Best way to manage griefing at events

Since everyone got really fired up over the suggestion of Clubwatch and the idea that it's a banlist, i'd like to just calmly ask everyone for their tried and true methods of preventing serious grief that can bring down a sim.

If you'd rather just point me towards an old thread, that's fine too.

My specific questions are:

1. What do you block at your event/club? (ie, build, scripts, obj. entry, etc)
2. Do you block unverifieds, and if so, has this helped?
3. Do you monitor top scripts and colliders?
4. Do you watch for attached weapons?
5. Do you use a tool or gadget to seek out script activity, and if so, what is it?

Please allow me to say that i am looking for ways to stop things like HUD att's that seemingly work in no script zones, or, if such a thing does exist, a scanner that can tell me who's running what regardless of it being a top script or a collider.
Chat, spam, nudity and other behaviours that are just a nuisance to the event are easy to handle. It's the invisible sim crashing enemies i'm concerned about!
Personally i see no problem in blocking (all non-group) scripts for *my situation* because i can provide dance balls to keep everyone animated and allow the performer to join the right group for their scripted instruments. If that means your chim, AO, twitchytail, or shield doesn't work during the performance, i think that's a small sacrifice to make. What do you think about that?

The best defense I can recommend is a full parcel, if it's a viable option in your case. It's a very very powerful defense against objects being rezzed on or entering the parcel.

No, we keep thousands of prims open to decrease lag. However, we block build at all costs. Thanks for your input!

I personally don't mind it being a blacklist (never saw any evidence that it was meant to be a banlist, though I'm sure some will use it as such). I personally run a blacklist banlist on my lands. But I don't mind calling it what it is.



All of the above, but build and scripts usually had to come down during live events because they interfered with things like the entertainer's tip jar.



No, and I never felt a need for it. Spent a lot of time talking with brand new residents and introducing them to SL.



I never did, but it could be useful.



No, weapons were ok as long as they weren't used.



No tool, just kept beacons on. lol, would show me who showed up with their, um, privates in place. Easy to



The only time I had scripts on were when the entertainers needed it. There is a script sniffer at the entrance to the Snowpeach racetrack that is red when you are wearing a script and turns green only when you've detached all scripted objects. Something like that might be useful.

1) Attend to and Respect your guests pro-actively. If you make them feel ignored, those that are inclined to become more likely to become disruptive, to get attention.

2) If they come wielding guns, suggest they visit Jesse or one of the other combat enabled areas for that kind of fun.

3) If someone goes nuts with particles, scripted items, etc, ask politely that they tone it down some so that it doesn't impact all the other guests.

4) If they're not bothering your guests or you, don't worry yourself about HUDS or scripted stuff.


If, despite all your charm and effort they persist in ignoring your requests... IM them, saying "sorry, I would prefer you play elsewhere for a while. I'd be happy to remove the ban tomorrow if you wish to participate here in a less disruptive way." -- or something like it.

On these two points i slightly respectfully disagree.
I can't pay attention verbally to 50+ ppl, plus run a great event, in such a manner that everyone feels constantly un-ignored. In a small setting i can see where this might work, but keep in mind that serious griefers aren't looking to make friends, or 'nice' for that matter. No level of attention is going to discourage them. They want attn for their deeds.

On the last suggestion, please know that our sim was crashed by a scripted device worn as a HUD by someone who was born that day, was in the sim less than 5 minutes, and deleted their account immediately. They spoke to no one, wore nothing visible, and didn't "bother" giving us any warnings like rude behavior. Now tell me not to worry

If you've annoyed a "serious griefer" enough that your their favorite new target to torment, you have little choice but to host "By Invitation Only" private sim events, because there's no scripted device you can wield that will protect you against someone exploiting a bug in secondlife to crash sims, nor likely will there ever be one.

The advice I gave was to help deal with the other much larger percentage of the griefers that are merely bored newbies trying to be noticed... by someone, anyone. Sure, it doesn't really scale to an event with 50 people. But with clever placement of your teleport -in spot, a welcome sign and a "links to other things in secondlife" you may divert off folks before they attempt to hijack your event into something more to their liking.

