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Toxicity. An important topic
georgeblack
Member
There will always be toxic people.
However in my opinion toxicity occurs more when a player does not feel connected with another player or players and it occurs less when a player feels that it belongs in a group of players.
I found that games in which the majority of time you spend it in Group Finders either for a battle ground or an instanced dungeon are 100% toxic or silent.
When playing a game in these rules you dont get to know the 3 random people that you got randomly teamed up for a dungeon. So obviously they dont need to be polite to you and you to them. Leading to toxic experiences. Same for BG PvP with a team that your only objective is the victoty of that round.
If the players in those random group finders are not skilled they receive a lot toxicity from the rest. This is not a team. It's a random assembly of people unknown to each other.
I found that I never came across toxic people when I was playing with familiar people. These were a group of 7-9 friends playing together all the time or a guild of 100 or so.
We knew one another and respected each other. We knew things about our friends and their ingame characters. We basically helped develop each other and get stronger and smarter.
In an open world mmorpg a player has to be part of a larger group such as a guild in order to experience all the features of the game.
The player feels proud of the guild and they work to promote their interests and fame all the time.
It's not the same with winning a BG battle or farming an instanced dungeon with some random people.
The more players feel like they belong in a small community the less likely they are to be isoleted, rude and act in a stupid way to make a bad name for themselves and be toxic.
Replace the open world mmorpg with instanced content and what do you have?
A group finder filled with people that want to complete the objective and /leavegroup and you better know that if they dont get to complete it there will be some bullshit accusations and toxicity thrown at each other
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When brave Moses Toxi traveled from Boston in a covered wagon, eating nothing but Doritos and Game Fuel, his dream was to found a settlement where people can cast off the restrictions of modern life and live free.
Toxicity is this place. Sure the drive by memeing rate has gone up in recent years, but don't forgot to remember the proud people who live there.
Someone's been hitting the bottle a bit too hard tonight I reckon...
As far as in gaming goes, I haven't dealt with it much. As I can mute others or, if drastic measures are needed, play something else. However, in a sub based game I am more likely to shrug it off and ignore until it stops and then troll. So I can't say I am above adding some poison to everyone's drinking water.
Its like gangrene: if its not cut out, it ruins.
I disagree. Punishing toxicity is like putting a bandaid on an infected wound. It covers it up but doesn't solve the underlying problems. Punishment should be a last resort, not a starting point.
We need a stable, small number of servers, where you cant just change the name of your character. Make the reputation of a person important.
I remember the days in WoW, when people knew the best tanks, healers, dps and blacksmiths by name.
They need to bring those days back!
Another thing that would be nice:
A Server sub-forum, where you can post events and names of griefers etc.
In my experience it stems from miscommunication, especially in PUGs. One person expects their teammate to do a certain action and when that doesn't happen they become toxic. You'd be amazed at how many problems can be solved just by discussing things before they go wrong.
Im not the one who has a problem with toxicity
FFXIV is a good example of this and has one of the most welcoming communities in the MMO scene.
They have one feature specifically that I hope Ashes will take note of, their commendation system. At the end of a dungeon run or group finder w/e. The game asks you to commend one player from that group for their performance/participation. In turn, that player that receives the commendation gets a currency that can be used for special cosmetic rewards for putting their best foot forward.
I thought this was an awesome system because it pits players against each other in a competitive nature to engage with the party. Both socially and mechanically.
I'm also a big fan of the "mentor" system some games put in, but it never seems to be done correctly. I do enjoy the concept of veteran players being rewarded for helping newbies though. I think it creates less divide in the community.
Addon Developer
OG Backer
I'm probably alone in this but as a teacher irl I don't need a reward for helping people. I do it because I enjoy helping others and seeing them grow. Mentor systems that offer rewards to the mentors take away that aspect because too often the mentors only do it for the rewards. There's also the problem of what criteria you put in for who can become a mentor. In FFXIV you have a basic set of competency requirements in order to get mentor status. The problem is that these requirements aren't really based on skill, just time. Completing a certain number of dungeons isn't hard, it just takes a long time.
On top of that there are a lot of skilled players who make absolutely terrible teachers. Just because you have a lot of knowledge doesn't mean you are a good at giving that knowledge to other people. It's not about what you teach, but what your students learn. If your students don't learn anything or improve, then you have failed.
In my opinion, leave the teaching to those who actually WANT to teach.
