Harassment. Is there anything to be done about it?

Aimora · January 2016

I was with a friend in game last night and we were just 'parked' chatting, when a chap came along and initially crouched down with us, then when we didn't respond he started firing skills and buffs - didn't get a rise, then he started dragging mobs into us. Once more we just ignored him. (My friend wanted to blast him out, but I talked him out of it as I have been in these situations before and that just fuels them) Eventually he just got bored and wandered off (he came back again - but we continued to act as if he wasn't there and he carried along on his merry little way!)

Of course this isn't the same as what occurred to you and I am not wanting to diminish the effect it obviously had on you, but the type of people that do this want a reaction - that is their primary goal - it gives a warped sense of validity to their actions, the absolute last thing they want is to not be acknowledge. So any kind of response plays right into their game - you offered over your power to them, and you are still doing it by being agitated by them.

This type of person really isn't worth the energy to even think about, zone to another area, go crafting, do as you take did a break, certainly don't continue to ruminate over them. Don't hand over time/thoughts/energy to someone like this they certainly do not deserve it!

JD2013 · January 2016

I'm sorry this happened to you. I always thought that maybe the ESO community was better than this. Perhaps not, it is the Internet after all.

I know it's rubbish but the best you can do is block and report. I do think Zenimax should do more to discourage this kind of shameful trolling in game, but it is quite rare.

I do know though from several RP sessions that if you don't pay them any attention they get bored and go away. Short attention spans and all that.

We definitely shouldn't have to accept this as something that just happens, but sadly it does, however rare it may be. I hope that you get some kind of response that you're looking for as it sounds like this guy needs a bit of a slap.

maharao_ESO · January 2016

Unfortunately,. this seems to have become more common since the game went free to play. But wasn't that what was expected?

N0TPLAYER2 · January 2016

How about harassing back. Kids these days man..

No one cares and no one will help you. You're letting the troll win. This is not the pc real world.

Deal. With. It.

Volkodav · January 2016

Try to TP out of where you are and return after a few minutes.It's easier than logging out.Sadly,other than reporting him,there's not a lot you can do.Well,..make an unattractive char,and NONE of us would expect that of you.

Cazzy · January 2016

My "serious" responses came from Bethesda and were passed to them by Zeni. I think when it's more than bugs and stuff they pass it onto special investigation teams in other departments.

altemriel · January 2016

screenshot, report, ignore

KramUzibra · January 2016

RizaHawkeye wrote: »

Troneon wrote: »

Zone out, wait a few minutes, zone back in...

They will get bored...

Ignore and block.

Get a thicker skin? This is the internet?

I don't condone this at all but honestly if the big bad wolf stranger on a game is bothering you, don't let it?

Believe me, I can - and have - walked away. But seriously, if I have one final freakin quest to finish in a zone and I can't finish that quest because someone is literally screwing up my game - not just tossing out comments, but interfering with gameplay - then I need to log off and start the quest zone again??? And if I don't then I'm letting them bother me?

No. Wrong. Their conduct is interfering with gameplay. To be clear: I'm not talking about comments or even just gestures; this individual was literally preventing me from proceeding with the quest.

Sorry, @Troneon, my skin is thick enough.

Players cannot prevent you from finishing a quest unless your in cyrodiil. They phase through you, attacks don't affect you, you can mute them if on console. Sounds more like someone said something mean and now your feelings are hurt. Vendetta!

Abeille · January 2016

Zorrashi wrote: »

KramUzibra wrote: »

Cazzy wrote: »

...and people wonder what's wrong with society ^

I know, society has become so weak and sensitive.

IKR! They shouldn't be afraid to ban these harassers on the spot if they have repeated offences. Or maybe put them in a comepletely separate shard where they can't use text chat or emotes and NPCs won't talk to them.
Punishment is too lax on harassment imo

I agree, although I think they do ban people for harassment. Unless the people that go cry on the sub-reddit are lying about the reason for their ban. I mean, maybe they think that we will offer them more sympathy and join them on saying it is unfair if they say it was because of a "rude joke" instead of for, I don't know, botting or selling gold.

By the way, I must say that this thread gives a pretty good idea of how great this game's community is. Many more posts here are offering sympathy to the OP and agreeing that harassment is bad instead of telling the OP that they shouldn't be so sensitive. It makes me happy.

TheShadowScout · January 2016

Abeille wrote: »

By the way, I must say that this thread gives a pretty good idea of how great this game's community is. Many more posts here are offering sympathy to the OP and agreeing that harassment is bad instead of telling the OP that they shouldn't be so sensitive. It makes me happy.

Agreed and likewise, happy that the people who choose ESO seem generally a better sort then those in... other games.

