reported

Said to give Nazeebo’s concoction its green tint is a poisonous gas that causes blurred vision, shortness of breath, burning pain, and blisters. Overexposure leads to…well we’ve all spent a bit too long trapped in a zombie wall with his toads, haven’t we now? This gaseous element is chlorine. Though dangerous by itself it combines with the metal sodium to make a harmless substance you’d find in an Ana healing dart: Salt.

 Getting salty is part of games and really any competitive situation. HOTS has 3 different kinds of salt. The first happens when you’re just having an off day. Okay okay, maybe this never happens to YOUUUUU, but some of us don’t nail every KTZ chain. It’s frustrating because there are plenty of times we DO. I grumble to myself when this happens. Besides getting salty of our own accord the other team can get under our skin. Okay okay, maybe this never happens to YOUUUU, but some of us get outplayed on occasion. Their perfectly timed stasis or interrupt, getting out-drafted, and losing to the enemy’s macro-play can be infuriating. Let them B-step or spray on you and wow, just wow, the blood boils. Game recognize game though.

 The first two types of salt are sometimes misconstrued for the third, which relates to team play and communication. Having a 5-stack can keep you less salinated but as the number of people in your party goes down the chances of salt goes up. The attacks start out small, “why would you get that camp right now?” and “shut up, do your job.” It usually progresses like this, “you’re so bad, go back to [insert rank below current rank], nahh better yet, uninstall.” “Why are you getting mad, it’s just a video game?” Throw in a racial slur, the r-word, and tell them their parents never should’ve had them. It ends on the ol’ hail mary “kys” (also, don’t let this get to you). Someone types “reported,” not capitalized, just haphazardly.

There are two types of reports: (1) a fervently written S.O.S. with a screenshot of the chat, timestamps for when they threw, and a demand for justice or (2) nonexistent. I’m the latter and like others I have little faith in the reporting system. This is not to say that it doesn’t work here and there. Blizzard will send you feedback when they take action, if they’re not too busy finishing another Orphea Diablo skin.

“You got a better idea?” Well, different. Instead of sending the reports to the devs they get sent to other peer-review players along with the replay. Maybe three reviewers so two out of three agreeing with the strike passes it. Strikes are connected to bans for certain amounts of time until you run out of strikes. For this to work reporting itself would have to be limited somehow. Say three reports per month or base it on how many games you’ve played in the last week, something to make it fair for players who don’t play a ton. You’d have to use them wisely but they would carry more weight. Of course you could appeal in which case it goes to the devs but if they still agree with the decision then you take two strikes. I get this sounds complicated but I bet some of the player base would pick it up (Counterstrike does something similar).

Ultimately, bans and reporting have to be about changing behavior. Psychology 101 teaches us that reinforcing positive behaviors works better than punishing negative ones. Reinforcement already exists in HOTS. At the end screen you can give points to players that made an impact on the game. What if these points (maybe call em “props” instead) added up to a “props chest?” Every ten props gets you the chest with a single random reward. Orrrrr, you can save up a bunch of props to get a legendary or epic props chest. In conjunction with weighted reporting teams may be inclined to “hold the salt” if there’s some tangible prize (other than intangibles like winning and sportsmanship).