Guild Wars 2

I’ll start by stating, I’ve never seen “Orb Hacking” nor been involved in a successful attempt to obtain an Orb legitimately due to the time of night that I usually play. Recent games where any supposed “Orb Hacking” occurred against my server, the gap was large enough in points it really didn’t matter to the outcome.

I write this with no interest other than to see fair games being played. I feel this is a point that is worth discussing with my only hope that an outcome which might appease those who have been unfairly affected by this.

I’ve seen many posts relating to “Orb Hacking” where a server team is able to some how take the Orb off from an opposing team without confrontation. In defence, members from the server who “Orb Hacked” say it is individuals and is not condoned by the server.

Until A-Net fixes this exploit, the fair thing would be to return the orb some how. If that means you have to temporarily give up the tower holding the orb so be it.

If a server team hacks and they want to make things right, I’m sure there are ways to do this in game. If these servers are unwilling to make it right then, in my view, they are condoning the actions of the few.

Before someone else brings it, it is the opinion of many that the Orbs in their current state should be removed as it gives too much power to the server which is dominating. Again, this we would require ANet to act and this thread is not about any action on ANets part. There are many threads for that already.

What I would like to see discussed, is how we, as fair players respond and bring balance back to a game which has been unbalanced through hacking.

Orbs should not be so powerful.

15% Health and an extra 150 to all stats is stupid, it should be something that raises chance to get badges and lowers repair costs, that alone would make them worth it but not be overblown to the point you can just get an extra 150 to all stats…

Whilst all solutions you write here have merit and on the face of it could work, however it would require trust first and foremost for any orb which has been taken by nefarious methods to be given back. A thing which is very unlikely to happen in the environment that is.

Another solution which is entirely in the hands of the players is not to go for the orbs. But alas we find ourselves back at the same problem of trust. No one trusts an opposition it is human nature, where there is a lack of trust a lack or respect is never far behind. The need for respect is never the less just as important as the need for trust.

All you have to see is the forum warriors, one call’s hacks and paint brushes the entire server. Another says they report all hacks when found, others deny such action dispite being on another server. The mind boggles really.

But down to the orbs themselves, they don’t win server matchs by themselves but they are a symbol, and should a symbol be taken away by nefarious methods that is what is making the blood boil. But an orb can only be handled by one person at a time, not an entire server..

And whilst orb hacking and the like are frowned upon, so is getting a paint brush and labelling an entire population on the action of a few upon the many.

The irony is a post such of this will go up in flames because of the very nature of the political aspect of the game and the culture than has taken root. Only a few will see the text for what it is, and only a few of the few will reply in kind.

Good response. I like the idea of not taking others orbs but unfortunately, it is clear that some will take orbs by any means necessary and the only way it could be resolved is through a “Gentlemans Agreement” which I suppose is not something which is going to happen. Thought it was worth posting none the less.

If you are a gentleman you don’t need a gentleman agreement. It just happens.

This came from one of the JQ WvW commanders, Jorgamund:

“Story time:

20 minutes ago from the time of this writing, on the BG borderlands, the JQ TS suddenly noticed that SBI’s orb, held at Hills for several hours, was on the move towards our keep at Bay. Quaggans weren’t up, we weren’t near the east side of the map, and the scouts didn’t see any of us doing a sneak attack. So the assumption was that one of our JQ guys had hacked the orb.

This made everyone on the server’s TS furious. Everyone started talking over each other trying to find out who it was so we could report them. Half our zerg dropped their current attack and re-routed to find out the name. As soon as the name and guild tag was announced, everyone online was to report them. The order went out on chat and TS that no one was to heal, defend, or portal the person with the orb; if it dropped, no one was to pick it up.

That is the proper response to hacking and exploiting: the entire server turns on the culprit. If your server did this constantly from the beginning like JQ has, you would not have the reputation you do now, and you would have fewer hackers.

Speaking of which, it turns out we jumped to conclusions. Right before we caught up to the orb, a player from SBI hopped on our TS and explained what happened. Their altar at Hills had been destroyed via a hack from BG, and they had no altar to re-place it, so they were running it over to give to JQ for free rather than let BG profit from the hack.

Our commanders on the map didn’t really want the orb. Most of the players weren’t happy getting a “free” orb without having to fight for it. If we were on SBI BL, we would have let the orb reset to the north altar… but we were on BG BL, so if it was not placed within 15 minutes BG got the orb back thanks to the hack. So we reluctantly took the orb from the SBI carrier (sorry about the zerg who shot you, whoever you were!). We put it in Bay, and posted a guard to try and catch the expected BG hacker the next time he tried it.

We’re not buddies with SBI now; as I write this, our zerg is backstabbing SBI’s attack on BG’s garrison. (And I’m sure there are whiners in BG complaining about being double teamed, because they can’t read the battlefield and figure out who is fighting who in a 3 way melee.) The friendly player who hopped on to our TS to let us know what happened had his IP banned—spies are still spies, even if they help you once.

But this is why we have more respect for SBI"

Oh – and I am sorry that I probably got your thread derailed and soon enough closed. Not because of this post but because of what will come.

Well, I like your response and it is encouraging that server members are attempting to take control of the situation. Reports like this give hope that we can change the behaviour of these individuals who think it fine to unbalance the game and affect the experience for 100’s of players.

earendil.1290:

If you are a gentleman you don’t need a gentleman agreement. It just happens.

snip

Oh – and I am sorry that I probably got your thread derailed and soon enough closed. Not because of this post but because of what will come.

I’m sorry for snipping the entire txt, it saves space and also takes the I heard this from a guy who told me this down the pub last Tuesday night feel. If you know what I mean, and just in case you did not. I am not saying it did not happen like it was wrote.

How ever I know how smear campaigns work, you take a base truth and “report” for want of a better word. Thus you build up a case where the person, or in this case a minority of the population which is the GW2 community, is discredited so when they bring things to the table the rest of the majority of the GW2 population has a predisposition towards the minority.

The fact that the snippet has been circulated beyond this forum and has been posted on many other forums is well something that happened in history.

Now the act may have or orb hacking is not in denial, as other have shown a willingness to report to Anet and get the individuals themselves banned. But until small minded people who smear a population with the actions of the few need to step back and think.

The very fact that posting the snippet does exactly what you intend, and this I do directly accuse you of derailing the thread. There was constructive dialogue before your post, which could just as easily have been linked. But it was a direct copy and paste of someone else post, and not even have the decency to put it in quote marks.

As for the “If you are Gentlemen…” I just does not happen if there are no rules its everything goes. Or would you deny such a statement?