Synaptic_AI wrote:
It's come to my attention you must have a reading comprehension problem. This would explain your inability to fathom what a hilariously stupid idea ban lists are.



"Let there be a pool of 10 players in a region for the purposes of illustration"



This is what's called a "hypothetical situation."



"(and really...it's not that far off most of the time, even better actually.)"



Is me explaining what I generally see in my zone at the times that I play. I'm not sure what zones YOUR playing in, but there is NEVER more than 1 or 2 "NEW GAME" in my zone at any one time, or more than 10 or so players actively waiting for a game.



But this is not the issue here, and it's due to your reading comprehension that we're at this point. I said that "successful multiplayer games" institute votekick functionality, and some of them I've played have ignore and the AAA titles all have an option profanity filter.



So yes, I've played MANY titles with many many thousands of players and I can speak quite authoritatively that those games do quite well with what they've implemented.



It really is pathetic that you want to form little cliques of public game pimps. To each their own I guess.

I was really hoping you were just going to leave when you said "Bye." Really hoping.



At this point I'm not even going to put together a counterargument. I'm half-convinced you don't even bother reading what I write, you just ignore it because it doesn't agree with you. I'm done picking a dead-end fight with you.

Fenrakk101 wrote:
I was really hoping you were just going to leave when you said "Bye." Really hoping.



At this point I'm not even going to put together a counterargument. I'm half-convinced you don't even bother reading what I write, you just ignore it because it doesn't agree with you. I'm done picking a dead-end fight with you.

Good, because this is a perfect opportunity for the community to voice their opinion on the matter. You've tried to gerrymander an explanation how great ban lists could be, and I've not only torn them down at each point but also pointed to the fact that many games with many thousands of players use the accepted and effective features I've outlined.



AAA and other popular titles don't use ban lists. That's because banlists are f'ing stupid for a public matchmaking arena.



QED.

And yet (just to play devil's advocate) there are many "popular titles" which in fact DO have banlists which work effectively. In fact, the only argument that I see against banlists only really has an affect on the overall community when the total multiplayer playerbase is particularly small (or the regional playerbase is, in the case of divided regions, such as with ES). In fact, many "popular games" have BOTH "votekick" and "ban" options available- so that the host ALWAYS has the ability to limit who is in his/her game, and the consensus of the players has an added OPTIONAL method of removing players as well.

raccoon_tof wrote:
And yet (just to play devil's advocate) there are many "popular titles" which in fact DO have banlists which work effectively. In fact, the only argument that I see against banlists only really has an affect on the overall community when the total multiplayer playerbase is particularly small (or the regional playerbase is, in the case of divided regions, such as with ES). In fact, many "popular games" have BOTH "votekick" and "ban" options available- so that the host ALWAYS has the ability to limit who is in his/her game, and the consensus of the players has an added OPTIONAL method of removing players as well.

Can you name a single title with a ban list as described in this thread? I'm dubious that you can.



To reiterate, Chibiblibababados was suggesting a ban list where player X can never join *any* game hosted by player Y *ever* if banned by player Y.



Any matchmaking game I've ever played limits kicks/bans to a single match only.

Actually, yes I can: the original battle.net version of Starcraft I is a prime example, and there have been many others. I recall MW3 (Mechwarrior, not Modern Warfare :P) on the original servers acting that way as well (or maybe it was after the move to the LIVE servers, I don't recall which now, one or the other...) and at least one version of the Civ games has acted that way as well (I want to say Civ3 but not positive on that one). True, most of them are just a "ban per game" or at most "ban per session" but many matchmaking services which have an "ignore list" or "blacklist" function also use that same list to prevent them from joining games which you host, often by just not even displaying the game in the list when they go to show current games (no "lock" icon as described earlier, it just plain doesn't ever show up for them in the lobby at all). Unfortunately, those that use the latter implementation cause confusion as well because it is hard to tell when trying to join someone else already in the game lobby from the main lobby whether the game is just not displaying for some connection/server issue or whether it is because you have been banned by the host

As a final note:



How about just maning up? Is that not an option anymore?



Generally I've found that if you let petty disturbances bother you, you end up being chronically disturbed.



+1 for growing a pair.

I agree. There should be a "blocked player" list that you can adjust to keep certain players from joining your games; something like what Minecraft has with servers, where you can enter a username and the server will check anybody connecting to you, and blocking people who match the name.

M11xStryker wrote:
I'd also like to point out you can go to a steam profile and use the report features to notify the powers that be of trolling.

Blacklisting does sound reasonable, though my only concern is potential abuse of this feature. Don't have any examples in mind, just cautious.

Yeah, I was thinking about that too. But I mean, it's not a problem for Minecraft servers, which was my example.

As long as the ban is host-specific, it shouldn't be an issue. Meaning that the host can ban whoever he wants (after all, it IS his game at that point) but if you didn't feel the need to ban that person then you would still be able to join any games the banned person hosts or any gamed with him in it. It's like having a restraining order, but futuristic!

