Rules: review and maybe revise/update

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kierra
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Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by kierra »

Rules: review and maybe revise/update
Constitution will elaborate here.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by kierra »

damns3xy wrote:2. Rules are pretty straight forward, I liked the idea with xleague only there was way too much hate, there could be a server or two for people that want to let out the occasional cuss just because it's human nature to get frustrated sometimes even if it's not really meant to be hurtful. Hate is a different subject though, you can have disagreements without personally giving abuse to someone else, most of us kinda know eachother and it's not nice to be given crap by friends. (I have 20 players on facebook lol).
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by kierra »

moto unit wrote: I think a review of the rules is appropriate but I am definitely not in favor of scrapping them in favor of a complete new set of rules. The rules established at the current time area result of much trial and error, learning curve and experience for the admins and cops in learning how to deal with a variety of issues that are bound to come up from time to time in such a forum as BZFlag or other online gaming communities. I for one see no reason to reinvent the wheel when all it really needs is a bit of fine tuning to fit the circumstance with the new league. I think a group of people - no more than 5 or 6 could accomplish this without muddying up the waters too badly. I think anymore than this could lead to endless discussion without accomplishing the desired effect of having rules without being so restrictive that no one wishes to play.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by figurines »

I'm a big fan of bzflag being very open with swearing etc. If someone is being particularly hateful they need to be banned (or muted whatever), but swearing itself is not bad. Yeah it's a children's game blah blah blah, but any child with access to the internet can see MUCH worse than our text based chat. IMHO we don't need to police every interaction. People have the ability to /silence on their own...let's relax on these particular kinds of points and give the admins and the player base some breathing room to be adults.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by blast »

figurines wrote:I'm a big fan of bzflag being very open with swearing etc. If someone is being particularly hateful they need to be banned (or muted whatever), but swearing itself is not bad. Yeah it's a children's game blah blah blah, but any child with access to the internet can see MUCH worse than our text based chat. IMHO we don't need to police every interaction. People have the ability to /silence on their own...let's relax on these particular kinds of points and give the admins and the player base some breathing room to be adults.
There are very few servers that explicitly allow swearing. Part of being an adult is being able to conduct yourself in a professional manner and know how to hold your tongue. Sure, it's a game, not a workplace, but considering the fact that you know there are children playing, that should be reason enough to keep your chat family friendly.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by figurines »

"considering the fact that you know there are children playing, that should be reason enough to keep your chat family friendly"

I'm still going with the "the fact that these children are on the internet means they are already exposed to much worse than anything text based chat can offer them"
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by figurines »

Swearing is self censorship and it doesn't make you cool and, yep we're adults...but also adults DO swear...just my two cents
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by blast »

The players of a league should especially be mindful of their sportsmanship. If you're unable to control your use of foul language, then perhaps it's best to unbind the chat keys from your game.

For instance, I would assume most sporting leagues have rules or guidelines against using profanity. Why should the leagues in BZFlag be any different?
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http://www.littleleague.org/learn/newsl ... SPORTS.htm
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by figurines »

Why should the leagues in BZFlag be the same? Why should we mass censor the whole league when each and every player has the ability to /silence without "unbinding the chat keys from the game". To me it just seems like, at least on this particular point, the attention to detail is wasted. Swearing exists and if someone doesn't want to see it they don't have to. A bit of casual swearing isn't the end of the world, hell it's more normal than NOT swearing in the real world. I just don't see the issue for kids who have access to the internet to come to BZFlag and see a couple swear words. We're an adult community and we should act like it...no reason to treat the players like they are still in www.littleleague.org
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by kierra »

First of all, forgive me for not being more explicit in what I'm looking for in this topic. The language rule is not in question here.

With public servers vs league match servers (Using gu as an example), there is sometimes indecision in how to handle issues that occur on public servers.
  • Do our rules apply to public servers which may be advertised as "GU" or "GU Style?"
  • Should our ban penalties for language and player harassment repeat an earlier statement that repeat offenders will be punished more severely?
  • What new and/or previously unspoken rules need to be explicitly stated in the new league ? For example, whether changing your FPS on the fly during a match is permitted. What of /retexture?
GU's goal, since it's inception, has always been to be family friendly in it's language, player treatment of each other and promotion of good sportsmanship. Hence the rules on match disturbance, language, player harassment and cheating. Simple, concise and to the point regarding the atmosphere the leagues' leaders had in mind.

