Game Moderators: What do you think?

[NightlyH]

Ok, so I have heard from alot of people that they don't like that way the multiplayer games are set up because of people breaking the rules! I feel the same way, because I see lots of people breaking rules on the game all the time but I don't think they know they are doing it. I have met a few people that said "I did not even know their were rules" o3o... And I don't think people are reporting the way they should or they don't know they can report! Now would it be great to have mods that strictly monitor the chats. I mean, we have forum mods to keep things going smoothly on the site, why don't we have multiplayer mods. I know the chat lexicon is VERY user safe but it is not always the words that can make you upset, sometimes it could be powerplays or simply bad RP's. And sometimes reporting is not enough. So that is why I thought of game mods, because I know people are upset over the whole powerplays and such. Now I know this sounds REALLY out their and might not happen but it is a thought and I want to say it.

I want you to tell me what you think about game moderators, I have already had a few people tell me to make a topic so I did ^^

Here is a quote from Cana about the topic, this may also help with thoes bug reports! Thanks Cana ^^

Well, Nightly-howler asked for my two cents, so here it is. Good luck getting through it all.

I don't personally support specified in-game moderators mostly because it may lead people to believe that the in-game moderators would be the only people who can report, when really, I want to encourage every single person who has ever seen inappropriate language or behavior to take the time to report it. I would love it if we could allow specific users to go into a game without taking up a space (be invisible, basically), but that would require quite a bit of new programming, and we unfortunately don't have the funding for something like that. That's the same story for an in-game report button... we actually discussed that but decided against it mostly because of the amount of spam it would create.

While we can't add new programming, we have already programmed an official list of rules (the same one as in the FAQ) that shows up before you start a game that you have to click to 'agree' to in order to play. So having a clear set of rules actually within the game should help people realize what is and isn't appropriate for WolfQuest. If we have space, we'll also include the link to the abuse report form within those rules. We also changed every page within the WolfQuest website to include a link to report abuse, rather than having the page hidden and sometimes hard to find.

With more and more people being aware of how to send in a proper abuse report, I've received quite a few that can actually lead to a warning or ban because that person included proof. Prior to the last 6 months or so, it was fairly rare to receive an abuse report with proof, and I, for the most part, had to just delete them all. So this has been a really great change and I think has helped deal with some of the behavior.

So I don't want to make my post super long, but I'll add this since it seems like it's not super clear to everyone what happens when you send an abuse report. When you send an abuse report, here's what happens:

• You receive an automated e-mail and the abuse report shows up in my inbox.
• I go through each abuse report (delete gibberish) and take note of inappropriate players
• If the report included proof, I either make a note to warn/ban the player when I receive more reports to deal with at one time, or I warn/ban them immediately.
• If the report does not include proof but does report something that's not allowed, I take note of the username and make a list for the moderators to look out for while patrolling games.
• If the report includes a word that shouldn't be allowed (like 'breading'), I add it to the list of words to filter out of the game, and that's updated once monthly.

So with all this means that if I'm at all behind on reading e-mails or have a lot of reports to go through, it may take a few weeks before an inappropriate player is warned or banned. I'm trying to do things more quickly than I used to, but can't always guarantee an immediate response. I receive about 30-50 abuse reports daily, about half of which are just gibberish or repeat e-mails but still take time to go through.

But no matter what, long story short, if everyone who sees inappropriate behavior reports it properly with proof, I'm more than willing to deal with receiving more reports if it means we're removing inappropriate players and future inappropriate behavior.

[Croix]

Nice to see you make the topic :3
I think it's a good idea to have game moderators, and like Nightly-Howler said, sometimes people on multiplayer don't even know there are rules, simply because they just sign up to go on the game, not the actual website (even I did that when I first started a few years ago). I see people being bullied on multiplayer quite often, and most of the time no one reports it. I also see people looking for mates and doing... other activities >.<, even though the word "mate" was taken off the chat lexicon itself, again, not a lot of people report it.
Also, roleplaying is fine, but if it gets out of hand, i.e. constant, bloody battles, people attempting to "kill" other wolves, or just someone (or a group of people) being rude and mean to people who aren't doing anything, it would be nice for someone to be there quickly and tell them right there to stop it and explain the rules.
Now, I'm not sure what it would take to do this, but I think it's a great idea.

[NightlyH]

I found a way for it to work! When something or someone o3o is being bad the user reporting them can press a key and then on the chat select a red light will be next to the name so the game mod can go in and settle things! That is so the mod knows where to go and when to stop it!

