A question of morality. Was I right or wrong? What would you have done?

[Tigdam]

Now  I know that this is a bit long but please bare with it till the end.  (Skip to bottom for Abbreviated version)

 

World of warships just like any other multiplayer game has its share of diverse individuals from all walks of life/education/age: There are those who are friendly who come online to have fun, those who are competitive who will do what ever it takes to win, there are those who aren't the best but still give it there all to support their team and win the game, there are those who get wound up and insult because things aren't going well or its been a bad day, then there are those who are truly abusive and vile who either understand and ignore or don't care and want so spread hate about the game. You're going to find all these kinds of people and its not so much there response but my own.

To give some context I've been gaming since I was young and in all that time I've never ever thrown a game or deliberately shot an ally because he was doing better than me etcetera but the former  changed today. I also enjoy all types of ships here in world of warships though I'm quite partial to carrier and destroyers, I've gotten to tier 8 in the ijn carrier line and tier six in the American line so I've got a fair bit of experience about the systems involved and how they work on various maps.

I was in my Independence I with the default module (Don't like air domination module not very sporting in my opinion so I never use them) I also have captain skills that let me aircraft take off from 25-40 seconds. The enemy ryujo had a fighter load out (3 squadrons of fighters 1 torp bomber 1 dive bomber). On my side there was a player name [edited] or something along those lines and he along with his friend became a problem later on.

I started out the game as usual by wishing everybody good luck and fair seas and asking which way we where doing to the right or to the left then I started to talk in general to the team about where they wanted my fighters since I could tell thanks to the loading screen that the enemy carrier had a fighter setup (+4 to his aircraft rating) and I know in my standard set up he'd eventually destroy my squadrons so I wouldn't be able to provide cover for long, this was whilst my aircraft were still preparing to launch and I was only a few seconds late on launching my torpedo bombers (first thing ready at 25 seconds and I took about 30 to finish talking)  this guy and his mate suddenly start having a go at me in chat, not talking to them and suddenly throwing insults along the lines of: wtf u doing f bleep noob cv, don't know how to play, go play lol (think league of legends?). This kind of thing happens from time to time and there are unpleasant people out there anyway I launched my aircraft and ordered them in my usual formation, fighters then dive bombers then torpedo bombers by which point this guy and his friends are again insulting me saying why aren't I spotting DD's, where's their support noob clueless CV to which I responded that my aircraft were already on their way and if you send single sets of aircraft to wards the centre on Estuary they usually die. Sending my planes grouped together I spotted for the team, saw which way the enemy were going and what was coming then I saw an opening and a chance to attack a top tier battleship that had split off from the group (Tirpitz), I saw the enemy fighters approaching but decided to take the risk anyway because it was heading towards an area with a koing and a DD so with its escorts lagging behind they could have made an early push and my attack successfully broke it up, forced the Tirpitz to go around an island near their base, early manual torpedo drop had done this so I only lost an aircraft, my fighters strafed the enemy fighters and wrapped up seven kills (on all three enemy squadrons, 12aircraft all togeather) before my fighters got caught and killed by combined AA and fighter power, my bombers dropped on a destroyer who was attempting to sneak in the middle while my torpedo bombers headed for the reload. At this point again [edited] and his mate decided they were going to have ago at me, he pushed his battleship in front of my carrier and threw further insults at me, each way I turned in my carrier he pushed with his battleship practically running into me on several occasions and he said I was a complete noob and a bot saying he'd reported me as such then said I'd soon be crying that I'd run out of aircraft. I still think it was the right decision to force the enemy to evade to give our team a chance to organise but [edited]and his friend didn't think so. Later in the match they also demanded to know why I wasn't helping them, having one squadron of fighters and our team spread out over both left and right sides of the map and why I wasn't spotting destroyers, at this point I was retrieving and rearming my aircraft and apparently that makes me again a noob and an idiot who clearly can't play CV and should uninstall the game.

