Guild Wars 2

The collection for “Twilight I: The Experimental Nightsword” is broken. The Modniir Ulgoth fight does not drop the required “Modniir’s Ruin” item. Instead, it drops an “Overlord’s Defeat”, which is from the Harathi Overlord in Kessex Hills. It has halted me from continuing with my precursor, making it progress-blocking and game breaking.

Maybe he suffers from a curse like Jora, and is unable to channel the spirits in a way that allows him to transform.

As cool as all these ideas about the Realm of Torment, Abaddon, Menzies, Razah, et cetera… I think you’re all setting yourselves up for a major disappointment. I think this story will, unfortunately, go about with us following the footsteps of Scarlet to understand Mordremoth. If something from the original Guild Wars lore pops up, like any of the aforementioned names (or even Mursaat for that matter) then I will be pleasantly surprised. However, I don’t see it happening.

Not trying to be a pessimist or anything. I’m just trying to be realistic and I want to make sure that people don’t hype up the season too much. It led to a huge disappointment with Season One.

Please, this ANet! It can’t be that hard to program, but lord is it annoying to assign privileges to ranks when rank permissions are programmed how they are.

Well I guess ANet figured out how they will charge us for “an expansions worth of content”.

bloodletting wolf.2837:

Mirta.5029:

bloodletting wolf.2837:

I find it hilarious that care bears are complaining about having to grind for gold now when all they did before was grind. How about just playing the game. After spending gold on consumables and siege I don’t make that much per hour but I’m fine with that because I enjoy what I’m doing. I have no sympathy for all of the cry babies that claim that the game is ruined when that type of player has been ruining this game for me from the start.

well I already put the response to “just play the game” statement into my original post – we are stuck with the same game content for two years now. You can only do something so many times until it becomes not entertaining. Unless of course there’s something else behind it that would drive you to repeat the content. Like for example loot.
So no loot = at least give us new permanent content
and
no new content = at least gives us loot to chase after our goals.

And really everything wouldn’t even be as suspicious for me if not the “did you know that you can buy gold from us?” add on their website.

So you have a problem buying gems? Why? If you want new content maybe you should support the company. Too many of the farmers and grinders just turn their gold into gems which I’m pretty sure doesn’t contribute to any sort of development money.

Perhaps people would be more inclined to support Anet if Anet produced something worthy of supporting. We already bought GW2, so we supported them on that front. Now if they want us to buy a bunch of gems with real cash, produce content worthy of it. It’s ridiculous that I can spend ~$50.00 in gems for BL keys and not even get a ticket, or spend ~$40.00 to get 3 infinite gathering kits and a salvage kit.

If you buy a bunch of gems now, you’re only supporting the micro-transaction market. Anet knows this. That’s why the price of armor pieces is so spontaneous. One day you can get a set of armor for 800 gems, another day a crappy scar/face paint will cost you 500 gems, and now Anet is selling individual armor pieces for ~300 gems each which will total a set to 1800 gems instead of 800. I see no reason to support a company that is only looking to milk us at every chance they get.

Shiren.9532:

Why would someone who displays the same skill now not obtain the same reward as someone who displayed skill last time? Let them get the mini, if the content is the same, the reward should be the same.

Because people who displayed the skill required last time weren’t awarded with a title? Those people have to go and kill Liadri again to get it.

Is there any reason why this achievement was reset? I already killed Liadri and I have her minipet. I don’t really have an interest in killing her again for something that should have been awarded in the first place.

I like how I beat her already, and Anet reset my achievement :c

Iplaytokill.1674:

This surprises you? It’s been like this for months. All throughout the LS. New content? Nope. New gem store items? Weekly.

It doesn’t surprise me that much. I never really read the gemstore pages before though. I’d get all my information from Reddit. So they’ve been advertising this all along? Eck.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/incredible-new-items-in-the-gem-store-4/

“Get More Gold!
Remember that you can exchange gems and gold at our currency exchange on the second tab of the Black Lion Trading Company! Currently, you can get 1 gold for about 15 gems and 50 gold for about 675 gems!”

