Ok, I know this is a very touchy subject and one best left to private discussions between the accused and the Game Masters - However.
I would just like to bring everyones attention to something that I simply just could not believe. Here's the story:
Last night we had a 'confrontation' with some '3rd party program' users or chinese adena farming bots what ever floats your boat.
A lot happend - including me training this group to remove them from the room that we wished to hunt. This also resulted in one of the lowlifes being 'power leveled' by this bot group dropping his earing.
This is now our earing.
Anyway - after being threatend by someone claiming to be the friend of the person(s) running the 3rd party programs to give him back this earing we proceded to hunt in the room with no further bother.
Today - after getting home from work I am told by my friends that they have been banned for EULA Violation...
I know ALL these people since prelude - they don't bot, ebay, scam, cheat in any way shape OR form. They have got to be the most legit people playing this game. Now how is it that in a place FULL of these ELUA abusers ( Witchs Catacomb ) that my friends get banned ???
Aparently a lot of them recived emails saying they were banned for violation of the ELUA without any explination of exactly what they have done.
So what is the point of this post.
Firstly: It is to show that legitimate players are still being banned while PLAINLY FREAKING OBVIOUS cheaters are not.
Secondly: Does the community feel that this is acceptible? We pay how much every year only to have our TWO YEARS worth of work put on the line due to a 5 second on the spot decision. - Ban first - Ask questions later
Then WE the people that have been hard done by have to fight and plead for innocence - beg for fogivness to something we are not guilty of?
I know one thing for sure - NC soft will fast lose dedicated players (players that have been playing thier original accounts since open beta) if they continue to let this fly - fine keep the stupid bots in - but leave us legit players in peace.
Disclaimer
I'm keeping names, server and everything else anonymous so as not to have this post removed - if anything in this post is contrary to the NCsoft rules please modify or let me know and I will modify it. Intent of this post is not to produce unwanted arguments but to have a collective dicussion about a process that may well affect a high percentage of players in the future.
I think their system should be re-thought as well....but most of these type of things have to remain hush hush around here. A year ago my friends buffer got banned. Yes a prophet, which isn't rare for anyone to have now a days. Well any case she was on auto follow in our group and I guess the gms or who ever runs things on the other side decided to pm the prophet.
Well he didn't respond in time, when he did the gm stated everything was cool. Next day bam, banned. They said they had the evidence that he was using 3rd party programs(which he wasn't). From what I gather ncsoft has zero way to detect boxed toons from 3rd party program users. Their method was look to see if this character is on auto follow, pm and if no response then banned. Really, not hard to miss a pm if your 2-3 boxing. IMO their system should be more open with the consumer they are accusing for banning. Because atm it just seems like they just cut you off, despite any evidence you might bring to the table.
Just my opinion and I expect this thread to be locked and then vanish.
Ncsofts communication to their player base is very very impersonal. Its almost like living in some obscure sci-fi world where authoritive figures have taken complete control of the world and you have no say so with anything you do. >< Thats what ncsoft's communication feels like to me. I wish their interaction with the players becomes more like Guild Wars. Their developers are in constant communication with their players.
From that comment I can only give a weak guess, on what might be the reason for the banning.
I am not sure, what was said in an open chat, during your session, but if your buddies maybe refered to the suspected botters as "chinese ... (insert any curse here)" then they can be banned for racial harassment.
Unfortunately "bad language" and "racial harassment" are far easier to proove than using of 3rd party tools. You read it in the logfiles and it is the proof, that they said it. And contrary to saying "I am botting, lalalalalala", you cannot make racial slurs as a "joke".
I am not claiming, that this is indeed the reason for the ban, but it is one possibility. As I do not know, what was said, I cannot say, if that could be a resonable ban.
But I am absolutely sure, that they were not banned cause some guy said to the GM "Hey, these idiots are keeping me from my job".
And yes, I do agree, that ANY ban should automatically include the exact reason.
There is absolutely no harm done to the testing procedures, if a banned player gets told, that he was banned for "offensive language" or "racism" or "3rd party use" or "hacking" or "exploiting"... These are all different reasons and none of them would give the banned player a hint, on how to get away with that exact rulebreaking. But if I were told, I was banned for "racism", I would know how to write the answering mail.
Oh, in all cases other than the "3rd party tool use", it would be nice, if the exact words and actions could be told.
Like:
"On monday, 8th May, you said in global chat (!) : [beep] [beep] [beepo] chinese. This was reportet as racial offensive and since we do not allow such actions according to EULA #X, your account is suspended indefinitely."
or
"On monday, 8th May, you were proven guilty of using an exploit, which allowed you to overenchant your weapon without fear of failure to +18. The log of your actions show, that it was not an "honest mistake", but an intentional exploit of a bug. According to EULA #Y, your account is suspended indefinitely."
