Amazon Code of Conduct

[Pump]

There are numerous Steam discussions that indicate many players are getting banned from the New World game due to violation of the Amazon Code of Conduct (usually called TOS ?). So I read the document (again) and realized that I don't fully understand the meaning of some of the words used therein. Some of the words did not exist when I learned the English language and some are not defined in most English dictionaries. So I would appreciate help in understanding the meaning of some of the words in the TOS.

Item 2: Do not engage in behaviors that reduce or disrupt the enjoyment of the game for others. This includes spamming chat, griefing, throwing matches, boosting, win-trading, trolling, or spoiling the game by sharing unreleased or confidential materials.

"Spamming chat" - not in most English dictionaries; however, an internet search indicates "spamming" is defined as "sending the same message indiscriminately to (large numbers of recipients) on the internet". I could be wrong, but I thought any message in the New World global chat will be sent indiscriminately to numerous (or all) players in the game, is that correct? So if I send any message in the global chat would I be violating the TOS? Or does the TOS mean that I cannot send the same message multiple times and if so, how many times until TOS violation?

"Griefing" - not in most English dictionaries; however, an internet search indicates "griefing" means "harassing or deliberately provoking other players or members in order to spoil their enjoyment." The PvP portion of New World is specifically intended to cause "grief" and reduce the enjoyment of players that lose the battles, and the associated fighting is usually considered to be "harassing" or "provoking". If I choose to play PvP, what do I need to do or not do to prevent someone from accusing me of "griefing"? Other Steam discussions indicate there are numerous and widely varying interpretations of this word.

"Throwing matches" - Internet search indicates this means "deliberately losing a contest". It seems very difficult for any single person to "throw a match" in New World, so this probably does not apply. If it does, please help me understand.

"Boosting" - Internet search indicates this usually means "helping or encouraging (something) to increase or improve", which does not really make sense in the New World game. More detailed search indicates this could mean "steal, especially by shoplifting or pickpocketing". The resources in New World don't really belong to anyone until after they are harvested/skinned, and to my knowledge, there is no ability to steal these from other players. So if this applies to New World, please help me understand.

"Win-trading" - Internet search indicates this means "two players throwing a match for each other to secure easy victories". Can't see how this applies to the New World game - if so, please help me understand.

"Trolling" - Internet search indicates this means "making a deliberately offensive or provocative online post with the aim of upsetting someone or eliciting an angry response from them". I understand the meaning but it seems to me the originator of a New World chat message is the only person who really knows the real "aim" of his/her message. There are a lot of "nice" messages that are intentionally misinterpreted by people who are already angry at the originator. The vast number of Steam messages on this subject demonstrate that this misbehavior is real. So this is a very dangerous part of the code of conduct that may not stand up in a court of law. It does seem to be generating a lot of unwarranted bans though. If I am mistaken, please help me understand.

[Dreaming Prince]

Not ToS but Amazon Code of Conduct or "A Coc" even.
did they really call it A coc?

[Protus]

missed some... https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=GK4QHHHAC82SQTS8&pop-up=1

"You are responsible for all actions that occur under your account. In the event you receive a warning, penalty, suspension, or other disciplinary action, please know that we do not make these decisions lightly. We take these actions because we want to ensure the community stays welcoming for everyone.

Do not try to evade any disciplinary action by, for example, creating new accounts or asking others to act on your behalf. Any attempt to circumvent a penalty will also result in additional enforcement against your account, up to a permanent ban.

Disciplinary actions may include: a warning, a strike on your account, restricting your account, suspending your account, or permanently banning your account (resulting in forfeiture of in-game items and in-game currency balances associated with the account).

If you believe your account was penalized in error, you may choose to appeal it by contacting us through the applicable game's support page.

***

While we have included a few representative examples above, this is not an exhaustive list of things you should and shouldn't do. Accordingly, to protect the integrity of our community and foster a fun and safe space in which to play, we reserve the right to penalize any account or take other disciplinary actions at any time for any conduct that we determine to violate the spirit of this Code of Conduct or otherwise find to be inappropriate or harmful to the community. If you are unsure if your behavior will violate the Code of Conduct, it probably does."

[ERROR-404]

Everything in their Code of Conduct is open to interpretation so they can ban players for any reason they see fit. On top of that they reserve their right to withhold any information regarding their bans. I requested proof of my violation and I was told that they have the right to refuse to provide me with any information. They need to be sued.
https://www.reddit.com/r/newworldgame/comments/q1fgqe/amazon_hypocrisy_exposed/
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1063730/discussions/0/2961670721759946737/?ctp=5

[Protus]

Originally posted by FancyGhost:

Everything in their Code of Conduct is open to interpretation so they can ban players for any reason they see fit. On top of that they reserve their right to withhold any information regarding their bans. I requested proof of my violation and I was told that they have the right to refuse to provide me with any information. They need to be sued.

