I was one of those who suggested the not being grouped with people on your ignore list. I am used to it from a game the forum censor does not allow to be named. However it would require a reworking of the ignore/report spam system as they are linked here. It is harder to abuse than the vote kick system as ignore lists are generally limited.
That game also has a vote kick system. However it is abused upto a point as after a certain number of vote kicks the person is then immune from it happening to them for a certain length of time. Now imagine if that person you vote kicked earlier is part of a group later on with you and you try to vote kick them only to get the message they can not be kicked for x hours. How would you feel? Effectively they can do whatever they want and are immune from being kicked.
The not grouping with people on your ignore list is the lesser of two evils because of its' limit. In that other game there is a cut off point on queue times. This means if the queue times go higher than a point they have set you can be grouped with people on your ignore list for the same of faster games. This adds to the limitation of abuse of this system.
simple group vote system would cure it, many other games have it you can vote to kick a player in your group and everyone has to vote them out, they cannot vote if they are being voted on.
do it asap.
The idea of putting this kind of power in players hands has got to be, in all honesty, the stupidest thing I've ever heard of. Giving a bunch of angry nerds the ability to permanently ruin another players game (for which they could have forked out hundreds of dollars in fees) for no other reason than because they can is so utterly and unbelievably stupid I think I might just have developed brain cancer from reading it.
For the love of Trek do not, I repeat NOT give this kind of ability to players. Hard code it into the game and refine it as you go to weed out false positives and make sure the system is stable. Unless of course you have all forgotten about the Goons and their exploits already?
Most MMOs have votekicking, and contrary to people's concerns here, they are not horribly abused. Either our player base is especially extra mean or what?
If you can't handle the possibility of getting kicked, form private groups. If you constantly get kicked from pugs, the overwhelming likelihood is that it's you who is doing it wrong.
The last MMO I played that allowed votekicking was a certain Korean import featuring overly twee avatars (you can probably guess which one I mean). With 400+ hours logged in that game I was kicked from pugs exactly zero times. It's just not that big of a problem in other games, I don't understand why it supposedly would be here.
-edit-
And to the poster above me, I don't understand how a votekick would permanently ruin anyone's game. If you get kicked every single time you get into an instance, it's because you've acquired a bad reputation. And even then, the user base isn't a hive mind. Even the worst players would still get groups. Unless you are an afk'er I don't see why you're so scared of this.
Although I don't like the idea of someone gaining something at others expense, I usually don't care much if they are afk/idle as I focus on playing my game. I like the idea of conditioning my game because of these issues even less.
The other day there was one of those. I simply asked at the end if there was something wrong with is ship, if it was unable to fire.
Frankly, this is a game, it's meant to be played. What's the fun of sitting around and let it "play itself"?
But I am sure they are not all intentional. Just the other day, I got into an Azure. It took some 2 minutes just to see the team. I could see them moving but my ship wouldn't. Sometimes I got connection to server lost, but most of the time I could see them play I just couldn't move. The ship kept resetting. I asked if anyone was experiencing the lag as I was. I got a reply saying no, so in order not to be a leecher I exited the game. I got out promptly, so i wasn't really lagging (!?). After I logged in again I was automatically sent to the same scenario, and although I could move the game was ending. I got the marks but did not play at all. From the other's point of view it could seem that I was deliberately not doing anything.
Implement a low "Point" requirement (whatever points system is used to determine 1st place in the dilithium fleet actions) for Mark events. Anyone who actually plays the event will naturally accumulate enough points. Anyone who AFKs at spawn won't, and will not receive any rewards.
Just like the thread says. I'm sick of earning free marks for afk players in Vault Ensnared and Azure Nebula while I try to grind out Nukara rep.
Because of the leaver penalty, I have the dubious choice of fighting at a disadvantage to win free marks for leeches, or leaving the group and being penalized with a cooldown.
Why is there a penalty for leaving a group but no penalty for cheating your group by not playing?
Ever watch the loot need/greed responses? Allot of leeches will just sit there and try and collect loot while pretending to be afk. If someone pretends to be afk the shoot an enemy and train them to the leech then just sit next to the leach and let the enemy kill you so they will target the leech next. Pita but funny to die and then see the leech start moving and fighting.
