The Sad Direction of the Official Forums...

[Traltor]

Just as I feared with the very small number of people who were okay with the insertion of RealID, the forums are becoming a desolate grounds of boring "I love you Blizzard!" posts and "We need more moderators!" threads. Just recently I was hit with the 1 week banhammer for posting "I give this troll 8/10 mostly because she got an MVP to post twice." in this thread which further emphasizes the direction the boards, and possibly the direction WoW is going:

forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=26399150942&sid=1&pageNo=1

Harmless trolling? Apparently Blizz is coming down hard on it and as a result... boring Blizzard ass kissers.

I had always heard that the age range of WoW was heading upwards towards the mid to late 30s, but people who take such a serious offense to silly names like the ones stated clearly represent that category of grumpy old WoW players... I'm posting here after my immediate ban and am not giving myself time to cool off and just play WoW (which I will in about an hour or so) but I think my opinion is something people should think about... or flame. This isn't the Big Brother forums here so I know that what I say will actually make it out to a few people before falling down and out of the page like a lead balloon.

[Izenhart]

I actually don't think he/she was trolling?

[jaimelannister]

You have to realize that, 5 years ago, players didn't spam nor troll in trade, and there were very few instances of people with names that clearly break the rules but get around it with silly accents and whatnot (in fact, I don't even think you were allowed to use those characters when WoW launched). The players from back then who are still around today are just getting sick and tired of how badly this game has degenerated...we want our peaceful community back!

[thedoomsayer]

yea that forum is the most moderated one ive been on in a friggin long time

[Nodja]

Your post was useless and a waste of time, the person in question was also making a valid argument, I read the whole thread and your post would be unwarranted and out of place.

I give you 3/10 because you made me read the thread.

[Traejun]

Your post was useless and a waste of time, the person in question was also making a valid argument, I read the whole thread and your post would be unwarranted and out of place.

I give you 3/10 because you made me read the thread.

I think what you're missing is that "unwarranted and out of place" probably doesn't warrant a 1 week ban. Jus' sayin'

I'm perma-banned from the official forum for multiple bans - some were deserved and some not. But I will say that when my bands were "undeserved" they were for the most insignificant and harmless comments. That place is terrible.

[Deleted]

Welcome to the US forums.
We have the complete opposites:

We hate you blizzard threads
Boost our class
NERF THAT CLASS

[Traltor]

You have to realize that, 5 years ago, players didn't spam nor troll in trade, and there were very few instances of people with names that clearly break the rules but get around it with silly accents and whatnot (in fact, I don't even think you were allowed to use those characters when WoW launched). The players from back then who are still around today are just getting sick and tired of how badly this game has degenerated...we want our peaceful community back!

I was playing 5 years ago and yes, WoW was exactly the same. Remember Barrens chat? It was the WoW equivalent of 4Chan for the longest time. Remeber the very short lived Global Trade Channel? Now I am in no way supporting violent and aggressive behavior or spam, but sometimes useless chatting adds a bit of flavor to the community. Sometimes a random comment or post gives me a quick giggle before I go back to the daily grind of killing Dragons. Some of you seem to wish you lived in Pleasantville where everything is black and white and perfect, but without any colors, what the hell is the difference between a "thank you Blizz for helping to make the game better", and an "I LOVE YOU SO MUCH BLIZZARD!" post?

You can only censor the population so long before they become too frustrated and finally fight back!.... RealID? Was one of the best examples of the community working together to fight the ban/lock/delete happy moderators on the forums burying the useless posts praising Blizzards actions like sheep and the others will legitimate concerns... Even then some people were angry that Blizzard didn't go through with RealID because it wouldn't clean up the trolling, but then again some people have a layer of ignorance that surrounds them like pea soup fog.

---------- Post added 2010-08-06 at 02:30 PM ----------

Oh and I haven't even gone into the hypocrisy of Blizzard mods posting random and useless replies to get a chuckle out of the community. The sig on my forum char represents that. As a reply on a thread to a dwarf character who had a gripe about one of the mechanics in the game, a forum mod replied, "I like your beard."

Funny? Yes very.

Appropriate? No, but who cares? Moderator's don't get banned for trolling... of course the most resent replies seem like maybe Blizz cracked down on them too... pathetic.

[jaimelannister]

I was playing 5 years ago and yes, WoW was exactly the same. Remember Barrens chat? It was the WoW equivalent of 4Chan for the longest time. Remeber the very short lived Global Trade Channel?

Well, I wasn't Horde back then, so I don't have any experience with Barrens chat, but to say that the community hasn't changed is ridiculous. There has been a HUGE shift in the community since the early days. Helping people used to be the rule; now it is the exception. It's not rose-tinted glasses, it's just a fact, or at least on the servers I've played on. My main is on Illidan, and you can't even read trade chat because it scrolls so quickly. This type of ridiculous behavior never happened in vanilla.

