Tuesday, March 9, 2010

The Broken Vote to Kick system

The Dungeon Finder system introduced in 3.3.0 was in many ways a revitalization of the casual dungeon system, and allowed players with only half an hour to play each day an effective way to get a measurable amount of progress toward new loot every day.

However, one aspect of it that is deeply flawed is the Vote to Kick system. I was really excited when I read a blue post a few weeks ago saying:
Quote from Zarhym
It's not mentioned in the notes, but the Vote Kick option no longer has a 15-minute cooldown. Enjoy. :) (Source)

However, last night we got into Occulus, and 2 pulls into the dungeon, our rogue happily announces that he has to go afk to eat dinner. We immediately attempt to kick him and get the frustrating message "You cannot kick this player for another 14 minutes". I don't know if the change got reverted, or if this was a bug, but we had to go through the already annoying trash and early bosses of the Occulus with only 4 players, and then when the timer was about to run out, our rogue returns and says "Ok ready!". Naturally, because we're not idiots, we still just waited for the timer to run out and then kicked him anyway, but it still was an irritating reminder that there are still people in this game who know that it is possible to get something for doing nothing.

I have had so many conflicting experiences with the Vote to Kick system that I really don't know what to expect from it at any given time. At present though, it is not a reliable way to keep lazy players from leeching effort from regular players just trying to have fun and playing the game as it is intended. In that regards, it is very similar to the well-intentioned, but ultimately useless "report player AFK" option in battlegrounds. I have to say that I've never seen this deter any afkers from happily going about

3 comments:

Miss Medicina said...

Z, I believe that post is in regards to the PTR. The timer is supposed to change in the next patch, if I understand it properly.

Zigi said...

Argh, this shammy is not reading-spec'd.

Thanks Jess. I guess I can suffer jerks for just a little bit longer.

chamsa said...

a freakin tank walked up to just before aggro radius and sat down... said "u should kick me" and went afk...
Yes, to avoid the 15 minute dungeon debuff he wanted to afk for us to kick him.
Really, has it come to this?
i didn't give him the pleasure. I apologized to group and left group.
I'll eat the 15 minutes and hopefully screw him over!
totems down, hero up!
~chamsa