Maybe I’m the only one that thinks this, but it seems like a sleazy move to advertise gems as a way to get more gold to deal with the ever-inflating cost of items in GW2.

It would be kind of cool to build Lion’s Arch using the remains of the Breachmaker or w/e Scarlet’s drill was called.

Dean Calaway.9718:

Jamin.6528:

Refer to my first post.

Refer back to his/her post.

I hope you realize that there were two portions to my quote. It seems like you bundled them together to form some sort of retort though. I suppose this is the part where I respond to you in full:

• Never did I say that I wanted as many skills as GW1 offered. GW1 worked with an entirely different skill system too, in the sense that you could use skills from two professions instead of one. All that I said is that Anet should introduce more skills as time goes on. Think of the new healing skills for example. I was excited when Anet announced them. Releasing new skills over time =/= releasing ~150 skills every year like GW1 did.
• Can you show me where they said that new or already existing weapons have been under work for a long time? Sounds just like the alternative method for obtaining pre-cursors that they have been working on, or guild halls for guilds. Let’s face it, it took Anet ~2 years to make this ‘big’ feature patch. The patch itself was fairly minute though, adding quality of life changes to things that we have been requesting for a long time. If it takes two years to get those quality of life changes in, I would hate to see how long it takes to get actual content and balancing into the game.
• I will admit that Anet was doing a better job with the living story near the end. Still, their tactic of using temporary content has proved inefficient. Players come back to the game and realize that they missed all the content, never to be played again. Sure, LA may have been blown up, that’s definitely a big example of a change. For dealing with an invasion from Scarlet’s forces, who are pretty much the Anti-Pact, I would have expected more changes around the world besides a blown up city, some thumper turrets, and a vista. Anet could have done a lot better with the story and they know it.
• You misread my post, again. I said “What we have is a game that could last for a very long time: …The lack of raiding tiers results in more of a focus on creative cosmetics”. This means that Anet doesn’t have to spend as much time balancing complex raiding content, like Blizzard does when they release expansions. Instead, Anet can focus on making ‘creative cosmetics’; awesome and beautiful stuff that people would want to buy. As I mentioned in one of my later points though, we instead have Anet going to quick cash grabs. Refer to Mask of the Wanderer/Silent Something for examples, as well as Flamekissed armor.
• So I think you identified a crucial point here – There’s a lack of real challenging content in PvE. Anything that is challenging, like fotm 50 for example, gives poor rewards. The three-headed wurm also gives terrible loot for the amount of effort and coordination required to down it.
• Buys are voluntary to an extent. You said so yourself though that there is no gear treadmill in GW2. The only thing that players have to look forward to are new skins. If all of these new, and arguably better looking skins, are being released through the gemstore, then of course many players will feel compelled to buy them. It’s the only way to progress in what I like to call the Cosmetic Treadmill!
• Where did I say that Anet was the one rigging matches? I said “Rigged wvw matches that are decided before they are even played.” You really have to stop misquoting me, as it takes credibility away from your rebuttal. WvW is structured in a way where servers can collaborate and decide matches before the game even begins. Take a look at tier 1 for an example of this.
• The gambling issue is still a problem. I questioned the legality of it because it is an online gambling option for in-game goods. This is a service that Anet has proffered to those below the age required to actually engage in gambling. It doesn’t matter that there is an alternative. An example of this dilemma would be: offering a child a chance to play on the slot machines in a casino. The child can either (1) use money that they have, or got from their parents, to gamble with, or (2) go work in the back for hours on end until they earn the equivalent to the cash required to gamble. This example correlates with the gemstore gambling dilemma, in the sense that players can either (1) buy the gems with cash and gamble, or (2) spend a lot longer farming gold in-game to buy a chance at gambling. No matter how you spin it, there is a moral dilemma that Anet is offering children a chance to gamble online, and I don’t know how the Legislature or the Courts would respond to that. I would be very interested in seeing such a response though!

