Do GMs really have no discretion?
No, not really. Given the fact that they canât really pick and choose when to follow it. More so when itâs something a lot of folks ticket about something.
6 Likes
I hope you got this reply from Vrakthris. Unfortunately Iâm not very good at quoting closed threads.
For clarification, your ticket wasnât autoclosed by a Game Master. We tend to receive a lot of tickets for issues that our staff are unable to assist with. So, during times of high volumes, like now, we have an automatic system that will send players submitting tickets under certain categories a response that is intended to provide some advice and direction to self-help options to better direct folks who might be in that category.
For those who still have an issue we ask them to reopen their ticket.
For one of your tickets, this may apply:
Didnât Receive Sinister Calling
Troubelshooting the achievement Sinister Calling.
6 Likes
Thatâs a tough position to be in where thereâs a clear, correct outcome. I would think that if they did have some discretion it could diffuse a lot of situations, like this, where people will just escalate. I have an open ticket, I will ask the GM that responds for clarification. Iâm curious.
Also there no gms here only way to get this relooked at is reopening. The ticketvif your dead setvon having it looked at.
3 Likes
There is a clear, correct outcome, and the OP has already received it. They have to loot the helm or get it through the treats. Just having it does not trigger the achievement.
Itâs been told above, and the OP (who is being blatantly obtuse and belligerent on SEVERAL fronts in here) refuses to accept it. That does not make it a GMâs issue to âsolveâ. The GMâs have to follow policy. And to answer this:
Yes. Break the rules at your job, and you will get fired. There are no exceptions for high-volume times or being short-staffed.
7 Likes
Melaesia, Iâm trying to find out what the rule is. I just came here from a different thread where you stated that GMs do, and can, deviate from policy. Now youâre saying they get fired if they do. My point is that itâs unclear, at least from what Iâm reading here, and from your contradictory posts. Posting incorrect information is looked down upon, from what Iâm seeing from other responses to other threads.
My job allows me discretion. Iâm not breaking the rules if I exercise it. I suspect the GMs also have such discretion.
Edit: Youâre actually not quite correct about the achievement. Itâs a different standard from retail to WoTLK classic. I made the same mistake. In WoTLK it doesnât read âLootedâ
No, I didnât say that GMâs âdeviate from policyâ. Iâm saying that GM"s follow policy, but there are also high-emotion situations (like Master Looter loot distribution) where players donât understand how complicated the policy can be. What a GM can or cannot do is determined by what the developers want.
When it comes to awarding achievements, they are not allowed unless given explicit instructions. Those rare circumstances donât apply when the player does not qualify for it.
There is no incorrect information from regulars, including myself.
I know exactly what the Wrath achievement says, and I donât disagree that it can be a bit confusing. Thatâs why they added the specific looting methods in retail, and I do wish they wouldâve added that to Wrath Classic.
But itâs also a different situation, as already discussed. In later Retail years, they added the helm to purchase and that does not trigger the achievement, which is why the text was added. To qualify for the achievement, you have always needed to loot it from the Horseman or find it in the trick or treat loot, even if the text of the achievement didnât explicitly say it at this point in time.
You also cannot have it in your inventory from pre-Achievement years. That worked for items you can no longer obtain, but when it comes to this piece of loot, you have to obtain it again during the holiday.
6 Likes
Itâs obtained. Considering that neither achievements nor achievement tracking existed this time last year, it doesnât register as being obtained. Something sitting in someoneâs bags from before isnât the same thing as obtaining now that such things are now being tracked.
6 Likes
Melaesia, this is what you said:
âAs you have been told many times by Blue posters, this is exceedingly rare, and this one time, loot rules were clearly stated beyond the dumb âMS>OSâ.â
If you are going to do that thing where you claim that you didnât literally say âdeviate from policyâ so therefore Iâm wrong about how I took your meaning, even though you admit that GMs at least on one date didnât follow policy, then OK! You did that trick to me yesterday and I saw you do something similar to someone else. Iâm not going to fall into the same trap with you today. You seem to take everything I say as being in bad faith, but Iâm genuinely curious. Iâm not trying to pick a fight with you. Truly. I will let you have the last word.
