Shoutout to Balrog

What a thread to walk in on... While I don't know the exact rules here I feel like anything that can be perceived as negative will get you banned and even then there is Cherry picking moments. Idk if it's a specific mod or just a new standard there enforcing.

I definitely expect OP is gonna get banned and possibly any of the rest of us to get banned for just speaking against the ban or they'll just shut the thread down

I'll be entirely honest, I have no idea who UndeddJester is because I'm not very active on here anymore, but hearing that they were apparently banned unfairly does not surprise me. I've had many friends unjustly banned and warned before. In my opinion there is a serious problem with the moderation on this forum.

Some of the rules are pretty vague and, honestly, I can think of few regular posters, even the very mild ones, who havent pushed the boundaries on some of them.

I have been fortunate with my resume and that for the most part even walking in to ask for an interview in-person I was able to get one on-the-spot.

But I am biased in the sense that I see value in nearly all positions. Office jobs are not the end-all-be-all. And trades are sure to make even more of a comeback than they have already.

None-the-less people skills are a great thing in nearly any environment. A moderation position with glowing recommendations isn't something to scoff at either. Able to work with people and discuss problems works wonders.

But back on topic, since moderation cannot be discussed, it's a black box where we (average/avid forum users) only see punishment, not its context, and the executioner is nearly always painted in a bad light, since problems never get discussed in the open. (Although I don't know if the reason for this is due to legality).

Forums seem ripe for no shared learning of mistakes, since moderation is discussed personally, with offending material scrubbed, and the ramifications are little if burner accounts can then be created, and too final depending on the charge(s).

I dont know if it is still that way and I dont know if it is still somewhere on the Forums, but it at least used to be like this (and I think it still applies):

First Warning —> Just a Warning

Second Warning —> First escalation and you cannot open Threads and you can only post on a Cooldown

Third Warning —> Second escalation and you are banned for 30 days

Fourth Warning —> Third escalation and permanently banned

This is the usual process. This only really applies to the regular uses tho, if you are ban evading you get a perma ban immediatly. If you are only on the Forums to flame and insult and created an account just for that, this account is also gone very soon. And if you say some especially nasty things, you can also jump a few steps. Which is overall fine I would say.

Personally I dont agree with some things done by the moderation here, because I have seen people getting banned for posts which I would not really deem problematic. Because in the end, discussions can get heated and as long as it is not too bad (e.g. slurs are used), I would not see such a big issue with it. Especially if, as you said, previous contributions are also counted in. I dont think that someone who might get rude after being nice and helpful for several months in multiple topics should immediatly be warned (at least not if this would mean an escalation), if they get rude in an heated discussion. IF their way of expressing themselves is an issue, the mods can also write a message and dont issue a Warning point and then only issue a Warning point if it continues.

Balrog was active yesterday. Mandy was active before yesterday. ThatRyanB was active 3 days ago. Rizzo 10 days ago. Balrog must have seen this thread or maybe he was gone just before this thread posted.

I'm certain one of them will be online tomorrow or maybe even today if they feel like it. Here are a few options what will happen: We get or get no explanation, lots of forum members getting banned here, they remove it all or hide it, or they keep this thread up which is the most surprising choice. It's almost respectable if they choose the last option. I'm interested what choice they'll make.

Fully agree. Perma-banning people who are regular good-faith contributors does nothing but reduce the quality of content and discussion on the forum. Pretty soon all that will be left is a cesspool of back-and-forth arguments about whether the devs hate the killer side or survivor side more.

I've been around too long anyways.

This Forum is basically the last thing tying me to the game in any real manner.

I'd just like to throw some observations in, since we're talking about moderation in general, and I'm likely currently on the forum more than all the mods combined.

There's someone who occasionally shows up to the forum and drops a gore post. This post will sit here for 6+ hours before being deleted. So the mods have huge gaps in their coverage.

Also, these posts will get many flags, and that's my next point. There are sometimes a ton of posts. If the mods are on infrequently, they aren't looking at every word of a 10-page derailed post. This is likely why some people seem to get away with more. My guess is it's often flagged posts that get checked and many others are ignored.

I used to see Rizzo drop the ban hammer pretty much everyday at the same time and I haven't seen that in awhile.

The last point I have to be vague about and is very theoretical and based on an observation of patterns. When posters reveal aspects of their personal lives, I file it away in my head. Most of these are things like location and potential age range, but sometimes these are bits of deeper personal info. If an argument happens between two people and one of them drops one of these very specific data pieces (or has in the past), they seem to get awarded extra protection. There are a few people who I've seen make either nothing but useless or divisive posts or who cause conflict every time they speak, and this is the only consistent criteria I've seen that might explain the allowance of this. It's not a free pass, but it might allow for extra grace.

Heh, them mods at it again :) They perma banned me on steam for kindly warning another user that they were breaking the rules and that I had a temp ban for it before (100% blatantly obvious with good intentions). They did so under the rule "bans will not be discussed publicly". Obviously complete nonsense and I took it as bullying, especially since the temp ban before that was also based on complete nonsense, so I rly did think they were bullying me on that forum. I haven't dropped a single cent to the game since. This was years ago at this point. I just can't support this type of god-complex behaviour and I am not surprised it is still happening to this day.

There seems to be times when they decide its just best to let the forums go and rage. When they announced the FNAF colab they let the 'thanks for David' post, which had been stickied for years, go for a few days. People violated lots of forum rules, open discussion of politics as one example, before they eventually closed it. Possible we're in a similar 'let people vent' moment.

Very tempted to expose the double-standard the mods work with.

Isn't this what is called 'favoritsm'? If I would do the same thing as you did, they would boot me from the forums immediately without notice.

I applaud you for exposing them though. You're a real man.

There should be one set of fair rules. Not one set of unfair rules and another set of hidden rules for certain people.

They where begging you to stop?

I didnt get that treatment when I got suspended for a week. I dont get why tagging a mod in a discussion that required direct information from BHVR to solve an issue was considered a bannable offence. We are trying to be constructive here but instead of supporting the discussion we basicly got told to shut up.

How is this a healthy environment to provide constructive feedback?

I mean, if that person was the way you describe, then I understand your reasoning. That however makes the situation even weirder, as they then defended a bully, while their job should be exact opposite.