Support Ingress urgently requires attention.

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Comments

  • TheKingEngineTheKingEngine ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited June 2021

    Yes. A post with lively conversation, where we ask for a solution, and expect players truly reading our words, but encountered:

    Vanguard not reading the links and start weird criticizing instantly by making false statement

    XMA ignoring the content of the post and refer to completely useless rules that have been proven irrelevant to the problem already

    Strange players asking to delete this post and calling players toxic directly in the post

    Suspicious group clicking massive insightful and likes for inappropriate behaviors mentioned above

    @12tyTri11ion Dear Community Manager, May I have your kind assistance to review this post, identify the problem, send our inquiries and doubts to the back-end, and also tell those Vanguard and XMAs that are not behaving properly in this post to respect other players more on the forum? Thanks.

  • TheKingEngineTheKingEngine ✭✭✭✭✭

    which means the system and support channel that sending automatic warnings (as you mentioned are nothing) is working improperly, instead of "The system in place for Ingress is actually in my opinion good“ as you said.

    Obviously.

  • TheKingEngineTheKingEngine ✭✭✭✭✭

    Sending warning emails to and threatening players to stop doing so otherwise they might get banned, because of players' saying welcome in the COMM, is an intended behavior? Which earth do we live on?

  • GoblinGranateGoblinGranate ✭✭✭✭✭

    If this functionality is intended then I'm definetely defending the wrong cause and me and anyone who think/feels like me should completely go away from this game as abusers are intended to be rewarded over nonabusers.

    But, as this can't be true, I'd just say, based on this comment and previous comments, that you are just trolling. And this makes it a perfect moment for de Community Manager to... well, manage the community.

  • MuzzgoodMuzzgood ✭✭✭

    No I meant I can not remove my own post -also I could not remove the quote -or is there a way?

  • GoblinGranateGoblinGranate ✭✭✭✭✭

    Oh! Ok, sorry then.

    Yes, quotes are suposed to be removable. If you access the forum on mobile browser, it even gets a "trash" button so you can click on it.

  • TrerroTrerro ✭✭✭

    There's been a couple of times where I've been at a convention or something, pulled out the game during downtime, and gotten a "ah, cool, someone else plays here, want to meet up at [location]?" - from someone on the other side. I'm also pretty sure I've -never- seen toxic behavior on my local COMMs - which admittedly, aren't very active. I'll also answer the occasional newbie question on there, and don't care if it's someone on the other side. Friendly competition is the way to go, IMO, and they aren't actually competitors until they learn how to play.

    I get that completely removing the ability to talk to the other side would indeed probably greatly reduce the ticket queue by getting rid of most of the instances of trolling and just plain abuse, but is taking a game that's supposed to be social, and removing one of the ways to actually communicate with your fellow players really worth it for that benefit? I'd argue a strong no. It's like saying you can eliminate traffic accidents in your city by banning cars. It's true, but is that really the way to go?

  • GoblinGranateGoblinGranate ✭✭✭✭✭

    Thanks for the reply, but topic advanced a bit over original post. We agreed that not all regions experience this level of toxic use and therefore the amount of tickets that this might generate will be significantly lower. That is why suggested solution is currently a metric from Niantic side which determines, based on regions, where should COMM chat be disabled and study the evolution over a short period of time (lets say 60 days). This would also ensure the awareness of affected agents and surely help them "behave" in the future, which means less tickets in the future.

    This also comes from the fact that abuse is happening and some agents, including me, are being notified by NiaOps for breaking ToS upon COMM XF use while messages were not violating ToS in any way and some of them weren't even tagging anyone. No human being would have accepted such reports and that is why support needs modifications at some level (or an official statement where this is the intended functionality).

    It would be very helpful if someone from Niantic side (@NianticBrian for instance) clarified some of this data. It is always possible that the amount of tickets created this way is very low and therefore this solution would be of little to none impact. But the 15K daily tickets is a reality. Target is to get humans to handle tickets properly. It is just not possible with current numbers! Being very optimistic, one human being could review up to 100 tickets a day, and that is assuming they work 7 days a week.

    If a better game experience is intended to be achieved, a better support system is mandatory. Solutions are required.

    This thread might be moved to "Community Feedback" as discussed topic could better fit in that section. @NianticBlue is that possible to perform?

