Guild Wars 2

Can we please have something done about:

1) LFGs which advertise websites which then advertise selling groups with no intentions of immediately forming a groups (not to mention the questionable safety of some of these “short links” which bring you through a wall of spam/adds before sending you to your final destination)

2) LFGs on alts that are parked there with a “/w another character”, these again are usually advertising selling groups with no intention of actually starting a group

3) LFGs advertising for guilds which do raids, again with “/w someone else” without any intention of doing a raid.

It’s rather inconvenient during busy time when looking for a raid group and having 10+ of these polluting the raid LFG category with legit LFG posts usually looking for 1-2 more and lasting less than 30 sec.

Can we either get people kicked off the LFG for posting adverts that don’t lead to an immediate group or can we at least have a “sales” category for these people to park their adds in?

Join the group and then report the one who posted the LFG if you think they have broken the rules about what can and can’t be put into the LFG.

I send in about 10 reports a day… It’s getting ridiculous.

Make a ticket and discuss it with support directly? Support isn’t reading the forums. They’re reading and answering tickets. Posting on the forum means that you’re hoping a staff member will read it and foward information that has no names, times, locations, actions or dates to a relevant person.

Seera.5916:

Join the group and then report the one who posted the LFG if you think they have broken the rules about what can and can’t be put into the LFG.

anet isnt going to do anything.

sophiewhite.3149:

Seera.5916:

Join the group and then report the one who posted the LFG if you think they have broken the rules about what can and can’t be put into the LFG.

anet isnt going to do anything.

How do you know? Do you work for ANet? If not, then you can’t say whether they do not follow the things they have posted they do.

People who do not report because they feel a company does not act are just as bad as the players who break the rules. Because to me, not reporting rule breaking is the same as condoning it.

Seera.5916:

sophiewhite.3149:

Seera.5916:

Join the group and then report the one who posted the LFG if you think they have broken the rules about what can and can’t be put into the LFG.

anet isnt going to do anything.

How do you know? Do you work for ANet? If not, then you can’t say whether they do not follow the things they have posted they do.

People who do not report because they feel a company does not act are just as bad as the players who break the rules. Because to me, not reporting rule breaking is the same as condoning it.

We don’t need to work for Anet to know nothing will happen…. Just take for instance… Gold Sellers. Been here 4 years and they still going strong with the same advertisements from the same website, selling the same service, using the same broken system that has been in place. Some things they are good at fixing, others not so much. Advertising and spam has been met with no fix and no response for 4 years now. Feel free to post or make a ticket all you like, it isn’t going to change what they are already aware of and not fixing….

That’s not true. Gold-sellers used to mail everyone. Before that, they used Map Chat. Being whispered is probably the least of the evils. They have paid accounts, ever wonder why you never see their advertisements on the forums? Gold-seller accounts don’t last long, at all. They are quickly removed, once reported.

It’s wrong to say there has been no fixes and no responses.

The thing is, anet stated that using lfg to sell spots in a group is legal.

Lendruil.9061:

The thing is, anet stated that using lfg to sell spots in a group is legal.

Consequently, those LFGs that do not directly sell spots, but only advertise a service in general (by, say, offering a link to a website) should likely be considered an abuse of the LFG system.
in short, any LFG message should be about getting into a group/getting players to a group, with all additional requirements (whether they are gear restrictions or monetary ones) being okay. Any LFGs that aren’t about grouping, but are merely ads are not okay.

Astralporing.1957:

Lendruil.9061:

The thing is, anet stated that using lfg to sell spots in a group is legal.

Consequently, those LFGs that do not directly sell spots, but only advertise a service in general (by, say, offering a link to a website) should likely be considered an abuse of the LFG system.
in short, any LFG message should be about getting into a group/getting players to a group, with all additional requirements (whether they are gear restrictions or monetary ones) being okay. Any LFGs that aren’t about grouping, but are merely ads are not okay.

The thing is, advertising for a certain boss kill is no different than selling a boss kill, both require setup time. The main difference being that most of the time, boss kills fill quickly with the intent of killing it ASAP, where selling runs can either be ASAP or scheduled for later.
With a lack of a reasonable player selling boards and a lack of guild recruitment systems in game, 1 subset of lfg being used to fill a need is not the worst thing.
The note able issue on NA is that no one wants to start groups simply wanting someone else to lead it.

They always ruining challenging end-game content by not making e-sports LFG. When are we going to get prize money for these raids. It’s not fair they’re hogging all the gold in raid content.

Next time they need to post in speed clear in SW so LFG people aren’t being abused.

JaddynnStarr.5201:

Seera.5916:

sophiewhite.3149:

Seera.5916:

Join the group and then report the one who posted the LFG if you think they have broken the rules about what can and can’t be put into the LFG.

anet isnt going to do anything.

