Voting requirements for the AFK debuff
by Mike Schramm 
Sep 6th 2007 at 3:32PM
One of the choruses we heard at BlizzCon was that Blizzard knows about the AFKers in Alterac, and justice will be handed out. The plan, we've been told, is that it will be handed out in the form of a no-honor debuff, that breaks on combat. In other words, if enough people report you for sitting in the Peace Cave, you don't gain any honor until you get moving and start fighting.The problem, however, is that we don't know exactly how many people it takes to hand out that debuff. Thunderbein tells the story of an AV where only 20 out of 40 players were actually playing, and so if the number of players that have to "vote" for the debuff is anywhere over 20, no one's getting the debuff in that BG. Hortus replies and says that it's not as high as 30, but how high is it? Can you give someone the with two people? With ten?
And then there's the question of whether we should know at all. What if we learned it was 10 people (in the interest of clarity, I should stress that we don't actually know what it is yet), and a group of 31 AFKers joined up to the BG? Then, nothing is solved at all-- those guys could sit in the Peace Cave all they wanted and gain honor the whole time.
The AFK debuff sounded like the best solution at BlizzCon, but every system can be gamed. Blizzard is going to have to be really careful about setting up the numbers on how the reporting works. And because we'll likely find out whether they tell us or not what the number is, they'll have to watch out for other ways AFK players can get around the punishment.
Filed under: Patches, Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, PvP, BlizzCon
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Roguerhunter Sep 6th 2007 3:41PM
Its a Simple solution.. All you have to do if you go afk then your debuff is for a full day... hey sorry if that sounds a bit extream but in the long wrong you will see it make a difference...
defektive Sep 6th 2007 3:44PM
It should be as low as 5. It's a debuff that is taken off when you enter combat. If you're in the cave and 5 people vote on you, if you're there, you smack a player or a wolf, or NPC, or toss a heal... If not, good bye.
Doffencrag Sep 6th 2007 3:50PM
@2: I agree. As most people might actually be *playing* the BG, not everyone will be able to weed out the AFKers. It shouldn't bee too high a number. Can't have half the raid group focusing on looking out for AFKers.
Besides, I really think that these crafty AFKers will always find a way around the rules. But as long as it makes it harder for them, I'm all for it.
RogueJedi86 Sep 6th 2007 3:50PM
Lower than 5. Hell, make it one. It's not that hard to get into combat. Go fight with the rest of the pack that's zerging the enemy.
RJ Sep 6th 2007 3:52PM
They should make it so the debuff isn't removed unless you make (or help make) an honorable kill. It would probably be a little more difficult to code in, but it would end the problem once and for all.
Roguerhunter Sep 6th 2007 3:56PM
LOL Like I said if you knew society jailed you for life for crimes there be a lot less crime in the world. So yeah like i said you afk in BG's then you get theno BG defuff for 14hrs. If you really need to go then sign out or hearth out. Simple as that this is a really a no-brainer lol...
Lummox Sep 6th 2007 4:00PM
The threshold should be variable. Like 10 or 20% of ACTIVE players. Then all it takes is two votes from the 5 active players out of the 35 AFKers to apply debuffs. Still, even with that I fear the reporting system is going to be too difficult to report on a lot of people. :(
If the match ends and you have the AFK debuff, it should be treated like the Deserter debuff and prevent you from going back into a BG for a period of time.
Roguerhunter Sep 6th 2007 4:00PM
Sorrie my lil sis butted in let me rephrase, you afk out then you get a no BG defuff for 24hrs. Too bad you made that choice go cry to your mom LOL...
Tobie Sep 6th 2007 4:03PM
I think that if you have been out of combat for a certain amount of time, you should be flagged so your own faction can attack and kill you. Your equipment should also suffer durability and your death will provide bonus honor for those that are actually playing.
Slayblaze Sep 6th 2007 4:23PM
How about as soon as the gate opens EVERYONE gets the debuff automatically? The same would be true for anyone entering after the battle has begun - they get the debuff just for entering. To remove the debuff, just enter combat within 5 minutes (or whatever the period of time is) or begin to cap a gy or talk to an npc or some other willful action.
From that point on you could still have the "report an afk'er" as usual also.
Koll Sep 6th 2007 5:35PM
Hell, make it 1 person. It's gone as soon as you enter combat, so WTF? as soon as you are labeled AFK you get no honor until you attack something. bam! problem solved.
Chay Sep 6th 2007 4:31PM
@10. That's a great idea imo! Sounds like a good solution to the cheating or "leeching" if you want. I prefer cheating.
Elzam Sep 6th 2007 4:43PM
The problem that everyone suggesting "5" or "2" is neglecting is the fact that that makes AV ripe for abuse and the AFK debuff can quickly be used as a harassment tool.
