That's an extremely narrow view. In many games, having multiple accounts is almost a must. In some you cannot trade between your own alts (POTBS), or you are limited to one toon per server (old SWG) or toons will not be able to function solo, making a buffbot alts a necessity (try a stone tank in CO), to name but a few examples. Now you can come with the 'get friends' argument, but that is not always how it works. By far most people want to be able to log in and have some fun without having to wait for others. A lot more people that you'd think play in off hours, so they are limited in who they could ask for help in the first place. And frankly, it's none of your damn business how other people play the game, as long as they do not negatively impact YOUR ability to play it.
And to use a POTBS example: So in your view, someone who pays for 4 accounts to use 40 lots is bad, and someone who trades lots with players on other servers (which is perfectly legal), and also has 40 lots available, is OK? Seriously... Linna
In the PotBS forum yesterday, somebody complained about how you HAVE to do dailies every day like it's a job. This isn't true; I've done the dailies all of twice, I get my money from MoT/MoV and a little bit of econ every 3rd or 4th day (depending on the wind). All these things you're saying you HAVE to buy multiple accounts for, you don't HAVE to do; you CHOOSE to do. You CHOOSE to buy yourself an army of alts for whatever reason. And just because you expect the argument of "make moar friends" doesn't make it any less valid an argument.
I played EVE for over a year, ran my own corporation and participated in two large-scale 0.0 alliance wars (one was the .-A-. vs. IAC war, the other was G00DFELLAS vs. Pure./IRON). 0.0 Alliance action is the place where you run into the most two, three, four+ account-holding players - hell, the Industry director in MY corp have 4 accounts just for CYNO ALTS, then another account with an actual alt that he used! Not me, I had one account, one character and two cyno alts. I didn't CHOOSE to have a bunch of alts or extra accounts and I made out okay.
It's a game, there's nothing mandatory about it - least of all paying extra for more accounts!
You're trying to sidestep the point again. As long as it doesn't negatively impact your gameplay WHY SHOULD YOU CARE.
The reasons I mentioned are just some of the many that people have for owning multiple accounts. And they are each in their own way good and valid reasons. People have these alts to enable them to have fun, precisely BECAUSE it's a game. It doesn't hurt anyone if someone wants to play both a crafter and a PVP toon in a game that only allows one toon per server (old SWG). No one gets an unsportsmanlike advantage if a stone tanker drags their own kinetic around (COH). No one gets disadvantaged if someone decides to level two freetraders to 50. All it does is enable people to have fun in the game. It may not be the way YOU have fun, but that doesn't mean a thing in the end, it's their money, and they decide what is fun for them.
I myself have no problem with all the RMT-games,too. When I choose to play them for free, then I know, it is "free to play as cannonfodder". I also understand the "free money for the devs"-argument. It is a business, of course. I just mentioned it as a daydream from a gamer´s perspective. The point, where I was directly "harmed" by multi-accounts, was in DAoC as an example:
It began as a small happening. When the one or the other stealther was weak in PVP, he logged into his friends account and buffed his main toon.
After a while it became a trend. People in PVE then became too lazy to look for groups and just boosted their twinks with buffbots. The newer players without "bots" found less and less people to party with and the population decreased. Ok, there were two more reasons for it, but this one also had some impact. Sorry btw for using the word "cancer". A stupid choice. I tried to find a word for something, that you can barely contol.
I give you one thing into consideration: what makes you think those people would have grouped with you if buffbots had been forbidden? In my experience, the use of one means you're seriously ticked off about never being able to find the correct type of buffer in the times you play (the stone tanker in COH NEEDS a kinetic buffer in order to function at all in armor form, for instance). Which makes the choice obvious: make your own, or stop playing.
It really has nothing to do with 'lazy', and everything with being sick of pick up groups and waiting around for hours, trying to find a kinetic (in my example) who wants to group with you and do the same things you want to do.
I played this game for a while when it first came out had 2 accounts (both pirates) for the express reason to own national noobs easier...it worked...like a charm with my hand eye coordination I easily owned 3-4 real players at a time and could do 6-8 npc convoy's with ease...Reading this made me glad I had to quit anything to do with SoE long ago and save me from any hassels from FLS I may have had.
In fact I haven't played a MMO yet that I didn't own mulitple accounts (the most being 4 in EQ). I am one of those people that play at odd times when the servers aren't bustling with activity.
As long as your paying for the accounts you should be able to do what ever the hell you want to with them. If I want to work harder and make it easier for me to get better gear/items for me to kill you easier in game the company shouldn't care.
I pitty you for your loss, specially when FLS does something like this, im happy that i never wasted money buying this game because i would be in the same situation as you with multiple accounts and different nations.
My (a bit drastic) opinion is: 1 player = 1 account.
If the devs in DAoC or EVE only would get rid of all these multi-accounts, too. In my eyes multi-accounting is a perverted form of RMT. So not trying to make a personal attack, but in general I applaud to developers, who try to stop this kind of cancer.
That would be nice, perhaps, but would there be a publisher in its right mind that would say no to "do you want free money?"?
Sorry Herodes, but these companies are businesses. It is in their interest to allow multiple accounts.
Because more accounts = more revenue and more revenue = more money for continued development.
You will find even some of the Free to Play MMOs offer "premium accounts" for cash.
The challenge then is for a developer to design a game that does not allow multiple (or premium) account holders an 'unfair' advantage. And really, the game should have those safeguards in anyway, because if one player with multiple accounts has an unfair advantage then so will a guild, a group of close friends, or a family?
RMT is the same in many ways. I have nothing against Micro Transactions done in a fair way. If someone wants to throw money at a developer rather than play the game grind then that's fine with me. I prefer to play the game for what it is. Each to their own I guess.
RMT is fine as far as free-to-play games are concerned. That's how they make their money.
But the danger is that some wiseguy publisher will take to the idea of letting players of their subscription-based MMO's buy themselves their Armor of Uberleetness with real cash. SOE certainly opened the Pandora's box with their Station Cash venture, even though it seems to be mostly confined to cosmetic junk for now.
That alone could kill MMO's, for the community is bound to rebel. If it doesn't, then I think I'd be done with such games anyway.
Originally posted by Linna You're trying to sidestep the point again. As long as it doesn't negatively impact your gameplay WHY SHOULD YOU CARE.
The reasons I mentioned are just some of the many that people have for owning multiple accounts. And they are each in their own way good and valid reasons. People have these alts to enable them to have fun, precisely BECAUSE it's a game. It doesn't hurt anyone if someone wants to play both a crafter and a PVP toon in a game that only allows one toon per server (old SWG). No one gets an unsportsmanlike advantage if a stone tanker drags their own kinetic around (COH). No one gets disadvantaged if someone decides to level two freetraders to 50. All it does is enable people to have fun in the game. It may not be the way YOU have fun, but that doesn't mean a thing in the end, it's their money, and they decide what is fun for them.
Linna
Your PvP examples were particularly bad defenses - if one player has a 2nd account JUST to help them PvP with their main (example, Falcon alts in EVE), then you're damned right I've got a problem with that. It's very much an "unsportsmanlike advantage." To say it's not "unsportsmanlike" is to say it would be okay for a boxer to have his main sparring partner in the ring with him to help him with fights - the sparring partner isn't a "real" boxer himself, but his presence will definitely tip the scales. That negatively effects MY ability to play the game. If a person wants an ally to fight with them in an MMO, they should do it "the right way" and make friends - after all, it's supposed to be Massively Multiplayer Online, not More Money (for more accounts) Online.
(Note: From this point on, the words "you," "you're" and "your" are not used in direct reference to Linna or any other specific person, they are used for illustrative purposes only. Let no one complain that I am "attacking them".)
In PotBS, whether I want to sell marks I win myself, or buy marks other people sell, having players farm their own bots for free marks negatively effects MY ability to play the game by artificially creating more marks in the system so the mark seller, in turn artificially effecting the price of the marks - that is, IF you're selling them. If you're farming yourself for marks to trade directly for a ship, then you negatively effect MY ability to enjoy the game by getting almost effort-free MoV refits, explosive shot, 90-MoV outfittings, etc - getting those things without the actual effort of PvPing for that many Marks of Victory/Trade (depending on the refit) or without at least grinding your dailies/JOMT for the cash to buy all those marks is most certainly an "unsportsmanlike advantage."
If you're buying multiple accounts just to have 100 econ lots, you're buying an "unsportsmanlike advantage" over any other producer (indeed, even over small groups of producers) - might as well add RMT to the game and pay cash for in-game items for all the actual player effort required for running econ structures. That negatively effects my ability to enjoy the game by making it so that getting into ship production as a solo player is very literally too expensive in materials (if I were to buy them on the AH) to produce a ship at a price anyone would willingly pay for it. Yes, I could produce ships in-house with free or at/cost materials from my society but that would mean giving them free or at/cost ships - without profit, it's not worth my time or effort and after all we're talking about MY ability to enjoy the game and how it's effected by people who shell out more real money to buy more power in video games.
Are those people a fact of life? Yes, there will always be people who want to buy power, whether it's real world power and influence or imaginary video game power and influence. Do I have to deal with it? Yup, I haven't got the money to buy the power and influence to stop them and the video game companies will always welcome more cash to fill the coffers :P Am I pleased whenever I see a video game company do anything at all, no matter how small, to thwart that sort of player? Yes. FLS's policy change didn't stop EVERYbody using multiple accounts to give themselves an edge, not even MOST of them, but it shut down a few at least. That's better than nothing.
