Curse

dansamy · Jun 20, 2005, 10:58 AM // 10:58

That's actually a good idea, Aldrich.

Dirkiess · Jun 20, 2005, 11:57 AM // 11:57

Quote:

Originally Posted by EternalTempest

Arena Net Employee's read the official / ellite forums. I do think they need a pop-up about the final server choice before letting you go through with. I would drop the suggestion in the threads that talk about adding stuff to the game.

The reason for the server system is the "favor" of the gods and incentive for the countires to band togther in competion. If you could switch servers at will, you always have access to fissure, etc. Then you get stupid people spamming other countries area's. There are some ppl from the american server I don't want being rude / crude on the other servers.

This was the first time I had heard about this 5 times and thats your lot.

I had a few weekends on the Beta and then they brought in the Release. I had changed 2 times to begin with. I was originally in America, then I went back to Europe as that is where I am from, then went back to America, as that was where most of the English speaking players were.

I still have my 5 choices, so this option has obviously come in with some recent changes. I don't ever remember it being mentioned in a game update, but I may have missed it.

How does this option sound.

They will let you change the server you are located in, but you can only do it once. You then have to wait 2 months, before they allow you to do it again.

This way, as EternalTempest says above, you can't abuse the Favour of the Gods, but it gives you a choice to try out the different servers from time to time, and see if there is any improvement in how many people are playing there.

All I can say is, if more and more people keep flipping back and forth between Euro and American servers, we will see the American Servers getting more full, and the European servers being next to empty and useless and would make the Favour of the Gods and PvP between these two camps, pretty useless.

Just my thoughts on this issue.

fleeb · Jun 20, 2005, 12:12 PM // 12:12

That looks reasonable to me.

Or perhaps you have to earn so much experience before you can change regions again (as with attribute point allocation).

It does seem brutal to me to prevent someone from returning to their home region at all after an arbitrary number of times.

Worse yet, who in the world chose '5' as a number? It would make much more sense to choose an even number, not an odd one; you'd most likely be able to return to your region, only to find that you couldn't change *out* of your region anymore.

This said, I would be against any policy that required the efforts of a dedicated customer support person to 'fix' this kind of problem for the user; those guys have enough to do dealing with real problems than user errors like this (and, no, I'm not saying user errors are ignorable altogether; they just shouldn't demand the attention of a support person).

One person said something about only requiring two minutes to twiddle a database somewhere. Multiply that number by even 5% of the people playing the game, and decide if you could really spend that much time twiddling databases for people who made bad decisions? Especially, consider whether you could afford to pay someone to deal with that on an ongoing basis when you don't charge a monthly fee.

Shao · Jun 20, 2005, 05:31 PM // 17:31

Quote:

Originally Posted by fleeb

That looks reasonable to me.

Or perhaps you have to earn so much experience before you can change regions again (as with attribute point allocation).

It does seem brutal to me to prevent someone from returning to their home region at all after an arbitrary number of times.

Worse yet, who in the world chose '5' as a number? It would make much more sense to choose an even number, not an odd one; you'd most likely be able to return to your region, only to find that you couldn't change *out* of your region anymore.

This said, I would be against any policy that required the efforts of a dedicated customer support person to 'fix' this kind of problem for the user; those guys have enough to do dealing with real problems than user errors like this (and, no, I'm not saying user errors are ignorable altogether; they just shouldn't demand the attention of a support person).

One person said something about only requiring two minutes to twiddle a database somewhere. Multiply that number by even 5% of the people playing the game, and decide if you could really spend that much time twiddling databases for people who made bad decisions? Especially, consider whether you could afford to pay someone to deal with that on an ongoing basis when you don't charge a monthly fee.

