griefer
Latest
World of Warcraft hit by DDoS attack on expansion launch day
There's something about a major launch that brings out all of the cyber griefers, and Warlords of Draenor's launch day is no different. Blizzard confirmed this evening that the game was hit by direct denial of service (DDoS) attacks that have been causing issues, and the studio is taking steps to combat it, including temporarily lowering the maximum populations on servers: We're excited to finally launch Warlords of Draenor and explore this new world with you, but we know that the experience has been less than ideal as we approach our first full day of launch. Europe was our first region to launch, and we encountered a few issues due to the sheer number of players attempting to enter Draenor from a single location. We worked to add multiple new ways to access Draenor, and this helped ease some of the initial rush into the new expansion as players were able to access it from their capital cities, as well as from the shrines in Pandaria. While that solution helped a ton for our North American launch, we ran into a few other issues, including a distributed denial of service attack, that resulted in increased latency. Later this evening, Bashiok updated players on the ongoing server issues as they unfolded over US prime time: We're continuing to work toward greater realm stability and address the service issues impacting latency. Our current biggest hurdle is the concentration of players in specific areas and zones, and an unexpected effect of that concentration on the realm stability. We're continuing to maintain a lowered realm population cap to help with the stability, which is resulting in increased queue times. We're seeing some increase in individual zones drop which are causing localized player disconnections as we get into primetime in the Americas, and if someone is disconnected they will quite likely run into a queue to log back in. Work is progressing on improving realm stability through fixes targeting individual in-game issues, as well as on the backend game and network services.
CCP: Real-life harassment 'morally reprehensible,' in-game villainy integral to EVE
EVE Online developer CCP has released an official statement regarding real-life harassment in the wake of the sandbox title's latest brouhaha. CCP Falcon says that the company, in collaboration with the player-powered Council of Stellar Management, "have agreed and would like to state in the strongest possible terms and in accordance with our existing Terms of Service and End User License Agreement, that real life harassment is morally reprehensible, and verifiable examples of such behavior will be met with disciplinary action against game accounts in accordance with our Terms of Service." The forum post also states that "the freedom to scam and commit piracy, espionage, and extortion are all fundamental to the EVE Online experience, and CCP will never change that." [Thanks Pierre!]
Here's some of the cyberbullying that happens in EVE Online
EVE Online griefers have grabbed their share of headlines during the game's first decade, but rarely have the masses gotten a chance to witness them in action. Now you can, though, thanks to a player named Erotica 1 who has publicized an audio recording of a "Bonus Round" scam being carried out via voice chat. Jester at EVE News 24 has the full story as well as a link to the Soundcloud file. It's worth noting that portions of the audio are NSFW due to graphic language. [Thanks Max!]
The Daily Grind: Does griefing in MMOs reflect a sinister personality?
A recent psychology paper picked up by Slate suggests that maybe there's more to bad behavior on the internet than previously thought. Researchers asked study participants to evaluate what they found most fun about commenting on the internet, then gave those same participants a personality test to determine their levels of sadism, narcissism, psychopathy, and Machiavellianism -- the "dark tetrad" of antisocial personality traits. (One of the agree/disagree statements on the personality exam? "I enjoy griefing other players in multiplayer games.") The researchers found a significant correlation between those who flagged as sadists and those who claimed to enjoy trolling and expressed "sadistic glee at the distress of others." While the study focused on the 5% of participants who cause comment moderators the most grief on the internet, over here in MMOland I'm wondering whether this study would map equally well to griefers in video games since we might define griefing in a virtual world the same way: causing someone distress because it's pleasurable for the griefer. That guy who ganks your lowbie and corpse camps you for an hour might not be so socially well-adjusted in the real world after all, in spite of what griefer-apologists have been claiming all these years. What do you folks think? Does griefing in MMOs reflect a sinister personality? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Blizzard to fix exploit with Diablo III's votekick system
Playing Diablo III in Hardcore mode is a harrowing experience. No matter how good you are as a player, there's always the real worry that one careless move will mean the end of a character you've worked hard to level. Unfortunately, sometimes that careless move is simply playing in a public game, as griefers have been exploiting the votekick system to cause players to die and lose everything through no fault of their own. As it currently stands, a player who has been kicked by popular vote will be rooted in place for 10 seconds while the character is ejected. Griefers have used this to kick players in the middle of monster-heavy rooms, resulting in 10 seconds of uninterrupted monster beatdowns with no chance of reprieve. So how to fix this? Well, Blizzard plans to remove the 10 second lockout in the near future to ensure that a kicked player can still move and respond rather than get pointlessly murdered. There's no word on whether this will be a hotfix or rolled into a larger patch, but it's definitely on the horizon. Until it goes live, though, you might not want to have your hardcore characters on a public game.
