Guild Wars 2

I’m sick and tired of being harassed by gold sellers whenever I get on my alt account or whenever I make a new character. The record that they hold is 5 pms – that’s 5 lots of 6 lines of text – in 2 minutes.

My suggestion to counteract this is adding a feature that only allows people on your friends list (not followers, but only friends) to pm you. Whether this be a new option added to the status choices (friends only, perhaps?), or whether it be an option that you can check in the options menu.

To anyone who feels the need to say “block and ignore”, I do. Every single time, pretty much immediately after the pm. These are different accounts messaging me the same thing, and instead of being reactive, I want the option to be proactive and stop them before the harassment begins.

Please Anet, I’ve been so very close to having panic attacks over this. It’s harassment and the only thing I can do to stop it is to appear offline, but appearing offline doesn’t let you talk in guild chat – which is half the reason I log in to gw2.

+1 to the idea of being proactive.

Oh, and inb4 toxic commentary blaming the victim.

I’m all for this. Getting real sick of having the spam come up cause it’s never just one. It’s like four or more from different bots. I don’t really see a downside besides from them spamming map chat but really that happens with guild recruitment and I don’t mind the guild recruitment spam.

Gold seller spam in map chat I can handle. I only see them there maybe once a week. I get pmed at least once a day on either account that I have.

I’ve made a request for a “do not disturb” function before, but nothing came of it. Please, can I get some dev attention on this? It’s getting so bad – especially with the sales – that I’m thinking of completely quitting the game (which is a drastic decision for me because I really do love the game and the community). It should not have to come to this. People have the right to not be harassed, and that’s all I’m asking for here.

I never got more than one spam message from each person, so I really don’t see how reporting them would personally help with what OP is talking about.

I used to block them but lately I just ignore it. They all get banned within an hour anyway.

Royal.2693:

I never got more than one spam message from each person, so I really don’t see how reporting them would personally help with what OP is talking about.

I used to block them but lately I just ignore it. They all get banned within an hour anyway.

They get banned because someone took the 5 seconds or less it takes to report them and then block them, it’s not that big a deal. As for the OP, I’m guessing from his/her post they have some personal issues that cause them to have anxiety over this, otherwise it wouldn’t be causing them to want to quit the game(though it does give others the power over you when something like that happens, sort of like terrorists in that regards). The only time I get messages are in town, so I’m rarely in town, usually only to put something in the back, collect from the TP or when I’m doing one of my mass open bags and salvage sessions.

Gaile Gray.6029:

When someone sends you a PM, report him or her. Hit the ! (exclamation point) in the lower left of the message and send it over for review.

If everyone would take this simple step before deleting and blocking, the team would be able to make significant reductions in spammers! It’s fast. It’s effective. It’s appreciated.

I would imagine that implementing a “Do not disturb” function is something that would be complicated and time consuming. I don’t anticipate that it’s a system we’ll see in the near future, and we may never see such an option. Keep in mind, though, that we already have a means for you to handle these situations: report, block, delete. And using “invisible,” while not ideal, is another means at your disposal.

I could be wrong, Gaile, but I think OP is talking about whisper chat, not mail.

if gold seller whispers bother you that much you can turn off whisper in map chat so no one can whisper you. Tell your friends to email you or party up with you if they need to say something. Once they do get your attention you can turn whisper back on while you talk to each other and turn it off again afterwards.

If create a checkbox and check if you’re on the friends list of the person you’re trying to whisper is complicated, then there’s no hope at all, lol.

I think Anet should have someone who is undercover and play along with a gold seller who is trying to sell. There’s no doubt in my mind that they are spreading the money around through multiple accounts, just like they use hacked accounts to advertise and then follow up with a runner to actually sell the gold.

This undercover could begin to find out the accounts in question and start to see which accounts the gold really coming from and delete it with all it’s assets. It’s not a permanent solution but it’s a way to police and maintain more control over the situation and keep the spam down even lower than it is now, which is actually very low now.

Gold sellers will never stop as much as anything else that’s been prohibited in history, but Anet at least acts like a government and regulates gold buying with it’s gem exchange. A good way to avoid shady purchases and even shadier people.