You’ll find that I haven’t merely bashed GW2. I still support the game to an extent and hope it does well. I’m just very disappointed in the direction that Anet is taking.

Karizee.8076:

Probably a good thing they are being removed, they never were very popular.

They’ve been out for a year and still only cost 3 tickets, most weapons go to 5 or 7 tickets within a couple months. Never see anyone using them.

Still seems like a silly reason to remove them. Anet has been criticized numerous times for all the temporary content that they have put out, and now they’re removing skin items too?

Donari.5237:

Here’s the interview where Colin explained the problem:

http://www.usgamer.net/articles/colin-johanson-talks-dungeons-dragons-and-chairs

Not going to lie, I lol’d irl. WoW has races of different sizes, but it doesn’t have this problem. I’m sure someone will come in here and explain how difficult it would be for Anet to go back and change this, but really I think it would not be that hard of a task to solve. Just do what WoW did.

Porterhouse.6304:

Jamin.6528:

Sounds like they’re artificially creating scarcity in an attempt to get more sales. I hate it when they do that.

^^^^^^^^ This

Though, I have to wonder if it works.

It does, otherwise they wouldn’t do it. That’s not to say that it doesn’t tick off a portion of their player base though. It’s the same with the old RNG boxes that they had for Southsun/Molten weapons. Sure, they were profitable enough to continue for a few seasons, but eventually the profit that they were making was not worth the amount of backlash that they were receiving.

It’s the same here. By removing these from the merchant, it will cause people who want the skin, or who simply want to unlock it for their wardrobe, to (1) key farm to no end, which will become very dull, and then (2) buy a bunch of Black Lion keys and hope for the best. Black Lion keys in and of themselves are RNG boxes in disguise.

Instead of getting new professions, I would like Anet to provide competitive alternatives to each profession in each game mode.

Why implement something like a Ritualist, when you could augment the Necromancer with Ritualist-like skills and make the Necromancer competitive in other areas (specifically PvE, where it is lackluster compared to other professions).

Fix the professions that we have already, then worry about adding new professions when the core eight get dull. If Anet plays their cards right though, the core eight professions won’t get dull.

Gulesave.5073:

The Chinese Living World is supposed to keep up to date with our own. Rebooting back to intact LA would be difficult and pointless, because everything else in the game meshes with it being destroyed.

Except the personal story.

Tell us more about this teacher that you got pregnant.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Jamin — I cannot see any new ticket from you, not since February. I suggest you find the auto-receipt confirmation e-mail or if you do not have that, submit a new ticket. Because if this is the account for which you wish to get a refund, this account has no current/unresolved tickets in its folder.

The number/title for the ticket is — 549929:Re: Gem Store Item Refunds

Glad to see you guys lost my ticket and I have been wasting my time. I’ll submit another one.

Gaile Gray.6029:

You should be receiving automatic updates. I know that’s not the best way to communicate, but it is a way to let you know your ticket didn’t fall into the abyss, and with the heavy volume, it’s something we want to send, just to touch base and let you know your ticket is properly assigned and will be addressed as soon as possible.

Jamin and Feycat — are you not getting any communication from us whatsoever, not even the automatic updates? Or are you getting those but are not seeing forward movement on the ticket?

Thanks for that info.

Since my ticket was transferred on April 17, I have not received any communication; no messages from an employee and no automated messages.

Gaile Gray.6029:

Dead Smexy.1456:

Yup, it did take me over a week. I submitted on patch day, so you should be close! To Gaile, I think the auto-update system is a great idea. You should keep it in effect permanently. It’s always reassuring, even if only an automated message, to know that you haven’t been forgotten about.

I like it too, even though I know some people are irritated by the “auto-send” nature of the response. But with delays, I personally like to know things are moving along, that the company still knows I’m waiting, and so forth.

Thanks for the vote of confidence.

And yes, things are moving along, albeit not as swiftly as either our players or we would like! :-/

So my ticket was transferred to another department on April 17, 2014. I have yet to receive an auto-update message of any sorts, nor have I received any confirmation that my ticket is being looked into. When can I expect this?

