Dancer Archive
Thread: So where is all the /denyservice abuse???
"I use it only during war though, I won't heal anyone overtly rebel or spewing rebel rehtoric while I allow my Imperial brothers and sisters a quick heal. "
There's nothing wrong in doing that. That's a good way of roleplaying, and no one should have a problem with it. It's certainly not abuse.
I use it all the time. If you pull out your stupid pet in the cantina, you get /denied. If you rush off after being healed, without either a tip or a thank you, you get /denied. I don't have to listen to them complain, because they're usually /ignored at the same time.
I'm tired of passively submitting to inconsiderate and rude players.
Beery wrote:
But according to the naysayers, this was going to be a feature that would be exploited to extort tips on a regular basis. By now, we weresupposed tohave a mafia of evil entertainers denying everyonemind healsuntil they got paid. It's been a few weeks now, and I just don't see the 'Cosa Entertaina' muscling in on the game andrunning extortion rackets. The folks who argued vociferouslyagainst this feature should come out and admit they were wrong.
First of all, you don't have ANY data to prove that it hasn't been abused --just as no one hasdata to prove otherwise. But either way, how can you make the assertion that it hasn't been happening? Have you interviewed all 300,000 players on all the servers to get a feel for the facts?
Second point, nobody ever claimed that there would be a "mafia of evil entertainers" -- you're overstating by quite a bit. What we (that includes me) were concerned about was the potential for griefing and abuse by denying service until someone is forced to tip. That potential is real and it still exists. The main reason there hasn't been a massive outcry over abuse is because 75% of the entertainers in cantinas aren't even at their keyboards.
"how can you make the assertion that it hasn't been happening? Have you interviewed all 300,000 players on all the servers to get a feel for the facts?"
My point is not that it has never happened (as I think you well know - or you should if you had read my messages). My point is that there has not been widespread abuse of the kind that the fearmongers were claiming would happen. Let's not start creating straw men here.
"You indicate you would like a logical discussion, but that was just what we did."
By 'we' I assume you mean all of the naysayers. If that's so, then no - you're wrong. The example I gavein the first post herewas almost a direct quote. That example was not logical. It was inspired by paranoia driven by fear of the unknown. To claim that such rationales are 'logical' is to rationalise what was in effect, a witch hunt.
Beery wrote:
My point is not that it has never happened (as I think you well know - or you should if you had read my messages). My point is that there has not been widespread abuse of the kind that the fearmongers were claiming would happen. Let's not start creating straw men here.
That's not my strawman, Beery. It's yours when you claim there were predictions of "widespread" abuse. Now, maybe you can name names so we know who exactly you're talking about, because I've been against /denyservice and all I've ever claimed was that it was just a loophole for extortion, nothing more. And that it is, and still remains.
"23.78% of all statistics are made up on the spot." -- Anonymous
Like just about everything else in this Drama Queen's fantasy of a message board. You're making mountains out of durni warrens. AFK'ers aren't _that_ bad. /denyservice isn't _that_ likely to be abused.
Seek the middle path: People who rant with extreme opinions look like lunatics to outsiders.
The people who took a moderate view: /denyservice might be abused, but probably won't be. Were right. Next time the debate comes about, try the moderate path yourself. Don't be so terrified to try new things.
You'll never get anything changed with your profession if you balk at every suggestion and refuse to compromise.
JohnReed wrote:
"75% of the entertainers in cantinas aren't even at their keyboards" -- Sinda
"23.78% of all statistics are made up on the spot." -- Anonymous
Like just about everything else in this Drama Queen's fantasy of a message board. You're making mountains out of durni warrens. AFK'ers aren't _that_ bad. /denyservice isn't _that_ likely to be abused.
If you want to make a point, I suggest you avoid condescension and dismissal. If you want reasonable responses, it's a requirement.
I don't know whether you are an entertainer or whether you frequent cantinas because you didn't say - but I DO, both as a dancer and as my alt, a scout. What I've seen tells me that 75% just may be right - and perhaps even conservative. I've seen groups of 10 entertainers in Theed where only one of them were really at the keyboard. I've seen groups in Mos Eisley where every single one of them was AFK! My statistics may not have any scientific sampling method behind them, and I acknowledged that, but they ARE based on my own observations, so there goes your "Drama Queen's Fantasy" theory, bucko.
