Last time on KI Live we talked briefly about how to report harassment or inappropriate behavior in our games, but I wanted to take some time to elaborate.
First, know that our Customer Support and Community teams keep watch of any concerns that appear both in the game and elsewhere in the community. All reports are reviewed to determine an appropriate action. We are as vigilant as possible in preventing player abuse and related concerns, but we still need the community’s help to ensure all concerns are seen and reported properly.
If someone is bothering you and you want them to go away, you can use the Ignore option. Poof! You won’t see their chat anymore and they can’t send you messages. The Ignore feature is there for cases which don’t necessarily violate the Terms of Service but may still cause you to want to stop interacting with someone.
Tricking someone into providing access to their account
Falsely reporting someone
These are great ways to help you and to help us take action:
Ignore them so they can’t bother you anymore.
Report the individual if you have the ability to do so. Just a few words on why they’re being reported is enough – for example – “Foul language”.
If you cannot report, please submit a Customer Support ticket with as much detail as possible. An example of a really helpful ticket: “Hello, my username is ProfFalmea333 and I am in The Commons and I just watched Wolf Stormblade say inappropriate things in chat. My character name is Drake WinterHammer.”
The least helpful way to report someone is to not use these tools and go directly to social media. Wizard and Pirate names are NOT unique per account, so posting on Twitter that the dastardly Wolf Stormblade was harassing people doesn’t really help us as much. We also can’t guarantee we will see your post (though we are out there and we try!). We have much more information readily available when you submit through our system, and can more quickly and efficiently track down what happened.
If the same incident was reported with the official method above, Customer Support starts with:
A message in their queue with a summary of what happened
A timestamp of when the incident happened
A confirmation of which account was being inappropriate and a log of what was said
Customer Support response is not instantaneous, but they will review and process every ticket as quickly as possible.
We are currently reviewing our in-game tools to see if we can make any improvements. After listening to the community’s latest comments, these are two topics of discussion we’ve had:
Yes, only paid players can use the report function. We have this in place so that bad actors cannot simply create accounts and mass report. Submitting a Customer Support ticket, which everyone can do, is the important part of the process, but reports are helpful as well. We’re considering ways that we may be able to separate these “throwaway” accounts from legitimate non-paid accounts and at that time, we could open up the ability to report to these legitimate players.
We want to make sure that reports can be made without fear of retaliation. Yes, we sanction players for false reporting, but that doesn’t help in the moment when it happens. We’ve discussed some options, including removing immediate notifications that someone was reported.
We care very much about the community's well-being. For an overview of our player policies and what you can do to help us in keeping the community a safe place, please review the Community Code of Conduct as well as the Terms of Use.
Thanks for helping each other to build a positive experience in the Spiral!
See you in the Spiral,
Leah “Professor Falmea” Ruben Game Director
“If the Mind is like a candle, the Heart is like the sun.”
Professor Falmea
Thank you for the Dev Diary. It was an interesting read. I only have two comments and they directly relate to going forward/my opinion on such.
1. I think removing the immediate chat notification is good and bad. I personally would be for removing it because I often see people freaking out of "why was I reported?" I feel that perhaps removing that would put a lot of people's mind at ease that are genuinely falsely reported (might also reduce the number of False reports). The only downside I see is when the report is genuine and to have a sanction with no warning will definitely put the trolls on social media into a frenzy. So if you do remove the in game option, when a sanction is put against a player then I think that you'll have to include some information from the ticket such as when, where, why in the email when a sanction is implemented. Hopefully this information could be automated.
2. If a Crowns Purchase and/or Membership has been used on the account at anypoint. I think it's safe to say that it's less likely a "throwaway account" or if a character is above level 20. If any of these conditions are met. I think it's appropriate to have the reporting feature etc. (I still think that any account should have this feature honestly, but I understand false reports can be an issue). If character level/Crowns/Membership has been had on the account then I feel that this should be unlocked, unless the account shows that it's a problem one then the feature can be revoked.
Those are my two cents. I hope that it helps. I also feel that some of the social media posts (especially the racist one that probably helped inspire this Dev Diary) are also more sensationalist than anything. People are just posting it "for the views"/drama. In my personal experience, I rarely encounter people being a problem (granted I don't hang out in the commons as much anymore) but when I do see them. I use the ingame reporting tool. (Usually people are swearing around filters).
Thank you for the Dev Diary. It was an interesting read. I only have two comments and they directly relate to going forward/my opinion on such.
1. I think removing the immediate chat notification is good and bad. I personally would be for removing it because I often see people freaking out of "why was I reported?" I feel that perhaps removing that would put a lot of people's mind at ease that are genuinely falsely reported (might also reduce the number of False reports). The only downside I see is when the report is genuine and to have a sanction with no warning will definitely put the trolls on social media into a frenzy. So if you do remove the in game option, when a sanction is put against a player then I think that you'll have to include some information from the ticket such as when, where, why in the email when a sanction is implemented. Hopefully this information could be automated.
