Toxicity in RenX

[Tomcat_]

I'm not talking about tongue-in-cheek ribbing or occasional outbursts, like calling someone a camper, a noob, a little bitch, even a cunt or whatever. That's fairly typical and easy to look past. It's momentary and not very harmful. It is expected in pretty much any multiplayer FPS. Even small arguments are inevitable and that's ok. I am talking about the unfortunate presence of real toxicity within RenX.

I'm talking about players who launch into 20, 30 minute tirades about Player X for using tactics they don't like, or for "cheating," or for seemingly no reason at all. Using offensive statements over, and over, and over, and over again, well in excess of the situations I described above. Sometimes using unnecessarily abrasive words like faggot and nigger. Finding it necessary to make remarks every time they die or kill the player who is the subject of their ire. Changing their in-game name to provoke a response. General griefing or team hampering and being abusive to others.

Others will comment, either in confusion, in annoyance, or in defense of Player X which prompts the toxic player(s) to target them as well. Disconcertingly, some comment in favor of the toxic player(s). All of this breeds frustration, anger, and disappointment that causes people to leave or succumb to the toxicity themselves, creating additional conflict through a vitriolic chain reaction.

 

In another case, someone suggested that Player Y is female, creating a flood of commentary. Some players acted in an appreciable tongue-in-cheek way, some made cringeworthy statements, some were misogynistic at worst, and some danced a questionable line between the three. Looking at the chat, I had to wonder, what the fuck am I reading? It's the sort of stuff I expect in Call of Duty, even Battlefield, but not Renegade X; the reason being that I assumed Renegade X's playerbase is in their 20s to 30s, since many regulars have played since the original Renegade or shortly after its release.
 

Some of these things are easier to ignore than others. It's hard to ignore certain things that happen in-game, and that includes player dialogue. Muting players is not a favorable solution because you can potentially miss out on messages relevant to the game, especially in teamchat. Votekick doesn't accomplish anything, because toxic players will simply hop back in and make a big stink about getting kicked. Mod presence is lacking, indifferent, or ineffectual. 

This kind of toxicity doesn't always happen, but I think it happens frequently enough to be a problem worth discussion, and it deserves a call to action. I believe there's too much tolerance for toxic players. There needs to either be a push by the community and the mods/admins to seriously discourage this kind of behavior, or introduce a 1hr voteban system, or preferably both. Boot the toxic player before the server gets sick, and keep them booted.

[Madkill40]

The idea that banning people is not an option because the playerbase is low is the most counterproductive excuse I've heard regarding these matters, but banning is all it would take.

[vandal33]

It's the constant bitching and whining about the team that shows the true colors of the players, especially after a friendly building is destroyed where the team blaming/flaming begins. I don't mind competitive taunts like cunt and so on to the enemy, but backfiring to your team members isn't anything competitive. 

Yesterday at Complex in GDI, you were complaining too (but no harsh language, just annoying that doesn't make situation better)  but another teammate said "idiot team" which causes a new player to respond "toxic community" and then she left. This is the kind of thing that keeps newcomers unwelcome. I'm sure many players here play the game because they were Renegade players in 2002, eventhough the game isn't much alive now. Some people stay in dying games because they want to feel attached to the game and the people playing it. It's a small community so we can be nice and respected by fellow RenegadeX players, this is why I'm still playing Tiberian Dawn today as people there are nice and I not only play TD for its enjoyment, but playing against/with fellow TD players makes me feel welcomingly attached to the community...

but this kinda community we're having in Renegade X makes people unwelcome, the only thing that keeps people playing is nostalgia, the gaming environment/community is toxic and it keeps people feel uncomfortable playing it. I can handle the salt from this cringey community, but yesterday's event at Complex is a perfect example of how new players show their disgust playing here.

[Tomcat_]

33 minutes ago, vandal33 said:

Yesterday at Complex in GDI, you were complaining too (but no harsh language, just annoying that doesn't make situation better)  but another teammate said "idiot team" which causes a new player to respond "toxic community" and then she left. This is the kind of thing that keeps newcomers unwelcome.

