Players hogging/gatekeeping pubs and endlessly resetting

[Atkvin]

Hi, this was something that I ran into last night and just rubbed me the wrong way.

There were 3 players sitting in two different Singapore public servers hosted by Klei, endlessly resetting the world and abusing votekick to kick anyone else trying to join.

Here I actually managed to login quickly enough to catch a chatlog before being kicked again - they are talking about resetting the world in the chat, explaining why both servers are always on day 1 as a result, and dispelling the assumption someone just put bots on the server.

 

My friend suggested they're probably refreshing the world repeatedly to find an optimal worldgen seed. I'm very much aware public servers are free reign and it's foolish to ask Klei to monitor griefers in normal play. But.. this is just another level of ridiculously trollish/inconsiderate action.

Why the heck are they squatting up not just one, but TWO *PUBLIC* servers to do that?? Just for good ping? Why wouldn't you do that on your own private servers, rather than gatekeep others that want to play on local servers with good ping and with randoms? It's so baffling and frustrating!

I just hope something can be done about this. I was able to play on a European pub server after (and got some unfair hits by pigmen and spiders with the ping) - but that players are abusing public server systems to do this (and hardly actually playing the game) is just really upsetting. Absolutely nothing seems to be stopping them from squatting in those servers as long as they want.

[Gashzer]

The whole voting system needs removed from klei server altogether... its too easily abused by groups of friends for stuff like this.

Ill rather a base-burner griefer than this sort of server-control griefing anyday!

[Cheggf]

In my experience the vast majority of the votekicks passed are genuine, and it is rather uncommon for something like this to happen. If it bothers you so much I'd recommend taking your own advice and joining moderated servers.

[Gi-Go]

12 hours ago, Gashzer said:

The whole voting system needs removed from klei server altogether... its too easily abused by groups of friends for stuff like this.

Ill rather a base-burner griefer than this sort of server-control griefing anyday!

That's exsactly what grifers are waiting for. 

[Gashzer]

23 minutes ago, Gi-Go said:

That's exsactly what grifers are waiting for. 

What is the worst a lone griefer can do? Burn my base? Big woop! I'll just rebuild.  Klei has been making it so almost everything is renewable anyway. However a group of people can force you out of the server completely or start false votes that other randomers just go along with, without questioning it.

The appeal of klei servers is the lack of someone owning it.... its truely a free server for everyone however in its current state, a group of people can effectively own it if they have voting control.

Removing the voting system will ensure it is properly free. If klei finishes off making absolutely everything renewable in some way (fossils, beefalos etc...) then base-burner griefers cant cause any permanent damage. 

[mr. brj]

13 hours ago, Gashzer said:

The whole voting system needs removed from klei server altogether... its too easily abused by groups of friends for stuff like this.

Instead I would suggest removing the ability to spam votes. Give the public voting a cooldown that is 1) connected to the player's account and 2) separated by the host player's account so that regenerating worlds don't reset the cooldown timer, but visiting worlds hosted by others have separate timers. I'm not entirely sure if the second suggestion is abusable though, but it also prevents an individual host's mulltiple servers (for example, Klei official servers) from getting held hostage.

[Gi-Go]

34 minutes ago, Gashzer said:

What is the worst a lone griefer can do?

Not that I'm a grifer or anything, but... 

[Cheggf]

39 minutes ago, Gashzer said:

What is the worst a lone griefer can do?

Trap every touchstone to be unusable, run around killing every player, collecting every LGA that drops. Now no one can play at all.

[nimzowitsch10]

Good luck trying to make klei do anything for their servers. I've tried pretty diligently the past year and it's clear they give zero craps about anything the community has to say about their public servers. Don't even waste your effort making these types of posts, they will not fix or change anything/.

 

I've since then moved on to other communities that host their own public servers in a much better fashion. I still will miss playing on the klei servers because that's about 90 percent of my 3k hours on DST.

[dois raios]

you can call your friends and kick those people.

(or at least make them fail the attempt to kick you)

[Captain_Rage]

Any countermeasure against griefers can be abused the other way. Even moderated servers. Framing or causing sedition will always be possible. Simply play with people you know and trust. It has been the premise since day one.