And thus the ploy is further highlighted. Amidst this grand wardrobe feature, ANet has designed a system that will require us to buy more transmutations via the gemstore than we ever had to before.

My mistake? Trying to reform trolls.

Well… Contrary to what people are saying, specific unnamed ANet staff members were going around and issuing bans for AFKers. This was back in the first phase of Attack on Lion’s Arch though. I don’t know what their stance is now, since I have yet to see that employee in Lion’s Arch.

But yeah, people have been banned for AFKing.

fadeaway.2807:

Can I suggest a mini taimi available to all with a portion of profits going to a multiple sclerosis related charity?

I don’t know how I overlooked this. Thankfully, I saw it quoted many times after. This would certainly be a great idea. It’s easy enough to program, gets people into the gemstore, gives a fair chunk of the profit to charity [because I doubt ANet would give 100% away] and overall gives ANet publicity and a good reputation.

Get on it ANet.

I’m all for this idea. Other game companies have done special things for players like Christina before.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

Jamin.6528:

I like how this is still a debate between AFKers and Power-Hungry-Devs. No one is accounting for the people who get banned without reason. They are between these two groups, and it is that group of people that I am sticking up for. If ANet wants to ban AFKers, then fine, but make it transparent so we know what we can and can’t do, and make it an automated system so there is no human error.

The last thing I want to do is log on and think of the endless possibilities that could get me banned. I should be able to just sit down, read some clear-cut rules, and play the game. I can’t do that when we have Devs on power trips.

The people who got kicked deserved so. People who got 72 hour suspensions got what they deserved as well, because they repeated the behaviors that got them kicked in the first place. We call this an open-and-shut case.

They deserved it? Maybe some of them did, but certainly not all. I’m disturbed by how blind you are Penguin. I had a level of respect for you before because you were at least passive and articulate with your statements. Now, not so sure. In the case of my friend, she kept reconnecting and was disconnected shortly afterwards, without even AFKing. This shows that the standards that the ‘ANet dev in question’ outlined in his conversation with me weren’t even being followed. He was doing his own thing. That should not be promoted in a company like this.

I don’t see why you want to defend the actions of this employee. I’ve been supporting ANet since GW: Prophecies first came out. That’s almost a DECADE of support as a customer. I don’t want to see this one guy tarnish the reputation of a company that has been around for almost a decade. I don’t want to see the day come when I, as a loyal follower and supporter of ANet, am randomly banned because one guy goes on a power trip. I would hate to see the same happen to you or anyone else.

I like how this is still a debate between AFKers and Power-Hungry-Devs. No one is accounting for the people who get banned without reason. They are between these two groups, and it is that group of people that I am sticking up for. If ANet wants to ban AFKers, then fine, but make it transparent so we know what we can and can’t do, and make it an automated system so there is no human error.

The last thing I want to do is log on and think of the endless possibilities that could get me banned. I should be able to just sit down, read some clear-cut rules, and play the game. I can’t do that when we have Devs on power trips.

CETheLucid.3964:

Jamin.6528:

-snip-

K. Good luck with your arraignment and preliminary support ticket m8.

Don’t worry man I will! Thanks for all your concern O u O

CETheLucid.3964:

Sorry. There’s legitimate reason to doubt your claims.

If this all happened in a matter of mere moments, yet your friend was kicked at least three times with a GM telling you it’s 5+ with attempts to communicate.

There’s a disconnect there on your part. If we’re going to be strict on the word, that’s at least 15 mins of AFK bare minimum.

Further, there’s reason to believe it’s not all that cut and dry. Anet are as infamous for their mercy as they are their decisive action.

Again, life happens and as long as you’re not making it a budding hobby to be AFK in the LA event constantly, you have nothing to worry about.

Leech at your own risk. It’s proven they have a lighter and they’re not afraid to use it.
_

No high horse here. Just reasonable doubt. I’m sure you understand that.