Yeah, I complain and bitch sometimes, I think everyone does. I define that on the same level as the occasional outbursts I discussed in the OP. Nobody's above that, certainly not myself, that was part of my point. But I wouldn't call it toxic. I didn't stick around, go on and on about it, or harass people or blow up the chat with abusive crap. I made my grievance known and then left shortly after the game's conclusion.

If you ask me, the chat on that game of Complex was nothing compared to what happened on Crashsite, Under, and Field today. If you think "idiot team" is toxic enough to turn new players away, the stuff people were saying today would be enough to turn old players away, and it did. It was beyond ridiculous.

Edited July 1, 2017 by Tomcat_

[RoundShades]

My opinion of most team based shooters tbh:


I don't see it as often in RenX, to be fair. Some people still act like they've got sensitive nipples to their team not somehow winning every single game. If it were that easy, it wouldn't even be a competitive game, it'd be a coop campaign.

[Calvin]

Yesterday is a great example i been harassed by multiple people for 70 mins long (full under game). They didn't play the game they were mostly afk with 10 kills and a few points. I usually keep my mouth shut but this time i gave them a few responds because they were blocking me in the airstrip preventing me from moving out etc full on TH.. We're a small community muting people for bad behaviour wouldn't hurt even banning them for a few days wouldn't hurt.. I just wish that there was more attention towards this because tbh im not enjoying this game as much as i used to anymore, I play this game to enjoy it not to get harassed all the fucking time. I did not wanna call names but seriously algol has been "KNOWN" for having a very bad behaviour always calling people faggots even niggers in game and still is even around or isn't even muted i don't fucking get it. I know this is server side stuff and should probably post on the server-forums about it and i probably will do that but it's a great example of how TOXIC this game got over the years. 

[Guest Gliven]

I dont believe this is a toxic community. I definitely agree that there are some pretty toxic people though. If admins are so afraid of losing players, so they wont outright ban them. At least mute them and stop them from posting votes in-game. I've played some days where algol would constantly call for surrender or call his team shit. You could be winning, and he would still call for a surrender. 

If we cant get rid of the few bad apples, this community will always be viewed as toxic.

[Agent]

I've said this before, but banning someone from the game for misbehavior in chat is a drastically disproportionate response. We have chat bans, and I will gladly deliver them for repeated harassment as I've already told @poi many times in the past. All I ask is for proof and that it not be a 1-off remark (so proof for multiple incidents). The burden of proof is on the reporter, and I wouldn't chat ban someone for a single instance of misbehavior, but we don't want members of the community to feel harassed and unwelcome. Again, if you repeatedly experience harassment by an individual and provide proof, I'll gladly deal with repeat offenders. This isn't a technical challenge; we just need reports and proof (just screenshot your chat).

There has only been 1 person who has ever been banned from the game for chat misbehavior, and that was Max. As soon as chat bans were technically possible, his ban was removed and replaced with a chat ban instead. To this day, he remains the only person to be currently chat banned. Game bans are not the solution for chat offenders; chat bans are.

 

And just to clarify: Harassment is distinctly different from general remarks. Harassment is repeated. Harassment is targeted. Harassment is personal. If you're being personally targeted, repeatedly, that is harassment, and that is not condoned in any form.

[boxes]

In most situations, I personally would use a mute or tmute option over tbans if it were integrated in the game and not just through the IRC bot

And if possible I feel this is something players can moderate themselves through voting

[KrypTheBear]

"There's no cure for being a cunt"

Some players are just used to call others names cause they dislike pointing the finger to themselves. Sometimes they had a shitty day, hop on RenX to distract themselves and end up being pissed off and stressed even more. And these players let it out on other players to make them either feel just as bad or cause they need a punching bag.

What I end up doing with highly toxic players is warn them via psay, if they continue kick them, if they return and continue mute them. And the final step of escalation would be a ban. At least that's my approach as a moderator on CT. 

