a neophyte's experience with a troll

Ignoring is still the most effective. Booting encourages alternate identities, etc. After a while the troll will starve and leave.

Demotion of status is fine and identifies the troll more clearly to everyone.

And yes, this was the first troll.

Or throw them to the sharks.. Plenty down here in the better hemishpere and I'm sure G.R.O.S.S. can round up a few as well.

But what about the profanity? It's just sitting there. Don't get me wrong, my potty mouth can be fierce, but I don't share it on any boards. It's a common internet understanding that profanity will be stricken from public boards, right? It's like bad advertising for galciv.com.

The small droid seemed to appear out of nowhere, as droids are often ignored and blend into the backround. This droid came to KitWarrior's attention as it suddenly stopped in front of him, quickly scanned is visual characteristics and spoke in cold metallic tones.
"Identify: KitWarrior of the Gross empire. Is this correct?"
"Yes, I'm KitWarrior"
"You have a message from the Repulic"
The droid then projected a holographic image of of male, Terran species, and replayed the recorded message:

"Thank you, KitWarrior, for your warning on another subspace channel for the dark troll force entering our sector. I suspected as much when he went so totally off topic just to complain about a game feature that has been covered before. I wanted to be polite to him just in case he was a Jar-Jar head or something. Take care. Too bad you're in G.R.O.S.S, your instincts would serve you well in service of the Force. Take care. LifeWish out"
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Troll. Ah, yes that little conception that the great "veterans" have imposed upon the Vasueden. What exactly does troll mean? Mischievious? Most likely. Cruel intent? Definitly not. I come from the world of StarCraft and Warcraft 3. Now, on their online sessions people are always insulting each other's mothers, making fun of a clan or race, and busting each other's jaw. But this is all in the intent of having fun. Now isn't that what a game is all about? It is good to see some people creating cyber empires and running metaverse civilizations but they must be able to tolerate and understand that there are other cyber worlds out there, and many with people much different than you and I. If I don't know something or understand something it is because I have not yet interpreted the world of galactic civilizations, my intensions never were to stir up trouble in this paradise you have created. As for the profanity, what I said is nothing compared to the things they say in Blizzard Online, but now that I know that your people will take offence I could now consider what is appropiate for galciv's. The time will come when I am fully aware of the potential of galciv's
-It is likely that you will see me as the emperor of a great new empire in late september 2003 to early December 2003.
I wish you all good luck in your coming epic battles and events that await you and hope that you will not continue this vendetta.
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Sharks recaged..

Vasueden, I will break the cone of silence to give you some friendly advice: on forums, you do the time before you commit the crime. You busted in here and expected us to be like a lot of other places. Wrong. We are unique. We do not adapt to your whims based upon your expectations. You adapt to our expectations. And if you are meant to be next uber-gamer on the Metaverse, then come on, show us what you are made of. You earn respect on the Metaverse one game at a time. You earn respect on the forum one post at a time. The difference here is your initial attitude. Punks get owned here, not us being the victims of punks. If you cannot hack it here, then go back from whence you came, where profanity and ill manners rule the day.

Well said, Gerakken.

Show us that you don't deserve to be treated like a troll in this forum, Vasueden. You will find us to be very reasonable people.

I hang around in Medieval total war boards a lot. I think the caracteristics of the game mark the expected behaviour of its members. Take Europa Universalis 2 for example. I would be ridiculous to go trolling intheir boards. People are just so educated and polite...

But take Warcraft3 for example. Their community is 50% Troll (young trolls) at least. They do have a severe social disability to communicate without insults. Who are you supposed to impress by insulting/flamming other people? Swearing is Ok if you don't overdue it and don't aim it at other people...

Bottom line, each game has the community it deserves. In Galciv you are managing an empire in almost chess like manner, not trying to kill your opponents without thought (like in W3 or AoK). First you think who to kill, how to do it, then strike with class. LOL

Nuno nice words. Yea I admit it once and awhile some profanity comes out, but who here can say they havent had that. Its when you constantly abuse people that makes it wrong. We are just people who want to enjoy a great game and have some fun. Trolls are not welcomed here.

Vasueden has been Exiled by the Moderator.

Bobo big happy.

In my experience, it is not a common internet understanding that public forums will strike profanity. Most corporate forums will choose to do so, but you should not expect that public forums in general will do it.

Anyway, would you rather have Frogboy spending his time hunting down swear words on the forum, or working on the expansion? I know which one I'd pick, especially since this community is doing a fine job of regulating itself.
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I don't expect Frogboy to hunt for anything. Aren't we all his servants? LOL I just figured with all this "high-tech" stuff they could automatically catch profanity. But it's gone and... what are the chances Frogboy had to get involved?

Frogboy didn't have to hunt. The troll was fed to him.

But yes, it was Frogboy.

What is this? A one man show? :notsure: There must be other folks we can nag. Ain't there?

So we regulate our own community. That's cool. We regulate by calling attention to the problems. Well that's half of the solution, but I just feel kinda guilty if we keep going to the same person to bring on the lightning. That's all.

No need to feel guilty, Kit. When "Call Lightning" was cast, no particular deity was called upon.

Frogboy was the one who responded.

There are all kinds of ways around swearing filters. Substitute an ! for the i, for example, and you can make a very obvious reference to excrement without triggering the filter. You can block something like that too, but ultimately someone who wants to be offensive will find a way around any automated system.

You don't even have to swear to be offensive

True, but as is with all humans, one may be declined to react to counter what might or might not be an offense, depending on they're level of understanding.

Yes, this is how the Torians often view me:
" Oh look, darling, the Terrans are invading our home planet"
"Yes, dear, but they are conducting themselves so professionally and with so much more class than when the the Drengin did it!"

And when this happens [cough], but the troll appears to be behaving, we act as "very reasonable people", correct? I feel like I'm asking my grandfather questions. :notsure: LOL

Yes, we do. I'm of the view that trolling is a behaviour rather than an identity.

So Vasueden, you know what to do this time round.

My nifty True Seeing spell has revealed much to me.