There should be predefined valid reasons required for kick and mute votes (for example: “Ghosting”, “Chat Spam”, “Griefing”, etc…), where if a predefined valid reason isn’t used in those the calling of those votes, an error would result. Server owners would be able to set the predefined valid reasons in a file (or choose to disable this feature). This feautre would reduce many instances of vote abuse, and greatly reduce the need for canceling such votes by admins.
Some additional features and enhancements:
Allow for the possibility of including more than one predefined valid reason in the same callvote.
Disable /callteamvote kick & /callteamvote mute. Instead, allow some predefined valid reasons for /callvote kick & /callvote mute to be identified as team related. A team related predefined valid reason can only be called by a player1 on the alien team or the human team, and can only be called on a player2 that is on the same team as player1. For such called votes, only spectators & players on the same team as player1 & player2 can see the voting prompt & participate in the vote. Players on the same team as player1 & player2, who abstain count as no votes. Spectators & players that are on a different non-spectator team from player1 & player2, who don’t vote, don’t count as no votes. However, all players will still see in the console the announcement of these kinds of votes and their results. Another /callvote can’t be called while these kinds of votes are still in progress.
Allow some predefined valid reasons to be identified as multiple player related. A reason identified as multiple player related can have more than one player entered into a callvote that uses this reason, and requires that at least two players are included.
I agree that it’s a good idea, but I don’t think it will change joke votes much. If we implement this, the only thing that will change is that whoever calls a vote will now have to attach a reason for it. We’re not going to be able to check that the reason is actually valid, and depending on people’s attitudes the will pass or fail as before.
Could you clarify this? Do you mean calling for example a mute vote on two spammers at once?
no he’s saying that if u callvote kick someone for the reason “multiclient” or “dogpiling” u have to supply 2+ player parameters b/c if it didn’t involve 2+ players it wouldn’t be multiclient it would just be client.
somethiing as common as voting should not be complicated tho. in a general thing btw not everything that u can possibly think of needs to be coded into the game lol
Actually, ensuring that submitted reasons are valid is exactly what this feature is meant to achieve.
On GrangerPub/GrangerClub for example, their rules explicitly state what are all of the valid reasons for mute votes and for kick votes. Those reasons can be summarized/categorized into about a dozen “flags” each consisting of 1, 2, 3, or 4 words. A finite number (and in this case a very small finite number) of concepts can represent an infinite number of applicable instances.
what rib is saying, if i may , is that requiring some kind of flag in the game doesn’t mean ppl are calling good votes. if i join the server and say hi and someone calls a votemute w/reason “spam” it’s not a valid vote. and that’s true with or without ur flag system. just b/c u somehow list all valid reasons u think are possible doesn’t mean they are being used in valid situations at all lol
it just adds like a minor annoyance when u mistype ur reason and get an error? and then all the foreign players get mad b/c they can’t figure out why their votes aren’t working like they have for the past 10 years lol
i think it’s great that u want to hard code server rules in the game, b/c it’s a way of acknowledging that no players and almost no admins read the rules or want to be trem lawyers lol. this is just a case of fixing something not broken sry it’s sort of like ur trying to create an adminless trem server with all these random changes but that’s never going to happen, it’s a social game and u always need admins in the loop
Actually spam (flooding the chat) is a valid reason for mutes on the GrangerPub & GrangerClub servers, it is just not a correct reason in the example you gave. Yes even with only valid reasons, votes will still be called that are not correct. However, at least reasons that are not against the rules would no longer be used, and admins would no longer have to cancel votes for the reason of those votes being invalid, since invalid reasons could no longer be used. This feature alone doesn’t solve all voting problems, but it solves some common ones.
The error would list all of the predefined valid reasons. Also these predefined valid reasons would be concise in that most can probably be identified with a single word, and there would be limit of a maximum of 4 words that can be used for a predefined valid reason. What would be very beneficial with this feature is a good voting UI that displays all of the predefined valid reasons, and then it would be a matter of just clicking on one or more.
Yes admins will always be required, but there are a lot of things that can be fixed that would free up some of the focus and time of Admins so that they can better managed and improve the environment of servers.
Kick & mute votes are in place primarily for when admins might not be available. Those votes give some administrative power to players on the server in general. However, since players generally don’t have to go through an admin application process, no rgo through admin training, it would be beneficial to have built in guidance.
umm so exactly like i said, it’s not a valid vote. i didn’t say the reason is not listed on ur tremulous penal code. i said the VOTE isn’t valid.
this doesn’t solve anything. it just replaces all ur “invalid” votes with “incorrect” votes which is the point u didn’t see i guess…
btw so in ur dream system someone calls a vote to kick someone and they can pick an umbrella predefined reason for them so they don’t have to think called “griefing”
is there some way u could add a field to this system where someone can clarify what just happened? more specifically? so for example if someone psaws u on medipad, there could be some kind of flag, we’ll call it -r for recent events. and then u could type something like /callvote kick vash -r psawing teammates on medipad
is there any way u could implement something like this in the future? i think that would rly help ppl clarifying the reasons they use for votes lol
if u think u can change the way ppl act, u can’t, and u shouldn’t want or need to b/c it’s a game. if u want to prove to someone that u can think of a “better” UI than the devs did 10 years ago when copying the established way voting works in all games, esp. fps/q3 games, that’s a different problem and it’s basically not knowing why ppl like trem or what trem needs!
