Daily reminder that the need for vote kicking is absolutely dire

It's incredible that the game got released without. Altho I'm enjoying sandstorm, this is the most uncomplete NWI release I've seen.

This is a KEY feature. The community on this game is the most cancerous of all milsim communities. Right now there's nothing to do in cases of people yelling nonsense in mics, one tapping everyone without killing them, or just blocking the game in push.

Pretty sure this is planned, but I'm also pretty sure it should have been in before release, so I'll hella push that one.

@tohkai They said we aren't getting vote kick because it was "abused" in previous games.

In other words, a bunch of trolls, cheaters, and griefers complained about there being consequences for their actions, so now everyone gets to suffer.

We all still bought the game, so NWI doesn't give a damn whether we want vote kick or not. They already made money.

they did say if the situation gets worse they might but for now, they don't want new players to leave. nwi right now doesn't care about the money but more on the newbies that just got into insurgency. they probably looked at a game like csgo where every new player gets kicked because they aren't doing as good as the rest of the team. its very stupid how when we don't get what we want as a community, the devs that made the game instantly become on the same level of shame as EA or Activision. don't have a vote kick system, greedy devs who just want money. don't get updates, greedy and lazy devs who just want money. don't get bug fixes for a lot of bugs, greedy devs. devs don't listen to the community, well its totally because they are greedy and not because they are an indie studio still and are probably fixing the game up right now.

Absolutely need it. The cheating is seriously getting out of hand already.

@burntflames People have been asking for vote kick since alpha, and the devs just told them no. I'd say that's not listening to your community.

And they're planning to add microtransactions at some point despite overwhelming opposition to the idea. I'd say that's definitely not listening to your community.

Vote kicking is not the answer to cheating--reporting them and getting cheaters banned is the solution. Below is the link to report cheaters. Be sure to go to your History from the Sandstorm main menu and copy the game ID so you can include it in your report.

Report cheaters here:

Link to Easy Anti-Cheat Sandstorm Cheat Report

Couldn't it work like when a teammate hits 2-3 teamkills, it allows the vote kick to happen then?

Or, once a player kills a few teammates, allow the players who were killed or other players to kick the TKer?

This seems like an easy problem to solve, if we don't just dig our heels in and refuse to admit there is a problem here.

The answer is the server browser. Several of us have independent servers, of which none are being used because of this asinine matchmaking nonsense. If you find some public servers you like, and keep going to them, admins will solve the bullshit problems. Which is what we should be focused on. As for now a bunch of bought servers for no reason.

I completely agree and even wrote in privately to NWI about this. I've encountered trolls who ruin the game by flashing teammates, running circles around teammates while mic-spamming, or feeling free to express outright unacceptable racist bullshit (not talking about PC, talking about crossing a line of acceptable communication).

Bottom line is - the community needs some tools to moderate their game, and I think it comes down to trust.

@skillet said in Daily reminder that the need for vote kicking is absolutely dire:

Vote kicking is not the answer to cheating--reporting them and getting cheaters banned is the solution. Below is the link to report cheaters. Be sure to go to your History from the Sandstorm main menu and copy the game ID so you can include it in your report.

Report cheaters here:

Link to Easy Anti-Cheat Sandstorm Cheat Report

Ok, why are you talking about cheating on a thread that's not about it?
As far as I know I haven't met one, and keep running into fully cancerous people who TK, mic spam, or don't attack in push , often holding the game on hold for minutes.

@thenickgann said in Daily reminder that the need for vote kicking is absolutely dire:

The answer is the server browser. Several of us have independent servers, of which none are being used because of this asinine matchmaking nonsense. If you find some public servers you like, and keep going to them, admins will solve the bullshit problems. Which is what we should be focused on. As for now a bunch of bought servers for no reason.

The answer is to fix the game, especially when the community servers don't allow for tokens to be earned.

last edited by tohkai

@tohkai I was not clear in my post, so my apologies. The developers have said to report toxic players and griefers through the EAC report feature to which I linked. It's been discussed over and over here and on Reddit.

