Nothing special, I am a F2P tac in a Lvl 40 escort. But I've found a pretty reliable way to do it based on trial and error.
First you need to know that the disable button pops up when you are within 8km of the Romulan ship, IF the tractor nodes are within your line of sight.
Second also know that the Tholians actually dont open up on you as soon as you're within 10km of them. You get a little grace period of about 1 km.
Third, be aware that the Tholians actually 'patrol' around a small area in a circle (counter-clockwise, usually) and are not statically placed, so if they're too close, wait 10-20 seconds and you'll be fine.
Finally, remember that space has a Z- axis.
I typically fly much below the asteroid, make sure I'm just outside (underneath still but not directly) of the asteroid's diameter on the side with the romulan ship, and then simply point myself at the romulan ship and fly up, trying to get within 8km of it while keeping the tholians >10km away from me.
I've actually even had some success in not firing back, if one of the group shoots at me, about half the time, if I back off a bit, just out of range, I dont aggro the pack, and the shooter rejoins them.
all you have to do is have one drag them away from the base so the rest can work on the TB
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?
Believe me, I know. All I can suggest doing , is what I do, which is, report the player while your in-game, by choosing "request GM help", and tell them. Usually I get a response back by the GM saying that they have been given the appropriate penalty or something like that.
What they ought to do is , somehow (as I'm sure they could figure it out), have the game map itself, detect whether a ship has fired against the enemy within a certain time frame or not, and if they have not, then they should be booted, or , you only get rewards if you cause a certain amount of damage to the enemy.
Then that would certainly give the players whom do more work, more rewards, if it's based upon the amount of damage done per player.
What they ought to do is , somehow (as I'm sure they could figure it out), have the game map itself, detect whether a ship has fired against the enemy within a certain time frame or not, and if they have not, then they should be booted, or , you only get rewards if you cause a certain amount of damage to the enemy.
This ignores the fact that in Azure, it is entirely effective to play without ever firing a shot. A player could thus be highly effective and yet be socked with no reward because they didn't do the counterproductive action of firing any shots. There are several missions in which it is entirely possible to play as pacifist and never kill any enemies while remaining effective, such as this one. I have done lots of Starbase Blockade where my ship doesn't even have a weapon on it.
This ignores the fact that in Azure, it is entirely effective to play without ever firing a shot. A player could thus be highly effective and yet be socked with no reward because they didn't do the counterproductive action of firing any shots. There are several missions in which it is entirely possible to play as pacifist and never kill any enemies while remaining effective, such as this one. I have done lots of Starbase Blockade where my ship doesn't even have a weapon on it.
Then the question still remains... what's to do ....
I just leave the group....no time for leeches personally.....the sad thing is the other three are left at a seriously depleted strength but I will not suffer the folly of others ...
Today we fight the GAULS......monstrous and HAIRY beyond reason.
I just leave the group....no time for leeches personally.....the sad thing is the other three are left at a seriously depleted strength but I will not suffer the folly of others ...
Sadly that's the view I have also taken when dealing with players who leech.
I will monitor the player for a minute or so, if they show no sign of any activity I'll try to contact them in team chat. If they still remain motionless after another minute or so I will apologise to the other members of the team explaining that I will be leaving the mission rather then continue to carry the leech.
Do you at least have the decency to explain why you are leaving to your team mates, or do you bail unannounced. If you do the latter then you are no better than the leechers.
Personally I view people who carry on playing little better then those who leech. By continuing to do the work for them they are pretty much giving them the green light and saying it's okay to leech.
