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Seminal Inhalation

Legendary Skial King
Contributor
Anyone who gets genuinely offended over some mean words on the internet needs to get a grip. Let players do whatever they want, it's a FPS online multiplayer game not a preschool class. Of course if they threaten to do something actually bad like doxxing then that's where the line draws. Otherwise, let people have their fun like the COD players once did.

This thread is dead and the rule is already in place as of over a month ago.
 
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Sud

Uncharitable Spy
Contributor
An AI might be impartial but it also lacks the ability to judge context.

"You [teammate] guys are idiots" coming from the lowest score on the winning team carries a completely different meaning from saying the same thing as the highest score on a horribly losing team. The former is toxicity, the latter is likely a fact.

I think this targets the wrong type of toxicity. You're trying to deal with toxic people without acknowledging that the bigger issue is toxic environments. When you join into a server and a kid is screaming into the mic, while two alltalk dudebros are giving a running commentary of their gameplay never stopping to take a breath, while some guy is cosplaying hitler with swastika cosmetics, and someone starts a vote on you for killing the "fwendly" this is what needs to be curtailed. These are the scenarios that leave lasting impressions on people, not some random saying "ur mom" after you dom him.
 
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gala

TF2 Admin
Contributor
An AI might be impartial but it also lacks the ability to judge context.

"You [teammate] guys are idiots" coming from the lowest score on the winning team carries a completely different meaning from saying the same thing as the highest score on a horribly losing team. The former is toxicity, the latter is likely a fact.

I think this targets the wrong type of toxicity. You're trying to deal with toxic people without acknowledging that the bigger issue is toxic environments. When you join into a server and a kid is screaming into the mic, while two alltalk dudebros are giving a running commentary of their gameplay never stopping to take a breath, while some guy is cosplaying hitler with swastika cosmetics, and someone starts a vote on you for killing the "fwendly" this is what needs to be curtailed. These are the scenarios that leave lasting impressions on people, not some random saying "ur mom" after you dom him.
The AI thing is on hold as there are more important things to do currently and it would require a lot of work to teach our own

We do have a bot which uses an AI capable of detecting toxicity but it's based on wikipedia's standards so it isn't nearly accurate enough to automate it
 

Hematite

Somewhat Threatening Sniper
Contributor
Anyone who gets genuinely offended over some mean words on the internet needs to get a grip. Let players do whatever they want, it's a FPS online multiplayer game not a preschool class. Of course if they try to do something actually bad like doxxing then that's where the line draws. Otherwise, let people have their fun like the COD players once did.
This type of statement is often the crutch of offenders. I'm not saying that you are, but I'm sharing my experience.

I'm not a staff member and do not speak for the staff, but I believe what was discussed was including a rule opposing toxicity to curtail some of the unwanted behavior and the behavior's results.

People should be able to have fun in an online game; I agree with you on that. However, to state that you can only have fun by intentionally degrading, humiliating, ostracizing, or causing emotional distress to others is fallacious. Additionally, there's a difference between joking around with someone and harassing them, especially when intent and prevalence is considered.

"Your rights end where mine begin" applies here.

Almost none of these rules would need to exist if we could just act like decent human beings to each other.

The other issue is enforcement. Having rules in place is one thing, but enforcement is another. I hear a lot of voice communication that blatantly runs afoul of the rules, but as there are few admins, almost never gets caught.

Are there any plans for that, @Bottiger?
 
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herp 105.4

Rage-Inducing Forum Troll
Contributor
FF2 Balancer
but as there are few admins, almost never gets caught.
i bet 3 cumsoaked muffins that i've reported more people than an admin dealt with first hand rule breakers

you, the player, have a lot of power on skial but so few people use it (and even fewer correctly)

see a naughty person? report it

see a naughty person but don't know if he/she is breaking the rules and cannot be fucked to check? report it

simple
 

Grass velk.ca

Unremarkable User
For those of you who have been here for a long time, you know that the Skial stance on moderating players leaned towards the side of player freedom.

We believed it was not our place to moderate chat among players (like Valve) except for clearly defined and unarguable cases of things like racism or advertising. There is a votemute available to the server.

However, after many years, one of the most frequent and reoccurring criticisms by people talking trash about us on reddit and youtube is that our servers are more "toxic" than casual. So we've decided to look into adding some kind of anti-toxicity rule.

Before we throw something up there, I'd like to see your thoughts and opinions on this, especially how the anti-toxicity rule should be phrased.
Def do this, I hate when people argue
 

KalashnikovA

TF2 Admin
Contributor
For those of you who have been here for a long time, you know that the Skial stance on moderating players leaned towards the side of player freedom.

We believed it was not our place to moderate chat among players (like Valve) except for clearly defined and unarguable cases of things like racism or advertising. There is a votemute available to the server.

However, after many years, one of the most frequent and reoccurring criticisms by people talking trash about us on reddit and youtube is that our servers are more "toxic" than casual. So we've decided to look into adding some kind of anti-toxicity rule.

Before we throw something up there, I'd like to see your thoughts and opinions on this, especially how the anti-toxicity rule should be phrased.

I've been wondering about a hybrid solution (for lack of a better term). My big queston initially was about differentiating banter from toxicity. I like the idea of AI but I imagine that is challenging as well.

For the hybrid solution, my thoughts are this: why not leverage the use of discord servers (both skill and private). So the Skial server chat and mic use would be strictly no toxicity and also no banter. It is hard for outsiders to differentiate when friends are bantering with each other and might feel encouraged to be toxic. Then people can use discord or other chat means to banter with friends and that would keep things separate and clean from Skial. You could even create an 18+ or special section on your discord to allow for banter or strong language.
 

phannyclown

Unremarkable User
For those of you who have been here for a long time, you know that the Skial stance on moderating players leaned towards the side of player freedom.

We believed it was not our place to moderate chat among players (like Valve) except for clearly defined and unarguable cases of things like racism or advertising. There is a votemute available to the server.

However, after many years, one of the most frequent and reoccurring criticisms by people talking trash about us on reddit and youtube is that our servers are more "toxic" than casual. So we've decided to look into adding some kind of anti-toxicity rule.

Before we throw something up there, I'd like to see your thoughts and opinions on this, especially how the anti-toxicity rule should be phrased.
if someone can't handle trash talking they can just mute chat and voice
or you know simply ignore it
 

lordfa9

Unremarkable User
Most mature TF2 community servers has always had that local dive bar atmosphere (except christian servers, those places are so clean they are lame)

Weird characters?
LARPer over voicecoms?
Smack talk? (good-natured or otherwise)
Self depreciating (toilet) humor?

TF2's got it all and i say, its part of the experience
Just like a 10 year old bragging about banging your mom is a quintessential COD experience

On the grand scheme of things, its the internet, if you cant take light-medium smack talk, go back to Neopets or Hello Kitty Island Adventure

For the rest there is muting and reporting