Zorrashi · January 2016

Abeille wrote: »

Zorrashi wrote: »

KramUzibra wrote: »

Cazzy wrote: »

...and people wonder what's wrong with society ^

I know, society has become so weak and sensitive.

IKR! They shouldn't be afraid to ban these harassers on the spot if they have repeated offences. Or maybe put them in a comepletely separate shard where they can't use text chat or emotes and NPCs won't talk to them.
Punishment is too lax on harassment imo

I agree, although I think they do ban people for harassment. Unless the people that go cry on the sub-reddit are lying about the reason for their ban. I mean, maybe they think that we will offer them more sympathy and join them on saying it is unfair if they say it was because of a "rude joke" instead of for, I don't know, botting or selling gold.

By the way, I must say that this thread gives a pretty good idea of how great this game's community is. Many more posts here are offering sympathy to the OP and agreeing that harassment is bad instead of telling the OP that they shouldn't be so sensitive. It makes me happy.

I do have to draw the line at player-dispensed 'justice' though. I don't believe in players trying to troll or harassing harassers back if they are harassed themselves. They should just report, turn the other cheek and let the GMs do the rest.

Abeille · January 2016

Zorrashi wrote: »

Abeille wrote: »

Zorrashi wrote: »

KramUzibra wrote: »

Cazzy wrote: »

...and people wonder what's wrong with society ^

I know, society has become so weak and sensitive.

IKR! They shouldn't be afraid to ban these harassers on the spot if they have repeated offences. Or maybe put them in a comepletely separate shard where they can't use text chat or emotes and NPCs won't talk to them.
Punishment is too lax on harassment imo

I agree, although I think they do ban people for harassment. Unless the people that go cry on the sub-reddit are lying about the reason for their ban. I mean, maybe they think that we will offer them more sympathy and join them on saying it is unfair if they say it was because of a "rude joke" instead of for, I don't know, botting or selling gold.

By the way, I must say that this thread gives a pretty good idea of how great this game's community is. Many more posts here are offering sympathy to the OP and agreeing that harassment is bad instead of telling the OP that they shouldn't be so sensitive. It makes me happy.

I do have to draw the line at player-dispensed 'justice' though. I don't believe in players trying to troll or harassing harassers back if they are harassed themselves. They should just report, turn the other cheek and let the GMs do the rest.

Absolutely. And not only because that is morally wrong and is also getting on their level, but also because you risk being reported yourself if you try to harass back.

Necrelios · January 2016

The most effective thing, is to just AFK for about 15 minutes. Go make a snack and let them get it out of their system. By the time you come back to your AFK'ing character, they will have succumbed to boredom and moved on.

Leon119 · January 2016

Unless that person can track your character you could just ignore him so u dont see him in chat and just port somewhere else. Zones are big enough to quest on the opposite end and not meet him. Or just move to the next zone. People like that always exist though so find your own way to deal with it.
Personally the only thing someone can do that will actually annoy me is be a streaking sorc in pvp. Those guys are just a pain =_=
The rest are just filtered out

MercyKilling · January 2016

Ackwalan wrote: »

Do not, under any circumstance, interact with a troll. All you can do is report them and put them on ignore. Do not tell them you are ignoring them or reporting them, do not talk about them in zone chat, you just have to completely ignore them. Even the slightest interaction with them will cause them to double their effort to get attention. Report, ignore and move on.

Seriously. Do not even acknowledge they exist. It's the worst possible thing you can do to them. Deny them the one thing they're after. Attention. They'll go away eventually. They always do.

Volkodav wrote: »

KramUzibra wrote: »

Korah_Eaglecry wrote: »

Abeille wrote: »

I think that's all you can do, really. Report and move on.

Taking by all the posts I see on reddit of people annoyed because they were banned just for "fooling around", I imagine that reporting works.

Seems to be the new trend among younger people now a days. Its not Harrassment or Stealing or Assault. Its Pranks and Fooling Around. They didnt mean anything by it so they should get a pass.

Exactly! Don't be weak. Just block, report and ignore. It's life! People will talk ***, deal with it. If your an adult you should already be mature enough to know this.

If those rude young ones should get a pass ingame,why shouldnt it be the same for them here in the forums? Oh,absolutely!
Let them have their fun.Teach them its cool to attack and harrass someone.Suuuure,..why not. We give them everything else,why not a free pass on kindness,manners,and good behavior.

Because it's not our responsibility nor duty to dish out discipline in Zenimax's game. It's THEIR yard we're playing in, and THEIR rules to enforce or ignore.

istateres · January 2016

Acrolas wrote: »

We need an unlimited ignore list with at least a few quarterly Phase Out Player allowances for the real *** out there.

Because you shouldn't have to play an old Argonian woman to get people to leave you alone.