Of course the number should have been an even one... that's what we call logic. Uneven numbers just don't make sense. I wouldn't mind being stuck in Europe. I will have to disagree with what you said about customer support. I think is exactly an issue for them. Remember... if you are working as customer support its your job to help/assist customers. They are not paid to bug hunt or re-write the application, so they can dedicate their time helping customers. Although it's their policy/right not to help people with this issue, I still think it's pretty harsh and this will prevent me from buying any new games/expansions released by Arenanet. Also a good friend who wanted to try it and play together with me will not buy the game now. I wasn't too smart not reading the text but they arn't too smart also. This will cost them at least 180 euro (2 normal games, 2 expansions). I am pretty sure a database fix is way cheaper and they will have no bad reviews.

Principa Discordia · Jun 20, 2005, 05:39 PM // 17:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shao

Of course the number should have been an even one... that's what we call logic. Uneven numbers just don't make sense.

Shao... Of course you should have read the blatant warning before changing five times, that's what we call logic. Not reading blatant warning just doesn't make sense.

No offense, but the whining in this thread is frigging pathetic. Deal with your own ignorant mistakes instead of acting like children needing hand-holding. I lose my faith in humanity every day, it's little things like this that help push that along.

Shao · Jun 20, 2005, 06:36 PM // 18:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by Principa Discordia

Shao... Of course you should have read the blatant warning before changing five times, that's what we call logic. Not reading blatant warning just doesn't make sense.

No offense, but the whining in this thread is frigging pathetic. Deal with your own ignorant mistakes instead of acting like children needing hand-holding. I lose my faith in humanity every day, it's little things like this that help push that along.

You quote things out of context which isn't fair. Don't make me look like all I do is blaming others since that's not the case. I admitted making that mistake myself. We are not whining but discussing an issue. That's what these boards are for. If we do not discuss and/or talk about games and how to improve stuff anymore, things are going to get pretty ugly. All I can say is that I hope they will tweak this so other people won't end up in the wrong territory like me.
Like I stated before this thread is also to make people aware of this issue.
Why are you acting so hostile?

Snuffles · Jun 20, 2005, 06:49 PM // 18:49

Where is the customer services based, there seem to be a few noticeable errors in their replies.

dansamy · Jun 20, 2005, 06:55 PM // 18:55

Why not do this: transfer the old account to a new "disposable" email address, like hotmail or yahoo and sell the account on eBay? Then buy your new account. True, you'll have to begin new characters.

Diplo · Jun 20, 2005, 07:03 PM // 19:03

Quote:

Originally Posted by Principa Discordia

No offense, but the whining in this thread is frigging pathetic. Deal with your own ignorant mistakes instead of acting like children needing hand-holding. I lose my faith in humanity every day, it's little things like this that help push that along.

No, what is pathetic is peoples' need to try and polarise a debate into black and white. What is pathetic is people who have no empathy and can only attack others' instead of trying to see both sides of the argument. Yes, the person in question clearly acted stupidly by not reading the warnings but that doesn't mean we shouldn't question the reasoning of why you are only allowed to change the setting five times in the first place. I think it's perfectly reasonable to ask the questions:

Why can't we play in whatever region we want? How does this benefit me as a paying customer?
Why is the number of times we can change region set to seemingly arbitrary five? Why is this an odd number when logic would dictate an even number would be less risky?
Why isn't there a final confirm dialogue when you attempt make the last change? Would it be a good idea to implement one?
Why don't Arena Net support have the ability to change the region in exceptional circumstances? Why is it so difficult to change one field in a database?
Why can we only read the EULA once we have bought and opened the game, meaning we can't return it to the shop even if we disagree with the EULA? (This is a general point that applies to nearly all games but is an example of how customers often get screwed).

I think these are reasonable points to raise. Arena Net are not God and are not beyond improvement or above criticism. I would hope they would learn from a situation like this and show more maturity than some of the posters in this thread who just seem to relish it as a chance to make personal attacks.

arnansnow · Jun 20, 2005, 07:04 PM // 19:04

The reason Anet doesn't want infinite skipping (I am just guessing) is so that people don't just skip to the area with the god's favor everytime it changes.

