Curse

Pro-Monk · Aug 18, 2007, 12:30 PM // 12:30

This whole duping exploit episode is most likely only the tip of the iceburg. This game has been invaded by a host of hardcore, exploiting, hacking players and this is just an instance that has come to light in the community. I place a great deal of the blame on Anet itself for continually making gameplay less and less friendly to the casual players while creating a paradise for the children who have nothing better to do than take advantage of things like duping. (Juding by the spelling and grammer of many admittedly affected by the duping in the forums, they are either youngsters or illiterate,maybe both).

Anyone that cares to can search the web and find a huge number of subscription sites that provide detailed information on how to exploit and hack GW. Why Anet doesn't subscribe to such sites and close up the loopholes in the game is beyond comprehension. Given that Gaile has so much as said nothing goes on in the game that Anet isn't aware of and can't deal with, why are the bots still as prevalent as ever? It's just hard to fathom where Anet is coming from in dealing with these issues.

Just reading theads on this fansite forum gives anyone an insight into the "elitist" players who trade armbraces and high-end items as though they were charr carvings for the rest of us. These are the very same players that constantly berate and flame any poster that questions the current state of gameplay. These are also the same players that claim the game is "too easy". It's Anet's own fault that they have to step in and deal with issues like this and, as usual, the rest of us take the hit for it (no reconnect in this instance).

I, for one, have little sympathy for any banning (temporary or permenant) that was given over this exploit. Apparently it mainly affected a particular guild, difficult to imagine isn't it, a whole guild involved in exploiting the game? I'm not paranoid about trading, and neither is 99% of the community. Why? Because we just play the game to have fun, not to impress anyone over what titles or items we have garnered. Not only that, we don't have millions in gold flow through our accounts on a regular basis.

Come Anet, undo the mess you have created yourself. Open the game up rather than clamping it down. Level the playing field so that the casual players have reasonable oppuntunites to acquire gold and items that the hardcore, exploiting, and hacking players now have such easy access to get. Quit catering to the few, pay attention to your main player base, and these issues will resolve themselves!

Kas · Aug 18, 2007, 12:43 PM // 12:43

Yes I'm paranoid about trading now.
You never know if that item you're about to get might be duped or not... hell, how are you supposed to know? And don't give me that crap about one sided trades... every trade is onesided, I've never ever seen a single really fair trade in my entire life. One side allways loses out on a trade. It's the simple law of how things work. You either pay too much and lose or you pay less than enough and the other one loses.
Simply "Buy low, sell high" is now suscpicious behavior? Blergh.

Cherrie · Aug 18, 2007, 01:26 PM // 13:26

t_the_nihilst, I'd like to point to few things before I anwser:

1) you say some are banned while others still sell Armbraces for 10k. Well, there ain't many who actually try to sell them for that ammount. I've only seen buyers who were looking for AoT for this prices and all sellers were actually people who tried to test those buyer's reactions. I don't belive many were sold for that price for a simple reason: I'f youre a duper, you'd have loads of gold by the bans and you wouldnt be wasting your time for selling xxx ammount of them for such a low price... you wouldnt need the money anymore. The 10k is a drop in the sea of the actual price... I can't imagine ayone carying to actually sell it for AoT. Buy it.. thats annother story.

2) you're complaining that someone has been banned for 34 linen. I'd like to remind you the 2 guys who tested the dupe on red dye before sending the process to ANet were duped as well. You seem to be forgetting that noone manually searched the database! Thats near to impossible, to be honest. They used a script, quite a detailed and well written one if I might say so myself, which tracked every event of dupe and a way from the duper down to other people in trades in an X ammount of time, clearly focusing on high ammounts of duped items or one-sided trades. The script probably returned Hundrets, if not Thousands of lines of data, which was still rather impossible to check manually, but for the sake of community, they decided to act asap and banned all accounts flagged.

Now, I don't see anything bad in the way they acted. As you see, they examine every ticked carefully and if youre pollite and responsive, they unban you. Sure, they saw 34 duped items recived in trade at firs thats why someone got banned. You really blame them? Keep in mind they had a HUGE ammount of data to go through. They did what was best at that moment not to hurt community further. But they unbanned you.

And also, one more thing.
All Dragon Festival Redux I was running - using my 2 PCs (with one IP) and 2 accounts - for tokens. Actually, my 2 accounts were being run by a friend, so at the end of each run I gave all the tokens/Cremes along with gold (one sided trade) to one of the chars and placed them in storage, saving an incredible 50g a run (and time). I did it dozens of times which means many hours of 2 accounts spend on same IP, with disconecting and reconecting (my ISP sux..), and one sided trades of same ammount of same items. None of the accounts were banned tho I was really afraid they might get flagged. This is why I belive the script was quite well written.