Sued for what exactly??? Everyone playing is on their private property and signed the ToS.

[neoVictrix]

TL;DR

You're responsible for the account given to you by the publisher and you are held accountable for everything that happens on the account, as mentioned earlier in the thread by Protus.

If you or anyone using the account is engaging in behavior not condoned by the publisher, which includes some examples provided but is not limited to the provided examples, you are the one held accountable and are subject to any action the game's support team deems appropriate.

[Zakayel]

Except this isn't a court of law, you're playing their property on their servers, which means you're agreeing to be treated however they want to treat you. These rules are often vague enough where they can be manipulated to justify whatever actions they want to take against you. Your free speech is not a given right when you're agreeing to these terms. Basically leave the personal opinions and views to less strict platforms like reddit forums and leave it out of the game if you want to continue to play in it.

[ERROR-404]

Originally posted by Protus:

Originally posted by FancyGhost:

Everything in their Code of Conduct is open to interpretation so they can ban players for any reason they see fit. On top of that they reserve their right to withhold any information regarding their bans. I requested proof of my violation and I was told that they have the right to refuse to provide me with any information. They need to be sued.

Sued for what exactly??? Everyone playing is on their private property and signed the ToS.

Sued for withholding information they are not supposed to. They should be required by law to provide any information they have on their consumers.

[Atma]

Originally posted by FancyGhost:

Everything in their Code of Conduct is open to interpretation so they can ban players for any reason they see fit. On top of that they reserve their right to withhold any information regarding their bans. I requested proof of my violation and I was told that they have the right to refuse to provide me with any information. They need to be sued.
https://www.reddit.com/r/newworldgame/comments/q1fgqe/amazon_hypocrisy_exposed/
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1063730/discussions/0/2961670721759946737/?ctp=5

I love it when all these internet armchair lawyers come out of the woodwork to talk about the legality of their perceived slights.

Please do sue them and let us know if it was worth the time, money, and effort.

[neoVictrix]

Originally posted by FancyGhost:

Originally posted by Protus:

Sued for what exactly??? Everyone playing is on their private property and signed the ToS.

Sued for withholding information they are not supposed to. They should be required by law to provide any information they have on their consumers.

That's not really how that works in regards to games, even with the GDPR and such in place for EU residents. Until a case is successfully taken to court and won, not settled, the ball will forever be not in your favor.

[Milo de Vries]

"Spamming chat" - putting a message in global chat is fine. Putting the same message twenty times in an hour in chat would be considered spamming

"Griefing" -playing pvp is not considered griefing. Tea bagging (repeatedly hitting the crouch button to make it appear as if you are putting your crotch on their face) after you win and they are lying there at deaths door could be considered griefing. Direct messaging the person after you win to tell them how bad they are at the game would definitely be griefing.

"Throwing matches" - It would be difficult for one person to do so, but a group of 10 in a war intentionally losing could cause a loss. Some people just want to see others suffer, as such this behavior does happen.

"Boosting" - Ignore the 'stealing' definition, that is the British form of the word and not applicable to what Amazon means. Boosting here means a high level player giving huge assistance (dungeon running, giving materials, etc) to a low level player in order to get the low level ahead quicker. A group of friends questing together is perfectly fine. A level 60 helping a level 1 technically isn't. This is also an odd one because if they level 60 and 1 are friends, amazon might be fine with it up to a point - but the biggest thing is they need to discourage level 1's paying 60's with real money outside of the game in exchange for this service. Once people start paying real money outside of game things get bad quickly, as such, amazon has it listed as something they can ban for if they choose.

"Win-trading" - A group of 10 purples and 10 greens all flag for pvp and meet outside. Player 1 from the purple kills all 10 greens without them fighting back. Then player 1 from the greens kills all the purples. Everyone respawns, meets back up, does this all day long. Free xp. Amazon rebalanced the xp from pvp to make xp based on how long the timer was active, which greatly discourages this. But some people will still try.

"Trolling" -If a person gets reported because one person reported them for trolling, it is possible it was a misinterpretation of intention. If 20 people report the person in a week, then chances are they were not misinterpreted. The majority of people complaining about bans were not for single offenses (or if they were, it was something worse than trolling, such as racial slurs)

[Pump]

Originally posted by bmilohill:

"Spamming chat" - putting a message in global chat is fine. Putting the same message twenty times in an hour in chat would be considered spamming

"Griefing" -playing pvp is not considered griefing. Tea bagging (repeatedly hitting the crouch button to make it appear as if you are putting your crotch on their face) after you win and they are lying there at deaths door could be considered griefing. Direct messaging the person after you win to tell them how bad they are at the game would definitely be griefing.

"Throwing matches" - It would be difficult for one person to do so, but a group of 10 in a war intentionally losing could cause a loss. Some people just want to see others suffer, as such this behavior does happen.

