hassels, just like banning bot accounts hasn't stopped botting.

Monk Mystic,
Nice catch with the 18yrs, I knew I had seen it somewhere, but I got lost in the volunteer game classification

/not sighned

If anet did this they would have to higher more people or have current employess stop what thier doing now to do this.

Should anet higher more people thier is the problem of money. They would need to get his extra money from somewere without cutting into thier current profits. This could result in monthly fees or higher cost for further game expansions.

If anet were to have thier people stop what they are currently doing then they would lose productivity capabilities resulting in less updates, longer time periods between expansions, and bugs would take longer to fix.

I admit i didn't look through all the other post so i apoligize if i've repeated anything that's already been stated.

thats what im here for, there was a lot of stuff viper really needed to reread a few more times.

moderators to moderate moderators? I think we can take out the middle person here, otherwise you're wasting resources.

/signed

EASPECIALLY around New player Areas. I'v even seen "Hacked Althea's Ashs! 10k! Use as many times as you want! Never Wears out!"

Good thing they have a Report function.