The other day I was doing a little homework reading about an MMO and stumbled upon a chunky section dealing with proper etiquette. And this wasn’t merely “don’t be a jerk and don’t troll general chat” but full of community-made rules how to conduct yourself while dealing with gathering nodes or at certain events. The penalty for breaking these unwritten rules was, the section said in no unclear terms, being shamed and blacklisted.

Now, I’m all for urging people to behave and play nice, but it does irk me when veteran players quickly turn toxic against newbies because they don’t know all of these social mores. It reminds me of way back in high school when I was shamed out of a Star Trek roleplay BBS because I wasn’t restraining my Mary Sue impulses and nobody deigned to kindly explain those unwritten rules to me.

Maybe this is more of an obscure question, but have you ever been shamed out of an MMO because you breached some unknown rule or law of etiquette? How can we better inform our fellow players with gentleness on these subjects rather than harshness?

Every morning, the Massively Overpowered writers team up with mascot Mo to ask MMORPG players pointed questions about the massively multiplayer online roleplaying genre. Grab a mug of your preferred beverage and take a stab at answering the question posed in today’s Daily Grind!