Talk:Griefer

message: added a caveat re griefing and PvP in MMO's, as there is much misconception on this topic.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 120.156.5.103 (talk) 10:02, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: MMO Griefing

message: Microsoft has a good definition of this (no link, sorry!), which covers more about verbal abuse rather than the team killing and techincal aspect of Griefing Borgs8472 17:37, 23 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd concider any gamer who initiates nonconcentual PvP to be a griefer.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.160.77.255 (talk) 23:29, 16 November 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Microsoft's Griefing Definition 

message: Having read the article today and made some minor edits for the sake of clarity I have removed the weasel tag as the offending passages seem to have been removed. 13:53, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Weasel words 

message: I found this article helpful, even if it is overly filled with jargon. I support its inclusion as a standalone article on the English-language Wikipedia. I would like to see it improved, however I lack the technical knowledge to do so. But I did come across a recent newspaper article that could point to recent trends in the use of this term and could be used as a reference: Davies, Martin (June 15, 2006) "Gamers don't want any more grief", The Guardian.  - Wisekwai 11:01, 16 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Helpful 

message: Griefing isnt just about scamming or harrassing people, the abuse of features in ways not intended is a major part of it too. Non griefers also do this yeah, but similarly not all scammers or team killers are griefers.
:No, I'm certain that is a misapprehension.  Griefing is the act of abusing other players online.  It's true that griefers typically make use of exploits - in fact, most of them do, and it's worth mentioning.  But we must make it clear that not all griefers exploit, and it's not required for the definition of what griefing is.  Kasreyn 22:56, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ah yeah I see what you mean, its more a means to an end. 82.21.150.24 15:39, 15 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: abuse of features

message: It seems to me that this particular section lacks hardly any verifiable sources. In fact, it seems to be mostly made up of the sheer opinion of whoever wrote it. Does anyone else have reason on why this section should exist? Also, is there any credible proof that any of the groups listed are "griefing groups"? DarkWolves was the only group listed in which evidence was actually supplied. 66.56.44.90 23:40, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Groups 

message: Based on Google searches it appears that this term "Griefer" was coined by one of the online game manufacturers (WoW?) sometime on or before 2003. If someone could determine who coined the slang term this should be added to the article. This term was certianly not in use back in the Quake/Doom timeframe. We tended to just call them "campers". Cshay 23:14, 14 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: After doing some Google Groups searches, it seems that this term showed up in the year 2000 with Ultima Online. Cshay 10:29, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

text: Didn't mean to step into any religious war, I don't even play games anymore. I was just saying that "camping" was the closest word we had for it back then since at least *some* people were seriously annoyed with campers. There didn't seem to be any general term for troublemaking back in the Quake days. I still think this term was invented by an Ultima Online documentation writer :) I never saw it before then.  Cshay 17:46, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Origin of the Slang Term

message: I think perhaps something should be said about this concept mostly relevant to FPSes.  A talented griefer may aim to not just target individual players but have the goal of causing chaos on an entire server causing it to degenerate into an orgy of team killing, kick votes, fear and loathing.
The griefer might operate more covertly attempting to have a target think another player had caused the offense, leading him to take retribution on the innocent player causing him to think that his attacker is a griefer so he attacks back.  Instigate this trouble enough to reach a critical mass and the server degenerates.
Also throw in random griefs in the interim such as kick votes (which has the additional benefit of keeping people from running a kick vote against you).  Team griefing (having a partner in crime) is very usefull when trying to cause widespread chaos. - AbstractClass 16:53, 19 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This kind of comment is not useful if it is Original Research. Please cite your sources or don't bother with it. Cshay 17:56, 20 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Griefers of Scale 

message: I can't make heads or tails of this article, and I'm a pretty old hand with video games. Could someone go through the piece with an eye to making it understandable to someone who has never played an online multiplayer game before? — Brian (talk) 06:42, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Too much jargon 

message: This article, while lacking any citation to the effect, appears to glorify griefing as some kind of exciting new sport. "Griefing is a malignant form of emergent gameplay." -- while it may be malignant and emergent, it is certainly not a form of gameplay. 
Article suggests that Griefing is some sort of specialized form of harassment, where flaws in game design must be employed. I argue that while exploiting game flaws may be quite popular for griefers, it's certainly not required. All that is required is intent to diminish gameplay for others.
Casual griefing should also be mentioned. As any person who is bored and begins misbehaving (teamkilling, cursing/screaming into the vox, etc) essentially becomes a griefer.
I am hesitant to try to push any of these objectives in the article however, as griefers (malignant, evolved versions of trolls) exist here as well and are likely to try to derail Wikipedia's own production process in order to cause grief to the readers and maintainers of this encyclopedia. I don't feel any urge to jump headlong into the cesspool of drama that shall inevitably result. Jesset77 (talk) 02:58, 27 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:      You're wrong—it *is* a form of gameplay; just one you don't happen to like. All the worse for you. All the better for the griefer. You're exactly the type griefers pray to come across, sport.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 138.163.0.42 (talk) 16:34, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  In that case, please add the appropriate emergent gameplay attributes to the article on gang warfare. That is, after all, the real-world equivilant to griefing. Jesset77 (talk) 08:51, 3 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  That's absolutely ridiculous. There is no real-world equivalent to griefing because there are things you are unable to do in real life that games allow you to do. This is ultimately what is exploited by griefers: capabilities of the game itself. To insist that griefers are the same as street gangs is nonsensical. It sounds more like you have a personal grudge against griefers that you wish to express on Wikipedia. Please leave your personal biases and grudges somewhere else. --LordZimmer (talk) 14:03, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Why does article glorify griefing? 

