Concerns About Players Being Suspended

[Alec_Fortescue]

Many people never bother to look at the patch notes or any other information BW happens to release before patchday. Especially when it comes to the Cartel Market. In my guild the majority doesnt care about the GTM and barely looks at other patchnotes.

Expecting people reading through pages and pages of CM update notes to figure out how a system is intented to work is just silly.

They just log on and try it out.

 

We read through patch notes and the only thing leading to any sort of exploits is mention of making white crystals non-reversable.

[tiennen]

What I'm shocked is that they should have had a preliminary discuss about this.

 

Didn't someone say, "Hey we have xxx people that we are about to give a 1 week ban who are potentially subscribers and have bought cc with real money. Do we want to risk lose a lot of subs during a time where it looks like the game is in a little bit of a rebound?"

 

This.

 

Worst PR move ever. Unless the bans are legit, which I'm leaning towards "no" on that.

[Master-Nala]

Many people never bother to look at the patch notes or any other information BW happens to release before patchday. Especially when it comes to the Cartel Market. In my guild the majority doesnt care about the GTM and barely looks at other patchnotes.

Expecting people reading through pages and pages of CM update notes to figure out how a system is intented to work is just silly.

They just log on and try it out.

 

Lack of due diligence is almost never a sufficient defense. This is a situation where the likely standard being used is 'did you know or SHOULD you have known what you were doing was an exploit'. I'm not saying that is fair or unfair, but fairness may not be the overarching consideration at play here.

[Samoth_Nomad]

I'm just gonna leave this little gem here:

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=639684

 

When players asked if mailing crystals to an alt was an exploit, BW had no comment.

 

screenshot in case it goes down:

http://oi41.tinypic.com/fles10.jpg

[Alec_Fortescue]

Bet you they're gonna give clarifications after bans expire. So much for my affection and support for this game. See you everyone. To think I was such a big spender...

[Ratajack]

Many people never bother to look at the patch notes or any other information BW happens to release before patchday. Especially when it comes to the Cartel Market. In my guild the majority doesnt care about the GTM and barely looks at other patchnotes.

Expecting people reading through pages and pages of CM update notes to figure out how a system is intented to work is just silly.

They just log on and try it out.

 

BW provided plenty of information in this case as to how the feature was designed to work. Tell me again how a player choosing not avail themselves of the information that BW provided in abundance makes it BW's fault.

 

At what point do people actually grow up, accept responsibility and stop trying to blame someone else for their own actions or inactions.

[Ratajack]

We read through patch notes and the only thing leading to any sort of exploits is mention of making white crystals non-reversable.

 

How is using a legacy weapon to get around having to pay the CC for the account wide unlock not an exploit? Especially since you KNEW, by your own admission, how the collections interface was designed to work.

[Alec_Fortescue]

Just considering the amount of people NOT SUSPENDED who had fun with the crystals ( i can name someone who moved dozens) and are still enjoying the game - I hope it's not the issue everyone is assuming it is.

[curtkram]

So...I didn't get banned or anything but I'm wondering something...

 

My friend has a sage and sorc lv 55. She has a legacy hilt with BiS mods that she sends between the two. If she used a duped crystal in her shared legacy hilt, would she get banned? Is sharing legacy gear between characters now dangerous?

 

Uhm... I'm going to text her now actually and warn her about this...

I would recommend telling your friend to avoid doing ANYTHING with Collections -- specifically crystals -- until we get further notice.

 

Those seem to be the two major things that are related in all of the accounts of bannings. Best to avoid them -- and I wish BW would give people enough information so they didn't end up banned.

this is where i think their problem is. if the 'exploit' is what i understand it to be (there are sort of a couple things i think it could be), then it's not something i would have considered an exploit at all. at least it's not much worse than bioware accidentally leaving dyes from the collectors edition vendor unbound.

 

what they're really doing wrong is spreading fear and paranoia. the game should be fun, because it's a game and that's what games do. Radzkie and his friend should not be worried about being banned for doing nothing wrong, and they should not have to avoid or tiptoe around the features bioware gave them. that doesn't make sense to me.

