Relic and Org need to update their banning policies

True. You failed as moderator to moderate Rosbone behavior here for a long time, he had since long nothing relevant to say on this game but still daily spam and spam this forum with non-sense comments. Moderation isn't only about moderating inappropriate content posted by people but also making sure things posted, even if not breaking any rule are relevant.



Companies will never tell you why (and if they do they are the exception) because it doesn't matter anymore once the action is taken. The psychological journey of the person impacted make it will never be rational enough to accept the true and will still and again contest it and find anything in the potential explanation to be a sign of persecution. This thread and your own reply is the perfect example of it.

It's the same process when you fire someone, you tell him the bare minimum of why. It's the same process when you break your sentimental relationship by saying "It's me" etc... Even more when the person, such as Rosbone, went toxic in the "relationship".

All of this has been studied and documented, here an example: DABDA

This is the five stages of grief. I find it odd that they just put the term layoff on the page and call it something else lol.

Anyways though, even if people go through grief of being fired in a similar way, that doesn't excuse the management from being a dick about it. You make your stance clear, you give a reason and that's the end of it. If management turns out to be an asshole so be it, at least they made their point clear. Excusing them simply because "everyone will react that way anyway" is a good way to see respect as a whole dwindle.

Rosbone, stop wasting your energy, what is done is done. Take solace in the fact that you will be around longer than Relic/COH3 will.

I agree, I alone will not change Relics operations. I may be able to get thru to Org admins that adding some more info is a good thing. Once they realize I am not trying to be a troublemaker and just want the site to be better.

But you guys love drama. So I was originally just going to move on and do the other stuff I normally do when not playing Coh2. But I have been adamant about this policy for years and no one cared. With the drama of being banned I knew I would get more eyes on the subject and maybe get some changes made.

Sadly, most RTS players (people in general) have no reading comprehension. So they are just focused on why I got banned and are throwing out guesses. It is not my job to guess why I got banned, I have given examples why this is. It is Relics job. And they are not doing it.

So your assessment is spot on. Waste of time. Every single time I have ever worked with people I have been let down by their lack of logic/intellect. It started in the 3rd grade. That must have been when I began surpassing those around me.

I post on several other websites. Never come close to being banned. But Coh is an all white male played game ages 18-70. I know the audience here. Being an RTS I always assumed intelligent people play it. This gave me the personal license to push limits I would normally apply on other sites.

This site, to me, is an extension of Twitch. Communities gather on Twitch and chat for info and entertainment. When that streamer turns off, people fill in here as they wait for the next streamer to start. But the people here are not always here for entertainment. So they are very sensitive and maybe even socially stunted a little. The only conversations they want are "Are Pgrens under performing". Anything beyond that they take personal and begin to harbor hatred for that person. It is very weird. And it does not appear to exist in the Twitch Sphere.

You can't be serious

It is a grey area. That is the whole point of this topic. A good lawyer could rip thru either side of the argument.

Some people: You posted an employee picture you are evil.
Other people: You suggested Relic hired trans people over others. You are evil.

Relics judgement lies somewhere in between. It would help people to know where that line is.

How can a person know where the line is if you cant ask what exactly is the criteria for being banned?

It is not possible to post every possible option for being banned. Therefore, Relic must respond with detailed information about what exactly got you banned.




The counter argument is Relic does not have the resources to argue every ban. So to limit the back and forth with the accused, I would suggest providing as much detail as possible with a time limit on the ban.

SECNARIO:
- User team kills and gets banned.
- Gets CODE OF CONDUCT message. Player is still confused exactly what they did.
- Asks Relic/Sega support.
- They respond "You destroyed your team mates base buildings. This is defined as team killing. Your ban is up in 2 weeks".

That is the bare minimum I would expect. It would be best if this was printed right in game, but we all know Relic is not good enough to do that. So it falls on John and Gabby's shoulders.