I'm sorry you lost 3 days of playtime, but honestly... I belive sometimes people should sacrifice a bit for the sake of the community.

Edit: some typos.

Elisa · Aug 18, 2007, 02:37 PM // 14:37

People. Grow up, play the d-REDENGINE-mn game.

Kook~NBK~ · Aug 18, 2007, 03:56 PM // 15:56

This isn't the first time that innocent people have been banned, and it won't be the last. It's been commonly reported here and elswhere that people who have had their accounts mistakenly banned and have appealed in a courteous and persistent(but not harrassing) manner have had their accounts re-instated in less than a week. If anyone can't handle a few days without their beloved GW, then they really need to seek help.

This is nothing to get paraniod about. I'm going to play on and keep on trading like I have for the past 2+ years and not worry about getting my account banned, because if it happens, I'll be sure have it back in a few days.

From a business standpoint, A-Net does not want to lose customers. But which way will they lose more?

A. Taking their time to act on a matter that can potentially crash the whole GW economy to make sure that only the guilty are caught, giving those guilty parties time to launder their ill-gotten gains, making the problem even more wide-spread than it currently is, ruining the game for thousands and thousands of people. OR

B. Taking quick action and getting the slime-balls (and their duped items, thereby vastly reducing the impact on the economy) out of the game which also, unfortunately, resulted in the ban of several innoncent people who can go thorugh a appeals process and, if truely innocent, will get their accounts back within a few days.

The folks who duped the red dye to report to A-Net what was going on got their accounts banned. Did they complain? No (someone else did on their behalf, tho) They got with A-Net and sorted it out. In the thread where that was discussed, they set a very good example for everyone to follow. Kudos!

t_the_nihilst · Aug 18, 2007, 04:21 PM // 16:21

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cherrie

t_the_nihilst, I'd like to point to few things before I anwser:

1) you say some are banned while others still sell Armbraces for 10k. Well, there ain't many who actually try to sell them for that ammount. I've only seen buyers who were looking for AoT for this prices and all sellers were actually people who tried to test those buyer's reactions. I don't belive many were sold for that price for a simple reason: I'f youre a duper, you'd have loads of gold by the bans and you wouldnt be wasting your time for selling xxx ammount of them for such a low price... you wouldnt need the money anymore. The 10k is a drop in the sea of the actual price... I can't imagine ayone carying to actually sell it for AoT. Buy it.. thats annother story.

2) you're complaining that someone has been banned for 34 linen. I'd like to remind you the 2 guys who tested the dupe on red dye before sending the process to ANet were duped as well. You seem to be forgetting that noone manually searched the database! Thats near to impossible, to be honest. They used a script, quite a detailed and well written one if I might say so myself, which tracked every event of dupe and a way from the duper down to other people in trades in an X ammount of time, clearly focusing on high ammounts of duped items or one-sided trades. The script probably returned Hundrets, if not Thousands of lines of data, which was still rather impossible to check manually, but for the sake of community, they decided to act asap and banned all accounts flagged.

Now, I don't see anything bad in the way they acted. As you see, they examine every ticked carefully and if youre pollite and responsive, they unban you. Sure, they saw 34 duped items recived in trade at firs thats why someone got banned. You really blame them? Keep in mind they had a HUGE ammount of data to go through. They did what was best at that moment not to hurt community further. But they unbanned you.

And also, one more thing.
All Dragon Festival Redux I was running - using my 2 PCs (with one IP) and 2 accounts - for tokens. Actually, my 2 accounts were being run by a friend, so at the end of each run I gave all the tokens/Cremes along with gold (one sided trade) to one of the chars and placed them in storage, saving an incredible 50g a run (and time). I did it dozens of times which means many hours of 2 accounts spend on same IP, with disconecting and reconecting (my ISP sux..), and one sided trades of same ammount of same items. None of the accounts were banned tho I was really afraid they might get flagged. This is why I belive the script was quite well written.

I'm sorry you lost 3 days of playtime, but honestly... I belive sometimes people should sacrifice a bit for the sake of the community.

Edit: some typos.

/sigh /sigh /sigh
Look. I understand that it is hard to discern yadda, yadda, yadda and computer BS and mumbo jumbo. But this is a case of wrong place at the wrong time. People who play GW who were at the wrong place at the wrong time are being punished for nothing.
Spare me the logistics and try to view it for what it is and do not cover it in red tape.