---------- Post added 2010-08-06 at 01:53 PM ----------

You can only censor the population so long before they become too frustrated and finally fight back!.... RealID? Was one of the best examples of the community working together to fight the ban/lock/delete happy moderators on the forums burying the useless posts praising Blizzards actions like sheep and the others will legitimate concerns... Even then some people were angry that Blizzard didn't go through with RealID because it wouldn't clean up the trolling, but then again some people have a layer of ignorance that surrounds them like pea soup fog.

RealID is great, and I love it. The real names on forums part of it was pure stupidity, however, and I'm glad that's gone.

But the first part of your paragraph...are you saying that censorship in WoW is bad?

[Shokzman]

You have to realize that, 5 years ago, players didn't spam nor troll in trade, and there were very few instances of people with names that clearly break the rules but get around it with silly accents and whatnot (in fact, I don't even think you were allowed to use those characters when WoW launched). The players from back then who are still around today are just getting sick and tired of how badly this game has degenerated...we want our peaceful community back!

Because back then it was LFG everyone used to spam. Aww i miss the old LFG :'(

[jaimelannister]

Because back then it was LFG everyone used to spam. Aww i miss the old LFG :'(

But it was spammed with actual LFG messages, not Anal [whatever] spam.

[Galvanon]

You can only censor the population so long before they become too frustrated and finally fight back!.... RealID? Was one of the best examples of the community working together to fight the ban/lock/delete happy moderators on the forums burying the useless posts praising Blizzards actions like sheep and the others will legitimate concerns... Even then some people were angry that Blizzard didn't go through with RealID because it wouldn't clean up the trolling, but then again some people have a layer of ignorance that surrounds them like pea soup fog.[COLOR="red"]

It's a video game with terms that you click "I agree" to play. I recommend you click the other option next time if you have trouble accepting the terms of use to play.

Real ID is gone and that's fine, but it wasn't a green light to spam or troll the forums.

[kerwyn]

But it was spammed with actual LFG messages, not Anal [whatever] spam.

I can tell you right now that global LFG was not used for finding groups.

[jaimelannister]

I can tell you right now that global LFG was not used for finding groups.

In early vanilla, it was on my realm.

[Clockwork Pinkie]

I for one have always found the official forums bland and boring, filled with threads that have nothing but a level 1 "alt" trying to derail a thread. As for the whole "trolling trade" thing. It's a public channel, things will happen, you can't ban a person for talking in trade unless it really is something offensive to the public, not just one person. But if they do "crack down" on trade, then the fun of the game will officially be gone and I might as well play on a server in China.

[jaimelannister]

I for one have always found the official forums bland and boring, filled with threads that have nothing but a level 1 "alt" trying to derail a thread. As for the whole "trolling trade" thing. It's a public channel, things will happen, you can't ban a person for talking in trade unless it really is something offensive to the public, not just one person. But if they do "crack down" on trade, then the fun of the game will officially be gone and I might as well play on a server in China.

Maybe for you, but my fun would be increased if the Trade channel was limited to strictly trade discussions. There is a General channel that is just fine for discussions about everything else, but no one uses it. I'd love to filter all the garbage out of Trade and into General so I could just turn it off. They also really need to bring back the global LFG channel, despite the semi-redundancies with the LFG tool. Removing that channel was a huge mistake, imo.

[Traltor]

Well, I wasn't Horde back then, so I don't have any experience with Barrens chat, but to say that the community hasn't changed is ridiculous. There has been a HUGE shift in the community since the early days. Helping people used to be the rule; now it is the exception. It's not rose-tinted glasses, it's just a fact, or at least on the servers I've played on. My main is on Illidan, and you can't even read trade chat because it scrolls so quickly. This type of ridiculous behavior never happened in vanilla.

---------- Post added 2010-08-06 at 01:53 PM ----------



RealID is great, and I love it. The real names on forums part of it was pure stupidity, however, and I'm glad that's gone.

But the first part of your paragraph...are you saying that censorship in WoW is bad?

You must have been on a very low population server... which does not make your view invalid... but it would be like coming from Alaska and then to New York City and saying, "Traffic was NEVER this bad!" I remember the trade channel or LFG channel being spammed with ASCII art every half hour or "Hey everybody, whisper (some random player) and tell him he's an asshole lol!"

In fact I would say chat has become better than EVER since vanilla. Barrens chat is just that now... Barren. Most people are alts or old players picking up again so they have no reason to ask anything anymore, and Trade is filled with "WTS [Broken Tooth] for 5s" posts... which is good I suppose, but my point is that I don't feel like a community anymore. Those who complain seem to wish WoW was a solo experience where no one would ever bother them unless they needed a bot generated character to help them through an instance or an area.

And no I am not an anarchist as you seem to imply in your final statement...

It's a video game with terms that you click "I agree" to play. I recommend you click the other option next time if you have trouble accepting the terms of use to play.

The Terms of Use can say, "By clicking this we can, at will, sell your soul to Satan himself." But because the user base is so huge, if the majority of players feels their rights are being suppressed in order to play, they will fight back... I feel like I mentioned RealID already but whatever...

---------- Post added 2010-08-06 at 03:30 PM ----------

Sorry I meant to also at that options like Filter and Ignore are examples of good censorship. Perma bans for names, trolling, anything that may upset a minority of users just don't seem like the best option to me...