The next conversation is should Relic respond to more of this persons inquiries? At what point do they stop responding? Time is money. If it is done right the first time, they would never have to respond again.

SUMMARY
1) Relic are wasting their own money by NOT PROVIDING PROOF AND BAN DATES. They are begging people to harass them with inquiries.
2) If they just printed ban reasons and dates in game, it would cost them nothing. No human interaction would be required at all. Community Managers / support would never need to be contacted.
3) They are losing future sales to people who have felt like they were being wronged.

I think most people on here know that your criticisms come from the fact you are just very passionate and love the game.

I appreciate your intelligent comments.

Some interesting background on me and Coh.

I used to play Quake 3 at work everyday. Everyday at lunch. Sometimes after work. It all started organically that some people just started playing. Eventually someone was a dick to management and games were banned at work.

I had a huge office because I was a technician that needed space. I also had several PCs setup for long running tests. So my office became the hidden/secret gaming lab. Management knew but turned a blind eye if we kept it quiet.

I then wrote a mod for Quake 3 to make it funner and wrote an app that sorted thru the game log so we could all gather after a game and see kill logs, graphs, who killed who the most, etc. It was heaven. It made going to work fun for many people. And the connections it made between people that normally would not interact got stuff done for the company.

There were two buildings that played. When the ban came down we had to take roll to know who was playing. We only had so many PCs. That is where I really began to know my future wife. We would have to talk everyday before lunch to see who was playing.

Eventually, we got tired of Quake 3 everyday. We switched to vCoh. So my future wife played vCoh everyday at lunch.

When I finally started playing Coh2 (because Tric said I should), it was like I died from heaven and went to a better heaven.

To me this community is the coolest thing to ever happen on earth. When I was asked to be on Org as a member, I felt like I was back at work making the day better for everyone each day. But I was hesitant to join because I could see how badly run Relic was. And being very passionate about its success, I will not bite my tongue.

This is why I wanted to make maps better. Make a CELO app that would help streamers. Give money to tournaments, etc.

Playing my favorite game Coh, watching tournaments, watching streams, interacting with people who play the game, etc is very important to me. Anything I can do to make it better for others is what I will always try to do.

The Community has spent the last week or so dumping on relic because COH3 is shit because they didn't hire people who could make a good game but instead to fill diversity quotas [Citation needed]


Then you chose to post pictures of Relic Team Members and ask if they are men or women.

- Because if you can't tell they must be trans and therefore only hired to fil quotas and therefore bad at their jobs

- Or if they are ciswomen they were only hired to fill quotas etc etc


Either you did mean to do exactly what you did or you are really stupid and arrogant or you were not thinking clearly because you were reacting emotionally



Also you are moving through the standard internet defences of:

"It was just a joke" - If you have explain it it isn't funny

"I was just asking to be polite" - Now that is a joke, Hahahahah

"Y'all are too stupid to understand me" - Because it everyone else's fault you are bad at communication


+++++++++


I get it, you put a lot of effort into supporting the franchise and now feel upset that it isn't what you wanted.


Go ahead, vent a bit, but it doesn't mean the rules don't apply to you and it doesn't make you special


That's a tale as old as this website, here's your very worn participation trophy because the BlackAdmins didn't order enough and people have to share

Something kind of similar. Not really, happened to me. Someone said something 100% unhinged. Not a joke. Nothing happened to said person that did it. Not defending anyone’s actions. But “rules” do not in fact apply to everyone and there is favoritism/variance of actions taken.

I’ve been banned on twitch for “hateful conduct”. Not the game itself or the org. But I deserved the ban and am self-aware of my personality. Of coming off as abrasive, an asshole, and mostly “toxic”.

But like I said above. There have been other people (who are way more in the spotlight than Rosbone) presenting similar actions, and nothing has happened.

...