Seek the middle path: People who rant with extreme opinions look like lunatics to outsiders.
Some of us here have strong opinions. It's part of our prerogative to express those opinions. Don't like it? Take your sermon elsewhere.
The people who took a moderate view: /denyservice might be abused, but probably won't be. Were right. Next time the debate comes about, try the moderate path yourself. Don't be so terrified to try new things.
And I will suggest that you take a Statistics 101 course to understand what I told Beery: The fact is, it HAS been abused. Was it a major problem? We don't have data to say one way or the other, contrary to Beery's assertions. Second, what the h*** does "trying new things" have to do with a debate over abusing a game feature?
You'll never get anything changed with your profession if you balk at every suggestion and refuse to compromise.
I don't know about anyone else, but I'm very grateful that John just decided to drop by and provide us with his pearls of wisdom. We should all genuflect in gratitude for the time it took him to type out his message. Then maybe we canmove along and discuss something that actually matters.
/sarcasm off
Beery wrote:My point is that we need to give proposals the benefit of the doubt, rather than rushing to judgment.
< snip >
That is knee-jerk reaction,regressive thinking, and based purelyon fear, rather than logic.
While you are right that rushing to snap judgments is never a good thing, I am not at all convinced that anyone did that in this case. You indicate you would like a logical discussion, but that was just what we did.
I, at least, used logic.
- I looked at evidence. This is inductive logic. The evidence included (but was not limited to... I will be brief in the interest of saving space):
- "Entertainers Strike on Naritus" is a great example of evidence. People weren't giving them the money they wanted in tips, so they did their own workaround version of Deny Service and went on strike. This had very bad repercussions on my server. It can be thought of as a small experiment on what deny service might have meant.
- Numerous posts on this forum saying, "I wish I could deny service unless I got tipped." From the frequency it looked as if a sizeable chunk (though NOT the majority) of dancers and musicians would use it for essentially "extortion." Note I put quotes around it because charging for services really isn't extortion, but we all know that the combat types would have thought of it that way. They already think just having to GO into the cantina is almost extortion.
- People in-game (who I frankly haven't seen in a long time) making similar threats and wishes about denial of service and wanting the command to "force tips."
- "Entertainers Strike on Naritus" is a great example of evidence. People weren't giving them the money they wanted in tips, so they did their own workaround version of Deny Service and went on strike. This had very bad repercussions on my server. It can be thought of as a small experiment on what deny service might have meant.
- I thought about actions, consequences, and human behavior. This was deductive logic.
- People who are stingy tend to hate having money squeezed out of them and resent people who do so. Deny service for tips thus is likely to make the stingy types angrier. So you get some more money out of them but they hate you even more and will do everything they can to undermine you.
- Generous people who have been kind and giving tend to feel (justifiably) maltreated when their generosity is spurned or treated as if it is "not sufficient." Forcing more tips from someone who thinks he is giving generously is highly likely to turn a generous person into a stingy one and cause tons of resentment.
- People who are stingy tend to hate having money squeezed out of them and resent people who do so. Deny service for tips thus is likely to make the stingy types angrier. So you get some more money out of them but they hate you even more and will do everything they can to undermine you.
I looked at this evidence and the potential chains of events, and logically assessed the situation, and developed an hypothesis based on both inductive and deductive logic.
That my hypothesis has been proven false does not mean it was arrived at by panic rather than logic. Many hypotheses that are arrived at by flawless logic fail to be proved true in a real-world experiment. That's the difference between theory and practice.
I may have been incorrect, but I reject the idea that my incorrect hypothesis was arrived at through "the sky is falling!" type panic.
These forums are a place for discussion. As such, people will debate, and will put forward competing hypotheses. By definition only one of the competing ones will be proven true. Does that mean all the others should never have been spoken of? Surely not. Some of us (/raises hand) enjoy the act of written debate and argument, the point-and-counter-point, and that is why we come here (by argument I mean "a logical argument", as in, defending a line of reasoning rationaly and politely -- not a fight).
So you're right... panic is a bad thing. But I don't think anyone panicked here. Just because they passionately believed their hypothesis and vigorously defended it does not mean people were being irrational.
C