(From this point on, the word "your" will refer directly to Linna.)
And NOTHING means a thing in the end, here, Linna, including your rage over being banned for something that at one time was allowed but then was no longer allowed; we're talking about a video game.
EDIT: The below quoted post is a perfect example of someone buying multiple accounts just to get the unfair advantage in PVP.
Originally posted by happilpie Wow, that is pretty much BS Linna. I played this game for a while when it first came out had 2 accounts (both pirates) for the express reason to own national noobs easier...it worked...like a charm with my hand eye coordination I easily owned 3-4 real players at a time and could do 6-8 npc convoy's with ease...Reading this made me glad I had to quit anything to do with SoE long ago and save me from any hassels from FLS I may have had. In fact I haven't played a MMO yet that I didn't own mulitple accounts (the most being 4 in EQ). I am one of those people that play at odd times when the servers aren't bustling with activity. As long as your paying for the accounts you should be able to do what ever the hell you want to with them. If I want to work harder and make it easier for me to get better gear/items for me to kill you easier in game the company shouldn't care.
I really don't see the difference if you are pwned by one person with multiple accounts or many people with one account.
I had a similar discussion with a couple of FLS Fanbois in the FLS forums pre-release where they were arguing that instancing would prevent ganking and zerging because it limited the number of opponents that could fight you at one time?
IIRC their argument was that it was much better if you got ganked by 6 Level 50s as opposed to 100 Level 50s because it was much 'fairer' that way?
Either way though... you still got ganked (maybe not zerged though). So, does it matter?
Yes, you could argue that the true spirit of MMORPGs is that you play one character and one account and make friends.
But if that's the way the Developer wants their game to be played then there should be rules in place to make sure this is how the game is played?
If a player is skilled enough to play multiple accounts in combat at the same time... more power to them.
To me this just suggests the combat is not tough enough.
You're trying to sidestep the point again. As long as it doesn't negatively impact your gameplay WHY SHOULD YOU CARE.
The reasons I mentioned are just some of the many that people have for owning multiple accounts. And they are each in their own way good and valid reasons. People have these alts to enable them to have fun, precisely BECAUSE it's a game. It doesn't hurt anyone if someone wants to play both a crafter and a PVP toon in a game that only allows one toon per server (old SWG). No one gets an unsportsmanlike advantage if a stone tanker drags their own kinetic around (COH). No one gets disadvantaged if someone decides to level two freetraders to 50. All it does is enable people to have fun in the game. It may not be the way YOU have fun, but that doesn't mean a thing in the end, it's their money, and they decide what is fun for them. Linna
Your PvP examples were particularly bad defenses - if one player has a 2nd account JUST to help them PvP with their main (example, Falcon alts in EVE), then you're damned right I've got a problem with that. It's very much an "unsportsmanlike advantage." To say it's not "unsportsmanlike" is to say it would be okay for a boxer to have his main sparring partner in the ring with him to help him with fights - the sparring partner isn't a "real" boxer himself, but his presence will definitely tip the scales. That negatively effects MY ability to play the game. If a person wants an ally to fight with them in an MMO, they should do it "the right way" and make friends - after all, it's supposed to be Massively Multiplayer Online, not More Money (for more accounts) Online.
(Note: From this point on, the words "you," "you're" and "your" are not used in direct reference to Linna or any other specific person, they are used for illustrative purposes only. Let no one complain that I am "attacking them".)
In PotBS, whether I want to sell marks I win myself, or buy marks other people sell, having players farm their own bots for free marks negatively effects MY ability to play the game by artificially creating more marks in the system so the mark seller, in turn artificially effecting the price of the marks - that is, IF you're selling them. If you're farming yourself for marks to trade directly for a ship, then you negatively effect MY ability to enjoy the game by getting almost effort-free MoV refits, explosive shot, 90-MoV outfittings, etc - getting those things without the actual effort of PvPing for that many Marks of Victory/Trade (depending on the refit) or without at least grinding your dailies/JOMT for the cash to buy all those marks is most certainly an "unsportsmanlike advantage."
If you're buying multiple accounts just to have 100 econ lots, you're buying an "unsportsmanlike advantage" over any other producer (indeed, even over small groups of producers) - might as well add RMT to the game and pay cash for in-game items for all the actual player effort required for running econ structures. That negatively effects my ability to enjoy the game by making it so that getting into ship production as a solo player is very literally too expensive in materials (if I were to buy them on the AH) to produce a ship at a price anyone would willingly pay for it. Yes, I could produce ships in-house with free or at/cost materials from my society but that would mean giving them free or at/cost ships - without profit, it's not worth my time or effort and after all we're talking about MY ability to enjoy the game and how it's effected by people who shell out more real money to buy more power in video games.
Are those people a fact of life? Yes, there will always be people who want to buy power, whether it's real world power and influence or imaginary video game power and influence. Do I have to deal with it? Yup, I haven't got the money to buy the power and influence to stop them and the video game companies will always welcome more cash to fill the coffers :P Am I pleased whenever I see a video game company do anything at all, no matter how small, to thwart that sort of player? Yes. FLS's policy change didn't stop EVERYbody using multiple accounts to give themselves an edge, not even MOST of them, but it shut down a few at least. That's better than nothing.
(From this point on, the word "your" will refer directly to Linna.)
And NOTHING means a thing in the end, here, Linna, including your rage over being banned for something that at one time was allowed but then was no longer allowed; we're talking about a video game.
EDIT: The below quoted post is a perfect example of someone buying multiple accounts just to get the unfair advantage in PVP.
Originally posted by happilpie
Wow, that is pretty much BS Linna.
I played this game for a while when it first came out had 2 accounts (both pirates) for the express reason to own national noobs easier...it worked...like a charm with my hand eye coordination I easily owned 3-4 real players at a time and could do 6-8 npc convoy's with ease...Reading this made me glad I had to quit anything to do with SoE long ago and save me from any hassels from FLS I may have had.
In fact I haven't played a MMO yet that I didn't own mulitple accounts (the most being 4 in EQ). I am one of those people that play at odd times when the servers aren't bustling with activity.
As long as your paying for the accounts you should be able to do what ever the hell you want to with them. If I want to work harder and make it easier for me to get better gear/items for me to kill you easier in game the company shouldn't care.
I'm personally taking that person with the tow pirate pvp accounts with a LARGE grain of salt. The PVP mechanics of the game are such that playing two toons at the same time should not really give you an advantage in PVP, rather the reverse. Which was acknowledged by the devs in one of those posts from beta in the above thread. Things like positioning and wind gauge are too finicky. If he won with two toons, I think he could have won even easier with one toon. An experienced captain could win from an inexperienced one even when the experienced one was in the best ship available for their level.
The rest of your post once again obscures the issue. I've been telling you again and again that the problem with the exploiters and the issue with multiple accounts are NOT linked to an extent that they could not have easily found and banned the exploiters without going after all the harmless multi-nationals (of which there were, in my experience, far more than there were exploiters). ALL the exploits could as easily be done with friends and guildmates, and WERE done with friends and guildmates in all the cases I know of. Forbidding multiple nationalities was like putting a bandaid on a cut while ignoring the spurting femural altery: easy, but not really helpful.
As to your point about the economic lot advantage: may I once again point out that cross server lot trading gives the exact same economic advantage? And is available to everyone? At least those with multiple accounts actually played all those accounts, and levelled their toons. That involves a lot more work than the lot trading. Furthermore, a guild or group cooperating on shipbuilding would ALWAYS outdo your production (and mine on multiple accounts, frankly - many hands make light work). Should that, too, be made bannable then?
FLS made a game with so many inbuilt problems (which they were warned about in beta) that they've literally painted themselves into a corner. Many of their changes, especially after April/May, seem desperate attempts to stem the bleeding of players, madly flailng about for anything that seems like a quick solution. But quick solutions often only cause more problems, as in this case. At the point of my banning, I was probably the lynchpin for holding Spain together on Rackham, the one guild leader still trying (or at least trying hardest) to keep things together. With my departure, my guild left and the nation died fast. I cannot see the two as unrelated. Which makes it even harder for me to understand the why of the entire sequence of events. since FLS employees themselves admitted they KNEW what my role was in Spain. And the worst thing is, that if I'd lied about my accounts from the start, all this would never have happened. I was damned for being honest.
Originally posted by Linna I'm personally taking that person with the tow pirate pvp accounts with a LARGE grain of salt. The PVP mechanics of the game are such that playing two toons at the same time should not really give you an advantage in PVP, rather the reverse. Which was acknowledged by the devs in one of those posts from beta in the above thread. Things like positioning and wind gauge are too finicky. If he won with two toons, I think he could have won even easier with one toon. An experienced captain could win from an inexperienced one even when the experienced one was in the best ship available for their level.
In other words, "What he says flies in the face of what I said, therefor I shall dismiss what he says as lies." kk, gotcha.
Originally posted by Linna The rest of your post once again obscures the issue. I've been telling you again and again that the problem with the exploiters and the issue with multiple accounts are NOT linked to an extent that they could not have easily found and banned the exploiters without going after all the harmless multi-nationals (of which there were, in my experience, far more than there were exploiters). ALL the exploits could as easily be done with friends and guildmates, and WERE done with friends and guildmates in all the cases I know of. Forbidding multiple nationalities was like putting a bandaid on a cut while ignoring the spurting femural altery: easy, but not really helpful.