[ObsidianBlossom]

Although this is already on the list of ideas for future episodes and such, I personally think the idea should be discussed a bit more. Game Moderators would be pretty cool, but I would think it would be hard to be put the ability to ban people from the game and close chats into the game, never mind having that linked to specific accounts. It would be nice if they could log into a game anonymously with no one else knowing to search for inappropriate behavior. They would still be able to join normally, but the option would be there if they wanted. In the mean time, I wish there was a way to show people how to report accurately and easily. Just today, I saw a chat titled HumanBreadingRpg and that's just... not acceptable. As soon as I went in to report them, they closed the chat. So, obviously in-game mods are really, really needed. Maybe they could have the power to report/temporarily ban someone while still in the game?

[Croix]

...Game Moderators would be pretty cool, but I would think it would be hard to be put the ability to ban people from the game and close chats into the game, never mind having that linked to specific accounts. Maybe they could have the power to report/temporarily ban someone while still in the game?

Yeah, I think the difficult part would be figuring out how the moderators could do their job... >.<
But I do agree with you, in my mind, they are really needed.

[NightlyH]

That... Is just wrong o3o! But you are right, but I did not mean closing the chat. What I did mean is the mods had the option to report right away with a simple key press. Like a web page would come up and then he/she could report them before the chat is closed.

[Croix]

... Like a web page would come up and then he/she could report them before the chat is closed.

I guess that is a good idea, but some people don't have really fast internet, so it could take forever to load/report.

[NightlyH]

The web page could be made of HTML text and boxes only! They load VERY fast and are meant for people who have slow internet! Maybe the mods could have an option to select HTML or normal

[ObsidianBlossom]

Well, I thought that being able to close chats would be used when there isn't reason to report but the chat is taking a suspicious turn or two players start getting into a fight and won't calm down, such as: Assume that two players have a disagreement about an RP or something and someone calls in a Mod, or a mod happens to be there. The mod tells everyone to calm down before they do something such as harassment or swearing that is worthy of reporting. Nothing is resolved, but there still isn't any real reason to ban the players, so the mod tells them again they need to calm down, explains why they are closing the chat, and the chat ends. I don't know, maybe it isn't needed, but this is a thread for discussing the idea, so I threw it out there. either way, game mods would be a huge step in the right direction, as far as I'm concerned. And reporting in-game would be nice, although that's off-topic. Some people's games crash when they open a web-page while running WQ, so that might not be the best idea..

[NightlyH]

Well, I thought that being able to close chats would be used when there isn't reason to report but the chat is taking a suspicious turn or two players start getting into a fight and won't calm down, such as: Assume that two players have a disagreement about an RP or something and someone calls in a Mod, or a mod happens to be there. The mod tells everyone to calm down before they do something such as harassment or swearing that is worthy of reporting. Nothing is resolved, but there still isn't any real reason to ban the players, so the mod tells them again they need to calm down, explains why they are closing the chat, and the chat ends.

Oh, sorry. Yes that is a good idea and would be better than reporting users. I am sure if this does happen the admins will know what to do and things would have to be approved before anything would happen.

[ObsidianBlossom]

It's fine. I was just explaining the idea more. I can't help but think that all of this would increase the amount of reported and banned offensive users, but that would also increase the amount of reports that Cana has to look into and deal with, especially if the majority of the overwhelming large amount of bad chats I see everyday are reported. How would they manage to keep up with it all?

[NightlyH]

How would they manage to keep up with it all?

Hmm, you are right... Maybe they could have a whole new address for the reports. So Cana wont have to go through everyone! Or they have a new admin for just reviewing reports o3o

[Croix]

It's fine. I was just explaining the idea more. I can't help but think that all of this would increase the amount of reported and banned offensive users, but that would also increase the amount of reports that Cana has to look into and deal with, especially if the majority of the overwhelming large amount of bad chats I see everyday are reported. How would they manage to keep up with it all?

Well I supposed that should be expected when you are at the head of a website like WolfQuest.

[ObsidianBlossom]

True, Croix, but still. Cana probably has more important matters, and having reports handled swiftly would be best. The mods could all help, if they don't already, (I'm not sure, I guess that could work..) or otherwise:
Pretty radical idea just for in-game mods. Maybe they could choose a few people who have the power to also go through the reports and take any necessary actions? Like, they could be regular mods, in-game mods who apply for the position, or even just qualified regular members? It would be more then one so that reports could be dealt with faster, and they wouldn't necessarily have any other powers on the forum, other than the aforementioned.. But they would have to be people we know wouldn't abuse the power or bring personal bias into the matter when reviewing reports. Like I said, it's just a radical idea I'm throwing out for discussion, I'm open to better and less complicated suggestions.

[Thandi]

Actually, we kinda already do. :3

You see, reporters are actually sort of like game moderators because they have the same purpose: Putting a stop to innapropriate multiplayer games. In fact, I used to belong to this 'program' the WolfQuest Innapropriate Graph-a Something or Something. (I forgot the name) But, they gave jobs to people to graph how much innapropriate-ness there really is in WolfQuest.

So, yup, I guess we already do, I'm just not sure if that 'program' is active or not.