The account suspensions and gil reset leave a black mark on this game.

[OldGeezer]

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Data? What data. All we have are people's testamonials on how they're victims.

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Once again since SE hasn't opened up it books all we have is the statements of 2 French guys,.

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You gotta draw the line somwhere. Storyline money for those who powergrinded to 50 in 3 days is about as accurate as you're gonna gert for the average player. Still short of 1 million.

Wait, you have no faith in all the other posters who claims they were wrongfully hit by SE, but you have no problem buying into this one?

I hold all testamonials at face value. But people made wild claims that SE didn't vet accounts to separate innocent transactions from Gil buyers. That everyone was hit with the 90% gil wipe brush. This latest testamonial (if true) says that's not the case. That vetting was done to individual accounts. It's worth taking notice before people goto Japan with their fires and pitchforks

[Susanoh]

I do sort of feel bad for the special few that may have been punished through no fault of their own... But I have to say, there really is no black mark on the game. In fact life is better than ever for us regular players.

Prices seem to be stabilizing on the market. Our gil is now worth more. The prices of high ticket items are slowly dropping to more reasonable levels. There aren't nearly as many farmers as there used to be. And funny thing is, there is absolutely no talk about this happening in game or in the media. People are going about their daily business same as they ever did, and there are just as many of them as there used to be if not more.

The "black mark" I was referring to comes from the knowledge of how SE policies are carried out and how its customers are treated. This isn't being talked about much because it hit a minority of players. If the same type of actions were to affect the majority of players, the forums would be flooded with people screaming bloody murder. It would be chaos. Instead, only a minority is directly affected, leaving the majority to either remain complacent or label them cheaters.

For the complacent majority, you're right, everything is rosy and their game experience is fine. If you happen to be one who cares about the policies in this game, and what happens to your fellow player, and possibly even you and your friends in the future, it's not looking quite as nice. Even if I was not affected, and heck, even if I didn't play this game, knowing the policies which have been carried out would leave a bad impression on me and anyone else who cares about the way that the developers treat their players. Even if I were of the mindset that everyone who's banned is guilty (I'm not, personally, but that's a different matter) I'd still be put off by the fact that those who do feel that they have been falsely punished have no form of support to turn to in such a situation.

[ArkhamNative]

[SE's] game at the very beginning specifically tells the player that one of their ultimate goals can be to amass a fortune. How the hell do they encourage playing and winning the crafting and gathering game on one hand, and then turn around and say 'oh well we told you it would be cool if you made a fortune, but now actually you don't need it, and we'll never talk to you about it again. Bye!'

More than that, the character is given a ring to help make that fortune. Its only bonus: Crafting Points! I've prepared an exhibit of SE's own words to summarize:

[Nica]

Data? What data. All we have are people's testamonials on how they're victims.

Once again since SE hasn't opened up it books all we have is the statements of 2 French guys.

That’s exactly my point, but what some people doesn’t seem to realize is that it goes both ways.

I hold all testamonials at face value.

That’s certainly not the impression I’m getting, for example, the rest of your post that follows:

But people made wild claims that SE didn't vet accounts to separate innocent transactions from Gil buyers. That everyone was hit with the 90% gil wipe brush. This latest testamonial (if true) says that's not the case. That vetting was done to individual accounts. It's worth taking notice before people goto Japan with their fires and pitchforks

Why are the multiple claims that vetting wasn’t done wild, but a single claim that may suggest otherwise not? Why is applying the former to all suspended accounts worded negatively, yet applying the latter to all suspended accounts something you have no issue with?

You may hold all testimonials at face value, but it sure seems like you think some are of the $1 variety and others $100.

Regardless, I don’t really care much about who is and isn’t actually guilty. Generally speaking many will turn out to be guilty, while a few will be vindicated. My issue is primarily with the way SE has handled this, especially given their less-than-sterling record in the past.