I agree with you that Relic should provide durations and also reasons given for bans.
As I've been a mod here for quite a while now, I can tell you from experience that the clear cut examples are few and far in between. In the game it might be team killing, on forums or game chat personal attacks or threats of violence. But those are (luckily) not the majority of issues.
There's qualitative differences of people saying the same things. Context matters a lot. What's the topic of the thread, the current discussion, the posts that are being responded to. Even previous posting behaviour. An impolite post can potentially be different if posted by someone who spent his last 100 posts insulting others than from someone with a "clean sheet". Doesn't have to be, but the chances of malicious intent vary; yet, I have also have to give both the benefit of the doubt.
Then there's external factors: Non-native English speakers using wrong words, cultural differences of both poster and moderator themselves. Subconsciously also personal opinion, even if you try to avoid that to the best of your ability. To some degree, a moderator has to take all of thit into consideration, but still assume that everyone applies some basic common sense regardless of their background.
Lastly, as you've already stated in one of the first posts: No one can know all of this stuff. Either because it's literally impossible, or pragmatic reasons like time constraints. What if there is a probably insulting post, but I only have a minute to decide? I can leave it, hoping someone else with more time can have a look. If this doesn't happen, what then? I have to make a call, and they're wrong sometimes. I can make a judgement to the best of my abilities, but I'll still misjudge from time to time. Even the best guide lines will leave a lot of space for interpretation, and mindlessly applying words from guide lines will not make good moderation, either.

This is also what happens at Relic: They see a small excerpt of a chat, no info on the players, just a few lines of text. Maybe a message that this player has been reported another time this week. While I think that they should still write "You have been banned due to insulting other players" on their message in the main menu, I guess those won't solve much, because there is still a lot of grey area involved. How often have I seen posts in CoH and other games of users complaining how they got banned, with some later on literally stating stuff among the lines of "yeah I flame others if I think they play bad but that can't be a reason". Some might be troll posts, but there's legit idiots out there. Obviously everyone thinks they're in the 10% of misjudgements or due to mod bias or whatever. Might be, but chances are: they're not. They violated some rules, but are either too dumb or unwilling to realize and take the blame. It's much easier if someone else must be wrong. Still, false decisions can happen.

This makes it even more important, especially if there's bans of products you bought, that there are appeal mechanisms. Relic not offering any of this and basically saying "don't bother writing us" is poor. They can effectively lock you out of the money you spent on their game. It should be seen as a disadvantage to their product, but people don't see it as such until they get banned themselves.

I agree with you that Relic should provide durations and also reasons given for bans.
As I've been a mod here for quite a while now, I can tell you from experience that the clear cut examples are few and far in between.
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Thanks for this behind the scenes look. Very enlightening post. I always try to back the mods. You guys do this for free. And all you get for it is hate and arguments.

As Shadowlink has stated, my personal ban probably comes from years of being on the verge of being demoted. Not a black and white situation in his mind. Or probably in the persons mind who actually demoted me. And I can agree with this as a valid reason.

You guys do not have an easy job. I apologize for making it harder for you. But I do it mostly to make it fun here. Which sometimes is not reason enough for the hassle it causes.

Thanks for this behind the scenes look. Very enlightening post. I always try to back the mods. You guys do this for free. And all you get for it is hate and arguments.

As Shadowlink has stated, my personal ban probably comes from years of being on the verge of being demoted. Not a black and white situation in his mind. Or probably in the persons mind who actually demoted me. And I can agree with this as a valid reason.

You guys do not have an easy job. I apologize for making it harder for you. But I do it mostly to make it fun here. Which sometimes is not reason enough for the hassle it causes.

Just a quick clarification after skipping through some posts here, since the ban and demotion often get tossed into the same pot during the discussion:
There has been no ban for Rosbone on this site (.org), "only" demotion.
A ban has been issued by Relic, resulting in a ban from Relic's games (and probably official forum?), but not on this forum. Relic can't ban anyone here on .org.

Relic not offering any of this and basically saying "don't bother writing us" is poor.