message: This article is woefully out of date without any mention of TF2's Team Roomba griefers.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 138.163.0.42 (talk) 16:39, 23 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: This isn't meant to be a list of every single group, just the ones that are the most unique and well-known. --LordZimmer (talk) 13:54, 4 September 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Team Roomba

message: too much text, few examples, fuzzy categorization/generalization.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.191.175.243 (talk) 22:39, 17 July 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  needs cleanup 

message: The entire article was written in a broken, stream-of-consciousness fashion. I deleted a great deal of redundant material. It does not seem useful or informative to mention specific games, since griefers are found in all of them. There was approximately a full page of text devoted entirely to Warcraft III and Second Life that seemed unnecessary.
The "social aspects of griefing" section was entirely redundant, so I deleted it.
Some of the malicious activity mentioned here, such as the epilepsy forum bright-light attack, seemed better described as internet trolling instead of video game griefing.
I also reorganized the article somewhat, since some of the talking points were fragmented, or entirely misplaced.
Hope these edits were helpful,
Bradridder (talk) 06:57, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: You changed a lot, and I think we need to look at it carefully. I suspect that cleaning up some of the stream-of-consciousness and excess game information was probably good. On the other hand, I think that it very important to bring back some of the social aspects, and not to interpret the subject too narrowly as just video gaming-related. Trolling is usually an individual behavior, whereas griefing is increasingly being used to describe coordinated multi-person disruption online, not limited to game sites. --Tryptofish (talk) 18:49, 24 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: It is perfectly OK to add things. If the primary argument is that trolling is individual behavior, whereas griefing is a coordinated effort, then I think the definition at the top should reflect that. However, I disagree with that statement, based on what I have seen in the games I play. I have played several FPS's, and disruptive teammates were commonly referred to as "griefers", whether they acted alone or with others. In RPG's, such as Diablo 2, games are commonly griefed by a single person. I do not play MMORPGs though, so I cannot comment on the group-griefing practices that occur in them. A good remedy might be to add a section titled "Organized Griefing", to describe this type of behavior. Bradridder (talk) 02:01, 26 January 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: Thanks, I will, in the near future. I think this, the chapter starting on page 9, is a good reference on the subject. --Tryptofish (talk) 23:41, 26 January 2010 (UTC)

text: I've made some edits per the above, explaining "feeding", and selectively adding back a little of the deleted material, mainly showing the variety of usages of the term. --Tryptofish (talk) 00:02, 11 February 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Explanation of Large Edits

message: I tried to explain how kiting could cause problems, and how people drag monsters from other zones into newbie/starting-zones, but it keeps getting undone, because I guess the language is not sufficient.  That is fine, but can someone else take a whack at it then?  I tried and it kept getting rejected.  
It would be helpful if the _why_ portion of why-is-kiting-griefing is added.  Those less familiar with gaming might not understand from the few words currently there, as to why kiting is even a problem.  Aggroing raid bosses, kiting mobs from other zones, etc.  
Thank you very much. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.33.240.95 (talk • contribs) 
:It used to have something in there about that, we formerly called it trains, some people doing it on purpose to grief others.  Dream Focus 20:07, 28 March 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Can someone please help me clarify on the kiting part of griefing?

message: I think that adding a section on how to prevent the methods of griefing in the beginning of the article would help neutralize this page as being less how-to grief, and more how-to stop griefers. As far as I can tell, I'll just wiki search griefing and find a whole list on what I can generally do to become a griefer. I am the one that adjusted one of the methods (the third one, starting with "or by adding") and sort-of explained it more with how-to grief on sandbox games, but I think we should start work on another section to give ways to stop griefers rather than give them ideas with the methods section (but still keep the methods section) —71.211.189.108 (talk) 23:24, 6 January 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Griefing Prevention Section 

