[FORUM] Community Moderators FAQ

[[DE]Ronnie]

This is a FAQ concerning the Community Moderators and the forum staff from the perspective of the members of this forum.
 
Q: What are Community Moderators, exactly?
A: When the forums grew past the few thousands of Closed Beta, the workload to maintain and run the forums increased, more and more, to the point where it became almost a full-time job just reacting to the reports. DE then contacted a handful of individuals and asked if they would volunteer to help out and uphold the Guidelines. These individuals are not DE employees, nor on DE's payroll, and fulfill their positions in their free-time.
 
Q: But, they are privy to secrets and their statements are representative, right?
A: Community Moderators are, where the forum tools end, players just like everyone else. They see the same patchnotes, play the same game and get the same treatment from support. They watch the livestreams and read the forums. Sometimes, they get a briefing on general topics, but unless a ComMod explicitly says that this is handed down from above, they are just posting an opinion, with the same weight as another poster's.
 
Q: Surely, ComMods can influence the game more than normal members, right?
A: ComMods are just other members on the forums. There are sometimes discussions with the DE Community team, but ComMods have no "hotline" to the developers.
 
Q: So, who are these ComMods?
ComMods from other languages with an * next to their name are also global moderators and can moderate in the English sub-forums. 
 
English:
Haldos
Letter13
Cleesus (formerly theclinton)
-Himari-
(PS4)Crackle2012
NovusNova
Digressive

Portuguese:
MaestroLima

Italian:
Azzu-nyan

German:
S3TH

Russian:
White_Lugaru

Spanish:
ZerNacK

Q: Okay, and what DE staff is occupied with the forums?

Admins:
[DE]Rebecca
[DE]Megan
[DE]Danielle
[DE]Taylor
[DE]Helen
[DE]Marcus
[DE]Ronnie
[DE]Dudley
[DE]Zach

German: 
[DE]Marley
[DE]Saske
 

Spanish: 
[DE]Zorro
[DE]Fernanda

French: 
[DE]Kev

Russian: 
[DE]Marat
[DE]LeXX
[DE]Vladimir
[DE]Stacy

Turkish: 
[DE]Unsal
[DE]Teo
[DE]Oz

Korean: 
[DE]Yun

Italian: 
[DE]Maurizio
[DE]Anna

Polish: 
[DE]Mag

Japanese:
[DE]Kanna

Traditional Chinese:
[DE]Adrian

Portuguese:
[DE]Tiago
[DE]Philippe

Q: So, what do these ComMods do, precisely?
A: ComMods make sure that the community rules and posting Guidelines are observed. They also move threads into their correct subforums, close discussions that derail, answer first level issues and complaints, rename misleading topics, and warn - when rule violations occur.
 
Q: Okay, I got warned for breaking a rule. What happens now?
A: Ideally, nothing. You receive a reason with your warning and that could be it. If you understand why you were warned and don't repeat the offense (or any other), there are no repercussions whatsoever. Warnings are just a pointer for you to ease off and get you back on track, and a marker for the other staff to see your history, if they interact with you. As long as you stay below three warnings, nothing happens.

If you collect three warnings, you will be suspended, for three days. That is not a ban, but a temporary suspension. You can still play, you just cannot read or post on the forums. In the case of repeated offenders or severe transgressions, such as fits of rage, you may also face moderation queue - which means that you can only post if DE staff approves your posts.
**Please note that that certain offenses will lead to a permanent ban right away, and not just a warning.
 
Q: I have received a warning and I disagree with it. What should I do?
A: If you feel a warning was unwarranted, then you may submit a ticket to our Support team to begin an investigation. This will allow both the Warframe Support and Community teams to review the warning & rebuttal to determine an outcome. Before submitting your ticket, it may be helpful to review the Community Guidelines to ensure that you have indeed not broken any of them.  

In your ticket, please explain why you disagree with the warning, and why your specific incident may be acceptable based on the Community Guidelines. Keep in mind that the ComMods are working based on a "Mature" rating, with an eye on swear words, foul language and disruptive/negative behavior just as much as more blatant rule violations. Decisions resulting from investigations are final and it is considered abusive behaviour to harass or seek to change the outcome rendered by the Support team. The goal is to always keep the forums friendly.
 
 
Q: How long do Warning points stick around?
A: Warning Points expire 1 year from the date/time when originally issued. Verbal Warning warnings do not carry warning points at all. The Other warning category may be permanent, temporary, or lacking a warning point. Any other infraction will leave you with a year warning point. Warning points are only visible to the recipient, so no one else can see them.
 
Q: What are reports for?
A: Reports alert the entire mod staff to a post or member profile. You can use reports to suggest a pin, point out a thread in the wrong subforum, point out a misleading title, a rules violation or announce an "I got banned!" thread to the staff. Your report is dealt with as soon as someone has the time to do so. 

