Chat Report System has Caused More and More Issues Lately

Fighting gold spammers and other offensive behavior is an ongoing task every MMO faces. To help out the devs, and the players, Neverwinter offers a chat report system that allows players to flag behavior directly from the context menu of the chat. Reports are not manually verified however and can lead to an automated ban. And that’s exactly where the trouble begins.

[su_quote cite=”kreatyve” url=”http://forum.arcgames.com/neverwinter/discussion/comment/12916408/#Comment_12916408″]It’s not that simple… If someone is upset enough with you and has enough friends that will help do their bidding, it’s not hard to get someone chat banned no matter what they say in chat. 🙁 The system is very faulty and needs work. It’s one of the main reasons why I generally don’t chat outside of guild and alliance chat.[/su_quote]

Chat Report System is getting abused

Two cases of obvious abuse of the system have surfaced in recent weeks on the PC version. Meet weaver936, a player that founded a private channel for Storm Kings Thunder content and suddenly was chat-banned for consecutive days. Some users of the channel apparently decided to troll and report weaver until the auto-ban was applied. Another case happened during the first days of the currently running Winter Festival. Well-known zone chat resident ph33rm3 circled through toons to exchange gifts using a very specific announcement in the chat. She or he also got banned and the announcement got taken over by a scammer. Other players confirmed they fell victim to the chat report abuse as well.

As the latest thread about the topic shows, it’s not only an issue of intended misuse, but also misconception about what is a reportable offense. Many players seem to think that it’s perfectly ok to report what they feel is an inappropriate posting frequency. And that’s wrong.

[su_quote cite=”Spam Definition” url=”https://www.google.com/search?q=spam+definition”]irrelevant or unsolicited messages sent over the Internet, typically to large numbers of users, for the purposes of advertising, phishing, spreading malware, etc.[/su_quote]

Posting lfg requests in the chat is neither irrelevant nor unsolicited, it’s the intended way to use the channels. More than that, the system already automatically punishes posting the same stuff over and over again. It allows three repetitions every 20 seconds or so. If players feel this is insufficient, the appropriate way to deal with it would be to contact PWE and not punishing users that operate within the boundaries. You cannot report players just because they do not meet your personal standards. That applies to both post frequency and content as long as it does not violate the game’s ToS.

Do we even need it?

With some users abusing it and other not applying it correctly, the question arises whether the system in its current form is even needed. It is kind of irritating anyway that the bans are automatic, but users have to be released manually. Shouldn’t it be the other way round? In the end the situations where the system does really help are rare. Players can use the ignore function to get rid of annoying users and in most cases manually reviewing reports and handing out bans should do it.

More than that, abuse should be banned as well. This applies to intentional and ill-advised cases. It might actually educate players how to apply the function correctly.


Have you had issues with the chat report function? Is this an issue on consoles as well? Share your experience in the comments below or visit the corresponding thread on our message board!

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j0Shi

j0Shi plays the Neverwinter MMORPG since the open BETA in 2013 and is a regular contributor to the blog and the whole UN:Project. Originally a Guardian Fighter, he has built up ALTs of all classes and plays on BIS/near-BIS level.

4 thoughts on “Chat Report System has Caused More and More Issues Lately

  • December 19, 2016 at 1:52 pm
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    I have had negative encounters with both players that have been chat banned. And even though i had no role in them getting banned i can see how they have gathered a fan club. Both seem to conduct themselves in a self righteous and Mr know it all demeanors. Also can say seeing the same posting over and over in zone chat can be annoying. And even worse when you know it is also misleading other players at the same time. If i felt the issue was only affecting me then ignore is good enough yet when i see it can be detrimental to others then spam hammer.

  • December 19, 2016 at 2:58 pm
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    We had ourselves, we just made new Guild and whenever we advertised through Protectors Enclave for recruits we would get chat banned immediately to the point that in the zone chat one of our members only made announcement once and was banned immediately

  • December 20, 2016 at 5:24 am
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    Anonymous and online brings out the worst in people.

  • December 20, 2016 at 9:52 pm
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    My guild co-leader and I have been targeted by this a lot of late. I suspect that it has been organized by someone in the alliance my guild left a few months back or by the guild we replaced in our current alliance.

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