How do you know? Do you work for ANet? If not, then you can’t say whether they do not follow the things they have posted they do.

People who do not report because they feel a company does not act are just as bad as the players who break the rules. Because to me, not reporting rule breaking is the same as condoning it.

We don’t need to work for Anet to know nothing will happen…. Just take for instance… Gold Sellers. Been here 4 years and they still going strong with the same advertisements from the same website, selling the same service, using the same broken system that has been in place. Some things they are good at fixing, others not so much. Advertising and spam has been met with no fix and no response for 4 years now. Feel free to post or make a ticket all you like, it isn’t going to change what they are already aware of and not fixing….

And those who do sell gold, get the account(s) used banned. The gold sellers just use stolen credit cards to buy new accounts to start over. So please, tell me how ANet doesn’t act on gold sellers.

No MMO company can get rid of 100% of all gold sellers until such time as players stop using their services. In this case, it’s not ANet’s fault that gold sellers exist.

Players putting up non-legal LFG posts aren’t gold sellers and likely care about their account getting banned for too many rule violations. But saying that you shouldn’t report rule violations because ANet doesn’t do anything is just as bad as breaking the rule yourself. Because that action to me condones the rule violation.

If they do act on it, the rule violator will get punished. If they for some odd reason don’t act on it (I can’t think of a single reason why ANet wouldn’t act on reports of rule violators), then reporting them will give ANet more work to do clearing out the report log and maybe they’ll eventually start acting on it to reduce the number of reports they get on it.

Can someone give a link to some official documentation that says these LFG posts where people are selling raids are against the rules?

I’ve always viewed the LFG tool as a pretty free and open form of communication and don’t like the idea of adding restrictions to how it could be used. If we don’t allow these selling posts we need to be very specific about the rules and consider what other types of posts would be disallowed.

In the current system, if I want to form a group to just chat with other players about things in the game I can do that. There doesn’t have to be gameplay involved. I think this is a fair and positive use of the LFG tool.

If I want to talk about a specific subject, it makes sense to put my lfg in that subject’s category. If that topic is raids, then there is no reason not to put it in the raid lfg.

If I’m looking for a group of people to talk with me about buying raid kills from my guild, then it makes sense to use the lfg tool and to put it in the raid section. This is exactly what the lfg tool was meant for.

Also, one of these posts in the lfg tool takes up a relatively small amount of space. The most I’ve seen at one time is 4, which can just be scrolled past. If these posts were not allowed in the lfg then you’d have those 4 people spamming map chat every couple minutes instead which would be much more disruptive.

If a post doesn’t interest you, just move on like you do with the rest of the LFG.

Fluffy.1932:

Can someone give a link to some official documentation that says these LFG posts where people are selling raids are against the rules?

I’ve always viewed the LFG tool as a pretty free and open form of communication and don’t like the idea of adding restrictions to how it could be used. If we don’t allow these selling posts we need to be very specific about the rules and consider what other types of posts would be disallowed.

In the current system, if I want to form a group to just chat with other players about things in the game I can do that. There doesn’t have to be gameplay involved. I think this is a fair and positive use of the LFG tool.

If I want to talk about a specific subject, it makes sense to put my lfg in that subject’s category. If that topic is raids, then there is no reason not to put it in the raid lfg.

If I’m looking for a group of people to talk with me about buying raid kills from my guild, then it makes sense to use the lfg tool and to put it in the raid section. This is exactly what the lfg tool was meant for.

Also, one of these posts in the lfg tool takes up a relatively small amount of space. The most I’ve seen at one time is 4, which can just be scrolled past. If these posts were not allowed in the lfg then you’d have those 4 people spamming map chat every couple minutes instead which would be much more disruptive.

If a post doesn’t interest you, just move on like you do with the rest of the LFG.

Here’s a link to the rules for the LFG:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Policy-on-the-LFG-Tool/first

@Fluffy there are no rules against selling raids and that wasn’t at all what my complaint was about.
“Our policy: Players may use the LFG Tool only for the formation of a group.”
https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Policy-on-the-LFG-Tool/first

The problem are people using Raid LFG to either recruit for guilds like [raid] with no intention of actually running a raid with said LFG or people who park alt accounts to promote websites which then sell raids. These websites may or may not adhere to anet’s policy (buying raid in gold is ok, in $ is not) but they do pose a security threat to people who follow said link to be met with adware/malware portals.

Edit: Seera beat me to it XD

Xcorpdog.5618:

Astralporing.1957:

Lendruil.9061:

The thing is, anet stated that using lfg to sell spots in a group is legal.

Consequently, those LFGs that do not directly sell spots, but only advertise a service in general (by, say, offering a link to a website) should likely be considered an abuse of the LFG system.
in short, any LFG message should be about getting into a group/getting players to a group, with all additional requirements (whether they are gear restrictions or monetary ones) being okay. Any LFGs that aren’t about grouping, but are merely ads are not okay.