....
Actually by typing out 5 mins more of text, NCsoft could safe up on hours of E-Mail ping-pong, where the paying customer is hanging out alone in the dark, not even knowing, what they are accused of.
Breaking the EULA is like commiting a minor crime, but still then, the police does always tell you, what you are accused of, when they arrest you. At least in most democracies they do so.
Imagine to get arrested by some cops, thrown into jail and you need your first (and only) phonecall to ask the court, what you are accused of.
Funny Thing is I have reported 500+ Bots/3rd Party Users in the last 2 years and have Screen Shots to Prove it, and yet none of them have been banned AT ALL, I still see the Bots Trains (up to 9 Bots in a Party) I Reported 1 and half years ago...
Yet in 1 Day a Farmer Group Reports all my Friends and they get Banned for Botting... and I know these People IRL and Know for a FACT that They have NEVER used 3rd Party Programes...
NCSoft... If you ask me The system needs a MAJOR Overhaul... and Stop Banning the Iegit Players...
Nothing of the sort was said.
I think that the worst thing I said was legable and not a "-_-" was "die" and I wasn't the one banned - Deffinatly no racial slurs.
The people in question just wanted to hunt there and the only "aggressive" thing they did was actualy kill them - going red all perfictly fine by the lineage rule book.
My friends have now gotten a response and it is indeed for 3rd party program use.
They are now proceeding to combat this charge and clear thier name.
They could be banned for real use of some unmentioned tools, let it be shop mode macros, HP/MP visibility tools etc. You can never say never.
Most probably I think someone reported that "automated friends" party hunting there earlier, GM took the case ... it's catacomb, this room, here they are - bam! Not noticing owners of the room changed meanwhile. Or "automated friends" coud report them, as it is known location for AFK playing, and GM just automatically smash the ban hammer. Who knows ...
Good luck to your friends retreiving their accounts, if they are 100% legit. NC should really post more accurate reasons. It's stated in ToS that they can do whatever with accounts since it's their ownership, but still ... customers PAY for the service. Legit or not, they deserve treating like a real worthy customers.
The odd thing is that people do receive emails with accurate reasoning - I won't repost this here, but Divath recently posted the full email with his temp ban for foul language on L2blah, and it contained every one of the offensive lines (including the channel he said it in) he was suspended for.
Accurate reasoning would be very good - and so would a complete revision of the banning policy to include more false positives but a thorough strike against all possible true positives.
Then again, the ability to ban efficiently depends very largely on the tools available to the people banning. We don't know anything about the testing procedure. I assume though that the server doesn't automatically detect (and thus log) suspicious behaviour (the amount of data generated if you log every movement/attack/action is pretty darn huge), which would be the reason player reports are needed at all.
I've also heard that the client receives notice of an invisible GM's presence and merely doesn't display that GM or make it targetable - of course for a botter, identifying them is not a problem.
Tbh I think the problem with our bot goes back farther than the team in NCNA and all the way to the development team that decided - much like those of other games, by the way, from what I'm aware - not to take precautions against botting up front.
Belive me when I say that my friends were not using any kind of 3rd party program. To quote one of my friends, she said on teamspeak "I can't program my VCR - how would I run a bot ?"
One of the accused is a long time IRL friend and he has no reason to lie to me... but I accept your point that yes, I don't sit there watchinig them the whole time so I wouldn't know for sure.
However I would point out that protesting innocence is a clear sign that they belive that they have done no wrong.
Another thing has come to light, the people who were indeed using a 3rd party program came back after we killed them and said something to the effect of "Hello GM all witchs catacomb are bots" and then listed my friends names including me... but I wasn't banned.
This gets stranger and stranger, a bot got a not botting player banned ?
Every bot report results in an investigation and these reports are never ignored. An investigation of a player who may be using a bot program does take some time.
So basicly what he is saying is that NCsoft takes thier time banning bots to make sure they get it right and thats why we see a lot of:
I reported a bot [time frame] ago, and they are still playing. Why did you ignore my report?
If that is the case then why did my friends get banned _overnight_ when I have reported bots _repeatedly_ in chronical 1 and they are STILL botting even today...
is it really a matter of 3rd party program ?
bot are a pillar of the economy, they are (i guess) the most reliable custommer and so, they may be protected by NCSoft (at least by "not deleting them").
or more realistic : the reported bot were deleted, they just recreated some new with teh same names.
i made some studies in programmation, and the name can be a factor in the macro, and so, they need always the same name to keep the macro working. (re-writte a macro is hell).
there too many urban legends about real player being deleted, and so, i guess that isn't totally false, since all legend are from facts...
a real player could not stay stuck in the same rock for 2 week, even when i dropped to him scroll of escape... maybe he was in vacation, forgetting to turn of his computer ? (even if he auto-relog after restart/crash...)