If spamming is against the rules, and a mute vote is a permitted enforcement of such a violation, then to call a mute vote for spamming would always be valid for every case, even if the reason of spamming was incorrect for that case.
Saying hi once when entering the server is generally not considered spam, so if someone calls a mute vote on you in response and uses “spam” as the reason, that reason would be valid, but incorrect.
If on the other hand someone called a mute vote in response to you saying “hi” with the reason “greeting”, and greeting is not against the rules, then that reason would be invalid but correct.
Sound reasons require that said reason be both valid and correct. The particular feature discussed here is meant to require the valid component of the reasons’ soundness. The actual voting is meant to judge the correctness component of the reasons’ soudness by popular decision.
These articles contain more information about logical validity and logical soundness:
i’ll try different argumentation. this feature is worse than status quo because:
it complicates the system: people have to learn new thing, not seen in any other game. non-english users have to understand the wording you choose in your predefined reasons. instead of simply calling -r ‘enough’ or -r ‘destroying mission map’ they would have to choose something from the list they may not understand, like ‘griefing’
AND
it doesn’t solve anything: if you did nothing wrong i still can do /callvote kick sparky -r ‘predefined reason 7’
ps.
world is more complicated than predefined list of reasons. give us any list you can think of and we will probably find valid but not listed reason
Here is a possible example predefined valid reasons list (not a final list, a better list might be possible, with a use of simpler words that are easier to understand):
vote abuse
command abuse
admin impersonation
constant torment
flaming
sharing personal id info
linking to prohibited websites
suggesting harmful commands
hacking
cheating
griefing
unsolicited disruptive advertising
ghosting
name abuse
spamming
begging for admin level
Find examples of possible reasons that would be valid in the rules below, but that the list above would not address. Find examples of situations that one or more of the above listed reasons would address but that the the rules below would permit.
No vote, nor teamvote, nor /suggest abuse. No excessive spamming of called votes nor /suggest, nor calling the same votes nor /suggest that have recently failed. No using multiple clients to cast votes. No using votes nor /suggest in a way they were not intended to be used (where another vote type or /suggest type or other command, which is intended for that use, would be more suitable). No server takeovers (Kicking others with votes and taking the server for yourself). No glitching votes nor /suggest. No calling votes nor a /suggest which require a valid reason (like mute and kick require) without providing a reason that is both valid and accurate. The rules designate which violations are valid reasons for which kinds of votes. A violation of rule 1 is a valid reason for denycallvotes votes (available soon) , mute votes, and/or kick votes depending on the situation. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings, canceled votes, denycallvotes (available soon) , mutes, kicks, and/or bans.
Do not impersonate any admin or falsely claim you are an administrator or GrangerHub staff member. A violation of rule 2 is a valid reason for mute votes and/or kick votes depending on the situation. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings, mutes, kicks, and/or bans.
Cursing, foul language, swearing, profanities, trash talking, distasteful/controversial/taboo/offensive chat, disrespecting both players and/or admins, as well as any other undesirable chat that doesn't violate any of the rules are ALLOWED (but not condoned, encouraged, nor recommended), and are NOT valid reasons to mute, kick, nor ban (neither by admin nor callvote). Reasonable arguments and civilized debates are also ALLOWED. However, chat may not cross the line from disrespect to persistently tormenting/pestering/persecuting as addressed in rule 4, and chat may not cross the line from civilized debate to persistent flaming as addressed in rule 5.
No persistently tormenting/pestering/persecuting nor targeting any individual(s) with attacks that could cause harm, induce excessive emotional stress, and/or traumatize. If you are continually pestering someone, when they say "NO" (or stop, quit, etc.), you should STOP. A violation of rule 4 is a valid reason for mute votes, and/or kick votes depending on the situation. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings, mutes, kicks, and/or bans.
No persistent flaming (not to be confused with civilized discussions of controversial topics, nor with friendly trash talk banter) between 2 or more players in any non-private chat. Take any fights to private messages. Don't feed trolls. A violation of rule 5 is a valid reason for mute votes for flooding, and for all participants in any persistent non-private flaming incident, regardless of who initiated it. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings and/or mutes.