And about the armbraces. While I did hear from people that have no reason to lie that armbraces were being sold in Piken for 10k (I know right? Why Piken of all places?) I was not playing at that time and did not see them being sold myself. The point of bringing that up was to bring up more of an example as to how people are still duping and yet innocent people have lost their accounts, but I guess that wasn’t inherently obvious to some of you.

t_the_nihilst · Aug 18, 2007, 04:37 PM // 16:37

Quote:

Originally Posted by $neekie

k, probabely shouldent get in to this discusion. As i didnt even knew the armbraces excisted, before all the duping crap....

But 2 things @ t_the_nihilst: 1. You did get your account back so Anet does follow up and correct mistakes.

2. Shouldent you be blaming your guildleader and officers(wich you guys still call friends)?? They are the ones that put you in that position, they are the ones that risked your account. I would be pissed at them not Anet

Mzzls

1. I AM no longer talking personally about my situation and my account. Great big duh, I got my account back *points and waves over to it* *jumps on it*
Okay now that's it's clear, apparently you people have are afraid of anything contrary to what you believe and do not understand why it's important that I think people know about this despite the fact that yes, I got my account back. It's actually quite sad how blindly unconcerned you are for your fellow players. As long as it doesn't concern you or your playing lives you are willing to deny it. That to me is very, very sad.

2. If I did blame any player it would be the dupers, not my guild members as they weren't TRYING to get me banned. I was banned due to neglegence. But to your point, could this be considered a player's fault? Of course, the dupers.

assassin_of_ni · Aug 18, 2007, 08:48 PM // 20:48

just by reading the threads im glad i havent played in a while o_O i constantly give away free mats and items and plat and what have you along with always switching items back and forth between accounts which turn up as 1 sided. i have no idea what was goin on about the duped item shpeel (havent been able to access forums for work =( they finally caught onto me) and i woulda probably have been banned for god knows what reason.

but even more disturbing than a general paranoia of trade, is the process that a-net takes to "deal" with would-be scammers or bots or what have you. it seems as though its always the almighty ban-hammer being brandished at the first sign of trouble. no investigations or anything like that until well afterwards after all the innocent and non-innocent people have had their accounts taken away. now if someone walked up to me and tried to give me tormented....anything...i would be skeptical but also quite tempted. who wouldnt really... but how fair is it because maybe a person a i trusted, say RL friend or guildie from way back, happens to be an item scanner and i get banned for it? as ive said before i have on many occasions given away many items of great value (including a req 8 collosal to a guildie before they started getting over farmed) so it is possible in my mind that someone may offer me something of great value one day (albeit a slim to none chance anyways). point is i really think they need to re-think theyre ban-first ask questions later tactics.

ducktape · Aug 18, 2007, 09:35 PM // 21:35

Maybe it would help if instead of coming up with an error code saying you had been permanently or temporarily banned when they are "investigating" your account for violations, what if the error instead said something like:

Your account is temporarily disabled for investigation due to possible use of a 3rd party program. If you feel this is an error and wish to aid our investigation, please contact PlayNC support.

Your account is temporarily disabled for investigation due to possible exploitation of game mechanics. If you feel this is an error and wish to aid our investigation, please contact PlayNC support.

Your account is temporarily disabled for investigation due to possible fraudulent trades. If you feel this is an error and wish to aid our investigation, please contact PlayNC support.

I don't know about how anyone else feels, but to me that sounds a lot better than "Your account is temporarily banned" with no further explanation or "Your account has been permanently banned" with no further explanation. The current system of banning is "OMG YOU ARE A DUPER! BANNED!!" or "OMG YOU ARE A DIRTY BOT! BANNED!!" and then you have to plead and grovel during the review your case while they are rude and harsh in every reply they give during your account review. If the reason they are so quick to ban is so that you can't hurt the economy or whatever even further while they investigate you if you are indeed doing something illegal, then it would go a long way to explain that you are being investigated with a general explanation of your violation rather than saying that they are certain you have done something wrong and then treating you like a criminal until they prove or disprove it. Be nice throughout the process and then be mean if it is confirmed that someone did something illegal, you know?

I agree with the person who posted that the process is Kafka-esque in that you are suddenly in trouble and know not why and if you are cleared you usually don't even know what you allegedly did to get in trouble. I also agree with Gaile in that if they gave every little detail about what flagged your account for investigation or banning that it would make it even harder to stop bots. However, is it really so bad to generalize that you are in trouble for allegedly using 3rd party programs, for exploiting the game, or for fraudulent trades? And for trade issues to maybe even be a little specific and say "You have traded with an illegal gold seller" or "You have traded for items obtained in an exploit" or whatever when someone contacts support? A little transparency, just enough to help people understand what's going on when their account is being actioned, would go a long way in ensuring that people trust that the investigation and banning process is managed fairly.