If everyone who had a leech in their mission warped out then maybe the leeches might just get the message when they are sat there alone earning nothing. It may take a while but after a few dozen times of being left alone to leech nothing it might just sink in that they are expected to actually contribute to the mission.
then your stuck doing nothing for a hour and and it would not stop leechers to and also every one leaves he going to go to a new so and so because the leecher did not leaves so the leecher is not stuck doing nothing for a hour
a leecher is not going to leave unless 1 the whole group leaves then they are auto kick for not enough members or 2 you complete the mission
You are not stuck doing nothing for an hour, It may seem like a waste of time to simply all wait for 15mins. to expire than everyone simply leave the afker. If you at least have been in a mission for 15mins. you can leave without the hour penalty, and 15mins. of wasted time is better than an hour wait do to a leavers penalty any day.
vote to kick is the only option..
but of course you will get that one guy that just wont vote.. then it will become useless.
[12:35] Vessel Two of Two Unimatrix 01 deals 225232 (271723) Plasma Damage to you with Plasma Lance.
[12:44] Vessel One of Two Unimatrix 01 deals 1019527 (1157678) Kinetic Damage to you with Plasma Energy Bolt Explosion.
I know a few games that have an inactivity timer on them, why doesnt STO have this? If a player is motionless for more than a minute in the middle of a battle, then he is obviously afk, the system should recognise this with a timer, so the offending player would not only get kicked, but completely logged off. You can also have it set, so if they get logged off for being afk, then they get the 1 hour leaver penalty.
Lets see how many players go afk if this system was in place!
I know a few games that have an inactivity timer on them, why doesnt STO have this? If a player is motionless for more than a minute in the middle of a battle, then he is obviously afk, the system should recognise this with a timer, so the offending player would not only get kicked, but completely logged off. You can also have it set, so if they get logged off for being afk, then they get the 1 hour leaver penalty.
Lets see how many players go afk if this system was in place!
The trouble with that idea is a lot of the afk players are still actively doing something to prevent this, also it would affect people who get DC'd and try to relog to continue the fight.
or how about an option of you have till x number of kills or re-spawn points to leave without a penalty. For example lets say infected space once you kill the first 3 you cant leave but before that you have the option to without penalty
The trouble with that idea is a lot of the afk players are still actively doing something to prevent this, also it would affect people who get DC'd and try to relog to continue the fight.
Well, getting disconnected from the server is different from getting logged off due to inactivity. I'm sure that the system can handle spotting the difference between timed out players, and DC'd players.
When people get disconnected, they know that if they get the "Server not responding" if you haven't got back in after 15 seconds, then you will get DC'd. Typical PvE's go on for 15-20 mins dependant on which one, so all you have to do is have the timer set to 2 mins of inactivity. the first min, they get a warning message in chat. the 2nd minute crosses, they get disconnected.
I cannot see a typical afk'er sitting there tapping a few keys on his keyboard every single minute just to remain in the game, that would be like running your toohbrush under the tap for 30 seconds without using it to brush your teeth! An exercise in futility.
There should be a list where we can go and name and shame these fools. Then PW should ban them from entering any fleet actions or any kind for a week. Hard penalty? I don't think so.
tried doing elite other day three sitters and two of us fighting,,,,joke,,,,,,they also need to stop the launcher from crashing,,,,,,get it quite often and as i have to reboot to get back in cause steam says the game is still running computer says not,,,,game over banned,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
- if at least 2 players in the group flag someone as a leecher, it records the play session of the flagged player for review by a GM. If the GM determines the player has leeched, the player gets a one month cooldown on ALL STF's.
- If a player is troll-flagged, the trolls get the one month cooldown. Upon third offense, their account is banned.
Of course this all depends on the number of GM's they have.
I think people need to understand many afk people in azure are sitting afk after you've capped the event. I think azure is what 10-15 minutes? You cap it out after 5. I always sit afk...as do many of my friends as there no point in doing anything else. Its a probably with the event, not the playerbase.
As far as Azure Nebula goes - No to this this idea of using damage/healing to determine AFK status.
I have no heals to give to others, and, significantly, I make it a point not to get into any fights in Azure Nebula. I actively avoid trying to do any damage. I find it far more effective and time-efficient to avoid the Tholian patrols completely and just free the ships without engaging. The vast majority of my AZ runs I don't fire a shot, and rarely even get attacked.