For more information on reports, refer to the FAQ: 

https://forums.warframe.com/announcement/65-decommunity-faq/

[TakeMeHomeCountryRoads]

cool

[-DL-Interittus]

okay

[Sir_Goreth]

Quote

it is considered abusive behaviour to harass or seek to change the outcome rendered by the Support team

I find it concerning that, in the event of erroneous or heavy-handed moderation action, attempting to revert or nullify such actions is considered abusive.

[Scholar_Andrew]

Okay, now let’s talk about in-game Chat Moderators. 

[Tiltskillet]

@[DE]Ronnie

Thanks for updating this.

Is there anything you can tell us the about team's  philosophy behind merging or moving threads?  Or put something about it in the FAQ?

In the FAQ you talked about contacting Support if we disagree with a Warning.  Who should we contact or how should we make contact if we have a concern  about moderation that isn't tied to a Warning or to a problematic post?

[Numerounius]

6 hours ago, [DE]Ronnie said:

Q: So, what do these ComMods do, precisely?
A: ComMods make sure that the community rules and posting Guidelines are observed. They also move threads into their correct subforums, close discussions that derail, answer first level issues and complaints, rename misleading topics, and warn - when rule violations occur.

Sometimes they move posts around or delete or rename comments that aren't usually warranted. Most of the time I understand why it happens for rule violations or keeping the forums clean.

But there are cases where it just isn't needed and worst of all is that there is no indication that is what has been done leading to my comments that I am awaiting a reply for to be vanished with no trace with no way of restoring it or seeing my post with a different title.

Likewise with merging threads, it has the possibility to stifle someone's idea that they posted about since it is now one comment in a sea of merged comments rather than being its own post talking about how it is feedback that is sometimes only tangently related. This is why there is numerous sub-forums set up so that people can ensure their ideas are being talked about. 

Its okay to do some sprucing here and there to fix rule violations or to prevent the forums from getting out of control but sometimes it just isn't warranted. So just be careful. 

 

Unrelated, another issue I had is when a forum post was removed due to spamming and profanity language. Yet remnants of that post and contents could be seen in the forum. Since I couldn't report the post/user, my next best course of action was to directly message a moderator so that it could get fixed ASAP. Was this the correct course of action or is there another course of action for a way of dealing with something that can't be reported? 

[ultimitloozer]

1 hour ago, Sir_Goreth said:

I find it concerning that, in the event of erroneous or heavy-handed moderation action, attempting to revert or nullify such actions is considered abusive.

You are misconstruing what was said. If you believe moderation was incorrect in their assessment, you can bring it to the attention of Support. Support will investigate and render a decision regarding the complaint. Attempting to change the decision issued by support, not the original actions of moderation, is what is considered abusive. Those are two very different things.

[vanaukas]

Really sad to see the same bad actors in the same charges in the spanish team.

[NightmareT12]

@[DE]Ronnie Noticed Zorro's link is wrong and leads to Member not found, this is the correct one! https://forums.warframe.com/profile/764236-dezorro/

[[DE]Ronnie]

3 hours ago, NightmareT12 said:

@[DE]Ronnie Noticed Zorro's link is wrong and leads to Member not found, this is the correct one! https://forums.warframe.com/profile/764236-dezorro/

Thank  you!

[mycroft_]

@[DE]Ronnie Can we please see more open communication, transparency, and communication from Community Moderators when they take actions that don't amount to a warning? It shouldn't be possible to see comments disappear without a trace, without a hint of why it was removed, without knowing who removed it, or without being notified it's happened. The same is true of thread merges and other actions that amount to less than a warning.

 

On 2022-10-31 at 8:41 AM, [DE]Ronnie said:

ComMods have no "hotline" to the developers.

I've been told in the past that DE relies on ComMods to compile user feedback and major topics of discussion to keep an eye on the forums. That this is a necessary part of the process and the main way DE processes user feedback. The old ComMods FAQ says "If anything, ComMods read all feedback and aggregate reports that are forwarded to DE - more eyes to sift through the myriads of topics. These reports are eventually processed by DE"

Is this not the case?

[KIREEK]

Keep up the good work.
The topic is structured well, separating mods by language altough i do note that some mods are bilingual and can speak english just aswell as their main language.

My sugestion however would be to add a part for the abusive behavior, aka users just using the report funcionality to report topics just for the sake of it, just to add some clarification that you can't just go around mass reporting things left and right.

[mycroft_]

On 2022-10-31 at 10:05 PM, XHADgaming said:

Sometimes they move posts around or delete or rename comments that aren't usually warranted. Most of the time I understand why it happens for rule violations or keeping the forums clean.

