Leeching and Possible Countermeasure

broodwyn

Over the past month I've seen a large increase in players just leeching in STFs/FA/MU Events/RA Events

For those who do not know what "leeching" is:

Leeching is the MMO term for a player who spends the entirety of the match/event/instance away from keyboard with their character sitting in the Spawn area, doing nothing to help the team bust still 'earning' XP/Skill Points/Honor/Marks, the only time they do move is to collect their loot at the end

Now I am aware that we can report players via "Report Player to GM",
However given the turn over of GM tickets, it doesn't feel very effective and you also have to stop what you are doing to write up a report,

Now if your on a timed map with a leech on your team you're already down 1 man, so the more spent writing the less chance you have of being successful (and having to wait another 30 minutes because someone couldn't be bothered with playing doesn't sound all to fun)

Countermeasure:

Now Leeching isn't new, its been around for ages, and it seems its slowly growing larger then it already was in STO since season 6
(There were leechers before but not as bad an infestation as this)

In WoW if a player was leeching team mates could report the player AFK, after a while the Devs took it one step further, the player when reported AFK was then given a debuff which awarded him no rewards until he engaged another player in PvP combat, and IIRC after a while had he not engaged in PvP he was removed from the battleground with a penalty, unable to requeue for x hours

How could this be a applied to STO?

Add a Report Player AFK button which then negates any experience until they engage an enemy

Now considering most STO events are on a 15 minute timmer (FA/RA/STFs)
1-5 Minutes with the Debuff - No Skillpoints/EC/Fleet Marks earned - Only able to greed on items
5-10 Minutes With the Debuff - All of the Above - Unable to roll on items
10-15 Minutes with the Debuff - All of the above - Does not receive any loot, personal or otherwise,
1 hour 'leecher penality' debuff upon leaving/Leave map timer runs out - Unable to queue for any thing in the PvP/PvE queue


The best course of action to stop leechers going into combat and then dying to leech while dead?

If the player is reported by 2 same players for a second time the timer resumes from where it left off before they engaged the enemy, like so:

Leecher gets the debuff
Leeching for a bit - 5m:2s on the debuff
Leeecher engages the mob - Debuff is frozen (Removed completely after 30 seconds of actions)
Leecher dies
Reported AFK again
Leechers timer resumes at 5m:3s


Now this is my idea, the likelihood of it being added to the game is slim, though I would like to hear your feedback

-Genex/Broodwyn

alesiam1

I have to agree, there has been a large number of players doing nothing in events such as STF and Fleet Actions. I don't know if it is a matter of the players do not know what to do, or just plain do not care if they are of any assistance.
For those actions we need all 5 players to be actively involved in the battles, the fact they are not makes the chances for success much more difficult and sometimes not possible at all.
The idea to add some form of penalty system is a great idea, at least it will detour players from trying to just get by.

That all being said, if you just do not know what your doing when you enter in a match, speak up. Many players don't mind giving you the run down of how each mission is done. Players are willing to help if your willing to open your mouth and tell them your new to that mission.
There are also many helpful Threads and YouTube Turtorials.

I like Genex's idea and from experience in other games with similar systems, it would be a working solution that could alleviate some of the GM Reports.

labrador305

broodwyn wrote: »

Over the past month I've seen a large increase in players just leeching in STFs/FA/MU Events/RA Events

For those who do not know what "leeching" is:


Now I am aware that we can report players via "Report Player to GM",
However given the turn over of GM tickets, it doesn't feel very effective and you also have to stop what you are doing to write up a report,

Now if your on a timed map with a leech on your team you're already down 1 man, so the more spent writing the less chance you have of being successful (and having to wait another 30 minutes because someone couldn't be bothered with playing doesn't sound all to fun)

Countermeasure:

Now Leeching isn't new, its been around for ages, and it seems its slowly growing larger then it already was in STO since season 6
(There were leechers before but not as bad an infestation as this)

In WoW if a player was leeching team mates could report the player AFK, after a while the Devs took it one step further, the player when reported AFK was then given a debuff which awarded him no rewards until he engaged another player in PvP combat, and IIRC after a while had he not engaged in PvP he was removed from the battleground with a penalty, unable to requeue for x hours

How could this be a applied to STO?

Add a Report Player AFK button which then negates any experience until they engage an enemy

Now considering most STO events are on a 15 minute timmer (FA/RA/STFs)
1-5 Minutes with the Debuff - No Skillpoints/EC/Fleet Marks earned - Only able to greed on items
5-10 Minutes With the Debuff - All of the Above - Unable to roll on items
10-15 Minutes with the Debuff - All of the above - Does not receive any loot, personal or otherwise,
1 hour 'leecher penality' debuff upon leaving/Leave map timer runs out - Unable to queue for any thing in the PvP/PvE queue


The best course of action to stop leechers going into combat and then dying to leech while dead?

If the player is reported by 2 same players for a second time the timer resumes from where it left off before they engaged the enemy, like so:

Leecher gets the debuff
Leeching for a bit - 5m:2s on the debuff
Leeecher engages the mob - Debuff is frozen (Removed completely after 30 seconds of actions)
Leecher dies
Reported AFK again
Leechers timer resumes at 5m:3s


Now this is my idea, the likelihood of it being added to the game is slim, though I would like to hear your feedback

-Genex/Broodwyn

1-5 minute punishment is a little harsh but I think this-

10-15 Mins no action- No end game reward

15+ Mins no action -kicked from game, no reward

If you do another game after being kicked and leach again, you get nothing and are kicked again

If you do another game after being kicked and leach again, you get nothing and are kicked again

By now you have tried to leach 3 times. This means you are banned from PvE rewards and in game loot can only be passed.