So no, bad idea, at least for AZ. Now if they tracked how many times you clicked 'disable tractor beam' that'd be okay
I'm referring to the afkers who sit at spawn, on azure, it's an annoyance at best, as 4 of us can get the job done, with the others it's an extreme annoyance. As a lot of you have said an auto kick feature is a good idea, but at the same time it's a double edged sword as it can be abused, the same can be said with flagging.
As a matter of principle, if i'm in the respawn countdown, i'll pass on the loot roll. There is an old saying, the minority spoil it for the majority.
"The meaning of victory is not to merely defeat your enemy but to destroy him, to completely eradicate him from living memory, to leave no remnant of his endeavours, to crush utterly his achievement and remove from all record his every trace of existence. From that defeat no enemy can ever recover. That is the meaning of victory."
-Lord Commander Solar Macharius
I think people need to understand many afk people in azure are sitting afk after you've capped the event. I think azure is what 10-15 minutes? You cap it out after 5. I always sit afk...as do many of my friends as there no point in doing anything else. Its a probably with the event, not the playerbase.
No, that's not what any of us are talking about.
Extend a bare minimum of respect for us by not assuming we are idiots who can't tell the difference between someone idling at the end of an event and someone who idles from the very beginning.
The STFs are all either scored or score-able. You get points for destroying ships, points for completing objectives, etc. While I strongly feel there should be separate points (and rewards) for dps, tanking, and healing - why couldn't we just have a minimum score required to earn any marks/dilithium/etc. from the STF?
For STFs that have multiple stages (like Vault Ensnared, etc), make the minimum score a per stage thing. This would discourage peeps from participating at the begining of an STF and then going AFK as soon as they'd met the minimum.
I would even go so far as to suggest that someone who fails to earn any points (because they didn't meet the minimum score in any of the stages) should receive the same penalty as if they'd left the STF.
The problem with a kick feature is that it also requires the system to find a replacement, otherwise, you are no better off for having kicked an afk player (other than the satisfaction of not letting them leech off you).
Currently, for Vault Ensnared, I just leave and requeue when there's a leecher. There is no penalty, and the time it takes to tell if someone is leeching isn't that bad compared to running the whole instance with an afk player and likely getting reduced rewards plus a cooldown.
I agree that a more sophisticated system which simply doesn't reward someone for not participating would be preferable, but I think the chances of Cryptic implementing that (and having it work reasonably) are nil.
No it isn't. a votekick system would be heavily abused, just like it is in the very few games stupid enough to use it
First off, the idea that a player in this game could acquire a reputation bad enough that every single person in the game knew his @name on sight is ludicrous.
Except that it has happened in many games: Meridian, EQ, UO, SWG, **** and several others all have several people that are well known to their respective communities in such a way. That is why communities do not allow blacklisting in any form
Second even if this hypothetical player's @name was that well known, everyone in the game would have to have to be willing to waste time actively checking @names to avoid people they don't want to team with.
No, word gets around quite fast on its own
Another good plan, and a workable one, would be for the Dev's to actually take action against player who consistently AFK (deliberately)
No. Being AFK is not a tos violation. Therefore they currently have no basis to take action against any such person
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
So...you act like a jackass then? Did it ever cross your mind that such a person may very well be right about the person they told you about?
Reporting them is not only futile but could be considered as harassment according to the TOS.
Correct
I'm not aware of anybody having been warned or actioned for harassment for merely reporting AFKers. As long as they weren't using "report spam" to do so, or using some automated tool to spam reports. Stay away from anything with "spam" in it and you'll be fine
No. Technically its still harassment because the purpose behind reporting them is to get them in trouble, whether its for spam or anything else.
I GM report every single one. Is that not what the system was designed for?
Again, that is harassment
I don't care. I'll keep doing it until a system is in place that forces people to actually contribute to PvE to reap its rewards.