A good fix to the leech problem is lose the need/greed and replace it with killing shot gets the drop, and you need to be not AFK to get any marks or reward. Go AFK and get nothing at all. Then final solution make it a temporary ban offense to join an stf and go AFK but give an option for emergencies where they can leave without penaly but be locked down for and cannot play until 1o or 15 minutes pass.
Join Date: Nobody cares.
"I'm drunk, whats your excuse for being an idiot?" - Unknown drunk man. :eek:
In CoH when a drop occurred every single person on the team automatically made an individual roll for a reward and if successful the drop went directly into their individual inventory's. No muss, no fuss, no fighting.
That's even worse than Need and Greed. At least there is some scope in the current system for pre-made teams to distribute items fairly (randomly) amongst those who really need them, and for those who don't to pass. Need and Greed is a staple of MMO looting and has been used for ages. Plus if you don't like it, you can change the loot system to free for all, or Round Robin, in the team settings.
something needs to be done about AFKer there just a^$?^*!e if u ask me but cryptic refuses to do out about them, u report them nothing happens i know this because i found one in one of my old fleets n he was reported to GM by me n 2 others n he was still at it a week after i got GM none response auto message. (cant call it a response message)
a fix for this is actually so easy it is almost as if cryptic wants afk players in grp content. They certainly made it easy enough to compensate for atleast 1 afk player.
even if it sounds hard on newbys, i'd suggest a 15-20% contribution to dmg/healing needed to be eligible for any reward.
If you fail to deliver that, you either were afk, or you are not suited (yet) for that kind of content and need to rethink your build and skills.
the ranked loot at the end expanded to stfs, and the loot automatically dropped into your inventory. i see so many leave stfs without opening the reward canister.
I'd like to see as a next season update, the above in some form or shape...plus a rewards system for PVP (PVP reputation faction) that has SETS, WEAPONS, etc...
All in all, a nice consolifation season that looks at existing content, improves the obvious flawes there and adds some long needed PVP updates.
This is one of the most infuriating things in game, I'm honestly thinking of doing it myself until cryptic grow a pair and address it just out of sheer irrational frustration
Most MMOs have votekicking, and contrary to people's concerns here, they are not horribly abused. Either our player base is especially extra mean or what?
If you can't handle the possibility of getting kicked, form private groups. If you constantly get kicked from pugs, the overwhelming likelihood is that it's you who is doing it wrong.
The game that can not be named has it and it was abused during testing just to show it could be that is when they introduced the cool down system into it.
I have seen and heard about a lot of people kicking because someone neded on something that the person who instigated the kick wanted, because they were new to that particular part of the game, they weren't up to so-an-sos' ideal of how much DPS/healing should be done, etc, etc, etc. I am not talking end game content here even the low level dungeons where newbies are meant to learn about playing in groups have this sort of problem. They have a larger community so it is easier to see more examples of the abuse of this sort of system.
They daren't introduce it into the BG side of the game because they know it would be a disaster. It has been asked for in the PvP side since it was introduced in PvE but it has not made the cross over thankfully.
This is one of the most infuriating things in game, I'm honestly thinking of doing it myself until cryptic grow a pair and address it just out of sheer irrational frustration
Oh yeah, fantastic idea
"Yeah, damn cryptic won't fix these AFKers, now what could i do..." "Why don't you become an AFKer yourself, harming the community rather than the developers" "Aww gee what a good idea!"
No offense, but you missed the point a little here:
If they "had an emergency or something" they wouldn't still be clicking on 'need/greed' whenever items/loot drops.
A lot of times, AFKers won't click need/greed to give the illusion they aren't there.
As for the AFK issue in my own personal experiences. I usually will report them, not to a GM (Which doesn't seem to do anything) but to their fleet if they're in one. 90% of the time, a fleet won't accept a member giving them a bad name and will most likely remove that member. It's a little justice, which is more than can be said about the in-game report system. Granted there are fleets out there that don't mind having trolls within their ranks, so if you do go that route you might get a "Don't care" response. lol
someomne tell me to do somethng about anyone in my fleet, i tell my fleet there is a cry baby out there - and to beware
Like I said, not all fleets care. If anything I phrase the complaint to a officer/leader as more of a warning about their community standing than a demand for action. Since there are blacklist out there. lol
Pretty simple really ... and this has been a drop mechanic in some other games for a long while ...