The Game Archaeologist's excellent EverQuest Online Adventures: The memories
It's been a good month looking back at EverQuest Online Adventures, wouldn't you agree? Educational, almost. While this title is just about as far from the mainstream MMO eye as can be these days, it's heartening to know it's still out there, still running, and still capable of evoking fond memories from current and former players. While we did attempt to contact SOE for an interview to see if we could find out anything new -- or even old -- about EQOA, it failed to materialize. As a wonderful consolation prize, however, this week we'll hear from three players who have extensive experience in the game. So let's hit this column running and equip our +2 Ears of Paying Attention!
The Game Archaeologist spins A Tale in the Desert: The highlights
Readers of the ever-so-humble Game Archaeologist will recall that earlier this year I had the opportunity to exchange informative words with Dr. Richard Bartle, the creator of MUD. Since he was -- and is -- a highly opinionated designer, I asked him what he thought was the most innovative MMO from the last decade. The answer was short and succinct. "A Tale in the Desert, he replied, then added: "Note that 'innovative' doesn't necessarily mean 'successful.'" Right there is the crux of ATITD's unique position in the MMO industry. Instead of storming down a path well-traveled, it took a machete and made its own trail -- a trail down which few have followed. As Jef recently noted in Some Assembly Required, it is an "odd duck" of a game, skewing as far away from combat as possible to focus on two often-neglected aspects of MMOs: crafting and politics. Even though its population has pegged it as an eternally niche game, it's proven that constant fighting isn't the only thing that can draw an online community together. This week we're going to look at some of the more unique features of this innovative yet diminutive MMO, which began telling its tale back in 2003.
The Soapbox: Why we grief - a therapy session
Disclaimer: The Soapbox column is entirely the opinion of this week's writer and does not necessarily reflect the views of Massively as a whole. If you're afraid of opinions other than your own, you might want to skip this column. Welcome to the Massively Psychiatric Center for Gamers, Griefers, and Greater Internet F-wads (link NSFW). I'm Dr. Reahard, and while I'm most definitely an armchair psychologist, psychiatrist, and MMOlogist, pay no attention to any of that. I'm more than qualified to help you determine whether or not you're a bleep (sorry, a griefer). So please, have a seat, make yourself comfortable, and let's talk about you. Tell me about yourself. Do you relish that feeling of power you get when messing with another human being? Is there a certain sense of being alive, a rush if you will, that only comes around when you bleep with another person? Does said bleeping happen exclusively in video games where your actions carry no perceivable repercussions? Are you secretly frustrated with a banal and disturbingly meaningless white-collar existence? Does releasing your inner bleep in a (theoretically) anonymous online environment scratch the itches made manifest by a minivan, 2.3 kids, and the otherwise inescapable confines of suburbia?
The Daily Grind: What's the worst you've ever been griefed?
