Discussing the "rename rule"

So on FAF there is a rule that says no player can "impersonate" or rather take the name of another player. For example if someone is called "All", and someone else renames to "AII" (with capital i), that person will get banned on report.

In my opinion someone should only be banned on rename for these reasons:

• the player he renamed himself to reported him
• the name is racist or offensive

I don't really get why one should be banned because of similar (or same looking) name as someone else and that the rule should be removed. It honestly is sobody's business what anyone renames himself to and is not enforced anywhere else (that i know of at least).

But as i heard some specific person defending the rule i'd like to hear any positive argument on why this rule should stay.

That is how the rule worked. That got put in place when everyone renamed into marshallichking variants and nobody cared until lichking complained. Then me and farm made barcode renames and a rule got made midargument about names being mimics that got around that condition for us to be banned. Got accused of photoshopping the rules page since i had a screenshot of the rules page without it existing prior to the argument 4head. I very specifically asked Gorton back then about the report condition being necessary to get banned for impersonation btw.

So basically you’re gonna get banned for the mimic rule and if you got banned for the impersonation one then the mod that banned you doesn’t know how those rules apply anyway. It’s also always variable in application because SNF had like 2 diff rename things going on similar to barcodes and the copypaste and didn’t get a ban for.

I get how the rule came to be. (i am also not 100% sure on the exact wording on the ban - didnt save it)

The question still is, why does it exist? What harm befalls the comunity when someone renames himself to a same looking name as someone else? Is something like this anywhere else?
I also heard the comment "can be confusing to players". So what? Every rename can be confusing

Be annoying if you’re mr streamer and dudes rename to a name very similar to yours and keep throwing games or being obnoxiously annoying, even if mr streamer fits both of these himself. But that’s why the original rule required you to report the dude yourself.

I honestly don't get what you just said. If I am the streamer and someone renames himself to a name similar, i can report him and he gets banned. If someone is throwing games or being annoying I can report him, which has nothing to do with a rename.
So basically change the rule to only the guy they are mimicing can report them for the rename

That change makes the mimic rule redundant and a carbon copy of the impersonation rule, the whole reason they are divided revolves around proactive and passive action

And how is that bad? I was literally told that these cases only get dealt with on report. So there is nothing proactive happening.

The thing with the barcode is something that should obviously be prevented (even though this is not enforced anywhere else aswell), but to then just say in general "no mimicing" is kind of ridiculous. The point still stands that this is a faf specific thing (unless i am mistaken?). Its literally tolerated in the faf discord.

So basically what I am saying the impersonation rule is perfectly fine. The mimic rule just does not make sense for me. You listed the barcode as an bad example for when there is no such rule. It's obviously annoying (and should be prevented in my opinion) but even that should not be bannable. What exactly is the reason why this is not allowed? Some players having the same name??
What would happen if 3 random people joined faf today that have the same or basically same looking name. Are you (or rather, the rules) now forcing 2 of those players to pick a different name or ban them?

I wanted to be called nuggets but because of nuggets i was forced to change 2 letters, after which the faf moderation team banned me. This is total injustice

@thewheelie I even gave you permission! Mods!!

There is a benefit for both other players and mods for being able to tell different players apart.
For example, if a player starts breaching faf rules in aeolus chat, and there are two people with identical looking names (one using lowercase L and the other uppercase I) the wrong person might be accused or punished.

Similarly you might play against someone and really dislike the experience and then end up avoiding a different person (with the same looking name).

I also don’t see the benefit from eg allowing eg both a maudlin27 and a maudIin27 to exist; the main ‘benefits’ would be someone with malicious intent (via impersonation) or someone thinking it would be funny.

@maudlin27
Why do you need to tell players apart when there is no reason? The only reason when mods need to tell people apart is upon a report. If its ingame report the name does not matter, because replay-ID is attached.
For the example in aeolus chat, that is something i did not consider, but more like a fault with the client that i cant right click someone and report.
If i want to avoid someone i use the foe list. There can't be any confusion there even with renames. (If you dont use foe list you can't really avoid anyone, because he can rename)
If you dont want there to be a 2nd maudlin, just report him and he gets banned. That should always be your right, as its "your" name. But not the right of anyone else to report that there are 2 maudlin.
The point is that for example 2 people want to play together and decide to take the same name (ot at least same looking name), they can do that (as literally tons of people do on other platforms)

Don't get me wrong, I am genuinely looking for a reason for this rule to exist, but personally i can't see it

He just gave you reasons. You might not think they are valid, but that is just your opinion

I've already mentioned two examples where not being able to tell who a player is causes harm. Many players won't be aware of the foe feature (while it also doesnt work for matchmaker), and you didn't give a solution for the aeolus chat issue. I'd also note you haven't given a reason for the rule not to exist beyond 'two people might want to have indistinguishable names'. If two people want similar names that's already probably ok, so you're presumably not talking about similar names, you're talking about indistinguishable names.