Our side was doing fairly ok it was relatively even and I'd managed to do a good 12.000 points of dmg though I'd listened to the team and gone after the destroyers that were trying to slip through the centre, using torpedo runs and bombs to throw off their attacks against our bbs and to protect our cap, pinging the map each time I saw a destroyer to let the team know where they were and now a third member of the team had a go at me for not spotting destroyers even though I was bombing them and pinging the map on their location and this member also said reporting me for being a bot.

 

A bit later on things had taken a turn and [edited]decided to say in chat that he'd had enough and was going to kill me, he sailed his ship close to mine forcing me to turn and hit the breaks before he shot, if I hadn't have manoeuvred he'd have hit me his shots were so close, I asked them to be quiet and again he said he'd kill me so I launched my dive bombers and dropped them to his side saying I could do the same, I missed so I wouldn't incur penalty and again to let him know friendly fire works both ways, he then proceeded to gloat in chat that I couldn't even hit him with a manual drop. The third member of the three then had a go at me for not covering him and reported me for being a bot when I had said several mints earlier that my fighters had died to the enemy (Used them to strafe the enemy giving my torpedo bombers a chance to do some damage so they were dead) He then also said he'd reported me for being a bot.

 

A bit later on after taking abuse from these people so I moved into the cap and while I could have done something to help I instead I sailed around with dive bombers left in my hanger while the enemy team came around the corner, this had originally been to keep hold the cap (As a cv it was that desperate of a situation) and to drop bombs on the cruiser and destroyer who were coming through the middle. I'd lightly damaged the cruiser and almost outright killed the destroyer but at this point I stopped helping the team, set course in the overset direction and with bombers in my hanger did nothing. Apparently now [edited] will tkill me the next time he sees me so there is also that.

The enemy Ryujo knew what he was doing, I never approve of fightersetups but three squadrons of fighters+ three squadrons total on my Carrier with AA he managed to do what an air domination set up was suppose to do and tie me down and kill my aircraft and do damage with his torp/dive bombers so I'd be more impressed if it wasn't a fightersetup but he did quite well and credit where credit is due.

 

By the end of it I simply had enough and did nothing, I could have helped and by the end it was three bbs against one, he killed one bbs and the others were on such low health I could have killed them both with what I had left yet I didn't because of the shear amount of abuse and hate I'd suffered from three members of the team.

My question was I right to stop helping and let them loose or was I wrong and should have helped because not everyone was being vicious?

I chose to stop helping and let the whole team loose but was that ok? To let everyone loose for the sake of three unpleasant individuals?

I don't expect everyone to know the aspects of all classes, sure its quite possible that even a tier five battleship captain doesn't know that Aircraft carriers have a delay before they can launch but when you're told surely it can't be right to harass that person? Its like asking a battleship captain who just fired why he isn't doing anything, well because he just shot and is reloading, its the same for carriers.

 

Before the game I had a rating on my profile of +9compliments and I've had people openly state that i'd outplayed them and genuinely praised me for the support my carrier had given them and my general assistance to the team which shows the positive side of this community when we can recognise what others have done to help the team win as a whole and I do try to use my daily limit of compliments or occasionally reports as a thankyou to people even if its a bit empty (Maybe wargaming will add some benefit to it later but its still nice all the same) though [edited] had said he used his daily limit and now my profile  had +2 compliments so its not a game that I came away from with any positive feelings.

However i'll leave it upto you guys. Was I right to stop assisting the two vicious people and one innocent or was I wrong to stop launching planes and help the one guy out?

Right or wrong, I believe I was right though that gives me no comfort in this matter. Anyone have any suggestions on what wargaming could do to help remove this kind of unpleasantness or is it simply something that will stay in gaming for ever?

PS. I'm not really complaining about people with a reason to be annoyed just those who do it for the sake of it or deliberately go out of their way to harass certain players for fun or for minor mistakes they have made.

