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Revisit punishment severity


mj2002

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7 minutes ago, i dont wanna od in LA said:

And what if you did something that another server plans to do? Namely they literally listed what exact offences get you banned, what offences get you ajailed, kicked or warned. I think being more transparent would really solve the issue here.

While you can't preemptively cover all cases to completely make reports obligatory (Who could have expected pirates seriously lol), this is really what it needs to a degree.

 

Admin discretion then could be applied the other way- to let people that realize their mistakes go, opposed to have to make use of it to punish someone.

 

And on further reflection: Such a guideline- even if covering only some basics- would remove the feeling some people display for punishments they receive "unfairly".

As it stands currently, eventual sanctions, may it be ban, ajail or property seizing, are outlined not or if, then vaguely (let's say what property design is fit and what not- and that is one of the best detailed guidelines already for players both as for staff).

Due to this, every punishment- even the ones we complain about as too lax- is received as arbitrary and unfair by the ones that receive them (you'll always find a comparable case where someone else got let off softer/was treated harder).

Edited by knppel
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4 minutes ago, Brian3898 said:

 

The system you speak of, about filtering petty or useless staff reports already exists. Problem is that its incredibly easy to spin your staff report in such a way that gives your case validity, and even if it the end your punishment doesn't get withdrawn, it may very well be reduced because you worded it in just the right way, and mentioned a little word or half-truth that gets you cleared of a part of the handling admin's reasoning, much like actual court. 

 

People who are repeat offenders are some of the most crafty rule lawyers, they'll find the loopholes and convince others they shouldn't have been punished as harshly.

Exactly those people looking for loopholes instead of following the rules should be banned from playing here, cause their approach only means, that they are aware of the rulebreaks and they will continue breaking the rules.

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6 minutes ago, Brian3898 said:

 

People who are repeat offenders are some of the most crafty rule lawyers, they'll find the loopholes and convince others they shouldn't have been punished as harshly.

Just start by ignoring people that fail to uphold the 250 word on reports rule and try to lawyer then

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30 Minute AJails are pointless & players don't learn anything by them.

 

It's barely time for people to grab a drink, make some noodles and check their social media.

 

The only punishment here is on admins who have to spend far more time processing the report, knowing full well there time is being completely wasted.

 

 

Edited by Alyssa McCarthy
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5 hours ago, mj2002 said:

 


Please help avoid turning this discussion into arguing about "illegal vs legal", "mallrats", "erp", "too many robberies" or the other usual tropes.


 

I'll keep this post brief, because I think it mostly speaks for itself. Ever since I joined this server, it has surprised me that punishments are relatively lax in this community. It appears as if this is a leftover from other related communities in earlier GTA versions and other related games, but I'm not entirely sure. I understand that a complete overhaul is not feasible.

 

What I do believe is possible is the following.

 

At present, there a standard by which punishments are awarded to players breaking rules. To my (outdated) knowledge, there is no written standard for punishment. This means that on average, punishments are handed out in a progressive manner, taking into account; existing player server record, time since last punishment, severity of infraction, attitude of player, impact on other players, and some other factors.

 

This is all fine, except I believe that punishments for severe infractions are too light. This results in reports concluding with ajails (sometimes even warnings) for events that either lead to very negative experiences for other players (deathmatching, poor escalation, to name a few) or events where players abused the situation for their own gain (script abuse, looting). 

 

This has been going on for a while now, and I am somewhat convinced that this is leading to a degraded experience for the entire community. There are too many second, third,  and fourth chances for players who, through their behavior and attitude, demonstrate that punishments like these are something they can simply endure for a little while, and then simply continue unchanged, perhaps slightly more careful to avoid getting in trouble again. Yes, I know, we are a community aiming to educate players when they make errors in judgment. I have heard this argument before, I have made this argument myself, and I continue to believe that this is an excellent principle that the community as a whole should maintain. However, I believe that the severity of punishment at present, is too low. There is a balance, and it needs to go further into one direction.

 

This is not just an appeal to the community, or server management, but also to individual administrators. You are in a position to make improvements to this community. When you hand down a punishment, please consider if it is the right punishment, and if the player being punished is likely to change their behavior because of it. It is very difficult to quantify what is good for the community at large, over a longer time span.

