"Being Contentious" as ban criteria. I WAS LITERALLY DIRECTED HERE BY HELP STAFF TO DISCUSS THIS

[👁]

This isn't disputing a ban.

This is about the criteria generally.

When being contentious is reason enough for a ban none of us are safe. Any statement that people are likely to disagree with is contentious. Any disagreement is contentious.

If being contentious were strictly enforced as ban criteria almost everyone on the forums would be banned.

[Brian9824]

Diposting pertama kali oleh Seraphita:

I already put a logical reasoning as to what contentious would mean, compared to what being argumentative is... Not just anyone is "contentious". You have to provoke a heated argument to deserve it. As in, you have to be baiting for arguments.

Such as repeatedly refusing to post in the correct place which actually IS against the steam rules and clearly listed

[William Shakesman]

Really at this point all the discussion is just people not involved in the process at all making up explanations that they think would fit the question. You can imagine a definition of contentious or argumentative that is exclusive all day but that does not make it Valves definition.

[Brian9824]

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

snip

You've been given the answer repeatedly. if you refuse to accept it and want to keep getting banned because you won't listen then thats on you. I'm not going to keep telling you the same thing over and over so i'm unusbbing before mods lock this thread as well

[Brian9824]

Diposting pertama kali oleh William Shakesman:

Really at this point all the discussion is just people not involved in the process at all making up explanations that they think would fit the question. You can imagine a definition of contentious or argumentative that is exclusive all day but that does not make it Valves definition.

Hence why they should ask for clarification on the forum they got the message from, aka the Avowed forum

[William Shakesman]

Diposting pertama kali oleh Mad Scientist:

Inaccurate. They only don't interfere with, "handle", game hub bans.
They often issue them or interfere with them for the main hubs (not game hubs), else may note it was correct and close, or remove it from people that absolutely need it more than removing ones that made no sense.

Not according to this other user unfortunately.

Diposting pertama kali oleh HikariLight:

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

Support staff told me this was the place to discuss ban criteria.

That's because support doesn't handle ANYTHING in regards to bans.
It is their way of POLITELY telling you to bug off and leave them alone.
Support handles account login issues and billing issues only.

He is fairly clear on it being all bans and nobody has disagreed with him on it.

[👁]

Diposting pertama kali oleh Seraphita:

I already put a logical reasoning as to what contentious would mean, compared to what being argumentative is...

But that's not the context I've ever encountered it in

Twice I've encountered "being contentious" as a reason for a ban, one was when responding to a stalker who followed me around intentionally misgendering me and accusing me of all kinds of weird ♥♥♥♥ when I confronted them about their behavior.

The other was when a troll was making accusations against someone else and the target of their accusations asked the troll to explain. The troll didn't and had an established history of refusing to answer questions like that so I pointed out that they refused to explain, and then they argued they didn't refuse and I pointed out that refusal through a repeated failure and unwillingness to explain was still a refusal.

At least one of those, I think both, was overturned as excessive, and one was swiftly changed from being contentious to inflammatory before it was overturned.

These were on separate forums for separate games with separate publishers and devs so it suggests that it's not specific to one hub. And neither instance involved the sort of behavior you described.

[William Shakesman]

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

I don't currently have a good reason to think it's is a hub specific issue. Also no one ever explained anything about hubs having their own rules to me before this thread.

You would be able to tell if the moderator who took the action was a Valve employee acting in Valves rules or a community manager appointed by a dev. There is no question mark here. Valve only implements Valves rules.

The community mods used by a dev can ban you for any reason or no reason however.

[Mad Scientist]

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

Ok but couldn't these just be given as the reasons instead of "Being Contentious" if they were the reasons for a ban though?

What was the exact reason given and what team assigned it?

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

How am I suppose to know whether being contentious is a hub specific rule or an unwritten rule generally on Valve?

Valves rules apply everywhere because it's their service.
Developers can opt-out of Steam Moderation, which clearly, the Avowed hub did not do. Though Support can still get involved if they need to, Employees can as well.

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

Can you recognize that this topic isn't about a specific and isn't seeking to contest a ban, but is about a broader criteria?

The criteria is fairly obvious if the rules/guidelines are read. Either someone has good intention & behavior, or they do not.

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

Ok well none of that is relevant to the topic. I'm not sure how to read this unless it's meant to threaten me.

It's relevant because it's really obvious this is about the Avowed hub due to the timing and a identical line being used in that hub before this thread was made with an identical line about the whole "contentious" bit. In general, people like to argue in upcoming or recently released games. Those are recommendations, and in no way are considerable as "threats". It's a recommendation because Devs/hub mods have had enough of that activity, and tend to take action on people being a nuisance in their hubs in the earlier operational months.

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

I still find "Being Contentious" a disconcerting criteria because by my understanding it basically means any of us could be banned at any time simply by arguing.

Only if intentionally being argumentative with bad faith or ill-intentions. Not doing that is a good way for people to avoid warnings/bans/thread locks. They will moderate their hub as they please, so if individuals aren't being an issue, they're not likely to be banned. The thread in question was just another social-political bait thread of an upcoming game, so it being locked was entirely expected. Also individuals feigning innocence tend to still result in the Dev or Hub Mods acting on bad actors, there are a decent number of people that have found that out and take what happens in a hub into the main hubs only for it to happen again.



If you have questions about a game hubs specific rules, feel free to post in the game hub and ask about it. Until then, the advice is follow the rules Valve puts for their service. Given you're on SteamCommunity as a domain, following their rules/guidelines is recommended regardless of the game hub.

[👁]

Diposting pertama kali oleh Brian9824:

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

snip

You've been given the answer repeatedly.

Well neither your answer nor Seraphita's answer seem accurate just going by my own personal experience.