 

 

 

Abbreviated version here= Basically three members of my own team were harassing me the whole game, demanding I make certain moves some of which I was already doing (spotting and pinging map for DD's each time they were spotted), launching my aircraft a few seconds later because I was talking to the team about where they wanted my fighters in chat and it got the point where by the end of it I had, had enough and gave in. I sailed my carrier around the cap but didn't launch the bombers in the bay providing no more assistance to the team even though with the bombers we could have won. Three team members really having a go at me for baseless reasons, my compliment score went from +9 to +2 and now one of them says each time he sees me he will team kill me. By the end of the match there were 2 of the harassers left (because they stayed in the back) and one innocent team member. I didn't help the innocent guy and let the innocent members of the team down because I wasn't going to let the abusers win and I had genuinely had enough of them. Was I right to stop helping the team (which lead to us all having a defeat) or was I wrong and should have fought to the end?

 

[TomaszuJerzy]

Can somebody tldr this?

[ColonelPete]

Make it shorter.

[xXx_Blogis_xXx]

lol to much to read , make shorter

[Tigdam]

Good point. I have added an abbreviated version at the bottom for those who want it shortened. I made it so large as to give people all the info they needed so they didn't have to guess and judge me too harshly _-_

[TomaszuJerzy]

Yes.

[krautjaeger]

A bit of both. People who harass, or what you wanna call it, usually when you look at the scoreboard later on did f-all or very little. Some of these people are just pure trolls too, they get their kicks out of other people becoming sad, angry, irritated. Just ignore them, like through the interface, and move on with the game. These are sad muppets, don't let them ruin your sense of fun.

[EmilyFara]

A bit of both.

I would have let him tk me though.

 

Friendly warning, naming and shaming gets threads locked.

[Runner357]

If they loose, you loose. Don't mind them and win the game instead. Rise above their immature attitude, take screenshots and send them to WG.

[procrastinatingStudent]

if they annoy you too much just block communication with them and contiune on your day.

 

people are like that, why do you think the sea is salty?

[Molybdane]

I votes yes because it is you that decides what you are to do.

 

Also, in a bad situation, you can't always rely on your teammates to help you out if you try to recover a bad situation, which is a good reason to hesitate. In this case, you can be certain you wouldn't get help. You would only get killed and the 2/3 other would only gloat, leaving you with a bad feeling and a repair bill.

[StringWitch]

No opinion, but for the future:

Disable chat.

Play how you see fit.

[Fred3n]

You did the right thing, it felt right for you and it did not really hurt anyone

[mrk421]

I feel for you man! I have played close to 2000 games in total and I've never witnessed abuse on the scale you described. So at least you'll know it's relatively rare. I've seen plenty of unpleasant people in the chat though and I have no problem reporting them and if they're really annoying I disable messages from them.

In your situation I'd probably done that first and in case they were really bad, ask my other teammates to report them as well. And try to continue with my own game if possible. I have exited to port when I was still alive and before the match had finished on one occasion. But it was a different situation: the match was almost over, I was the last one alive and we were losing badly, so I just wanted to skip the last few seconds. I don't think they even managed to kill me before the time ran out... If some of my teammates were outright out to get me and attacking me, I would possibly do the same, so more-less what you did.

 

As for ways to fix these kinds of things from happening. I think one way to at least better the situation would be to make use of the karma system. It could be made that if a person has accumulated a lot of bad karma, they would acquire teamkiller status. And any further reports would add to that as if they'd caused further team damage. Since after a certain point players lose the ability to do friendly damage as all of it is reflected back to them, this way they'd at least not be able to bring anyone down with them - at least not directly. An added punishment could be also that they could lose their ability to use the chat. This could help get rid of some of the a**holes.

 

Edit: Well apparently, according to this  thread that is actually how it works, at least concerning the ability to use chat.

[Runner357]

I have +28 karma and I rant in game all the time when my team goes 4F. I just can't help it

[Deckeru_Maiku]

Just ignore *beeps* like those and do your thing.

 

Reports for botting etc. don't do nothing and Karma is useless anyway.

If something like that would happen to me, I wouldn't even bother reading the chat or answering to those *beeps*

[GoT_PcDealer]

There is no innocent player if they don't back you up in chat.