Participation in the drop mechanic is requisite upon a player being in aggro range of the corresponding kill at the time of the drop.
Of course, this works for loot drops but not for reputation marks; however, since STFs are basically a reputation farm, it's the mission design itself that is to blame. As they are currently designed, STFs and other group events encourage AFK farming. After all, some people have an aversion to doing the same time consuming task in the same manner over and over and over again. They could scale reputation rewards on a point system based upon dps, healing, buffing, and/or debuffing. Wait, don't they already do this for Red Alert events?
Remove the incentive and you decrease the associated behaviour.
Consider this post an objective opinion since I don't farm STFs or any other group events, and even if I did, I certainly wouldn't pug them.
but i think they should bring back teams only.
to where you need to join up with a team to do stf.
until they can come up with a solution.
but i think borg elite stf should be teams only
and pvp queue should be teams only.
I disagree with this 100%, reason being I am a lone wolf. I am the only member of my fleet. So to expect me to try to find a group for these things would be foolhardy. Yes, this is the way we used to have to do things, and I never experienced any of the stfs until we had queues, which is why I left for a while.
Why is there a penalty for leaving a group but no penalty for cheating your group by not playing?
Because leaving your group is trivial to detect, and was being exploited so people demanded a penalty.
Being AFK is much harder to deal with. It's trivial to make your client occasionally do something to defeat any simple AFK detection, and more complex AFK detection is likely to have significant rates of false positive.
Former moderator of these forums. Lifetime sub since before launch. Been here since before public betas. Foundry author of "Franklin Drake Must Die".
Unless they have changed things with recent updates, it used to be you only needed to wait 15mins. into your mission, and you could leave without suffering the leaver's penalty. I would have to test this as of recently to see if it still works.
I dont't think Azura lasts but 8 or so and 15 minutes would be on stage 2 of Vault. By then, you have only saved 7/10 and lost points. These are fairly short but intense instances. By the time you can quit, it's over or you have more time in than you have left to the end.
I usually will report them, not to a GM (Which doesn't seem to do anything) but to their fleet if they're in one. 90% of the time, a fleet won't accept a member giving them a bad name and will most likely remove that member.
This works well for quitters, AFKers, the surprisingly rare griefer, and other such beings. (Made up name to not offend anyone and if THIS fleet exists, I apologize twice!) The Lovers of Adorable Kitten Pictures Fleet generally hates for their name to be seen and generate, "OMG! That is the worst fleet on STO! They are all AFK or Quitters!" Particularly two seconds after a recruitment post on ESD. The AFK still gets marks but may find themselves looking for Lovers of Adorable Puppy Pictures Fleet very quickly.
My personal answer is to leave, and to encourage the rest of the group to leave. Painful, but if everyone did it the problem is solved.
_________________________________________________ [Kluless][Kold][Steel Heels][Snagtooth] [Louis Cipher][Outta Gum][Thysa Kymbo][Spanner][Frakk] [D'Mented][D'Licious]
Joined October 2009. READ BEFORE POSTING
I have a simple question. Is it against the ToS or Rules to AFK? The reason I ask, is because I am not aware of rule regarding AFK players. I don't afk and make a point to make sure I can finish a mission before I start.
I keep hearing about an uproar and people encouraging others to report afkers but if they are not breaking any rules, reporting them is futile.
I have a simple question. Is it against the ToS or Rules to AFK? The reason I ask, is because I am not aware of rule regarding AFK players. I don't afk and make a point to make sure I can finish a mission before I start.
I keep hearing about an uproar and people encouraging others to report afkers but if they are not breaking any rules, reporting them is futile.
there isn't any rules about players going afk during stf.
thats why alot of people do it and never get punished.
for a long time now.
I don't think they are always AFK, they are just to lazy to contribute to the mission, they have to be there to join the queue, they have to accept the mission, they have to hit the need button so I presume they just like leaching while chatting to people....... what they don't seem to grasp is that if they pull their fingers out and do something they mission could be over much faster and they could be on to the next one earning marks.
Comments
That game also has a vote kick system. However it is abused upto a point as after a certain number of vote kicks the person is then immune from it happening to them for a certain length of time. Now imagine if that person you vote kicked earlier is part of a group later on with you and you try to vote kick them only to get the message they can not be kicked for x hours. How would you feel? Effectively they can do whatever they want and are immune from being kicked.