The rest of my post doesn't "obscure" anything - YOU said "if it doesn't negatively effect your gameply, why do you care?" and I explained how it DOES, in fact, negatively effect my gameplay and everybody else's. I've been telling you again and again that it's their game, they'll make the rules, and sometimes rules change. That's life. They changed the rules in my elementary school while I was there regarding chocolate milk in the cafeteria (they added it to the menu where before it had been forbidden), they changed the rules in my high school while I was there regarding dress codes (they added one, we all had to dress like tools starting with my Junior year), they changed the rules at the office where I worked raising our data entry quota from 10k keystrokes/hr to 13k keystrokes/hr (was okay, though, I usually hit around 14.2k before they upped it), they raise taxes, they change the statute of limitations on offenses of varying severity, they change the rules in online video games. Rules change!
If anyone's trying to obscure anything it's you with your insistence on pressing that the only people you know of who were exploiting possession of multiple accounts with different nationalities on one server were friends and guildmates and your marked avoidance of mentioning anything having to do with MoVs. OF COURSE the people exploiting would be friends and guildmates - people aren't going to sail up to some complete stranger and say "hey, let's make some more accounts and farm ourselves for free marks" or whatever else, they're going to bend/break the rules with people they trust not to "tell on them."
Originally posted by Linna As to your point about the economic lot advantage: may I once again point out that cross server lot trading gives the exact same economic advantage? And is available to everyone?
Now I know you don't really read these posts - I've already said I don't like the lot trading either. I've also said that there's nothing they could do to enforce any rule they can make regarding what people do across servers and with multiple accounts. I've also agreed that, for that reason, making any rule about it is a poor decision, at best, except for that it gives them a rule to point to in the rare instance somebody happens to be caught cheating in that manner.
It's a "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" sort of thing.
Originally posted by Linna At least those with multiple accounts actually played all those accounts, and levelled their toons.
I don't know that. With all the spamming about gold selling and powerlevelling services, for all I know half the 50's on the OS could be dirty. I'm sure it's not that many, but the point remains.
Originally posted by Linna That involves a lot more work than the lot trading.
If playing a game is work, you need a new game.
Originally posted by Linna Furthermore, a guild or group cooperating on shipbuilding would ALWAYS outdo your production (and mine on multiple accounts, frankly - many hands make light work). Should that, too, be made bannable then?
That's more than one person, it's not even at issue. We've been talking about single players (at least, that's what I've been talking about...) gaining unfair advantages over other single players for no reason other than that they have more real life money to spend on buying more accounts for the express purpose of gaining an advantage over other players. An entire society working together SHOULD outperform a single person under any circumstances. In the cases where this isn't true, something is wrong.
Originally posted by Linna FLS made a game with so many inbuilt problems (which they were warned about in beta) that they've literally painted themselves into a corner.
So has every other MMO game ever to release; if you could be arsed to go looking, I guarantee you'll find in every MMO's community the players who "warned them" about some game feature they didn't like, but that made it into the live game anyway and performed poorly or conversely some game feature that was needed but that wasn't put in on time and for which the game seemed to suffer. Some games will even have clearly identifiable periods of population distress (EVE, which has passed the 5 year mark and which has more daily "I'll quit if CCP doesn't do THIS" threads on their forum than PotBS will EVER have, Tabula Rasa which called it quits almost at their 1 year anniversary, AoC which hasn't gotten to its 1 year mark yet, PotBS which is less than a month from its 1 year anniversary and has not said anything about calling it quits yet - those are just examples on the top of my head, I can't be bothered to look at every live MMO game past and present).
My point is, every game has inbuilt problems at launch. This is why game mechanics are changed, added and removed, this is why rules and policies are altered after the fact. Every game with RvR and PvP rewards has the capacity to be farmed/exploited by people with multiple accounts. There is nothing that can be done to prevent this from happening; all you CAN do is make a rule, hope most people obey it and drop the hammer on anyone you DO happen to catch breaking it. (that last sentence was mostly in response to Gyrus, who has said a couple of times that they should've done something to prevent it beforehand... you can't prevent people with extra cash from buying more accounts if that's what they want to do with their money).
Originally posted by Linna At the point of my banning, I was probably the lynchpin for holding Spain together on Rackham, the one guild leader still trying (or at least trying hardest) to keep things together. With my departure, my guild left and the nation died fast. I cannot see the two as unrelated. Which makes it even harder for me to understand the why of the entire sequence of events. since FLS employees themselves admitted they KNEW what my role was in Spain. And the worst thing is, that if I'd lied about my accounts from the start, all this would never have happened. I was damned for being honest.
Linna
I don't think anyone has said that your banning, your guild leaving with you and Rackham Spain falling were unrelated. Again, I get why you'd be upset over what happened. It's not fair from your end. At the same time, I get that, regardless how much good one person is doing, you can't just let them ignore any rules, new or old. Frankly, you were fortunate that they grandfathered you in for any length of time to begin with - it's more than I would've expected if I'd been in your shoes.
EDIT: Also, honesty is rarely the best policy... regardless of what our mothers told us when we were kids :P
I'm personally taking that person with the tow pirate pvp accounts with a LARGE grain of salt. The PVP mechanics of the game are such that playing two toons at the same time should not really give you an advantage in PVP, rather the reverse. Which was acknowledged by the devs in one of those posts from beta in the above thread. Things like positioning and wind gauge are too finicky. If he won with two toons, I think he could have won even easier with one toon. An experienced captain could win from an inexperienced one even when the experienced one was in the best ship available for their level.
In other words, "What he says flies in the face of what I said, therefor I shall dismiss what he says as lies." kk, gotcha.
Originally posted by Linna
The rest of your post once again obscures the issue. I've been telling you again and again that the problem with the exploiters and the issue with multiple accounts are NOT linked to an extent that they could not have easily found and banned the exploiters without going after all the harmless multi-nationals (of which there were, in my experience, far more than there were exploiters). ALL the exploits could as easily be done with friends and guildmates, and WERE done with friends and guildmates in all the cases I know of. Forbidding multiple nationalities was like putting a bandaid on a cut while ignoring the spurting femural altery: easy, but not really helpful.
The rest of my post doesn't "obscure" anything - YOU said "if it doesn't negatively effect your gameply, why do you care?" and I explained how it DOES, in fact, negatively effect my gameplay and everybody else's. I've been telling you again and again that it's their game, they'll make the rules, and sometimes rules change. That's life. They changed the rules in my elementary school while I was there regarding chocolate milk in the cafeteria (they added it to the menu where before it had been forbidden), they changed the rules in my high school while I was there regarding dress codes (they added one, we all had to dress like tools starting with my Junior year), they changed the rules at the office where I worked raising our data entry quota from 10k keystrokes/hr to 13k keystrokes/hr (was okay, though, I usually hit around 14.2k before they upped it), they raise taxes, they change the statute of limitations on offenses of varying severity, they change the rules in online video games. Rules change!
If anyone's trying to obscure anything it's you with your insistence on pressing that the only people you know of who were exploiting possession of multiple accounts with different nationalities on one server were friends and guildmates and your marked avoidance of mentioning anything having to do with MoVs. OF COURSE the people exploiting would be friends and guildmates - people aren't going to sail up to some complete stranger and say "hey, let's make some more accounts and farm ourselves for free marks" or whatever else, they're going to bend/break the rules with people they trust not to "tell on them."
Originally posted by Linna
As to your point about the economic lot advantage: may I once again point out that cross server lot trading gives the exact same economic advantage? And is available to everyone?
Now I know you don't really read these posts - I've already said I don't like the lot trading either. I've also said that there's nothing they could do to enforce any rule they can make regarding what people do across servers and with multiple accounts. I've also agreed that, for that reason, making any rule about it is a poor decision, at best, except for that it gives them a rule to point to in the rare instance somebody happens to be caught cheating in that manner.
It's a "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" sort of thing.
Originally posted by Linna
At least those with multiple accounts actually played all those accounts, and levelled their toons.
I don't know that. With all the spamming about gold selling and powerlevelling services, for all I know half the 50's on the OS could be dirty. I'm sure it's not that many, but the point remains.
Originally posted by Linna
That involves a lot more work than the lot trading.
If playing a game is work, you need a new game.
Originally posted by Linna
Furthermore, a guild or group cooperating on shipbuilding would ALWAYS outdo your production (and mine on multiple accounts, frankly - many hands make light work). Should that, too, be made bannable then?
That's more than one person, it's not even at issue. We've been talking about single players (at least, that's what I've been talking about...) gaining unfair advantages over other single players for no reason other than that they have more real life money to spend on buying more accounts for the express purpose of gaining an advantage over other players. An entire society working together SHOULD outperform a single person under any circumstances. In the cases where this isn't true, something is wrong.
Originally posted by Linna
FLS made a game with so many inbuilt problems (which they were warned about in beta) that they've literally painted themselves into a corner.
So has every other MMO game ever to release; if you could be arsed to go looking, I guarantee you'll find in every MMO's community the players who "warned them" about some game feature they didn't like, but that made it into the live game anyway and performed poorly or conversely some game feature that was needed but that wasn't put in on time and for which the game seemed to suffer. Some games will even have clearly identifiable periods of population distress (EVE, which has passed the 5 year mark and which has more daily "I'll quit if CCP doesn't do THIS" threads on their forum than PotBS will EVER have, Tabula Rasa which called it quits almost at their 1 year anniversary, AoC which hasn't gotten to its 1 year mark yet, PotBS which is less than a month from its 1 year anniversary and has not said anything about calling it quits yet - those are just examples on the top of my head, I can't be bothered to look at every live MMO game past and present).
