Guild Wars 2

Please do NOT submit another ticket. That will delay things, not help.

Please post your 12-digit incident number in the Tickets for Review post above. Give the details you’ve provided here and we can get this examined again.

Keep in mind that different game elements put different "loads’ on a computer. I know of a certain video card the will freeze up in Guild Wars when the player enters a specific map. This is a system problem that appears to be a game problem, and that may be what Technical Support is seeing with your report.

We will be happy to review if you add it to the review thread. Thanks.

(And we do not discriminate against people from any country or region. Everyone gets the best level of support that we can ofer.)

Sure, he can get help! Please have your friend contact support for assistance. He can reach them through the support site using the “Ask a Question” tab to submit a ticket.

First, please do not bump threads.

Secondly, as far as I have seen we have had no other reports of this particular issue. The last thing I want to do is appear rude or uncaring, but honestly, this sounds much more like user error than a game or account issue. If you believe it is a game issue, please post in the Bugs Forum, giving as many details as possible.

Account restorations are not designed for replacing items acquired in error, and it is highly unlikely that the service would be or will be offered for such an occurrence. To expand the service to those instances would mean that support would be inundated with requests to use a pretty complex tool — with potential game economy impact — for what, in the overall scope of things, would be considered somewhat-trivial reasons. Account restorations are undertaken, in Guild Wars, at least, only for account compromise incidents.

Gatto.5168:

Got a response back from Kenneth right after I posted this. Thank you Kenneth you rock!

I am glad that you were helped, Gatto.

Renegadeimp.8439:

Tickets are taking around 5 days to be answered atm, but in some circumstances they are taking a lot longer.

No, this is inaccurate. Tickets are usually resolved in less than 48 hours. As the case in this thread illustrates.

Isirus.8367:

Will i be able to request to have those tokens back in the future?

Perhaps. The system was designed, in Guild Wars at least, for account compromise incidents, only. If you were “hacked,” met the requirements and qualified for restoration, then the account could be “rolled back” to a point prior to acquiring the items. However, the feature is not yet live, and anything you get from the point of reinstatement to the date of restoration would be lost in a “roll back.”

I think it would be a rare occurrence where someone was willing to stop playing, or was willing to give up all his/her attainments and acquisitions, in that timespan.

Questions of how the account restoration service works and when the system will be released are very much the developers’ area of expertise and we hope to be able to provide some details soon.

Isirus.8367:

I got hack, like many other people and i did the 100% completion on my guy so i got the 2 token of exploration. of course when i got my account back they were both gone, really i don’t care about much else because i did have 22g on my account.

Is it really impossible for them to give me my token of explorations back? i really have to level up a new character and do that all over again!? Take all the gold away i don’t care just give me my tokens of exploration back please!

It is not possible for the account to be restored at this time. Nor is it possible to generate items to hand out. We will have an account restoration feature in the future.

Regulater.9628:

I had amassed a rather nice supply of colectibles before I was hacked. Now they are all gone. Will I get them back? This is a deal breaker for me.

Sorry to hear you were hacked. I hope that your account is now fully secure, with a unique password and so forth.

At some point in the near future, we will be able to offer the account restoration service that will “roll back” the account just prior to the compromise, in which case your items will still be intact. There are certain requirements for this system to be implemented for an account, but many happy Guild Wars players have taken advantage of the system.

We are gathering the data now, so when the system is in place you could theoretically be restored to your pre-compromise state. However, since we don’t have a release date, and since you’d lose all that you acquire between reinstatement (resumption of play) and restoration, most players are going to elect to let it go and simply move on with their reinstated, re-secured accounts. I do believe you will have this option, but again, I cannot say when the feature will be offered.

Pvp.2758:

I just recieved an email with this “[Incident: 120918-004658]” and when I go to see my ticket I created before, it says denied permission.

& when I go to log in my support account it says the account is locked.

Can you respond to the email? If so, do that.

Support can help you with this. You can reach them through this page: http://support.guildwars2.com/. Use the “Ask a Question” tab to submit a ticket.

Kauna Arget.7052:

I’m having to authorise my account almost every time I try to log in. Whilst this is annoying, I don’t mind so much although it does mean I have to keep my emails open. My problem is that every time I authorise, it’s coming up with a different location. It has never once come up with my city, and the closest it’s been is about an hour away. This has ranged up to the other side of the UK. I know that it’s me asking for these emails because of the times that they come through, but it seems ridiculous to authorise these IP addresses and locations if it’s not going to stay the same (I only game from my house). Surely this makes it more likely to be hacked?