---------- Post added 2010-08-06 at 03:35 PM ----------

Maybe for you, but my fun would be increased if the Trade channel was limited to strictly trade discussions. There is a General channel that is just fine for discussions about everything else, but no one uses it. I'd love to filter all the garbage out of Trade and into General so I could just turn it off. They also really need to bring back the global LFG channel, despite the semi-redundancies with the LFG tool. Removing that channel was a huge mistake, imo.

The Global Trade Channel? Now I REALLY know how out of touch with the WoW community you are. It lasted about two weeks because the entire thing was FILLED with spamming and trolling. It became the Global Barrens chat.

If you really don't believe this "Barrens Chat" I keep talking about, Google it and read the first instance. I can't post links here but I'm sure it will be easy enough for all of you.

[scabsworth]

You have to realize that, 5 years ago, players didn't spam nor troll in trade, and there were very few instances of people with names that clearly break the rules but get around it with silly accents and whatnot (in fact, I don't even think you were allowed to use those characters when WoW launched). The players from back then who are still around today are just getting sick and tired of how badly this game has degenerated...we want our peaceful community back!

I fall into this category and agree completely. Trade makes me sick to even try and read anymore. It's not so much even the yawnfest trolling that goes on nonstop "xbox 360 etc" as much as it is the rampant displays of racism/sexism and general hate speech that people seem to think it's fun to post now.

[jaimelannister]

You must have been on a very low population server... which does not make your view invalid... but it would be like coming from Alaska and then to New York City and saying, "Traffic was NEVER this bad!" I remember the trade channel or LFG channel being spammed with ASCII art every half hour or "Hey everybody, whisper (some random player) and tell him he's an asshole lol!"

In fact I would say chat has become better than EVER since vanilla. Barrens chat is just that now... Barren. Most people are alts or old players picking up again so they have no reason to ask anything anymore, and Trade is filled with "WTS [Broken Tooth] for 5s" posts... which is good I suppose, but my point is that I don't feel like a community anymore. Those who complain seem to wish WoW was a solo experience where no one would ever bother them unless they needed a bot generated character to help them through an instance or an area.

And no I am not an anarchist as you seem to imply in your final statement...

My server back then was high-pop, so that wasn't the issue. I guess the players on my server were just more civil than on yours, because we simply did not have constant spam and whatnot. Trade was used for trade, General was used for reasonable levels of shit-talking, and LFG was used to make your dungeon groups. Everything had a place and those boundaries were adhered to by the community.

As for Barrens chat, again, I never experienced it, but frankly, I can't see that it would matter how bad it was. You're in Barrens for a short period while leveling select races (and you don't even have to level there if you don't want; I'm leveling my Orc in EK because I've never done it before). Furthermore, you can just leave Barrens chat if it offers no value to you. That option doesn't exist with Trade chat if you find entertainment in the economic aspects of this game. I really enjoy looking for deals in Trade, but I have to wade through all sorts of non-trade-related spam to do it.

And I wasn't trying to imply anything with my last comment, but rather it sounded to me like you were advocating for zero censorship in WoW, which I think would be a terrible idea. I'll go into more details as to why if that's really what you meant, but I'm hoping you didn't!

[Noomz]

Just as I feared with the very small number of people who were okay with the insertion of RealID, the forums are becoming a desolate grounds of boring "I love you Blizzard!" posts and "We need more moderators!" threads. Just recently I was hit with the 1 week banhammer for posting "I give this troll 8/10 mostly because she got an MVP to post twice." in this thread which further emphasizes the direction the boards, and possibly the direction WoW is going:

forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=26399150942&sid=1&pageNo=1

Harmless trolling? Apparently Blizz is coming down hard on it and as a result... boring Blizzard ass kissers.

I had always heard that the age range of WoW was heading upwards towards the mid to late 30s, but people who take such a serious offense to silly names like the ones stated clearly represent that category of grumpy old WoW players... I'm posting here after my immediate ban and am not giving myself time to cool off and just play WoW (which I will in about an hour or so) but I think my opinion is something people should think about... or flame. This isn't the Big Brother forums here so I know that what I say will actually make it out to a few people before falling down and out of the page like a lead balloon.

I got perma banned from those forums for literally saying I want jesus out of my holidays. I didn't swear, I didn't say it in an offensive way.

Apparently it was hate-speech or some of that sort. Blows my mind.

The WoW forum mods are more uptight and irregular then mmo-champs. Since I did deserve my last ban here.

You have to realize that, 5 years ago, players didn't spam nor troll in trade, and there were very few instances of people with names that clearly break the rules but get around it with silly accents and whatnot (in fact, I don't even think you were allowed to use those characters when WoW launched). The players from back then who are still around today are just getting sick and tired of how badly this game has degenerated...we want our peaceful community back!

Bad behavior is viral in an annonymous environment. It's like when the power goes out in the wrong neighbourhood, people go monkey and start to loot etc.

As long as actions go unaccounted for, people missbehave.