My point is, every game has inbuilt problems at launch. This is why game mechanics are changed, added and removed, this is why rules and policies are altered after the fact. Every game with RvR and PvP rewards has the capacity to be farmed/exploited by people with multiple accounts. There is nothing that can be done to prevent this from happening; all you CAN do is make a rule, hope most people obey it and drop the hammer on anyone you DO happen to catch breaking it. (that last sentence was mostly in response to Gyrus, who has said a couple of times that they should've done something to prevent it beforehand... you can't prevent people with extra cash from buying more accounts if that's what they want to do with their money).
Originally posted by Linna
At the point of my banning, I was probably the lynchpin for holding Spain together on Rackham, the one guild leader still trying (or at least trying hardest) to keep things together. With my departure, my guild left and the nation died fast. I cannot see the two as unrelated. Which makes it even harder for me to understand the why of the entire sequence of events. since FLS employees themselves admitted they KNEW what my role was in Spain. And the worst thing is, that if I'd lied about my accounts from the start, all this would never have happened. I was damned for being honest.
Linna
I don't think anyone has said that your banning, your guild leaving with you and Rackham Spain falling were unrelated. Again, I get why you'd be upset over what happened. It's not fair from your end. At the same time, I get that, regardless how much good one person is doing, you can't just let them ignore any rules, new or old. Frankly, you were fortunate that they grandfathered you in for any length of time to begin with - it's more than I would've expected if I'd been in your shoes.
EDIT: Also, honesty is rarely the best policy... regardless of what our mothers told us when we were kids :P
Big wall of text, and I'm not really good at messing with quotes in quotes, so I'll have to try point by point.
The two-accounts-pvp issue: no, I said that to the best of my knowledge (me being a fairly hardcore PVPer with a lot of experience in POTBS) sailing two accounts at once, while possible, would not exactly make it easier to kill anyone. There would not be an 'unnatural advantage', rather the reverse.
The negative effects on gameplay is what your argument boils down to. And I simply have to disagree. ANYONE who plays more has an advantage over anyone who plays less. If you only play one hour a day, you will not level as fast, earn as much money, play the economy as well etc. as someone who has the leisure to spend two hours (or more) a day on a game. That is simply the way it is. One or two accounts makes no difference here, the total time spent playing does.
Arguing you wonder how many people with multiple accounts got their toons to 50 legitimately is almost slandorous, combining an illegal form of in-game behavior in people's minds with multiple account holding, to cast doubt on a form of play you disapprove of. Why not simply assume most people play fair, and that the percentages of PL service abusers do not differ in different segments of the population? And I would like to point out that LOGIC says that if anyone is likelier to buy PLs, it is those who do not in fact have that much time, yet still want to have access to the end-game content as soon as possible.
Your whole statement about the friends and guildmates points out YOU don't read MY posts. I said that the incidents involving the known exploits that I became aware of, were always between people who were friends and guildmates of each other, and DID NOT involve people with multiple accounts. Another indication you don't read them is this reference to my avoiding MOVs. Reread the thread please, thanks. Unless the mods deleted it (because talking about exploits is generally disapproved off), there should be several posts on it.
As to me not reading your posts on the lot issue: it is 100% legal to have two same-nationality accounts and thus double your lots. Nothing was ever said or done about lot trading between servers, so one has to assume that is legal too. I am simply pointing out that whether you like the lot trading or not, IT IS LEGAL, and that it is available even to people who only have one account. So any complaints about economic advantages on multiple accounts go right out of the window, unless you want to assume that every multiple account holder also engages in lot trading on each account. Which would be a mindboggling amount of work (yes, work).
I was in the beta for Tabula Rasa. It is not an RvR game, so population balance didn't come into it, but the flaws of the game we pointed out were pretty severe, and it came as no surprise the game failed. When pretty much your entire closed beta community agrees that you should fix the game before launching it, you ignore that at your peril.
While PotBS didn't have the severe PVE issues TR had (at least the quests needed to level to level cap were all there), there is still a lot wrong with it, and like it or not, it is NOT a successful game. I'm not going to reiterate the entire list here, suffice it to say that in this day and age, even a niche game cannot afford to publish in an incomplete form to the extent PotBS is and was.
You're bit about rule changes is just silly and not to the point. You CANNOT change products beyond the use they were sold for. That is LAW. If you sell something and tell people a certain form of use is OK, you cannot legally go back on that. It would be like selling a PC for gaming and office work, then telling you it can now only be used for work, or else they'll come repossess it.
I believe you were one of the "Vet" SWG players I met on O-brds when they popped the NGE on folks. Seems like either you or your hubby were a network admin. Rather respectfull poster, unlike so many other "vets" I have run across the past 3 yrs.
Didnt take the time to read entire threadt, but sorry you two are having problems with games again.
Hopefully it works out for you and your husband. If not, then best of luck in finding your next game soon.
I saw you had mentioned CoH...if like me, the both of you got burnt out on that game quickly. Which is a shame, cause the fighting was actually pretty cool. Replaying the same basic missions over and over was akin to watching paint dry though. Bleh.
Anways see you guys around the MMO universe, and GL again
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
I believe you were one of the "Vet" SWG players I met on O-brds when they popped the NGE on folks. Seems like either you or your hubby were a network admin. Rather respectfull poster, unlike so many other "vets" I have run across the past 3 yrs. Didnt take the time to read entire threadt, but sorry you two are having problems with games again. Hopefully it works out for you and your husband. If not, then best of luck in finding your next game soon. I saw you had mentioned CoH...if like me, the both of you got burnt out on that game quickly. Which is a shame, cause the fighting was actually pretty cool. Replaying the same basic missions over and over was akin to watching paint dry though. Bleh. Anways see you guys around the MMO universe, and GL again
Fated were on Bloodfin when first the CU and then the NGE happened. During the CU, we lost some 60% of the members. The NGE cost us the rest, including me and the hubby (who is, indeed, a DBA and network admin). So yeah, I guess that was me.
We went to COV/COH, stayed there for 2 years. It's not a bad game, and they keep adding stuff. It just got boring for me as a PVPer. Arena PVP is not me, and the zones are smallish. Some of the guild are still there, others followed me to PotBS, which was a vast disappointment to all.
Currently playing Warhammer, which isn't entirely my kettle of fish, but which will do until either they implement everything they still have in the works, or the next MMO comes along that can hold my interest.
I'm starting to think anything even vaguely related with SOE is truly cursed. The lack of respect for customers seems to infect anyone dealing with them.
The ban was justified. why should you multination when no other could... you had the chance but you refused it and got owned!
I find your skill at reading comprehension lacking. EVERYONE could multination when I bought my accounts. It was allowed. And when I was told we couldn't anymore, I cancelled my accounts. Even though I still find their action legally unsound and morally unjust.
Then they told me I could keep them. Then they told me two month later that no, I couldn't keep them. And so I cancelled again. And then they banned me regardless, three days before the accounts expired.
So erm... who refused what? I behaved strictly according to their guidelines. I have the evidence in writing. The only ones who got 'owned' were FLS, for proving themselves to be yet another untrustworthy gaming company.
The ban was justified. why should you multination when no other could... you had the chance but you refused it and got owned!
I find your skill at reading comprehension lacking. EVERYONE could multination when I bought my accounts. It was allowed. And when I was told we couldn't anymore, I cancelled my accounts. Even though I still find their action legally unsound and morally unjust.
Then they told me I could keep them. Then they told me two month later that no, I couldn't keep them. And so I cancelled again. And then they banned me regardless, three days before the accounts expired.
So erm... who refused what? I behaved strictly according to their guidelines. I have the evidence in writing. The only ones who got 'owned' were FLS, for proving themselves to be yet another untrustworthy gaming company.
Linna
Yes, well, we are talking about FLS. The treatment you recived is similar to their haphazard handling of the game. Having in mind poor product and even worse treating of customers I have to agree that FLS is one untrustworthy company.
While I completely agree wit hthe original poster, and even sympathise your plight, I also have to admire the effort on the devs part to keep the game honest,
Lets face it, In MMOs today that revolve around PVP or RVR, like PotbS, there are and always have been easy ways to circumvent the true nature of the game. Its the nature of Potbs to have alliances based on nationality, and thats a core aspect of that game in more ways than just PvP. That game in particular uses nationality to divide resources , which effects tradeskills, which effects war outcomes etc.
I definately do not like what happened to the OP. But, I also think that the integrity of the game matters more. And while they definately should have had this aspect of the game figured out on day 1 so you could know for sure, they also have the right to adjust their game on the fly. Every EULA ever made usualy hasa section that clearly states the game is always an incomplete product and will change. Its unfortunate, but you must adjust ,not them.
While I completely agree wit hthe original poster, and even sympathise your plight, I also have to admire the effort on the devs part to keep the game honest, Lets face it, In MMOs today that revolve around PVP or RVR, like PotbS, there are and always have been easy ways to circumvent the true nature of the game. Its the nature of Potbs to have alliances based on nationality, and thats a core aspect of that game in more ways than just PvP. That game in particular uses nationality to divide resources , which effects tradeskills, which effects war outcomes etc. I definately do not like what happened to the OP. But, I also think that the integrity of the game matters more. And while they definately should have had this aspect of the game figured out on day 1 so you could know for sure, they also have the right to adjust their game on the fly. Every EULA ever made usualy hasa section that clearly states the game is always an incomplete product and will change. Its unfortunate, but you must adjust ,not them.