That's why I said I haven't seen a game do it correctly. I enjoy the concept, but execution always seems to be very poor. The commendation system is based in the simple science that makes the RPG loop work. Explore -> Kill/Quest -> Collect. It's a feedback loop that gives a hit of dopamine every time the player does something good they are rewarded for it. By integrating this template into something that promotes positive behavior from players, it might be a one of many solutions to keeping toxicity to a minimum.
Bad teachers are a problem in real life, but this is a video game. You don't need a degree to teach games and you aren't required to show up and learn what someone wants to teach you. I think you're looking too deep into this and making a hard comparison to how teaching works in the real world. (and getting a wee bit defensive about it) The two cannot be compared fairly.
You aren't forced to participate in either of those systems if you don't want to in FFXIV. You can play the entire game without ever giving/spending a single commendation or being a mentor/under a mentor. In the end isn't that really what most games are about, freedom of choice by the player? Especially in Ashes with the different nodes. Some people really suck at making money in games and are just poor economy players, does it mean we shouldn't have economic nodes? No... It means that we should give players other avenues to have fun and play the game the way they want like scientific nodes.
Addon Developer
OG Backer
Let me ask you something. Why does a mentoring system need to have rewards or titles attached to it?
I'd like you to really think about it before you answer.
As I explained above.... A simple dopamine loop is usually how games keep and engage players.
Social sites like Twitter, Facebook, etc. all use this approach as well. It's why you never have to refresh the page. You reach the end of the page, it automatically loads new information that you might find relevant or what's commonly referred to as a "dopamine hit". The same mechanic is employed is most addictive behaviors like gambling, loot boxes, etc. It's why you get a big animation, flashing lights and sounds when you open a lootbox in other games. The game wants to make you feel good about performing that action.
Now while this mechanic is employed in horrendous things like lootboxes, the same concept can be applied for positive reinforcement when the player does something good like help a new player.
"Why does a dungeon system need rewards attached to it?"
"Why does currency need rewards attached to it?"
"Why do monsters need to drop loot when they die?"
"Why do you need to be rewarded when finishing a quest?"
"Why do I need to pay someone to make this for me? Isn't self-satisfaction enough?"
It's the reason that almost every game on the market right now employs the use of achievements. Achievement points are usually meaningless, BUT, it's a way of rewarding the player for doing something the game considers good.
Just like how most forums now employ that little like button below this post. When you receive a like/agree, it makes you feel good that other people on the forums agree with what you have to say. In turn, you'll probably post more because you feel valued as a member of the community.
Addon Developer
OG Backer
You haven't answered my question. I didn't ask why games give rewards to mentors (I am well aware of the various skinner box techniques games employ to keep their players playing). I asked why a mentoring system would need rewards attached to it.
Those are 2 entirely different things. In your other examples of rewards, there is a secondary purpose behind the rewards, mostly to stimulate the in-game economy. Monsters drop loot and/or gold that players can exchange to buy items that improve their character in some way. If you were to take that away it would invalidate the entire in-game economy and you'd lose a huge portion of character progression in an RPG. Yes the dopamine hit from being rewarded does help encourage players to kill monsters and do quests, but that is not the primary purpose of those rewards.
Going back to a mentoring system, any rewards that are attached to it (particularly things like titles or achievements) are purely to get players to engage in that system. They have no other purpose. The result is players will engage in that system purely for the rewards even when they have no interest in helping others.
The irony of all this (as seen in FFXIV) is that systems designed to help players and reward positive behaviour can often produce toxicity. Reward-centric gameplay that forces players to do things they wouldn't normally do breeds toxicity.
If there's no rewards attached to it, then why does it need to be a system in the first place. Then it's just people offering help to other players like usual. A system implies custom functionality. Why would developers spend the time to develop a mentor system if literally the same result can be achieved through a simple chat channel. The idea behind a mentor system is to not have the community be as divided, having a reward incentivizes veteran players to interact with newbies.
"Reward-centric gameplay that forces players to do things they wouldn't normally do breeds toxicity." The game isn't FORCING you to do anything. Cosmetic rewards are completely optional. I believe what you're looking for is, "REQUIRED Reward-centric gameplay" An example of this is the PvP scene in WoW for a long time. There were best in slot trinkets for PvP that could only be obtained through the highest difficulty raid. This is a forcing a player who doesn't engage in PvE normally to do it to advance with the PvP part of the game.
That's what games are all about though, freedom of choice and a good MMO understands this and attempts to keep certain game mechanics separate so those sub-cultures aren't forced into doing something they don't want to do. You're looking purely negative side as well, like, "Oh not everyone should teach!" but what about players who go into a system like that blind and end up loving it and being good at it.