Well, yes and no to that last bit. It’s far, far more likely you’d be hacked from a different continent than that you’d be hacked from a location an hour away. So the authorization emails can be very helpful, where you see, say, “Leeds,” “York,” even “Chester” or “Portsmouth” and then suddenly see “Beijing.” It’s that last one that is the “ah ha!” moment, although naturally a compromise could come from the other places (but not nearly as likely).

Having said that, I will ask the team if disabling the feature is on the cards. We’re so intent on trying to protect our players — and help them protests themselves — that I’m not sure how high a priority it would be to disable a feature that is provably effective, but I take on board that there are cases where disabling may be the player’s desire.

I’m not exactly a GM, but I’ll be happy to answer. The process of investigating these issues takes more than a few hours. Please be patient and allow the team to look into the matter and get it resolved.

If you purchased the game from us, the refund should be processed quite soon. If you purchased from one of our partners or from another source, naturally we cannot offer a refund. But if you bought on buy.guildwars2.com, you should hear back soon. If you’d like to follow up (after giving it another day, perhaps?), please post in the Tickets for Review thread above.

I totally agree this is a very wonderful thing. Welcome, Mac users!

I do believe this was addressed a little over 2 hours ago.

AvaAzul.8290:

- 1 Reformat
- 2 Change Password on E-mail
- 3 Change Password on Game
[Example of a Strong Password: H3><@|>eCimal]

- 4 Reset ALL Security Question
[Tip: Make ur security Question a Password instead of a Obvious answer]

- 5 Make sure your browser is set to “Private”
[Example to set Explorer to Private Mode: “C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe” -private www.google.com"]

- 6 Delete Accounts you no longer use that maybe related to your GW2 Account or have any possible trace to that account. (Check forums you’ve been to and delete/request a deletion of that account). If they fail to delete it put a randomize Password such as )U@IOUDJ(&Y(AHUHA5606484a9a8y as the password so its “locked down”

At a glance this all seems like solid advice.

The key thing is, something is giving out your info, and it’s truly not coming from us. (Hence you see only a couple of threads about repeat hackings, amongst a couple million games sold.) I agree with the others, there’s something on your system that, despite your best precautions, is giving out your credentials. Trojan, keylogger, call it what you may.

I strongly encourage you to “reset and start again,” but naturally if you wish to obtain a refund, and you purchased from us, we will oblige.

Ollie — please add your tickets to the stick post above — Tickets for Review (5+ days). Thank you!

Also, we tried phone support but found it was far less efficient for both the customer and the team. Tickets really are working, but volume can mean you wait a few days. We’re working on reducing the wait and have made big inroads. We can review if you include those tickets in the review thread.

So sorry for the delays and/or mixups. It’s true that multiple tickets can cause confusion on everyone’s part, but we’re really wanting to help!

Please add to the sticky post above and I’ll include in today’s review list.

Thanks for your patience.

maximumpanda.5178:

yesterday i attempted to submit a ticket to support that i havnt been able to buy gems for a few days now, and it turns out my account has been blocked from submitting questions for some reason.

arena net please rectify this… i want to give you my money but you dont seem to want it

Oh Max, I can’t believe that could happen. Are you sure you have all the details? I’ve been doing this a long, long time and I can’t think of an instance when someone’s account was closed for contacting Support.

Could I get the 12-digit ticket number so I can take a peek?

quacthulhu.2546:

did you try ringing for help on the 5+ says ticket thread?

Thanks, quacthulhu — that’s exactly what I was going to say. Please do post if you’ve been waiting 5 days or more!

Calmwindskitten

Can you please confirm that we will be able to change our display names in the future as per the answer on the FAQ. Here is the link, http://en.support.guildwars2.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/8982

It’s under the question How do I change my Display Name.

Fair question, and I’m not sure that answer is correct. There are reasons to allow it, and perhaps an equal number of reasons to disallow it. I’ll see if I can find out more about this and will post if I do.

I’m sorry that you’re unhappy with the system, and that you misunderstand how it works. As for using an email address as a log-in, that’s commonplace across many games and media. If your email is secure, it’s no more a risk than making a “creative” user name. The problem is, people are not keeping their entire security exposure to a minimum and that can impact everything, from games to bank accounts.

billyfortenbury.4873:

I submitted a ticket Saturday because I got an error message saying “We have detected your account may have been accessed by an unauthorized individual”. I got a request for more information late Sunday. I responded immediately, and then waited another entire day until late Monday before getting a response saying my account had reactivated. I then tried to log in and got the same error.

This is unacceptable for support. If you say the issue has been fixed and you can log back in, it should be fixed. So what do I do now? Submit a response saying it hasn’t been fixed and wait another entire day to be told its fixed only to find out it isn’t?