Maybe it's just a manpower issue

Maybe it's just a manpower issue

Probably, yes. I am not blaming Relic for making misjudgements, they surely know that many decisions are in the grey area they describes. They're a company, they sell a product and allow themselves to lock out their customer from the money he spent. Knowing that they can decide wrongly, they should have appeal mechanisms especially since a Relic ban locks you out of all of their products, not only the one you got the ban for.

Their current policy is 'you got banned. We don't tell you why and for how long. If you don't like it, appeal here. We also won't tell you if we've even read that'.
I know the task is different, but that's even beneath .org standards while we're doing this all for free and the stakes are to be fair non-existant. A ban here means losing access to writing on a forum that didn't cost you anything to join.
I fully agree with Rosbone on this point. Relic should tell you the reason and duration of the ban, best case also the reported incidents that lead to the ban. Many will just screech because obviously they can never be wrong and banning them is surely always justified, but
1. In cases of false bans you can provide the context on the incidents, that might change the meaning of what you wrote.
2. In cases of people accepting their ban, only then you'll get a learning effect.

Relic's system is the most vague possible. I can't appeal if I barely know what I got banned for. At this point appealing is just hoping that the moderator has 'a better day' than before.

Tldr:
You buy a product, they sell a product, they can take the product away from you at any time, they don't provide any info or reasonable appeal procedure. That's not professional. They should change it.

You can't be serious

Feel free to point out which part of that post you find to be a joke and I can then tell you if it serious or not.

I know this is a hard to swallow pill, but having different opinion is not a valid reason to ban or moderate someone.

He was talking shit in-game and that's where he got banned.
As nazi-like as relics mod policy is, you really have to go overboard to get banned in the game itself.

You a mod on reddit?
You have the attitude.

I guess that you make that comment because of own experience failing to swallowing that pill. You also seem unable to understand what that post is saying since it does asks someone to be banned.

The theory that COH3 is failure as game because "woman and non-binary folks where involved in creating it" is simply false as explained even by the moderator of the site. It also a theory based on racism which is not tolerated in this forum.

Tldr:
You buy a product, they sell a product, they can take the product away from you at any time, they don't provide any info or reasonable appeal procedure. That's not professional. They should change it.

Read the EULA, they sell you a license to use a product through a service company (Steam). They can revoke it anytime if they get evidence you're not complying with the rules they set (accordingly that those rules aren't illegal themselves).

As it as been said before, Relic hasn't a history of blindness banning players so either Rosbone is playing fool by not acknowledging his own behavior either they may have various reasons and he's not sure which one of them triggered the ban.

In any cases, with what he wrote around this forum, that's probably enough to trigger an end of the license contract, something probably related to defamation of Relic/Relic's employees that you, Rosbone, we, aren't enough versed into law to judge if valid or not but that their legal service/legal adviser most likely is.

As per communicating of the reasons, Relic is fully entitled to not produce their evidences at will and only reserve them in case of legal action. AKA if Relic does so, and so the majority of major gaming companies, when banning players that's because legally it is way better for them to manage it that way.

The appealing process is most likely an internal process and the case transferred to a 3rd party group/manager who'll review it from a neutral point of view and asses if the sanction is valid. It doesn't involve the player because what they asses is their decision making based on the information they had the moment it was taken. They do not seek for more information or to give more information. If the reviewer board valid the sanction, then the sanction is confirmed, if the board invalid it then the sanction is revoked.

I'm not saying it 100% works like that at Relic, but this is the general process of appeal of sanction. If you want to know the reason behind the decision, then you must take legal action against them.

Read the EULA, they sell you a license to use a product through a service company (Steam). They can revoke it anytime if they get evidence you're not complying with the rules they set (accordingly that those rules aren't illegal themselves).

As it as been said before, Relic hasn't a history of blindness banning players so either Rosbone is playing fool by not acknowledging his own behavior either they may have various reasons and he's not sure which one of them triggered the ban.

