Guild Wars 2

I remember when you guys used the banhammer with no mercy when an exploit was abused, but as of lately. It has become a first come first serve with no consequences at all. These are what I’m talking about:

1. Aetherblade Dungeon
When it first appeared, the end reward was bugged for a few hours before it was turned off. Basically the dungeon completion reward pop up popped nonstop and players were receiving the reward every time. Making tons of people several hundreds of gold fully knowing that this was not intended. What happened to the players that abused and exploited this bug? Absolutely nothing.
There’s no excuse as like ‘But this was a bug on their end, it’s not our fault!’. Every single player knew it was unintended and every player that sticked around to exploit the bug is as guilty to it.

2. Aetherblade Jumping Puzzle
The chest rewarded a shoulderpiece that you could sell for 60s each. This brought forward organized groups that used a mesmer to basically farm it with new characters and making (again) tons of gold for several hours before it was actually addressed.
If you create a mesmer and make organized groups to farm a chest for money. Then it’s obvious that these players fully were aware that this was not intended and a ‘too good to be true’. Therefore exploiting unintended mechanics. So once again, tons of people making tons of gold with no consequences at all.

3. Belcher’s Bluff
Even though I probably never was going to play it 2000+ times. I was thinking of buying the unlimited bluff kit which costs 100g and I’m usually a sucker for anything that has ‘unlimited’ in it. Just to find out that there were tons of people that were able to buy it for 15s due to an unintended bug. Yet again fully aware that the real unlimited one is 100g, making it exploiting unintended mechanics.
You think I’m going to buy it for 100g now knowing that tons of people got it for 15s? Yea right.

To sum it up. Why has it suddenly become a ‘first come first serve’ policy where players that discover exploits get rewarded, while those that come late or don’t exploit get a kick in the nuts?
What has happened guys?

I think the exploiters merely didn’t get their proverbial kick in the nuts yet. However good thing to pull attention, it’ll provoke an official a.net response, once again clarifying that such behaviour obviously leads to permanent bans.

I want unlimited gold too.

But seriously, every time they release new living story content it’s gonna have bugs because they have such a short time to test it. And here’s the result; people abusing it as much as they can.

They did nothing to dragonball exploiters aswell. I guess it’s time to change my personal policy from standing against exploits to standing with exploiters. I feel like a fool for not abusing those bugs

marnick.4305:

I However good thing to pull attention, it’ll provoke an official a.net response

I wouldn’t hold your breath if I were you

Actually all but 2) are bannable offence according to the fact they say any exploit impacting the economy is banworthy.

2) is not mostly because it was completely legit (and no i didn t do it i got just 1 shoulder piece i still have because it has my fave skin).

they will possibly be banned once they sorted out stuff.

I got it went ‘meh’ and merched it without looking at it. 61s and never even realized until after the fact, never went back to get another so I guess I’m safe, but, will give up the unfair gain if asked.

They have probably relaxed the policy…because they don’t want to lose players…

When GW2 came out, they had hordes of players, so could make harsh examples of some of them…

If the bugs didn’t exist in the first place there would be no exploiting…

Meglobob.8620:

If the bugs didn’t exist in the first place there would be no exploiting…

You just made me puke a bit inside my mouth.
You’re basically saying that if a store owner forgets to lock the door to his store and someone see’s this. Then said person is free to enter the store and take anything he likes as the one at fault is the store owner for forgetting to lock the door?

Court: So Jack, you’re guilty of robbing over 5000$ of money and items in this store. What do you have to say before I sentence you?

Jack: The store owner forgot to lock the door.

Court: But why didn’t you say so? You’re now declared innocent and are free to go with all the money and items you’ve acquired. Case dismissed.

I do hope something happens those exploiters because as it stands it’s telling players hurry exploit new content as fast as possible with no repercussions…

This game shouldn’t have these exploits either way..

Ban them all. It’s the policy till now and should be always the same!

If ppl are exploiting the game, report and BAN them all!

Blackwyn.8127:

Meglobob.8620:

If the bugs didn’t exist in the first place there would be no exploiting…

You just made me puke a bit inside my mouth.

