Vote to Kick is Poorly Suited for its Intended Purpose

The vote-to-kick system is in serious need of an overhaul.

It’s possible that sometimes it is used for its intended purpose, policing toxic behaviour in LFG.

However, I’ve only ever seen it used to punish people who are new to the game, dungeons or make simple mistakes. The leaver debuff just adds insult to injury to people who are kicked. I understand why it was implemented but a little more thinking should have been put into how it works than has been in its current state.

By keeping the system the way it is, just like the automated reporting system Blizzard is passively endorsing toxicity in the game. I don’t seriously think anyone at Blizzard wants people to be toxic, but that desire is not being reflected in the tools they give the players to use to moderate unwanted behaviour in the game.

There’s no punishment for abusing the vote to kick system and there’s no recourse for someone to contest being wrongfully kicked. This creates a massive power imbalance in the system. Understandably Blizzard having manpower dedicated to contesting a 30-minute debuff is asking a lot.

A better handoff solution needs to be put in place. It starts with there being more steps involved in voting to kick someone.

Firstly, the reason for kicking someone should be on a drop-down menu and the game should validate that you are in fact doing that reason that’s been selected it initiates a vote for other players to interact with.

  • If you’re being abusive in chat, it should check the chat log before it pushes the vote to other players.
  • If you’re AFK, it should check if your character hasn’t been in combat in the last 5-10mins then push the vote to other players.
  • If you disconnect from the game, there should be a 3-minute grace period before the vote is presented to other players.
  • If you disconnect more than once the grace period is reduced by half each time.
  • The players who vote should have to select the character’s name from a list
  • Should be asked to confirm two or three times not just accept once and move on.
  • If the vote fails because the condition is untrue the player who initiated the vote should get an automated warning.
  • If they get three warnings within a week for abusing the system, they lose access to the vote to kick system for a week or however long is suitable.

I’m sure there are experts in the industry who know better than me and have better solutions than the ones I’ve proposed. Hire them if you haven’t already and give them some resources to improve your moderation tools. As it stands its infuriating.

Thank you for reading my post.

12 Likes

No such thing.

Group votes you out you leave.

If you’re getting kicked often enough to come here and write all that out maybe you should look at yourself and ask why.

Only if someone that gets kicked three times in a week loses access to random grouping for a week.

Fair is fair.

PS you don’t have anything on your “valid” reasons list for them being a leech which just makes it even more clear you’re getting kicked because they don’t want to carry you.

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This. Anomalies and one-offs exist but generally speaking if a pattern forms there’s a reason.

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People have a real issue these days with accountability. It’s never them. It couldn’t be them.

If everywhere you go there’s a problem… you might be bringing the problem with you.

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Let’s just get 1 thing clear: Using blizzard’s definitions (IE: the only ones that matter), neither of these are a thing.

Well, LFD killed accountability by existing.

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It’s fine.

I honestly don’t understand how you people get kicked so often. Last time I was vote kicked was all the way back in Cata.

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How is one wrongfully kicked? Group wants them out, so they’re out. No one is obliged to play with you.

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Right. Because why would you want to have a discussion on the general discussion forum?

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Yup. We said it would when they first talked about it back in the before times.

These days we don’t even have servers anymore. Just character select lobbies and get yeeted into a shard. Want to raid? Queue up. Want to dungeon? Queue up. Annoy the entire raid and get kicked? Queue up and the game will find you new victims.

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I’ve only been kicked twice 2 months apart and on different toons. In fact, until this scenario in TWW I’d never been kicked before.

The first time I dc’d and reconnected within a minute and was kicked as I logged back into the game and people could see I was back. My friend who had signed up with me said the reason he was prompted with was AFK, I dc’d through no fault of my own. These things happen cause the internet is not flawless. I was given no grace whatsoever and a 30 minute penalty.

The second time was today I walked the wrong way and fell off a ledge in a Dire Maul, an easy place to fall off ledges or take a wrong path and was making my way back to the group and got kicked 30 seconds later.

On damage meters I was topping that because let’s face it it’s easy to do that in LFD people are mostly on autopilot, I was interrupting out of habit because I play M+ even though in TW or LFD it’s not necessary most of the time.

What should I have been accountable for?

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Based on your own admission, the groups already held you accountable for DCing and being a goof and falling off ledges making them wait.

Cry post, nothing more.

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The truth would be a start.

No way you went this karen over two justified kicks.

Anyone else notice that the ones crying about getting kicked are always topping the meters, didn’t do anything wrong, and it wasn’t their fault?

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Cheers, I think better tools would serve everyone equally. I don’t need to interact with LFD often but since I’ve done a bit more this season, I’ve noticed these tools are lacking and I’d like to see some improvement.

Thank you for your kind words!

It’s fine how it is, if any changes are needed the debuff needs to last longer because people still are abusing it by AFKing/Griefing in content just because they don’t like what the roulette gave them.

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Kick initiators and those that click “yes” to kick people need a penalty as well, a very mild one that gets worse over time if they continuously kick people just for laughs.

I propose that the number of kicks a person does is kept track of, is account wide and resets on Tuesday, Your first weekly kick is free, but after that, there is a 1% chance that if you initiate a vote kick or vote yes on one, you will be kicked as well, and if you do it again during same week it goes up to 2%, then 3% etc…

This will severely limit griefer kicking’s as it wont be long before their % becomes too high to bear for all the toons on their account, but not too terrible of a penalty to live with if a player does feel its necessary to kick a player. And it cant be forced on anyone because there is no penalty for clicking “no”.

His point is invalid though, notice his his drop down menu doesn’t include an option for “lazy player.” So let’s say a priest is using holy nova every 20 seconds you can’t kick them?

And that’s just one small thing, we could pick apart his post a dozen ways

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There’s already a cooldown to using the vote kick feature lol.

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That sounds horrible, I rarely kick people but if someone DCs on Wednesday and we get then someone else DCs on Thursday you’re telling me I have a 1% chance to get booted from the dungeon?

Should be a ramping penalty.

Get kicked enough and you can’t queue for a week.

It is. Kick enough and you can’t kick, but can still vote.

Get kicked enough and you can’t be kicked. <— if anything is unfair with VtK it’s that.

Exactly. Their “fix” is 100% tailored to someone just derping around while you earn them loot.

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I’m not sure why you’re so antagonistic towards me for asking for a better system. I’ve no reason to lie either. If my post sounds angry, it isn’t. I am feeling frustrated that for no good reason and twice the 30-minute penalty has wasted my time while I was trying to accomplish something because other people didn’t have patience.

I don’t interact with most people in this game as a rule, especially if they’re not people in my guild or people I know IRL.

And when I do interact with people I do so with respect, if I sign up for a dungeon, I complete it, I don’t cause trouble, if someone is new, I try offer them advice or tips.

In both these instances I honestly did exactly what I said. Anyway, I’ve said what I’ve said, and I thank you for your input. Good day!

EDIT: Missed a word “no”

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