As someone who does play one, I can assure you this works. Not that anyone should play one for that reason, but because Argonian's are awesome.

istateres · January 2016

N0TPLAYER2 wrote: »

How about harassing back. Kids these days man..

No one cares and no one will help you. You're letting the troll win. This is not the pc real world.

Deal. With. It.

OP - this (above) is not a solution and IS the problem. What can you do??

A) Text ignore them (I know it's only half the battle)

Report them, you did; good for you
C) Push ZOS to add a VISUAL IGNORE

This has been discussed in other threads related to harassment. What's needed to self police is a Visual Ignore. This is TOTALLY possible with the current game and already occurs in select situations (your character does things that no one else sees, REALLY). You would not see the person's character, their spells, etc. This would also benefit RPs who's activities are sometimes 'hazed' by trolls. It would also work in banks and crafting station where some tend to spam stuff.

RDMyers65b14_ESO · January 2016

1) I see Troll doing trolling.
2) I ignore Troll.
3) Guess who won't be able to join the PVP as they are on ignore? That's right.. Troll misses out.

True story. Happened yesterday.

revonine · January 2016

I recall FFXIV had an in-game way of dealing with griefing like this. You could "block" the player. Afterwards you could not ever see each others characters ingame again, he can't send you ingame /tells and the duty finder would never pair you up for dungeons.

Sausage · January 2016

It isnt going to stop until Government takes action against it, as far I know some people have been jailed/fined/warned about something they did on social media like Facebook already. Ultimately Governments wants to control everything, future doesnt look bright if asked from me, maybe some people find a heaven in South America or Asia.

SlayerTheDragon · January 2016

Next time just tell the perv that you are in fact a man in real life. Problem solved.

Pendrillion · January 2016

[snip]

As a little update... I checked how my own tickets were handled. I sent in some about harrassment in late december and they were both resolved and I had a message from a Community manager...

Moderator Note: Edited for removed content

magnusthorek · January 2016

It's sad to see people still acting like this nowadays... I had an issue like this back on BETA where someone was harassing me just because my character was female, which I didn't do for personal preference but because male characters are ugly and I had in mind something like Skyrim's passive bonus "Agent of Dibella" (deal more damage against opponent of opposite gender)

If I was you I would report it through a manual ticket. So far, things I reported in-game never got fixed and are still pending on my account. But one issue manually reported, was solved fairly quickly

Sausage · January 2016

If you google stuff, you will find tons of stuff about people being jailed, fined, even something as simple as what they said on social media. I think it comes to Sony, Microsoft, and Valve if they give a damn or no.

eventide03b14a_ESO · January 2016

I would really like to know why ZOS has virtually no in game support. In EQ and EQ2 you would get a prompt response when filing a complaint in game. They would even show up in game with their avatars and take care of problems. That's the sort of level of in game support we should be expecting from a subscription MMO and certainly not what the OP is describing.

Oldmanlawlor · January 2016

Unfortunately, Nothing will be done by Zenimax (from my experience).

However, if you're on Xbox and report the problem to them something will be done. Xbox don't tolerate this stuff at all, people who regularly harass loose all ability to communicate over Xbox live.

(Funny story, playing destiny one day and some random ripped the heavy on his own and a friend o mine called him a c*nt, and the following day my friend had a 48 hour communication ban over Xbox live)

But sexist, racist and homophobic discrimination can result in permabans.

istateres · January 2016

eventide03b14a_ESO wrote: »

I would really like to know why ZOS has virtually no in game support. In EQ and EQ2 you would get a prompt response when filing a complaint in game. They would even show up in game with their avatars and take care of problems. That's the sort of level of in game support we should be expecting from a subscription MMO and certainly not what the OP is describing.

ESO isn't a subscription MMO, it's BTP. Second, I don't want ESO spending resources policing except in the most serious cases. Instead give us the tools to manage this ourselves. Trolls are NOT going away, but if we could visually ignore them (via software), we will win. Trolling becomes no fun. No one sees them, no one hears them, no one calls the 'cops'. They get NO attention for their actions. That's a WIN.

Zerok · January 2016

I did not read the 5 pages of this thread, so this might have been answered by someone else.