 

if there is a real exploit, then i understand they have to find a solution, then implement the solution, and limit the player base from taking advantage while that occurs. i understand that requires some secrecy and i understand it takes time. what i don't understand is why bioware is approaching the problem in such a way as to create an environment of fear and paranoia.

 

first of all it looks to me like the problem is not a real problem and many of these people shouldn't be banned in the first place. crystals stay bound, unless there is a way to unbind them (that would be an exploit). you can't dupe them and put them on gtn in the current system. the amount of credits you get from RE or vendoring something like that is pretty limited and spreading crystals to your alts is limited to your account and server.

 

second, there was collateral damage that could have been avoided by having real people try to find out what happened in each case. don't ban people unless your sure that individual did whatever the crime was, and don't call it a crime unless a reasonable person might assume it's a crime.

 

third, and probably most important, don't let it blow so far out of proportion. now people who are absolutely and completely innocent of whatever went wrong are afraid of getting banned for nothing. not just the forum people, but guildmates of people who were banned without knowing why. that really hurts player's ability to trust the developers and community team. this was not some organic thing that just happened. this whole thing was created by decisions made by bioware staff, and in my opinion it was bad decisions that hurt what appears to be a lot of their customers.

[Ratajack]

I'm just gonna leave this little gem here:

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=639684

 

When players asked if mailing crystals to an alt was an exploit, BW had no comment.

 

screenshot in case it goes down:

http://oi41.tinypic.com/fles10.jpg

 

I would not use the fact that there was no official response as justification that it was not an exploit. A good rule to follow is "if it seems to be too good to be true, it probably is".

 

In this case, we can unlock a crystal and create multiple copies for that character, and we can also pay CC's to unlock it account wide. I would hope that any reasonable person would think that avoiding having to pay the CC's to get, in effect, the same benefit that an account wide unlock would provide would be "too good to be true".

[Samoth_Nomad]

Just considering the amount of people NOT SUSPENDED who had fun with the crystals ( i can name someone who moved dozens) and are still enjoying the game - I hope it's not the issue everyone is assuming it is.

It really is odd. Most folks are guessing it's the crystal thing, and yet we have folks being suspended that never even touched the crystals, while in other cases, some players that made hundreds of crystal copies for alts, were not suspended.

[Benfynyn]

Well, I didn't get banned after all. I got home from work, after reading the now deleted threads of people who were banned, fully expecting to have been banned. In my case I had copied a crystal on one character and then sent a crystal to an alt via a legacy weapon.

 

However, I think I moved the original one from the cartel pack and not the copy. Did that save me from a ban? And if so, how is that any different?

[Samoth_Nomad]

I would not use the fact that there was no official response as justification that it was not an exploit. A good rule to follow is "if it seems to be too good to be true, it probably is".

 

In this case, we can unlock a crystal and create multiple copies for that character, and we can also pay CC's to unlock it account wide. I would hope that any reasonable person would think that avoiding having to pay the CC's to get, in effect, the same benefit that an account wide unlock would provide would be "too good to be true".

 

Thing is, you could look at the whole legacy system as too good to be true. Sending bound armoring and mods to alts seems to good to be true and yet BW gave the green light on this, which significantly shortens the gear grind on alts.

But its a moot point, because as it stands now, many folks were suspended for no reason at all. they didnt even touch the crystals. It's going to be very interesting to find out what really happened. To me, it still seems like a blanket exploit detection script went awry.

[Alec_Fortescue]

Thing is, you could look at the whole legacy system as too good to be true. Sending bound armoring and mods to alts seems to good to be true and yet BW gave the green light on this, which significantly shortens the gear grind on alts.

But its a moot point, because as it stands now, many folks were suspended for no reason at all. they didnt even touch the crystals. It's going to be very interesting to find out what really happened. To me, it still seems like a blanket exploit detection script went awry.

 

This. Have a nice day. I am out of here forever! no more hood toggle whining.

[curtkram]

It really is odd. Most folks are guessing it's the crystal thing, and yet we have folks being suspended that never even touched the crystals, while in other cases, some players that made hundreds of crystal copies for alts, were not suspended.