You do realize that “reasonable doubt” [as I’m sure you’re referencing it in the criminal law context, based on your “I’m sure you understand that” comment] doesn’t apply to the accused’s defence. It is the prosecutions job [aka ANet employee in this analogy] to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that my friend did what he states she did. He has shown no evidence. If anything, he said “this is our procedure” and “she knows what she did wrong”. That’s hardly proof. I invite him to come into this topic, with chat logs and a log of his GM powers, to show that my friend deserved the ban. If he can come in with proof that my friend was banned for the reason he stated [actual proof, not just his word, because his honesty is in question here] then I’ll back down. Otherwise, he’s just another employee abusing his power. I don’t stand down to bullies or tyrants like that; I stand up and show the populace who they really are.

CETheLucid.3964:

… Have you considered teaching law?

Cool response man. Does it have any purpose for this argument, or are you just trying to make some sort of personal attack on me? If it’s the latter, that severely diminishes your argument.

CETheLucid.3964:

They say I was AFKing? Oh kitten, I’m in trouble? Deny, deny, deny.
^
Vast majority of humanity.

I was trying to troubleshoot the problem with her the whole time. When we found out it was due to “offensive behavior”, we thought it meant that someone in PvP reported her or something. Never in our mind did we think that AFKing constituted some sort of offensive behavior. That’s stretching the definition a bit, don’t you think?

CETheLucid.3964:

You’re basically asking the GM: How long can I ride the edge of the rules to exploit dubious thing before I am actioned against?

In a sense, yes, that is what I am asking. Compare this to speed signs for example. If a sign says I can only go 70 km/hr, then that is the limit. If I am pulled over by a cop for going 75 km/hr, I know why I was pulled over. The standard for “offensive behavior” is not clear though. It’s the equivalent of turning the 70 km/hr sign into a sign that says “moderate speed”. What is a moderate speed? Would that be 50 km/hr? What about 30 km/hr? Or even 100 km/hr? There is no certainty! All that I am asking for is some certainty.

If anything, you are the one rewording my concerns. For some reason, you’re engraving some malicious intent into my actions. I don’t know why you’re doing that, or why you have such a high stake in defending this employee’s action. If anything, it seems like you’re just trying to act high and mighty on that horse of yours, as I have already stated.

CETheLucid.3964:

You understand they can’t tell you exact specifics like that for a very good reason, right?

Can you prove they weren’t acting in good faith based on the evidence you yourself brought?

Or are we back at the beginning of the circle about how it’s okay to AFK events at the expense of others?

Since you cited the criminal law example of “reasonable doubt”, I’ll continue the analogy down here. A criminal never has to prove that they are innocent. They are, presumptively, innocent until proven guilty. An accused only has a tactical burden to prove their innocence when the prosecution raises enough evidence to show that the accused did that action [actus reus] and intended to do that action [mens rea], beyond a reasonable doubt.

The ANet employee here has shown no proof. If anything though, I invite Qt Spy/Permapan/Chris Cleary to come and demonstrate why this ban was justified. Show us the chat logs, show us the time stamps, show us the whispers that he made to my friend. I provided some of my proof, even though I don’t have to. They are the “prosecution” in this analogy, and the burden is on them to show that my friend did what she did.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

I, too, have some legal background, albeit not as much as you guys (I assume). But that’s besides the point. I would like to point out that we’re 1) not allowed to debate decisions, appeal or contest on other player’s suspensions and such
(https://www.guildwars2.com/en/legal/forum-code-of-conduct/)
and 2) you can’t compare procedures with our legal system with that of Anet’s decisions in-game. Anet does have full rights to do what they feel is best for their game. If someone was suspended incorrectly, or inappropriately, that person can dispute that with Customer Support agents.

Is transparency good? Of course it is. But Anet, as a company, has the rights to do what they want, when they want. They also have the rights to withhold discussions of policies and practices related to policing their rules. Call me a White Knight, but I do support Anet employees for this game. That includes the actions they take on people whose activities may be harming other people’s ability to play. If they make a big mistake, I’m not afraid to say something.