Please note that the attack wasn't directed at anyone in particular, but at the performers themselves as a group.
If diversion is our only hope, then we've already lost the battle. I'm not going to waste prims on ten year olds, pointing them to "better things to do" when it's LL job to stop such devices in the first place. While i see your point, i'm not one to pander to troublemakers.
Look forward to more lag, more crashes, and more grief in general over the coming years until sim owners get better tools is the conclusion that I am coming to.
Had i had a warning, from a group such as the one i spoke of in the OP, that these people were "out and about" or on the rampage, perhaps i could have stopped it. Since that happened we took extra precautions that i also hinted at in the OP, and our single crash was not grief related. I sincerely hoped someone out there had something up their sleeve other than being extra attentive and playing nurserymaid. (no offense to responders)
*sigh*

Could you please send me an IM in-world ifentifying the group? I have an alt in a serious anti-griefer group (we go out of our way to screen out and weed out griefers) that wants to help. Not sure we could make a difference for this group, maybe yes, maybe no, but it might help to give that group the option and see if we can.

I think the suggestion (elsewhere on the forums) of *phantom* textureless boxes at 750m height to fill parcel prim quota is a good idea.

1.) Give employees / helpers the power to ban/eject through group roles.

2.) Turn off push.

3.) Turn off build.

4.) Turn on auto return.

Dont worry about it.



Greifers are the most overated problem in Second Life.

The only ones that are unmanagable are the grid attackers.

We don't allow build or object entry. That's easier than wasting prims. We need open room for instruments, speakers, and things performers might bring with them.
It's my feeble understanding that textures or no textures, your client is still 'rendering' them and therefore lagged by them (we have builds from ground level up to 500m). If you can just turn off these two options, not really understanding why you'd fill your parcel up instead. Sorry.

Done, done and done. Still had that bad attack i mentioned.
Don't worry about it. Ok sure. Just like other business owners who don't care if they sell a quality product? My job is to run good events in this sim, of course i'm going to worry about it I'm just trying to find people who know something i don't Colette. If we crash, we crash...but what's the harm in preventing it?

Here here. As well as weapons...on land that is not damage enabled they are for the most part ineffective and unnoticeable, I recall the tping it to my club once and finding someone with some sort of weapon. The only way I knew he was shooting me was because my Mystitool collision detector was telling me his bullets were colliding with me. The customers were totally unaware he was even there and doing anything. Took about 2 seconds to eject/ban him and it was over. No drama, just poof.

Back to the sim-crashing HUD, wonder if that is a worn particle spammer? If so, turning on particle source beacons will mark anyone wearing such a thing with a big blue beacon. You'll be able to see that from a lot farther away and much more easily in a crowd than you will their name tag.

I dont think you can stop grid attackers - they are LL's responsibility.

Maybe if people would stop clogging up the AR system with stupid griefer complaints that they can easily handle on their own -

the que would be clear enough LL could QUICKLY respond agaisnt Grid attackers.


I do not know the technical specifics of attacking the grid.

If you dont shut off people's scripts - but build is off , and autoreturn is on - then they can only attack your sim via a scripted attachment. Right?

Dont see how you can prevent that without precognition.




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I wouldnt give ANYONE the power to build in the sim except SOME group members who you trust.

For vendors - I would grant them temporary build ability ONLY.

Yes, but I'm not sure no build and no object entry protect against dropping a worn item.

and i can do this by using which menu please? i've used beacons for top scripts/colliders, is there a particle source beacon in the client menu somewhere?

As far as the responses of "don't worry, can't control grid attacks" yes i agree and i'm not going to worry about grid-wide stuff at all! however, if it's possible for someone to crash a sim (that took hours to get back up) using an exploit, then that means we are all sitting around just hoping they don't come pick on us, and ruin our black panther party right?
(sorry Forest Gump line there.) I also agree that minor irritations like push guns, cagers, orbiters, blingtards, and just general stupidity is easy enough to manage with a curt yet polite IM followed by eject/freeze/ban if need be. So going back to the OP...anybody got any magic fairy dust or gadgets that are like the script sniffer at the racetrack he mentioned earlier, or even (dare i say it) something that detects an agent's rezday and reports <2 weeks inworld (payment info or not) to you, the land owner?
Thx again

I've managed the Shelter for the past 3 years, and its associated events. Since our 'target audience' is new residents, we tend to receive an above-average share of griefing compared to others.

Here is our strategy:

1. Create a land-group that is seperate from the primary Shelter-group.
2. Turn on Autoreturn to a short duration (5-10 minutes).
3. Turn off Scripts & Push
4. Clearly post the house rules
5. Delegate folks that have the ability to remove troublemakers across all timezones.
6. Subscribe to BanLink, and honor bans originating from other locations similar to our own, such as NCI.

