Recent Bans for Botting and Exploiting

Thread is information on what was and is being done that is all. no need for negative or controversial feedback and defiantly not even attempt to bring up the Renaming issues as it is a dead horse and know sticking point, that is just bad form. Good for then for taking a stance should be doing this with more things such as players who usedone bug to make more plants and another to sell plants what should not have been tradable -bug and exploit. all good now but damage done.

Congrates Devs

and to those gone DLTDHYOTAOTWO.

 

Obviously you have to have some kind of automated monitoring in a game where people can make themselves invisible to other players, but I agree with the sentiment that you need to be absolutely sure before banning a player. It's not okay for someone to spend their money and time on something and then have it taken away if they did nothing wrong, especially in a game like this that's funded by a small group of players that have spent a huge amount of money. I have no reason to believe that SotA management feels any differently, but clearly some here do, and it's a little bit disturbing.

 

Sure maybe the magnitude is different. But consider this. Let's say if a group of people do not like you either in-game or personally due to some arbitrary reason(s). They decide to troll you by submitting, let's say 20 reports with authored screenshots or chat logs of your wrong doing that you never actually did it. Your account got suspended on Friday around 8 PM before the devs went home. You didn't find out about it later until it's late at night around 10 PM right when you're about to go immerse yourself into the game after your kids went to bed, your wife/husband let you off the hook. There is nothing you can do until Monday, when the customer service finally got the your request, investigated for another day and found that you're clear of wrong doing and reactivate your account. Those accusers somehow got away because they managed to be so convincing and claimed that it was just a misunderstanding. Would you just shrug it off, hold no malice, and pretend like nothing happen? If it were me, by the time, I would be so salty that I did not feeling being part of this great venture no more. Maybe it's just me. You guys are probably more tolerant and forgiving than I am.

This is the point that I'm trying to emphasize: botter/exploiter can go to hell, but be wary of witch hunting and false positive detection. I'm sure there are plenty of obvious ban hammer cases that can be done swiftly and all. However, the false accused/detection should not be treat lightly just because only a small % of people are affected by it. That negligent % could be anyone including you. It also doesn't really take much effort to accuse other people compare to how much grievance those on the other end may have to go through to clear themselves.

 

I don't believe so, unfortunately it is the nature of the forums to see that this post gets about 5 more pages though!

Everyone worrying so much, and having their own rules that Port must follow (internet police type ppl)! Don't worry, they know they've made mistakes before, and they will be careful, why don't ppl think they would? Even if they make a mistake, relax, its only a game, and things will be set right! Anyway, keep on arguing! Just remember, they've put more thought into this than those few with alarmist personalities.

 

I can hardly believe my own eyes! The devs took action to curb botting and exploits, and there are actually people in here complaining about it?!

So a couple of people who did nothing wrong couldn't play for 24-48 hours over an accident. Somebody please call the whaaaambulance! Cry me a river! And other cliches... Oh poor babies were so so traumatized by it all! Please...

That means... what exactly? The devs should just allow everybody to let their exploity-bots run rampant then?

Seriously... you'd think that exploiters and bots are going to ruin this game? No- it's actually members of the "community" who seem to make it their personal mission to rant and complain about every single decision that the devs make on the forums.

Newsflash: This is a game wholly owned and operated by Portalarium, Inc. This is not a democracy. You don't have a 1st amendment right to say whatever you want, whenever you want. There is no guarantee of due process. There is no trial by jury of your peers. There is no court of appeals.

All the legalese which exists here is what is known as an adhesion contract: Namely the TOS and EULA that you agreed to over and over again with every click of the mouse button that you play this game, or when posting in these private forums.

If you seriously have that much dissent over what the dev team is doing, and the types of decisions that are being made, there is a quick and permanent solution to the problem. Leave the game.

Thank you, and good night.

 

Maybe we should collectively just give this thread a rest. If we hear or know anyone that was mistakenly banned then maybe we should review it. As it stands, it seems like Port checked and double checked, looked at linked accounts and studied the data before they did this. Unless you personally are affected then you can talk, all else is speculation. Lets have some faith in port. They would not try to cut their nose off to spite there face. We all can look at it from different perspectives, and that is ok, but lets let port do what they do. Like I said, if we find out about wrongdoing then lets say something, but not before. Have a drink, a smoke and chill the f*ck out

 

I'm not fully confident because of personal interactions with the lead community manager. But Im happy they are taking action. Just hope it's handed out fairly.

 

Well, take it up with him, he isn't the one banning ppl for macroing though.. promise.

 

+1

 

Do you not have any game features that you don't like or any concern about the game at all? If you do, how would you feel if people tell you "Somebody please call the whaaaambulance! Cry me a river! And other cliches... Oh poor babies were so so traumatized by it all! Please..." Explain why your concern or your feedback is such non sense, and then end with "If you seriously have that much dissent over what the dev team is doing, and the types of decisions that are being made, there is a quick and permanent solution to the problem. Leave the game."? Probably not so impressed, yes? I'll let you ponder on that.