[Charger76]

First off, there are many ills in large scale multi player games, abusive players only one of them. Specific issues in WoWS:

 

How about Battleships that spend most of the game hiding behind a rock or are sitting behind the start line?

 

Or CV's who have all strike set ups and are thus of little use when the enemy CV has a mixed set up and can thus dominate the game?

 

What about idiots that fire torpedos without thinking who is in the path of those torpedos even when your ship is only 30M in front of them?

 

I get very annoyed at such cowardice, selfishness and stupidity and I tend to say as much. I sometimes also shoot offenders because I think cowards (Battleships who hide behind islands / stay so far back they are only getting hits by RNG handjobs) and fools (wanton torpedo firers) should be shot given that the game does very little to punish such egregious behaviour.

 

Next to those offences I think some verbals irrelavant.

 

However, I have never ever deliberately thrown a game and I don't agree with doing so. I will from time to time encourage the enemy team not to lose to a team of cowards, but will still do my best to cap, shoot, decap etc.

 

Moral of the story: do your best, try to ignore the worst offenders and get on with playing. People are always brave behind a keyboard (even if not in game) and will say things that they never would otherwise. In fact I have yet to meet the person who would ever speak to me as people have online, but then again, not many people are mouthy to an 18 stone man...... Anyway, let it go.

[Ze_Reckless]

Do you play this game for fun? Great! Don't let others take your fun hostage. Just mute them (right-click player in team table) and keep enjoying.

On the one hand I want to say you shouldn't abuse your power to punish your team, on the other hand do as you like. Who am I to tell you how to play this game?

 

I had similar experiences like this 3 or 4 times, but only with 1 'chat-active' person. I learned to ignore those people and just do my best in spite of it. If you can win battles with afks or team killers, you can win with those pitiful guys on your team.

[Kazinjo]

I know that feeling. Last time that I remember was a guy that attacked me for not going to spot with Kutuzov. I said that we have 2 or 3 destroyers and that I am more useful in second row with my good RoF and range then in first line because I am dead the moment they spot me, due to Kutuzov paper armour. He continues to rant but I just ignored him and continue to play my style. But surely it is not pleasant when you get called names for no real reason.

But that is so rare that its bareable.

Take care!

[Blood_Vessel]

Four things you can do to help when this happens:

1 - Hold CTRL and move your in game pointer over their ship in the Players Panel (top left corner where it shows your team) You can right click and set them to "Ignore chat from this player" You can also do this from the scoreboard screen holding TAB.

 

2 - If anyone is being abusive (and let's not get all unreasonably triggered here...) you can use the same method to Report > Misbehaviour in chat, which when they add up leads to a chat ban so they can't continue spewing their mouth excrement.

3 - Let anyone threatening to TK you do so. They will get TK penalties (pinkie) and reflected damage whereas you just end up having to join a new round... (without them in the first place - even better)

 

4 - Ignore raging man-children and be happy that you destroyed them in the results screen when you were first on your team and they were languishing in the bottom, further proving that they know cack-all and are no-skill scrubs

[AnotherDuck]

Abandon the idiots to their own devices and play your own game. Or steal their kills; that's often funny, even if it might not be efficient.

[Celandri]

i had one game since alpha where i got a platoon of people blocking my ship totaly and i couldnt do anything, could go forward or backward as i would hit their ships. i just ignored them and shot whenever i could and reported them via copy of the replay to the system.

i had a few others donkying around but not as bad as that division above. And one division shooting themselfs one got actualy temp ban because he shot all his division members and sank them 

[dasCKD]

Ultimately, I think the only wrong thing you did was cost yourself a win you could have taken. Nevertheless, you are an individual player and not a member in a team battle or competition match so if you choose to throw a match on your own volition then that is your choice. I personally would throw a match if the match was going to be a draw, meaning a loss for both sides (at least back in the days when draws were a thing).

[aboomination]

Of course it was wrong, it's always wrong to share your own butthurt with the whole team, but it happens all the time - and it's certainly not that important that you had to create a topic on the forums...

On topic: I personally never deliberately throw a game.