Regarding Auto Mutes and Auto Bans for Offensive or Vulgar Chat.

**Samhayne** · 04-22-2011, 09:44 PM

We recently implemented a system where swearing or saying other very vulgar statements will cause your chat to be auto muted. If you are auto muted several times over the course of a day the system will auto ban you for 24 hours.

Should you find that you are auto muted because of what you chatted in game, we would ask that you stop and reflect on what you are saying. Please keep in mind that offensive or vulgar chat is in violation of the Pocket Legends Terms of Service.

We log everything this new chat system does. We are looking at it very closely to fine tune it. As asommers said in an earlier post:

For every feature we add we go through the same thing. We'll tweak it. If you see a word that shouldn't be allowed, let us know. If you see a word that should be on the list, let us know. I can't help auto-correct. Make sure your chat says what you want before you hit enter. For words used mostly in a negative manner, they will be on the list.

Like the GCD, the mute filter will be a tremendous help to our Customer Service workload and is here to stay.

-ALS

We value our customers tremendously. We know that this system will need some tweaking, as ALS outlines above. Also, we feel strongly, for example, that some jerk should not be able to make a free account, log into Forest Haven and start spouting filth and directly impacting our other customers play experience.

As always, thank you very much for your understanding, for your patronage and for your enthusiasm for Pocket Legends.

**JaytB** · 04-22-2011, 09:45 PM

Thx for keeping us updated

**Junside** · 04-22-2011, 09:48 PM

What if I said Japanese multiple times? Or is there a warning when I get muted? This system is kinda flawed. Though, I understand that it's something to make your workload much easier and free for other issues.

**Beanmachine** · 04-22-2011, 09:50 PM

Can we at least have a special FREE emote or reply that indicates we are muted to people who try to talk to us please?
I dont want a good trade gone down the drain cause they didnt answer or they thought I ignored them.

Thanks devs

**JaytB** · 04-22-2011, 09:51 PM

Originally Posted by Beanmachine

Can we at least have a special FREE emote or reply that indicates we are muted to people who try to talk to us please?
I dont want a good trade gone down the drain cause they didnt answer or they thought I ignored them.

Thanks devs

I agree that some kind of indicator would be very useful

**Beanmachine** · 04-22-2011, 09:52 PM

Originally Posted by JaytB

I agree that some kind of indicator would be very useful

I was thinking maybe the emote could be your toon zipping up his mouth shut

**Kossi** · 04-22-2011, 09:50 PM

I made a private game and swore once to test it
And i got muted

Does it add up or reset over a day?
Its a good thing i dont even swear irl

**Lesrider** · 04-22-2011, 10:34 PM

Are people really being muted for saying "hell" and "sucks?"
This will lead to a very quiet game.

**asommers** · 04-22-2011, 10:37 PM

Originally Posted by Lesrider

Are people really being muted for saying "hell" and "sucks?"
This will lead to a very quiet game.

I take it you didn't try it.

-ALS

**Lesrider** · 04-23-2011, 03:24 AM

Originally Posted by asommers

I take it you didn't try it.

-ALS

Nope, not interested in testing out words others claim are getting them in trouble. Others have been quite ridiculous, so not taking anything for granted.

**Physiologic** · 04-22-2011, 10:40 PM

Originally Posted by Lesrider

Are people really being muted for saying "hell" and "sucks?"
This will lead to a very quiet game.

I'm gonna risk a ban and just isolate myself to a locked game and see what's good and what's not good (cept the obvious vulgar ones).

**Junside** · 04-22-2011, 10:59 PM

You can get muted/banned for saying flamer...

**Herb** · 04-23-2011, 01:45 AM

Yes, this just happened to me...