Urgh…go see a doctor about that if I was you…

Blackwyn.8127:

You’re basically saying that if a store owner forgets to lock the door to his store and someone see’s this. Then said person is free to enter the store and take anything he likes as the one at fault is the store owner for forgetting to lock the door?

No…you said that…it came from your head…look the quotes prove it.

I hope you really know the difference between bugs in a computer game and theft…

Meglobob.8620:

No…you said that…it came from your head…look the quotes prove it.

I hope you really know the difference between bugs in a computer game and theft…

You said this:
“If the bugs didn’t exist in the first place there would be no exploiting…”

This is heavily implying that Anet is at fault and they have full responsibility for the players exploiting the content.
There is nothing like a perfect game that is free from bugs, especially an mmo which is constantly expanding itself. It’s the responsibility of the player to know that exploiting bugs is wrong. The example given was an analogy of a situation that has the same principles as the mentality you just showed with the quote in this post.

Blackwyn.8127:

Meglobob.8620:

If the bugs didn’t exist in the first place there would be no exploiting…

You just made me puke a bit inside my mouth.
You’re basically saying that if a store owner forgets to lock the door to his store and someone see’s this. Then said person is free to enter the store and take anything he likes as the one at fault is the store owner for forgetting to lock the door?

Court: So Jack, you’re guilty of robbing over 5000$ of money and items in this store. What do you have to say before I sentence you?

Jack: The store owner forgot to lock the door.

Court: But why didn’t you say so? You’re now declared innocent and are free to go with all the money and items you’ve acquired. Case dismissed.

I think a better analogy for these exploits would be that the store owner price marked a $100 item as a $1.00. Yes, the store owner loses money, but the customer didn’t do anything wrong/illegal. As soon as management is made aware they fix the problem.

Lynne.8416:

I think a better analogy for these exploits would be that the store owner price marked a $100 item as a $1.00. Yes, the store owner loses money, but the customer didn’t do anything wrong/illegal. As soon as management is made aware they fix the problem.

So you’re implying that knowing it is not intended for that reward pop up to come up every second, the player is not at fault for staying there and get 500 gold in the course of a few hours doing nothing?

I get where your analogy goes at, but it isn’t the same I’m afraid. There’s a difference between a management fault of setting the wrong price and an unintended bug that gets exploited.

Lynne.8416:

Blackwyn.8127:

Meglobob.8620:

If the bugs didn’t exist in the first place there would be no exploiting…

You just made me puke a bit inside my mouth.
You’re basically saying that if a store owner forgets to lock the door to his store and someone see’s this. Then said person is free to enter the store and take anything he likes as the one at fault is the store owner for forgetting to lock the door?

Court: So Jack, you’re guilty of robbing over 5000$ of money and items in this store. What do you have to say before I sentence you?

Jack: The store owner forgot to lock the door.

Court: But why didn’t you say so? You’re now declared innocent and are free to go with all the money and items you’ve acquired. Case dismissed.

I think a better analogy for these exploits would be that the store owner price marked a $100 item as a $1.00. Yes, the store owner loses money, but the customer didn’t do anything wrong/illegal. As soon as management is made aware they fix the problem.

In stores that usually goes and is the sole problem of the owner. In an MMO, however, generating mass profit out of simple exploits mostly harms other players instead of the company. As such, you’re not stealing from A.net, but from me by inflating the economy. That’s not acceptable even if it is due to A.net’s fault. To keep the playing field even, exploiters have to be justly punished.

Chances are Anet forget to set up their logs to record those these specific events and actions, and thus have no proof for individual player. Otherwise, there is no reason the banhammer had not dropped yet.

So yea, I wouldn’t hold my breath. Those exploiters got away with it this time. Just curse the fact that you weren’t among them.

Blackwyn.8127:

To sum it up. Why has it suddenly become a ‘first come first serve’ policy where players that discover exploits get rewarded, while those that come late or don’t exploit get a kick in the nuts?
What has happened guys?

I think ArenaNet has learned that the GW2 community is dominated by exploiters, farmers, grinders and addicts (who in the end are the same thing), so if they banned all exploiters they would end with next to no players.

Take a look at dungeons now. Ascalon Catacombs today is done mostly through exploits, by hitting bosses from where they cannot hit you, even if it would be faster to kill the boss in other ways.

