Guild Wars 2

Looks like the discussion of Forum Moderation – Clarification, which is a user-created post has been closed by Anet. And their last line was:

“Hello again all!

Thanks so much for having this conversation with us today. The whole Community Team has been reading this thread, and we will gather up all the feedback (positive & negative) to discuss.

I’m closing the thread now
"

IMHO, i mean, the Team don’t have to be there in an ACTIVE role in that thread. People are still talking. I don’t see there’s a reason to close it (unless they have one) when players still exchange to each other (not necessarily to Anet) their takes on the new and improved censoring policy . It is just a regular thread like millions of other thread, which are still active. If someone doesn’t feel like keep on reading, by all means, he/she feel free not to. There’s no violation in that.

I’m hoping it means they’re re-thinking the whole warning and rewriting it to be something that makes us not afraid to post, and something that protects and punishes all players and employees equally.

My guess? It was becoming too negative for them, so instead of letting the community continue discussing it, they closed it.

Like you said, it was a community made thread, not moderator made. It was a discussion just like any other and ending the discussion by closing it was not their call.

But according to the rules we have, we are not even allowed to have a discussion about moderation. It against the rules to discuss it. So I’m guessing the only reason they left it open temporarily was to gather a bit of information (because of their whole new “let’s talk to the community” thing they are doing), and then close it to keep it from getting out of hand since they wouldn’t be there to moderate it anymore.

But I agree. It was a community thread, not a moderator thread, and should still be left open for debate. But seeing as it “breaks the rules”, I don’t see that happening.

Clark Skinner.4902:

I’m hoping it means they’re re-thinking the whole warning and rewriting it to be something that makes us not afraid to post, and something that protects and punishes all players and employees equally.

Unfortunately, the cat is out of the bag. People who have seen it are afraid to post. In any case, I feel it’s a reflection of Anet’s general attitude towards the forums and their customers.

Anyone who has been active on these forums a while will notice that as the game progresses, the level of dissatisfaction and criticism is steadily increasing. I won’t go into the reasons for this, but it’s basically because more updates, equals more opportunity to criticize.

This increase in criticism has meant that from the player perspective, and even more so the perspective of outsiders (Google, Game review sites, potential customers, etc.), the game can appear to be inundated with issues, and the company is not competent.

In response, it appears that ANet has decided to basically perform “damage control” by trying to control the information being presented. For example, if ANet starts posting and discussing thread topics, they can basically sway the community into talking about what they want, in a way they want.

However, it was fairly obvious that an increase of ANet employees discussing topics on this website, would inevitably create more of what they’ve been attempting to avoid (negative threads).

So, as a “preemptive strike” if you will, ANet has decided to modify the forum expectations in order to justify what will inevitably result in the suspension of many players.

The closing of the mentioned thread is, in my opinion, another attempt at control. If you go read the thread, you’ll notice that much of it is, “negative” towards ANet. Everyone was being respectful, and providing well thought out answers, which ANet has asked for, but because it didn’t paint things in a positive light, it was locked down.

Discussing this topic is going to be very difficult around here from now on. ANet has placed themselves in a position where they retain ultimate control. By using vague terminology and weasel words, they have allowed themselves the freedom to get rid of any posts, and or players who don’t contribute to what I feel is ANets new attempt at damage control.

Anyway, time will tell to what degree ANet takes this. This post alone (mine), has so many statements that an overzealous mod could determine to be “insulting” thus resulting in a suspension. This fear and hesitation of what will, and won’t be considered “insulting to an individual (Aka ANet)” will make posting here very difficult in the future.

So, from now on, whenever I press “Post Reply” the question will be, “Is this the post that will end my time here?”

If you want a place where you can openly discuss stuff there’s something in the works, check out my sig.

half the thread was deleted for being off topic aswell

oh well…

I don’t see the problem.

I’ve made a few posts in the last year that were critical of the game and made statements that might have been interpreted as a violation of the new policy. Lately, I’ve been highly critical of the game. In light of the new policy I’ll still provide criticism, but will confine my remarks to comments about the game, its features and direction without offering my opinion of the company. It’s pretty easy to comment about something like balance, without resorting to remarks about the company or the individuals at the company involved in balance. It just takes some self restraint, something that I’ll grant is in short supply on the internet.

Some posters lament the lack of civility on the internet. This is usually explained by the lack of consequences. Now, there are consequences, at least on this forum. Deal with it.

Because of the toxic nature of the forums recently, some people are afraid to post their thoughts. Seeing that rampant disrespect and rude remarks toward the very developers of the game goes unchecked does not facilitate an atmosphere where others whose opinion doesn’t ‘go with the current flow’ can feel safe to post that opinion.

Hopefully, the forums will become a place where no one will be attacked, and we can all discuss issues like the civilized people we are.

Crazylegsmurphy.6430:

Anyone who has been active on these forums a while will notice that as the game progresses, the level of dissatisfaction and criticism is steadily increasing. I won’t go into the reasons for this, but it’s basically because more updates, equals more opportunity to criticize.

This increase in criticism has meant that from the player perspective, and even more so the perspective of outsiders (Google, Game review sites, potential customers, etc.), the game can appear to be inundated with issues, and the company is not competent.

In response, it appears that ANet has decided to basically perform “damage control” by trying to control the information being presented. For example, if ANet starts posting and discussing thread topics, they can basically sway the community into talking about what they want, in a way they want.

However, it was fairly obvious that an increase of ANet employees discussing topics on this website, would inevitably create more of what they’ve been attempting to avoid (negative threads).

So, as a “preemptive strike” if you will, ANet has decided to modify the forum expectations in order to justify what will inevitably result in the suspension of many players.