Yes, you should update your ticket and they will help you. If you provide your 12-digit ticket number, I can route it for assistance.

Panzer — you seem to be laboring under the mistaken belief that support if 9 to 5. In fact, the team that works 24/7. We have people working in three or four countries, every day, all day, including weekends and holidays. We have more than doubled the support team, and we’re streamlining processes, as well.

Ill Reaper Ill — we have a full restoration service in Guild Wars, and will bring it to Guild Wars 2 very soon.

Braxxis — account compromises are seldom cut and dried and they take a bit of time to sort out. But since you submitted a ticket, you’ll be helped.

SnakeSniper.4913:

120912-000385 this is my incident report i was hacked and i finally get my account restored so that i can attempt to log and be shut down telling me that my account has been hacked and i can’t access it…….. someone really needs to file the restored accounts properly so that we can play again….

I am sorry to see that. I sent over a note just now.

Defrost.1679:

When I reported one of this person’s characters for afk botting, I noticed the account name was:
DrPoonSlammer.3547 = sexual reference.

Not real good. Thanks for the report.

Update — Monday, 17 September: Part 2

120911-006605 Resolved
120902-008437 Resolved
120906-007244 I responded to this one in the ticket
120825-004909 I responded to this one in the ticket
120903-013436 Additional info requested on 9/14 – please respond
120911-002506 Friend updated 2 days ago; should hear soon
120912-002664 You updated 2 days ago; this should be answered soon
120905-004000 On yesterday’s review list — I hope to have an answer tomorrow
120909-002932 On yesterday’s review list — I hope to have an answer tomorrow

A few of those on tomorrow’s review list:

120829-012492
120901-030134 
120912-004572
120912-005302

Update — Monday, 17 September: Part 2

120911-006605 Resolved
120902-008437 Resolved
120906-007244 I responded to this one in the ticket
120825-004909 I responded to this one in the ticket
120903-013436 Additional info requested on 9/14 – please respond
120911-002506 Friend updated 2 days ago; should hear soon
120912-002664 You updated 2 days ago; this should be answered soon
120905-004000 On yesterday’s review list — I hope to have an answer tomorrow
120909-002932 On yesterday’s review list — I hope to have an answer tomorrow

A few of those on tomorrow’s review list:
120829-012492
120901-030134
120912-004572
120912-005302

If your ticket is at least five days old, and if you still need assistance, please post in the Tickets for Review – 5 days and older [merged] thread, which is here at the top of this forum.

ArenaNet Mike O’Brien will be posting a lengthy and interesting article on account security in the next few days. Please read it — I know you will find it enlightening.

In the meantime, hackers cannot change your information unless they have your information, and if they have your information, they did not get it from us.

Ramasu.8160:

I am looking for a response to my ticket. I was online playing and was “banned” mid-game. After force quitting (the “Ok” button was inactive), I tried to log back in and found that I was banned for suspected access by an unauthorized individual.

I use email authentication, a totally unique password, have no viruses, never click email links. I changed my password immediately, and checked the security status on my account page. The only log ins recorded were from my own IP address. I do not understand how there could be suspected access. I did not receive any emails requesting authentication.

I have been waiting over 3 hours for a response to my ticket.

Something happened that triggered that action — we wouldn’t boot you and lock the account unless there was a real threat.

Please hang tight and Support will respond. There are millions of people playing the game, and some of them have issues, so please do get impatient with a few hours pass without a response.

That sounds very much like a bug. Would you mind posting that in the Bug Forum? Thank you.

Nox.4207:

Thank you for your fast response. If it is not a break down in your companies security measures although that is arguable. Where is the problem stemming from? Personally i do not use email do not open them and i do not go to web sites or follow links. So how is it feasible to hack that account? Also with the issue that is so obviously present is there any future plan to offer an authentication system?

As we have explained repeatedly, tens of millions of account credentials have been hacked/stolen from other places: games, email accounts, forums, websites, through Trojans and keyloggers, etc. Do a Google search, you’ll be amazed at the highly reputable companies who had have security breaches.

We’re seeing thousands of attempts to use those stolen credentials, and in cases where someone has been foolish enough to use shared credentials — the same password on more than one resource — the RMTs are trying to gain access and, in some cases, succeeding. Example: RMT has username “gamer@fakeemail.com” and a password that Gamer has used on his email account or another game service: “password123.” (Ok, I joke about my examples, but you see my point. ) RMT says, “Let’s try that possible username and password on Guild Wars 2.” And if the user has created his/her GW2 account with those credentials, well, the RMT succeeds in stealing the account.