Like I and others have already stated several times in this threads, the fact it's in the Eula doesn't make it legal. The discussion on this topic took place throughout beta, and they chose not to forbid it in live. Suddenly changing the rules like they did, altered the product beyond its implied use on sale, which is illegal in my constituency.
And as to keeping the game honest: things like lot swapping (which can imply that the one making their lots available has a toon in a foreign nation) are legal, and happen on a large scale. But actually paying for multiple accounts to the same effect is not. Trading items between a french and spanish toon is completely legal if friends do it, but if one person (or these days even relatives) are doing it, it's bannable? Where is the logic? The failure of economic warfare was proven in the first months of the game. It could not function, because foreign traders would gladly supply stuff a moderate enough markup that the impact of port takeovers on healthy nations was minimal.
Espionage... as the devs are fully aware by their own postings, most espionage takes place through discontented people ratting out or people chatting with friends/roommates. So this too is not really an something that multiple nationalities helps or hinders. Especially since it's highly arguable whether espionage even gives an advantage in this specific game. I always got my information by keeping the map open and having the 'unrest gain' checkbox ticked. Which is something everyone can do.
I haven't read the whole thread but this matter seems to be a storm in a tea cup that got out of hand.
Even the guy that banned you has now left FLS so perhaps he decided to go with a fling which you got on the wrong side of. No matter its over now so just re-subb or check privately with Rheagar if you still feel there are issues outstanding that need to be discussed; plastering all over public forums will not help your case.
I haven't read the whole thread but this matter seems to be a storm in a tea cup that got out of hand. Even the guy that banned you has now left FLS so perhaps he decided to go with a fling which you got on the wrong side of. No matter its over now so just re-subb or check privately with Rheagar if you still feel there are issues outstanding that need to be discussed; plastering all over public forums will not help your case.
I didn't put the matter of me being banned on this forum. It was brought here by Havohej (see the locked thread @Linna). But since it was out here, and could potentially be used to discredit anything I said here, I decided to just tell my side of things.
Re-subbing is not possible if you are banned. Even if I wanted to, I can't go back, and I refuse to pay money to the company who treated me and my family like this. And what do I have to go back for anyway? Everything I worked for was destroyed.
You think writing to Rhaegar would help, but I very much doubt it. At the last, I cced Rusty himself on the matter. I never even got a reply. The last mail I ever got regarding my tickets was from ToddS (QA Manager). It said he thought at this point everyone was aware of the issues and that he was going to go ahead and close the tickets on the matter. No appologies, no explanations, no offer to work things out, not even an attempt to straighten out what exactly had happened. I STILL don't really know what I was originally reported for. And I still don't know why they first told me it was OK to continue playing my frenchie, and then banned me for it. I mean, after I got the FLS go-ahead, there suddenly was a month's worth of free subscription on the French account. What was I supposed to think there?
So yes, this is on the public forums, and that is very much where it belongs.
Re-subbing is not possible if you are banned. Even if I wanted to, I can't go back, and I refuse to pay money to the company who treated me and my family like this. And what do I have to go back for anyway? Everything I worked for was destroyed. Linna
Yes that kinda sucks & I can see where you are coming from.
You are still huffing and puffing because you were caught violating the rules? Boo Hoo. If you valued all your 'hard work' and 'time' then you shouldn't have been cheated.
So what if someone had one rule one year and another rule another year. That happens in professional sports ALL the time. Look at steroids and baseball, first its okay and then after its apparent how bad it is over all for baseball they ban it. Dudes kept doing it cause they thought they HAD to in order to be competitive. Sound familiar yet?
You knew the changes. You chose to break the rules. I am sure they probably tried to give you warnings and ways to correct your ways. And, judging by how you endlessly go on about everything I am sure you were a complete ass on the forums making up all kinds of outrageous crap. I bet they even tried to give you chances to correct the situation but you decided to go the drama queen route and buried yourself in a hole.
You paid what. 50 cents a day x however many cheating accounts? Sounds like they should have charged you more for being such pain in the ass.
Your sub entitled you to play the game according to their rules. Your out of whack sense of entitlement is really spectacular.
You are still huffing and puffing because you were caught violating the rules? Boo Hoo. If you valued all your 'hard work' and 'time' then you shouldn't have been cheated. So what if someone had one rule one year and another rule another year. That happens in professional sports ALL the time. Look at steroids and baseball, first its okay and then after its apparent how bad it is over all for baseball they ban it. Dudes kept doing it cause they thought they HAD to in order to be competitive. Sound familiar yet? You knew the changes. You chose to break the rules. I am sure they probably tried to give you warnings and ways to correct your ways. And, judging by how you endlessly go on about everything I am sure you were a complete ass on the forums making up all kinds of outrageous crap. I bet they even tried to give you chances to correct the situation but you decided to go the drama queen route and buried yourself in a hole. You paid what. 50 cents a day x however many cheating accounts? Sounds like they should have charged you more for being such pain in the ass. Your sub entitled you to play the game according to their rules. Your out of whack sense of entitlement is really spectacular.
This is not professional sports. I do not get paid to play, I PAY to play. This is about a product bought for entertainment, under the assumption that a specific use was allowed. An assumption based on PUBLIC statements of the developers that the use was in fact allowed. There was no cheating, everything was strictly above the table, including the request to be allowed to continue under the old rules.
Say you buy a Playstation so you can play and see the occasional DVD. And then they say 'we changed the rules, playing DVDs is no longer allowed. Are you seriously saying you think that is OK?
Comments
In the PotBS forum yesterday, somebody complained about how you HAVE to do dailies every day like it's a job. This isn't true; I've done the dailies all of twice, I get my money from MoT/MoV and a little bit of econ every 3rd or 4th day (depending on the wind). All these things you're saying you HAVE to buy multiple accounts for, you don't HAVE to do; you CHOOSE to do. You CHOOSE to buy yourself an army of alts for whatever reason. And just because you expect the argument of "make moar friends" doesn't make it any less valid an argument.
I played EVE for over a year, ran my own corporation and participated in two large-scale 0.0 alliance wars (one was the .-A-. vs. IAC war, the other was G00DFELLAS vs. Pure./IRON). 0.0 Alliance action is the place where you run into the most two, three, four+ account-holding players - hell, the Industry director in MY corp have 4 accounts just for CYNO ALTS, then another account with an actual alt that he used! Not me, I had one account, one character and two cyno alts. I didn't CHOOSE to have a bunch of alts or extra accounts and I made out okay.
It's a game, there's nothing mandatory about it - least of all paying extra for more accounts!
You're trying to sidestep the point again. As long as it doesn't negatively impact your gameplay WHY SHOULD YOU CARE.
The reasons I mentioned are just some of the many that people have for owning multiple accounts. And they are each in their own way good and valid reasons. People have these alts to enable them to have fun, precisely BECAUSE it's a game. It doesn't hurt anyone if someone wants to play both a crafter and a PVP toon in a game that only allows one toon per server (old SWG). No one gets an unsportsmanlike advantage if a stone tanker drags their own kinetic around (COH). No one gets disadvantaged if someone decides to level two freetraders to 50. All it does is enable people to have fun in the game. It may not be the way YOU have fun, but that doesn't mean a thing in the end, it's their money, and they decide what is fun for them.
Linna
I give you one thing into consideration: what makes you think those people would have grouped with you if buffbots had been forbidden? In my experience, the use of one means you're seriously ticked off about never being able to find the correct type of buffer in the times you play (the stone tanker in COH NEEDS a kinetic buffer in order to function at all in armor form, for instance). Which makes the choice obvious: make your own, or stop playing.
It really has nothing to do with 'lazy', and everything with being sick of pick up groups and waiting around for hours, trying to find a kinetic (in my example) who wants to group with you and do the same things you want to do.
Linna
Wow, that is pretty much BS Linna.
I played this game for a while when it first came out had 2 accounts (both pirates) for the express reason to own national noobs easier...it worked...like a charm with my hand eye coordination I easily owned 3-4 real players at a time and could do 6-8 npc convoy's with ease...Reading this made me glad I had to quit anything to do with SoE long ago and save me from any hassels from FLS I may have had.
In fact I haven't played a MMO yet that I didn't own mulitple accounts (the most being 4 in EQ). I am one of those people that play at odd times when the servers aren't bustling with activity.
As long as your paying for the accounts you should be able to do what ever the hell you want to with them. If I want to work harder and make it easier for me to get better gear/items for me to kill you easier in game the company shouldn't care.
I pitty you for your loss, specially when FLS does something like this, im happy that i never wasted money buying this game because i would be in the same situation as you with multiple accounts and different nations.
List of SOE lies
That would be nice, perhaps, but would there be a publisher in its right mind that would say no to "do you want free money?"?
Sorry Herodes, but these companies are businesses. It is in their interest to allow multiple accounts.
Because more accounts = more revenue and more revenue = more money for continued development.
You will find even some of the Free to Play MMOs offer "premium accounts" for cash.
The challenge then is for a developer to design a game that does not allow multiple (or premium) account holders an 'unfair' advantage. And really, the game should have those safeguards in anyway, because if one player with multiple accounts has an unfair advantage then so will a guild, a group of close friends, or a family?
RMT is the same in many ways. I have nothing against Micro Transactions done in a fair way. If someone wants to throw money at a developer rather than play the game grind then that's fine with me. I prefer to play the game for what it is. Each to their own I guess.
RMT is fine as far as free-to-play games are concerned. That's how they make their money.