That’s who’s playing this game with you.

ArenaNet achieved something incredible by making a game in which it’s so easy to play with other people, only to have it filled with people who you don’t want to play with.

Blackwyn.8127:

Lynne.8416:

I think a better analogy for these exploits would be that the store owner price marked a $100 item as a $1.00. Yes, the store owner loses money, but the customer didn’t do anything wrong/illegal. As soon as management is made aware they fix the problem.

So you’re implying that knowing it is not intended for that reward pop up to come up every second, the player is not at fault for staying there and get 500 gold in the course of a few hours doing nothing?

I get where your analogy goes at, but it isn’t the same I’m afraid. There’s a difference between a management fault of setting the wrong price and an unintended bug that gets exploited.

For the love of all things holy, please, stop using real world analogies in the digital realm. It’s all fake. 10101010101010111111010101010011 <—— machine language; that’s all your 100 gold item is. I’m just saying…not the same as stealing or even buying a real, tangible, physical object in the real world. Do you fight dragons IRL? Do you dive off a giant trade ship 1000 feet into water?

GW2 is an outlet for players to have fun. So long as there’s no infinite loop or money creation, I don’t see an issue with this. So what? A little bug. I never got a cheap kit but who cares? Every time I play I’ll bet gold anyways so the 5 silver cost doesn’t really even matter.

By the way, The infinite kit looks like it was designed for guilds to own. 100 gold is a price any decent guild could muster, especially if they like to drink IRL. It could be a fun way to unwind after wvw or long dungeons. Especially on VOIP it would be hilarious.

Afaik anet has set the precedent that people who counterfeit gold or ecto get perma bans. It would suck if they extended that to stuff like this. Why?

Imagine this: you’re a new player, just hit 80, you are told you need a guild and you are lost at what to do next. You get pwned in spvp. You get pwned in wvw. Dungeons are really hard (remember those days?) so basically you are focused on everything but the economy. You see a cheap it “infinite kit”….whoa! I gotta get me one of those! Then Dhuum comes out of the ground and bans you forever. Not cool, dude. Not cool.

Chopps.5047:

—
Imagine this: you’re a new player, just hit 80, you are told you need a guild and you are lost at what to do next. You get pwned in spvp. You get pwned in wvw. Dungeons are really hard (remember those days?) so basically you are focused on everything but the economy. You see a cheap it “infinite kit”….whoa! I gotta get me one of those! Then Dhuum comes out of the ground and bans you forever. Not cool, dude. Not cool.

Well, they could have just removed all functionality from infinite kits and allow selling them back to vendors for 15 silver. And then create a new item with proper pricing.

Wethospu.6437:

Chopps.5047:

—
Imagine this: you’re a new player, just hit 80, you are told you need a guild and you are lost at what to do next. You get pwned in spvp. You get pwned in wvw. Dungeons are really hard (remember those days?) so basically you are focused on everything but the economy. You see a cheap it “infinite kit”….whoa! I gotta get me one of those! Then Dhuum comes out of the ground and bans you forever. Not cool, dude. Not cool.

Well, they could have just removed all functionality from infinite kits and allow selling them back to vendors for 15 silver. And then create a new item with proper pricing.

I totally agree…just the logical fallacies associated with people asking for bans and/or using a store IRL analogy to make a point really grinds my gears, wethospu.

Amazing how fast you responded to that, by the way. I think you got 24 s, world record. Haha

Chopps.5047:

just the logical fallacies associated with people asking for bans and/or using a store IRL analogy to make a point really grinds my gears, wethospu.

It was an accurate analogy that basically just pointed out that if you commit the crime, then you shouldn’t be putting the blame on someone else. Especially when the reason can’t be justified by a reasonable reason (like being forced to commit a crime while having a gun pointed to your head).

If you think it’s fine to make hundreds of gold through exploits in the game just cause it’s “a game” with no consequences at all. Then I’m going to assume you’re one of those that exploited and basically just trying to justify it with nonsense.

Blackwyn.8127:

Chopps.5047:

just the logical fallacies associated with people asking for bans and/or using a store IRL analogy to make a point really grinds my gears, wethospu.

