Ravagers Exploit Action Update

[PavSalco]

Players need to take the responsibility for their action. They knew about the risk that goes along with exploiting BUT Bioware is also responsible for the current state.

 

1. They encouraged players to use exploits as they didn't take any action against players that exploited Nefra. People refused to do Nefra, but after watching people getting advantage without punishment they jumped on the Ravagers bandwagon.

2. The exploit was reported in PTS and they allowed it to be released and alive for a month.

Edited January 13, 2015 by PavSalco

[OrionSol]

Here is my issue with this whole thing.

 

Our guild was actively harassed in game, and out by a handful of players for months. Reported hundreds of times by dozens of members.

 

Nothing ever happened to them.

 

In PVP, speed hacking, /quit ranked conquesting, and many other problems like "instant resolve no stun" happen and Nothing ever happened to them.

 

Spammers sending emails, tells and blocking up chat 24/7, Nothing ever happened to them.

 

Crafting exploits that make guilds win conquests when it is mathematically impossible and proven to be so - Nothing ever happened to them.

 

Yet, they are going to punish players who did something that does exactly NOTHING to harm or hurt other players or interfere with other players game experience?

 

Do you think that any of these people are going to stop playing the game because they got a slight advantage in end game raiding?

 

If they punish people for this, but let all the other things slide, they are going to royally piss off a lot of people.

[Spamfritter]

BioWare should tread carefully. The bulk of the people who used the exploit were probably subscribers. That's the crowd that actually supports this game and kept it viable after going F2P. I think they are underplaying just how many people used the exploit. At least going by what I've seen on Harbinger. By BioWare's own admission that's the crowd that buys the most Cartel Market stuff and many of those people spend well more than the subscription fee per month supporting this poorly managed entity we call SWTOR.

 

That's BioWare's bread and butter. How they handle this can have a direct financial impact. Also BioWare never did anything to people who used the valor exploits, held the ball where the other team can't reach it in Huttball, stacked adrenals in PvP, cheated the **** out of the bolster system time and time again, glitched NiM EC to allow 16 players into an 8 man operation, used ship parts to bolster themselves in PvP, used Revan statues to enable their heroic moments in operations boss fights or farmed Nefra for implants over and over again for weeks and weeks at a time. There are probably some major exploits that I'm forgetting but there were definitely a number of them over the years.

 

And let's not forget the credit spammers who are rampantly out of control. It's against the terms of service but BioWare allows this rampant **** to go on day after day and annoy the crap out of everyone.

 

The exploit is BioWare's fault. It was their ****** coding that allowed it to happen. Supposedly it had been reported on the PTS and they didn't do anything about it. This went on for weeks until the masses started using the exploit. Again BioWare took an additional two or three weeks to patch the flaw in the game after it went viral. People literally discussed the flaw openly on fleet stating "BioWare can't ban us all" encouraging the exploitation of the flaw. They were probably emboldened by the fact that BioWare has never punished such things in the past. We all know where the exploit leak and lockout came from. Only a handful of guilds can clear HM Ravagers at the moment. If anyone should be punished it should be the people who spread it like a Venereal disease. BioWare also needs to take some responsibility as a company for not only coding the game in such a way as to allow for the exploitation of it but for not handling this far sooner.

 

BioWare, through their inaction in the past has set the precedent that this sort of thing is OK. At this point expectation of punishment is not only unrealistic but it wouldn't even be fair given what people have gotten away with in the past and the precedent set by BioWare themselves. Many people probably used the exploit without fear of reprisal because that's how BioWare hasn't done jack **** to exploiters since day 1 with this game.

 

The only real incentive BioWare has to punish anyone is to make the people who didn't exploit anything happy. The pitch fork crowd is probably not going to be satisfied when we are talking about punishing subscribers. If BioWare doesn't temper their punishment then it could impact their bottom line. The funny thing is some of the people screaming for punishment were the same ******es who used the above mentioned exploits in the past. I've seen people take advantage of the ship parts bug bolstering them further in PvP while crying about the Ravagers exploit.