You will care when the person you are reporting reports you for harassment and has you banned.
Cryptic records what we type in-game for use if there's a complaint against you. Why don't they keep track track of the damage and healing you do in each mission? That way if a complaint is made against a person they can look at the log to see if the person leeched of not.
What complaint exactly? Being AFK isn't a violation of the TOS and therefore there is no valid complaint
I'm not sure what your concern is with a punitive component of rep? Since the primary way of getting negative rep would be AFKing, I think there needs to be a punitive component to dissuade that behavior.
No, the primary way of getting negative rep would be to not log in for extended times. As many casual players do.
Reporting them isn't working clearly
That is because it is not supposed to work. There is no tos violation in it
Believe me, I know. All I can suggest doing , is what I do, which is, report the player while your in-game, by choosing "request GM help", and tell them. Usually I get a response back by the GM saying that they have been given the appropriate penalty or something like that.
No you don't. No GM can take any action against such a person because it does not violate the tos.
they also need to stop the launcher from crashing,,,,,,get it quite often and as i have to reboot to get back in cause steam says the game is still running computer says not
Just shut down the sto process in the task manager
if at least 2 players in the group flag someone as a leecher, it records the play session of the flagged player for review by a GM. If the GM determines the player has leeched, the player gets a one month cooldown on ALL STF's.
- If a player is troll-flagged, the trolls get the one month cooldown. Upon third offense, their account is banned.
No. This is harassment. There is no rule in the tos that says they can take action against anyone for doing something like that, no matter how annoying it may be
they should atleast make it so that any player that is inactive for 3-4 minutes is autokicked and penaltized for 1-2 hours, which ever you'd prefer, i know azura reque is a different story because you can literally finish with max marks in 4 minutes and afk for rest of the duration and get noe xtra marks from it
Say the word, it saves the world. CUUCUUMBEER!"-With slight partigen with it." Proud member or DPS-800"-We kill dem mines with our scitter turrets."
Yup I remember when the queues first came out on that game and you had to be a real idiot to get kicked from a group.
Most group kicks I saw were rejected. The only time people were ever booted from the groups I was in were for legit reasons. Like trying to troll by pulling adds on purpose or seriously afking. No one was ever kicked for being under geared or making a mistake or just to troll kick.
I mean hell I understand life interferes with gaming sometimes and as a healer I'd just tell someone who had to afk to autofollow me until they got back.
I do not believe the STO community is so sad that votekick would ruin the game because if I did I certainly wouldn't be spending my spare time here.
Oh and to the topic.
I really haven't seen a lot of afking in public queues on sto. Currently one thing you could do if you really really don't want to farm marks for a leechbot is to just leave the map, take the penality and hop on an alt to farm dil.
^^^^
THIS!! Please, oh please, Cryptic ... SO many reasons to have this feature implemented.
[OUTE=glassguitar;10740461]?Players no longer get points for Assists if they do not deal damage to the target player. ?We are aware that this puts healers at a point disadvantage; we are looking into solutions for a future update[/QOUTE]
:rolleyes:, its not as if they haven't already done screwed things up, if this patch is to come to date they are going to have to find a solution like NOW!.
My solution would be as follows, and i think it's the best put forward.
Each player has a report away from keyboard (or something alone those lines)
If this is activated more than 10 times in 1 week (a single account can only active it twice)
The player in question then gets moved to stf (or equivalent) afk pool, the afk pool is filled with players who have had this activated. And they can only play with each other unless a private game.
Once the player is in the pool for a week or a month (take your pick) and they have not re offended they are then moved back into the normal pool for stf (or equivalent).
This way it does not punish them if they only go afk for 1-2 games over a week, hey stuff happens after all.
They can also continue to play the game without any issue, but are relegated to play with other afk players so they either start to work or they get no rewards.
