SE, Please fix this FC exploit

[Kantide]

This is why only I as master have the ability to promote and my quartermaster is the only person with access to the gil in our chest other than myself.

[Mcshiggs]

Just another example of how they didn't think out and just plain rushed out content. Free companies were given so much praise while they were telling us how awesome ARR was going to be, but all they come down to is linkshells that share a few extra inventory slots and minimal buffs. I highly doubt the promoting over your own rank was planned, my opinion it was just an oversight, if it was planned, then wow someone really screwed the pooch there. Expecting people on the internet to always be civil and honest means they have no clue who their customers are, content needs to be planned and implemented with the intention that people will try to break and take advantage of everything they can, if it's not, then they aren't doing their jobs as developers. Some games use test servers for this, maybe if this game did, it wouldn't have such blatant exploits, or maybe it wouldn't take 5-10 hours of emergency maintenance to fix their hotfix to their latest patch.

[Sunarie]

Just to be clear... I just checked this in my FC. I can promote people up to the rank under FC master. I cannot demote the master, nor can I promote someone to master. So this DOES NOT fix an instance where the master goes missing but does not actually leave the guild. The only instance I can think of it fixing is if someone physically leaves an FC without first appointing someone. I can't test if leaving is actually possible without first doing that because I'm not the Master.

Why not just make the FC leader promote someone new before leaving?

[AkashiXI]

Just to be clear... I just checked this in my FC. I can promote people up to the rank under FC master. I cannot demote the master, nor can I promote someone to master. So this DOES NOT fix an instance where the master goes missing but does not actually leave the guild. The only instance I can think of it fixing is if someone physically leaves an FC without first appointing someone. I can't test if leaving is actually possible without first doing that because I'm not the Master.

Why not just make the FC leader promote someone new before leaving?

It's been linked already, but one of the devs already said in 2.2 that there'll be an automatic demotion of a inactive FC leader. The time hasn't been announced.

[Sunarie]

It's been linked already, but one of the devs already said in 2.2 that there'll be an automatic demotion of a inactive FC leader. The time hasn't been announced.

I wasn't talking about that... I was more pointing out that what the mod gave as a reason doesn't really fix anything at all (as several others in the thread seemed to think it would work if the FC leader was afk). There is no legitimate reason for someone to be able to promote a person to a rank above their own. The OP's situation should not have happened, and is a serious, blatant design flaw.

[Jill1808]

Just to be clear... I just checked this in my FC. I can promote people up to the rank under FC master. I cannot demote the master, nor can I promote someone to master. So this DOES NOT fix an instance where the master goes missing but does not actually leave the guild. The only instance I can think of it fixing is if someone physically leaves an FC without first appointing someone. I can't test if leaving is actually possible without first doing that because I'm not the Master.

Why not just make the FC leader promote someone new before leaving?

It's not possible to leave without first appointing someone else as GM. I tried that with an alt char.

[mbncd]

A lot of people seem to be misunderstanding what the problem is. It has nothing to do with the Master and everything to do with the ranks below.


Fictional FC organisational ranks:
1 Master
2 Treasurer - only one person other than master who can withdraw gil and items from the chest, let's say they're a lifelong trusted and trustworthy friend of the Master, they also use an authenticator and never go to dangerous sites, etc
3 General leaders - these guys can promote people from the social rank into something more specific, indicating what that person does for the FC, they may also lead events, etc
4 Crafters and gatherers - who you go to first to ask for things to be produced/melded/gathered
5 Combatants - These would be the professional raiders and FATE grinders and chocobo trainers and everything else involving whacking/zapping/band-aiding something/someone with other members of the FC
6 Social - the first rank someone goes into when they join, before they become well known for one of the above roles, also good for the casual jack of all trades or those who don't participate much

Say a bigger FC absorbs a smaller FC and the leader of the smaller FC is given the authority to bring in and promote their members to the appropriate gatherer/crafter/combatant/social rank as they're the ones who should know what their members do. Presumably the company chest is still safe because only 2 people have been given access to that: rank 1 and 2, Master and Treasurer, both above the rank of the promoters.

The leader of the smaller FC can promote another member to a higher (but still non-Master) position than the promoter is currently in, meaning they can make their entire FC (other than themselves) Treasurers without permission and rob the bigger FC blind.

That is the problem. It has NOTHING to do with the Master rank and everything to do with every other rank.

[Fyce]

In the year 2014, where MMO is a common game genre, they are still unable to include or even figure out how to make some useful (and basic) social features. In fact, most MMO games are not able to do better than the job of an IRC bot.
In the year 2014, MMO developpers still don't focus on social stuff, while their whole game is based on that.

[Marxam]

Easily solved by having a "Double-check" feature where one or more officers/leaders will be required to approve of a said action or transfer. In this case, gil, there will be thresholds as to how much approval will be needed depending on the amount being withdrawn.

Example:
100k requires the approval of one other officer, excluding the person attempting to withdraw.
1m requires the approval of the founder of the fc or three other officers, excluding the person attempting to withdraw.


Complicated? Yes. Safe? Yes.

[mbncd]

Easily solved by having a "Double-check" feature where one or more officers/leaders will be required to approve of a said action or transfer. In this case, gil, there will be thresholds as to how much approval will be needed depending on the amount being withdrawn.

Example:
100k requires the approval of one other officer, excluding the person attempting to withdraw.
1m requires the approval of the founder of the fc or three other officers, excluding the person attempting to withdraw.


Complicated? Yes. Safe? Yes.

Actually, under your system, the thief simply needs to have 3 other characters that they can promote to officer rank (regardless of their own rank) in order to steal the 1m. Easily achieved with an FC of thieves or just a bunch of mule characters. Does not remedy the promoting-over-your-own-authority issue.