Samstag, 21. Januar 2012

Vote kick system - and what's going wrong with it

You know, many games feature a vote kick system. That's a system that allows players to start a kick vote on another player. If enough people in the game room / at the server agree, the player targeted by kick has to leave.

The initiative "Use it, don't abuse it" is meant to prevent players from kicking others without any reason. Fair use of a vote kick system is fair play in my opinion. A community that doesn't use vote kick just because certain players are too good is a great community if you ask me.

First of all, I'll tell you why there is a vote kick system. This should be clear to everyone who wants to start a kick.

Vote kick gives regular players the ability to remove players from the game that play against the game's rules and especially against the Netiquette.
What I would consider just two reasons to kick a player a good reason: game hacking / cheating and glitching. A hacker doesn't deserve to see the scoreboard at the end of the game, same goes for glitchers.

Now you could say "What if the player is away from keyboard? What if the player spams and insults me?". Well, many games have solutions for that. Players that are idle get auto kicked after a few minutes. And you can usually block a certain player, so you won't read what he writes.

There are also some reasons for kick that I would consider simply wrong. Biggest one is kicking for a clanmate or a friend. I don't understand why one person should be worth more than another person.

Now I said that kicking hackers is good. Of course it is, but before you start a kick: Make sure that the person REALLY HACKS! If you kick a player that is good then you will simply destroy his game experience. And I would let a possible hacker stay, if I don't know for sure what kind of hack he uses.


If you are annoyed by pointless kicks, then spread this post! Help every legit player to stay in-game, help your game's community to become better! Use it as a forum signature. Promote it in game. Spread the word: Vote kick - use it, don't abuse it!

If you have problems detecting hackers, then read this short tutorial: http://fairplay-gaming.blogspot.com/2011/11/how-to-detect-them.html