Cherrie · Aug 18, 2007, 10:53 PM // 22:53

Quote:

Originally Posted by t_the_nihilst

/sigh /sigh /sigh
Look. I understand that it is hard to discern yadda, yadda, yadda and computer BS and mumbo jumbo. But this is a case of wrong place at the wrong time. People who play GW who were at the wrong place at the wrong time are being punished for nothing.
Spare me the logistics and try to view it for what it is and do not cover it in red tape.

And about the armbraces. While I did hear from people that have no reason to lie that armbraces were being sold in Piken for 10k (I know right? Why Piken of all places?) I was not playing at that time and did not see them being sold myself. The point of bringing that up was to bring up more of an example as to how people are still duping and yet innocent people have lost their accounts, but I guess that wasn’t inherently obvious to some of you.

Even more /sighs

Let me make it really short and simple: sorry you got banned for being in a wrong place in a wrong time, but still I belive what ANet did was the best thing they could do, and if that ment banning some accounts by mistake, it's a pity, but it doesn't make it less rightful by a bit. Saying otherwise is just plain egoistic (read Kook~NBK~'s post for more reference).

Btw, people are still duping? You know anything about that? Have you reported that to Anet?

Bryant Again · Aug 19, 2007, 12:22 AM // 00:22

Yeah I got banned as well. I can't bitch, though - for one, I understand being careful in a situation like this. It's hard to tell who's innocent or not, all ANet can see is "OH SNAP DUPED ITEM". And secondly, I am no longer banned, not that I was terribly upset in the first place (this is my fourth ban now, I'm used to it these days).

Now this is the good part: I got the same response as Flesh got, but it was with a - get this - a Fiery Dragon Sword. A mother RED ENGINEing Fiery Dragon Sword. Who the hell would dupe that?

KANE OG · Aug 19, 2007, 02:07 AM // 02:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by two x knives style

Also, who would dupe linen in the first place.

A person who wanted to stay under the radar.

KANE

MoldyRiceFrenzy · Aug 19, 2007, 05:55 AM // 05:55

im scared to get torment weapons anymore...

youwillknowfear · Aug 19, 2007, 04:33 PM // 16:33

I'll call it paranoia, but with a recent trade, I asked if the items where aquired in less than legitimate means. Took screen shots of various stages of questioning and the transaction. Of course, I did this in all prior high end transactions before news of cheaters getting banned hit these lists.

jesusrunz · Aug 19, 2007, 07:05 PM // 19:05

loluparanoid?

Shakti · Aug 19, 2007, 07:14 PM // 19:14

Dead horse in corner------------->

quick, everybody beat it :P

Nemo the Capitalist · Aug 19, 2007, 08:11 PM // 20:11

this game is changing for the worst lately

Cherrie · Aug 20, 2007, 10:03 AM // 10:03

ok... let me emphasize my question...

Quote:

Originally Posted by t_the_nihilst

(...)

And about the armbraces. While I did hear from people that have no reason to lie that armbraces were being sold in Piken for 10k (I know right? Why Piken of all places?) I was not playing at that time and did not see them being sold myself. The point of bringing that up was to bring up more of an example as to how people are still duping and yet innocent people have lost their accounts, but I guess that wasn’t inherently obvious to some of you.

so... are people still duping?
now you get me paranoid. you know anything about that? any reason to allert ANet? as a paranoid person Ive noticed you haven't anwsered this thread since that post.

higaru · Aug 20, 2007, 10:49 AM // 10:49

Innocent until proven guilty, that's the rule, if ANET have solid proof then the banned players deserve it, otherwise they shouldn't ban and i think its a tragedy and would compromise our trust in the game.
If u buy a stolen car, u didn't steal it and u didn't know it was stolen, but u can't punish someone because the car ended with them; delete the duped items if ur so sure, the lost gold is already a punishment put the account under close monitoring for future transaction until u get a more solid proof, then u can ban them so bad they will learn their mistake...

lucifer_uk · Aug 20, 2007, 10:59 AM // 10:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by higaru

If u buy a stolen car, u didn't steal it and u didn't know it was stolen, but u can't punish someone because the car ended with them;

No but presumably if the police in your area are any good at their job will take take you to the station for investigation until they can prove you didn't buy the car knowing it was stolen.

Just like if you handled some stolen electronics goods unknowing that they were stolen by a prolific theft ring the police would have to arrest you to then investigate that you weren't knowingly handling stolen goods.

Anyone wanna stop beating that horse yet?