M11xStryker wrote:
For me, my main point of debate is just how much power a host has over the lobby. From my experience, rarely do you have enough players to have multiple open lobbies, and as such only one or two lobbies are available at most times. Therefore, how much power should a single person, the host, have over such a commodity?

I'm not going to say you're wrong, but remember that players are divided by region; there's definitely way more than two games at any given time where I am.



And the host already has a decent amount of power, especially when you start thinking about modding the game. The host can use a mod for his game and then you need that mod to join. He also decides all the game settings.

If you're truly worried about hosts abusing their power, then petition the devs to have community lobbies, or a system where the server itself will host a game, meaning there are no banned players. Now that I wrote it, it sounds like a bad idea, but hey, it's something to think about.

M11xStryker wrote:
In any case, if we do end up implementing a blacklist, make it viewable to all players in lobby and possible put in short description why a player is blacklisted.

I'm not so sure about this. Frankly because I don't see the point in having a public blacklist. Obviously the fear is that the host will abuse the blacklist, but really, what trouble is that to you? If he hosts a lobby and then bans everyone that joins, he's created a situation where he has no one to play with. Eventually he'll run out of people to ban and his trolling will come to an end.

M11xStryker wrote:
Well I suppose I meant new open games. Rarely to players join in already progressing games.



I will admit though, I do lean a bit heavy on the side of caution. The point of public blacklist is to also inform players what the host thinks are ban-worthy players. As for me, if I see a friend/acquaintance on the ban list, I would be curious as to why said player is banned. Without the public blacklist, I would never be aware. I'd simply like transparency, much in the same way game settings are obvious for all to see.

When you put it that way, I do see your point. Still, I lean on the side of paranoia; in this case, how things won't work. For example, what if a person had around 40 banned players? You wouldn't sit there reading them all. When you're talking 5-7 names it's not a big deal to see them in a little box on the side, but the longer and longer those blacklists get the less useful it is to have them public. Plus, as a host, you probably don't want to be berated over every single name on your banlist.

If your friend is banned, they could tell you so; either because they can't join the game, or if the devs are real nice, they could could have a neat little "locked" symbol on any games in the lobby that the host has banned you from. Then you could approach the host, if you are so inclined. You don't need to berate the host over every name on his list, but people probably will.



The settings are made visible so that they can be open for debate/discussion, and also so that all the players are aware of what the lobby would entail. If you make a banlist public, it would have to be for the same reason. But you should only be discussing bans of people who are your friends, and those friends (in my scenario) would know that they're banned, and thus be able to tell you, thus negating the point of the public banlist.

M11xStryker wrote:
Well I was thinking of a button you clicked and it showed a list of players, not some side box. It would have a scroll feature, so you could easily browse through.



Nonetheless, I do agree that a public ban-list would leave a host open to en mass criticism. I think not being able to join a game because a friend is banned is a bit far, as I have added dozens of players because that is the only way to have private diplomatic chats. Once again, the lock symbol does not help much in such a case.



Possibly when a person joins a lobby but is blacklisted, a little notifier states in lobby chat that the player is banned? This would keep the entire ban list visible to only the host, but would still inform the lobby of specific people on the list.

I think one of us had a misunderstanding somewhere; either you did in response to my previous post, or I do right now in response to yours.

In case it is the former, I'll try to re-clarify what I suggested before:



If your friend (Steam, Skype, Email, Real life, any kind of friendship you have) can't join a game, then when they log into multiplayer, they'll see that game, but it will have some graphic showing that he is banned; it would be greyed out, or maybe have a locked symbol, etc.

You, because you're not banned, can see the game and join without any extra problems. When you're sitting in the game, you won't have any way of knowing that your friend is banned.

However, because your friend can see that he is blacklisted, he can tell you (Via Steam/Skype/Email/Phone/Post?) that he is banned. Now the host's ban list is still hidden from random critique/inquiry, but the specific interests of your friend can still possibly be debated if you confronted the host about it.





Hopefully that clears it up. In response to your popup suggestion, it would probably create even more problems than a public banlist, because a popup means that someone was trying to join but was not allowed to. Waiting times are already frequently long, and such a popup would lead people to start asking "Why was he banned? If he wasn't banned, we could be playing now!" Followed by those people leaving the lobby, further increasing the wait time, and you could see your lobby plummet from 7/8 players to 1/8.

M11xStryker wrote:
Maybe make this message appear only to friends of said player? Not sure if this is possible, but would be nice.

Possible? It depends. I bought the game through Steam and there's something I do not know: For the people who bought the game off of the Amplitude site, or who buy the retail version, will Steam come built-in or can it be played without? If it doesn't come with built-in Steam then you can scrap the idea, because then it becomes an option available only to certain players. But again, I don't know.



