I think that a forum thread is the wrong format for reporting players. My suggestions is that you use a bug tracker, for example MantisBT, or write something similar yourself. Hackers aren't that different from bugs anyway.
How?
Instead of creating a new forum post, a user enters the information in a form. The form contains the following fields:
The form then creates a new issue on the bug tracker.
Staff members can set the report status from open to accepted/denied/incomplete.
Incomplete reports can be opened again by the user.
Why?
It's more convenient for users to create reports:
After the player name is entered, the form automatically checks if the player exists and has already been reported. Also optional auto completion for player names.
After the report reason is choosen, the form shows the required type of evidence (video, screenshots) and optional additional information like reqired warnings.
It's easier for users to keep track of their reports:
Users can filter their own reports by status.
No more (less) reports with missing/unsufficient evidence:
The form cannot be submitted if the link doesn't match the report reason, for example if someone is reporting a hacker, the link must point to a video.
The form can automatcally check if the resource is available and if a youtube video is private. Also if the length of a youtube video exceeds 3 minutes the form shows that a timestamp is necessary.
It's easier for staff members to view open reports:
Staff members can filter reports by their status.
P.S. While writing this, I thought of the following scenario: I want to report a hacker, but I see he already has been reported. If I upload my evidence one week later and report him, will he get banned again? Afaik there's no way to see if the video is a week old and the rules only state that evidence shouldn't be older than two weeks. Not that I advocate doing this
I for one am highly against this. If you look at the MantisHub website you have to invite every single person. Also, if you have to invite 1,000 people that would cost 6,000 USD to run annually (4,588 GBP , 5,298 Euro)
In addition, when inviting we would have to get every email and every username from every person:
This would result in tons of requests from staff members and reports would go slower than before.
I for one am highly against this. If you look at the MantisHub website you have to invite every single person. Also, if you have to invite 1,000 people that would cost 6,000 USD to run annually (4,588 GBP , 5,298 Euro) View attachment 104267
In addition, when inviting we would have to get every email and every username from every person: View attachment 104268
This would result in tons of requests from staff members and reports would go slower than before.
Good point, it should be tied to your forum account. So if you're looged in to the forum you just have to click a link to get to the form.
For the costs, I'm not sure if I understood it correctly, but I think those are just the costs for the hosting. So if you install mantisbt on your own server its free. Anyway it was just an example, I'm sure there are free (as in free beer) solutions.
I think that a forum thread is the wrong format for reporting players. My suggestions is that you use a bug tracker, for example MantisBT, or write something similar yourself. Hackers aren't that different from bugs anyway.
How?
Instead of creating a new forum post, a user enters the information in a form. The form contains the following fields:
The form then creates a new issue on the bug tracker.
Staff members can set the report status from open to accepted/denied/incomplete.
Incomplete reports can be opened again by the user.
Why?
It's more convenient for users to create reports:
After the player name is entered, the form automatically checks if the player exists and has already been reported. Also optional auto completion for player names.
After the report reason is choosen, the form shows the required type of evidence (video, screenshots) and optional additional information like reqired warnings.
It's easier for users to keep track of their reports:
Users can filter their own reports by status.
No more (less) reports with missing/unsufficient evidence:
The form cannot be submitted if the link doesn't match the report reason, for example if someone is reporting a hacker, the link must point to a video.
The form can automatcally check if the resource is available and if a youtube video is private. Also if the length of a youtube video exceeds 3 minutes the form shows that a timestamp is necessary.
It's easier for staff members to view open reports:
Staff members can filter reports by their status.
P.S. While writing this, I thought of the following scenario: I want to report a hacker, but I see he already has been reported. If I upload my evidence one week later and report him, will he get banned again? Afaik there's no way to see if the video is a week old and the rules only state that evidence shouldn't be older than two weeks. Not that I advocate doing this
I think that its fine as it is... It would be fine if Locked Reports would be moved to the Last pages of the Section... I dont think cube needs to pay even more..
I think that its fine as it is... It would be fine if Locked Reports would be moved to the Last pages of the Section... I dont think cube needs to pay even more..
It shouldn't cost anything. Mantisbt is GPL licenced, I didn't find a quote on this, but I'm pretty sure it's gratis if you install it on your own server.
I currently have 9 open report threads without an answer, and I think it might be easier for staff to go through them if there were less reports without evidence. Especially now that hackers get unbanned after a week and we can expect a lot more reports than before.
It shouldn't cost anything. Mantisbt is GPL licenced, I didn't find a quote on this, but I'm pretty sure it's gratis if you install it on your own server.
I currently have 9 open report threads without an answer, and I think it might be easier for staff to go through them if there were less reports without evidence. Especially now that hackers get unbanned after a week and we can expect a lot more reports than before.