The not grouping with people on your ignore list is the lesser of two evils because of its' limit. In that other game there is a cut off point on queue times. This means if the queue times go higher than a point they have set you can be grouped with people on your ignore list for the same of faster games. This adds to the limitation of abuse of this system.
The idea of putting this kind of power in players hands has got to be, in all honesty, the stupidest thing I've ever heard of. Giving a bunch of angry nerds the ability to permanently ruin another players game (for which they could have forked out hundreds of dollars in fees) for no other reason than because they can is so utterly and unbelievably stupid I think I might just have developed brain cancer from reading it.
For the love of Trek do not, I repeat NOT give this kind of ability to players. Hard code it into the game and refine it as you go to weed out false positives and make sure the system is stable. Unless of course you have all forgotten about the Goons and their exploits already?
Sig by my better half.
If you can't handle the possibility of getting kicked, form private groups. If you constantly get kicked from pugs, the overwhelming likelihood is that it's you who is doing it wrong.
The last MMO I played that allowed votekicking was a certain Korean import featuring overly twee avatars (you can probably guess which one I mean). With 400+ hours logged in that game I was kicked from pugs exactly zero times. It's just not that big of a problem in other games, I don't understand why it supposedly would be here.
-edit-
And to the poster above me, I don't understand how a votekick would permanently ruin anyone's game. If you get kicked every single time you get into an instance, it's because you've acquired a bad reputation. And even then, the user base isn't a hive mind. Even the worst players would still get groups. Unless you are an afk'er I don't see why you're so scared of this.
The other day there was one of those. I simply asked at the end if there was something wrong with is ship, if it was unable to fire.
Frankly, this is a game, it's meant to be played. What's the fun of sitting around and let it "play itself"?
But I am sure they are not all intentional. Just the other day, I got into an Azure. It took some 2 minutes just to see the team. I could see them moving but my ship wouldn't. Sometimes I got connection to server lost, but most of the time I could see them play I just couldn't move. The ship kept resetting. I asked if anyone was experiencing the lag as I was. I got a reply saying no, so in order not to be a leecher I exited the game. I got out promptly, so i wasn't really lagging (!?). After I logged in again I was automatically sent to the same scenario, and although I could move the game was ending. I got the marks but did not play at all. From the other's point of view it could seem that I was deliberately not doing anything.
Ever watch the loot need/greed responses? Allot of leeches will just sit there and try and collect loot while pretending to be afk. If someone pretends to be afk the shoot an enemy and train them to the leech then just sit next to the leach and let the enemy kill you so they will target the leech next. Pita but funny to die and then see the leech start moving and fighting.
A good fix to the leech problem is lose the need/greed and replace it with killing shot gets the drop, and you need to be not AFK to get any marks or reward. Go AFK and get nothing at all. Then final solution make it a temporary ban offense to join an stf and go AFK but give an option for emergencies where they can leave without penaly but be locked down for and cannot play until 1o or 15 minutes pass.
"I'm drunk, whats your excuse for being an idiot?" - Unknown drunk man. :eek:
That's even worse than Need and Greed. At least there is some scope in the current system for pre-made teams to distribute items fairly (randomly) amongst those who really need them, and for those who don't to pass. Need and Greed is a staple of MMO looting and has been used for ages. Plus if you don't like it, you can change the loot system to free for all, or Round Robin, in the team settings.
even if it sounds hard on newbys, i'd suggest a 15-20% contribution to dmg/healing needed to be eligible for any reward.
If you fail to deliver that, you either were afk, or you are not suited (yet) for that kind of content and need to rethink your build and skills.
the ranked loot at the end expanded to stfs, and the loot automatically dropped into your inventory. i see so many leave stfs without opening the reward canister.
I'd like to see as a next season update, the above in some form or shape...plus a rewards system for PVP (PVP reputation faction) that has SETS, WEAPONS, etc...
All in all, a nice consolifation season that looks at existing content, improves the obvious flawes there and adds some long needed PVP updates.
maybe like the had an emergency or somethng
and its just a game where you shoot stuff so its like no one gets hurt or anythngn
The game that can not be named has it and it was abused during testing just to show it could be that is when they introduced the cool down system into it.