"Boosting" - Ignore the 'stealing' definition, that is the British form of the word and not applicable to what Amazon means. Boosting here means a high level player giving huge assistance (dungeon running, giving materials, etc) to a low level player in order to get the low level ahead quicker. A group of friends questing together is perfectly fine. A level 60 helping a level 1 technically isn't. This is also an odd one because if they level 60 and 1 are friends, amazon might be fine with it up to a point - but the biggest thing is they need to discourage level 1's paying 60's with real money outside of the game in exchange for this service. Once people start paying real money outside of game things get bad quickly, as such, amazon has it listed as something they can ban for if they choose.

"Win-trading" - A group of 10 purples and 10 greens all flag for pvp and meet outside. Player 1 from the purple kills all 10 greens without them fighting back. Then player 1 from the greens kills all the purples. Everyone respawns, meets back up, does this all day long. Free xp. Amazon rebalanced the xp from pvp to make xp based on how long the timer was active, which greatly discourages this. But some people will still try.

"Trolling" -If a person gets reported because one person reported them for trolling, it is possible it was a misinterpretation of intention. If 20 people report the person in a week, then chances are they were not misinterpreted. The majority of people complaining about bans were not for single offenses (or if they were, it was something worse than trolling, such as racial slurs)

Thanks that gives me a little better understanding of the TOS. I don't really understand why the developer should be concerned about many of those things like "boosting", "win-trading", and activities outside the game, but so be it. This reminds me of the fanatical control methods used in communist countries (i.e., people with no accountability for their actions punish people until they all get along) - this is very abusive in my opinion. At least people can stop playing New World if they don't like the bans and abusive control methods of the all-powerful leaders. In communist countries, people cannot leave to avoid abuse in their "new world".

[Milo de Vries]

Originally posted by Pump:

I don't really understand why the developer should be concerned about many of those things like "boosting", "win-trading", and activities outside the game, but so be it.

Because in the last 3 decades games that didn't do this did not last very long. If one faction company can come along and spend a few thousand USD outside of game in order to get instant gear and levels and then easily beat everyone else who is playing fairly, then everyone else no longer wants to play against them. If it happens just a little bit then it wouldn't kill the game, but if it is too rampant and never addressed it doesn't really matter if that one company is winning or not - there would be enough people *complaining* that it isn't fair that many people would stop playing, and the game dies.

[Pump]

Originally posted by bmilohill:

Originally posted by Pump:

I don't really understand why the developer should be concerned about many of those things like "boosting", "win-trading", and activities outside the game, but so be it.

Because in the last 3 decades games that didn't do this did not last very long. If one faction company can come along and spend a few thousand USD outside of game in order to get instant gear and levels and then easily beat everyone else who is playing fairly, then everyone else no longer wants to play against them. If it happens just a little bit then it wouldn't kill the game, but if it is too rampant and never addressed it doesn't really matter if that one company is winning or not - there would be enough people *complaining* that it isn't fair that many people would stop playing, and the game dies.

The developer may be trying to keep most of the customers happy but attempting to control toxicity by indiscriminate banning of suspected players can have the opposite effect. The developer seems to be avoiding visibility and accountability for these decisions, which usually does not work very well in my experience. Anyway you have helped me understand the issue a little better and for that I thank you. So far I am enjoying the game except for the toxic areas such as global chat and PvP.

[Disabled Veteran]

So, no true freedom of speech? Figures.

[SertanDoom]

Originally posted by Protus:

missed some... https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=GK4QHHHAC82SQTS8&pop-up=1

"You are responsible for all actions that occur under your account. In the event you receive a warning, penalty, suspension, or other disciplinary action, please know that we do not make these decisions lightly. We take these actions because we want to ensure the community stays welcoming for everyone.

Do not try to evade any disciplinary action by, for example, creating new accounts or asking others to act on your behalf. Any attempt to circumvent a penalty will also result in additional enforcement against your account, up to a permanent ban.

Disciplinary actions may include: a warning, a strike on your account, restricting your account, suspending your account, or permanently banning your account (resulting in forfeiture of in-game items and in-game currency balances associated with the account).

If you believe your account was penalized in error, you may choose to appeal it by contacting us through the applicable game's support page.

***

While we have included a few representative examples above, this is not an exhaustive list of things you should and shouldn't do. Accordingly, to protect the integrity of our community and foster a fun and safe space in which to play, we reserve the right to penalize any account or take other disciplinary actions at any time for any conduct that we determine to violate the spirit of this Code of Conduct or otherwise find to be inappropriate or harmful to the community. If you are unsure if your behavior will violate the Code of Conduct, it probably does."

"Do not try to evade any disciplinary action by, for example, creating new accounts or asking others to act on your behalf. Any attempt to circumvent a penalty will also result in additional enforcement against your account, up to a permanent ban."

The asking others to act on your behalf, do all the "I was banned for no reason" threads count for this?