People are not against the banning of the exploiters and botters. They primarily have concern over their game service being interrupted due to false positive action regardless of whether it's a glitch on automated system or some group of people systemically accuse them. While 24-48 hours, may not mean anything to many people, but it could be huge deals for other people as well.. Who are we to decide which one is more important for other people? Also, 24-48 hours are just a mere estimate. What if it takes up to 5 business days to sort it out? Where do we draw the line? Where can we get the assurance?

Let me give you an example. Let's say there are 30 people with unique accounts with unique IPs submitting a chat log to the dev to take action with the following content (each come with some slightly variation with guild chats and combat logs):

... some log beforehand ...
Budner: How're you doing, beautiful?
Foster Magus (To Zone): [10th time usages of several racial slurs against another player]
Ravigard Domnius (To Zone): WTS quick XP power leveling, $50 per 1 mil.
Jaanifer Dejuresa (To Zone): I just duped an item, will make copies of any item for $100. Please PM.
... some log afterward ...

[All the names are fictitious. The similarities are coincidental.]

Should the dev ban everyone on the chat log after Budner's message just because there are many people submitted the chat logs that look very similar? What if these folks never actually typed any of those things?

Now imagine the due process is not guarantee, no verification by other peers beside the accusers, nor appeal for review.

Anyway, that's just my 2 cents.

 

"Somebody please call the whaaaambulance! Cry me a river! And other cliches... Oh poor babies were so so traumatized by it all! Please..." Explain why your concern or your feedback is such non sense, and then end with "If you seriously have that much dissent over what the dev team is doing, and the types of decisions that are being made, there is a quick and permanent solution to the problem. Leave the game."?
I have some in game things that I talk about. Its called pvp. I get these kind of responses all the time, well I used to because there are very few of us left.

 

I got moderated not too long ago because my signature didn't meet the guidelines. Berek removed my sig, pointed me to the guidelines, and I made a new sig.

Since then, I see tons of sigs that don't meet the guidelines that are allowed to pass. *cough cough* *nudge nudge* I strongly suspect some douchetwaddle reported me for reasons I will likely never know. Is it unfair? Yes. But oh well... cookie crumbs...

And truth be told yes I am also the recipient of gold and xp that I am now realizing may have been ill-gotten. And if that determination was made and then it was decided to take back the gold and xp, then so be it. I'd be out about $250. My bad.

It's called taking responsibility for oneself. If somebody feels they were wronged, they are free to speak up for themselves. So far all I see is people speaking on other people's behalf... hearsay and conjecture. Who elected you to be their guardian?

Yup 24-48 hours is an estimate... up against text walls of purely hypothetical and strained "examples" based on nothing. If it took 5 business days to sort it out, so what? Such a person would deserve an apology, but that's about it. Mistakes happen.

The bottom line is that the devs deserve a presumption of good faith, which is constantly under assault in this forum by people with a bone to pick for reasons which are beyond my understanding.

I'll double-down. If somebody really believes that the devs are trying to take their money with no intent to deliver on their promises, while capriciously lording their "power" over others and behaving like a bunch of tyrants, then there is a "Quit" button that has their name on it. Go play something else.

 

Isn't this getting pretty heated for a hypothetical? We don't know if any of THESE bans were false positives...and.. As far as I can tell no one here has actually complained about a false positive of their own account. Only other people's. I mean 48 hours without gane access for a false positive sucks.. don't get me wrong... but it's nothing like, say, the aftermath of a hurricane... or false imprisonment or whatever someone wants to compare it to... this clearly falls under #FirstWorldProblems

Thank you Berek and team for tirelessly seeking out the true scammers/botters/exploiters.

 

It's one thing if it's your own action that cause your downfall. No one else to blame but you. However, if you were accused and suspended not because what you did, but rather because someone else said so. Is it fair for you to have to go out of your way to spend hours or days trying to get the account cleared? My previous example was not based on nothing, it's a probable scenario that happened before. Can you be 100% sure that it would never happen anyone on any circumstances?

Anyway, It is not my intention to bash the dev team for doing their jobs. I'm merely pointing out the potential flaw of peer reporting that we as a community should be aware. Also, I spoke out for my own interest because I put a lot of time, money, and effort into this project like many other people. I would rather not spending my time clearing myself for the wrong things I did not do.

I would like to emphasize the necessity of people bringing up the concerns if people think it could be potentially become serious issues. Once the concerns have been brought up, how the dev will handle these concerns would be up to their discretion. At least they would be aware with these concerns that could affect the development and reduce any hindsight in the long term. Because the development schedule is tight, they may not have time to cover every possible edge cases.

The mockery is unnecessary. If one doesn't like to read other people's concern, there are many other threads to contribute on the forum as well.

Anyway, the walking dead is on....

 

Westworld is on. I wonder how much they're going to let the man in black exploit the game and the NPCs before they ban him.

 

But, you go on and on and on, and then on some more. We get your point, but then you go on again with some useless real world example.

 

Seriously?! Temporary bans compared to the Holocaust?

Wow.. just... wow. That is beyond offensive.

 

Thank you @Berek , we appreciate the effort to keep the game strong and worth playing.

 

I'm sorry, that was not my intent. I wanted to say that people shouldn't ignore the issue just because it seems to be a non-issue to them at a time. I'm not speaking against the botter/exploiters being banned. It is the witch-hunt style peer report that concerns me.