Madjik · Jun 20, 2005, 07:27 PM // 19:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shao

You quote things out of context which isn't fair. Don't make me look like all I do is blaming others since that's not the case. I admitted making that mistake myself. We are not whining but discussing an issue. That's what these boards are for. If we do not discuss and/or talk about games and how to improve stuff anymore, things are going to get pretty ugly. All I can say is that I hope they will tweak this so other people won't end up in the wrong territory like me.
Like I stated before this thread is also to make people aware of this issue.
Why are you acting so hostile?

Might be because you posted in the technician's corner. If you wanted to discuss a problem and suggest a fix for it, the sardlac sanitarium would have been a better choice. I highly doubt a.net looks about this particular section of the forums for game fix's because its based on helping poeple with physical problems with thier computers.

EDIT:: ugh, been trying to fix this for like 10 mins now, forums runnin slow

ANYWHO, I would like to point out that your first post or two did sound like you were whining. I realize that isnt the case, but the person who starts a thread indirectly sets the mood for anyone posting in it there after.

Diplo · Jun 20, 2005, 08:05 PM // 20:05

Quote:

Originally Posted by arnansnow

The reason Anet doesn't want infinite skipping (I am just guessing) is so that people don't just skip to the area with the god's favor everytime it changes.

Perhaps a less Draconian way of preventing this would to simply have a delay between being able to change (which got progressively longer the more times you change)? For instance, after the 5th change you have to wait a week until you are able to change again. This would prevent people changing all the time whilst still allowing people who've made a mistake some leeway.

Night · Jun 20, 2005, 08:50 PM // 20:50

Ok one I have read through this and I will make some comments which are not in any way meant to bash, belittle, or insult anyone:

First Shao, yes I realize you admit your mistake but you go on to say that they should correct your mistake. That's not really owning up to it but I am not here to offend or talk about that. I looked at the initial warning and well its pretty obvious that its states 5 times before the change is permenant. I happened to be colorblind and that stood out pretty brilliantly to me. From my own experience working on a website and I needed to push out updates to clients, I highly doubt that if a pop-up was issued the person receiving it would pay any more attention if they didn't pay attention to the first message. Heck, you can say the message telling you that you only have more times to change your server as a pop up. I know I don't get that screen everytime I log on (in fact never even knew that you could do that so I have never seen that screen until here) so I would think if I got a new message or screen, I would read it to see what it was but I digress as I don't want to rehash how or why it occurred. They are inclined to hit the OK button as fast as they see the pop-up so I doubt it would make that much of difference.

Now am I saying what happened to you is fair? No. I have an idea as to why they limit the change but since I don't have access to their code, can only formulate a hypothesis. Depending on how the changes replicate across the network, continual changing may stress the servers to the point that individual clients (yours and my machine) may/will lock up.

To give you an idea, I am a developer working on a Telephony system that we discovered whenever we moved users between the different queus for answering phone calls during peak hours, we would get a data spike that would lock up agents (folks who answered the phone) for up to 10 minutes yet at the central office we wouldn't have any problems, it was our outside locations that bore the brunt and we only had like 500 agents using the system. Imagine the load with several million users. It may be that if only one or 2 users do the switching, it won't affect much but let's say folks got into the habit of constantly switching, I would imagine the stress would be dramatic.

2ndly towards the issue of not being to immediately correct ones character immediately. I can tell you from database programming it isnt that simple. Chances are they would have to shut down the whole database server to implement the corrections to your mistake (the entering everything in a useless attribute). 1) I couldn't imagine shutting down the whole server simply because one user has his/her mouse in the wrong location. 2) They give you an out. They allow you to continue to gain experience in order to get more refund points. I am not saying its easy nor am I saying its not time consuming but it is available. Because that option is available, I am not surprised that they won't fix your mistake. Sorry, this is coming from a coder's perspective. Think of it another way. How many games allow you to correct a mistake like this? I know with Diablo, you got no such reprieve. Once you clicked that mouse see ya and there is no room for help on that.