It was an accurate analogy that basically just pointed out that if you commit the crime, then you shouldn’t be putting the blame on someone else. Especially when the reason can’t be justified by a reasonable reason (like being forced to commit a crime while having a gun pointed to your head).

If you think it’s fine to make hundreds of gold through exploits in the game just cause it’s “a game” with no consequences at all. Then I’m going to assume you’re one of those that exploited and basically just trying to justify it with nonsense.

No because that affects other people. So long as you’re not breaking the market or finding an infinite loop of ecto creation, how does the fact that a few plays got a 100 g item for 15 s affect you? It’s too little gold to affect the overall market. It’s too harshto ban for that, I’m sorry. You guys are nutso

Chopps.5047:

Blackwyn.8127:

Chopps.5047:

just the logical fallacies associated with people asking for bans and/or using a store IRL analogy to make a point really grinds my gears, wethospu.

It was an accurate analogy that basically just pointed out that if you commit the crime, then you shouldn’t be putting the blame on someone else. Especially when the reason can’t be justified by a reasonable reason (like being forced to commit a crime while having a gun pointed to your head).

If you think it’s fine to make hundreds of gold through exploits in the game just cause it’s “a game” with no consequences at all. Then I’m going to assume you’re one of those that exploited and basically just trying to justify it with nonsense.

No because that affects other people. So long as you’re not breaking the market or finding an infinite loop of ecto creation, how does the fact that a few plays got a 100 g item for 15 s affect you? It’s too little gold to affect the overall market. It’s too harshto ban for that, I’m sorry. You guys are nutso

Aha I see. Exploiting is basically fine as long as it’s just a few doing it and gaining advantage of it? Got you.

Dude. It’s belcher’s bluff. How does it affect you that some noob got belchers bluff cheap? Please tell me. Because thus far the precedent set by ANET is that if you mess up the market or counterfeit gold, you get banned. This belchers bluff bug is neither. Do you have any clue how many people looked at the low silver price and decided not to buy it?

It wasn’t obvious to people who aren’t on here thousands of hours like us. Don’t you remember being a noob? Anyone could have made this mistake. It’s not like the snowflake or pepper bans at all. I think it’s awfully presumptuous to believe that anyone who bought that knew they were getting it below true price.

Honestly, it’s not THAT cool anyways. It’s a guild item. It’s not like anyone who plays gw2 will want to sit there and llay belcher’s bluff all day long. You play 5 times and you’re bored of glorified rock/paper/scissors. Big whoop

Chopps.5047:

Dude. It’s belcher’s bluff. How does it affect you that some noob got belchers bluff cheap? Please tell me.

I’m so glad you don’t work over at Anet. I can see it now:
“Exploits are fine as long as it’s only a few that take advantage of it as it won’t affect the economy on a large scale. So every time we put a patch up, we encourage you all to find so many exploits in our game and make as much money as possible as we won’t punish you at all!”

I’m sorry Chopps, I won’t be replying to you anymore because if I keep facepalming this much, I’ll probably injure my forehead.

You should maybe it will knock some sense in your head.

Can you honestly say you wouldn’t have been tempted? Lol.

Derren Brown did a test to see how human nature worked. People were, one at a time, promised £4000 to be in a room for 2 minutes, with a kitten in a cage and told not to press a button. If they didn’t press the button for 2 minutes then they got the money. If they did, they electrocuted the cat (of course, they wouldn’t actually, but only the viewers knew that). Not ONE person managed it. For £4000 they couldn’t last 2 minutes.

The only reason more people didn’t buy the game is because they either had literally no interest in the game itself (like me), or they decided it wasn’t even worth the 15s.

My point is, a lot of people who DID buy this would have clicked buy just to see what happened – ie, is this a mistake? Try buying it and see if it takes the full 100g. Some would have seen “chance to exploit”, some would have just thought that’s what it costs because they haven’t read the guides. Others will just have wanted to check to see if what they’re seeing is correct.

Who are you going to punish?

Crossed horse I wouldn’t pay 5 silver for belchers bluff. I have real goals to achieve in gw2 besides a ridiculous drinking game you all are having a brain hemorrhage over. Your analogy is wrong too. No one knew the price floor anet would set is 100 gold so your point is irrelevant. Cry all day long, watch, ANET won’t ban anyone because they’re sensible NOT because they’re lazy, weak, or don’t care.