 

I think the funny and sad part is, BioWare is probably only looking to punish anyone because this was so widespread. Their mistake was bigger than ever and they are looking for retribution to deflect from the fact that the quality of the game since 3.0 dropped has been worse than anything we've seen since TFB was introduced and the patch that gave us TFB became known in some circles as the "error from beyond."

 

Now that the exploit is fixed, there are bigger issues in the game right now such as lost mail, performance problems, ability lag and most importantly unresolved in-game tickets that need to be addressed but those resources are probably being directed at punishing people who used the exploit.

Edited January 13, 2015 by Spamfritter

[Andryah]

2. The exploit was reported in PTS and they allowed it to be released and alive for a month.

 

Again.. there was NO PTS for 3.0. There was closed beta testing, according to Bioware and the NDA was never lifted.

 

Facts do matter, especially when trying to lay blame elsewhere.

[Anuduin]

Here is my issue with this whole thing.

 

Our guild was actively harassed in game, and out by a handful of players for months. Reported hundreds of times by dozens of members.

 

Nothing ever happened to them.

 

In PVP, speed hacking, /quit ranked conquesting, and many other problems like "instant resolve no stun" happen and Nothing ever happened to them.

 

Spammers sending emails, tells and blocking up chat 24/7, Nothing ever happened to them.

 

Crafting exploits that make guilds win conquests when it is mathematically impossible and proven to be so - Nothing ever happened to them.

 

Yet, they are going to punish players who did something that does exactly NOTHING to harm or hurt other players or interfere with other players game experience?

 

Do you think that any of these people are going to stop playing the game because they got a slight advantage in end game raiding?

 

If they punish people for this, but let all the other things slide, they are going to royally piss off a lot of people.

 

And this!

[Andryah]

BioWare should tread carefully. The bulk of the people who used the exploit were probably subscribers. That's the crowd that actually supports this game and kept it viable after going F2P. I think they are underplaying just how many people used the exploit. At least going by what I've seen on Harbinger. By BioWare's own admission that's the crowd that buys the most Cartel Market stuff and many of those people spend well more than the subscription fee per month supporting this poorly managed entity we call SWTOR.

 

That's BioWare's bread and butter. How they handle this can have a direct financial impact. Also BioWare never did anything to people who used the valor exploits, held the ball where the other team can't reach it in Huttball, stacked adrenals in PvP, cheated the **** out of the bolster system time and time again, glitched NiM EC to allow 16 players into an 8 man operation, used ship parts to bolster themselves in PvP, used Revan statues to enable their heroic moments in operations boss fights or farmed Nefra for implants over and over again for weeks and weeks at a time. There are probably some major exploits that I'm forgetting but there were definitely a number of them over the years.

 

And let's not forget the credit spammers who are rampantly out of control. It's against the terms of service but BioWare allows this rampant **** to go on day after day and annoy the crap out of everyone.

 

The exploit is BioWare's fault. It was their ****** coding that allowed it to happen. Supposedly it had been reported on the PTS and they didn't do anything about it. This went on for weeks until the masses started using the exploit. Again BioWare took an additional two or three weeks to patch the flaw in the game after it went viral. People literally discussed the flaw openly on fleet stating "BioWare can't ban us all" encouraging the exploitation of the flaw. They were probably emboldened by the fact that BioWare has never punished such things in the past. We all know where the exploit leak and lockout came from. Only a handful of guilds can clear HM Ravagers at the moment. If anyone should be punished it should be the people who spread it like a Venereal disease. BioWare also needs to take some responsibility as a company for not only coding the game in such a way as to allow for the exploitation of it but for not handling this far sooner.

 

BioWare, through their inaction in the past has set the precedent that this sort of thing is OK. At this point expectation of punishment is not only unrealistic but it wouldn't even be fair given what people have gotten away with in the past and the precedent set by BioWare themselves. Many people probably used the exploit without fear of reprisal because that's how BioWare hasn't done jack **** to exploiters since day 1 with this game.

