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Criticism & Suggestion.

Discussion in 'Rejected' started by OutOfCure, Feb 16, 2022.

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  1. OutOfCure
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    OutOfCure Slime

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    Criticism & Suggestion.
    If I posted this thread in the wrong forum, I would appreciate it if you could please move it away as I felt like this is the most appropriate place for me to post my thread, thank you.

    Let me state that I appreciate our GMs, this is not their job, making sure that our community is staying clean from RWT, toxicity, and anything that can hinder our gameplay, from making sure that big boss runs like PB go smoothly to taking care of small issues.

    I know from first-hand experience, that moderating a community and pushing decisions can be rough sometimes, especially when you have a personal connection to some of the players, I can empathize with all of the above, but, with that being said, while it's not their job, it is a responsibility that each of them willingly took over and some of the decision and way of approaching situations do need to be looked over.





    A few days ago, there was a big RWT ban wave that went over multiple timezones, usually, people who played the game for a while can spot some of the IGNs that got banned, "Oh I know this person" or "Damn I ran X with this character the other day" are common phrases that you hear, in other cases, you see smegas cheer for such ban waves, justifying and pushing validity, but, at what cost?

    I always try putting myself in other people's shoes when I see an issue, and by that try to understand to the best of my abilities the situation, having your name advertised to the public, labeling you as a RWT or pushing any other offense is a valid punishment in my eyes - As long as it's true. But, what if it's not?
    In exchange for such service from our GMs, people's names are being dragged through the mud, players who spent years investing themselves into the game, doing things legitimately, from minor offenses to bigger ones.
    In short - damaging players' reputation, aka defamation, and most importantly, thinning our already small community of dedicated player base down.


    To be fully transparent, one of the people who got banned is a close friend of mine which is the reason I'm typing this post, in my personal opinion, and based on knowing the dude for over a year and a half by now, I see him as innocent, he legitimately the last person I'd ever see RWT as he grinds the game day in and day out to achieve his goals, but you see, this is my biased opinion speaking here, which I'm 100% aware of, but at the same time, being a close friend with him also allowed me to glanced at the process behind the scene, what happens when someone who (to my personal opinion) is innocent has to go through.

    What a banned player has to do? what a banned player can he do? and the answer - A player needs to appeal in the forums while answering convicting questions, he is not presented with evidence, he is not presented with a 'fair trail', no matter how much good faith you have in these discussions, there is one person with all the information, while the banned player is trying to keep up with questions to satisfied the GMs conviction, being presented with nothing but a wall of questions, His 'trial' is a onesided, one that has no jury or judge in it, just a conviction based on very blurry and broad questions.

    After my friend got banned, I asked a GM about his ban, and in response, I was told:
    "Theres evidence cuz why else would he have been banned"

    This makes me wonder what kind of evidence can incriminate you enough to be publically defamed by a small group of people that has power over the game, what does it take to genuinely press the 'ban' button? because, from what I can tell so far, as long as you got the thinnest of them connections, even if it means a little bit of brain exercises to connect you to a MAYBE you were given an item or sold an item or got rich too quickly, you are on the chopping board, having no regard towards your character as a person, how long you have been playing, having no reflection towards your past action. This is a big concern to me as it shows me lazy moderation, the moment you don't judge a case by itself, but rather look at a group of people altogether, can create a collective punishment attitude that won't show forgiveness or empathy towards people who get caught in the crossing fire. It's taking action before taking a second to think about the consequences of your actions that can create confusion.

    Not too long ago, a GM banned a 30 man PB squad which created a big topic of discussion, to me, the thing that I have always missed from this ban process is transparency (besides the specific case I just pointed out, in which ML GMs were transparent), accountability over our GMs decisions.

    If we advocate for fairness and strive for fairness, let's all be fair to one another.
    Thank you for reading.
     
    • Informative Informative x 1
  2. throwaway123
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    throwaway123 Red Snail

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    RWT banwave was long overdue. If your friend is innocent as you suggest, there's nothing to fear, right?
     
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  3. mjk
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    mjk Master Chronos

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    This ^

    Any legitimate player should have no problem explaining how they got their gear / mesos.
    Let the appeal process run its course. Also not exactly sure what the intent of this post was.
    It sucks your friend was banned but its quite a jump to say we have "lazy moderation" in legends when you have no idea how staff operates
     
    • Agree Agree x 6
  4. akashsky
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    akashsky Horntail

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    It really does not matter how long you have known this person or that you believe he is innocent. Your friend could be guilty, or he could be innocent - that is something that the GMs will decide on, not you. If we want more accountability, then we should push for public ban appeals.
     
    • Agree Agree x 7
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  5. OP
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    OutOfCure Slime

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    I think that bringing a topic to light for the sake of discussion and having more clarity should be a welcomed thing at the very least, I also never said that our GMs are "lazy moderating" but I have pointed out that it is a big concern of mine.

    I do agree with you that any player should be able to explain where they got their stuff from, but even after you explain and share your side (from what I have seen so far) it might not fully help you out.
    I have seen a message from earlier today of someone who got banned for RWT and got unbanned over the same exact thing, and even if my friend is truly guilty (which is a possibility, I'm not that lost) I would hope that in the future the process can be more transparent which is the biggest point I had here.
     