In any cases, with what he wrote around this forum, that's probably enough to trigger an end of the license contract, something probably related to defamation of Relic/Relic's employees that you, Rosbone, we, aren't enough versed into law to judge if valid or not but that their legal service/legal adviser most likely is.

As per communicating of the reasons, Relic is fully entitled to not produce their evidences at will and only reserve them in case of legal action. AKA if Relic does so, and so the majority of major gaming companies, when banning players that's because legally it is way better for them to manage it that way.

The appealing process is most likely an internal process and the case transferred to a 3rd party group/manager who'll review it from a neutral point of view and asses if the sanction is valid. It doesn't involve the player because what they asses is their decision making based on the information they had the moment it was taken. They do not seek for more information or to give more information. If the reviewer board valid the sanction, then the sanction is confirmed, if the board invalid it then the sanction is revoked.

I'm not saying it 100% works like that at Relic, but this is the general process of appeal of sanction. If you want to know the reason behind the decision, then you must take legal action against them.

I know that today you only buy "licenses" instead of an actual copy. I'd be interested if that would actually stand up in court case, e.g. if Steam disappeared or something, since this system effectively works exactly the same way as buying a hard copy and everything in the store also suggests that you "buy the game", not a license to play. But that's another topic, so I'll leave it at that.

I don't care what Relic writes in its Eula. Relic being able to revoke the product I bought at any time without compensation or getting any information how I can dispute that, is putting me into a bad spot from the start. It's a system in which they have all the leverage and I don't. I can't just withdraw my money from their account just because they broke their game with a patch or something else that can go wrong. It's a disadvantage of their product and should be counted as their product being lower value. Most people don't care though until they get banned. The majority of bans are rightful (at least I guess/hope so), but there definitely are cases of wrong banning. The better they do their job, the less wrongful banning cases there are, but they will still be there. Relic (or any company for that matter) not providing any realistic course to appeal for a ban further lowers their product value.

The current practice of not giving any information might be industry standard, but is inherently anti consumer. I don't see why I should not criticise that system.

I don't know what factors exactly lead to Rosbone's ban. I guess him joking about the appearance of Relic employees was the trigger, maybe there's more, maybe not. I have literally no idea, I have never talked to any Relic employee ever. Which also leads to the next question: Should Relic even moderate based on behaviour on other platforms? And which platforms? And in which cases?

As per communicating of the reasons, Relic is fully entitled to not produce their evidences at will and only reserve them in case of legal action. AKA if Relic does so, and so the majority of major gaming companies, when banning players that's because legally it is way better for them to manage it that way.

You make an interesting point that counters what you are trying to do.

If you were a company making a game. You dont want to pay someone to sit in a cubicle all day explaining to people why they got banned.

You can:
A) Explain to people why they got banned and post a date of release.

B) Explain nothing and possibly get a legal action started against you.


You are right. I should bring legal action against Relic. Then maybe they will see the benefits of just posting some information on the game screen.


Which way is more cost effective for Relic?
1) Pay no one and print the answer in game.

2) Pay someone a low salary to answer inquiries all day.

3) Pay legal fees when they get sued. Lawyers are cheap I hear.


BAN CODE
I was talking to someone who got banned from another product and they stated the company sent you a number. You could then log on and enter your ban code. This would have more details about why you got banned.

This would be very easy to implement. PageP could bang this out in under an hour. Since it is Relic, it will take 6 months at least. But it could be done. And they would not have to touch the game/server side code.

Sounds like a good option also.

I know that today you only buy "licenses" instead ...

Careful, you are making way too much sense. People will begin attacking you in ... 1... 2...

Great post.

TBF, the Relic employee had their pronouns in the LinkedIn profile posted, so there was no need to "ask questions" about their gender.

