TLDR: No rules have changed. Harassment is, and always will be, something we investigate seriously, and act upon promptly. We are quite professional in how we do so.
Full Detail:
I will speak to harassment policy here, only. Specifics of any particular case will not be discussed - such discussions infringe upon player privacy, and almost never have any positive result. Any response regarding specific cases will be removed. If you feel the need to discuss a particular case, send us a ticket for in-game issues, or send me a pm for in-forum issues,
- Support investigates every case of reported harassment.
- The report itself will always remain anonymous.
- Support applies what is commonly known as a 'reasonable person' analysis. "Given the evidence presented, would a reasonable person conclude that the alleged harasser did in fact, harass the alleged victim?"
- Support only looks at the evidence supplied to determine if harassment actually occurred. We look for repeat patterns and at level of insult. You can harass someone with a single abusive message, and you can also harass with a pattern of repetitive but low levels of insult.
- It is quite possible that support will determine that no harassment has occurred, for a variety of reasons. In those cases, we will simply do nothing while maintaining the anonymity of the report.
- If we determine that harassment actually did occur, we then look at past history to determine the severity of the sanction to be applied.
- First time offenses rarely get anything more than a simple warning, with no penalties attached. The intent is to notify someone who is merely making a mistake, that they should stop making that mistake, without applying sanctions that can materially affect the game.
- Subsequent offenses get progressively stiffer penalties. At that point in time, we have to assume the harasser either has malicious intent, or needs to have it proven to them that we are serious.
- Players have the right to dispute the finding of harassment. The proper way to do that is to respond to the ticket which applied the warning or sanction. Bringing such matters into the public forum is NOT appropriate, and all such posts will be removed.
- If disputed, we will review the evidence and re-examine our conclusions and level of sanctions, and adjust accordingly.
Aside from policy, I am going to note a few more general observations:
- All players have a right to enjoy the game. Even players you don't like. This is also true of the forums.
- There is a line to be drawn between friendly teasing and harassment. Friendly trash talk stops being friendly when the other player is upset by it. If you detect that the other player is getting upset, you should stop before you cross the line into harassment. If you INTEND to make the other player upset, you have already crossed that line. (This is something most five year olds understand. We expect our players to figure it out, as well.)
- Alleged victims alone decide if they need to report harassment. It is always legitimate for them to do so. After all, harassers never self-report.
- Alleged victims do not have to say anything to their harasser. Silence is NOT equivalent to "consent to be harassed".
- Engaging in conversations in so-called Salty forums is generally at the player's own risk. But the forum rules are merely relaxed, not eliminated. Players can be salty and support will be generally tolerant - but players cannot be abusive, or discuss specific tickets within such forums.
In conclusion, we understand how harassment works, and how to deal with it. We have very experienced in-game and in-forum moderators here. They have seen it all, and have excellent understanding of how the culture in the game and forum operates. When support determines that harassment has occurred, it is for good reason, with clear evidence. This is not "the new guy changing things". I am merely continuing the already existing, common-sense, fair and practical ways to deal with these matters. Any support organization, anywhere, will use similar guidelines.