Problem: Many people can use the votekick system to grief other players for just playing the game. Most of the time it could happen in recently opened Gamma dungeons, where the most of gatekeeping and overall toxicity resides.
Quick Info to All the Gatekeepers and who doesn’t feel like to run a dungeon in RDF (!) with not enough sweaty/tryhard people:
There is a tool for forming your own pumper/gigachad groups in the group finder menu, this tool is not much of a difference you used to in retail for M+, and then after you formed a group, just que up in RDF for a dungeon port.
The reasons why I see the punishment from being kicked from a group a problem and should be removed:
As mentioned above elitists can just make use of the premade group finder tool to find the people they need for a pumper dungeon run, and then still be able to que up in RDF to get to dungeon fast. Most of elitists also have a guild where they can try to gather groups for a dungeons. The tool for premade groups is quite the same as for M+ in retail, here you have even the luxury of getting RDF dungeon port after forming the group.
RDF was not designed for min/maxers, elitists only - it is RANDOM, you should acknowledge that you might take a risk of getting not the pumper group or even get some ppl who wanna just grief and “hold your group hostage”.
3.When you queuing in RDF you always have a risk of getting kicked just because you wanted to play a game and the group you ended up were elitists who just moused over their merely 5k GS and booted you, although Blizz set the base requirement for queuing into Gammas as 210ilvl, which is quite lower than 5k GS. Basically you should have a right to go into gamma dungeons or whatever dungeons if blizzard lets you in and you are not a complete jerk and want to try out the dungeon.
The time loss for the group which was “held hostage” even by a tank, most of the times should be less than 30 minutes till they find another tank. Dps can be found in a seconds. So this should not be a problem for a group to just move on with new guy.
Regardless how much other groups the said person tried to grief by just sitting at start and making other ppl to votekick him the average time to kick and find another guy and move on is quite a little compared to the time you need to wait with deserter debuff. And you can try to report a griefer.
This one I find one of the most important to me: don’t let players to wield the punishment hammer, they can just abuse it and ruin the other’s day for just their own fun. There is no need to let everyone to make use of such punishments, because it can be easily abused (sometimes ppl will not read your kick message and press yes) The people helding group hostage is the problem but it is more about common sense and any punishments for such behaviour should be only made by blizzard (e.g. reports), normally people if witness such behaviour can just votekick the trouble guy and move on. If the said guy will continue grief other groups he will likely be repeatedly kicked and will mostly not be able to progress. And once again it requires a little time for a group to find a replacement.
Queuing in RDF is bound with risk to get Deserter debuff for just getting randomly assigned to group of 6k gs gigachads who doesn’t want even see you in the dungeon with them. And there are still many other groups which are consisting from random 4k-5k gs geared ppl, but you can’t que up again for entire 30 min because you was “lucky” to get into group of elitists instead of some random group.
This is for those who think that 1 person griefing the entire group is worse than the group of random ppl kicking 1 person and issuing the 30 min punishment for just trying to play the game. When even only 1 elitist was in group who don’t want you there, he can initiate votekick, and most of the time other random 3 people will just press yes to get rid of that annoying pop up window without even reading the kick message. So basically it can be enough of 1 person in the group to initiate and pass the votekick because other ppl will just agree blindly.
Gamma dungeons can be run with groups of not very high geared ppl, even 210 ilvl full group should be able to pull off if they wish, there are also buffs to make the dungeons even easier.
The final thought: this is RDF, it has the word Random in it, you taking the risk of getting not very effective group or some “griefers” who want to hold your group hostage, if you want smooth risk free experience form your group with the guild or in premade groups tool, and then queue up in RDF for dungeon port. Let the more casual and chill people just play the game, don’t make the GATE out of RDF, where you need to show your 5.5k GS permit to get into dungeon, which can be run even with 4.4k GS or even lower if your group knows what to do and not are complete bunch of jerks. But as we know we can’t stop people being people then Blizzard should just remove that deserter debuff for votekicks, it should still stay for leaving the group on your own, but only for such occurrence. And about reports, it is quite easier to report one guy who griefing groups than try to report the entire group especially after they booted you you need to try find their names.
Overall my wording can be a bit messy, but this is what I think about all of this being part of RDF, feel free to discuss this here.
I’m not entirely sure if this also applies for Wrath, but in Retail the Yes button has a cooldown of 5 seconds before it can be pressed so No is faster to click.
Lots of problems that covers each other.
If the party or one player is truly “elitist” as you claim to hold the party hostage, if the penalty is removed the first thing they will do is AFK in dungeon. If you can remove them, he will simply re-queue immediately again.