  • Thanks for expressing your opinion, unfortunately I wasn’t trolling. If I was my replies would have you flagging them than just hitting the disagree button. 🙄🤦🏻‍♂️

  • SSSputnikSSSputnik ✭✭✭✭✭

    Comm reporting is a massive issue. A lot of players are afraid to use it.

  • TheKingEngineTheKingEngine ✭✭✭✭✭


    Thanks for sharing your valuable story.

    Yes, probably they are good people, but they just refused to believe in your story and turned deaf year to players on the forum sharing practical experience, while their attitudes are showing "it's none of my business".

    Or telling you that you won't get banned for saying hello which is not the truth

    Or to make the matter worse: telling you that you deserve the ban and you are supposed to get banned because the system is working as intended:

    Absurd.

  • TheKingEngineTheKingEngine ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited June 2021

    Telling people that the system is running well and as expected by sending warnings to or ban players saying welcome or hello, is trolling, in every country on this planet. This shows attitudes of not caring about other players at all.

    Or you could keep telling others in that chat group that its' my/our issue that I/we "can't handle criticism well", not the issue of Ingress support system, as you've been doing today. Please just do not make fun of COMM ab.use attack victims by trolling.

    Post edited by TheKingEngine on
  • Alfred42Alfred42 ✭✭✭
    edited June 2021

    With respect, it's not his problem, at least in this post, sorry. From my point of view, you are criticizing completely wrong players here. Actually I'm impressed by how @LuoboTiX could still keep calm and polite after undergone such obvious bullying by a group of "elite" players.

    Your theory: "Forums are a place for discussion. Discussion often means different points of view, ideas and in general back and forth"

    Reality: Many players in this post, looking like very senior and experienced, didn't read comments of others, didn't correct their proven-to-be-wrong ideas, didn't show the least empathy for those who encountered unreasonable warnings/bans due to failure of system but treat them with scorn, and didn't show any respect for players who are making constructive discussion with convincible examples in practice. On the contrary, they actively bring off-topic and unreasonable criticism into this post. They are doing trolls, lying and name shaming together.

    Post edited by Alfred42 on
  • Alfred42Alfred42 ✭✭✭
    edited June 2021

    When the link that user was referring to is actually working well, the speech addressed by you like this is definitely a lie; a lie that is very easy to identify (with a simple click), a lie made deliberately, and a lie filled up with misinformation misguiding other players.

    So Ingress forum is where Vanguard making lies to attack players proving with solid evidence and politeness the fact that his/her ideas are wrong? Thank you so much for letting us know that even if not browsing the community often, there is still nothing to lose. By the way I really enjoy your "Agent A and B" drama show. Pizza? Squirrel? LMAO. I strongly recommend Monster drinks to accomodate your flavor and vigor.

    Post edited by Alfred42 on
  • Alfred42Alfred42 ✭✭✭
    edited June 2021


    Allow me to describe thoroughly your opinion about and actions around this post. In conclusion, it was a typical "trolling" & "telling others don't feed the troll" trap setting. This is not a defaming or shaming while I'm just reproducing what actually happened. Feel free to correct me if anything inaccurate.

    You were telling players that they wouldn't get banned by being viciously reported of "Welcome" messages. Thereafter, you were telling players who got banned/warned because of their "welcome" and "hello" COMM messages: "the system is supposed to do so and everything is working as expected". And afterwards you were telling players: "I'm not trolling, you may click disagree rather than reporting it via Flag".

    After that, you directly went to a chat group to do name calling and shaming upon players refuting your full-of-beans comments https://community.ingress.com/en/discussion/comment/145631/#Comment_145631. I double checked the chat history and could confirm that the account,

    in the second screenshot provided in this comment, that said "do not respond" and "This @LuoboTiX is the issue. The Agent can't handle criticism well"

    and even invited every member of that chat group to report that specific user

    and in the third screenshot that said "It’s a grand conspiracy I tell you" when replying to another player sneering at the statement "I'm OK with criticism. I do not accept being bullied with dirty words and collective shaming.""

    has the same nickname with you. Either someone is impersonating you, or it's you.

    .........