The closing of the mentioned thread is, in my opinion, another attempt at control. If you go read the thread, you’ll notice that much of it is, “negative” towards ANet. Everyone was being respectful, and providing well thought out answers, which ANet has asked for, but because it didn’t paint things in a positive light, it was locked down.

Discussing this topic is going to be very difficult around here from now on. ANet has placed themselves in a position where they retain ultimate control. By using vague terminology and weasel words, they have allowed themselves the freedom to get rid of any posts, and or players who don’t contribute to what I feel is ANets new attempt at damage control.

Anyway, time will tell to what degree ANet takes this. This post alone (mine), has so many statements that an overzealous mod could determine to be “insulting” thus resulting in a suspension. This fear and hesitation of what will, and won’t be considered “insulting to an individual (Aka ANet)” will make posting here very difficult in the future.

So, from now on, whenever I press “Post Reply” the question will be, “Is this the post that will end my time here?”

I agree with you that the level of dissatisfaction is increasing as each update gets released. But I disagree with you as to the why. It basically boils down to the updates being underwhelming and not what players want (nor “not want” but awesome that Anet thought of it and now I want more of that). Each LS update so far has added fluff (that is fun for the first half hour and then turns into a boring grind afterwards) but no fixes to what most players are wanting fixed.

Each player has their own expectations as to what the game could be for them. For myself, I wish for more core content and core content fixes such as more dungeons and a pve/pvp split. Other players might want something else. Anet so far has not satisfied not even one grp of players, hence, dissatisfaction is growing.

Its like a person who puts on a fake mask and acts cool with every single social grp, but after a while, those social grps start noticing it and start to get angry with said person. Ofc, im talking about their famous line in their manifesto “If you are an mmo player, you want to play our game. If you are not an mmo player, you really want to play our game”

Yup, this is nothing more than damage control. This is the first time I have seen Anets employees post in one thread so many times. Obviously things weren’t going the way they had planned….so they closed it.

The funny thing is….while Anet is waging war against us…its us, who complain the most, who are the players who want this game to succeed the most. We complain because we care. If we didn’t care….we wouldn’t be here posting…..

Caramel Ham.4891:

The funny thing is….while Anet is waging war against us…its us, who complain the most, who are the players who want this game to succeed the most. We complain because we care. If we didn’t care….we wouldn’t be here posting…..

Quoted for Emphasis

ANet should print this out as a reminder

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Because of the toxic nature of the forums recently, some people are afraid to post their thoughts. Seeing that rampant disrespect and rude remarks toward the very developers of the game goes unchecked does not facilitate an atmosphere where others whose opinion doesn’t ‘go with the current flow’ can feel safe to post that opinion.

Hopefully, the forums will become a place where no one will be attacked, and we can all discuss issues like the civilized people we are.

That is a completely separate issue. When a noob says something that is wrong and a player with more experience corrects him without disrespecting him, then the noob should learn something from the more experienced player. It is not so with noobs here. They get hard headed, start trolling the more experienced player trying to give advice….and then it turns into a troll fest. See all “zerker gear” threads.

We are all noobs at one time or the other. What matters is that we learn and become “experienced”.

Caramel Ham.4891:

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Because of the toxic nature of the forums recently, some people are afraid to post their thoughts. Seeing that rampant disrespect and rude remarks toward the very developers of the game goes unchecked does not facilitate an atmosphere where others whose opinion doesn’t ‘go with the current flow’ can feel safe to post that opinion.

Hopefully, the forums will become a place where no one will be attacked, and we can all discuss issues like the civilized people we are.

That is a completely separate issue. When a noob says something that is wrong and a player with more experience corrects him without disrespecting him, then the noob should learn something from the more experienced player. It is not so with noobs here. They get hard headed, start trolling the more experienced player trying to give advice….and then it turns into a troll fest. See all “zerker gear” threads.

We are all noobs at one time or the other. What matters is that we learn and become “experienced”.

Newb = New person, without knowledge, but with capacity to learn

Noob = Someone that will never learn, thinks they know it all and anyone that disagrees is a Noob

Lonesamurai.4852:

Caramel Ham.4891:

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Because of the toxic nature of the forums recently, some people are afraid to post their thoughts. Seeing that rampant disrespect and rude remarks toward the very developers of the game goes unchecked does not facilitate an atmosphere where others whose opinion doesn’t ‘go with the current flow’ can feel safe to post that opinion.

Hopefully, the forums will become a place where no one will be attacked, and we can all discuss issues like the civilized people we are.

That is a completely separate issue. When a noob says something that is wrong and a player with more experience corrects him without disrespecting him, then the noob should learn something from the more experienced player. It is not so with noobs here. They get hard headed, start trolling the more experienced player trying to give advice….and then it turns into a troll fest. See all “zerker gear” threads.

We are all noobs at one time or the other. What matters is that we learn and become “experienced”.

Newb = New person, without knowledge, but with capacity to learn

Noob = Someone that will never learn, thinks they know it all and anyone that disagrees is a Noob

Yah, I meant that lol. Thanks for the correction.

Now now, Ham and Samurai, these are “off topic”. They might be deleted you know =) (if you know what I’m talking about).

I have never called someone a kitten (I acutally wrote the baby cat word there to cover all curse words) on here. But I have had lots of infractions. Some of them were overturned because they were not for any legitimate reason. Others were stretches of the rules. I have a feeling that most moderation happens because fellow posters complain, not because a mod has personally thought the post to be bad. A system which people can abuse to hurt each other.

So I’d be fine with rules that are against being insulting to anyone. But if the credibility of the future moderation is of the same quality as in the past, I will be getting 2-week suspensions without actually breaking rules. They’d better be REALLY careful before clicking the “yes this report was valid” button, so users can’t abuse this new hefty punishment to punish their opponents.

A discussion of moderation is forbidden.This thread will be closed.