ZanchinFissure.7981:

I think Anet should have someone who is undercover and play along with a gold seller who is trying to sell. There’s no doubt in my mind that they are spreading the money around through multiple accounts, just like they use hacked accounts to advertise and then follow up with a runner to actually sell the gold.

This undercover could begin to find out the accounts in question and start to see which accounts the gold really coming from and delete it with all it’s assets. It’s not a permanent solution but it’s a way to police and maintain more control over the situation and keep the spam down even lower than it is now, which is actually very low now.

Gold sellers will never stop as much as anything else that’s been prohibited in history, but Anet at least acts like a government and regulates gold buying with it’s gem exchange. A good way to avoid shady purchases and even shadier people.

Their computers can see gold moving in and out of accounts, no reports needed, and once a gold seller has been reported then it’s easy to see where that account got its gold and where it sent gold to.

There was a thread a week or so back where someone complained about gold missing from his account, about 1500 gold iirc. A red post said it was removed because it was from gold buying.

Mojo Gris Gris.5941:

Gaile Gray.6029:

When someone sends you a PM, report him or her. Hit the ! (exclamation point) in the lower left of the message and send it over for review.

If everyone would take this simple step before deleting and blocking, the team would be able to make significant reductions in spammers! It’s fast. It’s effective. It’s appreciated.

I would imagine that implementing a “Do not disturb” function is something that would be complicated and time consuming. I don’t anticipate that it’s a system we’ll see in the near future, and we may never see such an option. Keep in mind, though, that we already have a means for you to handle these situations: report, block, delete. And using “invisible,” while not ideal, is another means at your disposal.

I could be wrong, Gaile, but I think OP is talking about whisper chat, not mail.

Meh …
right click → block
right click → report then

Khisanth.2948:

Meh …
right click -> block
right click -> report then

Did you even bother to read the first post?

Miss Lana.5276:

To anyone who feels the need to say “block and ignore”, I do. Every single time, pretty much immediately after the pm. These are different accounts messaging me the same thing, and instead of being reactive, I want the option to be proactive and stop them before the harassment begins.

@Gaile, thanks for the response, but I did indeed mean private messages, not mail. I guess I’ll have to find a workaround that works for me. Would this be something that could be looked into in the future?

Gaile Gray.6029:

When someone sends you a PM, report him or her. Hit the ! (exclamation point) in the lower left of the message and send it over for review.

If everyone would take this simple step before deleting and blocking, the team would be able to make significant reductions in spammers! It’s fast. It’s effective. It’s appreciated.

I would imagine that implementing a “Do not disturb” function is something that would be complicated and time consuming. I don’t anticipate that it’s a system we’ll see in the near future, and we may never see such an option. Keep in mind, though, that we already have a means for you to handle these situations: report, block, delete. And using “invisible,” while not ideal, is another means at your disposal.

I’ve played on private WoW servers where you can’t whisper someone until you’re above level 19. A status can be made that no whispers except from GW staff will go through. It’s not hard to implement.

Possible solution – A ‘whitelist’ chat tab that checks against a list of users stored client-side.. since the check will be done on the user’s machine, it shouldn’t increase server load.

it would be nice if whispers could be limited to lvl 20+ and an account of at least 2 months old, below that time they can only whisper by response.
it’s harsh but solves so much.

Gaile Gray.6029:

When someone sends you a PM, report him or her. Hit the ! (exclamation point) in the lower left of the message and send it over for review.

If everyone would take this simple step before deleting and blocking, the team would be able to make significant reductions in spammers! It’s fast. It’s effective. It’s appreciated.

I would imagine that implementing a “Do not disturb” function is something that would be complicated and time consuming. I don’t anticipate that it’s a system we’ll see in the near future, and we may never see such an option. Keep in mind, though, that we already have a means for you to handle these situations: report, block, delete. And using “invisible,” while not ideal, is another means at your disposal.

I know that the devs have fixed this problem long time ago. The game had this problem when it first launched but somehow the gold sellers dissapared after a month or two. So i’m a kittenocked that they came back with the same method and frequency all of a sudden.

Miss Lana.5276:

I’m sick and tired of being harassed by gold sellers whenever I get on my alt account or whenever I make a new character. The record that they hold is 5 pms – that’s 5 lots of 6 lines of text – in 2 minutes.