    Well, the attitudes of your making fun of other players, and the actions that you are inviting players in public to attack specific players who told you that they were not comfortable about your trolling behaviors and why you were literally trolling and why your opinions about the problem that other players are seriously discussing here are wrong, both astonished me and made me doubt that what's wrong with this forum.

    Players with wrong ideas and no empathy for others and "none of my business" attitudes for most of the time, blatantly attacking in group specific players treating others with respect and helping solving problems or getting more feedback and advice, simply to assert their ridiculous "authority". You guys are really good at setting such examples.

  • Alfred42Alfred42 ✭✭✭
    edited June 2021

    I hope that you could eventually get the COMM reporting attack problems solved in a constructive way as you expected, which look like less likely to be done rather than proactively and sadly abandoning using the COMM by players themselves. Some players in this post are as toxic as those in the case you used as reference and deliberately messing with and trying to destroy this post and preventing you getting better answers.

    I myself was intensively ha***sed by famous toxic players in the COMM as well but after I reported them to Niantic Support, nothing was done and the situation was not getting better. I suppose COMM reporting attacks as mentioned here, require filing from a lot of sub-accounts at the same time which is the elementary configuration for toxic players but unfortunately not for us normal players.

    Or maybe the reason why some players were messing with your post is because they are secretly exploiting such technique, who knows.

    If supposed some players build chat groups and nominate new victims on a daily basis by throwing the nickname and saying "hey everyone, this guy in COMM has some issues, this guy can't handle criticism well, this guy has been refuting my theories, this guy is insulting us, let's report him for everything he said, starting from his saying welcome today". Sounds creepy but according to actions done by some players here it's entirely possible.

  • Alfred42Alfred42 ✭✭✭

    With their sub-accounts, as you said, a dozen jerks could indeed trigger the required amount of tickets to activate. Sounds familiar?

    Just like with their "elitism" and "friendship" and "roles in the community", a dozen j could tell tales, stir the post and bully earnest and rightful players, without being punished. Nah. No need to persuade them, cauz those players just adds to the toxicity of this website and won't help.

    Anyway, thanks to your and @LuoboTiX 's work trying to make things right. At least it helps to expand the forum "worth-blocking" list.

  • MoogModularMoogModular ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited June 2021
  • Alfred42Alfred42 ✭✭✭

    Typical example of stirring the post by introducing off-topic buzzing, for a continuous second time in this post. 1K posts and comments didn't make you treat others with respect and make discussion with sincerity. Blocked, bye.

  • GoblinGranateGoblinGranate ✭✭✭✭✭

    I don't quite understand their attitude, to be honest. If that dozen jerks could actually trigger the metrics I suggested and cause a 60 days COMM chat disablement as I suggested, it would just prove that support requires urgent attention, which is the topic. So, they are indeed validating the topic, but then they prefer to ignore it. Can't find a logic for that.

    About trolls: don't even reply, use the flag system an that's it.

    It is obvious that this situation and many other issues regarding Support need some human interaction. I'll keep studing some more ways to reduce the tickets income, but I'm afraid that is mandatory that abusers get sanctioned for the abuse since they are contributing to those 15K daily tickets too. Perhaps, that is even the reason why there are so many tickets! It would be really helpful if someone from Niantic could detail at least if all those tickets actually belong to Ingress.

    Or maybe the reason why some players were messing with your post is because they are secretly exploiting such technique, who knows.

    I already said elsewhere that #SpoofersHaveTheirOwnFaction. Stating that spoofers have no faction has not been accurate for a long time.

    One would expect some interaction from Niantic side on this matter, especially now that there is a CM, but there are other post that would also have the same expectation unachieved. I joked with some mates that she might left already xD Stepped in, said "Nope" and left. Prove me wrong, @NianticThia !

  • TheKingEngineTheKingEngine ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited June 2021

    Maybe it's just their fan group following every comment of their leaders or bosses, overwhelming opponents, that utilize every post to shame and troll at specific user.

    Or maybe there really is a cheating union that does not want Niantic to notice these COMM exploits seriously, that's why they intentionally messing with this post.