I have seen and heard about a lot of people kicking because someone neded on something that the person who instigated the kick wanted, because they were new to that particular part of the game, they weren't up to so-an-sos' ideal of how much DPS/healing should be done, etc, etc, etc. I am not talking end game content here even the low level dungeons where newbies are meant to learn about playing in groups have this sort of problem. They have a larger community so it is easier to see more examples of the abuse of this sort of system.
They daren't introduce it into the BG side of the game because they know it would be a disaster. It has been asked for in the PvP side since it was introduced in PvE but it has not made the cross over thankfully.
Oh yeah, fantastic idea
"Yeah, damn cryptic won't fix these AFKers, now what could i do..." "Why don't you become an AFKer yourself, harming the community rather than the developers" "Aww gee what a good idea!"
Seriously?
if i can help the poor and tired with getting stuff its cool
A lot of times, AFKers won't click need/greed to give the illusion they aren't there.
As for the AFK issue in my own personal experiences. I usually will report them, not to a GM (Which doesn't seem to do anything) but to their fleet if they're in one. 90% of the time, a fleet won't accept a member giving them a bad name and will most likely remove that member. It's a little justice, which is more than can be said about the in-game report system. Granted there are fleets out there that don't mind having trolls within their ranks, so if you do go that route you might get a "Don't care" response. lol
someomne tell me to do somethng about anyone in my fleet, i tell my fleet there is a cry baby out there - and to beware
Like I said, not all fleets care. If anything I phrase the complaint to a officer/leader as more of a warning about their community standing than a demand for action.
was kinda kidding there, really what was suggested is a good idea for a percieved problem
however, a leisure activity - no one is going ot go to far out of ther way
Participation in the drop mechanic is requisite upon a player being in aggro range of the corresponding kill at the time of the drop.
Of course, this works for loot drops but not for reputation marks; however, since STFs are basically a reputation farm, it's the mission design itself that is to blame. As they are currently designed, STFs and other group events encourage AFK farming. After all, some people have an aversion to doing the same time consuming task in the same manner over and over and over again. They could scale reputation rewards on a point system based upon dps, healing, buffing, and/or debuffing. Wait, don't they already do this for Red Alert events?
Remove the incentive and you decrease the associated behaviour.
Consider this post an objective opinion since I don't farm STFs or any other group events, and even if I did, I certainly wouldn't pug them.
I disagree with this 100%, reason being I am a lone wolf. I am the only member of my fleet. So to expect me to try to find a group for these things would be foolhardy. Yes, this is the way we used to have to do things, and I never experienced any of the stfs until we had queues, which is why I left for a while.
(lol)
your right
say you've done about 1,567 of them and are trying to get romulan set or somethng and thats your main goal
afk farming is the logical thing to do if your bored but want that engine
in such a scenario afk'rs are smart
Because leaving your group is trivial to detect, and was being exploited so people demanded a penalty.
Being AFK is much harder to deal with. It's trivial to make your client occasionally do something to defeat any simple AFK detection, and more complex AFK detection is likely to have significant rates of false positive.
Ringing any bells? :rolleyes:
I dont't think Azura lasts but 8 or so and 15 minutes would be on stage 2 of Vault. By then, you have only saved 7/10 and lost points. These are fairly short but intense instances. By the time you can quit, it's over or you have more time in than you have left to the end.
This works well for quitters, AFKers, the surprisingly rare griefer, and other such beings. (Made up name to not offend anyone and if THIS fleet exists, I apologize twice!) The Lovers of Adorable Kitten Pictures Fleet generally hates for their name to be seen and generate, "OMG! That is the worst fleet on STO! They are all AFK or Quitters!" Particularly two seconds after a recruitment post on ESD. The AFK still gets marks but may find themselves looking for Lovers of Adorable Puppy Pictures Fleet very quickly.
[Kluless][Kold][Steel Heels][Snagtooth]
[Louis Cipher][Outta Gum][Thysa Kymbo][Spanner][Frakk]
[D'Mented][D'Licious]
Joined October 2009. READ BEFORE POSTING
I keep hearing about an uproar and people encouraging others to report afkers but if they are not breaking any rules, reporting them is futile.
there isn't any rules about players going afk during stf.
thats why alot of people do it and never get punished.
for a long time now.