 

The only real incentive BioWare has to punish anyone is to make the people who didn't exploit anything happy. The pitch fork crowd is probably not going to be satisfied when we are talking about punishing subscribers. If BioWare doesn't temper their punishment then it could impact their bottom line. The funny thing is some of the people screaming for punishment were the same ******es who used the above mentioned exploits in the past. I've seen people take advantage of the ship parts bug bolstering them further in PvP while crying about the Ravagers exploit.

 

I think the funny and sad part is, BioWare is probably only looking to punish anyone because this was so widespread. Their mistake was bigger than ever and they are looking for retribution to deflect from the fact that the quality of the game since 3.0 dropped has been worse than anything we've seen since TFB was introduced and the game became known in some circles as the "error from beyond."

 

Now that the exploit is fixed, there are bigger issues in the game right now such as lost mail, performance problems, ability lag and most importantly unresolved in-game tickets that need to be addressed but those resources are probably being directed at punishing people who used the exploit.

 

Nice try. No cigar.

[Jonitor]

A stacking debuff lasting 2 weeks or so called "Exploiter" would be fun. For every exploit you did, you get a new stack and every stack lowers your stats by 5% ending at 25% (the debuff is still stacking after 5 stacks). Edited January 13, 2015 by Jonitor

[OrionSol]

Players need to take the responsibility for their action. They knew about the risk that goes along with exploiting BUT Bioware is also responsible for the current state.

 

1. They encouraged players to use exploits as they didn't take any action against players that exploited Nefra. People refused to do Nefra, but after watching people getting advantage without punishment they jumped on the Ravagers bandwagon.

2. The exploit was reported in PTS and they allowed it to be released and alive for a month.

 

And this

[Nigredo]

BioWare should tread carefully. The bulk of the people who used the exploit were probably subscribers. That's the crowd that actually supports this game and kept it viable after going F2P. I think they are underplaying just how many people used the exploit. At least going by what I've seen on Harbinger. By BioWare's own admission that's the crowd that buys the most Cartel Market stuff and many of those people spend well more than the subscription fee per month supporting this poorly managed entity we call SWTOR.

 

That's BioWare's bread and butter. How they handle this can have a direct financial impact. Also BioWare never did anything to people who used the valor exploits, held the ball where the other team can't reach it in Huttball, stacked adrenals in PvP, cheated the **** out of the bolster system time and time again, glitched NiM EC to allow 16 players into an 8 man operation, used ship parts to bolster themselves in PvP, used Revan statues to enable their heroic moments in operations boss fights or farmed Nefra for implants over and over again for weeks and weeks at a time. There are probably some major exploits that I'm forgetting but there were definitely a number of them over the years.

 

And let's not forget the credit spammers who are rampantly out of control. It's against the terms of service but BioWare allows this rampant **** to go on day after day and annoy the crap out of everyone.

 

The exploit is BioWare's fault. It was their ****** coding that allowed it to happen. Supposedly it had been reported on the PTS and they didn't do anything about it. This went on for weeks until the masses started using the exploit. Again BioWare took an additional two or three weeks to patch the flaw in the game after it went viral. People literally discussed the flaw openly on fleet stating "BioWare can't ban us all" encouraging the exploitation of the flaw. They were probably emboldened by the fact that BioWare has never punished such things in the past. We all know where the exploit leak and lockout came from. Only a handful of guilds can clear HM Ravagers at the moment. If anyone should be punished it should be the people who spread it like a Venereal disease. BioWare also needs to take some responsibility as a company for not only coding the game in such a way as to allow for the exploitation of it but for not handling this far sooner.

 

BioWare, through their inaction in the past has set the precedent that this sort of thing is OK. At this point expectation of punishment is not only unrealistic but it wouldn't even be fair given what people have gotten away with in the past and the precedent set by BioWare themselves. Many people probably used the exploit without fear of reprisal because that's how BioWare hasn't done jack **** to exploiters since day 1 with this game.