Bad language on a server is a deliberate choice to type out these words/phrases. I get many complaints on language from a variety of players, young and older alike. It is not a sign of good sportsmanship. If a player must curse, let him do so a loud in his own home/workplace, etc - no need to spew it out on the server. For those totally lacking self control, we have the 'spawn only' list to help them play and stay out of trouble.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by Bullet Catcher »

One (hopefully) last note on language: A significant part of the problem is that if we were to allow players to simply express frustration by saying #$%&, we know from experience that too many would interpret that as permission to say "@*#% you". The latter is personally abusive and not the kind of sportsmanlike behavior required by the league admins. This is the reality, and as kierra already said, relaxing the language rules is not an option under consideration.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by Bullet Catcher »

kierra wrote:Do our rules apply to public servers which may be advertised as "GU" or "GU Style?"
The rules on league servers are set by agreement between the league admins and the server owners. Unless there is a similar agreement for non-league servers, this question can only be answered by the server owners, who are solely responsible for setting the rules on their non-league servers.

This leads to the question of whether we want some sort of trademark-like protection for advertised server names that would prevent, for example, the confusion from advertising a "GU-style" HiX server with MoFo language rules. Since blast runs the list server, he would be the final authority on such a thing.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by macsforme »

Sorry I'm a little late getting to this. The main purpose of this topic was to discuss a new rules document for the league (based on existing rules in GU and ducati). There have been a lot of complaints about GU rules--that they were too vague, or didn't cover specific cases, etc. Another problem was that the rules were in about five different documents.

To be sure, we will never be able to write rules that cover every possible scenario, but in GU we felt like a refresh was appropriate, and a league merger might be a good opportunity to discuss, revise, and implement an updated set of rules. I am posting a draft I wrote for GU here for discussion, with some changes so it would apply to the merged leagues. Right now there are a few assumptions about things that are still being discussed (the name of the league, match durations, etc.), but those can be updated later.
PLAYERS

Membership in the BZFlag League is available to any BZFlag player who has an understanding of the league rules, is competent enough to follow them, and has not previously had his membership revoked. In order to be eligible for membership, a player must be registered at the BZFlag Bulletin Board (http://forums.bzflag.org) and must establish a user account on the BZFlag League website (http://league.bzflag.net) by logging in at least one time. Upon changing his callsign, a player must log in to the BZFlag League site again to update his callsign before playing any match. Players are considered to be league members upon being added to the league "spawn group" on the BZFlag Bulletin Board, which allows playing and talking privileges on league match servers. A player may have only one account on the spawn list, and must not allow other people to play using his account. A player may renounce his membership by contacting an administrator and requesting to be removed from the spawn group. Administrators are not required to remove and re-add a player from/to the spawn group for the player's convenience or if such requests are unreasonably frequent.


TEAMS

A player may be a member of one BZFlag League team (having a membership on more than one team or maintaining any kind of control over a team while being a member of a different team is prohibited). Any player may start a new team. A team leader is responsible for inviting new members to his team, or configuring his team to be open for anyone to join. A team may have up to 20 players. A player may leave a team (reassigning leadership or disbanding the team first, as necessary) at any time. A disbanded team may be revived by an administrator upon the request of any former member, and the requesting member will be assigned as the new team leader.


MATCHES

BZFlag League matches are held on official BZFlag League match servers. All official match servers are listed on the BZFlag League website. Multiple map styles are available for use in BZFlag League matches. Matches consist of official matches (between two league teams, with the result recorded and used for team rankings) and funmatches (between two arbitrary groups of players, with the result not counted or recorded). A match may be 15, 20, or 30 minutes in length (excluding pauses). The winner of a match is the team which captured the flag more times than the other team by the end of the match. If both teams score the same number of captures, the match is a tie.

A match begins when all players on both teams signal that they are ready and a player initiates the “/official” command (or “/fm” in the case of a funmatch). Matches are strictly voluntary, and no player shall be compelled to match any unwanted opponent nor to agree to any match conditions. All players should rejoin the server prior to or during the countdown, and must not spawn until the countdown has ended. The game timer may be paused when necessary by initiating the command “/pause”, and may be resumed by the command "/resume". Players should not move their tanks when a match is paused, or should re-take their positions prior to resuming the match. If the match must be terminated prematurely, it should be ended with the “/finish” command if it is an official match and the result is to be entered, or “/cancel” otherwise. A match should only be paused for reasonable interruptions or when it is otherwise necessary. Unnecessary or excessively frequent pausing of a match may cause the match to be forfeited by the perpetrating team upon review by the administrators.