I was trying to support your argument, but nevermind!

I wouldn’t pay 5s for it either. I am not paying anything for it at all as I have literally no interest in it whatsoever.

But I knew the price floor would be 100g before the patch hit, so you’re wrong there.

And my point isn’t really irrelevant. My point is really that people will do things, exploits, whatever the OP wants to call it, just to see. It’s human nature to do what we’re expressly told not to do. Some people do it innocently, some do it knowingly. You can’t separate out the two all the time. So who would the OP like ANet to punish?

Cheaters gonna cheat. That’s the fact of life.

Blackwyn.8127:

Chopps.5047:

just the logical fallacies associated with people asking for bans and/or using a store IRL analogy to make a point really grinds my gears, wethospu.

It was an accurate analogy that basically just pointed out that if you commit the crime, then you shouldn’t be putting the blame on someone else. Especially when the reason can’t be justified by a reasonable reason (like being forced to commit a crime while having a gun pointed to your head).

If you think it’s fine to make hundreds of gold through exploits in the game just cause it’s “a game” with no consequences at all. Then I’m going to assume you’re one of those that exploited and basically just trying to justify it with nonsense.

Nope, it’s just a game and you should probably take it much less seriously.

@CrossedHorse
It’s true that the human nature will always be tempted by things like this and resisting it can be very hard. Hence this topic encouraging a stricter policy on those that do exploit so people won’t do it. They were strict in the beginning, but suddenly they’re now letting all those that exploit gold earning stuff just walk away.

Human nature will always be human nature and can’t really be controlled to the fullest. But it can at the very least be maintained to a certain point to reduce said activity. By giving no punishments to those that do exploit, they’re sending the wrong message that exploiting is fine and you won’t be punished by it. Encouraging said human nature to take advantage of it as there will be no consequences at all will just make it worse.

But if they suddenly strengthened their exploit policy by actually doing something, then less people would do it and control themselves.
If you had a chance of getting 100 gold through an exploit, fully knowing that there are no consequences, would you do it? Most likely.
If you had the chance of getting 100 gold through an exploit, knowing that Anet has punished everyone that has exploited in their game so far with a strict enforcing policy. Would you then do it? Maybe you still would, but you wouldn’t take it as lightly as opposed to the one above.

I find the OP’s reaction to people taking advantage of exploits more shocking than the presence of the exploits themselves. Like CrossedHorse said this is human nature, to expect anything different or to even be remotely surprised by this type of behavior is laughable. Exploiting, hedging our bets, taking advantage of the system, whatever you want to call it is a universal things that’s existed since the dawn of human beings. It’s been around forever and it will continue to be around.

Also the initial post is full of hyperbole and assumptions. No one has any proof yet that Anet won’t punish the offenders, so why are we making judgement calls on Anet’s exploit/ban policy?

This is also the line in the OP’s post that gets me: “Why has it suddenly become a ‘first come first serve’ policy where players that discover exploits get rewarded, while those that come late or don’t exploit get a kick in the nuts?”

I understand the perspective of the people who don’t exploit, but what argument is there for people who come late? So these people are angry that an exploit didn’t last long enough for them to take advantage of it, while some other early exploiters did. This is pretty much how your wording presents it. So what is it here OP are you angry that people exploited and cheated the system, or are you just kitten ed that you were late to the party and a some people got in while you couldn’t?

You see money falling from the sky, you know somethings not right what do you do?

You stuff it in every pocket you have and anywhere else you can fit it.

And no I havnt even done any of those events even once.

the same identical posts of snowflake jewelry accident.

that could be answered with the same answer dev gave…. i hope they will come here and say that themselves.

Blackwyn.8127:

@CrossedHorse
It’s true that the human nature will always be tempted by things like this and resisting it can be very hard. Hence this topic encouraging a stricter policy on those that do exploit so people won’t do it. They were strict in the beginning, but suddenly they’re now letting all those that exploit gold earning stuff just walk away.