To get rewards again you need to do 20 PvE matches with no reward to you and you HAVE to contribute after 20 matches you get rewarded again, as long as you don't leach!

If you try to leach on more than 3 of these no reward matches you have to start over with no rewards

-That would be my suggestion

NO TO LEECHING!

kamenskshax

The issue with this system is that you can wreck a game for healers and those who support rather than directly contribute to combat.

I agree in STO there aren't too many opportunities to heal exclusively, but as an example, Starbase Blockade is completely do-able without firing a single shot....

_____

Any report option that involves a penalty needs to be "verified" - and an automatic penalty system is more open to exploit than the potential penalty for leeching.

To me the simplest system is to scale rewards based on damage caused AND healing given - as there are rankings in some events, STF's and Fleet Actions could have rankings with most damage + healing getting 120% of standard reward down to 50% for the least effective.

__________

In reality I don't think there is a fair solution - and actually leechers are not nearly as bad as the trolls who deliberately wreck missions, or do not start the queue for the vault etc.... and they would not be caught by that system. Only real solution I'm afraid is pre-made teams....

diogene0

The problem isn't the AFKer, the problem is the leaver penalty in STFs. I don't mind if there is an AFK in other pve queues, I can just quit whenvever I want. :rolleyes:

canis36

The biggest problem with this solution is that it'll kill public queues if it's implemented and they'll stay dead until it's taken down. There are trolls out there in the game and I've encountered a few of them before but for the moment they're little more than easily ignored annoyances. Add this system though and they'll be anywhere and everywhere this system applies and they'll be spamming that little button/command that blocks somebody's ability to earn/gain their rewards. And they'll keep doing it so long as there are people to do it to.

The only way to prevent it, and probably the reason why a paid MMO like WoW can manage it, is to hire on a sufficient number of full-time GMs that are constantly looking into these things to make sure stuff like that doesn't happen. And if they could hire that many GMs, would the tickets be so useless as to have people calling for this relatively extreme method?

Honestly a "Vote to Kick" system (which is a horrible idea anyway) would work better as you're less likely to bust your butt to complete an Elite STF only to be denied the ability to pick up your loot bag because some joker though he'd be cute and nail you with a leecher penalty when you took an unlucky hit and died just before the boss went down.

markhawkman

Well, any system needs to look at the player's contribution stats. IE you can't tag someone as a leecher if they're actively fighting enemies or completing objectives.

rohirrim

This could be automated.

Anyone having bellow X amount of damage done or Y amount of healing done and not passed through the checkpoints on the map don't get anything at all and to be able to do "need", "greed" or "pass" on loot you need to be within a certain radius from the group (means you won't get the pop-up if someone picks something up on the other side of the map).

whamhammer1

My curiosity is what do the GM's and other Cryptic team members think about this subject? I haven't really heard anything from them.

lostmoony

the basic idea sounds ok.

so if a player is ~2 min doing nothing you switch him to AFK report.
then the player get a message on that he must answer in ~10 sec or he is marked afk and loot option is automatikly with that disable for him +2 hours que ban.
if he show any reaktion and start again moving he is there and all nice again.

i remember to have seen somethink like that in a game but dont remember ... where

markhawkman

rohirrim wrote: »

This could be automated.

Anyone having bellow X amount of damage done or Y amount of healing done and not passed through the checkpoints on the map don't get anything at all and to be able to do "need", "greed" or "pass" on loot you need to be within a certain radius from the group (means you won't get the pop-up if someone picks something up on the other side of the map).

My thoughts exactly. It's simpler and probably better if the people working to win the mission don't have to stop just to get rid of a leecher.

contrarydecision

Quick lets add the means of punishment for perceived or real slights to the oh-so-mature playerbase. This can't POSSIBLY go wrong.

whamhammer1

Without Cryptic working with players, nothing can or will be done with "leechers". And really haven't read (ie. none) too much on the issue from staff.

antras1

another suggestion, also to *bump* this thread...:

implement a minimum hurdle to STFs, if a player doesn't make it, he gets no loot (and preferably even a queue-ban for X hours).
For example, dealing 10k heals/damage on an elite ground STF is easily possible, even for a poorly geared player, as long as he's working with his team. 5k easily come from hypos alone.
If a player doesn't meet that 10k-mark, he's obviously afk/leeching for a long time.

A script determining the amount of a players heals/damage during an STF could be easily made, after all something similar already exists for fleet actions.
That change wouldn't affect all those teamplayers out there, but could easily deal with that bunch of leechers who seek to destroy the STO-experience for everybody else.

Hope you, dear cryptics, will finally do something here - being fooled by leechers and feeling abandoned by you just isn't fun.

mastergenera1

I agree with the poster that said it should be automated,cryptic already has something of the sort in place for dmg and heal accolades.i would make it though where 1-5 min is a warning phase(clock doesnt reset by moving) 5-10 min would be you forfeit your loot bag and it gets dealt with in the manner an optional bag would,10+ min you get booted from the stf and forfeit any chance of loot for 20 matches and are(penalty stacks on a by match basis)stuck doing normal modes with the rest of the scrubs until probationary period is over

marc8219

My solution to this problem is usually to just do fleet/ and chat channel private games. On the rare occaisons where I can't find a private game and have to que I will just quit and take the penalty rather then help an AFKer get undeserved loot. If people don't have multiple elite stf capable alts like me and don't want penalty just go afk too for 15 min then quit without penalty.