 

The only real incentive BioWare has to punish anyone is to make the people who didn't exploit anything happy. The pitch fork crowd is probably not going to be satisfied when we are talking about punishing subscribers. If BioWare doesn't temper their punishment then it could impact their bottom line. The funny thing is some of the people screaming for punishment were the same ******es who used the above mentioned exploits in the past. I've seen people take advantage of the ship parts bug bolstering them further in PvP while crying about the Ravagers exploit.

 

I think the funny and sad part is, BioWare is probably only looking to punish anyone because this was so widespread. Their mistake was bigger than ever and they are looking for retribution to deflect from the fact that the quality of the game since 3.0 dropped has been worse than anything we've seen since TFB was introduced and the game became known in some circles as the "error from beyond."

 

Now that the exploit is fixed, there are bigger issues in the game right now such as lost mail, performance problems, ability lag and most importantly unresolved in-game tickets that need to be addressed but those resources are probably being directed at punishing people who used the exploit.

 

 

can a brother get a amen!

[OrionSol]

A stacking debuff lasting 2 weeks or so called "Exploiter" would be fun. For every exploit you did, you get a new stack and every stack lowers your stats by 5% ending at 25% (the debuff is still stacking after 5 stacks).

 

You sir, are brilliant

[EvenHardNiner]

BioWare should tread carefully. The bulk of the people who used the exploit were probably subscribers. That's the crowd that actually supports this game and kept it viable after going F2P. I think they are underplaying just how many people used the exploit. At least going by what I've seen on Harbinger. By BioWare's own admission that's the crowd that buys the most Cartel Market stuff and many of those people spend well more than the subscription fee per month supporting this poorly managed entity we call SWTOR.

 

That's BioWare's bread and butter. How they handle this can have a direct financial impact. Also BioWare never did anything to people who used the valor exploits, held the ball where the other team can't reach it in Huttball, stacked adrenals in PvP, cheated the **** out of the bolster system time and time again, glitched NiM EC to allow 16 players into an 8 man operation, used ship parts to bolster themselves in PvP, used Revan statues to enable their heroic moments in operations boss fights or farmed Nefra for implants over and over again for weeks and weeks at a time. There are probably some major exploits that I'm forgetting but there were definitely a number of them over the years.

 

And let's not forget the credit spammers who are rampantly out of control. It's against the terms of service but BioWare allows this rampant **** to go on day after day and annoy the crap out of everyone.

 

The exploit is BioWare's fault. It was their ****** coding that allowed it to happen. Supposedly it had been reported on the PTS and they didn't do anything about it. This went on for weeks until the masses started using the exploit. Again BioWare took an additional two or three weeks to patch the flaw in the game after it went viral. People literally discussed the flaw openly on fleet stating "BioWare can't ban us all" encouraging the exploitation of the flaw. They were probably emboldened by the fact that BioWare has never punished such things in the past. We all know where the exploit leak and lockout came from. Only a handful of guilds can clear HM Ravagers at the moment. If anyone should be punished it should be the people who spread it like a Venereal disease. BioWare also needs to take some responsibility as a company for not only coding the game in such a way as to allow for the exploitation of it but for not handling this far sooner.

 

BioWare, through their inaction in the past has set the precedent that this sort of thing is OK. At this point expectation of punishment is not only unrealistic but it wouldn't even be fair given what people have gotten away with in the past and the precedent set by BioWare themselves. Many people probably used the exploit without fear of reprisal because that's how BioWare hasn't done jack **** to exploiters since day 1 with this game.

 

The only real incentive BioWare has to punish anyone is to make the people who didn't exploit anything happy. The pitch fork crowd is probably not going to be satisfied when we are talking about punishing subscribers. If BioWare doesn't temper their punishment then it could impact their bottom line. The funny thing is some of the people screaming for punishment were the same ******es who used the above mentioned exploits in the past. I've seen people take advantage of the ship parts bug bolstering them further in PvP while crying about the Ravagers exploit.