2. If a Crowns Purchase and/or Membership has been used on the account at anypoint. I think it's safe to say that it's less likely a "throwaway account" or if a character is above level 20. If any of these conditions are met. I think it's appropriate to have the reporting feature etc. (I still think that any account should have this feature honestly, but I understand false reports can be an issue). If character level/Crowns/Membership has been had on the account then I feel that this should be unlocked, unless the account shows that it's a problem one then the feature can be revoked.
Those are my two cents. I hope that it helps. I also feel that some of the social media posts (especially the racist one that probably helped inspire this Dev Diary) are also more sensationalist than anything. People are just posting it "for the views"/drama. In my personal experience, I rarely encounter people being a problem (granted I don't hang out in the commons as much anymore) but when I do see them. I use the ingame reporting tool. (Usually people are swearing around filters).
Couldn't have said it any better myself. Your two cents are greatly appreciated. I really like that you touched base with the issue of internet-fame hungry people. It's really just pitiful.
Last time on KI Live we talked briefly about how to report harassment or inappropriate behavior in our games, but I wanted to take some time to elaborate.
First, know that our Customer Support and Community teams keep watch of any concerns that appear both in the game and elsewhere in the community. All reports are reviewed to determine an appropriate action. We are as vigilant as possible in preventing player abuse and related concerns, but we still need the community’s help to ensure all concerns are seen and reported properly.
If someone is bothering you and you want them to go away, you can use the Ignore option. Poof! You won’t see their chat anymore and they can’t send you messages. The Ignore feature is there for cases which don’t necessarily violate the Terms of Service but may still cause you to want to stop interacting with someone.
Tricking someone into providing access to their account
Falsely reporting someone
These are great ways to help you and to help us take action:
Ignore them so they can’t bother you anymore.
Report the individual if you have the ability to do so. Just a few words on why they’re being reported is enough – for example – “Foul language”.
If you cannot report, please submit a Customer Support ticket with as much detail as possible. An example of a really helpful ticket: “Hello, my username is ProfFalmea333 and I am in The Commons and I just watched Wolf Stormblade say inappropriate things in chat. My character name is Drake WinterHammer.”
The least helpful way to report someone is to not use these tools and go directly to social media. Wizard and Pirate names are NOT unique per account, so posting on Twitter that the dastardly Wolf Stormblade was harassing people doesn’t really help us as much. We also can’t guarantee we will see your post (though we are out there and we try!). We have much more information readily available when you submit through our system, and can more quickly and efficiently track down what happened.
If the same incident was reported with the official method above, Customer Support starts with:
A message in their queue with a summary of what happened
A timestamp of when the incident happened
A confirmation of which account was being inappropriate and a log of what was said
Customer Support response is not instantaneous, but they will review and process every ticket as quickly as possible.
We are currently reviewing our in-game tools to see if we can make any improvements. After listening to the community’s latest comments, these are two topics of discussion we’ve had:
Yes, only paid players can use the report function. We have this in place so that bad actors cannot simply create accounts and mass report. Submitting a Customer Support ticket, which everyone can do, is the important part of the process, but reports are helpful as well. We’re considering ways that we may be able to separate these “throwaway” accounts from legitimate non-paid accounts and at that time, we could open up the ability to report to these legitimate players.
We want to make sure that reports can be made without fear of retaliation. Yes, we sanction players for false reporting, but that doesn’t help in the moment when it happens. We’ve discussed some options, including removing immediate notifications that someone was reported.
We care very much about the community's well-being. For an overview of our player policies and what you can do to help us in keeping the community a safe place, please review the Community Code of Conduct as well as the Terms of Use.
Thanks for helping each other to build a positive experience in the Spiral!
See you in the Spiral,
Leah “Professor Falmea” Ruben Game Director
one of the things that would be good to add is a popup - and a timeout on being able to report again. It would work like this:
someone clicks report on someone else and the popup comes up and displays the message:
The only things you may report another player for are:
1. xxx 2. yyy 3. zzz etc.
If you are using the report function for something else, be aware that it will be considered a false report and will result in a negative impact to your account. Do you wish to proceed? yes no
And then if someone goes ahead and reports someone else, and the logs don't show the other person was actually doing what they were being reported for, the person reporting should get an email with details about the report they put in, the date, time, and so on - and informing them that the logs have been checked, their report is deemed false, and they won't be allowed to report anyone for a couple weeks or so.
Tarlac Drake - Magus Conjurer - Level 33