You gotta draw the line somwhere. Storyline money for those who powergrinded to 50 in 3 days is about as accurate as you're gonna gert for the average player. Still short of 1 million.

Do not confuse the arbitrary line that you’re drawing based on your rather limited view/criteria as an actual accurate representative value.

Why are you using the income from questing from 1-50 as the only source of income? Taking only one while ignoring everything else is about as far as you can get from getting an accurate picture. It’s like trying to determine how good a quarterback is by looking only at how many yards he threw, or a baseball player by how many RBI he has.

[KevinC]

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I sold mining mats at no higher than 13k each (or like 6 HQ ds ores for 20k for HQ). I presume someone spending 36k for his relic mats is encouraging RMT?

Please tell me more about your limitless logic. I really think your high intellect would benefit this whole community.

[Eclipsed]

some uneducated stuff...

Sorry, but even if it did happen to me it is more than logical that it is for the good of the game that counterfeit currency that was never meant to exist was taken away.

And for the record, all the gil being held in the hands of what was an extreme minority of players IS NOT good for the players of the game.

[Susanoh]

Sorry, but even if it did happen to me it is more than logical that it is for the good of the game that counterfeit currency that was never meant to exist was taken away.

That's how you respond to my legitimate response to your post? By typing "some uneducated stuff..." in the quote box in an attempt to make yourself and your position sound superior, and then basically saying "Sorry, this is the way it should be and that's that" while completely ignoring any of the points I brought up?

I can see I shouldn't have bothered spending time responding to you to begin with.

[Mordrim]

All of this reminds me of D3 launch, where tons of post were made, with people claiming that they were hacked and it was not their fault.. Blizzard wasn't answering to these post for a good reason, and then came the best "pounding" Blizzard delivered imo: A guy claimed that he was hacked using an authenticator.. The thread got rather big, people claiming there was a "session hack", suddenly a Community manager pops up (was it Bashiok can't remember) and simply destroyed the guys testimony: He had never attached an auth to his account, and he had obviously bought in-game gold. This was a turning point, after that the complainers mostly disappeared in fear of being called out, there were like 10 threads a day at the time and magically it was only 1 or 2.


I believe blizzard took their time because "naming and shaming" isn't appropriate, yet this dude went too far and forced them to do it. But what a laugh, one of the best "owned" moment ever. IF SE took actions against an account it IS obviously for good reasons, and they probably won't make it public to avoid "punishing" the guilty twice by "naming and shaming" them. IF they made mistakes they ought to correct it after proper investigation.

[KevinC]

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I applaud you sir for a brilliant post.

Now let's take all the money off of Bill Gates, whoever own toyota/honda/coca-cola/apple/etc. and tell them "Well you guys lead your enterprises to the top, making a fortune with innovative ideas and a lot of work but now we need to take 99% away because you know, it's not fair for this highschool janitor. Oh and by the way, here's 300$ so you can at least eat for the next 2 weeks."

We should remove all the DL gear and relics from the game too because someone players abused speed runs and bugged titan. But we can't really tell who did it the legit way or cheated so let's just wipe out everyone with 4+ pieces.

Can we give some kind of rewards to the top poster of this topic like Eclipsed and OldGeezer? They obviously took the time to think over and over before making such insightful and helpful posts which contributed in making valids points in this thread?

[KevinC]

He had never attached an auth to his account, and he had obviously bought in-game gold. This was a turning point, after that the complainers mostly disappeared in fear of being called out, there were like 10 threads a day at the time and magically it was only 1 or 2.


I believe blizzard took their time because "naming and shaming" isn't appropriate, yet this dude went too far and forced them to do it. But what a laugh, one of the best "owned" moment ever. IF SE took actions against an account it IS obviously for good reasons, and they probably won't make it public to avoid "punishing" the guilty twice by "naming and shaming" them. IF they made mistakes they ought to correct it after proper investigation.

Please do post the result of the investigation for my account on the forums, I really want to read them too.