The 30 minute penalty is therefore a choice of several worst options at the time of introduction and since then there has been no good suggestion for a replacement system sadly enough.
It is best to do challenging content with players you can trust, your friends or guild members.
Edit: Using the votekick system for any reason is not deemed "griefing’. If you’ve been harassed with insults, you may report them for that though.
I was luckily not kicked once with votekick system yet, but I wanted to try to explain, why I see the current system quite a trouble for players wanting queuing dungeons and playing them. I am talking about Wrath, and as I saw one time, when some guy was being kicked from our group, I could press Yes straight away, I don’t remember to see any cool downs there, but will need to check that one.
In terms of what could be better: there are pretty much no ideal solutions to this problem, but maybe blizzard could implement the following system for deserter debuff - give the debuff depending on the average time you would need to find the player of certain role (dps, tank, heal). For example for dps debuff could have the lowest time, since they are so easy to replace and the tank should have more time of the debuff. But I guess it will be quite hard and resources consuming to implement.
And about jerk people who just want to hold the group hostage I don’t see much of a problem if they can reque straight away or not, because usually it takes so little time to votekick the troublemaker and find another one. And if that guy is continuously trying to abuse RDF in such way by just AFK in dungeon every time, players could report such players, I guess for such behaviour reports can be used as well. At least as I know about wrath, where you can votekick straight away without the requirement to either wait 15 min or kill 1st boss. Maybe you can implement the system where the guy gets debuff not after the first kick but if they got kicked like 3 times in a row.
And I also don’t understand why some elitists can just punish you with 30 minute debuff if you have e.g. 5.2k GS and not 5.7k GS. And once again if they don’t like to wait till the new tank or whatever role they kicked joins them, they can just use premade groups tool and find the sweaty/tryhardy people there to pump in dungeon, and then queue in RDF to get to the dungeon. Thank you for your response and understanding of my quite hard to understand post with all of that long read text and a bit weird wording.
Edit: I quite agree on the suggestion to do challenging content with friends or people you trust, but I think making the system where other people can just punish you with 30 minute deserter debuff is a bit too much. The suggestion to run the content with friends, guild, people you find via premade group tool could also apply to these “elitists” who doesn’t like to wait for a replacement guy after kicking the afker. RDF should remain the place where no guarantees or some advantages to either side given. But for now it looks more like there is more incentive to kick someone for any reason and you don’t get punished for that, but the guy who kicked get immediate 30 min debuff just because he did not met high standards of some sweaty /tryhard people in the group.
And just for comparison: OG Wrath system vs current RDF system introduced to WoTLK Classic, in OG wrath as I remember there were no deserter debuff for being kicked and if that system could be adjusted so that there were no 15 min cooldown on kick from start of the dungeon, the problem of having one guy AFKing in dungeon and then after being kicked trying to ruin another’s group experience is not that huge anymore because you can find a replacement in quite short amount of time. I don’t know what happened with community since then, if there were so many cries about groups held hostage, but I would rather choose the OG RDF system but without 15 minute cooldown on kick. I can wait for a tank or any other role after AFKer got kicked, it is not much a time usually, especially when we have crossrealm RDF. And I see this quite fair to me, because it is RDF, anything can happen. If you want smooth risk free experience you can try to form your own group, no problem.
Im terribly sorry Blizz but this system is absolutely broken… I just came home from a 14 hour long shift to log on to do the daily at least, and since i have limited time to play i only have 4.2k GS and i got insta kicked with the deserter bug, not to mention its 11:34 pm dead tired and forced to wait for 30 hour for the debuff to disappear, absolutely broken and super disheartened… Tastylag im your walking example…
Tbh rdf is just faster and if you get a very badly geared DPS a votekick and replacement can be done in under 20 seconds total, and will speed up the dungeon substantially
Most people in rdf are raiders doing their dailies so badly geared players stand out.
you do not have a right to other people’s time, and never will. If people you landed with decide they do not like you they will remove you, simple as.
Once again I personally did not have much of a problem to run gammas, and I could also go with a guild once someone forming, but I am talking about this system as a whole.
Firstly, about putting a bit of the effort before going to gammas:
Blizzard have put requirement of 210ilvl, blame them for such low requirement
If you want to find 5.5k+ sweaty ppl, feel free to form your own group or go with a guild.
If you try to do the same on some nooby 4.2k GS it will not work mostly, and no one will want to go with you, or it will take much more time to find people.
It is not necessarily about the effort if you know what to do in a dungeon but some elitists just decide to punish you for 30 minute because they did not like your GS. They should be free to kick you, but not issue the debuff.
