Curse

The Herbalizer · Aug 13, 2007, 07:20 PM // 19:20

Fenix was sighted in-game by a guildie...

http://www.guildwarsguru.com/forum/s...&postcount=795

Enko · Aug 13, 2007, 07:28 PM // 19:28

my two mule accounts have been reinstated.

did someone see fenix's mule account online too?

lyra_song · Aug 13, 2007, 07:32 PM // 19:32

Can we close this thread nyiaow?

Jason Xll · Aug 13, 2007, 07:33 PM // 19:33

I'm not his guildy but yea i saw him in ID1 Ascalon.
Not his mule account, I think Fenix Magezi is his main yea?

Tijger · Aug 13, 2007, 07:35 PM // 19:35

So, in summation, we have 4 pages of ranting about how bad Anet is when all they did was take a totally routine and normal step when an issue like this appears which is to trust no one and especially not the ones who pose as white hat hackers without a serious check on their actions.

Check has been made, accounts have been unbanned. I'd say Anet did exactly what should have been done and what needed to be done given the circumstances and the time frame.

I'm sorry that Enko and Fenix got temporarily banned but speaking as someone who is himself responsible for IT security professionally I'd say Anet did exactly what I would have done and they've done it pretty fast too. I can only hope they banned the real dupers as speedily as well which would be a fitting conclusion to an otherwise very bad situation.

Tom Swift · Aug 13, 2007, 07:37 PM // 19:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by ShadowbaneX

All the A.Net hate in here is really making me sick. Some of you people really do like nothing better to kick people when they're down, don't you? There was a problem and they took steps to fix it. Some innocents got caught in those actions. This is regretable, but it had to happen.

It did not have to happen and that is the problem

What this situation has brought to the forefront is ANet's failure to anticipate. Yes, now they are in a position of having to ban accounts and then investigate, resulting in innocent people being punished. However, this was a situation that was completely avoidable if they had used some forethought.

1: They have no central effective way of reporting problems. Instead of hosting their own official forums they depend on the fanbase to do it diffusing the discussion of problems over too wide an area to be easily handled. How long ago was this first mentioned? A month? But because the right person did not see the right post on the right forum (or did not consider it important) it was allowed to continue. (Yes - there is the report a problem method. But this covers everything from billing issues to violation reports - it's just too broad to handle these kinds of issues effectively and quickly)

2: They were too confident that it was impossible to dupe items in the game and so when the first posts started coming in they were ignored and nothing was done. Had they not been so overconfident they likely would have found this problem a lot earlier and fixed it without people having to do the investigation for them. They should have done this on their own without their players having to do it for them. But they were too confident and let it slide until it became an emergency. The best way to deal with an emergency is to keep it from happening and, had they listened to their players, this was one emergency that was very preventable.

Yes, they will probably get this straightened out but problems like this will continue to occur unless Anet learns to anticipate that exploits are very likely to happen and are willing to check them out on their own.

ChoKILLate[FDG] · Aug 13, 2007, 07:49 PM // 19:49

I completely understand why Anet had to handle this exploit this way. They banned all flagged accounts and removed the problem. Gaile also mentioned (pg 3?) how individual accounts will be taken into consideration later on, once the more important game-wide problem gets resolved! I applaud Anet for their quick and all encompassing shut down of this exploit! No other MMO actively fixes exploits and botting at the speed Anet does IMO.

I assume that the the ban was based on individual accounts having 2 or more items with the same unique ID number. So here is my question:

For the Armbrace of Truth: If the guilty was smart enough to do this I assume they would know about unique ID numbers and would sell what they could and immediately trade the rest in for legit unique ID numbered torment weapons once word got out about the exploit. If this is the case could they still track and punish the guilty?

Sure duplicated mini-pets and weapons would be easy to catch, but the Armbrace is unique in that it can be traded in. I hope they had other means of detecting who all was involved in this fiasco!

ShadowbaneX · Aug 13, 2007, 07:50 PM // 19:50

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tom Swift

It did not have to happen and that is the problem

What this situation has brought to the forefront is ANet's failure to anticipate. Yes, now they are in a position of having to ban accounts and then investigate, resulting in innocent people being punished. However, this was a situation that was completely avoidable if they had used some forethought.