In other words, if someone wants to call themself maudlin28 then that's similar to my name but clearly distinguishable, so is probably ok (although this shouldn't be taken as a general rule as I'd have thought the main factors likely to be taken into account on whether a name is ok is both whether the name is distinguishable from others and if there's an intent/risk of impersonation). If instead they want to call themselves maudIin27 then that's indisguishable from my name even if technically different.

First of all, yes i am talking about indistinguishable names.

So regarding aeolus, i myself can't give a solution, because i feel like the only solution is if you can right-click people to copy username or directly report. Seems more like a client feature that should exist (in general).
Other than aeolus, there is no way a wrong person gets reported, as with reports you have to give the replay-ID and then the player is 100% identified.

The reason for the rule to not exist is freedom of picking your own username, i guess. As i said, this is not something that is enforced anywhere else.

I completly get that it makes everything easier for mods. As they can more easily identify the player "who is causing harm". But I do not see this as a valid reason for the rule to exist. But as @BlackYps said, thats my opinion.

I generally agree with Nuggets, the rule sounds like it’s banning what amounts to annoying behavior. If we go down the path of banning what’s annoying then there goes 99% of faf.

If someone copies someone and then starts being toxic/messing up games/causing any other issues then we have rules to ban them for those offenses. The only kind of argument against that is reporting someone from chat but that seems niche enough that it doesn’t really justify the rule.

I could go play any other game and have an account name that looks like a famous player’s account and there are no rules against that. Not sure why FAF would be different

Having a clear rule that is in effect for everbody is MUCH better than just enforcing an arbitrary case-by-case subjective too-annoying vs. not-annoying-enough rule.

@exselsior said in Discussing the "rename rule":

I could go play any other game and have an account name that looks like a famous player’s account and there are no rules against that. Not sure why FAF would be different

Impersonating another community member in a large community is much less impactful than doing the same in a small community such as FAForever. It's trivial to end up on a foe list on accident and then be unable to join a lobby because of that.

@nuggets said in Discussing the "rename rule":

In my opinion someone should only be banned on rename for these reasons:

(1) the player he renamed himself to reported him
(2) the name is racist or offensive

Won't you agree that (1) is a bit lame? Unless Maudlin (to continue the example) is around to report it himself then nobody else is able to report the fake Maudlin26 who's being a total douche bag and actively trying to be toxic within the boundaries of the rules? How does that contribute to a healthy environment?

I would personally not appreciate it if it would happen to me for sure.

@katharsas said in Discussing the "rename rule":

Having a clear rule that is in effect for everbody is MUCH better than just enforcing an arbitrary case-by-case subjective too-annoying vs. not-annoying-enough rule.

I agree with this. Just disallowing it in general is better than making it subjective. I also do not understand the origin of the discussion; did someone get banned over this?

@jip said in Discussing the "rename rule":

I agree with this. Just disallowing it in general is better than making it subjective. I also do not understand the origin of the discussion; did someone get banned over this?

Yes. But I did not want this thread to become a discussion about specific moderation action, so I asked nuggets to just discuss the rule.

@jip said in Discussing the "rename rule":

Impersonating another community member in a large community is much less impactful than doing the same in a small community such as FAForever. It's trivial to end up on a foe list on accident and then be unable to join a lobby because of that.

Its true, that it's a bit different in smaller communities, but it is also not like other communities where it is completly indistinguishable, as you have country, game amount and avatar (even cpu score). I do not see the landing on a foe list on accident as a good point, because that is just user error. If you want to prevent that might aswell make a popup confirming every foe or friend.

@nuggets said in Discussing the "rename rule":

In my opinion someone should only be banned on rename for these reasons:

(1) the player he renamed himself to reported him
(2) the name is racist or offensive

Won't you agree that (1) is a bit lame? Unless Maudlin (to continue the example) is around to report it himself then nobody else is able to report the fake Maudlin26 who's being a total douche bag and actively trying to be toxic within the boundaries of the rules? How does that contribute to a healthy environment?

I would personally not appreciate it if it would happen to me for sure.

Well first of all, if someone is being toxic - report him. This has little to do with the rename. And the example you provided is impersonation, which is a different rule. I am talking about 2 players getting the same name (with each others permission).

@katharsas said in Discussing the "rename rule":

Having a clear rule that is in effect for everbody is MUCH better than just enforcing an arbitrary case-by-case subjective too-annoying vs. not-annoying-enough rule.

I agree with this. Just disallowing it in general is better than making it subjective. I also do not understand the origin of the discussion; did someone get banned over this?

I actually do not think that my take on the rule, makes the rule subjective. It's not like the mod has to actually debate on whether to ban someone misusing the rule or not. If the "original owner" of the name reports him - ban. If someone else reports him, discard (toxicity and stuff like that falls under other rules).