I’ve been posting a recruitment message for a GDKP-focused guild/raiding team in /LookingForGroup chat and have received a Behavior Warning. Apparently several people have reported me for posting this.
I’m curious as to whether /LookingForGroup is the appropriate channel for this sort of posting, whether there is a more appropriate place, and/or whether actions may (or will) be taken on my account.
For reference, here is the post:
<Diamond GDKP> Naxx 25 GDKP Starting Saturday October 15th at 11am. Looking for more Core and Guests welcome! Join our discord for info & sign ups: dsc.gg/DiamondGDKP
I’m on Skyfury, which was a Fresh start realm for Wotlk Classic, if that makes a difference.
The message was likely marked as spam by your fellow players. The message itself is a automated warning that reports were placed, but if no rules were violated then nothing will happen. There’s no set rule on how often you can send your message and not have it reported either.
LFG is for forming groups to run things in the right then and there. It is not meant for advertising, be it guild adverts or GDKP or anything else. People have absolutely been getting silenced or even suspended for using the channel for anything but forming groups because it was never meant to be a global Trade chat.
Nope, just in retail at current. And really, it should only be advertised in Trade chat, because it is recruiting as well as advertising the service. Any other channel (LFG, Defense, General) can and will be rightfully reported. Until a Trade Services channel goes up on classic, Trade chat is the only place it should be posted.
This is interesting, and not something that is obvious to me. I’m curious how I’d verify this, or if that’s even possible?
For example, what I’m posting is looking for more people for a Saturday raiding group.
So what you’re saying is guild or raid recruitment should be posted in trade chat?
Now, I’m not disagreeing, so please don’t take my question the wrong way; I’m curious as to how I might verify this? Is there something that suggest recruiting for a raid group or guild for an activity that is not happening right that moment should not happen in /LookingForGroup and further that it should happen in /Trade chat?
Any guidance would be appreciated, as I took the advice above:
And have since received a temporary chat and mail suspension.
You’re fine! Tone is hard to convey through text, I’ve gotten hit with people assuming that I’m being a mean jerk because I don’t often fluff my statements. Linking up the support article re: advertising and some other relevant posts. I will point out too, this is the most moderated forum there is. So anyone who is pulling some random rule or policy out of thin air won’t last too long. If a SFA doesn’t sweep in to chastise (or just delete) the falsehood, you can be sure the regulars will speak up in how they are misguided in their thoughts. So if you see people being quoted or saying how X is supposed to, it is most often times the truth. We’ve got some regulars around here who know the policies pretty thoroughly and we’re happy to try and help folks avoid getting in trouble by sharing this knowledge.
I’ve seen several threads over the past year or so alone with people who have been sanctioned for using LFG specifically incorrectly, and also for just spamming any and all channel for guild adverts, sales, services and the whole spectrum. And too, just because you see other folks misusing channels, doesn’t mean they’re being allowed to while others aren’t. Those who are still misusing them are either unknowing of the rules or their reports are still in investigation and they just haven’t been hit with sanctions yet.
This person was recently given official “warning” dialog due to using LFG to advertise for their guild formation. They stopped before being sanctioned, heeding the warnings and coming here to try and figure out how and why they were likely being warned.
This instance, the OP had been getting hit with warnings as well, but you’ll see they make mention of “not LFG anymore, as I was told that was not allowed a bit ago” that Vrak even used in his quote to respond. If it were untrue, he would have squashed it, not used it in his reference point:
This is just a short three-post thread, but it has the relevant question asked, answered and rubber-stamped by an SFA.
For guild and raid teams, trade and general are okay. But GDKP guilds are a bit of a grey area since you’re essentially looking or even hiring (in a sense) to assist in the sale of runs and/or services. It’s not the typical guild recruitment, it would veer more into the sales aspect (me note - if any of our SFAs or folks want to correct me on this, by all means!). I personally would err on the side of caution and keep it in trade. If you really want to try your luck with general channel, that does open you open for being reported for sales or even spam for going across multiple channels.
If you’re trying to fill raid spots that you are NOT selling, you can use LFG. If you’re trying to hock the last few raid spots for participation in a GDKP run, you keep it to trade.
This is an interesting point, and I definitely understand both that the idea of GDKP triggers some people and that while we are recruiting for core members as well as guests, it could be seen as selling a service.