All the volunteers at the Shelter are instructed *not* to use the land tools, and to issue bans via BanLink instead - and there's a reason for that:

-The land tools don't *document* what happened. Especially since we have so many volunteers, if someone comes back a week or month later, I need something to refer to so I can discuss what happened with them, and if appropriate, offer them a 2nd chance.

-95% of the bans we issue at the Shelter are 'Temp Bans'. Temp bans are logged on BanLink so we can take advantage of its documentation capabilities, but they are *NOT* shared with anyone else. Only full bans are shared, and the only time those are issued are when its something pretty hardcore or chronic.

The other advantage of issuing mostly Temporary Bans, is that the '2nd Chance' is built in. When someone receives a 2-hour ban, its usually enough to make them realize that the House Rules are actually enforced, and a permanent ban is rarely neccesary.

Hope this helps!

View->Beacons->Particle Sources

Hide Particles on the same menu is also useful.

During events I usually ran with all beacons enabled (gets a little cluttered with scripts, though)

Your best defense is knowledge. While the viewer may have its problems, LL has endowed it with a wealth of options. If you are really serious about being prepared to handle anything, get to know the client well. While groups like Clubwatch may seem like they help, chances are most griefers you encounter won't come with a prior warning from such a group, and once you are well prepared to handle griefers it won't really matter if you have a warning or not.

The best way to handle griefers is quietly and quickly. They are there to cause drama, and if you eliminate the drama you eliminate the attraction. And don't get overly concerned about them.

Agree 100%. Griefers want attention - that's why events or hangout spots with lots of green dots are a preferred target.

As Kevyn mentions, don't get upset - just calmly deal with the problem, and let your visitors get back to enjoying the event they came for as quickly as possible.

If your guests are already riled up after the attack, do something to calm them down, and change the subject to focus back on your event; drama has a tendency to snowball.

Not only that, but if you show the griefer that they've annoyed, bothered, upset or angered you, the host... you can bet they'll be back for more of that kind of fun.

Even if you are upset, squash it.

Treat them as you would a stray ant you flicked off a table,
no threats, no "you better or else"'s, no long explanations.

"Thanks for choosing to visit us... but your conduct is a bit too disruptive. Keep exploring, I'm sure there's a group or place where you will fit in better." ban&eject.

If someone purposely does something to cause a severe problem, i ban them.
If it's a matter of just getting them to realize they are a nuisance, i talk to them.
It boils down to intent and degree of severity for me. I don't give anyone info about the grief while it's happening, there's no time, and i certainly don't bellyache about it afterwards. When asked recently why we blocked scripts, and some of the dance balls failed to work post-crash, i simply made sure other dances worked and pointed those out, remarking that i was there for the live concert and friends, not just the animations.
Since i don't run contests or discussions, i'm always focused on making sure the show just goes on the best way possible. Everyone i've had a chat with agreed to stop whatever they were doing right away. Those who got banned instantly without warning already knew they'd done something horribly wrong, so they didn't bother IMing me to ask why.
It's all pretty cut and dry, i know grief when i see it, and i haven't banned anyone from an event that didn't deserve it along with an AR.
Thanx again Travis & Kevyn for your help!

Where do I find something like this?

This can actually be accomplished with a relatively simple script, using the function llGetAgentInfo()



llGetAgentInfo returns a bitfield of Agent (Avatar) information, one of which is if an agent has scripted attachments.


Here's some example code (modified from the Wiki) if you want to play with it:

// when touched, check if the agent has scripted attachments and say so.
default
{
    touch_start(integer total_number)
    {
        // we use a FOR loop here because two people can click the object at the same time.
        integer i;
        for (i = 0; i < total_number; i++)
        {
            // llGetAgentInfo returns a bitfield. Use & instead of == for comparisons.
            if (llGetAgentInfo(llDetectedKey(i)) & AGENT_SCRIPTED) 
            {
                llSay(0, llDetectedName(i) + ", you are wearing scripted attachments.");
            }
            
            else
            {
                llSay(0, llDetectedName(i) + ", you are not wearing any scripted attachments.");
            }
        }
    }
}

Much too much undeserved attention for griefers. Freeze-eject-ban is fast, quiet, minimizes disturbance for other visitors (very important to most owners), and is always understood perfectly by the recipient.