  6. OP
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    OutOfCure Slime

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    Never said it's my decision who gets banned and who isn't so I'm not sure why you point the obvious out. The main point I pushed here is about transparency and accountability. I even pointed out how I'm well aware that I'm 100% biased towards my friend, but can still understand that reality hits different and he might be guilty.
     
  7. akashsky
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    To be fully transparent, one of the people who got banned is a close friend of mine which is the reason I'm typing this post, in my personal opinion, and based on knowing the dude for over a year and a half by now, I see him as innocent, he legitimately the last person I'd ever see RWT as he grinds the game day in and day out to achieve his goals, but you see, this is my biased opinion speaking here, which I'm 100% aware of, but at the same time, being a close friend with him also allowed me to glanced at the process behind the scene, what happens when someone who (to my personal opinion) is innocent has to go through.

    The above paragraph is the main reason I mentioned it, and I perhaps didn't quite catch the opinion disclaimers on the first read through. But if you want more transparency and accountability, public ban appeals would be a good way to bring that out.
     
  8. OP
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    OutOfCure Slime

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    The way I approached this post is to explain my thought process and how things came to be so I decided to share some of my feelings towards the friend who got banned and open up about it. I've watched the process from the side, seeing how the back and forth went and even the type of questions that he was asked which made me realize that the process should be more transparent.

    Public might be the way to go, could be a solid solution for sure.
     
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  9. -ovv
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    -ovv Horntail

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    Cure does make a good point - a system where the judges need not provide any evidence to convict seems like a system rife with corruption. "Prove to me you did not RWT" is not a fair ask of those accused especially when accusations come free, and the onus should be on those who make the claim with evidence of RWT.

    I get that releasing evidence might out your sources, but why not cultivate instead a safe space to encourage this behavior of reporting more? If the end goal is to prevent RWT, foster the culture of openly reporting evidence. Sure, RWTers might get more savvy with their operations, but it may also prevent more people from even considering it to begin with.
     
    • Agree Agree x 11
  10. Kimmy
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    Kimmy Administrator Staff Member Administrator Game Moderator

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    This approach is already 3 miles and a half better than the last topic about this very same thing, since there's actually a description and reasoning instead of simply demanding things out of personal emotions.

    Now off to RWT. The way we handle RWT bans has been the same for many years. We have all the logs, and we never deleted any logs. Every transaction from 2015 until the present day is still in our DB. Even if someone RWT'd in 2016 and it's suddenly seen today you could still get banned for it.

    I just can't describe completely how we go through these logs though. The issue is that we have constant people ban evading, and RWTing again. The more information we give, the harder it will become for us to catch them again. As soon a seller gets caught, we have the ability to trace every single person (customer) this person had, and attach them together. This means that not only every seller is at risk, but also every buyer.

    The ban appeal process itself is currently done by you, the appealer (talking here in the case you are banned, not implying OP is), by answering questions related to transactions that occurred at x period or x date. Again, we know the facts due to the logs (and knowing if someone is a well known RWT seller), so it's up to the appealer now to give us a reasonable explanation why they suddenly received let's say 500m as an example.

    I have said it so many times now, but when a RWT seller says they have an "Undetected method" it's them assuming we didn't implement any custom logs ourselves, and base it on whatever HeavenMS for example logs. A RWT seller has no access to our internal system, so them claiming they have an "undetected method" is purely done so YOU, the buyer, think positive of the seller, and buys from them. It's the very same reason they will too always say they have "0 ban record" as well as other similar things. After they got banned, they will simply say they sold all the mesos. You will never see them openly say they got banned because that would hurt their future reputation. Why would you buy from a seller that mentioned they got banned in past? You won't, so they lie to you about it.

    RWT investigations are currently done by most of our staff members. We look at things together, investigate together, look at mentioned logs together, etc. Mentioned again that some bans can still happen even if you RWT'd years ago, and that sometimes that can sting especially if you "did it" "only" once.

    After this ban wave, we already had some people admit they were guilty. I definitely know some never will until the very end, and that's the most common occurrence when it comes to RWT bans. The best you can do when you are the appealer themselves is to truthfully answer the questions the staff give to you. All things you will say or mention will be fact-checked to see if you tell the truth or just make up some "bullshit" story that does not make sense whatsoever. At the end of the day, logs never lie. However, we always can make mistakes too! This is why we do give people the chance to appeal and help us provide information regarding suspicious transactions that occurred.
     
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  11. Vystical
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    My main takeaway from the OP post is improving transparency in the GM banning and appeal process.

    I'm wondering if, in the appeal process, the person appealing is able to see the evidence stacked against them immedietly in the process? Maybe not specific logs, but the admin handling the appeal case noting to the defendent that "X traded X amount at X time" and following up with a "what was the reason for this?"

    For example, that trade could have been a loan/gift from a quitting friend/winning a roll, which the defendant can identify and prove through discord chat or SS that they are innocent. But without knowing the specific trade or specific instance of suspicious behaviour, the defendant would be unable to mount a significant defence against the admin who is prosecuting them.