Comments
all you have to do is have one drag them away from the base so the rest can work on the TB
system Lord Baal is dead
::WARNING:: This game is not intended for use as a source of self-esteem.
Believe me, I know. All I can suggest doing , is what I do, which is, report the player while your in-game, by choosing "request GM help", and tell them. Usually I get a response back by the GM saying that they have been given the appropriate penalty or something like that.
What they ought to do is , somehow (as I'm sure they could figure it out), have the game map itself, detect whether a ship has fired against the enemy within a certain time frame or not, and if they have not, then they should be booted, or , you only get rewards if you cause a certain amount of damage to the enemy.
Then that would certainly give the players whom do more work, more rewards, if it's based upon the amount of damage done per player.
ya more reasons to fly escorts...........:rolleyes:
system Lord Baal is dead
Too true, Friend. Too True.
Then the question still remains... what's to do ....
Sadly that's the view I have also taken when dealing with players who leech.
I will monitor the player for a minute or so, if they show no sign of any activity I'll try to contact them in team chat. If they still remain motionless after another minute or so I will apologise to the other members of the team explaining that I will be leaving the mission rather then continue to carry the leech.
Personally I view people who carry on playing little better then those who leech. By continuing to do the work for them they are pretty much giving them the green light and saying it's okay to leech.
If everyone who had a leech in their mission warped out then maybe the leeches might just get the message when they are sat there alone earning nothing. It may take a while but after a few dozen times of being left alone to leech nothing it might just sink in that they are expected to actually contribute to the mission.
You are not stuck doing nothing for an hour, It may seem like a waste of time to simply all wait for 15mins. to expire than everyone simply leave the afker. If you at least have been in a mission for 15mins. you can leave without the hour penalty, and 15mins. of wasted time is better than an hour wait do to a leavers penalty any day.
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
but of course you will get that one guy that just wont vote.. then it will become useless.
[12:44] Vessel One of Two Unimatrix 01 deals 1019527 (1157678) Kinetic Damage to you with Plasma Energy Bolt Explosion.
Lets see how many players go afk if this system was in place!
The trouble with that idea is a lot of the afk players are still actively doing something to prevent this, also it would affect people who get DC'd and try to relog to continue the fight.
Praetor of the -RTS- Romulan Tal Shiar fleet!
Well, getting disconnected from the server is different from getting logged off due to inactivity. I'm sure that the system can handle spotting the difference between timed out players, and DC'd players.
When people get disconnected, they know that if they get the "Server not responding" if you haven't got back in after 15 seconds, then you will get DC'd. Typical PvE's go on for 15-20 mins dependant on which one, so all you have to do is have the timer set to 2 mins of inactivity. the first min, they get a warning message in chat. the 2nd minute crosses, they get disconnected.
I cannot see a typical afk'er sitting there tapping a few keys on his keyboard every single minute just to remain in the game, that would be like running your toohbrush under the tap for 30 seconds without using it to brush your teeth! An exercise in futility.
Use the flag system:
- if at least 2 players in the group flag someone as a leecher, it records the play session of the flagged player for review by a GM. If the GM determines the player has leeched, the player gets a one month cooldown on ALL STF's.
- If a player is troll-flagged, the trolls get the one month cooldown. Upon third offense, their account is banned.
Of course this all depends on the number of GM's they have.
I'm referring to the afkers who sit at spawn, on azure, it's an annoyance at best, as 4 of us can get the job done, with the others it's an extreme annoyance. As a lot of you have said an auto kick feature is a good idea, but at the same time it's a double edged sword as it can be abused, the same can be said with flagging.
As a matter of principle, if i'm in the respawn countdown, i'll pass on the loot roll. There is an old saying, the minority spoil it for the majority.
-Lord Commander Solar Macharius
No, that's not what any of us are talking about.
Extend a bare minimum of respect for us by not assuming we are idiots who can't tell the difference between someone idling at the end of an event and someone who idles from the very beginning.