Do not share any personally identifiable information (information that can be used on its own or with other information to identify, contact, or locate a single person, or to identify an individual in context.) about another person without their express consent, including but not limited to: their real name, contact information, profiles on social media, and so on. Never share any sensitive personal identifiable information about yourself nor about others, including but not limited to: phone numbers, mailing/physical addresses, financial information, legal information, and so on. No sharing passwords, QKEYs, GUIDs, or other private keys. Attacks based on someone's real name (or other personally identifiable information), as well as seeking out this information (phishing), are strictly forbidden. A violation of rule 6 is a valid reason for mute votes, and/or kick votes depending on the situation. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings, mutes, kicks, and/or bans.
No linking to sites or software containing pornography or other obscene content (including shock sites), criminal activity (phishing sites, copyright infringing material, obtaining unauthorized access, etc.), hacks or tools that may provide unfair advantage (aim / trigger bots, wall hacks, etc.), any kind of virus, worm, adware, malware, spyware, nor any other potentially unwanted program, network or security exploit. A violation of rule 7 is a valid reason for mute votes, and/or kick vote depending on the situation. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings, mutes, kicks, and/or bans.
No telling players to enter harmful commands that interfere with their gaming experience or their operating system (for example: unbind all, showimages, disconnect, quit, etc...). A violation of rule 8 is a valid reason for mute votes, and/or kick votes depending on the situation. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings, mutes, kicks, and/or bans.
The use of hacks/cheats is strictly prohibited. Violations of rule 9 is a valid reason for kick votes. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings, kicks, and/or bans.
Basenading/Deconstructing/destroying your own base to the detriment of your team, malicious building (glitchbuilding), malicious behaviour (such as team killing (tking) and bleeding), and all other forms of griefing are strictly forbidden. Violations of rule 10 is a valid reason for denybuild votes kick votes. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings, denybuilds, kicks, and/or bans.
Disruptive unsolicited advertisements unrelated to Tremulous or GrangerHub, and automated advertisements are not allowed, nor are any binds used to advertise anything. Discussions are not ads and are not unsolicited. Discussions of any project, product, and/or service are generally permitted provided they don't violate any of the other rules. A violation of rule 11 is a valid reason for mute votes. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings and/or mutes.
No ghosting (reporting the activities of a team to the other team). A violation of rule 12 is a valid reason for mute votes. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings and/or mutes.
No player names that violate other rules. A violation of rule 13 is a valid reason for kick votes. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings, renames, kicks, and/or bans.
No flooding the chat. A violation of rule 14 is a valid reason for mutes and/or kicks. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings, mutes, kicks, and/or bans.
No begging for admin, higher levels, or other elevated privileges. Admin applications at http://forum.grangerhub.org are required for consideration of potential admins. A violation of rule 15 is a valid reason for mute votes. Violations of this rule may result in administrative action taken in the form of warnings and/or mutes.
It prevents the use of reasons that are not against the rules (which is extremely common), and requires a bit more thought in the calling of kick/mute votes.
Some common more specific reasons that are subsets of general reasons can be included (like some subsets of griefing: teamkilling, base nading, base bleeding, team bleeding). Aliases can be given for various commands (like spamming and chat flooding, or tk and teamkilling and team killing) so that there could be different ways of saying the same thing. When all of the predefined reasons are listed (and displayed in vote prompts) , helpful and descriptive emoticons could be included for each reason (only for display purposes, not as a requirement for entering, this can be especially helpful if included in a call vote menu).
Perhaps an even better approach, besides having such per-defined reasons used in the console, would be to have a voting menu list all of the unabridged rules relevant to mute/kick votes, then indicating the reasons would be a matter of checking off the rule(s) that the alleged offender violated.
While i do agree this won’t fix the bad votes people call, i still really like the idea of this system, it just makes it easier for admins to look through logs etc. @Sparky Flaming and Constant Torment are basically the same thing, you’re just making the system less useful by having more than one name for the same thing, idem dito for hacking and cheating.
In the rules on GrangerPub and on GrangerClub we make a distinction where persistent flaming refers to two or more players having an on-going shouting match with each other that goes beyond friendly trash talk banter, or a mostly civilized debate. Where as constant tormenting is more about one or more players targeting one or more specific other players to persistently aggravate (it doesn’t have to be mutual). So they can be related and occur side by side, but there is a difference. Maybe a better phrase would be something like “shouting match” as a predefined valid reason instead of “flaming.”
i disagree. now you immediately see the reason ‘spamming’, ‘camping’, ‘idiot’, ‘blocking nodes’ and you immediately know which one is a good reason and which one isn’t. when this is implemented all you see will be just ‘griefing’. and you will have to ask: what happens? what did he do etc. in fact in logs you will have less information
, is that requiring some kind of flag in the game doesn’t mean ppl are calling good votes. if i join the server and say hi and someone calls a votemute w/reason “spam” it’s not a valid vote. and that’s true with or without ur flag system. just b/c u somehow list all valid reasons u think are possible doesn’t mean they are being used in valid situations at all lol
it’s sort of like ur trying to create an adminless trem server with all these random changes but that’s never going to happen, it’s a social game and u always need admins in the loop 