Also, vote kicking is a two-edged sword. Toxic players commonly abuse vote kicking to harass other players. Again, that's been discussed ad nauseam.

last edited by skillet

It has been used in games for years. No matter if it has been used for harassment purposes, you would require a majority of players to be in favor of it. In most cases, it offers a much better alternative than leaving the toxic players on ESPECIALLY since, in most games, people will by default choose no even in cases where someone is toxic. It really requires to be pretty shitty to be vote kicked by everyone. And there's a lot of very, very shitty people ATM.

Mute has been used for years and can't be abused.

Yep, the community has really gone way downhill. I wonder if it's not because a lot of the toxic CS:GO community migrated over when CS went free-to-play. I've made it my mission to submit a report every time someone harasses other players as described in the OP. We'll see if anything happens--when you submit a report, it says to expect a response in 3-14 days. Time will tell if this is at all effective as I have no idea how closely the devs work with EAC to deal with this stuff.

@jballou - what do you do when they are blocking you. jumping into your fire. Ive had some people run into the building I threw c4 in to clear. 1 guy just ran in.....so if someone was turning that around on us...it would kinda suck.

If you're seeing someone cheating or harassing users, you can report them via this form:
https://www.easy.ac/en-us/support/sandstorm/contact/report/
Be sure to include the user's Steam name and a replay ID (from the history tab). This is the only permanent way to get rid of abusive users.

@alexblonski What is the relationship between the NWI team and the EAC team when it comes to players harassing others? Does NWI get all cheat and harassment reports, then review them and deal with them or does EAC do that?

@mlb7 said in Daily reminder that the need for vote kicking is absolutely dire:

Mute has been used for years and can't be abused.

Ah yes, the one feature that automatically is disabled after a few minutes, for no reason? that's what my other thread is about, do feel free to upvote it!

Regardless the muting feature isn't an answer to continuous team damage, people hiding without wanting to do anything on push as the last survivors, or any creative way you can piss off your teammates on purpose (smoking your own objective, blocking sight on purpose, etc)

So I'm gonna give a hard no to that comment especially since I had explained that communications weren't the sole problem in the original post

@alexblonski said in Daily reminder that the need for vote kicking is absolutely dire:

If you're seeing someone cheating or harassing users, you can report them via this form:
https://www.easy.ac/en-us/support/sandstorm/contact/report/
Be sure to include the user's Steam name and a replay ID (from the history tab). This is the only permanent way to get rid of abusive users.

Shoo, I guess even the NWI staff doesn't read then

last edited by tohkai

@tohkai I don't see that team killing is a huge problem. We all shoot teammates from time to time. I never see people team killing purposely. Well, on occasion you have a couple guys get into it, but they just kill each other so who cares.

The last guy alive can play how he wants regardless of how stupid he may be. He bought the game too. The time limit takes care of them fairly quick. Stretch your legs while you wait. It's good for you.

Some of the annoying things like smoking while on defense are just new people. Just tell them why you shouldn't do that. Sometimes, they will listen.

I know they need to fix the mute which I have said in a previous post. Not sure why they are dragging their feet on it. I have had some success muting so it's still worth a try.

last edited by MLB7

@tohkai smoking your own objective is not trolling. especially for a point like the last one on oil refinery with a huge front door just asking for an RPG inside the building. In fact, I often smoke half of the objective almost always especially if there is a giant front door with windows and or doorway where they can see in for half that sector of the map. I will toss smoke or launch it via under barrel every time to help avoid a rocket flying in. And it does help.
Many people avoid smoke just because their rig cant handle the graphic intensity needs at the moment. So they yell and berate others that their fps is dropping hence the start of demonizing it because their rig is weaker. (this was often the case in insurgency) So I would hope that you werent one of those people vote kicking other players because they saw the value of smoke nades and you didnt.
Do I want vote kick.....yeah sometimes I do. But I also remember getting kicked often for useing weapons in the game that were there to help me....but others chose to hate on me because they lost 5 fps....