message: Please add the following peer-reviewed journal articles under the External Links section because these are research papers that directly relate to griefing.
Bakioğlu, B. (2009). Spectacular Interventions of Second Life: Goon Culture, Griefing, and Disruption in Virtual Spaces." Journal of Virtual Worlds Research, 1(3).
Bakioğlu, B. (2012). "Negotiating Governance in Virtual Worlds: Grief Play, Hacktivism & LeakOps in Second Life." New Review of Hypermedia & Multimedia, (18) 4, 237-259. Free copy of an earlier version available from http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2179886
Butterz13 (talk) 13:19, 21 August 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: Anyone can publish a paper like that, that doesn't mean its notable enough to be included in an article.  Dream Focus 14:58, 21 August 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: - Hi, , may you please explain how adding the link given by you to the 'external links' of the article, improves the present article and makes it better for readers? We prefer inline citations, it could be better you propose some changes based on that source in a "change X to Y" format to expand the present article, and in turn to have more, people to learn the subject. Anupmehra -Let's talk! 17:08, 22 August 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Semi-protected edit request on 21 August 2014 

message: There is no need to take things that belong on their own lines, and shoving them together.  Also, if you edit, be careful not to remove valid content, or references.  If you wish to make such drastic changes, please discuss it here on the talk page first, instead of edit warring.  Dream Focus 00:16, 10 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  changes 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 2 external links on Griefer. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090716195738/http://gawker.com/231320/internets-most-wanted-a-rogues-gallery to http://gawker.com/231320/internets-most-wanted-a-rogues-gallery
*Corrected formatting/usage for http://msn-cnet.com.com/Virtual%20magnate%20shares%20secrets%20of%20success/2008-1043_3-6144967.html
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 12:07, 25 March 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: Hello fellow Wikipedians,
I have just modified 2 external links on Griefer. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20071009161333/http://www.gamegirladvance.com/mmog/archives/2002/10/21/online_bullies_give_grief_to_games.html to http://www.gamegirladvance.com/mmog/archives/2002/10/21/online_bullies_give_grief_to_games.html
*Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20140527213408/https://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Griefing to https://wiki.eveonline.com/en/wiki/Griefing
When you have finished reviewing my changes, you may follow the instructions on the template below to fix any issues with the URLs.
Cheers.—InternetArchiveBot (Report bug) 06:04, 24 October 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: *Support move to griefing Previous similar proposal - Talk:Griefer#Requested_move_2012 Wikipedia is organizing around the actions not the actors. I was looking at types of online misconduct which have Wikipedia articles and found these. Shitposting, Catfishing, Cyberbullying, Astroturfing are about actions. Currently the article Internet troll is about the actor but I support changing that also.  Blue Rasberry (talk) 15:25, 20 June 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Proposed move 2019 

message: A lot of people use the word "griefing" to just mean bothering other players when that's not the primary objective, not necessarily "using aspects of the game in unintended ways", for example killing players in Grand Theft Auto Online or blowing up bases in an anarchist Minecraft server. Minecraft griefing like this is even mentioned later in the article
Jessaay (talk) 18:11, 25 October 2021 (UTC)
replies: text: A lot of people also use it the other way, and argue heavily about it. If bothering players is not the primary objective, yet they're not using aspects of the game in unintended ways, could it not be said that bothering other players is a secondary objective? In GTA Online, 'cargo griefing' refers to blowing up cargo, yet the objective tells other players to destroy it. So there are many online debates about whether it's griefing or if it's just playing the objective, but since they updated it to allow invite-only sell missions without a PvP payout bonus, the consensus on subreddits has been that it's not griefing, regardless of how annoyed someone gets with someone playing that objective. Also in GTA Online, killing other players is sometimes seen as griefing, and sometimes seen as PvP, and there's also a scoreboard and killfeed which encourage it. The difference in online communities usually seems to be that targeting and killing a single player repetitively and uninvitedly is called 'griefing', whereas otherwise it's just casual PvP, which players have tools to opt of, such as passive mode and ghosting. So there are more layers to deciding whether a behavior is griefing beyond just being bothersome. Although there are people who use the word to refer simply to being annoying, it's not necessarily the commonly accepted internet definition as using the word in that way typically results in heavy arguments. In any online FPS, if killing another player annoys them, and not killing the enemy team annoys the teammates, then which behavior is griefing? That's likely why the cited definition provides the clarification that it's up to the developer's intentions for the game's design. BiophysicsGuy (talk) 19:59, 30 October 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  I think this definition is outdated 

message: I think we should define it by the action, not the actor. Note that there is a similar page called 'griefing', which is listed as a 'Wikipedia essay' (I'm unfamiliar with what Wikipedia essays are for), but the wording there is uncited, highly subjective, and makes a lot of bold assumptions about the psychology and background of griefers, which reads like the letter of someone who's venting, so I think these pages should NOT be merged, which isn't an option anyway considering that page is a 'Wikipedia essay'. However, calling this page 'griefer' is somewhat confusing, considering much of the page describes the methods, responses, etc to the literal act of griefing in online gaming, so it should be renamed so people stop trying to merge ideas from that page. BiophysicsGuy (talk) 21:45, 16 December 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Propose renaming to 'griefing' (NOT merging)