Public servers can be great for making friends but don't expect your in-game progress to last.

[MondayNight]

Correct me if I'm wrong, OP, but since quite some time now I believe no-one is able to start a world regen vote without prior playing for 20 in-game days. You're saying they play 20 days (2.6h irl) - the trio mentioned - then they restart, play another 20 days, bis, a.s.o.? I reckon they got bigger problems than being labeled griefers or whatnot.

[Cloakingsumo198]

Can't you just use another pub?

[Waynel]

If Klei tackles public server gatekeeping they are bound to do the same with griefing, trolling, etc.

[dois raios]

54 minutes ago, Waynel said:

If Klei tackles public server gatekeeping they are bound to do the same with griefing, trolling, etc.

I dont want admins or anything in klei pub servers, I only want endless servers again ;-;

We can solve this specific problem easily, just get into a discord, call some people, then mass enter the server with those people and now they cant kick you anymore.

And there is no problem regenerating klei endless servers neither griefing, it is a very important part of the experience.

[00petar00]

It is kind of sad how people believe that nothing can be done. While I am not trying to put pressure on klei I've hosted many different game servers in the past to know that it is nowhere near impossible for them to get a group of forum members to manage their servers.

No one should be asking for klei developers to actually take their work time and manage a server when they can be doing more productive game development but I don't see why it would be a bad idea to have someone active in the community be picked to manage server/s and get volunteers as staff, install wolly logger mod at the least and give access to them to view logs and keep everything else the same.

Proper hierarchy for reporting situations that happen on the server and the ability for developers to be contacted if managers go rogue which is really not likely to happen if decent community members are picked.

There should be quite a few of DST players that frequently visit forums/discord and would be willing to play on klei servers if there was moderation including me.

There's no way it can get any worse compared to what it is now if what i just said is implemented.

[Cheggf]

1 hour ago, 00petar00 said:

It is kind of sad how people believe that nothing can be done. While I am not trying to put pressure on klei I've hosted many different game servers in the past to know that it is nowhere near impossible for them to get a group of forum members to manage their servers.

No one should be asking for klei developers to actually take their work time and manage a server when they can be doing more productive game development but I don't see why it would be a bad idea to have someone active in the community be picked to manage server/s and get volunteers as staff, install wolly logger mod at the least and give access to them to view logs and keep everything else the same.

Proper hierarchy for reporting situations that happen on the server and the ability for developers to be contacted if managers go rogue which is really not likely to happen if decent community members are picked.

There should be quite a few of DST players that frequently visit forums/discord and would be willing to play on klei servers if there was moderation including me.

There's no way it can get any worse compared to what it is now if what i just said is implemented.

What you are asking for literally already exists. Community moderated servers are community servers. If you're paranoid about griefing and would rather have an anonymous community member moderate the server you play on you have that choice. If you don't care about long term public worlds and just want to play the game you have that choice. I see no benefit to taking away choice.

[00petar00]

1 hour ago, Cheggf said:

What you are asking for literally already exists. Community moderated servers are community servers. If you're paranoid about griefing and would rather have an anonymous community member moderate the server you play on you have that choice. If you don't care about long term public worlds and just want to play the game you have that choice. I see no benefit to taking away choice.

That's where i have been playing for the last few years when i don't play alone but the difference is that you can only put so much trust in server, especially when you are looking for one that you don't know people on.

Why are you against moderation on klei servers? It would just be a benefit, what i am saying is basically that there would be no other changes and servers would function the same, there would just be an option of getting rid of griefers but it would need to be 100% confirmed.

What choice are we taking away? Slowly griefers would be removed and it can only improve the experience for regular players and there would be more trust in the community. I don't think you have as much experience playing on moderated servers if you think that something drastic will happen with how people currently play on them.

[Gi-Go]

10 minutes ago, 00petar00 said:

That's where i have been playing for the last few years when i don't play alone but the difference is that you can only put so much trust in server, especially when you are looking for one that you don't know people on.

