Guild Wars 2

Hello everyone,
I hope your accounts are secure and that you have not suffered a similar fate as myself or the 11,000 other accounts that have been hacked.

I would like to open a topic to allow Arenanet to understand the impact that a hacked account has upon the player. In doing so, I hope that we will be respectful of the great fantasy world that they have created and effort placed within, but also understand that resources have a limit. Arenanet have stated that they are taking steps to eliminate bots and hackers. I would rather focus on two points for discussion:-
a) How you felt about the game after this happened to you (reasoning for this is our emotions/perceptions about a game are what drive us to play and conversely not play)
b) Difficulties you had after the hacking incident (how you continued to play or otherwise)

I believe that these are important points that arenanet need to know as it has an impact on game development.

So background.
I was hugely excited by Guild Wars 2 and pre-purchased to allow me beta access. As such I gave feedback to NCsoft with full system specs and played my part. The game has not failed to make me laugh and smile at it’s beauty and I worked hard at three level 80’s. Everything was starting to come together and after buy gems to fill out eight char slot (one for each profession) I was enjoying the game and having fun. Then I received spam emails trying to connect from
Address: 120.43.63.172
City: Hanyang
Region: 07
Country: CN

I did not validate these but found myself locked out of the game. Time was 20:45 I reported this through Arenanet and by 21:03 my account was restored. I am adding times to allow readers to know Arenanets quick response and how little time it takes for you to loose everything on your account. I returned to my account to see my three lv 80’s naked, so much for the exotic armour I had crafted. The back was void of mats collected from the start, bags, armor, coins evrything gone except 23copper. In had lost approximately £190 of mats and gold, but that was not all.

a) How did I feel, well disappointed, disallusioned annoyed with myself that my password was not good enough. I contacted Arenanet to see if there was anyway they did char rollback but I already knew the answer. I felt like quitting the game, “what is the point” I thought. However I also know Arenanet help to the best of their current ability, but the world that they had taken care in crafting and that I had enjoyed had been shattered. No longer was it an immersive world but one ruled by money. I actually thought I may have brought it upon myself by reporting so many bots, see attached images which I take just incase. Anyway I hate giving up.

b) So getting back into, well it has been a grind in the literal sense. As 80 I had completed most areas. I started small, grinding areas to buy some bags as none would be given via quests. I will say this again IT HAS BEEN A GRIND. So what am I to do, well deleted 4chars and I am beginning again, shake off the taint connected to the hack. So Arenanet if we are hacked and 80 with nothing to show the game is a grind.

Thank you and protect your account

(BBC link on GW2 targeted by Chinese hackers)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-19543035

Yes that article is now about 2 months old. Anet did make numerous statement in regards to it. They increased security and since the hacing has decreased. I wont say it has stopped as hackers will find a way into any system if they really want to. GW2 is no exception.

Also as Anet and others have said, a majority of the people hacked tend to use passwords that they use on a variety of sites and in fact the passwords where obtained from people going to other sites and not from Anet.

I know it is upsetting to lose everything. My girlfriend was hacked in GW1, got her account back really fast but things they sold off where gone forever (she was lucy that Anet got the account back before the hacker to transfer the money so she made about 400 gold). Anyway, Anet (I wont speak for other games) rarely ever does any type of rollbacks. Look at the Karma exploit from the first week. Anet didnt rollback anyone, they just required them to delete the items themselves.

Anyway I hope you learned to use a password for GW2 that you dont use anywhere else.

The fact that you say the article is 2months old and yet hacking is still happening proves that it is still going on. Secondly I have secondry authentication via email. In the UK our servers switch around and I often have to go to my email, check ip address and authenticate. As I said Address: 120.43.63.172
City: Hanyang
Region: 07
Country: CN
asked for authentication and it is then that I contacted arenanet. So without my authentication my account was still hacked! This demonstrates a flaw in the system at arenanets end. (If you require further explanation, just say)

However the point of discussion was not the date of the BBC post but the fact I was hoping that Arenanet would understand that negative perception (how hacked players felt) of their product could damage future sales and that this needs to be addressed.