It is matchmaking game, some people would not like to play with you and it is fully okay, but it should not make a hindrance for you to find another people where you could be suitable. (There are many groups around 4k-5kGS running gammas without problems and you could join there instead but you can’t after some elitists with 6kGS kicked you).
And hereby I would also suggest some kind of solution, which could not be the ideal at max, but at least something: Blizzard could implement option called “Report for abuse” for votekick system. It could be something like checkbox on that votekick popup window, where if all 4 ppl will click on it, then the votekick system should issue the deserter debuff. So it would be more fair, if you think the guy was trying to ruin your experience by AFKing or whatever and should be not able to run a dungeons you will report them like that, but if it just some random kick you can just press yes and don’t care.
But overall, I don’t think giving deserter while kicking ppl is something terrible. I understand you kinda lower the occurrence of clowns trying to ruin as many groups as possible. But:
Clowns can’t hold the group hostage for 15 min as it was in OG Wrath, you just votekick them at start and move on.
What is wrong with this “I want to punish ppl for 30 min” mentality, why you think it will be terrible without deserter on kick. I would like to know what are advantages of defending current system with issuing debuff upon kick. I am not talking you should not kick people you don’t like, I am talking only about this debuff thing you get after being kicked for whatever reason and not only because you could be griefer or something.
Thankfully they also implemented the ability to instantly vote kick instead of having to wait 5 mins like on retail, so we can fix that ourselves.
Generally it’s really blizzards fault for not implementing a higher requirement and not differentiating between spec appropriate PvE gear and the rest.
I have no issue with them removing the deserter debuff but kicking people who will obviously just drag the group down and are there with minimum gear, no enchants and no gems is healthy for the smooth flow of rdf groups.
I am totally fine with the people kicking you because they don’t like you, but I don’t agree with issuing the 30 min deserter debuff for just being “lucky” to get in a group of 6kGS people with full hc ICC gear and obviously they will not want to carry you, but getting the 30 minute debuff for such bad luck is quite harsh ngl. And I am talking about this thing only, feel free to kick everyone you don’t like, but don’t punish them with 30 minute debuff. It is RDF, there are also low geared ppl trying out dungeons, and you could theoretically get a group consisting of such but once again, you can’t after getting booted from elitist group, because of the debuff, not because they kicked you.
And you can not use this tool for finding People with minimum GS cause?
I only read from people with minimum / cheated GS who gets removed from the Dungeon. Never heard from High GS people they getting removed. So better you search the group or? If you do so you are save not getting removed.
Suggestion: many people grief others in dungeons and get rightfully votekicked. Deserter debuff was added 15 years ago because without it dungeons were unplayable, it should stay.
Okay, I totally agree with votekicking people who making hindrance to the groups, but the deserter debuff? Tell me some reasons why we should keep deserter debuff (30 minute one) for votekick?
For now I can add some reasons why I see this debuff could not make much a difference for a group facing griefer:
You instantly votekick them and move on
Griefer will not get to your group again, at least as I could read from the wiki for old OG Wrath tool without debuff on kick
If you face griefers in every group you get in, probably you just out of luck, and once again finding replacement takes a little time.
As for now you just telling you want to punish people who is griefing, but what if I tell you that not everyone you kick is necessarily AFKer who will not even move from the dungeon start because he doesn’t like Oculus for example.
For that matter I would rather implement a tool with votekick system which has 2 options on kick: just kick as it is for now and checkbox option for reporting the griefers. If all 4 people will agree that the guy was griefer and click that option while voting for kick then the guy should get a debuff, not because he was kicked, but because there was a reason he should get a punishment and not being able to play with other people for a while (e.g. griefing groups intentionally)
If you get kicked it is most of the time for a legit reason (most not all), there should be a deserter on the person getting kicked so they can not directly jump in another dungeon and grief others.
He actually trying to grief other ppl and sits there AFK or whatever to just not let the group to progress
He performing not that good for a speedrun
He is running his mouth on teammates
Out of all possible criterias I would tell the person doesn’t deserve to play with others if either he is in 4 or 6 category. Even category 5 doesn’t necessarily mean he will try to ruin everyone’s experience if he at least tries to pull his weight and do mechanics.
But you want to say, if I kick them (even if it is because of my and 3 other like minded people’s standards) then the person doesn’t deserve to play with other people at all => you telling that your standards are the everyone’s standards.
To be honest, if someone who I and 3 other teammates really didn’t like joined our group we’d definitely feel he did it just to grief us. I’d say number 3 counts.
Number 2 should count for alpha/beta/gamma content.