The thing is, advertising for a certain boss kill is no different than selling a boss kill, both require setup time. The main difference being that most of the time, boss kills fill quickly with the intent of killing it ASAP, where selling runs can either be ASAP or scheduled for later.

Yep. And, while the first use is okay, the second one (“for later”) isn’t.
And guild joining advertisements were specifically mentioned at some point to be an abuse of LFG.

(just to be clear, i have absolutely no beef with raid selling. It’s just that rules are rules, and Anet did make some clear statements about LFG)

Do you happen to have a link to that statement about guild advertising being LFG abuse? Would be nice to have it for everyone to see.

Currently looking at the Raid LFG 60% of posts are spam… This has got to be fixed.

Our policy: Players may use the LFG Tool only for the formation of a group.
Players may use the tool to sell a spot in a group, but they may not use it to sell or trade items or for any other unintended purposes.

Is it ok to form a group for talking about joining a guild? You are still forming a group, just the purpose of the group is conversation instead of gameplay. It doesn’t seem like that is against the rules.

It seems like about the only thing this stance disallows is selling items. The ‘unintended purpose’ clause might cover more things but it is ambiguous. I feel like it would rule out website links or other potentially malicious posts.

Unless the person making the post is completely unresponsive on both that and other accounts they have given info for, and is just using the post for a message to be advertised to the community, then I think it is allowed.

Edit: Also, thanks to Seera and pfc for linking to Anet’s statement. I appreciate it

Sure that could be argued but that pollutes LFG and at the very least is still LFG abuse if posted in the wrong category. Adding a guild recruitment category would make more sense…

I agree that adding a guild recruitment category would be the best solution to this issue, but until that happens the best spot for a raid guild recruitment lfg is in the raid category. Thus it is not appropriate to report those players at this time.

Fluffy.1932:

I agree that adding a guild recruitment category would be the best solution to this issue, but until that happens the best spot for a raid guild recruitment lfg is in the raid category. Thus it is not appropriate to report those players at this time.

It is appropriate as it is against the rules.

In what way is it against the rules? You are trying to form a group to discuss joining your guild which is a legal use of the LFG tool. Since you guild is a raid guild, the raid lfg is the best currently existing category for that purpose.

What is legal:
The use of lfg tool to form parties, even if its a service like running a raid for a gold.
What is not legal:
Offering services not related to forming parties, like trading, advertising etc

The first is legal, sometimes in the grey, but the second is ill-eagle and should always be reported. Anything that doesnt result in a party is an illegal afront

Fluffy.1932:

In what way is it against the rules? You are trying to form a group to discuss joining your guild which is a legal use of the LFG tool. Since you guild is a raid guild, the raid lfg is the best currently existing category for that purpose.

Here are a couple posts that reference guild advertising in the LFG isn’t legal in the thread that was posted earlier in this thread by me and one other person:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Policy-on-the-LFG-Tool/first#post4770676

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/gw2/Policy-on-the-LFG-Tool/first#post4771535

@Seera: Thank you for those links. I stand corrected.

Fluffy.1932:

In what way is it against the rules? You are trying to form a group to discuss joining your guild which is a legal use of the LFG tool.

Creating a group for talking purposes is not creating it for the purpose of raiding, and as such does not belong in raid category. Besides, that very same argument was made about legendary selling ads in LFG (that it was okay, since the sellers were creating a group to talk abour selling). It got shot very fast by devs then.

And i see Seera managed to find some of the relevant quotes, that should make the situation clear.

Thank you for those quotes. Makes sense though, if every guild was recruiting in LFG then LFG would grind to a halt in terms of legitimate posts.

I agree that it’s illegitimate to use the in-game LFG to direct players outside the GW2 game, doing this to players could lead to unknown harm. It would be no better than Gold Sellers: Going outside the game and useing real world currency to pay for a in-game Currency or Item or for Content from a third party seller that has no contract with ArenaNet to do the Sale.

Rules are important for LFG, it’s only intended for players to create and join a group (some costing in-game currency) that will intend to do content within the GW2 universe.
It is not intented to be used as a advert for something outside the game. Even if the currency exchange is only with in-game gold.

I personally do not want to send people to unsecured websights. Please protect your personal information and don’t risk your computer.

Tearthy Flame.1463 -

All of the LFG is meant for one simple thing. you are forming the group at the time of advertising, to run the content.
If you are selling for a later date? LFG is the wrong place.
Trying to form a group to chat about, anything? LFG is the wrong place.
Trying to pre-arange a group that isn’t a run sell for a later date? LFG is the wrong place.

ALL LFG adverts should be to run the game at that time. IE, the second you get a full group you are running the content. If you don’t want to run it right away, or won’t be ready to do so right away? Do not go into LFG!

Note: I am talking, of course, about the raid and dungeon LFGs.