Bad boys, bad boys, whatcha gonna do? Whatcha gonna do when griefers come for you? My grandmother warned me of a time when online hooligans would invade the sanctity of my gaming space and do anything they could to ruin my fun. Some feel that griefing is a legitimate type of play that gives them great satisfaction. I feel that griefers should be carefully rounded up, tagged, and shipped to a small desert island where they can smack each other over the head with coconuts and leave the rest of us in peace. Just about everybody's been griefed in an MMO at one point or another, whether by an overly antagonistic camper, a con artist who swindled you out of in-game gold, or that node stealer who stalked you and swooped in to grab the ore that was rightfully yours while you tangled with a nearby tiger. Today we want to hear your testimony of a time when another player actively tried to spoil your fun. What's the worst you've ever been griefed in an MMO? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
The Soapbox: Sandboxes and the cop-out of FFA PvP
Disclaimer: The Soapbox column is entirely the opinion of this week's writer and does not necessarily reflect the views of Massively as a whole. If you're afraid of opinions other than your own, you might want to skip this column. Last week, our own Jef Reahard mounted the Massively Soapbox with an article titled Sandboxes and the fear of FFA PvP. In it, he argued that open PvP was a natural and necessary part of any solid sandbox MMO. He also made waves by suggesting that FFA PvP is crucial to the roleplaying experience and that roleplayers should really face their "fears" and give it a try. I'm a sandbox gamer and a PvPer at heart. I played the early years of Ultima Online and lived the adrenaline rush of full and brutal PvP and thievery. Dark Age of Camelot's RvR sucked up another year of my life. Star Wars Galaxies remains my sandbox of choice, and I've braved a World of Warcraft PvP server since launch. I know this territory very well. I'll knock it, because I have more than tried it -- in several tasty flavors. And even though I'm an unabashed Jef-fangirl, I think there are a few debatable issues with his article. Hit the jump for some good old-fashioned counterpoints!
Blood Sport: Griefers in arena
Want to crush your enemies, see them driven before you and hear the lamentation of their women? Blood Sport investigates the entirety of all things arena for gladiators and challengers alike. C. Christian Moore, multiple rank 1 gladiator, examines the latest arena strategy, trends, compositions and more in WoW.com's arena column. Listening music: Eurythmics' Sweet Dreams. An awesome '80s song -- who can dispute this claim? Last week: We talked about some fun things to do in arena while Wrath of the Lich King and the old world are still with us. This week: All of us have had that random guy in a battleground get under our skin. Maybe he's proclaiming how terrible he thinks you are over /battleground chat, or he's an annoying jerk in some other way. Griefers are a part of the game, and they're here to stay. Nothing excites them more than making others miserable. Maybe you are a far better person than I, but I tend to wish ill towards these individuals. There are lots of ways to exact revenge upon griefers or rivals, particularly in arenas. Justice can be fun -- very fun. Some people, however, take it too far or make it menacing. Revenge is fine; trying to make someone quit the game or use RL money for a server transfer (for instance) is not. I mention the latter because I knew a guy who recruited someone from the #2 arena team three days before season 7 ended. They never invited him to the team, thus assuring themselves #1 gladiator because they had no competition. That goes beyond creating a rivalry into the realm of downright douchebaggery. While I suppose what he did is completely legal, I don't know a lot of people who want to transfer over to play with him after what he pulled. His ex-partners actually play with the guy that he recruited instead of him. Poetic justice, I suppose.
The Escapist: A folk hero for the online age
Tom Endo over at The Escapist has written an interesting editorial in which he suggests the idea that we all need a villain as a vessel for people's frustration with authority such as Bonnie and Clyde or Robin Hood. In the case of MMOs, that anti-hero is the Griefer, who will push the game mechanics to and past their breaking point or intended use in order get ahead.Second Life has had more than its fair share of griefers over the years, and it's true that in games such as Eve Online, the actions of the players have had a massive impact on the game. Some might say that with some games they have had more than the developer itself. Such is the case with the various self-styled bad-boy corporations and alliances throughout the years in that game, or the actions leading up to the Felluca/Trammel split in Ultima Online. But Endo puts forward the idea that players need these griefers and the stories that they create, despite the true nature of their actual actions. Head on over to The Escapist to read the full article and see if you agree with his ideas.
