Suggestion: When a person receives a ban, he or she should be told clearly which rules in the Terms&Conditions he or she is violating. (via ban message when trying to log in/abuse report on forums) Reason: I'm really sorry to bring up Cheesecake again, but his situation just happened to be a really good (and recent) example. His last post in his ban appeal states that he thinks that he violated Section 5 one time & Section 8 two times, while Katsuruka Admin and Daniel GM state throughout the ban appeal that he has been banned for breaking only one rule three times(5. Engage in rude, unlawful, harassing, vulgar, obscene, hateful, threatening, abusive or otherwise objectionable behavior, including, without limitation, looting, kill stealing, making sexual comments; Punishment: 1st offence - 3 day ban, 2nd offence - 7 day ban, 3rd offence - permanent ban). As seen in this thread, many players are confused about whether or not he had violated Rule 5 three times or Rule 5 one times & Rule 8 two times. There was a lot of discussion due to different interpretations of the rules. Staff should make sure to explicitly state which rules are being violated in the future. On a side note, it is also probably a good idea to rewrite/reword the Terms & Conditions so that they are more easily understood and not open to too many different interpretations. Thank you for taking your time to read this.
I do believe that there needs to be clarification when it comes to that rule (rule 8). I would not be opposed to specifically informing people which rule number they broke when responding to ban appeals. I, personally, have no problem with this. Since I became a GM in September 2013 we re wrote the rules about 20 times, it's almost impossible to create a perfect set of rules. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't always strive to make them better. Good feedback.
Just dont harass, KS, bot, or smega the two forbidden words. Idk whats so hard about it. If you need to be punished for this 3 times, you deserve the perma
Omg. <3 Ofc rules can be changed. That's the whole point of this thing. People saying "Don't speak your mind because rules are rules and you should just shut your face and deal with it" seems so silly to me. It's always good to discuss and always good to try and improve No harm in talking. <3 Daniel
Do we have custom ban reasons in game yet? If we do, a good idea could be to put the rule number into the ban message.
What I mean is, inform the player of which rule exactly they are violating. For example, "______" has been banned for violating Section (#) of the Terms & Conditions. This way, the player & the staff can clearly see that the SAME RULE has been broken three times & so that there can be no further discussion on the matter. If it is clearly stated that Rule (#) has been violated at the time of each of the bans, there is less discussion from the other party since it had been made clear at the times the bans occurred.
I personally believe anything is up for discussion. There are never any promises that rules will be changed, but player input is very important to us. EDIT: Okay not EVERYTHING is up for discussion. Everything that @GoodDoodoo mentioned will remain bannable offenses.
To be honest, us English-fluent people have no excuse nor any reason to first break a rule, then have the audacity to try to worm our way out of it. If you break a rule, you should be punished. Break too many (this imo should be up to Matt/John, not dictated by breaking the same rule 3 times) and you will be permanently blocked. The fact that said person was banned multiple times kind of hints to them that they need to stop, REGARDLESS of which rule # he thought he broke! To give an example, if you're on a final written warning at work due to misconduct, fucking around isn't the smartest idea, and you'd do your best to keep your head down and do nothing that could affect your integrity from now on. If I were banned multiple times, I would for sure stop misbehaving because my days on the game would be numbered.
Wouldnt that just help people to troll and try to break some Rules twice to provocate. I dont think you can receive a permanent ban accidently... You need to provocate and forcing the rule breaks. And i dont think it should be easier to avoid the perm by giving them a chance to count how many times which Rules.
As I said in a chat with a group of players, I'm not going to waste my time sitting around while others play Mr. Lawyer saying "Well I didn't TECHNICALLY earn a permanent ban because I broke rules 1 -20 only once each." If you've been banned 20 times, I don't care what you think should happen, odds are, you've earned yourself a permanent ban. There's a reason a clause exists at the top of the T&C stating staff has final authority to interpret and/or change any and all punishments as they see fit. The idea of not being permanently banned unless you break the same rule 3 times is to ensure that someone being banned once for SMEGA in another language for example, and that putting them on their 2nd warning and closer to a permanent ban.
Yeah, I agree. And even if the 3 rules broken were technically different numbers, the player still could have demonstrated a pattern of unwanted behavior and shown that they are not learning from their bans. Any 3 non trivial bans racked up by a player (e.g. KS'ing, then botting, then being a dick to somebody in FM) that happen within a certain time frame is a good reason for the admins and GM's to no longer want said player to be a part of the server. Lets not forget that we have some individuals who are famous in the minor offences section, tending to just manage to hide from bans, and when they do get bans, they aren't necessarily for the same reason each time. Staff discretion will hopefully wipe them out eventually...
My own opinion, too, is that if you keep breaking the rules and keep getting banned...obviously either you haven't read the rules, or you're purposely ignoring them. There is no excuse to be banned, ever, really. Outside of accidental bans which is what the ban appeal forum is originally for. Accidental bans from the autoban system being wrong. It's not made to appeal because you were being a dick to people multiple times, ignoring GM warnings, purposely going around and doing what you were just asked not to do.. If you were asked to not smega "hail hitler", and you were banned for it once- what gives you the smart idea to go around and do it again? Or to name your pet Hitler and post a Hitler style video on a thread right after you were banned for it? My own opinion, once again, is that people who do things like that are intentionally pushing the line just to see who they can annoy and how long they can go before they get in trouble for it. It's like getting a referral in school for calling someone names, then the next day you turn around and do it again behind the teacher's back and laugh about it. Then you get detention when the teacher finds out. And obviously you didn't learn your lesson, as you turn around and start doing it once more- only to get suspended. Obviously we're not a school. Bans are your warning. The rules are your warning. They're clearly outlined and if English isnt your first language, you're more than welcome to ask someone for help in understanding a rule. Honestly it just reminds me of this:
Oh my lord. I was not referring specifically to Cheesecake. I WAS USING THAT INCIDENT AS AN EXAMPLE. I just thought it would be a good idea to reword the Terms & Conditions and/or tell players specifically which rules they were breaking. I thought "harassment" as a ban seemed a bit vague. That was all. Jeez.