 

I think the funny and sad part is, BioWare is probably only looking to punish anyone because this was so widespread. Their mistake was bigger than ever and they are looking for retribution to deflect from the fact that the quality of the game since 3.0 dropped has been worse than anything we've seen since TFB was introduced and the patch that gave us TFB became known in some circles as the "error from beyond."

 

Now that the exploit is fixed, there are bigger issues in the game right now such as lost mail, performance problems, ability lag and most importantly unresolved in-game tickets that need to be addressed but those resources are probably being directed at punishing people who used the exploit.

 

/Agree.

Couldn't be said any better.

[BuriDogshin]

The bulk of the people who used the exploit were probably subscribers.

Please note that everyone who did the expoit must have bought the Shadow of Revan expansion. It was impossible to do it without that. Also, you must have been a subscriber or bought a weekly operation pass.

 

Unlike some exploits, you could not do this one unless you recently sent BioWare some cash.

No one could do it for free.

[TUXs]

The exploit allowed people an endless supply of loot drops. They could reset and do it over and over as many times as they wanted.

Then obviously I don't know what the hell the exploit is/was...

[LordArtemis]

I would like to see some consistency, and think it would be wise to demonstrate a consistent stand, so players know what to expect.

 

That does not mean folks should not demonstrate self respect. An individual is responsible for his own actions. But it does mean that we know what Bioware finds acceptable and what they deplore...and we can act accordingly.

 

In some ways the game rules and the like can be ambiguous and/or confusing.

 

Again, this is not an indication that I believe this "exploit" is something that folks engaged in without being aware it was not appropriate...I am confident they knew what they were doing. It is simply my opinion as to how I think they should move forward after they deal with this issue.

[ddarkangel]

....... Edited January 13, 2015 by ddarkangel

[Pagy]

it still might be nothing, but im reading A LOT into the fact that from the items eric listed as "things they know" they did not include "items and which mods are gained from exploited instances"

 

everything else seems trackable...instance ID, sharing, learning schematics etc. tracking items and mods has always been an achilles heel in support tickets, wonder if that means that we'll see bans but no items being removed. unless maybe just the chestpiece armoring?

 

just my thoughts.

[GadgetDon]

A stacking debuff lasting 2 weeks or so called "Exploiter" would be fun. For every exploit you did, you get a new stack and every stack lowers your stats by 5% ending at 25% (the debuff is still stacking after 5 stacks).

 

Like the concept - but not what I want programming hours spent on.

[BuriDogshin]

A stacking debuff lasting 2 weeks or so called "Exploiter" would be fun. For every exploit you did, you get a new stack and every stack lowers your stats by 5% ending at 25% (the debuff is still stacking after 5 stacks).

It's a fun idea, but wouldn't you rather the devs spent their time, say, fixing the ability lag issue instead?

Among other things that need fixing?

 

Every man-hour BW spends punishing players is a man-hour that could have been spent making the game better.

[Pagy]

They could reset and do it over and over as many times as they wanted.

each character would be bound to the weekly lockout...so once, per week, per character could exploit.

[wadecounty]

Hey everyone, people have used exploits before, so they should never punish anyone ever again for any exploit, it is the fair and right thing to do! Or alternatively, they can draw the line at some point, but only if it doesn't impact me!

[onurduman]

BioWare should tread carefully. The bulk of the people who used the exploit were probably subscribers. That's the crowd that actually supports this game and kept it viable after going F2P. I think they are underplaying just how many people used the exploit. At least going by what I've seen on Harbinger. By BioWare's own admission that's the crowd that buys the most Cartel Market stuff and many of those people spend well more than the subscription fee per month supporting this poorly managed entity we call SWTOR.