Please recognize that this is outside our control." However, we are looking at potential new measures to try to reduce their likelihood of success, even while it should be clear that this is not a security issue on our part, but on the part of individual users.

You can read more about this in a blog post that will be published soon, written by ArenaNet President Mike O’Brien.

It’s very honest and forthright of you to point this out, Gamingglory, and I sincerely thank you for doing so!

Sanctem.3862:

So I was playing, and all of a sudden my game goes black.. I alt+f4 out of it and try to log back in.

“We have detected that your account may have been accessed by an unauthorized individual. For your security, further access to the account has been suspended until this matter can be resolved. To restore access to this account, please contact Support and one of our representatives will assist you.”

W.T.F. :c

Anyways, I tried contacting support.. Got a # or whatever, but what’s up with this? I have a guild to lead and can’t exactly be gone for 3 days while it just sits there..
And not being able to log in will just plain out suck.

Is there a support # I can call? Or do I just have to wait for email or whatev.?

Thanks.

Please wait for a support agent to respond to your ticket. It could take a bit of time, but the “lock” on your account is placed to try to protect it. I know it’s frustrating, but many times it helps prevent deletion of items or characters.

Malice.3519:

i have sent in 3 tickets now over a week , i still have not recived any more info about y problem all i get is a more info needed, i reply with the info requested then never hear anything back, this is my last attempt at this game, I bought gems with my CC. i sold gems for gold, i spent gold on my guild drinks to raise influence, i never recived anything at all no influence was raised nothing but it took my gold, Name of guild was DarkRaven Amount of Influence Lost 1,300 . ammount of gems lost 1400 i believe.

I am not sure how this would be resolved, but if you’ve been waiting a week, please post your details in the sticky post above, Tickets for Review (5 days and older), and I can add it to the review list.

Airia.4605:

I have purchased gems in the past with little problem, as of today I have been unable to purchase gems. Is anyone else experiencing this? Haven’t seen an official response or notification that gem purchases are down.

As far as I know, the Gem Store is open for business. I wonder if perhaps you’ve used the credit card a lot lately, making a number of purchases in the store? There are some rules in place to control RMTs and the use of fraudulent CCs. (NOT to say your use is fraud, mind you!) You might try making the purchase with an alternative CC, or you can contact Support and they’ll give you a hand.

Thanks, by the way, for your support of the game!

Yes, please re-secure your account right away. As the email says, “someone knows your log-in credentials.” Take that seriously and wrest that account back from the hacker.

And remember — always use a password that you use nowhere else because that is certainly how the hacker got access to your account.

WNFisher.7936:

At any time, will users be able to change the account information that was entered when we created our Guild Wars 2 account? I purchased the game for a friend, and would like to have his information in the account I created for him as opposed to mine. Will this be available any time soon? If not, how can a subscriber go about getting the information changed that is associated with an account?

This is a more complicated question than it might seem. We do not allow resales, trades, or transfers of accounts. Each is strictly prohibited by the User Agreement to which all players agree when creating an account. So having the ability to change all information is sort of counter to that policy.

You’re welcome to discuss this with Support: support.guildwars2.com.

Thanks for helping Popqr, Veeber.

Garloth.2061:

My wife’s account was suspended with no email giving a rhyme or reason why. She has only logged into the account on her own and my computer that are connected to the same router. She has opened a support ticket 120916-003926 to which she only received an automated reply to. Hoping to speed the process along if possible by this post. Thank you for your help in advance.

That is not the purpose of this forum. You have submitted a ticket, and thank you for doing that. Please await a response through the intended system.

Nox.4207:

If any of the moderators are privy to this information i would like to know the answer. Will your company be reimbursing items and gold that has been lost due to the lack of proper security on your compaines part?

The security issues taking place are not related to ArenaNet or NCsoft security, so the question is moot. Mike O’Brien will be sharing a lot of good information about security in the near future — I encourage you to read his article when it is published.

Lady Lozza.9670:

ShadowX, of course they have access to the live server, they have access the same way the rest of us do through the game. By giving the live server no administration rights the live server cannot be hacked by outside parties, and the command line/console cannot be hacked in the client by botters. If they live server data had administration rights people would be able to hack in an delete your character without even bothering with your account credentials. They would be able to spam the database itself and potentially crash that without crashing the game server and who knows what that would do. When a database exists on the internet it can be accessed by anyone if they know the right address. When a database on the internet accepts only connections made from a very specific piece of software a lot of those problems melt away.

