There needs to be some Moderation of FAF Moderation

[DeathBySuccubus]

Hello Everyone. This post is due to my recent experience with getting banned, trying to appeal a ban for the first time, and my recent interactions with the Moderators. I've also talked with other individuals about their experience with FAF moderation and appeals which motivated me to make this post.

I was banned! On 23/09/2025, I was banned for "Abuse of Union Mode." The ban description was very vague so I was under the assumption I was banned for when I played a GAP game and took control on someone's Navy HQ to stop Neptune Spam vs Infinite T3 Sera subs and have the HQ begin making coopers as I was already amassing destros from my Navy HQ so we did not NEED Neptunes.

Originally when I planned to make this post, I was going to entirely focus on my experience with the appeal process. If the mods thought I deserved a ban for something, I was just going to take my ban and move on. As I began to discuss my ban with other people, they told me about their experiences with getting banned and the inconsistent rulings they've received that contrasted with my own experience.

I've gotten banned before and just took the ban when others told me to appeal. This was the first time I had been banned for this long, 7 days, so I figured I would go ahead and give it a shot. Why not?

I have blocked all names in the screenshots besides my own as the intent is to not start a witch hunt for individual mods but to bring attention to the banned and appeal process as a whole. If the individuals in these screenshots recognize their messages and wish to chime in, they are of course free to do so.

As it turns out, I was banned for using Union Control to Ctrl K someone else's commander. Okay. That is a valid ban for sure. If someone did that to me, I would be annoyed and report them. My only excuse is that if you watch the replay, the game was over with no chance of coming back. It was late and I wanted to everyone to just move on to the next one. If anyone has ever played a game with Terarii, they understand the pain of people dragging out an obviously lost game. That being said: That is still an excuse, I shouldn't have Ctrl K'd a commander that was not mine.

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My issue now with this ban is consistency and the too often used phrase: "case-by-case basis". Case-by-case basis should not be the de-facto when moderating. Consistency needs to be set and case-by-case basis should not be used as often as I see and am told by other FAF members who have been banned and then appealed.

Here are 2 screenshots of when I was talking about my ban with another individual on a discord, they mentioned that they reported someone abusing union control to kill their commander 2 different times. Once was moving the com which resulted in a death and the other was a straight up Ctrl K... the same thing I was banned for. The inconsistency is I was banned for 7 days when I had never been banned for this before but this person who reported union control abuse was told: "because host has enabled union control, we can not take such actions".

So which is it? Bannable offense or "we can't take such actions"? or let me guess: Case-By-Case basis?

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Alright. So, I'm banned. Waiting out my days and on Saturday, a couple people asked me why I did not try to appeal it. Let's try.

My ticket is submitted at 2:01 PM on a Saturday afternoon. I do my best to be polite and apologize for the unban as I understand they don't have to unban me. I was expecting a quick no but that was not my experience. I actually would have just preferred a quick no however my experience makes me never want to try to appeal again.

This is my first ever appeal and I did see "processing your appeal might take a moment" however I was not expecting the wait I experienced. My thought process is that message for the people hitting up mods 10 minutes after their appeal is posted

An hour and a half after my appeal is submitted, while there is 1 Admin and 8 Moderators online, no response. So, I figured maybe they are busy and just did not see the appeal request. They are volunteers, right?

I private messaged 4 moderators total regarding this ban and appeal process and only 2 responded. "Moderator A" was the most responsive, helpful, and polite out of all of them. 2 of the Moderators have still not even acknowledged my direct message as of 23/09/2025.

I want to point out that when he responded to my direct messages he said I was second in line for ban appeals. and "shouldn't take too long". I guess I should have asked him to clarify how long long is.

Moderator A finally looks at my appeal and types that they've received my appeal and are working on it... and that I will receive an answer with seven to fourteen days? possible 14 days for a simple ban appeal? when I'm 2nd in line and "shouldn't take too long". I would say that's probably an automated message or automated deadline they give to every appeal but that is hilariously long when I'm assuming most bans they give out are less than 2 weeks.

Oh hey! The second moderator I mentioned above finally replied to my DM... and they basically told me to fuck off. My bad for asking you to do your duty as a Moderator.

Side Note: One of the people I talked to was banned for 7 days for Toxicity but I've literally seen Moderator C flame the shit one of my friends at time in a mapgen calling them a 1600 noob. A bit hypocritical.