Human nature will always be human nature and can’t really be controlled to the fullest. But it can at the very least be maintained to a certain point to reduce said activity. By giving no punishments to those that do exploit, they’re sending the wrong message that exploiting is fine and you won’t be punished by it. Encouraging said human nature to take advantage of it as there will be no consequences at all will just make it worse.

But if they suddenly strengthened their exploit policy by actually doing something, then less people would do it and control themselves.
If you had a chance of getting 100 gold through an exploit, fully knowing that there are no consequences, would you do it? Most likely.
If you had the chance of getting 100 gold through an exploit, knowing that Anet has punished everyone that has exploited in their game so far with a strict enforcing policy. Would you then do it? Maybe you still would, but you wouldn’t take it as lightly as opposed to the one above.

I agree that exploiting is a bad thing. But I just think that in many cases some people aren’t really aware they’re exploiting, or they know something is odd but not exactly what. It’s the minority (I think) that knowingly and maliciously intend to exploit.

Sorry, this is slightly off-topic from my post, but more relevant to yours so …

The JP exploit, for instance. I quite often just like to hang around at the end of a JP to see who else comes in, how people are doing, check out my gear, resort my inventory. I can be there quite a while.

Now, I didn’t do the AB one, so I’m not sure if you got the achievement several times for just standing around at the end, but that is what is reads like from your post. So, by simply doing what I always do, I might have received this achievement over and over, without meaning to exploit. And I might have noticed, but not thought much about it because, like I said, my intention wasn’t to exploit it. So should I receive a ban for this? I wouldn’t mind having to lose some of the AP for it, but I would be very upset to be banned over it.

I’m not at all arguing that people didn’t exploit it. Of course they did. It’s sort of part of human nature (and actually, since you asked, the majority may well be put off deliberate exploits if they knew the punishment was severe, but many wouldn’t, just because it’s sort of human nature to “push the button”).

My only argument would be that it’s very difficult for ANet to reach that line of management because so many non-malicious people would get caught up in it. So it’s a delicate balancing act.

Smaller transgressions, therefore, usually will be let go. Paying 15s for a drinking game that really should be 100g isn’t really that impactful on the economy of the game, or harmful to other players.

No, that doesn’t make it right, but it also probably won’t, and shouldn’t, be punishable by a ban etc.

Really, it’s in ANet’s best interest just to notice the issue, and fix it as soon as possible so that it can’t be exploited further. No harm done, the issue is fixed, and a few people get away lucky this time.

CrossedHorse.4261:

Blackwyn.8127:

@CrossedHorse
It’s true that the human nature will always be tempted by things like this and resisting it can be very hard. Hence this topic encouraging a stricter policy on those that do exploit so people won’t do it. They were strict in the beginning, but suddenly they’re now letting all those that exploit gold earning stuff just walk away.

Human nature will always be human nature and can’t really be controlled to the fullest. But it can at the very least be maintained to a certain point to reduce said activity. By giving no punishments to those that do exploit, they’re sending the wrong message that exploiting is fine and you won’t be punished by it. Encouraging said human nature to take advantage of it as there will be no consequences at all will just make it worse.

But if they suddenly strengthened their exploit policy by actually doing something, then less people would do it and control themselves.
If you had a chance of getting 100 gold through an exploit, fully knowing that there are no consequences, would you do it? Most likely.
If you had the chance of getting 100 gold through an exploit, knowing that Anet has punished everyone that has exploited in their game so far with a strict enforcing policy. Would you then do it? Maybe you still would, but you wouldn’t take it as lightly as opposed to the one above.

I agree that exploiting is a bad thing. But I just think that in many cases some people aren’t really aware they’re exploiting, or they know something is odd but not exactly what. It’s the minority (I think) that knowingly and maliciously intend to exploit.

Sorry, this is slightly off-topic from my post, but more relevant to yours so …

The JP exploit, for instance. I quite often just like to hang around at the end of a JP to see who else comes in, how people are doing, check out my gear, resort my inventory. I can be there quite a while.

Now, I didn’t do the AB one, so I’m not sure if you got the achievement several times for just standing around at the end, but that is what is reads like from your post. So, by simply doing what I always do, I might have received this achievement over and over, without meaning to exploit. And I might have noticed, but not thought much about it because, like I said, my intention wasn’t to exploit it. So should I receive a ban for this? I wouldn’t mind having to lose some of the AP for it, but I would be very upset to be banned over it.