 

That's BioWare's bread and butter. How they handle this can have a direct financial impact. Also BioWare never did anything to people who used the valor exploits, held the ball where the other team can't reach it in Huttball, stacked adrenals in PvP, cheated the **** out of the bolster system time and time again, glitched NiM EC to allow 16 players into an 8 man operation, used ship parts to bolster themselves in PvP, used Revan statues to enable their heroic moments in operations boss fights or farmed Nefra for implants over and over again for weeks and weeks at a time. There are probably some major exploits that I'm forgetting but there were definitely a number of them over the years.

 

And let's not forget the credit spammers who are rampantly out of control. It's against the terms of service but BioWare allows this rampant **** to go on day after day and annoy the crap out of everyone.

 

The exploit is BioWare's fault. It was their ****** coding that allowed it to happen. Supposedly it had been reported on the PTS and they didn't do anything about it. This went on for weeks until the masses started using the exploit. Again BioWare took an additional two or three weeks to patch the flaw in the game after it went viral. People literally discussed the flaw openly on fleet stating "BioWare can't ban us all" encouraging the exploitation of the flaw. They were probably emboldened by the fact that BioWare has never punished such things in the past. We all know where the exploit leak and lockout came from. Only a handful of guilds can clear HM Ravagers at the moment. If anyone should be punished it should be the people who spread it like a Venereal disease. BioWare also needs to take some responsibility as a company for not only coding the game in such a way as to allow for the exploitation of it but for not handling this far sooner.

 

BioWare, through their inaction in the past has set the precedent that this sort of thing is OK. At this point expectation of punishment is not only unrealistic but it wouldn't even be fair given what people have gotten away with in the past and the precedent set by BioWare themselves. Many people probably used the exploit without fear of reprisal because that's how BioWare hasn't done jack **** to exploiters since day 1 with this game.

 

The only real incentive BioWare has to punish anyone is to make the people who didn't exploit anything happy. The pitch fork crowd is probably not going to be satisfied when we are talking about punishing subscribers. If BioWare doesn't temper their punishment then it could impact their bottom line. The funny thing is some of the people screaming for punishment were the same ******es who used the above mentioned exploits in the past. I've seen people take advantage of the ship parts bug bolstering them further in PvP while crying about the Ravagers exploit.

 

I think the funny and sad part is, BioWare is probably only looking to punish anyone because this was so widespread. Their mistake was bigger than ever and they are looking for retribution to deflect from the fact that the quality of the game since 3.0 dropped has been worse than anything we've seen since TFB was introduced and the patch that gave us TFB became known in some circles as the "error from beyond."

 

Now that the exploit is fixed, there are bigger issues in the game right now such as lost mail, performance problems, ability lag and most importantly unresolved in-game tickets that need to be addressed but those resources are probably being directed at punishing people who used the exploit.

 

This x10.

[PavSalco]

Again.. there was NO PTS for 3.0. There was closed beta testing, according to Bioware and the NDA was never lifted.

 

Facts do matter, especially when trying to lay blame elsewhere.

 

I apologize. I meant a testing server in general. Yes, I know it was closed beta. Sorry.

Edited January 13, 2015 by PavSalco

[PavSalco]

Then obviously I don't know what the hell the exploit is/was...

each character would be bound to the weekly lockout...so once, per week, per character could exploit.

There was another exploit that was much more abusive than the well-known lockout issue.

Edited January 13, 2015 by PavSalco

[Nigredo]

Anyone else thinking that the effort they are proposing to punish/ban/warn/snicker at the paying customers who did this is laughable considering if they applied a fraction of that "motivation" to correcting the reported bugs prior to their break this wouldn't be a issue at all?

[DarthDymond]

Anyone else thinking that the effort they are proposing to punish/ban/warn/snicker at the paying customers who did this is laughable considering if they applied a fraction of that "motivation" to correcting the reported bugs prior to their break this wouldn't be a issue at all?

Two wrongs make a right? Yes, they should have taken quicker action on correcting the exploit. No, that doesn't mean exploiters should get a free pass.