**Arreth** · 04-27-2011, 04:45 PM

U can also get muted for saying crap or dang it happened to me 3 times lol

**azulflame** · 05-06-2011, 05:20 PM

Originally Posted by Junside

You can get muted/banned for saying flamer...

big problem: FLAME Rabbit ears

and can you Email the auto-mute list (and auto-ban, if there is one) to my account Email? I might need restructure my quickchat. one of my quickchats got me muted. deleted it, but want a similar phrase. mught have heen a mistype, but I want the list just the same

man, I love this emote. can you get a similar one in-game? =>

**Cloudiz** · 05-11-2011, 04:05 PM

i feel a restriction talking in this game. the big part of the game is the social interaction environment. it feels like we are being policed by school teachers and the effect is that you have treated the players like children. I understand a 5 minute mute for dastardly offensive words. but some words like '****' isn't offensive. it is used in daily life. you don't call your own waste Dung! or manure? you call it ****.
When you miss out on an opportunity, you say ****. you don't say "oopsy daisy". this is life. The word doesn't offend as much as f****.

if I can suggest, look at World of Warcraft. They have every bit of system you guys are trying to improve on and implement. it feels like you are trying to do things different, but really, if I may speak from an adult's point of view, this game ultimately has to please the majority, and also, no big secret, it has to be profitable to the company Spacetime.
Is the driving force of the game not commercial? Are you not charging platinums for exclusive content? The kids do not pay for most of these. The adults do. And like someone else said in an earlier post, kids nowadays watch movies with lots of words f**k! and worse. I have friends aged 13 and younger, and they accept it as part of Hollywood. They don't get offended, and they certainly do not use it.
A controlled environment breeds of disgust to me.

WoW - they use filters for speech deemed inappropriate. Players see ***** and they know they must have cursed. that has the same effect as letting someone know this guy said something bad and the only thing that made it different is that they don't have to visually see it. Intellectually, it provides the same effect.

Muted for raid leading:
I led a PUG group who was struggling with Gurgox with the canned message of "Big Boom coming in 5 seconds", and was muted for spamming, for 5 long minutes - a silent bird - after a few times using it. I would think that anyone who was in any group had the choice to either leave, or report me if I was truly spamming. And the host of the game can boot me. If im the host, anyone can leave in disgust if they wanted to.
For private games: sometimes friends play. why should a locked game be filtered? It is locked. protected from the outside world.

Surely, in summary, when you compare yourself to WoW in your pocket, that you do not re-invent the wheel? Look at the actual World of Warcraft universe, and the hours of board meetings they have conducted in order to create an immersive world for the biggest amount of players ever. As a commercial marketing researcher, I can certainly say with some strength, that WoW would have lost quite a reputation for what you guys have implemented at this moment.
In closing, I am not ashamed to compare PL with WoW, just because you guys have used its namesake as a form of marketing and publicity in your ad campaigns. Since you have gotten past that hurdle, at least do some comparison with WoW for how they manage their player community experience.

The anger that you see for these 9 pages long of complaints stem from people who love the game(or the community) like myself, enough to even care to [write] as I have done. Surely you know by a rough guesstimate, that for every one person that write, a good 100 or more others stay silent and just ignore voicing it out.
Look beneath the issue and you'd realise it's not about wanting to rebel, or swear. It's about fundamental freedom of speech, which no other human being should dictate against. Laws of a free world, of any recognised democracy, and of the United States of America.

**Chuck norris** · 04-23-2011, 09:04 AM

The swearing update is a good idea im not gonna' argue about that but i just got banned for 24 hours because i said "damn" one time, even with filter off, if you are gonna' keep this update you should make it so if u have filter off you can swear to an extent.. Or atleast tone it down a little bit because everybody in this game is going to say something that isnt appropiate at least once in the duration that they play this game untill they quit..

**Snakeyez** · 04-23-2011, 09:23 AM

I personally think its rediculous, im sorry but 13 year olds dont have credit cards, its the adults that pay the pocket legends staff to continue running this game. I agree that words that are too vulgar shouldnt be allowed, but thats why theres a filter. Like someone said earlier if im talking to another adult who is in no way affected by what I may say than why should I be muted. I love this game and so I spend my $ on it to support, but you guys keep shooting yourselves in the foot

**pennsco1999** · 05-06-2011, 09:17 AM

From the desk of Bleecker,

I have not read through all of the comments and for this I apologize if my issue has been covered. I am having trouble understanding why someone (me) was muted for saying "coon and friends" referring to a few South Park episodes while playing with mntberrychrunch yet we will allow folks to have screen names such as pktpuzzy and pekkahead. Can anyone answer this for me please?

Thanks,

Bleecker