GM Chris has access to tool and logs that we player’s don’t have. Could it be a false positive? Yeah, that’s happened. But with less people (potentially) exploiting a loophole in the LA Rescue rewards mechanics, there’d be less need for GMs to take action.

Edit -

Palador.2170:

How did someone with no “special” abilities make it through while under the effects of a quaggan tonic?

I can do the same by activating the tonic at the end of the JP. Do realize quaggans can’t jump.

Customer Support Agents have been ignoring tickets filed in relation to this issue.

Also, of course you’re right. ANet as a company has the right to make decisions in relation to their product. It’s certainly not good business practice to do what they are doing here though. They are destroying customer faith in the company. This is coming from a guy who has supported ANet since GW1 first came out. I have supported them, through thick and thin, but I cannot support them supporting their employees as they abuse their powers.

I’d also like to note that since this has been brought up, the ANet devs have been a whole lot less active in Lion’s Arch. I think they know what they did is wrong. If they want to make AFKing an offence, that is fine, but lay it out clearly.

Also, if we’re not allowed to post this discussion here, then we’ll just move it to Reddit or another forum. The discussion will continue though. If ANet decides to come in and shut it down or lock it, that just shows that they have no interest in reassuring their customers that everything will be alright.

CETheLucid.3964:

Jamin.6528:

Refer to my screenshots. He did ban people.

TL;DR
Your friend screwed up and you put on your lawyer persona (I’m a lawyer you know!) to talk about it.

A lot of it is your friends word VS the GM, and I’m certain you have a particular bias there for your lady friend.

You just know she’d tell you if she was PM’d and asked to stop AFKing.

She wouldn’t hide a detail like that from you to make herself out as a victim or be seen as less responsible for the fiasco or anything.

I’m sorry your friend was suspended just the same. If you’re going be AFK a lot (as opposed to generally), doing it in the LA rescue event isn’t a good idea.

http://www.upl.co/uploads/DFABo701.jpg
http://www.upl.co/uploads/wdaB5372.jpg
http://www.upl.co/uploads/HO1TsWr3.jpg
http://www.upl.co/uploads/cHaDaep4.jpg
http://www.upl.co/uploads/3vN0uOI5.jpg

Clearly, you didn’t read my previous posts. I was in the same party as her, in the same server as her, running around with her, and talking on Skype with her. The only two times she went AFK were when she went to the washroom (which took a whole 30 seconds or so) and when she went to switch the music on plug.dj. It’s hard to hide a detail like that when I am there with her THE WHOLE TIME.

The friend you see messaging me in chat is a different friend. She responded after I went into guild chat and said “Make sure you don’t AFK for any period of time in Lion’s Arch, or you risk getting yourself banned”. People were asking me questions about it.

Also, of course I am going to put a legal persona on. I am in the field of law, and this was a suspension we were discussing, similar to that of a prosecution. You can’t prosecute someone and throw them in jail if you don’t even say what they have done wrong. Nor can you go into a civil case and get damages or an injunction against a person without showing a reason for it. So why should an ANet employee be able to ban someone for “offensive behavior”, and then blatantly state that she knew what she did, when she is asking me what she did wrong. I wasn’t even trying to appeal the ban in that conversation [which I’m sure you read]; rather, I was asking if they could be transparent about WHY she was banned.

Get off your high horse buddy.

timmyf.1490:

Based on the chat log in those screenshots, I consider Qt Spy’s behavior to be even more professional than I had expected.

The fact that another friend of yours specifically asked if you were leeching or AFKing is proof enough that you knew what you were doing.

I would ask you to refer back to the screenshots and my above post then. The issue was never with how he responded. He was using structured sentences and responding in a fairly mature tone. The problem is what he is DOING and WHY he is doing it. If ANet wants to ban AFKers, then put an automated system in that can be appealed subject to an ANet employee investigating it. It was Qt Spy and Permapan [The names themselves even raise suspicion] that were running around banning people. Look around you bud, there’s plenty of posts of people who were banned for being AFK.