1: They have no central effective way of reporting problems. Instead of hosting their own official forums they depend on the fanbase to do it diffusing the discussion of problems over too wide an area to be easily handled. How long ago was this first mentioned? A month? But because the right person did not see the right post on the right forum (or did not consider it important) it was allowed to continue. (Yes - there is the report a problem method. But this covers everything from billing issues to violation reports - it's just too broad to handle these kinds of issues effectively and quickly)

2: They were too confident that it was impossible to dupe items in the game and so when the first posts started coming in they were ignored and nothing was done. Had they not been so overconfident they likely would have found this problem a lot earlier and fixed it without people having to do the investigation for them. They should have done this on their own without their players having to do it for them. But they were too confident and let it slide until it became an emergency. The best way to deal with an emergency is to keep it from happening and, had they listened to their players, this was one emergency that was very preventable.

Yes, they will probably get this straightened out but problems like this will continue to occur unless Anet learns to anticipate that exploits are very likely to happen and are willing to check them out on their own.

The ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure is a valid argument, but that doesn't quite cover this scenario. Could this have been prevented, perhaps, perhaps not, I'm not going to make a shot in the dark on this. The fact of the matter is it did happen, and then most people just joined the lynch mob, without even pausing to consider what would have been going on for them to take a drastic measure like this. The knee jerk reactions that this community has/had to this issue are just excessive. I'm just pointing out my disgust for all those then jumped up and said "OMFG ANet sucks! Deth to ANet!!"

I don't know how many of you played Diablo 2 back in the day, but the duping in there was excessive and I'm glad for the actions taken here versus the non-action that was taken there. If A.Net had done nother when they found out about it, in order to prevent banning the likes of Enko and Fenix the problem could have been several times worse. I for one am happy with the quick, decisive action with some temporary damage done to innocents, then inaction which would have made things worse.

Tijger · Aug 13, 2007, 07:52 PM // 19:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tom Swift

It did not have to happen and that is the problem

What this situation has brought to the forefront is ANet's failure to anticipate. Yes, now they are in a position of having to ban accounts and then investigate, resulting in innocent people being punished. However, this was a situation that was completely avoidable if they had used some forethought.

What a load of ****. GW is the least exploited and the least bugridden MMO out there and this has ALWAYS been the case. Yes, someone obviously got careless and I'm equally sure that there will be some harsh words, perhaps involving pink slips, at Anet HQ today but you're talking rubbish. No game is impervious to such issues and no innocent people have been punished AFAIK.

Quote:

1: They have no central effective way of reporting problems. Instead of hosting their own official forums they depend on the fanbase to do it diffusing the discussion of problems over too wide an area to be easily handled. How long ago was this first mentioned? A month? But because the right person did not see the right post on the right forum (or did not consider it important) it was allowed to continue. (Yes - there is the report a problem method. But this covers everything from billing issues to violation reports - it's just too broad to handle these kinds of issues effectively and quickly)

This is laughable. An official forum doesnt make for an effective reporting tool unless monitored 24/7 and even then it needs to be done by devs themselves to sort the wheat from the chaff.
But hey, go check some other MMO's which have official forums and see how fast things are patched there. From reporting this issue to shutting down the exploit took less then what, 4 hours? Bans have already been issued within 12 hours and judging by the unbans of Enko and Fenix they've also already been able to clear them of malfeasance.

Yeah, right, and official forum would have been SO much faster.

Quote:

2: They were too confident that it was impossible to dupe items in the game and so when the first posts started coming in they were ignored and nothing was done. Had they not been so overconfident they likely would have found this problem a lot earlier and fixed it without people having to do the investigation for them. They should have done this on their own without their players having to do it for them. But they were too confident and let it slide until it became an emergency. The best way to deal with an emergency is to keep it from happening and, had they listened to their players, this was one emergency that was very preventable.

Now here you might have a point. Yes, I do believe complacency may have set in because of GW's track record to date, I'm equally sure todays events will have been harsh wakeup call.

Quote:

Yes, they will probably get this straightened out but problems like this will continue to occur unless Anet learns to anticipate that exploits are very likely to happen and are willing to check them out on their own.

Dude, get real, please. If we could anticipate all exploits we would never ever have any in any game or piece of software.

The Herbalizer · Aug 13, 2007, 07:55 PM // 19:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jason Xll

I'm not his guildy but yea i saw him in ID1 Ascalon.
Not his mule account, I think Fenix Magezi is his main yea?

A guildie of mine

Takeko Nakano · Aug 13, 2007, 07:56 PM // 19:56

Unless there is real evidence these guys were trying to benefit from the bug, I think that they should be unbanned ASAP.

They should also be rewarded for their contributions and in way of apology for punishing them for alerting ANet to this serious problem. Maybe a free copy of GW:EN would be in order!