I wouldn't really go so far as to say they turn a blind eye, in a recent news artical they came down hard on a developer for producing the program that the botters actually use.
is it really a matter of 3rd party program ?
bot are a pillar of the economy, they are (i guess) the most reliable custommer and so, they may be protected by NCSoft (at least by "not deleting them").
or more realistic : the reported bot were deleted, they just recreated some new with teh same names.
i made some studies in programmation, and the name can be a factor in the macro, and so, they need always the same name to keep the macro working. (re-writte a macro is hell).
there too many urban legends about real player being deleted, and so, i guess that isn't totally false, since all legend are from facts...
a real player could not stay stuck in the same rock for 2 week, even when i dropped to him scroll of escape... maybe he was in vacation, forgetting to turn of his computer ? (even if he auto-relog after restart/crash...)
the truth is elsewhere, i believe.
I like the way you think! :)
And I dont get it either... to the OP, I'm really sorry man... I hiope all works out fine. But the way this game is beeing watched after is just.. well, not working, to say the least. It is absolutely unaxeptable for NCSoft not to be able to detect when a bot is running... It may not be easy to do, but they should do it. And what we really need is a GM team PER server, a team who will stay working on the same server for long periods of time, so that they know the current goings.. and who can have in-game toons to check out for themselves, if the need arises... That would take a lot of peaople per server, true, but its the only way to work...
is it really a matter of 3rd party program ?
bot are a pillar of the economy, they are (i guess) the most reliable custommer and so, they may be protected by NCSoft (at least by "not deleting them").
or more realistic : the reported bot were deleted, they just recreated some new with teh same names.
i made some studies in programmation, and the name can be a factor in the macro, and so, they need always the same name to keep the macro working. (re-writte a macro is hell).
there too many urban legends about real player being deleted, and so, i guess that isn't totally false, since all legend are from facts...
a real player could not stay stuck in the same rock for 2 week, even when i dropped to him scroll of escape... maybe he was in vacation, forgetting to turn of his computer ? (even if he auto-relog after restart/crash...)
the truth is elsewhere, i believe.
I like the way you think! :)
And I dont get it either... to the OP, I'm really sorry man... I hiope all works out fine. But the way this game is beeing watched after is just.. well, not working, to say the least. It is absolutely unaxeptable for NCSoft not to be able to detect when a bot is running... It may not be easy to do, but they should do it. And what we really need is a GM team PER server, a team who will stay working on the same server for long periods of time, so that they know the current goings.. and who can have in-game toons to check out for themselves, if the need arises... That would take a lot of peaople per server, true, but its the only way to work...
i think i read somewhere that here used to be one GM who took care about whole server, but they rather reorganized it because the servers are not of a same size
I think someone hit it on the head earlier. Last night, one of my clannies reported a bot. The two toons were in step on top of each other running from mob to mob. My clannie petitioned telling them how they were stuck together botting.
The response he got was:
Thank you for your petition, Your characters are now unstcuck.
Sure enough, the bots were separated. The only thing I can think up, is someone reported the bot group, who the overworked GM saw as your party when he got there. Still really doesn't add up, as you weren't banned. And if all is as you say it is, the gm didn't actuallyy investigate, but just hit the button or w/e.
Seems your friends violated their EULA right for 1 person (obviously very skilled L2 player) to play 4+ full 9 man parties ... all at once, 24 hours a day :p
I too have a friend that is fighting to get his account back, banned for botting, he has never touched a bot program. As far as ncsoft, i dont know. I understand that it can be difficult to govern this sort of thing, but there are a couple core things that can be done, to slow down botting.
First off, simple, ban any ip other than north america in the server. That will shut down alot of them. Two, your so quick to ban a player, why not bots? You can run through any catacomb, on any server, right now, and find a bot party, with one man playing the lead, the others bots. Sometimes not even them playing the lead. There names make no since, "242342342sdfgsdf" and stuff like that, ive seen them run right through the middle of giran in a perfect line...nothing banned. I personally dont get it. If i was a gm, i would ban all i see like that, and then sort out or reinstate those who make pleas. The bad part is, most farmers have accounts ready just incase thiers get banned.
We cannot know wether or not any botting was involved... and we don't have the means to get any wiser about this case. However we do know that false positives happen. And in a good democracy one must be considered "not guilty" unless proven otherwise.
However, with that policy NC would never ever get rid of the farmers, simply because it would take too much effort to collect water-proof evidence in every case... and the community wants to see the bots gone... rather last year than tomorrow.
It's not efficient to treat farmers like customers when it comes to EULA violations. Farmers should not be seen as customers and customers hate to be treated like farmers.