For STFs that have multiple stages (like Vault Ensnared, etc), make the minimum score a per stage thing. This would discourage peeps from participating at the begining of an STF and then going AFK as soon as they'd met the minimum.
I would even go so far as to suggest that someone who fails to earn any points (because they didn't meet the minimum score in any of the stages) should receive the same penalty as if they'd left the STF.
just my .02,
- SC
Currently, for Vault Ensnared, I just leave and requeue when there's a leecher. There is no penalty, and the time it takes to tell if someone is leeching isn't that bad compared to running the whole instance with an afk player and likely getting reduced rewards plus a cooldown.
I agree that a more sophisticated system which simply doesn't reward someone for not participating would be preferable, but I think the chances of Cryptic implementing that (and having it work reasonably) are nil.
No it isn't. a votekick system would be heavily abused, just like it is in the very few games stupid enough to use it
Except that it has happened in many games: Meridian, EQ, UO, SWG, **** and several others all have several people that are well known to their respective communities in such a way. That is why communities do not allow blacklisting in any form
No, word gets around quite fast on its own
No. Being AFK is not a tos violation. Therefore they currently have no basis to take action against any such person
So...you act like a jackass then? Did it ever cross your mind that such a person may very well be right about the person they told you about?
Correct
No. Technically its still harassment because the purpose behind reporting them is to get them in trouble, whether its for spam or anything else.
Again, that is harassment
You will care when the person you are reporting reports you for harassment and has you banned.
What complaint exactly? Being AFK isn't a violation of the TOS and therefore there is no valid complaint
No, the primary way of getting negative rep would be to not log in for extended times. As many casual players do.
That is because it is not supposed to work. There is no tos violation in it
No you don't. No GM can take any action against such a person because it does not violate the tos.
Just shut down the sto process in the task manager
No. This is harassment. There is no rule in the tos that says they can take action against anyone for doing something like that, no matter how annoying it may be
wow has it and it works just fine their
system Lord Baal is dead
sound like something a leecher would know
system Lord Baal is dead
CUUCUUMBEER! "-With slight partigen with it."
Proud member or DPS-800 "-We kill dem mines with our scitter turrets."
Yup I remember when the queues first came out on that game and you had to be a real idiot to get kicked from a group.
Most group kicks I saw were rejected. The only time people were ever booted from the groups I was in were for legit reasons. Like trying to troll by pulling adds on purpose or seriously afking. No one was ever kicked for being under geared or making a mistake or just to troll kick.
I mean hell I understand life interferes with gaming sometimes and as a healer I'd just tell someone who had to afk to autofollow me until they got back.
I do not believe the STO community is so sad that votekick would ruin the game because if I did I certainly wouldn't be spending my spare time here.
Oh and to the topic.
I really haven't seen a lot of afking in public queues on sto. Currently one thing you could do if you really really don't want to farm marks for a leechbot is to just leave the map, take the penality and hop on an alt to farm dil.
[OUTE=glassguitar;10740461]?Players no longer get points for Assists if they do not deal damage to the target player. ?We are aware that this puts healers at a point disadvantage; we are looking into solutions for a future update[/QOUTE]
:rolleyes:, its not as if they haven't already done screwed things up, if this patch is to come to date they are going to have to find a solution like NOW!.
My solution would be as follows, and i think it's the best put forward.
Each player has a report away from keyboard (or something alone those lines)
If this is activated more than 10 times in 1 week (a single account can only active it twice)
The player in question then gets moved to stf (or equivalent) afk pool, the afk pool is filled with players who have had this activated. And they can only play with each other unless a private game.
Once the player is in the pool for a week or a month (take your pick) and they have not re offended they are then moved back into the normal pool for stf (or equivalent).
This way it does not punish them if they only go afk for 1-2 games over a week, hey stuff happens after all.
They can also continue to play the game without any issue, but are relegated to play with other afk players so they either start to work or they get no rewards.