A year of dealing with support

HoopBeast420··2 votes·970 views

So, I've been having a back and forth with the Player Behavior support team for nearly a year now in regards to a perma banned account. This ban was made in error due to the lack of information that they have failed to provide in reform cards, such as muting all players at the start of a game to avoid being goaded into negative responses. During the time of the report system overhaul, which is when this started taking place, there was once an option to report someone for refusing to communicate. I tried telling them that if I had known that the option was valid, I feel as if the account in question would never have been banned, but they refused to listen and would respond with automated messages telling me they couldn't do anything more. I'm dead certain this has happened to other players, and I feel that the support staff isn't taking this as seriously as they're supposed to. I've had to make an entirely new account in an attempt to put forward my facts again in hopes that they will actually be read instead of being auto replied with spam. Why would a company refuse to give out all possible options for a successful reform and then refuse to act upon valid points when its brought to their attention? The content of abuse, I feel, doesn't even matter when the problem starts at the reform cards in the first place. All of it could have been prevented had Riot made clear that it was alright to mute players. Recently I've been talking with Hana, who has even contradicted herself (himself?), saying that muting players is more or less toxic. Which rule are people supposed to even follow? If I mute people I'm considered toxic, if I keep them un-muted I'm considered toxic by responding to people picking on me. Why isn't any of this information on player reform cards or even on the website? I've been fighting to get some answers to these questions for a YEAR now, and it's clear that support doesn't have the answers or just doesn't care enough to reverse a ban that was made in error. I believe they are hurting their community by not being clear enough in regards to their player reform cards and what options people can take to reform successfully. I also believe that when people bring up these points to Support they are completely ignored and resort to automated messages. I'd expect a company of this size to take its customers more seriously than they have been with me, its heartbreaking to see them treat customers so coldly even after 5 years of playing.

13 Comments

Moneymonster72 votes

Two things.

First, I don't mean to be rude, but isn't muting everyone and avoiding being baited into negative responses a given if you don't want to be banned? I don't get it. No one should have to tell you not to be toxic, rude, racist, etc. (anything negative, basically)

Second, I think every single player ever who gets banned complains that they've been playing for x years. That's great that you've been playing that long, but that just means you've had that long to get accustomed to the rules of the game and should have an even easier time avoiding bans.

HoopBeast4201 votes

This was during a time where you could report people for refusing to communicate, and after my time talking to support I've learned that the feature was never acted upon. Never was it mentioned in player reform cards that you could mute players without repercussion, so at the time, I believed that muting everyone wasn't a valid option.

Moneymonster71 votes

Fair enough. But you still have the option of ignoring comments that are clearly attempts to piss you off. I've had plenty of those situations happen to me too. And I will admit I definitely have done a terrible job handling those situations sometimes. I'm probably lucky to have not received a ban or anything thus far. But one of the biggest parts of this game is mentality, and the better your ability to avoid tilt, the better you'll play.

HoopBeast4201 votes

Its super hard to ignore, sometimes, an entire team of people picking on you. Even going to the point of requesting that the enemy team mass report me or encouraging them to stack on the abuse. I understand that this is a competitive game and such, but at the time I really felt the need to defend myself. Sometimes the game would end and I would start another and get the same people, the steady and strong stream of abuse was there, and it gets really hard to hold your tongue. I'm completely certain that if the mute function were clarified ahead of time, and they included such information in reform cards, it would have saved me a lot of grief and the people abusing me as well. I'm not even sure that their support staff looks into games with full context, they just make decisions with the chat logs the system feeds to them, which is kind of horrible.

MUSHROOM MIDGET2 votes

Never give in, never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in

Troll Armada2 votes

THAT'S THE SPIRIT!!!

...though, as you get older and possibly busier, you might want to learn to choose your battles.

Outdated2 votes

Honestly I don't really understand how anyone gets banned in this game other than luck.

A couple times I've witnessed the same account intentionally feed and expletive spam on multiple occasions; then stalked their match history for a while to find no interruption.

I think the entire behavior punishment concept in a random matched online game is fairly pointless. It hasn't made anyone nicer. And generally those that do intentionally grief their team game the system to evade punishment. Intentional feeders say, "I'm really trying guys. I'm just having a bad game" to look nice for the chat log (I'm not sure whether or not tribunal is still a thing). AFK's sporadically move around to evade a time-out. Sometimes players griefing in unique ways avoid chat all-together to avoid a record of events.

All-in-all; I do not believe the nanny efforts that put the toxic label into use has really helped the state of the community. If anything the report option is a tool of spite more often than not. On a related note the whole, "toxicity loses games" concept that riot has showcased is, I'm calling it, complete garbage. If you want to flaunt statistics as if they have merit - you need to publish your data. I have yet to see any of the riot metadata about toxicity subject to review and without peer review and experimentation the idea that being positive will turn into more wins is nothing more than out-of-context, correlative, propaganda.

You can find any number of personalities in sports, both players and coaches with "toxic" attitudes that had plenty of success. http://www.usatoday.com/story/gameon/2013/03/20/10-most-hated-coaches-in-college-basketball/2002111/ http://thequad.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/03/abusive-coaches-a-sad-history/?_r=0 Does it mean anything? No more or less than the claims related to LoL behavior.

We'd be better off if the standard recommendation to avoid negative interractions was "Utilize the mute function, language filter, and hide enemy team chat for those so offended" and Riot stayed out of policing anything outside of actual gameplay.

HoopBeast4201 votes

I really hope a Red could address this and the other issues other people have in this thread. I'm seeing valid questions and issues that should be commented on in order to better the community.

KORGtuners1 votes

So I too have done some interactions with support.

I asked for specific instances of my inappropriate behavior.

I got vague rules with no direct quotes. (demeaning language)

I was then told that my "suspension" was warranted. However, I was not "suspended", I was "banned".

So my opinion.... they do read at least partial parts of the logs. Just enough to make sure they aren't banning completely innocent people. If they find even one thing that can be considered toxic, you are banned. Basically, they are 100% non compassionate. Just showing up for work without putting their heart into it.

HoopBeast4201 votes

I encourage everyone to share some of their unjust dealings with Player Behavior Support here. Hopefully, we can get a Red in here to clarify some points and maybe even act on fixing some of the issues we have about player reform cards or dealing with the support team itself.

Astôlfo1 votes

You seem to think you have a valid complaint. I fail to see any.

HoopBeast4201 votes

Having an option to report players for refusing to communicate when it was never enforced. Failing to make aware that muting everyone is not a bannable or punishable offense. Having support tell me that muting everyone is more or less considered toxic to the community. Generally being vague about their rules and what you can do to reform successfully. Tried to make this as concise as I could so you don't have to read the book I wrote.

HoopBeast4201 votes

What are some suggestions you guys would like to give Riot and Support in order to improve how they go about dealing with account punishments and appeals? Hopefully some of the suggestions you write will be taken to heart so that they can improve their service and the community.

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