I, as well as many other people I know, often coordinate joining AV's at the same time as guildmates, often resulting in 8+ members being in the same area. If one vindictive group decided to make a playday of it they could easily mark players as AFK.
In addition, the AFK tag will surely be abused once people notice that intelligent AFKers (sorry, but they exist) will choose to AFK in densely mob-populated areas. In addition, some players fervently play a defensive holding game which entails actually staying at a bunker which takes several minutes to cap. I know it won't be long until people start thinking the Warrior-Paladin combo at the Stonehearth Bunker are AFKing when they are actually contributing to the win.
Also, someone suggested using a method that only removes the debuff after recieving an honorable kill. This won't work as the majority of AFK'ers run in Alterac Valley. I don't know what it's like on your battlegroup, but often AV's are races and there is minimal actual PvP.
Epiny Sep 6th 2007 4:33PM
@2 Agree. I'm horde and I have played AV's with as little as 6 people fighting. I have thus far been tempted to go afk but haven't yet.
John Sep 6th 2007 4:40PM
Well the problem i see is...
I'm sitting in the peace cave, watching "friends" (cause thats pussy AFK'ers watch). I see I get the afk debuff, i run to the nearest battle with out missing the witty banter on TV, throw a fireball or two, die and respawn at the nearest graveyard/cave and the debuff is gone. Will somebody else take the time to flag me afk again? and if they do how much effort is it really to run to the nearest fight to remove it.
PyroAmos Sep 6th 2007 4:48PM
@10 I was about to say the same thing, everyone should start with it, and it should be auto-reapplyed to everyone every 5 minutes or so.... as they explained it, its a debuff that if left on for 5 minutes, gives another debuff that prevents you from gaining honor, so you should have it constantly being applied to everyone.
tbh, if the 5 minutes come up and you still havn't gotten in combat, you should get kicked from the AV and get a 12 hour 'betrayer' debuff, rather than the 10 minute 'desserter' debuff you get if you /afk, hearth or walk out the portal to get out of a BG.
the only problem i see with that is defending towers or GY 'til they finish capping, you arn't in combat. really what they should do is give some gamemasters some overtime, and just have them goto AV for 2 hours after their normal working time and /boot /24 or 48 hour desserter debuff people that are afk. usually there are 10-20 AVs, it would take 5 minutes to come in, watch for a while, make sure its not people resurecting there 'cause they died on D, watch for about 2 minutes, then debuff/kick everyone sitting there not doing anything. so 5 minutes per BG, asuming theres 15 BGs on a battlegroup, thats 1 hour and 15 minutes to clean out AV, per battlegroup, with 1 person working.... not to mention it would be alot easier the next shift since all those AFKers banned from BGs for 48 hours wouldn't be there, so there would be less games to check. 1 week of 2 hours overtime per gamemaster and this epidemic would be over... people wouldn't afk any more because they wouldn't want to get the debuff and have complete honor loss for 2 days. eventually people would realize that the cleanup was over and they wern't getting kicked any more, but that would be a month or two, then its time for those GMs to earn a little overtime again. With 9million subscribers, pulling in over 20milllion a MONTH in subscription fees, i guess it is a little to much to ask blizz to give 1 GM per battle group 2 hours of over time to fix this huge problem that sucks the fun out of what should be the funnest BG.
Dipstick Sep 6th 2007 4:48PM
I think that after the novelty of reporting people for AFK (and the long-awaited revenge on leechers) has worn off, people just won't bother to report the AFK'ers in the belief that someone else will do it for them - it's called Diffusion of Responsibility, or the 'I thought someone else would do it'.
We see it all the time in game already, like the fact that despite Icewing Bunker is right next to the alliance graveyard, and people spawn and fight there all the time, no one ever bothers to go and recap the tower once Horde have tried to take it. Or they just run past honour-giving NPCs.
That's why it won't work unless they reduce the number of reports needed to something like 5 or less. It's not like the debuff is hard to get rid of :/
PyroAmos Sep 6th 2007 4:53PM
srry did i say 20mil a month, i meant 200mil... thats over 1billion a year. they could buy a country and make its citizens spy on you, and squirt you with a water gun if you afk BGs for a few billion dollars.
PyroAmos Sep 6th 2007 5:01PM
@16 your right, and the fact that it doesn't kick them out, it just removes their honor makes it a waste of time to report them, espeachally when you have 15-25 ppl afk... its not gonna kick them out so you can get someone whos gonna play, its either going to be taken off by him running out, hitting a wolf, or it will stay on him and he wont get any honor. either way it didn't help you. at all. he is still there, not helping, eating a slot of a player. All it will take is someone to sit in the cave and make fun of people flagging him on BG chat, when he runs out and hits something and take it off, to make everyone realize how pointless and stupid their 'fix' is and stop bothering to report 15 people every couple minutes.
Warparty Sep 6th 2007 6:20PM
Wouldnt an easier option be to remove the NPC's protecting the cave?