Heroes of the Storm's "Silence Penalty" Gags Trolls, Toxic Players

[Steven Bogos]

Heroes of the Storm's "Silence Penalty" Gags Trolls, Toxic Players

Heroes of the Storm's "Silence Penalty" will gag players who don't play nice, restricting the vast majority of their chat options.

For some reason, trolls are attracted to MOBAs like moths to a flame. Perhaps it's the being forced to play nice with four strangers for upwards of 30 minutes, perhaps it's the fact that when the enemy team snowballs in a MOBA, it is extremely difficult to recover, or perhaps it's just because trolls love MOBAs. It's something games like League of Legends have had to invent Heroes of the Storm [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/7.875640-League-of-Legends-Trolls-Can-Now-Be-Banned-Within-15-Minutes-of-Offending] has come up with it's own way of dealing with trolls. It's rather simple, really. A troll's power comes from his toxic words, so what's the easiest way to deal with that? You silence him.

As well as a slew of new reporting options, categories, and guidelines [http://us.battle.net/heroes/en/blog/19818500/introducing-new-reporting-options-and-the-silence-penalty-9-7-2015], Blizzard has revealed that the "Silence Penalty" will be applied to players who break the rules. If you are reported enough, you will be "squelched" for 24 hours, which will block you from communicating with any player who is not on your friends list (including private messages). Every additional infraction thereafter will double the silenced period.

For those of you looking over the reporting catagories, seeing stuff like "AFK" and "intentional feeding" and worrying about some of HoTS more, unique heroes (IE: Abathur and Murky) getting reported unfairly, Blizzard says that it will be paying special attention to reports from these heroes, and what's more, will be looking into investigating players who are found to frequently dish out trivial or false reports.

It's kind of sad that pretty much every MOBA these days has to have some kind of system in place to curb trolls, but I must admit that HoTS' solution is quite unobtrusive.

Source: Blizzard [http://us.battle.net/heroes/en/blog/19818500/introducing-new-reporting-options-and-the-silence-penalty-9-7-2015]

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[sneakypenguin]

People must be unlucky or hero league is totally different from qm. Most I get out of a QM game is a GLHF or Nice! if we get a multi kill. Maybe some pinging.

 

[Sight Unseen]

Isn't the easiest solution to deal with trolls to just give players a mute button that will silence them if a person is upsetting them?

 

[elvor0]

"will be looking into investigating players who are found to frequently dish out trivial or false reports."


Bwahaha. That'll be funny.
Also, they're not trolls, they're just assholes. Of course, generally you can wind them up, because in an attempt to get someone banned, they generally say a lot of things that are /actually/ ban worthy. Heh, actually had a game where someone was going to report me. I asked what he was going to report me for (I'd died twice at 17m) and "feeding" was the answer. Obviously I told him that there was no feeding option, so he said he would lie(Y'know, because they don't check the fucking chat ><), etc etc homophobic slurs, insults and swearing. Winding people like that up and up in the most innocent fashion that is completely safe from getting you banned but lays everything on them is very fun and I know blizzard doesnt take kindly to people being out order so it's pretty much all good for the community.

 

[LetalisK]

For some reason, trolls are attracted to MOBAs like moths to a flame.

Apparently someone else besides me is a Dark Souls fan. Happy to see such references pop up here and again

...eh? I thought that saying predated Dark Souls by centuries. Is it not common where you live?

 

[The Material Sheep]

As interesting as these ideas are... and as much as I would love to deal with less trolls/dickbags on Heroes, Blizzard's views on what an infraction is on WoW, and on their forums is pretty ridiculous. What constitutes hate speech in their forum ToS is as simple as making a joke at the expense of the Nazi's or even mentioning the holocaust. They're overzealous to say the least in their moderation on their products. I just worry bout easily it can be abused.

 

[Abomination]

Isn't the easiest solution to deal with trolls to just give players a mute button that will silence them if a person is upsetting them?

The thing is, such a method isn't really "punishment" and doesn't discourage the person from continued harassment.

A user getting hit with a genuine hamstring that impacts them beyond the individuals they're harassed sends a strong message "Shape up or ship out."

I approve of the idea but...

As interesting as these ideas are... and as much as I would love to deal with less trolls/dickbags on Heroes, Blizzard's views on what an infraction is on WoW, and on their forums is pretty ridiculous. What constitutes hate speech in their forum ToS is as simple as making a joke at the expense of the Nazi's or even mentioning the holocaust. They're overzealous to say the least in their moderation on their products. I just worry bout easily it can be abused.

Ding ding ding.

Blizzard has a horrible track record of dishing out punishment based on how the "victim" feels rather than investigating the actions of the "offender" in context.

 

[BarrelsOfDouche]

Every Blizzard game I can think of from the 1990s onward had some form of penalization or reporting mechanic that allowed Blizz to ban users for harassment and stuff.

Just because we're seeing it now under what people think are "newer political environments" (they're not new) doesn't really make it newsworthy...

 

[Sarge034]

So is this just out of game msgs, because if it is then what's the point? Most harassment and such is in the in game chat. If it does block in game chat too, it will severely limit that person's ability to communicate important things to their team. If you don't think they will communicate with their team then why don't you stop pussyfooting around it and just ban the fuckers blizzard?

 

[Diablo1099_v1legacy]

Apparently someone else besides me is a Dark Souls fan. Happy to see such references pop up here and again

OT: Now before anyone assumes this punishment is quite harsh or a bit much ... MOBAs can be, well ... very toxic at times. I advise you try rank and see how far people can play before one mishap leads to a flamewar while the match is still in play.