Why are you against moderation on klei servers? It would just be a benefit, what i am saying is basically that there would be no other changes and servers would function the same, there would just be an option of getting rid of griefers but it would need to be 100% confirmed.

What choice are we taking away? Slowly griefers would be removed and it can only improve the experience for regular players and there would be more trust in the community. I don't think you have as much experience playing on moderated servers if you think that something drastic will happen with how people currently play on them.

What would moderators even do? Ban griefers from the game that they payed for? Who is gonna moderate moderators? Who is gonna pay them? Who is going to be moderator? 

[KeshS]

5 minutes ago, Gi-Go said:

Who is gonna pay them?

Doesn't know that they do it for free.

Besides if that like ever becomes a thing, it's a headache for the Klei management and they will sort things out on their own.

[00petar00]

20 minutes ago, Gi-Go said:

What would moderators even do? Ban griefers from the game that they payed for? Who is gonna moderate moderators? Who is gonna pay them? Who is going to be moderator? 

Have you never heard of volunteers? People do a lot of things for free, why would it be so strange to see it here?

What is wrong with banning griefers from official servers if they intentionally, 100% griefed? They aren't going to be banned from playing the game, just from official klei servers. Also do note that thre would be progression system in place and not everything would result in a ban on the first offense.

Obviously there would be appeals and all logs would be saved so staff can't abuse this and get people they dislike banned.

There would be chain of staff like in any discord or most other games that have multiplayer community servers. If you report a staff member it goes to the next ranking staff group to deal with it and at the top is klei. While i did say that we don't want klei to manage this, they would be there just as a warning and to replace the highest ranking staff members in case they cause intentional problems which shouldn't happen.

If this is set up correctly like i've seen before, it would take years at the minimum for any issue big enough to pop up that klei needs to be contacted and there is also a possibility that it would never need to go that far that they need to be involved.

[Gi-Go]

1 hour ago, KeshS said:

Doesn't know that they do it for free.

Never understood why anyone would want to be moderator for free. 

[Gashzer]

2 hours ago, 00petar00 said:

Have you never heard of volunteers? People do a lot of things for free, why would it be so strange to see it here?

What is wrong with banning griefers from official servers if they intentionally, 100% griefed? They aren't going to be banned from playing the game, just from official klei servers. Also do note that thre would be progression system in place and not everything would result in a ban on the first offense.

Obviously there would be appeals and all logs would be saved so staff can't abuse this and get people they dislike banned.

There would be chain of staff like in any discord or most other games that have multiplayer community servers. If you report a staff member it goes to the next ranking staff group to deal with it and at the top is klei. While i did say that we don't want klei to manage this, they would be there just as a warning and to replace the highest ranking staff members in case they cause intentional problems which shouldn't happen.

If this is set up correctly like i've seen before, it would take years at the minimum for any issue big enough to pop up that klei needs to be contacted and there is also a possibility that it would never need to go that far that they need to be involved.

Nah people can't be trusted to moderate.... people are bias so it would cause far more issues than it would solve.

Plus Klei isn't even officially against base burners or griefing in general, could be a valid intended playstyle for all we know?

Klei doesn't want to waste time or resources to any sort of server moderation, only the bare minimum server maintenance. If they slapped on wilderness mode an PVP then people atleast could fight back but Klei deleted my posts talking about this.

So clearly they don't want DST to be full pvp.

Klei are happy to watch us argue about it on the forums 

 

 

[MondayNight]

5 hours ago, Gi-Go said:

Never understood why anyone would want to be moderator for free. 

Charity and/or "online community prestige" among others.

 

4 hours ago, Gashzer said:

Nah people can't be trusted to moderate.... people are bias so it would cause far more issues than it would solve.

Plus Klei isn't even officially against base burners or griefing in general, could be a valid intended playstyle for all we know?

Klei doesn't want to waste time or resources to any sort of server moderation, only the bare minimum server maintenance. If they slapped on wilderness mode an PVP then people atleast could fight back but Klei deleted my posts talking about this.

So clearly they don't want DST to be full pvp.

