Long term ban instead of permanent ban

Hello, everyone. Maybe it's shameless for me to mention this topic

However, after several months of investigation, I still want to send this article to know what you think.

I wonder if we can pass a long-term ban, such as three months, one year or two years

These so-called long-term bans replace the permanent bans. I think so because some players may make mistakes because they don't understand the rules or "try to see", such as "voting abuse".

For several months, I've come up to read these articles on blocked appeals, trying to sort out their mistakes and so on.

Some of them are due to RWT, some are due to account sharing, and most of them are vote abuse.

WHY I COME TO SAY THIS

Let me give you a simple example

https://royals.ms/forum/threads/ban-appeal.190395/

The protagonist of this article is a friend I know.
He is not very familiar with the operation of the computer. Once the page gets stuck or something goes wrong, he usually just presses refresh to refresh the page.
When it doesn't work, he only asks for other people's opinions. He got stuck when he voted that day, so she went to our discord group and asked us what to do,
We have a friend who replied to him and asked him to use his mobile phone or other computers to have a try. As a result, the silly boy still got stuck when voting with his mobile phone.
Then he decided to use other computers to vote.
In the end, it turned out that the page only ran slowly, and he succeeded in voting for the first time. As a result, because of his poor operation, he was directly banned.

At first, I was amused.

I thought this kind of thing should not be permanently banned. After all, he did not vote on two accounts like me for a period of time, which was only 14 days at most.

However, the result was not that GM directly permanently banned his account, which made me very surprised, because this person did not abuse voting maliciously from beginning to end, It's just that you've done a terrible thing operationally.

All in all, I want to say that I think this kind of permanent ban lacks a mechanism, that is, to judge whether the players are malicious and whether they will change themselves. I think the existence of such rules is necessary, and there is less "opportunity for players to review and correct".

For example, there is a player who uses voting abuse to earn points, but after getting a long-term ban, he does not do the same thing again after returning to the normal game, and knows that his mistakes are not worth the loss.

In this way, it will be better than blocking him permanently, and making the server lose the player group of him and his friends forever.

This is not good for both sides. This is my personal view.

And I think in some cases, GM did not carefully examine whether the person's words and deeds were credible, so it directly banned him.

This is like in the real world, someone made a mistake, but his mistake was not sentenced to death, but the judge still directly sentenced him to death.
In this server, he was deprived of the chance to live.

At the same time, I also hope that GM can make some concessions in dividing the degree of voting abuse and correcting its attitude.

Thanks for Mapleroyals GM Let me know that my friend was lied to us

 

The unfortunate truth is that if your friend was permanently banned for vote abuse, then they lied to you in claiming that they had accidentally double voted only once due to a slow connection.

 

@Sen with the quick, succinct truth bonk.

 

I'll just say that permanent bans in certain cases, depending on the intention of the user, or in the worst case, are pointless because:
1. RWT cases: RWTers know it's illegal. They'll just make more accounts to ban evade. Those who obey the permanent ban will most likely migrate to another server. RWTers for them means business. As long as they earn profit from this server, it doesn't matter what you state in your ToS. They'll just make more accounts to ban evade.
Result = Malicious users evade ban, "Potential" Playerbase loss.

2. Vote abusers: Some intentionally vote abuse, some don't, just like in the example OP provided. It is possible even I technically could vote abuse as I was not totally aware of how the voting system worked UNTIL, so I took my time to read the rules besides that I would not know the specific points about what is considered vote abuse or not. Same as above, those who vote abuse to hoard NX and then sell APR through RWT know what they're doing. For them permanent ban means nothing, they'll keep making more accounts and then again those who actually "obey" the rules will migrate to another server.
Result = Malicious users will still ban evade. More "potential" playerbase loss.