But there are cases where it just isn't needed and worst of all is that there is no indication that is what has been done leading to my comments that I am awaiting a reply for to be vanished with no trace with no way of restoring it or seeing my post with a different title.

Likewise with merging threads, it has the possibility to stifle someone's idea that they posted about since it is now one comment in a sea of merged comments rather than being its own post talking about how it is feedback that is sometimes only tangently related.

This is the main thing that still needs to be addressed - transparency, communication, and openness...it shouldn't be possible for comments to just disappear without a trace. There should be something between 'your content has been stuffed in a sack and tossed in a river in the dark of night' and 'you have received a Formal Warning, as punishment, which shall go on your Permanent Record, ultimately leading up to a ban'

They are both pretty extreme in different ways, and a really good moderation system would, most of the time, involve actions somewhere in the middle of those two extremes. But we are left with only those two extremes, which are inappropriate for the vast majority of situations. It's not standard operating procedure to make moderator actions visible in any regard, unless a warning has been issued. That's not great.

It seems like 98.9% of moderation actions are the 'in the dark of night' option. 1% is formal warnings. And 0.1% is clear and open communication about what action is being taken and maybe even why.

Things would be much improved if that were more like 1% 'in the dark of night', 98% clear and open communication, and 1% formal warnings...there are times when it's appropriate to wipe something off the face of the Earth without a trace, but it should be rare, far more rare than what we see today.

On 2022-10-31 at 9:15 PM, Tiltskillet said:

In the FAQ you talked about contacting Support if we disagree with a Warning.  Who should we contact or how should we make contact if we have a concern  about moderation that isn't tied to a Warning or to a problematic post?

I've been advised by @[DE]Dudley to reach out to ZenDesk for this now, even if it's not about a formal warning on your account.

I have one ticket open with them about this kind of thing currently, and will report back on how that goes once it is handled...I opened that 4 days ago and most of my experiences with DE's ZenDesk support involve a 2 week to 2 month response time, so we'll have to wait quite a while for these issues to be addressed, if they are at all. edit: It has been 9 days with no response and counting. What are we supposed to do for prompt action? This is not an adequate way forward when forum discussions can be pushed to the 3rd page or further within the length of time it takes to hear back from someone.

And then there's this problem:

On 2022-10-31 at 9:05 PM, Sir_Goreth said:

I find it concerning that, in the event of erroneous or heavy-handed moderation action, attempting to revert or nullify such actions is considered abusive.

This is extremely concerning, you're right. It sounds like, if ZenDesk decides they aren't touching a topic, talking to anyone else about it is a warnable/bannable offense...even if support were perfect, that would be a really damaging and dangerous way to run the forums.

If you look at it in the most shallow way possible, the choice 'makes sense', from a business perspective, given they're so often short on time, and overwhelmed - but that's precisely the problem. If they ever make the wrong call, or decline to act or review a topic, because they're so short on time, and overwhelmed, we are required to accept that 100% without question, solely to avoid taking more of their time and energy, because they are already so short on time, and so overwhelmed. This 'makes sense' from a business perspective to the degree that it's pathological.

This is, explicitly, a zero-tolerance policy on asking for a review of any given decision.

Nobody's perfect, DE. A zero tolerance policy on questioning even one decision of an individual support agent is not a good idea.

It's not abusive to say "Hey, is this right?" when something seems off.

 

What are we supposed to do when it takes, at minimum, over two weeks to get a response to a ZenDesk ticket?

[[DE]Ronnie]

On 2022-10-31 at 5:15 PM, Tiltskillet said:

@[DE]Ronnie

Thanks for updating this.

Is there anything you can tell us the about team's  philosophy behind merging or moving threads?  Or put something about it in the FAQ?

In the FAQ you talked about contacting Support if we disagree with a Warning.  Who should we contact or how should we make contact if we have a concern  about moderation that isn't tied to a Warning or to a problematic post?

Please contact Support if there is a concern about moderation beyond a Warning or to a problematic post. 
As for our threads, we keep them tidy and are aware that merging them will lose the original post. 

[(XBOX)sinamanthediva]

Thank you @[DE]Ronnie for explaining how the "process" works in simple terms.  I know you and the other Moderators have lives outside of Warframe, so thank you for your efforts to keep the peace and some semblance of decorum here in the Forums.  Generally speaking, I think you all are doing a wonderful job and just wanted to let you know that you are appreciated, as it's easy to forget that you are human too, with feelings and passions. Bottom line is we all have one thing in common, our fondness for Warframe, otherwise we wouldn't be here!

Have a pleasant tomorrow!

[mycroft_]

On 2022-11-22 at 10:49 AM, [DE]Ronnie said:

Please contact Support if there is a concern about moderation beyond a Warning or to a problematic post. 
As for our threads, we keep them tidy and are aware that merging them will lose the original post. 