 

But please keep those in mind that aren't habitual rule breakers, those who you don't often hear from (not me), and who just want to roleplay, but keep getting subjected to negative experiences caused by players who are here only for their own self interest and entertainment, and aren't really interested in creating a positive experience for everyone. Often, these events go unreported, and if they are reported, many punished roleplayers are back roaming around after 15 or 30 minutes of going AFK to serve out their ajails. This creates a negative environment, where many players simply have the idea that a substantial amount of players around them are probably going to cause a negative experience. It makes it less fun to be around here.

 

 

4 hours ago, Engelbert said:

I think the severity should be higher. I broke rules only once and was banned for 14 days for refusing to rp a robbery and deathmatching.

When the server started way back in 2017, this was the case, people were hit with severe punishment for breaking the rules. These days people do not get punishment and it shows, it does not deter people from breaking the rules. Not to mention that I was told of some cases where a guy was Permanently banned for breaking the rules and he was unbanned in a week. Moreover back then, there was less reports because people did not break the rules as often as they knew there are consequences that will follow.

 

3 hours ago, Dakimakura said:

After almost 3 years playing on the server with my record clean and I received a warning for a trifle, other players do worse things and leave with a pat on the back.

I broke a rule once, luckily had my clean record, was given a warning and had to face the IC consequences of my actions, which was Legal Punishment against my character.

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18 minutes ago, Vash Baldeus said:

These days people do not get punishment and it shows, it does not deter people from breaking the rules.

 

If anything, they just opt to not answer the report at all. Keeping quiet drags the report out and gives them more time. It also never actually leads to any outcome in which they're required to explain why they're breaking rules.

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1 hour ago, Vash Baldeus said:

 

When the server started way back in 2017, this was the case, people were hit with severe punishment for breaking the rules. These days people do not get punishment and it shows, it does not deter people from breaking the rules. Not to mention that I was told of some cases where a guy was Permanently banned for breaking the rules and he was unbanned in a week. Moreover back then, there was less reports because people did not break the rules as often as they knew there are consequences that will follow.

 

I broke a rule once, luckily had my clean record, was given a warning and had to face the IC consequences of my actions, which was Legal Punishment against my character.

 

You couldn't be more wrong and it shows that you have no idea of the ongoing punishments / all the conflicts we're handling.

In 2017 the server had 50 players online, we had sometimes weeks without a single player report. A single ban was known by everyone.

 

The leniency and punishements actually got way, way more strict along the years, we went as far as applying a 0 tolerance policy on all "noobs", new players to  RP who didn't care about learning, robbers with poor roleplay, or poor roleplayers in general by permbanning them immediately. You just never notice it because it's drown into thousands of other bans that happens now.

 

In 2017, there was 290 bans, out of which 120 were removed / expired.

In 2018 1580 bans, 552 removed / expired

In 2019, 1813 bans, 655 removed / expired

In 2020, 2985 bans, 790 removed / expired, and 2020 includes the drastic playerbase increase with lot of noobs joining due to a very brief Eclipse hype on twitch + Epic games free GTA

In 2021 we are already at 3807 bans, with only 405 removed / expired following changes on our bans policies. We are banning left and right toxic players, childish players, rulebreakers, we've been massively banning poor RP robbers too.


You have to realize the INSANE amount of bans we're delivering just for you to keep a decent experience despite the constant increase of the playerbase over the years, we've always been very strict and being more strict at this point isn't a solution.

Yes 30 minutes ajail is not a "long" punishment for a rulebreaker, it's to be used as a warning and it's an historic system from former RP servers that we kept, it makes players realize that it's a bit more than a warning which has no effect on them ingame.


Everyone will somehow manage to break a rule or respond badly in a situation when they play 1000+ hours, it's been happening to myself too when I roleplayed in the past. It's important to give everyone a second chance, every on major rulebreakings after we have a discussion with them as most of the time people realize their wrongdoing, are very happy that we allow them to get a second chance after X months and become perfect players. Yes bad apples remains, especially with younger players where some of them never learn and just pretend to understand when we discuss with them. We're starting to get a hold of their pattern, and it's part of the toxicity we're also trying to bring down - very toxic players have been given less and less chances since these population rarely change.

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