Potential avenues for MMO companies to deal with griefers
Ah, the MMO griefer. Most of us have encountered them, or been them, at some point. It can be frustrating to deal with but griefing in MMOs is enabled by the very nature of most online interaction -- anonymity -- and there's not much that can be done about that. Or is there? Much has been written on eliminating griefing before, and will continue to be written we're sure, but Allen Varney at The Escapist has a different take on handling griefers. Varney writes, "The motive to block and frustrate griefers masks what might be a great opportunity. Can we distract would-be griefers? Can we make the game so unpleasant for them they leave voluntarily? Sure. But go further: Could we turn griefers, despite themselves, to productive ends?" His article "Wanted: Ganked or Alive" points out how the behavior of griefers is something that can be predicted and exploited.
Griefing as a phenomenon
As new studies and research continues to look into the online aspect of behavior known as griefing (or as cyber-bullying to the mainstream media), it all appears to reinforce the correlation between the online and offline aspects of this all-too-human behavior. You see, griefing didn't start online. In a sense griefing is like one of many sexual kinks, in that it exists in the physical world -- it just wasn't until it went online that we really noticed that it was such a common thing.
Morality and legality in EVE Online
One of the strengths of EVE Online is that the game's professions can be freeform. Many players take the standard route of being a miner or a mission runner. However, new and deviant professions have arisen in a kind of symbiosis with the more established trades in the game. This is the focus of an article called 'Morality and Legality', written by ISD Magnus Balteus of CCP Games. 'Morality and Legality' looks at two of the sketchier professions that sprang from EVE's more standard career paths. Mining has given rise to ore theft, which boils down to theft that has the side benefit of potentially baiting the victim into combat, even in high security space. If the ore thief or 'can flipper' is successful, he or she can make off with the ore that someone else mined plus the modules looted from the miner's ship wreck. The morality of this type of career doesn't even enter into the equation... this is EVE. CCP's unwillingness to change the game mechanics involved in can flipping means that this is not an exploit, it's a valid profession, albeit not in the mind of the miner victim.
Ten things every new player should know about EVE Online
There are some valuable lessons learned as you progress in EVE Online, lessons which get pounded into you when making mistakes. There are so many things you wish someone had told you before you went out and made a noobish ass of yourself. Even with the much-improved Aura tutorial that's been implemented in EVE, there are lots of things that still cause players to scream something to the effect of, "Why didn't anyone warn me?!" This is often accompanied by frantically warping away from one's obliterated ship in an escape pod with a liberal amount of cursing. Of course, it doesn't have to be this way.
The Daily Grind: Who's got the best support team?
We like to think we'll never need help. That everything will run smoothly, your account won't get stolen out from under you, that you won't be the subject of routine griefing. Hope springs eternal, but there are whole fleets of people just waiting to help you when you need assistance. However, that doesn't always mean that you'll get it, or that it will be the kind of help you were expecting.With that in mind, then, I know that most of our readers are multi-mmo -- you've all got experience with many different games and companies. When the fewmets hit the fan, who's there for you? Which game has the best player support? Which has the worst?
Instance griefing not against the ToS?
Unless you've experienced it first hand, you may not realize what the term "instance griefing" refers to. In this particular case, it refers to any player or players who are maliciously stealing your guild's raid IDs in order to grief you during raid time. (For non raiders in the audience, high-end raid dungeons have specific reset timers on them, preventing you from constantly farming the dungeon. At some point after zoning into a dungeon -- usually after a boss kill -- you're "saved" to the specific instance and assigned an instance ID that is the same for you and all of your group. Anyone saved with that specific ID will zone into your instance rather than a fresh instance -- at least until the dungeon resets.) Poster Trindade offers some advice on how random players might wind up getting your Karazhan instance ID:Bob is a member of your raid and has your instance ID. Jim is a scumbag griefer in shattrath wanting to steal your ID. Ted is a scumbag griefer outside Karazhan waiting to steal your ID. Jim is in a group with Ted. They have made their group a raid. Jim whispers Bob "Hey Bob, wanna run Shattered Halls?" Bob whispers Jim "sure". Jim invites Bob to join his group. Bob joins the raid group. Bob is now the group leader. Ted enters Karazhan. So what happens next? Read on for the whole story.
