Beyond Irritating - A Vicious Pick-Up Group

This thread (and others like it) have prompted me to post a proposed solution at the Sardelac Sanitarium:

Dispute Resolution via Splitting Instances


...

I recently had a pick-up group where 7 of the 8 players were fantastic. The eighth person, however, was there to spoil the group. Very smart person, skilled, yet, for some reason had a "death" wish on the group. I was not the 'leader' in this pick-up group (playing a lowly mesmer, it is hard to attract a PUG) so I didn't pick the fella, but here is the story:

First, let me clear, that we had agreed _many_ times that we were
NOT going to run a Signet Capture, and that we were just going
to do the mission.

Everything was going great, till the person X, decided that he wanted to go way-off the path to capture his signet. Well, the group didn't agree. And he split off to do his own thing (cursing as he went). All was slient for a time - he was a good survivor, you'd see his bars going up and down, but never below 50% -- and then we got the threat:

IF YOU DON'T HELP ME CAPTURE, I WILL MAKE YOU ALL LOSE

He was serious, too. He followed up on his promise, as our health bars were going down, he brought in 3-4 extra hydra from _very_ far off. After engaging the hydra, he sprinted away leaving us to kill them. Then he said:

YOU ARE GOING TO HELP ME GET MY CAPTURE - WILLING OR NOT.

And then came the next set of Hydra. And the next set. And finally, he got his wish. He got his capture. Then what did he do?

SINCE YOU WOULD NOT HELP ME, I'M NOW GOING TO RUIN THE MISSION

He then aggroed everything in sight and brought them all back to us. He won. He got his signet, and we failed the mission, his quote:

YOU ALL SUCK - BYE

Did you take plenty of screens? If I'm not mistaken, griefing is against the EULA, and he could be banned for assholeism.

What I would have done is just sent a tell to each member of the group. Then all agree to map travel to the same zone and leave him out there all alone.

Geez, what a git. Especially as you had agreed not to capture.

I would have done what Skawtt said, as soon as he decided to go his own way.
This is a lesson for us all.


P.S. NAME AND SHAME!

Stuff <---(insert colorful cuss words here) happens. That does bite..been there myself, but then again that's the nature of MMO's. If everything went according to plan life would be boring

That is why I am all for a party "kick" system.

Mapping back is no problem early, but when your deep into the mission it's not fair for the group to be held hostage by one buffoon.

I very much think this is a good idea. More party control should be granted to the party leader. He/She is after all, the de facto leader.

And if the asshole is the group leader? IE, just about to complete a mission, when he punts people one by one back to town, so only he gets the win. This WOULD happen, im pretty sure.

At the end of the day you could of all left and restarted, a bit of a pain but better than a) playing with an idiot, b) having the mission screwed up because of said idiot.

how about a vote to kick. Someone can only be kicked with half the group votes to kick the idiot. Obviously with a 2 man party this wouldn't work, but with anything bigger it should.

make it a votingt system to kick players.

f.ex the leader initiates a kick vote. a 75% majority is need so 6 more people need to vote and he gets kicked. Would make it so the leader couldnt grief and also gives the option to get rid of people that the team doesnt like

i'm normally against public crucifixion....
but i might just make an exception in this case. This is such a display of bad play, that i still have a hard time believing it....

A kicking system should be implemented indeed. i see people trying to lift missions by joining and then just standing afk like an idiot. but that's not even as worse as this.

I agree, there are so many people who will call out "AFK" and then magically return just before you finish, leeching all your gold and time, as well as getting a free mission. There should definitely be an option to kick, with a simple majority or 75% or whatever.

Wow Ix Chel - I had the same sort of thing happen yesterday - granted, in a less important area - was taking my newest PvE toon through the first mission (Wall) and the guy who got the first piece of Kilnn Testbrie's (sp?) armour tries extorting us, explaining that we can't get the bonus without him and we have to pay him to do it. I told him that he was lucky that he was along at all and to smarten up, that we could complete the mission without him easily and that we can come back for the bonus if we need it. Little prats. Extortion in the game is more than annoying.

While such behavior is disgusting, what I don't understand is why you all didn't run away? Mobs will only aggro so far before going back to their area, so he could have tried to bring mobs onto you, but if you're not there...

Still, people like this just destroy internet gaming...

Creston

I have had a different experience. Doing the Galrath Quest yesterday, which took my 5.5 hours mind you, there were several times where those bloody forest minators and swamp leech thingy, (I forget their name) would chase me everywhere and not stop and go back, they were like the energizer bunny just kept going and going and going....

As for bad-arse group members, I agree with a party boot vote system. One similar to the cut scene skip vote would be nice. "1 of 6 members chooses to skip this cut scene” well "4 of 6 members wish to expel 'user's name' from the party"

Well if it was like the cut scene thing it wouldn't work. But in all seriousness... yes a boot/kick system is sorely needed.

Yep, he won alright. He got his little power trip and his skill capped, but he's probably a worser person for it. Just let him think that he's won, since assholes like that don't need your help.

Would be an idea to report him, but playing games online isn't as fun without 'characters' like those, and banning these kinds of people make them feel even more convinced about whatever it is they feel about themselves instead of making them learn.

Instead of kicking, how about
Dispute Resolution via Splitting Instances

You poor thing you, yes report him so arenanet can terminate yet another persons 50 dollar account. Too bad you can't report people for being morons by rushing in and agroing a ton of monsters, Like i've wanted to do since the first day of retail... In fact I think i'll go do thunderhead right now, and then come back half way through from being AFK and just aggro a bunch of monsters because there's no credible screenshot factor.

Some mobs will not stop pursuing. Doesn't matter even if they're well out of your circle of influence, they will keep on chasing until you exit the region.

Everyone has their stories of grief. Just a few nights ago I took my ascended warrior to Riverside looking to complete the bonus. Finally I joined a bonus party and after well over an hour of bashing through enemies, one guy, who refused to drop the scepter no matter how many Times he was killed and told to drop the scepter to avoid being targetted, finally showed his true intentions.

When we finally got to the last two towers, him and his ascended "friend" took off running with the staff and exited the mission before we could finish the last two towers and get the bonus. Had I taken a moment of thought longer I would have realized what this guy was doing, constantly insisting on taking the scepter no matter what, and I really kick myself for that.

The remaining four of us were shocked by such a disgusting display and eventually we all went back and did the bonus run again and got it. This Time we made sure we didn't even go for the scepter until bonus was complete.