I agree that a ban is the most suboptimal solution for this, but how else are we supposed to not let their shitty attitude go to other players OVER, and OVER, and OVER again. Harassment is as Agent said targeted. And people like Algol pick specific people during matches and talk shit over and over and over again. Thus if you want to see a change, just record the bullshit, send it to your favorite Dev (and please don't make it a 1-remark thing) and we'll take care of it.

[limsup]

I sincerely believe, that @Tomcat_ has touched upon a serious issue, which while it has always existed, it was nowhere as severe as it is now. It is true, that I follow this Community only since February, but it has struck me, how much more worse this situation got since then. “Toxic” remarks are now practically constant, appearing 3-5 times per minute on a “usual” CT-Marathon evening. The persons propagating this, usually do not suffice with having shouted their remarks for *all* to hear (whether they want it or not), rather they keep reviling, insulting, slurring for *hours long*.

Often foul, profane, discriminating regards to age, gender and sexual orientation these remarks are frequently quite personal. Generally this kind of foul tongue is not presentable, but in these quantities they can almost certainly disturb a significant portion of people.

According to my own personal observations, these constant spam of slurs are most of the time perpetuated by the same few persons. As bad as it is if someone starts this directed “flame-campaign”, there are always 1-3 other people, who join in and further instigate the one, who started this, “enjoying the drama” more, than the game.

As @Gliven remarked, these people are often very counter-productive to their own team, on numerous occasions they do more harm to their team, than to the enemy team. Actual examples I witnessed were not repairing building under attack, but fooling around it even when warned, destroying teammate’s vehicle, or obstructing MCT repairs. Generally these would exhaust the term Team Hampering. Besides this they tend to *constantly* flood the chat with their incessant bickering and hate. So perhaps someone spotted/wrote something important, but it does not reach people, because someone joined the game to typewrite 10 slurs per minute.

Most of the time, these “players” cherry-pick one or two targets, whom they constantly bully in public chat, team chat, or even in private chat. They do not stop, until their victims left the game, nor do they stop after. They immediately start looking after their next target, who commit the crime of stumbling upon them. While it is true that by a *very* wide margin @poi and @jpjtyld get the most of the insults, their departure means by no way the end of these slurs. They just choose alternative targets, or if none are at hand, they foul-mouth either their own team, or the opposing and at times the entirety of players present at that moment.

Another thing that I have recently noticed is (from my own perspective), is the *seemingly* decreased in-game moderator presence (when mods play in-game too, bearing witness to this first hand). I do know, that a significant portion of the staff is from North-America, and have very little time or chance to attend to a game played in the evening (by European time), but there definitely is a positive correlation between active, in-game moderator presence and a decline of hate speech, a more encompassing mod presence would be in my humble opinion be most welcome!

I concur with @CampinJeff, in my humble opinion the game could benefit from his proposal. I also think that the procedure @KrypTheBear mentioned is very fair, also I wholeheartedly agree that banning should be reserved as a punishment of last resort. Still, muting someone – while in no way should it be taken lightly – could be at least a temporary remedy of some sorts… But I strongly believe, that this phenomena must be addressed some way or another, in order to uphold other player’s rights and the general civility of the game’s tone. I have difficulty in believing, that having a constant hate war in the in-game chat for hours does not disturb others too…

I would kindly like to ask @Agent and @KrypTheBear, for what would the standard procedure, formality and the specifics for the filing of such a complaint be? I guess we would need some specifics such as minimal image resolution, file format, time stamp perhaps? (along with the written testimony) and exactly who we need to contact in this matter?

P.s.: I apologize for this “Wall of Text”, and I sincerely thank those, who took their precious time to read it.

[KrypTheBear]

I haven't read through all of this since I'm about to head out somewhere, however, the specifics for such a form would pretty much just be:

Screenshots of REPEATED harassment, timestamp optional, but is a nice extra.
I don't care about minimum resolutions, like you can crop the image to just show the chat (which is what I'd love to see, since I don't care what your character is doing at that time)
File format I also don't really care, it shouldn't be an overcompressed jpeg so, I just want to be able to read the thing properly.
Witnesses are also always a nice mention.