This is rather a light punishment if you ask me. When people are toxic in League of Legends, you get what's called a "Penalty Cooldown". Basically, whether you play a open lobby, ranked, or party lobby- you must wait 5+ minutes before you can start the match. The kicker is .. if ANYONE leaves, clicks the 'cancel' button or otherwise, it'll reset the cooldown. So unless you got patient / forgiving people, you're probably going to not play LoL for awhile. So this method Heroes of the Storm is doing, is again quite light in terms with other MOBA's methods.

Seriously? That's how they handled it?

It just seems like good players are getting the short end of the stick there, they never asked for their queue time to be possibly doubled.
I think Blizzard's approach is a bit better, I mean, my quick match queue times are already kinda long as a result of the wonderful internet we have, so adding another 5 minutes to that for something someone else did is kinda a dick move.
I know that's kinda the point and, while it does kinda sound like a good idea, I don't think it'd work for Heroes of the Storm because their games are usually a lot shorter then most MOBAs.
I remember a bot game I was in lasted for under 9 minutes on elite XD

 

[Shinkicker444]

For some reason, trolls are attracted to MOBAs like moths to a flame.

Apparently someone else besides me is a Dark Souls fan. Happy to see such references pop up here and again

That saying has been around since forever (Shakespeare used it I think), its definitely not something that was invented by Dark Souls.


OT, I can't say I've had that much of an issue with trolls and haters. I've seen it from time to time, but yeah I just block em. But like others have said most communication I see are from people saying GLHF and the like, or GG at the end. The time in between is complete silence.

 

[WhiteFangofWhoa]

Pretty close to what I do in DOTA 2. A lot simpler than forcing them into a separate tier of priority games for several matches.

 

[DoPo]

So is this just out of game msgs, because if it is then what's the point?

If you are reported enough, you will be "squelched" for 24 hours, which will block you from communicating with any player who is not on your friends list (including private messages).

Emphasis mine. It seems to be not in-game as well.

If it does block in game chat too, it will severely limit that person's ability to communicate important things to their team.

Have you played HotS? Because I don't actually believe it would impact much - the context command menu is quite good and it can be effectively used to plan and execute tactics without ever opening the chat window. Well, assuming your team mates are competent. I've barely ever needed to type in HotS, because of this.

I also assume that this isn't going to be squelched, as it really makes no sense - ping flooding is already taken care of, so at most, some player can go "going there" and not go there. Which basic map awareness pretty much solves.

 

[FalloutJack]

Trolls don't have ANY power, ever. They're just annoying. So, I imagine in this case there's gonna be ALOT of muting going on.

 

[Dr. Crawver]

For some reason, trolls are attracted to MOBAs like moths to a flame.

Apparently someone else besides me is a Dark Souls fan. Happy to see such references pop up here and again

It's a pretty common phrase Frappe. Far older than dark souls.

Back to OT, sounds like a pretty decent system. Blizzard have made a few missteps in my opinion in recent years, but this is sounding positive.

 

[Alleged_Alec]

hehehe. As if this would ever work. Dedicated trolls won't get stopped by this. In fact: they'll just abuse the system. It's much cleaner to just let people decide for themselves whether or not they want a troll muted or not and let them do so. Chat bans never work.

 

[WarpedMind]

Does anyone even use the chat in HoTs?

What's the point supposed to be? Not only are people prompted to mute their entire team at the beginning of matches, you can't actually talk to the opposing team at all.

As someone who mostly plays Dota 2 HoTs is already one hell of a hugbox by my standards.

 

[Bad Jim]

It's much cleaner to just let people decide for themselves whether or not they want a troll muted or not and let them do so.

Not really. You can only mute a troll when he has already trolled you, or mute everyone and be unable to communicate yourself.

Besides, I'd say that dedicated trolls are very much the minority. Most toxic players are just easily frustrated and won't go to great lengths to abuse the system or evade it's punishments. So you can get a less toxic environment with chat bans even if it is never 100% non-toxic.

 

[Vigormortis]

Isn't the easiest solution to deal with trolls to just give players a mute button that will silence them if a person is upsetting them?

It is, which is why Dota 2 does both.

Users caught repeatedly and routinely abusing the ingame text and voice chat will be hit with a "silence penalty". At the same time, a player can mute anyone in the game at any time by clicking on the corresponding button in the scoreboard.

It's the most ideal solution I've seen among the many Dota-like/A-RTS[footnote]I refuse to use the acronym 'MOBA' as it sounds incredibly stupid and is nebulous enough to describe damn near every online competitive game in existence.[/footnote] games out there.

 

[Sarge034]

Emphasis mine. It seems to be not in-game as well.

That much was known, I was asking if it killed in game chat too.

Have you played HotS? Because I don't actually believe it would impact much - the context command menu is quite good and it can be effectively used to plan and execute tactics without ever opening the chat window. Well, assuming your team mates are competent. I've barely ever needed to type in HotS, because of this.

I also assume that this isn't going to be squelched, as it really makes no sense - ping flooding is already taken care of, so at most, some player can go "going there" and not go there. Which basic map awareness pretty much solves.

Have you played HotS?

I have, the pings boil down to attack, defend, on my way, and hold position. There isn't even a champion missing ping. My point was that if blizzard doesn't trust these people to use in game comms and not be dicks, why are they allowed to play the game? It just feels like a half assed solution to me. They're still toxic, they'll still fuck you over in game, they're still dicks... they just can't call you a shit player while they do it. And I answer my own question, money. You can't make money off of banned players.