It has been 33 hours since my appeal has been submitted and 26 hour since my appeal has been acknowledged. Keep in mind this was over the weekend where at all times there were at least 4 Moderators on at all times. I was checking so its not like no one was on to receive a quick DM from another moderator: "Hey do you have 10 minutes to discuss this appeal we received?". I don't know how a ban appeal discussion could take longer than 10m.

Hallelujah! A decision has been made and sent to the ticket for myself to see! ...a whole 4 minutes before my ban is lifted. Surely they took all this time to come to a tough decision to approve my appeal right? No, its a denial. This feels more like they were just stringing me along until right before my ban expires. I would've rather just received an immediate no.

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This last screenshot is... from me crashing out in FAF General after I expressed my dissatisfaction about ban to another person who was banned with NO reason listed. you can not make this shit up. He is one of the regular GAP 2ks and he's just banned with no reason mentioned. As I was expressing my dissatisfaction, Moderator C decided to chime in and start discussing the ban and appeal process with me. He made some valid points but also had some excuses which were silly in my opinion.

The "we're volunteers" is so weak. Correct, you ARE volunteers. You volunteered to take time out of your day to moderate this community. No one is forcing you but if you're going to moderate, at least be attentive. You don't need to be on 24/7 to get things done in a timely manner. 9 people capable of reviewing the appeal were off and on over almost 3 days fighting back and forth over the TOUGH decision of my appeal. If you can't handle the appeals currently, maybe its time to get some new mods to help out with the flow of bans/appeals.

Moderator C then goes on to say that they had a whopping 14 tickets over the weekend. Okay, that is a decent amount. You know what would help that? If you didn't have these policies about 2 different moderators needing to review an appeal and those 2 moderators can't be associated with the original ban. Why can't one of the original moderators have been the one who did the original ban? If the moderators are consistent and impartial, it should not matter. That's the problem with the moderation's teams consistency. They have all this "case-by-case" basis and inconsistency that leads to them needing to have a bunch of checks and balances which heavily slows down the appeal process which in my opinion should not take so long to review for a 17-year old RTS game.

That's all I really have to say about this topic. Feel free to share your thoughts. Have a nice night.

[IndexLibrorum]

This response was prepared by the team as a whole, and I am posting it on their behalf. The original thread was locked earlier because, at the time, we were in the middle of addressing the DDoS situation and did not have the capacity to properly respond here as well. Ordinarily, a thread centered on a specific moderation case or appeal would be removed, since such posts are often more about venting frustration than genuinely resolving an issue. In this case, however, we chose to leave the post visible and use it as an opportunity to provide a clearer explanation of how the appeal system works, as we still frequently get questions.

A TL;DR and a link to the FAF information page on the moderation system are included below.

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On “vague” ban messages

We use a set of standard ban messages that accurately describe the reason for the ban. This is not because we want to be obscure, but because we process a very large number of tickets, and having consistent, pre-written messages allows us to keep things moving. Examples include “Abuse of union control mode”, “Griefing”, “Reclaiming allied units”, “Verbal abuse”, and “Ctrl-K’ing significant number of units”.

The expectation is that players remember the game they just played, especially when the ban is issued within a day of that match, which is frequently the case. If someone does not remember or feels the message is unclear, the ticket system is the place to ask for clarification, and we are always ready to provide details when asked. Typically such tickets are answered within hours.

On the appeal timeline

You submitted your appeal roughly 4.5 days into a 7-day ban. Your appeal did not ask for clarification; you explicitly acknowledged your abuse of union control and requested a reduction. You received a reply about seven hours later confirming receipt, and at that point you were informed that you should expect a verdict within 7–14 days. This time indication was longer than is usual because of ongoing issues related to the DDoS attacks at the time.

Normally, we resolve appeals in 1–3 days. We explain this on our website, along with an explanation of why appeals take longer than normal tickets. The reason for a multi-day turnaround is simple: an appeal is not just “pressing a button.” By protocol, the appeal must be reviewed by at least two moderators who were not involved in the original ban, with the issuing moderator only providing context. The original moderator does not have a vote on how the appeal gets resolved, but is asked for their input and reasoning behind the ban. That means three people are engaged in every appeal. This often involves the replay, verifying the offense, reviewing the reasoning for the original ban, and then discussing whether a reduction is justified. About half of appeals result in at least a partial reduction, which shows that the process is meaningful and not just a rubber stamp.