Banning from the game is harsh but to be honest you aren't missing out on much

I know that today you only buy "licenses" instead of an actual copy. I'd be interested if that would actually stand up in court case, e.g. if Steam disappeared or something, since this system effectively works exactly the same way as buying a hard copy and everything in the store also suggests that you "buy the game", not a license to play. But that's another topic, so I'll leave it at that.

I don't care what Relic writes in its Eula. Relic being able to revoke the product I bought at any time without compensation or getting any information how I can dispute that, is putting me into a bad spot from the start. It's a system in which they have all the leverage and I don't. I can't just withdraw my money from their account just because they broke their game with a patch or something else that can go wrong. It's a disadvantage of their product and should be counted as their product being lower value. Most people don't care though until they get banned. The majority of bans are rightful (at least I guess/hope so), but there definitely are cases of wrong banning. The better they do their job, the less wrongful banning cases there are, but they will still be there. Relic (or any company for that matter) not providing any realistic course to appeal for a ban further lowers their product value.

The current practice of not giving any information might be industry standard, but is inherently anti consumer. I don't see why I should not criticise that system.

I don't know what factors exactly lead to Rosbone's ban. I guess him joking about the appearance of Relic employees was the trigger, maybe there's more, maybe not. I have literally no idea, I have never talked to any Relic employee ever. Which also leads to the next question: Should Relic even moderate based on behaviour on other platforms? And which platforms? And in which cases?

That not game industry standard, that's trade/industry/whatever company standard. And bare with me but if tomorrow Microsoft release an update that wreck your Windows and all data stored... I have bad news for you.

Relic has delivered a game that works and been willing to patch every bug they find and to continue to do so for a certain time as per industry standard. From that your opinion that what they delivered doesn't meet your expectation is on you. Steam gives you 2 hours to refund and I don't know how the code of sale generally apply to this particular kind of service sold but I'm pretty sure that if you buy something, use it and don't like it afterward you're not going to get much from the vendor.

You make an interesting point that counters what you are trying to do.

If you were a company making a game. You dont want to pay someone to sit in a cubicle all day explaining to people why they got banned.

You can:
A) Explain to people why they got banned and post a date of release.

B) Explain nothing and possibly get a legal action started against you.


You are right. I should bring legal action against Relic. Then maybe they will see the benefits of just posting some information on the game screen.


Which way is more cost effective for Relic?
1) Pay no one and print the answer in game.

2) Pay someone a low salary to answer inquiries all day.

3) Pay legal fees when they get sued. Lawyers are cheap I hear.


BAN CODE
I was talking to someone who got banned from another product and they stated the company sent you a number. You could then log on and enter your ban code. This would have more details about why you got banned.

This would be very easy to implement. PageP could bang this out in under an hour. Since it is Relic, it will take 6 months at least. But it could be done. And they would not have to touch the game/server side code.

Sounds like a good option also.

Legal fees is part of any company budget. You're seeing this from a Private point of view but from Company perspective it is almost always better to go legal. It doesn't mean only going before a judge and spend hours appealing a case, it means everything said, any documents produced get a certain weight and from that a decision can be made to compromise or follow the legal path.

Anyway the way you speak of Relic in any of your post seal that it's most unlikely you get anything from them anymore, and Imo they're 100% right looking at how to turn any piece of information you get from them.

Feel free to point out which part of that post you find to be a joke and I can then tell you if it serious or not.

The entire thing

A) Nobody here genuinely thinks that women/trans people/minorities can't make good video games. At least I haven't seen any evidence of someone believing that. All I see is people saying Relic had poor priorities and that they didn't hire exclusively for merit. No one gives a fuck about what gender/race/orientation any of these people are. I could be mistaken but I see multiple people pointing out that's not what's they mean

B) Thinking that what people have been saying about Relic's hiring practices is anywhere near Rosbone posting ACTUAL PICTURES of the devs and asking what gender they were, is completely absurd. He went way over the line compared to anything else that's been said, and I'm not sure how you can possibly believe otherwise