An Eye on Player Behavior and Reporting Improvements in Patch 9.2.5

[Celement]

It's not the same issue with bots because they intentionally wait to do ban waves with bots so they can catch the most amount of people without the bot creators knowing Blizzard is onto them.

Right but much like vote kick protection blizz doesn't go after no effort players.

I can see them forcing people to be held hostage though like a lost league of legends match creating a hell for players.

[Amagh]

I'm sure this will be perfectly unbiased and not at all misused by fragile snowflakes and other thin skinned people... The rules about harassment and abuse will be equally enforced no matter the ethnicity, orientation or other preference/liking that may apply.

Right?

Surely?

[Otimus]

I see a lot of "Me being an asshole is not really me being an asshole, y'all are just thin skinned snowflakes" going around here.

I see MMO-C has not changed even a little.

Or the classic "Toxicity isn't real. I'm not toxic. It's those bads who can't play as good as me, no, those are the real toxic ones. I'm the one who's helping them by insulting them! Snowflakes just don't know!"

[Noobslayer]

<img src="https://media.mmo-champion.com/images/news/2012/july/wowmini.png" style="margin-bottom:-1px; margin-right:0px; vertical-align:bottom" /> Patch 9.2.5 - New Social Contract

An Eye on Player Behavior and Reporting Improvements in Patch 9.2.5

As a part of our ongoing efforts to foster a fun, fair, and safe game environment for our community, we’re implementing some improvements to the system with the 9.2.5 update. We know how important it is for our players to be a part of a safe and supportive community, and we want to help foster that by providing you with tools and information you can use to help promote and create it alongside us.

Just the Start

Creating a positive experience in World of Warcraft is important to the entire team. As a part of helping drive that focus, we’ve pulled together a multi-disciplinary team to look at varying aspects of what we can do to help make things better. The 9.1.5 content update allowed us to provide additional updates to our reporting system that enable more visibility to player reporting by sending thank you messages to players who reported others for violating our code of conduct. Additionally, most players who are close to being actioned within the game are now receiving a warning message. This is only the start of what we have in store, and the 9.2.5 content update provides some further improvements to the system.

New Social Contract

When players first log in to World of Warcraft after the 9.2.5 content update goes live, they will be greeted by the new Social Contract. This contract will need to be read and accepted before a player can continue into the world of Azeroth. The contract outlines behavior that will help make your experiences more positive and provides an outline of behaviors that are not acceptable within the game. While you should only need to accept it once, there may be a future point where you’ll need to reaccept the contract to continue playing.

Reporting Player Behavior

We’ve modernized how reporting works in-game, making it even easier to report disruptive or poor player behavior.

• Right-click the player's name in chat or other applicable area.
  
• Click 'Report Player'.
  
• This will open a popup allowing you to select the appropriate reason for the report as well as allow you to add additional details.
  
• Click ‘report’.

You’ll receive a notice acknowledging your report and thanking you for your help in making Azeroth a better place to be. Should action be taken against the reported player, you’ll receive an additional thank you message in the weeks following your original report.

Streamlining the System

We’ve also taken some time to further streamline our system and penalties, allowing us to act more quickly, accurately, and (if necessary) more severely depending on the in-game violation.

Looking Forward

These updates are merely the beginning of our efforts to provide a better place to spend your time. We know that Azeroth is special to many of you, and we want to make sure it continues to be a place you want to call home.

The short of it: Don't group, don't engage, don't talk in chat channels, don't use emotes. Got it. Because no matter how well intentioned, good, or genuine you are with your positivity towards others someone WILL get offended.

[TheRevenantHero]

I don't think they can do anything about that... it was a major point of contention with the orginal vote kick protection in wrath when people would simply queue into dungeons to be carried and would rely on kick protection.

Decent players already assume the system will be used against them and rely on raider io.

Sadly new players are gonna get screwed over again.

People get reported and suspended for griefing all the time.

- - - Updated - - -

The short of it: Don't group, don't engage, don't talk in chat channels, don't use emotes. Got it. Because no matter how well intentioned, good, or genuine you are with your positivity towards others someone WILL get offended.

If that's what you got out of this then you're likely the type of person who drove Blizzard to MAKE this new social contract.

[Celement]

People get reported and suspended for griefing all the time.

- - - Updated - - -



If that's what you got out of this then you're likely the type of person who drove Blizzard to MAKE this new social contract.

I can see a world were in low keys people go in group dies three times in less then three minutes then people rage report the guy who leaves the doomed endeavor.

I'm afraid blizzard is dumb enough to try and apply a leaver penalty to mythic plus much like dota games have.

