Offensive Language

[Captain Jack]

Ahoy all,

Pirates Glory community is getting larger and larger and we are thankful for this. These are indeed very good news. I have more good news; as administration we have the experience to manage the larger community very efficiently. We have managed larger communities successfully before, after all.

Now that the people are more and the game is becoming more competitive, we need to have an agreement with each other. I am mostly referring to our veterans and to all those that reading this post. There is no need to incorporate these into the game rules - the rules are just fine. All we need, is some extra information on what you should expect as well as what we expect.

The best way for the game to operate, is to have some unmoderated sections of the game where the players will be able to discuss freely without worrying too much of getting a ban. In the public forums, this already happens in Union of Honor.

Union of Honor allows you to clash with other players verbally. Anything up to mild flaming is allowed (calling someone an idiot, is okay. Calling him an @$$h0l3 isn't). We speak of course of a moderated forum. Union of Honor is a forum where admins gets to see what you write and that may penalize even if no one reports.

In the rest of the forums as well as in-game, things are pretty much stricter. It is true that we do not like offensive language, we do not approve it, we do not want it and we penalize it.

An exception to our strictness are the PMs, guild boards and nation boards. These are all unmoderated sections. This means that no admin will read what you write there and no admin will bother until a report is received. How do we handle these reports then?

For PMs, we are pretty much neutral. We prompt the user to block the other player. Only in cases of repetitive offensive language (especially against multiple players - this is why it is good to always report so we know of a player that commonly abuses other players) or real life threats or excessive offensive language, we will take actions. Actions can be a simple warning to an instant ban; there is no rule here, we just per player and per case.

The same happens in country and guild boards. To be sincere, we had very few problems till now at these sections. Lately, country boards are getting some more heat than normal. Nothing too bad though but surely outside of the normal peaceful life of Pirates Glory.

In our opinion, these boards should remain unmoderated and if some players resort to using stronger language than usual (like @$$h0le, etc) then the worse for them. I do not think we should bother too much with this. Experience teaches that if you leave no place for these players to express these specific feelings, they will either do it somewhere else or leave. So it is better to leave a place for this people. I am just not sure that national boards are the perfect place. They are surely the right place as this is where tempers will flare. For example, you cannot expect tempers to flare in a guild board.

Now, to make sure I have made my point I will make a synopsis.

I am not implying that we should allow any offensive language in national boards. I am saying that you should not expect penalties or bans if someone spontaneously starts to badmouth you. We will remove the content only if we think it really is over the line and we will judge per case/player - not based on any general rule. Deal with it I guess. Badmouth him back if you must - although you mustn't. Ultimately, it falls down to the players themselves to set what kind of environment they want; If you dislike bad wording, make sure you corner verbally the player who misconducts. Perhaps he is out of other arguments, if you get my point. Now, if the players misconducting are specific, well, we might ban them after all; easier for all.

To sum up, do not think administration as the guy who will come to dispute your personal problems. We will not.
We will get rid of the problematic guy though, the guy that constantly creates issues.

So, keep up reporting, we file every report. Today, we created a tool that allows us to moderate this kind of issues faster.

[PhoenixKnight]

+1

[DezNutz]

Does this only apply to using "offensive" language directly at another player. I can see how certain words, while generally considered inappropriate, are not used to attack another player but just stated in conversation. Such as sh** or @$$. A good example would be the recent pirate joke thread/topic, where a joke may contain a word deemed offensive.

[Captain Jack]

Well, I am mostly referring to small insults against other players where personal frictions exist. Nothing of the sort that you may notice to other games that include real life threats/curses. RL threats/curses are insta-bans here.

[DezNutz]

Well, I am mostly referring to small insults against other players where personal frictions exist. Nothing of the sort that you may notice to other games that include real life threats/curses. RL threats/curses are insta-bans here.

Thanks for the clarification.

+1

[Stan Rogers]

+1

Can Coital Dullard be used in place of f**king idiot ?

[Ziggfried]

You could creat A flame board.

[Stan Rogers]

As so rightly pointed out, the national forums are getting much busier and some simple tweaks could really improve some things.

For instance, when the king makes a proclamation, he should be able to sticky it to the top so it don't get buried if there becomes too many topics happening.

He could list many things a King is responsible for without having to 'bump' to avoid getting pushed down the list and off the board.
I know ...wrong place to post this suggestion.

[DezNutz]

As so rightly pointed out, the national forums are getting much busier and some simple tweaks could really improve some things.

For instance, when the king makes a proclamation, he should be able to sticky it to the top so it don't get buried if there becomes too many topics happening.

He could list many things a King is responsible for without having to 'bump' to avoid getting pushed down the list and off the board.
I know ...wrong place to post this suggestion.

Your suggestion is offensive to less important posts. We need to make sure that all posts are treated equally.

[Dreadnort]

snot brain is ok