 

it seems to me they are guessing the crystal thing because people were banned from the forums for mentioning it. the ToS says something along the lines of 'you can't talk about why you were banned,' or something. putting 2 and 2 together, 'talk about crystals' and 'can't talk about why you were banned,' implies the ban is because of the crystals. it could also be the forum mods don't know why people were banned and they just assumed it was crystals. it sounds like eric came out after forum sanctions to suggest they have no idea what's going on.

[RWScissors]

it seems to me they are guessing the crystal thing because people were banned from the forums for mentioning it. the ToS says something along the lines of 'you can't talk about why you were banned,' or something. putting 2 and 2 together, 'talk about crystals' and 'can't talk about why you were banned,' implies the ban is because of the crystals. it could also be the forum mods don't know why people were banned and they just assumed it was crystals. it sounds like eric came out after forum sanctions to suggest they have no idea what's going on.

 

This would be my guess.

[Kilora]

Basically -- there are dozens of possible reasons. For all we know, each person could've been banned for a completely separate reason, but they did a "Batch" ban. Yeah, rather unrealistic, but -- too many variables and too many possibilities.

 

If there is actually an exploit, the community at large will be given that information once said exploit is fixed.

We will not ever know the truth as to why anyone in particular was banned. That is solely on them to discuss it with BW.

 

In the meantime, the only thing we can do is wait and see what information is released.

[curtkram]

Basically -- there are dozens of possible reasons. For all we know, each person could've been banned for a completely separate reason, but they did a "Batch" ban. Yeah, rather unrealistic, but -- too many variables and too many possibilities.

this is what's creating 'fear and loathing in swtor forums'

In the meantime, the only thing we can do is wait and see what information is released.

we can also rant on the forums hoping for a real answer from eric or a dev until we get the focus and motivation to go back to our day jobs. there are dozens of other things we can do

[DarkDajin]

Basically -- there are dozens of possible reasons. For all we know, each person could've been banned for a completely separate reason, but they did a "Batch" ban. Yeah, rather unrealistic, but -- too many variables and too many possibilities.

 

If there is actually an exploit, the community at large will be given that information once said exploit is fixed.

We will not ever know the truth as to why anyone in particular was banned. That is solely on them to discuss it with BW.

 

In the meantime, the only thing we can do is wait and see what information is released.

 

 

But in the meantime, people are recieving speeding tickets for driving on a road without speed limit signs...

[Alec_Fortescue]

But in the meantime, people are recieving speeding tickets for driving on a road without speed limit signs...

 

Some countries have established maximum speed limits on certain types of roads... If there is no sign, you need to abide the common rules. You have to learn them before you get your driving license. This is absolutely the first case of mass-punishment Force-knows for what. I sincerely read every patch notes, was on the forums 24/7. I would know what's an exploit and what i should stay away from. Especially me, considering how much my account is worth.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Alec_Fortescue

[Kilora]

Some countries have established maximum speed limits on certain types of roads... If there is no sign, you need to abide the common rules. You have to learn them before you get your driving license. This is absolutely the first case of mass-punishment Force-knows for what. I sincerely read every patch notes, was on the forums 24/7. I would know what's an exploit and what i should stay away from. Especially me, considering how much my account is worth.

 

I apologize, Alec, but what you described earlier I would personally view as an exploit.

 

Because of that -- I wouldn't have done it. Using a workaround to avoid paying, that is just dirty IMO. If people don't purposely circumvent a system made to make you pay, they will be fine.

 

Ignorance is not a defense in a court of law. Considering no one has been perma-banned, no one is being fined, no legal action is being taken, and the investigation is ongoing -- I'd say twiddle your fingers and pray for the best.

 

They cannot give us information when they are still trying to gather it.

[Alec_Fortescue]

I apologize, Alec, but what you described earlier I would personally view as an exploit.

 

Because of that -- I wouldn't have done it. Using a workaround to avoid paying, that is just dirty IMO. If people don't purposely circumvent a system made to make you pay, they will be fine.

 

Ignorance is not a defense in a court of law. Considering no one has been perma-banned, no one is being fined, no legal action is being taken, and the investigation is ongoing -- I'd say twiddle your fingers and pray for the best.