I also don't mind IRC logs, however I might ask for more detailed logs in that case, so I can investigate the circumstances of that (Which I do actually prefer over screenshots)

Keep in mind that this whole thing would be a last resort thing, and you should try to address this to the players personally before escalating this. Some players already react with "Hey, you're going kind of wild. Just relax a little and have some fun, okay?", so you don't even need to report that cause they see the errors of their ways and stop being clowns.

And again, REPEATED harassment. Everyone is a cunt once in a while, I'm no exception from that rule. 

[limsup]

14 minutes ago, KrypTheBear said:

Keep in mind that this whole thing would be a last resort thing, and you should try to address this to the players personally before escalating this. Some players already react with "Hey, you're going kind of wild. Just relax a little and have some fun, okay?", so you don't even need to report that cause they see the errors of their ways and stop being clowns.

I wholeheartedly agree! This must not be taken lightly, and both parties must attempt to solve any interpersonal issues privately, only escalate things should that fail.

17 minutes ago, KrypTheBear said:

And again, REPEATED harassment. Everyone is a cunt once in a while, I'm no exception from that rule. 

Indeed! In my "article" my focus were those few people who were harassing others (and in many cases hampering their own team) on a regular, daily basis - with determination.

Also I would like to thank you for kindly clarifying the specifics for us!

[Canucck]

Why do you care about allchat? If they're raging on you just have a laugh, thank them for the attention and move on...

It's the least important and most inconsequential part of the game. 

[Madkill40]

On 7/1/2017 at 5:27 PM, Agent said:

...Again, if you repeatedly experience harassment by an individual and provide proof, I'll gladly deal with repeat offenders. This isn't a technical challenge; we just need reports and proof (just screenshot your chat).

...

And just to clarify: Harassment is distinctly different from general remarks. Harassment is repeated. Harassment is targeted. Harassment is personal. If you're being personally targeted, repeatedly, that is harassment, and that is not condoned in any form.

New msg for the bot to say.

"If you repeatedly experience harassment by an individual and provide proof, we'll gladly deal with repeat offenders. This isn't a technical challenge; we just need reports and proof. (just screenshot your chat)"

Followed by:

"Harassment is distinctly different from general remarks. Harassment is repeated. Harassment is targeted. Harassment is personal. If you're being personally targeted, repeatedly, that is harassment, and that is not condoned in any form."

Have this appear in the in-game chat via bot every 15 minutes. Maybe add a section to these forums for such posts to be posted? Saves people having to go to that servers' forum and encourages more players to come here.

Format:

Title of thread: 'PlayerName, Current Date.' (i.e. Max, 29th March, '17, or, Max, 29/07/17)

Date of Incident:
Time of Incident:
Server Incident occurred on:
Screenshot of Incident:
[Do this for each incident in one thread, one incident thread per player]

Example:

Max, 30/07/17

Date of Incident : 29/07/17
Time of Incident : 15:27
Server Incident Occurred on: ConstructiveTyranny Marathon
Screenshot of Incident: 
                       [Image]

 

Edited July 4, 2017 by Madkill40

[TheParachuteOpening]

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Edited February 7, 2020 by TheParachuteOpening

[Agent]

Max is currently being given another chance, and is being monitored for now. For what it's worth, his behavior has substantially improved over what it used to be. Unless he slips back into using hate speech and targeted slurs, he likely won't be muted, at least not globally.

[crazfulla]

Is there not a mute command so people can't use the chat? I remember in the originnal C&C Renegade when player numbers started to plumet that was often used as an alternative.

[Madkill40]

Once again I thought this was about my map 

[Fffreak9999]

On 12/11/2019 at 12:05 AM, crazfulla said:

Is there not a mute command so people can't use the chat? I remember in the originnal C&C Renegade when player numbers started to plumet that was often used as an alternative.

There is a mute command that can be run at a server moderator level, as well as globally.

There is also an ignore command that can be run at player level.