My suggestion to counteract this is adding a feature that only allows people on your friends list (not followers, but only friends) to pm you. Whether this be a new option added to the status choices (friends only, perhaps?), or whether it be an option that you can check in the options menu.

To anyone who feels the need to say “block and ignore”, I do. Every single time, pretty much immediately after the pm. These are different accounts messaging me the same thing, and instead of being reactive, I want the option to be proactive and stop them before the harassment begins.

Please Anet, I’ve been so very close to having panic attacks over this. It’s harassment and the only thing I can do to stop it is to appear offline, but appearing offline doesn’t let you talk in guild chat – which is half the reason I log in to gw2.

Make a chat tab without whispers, and use that.

Zaklex.6308:

As for the OP, I’m guessing from his/her post they have some personal issues that cause them to have anxiety over this, otherwise it wouldn’t be causing them to want to quit the game(though it does give others the power over you when something like that happens, sort of like terrorists in that regards).

Forgive me if I seem to be overreacting to this. I’m having similar issues irl. My mother in law is stalking and harassing my husband and I, even though we’ve told her outright to leave us alone. I come to gw2 to get away from that sort of thing, but all I get is more harassment.

Miss Lana.5276:

Zaklex.6308:

As for the OP, I’m guessing from his/her post they have some personal issues that cause them to have anxiety over this, otherwise it wouldn’t be causing them to want to quit the game(though it does give others the power over you when something like that happens, sort of like terrorists in that regards).

Forgive me if I seem to be overreacting to this. I’m having similar issues irl. My mother in law is stalking and harassing my husband and I, even though we’ve told her outright to leave us alone. I come to gw2 to get away from that sort of thing, but all I get is more harassment.

Even if they do change the whisper it’s not going to be anytime soon. I recommend that you turn whisper off it’s it’s bothering you that much and tell your friends to party up with you to chat if they need to say something to you or send a message by email or use guild chat.

Maybe turn whisper on for specific conversations after they contact you by email, then off again.

And keep in mind that with your mother in law it’s personal. She wants to upset you. With gold sellers, it’s business. It’s as personal as a billboard on the side of the highway.

OP & others suffering anxiety over this, its been mentioned a couple times but I think the best solution you will get (seeing as gaile’s official response is “nah”) is to set up a chat tab without whispers at all, and make it known to your friends and guildies that you aren’t taking whispers anymore. It sucks but I think it’s the best you’re gonna get to just use party/guild chat.

In your chat window there is a little arrow that drops down all types of messages you see, you can uncheck whispers to disable them.

As long as lazy players exist, gold sellers will too. The way to stop gold sellers isn’t to block and report and hope they get banned. That’s only a bandaid on a broken leg. Accounts that have been compromised should be banned forever and then deleted. It seems harsh, but in the end, the person who’s account was compromised will learn two important lessons.

1.) Don’t go to gold selling sites and try to buy gold.
2.) In case you were keylogged, take better care of your computer and game account.

I remember as a kid, if I messed up, my bike or video games were taken away. There’s no punishment when people don’t take care of their property or do something stupid. Pavlov has a point.

Quick Edit. When you have to buy the same game multiple times because your accounts are taken, it will be worth it to take things a bit more serious when your wallet starts getting thin or your credit card is too hot to handle from all the swiping.

Shivan.9438:

As long as lazy players exist, gold sellers will too. The way to stop gold sellers isn’t to block and report and hope they get banned. That’s only a bandaid on a broken leg. Accounts that have been compromised should be banned forever and then deleted. It seems harsh, but in the end, the person who’s account was compromised will learn two important lessons.

1.) Don’t go to gold selling sites and try to buy gold.
2.) In case you were keylogged, take better care of your computer and game account.

I remember as a kid, if I messed up, my bike or video games were taken away. There’s no punishment when people don’t take care of their property or do something stupid. Pavlov has a point.

Quick Edit. When you have to buy the same game multiple times because your accounts are taken, it will be worth it to take things a bit more serious when your wallet starts getting thin or your credit card is too hot to handle from all the swiping.

That will never happen. They are more likely to lose the customers who’s accounts they’d ban rather than said customers buying new accounts. Especially ones who have been playing for years.

The reality is that the average player isn’t computer savvy enough to avoid all the attempts to get at their accounts. You can’t avoid what you don’t know about.