Policy on Bans and Temporary Bans

[Ekaterin 0]

Hello,

I’d like some clarification on the temporary banning process, and what exactly warrants a temporary ban.

I know this is not the correct place to post a ban appeal, but a close friend of mine is leaving because he’s sick of dealing with private servers where the GMs don’t follow their own rules. What can I say, he’s been burned on other servers in the past.

Anyway, the friend in question got in an argument during a battleground and called someone a Nazi. Was this rude? Yes. Was it against the terms of service? Arguably. But the response from the GMs was to give him an account suspension without telling him why, either in an email or in-game whisper. In fact, we’re not even sure if the Nazi comment was why his account was suspended, but it was the only thing he could think of that would possibly warrant a response. He doesn’t even know how long the suspension is for!

According to the server rules, these are the behaviors that warrant an account suspension:

-Scamming;

-Lying to, or attempting to deceive Elysium staff;

-Abuse of in-game bugs;

-Organized killing for farming rank and/or honor;

-Griefing on World Bosses.

On the other hand, what he did, “Racist or offensive sentiments”, falls under the warning category, except in the case of repeat offenses and after a warning has been given.

Now I’m not looking to start an argument about whether calling someone a nazi should be against the rules, because at the end of the day that doesn’t matter. The server admins have the right to decide what is and is not allowed. Where I have a problem is the lack of professionalism by the GMs not following their own posted rules and procedures. My friend should have been given a warning by a GM, after which he would apologize and move on with his life because he is a reasonable person. Instead, he received a ban with no explanation.

There are a couple of obvious responses to this. You might argue that we’re overreacting to what is after all a temporary punishment, but many of us have had terrible experiences on other private servers with GMs overstepping their authority and banning people for minor infractions and with no explanation. People are not going to want to invest time into a character or a community if they’re afraid they’ll lose it because they ran afoul of some guy on a power trip.

In addition, I understand that this is a free server that is staffed by volunteers. That doesn’t mean the GMs should not have clear guidelines to follow for what I imagine is a pretty common occurrence, and be held accountable for their behavior if they “go rogue” and ban people without proper cause.

Just because the server is free doesn’t mean we shouldn’t all strive to make it the best experience possible, and part of that is giving constructive feedback to the gamemasters. I have the highest respect for you guys and I’ve had great experiences with GMs helping me with bugs in the past. But ultimately people will vote with their feet if they don’t think the server is being run in a fair way.

[Indormi 2]

Without him putting up an appeal to actually allow me to investigate the claim, the only thing I have to go off of is what you say in your original posting.  

Many things go into consideration when we ban or suspend a player.  It could be that he had been previously warned about something before, yet neglected to take that warning thus got a suspension.  It could be something entirely different not relating to what you claim as well.  The only way to tell is to put an appeal up.  But a suspension is just that, a chance to reflect on what happened, take a break, and bring our head out of the clouds.  

If he so feels inclined to know the nature of the suspension he can PM his information and I will have it looked up.  

NOTE: The GM team does follow their TOU to a T and a dotted I...  We do not wildly ban nor do we do it to flex power.  The ban is used as a chance for us to re-educate players, as well as a punishment for those who break our rules.  It is the most extreme punishment for the most severe rule breakings.  

[IzZaGod 0]

I have to say this is by far the most professional server I've ever played on. Glad i joined!

[Hurricane2 2]

If biggons posts were deleteted the world would be a better place.  I can only hope in the mean time that his stupidity is not contagious.

[Mahtan 15]

I guess Biggons is the haunted ghost of Alexensual. Lets call the Ghostbusters!

[Mahtan 15]

9 hours ago, Indormi said:

We do not wildly ban nor do we do it to flex power.  The ban is used as a chance for us to re-educate players, as well as a punishment for those who break our rules.

As far as I am concerned, GMs do not tell people the reason of a ban. Therefore I can not understand, in which way a process of education is granted. Instead, it is highly likely that people are confused and irritated and worst case abandon the server.

I know people who were banned and did not know the reason.

Sorry to be so rude... But the paranoid flamings that occur from time to time regarding unfair GM decisions have some kind of foundation. I advertise more transparency to negate this foundation.

[Filcek 0]

Hello, apparently my account has been baned. I wasn't playing for a few months and now when I want to log in it just says this account has been closed. So I checked my email wheter there is any explanation. No luck... Also I am not aware of any terms violation. Can I please have some explanation? Thanks in advance. 

[Hurricane2 2]

22 minutes ago, Filcek said:

Hello, apparently my account has been baned. I wasn't playing for a few months and now when I want to log in it just says this account has been closed. So I checked my email wheter there is any explanation. No luck... Also I am not aware of any terms violation. Can I please have some explanation? Thanks in advance. 

You were probably hacked while you were gone.  You'll need to enable 2 factor authentication and make a ban appeal.

1 hour ago, Mahtan said:

As far as I am concerned, GMs do not tell people the reason of a ban. Therefore I can not understand, in which way a process of education is granted. Instead, it is highly likely that people are confused and irritated and worst case abandon the server.

Except in the case of getting hacked in the above post you should be able to figure out why you got banned and if you can't figure it out or don't agree with the violation and punishment then leaving the server permanently is fine by me.

[Bigbloke 0]

how do you know the gm didn't just flex power ? its like this soccer mom who says that her child never does anything wrong. 

[Guest]

The Game Master team has better things to do than flex their 'authority' over the player base when they have a laundry list of things to take care of at any given moment.

12 hours ago, Ekaterin said:

In addition, I understand that this is a free server that is staffed by volunteers. That doesn’t mean the GMs should not have clear guidelines to follow for what I imagine is a pretty common occurrence, and be held accountable for their behavior if they “go rogue” and ban people without proper cause.

Just because the server is free doesn’t mean we shouldn’t all strive to make it the best experience possible, and part of that is giving constructive feedback to the gamemasters. I have the highest respect for you guys and I’ve had great experiences with GMs helping me with bugs in the past. But ultimately people will vote with their feet if they don’t think the server is being run in a fair way.

The commands we issue require a reason value to be appended and, by policy, are to have ban notes applied so that supporting documentation can be referenced if an appeal is made or an account needs to be reviewed at a later date. More than likely if a ban was issued for this offense it was not their first time offending or if their response to us warning them was less than cordial. We deal with all sorts and types as we do our job duties, and it's likely you may be getting a tailored story about what happened - I've seen on numerous occasions a banned player wildly misconstruing a situation to win support when they were, in fact, solely at fault. I'm not saying that is what has occurred here, but keep that in mind as you read or hear player accounts of the results of our investigations or sanctions.

Additionally, the Terms of Use are as binding to the GM team as they are to the players. We have discretion in our operations to an extent but we are bound much more strictly than the players due to our access and responsibility. The team does not take abuse of that access lightly.

I have raised the issue that our system isn't e-mailing registered e-mails for banned accounts, as it appears it may have done so at some arbitrary point in the past but is no longer. I agree it would be very helpful to have it do so. I have locked this thread, seeing as its more of a suggestion than a discussion on how we operate. If you have a particular issue with how a Game Master has handled an interaction with you (in a general sense, going forward), be sure to reach out to our head GMs Akuta, Pottu, or Skeith on the forums with information about what happened.