As for the use of such a feature, it would seem to me to be pretty useless. As in, what are the chances that you and a friend just happen to be trying to get into the same game? If you are actually TRYING to get in the same game, then presumably you're already speaking with them to stay coordinated, meaning it wouldn't be a hassle for them to let you know that they've been banned. Otherwise, they'll probably just browse over that game and try another. They're probably not going to message you asking you to question the ban; it's not like they know you're in the lobby unless you tell them (see: previous sentence). And if there's only one game available and they're banned from it, then they might message you because they see you playing and they figure you're in that same lobby.



EDIT: Plus, if you go off of my idea (having a locked symbol to display that you're banned) they can't attempt to enter the game, meaning you can't get a popup anyway.

The way it's usually handled in matchmaking games is there is a votekick and voteban feature in a lobby. This way the other players get a say over who they get to play with, and avoids tyrannical hosts or hosts with personal vendettas from ruining play for the community.



Hosts should not be empowered to be dictators over public games. They're fully welcome to host private games and invite only those they wish to play with.



In fact, in many games with public lobbies, the host cannot kick at all without a majority vote within a certain time-frame.



That's the responsibility you have being a host of public games. You put up with things you might feel personally irritating for the good of the community. If there's a quantifiable disruption, you let the community decide.



This is what voting is mean to solve.



+1 votekick/voteban for public lobby games.

Synaptic_AI wrote:
The way it's usually handled in matchmaking games is there is a votekick and voteban feature in a lobby. This way the other players get a say over who they get to play with, and avoids tyrannical hosts or hosts with personal vendettas from ruining play for the community.



Hosts should not be empowered to be dictators over public games. They're fully welcome to host private games and invite only those they wish to play with.

The problem with voteban is that it only lasts for that one game - after that, that same person can join again, which can lead to loopholes in the system.



And I repeat: So what if a host abuses their ability to ban? They'll just run out of people to play with, because no one would be able to join them, and their days of tyranny will end.

I dont think that a player bann is useful.In this game we have a "paranoia company".

So much people are marked that they cheat and it dont be true.Yesterday i played versus a very good player, if played a long time not versus him.3 People before says me, he must cheat!It cant be real that he are so fast at start and so strong without cheating.But if played a long game with him, and i found no reason that he cheating.If checked his raceconfig, and with this config you can push your points and fleets very fast.



The own races and many options in gameplay let you enough room to move to build unusal tactics and strategies.Before the game is not fixed with his crashes and bugs in multiplayer, and before it is impossibel to cheat, its not a good idea to set a bann option that arbitrarily used.



A Blacklist has the same problem....on a presumtion other player blacklisting will bring only toubel and anger.

Fenrakk101 wrote:
The problem with voteban is that it only lasts for that one game - after that, that same person can join again, which can lead to loopholes in the system.



And I repeat: So what if a host abuses their ability to ban? They'll just run out of people to play with, because no one would be able to join them, and their days of tyranny will end.

Well, again, hosts are free to create private games. That is again the duty of public hosts. If one set of players in one game win by 1 vote to have someone kicked from that game, there's nothing saying that a set of players without that one vote would win.



This is also why there is an ignore feature in many lobbies.



+1 for chat ignore in lobbies.



+1 for votekick



What's important to note is this is a game, not a employment office or a church. Just because you don't like talking to someone doesn't mean they can't play the game too.



In the end, players are nothing but sophisticated spreadsheet editors in a very elaborate version of Excel. You might not like them personally, but they still run numbers like anyone else.



Also important to note, that in a multiplayer community as anemic as ES, you're shooting yourself in the foot by "banning" anyone.

i am agreee with the argument of synaptic_ai

Two players have been spamtrolling lobbies of multiplayer games I try to initiate unfortunately, one in particular has been persistent after cursing at other players to leave. He and another player began purposefully joining, disconnecting and rejoining very rapidly, several times every second. Unfortunately the kick option doesn't prevent this. I was forced to make the game private.



I hate to say it, but there needs to be a player ban option to prevent abusive trolling like this. Its hard enough to get a game going, the trolling drove a number of players off my game as it was.

Synaptic_AI wrote:
As a final note:



How about just maning up? Is that not an option anymore?



Generally I've found that if you let petty disturbances bother you, you end up being chronically disturbed.



+1 for growing a pair.

What if this person is cussing and shouting in the chat while you play?

It's not about being a man. It's about wanting to enjoy your game without someone throwing a fit at you.



And how about this situation? What if you have one person who's joined your game multiple times, and every single time they've left as soon as the game started? And they return every time you kick them?

@fenrakk:How many peoples does this?1% from the 20 Multiplayers that you found in the public lobby.A bannoption only for this?you will see, if a bann is possibel, you split the small community on the regional servers.then you can bann player they are better as you. the people join normally in the server with the most players.They are dont be interested about any differences between 2 others.