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My approach to Player Behavior & Moderation threads

ModWuks·1/8/2016, 12:45:48 AM·17 votes·2,234 views

The Arbiter Program was implemented about two months ago, and since then, many of the Arbiters have been able to find a specific voice. This post is about explaining the voice that I choose to take in my replies and why I take that approach.

When the program first started, in my mind, a lot of the work that we'd be doing would be looking at chat logs and referencing resources to answer questions that other Summoners might have about the Player Behavior and Moderation. But as I worked with more Summoners, I realized that this sub-board is what you make of it. Whereas some people come for the smites and to re-affirm that a player was suspended justly, I decided to take another approach to suspension threads in particular.

When I see a suspension thread, I set a few goals:

  1. De-escalate the situation. The OP is probably hella upset that his account was suspended. Although (s)he may have deserved the suspension, I tend to put myself in their shoes and do my best to sympathize with their situation. How would I feel if my account were suspended? It's pretty easy to see them as just another name on the Boards, but I think everyone should be treated with respect and I do my best to do so.
  2. Clarify. If a player has a misaligned view of the Player Behavior systems, clarify those views with either personal experience or data/statistics/released information about the system.
  3. Look for opportunities to reform. If the OP has provided information about the circumstances in which (s)he was suspended, try to explain why (from what you can see) the suspension was justified. Furthermore, go beyond that and relate to them on a personal level or relate the example to a real-world situation to make their situation more understandable from a relative perspective.

Being able to humanize the people you interact with from behind the computer screen is huge in being able to retain positivity both on the Boards and in-game. Whether or not they want to accept your advice is irrelevant; what's important is that you've tried.

I strongly urge you guys to take a similar approach and see how it goes.

Stay true in victory and defeat! Wuks

Merry fucking christmas riot can i plz get a soft ELO reset?

Want to chat up an Arbiter? Stop by the Community Discord chat!

30 Comments

Transgressor1/8/2016, 2:46:03 AM2 votes

Question pretty plox:

This has ALWAYS mingled my mind; what is done for the cases that an arbiter is in a "fuck this post in particular" mood for whatever personal reason(a shitty day, a breakup, a headache or whatever), and brings down the deletion-hammer without fulfilling his/her role? We are only human, we're bound to make mistakes, to be weak and flawed in different ways. So how can it be made sure, that one's flawed modus operandi, doesn't ruin a NABoards(or any other region's Boards) member's experience?

To put it simply, how do you as arbiters, make sure everyone does their job the way they're supposed to? Because I know for a fact, were I to have the power to moderate, 70% of the people here would get their posts deleted, I'm that kind of an asshole :D

Samus721/8/2016, 4:54:58 AM2 votes

Badness, did you have a point other than to be a jerk posting that?

Samus721/8/2016, 1:28:40 AM2 votes

More chemistry homework upon ye?

As noble an approach as it is, it's very difficult to feel sorry for someone who was given two chat restrictions, then a fourteen day ban, and then comes to the forums upset that they were permanently banned. These are lengthy warnings. Two weeks of real time being unable to play the game. I cannot put myself in the person's shoes because they wouldn't fit! I know better than to do the things people who have been banned do to get themselves excised. I simply cannot relate to their inability to learn.

I'm right there with you on clarification.

I cannot make people reform. Many people who are banned don't understand why the actions that got them banned were bad things. The morality of right and wrong seems to be less of a thing nowadays. It's been my experience, and not just on Riot's forums, that showing or explaining to someone why throwing out racial slurs are very bad things doesn't resonate with people. And they usually just become hostile and insulting. If you tell someone that typing out certain words is wrong, they just shrug and say "No, it's not." Personally, if you don't have the common sense to know that insults and harassment is wrong, you don't need to be playing any kind of social game.

And believe it or not, banning people for bad behavior doesn't make a lot of folks realize their behavior was bad. They create another account and get banned all over again.

That would probably keep me from being an Arbiter. I cannot sympathize when someone breaks the rules.

Samus721/8/2016, 3:46:26 AM1 votes

My approach would be "common sense." Don't do bad things, bad things won't happen to you. In the past, this outlook has always labeled me "Mr. Negative." "You won't put yourself in the other person's place." Illogical. I don't need to pretend to be Bob to know that robbing a bank is a bad thing and you'll go to jail for it. Bob was wrong. He may have bought his family dinner for a month with the money he stole. But he still robbed a bank. To which people tell me "You just don't care." It makes me wonder if judgment is really something I'm good at.

I'd sign up for the Arbiters (where you do that anyway?) but I just have a feeling that after a few weeks, Riot would tell me to empathize more and quit being so "heavy handed." I am so used to that anymore.

TheBadness1/8/2016, 4:46:10 AM1 votes

funny how Riot went and made a troll a fucking arbiter.

Goes to show Riot's priorities and intentions.

Just another reason why Riot went and deleted my posts exposing Jubbinaut as a troll.

KuribohOP1/8/2016, 12:01:37 PM1 votes

If anyone could clarify my "MMR boosting" ban I would be impressed RIOT hasn't managed to in any of the support tickets I have submitted the only response they give is they consider the matter closed followed by closing the ticket without providing evidence that I have "MMR boosted" (I know none can exist but I guess they must have something they consider to be evidence) nor disputing the evidence I have provided that I have not "MMR boosted". I now also appear to suspended from the RIOT games support website for some reason.

De-escalate the situation. The OP is probably hella upset that his account was suspended.

I am not sure about upset but I am definitely extremely frustrated by what I consider to be an extremely poor customer service.

Samus721/8/2016, 1:55:16 AM1 votes

I will try, Captain.

Tract1/8/2016, 1:57:03 AM1 votes

I come here to try to help the people who post about punishments, whether they are complaining about supposed injustice or looking for help reforming. All in all, a pretty similar approach, although the most annoying situation is when someone repeatedly says that they "clearly arnt toxic, Riot is stupid, or their teammates where babes" while flaming the people who pointed out the toxicity in their posted logs. I always try and help the person...but its more annoying than usual. Keep the good approach up.