And all this negates the possibility that your GM accounts get hacked. Other games using the console to create new characters usually also allow the creation of gold, items, pretty much anything. Can you imagine the chaos if a GM’s account got hacked by gold sellers who created tonnes of gold and siphoned it away to associated accounts before selling it on? What about gems? They could potentially cause huge chaos in the market. And Anet would then be the worst company in the world if they tried to take all the created items out of the economy – did you see the whinning on the karma weapon incident?

At the end of the day Anet has decided administration level access either via their own machines or through the client isn’t worth the problems it could cause and could potentially fracture the community. I clearly remember accusations of favouritism when a prominent pvp player in GW1 was hacked. The simple fact that Anet could not spawn gold, armour, weapons was what kept the whole incident from becoming more than whispers of a conspiracy theory.

Anet have full access to the back ups and copies they take of the live server (which I assume they can probably fiddle with) yet as it stands at the moment they would have to take the live server down to provide a restoration feature. Now one thing Anet has NOT answered which may/may not improve things for those who have been hacked is whether the restoration feature – when ready – will be able to restore a single character back as far as August 25. In theory if they are restoring from the normal backup data then this will all depend on whether they keep the backup database for that long. If they are restoring from a special snapshot of the database, then that will depend on whether they have been taking that snapshot – and I certainly hope they have.

Thank you for your calm voice of reason.

Restorations are best — they do the least damage to the game economy. As one of the ArenaNet founders said to me years ago, “If you make a spawning system, you can be sure that sometime, somehow, someone will hack it and your economy could then be in ruins.”

I hasten to add that it’s up to the devs how things work moving forward. Maybe they’ll want to add such a system to GW2. But I’ve always taken that founder’s words to heart in believing that making a new character and decking him out in high-level goodies — while leaving the thief in possession of those same things — devalues the achievements of legitimate players where finding the hackers, taking away the items, and “rolling-back” the player to a point preceding the hack is the best way to go.

Much as I understand the distress of losses — truly understand and sympathize about them — I also try to keep in mind the larger picture. That’s why I’m excited about account restorations, which are very different than GMs “duping” items. It’s true the word “restoration” can mean many things and I apologize if my use was confusing to some of you. I meant it in what I believe to be the literal sense: restoring an account to its pre-compromise state.

I think by merging several threads players will be able to learn more about account roll-backs, item replacements, and our plans for account restorations in the future.

You need to submit a ticket, or update your ticket from a NEW email address, so the hacker cannot continue to use your credentials to access your account.

(And please do not bump threads 1/2 hour after you’ve posted. That is against the Forum Code of Conduct and may result in loss of forum privileges.)

P.S. My name is Gaile.

This forum is not to be used to try to expedite your tickets. Please allow the support team time to read, research, and resolve the issue. That means a few days, not a few hours.

Thank you.

anonymouse.9053:

It does seem ArenaNet is at least trying to squash the maggots when they appear.

Yes, it’s something we deal with every day, and in fact we stepped up observations and blocks just today.

And, I might add, nailed a lot of ’em.

If you want Support to investigate, then please contact them directly for help. Use the “Ask a Question” tab to submit a ticket.

Please continue to work with Support. I assure you the issue is not on our end, but our Technical Support folks will try to help you regain your system and game security.

Finess.2176:

Reference #:
120917-003840

A team member will answer you as soon as possible.

DocJDMD.5307:

Just as the title says.

My brother-in-law had his account stolen. He pre-purchased the game months ago and linked it with his GW1 account. He had work related matters that did not allow him to start playing. He went to log-in for the first time tonight and all of his information had been changed, (account name for GW1 and GW2 and passwords). He can change the passwords via NCsoft master account access, but since the IP address was never verified and linked to his GW2 account and the email address associated with the GW2 account was changed, he cannot login to this website and retrieve his account. He did submit a ticket with serial numbers and account verification info, but I would like to know what else he can do to speed up this process. One would think that a master account would supercede a game account, but I guess not. So I guess all he can do for now, is change the pw via the master account, but the person (suspected gold farmer…..login info ends in @163.com, which is a japanese address) can immediately change the pw using GW2 website here. This makes no dam sense. Please someone shed some light on this, TY.

This needs to be handled by a support agent through the ticket system. Please have him submit a ticket immediately.

Yoshiro.4159:

ticket: 120916-005007

Waiting for a long time now help me out if can.

My in-game mail doesn’t allow me to send mail. Any time I attempt to send mail to anyone results in the error “Processing previous mail.”. I also cannot put items up on the trading post to sell, it replies with the error
“Error attempting to sell.”
i have this bugg since 2 days ago already help me out if can please.

As this post subject says, please allow five days before you post on the forums asking for a follow-up. Also, this does not sound like an account issue, but more like a bug. You may wish to post this in the bug forum.