But the danger is that some wiseguy publisher will take to the idea of letting players of their subscription-based MMO's buy themselves their Armor of Uberleetness with real cash. SOE certainly opened the Pandora's box with their Station Cash venture, even though it seems to be mostly confined to cosmetic junk for now.
That alone could kill MMO's, for the community is bound to rebel. If it doesn't, then I think I'd be done with such games anyway.
Your PvP examples were particularly bad defenses - if one player has a 2nd account JUST to help them PvP with their main (example, Falcon alts in EVE), then you're damned right I've got a problem with that. It's very much an "unsportsmanlike advantage." To say it's not "unsportsmanlike" is to say it would be okay for a boxer to have his main sparring partner in the ring with him to help him with fights - the sparring partner isn't a "real" boxer himself, but his presence will definitely tip the scales. That negatively effects MY ability to play the game. If a person wants an ally to fight with them in an MMO, they should do it "the right way" and make friends - after all, it's supposed to be Massively Multiplayer Online, not More Money (for more accounts) Online.
(Note: From this point on, the words "you," "you're" and "your" are not used in direct reference to Linna or any other specific person, they are used for illustrative purposes only. Let no one complain that I am "attacking them".)
In PotBS, whether I want to sell marks I win myself, or buy marks other people sell, having players farm their own bots for free marks negatively effects MY ability to play the game by artificially creating more marks in the system so the mark seller, in turn artificially effecting the price of the marks - that is, IF you're selling them. If you're farming yourself for marks to trade directly for a ship, then you negatively effect MY ability to enjoy the game by getting almost effort-free MoV refits, explosive shot, 90-MoV outfittings, etc - getting those things without the actual effort of PvPing for that many Marks of Victory/Trade (depending on the refit) or without at least grinding your dailies/JOMT for the cash to buy all those marks is most certainly an "unsportsmanlike advantage."
If you're buying multiple accounts just to have 100 econ lots, you're buying an "unsportsmanlike advantage" over any other producer (indeed, even over small groups of producers) - might as well add RMT to the game and pay cash for in-game items for all the actual player effort required for running econ structures. That negatively effects my ability to enjoy the game by making it so that getting into ship production as a solo player is very literally too expensive in materials (if I were to buy them on the AH) to produce a ship at a price anyone would willingly pay for it. Yes, I could produce ships in-house with free or at/cost materials from my society but that would mean giving them free or at/cost ships - without profit, it's not worth my time or effort and after all we're talking about MY ability to enjoy the game and how it's effected by people who shell out more real money to buy more power in video games.
Are those people a fact of life? Yes, there will always be people who want to buy power, whether it's real world power and influence or imaginary video game power and influence. Do I have to deal with it? Yup, I haven't got the money to buy the power and influence to stop them and the video game companies will always welcome more cash to fill the coffers :P Am I pleased whenever I see a video game company do anything at all, no matter how small, to thwart that sort of player? Yes. FLS's policy change didn't stop EVERYbody using multiple accounts to give themselves an edge, not even MOST of them, but it shut down a few at least. That's better than nothing.
(From this point on, the word "your" will refer directly to Linna.)
And NOTHING means a thing in the end, here, Linna, including your rage over being banned for something that at one time was allowed but then was no longer allowed; we're talking about a video game.
EDIT: The below quoted post is a perfect example of someone buying multiple accounts just to get the unfair advantage in PVP.
See, I am with people like Linna on this.
I really don't see the difference if you are pwned by one person with multiple accounts or many people with one account.
I had a similar discussion with a couple of FLS Fanbois in the FLS forums pre-release where they were arguing that instancing would prevent ganking and zerging because it limited the number of opponents that could fight you at one time?
IIRC their argument was that it was much better if you got ganked by 6 Level 50s as opposed to 100 Level 50s because it was much 'fairer' that way?
Either way though... you still got ganked (maybe not zerged though). So, does it matter?
Yes, you could argue that the true spirit of MMORPGs is that you play one character and one account and make friends.
But if that's the way the Developer wants their game to be played then there should be rules in place to make sure this is how the game is played?
If a player is skilled enough to play multiple accounts in combat at the same time... more power to them.
To me this just suggests the combat is not tough enough.
Nothing says irony like spelling ideot wrong.
Your PvP examples were particularly bad defenses - if one player has a 2nd account JUST to help them PvP with their main (example, Falcon alts in EVE), then you're damned right I've got a problem with that. It's very much an "unsportsmanlike advantage." To say it's not "unsportsmanlike" is to say it would be okay for a boxer to have his main sparring partner in the ring with him to help him with fights - the sparring partner isn't a "real" boxer himself, but his presence will definitely tip the scales. That negatively effects MY ability to play the game. If a person wants an ally to fight with them in an MMO, they should do it "the right way" and make friends - after all, it's supposed to be Massively Multiplayer Online, not More Money (for more accounts) Online.
(Note: From this point on, the words "you," "you're" and "your" are not used in direct reference to Linna or any other specific person, they are used for illustrative purposes only. Let no one complain that I am "attacking them".)
In PotBS, whether I want to sell marks I win myself, or buy marks other people sell, having players farm their own bots for free marks negatively effects MY ability to play the game by artificially creating more marks in the system so the mark seller, in turn artificially effecting the price of the marks - that is, IF you're selling them. If you're farming yourself for marks to trade directly for a ship, then you negatively effect MY ability to enjoy the game by getting almost effort-free MoV refits, explosive shot, 90-MoV outfittings, etc - getting those things without the actual effort of PvPing for that many Marks of Victory/Trade (depending on the refit) or without at least grinding your dailies/JOMT for the cash to buy all those marks is most certainly an "unsportsmanlike advantage."
If you're buying multiple accounts just to have 100 econ lots, you're buying an "unsportsmanlike advantage" over any other producer (indeed, even over small groups of producers) - might as well add RMT to the game and pay cash for in-game items for all the actual player effort required for running econ structures. That negatively effects my ability to enjoy the game by making it so that getting into ship production as a solo player is very literally too expensive in materials (if I were to buy them on the AH) to produce a ship at a price anyone would willingly pay for it. Yes, I could produce ships in-house with free or at/cost materials from my society but that would mean giving them free or at/cost ships - without profit, it's not worth my time or effort and after all we're talking about MY ability to enjoy the game and how it's effected by people who shell out more real money to buy more power in video games.
Are those people a fact of life? Yes, there will always be people who want to buy power, whether it's real world power and influence or imaginary video game power and influence. Do I have to deal with it? Yup, I haven't got the money to buy the power and influence to stop them and the video game companies will always welcome more cash to fill the coffers :P Am I pleased whenever I see a video game company do anything at all, no matter how small, to thwart that sort of player? Yes. FLS's policy change didn't stop EVERYbody using multiple accounts to give themselves an edge, not even MOST of them, but it shut down a few at least. That's better than nothing.
(From this point on, the word "your" will refer directly to Linna.)
And NOTHING means a thing in the end, here, Linna, including your rage over being banned for something that at one time was allowed but then was no longer allowed; we're talking about a video game.
EDIT: The below quoted post is a perfect example of someone buying multiple accounts just to get the unfair advantage in PVP.
I'm personally taking that person with the tow pirate pvp accounts with a LARGE grain of salt. The PVP mechanics of the game are such that playing two toons at the same time should not really give you an advantage in PVP, rather the reverse. Which was acknowledged by the devs in one of those posts from beta in the above thread. Things like positioning and wind gauge are too finicky. If he won with two toons, I think he could have won even easier with one toon. An experienced captain could win from an inexperienced one even when the experienced one was in the best ship available for their level.
The rest of your post once again obscures the issue. I've been telling you again and again that the problem with the exploiters and the issue with multiple accounts are NOT linked to an extent that they could not have easily found and banned the exploiters without going after all the harmless multi-nationals (of which there were, in my experience, far more than there were exploiters). ALL the exploits could as easily be done with friends and guildmates, and WERE done with friends and guildmates in all the cases I know of. Forbidding multiple nationalities was like putting a bandaid on a cut while ignoring the spurting femural altery: easy, but not really helpful.
As to your point about the economic lot advantage: may I once again point out that cross server lot trading gives the exact same economic advantage? And is available to everyone? At least those with multiple accounts actually played all those accounts, and levelled their toons. That involves a lot more work than the lot trading. Furthermore, a guild or group cooperating on shipbuilding would ALWAYS outdo your production (and mine on multiple accounts, frankly - many hands make light work). Should that, too, be made bannable then?
FLS made a game with so many inbuilt problems (which they were warned about in beta) that they've literally painted themselves into a corner. Many of their changes, especially after April/May, seem desperate attempts to stem the bleeding of players, madly flailng about for anything that seems like a quick solution. But quick solutions often only cause more problems, as in this case. At the point of my banning, I was probably the lynchpin for holding Spain together on Rackham, the one guild leader still trying (or at least trying hardest) to keep things together. With my departure, my guild left and the nation died fast. I cannot see the two as unrelated. Which makes it even harder for me to understand the why of the entire sequence of events. since FLS employees themselves admitted they KNEW what my role was in Spain. And the worst thing is, that if I'd lied about my accounts from the start, all this would never have happened. I was damned for being honest.
Linna
In other words, "What he says flies in the face of what I said, therefor I shall dismiss what he says as lies." kk, gotcha.