Well, I know this may not be an option but you could in theory possible get your friends to help you out (I am not sure if this will work). First get your friends to switch 1 time (warn them about the limit to numbers of switches). then meet up with them have them hold of all your gear for you. Next delete the current account. Try starting a new account using the same key or try using a different email address (most IP allow you to make several email accounts which I do to limit spam and what not). Yes if you are really far along which most of us are, this is kind of a pain but maybe the friends would be willing to get you are your feet.

Diplo · Jun 20, 2005, 09:47 PM // 21:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by Night

I can tell you from database programming it isnt that simple. Chances are they would have to shut down the whole database server to implement the corrections to your mistake (the entering everything in a useless attribute).

Since when do you have to shut down an entire database to execute an UPDATE SQL statment?

davidmor · Jun 21, 2005, 12:04 AM // 00:04

Did anyone stop to think about the importance of using the number 5 in max. amount of switches. By using an odd number, if a player is switching between two territories they are automatically assured that they will not end up at their starting territory if they use up their switches like the OP did.

Eur to Amer.
Amer to Eur.
Eur to Amer.
Amer to Eur.
Eur to Amer.

5 switches and stuck in the wrong territory. They should either change the number to an even number, or like someone else suggested, make any subsequent changes only available after a long wait, something like a month. I also think that the final change needs to be preceeded with a big 'WARNING, THIS IS YOUR LAST CHANCE' box too. Heck, they have a verification process of typing in the name of a char. you want to delete, this is just as important. I know that I don't read everything that comes on the screen and I doubt that most of the rest of the players do either. I do however always read warning and confirmation boxes.

Narcissus · Jun 22, 2005, 01:58 PM // 13:58

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sovetskeey

I just clicked 11 times quickly, I don't go one click at a time to make sure each and every one goes into the right place.

"Put brain in gear before engaging mouth."

Am I the only one that see's the Irony of this statement?

kungfumonkey2 · Jun 22, 2005, 02:13 PM // 14:13

I think we should all see the obvious moral of this story.

DON'T COME TO AMERICA!

But since you did and you cant go back. WELCOME TO AMERICA!

I feel your pain thou. I would go crazy if I got stuck in Korea. I could never party, at least you can speak english. So, you will be able to survive. You can do what most immigrants to the US do. Find yourself a nice minial labor job, work in a factory and get paid really low salary. Live in a slum. Also you should start applying for welfare. Or just join the mafia that caters to your nationality. Again welome to the United States, by the way your new name is Fred Smith.

There are warnings on everything nowadays. Look at a McDonalds coffee cup. HOT COFFE INSIDE WILL BURN YOUR SILLY ASS SHOULD YOU SPILL IT ON YOU. Everything nowadays is sue proof, and that is why Anet has the EULA (End User License Agreement). They are not obligated to help you, because you clicked the little check box that says "I agree". Little did you know by doing so you entered into a contract. Yes it sucks you are stuck, and you got yourself there. I am sure you will get relief someday though. If you can not wait purchase a new game.

momo2oo2 · Jun 22, 2005, 02:34 PM // 14:34

Such an incredible thing it is. I questioned almost 2 weeks ago somewhere in the Ventari Sell how much can cost an item (if I remember well it was a Storm Artifact). And to the date it remains unanswered.

That makes me think: Should I had question that with: OMG! I sold the wrong item at the wrong price to the wrong npc! A.net get it back to me! That way I should have 3 pages full of answers?

Don't you all think this forum is getting a bit "flame!" ? That wasn't the style when I joined the day I bought the game (28th April I think)

Ok, nevermind...

Rellok · Jun 22, 2005, 03:29 PM // 15:29

You can still play with your friends in the international districts, wouldn't that work for you?

Matt

aphex twin · Jun 22, 2005, 03:55 PM // 15:55

jeez the number is SO large and yellow a blind man could probably just about make it out...