An official match must have at least two players from each team present to begin, but may have more (up to the server limit of players for each team), and one team may have more players than the other. Any changes to the players participating in the match require the agreement of all players still involved in the match. Any official match where players are added, removed, or substituted during the match shall be counted as official as long as the changes in participants are agreed to by all other participants. A player who joins a match at any time other than the match beginning shall selfkill upon spawning, except when joining immediately after a capture, or upon substituting another player (the substituting player may take the original player's position).

If one or more of the original match participants leaves before its conclusion, the remaining participants may agree to allow another member of his team to fill his spot in the match. They may also agree to change the number of players on each team in order to even the teams, to continue the match with uneven teams, or to postpone the match until any future time. If they do not agree, then if the team which has lost a player was in the lead (or if the match was tied, and the team losing a player stands to gain points from a tie being entered), the match shall be cancelled. Otherwise, the match shall be forfeited, and the score at the time when the player left shall be entered.

When a match is over, it must be entered on the league website. The server should announce that the match results were automatically entered. In the event of automatic reporting being unsuccessful or incorrect, the winning team (or the lower-ranked team, in the case of a tie) is responsible for reporting the match results to an administrator, who will then enter or correct it on the league website. A match which is manually reported shall include which teams played, each team's score, the date and GMT time when the match ended, that map style which was used, and the length of the match.


CONDUCT

The purpose of the BZFlag League rules is to preserve a friendly and comfortable playing environment. Players who do not observe and follow all BZFlag League rules shall be subject to disciplinary action by being temporarily suspended from league membership, or having their membership permanently revoked for serious offenses. Players who repeatedly or habitually do not comply with the rules will be subject to extended or indefinite suspensions, or permanent revocation of membership.

Upon observing or receiving complaint of player misconduct, BZFlag League administrators have full discretion whether to impose a suspension on the player (and what the length of that suspension may be), to warn the player, or to take no action, as they deem appropriate. Players are reminded that the league administrators come from a variety of backgrounds, and every person may view a situation from a different perspective. Disciplinary action may be taken against a player immediately by any administrator present, or upon review and discussion after the conduct is brought to the administrators' attention.

In addition to the rules enumerated here, any conduct which is clearly inappropriate or malicious toward the league or its players may subject the perpetrator to disciplinary action.

Prohibited conduct is listed below with the corresponding guidelines for how long of a suspension an offender may expect to receive for the offense the first time:

Match disturbance: anything that interferes with a match the player is not involved in, such as joining and playing in a match uninvited, pausing or ending the match, sending unsolicited private messages to a match participant, or excessive talking in public chat (1 - 7 days)

Player harassment: persistent, provocative, offensive, derogatory, annoying, or otherwise harassing comments made to or directed toward another player (1 - 7 days)

Profanity: using obscene, explicit, or offensive language, including acronyms or obfuscations, in public chat, or in team chat or private message to a player who might be offended by it (1 - 7 days)

Cheat accusations in public (1 - 7 days)

Cheating on other servers: using any client modification or external program or tool to gain an unfair advantage while playing on any server other than league match servers (6 - 9 months)

Cheating in the BZFlag League: using the above methods on any official league match server at any time (indefinite suspension - permanent revocation)


CLIENTS

Players are encouraged to use the latest version of the BZFlag game client version available for their operating system. However, any client compatible with the protocol version used by official league match servers may be used. An exception is if the BZFlag League administrators announce on the “BZFlag League Discussion" forum of the BZFlag Bulletin Board that a specific outdated client version is no longer allowed, which may be due to any sufficiently compelling reason.

Clients used in any BZFlag League match must be official BZFlag project binaries or built from official BZFlag project release or development code without modifications. Any client modification must be approved by the BZFlag League administrators prior to use, and will be listed in the WHITELIST section of the rules.

Players must not intentionally use any software or hardware program or tool which degrades the performance of their client or the quality of their network connection, or which masquerades the player's identity. Additionally, players must not manipulate any in-game setting nor use any in-game feature while a match is in progress in order to intentionally alter the behavior or consistency of game simulation (for example, using client commands to cause a freeze or stutter, or altering the FPS limit).