3. Account sharing: Since we are giving our opinion on this, I think permabanning people with account sharing when they haven't done anything else wrong shouldn't warrant them a permanent ban. A proper way to punish account sharing without banishing the player of the server is to give them a larger ban duration. Say 6 months should be enough to discourage anyone from account sharing. And if they're caught. Yes that's right. Another 6 months, or why not, raise the ban duration for a whole year. Instead they are permannently banned because one would normally assume it's okay to share your account with your brother, cousin, friend, girlfriend or anyone who's interested in the game and just wants to have some fun. I think the punishment for this ban is too harsh and counterproductive.
Or in extreme account sharing cases, terminating the involved shared accounts should be more than enough to give the player a "warning", a "lesson" how you prefer to call it, let them play again as new players from scratch. Sometimes the blow is too hard you simply don't have the motivation to start all over again after you lost all because of one dumb mistake. And this is even worse than getting your account permannently banned, which it is losing the will to try playing the game again. I don't know the numbers but for me it seems like a large number of the playerbase, even some GM admitted to account share. One of those ex-GM is not allowed to play back in the server despite the effort and support he gave into while fulfiling his role as a GM. The other GM... I can't say much but from what I've seen was given another chance to play the server instead of serving a permanent ban.
Result = Inconsistent punishment regarding this infraction. Some players who admitted to account sharing are permanently banned, while some others not. Rules should be enforced always and there should be no exceptions to the rule, either you ban everyone or no one for account sharing.

4. The way permanent bans are used. Once you are permanently banned, you as a person are no longer welcome to this server. Right? I know for a fact people who attempt to ban evade, try to avoid as many mistakes as possible and attempt to play the game cleanly and legit to try not get caught at ban evading. Because I have known a bunch of them in my short time playing this server, If It weren't for reports (specifically, revenge reports when player x no longer likes player y and report them for the sake of getting that player out of the server. A bit off-topic but this is a common practice within the spanish-latin community and why sometimes you will see large groups of spanish guilds flaming each other is because of this) that directly address them as ban evaders, these people would totally sneak with no clue of the GM's of who are actual rule breakers and who are playing the game cleanly. In other words they would be still be here alive and well, if of course not were for the hatred of people who reports them.

I mean the point of a permanent ban is to banish the player of the server because that player is hurting the server in someway or another right?

I would like that someone explains me how someone that account shares with his friends or girlfriend hurts the server in any meaningful way, it's not like they are hacking and RWTing to fuck up the server and inflate the economy, it's not like they are exploiting potential abusable glitches or something. It's just them sharing data on people they believe they can trust to do so.

My conclusion is: They don't want to reduce the permanent ban sentence for major infractions like these because that means a new door for ban appeals would open, if one banned player succesfully appeals his permanent ban in a scenario where the ban is not supposed to be lifted, many other permabanned players will follow this. This huge wave of new ban appeals would overwhelm the current staff that is handling the ban appeals section and they simply don't have time to deal with more ban appeals. That's why when you do a major infraction, you're no longer welcome as a player, because it's simpler for staff to discard these rule-breakers instead of considerating them and appeal on a case-per case scenario. This is optimal to reduce workload for staff, but also heavily punishes new/clueless players who are permanently banned on 1st try without previous warning.

My suggestion: For Vote abuse and Account sharing cases, instead of permabanning on the first try you should just punish them with a regular ban duration.
If the same player does the same offense again, then yes I could agree with GM's stance on permabanning them on the 2nd infraction.
Sometime like: "We will allow this mistake because it was your first offense, but you're still getting punished with a temporal ban duration. Consider this as a warning as the next infraction will be a PERMANENT BAN."

Also on some ban appeals, "The amount of x times you voted in y time period warrants you a permanent ban"
This quantity is never revealed, it's like there is a threshold to this limit but it's kept secret for some reason. Or there is no clarification about it. Why?
What's the limit to vote abusing before a temporal ban is shifted to permanent ban?
10k NX is the limit?
or it is 20k NX?
what if is 50k NX?
100k NX warrants the permanent ban?
1000000k NX????? Triple permanent banana?

Shouldn't instead these guys who vote abused massively "as their first offense" be issued a ban duration that is PROPORTIONAL to the amount of times they have been vote abusing? Again, a larger ban duration like 6-month should discourage "accidental" vote abusers from attempting it again.
Or something simple as removing their voting rights proportional to the same amount of time and votes they abused. Or why not both?

I think this way you can differentiate "malicious abusers" from "accidental or operational jerks that don't work how internet works"

And one last thing.
For god sake, don't assume everyone knows the rules just because they earned the Well-Behaved Child medal. It is technically possible to achieve the medal even if the text were in Chinese and the player had no clue of Chinese. This is a poor implementation to "enforce" the rules. You actually "enforce" the rules by giving large, but not permanent ban periods for those who breaks the rules. FORCE players to ban appeal before they are allowed to play the game after the ban duration is over. Then you explain them why they were temporarily banned in the first place.
A permanent ban does not "enforce" the rules any better, instead, it discourages you from playing and move to another server instead.