    If the person appealing is blindfolded and enters the appeal process completely blindfolded against an admin with all the tools and evidence, it would be an influencer in "why most people don't get their appeals overturned?" Defense lawyers get to see the evidence against their client by the prosecutor so they can mount an appropriate defence. Maybe not exact logs in this case, but identifying the suspicious behaviour in question early on in the banning/appeal process helps!

    Edit: Well I just got my question answered by above post^
     
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  12. Kimmy
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    Kimmy Administrator Staff Member Administrator Game Moderator

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    The problem with this is that many sellers appeal for the purpose of getting exactly this information - they want to KNOW what got them banned, so they can ban evade and do it again under a new method. MapleRoyals have a public ban appeal section, and you probably see countless RWT appeals happening there too. If you want a small idea of how log checking gets done, you could get somewhat inspired there.

    But for them it's the same story - they won't directly tell you how they got to those logs, etc. The problem is just that RWTers WILL ban evade again, and WILL do this again. This has been an ongoing battle for a long time, and many times when we find sellers, we say to ourselves "oh, it's *them* again".
     
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  13. OP
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    OutOfCure Slime

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    Had no idea people made other topics like this in the past, sounds rough out here.

    Personally, the main thing I wanted to push is the discussion over the process, since if you play the server for long enough, you'll sooner or later hear about people who got banned and later unbanned, which does make me hopeful that our GMs do a good job at taking back unjust bans to people who 'fall between the chairs', but with that said, it begs the question - is the system bulletproof? does looking at numbers provide you with the most accurate results? which is why I pointed out the approach of taking it "one case at the time" while also considering the player behind each case (how new of a player they are, have they done anything close to that in the past? etc.) especially to players who have been around for a min.

    With the current system, players who get caught in the crossfire are being dragged through the mud while others cheer, personally, I do not subscribe to such mentality, but I cannot feel like they are being done wrong while the people who banned them take little to no accountability (that we know of).


    Regarding the risk of having an open / public thread about people's ban - I can see the downfall of it, and it was something I thought about, but in the end, I think that showing the community the process and how you guys approach things should be the way to go, you can minimize the damage by removing the GMs messages from the thread IMO but still provide a list of accusations. There is nothing that stops people who got banned from taking screenshots and sharing them, while there is nothing that stops people who provide such service to stop as well, just a little bit more clarity on how they got caught.
     
  14. Vystical
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    "With the current system, players who get caught in the crossfire are being dragged through the mud while others cheer, personally, I do not subscribe to such mentality, but I cannot feel like they are being done wrong while the people who banned them take little to no accountability (that we know of)."

    For those that were publicly shamed for being banned (via blue text), throwing all of their legitimate progress into question by their friends/guild and then having their appeal go through because they are innocent, shouldn't they also deserve a public announcement proclaiming their innocence?

    Yes, being unbanned is proof enough that the player is innocent but having this system in place would hold administrators more accountable and thus, more careful, when making false bans and at the same time, to the players that were falsely banned, shown that the admins care, apologize and are willing to clear their name to the rest of the community.
     
  15. Kimmy
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    Kimmy Administrator Staff Member Administrator Game Moderator

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    The announcing of unbans was already discussed internally since it was bought up in the last topic too. We all kind of agree that it's fair to do this, so we are looking into implementing this way of doing big unbans in future, by announcing it like the server announce bans.
     
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  16. UnknownCode
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    UnknownCode Nightshadow

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    Its other bans not just RWT that damaging players' reputation, aka defamation. It could be completely crap internet connection get disconnected due to either connection or their modem died need it be replaced and they're deemed a scammer for roll gambling as another example, theres other circumstances that can also qualify as such.

    This is going to put up a witch-hunt to people that know the person on discord/guilded although blocking exists it wouldn't be a good thing.
     
  17. Myxxo
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    Feels like we're suggesting no one has ever been falsely been before...
     
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  18. OP
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    OutOfCure Slime

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    I feel like the best course would be taking it one step at a time, it would be much easier to start with RWT and tackle more issues like the ones you mentioned above, though I'm not sure how easy it is to prove your modem / internet is being shit or how much the staff can do about it, for example, if you try leeching and you get disconnected over and over maybe trying a different method to earn meso would be to your best benefit as there are some physical limitations that are beyond anyone power here.

    About the witch-hunt comment: While I do not condone any type of such behavior it would probably equalize things which is the main intent behind my post a the power dynamic is this situation is not ideal, it's a double-edged sword for both parties.
    If you are the person who got banned and unbanned - you might be looked down upon by other members of the community and it might even demotivate you from keeping playing the game which is fully justify.
    If you are a GM - You can get flamed by people that rather push their emotions all over the place, feeling overly demanding while not knowing the full story.

    I concluded my thread with "If we advocate for fairness and strive for fairness, let's all be fair to one another." this would be in regard to both GMs and players alike, if we want to be fair we also need to take responsibility for our GMs.
     
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  19. 8TEEN
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    I’m sorry for your loss, but it is what it is pal :(
     
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