[aviger]

You know what I did back in the day when I was annoyed? Logged out.

So you let someone who was harassing you win, by logging out of the fun game you were playing?
that isn't the win you think it is, you aren't "cool" for letting assholes drive you from fun ;P

[Ringthane]

So you let someone who was harassing you win, by logging out of the fun game you were playing?
that isn't the win you think it is, you aren't "cool" for letting assholes drive you from fun ;P

Well, back then we weren't vindictive little children who thought the only way to deal with it was to retaliate in every way we possibly could. We got annoyed, we went and did something else we enjoyed. Then we came back later and enjoyed it again.

It's people like you who think they have to "win" at everything or they've let the entire country down.

[aviger]

Well, back then we weren't vindictive little children who thought the only way to deal with it was to retaliate in every way we possibly could. We got annoyed, we went and did something else we enjoyed. Then we came back later and enjoyed it again.

It's people like you who think they have to "win" at everything or they've let the entire country down.

It's amazing how you thought what you posted was in any way what i said. It's not even close to making sense.
I'm making fun of the POSTER for wanting to WIN (as in thinking logging of is him "showing them") not whatever you thought.

How someone could get something so wrong from what i wrote is amazing and a much bigger let down to the country then what you said :P

[woofpup]

They forgot to mention the new gear item, brown armbands.

[shadowmatrix]

I dont like the new future where big corporations (especially american ones) try and control how people act,

You know there was a time when acting the wrong way could result in the church either sending you to prison, exiling you to some unsettled land, or just outright having you killed. It wasn't new then and it isn't new now. Turn around take a long hard look at your government.

[zysis]

Now we'll see people entangle others cleverly into being reported such as the collective that resides on the Blizzard forums. This is dangerous and there's a select few who will use this as a weapon to oust others. What gets to me is that this is borderline fascism. By even saying that I'd get reported but the context is quite innocent and wary of the many pitfalls involved in controlling the views of others.

I get that being toxic and abusive is not healthy, but who creates the ruleset? Who oversees what is toxic and abusive? To what end do we draw a line in the sand and say enough? The Nazis went from bashing communists to killing anyone that wasn't a conformist to the Nazi party in a very short time. Here I am, using historical context but even the mention of these words gives someone a chance to report me and offer me up as their prize simply because they can not because they should. All so they can feel empowered by punishing a complete stranger. I see this all the time on forums and I feel that there's not going to be a good result from all this.

WoW is mostly played by a generation that is thick-skinned and knows that sticks and stones break their bones, names never harm them. There's a very small minority who is the most vocal, wanting to be wrapped in cotton wool. Not a good thing for all parties.

[Nathiest]

SOCIAL CONTRACTS ARE COMMUNISM



If Blizz had simply called it a "Friendly Gamer Agreement Forum" then there would be no correlation, right? Maybe, but still Blizz choose to call it a "Social Contract". So they know. Now we know.

If this wasn't what Blizz had in mind then they need to pull it and consider some edits.

[zysis]

SOCIAL CONTRACTS ARE COMMUNISM



If Blizz had simply called it a "Friendly Gamer Agreement Forum" then there would be no correlation, right? Maybe, but still Blizz choose to call it a "Social Contract". So they know. Now we know.

If this wasn't what Blizz had in mind then they need to pull it and consider some edits.

This. As the descendant of a Kossack who was forced to walk to China when communism took over, I see this whole thing as yet another time when Blizzard acts on the voices of the very small minority without considering the broader implications. Reporting toxic abusive players has always been there. This feels like a litmus test which is giving these minorities the feeling of empowerment over the many who simply do not agree with their views.

[Flutterguy]

What counts as poor behavior? Do I have to indulge the fantasies of the mentally ill?

[Bristae]

What counts as poor behavior? Do I have to indulge the fantasies of the mentally ill?

And what do you mean by that?

[wowrefugee]

T

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_contract

Social contract goes back to the Age of Enlightenment in the 18th century.

The term has been used for plenty of things. It is not strictly a communist thing whatsoever. If you look for mentions of capitalism, you can see its been used there too. Gasp.

[Biomega]

SOCIAL CONTRACTS ARE COMMUNISM

Irrespective of whether or not that's actually the case (and what you provided to back this claim is specious and reductive), you're making a crucial mistake here by equating "THE social contract" (a very specific concept in moral philosophy originated in 17th/18th century Enlightenment thinking, most importantly Rousseau's 1762 treatise "The Social Contract") with "social contractS", a generic term for various forms of community agreements.

Those are not the same thing.

[dtrummel]

Good way to get people to stop communicating in game

[Unholyground]

People still pay to play WoW?