[Crazy Tiger]

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

Diposting pertama kali oleh Brian9824:

You've been given the answer repeatedly.

Well neither your answer nor Seraphita's answer seem accurate just going by my own personal experience.

Cause the only accurate answer is "you're on someone elses turf, you're not owed a place for your soap box and it doesn't matter what the ban reason is".

[👁]

Diposting pertama kali oleh Mad Scientist:

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

Ok but couldn't these just be given as the reasons instead of "Being Contentious" if they were the reasons for a ban though?

What was the exact reason given and what team assigned it?

Being argumentative.

Diposting pertama kali oleh Mad Scientist:

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

How am I suppose to know whether being contentious is a hub specific rule or an unwritten rule generally on Valve?

Valves rules apply everywhere because it's their service.
Developers can opt-out of Steam Moderation, which clearly, the Avowed hub did not do. Though Support can still get involved if they need to, Employees can as well.

Ok but is it a safe bet that if you encounter "Being Contentious" as a reason for a ban in two separate game forums for games from different devs and different publishers that it's an unwritten rule on Valve more generally?

I don't believe any Obsidian employee is even looking at Steam's Avowed page it was overrun by hate speech when I first saw it.

Diposting pertama kali oleh Mad Scientist:

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

Can you recognize that this topic isn't about a specific and isn't seeking to contest a ban, but is about a broader criteria?

The criteria is fairly obvious if the rules/guidelines are read. Either someone has good intention & behavior, or they do not.

The rules and guidelines don't even mention the word contentious, that's part of what's so confusing and disconcerting about it.

Diposting pertama kali oleh Mad Scientist:

It's relevant because it's really obvious this is about the Avowed hub

The only relevance to the avowed hub is a ban that got overturned as excessive before I ever made the ticket to discuss Being Contentious as a criteria more broadly, the only relevance to any ban is that's how I knew about the criteria, it wasn't about a specific ban nor any thread on the Avowed Forum it was about the criteria more generalkly.

Steam help staff said this was the correct place to discuss that and directed me here with a link.

Anything else related to Avowed here is entirely coincidental and irrelevant to the topic.

Diposting pertama kali oleh Mad Scientist:

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

I still find "Being Contentious" a disconcerting criteria because by my understanding it basically means any of us could be banned at any time simply by arguing.

Only if intentionally being argumentative with bad faith or ill-intentions.

That hasn't been my experience.

[👁]

If Valve doesn't ever give "Being Contentious" as a reason for a ban a member of Steam staff could clear that up very quickly by just saying they don't and it's only community moderators who do.

[Mad Scientist]

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

Being argumentative.

Then that is their reason. Typically when people get hit with this, they're breaking the rules by being uncivil, such as name-calling, lots of profanity with rude posts/insults, or other unwelcome behavior.

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

Ok but is it a safe bet that if you encounter "Being Contentious" as a reason for a ban in two separate game forums for games from different devs and different publishers that it's an unwritten rule on Valve more generally?

That would confirm the user is the source of self-inflicted issues. We've seen plenty of those, and they usually get bans in the main hubs for identical reasons.

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

I don't believe any Obsidian employee is even looking at Steam's Avowed page it was overrun by hate speech when I first saw it.

Do note in what is said or how one replies to "hate speech", it can still be against the rules in what one says and how one says it.
For example if one sees what they think is "hate speech" and they start insulting the other user, regardless of their own beliefs on the subject, insulting individuals will most likely result in moderation.

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

The rules and guidelines don't even mention the word contentious, that's part of what's so confusing and disconcerting about it.

They don't have to use specific words like that, reading the rules/guidelines shows they want relevant, civil, constructive discussion without such things like trolling or baiting people. They aren't going to list every possible word that is the same thing as what they wrote in terms of what not to do.

Not seeing a specific word does not mean it's ok to do, when reading the rules/guidelines clearly display welcome vs unwelcome behavior. Anyone trying to skirt around that tends to be moderated, repeatedly, for posting content with negative intentions.

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

The only relevance to the avowed hub is a ban that got overturned as excessive before I ever made the ticket to discuss Being Contentious as a criteria more broadly, the only relevance to any ban is that's how I knew about the criteria, it wasn't about a specific ban nor any thread on the Avowed Forum it was about the criteria more generalkly.

So it is about the game hub, as was easily seen as an identical post was made there as this thread.
If it was the Developer, Support would not overturn it, so it's best to ensure the content in the hub remains entirely civil to the discussion. It's also recommended to not post in a hub of a game one has no interest in, as if they moderate their own hub they're going to be far less forgiving like most Devs, as no one wants social-political heated arguments in their hubs that have little/nothing to do with the game.

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

Anything else related to Avowed here is entirely coincidental and irrelevant to the topic.

The post is easily seen in that hub as well in the locked thread. The whole story tends to show why some make threads outside of game hubs, when it's very transparently, about what happened in a game hub.

[William Shakesman]

Diposting pertama kali oleh Mad Scientist:

It's also recommended to not post in a hub of a game one has no interest in, as if they moderate their own hub they're going to be far less forgiving like most Devs, as no one wants social-political heated arguments in their hubs that have little/nothing to do with the game.

Is there something in his post history that suggests he is not interested in Avowed?

[Nx Machina]

Diposting pertama kali oleh 👁:

This isn't related to a specific ban but to the criteria itself, I was directed here to discuss this by Valve staff. I object to "Being Contentious" as a criteria because it's overly broad and can be used to ban almost anyone for any reason.

Specific ban has zero relevance.

Your previous locked thread on the same topic literally included the wording "banning people."

This thread title is literally "Being Contentious" as ban criteria. I WAS LITERALLY DIRECTED HERE BY HELP STAFF TO DISCUSS THIS

Did you literally miss on both threads you wrote ban, banning.