So how do we tell one group from the other? It's become quite hard, now that most of the biggerer alliances have their own professional farmers to do raisbosses for them or similar. Players protect farmers from other players to get their toons powerleveled in safety. There are just too many links between the two groups already.
Just a note: I'm sure that it must have been same GM who banned my friends just sent me ( along with the whole of giran ) to a one foot square tile just outside of Mayter's Necro...
Although extremely funny to me, I dont think it was a gm screwing with you hehe. I read somewhere that a player found a ****, and was banned. Prolly passing the **** around on other sites.
Now you do understand that GMSpam cann't talk about your friends that got banned. But at least you cant talk to him about the policies in place and how you feel they are unfair.
First off, simple, ban any ip other than north america in the server.
Gee...thanks...on behalf of all the Europeans who legally pay for and play this game.
Something you seem to have failed to notice is that L2 has quite a large European player base who are forced to use the NA servers. There is 1 server aimed at us, but its still in NA as far as i know and not nearly enough so many of us play on the other servers.
Just a note: I'm sure that it must have been same GM who banned my friends just sent me ( along with the whole of giran ) to a one foot square tile just outside of Mayter's Necro...
Don't be stupid, GMs don't do this. Exploiters do.
Ban any accounts accessed by countries who already have accounts, simple as that. NA server is used for Europe and South America and other parts of the world, who do not have a server already.
I think what is needed is as some one else put it, more capable men on the ground. People who know what they are doing and have the gift of observation to watch and know exactly what is really happening.
It does not take a degree in programing or some kind of wizardry in packet sniffing and port blocking (or whate ever) to see a whole team of characters following a single person, sitting when he sits, attacking when he attacks in an automated fassion for hours - days on end without a break.
All I know is that it does happen. And sometimes they aren't unbanned.
I think its truly too late with messing around with regular players. NCSoft needs to hit harder on the 24/7 bots with gibberish names and constant town deleveling. Its alot better because they're alot more apparent to the average player and you run alot less risk of banning minor infractions or completely innocent players.
Well.. Your friends were not mass-banned for the activities in the dungeon the night before. If that had occurred, you would have been banned as well. Further, the GMs do not ban groups of folks just because someone 'nominates' them as being bots. Each ban is individually based and investigated.
The events that triggered the 'third-party-program-use' ban must have occurred some time in the past since it takes a while for such investigations to take place, and probably at a time when you were not with them, since you did not notice any violation.
NCSoft can make mistakes, and that is why your friends should take the issue to support. Unless you've looked over their shoulder at their screen though, you can't be sure what proggies they have running.
We cannot know wether or not any botting was involved... and we don't have the means to get any wiser about this case. However we do know that false positives happen. And in a good democracy one must be considered "not guilty" unless proven otherwise.
Yes but you see, to me, the banning is the punishment phase. Guilt has already been "proven" to NCSoft.
Unfortunately "bad language" and "racial harassment" are far easier to proove than using of 3rd party tools. You read it in the logfiles and it is the proof, that they said it. And contrary to saying "I am botting, lalalalalala", you cannot make racial slurs as a "joke".
The OP's story sounds so much like my friend's story I almost wonder if it's the same case. Just yesterday my clanmate was banned. Not for botting though. He too got into an altercation in the catacombs/necros with some bots/farmers/powerlevelers. He made a sarcastic remark like "yeah, I'm a bot" or something like that. Know what he got banned for? "Promoting 3rd Party Programs"
The horrible thing is, when NCsoft bans legit players they usually turn to un-legit means to get back into the game. They figure, they've been playing this game the way their supposed to for 2 years, grinding hard and earning every adena, and what do they get for it? Banned, while other known EULA violators keep on playing. So they buy accounts or adena or w/e to get back up to where they were. I've seen it happen many times. In my clanmate's case, some of his friends have offered to buy him adena, just so he won't quit.
NCsoft has horrible policy when it comes to communicating with their customers. Back in Prelude, when there were a lot of problems with duplicate serial codes/stolen serial codes, I was banned. Only they never told me I was banned, never sent me an e-mail, there was no indication whatsoever that I was banned. I just couldn't log in. (It didn't even tell me "account expired") So I came here, looking for answers in the support section and did everything they recommended on my end, even calling up my ISP (a HUGE hassle.) Finally, after nearly two weeks of trying to figure it out on my end, trying not to bother NC-soft, I e-mailed support. They responded with something like, "oh, yeah, you stole a serial code so we banned you." I did not steal a serial code, but simply because I was the first person to register the serial code they assumed I was the thief and they banned me. It took a month for them to clear my name and reinstate me. AND THEY TOOK MY MONEY THAT MONTH AND NEVER REIMBURSED ME. Really ticked me off, still ticks me off.
We were talking in vent last night about where NCNA is located, LOL. If we were Koreans we probably would have stormed the building. Good thing for them that NA is different than Korea.