The rest of my post doesn't "obscure" anything - YOU said "if it doesn't negatively effect your gameply, why do you care?" and I explained how it DOES, in fact, negatively effect my gameplay and everybody else's. I've been telling you again and again that it's their game, they'll make the rules, and sometimes rules change. That's life. They changed the rules in my elementary school while I was there regarding chocolate milk in the cafeteria (they added it to the menu where before it had been forbidden), they changed the rules in my high school while I was there regarding dress codes (they added one, we all had to dress like tools starting with my Junior year), they changed the rules at the office where I worked raising our data entry quota from 10k keystrokes/hr to 13k keystrokes/hr (was okay, though, I usually hit around 14.2k before they upped it), they raise taxes, they change the statute of limitations on offenses of varying severity, they change the rules in online video games. Rules change!
If anyone's trying to obscure anything it's you with your insistence on pressing that the only people you know of who were exploiting possession of multiple accounts with different nationalities on one server were friends and guildmates and your marked avoidance of mentioning anything having to do with MoVs. OF COURSE the people exploiting would be friends and guildmates - people aren't going to sail up to some complete stranger and say "hey, let's make some more accounts and farm ourselves for free marks" or whatever else, they're going to bend/break the rules with people they trust not to "tell on them."
Now I know you don't really read these posts - I've already said I don't like the lot trading either. I've also said that there's nothing they could do to enforce any rule they can make regarding what people do across servers and with multiple accounts. I've also agreed that, for that reason, making any rule about it is a poor decision, at best, except for that it gives them a rule to point to in the rare instance somebody happens to be caught cheating in that manner.
It's a "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" sort of thing.
I don't know that. With all the spamming about gold selling and powerlevelling services, for all I know half the 50's on the OS could be dirty. I'm sure it's not that many, but the point remains.
If playing a game is work, you need a new game.
That's more than one person, it's not even at issue. We've been talking about single players (at least, that's what I've been talking about...) gaining unfair advantages over other single players for no reason other than that they have more real life money to spend on buying more accounts for the express purpose of gaining an advantage over other players. An entire society working together SHOULD outperform a single person under any circumstances. In the cases where this isn't true, something is wrong.
So has every other MMO game ever to release; if you could be arsed to go looking, I guarantee you'll find in every MMO's community the players who "warned them" about some game feature they didn't like, but that made it into the live game anyway and performed poorly or conversely some game feature that was needed but that wasn't put in on time and for which the game seemed to suffer. Some games will even have clearly identifiable periods of population distress (EVE, which has passed the 5 year mark and which has more daily "I'll quit if CCP doesn't do THIS" threads on their forum than PotBS will EVER have, Tabula Rasa which called it quits almost at their 1 year anniversary, AoC which hasn't gotten to its 1 year mark yet, PotBS which is less than a month from its 1 year anniversary and has not said anything about calling it quits yet - those are just examples on the top of my head, I can't be bothered to look at every live MMO game past and present).
My point is, every game has inbuilt problems at launch. This is why game mechanics are changed, added and removed, this is why rules and policies are altered after the fact. Every game with RvR and PvP rewards has the capacity to be farmed/exploited by people with multiple accounts. There is nothing that can be done to prevent this from happening; all you CAN do is make a rule, hope most people obey it and drop the hammer on anyone you DO happen to catch breaking it. (that last sentence was mostly in response to Gyrus, who has said a couple of times that they should've done something to prevent it beforehand... you can't prevent people with extra cash from buying more accounts if that's what they want to do with their money).
I don't think anyone has said that your banning, your guild leaving with you and Rackham Spain falling were unrelated. Again, I get why you'd be upset over what happened. It's not fair from your end. At the same time, I get that, regardless how much good one person is doing, you can't just let them ignore any rules, new or old. Frankly, you were fortunate that they grandfathered you in for any length of time to begin with - it's more than I would've expected if I'd been in your shoes.
EDIT: Also, honesty is rarely the best policy... regardless of what our mothers told us when we were kids :P
In other words, "What he says flies in the face of what I said, therefor I shall dismiss what he says as lies." kk, gotcha.
The rest of my post doesn't "obscure" anything - YOU said "if it doesn't negatively effect your gameply, why do you care?" and I explained how it DOES, in fact, negatively effect my gameplay and everybody else's. I've been telling you again and again that it's their game, they'll make the rules, and sometimes rules change. That's life. They changed the rules in my elementary school while I was there regarding chocolate milk in the cafeteria (they added it to the menu where before it had been forbidden), they changed the rules in my high school while I was there regarding dress codes (they added one, we all had to dress like tools starting with my Junior year), they changed the rules at the office where I worked raising our data entry quota from 10k keystrokes/hr to 13k keystrokes/hr (was okay, though, I usually hit around 14.2k before they upped it), they raise taxes, they change the statute of limitations on offenses of varying severity, they change the rules in online video games. Rules change!
If anyone's trying to obscure anything it's you with your insistence on pressing that the only people you know of who were exploiting possession of multiple accounts with different nationalities on one server were friends and guildmates and your marked avoidance of mentioning anything having to do with MoVs. OF COURSE the people exploiting would be friends and guildmates - people aren't going to sail up to some complete stranger and say "hey, let's make some more accounts and farm ourselves for free marks" or whatever else, they're going to bend/break the rules with people they trust not to "tell on them."
Now I know you don't really read these posts - I've already said I don't like the lot trading either. I've also said that there's nothing they could do to enforce any rule they can make regarding what people do across servers and with multiple accounts. I've also agreed that, for that reason, making any rule about it is a poor decision, at best, except for that it gives them a rule to point to in the rare instance somebody happens to be caught cheating in that manner.
It's a "Damned if you do, damned if you don't" sort of thing.
I don't know that. With all the spamming about gold selling and powerlevelling services, for all I know half the 50's on the OS could be dirty. I'm sure it's not that many, but the point remains.
If playing a game is work, you need a new game.
That's more than one person, it's not even at issue. We've been talking about single players (at least, that's what I've been talking about...) gaining unfair advantages over other single players for no reason other than that they have more real life money to spend on buying more accounts for the express purpose of gaining an advantage over other players. An entire society working together SHOULD outperform a single person under any circumstances. In the cases where this isn't true, something is wrong.
So has every other MMO game ever to release; if you could be arsed to go looking, I guarantee you'll find in every MMO's community the players who "warned them" about some game feature they didn't like, but that made it into the live game anyway and performed poorly or conversely some game feature that was needed but that wasn't put in on time and for which the game seemed to suffer. Some games will even have clearly identifiable periods of population distress (EVE, which has passed the 5 year mark and which has more daily "I'll quit if CCP doesn't do THIS" threads on their forum than PotBS will EVER have, Tabula Rasa which called it quits almost at their 1 year anniversary, AoC which hasn't gotten to its 1 year mark yet, PotBS which is less than a month from its 1 year anniversary and has not said anything about calling it quits yet - those are just examples on the top of my head, I can't be bothered to look at every live MMO game past and present).
My point is, every game has inbuilt problems at launch. This is why game mechanics are changed, added and removed, this is why rules and policies are altered after the fact. Every game with RvR and PvP rewards has the capacity to be farmed/exploited by people with multiple accounts. There is nothing that can be done to prevent this from happening; all you CAN do is make a rule, hope most people obey it and drop the hammer on anyone you DO happen to catch breaking it. (that last sentence was mostly in response to Gyrus, who has said a couple of times that they should've done something to prevent it beforehand... you can't prevent people with extra cash from buying more accounts if that's what they want to do with their money).
I don't think anyone has said that your banning, your guild leaving with you and Rackham Spain falling were unrelated. Again, I get why you'd be upset over what happened. It's not fair from your end. At the same time, I get that, regardless how much good one person is doing, you can't just let them ignore any rules, new or old. Frankly, you were fortunate that they grandfathered you in for any length of time to begin with - it's more than I would've expected if I'd been in your shoes.
EDIT: Also, honesty is rarely the best policy... regardless of what our mothers told us when we were kids :P
Big wall of text, and I'm not really good at messing with quotes in quotes, so I'll have to try point by point.
The two-accounts-pvp issue: no, I said that to the best of my knowledge (me being a fairly hardcore PVPer with a lot of experience in POTBS) sailing two accounts at once, while possible, would not exactly make it easier to kill anyone. There would not be an 'unnatural advantage', rather the reverse.
The negative effects on gameplay is what your argument boils down to. And I simply have to disagree. ANYONE who plays more has an advantage over anyone who plays less. If you only play one hour a day, you will not level as fast, earn as much money, play the economy as well etc. as someone who has the leisure to spend two hours (or more) a day on a game. That is simply the way it is. One or two accounts makes no difference here, the total time spent playing does.
Arguing you wonder how many people with multiple accounts got their toons to 50 legitimately is almost slandorous, combining an illegal form of in-game behavior in people's minds with multiple account holding, to cast doubt on a form of play you disapprove of. Why not simply assume most people play fair, and that the percentages of PL service abusers do not differ in different segments of the population? And I would like to point out that LOGIC says that if anyone is likelier to buy PLs, it is those who do not in fact have that much time, yet still want to have access to the end-game content as soon as possible.
Your whole statement about the friends and guildmates points out YOU don't read MY posts. I said that the incidents involving the known exploits that I became aware of, were always between people who were friends and guildmates of each other, and DID NOT involve people with multiple accounts. Another indication you don't read them is this reference to my avoiding MOVs. Reread the thread please, thanks. Unless the mods deleted it (because talking about exploits is generally disapproved off), there should be several posts on it.