Also, don't assume because foreign languages subforums exists, player should know in their native language what are and how the rules works.
You do not need to create a forum account in order te be able to play the game.

We all commit mistakes. If you don't believe as a staff your playerbase can learn from their mistakes, you may as well change the ToS to make every single punishable offense a permanent ban instead, while we're at it.

Also, putting a red text with caps like, "YOU CAN GET PERMANENTLY BANNED FOR VOTE ABUSING", on the voting website, could help too. Even if you're not a native english speaker it is more than enough to discourage players from vote abusing as it is a very specific and more direct warning.

 

I think it's a pretty obvious reminder every time a player vote. You can't accidentally vote 3 accounts on a daily basis

 

I approve of this.
Links to my ban appeals.

https://royals.ms/forum/posts/471796/

https://royals.ms/forum/posts/644463/


For context, in the first appeal I was hacked because presumably I shared my account information with someone else on a different private server as my accounts on both servers shared the same credentials. The person making that appeal was the hacker and I intervened to ensured it stayed banned.


In the next, I am banned for sharing/willing to share account information, yet nothing ever happened of it. I was and am permanently banned from MapleRoyals violating the rules and conditions of MapleRoyals while not playing MapleRoyals. And if I'm not playing MapleRoyals how am I supposed to remember that account sharing was illegal

I am so banned that I am not even allowed to create other accounts to play, I am banned as a person, while I have not exploited anything, not abused anything, nor even acted maliciously towards anyone.

It's been 3 years.

I could be on my deathbed at age 70, try to appeal my ban and still get the "Sorry, nope"

 

Yet there is no further clarification of what would happen if anyone voted more than once per day.
For the ignorant that doesn't know how the punishment/infraction system works, it may come natural into them to think their NX would be revoked or their voting rights could be revoked. "Oh yeah I vote abused, so what's the big deal? Just remove my NX and give me a temporal sentence". That's what many think.
DESPITE intentionally doing in, some of these people MAY not know that some of these infractions (account sharing, vote abuse), may eventually lead into a permanent ban. One would naturally think that the voting system would eventually punish you instead of the staff having to track manually each user's voting history. The reason some people aren't permanently banned is simply because sometimes staff is able to "catch" them vote abusing before the amount of vote abuses turn into a permanent ban. I think this is the main point.

If you ask me, the voting system is just so flawed and the developers don't have time to look at it, that it's simply left as it is and instead a bunch of rules is placed to prevent abuse instead of automating a voting system that can't be abused. But then again I'm no developer and I don't know how feasible is this to do.
Something like... autoban for the voting system.

 

Come on Staff, you can do better. Adding this additional warning in the voting website isn't that hard.

 

The permanent ban is to make the hackers/abusers dont have any hope anymore, i guess (or actually i think they still ban evade anyway).
But from how miserable they look like on the appeal, no one know if they are really dont know the rules or just a very good actor. I have a really nice friend to me and he got banned for rwt too, and i still think he is innocent and being very sad for his ban until he tell me the truth (lol).

However i agree sometimes read ban appeal feel very sad for some case got permanent ban because they seems like dont know rules.

The only way i think good is to "force" new players to read rules and i think they make it through Shanks questions already. Its not just a pop-up message to remind u read rules but its a must thing to do if you want to pass Maple island. That question is kinda annoying because even 1 answer wrong then we have to do all over again and is good chance to force new players care about rules.

From when the Shank question is release, if any new players still said that they not aware of rules here, im kinda dont believe it or they really want to take risk to get ban.

Many players got banned make server become less and less player, i agree as i seen some players got banned here play in other server. They prob can ban evade to play here but living with a mask on and cant even talk to their old friends and nervous of get caught on ban evade will discourage them soon to stop and move to other server.

Agree that sometimes feel the rules quite tough and can make lose some players (mostly are hackers, abusers) gone but if rewrite it as give them a second chance from now, many maybe will comeback? And GM will got more work to monitor them if they break rules the second time to ban them forever? Idk if they will agree on that.

Also agree on that picture of leodexe xD, that will be so obvious and no new vote abusers gonna make ban appeal anymore.