WHITELIST

(this will contain the whitelist from the GU league)
Please review and post any thoughts and suggestions.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by sn0w_m0nkey »

sorry all, just catching up on the forum.

regarding language rules, i prefer we keep gu and ducati principles to preserve sportsmanship and promote respectful conduct. Fig, in real life you'd find out that i have a terrible sailor mouth :) however when it comes to bzflag league play, i prefer lang rules.

thanks constitution, the draft of the rules looks great.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by styx »

Looks like a good set of rules there Consti, but I would like to raise one question regarding the FPS limit:

I do not change my fps limit myself, but I know of those who do not in order to lag/stutter, but to make them bounce off walls where people expect them to stick. This naturally would be banned as well, so do you want this, and if so, maybe mention it as well?
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by macsforme »

slamm wrote:Looks like a good set of rules there Consti, but I would like to raise one question regarding the FPS limit:

I do not change my fps limit myself, but I know of those who do not in order to lag/stutter, but to make them bounce off walls where people expect them to stick. This naturally would be banned as well, so do you want this, and if so, maybe mention it as well?
As I read the rules document draft, it seems to me like this would be covered by the existing wording... do you feel otherwise?
players must not manipulate any in-game setting nor use any in-game feature while a match is in progress in order to intentionally alter the behavior or consistency of game simulation
It seems better to me to directly address the prohibited behavior in general, rather than to address all the possible effects intended or the motivations. Primarily we are trying to prevent people from changing how their tanks move in the middle of a match. As long as they leave the FPS setting consistent (and it's not too low in general), I think we are good to allow players to set an FPS setting that is comfortable to them.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by styx »

Reading it again, yeah it does sound like it is covered. When I read it before, it sounded like it was primarily focused on things that caused lag issues.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by alezakos »

Very well-written set of rules, Constitution!

Just a question on a sentence:
Constitution wrote:
Upon changing his callsign, a player must log in to the BZFlag League site again to update his callsign before playing any match.
What's the rationale behind this? Is it for technical reasons, or just to keep data in the website up to date? Would making the League Overseer plugin notify the league website of any callsign changes when a user joins a league server render this rule obsolete in the future?
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by macsforme »

alezakos wrote:
Constitution wrote:
Upon changing his callsign, a player must log in to the BZFlag League site again to update his callsign before playing any match.
What's the rationale behind this? Is it for technical reasons, or just to keep data in the website up to date? Would making the League Overseer plugin notify the league website of any callsign changes when a user joins a league server render this rule obsolete in the future?
The team list on the league site should serve as a formal roster of teams. When people see an official match, they should be able to look on the league site and see who is on the team. There isn't really a technical reason for this.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by kierra »

There are so many players that are nick changers.
In official matches especially, players have a right to know 'who' they are matching against. Logging onto gu site, updates the team nicks.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by miro »

I would like to suggest a new rule for team reviving since i havent found anything about on the current leagues:
Let only the old team leader or founder be able to revive a team, or at least 2-3 of the past members together. thanks
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by dauphin »

miro wrote:I would like to suggest a new rule for team reviving since i havent found anything about on the current leagues:
Let only the old team leader or founder be able to revive a team, or at least 2-3 of the past members together. thanks
I think it's a good idea. A team belongs to its leader normally, it shouldn't be right to revive a team you haven't been on for a long time, or even been on at all.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by NTH »

I don't think anyone has thought about the server owner, if the policy from them is no swearing, no rejoining, no religious chat, etc.. then those have to be upheld. why not start with asking them for a list of acceptable rules and build from that.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by Bullet Catcher »

In my role as a server owner I am a little more permissive about player behavior than the admins of the Ducati and GU leagues. I am not willing to allow MoFo-style language rules, but the occasional f-bomb doesn't bother me either. I let the league admins enforce their rules as they want, and that compatibility is an important part of why we continue to work together.

The other server owners probably have their own specific ideas, so I think it is important for the league admins to have their own behavior standard as a starting place for negotiating with prospective server owners.
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Re: Rules: review and maybe revise/update

Post by gorgomol »

NTH wrote:I don't think anyone has thought about the server owner, if the policy from them is no swearing, no rejoining, no religious chat, etc.. then those have to be upheld. why not start with asking them for a list of acceptable rules and build from that.
+1 agreed
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