To OP, this player has broken the section 8 of the terms of service (the rules of conduct):

(...)
You agree not to use any Service to:

Take any action or upload, post, transmit, promote, or distribute any illegal content, including, but not limited to, User Generated Content;

Take any action or upload, post, transmit, promote, or distribute any content that infringes or violates any third party rights;

Engage in, take any action associated with, or participate in any type of child solicitation, grooming behavior, pedophilia, or predatory behavior in any form;

Harass, stalk, threaten, embarrass, spam or do anything else to another user of any Services that is unwanted, such as repeatedly sending unwanted messages or making personal attacks or statements about race, sexual orientation, religion, heritage, etc.;

Take any action or upload, post, transmit, distribute, or communicate Your or any person's real-world personal information;

Impersonate any person or entity, including, but not limited to, ZeniMax, ZeniMax's partners' or affiliates' employees, or falsely state or otherwise misrepresent Your affiliation with a person or entity;

Take any action, organize, transmit any content, effectuate or participate in any activity, group, or guild that is harmful, tortuous, abusive, hateful (including "hate speech"), racially, ethnically, religiously or otherwise offensive, obscene, threatening, bullying, vulgar, sexually explicit, defamatory, libelous, infringing, invasive of personal privacy or publicity rights, encourages conduct that would violate a law or is, in a reasonable person's view, objectionable and/or deemed to be in the sole discretion of ZeniMax inappropriate;

Promote, upload, transmit, encourage or take part in any activity involving hacking, cracking, phishing, taking advantage of exploits or cheats and/or distribution of counterfeit software and/or Virtual Currency or virtual items. In an effort to continuously improve the Services, You and other players discovering exploits, cheats, cracks or other inconsistencies are required to report them to ZeniMax;

Take any action or upload, post, transmit, promote, or distribute any content that may contain a Trojan horse, virus, worm, spyware, time bombs, cancelbots, corrupted data or other computer programs that You do not own or have permission to freely distribute that may damage, interfere with, intercept, expropriate or disrupt the Services, including, but not limited to, any Game(s), personal information, or confidential or proprietary information;

Engage in disruptive behavior in chat areas, game areas, forums, or any other area or aspect of the Services. Examples of disruptive behavior include, but is not limited to, conduct which interferes with the normal flow of gameplay or dialogue within a Service, vulgar language, abusiveness, hitting the return key repeatedly or inputting large images so the screen goes by too fast to read, use of excessive shouting [i.e., all text in capitals] in an attempt to disturb other users, "spamming" or flooding [i.e., posting repetitive text], commercial postings, solicitations and advertisements, posting advertising or promotional messaging, chain letters, pyramid schemes, or other commercial activities;

Attempt to get a password, Account information, or other private information from anyone else. As a reminder, ZeniMax employees will never ask You to reveal Your password.
(...)
If You encounter another user who is violating a code of conduct, please report this activity to ZeniMax by contacting ZeniMax Customer Service at support.bethsoft.com. If You are in-Game, You can report an issue using an in-Game help feature where applicable or You may contact Customer Service directly at help@zenimax.com.

Most likely, if this is his first offence, he will receive a warning. If he's been warned before, he may get banned for good.

Elsonso · January 2016

istateres wrote: »

ESO isn't a subscription MMO, it's BTP. Second, I don't want ESO spending resources policing except in the most serious cases. Instead give us the tools to manage this ourselves. Trolls are NOT going away, but if we could visually ignore them (via software), we will win. Trolling becomes no fun. No one sees them, no one hears them, no one calls the 'cops'. They get NO attention for their actions. That's a WIN.

They had the capability in the game to have a direct real-time chat with support while in the game. I am not even sure if that is still in the client, since most interactions with staff in the game now happens in whispers. I can imagine that with 6 servers full of people that speak different languages that this would require a sizable staff. It is not something I would expect outside of a subscription game. It is far more cost effective to have a ticket system with an email exchange over the next several days.

One thing that I would like them to implement is a filter that would visually remove players that are /ignored. The only way that I can see this working in an intuitive manner would be to filter them at the server, and that would just add to the server processing overhead trying to sort out all the people who hate each other.

Of course, this could only work in PVE since Cyrodiil depends on being able to see people, even people you hate.

(The reason it does not work client side is "ghosts". You would not be able to see the ignored player, but they would be taking resources, opening chests, killing monsters. You would see what they are doing, but not see who was doing it. Ghosts.)

Hopefully the Group Finder takes this stuff into account, though.

Eiagra · January 2016

While it's very clear that, in this case, the following is not relevant... there is one instance of "they're killing all my quest mobs" that should be taken into consideration before reporting them as a troll.

--> Make sure they are not trying to complete one of the Hunter achievements.

I say this because there are some areas where certain mobs (like elemental Atronachs) spawn more reliably than in others, and some of these areas are shared with quests. Unfortunately, there is nowhere else for these people to go if they are trying to finish off an achievement (usually to get the associated armor dye). Higher levels will go to lower level areas for this, as they can grind one- or two-hit kills quickly to get the blasted thing over with.

If that's what they're doing, see if they'll be understanding and either help you complete the quest by partying up, or if they can ease off for a short bit so you can finish the quests. If they're clearly just doing this to be a troll (as you have suggested with your instance) then there isn't much you can do except what others have suggested: Inform, report, ignore, leave for a short time (do inventory management perhaps), then come back and hope they're gone.