  • TheKingEngineTheKingEngine ✭✭✭✭✭

    Yes just block those who are making trolls and distractions and leave them alone. No need to even flag them if they stopped using inappropriate words after being warned because "off-topic" is hard to be determined while their true intention is to make moderators think that players of both sides are not doing anything except ranting in this post, throwing off-topic things to each other and then have to close the discussion. It's actually just those people throwing off-topic things, despite their roles, as we can see very clearly, while we are concentrating on the topic peacefully and trying to pursuade everyone with solid evidence and adequate logic.

    Looking forward to having more affected players to join to share their stories and cases regarding this COMM report ab.use problem.

  • GoblinGranateGoblinGranate ✭✭✭✭✭

    I'll summarize OP after 3 pages of discussion.

    -Support is currently getting an average of 15K tickets daily.

    -It is unclear if tickets ID are shared across all Niantic games or just for Ingress, but 15K tickets is an extremely high number for any human support team, therefore there is an automated system that resolves tickets and applied sanctions based on metrics pre-defined.

    -This causes the system to be vulnerable to abusers who use it to game upon specific agents in several ways known, such as COMM strikes, Agent Name modifications and such.

    -There is the posibility that this abuse is also contributing to system cluttering, which would push ever further away any possible solution given current status.

    -This ultimately leads to unfair and absurd situations where support applies sanction/warning in cases where any human being would act otherwise (examples all over the place). In this thread, COMM XF chat has been fingerpointed as one of the most obvious.


    In order to try to get some control about this situation, suggestion is to create, through ticket income support, some metric that allows Niantic how to identify areas where XF COMMs are generating high amounts of tickets and disabling them for a limited period of time (several days) in order to:

    a) Allow Niantic to check upon logs of disabled areas and find out a way to santion possible abusers.

    b) Allow Niantic to check previous COMMs to apply sanction to those who really deserve it according to ToS.

    c) Allow Niantic to study how automatic system is being gamed and try to apply some modifications if necessary.

    d) Make agent communities in affected areas aware of the presence of Niantic, passively inviting them to "think twice" before posting undeletable messages.


    Areas unaffected by this metric should not be suspended from XF COMMs as they would not be cluttering support with this kind of tickets.

    It is very obvious that Niantic actually cares about what we say in COMMs as there are many things that have been developed just for its safe use, such as getting it separated from COMM logs, having it separated in its own tag within the scanner, having the possibility to block agents in order to avoid receiving any messages from them, having its own category in Support forms, having its own section in ToS, etc.


    Some extra ways to help COMMs be less toxic could also be:

    # Pop up message box with written text for the agent to re-read what they just wrote with a 5 seconds timer before being able to press "Send".

    # Use wording filter detection and include some warning symbols for the agent to acknowledge that some "not nice" words were used and making them aware that it could be taken into account in the event of other agents reporting.

    #Stablish some cooldown for COMM messaging (30s before being able to post again).


    I'm very happy to acknowledge moderators intervention, though I feel like the warning should have been extend to other users.

  • ZeroHecksGivenZeroHecksGiven ✭✭✭✭✭

    I really wish Niantic would respond to this. Either to verify this is an issue or that your theory is incorrect (it does make sense to me).

    If those numbers are correct, I find it very plausible that automated systems are in place and that abuse could happen quite easily. I know in some local chats when there is obvious spoofing action, multiple people will report (not that it seems to work very often). So getting 5, 10, even 15 agents to report someone isn't out of the question.

    That being said, I don't think a popup would help or change anything. Jerks will be jerks, regardless if they have to wait 5 seconds or not. Also, the word filter here on the forums is atrocious, adding anything remotely close would make comms even more pointless in my opinion. Especially since a common word in one language is a swear word in another. A 30-60 second cool down between messages could help. Again, jerks will be jerks though and it's just making it more difficult for nice people to use the systems in place.

    I think the biggest problem here is support in general. It's inefficient and rarely helpful. Nothing like trying to get help and not be able to actually get help. This is all aspects of the game, missions, reporting agents, etc. As your original title suggests, support needs attention. That needs to be fixed, nothing in game does.

  • caytcayt ✭✭✭

    Calling someone "Dear" is sexist and misogyny. Please refrain from doing so. They have a name, please use it.

  • GoblinGranateGoblinGranate ✭✭✭✭✭

    Just for the record, it has been stated from VGs that submitting multiple tickets for the same incident is of no use when it comes to the investigation. Trying to get communities to avoid this would help reducing the income for sure!

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