This method of requiring 2 additional moderators has been designed this way on purpose. What you mistake for inefficiency, is in fact an intentionally designed system to ensure moderators are held accountable.

All of this takes time, especially since every one of us is a volunteer. We are not employees sitting in a call center waiting to pick up the next ticket. Our Discord status being “online” does not mean we are sitting there ready to process appeals at a moment’s notice. Often we are at work, studying, or just relaxing in our free time with Discord open in the background.

So when you say things like:

“My bad for asking you to do your duty as a Moderator.”

That wording is inappropriate and comes across as entitlement. None of us has a contractual “duty” to provide immediate service. Moderators donate their personal time to keep the FAF community functioning. If you expect an on-demand appeals office, that would require paid staff, not volunteers.

It is also worth pointing out that during the very weekend in question, the moderation team was working with admins and the FAF Board to respond to a series of DDoS attacks. Tickets, while important, are not the only part of the job, and sometimes they must wait while other pressing tasks are handled. In the end, we resolved your ticket within 3 days.

On the “case-by-case” complaint

You argue that moderation is too inconsistent and that “case-by-case” should not be the default. Here it is important to be clear about what consistency actually means. The rules are applied consistently: deliberately destroying an allied commander through union control is griefing and bannable. That is why you were banned.

What you describe as “inconsistency” in similar cases is usually one of two things:

• Misunderstandings by the reporter. Some reports we have received claim that an ally Ctrl-K’d their commander. On review, it turns out the commander was actually killed by enemy fire. For example, we recently received a report where it turned out a commander was sniped by enemy TML, rather than the reported allied abuse of union mode. Because there is no griefing in that case, such reports are dismissed with a short explanation.
• Reports of normal union control. If you join a union control game, you consent to allies using your units. A teammate moving your ships is not griefing. A teammate deleting your commander is. That is the difference between perceived griefing and actual griefing. The first will be dismissed, the second will result in action.

We cannot prevent players from misinterpreting the results, but that does not mean the moderation was inconsistent. In your case, it was unambiguous: you destroyed an allied commander. That always results in a ban. To say that others have done the same and been excused is a claim we have not seen borne out in the reports we process. We won’t pretend mistakes are impossible, but they are far rarer than players assume when they only hear one side of a story, and our appeal system is designed to catch such mistakes. Similarly, if you believe we have discarded a ticket when we shouldn’t have, a moderation ticket is the right place to bring that to our attention.

On the appeal outcome

It is true that your ban expired very shortly after your appeal was formally denied. We explained above why the process requires multiple moderators to review and discuss, and sometimes the conclusion of that process comes near the end of the ban duration. In your case, this was mostly a consequence of you submitting your appeal after most of your ban had already expired.

This happens sometimes, often when the duration of the ban is short or when the appeal was made later into the ban. However, even in these cases, the process serves an important function. An upheld appeal from a player will be taken into account for any future action taken, so it is to the benefit of the player in question. In addition, it helps us keep ourselves consistent and helps us make the right decisions.

You should now also understand that your implication that the moderators deliberately delayed your appeal until your ban expired was not the case. If our goal were to avoid appeals, we would not have built this system in the first place. The current ticket system replaced the old email-based process, which often meant waiting a month or more for an appeal. Because of the time volunteers give, most appeals are now resolved within a few days. We hope to continue with this system, but if it ever becomes too difficult to maintain, the fallback would be a return to the slower email-based approach.

On adding more moderators

You suggest bringing in more moderators. That is an ongoing process: most recently we’ve added TheCrimsonKnight to the team and are always watching for promising candidates. Recruiting, however, is not something that can be rushed, and it is not as simple as “just add more.” A moderator needs to be both trustworthy and willing to volunteer their time consistently. Given the sensitivity of the data a moderator has access to, a careless choice can create far more problems than it solves.

TL;DR:

The system is designed to be fair and careful, not instant. Appeals take multiple people and careful review, because that is how we ensure decisions are not biased or the consequence of a rogue moderator. Moderators are also not customer service agents on shift. We are community members who volunteer our own free time, and you cannot expect instant resolution.

You were banned for Ctrl-King a teammate’s ACU through union control, which is always actionable. The fact that the appeal was completed just before your ban expires is a consequence of you filing your appeal halfway through your ban.

For further questions and information I’d like to refer you to our general info page on our website: https://faforever.com/moderation.