Something interesting happened just in the last few days.

I received a request to be dropped from a game. BUT in my reading this players post I thought he was commenting on my last post to him, I did not see it as a request to be removed.

The next communication was, ......



  My question is first to the Mods. How does your involvement in these matters effect the member? Is this held against the member?

I ask, because I became very offend and upset, I felt that the request quickly became a threat to hurt me by reporting to a Mod. I don't want to break any rules, and I would hate to loss my games because of a misunderstanding.

The second question, ..... What is good etiquette? both for the player making the request the for the GM?

Anything that resembles them requesting to leave a game. I tend to send something back to clarify. Because I wouldn't want to remove someone, if they misworded anything. Also in that, if they do want to leave I don't want to ignore it either.

As for Mods involvement, and not knowing if there was any trouble between you and the player before this. I don't think it tends to affect much, the mods tend to let the GM's handle things mostly. If there is a big big issue, I am sure they would step in. But if it is something simple, then they would I would imagine from what I have seen before. Tell the player how they need to handle things, and if anything check the came for any issues if they thought it was needed.

The message you show there, though again still not knowing the full situation. Seems fairly non-threatening. They might have even thought that maybe you didn't know how to remove them from the game or something of the like. If they didn't hear back from you after their first request to leave, they might have figured they needed to get the mods involved to get them removed. As it is said in many places, that if you send a PM to be removed and it doesn't happen after a week or more. Check in with the mods to see if they can remove you. So I am thinking it might just be something simple like this.

I have been threatened before by a player, who was causing trouble in my game with other players and myself. Saying I was being unfair, and that they would tell the mods that I was being unfair. I told them to go ahead and cry to the mods, there is nothing in my game that I was sure they would find issue with. I never heard from them, and I kicked the player from the game. The only time I have found you have to worry, is if you are doing something bad and against the rules. And if you are, you probably know you are doing it already and biding your time.

When players ask to be removed from a game, we would appreciate the game's GM doing so in a reasonable amount of time.

When GMs do not do so within a week, the player can ask the moderators to remove them.

We do so, leaving the character in the GM's control.

That's the end of it as far as the moderators are concerned, unless the argument moves to the public forums.  :-)

A lot has been made, relatively recently, about players requesting to be dropped from games and at what point the player should consider going to the mods.  It seemed, for several weeks over the summer, to be a theme running through several different threads I was following...

Unless you, as a GM, are somehow abusing your players, the mods pretty much wash their hands of it.  I think you're reading more into the statement than what is there, but, as was mentioned earlier, without knowing the full context of the discussion prior to that statement, I couldn't say for certain.  However, it IS part of the SOP for leaving a game that, if you as a player request to be dropped and the GM doesn't follow through within a reasonable time (one week, as Shannara pointed out), they have the option to ask the mods to remove them from the game.

Not knowing how many days passed between when the player made their request and when this statement was made, I can only speculate...but going with a best-case scenario here (because I do that a lot), the player may have figured that you were having difficulty figuring out how to remove them from the game (not likely, I know, but we're talking best case, here).  So they simply offered to ask a mod to come take care of it for you.

At any rate, my experience is, unless you are repeatedly and blatantly violating RPOL policies or TOU, the moderators step in, correct the issue, and leave you in peace.  This would likely have no more lasting repercussions than being moderated for accidentally using profanity in a CC post, or going too far in referencing a specific game.  Unless it becomes a chronic issue, I don't know anyone who's had the moderators somehow start holding it against them.

Pretty sure they have better things to do with their time than track isolated incidents that don't really violate any TOU or other policies...

Good etiquette I guess would be the player asks in a plain, non-insulting fashion to be removed from your game.

You then do so.

You then both count yourselves lucky to have that cleared up: The player isn't in a game they aren't enjoying anymore, and the GM doesn't have a player that isn't enjoying the game any more and can recruit someone new.

Please remove me from this game.


How hard is that?

Actually, we wouldn't.  As far as we are concerned, it is up to the GM and the players to sort out any purely in-game disputes.  We would only become involved if the dispute carried over into the public areas of the site.


Yep, in-game dispute.  Our policy is that, as the GM, you are always right in any in-game argument.  You have more information than we do about what's going on there, and you have the tools to fix it (PM warnings, Group Z, removal from the game, ban from the game).

The only time we would intervene in a game is if there was an actual breach of the site's rules (and an in-game argument doesn't count as one of those), or if a player contacts us about a request to leave that has not been dealt with in a timely manner.

See also: link to a message in another game

As a general rule I would say be thick-skinned about any discussion re leaving a game (or any other dispute). People generally don't intend to offend, but sometimes written text can be interpreted differently from how it was intended in the writers head. So if you aren't sure then assume they didn't mean to be rude.

Re leaving a game I would say follow one of two simple rules:
- Either politely request to leave the game and say why. Be constructive and honest and part on positive terms. You may meet again in the future...
- Or politely request to leave the game. Don't explain why in any great detail, but be clear that you definitely wish to leave.

There is no need to get nasty. This is supposed to be fun...

If a PM doesn't explicitly say "please delete my character"/"I need to leave the game"/some variant of those, then how are you supposed to understand what the player wants?

If it were me I would have just kicked them without replying to that second PM :P

Why make something unpleasant out of the departure. You may find yourself in a game with the same individual someday. It doesn't hurt to be cordial and assume people are being the same until they prove otherwise.