Originally Posted by Xx_Sorin_xX

I'm a bit confused on how people are being banned for buying duped items.

Are they being banned for buying stacks? That i could understand, but are people being banned for buying 1 duped ambrace? What if a duper advertised they had one ambrace to sell for regular price and it geniunely looked like a real one? Unless of course they're only banning people buying stacks. Then it's not an issue.

Originally Posted by hallomik

Would it be possible to create a sticky somewhere for what we know (versus rumors) about this situation?

Originally Posted by Sasuke The Betrayer

People that have disconnected in the past week or even month are being banned, for "exploiting" this dupe, but many probably had internet problems. I'm lucky I've been avoiding guild wars the past week or so, as I've been playing Battlefield 2. ^^.

Originally Posted by Gaile Gray

What "mass banning" are you describing? The numbers being mentioned in this thread are in the single digits. There has been no mass ban. Period.

Here is what we've done:

• We've found the people who duplicated items. Their numbers were really quite small. We banned them.
• We found the people to whom the duplicated items were given in large quantities. Their numbers were somewhat larger, but again, relatively few. We banned them.
• We are examining records to see how far this extends. We may be banning more in the coming days, but we will most likely choose to not ban more than we will choose to ban. The decision is ours and will be based on a lot of factors, principal being whether it's reasonable to assume that the player knew he/she was getting ill-gotten goods.

We are quite sure that those players getting stacks and stacks of the most valuable item in the game realized that this largesse was not the result of the kind and generous spirit of a guild mate or friend. We're quite sure that those getting offers of 5 gazillion armbraces for item sales knew that something was wrong, and yet they made the sale anyway. It's obvious that certain players knew about the exploit, or suspected there was one. It's pretty easy to establish who such players were.

Did you think we'd never notice? Of course we noticed! Our recordkeeping is exceptionally detailed. You can't move a piece of gold from one bag to another without us knowing it. And as a result, those at the center of abusing this exploit were banned. That is as it should be.

The issue of someone selling a single ambrace to another innocent person, later on, is more complicated. The item was duped, but the buyer may not have been -- probably was not -- aware that he/she was buying a duped item. So, it's a matter of degree, intention, and knowledge. Do we ban the seller, with multiple stacks of 250 armbraces in inventory (or who handed off stacks to friends and guildies)? Yes! Do we ban the player who makes the one-off purchase -- an armbrace here, a couple of duped ectos there? It's not likely that we will.

Duplicating items is disallowed by the User Agreement under which each player is permitted to play Guild Wars. Getting stacks and stacks of free items -- or receiving ridiculous numbers of items for a sale -- must have pinged peoples' radars that "Hey, this can't be legit!" Just as receiving stolen property is a crime in the real world, this sort of act is disallowed in our game, and results in a ban.

Those who made an innocent purchase have very little to worry about. The accounts of those who were banned were examined with care and consideration, using extensive research to assure that the appropriate action was taken. It is highly unlikely that these players can successfully appeal their banning.

And if you're aware of someone who was involved, I invite you to report that player, for the good of the game.