I think OP knows that. The point is that automatic checks for video evidence, timestamps for long videos and correctly spelled IGNs could help dramatically reduce the number of low-quality reports and the Helpers could focus their efforts on something more important.
I too, have currently one unanswered report that is older than two weeks and I find it very frustrating when all the effort that went into a report (recording, cutting, uploading, creating the thread) was for nothing.
I think OP knows that. The point is that automatic checks for video evidence, timestamps for long videos and correctly spelled IGNs could help dramatically reduce the number of low-quality reports and the Helpers could focus their efforts on something more important.
I too, have currently one unanswered report that is older than two weeks and I find it very frustrating when all the effort that went into a report (recording, cutting, uploading, creating the thread) was for nothing.
That is simply not true. You cannot pick a random company and claim that their prices represent the real costs, that is not how it works. Cubecraft would probably host the hacker tracker themselves, which is much cheaper (and the tracking software needs to be slightly modified anyways).
You miss the point. The point is to lower the number of low-quality report significantly, not to make it zero (which is impossible, no web formular can completely prevent people from entering stupid stuff e.g. entering funny cat videos instead of evidence). Maybe the current Cubecraft forum software (XenForo) already has build-in support for validating submissions (as in: post has to match a certain pattern).
Alright, I'm sorry for my short responses, I wasn't at home and I hate typing on my phone.
I'm not arguing that setting this up would require some work, but there wouldn't be any additional costs.
Cubecraft already has a server that is hosting this forum (including the "report a player" section) that could be used to host the bug tracker as well.
If you look at the first page of the report forum right now, 10 out of 20 threads are reporting either hackers or teamers without video evidence. Of course they could bypass the form by reporting the hacker for spamming and then upload their pictures, but I think most of them would not do that.
So first off, what will this change do ?
- Improve time going through the reports.
- Having clean, structured easy to read reports.
- Faster responses to reports. How the REPORT A PLAYER section is now : View attachment 103981
How I think the REPORT A PLAYER section could be improved :
For this, Ignore the image above.
[PART 1] : The creation of the thread.
For the thread title: I think the thread title should be automatically generated from information inputted by the reporter.
So in the report section we would need three input boxes :
- An Offence drop down menu with predefined offence inputs
ex: "Hacking - Teaming - Spam - Advertising - Swearing - Skin - Name - CUSTOM "
- A name input box
ex : [ - Offender(s) - ]
- A Details box, dependant on the offence.
if the offence is hacking the details box would be a drop down menu with multiple inputs :
"Kill aura - Bunny Hop - Speed - Anti-knockback - Aimbot - OTHER"
if the offence is Teaming the details box would be a drop down menu :
"Eggwars Solo - Skywars Solo - Lucky Islands Solo - Survival Games Solo"
If the offence is swearing the details box isn't needed.
For the thread Contents: The Proof : Depending on the offence chosen a message changes in the textbox :
Hacking/Teaming : "Please post your video evidence here, we do not accept screenshots" Spam/Advertising/Swearing : "Please post a screenshot of the offence, and the two required warnings "
All of the above will help make sure reporters follow the guidelines without needing to know them and it creates reports that are easy to go through.
[Part 2] : Responding to reports
The advantage of having inputted the name and offence of the players inside dedicated textboxes can save the mods the time of having to reinput the details of the offence into the "punish a user" section. It can also input the link of the thread in the "Reason" section.
Suggestion 2 : Having a Punish button with a small preview of the punishment, and below the date of the last punishment for that user (to make sure they don't get banned twice, once in-game and once on the forums.)
Extra suggestion:
On the report section, for the mods, a list of pre-made (eventually custom? ) responses to common mistakes and others to be quicker replying to reports:
ex: screenshots instead of video evidence, Insufficient evidence,
The advantage of this is that one pre-made response can be long enough and go into the details that are tedious to rewrite at every report, those responses can also have all the useful links if needed.
I think OP knows that. The point is that automatic checks for video evidence, timestamps for long videos and correctly spelled IGNs could help dramatically reduce the number of low-quality reports and the Helpers could focus their efforts on something more important.
No more (less) reports with missing/unsufficient evidence:
The form cannot be submitted if the link doesn't match the report reason, for example if someone is reporting a hacker, the link must point to a video.
The form can automatcally check if the resource is available and if a youtube video is private. Also if the length of a youtube video exceeds 3 minutes the form shows that a timestamp is necessary.
P.S. While writing this, I thought of the following scenario: I want to report a hacker, but I see he already has been reported. If I upload my evidence one week later and report him, will he get banned again? Afaik there's no way to see if the video is a week old and the rules only state that evidence shouldn't be older than two weeks. Not that I advocate doing this
Really good suggestion, with a lot of good ideas, I really like the two points I quoted above.
As an answer to the scenario, we have a way of knowing the information of the last ban, proof, date etc... that I think should be automaically added to the report.
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