I’m not at all arguing that people didn’t exploit it. Of course they did. It’s sort of part of human nature (and actually, since you asked, the majority may well be put off deliberate exploits if they knew the punishment was severe, but many wouldn’t, just because it’s sort of human nature to “push the button”).

My only argument would be that it’s very difficult for ANet to reach that line of management because so many non-malicious people would get caught up in it. So it’s a delicate balancing act.

Smaller transgressions, therefore, usually will be let go. Paying 15s for a drinking game that really should be 100g isn’t really that impactful on the economy of the game, or harmful to other players.

No, that doesn’t make it right, but it also probably won’t, and shouldn’t, be punishable by a ban etc.

Really, it’s in ANet’s best interest just to notice the issue, and fix it as soon as possible so that it can’t be exploited further. No harm done, the issue is fixed, and a few people get away lucky this time.

as they did for snowflake they didn t punish who crafted and got few globs

They banned people who got thousands globs.

They could do tha before they will be able to do now…mostly because i saw myself how mmorpg logs works :|

It takes time but if they think they need to do something they already shown they can.

Ricky Da Man.5064:

You see money falling from the sky, you know somethings not right what do you do?

You stuff it in every pocket you have and anywhere else you can fit it.

Ha ha…

This kinda happened to me once…

Walking down the main street, suddenly notice people moving strangely all over the street. A shop owner’s bag of cash he was on his way to bank had been blown out of hands by high winds. Notes all over the place…it was bedlam…

A lot of people got the money and give it back to the shopkeeper btw…proving the vast majority are honest…

The local paper covered the story and he only lost about 20% of the cash in the end, probably the wind took most of that.

@CrossedHorse
An exploit really becomes an exploit when the player is aware of it and takes advantage of it. So let’s take the AB JP for example. First on how it worked, you completed it and got the chest. Which gave you the shoulders along with it. You could sell it to a regular merchant for 60s. This was repeatable by creating a new character. Many probably did it, sold and maybe a few did it a few more times with their other characters. These guys do not deserve any punishment Imo.

While some given in my example made organized groups to take full advantage of said unintended bug. You basically had a mesmer at top and he gave you a portal to it nonstop while you kept making new characters. Those that did this, were full aware that this was not intended and was taking advantage of an exploit. You could imagine the amount of money these people would make by doing this. These guys, deserve punishment.

Same as for example the AB dungeon. If you reached the end and suddenly you see the reward pop coming up nonstop. Your first reaction would be like ‘lol, wtf is this?’, after a little while, you would finally grasp what is going on and probably gaining a few, maybe like 5g-10g or whatever before deciding to leave the instance as it’s obviously not intended. These guys do not deserve a punishment.

On the other hand, we have those that basically reacted the same way, realized it in the same timeframe, but instead went ‘OMG I’M GOING TO BE RICH!’ and decided to stay in the instance fully aware that they were exploiting and made hundreds of gold. These guys, deserve punishment.

OK, thanks for your examples, Blackwyn.

I’d disagree that the people exploiting the JP with the mesmer should be punished. They are using legitimate, in-game mechanics as a workaround. It’s not fair, but they’re not breaking any rules. It’s not as simple as saying that it’s not the way ANet intended. They don’t intend for people to make several alts, grab the shoulders with each and make money that way either. But the option is there because it’s a legitimate use of in-game mechanics.

Otherwise the same logic would be there for people who exploit dungeons by finding shortcuts, skipping sections etc. Basically, any speed run is mostly relying on exploiting the game mechanic is some sense. Do ANet intend dungeons to be run in this way? Almost certainly not, but it’s not WRONG to run the dungeon this way.

I’m inclined to agree with you on the last part. Yes, people who just parked at the end of the JP, went AFK for a few hours and earned a lot of gold should be made to pay it back. Similarly, in LordByron’s example – those who made a few gold off the exploit with the snowflakes weren’t punished but the ones who made thousands were.

This is because at this point, the exploit becomes malicious.

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This thread is now closed, thank you for your understanding & concerns.