Anyway, thanks a lot for taking the time to reply and provide links for precedence. I guess at this point I just eat the chat and mail suspension and avoid LookingForGroup for specifically filling in my raid team, instead favoring trade chat going forward.
You are most welcome. I’m sorry you’re in time out, but hopefully it will pass quickly enough for you and you’ll be able to dive back in. All the best to you!
For actual guild recruitment - so id recommend tweaking your macro message, you can use either general chat or trade chat (just try not to double spam both continuously). LFG chat is purely for on the moment needing to fill bodies in a run messages.
One other thing to watch out for, even when posting in Trade. Make sure the character posting the message is an active participant in that raid (on that toon) or it can be reported as well. Blizzard doesn’t allow advertising from your alts unless those alts are actually participating in the raid. I’ve seen people mention reporting GDKP adverts because the posting toon was a level 1 bank alt. And the rules do forbid that.
This is interesting. I’ve been posting on a character that is participating in the raid, but definitely helpful.
Is there any actual documentation on this? I mean the posts provided above did point to:
Though, this seems to be specifically about in-game services.
“Individuals and guilds selling boost or assistance in raiding, dungeon, or PvP activities for gold is allowed but can only be advertised in-game through the Trade Services chat channel.”
I suppose that there are situations where GDKP can be used as such, i.e. a pure-buyer on a fresh max-level character who is not participating in the raid. However, that’s not who our group is using this loot distribution system, nor (afaik) how it works for most groups.
Well, in any case it seems pointless to raise that as an issue here, since I’ve been chat/mail suspended (which also prevents using group finder or forming groups with people outside of my friend’s list or guild) due to recruiting for a specific raid date and team in /LookingForGroup and while I’m not sure how long this suspension lasts, it’s been a couple of days since, and I suspect it will be a few more before my appeal is even reviewed.
Which I suppose is a handy refence. It happens to be in post talking about boosting/RMT though, which doesn’t necessarily answer its relevance towards guild/raid recruitment.
It would also be nice to have some reference to the EULA or some other such official source for referencing rules.
Also, so it’s not like I’m trying to instigate anything over in the other thread, I do want to thank you and appreciate you for being receptive and wanting to understand. I meant to say this at one point here, but especially in light of the other - yeah. The civilized discourse and discussion had here as far preferable even with the circumstances that brought you here.
Thanks! You’ve provided a fair bit of useful information. I’m somewhat hopeful that I’ve learned something here:
Guild/raid recruitment messages do not belong in /LookingForGroup, but /Trade chat is OK. Maybe the mention of GDKP affects this.
While I am a little frustrated that the rules aren’t as clear as I’d like, I suppose I can understand that when it comes to something like GDKP, that further complicates things, and even though a chat/mail suspension also prevents me from being able to use any chat channels or tools for group forming outside of my friend’s list/guild (which isn’t great), I’m at least happy that I’m able to login and group with my guildies!
And I think that is completely fair and understandable in regards to how they have the rules laid out. It would make it easier for people to understand having things laid out just so, but then on the flip side of it there would always be those who would do their absolute utmost to skirt just shy of breaking a rule to get around something they didn’t like. There just isn’t a pure and perfect way to go about it.
Lastly, I know I came down on opinions a few moments ago - but they do have their place. Or at least your suggestions and feedback do. If you really would like to offer your thoughts and suggestions where the proper staff can see it - you’ve got two options. If you’re not afraid of the General forums, you can absolutely make a post for it in either the Classic GD or the Wrath Classic GD, so long as it’s constructive and you make no mention of your sanction. Those technically aren’t supposed to be discussed anywhere, but we do get some leeway here on CS for educational purposes.
The safer of the two options though is to use the in-game suggestions and feedback interface. That would be a private post between you and the staff directly and would avoid any thread getting locked down or 404’d if/when it went off the rails.
Linking up the support article re: advertising and some other relevant posts. I will point out too, this is the most moderated forum there is. So anyone who is pulling some random rule or policy out of thin air won’t last too long. If a SFA doesn’t sweep in to chastise (or just delete) the falsehood, you can be sure the regulars will speak up in how they are misguided in their thoughts. So if you see people being quoted or saying how X is supposed to, it is most often times the truth. We’ve got some regulars around here who know the policies pretty thoroughly and we’re happy to try and help folks avoid getting in trouble by sharing this knowledge.