Rewards also help negate some of cost that might go into mentoring. "I don't mind giving this player some of my mats because I'm getting a reward out of helping him."
Pros: Bridging Community Divide, helping get new players hooked on the game, incentives for older players to help new players.
Cons: Some people may need to be reported/banned from using the mentor system
It really just seems like you're against rewards for mentors because you had a bad experience or feel like mentoring is something that should require a 4 year degree. Making these very general and vague statements.
However, I've presented my case and examples regarding the mentoring system and no longer wish to spend anymore time in this topic. Have a good one and thank you for being an educator, there's not enough out there currently.
Addon Developer
OG Backer
In my experience, when it comes to gaming, the divide you speak of is usually because less-skilled players (for whatever reason) refuse to ask for help. I've seen it happen so often in dungeon groups in pretty much every game I've played. Someone dies, or the group wipes and instead of asking "why did we die there?" the ignorant immediately start the blame game.
A mentoring system isn't going to fix that because those sorts of players think they know it all when they don't. And you are right that a mentoring system without rewards is just helping people out. Is that not enough? Why not just have a chat channel dedicated to asking questions? I've seen it work in countless online games, forums and discord servers with no need for any rewards.
And no, I don't feel that mentoring requires a 4 year degree (that would disqualify me straight away since I never went to university...). I'm just sick of games putting arbitrary rewards and achievements when they aren't needed and tend to cause more problems than they solve.
Anyway, I'm curious to hear other people's opinions on this topic. Yes I know we've gone off from the original topic, but it is related and it's been suggested enough to warrant discussion.
A guild should have 10-20 academy slots.
A cadet should be linked to a mentor. Whenever the cadet acomplishes some features which he learned from the mentor the guild should earn some points.
Once the cadet graduates, the guild should earn more points and the cadet can unlock a mid range low level armor set from an npc.
The cadet is happy for learning and earning and being briefly in a large guild.
The mentor plays a real life role, ingame.
The guild leader reaps some rewards and maybe keeps the new guild member.
This is an incentive for all but nothing that can be deminished to a plain game mechanic with total lack of real human interactions
As for regular, team up with buddy newbie, get bonus rewards for everyone, no. I don't think that is needed and as others pointed out I think it would be abused. If you want to be a friend and mentor a new player, then you should do that to foster a community and a good rep. Not to mention regular rewards gained while questing with new player.
If you need an incentive to mentor, outside of a guild setting, I don't think you should be mentoring. I do not consider running around and re-doing quests with new players in a video game something that should be rewarded by the video game. If you friend wants to drop you some real life dough, that's between you two.
If your reputation in a city or something larger has a very big effect on whether you can find groups or not, then people will most likely just be toxic on somewhere like discord outside the game. LoL does a really good job with their chat toxicity, but things such as griefing someone in game other than just killing them are much harder to prevent.
If you're having to go out and look for random people to do dungeons or quests or something with, then you're bound to find toxicity. If you have a guild or group of friends that aren't toxic then most of the time this shouldn't be a problem. At least to me toxicity doesn't affect me that much, as long as there is an option to MUTE someone or BLOCK someone then you can fix the problem yourself easily.
Something you can't fix yourself though would be other ways or griefing and being toxic in game like someone stealing your farm or blocking you from going somewhere or something like that.
It really doesn't, at all. The Instant Feedback System (IFS) in LoL is a complete joke. Oh sure it hands out punishments left, right and centre but since it's a computer system, it can't determine context, and context is very important when it comes to toxicity, verbal or otherwise.
Honestly the biggest problem with LoL and one of the reasons why it is so toxic is because of E-sports. Now don't get me wrong, E-sports on its own is fine, but it has a major side effect. The majority of players blindly copy whatever the pro players do even when their circumstances are completely different to the pro players.
What this means is that many players consider anything that isn't strictly part of the meta to be "trolling" or "griefing" even when it's not. Seriously if you do anything outside of the meta at all your teammates will start raging at you, usually resulting in them either insulting you, or refusing the play. And of course sending report after report after report. Every single match I played someone on either my time or the enemy said "report x for [insert bullshit reason here]". EVERY SINGLE MATCH.
I spent a lot of time on the LoL official forums shifting through threads of people complaining about all the "trolls" and "feeders" in their matches. I spent hours watching replays of matches where there were supposedly trolls in the match. Guess what, the majority of those matches I watched had no trolls or feeders in them at all, just people playing the game.
Sorry, I'm ranting a bit here but my god it is frustrating to watch.