So there's nothing to share about the philosophy behind merging or moving threads, aside from 'we do it'?

And as far as contacting support goes - it takes over a month to get a response most of the time. Are there any plans to improve this situation?

I'm disappointed not to see responses to any of the other legitimate and important concerns raised in this thread...

[Plat]

On 2022-11-22 at 11:19 PM, [DE]Ronnie said:

Please contact Support if there is a concern about moderation beyond a Warning or to a problematic post. 
As for our threads, we keep them tidy and are aware that merging them will lose the original post. 

why ask to contact support if you're not even gonna at least check the ticket for upto 2 weeks  

I mean hey I would understand but my other tickets are answered within 2-3days max sometimes a week and I can understand
seems like you understaff this section of support on purpose?

[QueenofYandxre]

While this is good to know, it still doesn't change that fact that I feel that I'm always personally targeted by the mods. And, given a warning point for simply defending myself against someone who I consider was very rude toward myself.  
I'd open a ticket to Support about the warning I got recently, but I know the end result would not end in my favor. It never does for anything like this.
And, I'm sorry, but I can't always be "friendly" and "happy" on a public forum, gaming or not. It doesn't work that way and you all know that.  I'm gonna disagree and defend myself against someone else. No matter how many warning points you give me. I may have only gotten two so far, but I will do what I feel is right to protect myself.
What really gets me, is that I've seen people most much worst on here, then what I have. Yet they don't get punished for it, only I do. Hence why I feel like I'm always targeted by the mods. What a joke.
 

[DeeDeeLyla]

On 2022-11-26 at 9:37 AM, Plat said:

seems like you understaff this section of support on purpose?

I really, really hope that's NOT the case, but... any such revelation(s) on social media regarding this department - and possibly others - would certainly explain a lot

[SpicyDinosaur]

22 hours ago, QueenofYandxre said:

While this is good to know, it still doesn't change that fact that I feel that I'm always personally targeted by the mods. And, given a warning point for simply defending myself against someone who I consider was very rude toward myself.  
I'd open a ticket to Support about the warning I got recently, but I know the end result would not end in my favor. It never does for anything like this.
And, I'm sorry, but I can't always be "friendly" and "happy" on a public forum, gaming or not. It doesn't work that way and you all know that.  I'm gonna disagree and defend myself against someone else. No matter how many warning points you give me. I may have only gotten two so far, but I will do what I feel is right to protect myself.
What really gets me, is that I've seen people most much worst on here, then what I have. Yet they don't get punished for it, only I do. Hence why I feel like I'm always targeted by the mods. What a joke.
 

Okay, I don't like defending the forum mods as I have no fondness for them, but you have no idea who they do and don't warn, and they are bound to miss some things. If it's concerning to you, you can always report it to them.

 

I used to get warned twice a year, my warnings would wear off and I would almost immediately get warned again. One year it was three, you get a temp ban at that point and I think the next one is perma. I haven't been warned in a good while *knock on wood* but it's their forum, so they can warn you if they see fit, and while you can appeal it with support, I think that's worked maybe once for me, and I've had mods change the content of my messages with no indication in the message that it was not my words. (tbf I didn't appeal to support about that, and regret it.)

 

You aren't by default targeted but if you become a problem case then, yea, they might pay closer attention to your posts. That's human nature. It's not personal, though. The forum mods care less about who is right or wrong, even in severe cases, and more about who is causing the "drama." It sucks, but it's the nature of the beast.

 

If you can't defend yourself with civility, then expect to eventually be banned, or take the high road and block the offenders and don't look at their posts, especially if you think they are talking to you.

[mycroft_]

On 2022-11-27 at 10:15 PM, SpicyDinosaur said:

If it's concerning to you, you can always report it to them.

They don't respond (:

And most moderator actions are hidden, secret, you aren't informed of who has deleted your comment or improperly merged your thread.

 

 

On 2022-11-27 at 10:15 PM, SpicyDinosaur said:

I've had mods change the content of my messages with no indication in the message that it was not my words.

Exactly - so you've seen it.

That is really bad.
 

 

On 2022-11-26 at 5:37 PM, Plat said:

why ask to contact support if you're not even gonna at least check the ticket for upto 2 weeks 

Exactly. Mine has been open for over a month now, with no response. And based on past communication I wouldn't be surprised if it never gets one. But it's the only option now.
 

 

When a thread is deleted, a message is shown to 'Contact Us' which opens a new message to the @[DE]Community mailbox.

This mailbox is unattended and ignored.

Who can we contact, who will actually respond, about these issues? ZenDesk hasn't addressed my ticket in a month and a half.