Klei are happy to watch us argue about it on the forums 

Community servers are moderated for years now and I for one confirmed no major incident. Probably opposed to "common belief", most moderators I've seen were pretty impartial and, dare I say, quite fair. There were, indeed, recurrent trouble-makers (aka what one would call "softcore trolls") that tried to paint certain moderators as biased because said trouble-makers seemed to like steering things up for lulz or personal agendas/vendettas, including the ones with "griefing in general, could be a valid intended playstyle" as argument even if respective communities stated clearly griefing in any form (exemplified) isn't tolerated at all - but I guess "trolls gotta troll" no matter what. Furthermore, PvP servers have almost no popularity/traction in DST (search for the handful of dedicated ones in existence and how they are in overwhelming majority of times empty plus don't progress, even Endless ones, past 1st Winter); and if, by a dark & fetid miracle, a KLei pub would sport such option (PvP on), be sure a group of trolls will camp gate at launch and spawn-kill everyone incoming (virtually all PvP servers I've visited in distant past had this occurrence happening all the while). Yes, seemingly (and this pretty much bares witness to the claim) griefing (burning/hammering) is allowed and considered valid play-style from KLei's pov in their pubs, or at least was considered as such when DST launched (when game leaned a lot more into its "uncompromising" Survival side, as opposed to the more-relaxed Sandbox faced favored now) - but apparent highly disruptive troll behavior like the one OP underlined would call for KLei's attention, since it pretty much invalidates the purpose of their pubs: to function in basic capacity.

[Gashzer]

1 hour ago, x0-VERSUS-1y said:

Charity and/or "online community prestige" among others.

 

Community servers are moderated for years now and I for one confirmed no major incident. Probably opposed to "common belief", most moderators I've seen were pretty impartial and, dare I say, quite fair. There were, indeed, recurrent trouble-makers (aka what one would call "softcore trolls") that tried to paint certain moderators as biased because said trouble-makers seemed to like steering things up for lulz or personal agendas/vendettas, including the ones with "griefing in general, could be a valid intended playstyle" as argument even if respective communities stated clearly griefing in any form (exemplified) isn't tolerated at all - but I guess "trolls gotta troll" no matter what. Furthermore, PvP servers have almost no popularity/traction in DST (search for the handful of dedicated ones in existence and how they are in overwhelming majority of times empty plus don't progress, even Endless ones, past 1st Winter); and if, by a dark & fetid miracle, a KLei pub would sport such option (PvP on), be sure a group of trolls will camp gate at launch and spawn-kill everyone incoming (virtually all PvP servers I've visited in distant past had this occurrence happening all the while). Yes, seemingly (and this pretty much bares witness to the claim) griefing (burning/hammering) is allowed and considered valid play-style from KLei's pov in their pubs, or at least was considered as such when DST launched (when game leaned a lot more into its "uncompromising" Survival side, as opposed to the more-relaxed Sandbox faced favored now) - but apparent highly disruptive troll behavior like the one OP underlined would call for KLei's attention, since it pretty much invalidates the purpose of their pubs: to function in basic capacity.

Wilderness mode, as i mentioned to switch the klei servers to, prevents spawn camping, you randomly spawn anywhere on the map everytime you die and you get a new character to boot. Meaning repeatly dying isn't a massive deal.

Yeah private dedicated servers are moderated fine to your standards of play were everyone has to work together and the rules are clearly set.

As you said, Klei has not set any rules at all for their servers and that anarchy is the appeal of Klei servers... true freedom from admins or rules or anyone having control.

I 100% agree if you want a long-lasting serious coop world were everyone holds hands and no one griefs, join a community/community server! Thats what i do as well.

However i personally don't want that for Klei servers... give us the anarchy, give us the true "uncompromising survival" experience back, for the klei servers. Stay true to the roots of DST.

I believe if Klei gave their stamp of approval on a PVP enabled, wilderness mode world, no voting system either, that resets after 500days (my ideal klei server)... people would 100% play it... not everyone would rush to grief instantly, some people would team up and you could actually kill griefers allowing you to defend yourself... would be great!