 

I'll vote for:
Account sharing: at max 6month ban instead of perma. Second offense would be another 6month.
Vote abuse: at max 6month ban, along with removing all excessively voted nx (if it's possible)
Rwt: perma ban, since it's still not fair for rwter to be release from 6month ban.
Hacker: perma ban.
Glitch abuse: 6month at max, following offense would be another 6month after 3times.

Some of the offenses doesn't hurt the server much after releasing from ban, some does, imo.

Well, let's see hows the autoban goes, if it's still relevant lmao.

 

Account sharing: at max 6month ban instead of perma, not sure the length on first offenses. I don't even think this should warrant a ban salve for a few cases as powerleving an account. Second offense both accounts deleted.
Vote abuse: at max first offense 30 days with nx deleted, second one account deleted and 6 month of ip/mac ban, if after 6 months they still abusing perma ban.
Rwt: A laughable permaban (they will just evade and keep RWT, for those people is just a business)
Hacker: perma ban no doubts.
Botters: 15 days if it was a weight, account deleted if it was programmed or something, don't quite understand how this works and account deleted, last one perma ban.
Glitch abuse: if it is just smuggling an skill on the event map I don't really see the harm on it, could be just a warning 3/7 days, same if it is a silly glitch. This one should be treated case by case since some glitch are just harmless while others like Intentional duping deserves a perma ban right away with not even a chance to appeal.
We are loosing more and more players for silly things when an account delete or a 6 month could change them, the game is practically dead at some times and you can find a lot of these banned guys playing on other servers following every single rule to don't screw it up that time, I know this because I got a few friends banned that invited me to try another server and talked a lot to them but still, a good number of our players are even ban evaders trying to no break any single rule and not getting involved in any kind of drama to not get caught and keep playing royals, isn't that a signal that people can change and deserves a second time?

 

Yes, but this guy is stupid enough to vote for the same account with three different devices.

Then I want to say a point you don't think much about is,

"how can someone be stupid enough to steal points and then vote three times with the same account?"

It's stupid in terms of crime.

It's just as ridiculous as someone grabbing a bank with a banana or an apple.

And what's even funnier is that he was sentenced to death after doing it. LOL

 

Well... this just sucks. I cannot say much but still you got a permanent ban despite not being a hacker, not being a RWTer, not being a major vote abuser, not even a glitch exploiter, etc.
You got a permanent ban despite your mistakes as a player didn't hurt the server in any meaningful way. Maybe someone got unfair advantage but that's easy to solve as terminating the account nullifies all the unfair advantage gained making you lose all your time which is the point of the punishment, but on top of that you're not allowed to play again here anymore.
Like what's the point anyways?

 

As for this I can understand it, since if they say what is the "limit" between minor and major vote abuse people will vote until they reach that limit and keep voting during their 15 days ban instead of asking for a 15 days self ban lol.

 

So I thought about this, but why not put this in at least 2 of the more common languages as well on that page? In Chinese and in Spanish. I think that would also help some people who are first timers not get perma'd.

 

There's already copies of the TnC in those languages. Spanish should be in the spanish subforum, and there was a website that was essentially royals in chinese (I think) but it was maintained by a former staff. No idea what happened to it.

 

You mean this? > https://royals.ms/forum/threads/vote-abuse-confession.189396/
If that's so, then that means one can vote abuse coordinately and then before reaching the unknown treshold, we make a ban appeal self-reporting us resulting in not a permaban, as in Kenny's words:

https://royals.ms/forum/threads/vote-abuse-confession-and-apologize.191201/#post-1121870

With the proper trial and fail until you figure out the threshold by yourself, theoretically this can be exploited, or am I wrong?

 

For this to work effectively you would need to force the players to make a forum account before being able to play the game. Not all players will use the forum first-hand and even they can spend a meaningful amount of time on the game before realizing there's more stuff that can be done in the forums.

 

I'll be completely honest with you... This is the first time that i have actually read what it says and it is because we are discussing it, but everytime i vote it's just entering the id, click and click again, that's it. I did read the terms and conditions when I first started in the server, but I also assume that most people doesn't and a large number of player doesn't even have a forum account tho

 

That's fantastic till you realize you don't need a forum account to see the TnC, or the spanish subforum where the spanish TnC is.

Edit: Here it is for those curious. Could use with an update but the important bits are there
https://royals.ms/forum/threads/terminos-condiciones-del-juego.111356/