Winterclaw · Aug 13, 2007, 08:06 PM // 20:06

IMO this sets a bad example to people who want to try and find bugs to help the game. A little extra communication before you started banning people, like saying chars X,Y, and Z reported they only did it for testing if they only duped a cheap item, delete the extra if possible but don't ban them. Instead they resorted to a heavy-handed SoE-style tactic and let someone else fix the problem whoever did the bans or ordered them created.

rancidgoat · Aug 13, 2007, 08:06 PM // 20:06

question, why dont bots get the same response out of A-Net as this did. they just proved that they can drop everything to solve a problem and issue mass bannings and yet there are still hords of bots running around killing the market and causing A-Net to do dumb things like loot scaling. its has been stated many times in the two threads about the dupe that this dupe only effects a very very small section of the GW players but the bots effect everyone.

can i get an answer from a dev please, probably not. oh well gg kk thx .

Theus · Aug 13, 2007, 08:08 PM // 20:08

Why did Anet ban them?

Its simple.

They're truly a RED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GORED ENGINE GOing retarded company.

Gaile Gray · Aug 13, 2007, 08:09 PM // 20:09

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tijger

So, in summation, we have 4 pages of ranting about how bad Anet is when all they did was take a totally routine and normal step when an issue like this appears which is to trust no one and especially not the ones who pose as white hat hackers without a serious check on their actions.

Check has been made, accounts have been unbanned. I'd say Anet did exactly what should have been done and what needed to be done given the circumstances and the time frame.

I'm sorry that Enko and Fenix got temporarily banned but speaking as someone who is himself responsible for IT security professionally I'd say Anet did exactly what I would have done and they've done it pretty fast too. I can only hope they banned the real dupers as speedily as well which would be a fitting conclusion to an otherwise very bad situation.

Thank you for the vote of confidence.

And yes, there were a number of accounts banned. As I expressed to Enko (and I am sure he will pass it along to Fenix) the immediate block of all accounts that were sorted according to various check points was absolutely necessary. As you can see, the erroneous bans were reversed within a very short period of time. But by handling the matter in this way, we were able to prevent substantial damage to the game economy, and I do believe that two game-spirited and committed players like Enko and Fenix will agree that a few hours' inconvenience is worth that, for the greater good of the game that they care about.

I understand that someone might say "Why didn't you leave them out of the sweep?" Well, we did not have the account names or IGN's or any other information that accurately would allow us to do so. Within minutes of my receiving that information, the accounts were unbanned. If you'll stop and think about it, that's the only responsible action for us to take. The alternative is to sit idly by while we wait for information from players who might not respond for many hours with the necessary info that allows us to not ban them. In that period, more dupes are made, more people are scammed with duped items, and the economy takes a bigger hit.

Before you offer "the better solution," I ask that you stop and ask yourself if -- in the big picture -- it really is the better solution. Because some of the "suggestions for a better course of action" that I'm seeing here are both inappropriate and irresponsible.

Prof Of Black · Aug 13, 2007, 08:13 PM // 20:13

I got banned too.

I sent a message to Ncsoft, telling my story.

I did never exploit, but I bought armbraces without knowing about the exploit.

How many people got banned now?

Am I one of the few? Are others unbanned yet?

~Prof.

Enko · Aug 13, 2007, 08:15 PM // 20:15

my two accounts were already unbanned and as soon as fenix gets his info into gaile, i'm sure his account will be unbanned (if it hasn't already been)

Gaile Gray · Aug 13, 2007, 08:22 PM // 20:22

I thought maybe Fenix was unbanned, but in fact it's your two accounts that were unbanned. Please relay to Fenix that he should get in touch and we'll take care of this.

Loviatar · Aug 13, 2007, 08:23 PM // 20:23

Quote:

Originally Posted by rancidgoat

question, why dont bots get the same response out of A-Net as this did. they just proved that they can drop everything to solve a problem and issue mass bannings and yet there are still hords of bots running around killing the market and causing A-Net to do dumb things like loot scaling. its has been stated many times in the two threads about the dupe that this dupe only effects a very very small section of the GW players but the bots effect everyone.

can i get an answer from a dev please, probably not. oh well gg kk thx .

there have been many dev answers already.

simply put every bot account makes a US dollar profit for the gold/item industry and banned bot accounts are replaced instantly with new one (or 2 or 3) new bot accounts to keep bringing in more income to hire addtional (china mostly) employees to make more profit.

any more stupid questions?

around · Aug 13, 2007, 08:34 PM // 20:34

What we have here is...failure to communicate. It doesn't matter if they were unbanned, or if they were just casualties of the system, they were banned as a byproduct of reporting a game exploit.

This is still bad rep for ANet.