These are from our Blues that have posted in other threads about this. I already posted it once earlier in the thread but itâs been disregarded entirely by the OP (who funnily enough was the one Vrak was replying to in another thread where they were quite so sure of themselves and how they believe the GMs operate).
Vrak was clear on that:
As to achievements?
5 Likes
Great, thank you. Looks like they do have discretion to hand out loot and to award achievements, though it may be rare. Auril was right. Thank you for the answer.
Discretion, no. Are there specific instances where sometimes there is no other fix and they have been given permission to nudge something forward? Yes. They are not given that much free reign to pick and choose when and where to apply discretion - but there are some specific instances where they can manually grant achievements.
5 Likes
Yes, thatâs correct. Thatâs not âdeviating from policyâ. It means that the one specific situation that the poster mentioned, if completely accurate, means that a scam was found and they were able to determine who shouldâve been awarded the loot. I donât doubt their claim, because there are rare times when loot can be awarded.
However, in the full context of the thread, loot rules like âMS>OSâ or âroll for the lootâ arenât specific enough to meet that criteria. Thatâs not âdeviating from policyâ, itâs âplayers think the policy is one thing, but itâs actually much more complicated and there needs to be more to reach that standardâ.
If you want to continue to play âgotchaâ by taking things out of context and into different threads, do it with someone else.
I mean, yeah. Thatâs the overall point. When someone says âblackâ, donât read it as ânon-whiteâ. It means âblackâ. Sometimes I do make mistakes (for example, in your quoted part, I shouldâve said âloot rules were likely clearly statedâ), but donât take my words and try to apply a different meaning.
3 Likes
Ok, so no discretion, but at least we can agree that they can do what Auril wanted. Which is a little ironic now that there may be consequences to the way he responded, but thatâs on him. Weird route to get to the finish line.
No, they cannot. Auril wants to continue opening tickets until they find a GM âin a good moodâ or âwilling to helpâ. Thatâs not the case.
All GMâs have the same policies to follow. If they are allowed to manually grant an Achievement, itâs because the developers set a policy for them to grant it under specific qualifying criteria.
That is not âdiscretionâ to award it. Itâs a policy that they are allowed to award it. Does that make more sense?
8 Likes
Thatâs a very Nixonian approach, but ok. Best wishes to you!
No, we cannot, because they can still get the achievement by obtaining the item now. They do not need assistance from a GM because they have not met the criteria of the achievement.
I donât know why this too keeps getting glossed over but the achievement says to obtain the item. They have not obtained the item during this yearâs Hallowâs End. Nothing was being tracked last year when they got the item. Last yearâs does not count for just sitting in their bag.
5 Likes
The issue is that once there is full transparency on internal policies, there are players waiting in the wings to exploit them fully, often, and repeatedly. Because of that, there tends to be a lot of assumptions based on one ticket where the outcome was made public, leading many to think that is the way it is going to be for all tickets of a similar nature.
There is a level of complexity in the game, that generic answers are not possible. âCan a GM do X in Y situation?â is a question that will always yield a âit dependsâ answer, and not one that is always 100% transparent. Again, those who would game the system are the cause for the misunderstandings.
One can always ask in a ticket. But just because one finds a similar example where the outcome was beneficial, does not mean that will always be the case, or that policies do not change.
You asked about discretions GMâs have. It is not willy-nilly, by whim, or through rolling the dice. Discretion comes with consideration of many factors that go unseen to us players, and is often a result of weighing a careful balance of how such an action will impact the game.
In the distant past, Game Masters have actually broken the game by making decisions in a manner that implied they had wider discretion at that time. The posts are long gone. But in learning from such events, the process on what a GM will do is something that is heavily governed, and done with guidance through developer direction.
5 Likes
Well, so they do have discretion? Everyone else says they donât. The blue post says what it says. It happens. Itâs hazy, and unclear i get it.
I also get that the point of all this is to get me to stop showing to people that GMs can do things that arenât in the policy. I will. Goodbye.