 

They cannot give us information when they are still trying to gather it.

 

I did not take any workaround. You are paying for an account-wide unlock and I hardly got it. I did not mail the crystals all over to all my alts. I mailed some as a test to a character which already owned them anyway and they've been there for days, unused.

 

Of course ignorance is not a defense. But Bioware established a precedent where they gave green light to far more dodgy issues like reverse-engineering player made schematics and making hundreds of millions out of it. Now that's a serious economic violation in m eyes. I am not justifying that because of this we can exploit the heck out of the game, but encouraging us to use legacy weapons, providing the legacy weapons and giving an ability to transfer lightsaber crystals via legacy weapons AND NOT responding when asked about this can lead us to assumption that nobody cares.

 

I myself expressed fondness for this feature in one of the threads before 2.1a or b and praised Bioware for putting in a nice compromise for the changes they made to toys. No removal of post, no answer. Anyone who cheated was them when they changed the features of items (toys) I have paid for already.

Edited May 23, 2013 by Alec_Fortescue

[RLWalker]

I wasn't caught up in this but I generally side with the players on these issues. For something that is entirely the fault of the developer the punishment should be restricted to removal of unintended benefits. For example, the crystals could be removed and then let players create tickets to restore any crystals that they destroyed in the process. Alternatively players could choose to pay whatever cartel coins in order to unlock it account wide and not be rolled back. Mistakes happen but in this case I don't think players did anything unreasonable.

 

This really shows the importance of getting every update on the PTS. I am certain that someone would have found this if it had been up a week before live. BioWare really needs to step up the quality of their code. I was hoping that every patch, major or minor, would have as many bug fixes as 2.0.1.

 

So basically my suggestion is to get *every* patch on the PTS. I realize that's a lot of work but you will have to do that work anyways and more by deploying bugs to live.

[Kilora]

I did not take any workaround. You are paying for an account-wide unlock and I hardly got it. I did not mail the crystals all over to all my alts. I mailed some as a test to a character which already owned them anyway and they've been there for days, unused.

 

Of course ignorance is not a defense. But Bioware established a precedent where they gave green light to far more dodgy issues like reverse-engineering player made schematics and making hundreds of millions out of it. Now that's a serious economic violation in m eyes. I am not justifying that because of this we can exploit the heck out of the game, but encouraging us to use legacy weapons, providing the legacy weapons and giving an ability to transfer lightsaber crystals via legacy weapons AND NOT responding when asked about this can lead us to assumption that nobody cares.

 

You really don't have to waste energy convincing me. The idea of making copies of an item and transferring them, without paying the CC cost that is in place to allow this -- was impossible pre-2.1. Doing so now without paying the fee is MOST DEFINITELY an exploit.

 

My assumption is that they realized the issue, but couldn't figure out how to fix it. Or, they are having a hard time fixing it. Because they do need to allow this 1 item in particular to be transferred without paying -- but only in the same way you could do it pre-2.1.

 

Poor implementation -- and that is probably why no one received perma-bans. But, like I said -- we will see what happens. It is possible that you weren't purposely targeted, and were banned by mistake. It is also possible that BW viewed what you did as just as bad. I have no idea, and I won't judge people either way.**

 

**If you notice, I'm not saying you deserved to be banned, or that you exploited. I'm merely saying that I personally view the exploit for what it is -- and also accept that you could accidentally take place in the exploit to a significantly smaller degree. They absolutely need to fix any issues that may have occured, fix the exploit itself, and give explanations to those who were banned.

[Kilora]

So basically my suggestion is to get *every* patch on the PTS. I realize that's a lot of work but you will have to do that work anyways and more by deploying bugs to live.

 

Not only is that completely unrealistic -- but pointless.

 

Exploits generally don't get caught on the PTS. If someone *does* find it, they most often don't report it, for hopes that they can get away with it. We've seen this often times in the past, not only in this game, but in others.

 

PTS is to find glaringly obvious bugs that negatively affect gameplay. And most often, give clues to larger bugs. But the playerbase as a whole is still not an excellent QA team.