As to me not reading your posts on the lot issue: it is 100% legal to have two same-nationality accounts and thus double your lots. Nothing was ever said or done about lot trading between servers, so one has to assume that is legal too. I am simply pointing out that whether you like the lot trading or not, IT IS LEGAL, and that it is available even to people who only have one account. So any complaints about economic advantages on multiple accounts go right out of the window, unless you want to assume that every multiple account holder also engages in lot trading on each account. Which would be a mindboggling amount of work (yes, work).
I was in the beta for Tabula Rasa. It is not an RvR game, so population balance didn't come into it, but the flaws of the game we pointed out were pretty severe, and it came as no surprise the game failed. When pretty much your entire closed beta community agrees that you should fix the game before launching it, you ignore that at your peril.
While PotBS didn't have the severe PVE issues TR had (at least the quests needed to level to level cap were all there), there is still a lot wrong with it, and like it or not, it is NOT a successful game. I'm not going to reiterate the entire list here, suffice it to say that in this day and age, even a niche game cannot afford to publish in an incomplete form to the extent PotBS is and was.
You're bit about rule changes is just silly and not to the point. You CANNOT change products beyond the use they were sold for. That is LAW. If you sell something and tell people a certain form of use is OK, you cannot legally go back on that. It would be like selling a PC for gaming and office work, then telling you it can now only be used for work, or else they'll come repossess it.
Linna
Sue, then, and good luck.
Linna...
I believe you were one of the "Vet" SWG players I met on O-brds when they popped the NGE on folks. Seems like either you or your hubby were a network admin. Rather respectfull poster, unlike so many other "vets" I have run across the past 3 yrs.
Didnt take the time to read entire threadt, but sorry you two are having problems with games again.
Hopefully it works out for you and your husband. If not, then best of luck in finding your next game soon.
I saw you had mentioned CoH...if like me, the both of you got burnt out on that game quickly. Which is a shame, cause the fighting was actually pretty cool. Replaying the same basic missions over and over was akin to watching paint dry though. Bleh.
Anways see you guys around the MMO universe, and GL again
Asking Devs to make AAA sandbox titles is like trying to get fine dining on a McDonalds dollar menu budget.
Fated were on Bloodfin when first the CU and then the NGE happened. During the CU, we lost some 60% of the members. The NGE cost us the rest, including me and the hubby (who is, indeed, a DBA and network admin). So yeah, I guess that was me.
We went to COV/COH, stayed there for 2 years. It's not a bad game, and they keep adding stuff. It just got boring for me as a PVPer. Arena PVP is not me, and the zones are smallish. Some of the guild are still there, others followed me to PotBS, which was a vast disappointment to all.
Currently playing Warhammer, which isn't entirely my kettle of fish, but which will do until either they implement everything they still have in the works, or the next MMO comes along that can hold my interest.
I'm starting to think anything even vaguely related with SOE is truly cursed. The lack of respect for customers seems to infect anyone dealing with them.
Linna
The ban was justified. why should you multination when no other could... you had the chance but you refused it and got owned!
It is hard to tell if a man is telling the truth when you know you would lie if you were in his place
I find your skill at reading comprehension lacking. EVERYONE could multination when I bought my accounts. It was allowed. And when I was told we couldn't anymore, I cancelled my accounts. Even though I still find their action legally unsound and morally unjust.
Then they told me I could keep them. Then they told me two month later that no, I couldn't keep them. And so I cancelled again. And then they banned me regardless, three days before the accounts expired.
So erm... who refused what? I behaved strictly according to their guidelines. I have the evidence in writing. The only ones who got 'owned' were FLS, for proving themselves to be yet another untrustworthy gaming company.
Linna
I find your skill at reading comprehension lacking. EVERYONE could multination when I bought my accounts. It was allowed. And when I was told we couldn't anymore, I cancelled my accounts. Even though I still find their action legally unsound and morally unjust.
Then they told me I could keep them. Then they told me two month later that no, I couldn't keep them. And so I cancelled again. And then they banned me regardless, three days before the accounts expired.
So erm... who refused what? I behaved strictly according to their guidelines. I have the evidence in writing. The only ones who got 'owned' were FLS, for proving themselves to be yet another untrustworthy gaming company.
Linna
Yes, well, we are talking about FLS. The treatment you recived is similar to their haphazard handling of the game. Having in mind poor product and even worse treating of customers I have to agree that FLS is one untrustworthy company.
While I completely agree wit hthe original poster, and even sympathise your plight, I also have to admire the effort on the devs part to keep the game honest,
Lets face it, In MMOs today that revolve around PVP or RVR, like PotbS, there are and always have been easy ways to circumvent the true nature of the game. Its the nature of Potbs to have alliances based on nationality, and thats a core aspect of that game in more ways than just PvP. That game in particular uses nationality to divide resources , which effects tradeskills, which effects war outcomes etc.
I definately do not like what happened to the OP. But, I also think that the integrity of the game matters more. And while they definately should have had this aspect of the game figured out on day 1 so you could know for sure, they also have the right to adjust their game on the fly. Every EULA ever made usualy hasa section that clearly states the game is always an incomplete product and will change. Its unfortunate, but you must adjust ,not them.
Like I and others have already stated several times in this threads, the fact it's in the Eula doesn't make it legal. The discussion on this topic took place throughout beta, and they chose not to forbid it in live. Suddenly changing the rules like they did, altered the product beyond its implied use on sale, which is illegal in my constituency.
And as to keeping the game honest: things like lot swapping (which can imply that the one making their lots available has a toon in a foreign nation) are legal, and happen on a large scale. But actually paying for multiple accounts to the same effect is not. Trading items between a french and spanish toon is completely legal if friends do it, but if one person (or these days even relatives) are doing it, it's bannable? Where is the logic? The failure of economic warfare was proven in the first months of the game. It could not function, because foreign traders would gladly supply stuff a moderate enough markup that the impact of port takeovers on healthy nations was minimal.
Espionage... as the devs are fully aware by their own postings, most espionage takes place through discontented people ratting out or people chatting with friends/roommates. So this too is not really an something that multiple nationalities helps or hinders. Especially since it's highly arguable whether espionage even gives an advantage in this specific game. I always got my information by keeping the map open and having the 'unrest gain' checkbox ticked. Which is something everyone can do.
Linna
I haven't read the whole thread but this matter seems to be a storm in a tea cup that got out of hand.
Even the guy that banned you has now left FLS so perhaps he decided to go with a fling which you got on the wrong side of. No matter its over now so just re-subb or check privately with Rheagar if you still feel there are issues outstanding that need to be discussed; plastering all over public forums will not help your case.
I didn't put the matter of me being banned on this forum. It was brought here by Havohej (see the locked thread @Linna). But since it was out here, and could potentially be used to discredit anything I said here, I decided to just tell my side of things.
Re-subbing is not possible if you are banned. Even if I wanted to, I can't go back, and I refuse to pay money to the company who treated me and my family like this. And what do I have to go back for anyway? Everything I worked for was destroyed.
You think writing to Rhaegar would help, but I very much doubt it. At the last, I cced Rusty himself on the matter. I never even got a reply. The last mail I ever got regarding my tickets was from ToddS (QA Manager). It said he thought at this point everyone was aware of the issues and that he was going to go ahead and close the tickets on the matter. No appologies, no explanations, no offer to work things out, not even an attempt to straighten out what exactly had happened. I STILL don't really know what I was originally reported for. And I still don't know why they first told me it was OK to continue playing my frenchie, and then banned me for it. I mean, after I got the FLS go-ahead, there suddenly was a month's worth of free subscription on the French account. What was I supposed to think there?
So yes, this is on the public forums, and that is very much where it belongs.
Linna
Yes that kinda sucks & I can see where you are coming from.
Hope you get better luck in your next mmorpg.
Linna wears wooden shoes and lives in a windmill
/wave
Palazious <The Vindicators> Darkfall
Palazious r40, rr45 SW War
Palazious 50 Pirate PoTBS
Palazious 35 Sorcerer Vanguard
Palazious 75 wizard EQ
Paladori 50 Champion LOTRO
Poppa Reaver bugged at rank15
No no no, the windmill is BEHIND the house. The wooden shoes are a vile slander.
/wave
Linna
You are still huffing and puffing because you were caught violating the rules? Boo Hoo. If you valued all your 'hard work' and 'time' then you shouldn't have been cheated.
So what if someone had one rule one year and another rule another year. That happens in professional sports ALL the time. Look at steroids and baseball, first its okay and then after its apparent how bad it is over all for baseball they ban it. Dudes kept doing it cause they thought they HAD to in order to be competitive. Sound familiar yet?
You knew the changes. You chose to break the rules. I am sure they probably tried to give you warnings and ways to correct your ways. And, judging by how you endlessly go on about everything I am sure you were a complete ass on the forums making up all kinds of outrageous crap. I bet they even tried to give you chances to correct the situation but you decided to go the drama queen route and buried yourself in a hole.
You paid what. 50 cents a day x however many cheating accounts? Sounds like they should have charged you more for being such pain in the ass.
Your sub entitled you to play the game according to their rules. Your out of whack sense of entitlement is really spectacular.
This is not professional sports. I do not get paid to play, I PAY to play. This is about a product bought for entertainment, under the assumption that a specific use was allowed. An assumption based on PUBLIC statements of the developers that the use was in fact allowed. There was no cheating, everything was strictly above the table, including the request to be allowed to continue under the old rules.
Say you buy a Playstation so you can play and see the occasional DVD. And then they say 'we changed the rules, playing DVDs is no longer allowed. Are you seriously saying you think that is OK?
Linna