If ANet really wants to ban AFKers, I am fine with it, so long as they are transparent about it and show their standard and definition for AFKing. At the moment, I don’t know what constitutes AFKing, and neither do you. If I turn away from my desk for a few seconds to get something behind me and then turn around… Can an ANet employee come along and ban me in that ~4 second period for being AFK? Standards need to be outlined, otherwise you are inviting employees to abuse their power.

JustTrogdor.7892:

Leo Paul.1659:

@JustTrogdor, if they are going to make a sudden change in policy then they better be transparent. And if I think it is reasonable then let me click on that “agree” button on their EULA again. Seems like you’re someone who just accept things thrown at you blindly.

It’s right here:

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/legal/guild-wars-2-user-agreement/

11. A. i.

You understand that You have no fundamental right whatsoever to use the Game, and that You understand that NCSOFT may in its sole and absolute discretion terminate Your ability to access or use the Game for any reason or for no reason whatsoever;

You agreed. So if you get kicked for AFK you can’t complain, like it or not.

If you’re arguing that we’ve agreed to this, then let’s go back to some basics of contract law. A contract needs offer, acceptance, an intention to be legally bound, and consideration to be given. Absent all of those, the contract is not binding. If we own nothing from ANet, then the contract is null and they should terminate every one of our accounts. Would they do that though? No! Because then they’ll lose all their money.

Be practical man.

JustTrogdor.7892:

GMs kicking people from events for standing AFK for extended periods of time is fine with me. That is part of their job to look out for the best interest of those that are actively playing. If you ask me we need more GMs during events just to do such things. They would come in handy during activities like Crab Toss and Keg Brawl where people just stand around waiting to get their daily activity credit. I wish they would have been doing this during the early times of Teq when people were AFKing just for achievements.

I still find it funny that there are a few people here that have spent so much effort arguing for the rights for people to stand running into a corner just to get rewards. Basically what I am reading from some people is, “Down with the man! You have no right to kick me!” Yes, yes they do and it seems they are. My guess is some of you don’t even AFK or even spend much time in LA but as soon as you see “Anet Dev kicking AFKers,” you go into rage mode just for the sake of arguing, “Don’t tell me how to play! Down with ANET!”

That’s the last I have to say in regard to this issue, rage on.

Nice rewording there bro, but no. People aren’t fighting for the right to AFK. People are asking ANet to be transparent and to adhere to their own rules. ANet has always taken their time with bans in the past: they gather information, look at chat logs, etc. Here, they are banning people on the spot.

Smooth Penguin.5294:

Teofa Tsavo.9863:

In those cases, Anet disabled the content, investigated, punished the “Worst” abusers and made the information known to all.

They have yet to address anything on the LA “issue”, and did in fact implement the event with no participation required. They haven’t changed that. They haven’t announced anything re AFK in LA. They have not responded to it in any official manner out of game. They have not given a rules framework.. ie.. 5 mins inactive, 10, 15, nothing. No rules to go by. As it stands now, you could participate 30 mins, take a short break… and be suspended upon the whim of whoever sees you standing still with no real investigation done.

What has happened is one.. perhaps 2 Anet employees have taken it upon themselves to “police” the event by handing out suspensions for macro use or offensive behavior, apparently on their own time and on the spot snap decisions.

But you hit on the crux of the matter for you I think. A remote chance at an item worth “hundreds of gold”. It isn’t about citizen rescues at all… is it. It’s about your bag farming, and resentment that somewhere, someone may get the item you wanted..by not playing YOUR way. That thought makes me warm and fuzzy, actually.

As far as whether Anet “intended” it… they coded it. No participation needed. A person doing a JP will get it. A person taking screenshots, exploring, doing Vistas will get it. A zerg farming champs will get it. A person only doing other activities will get it. You do not have to rescue to get rescue rewards. Seems fairly clear.. and if not “intended”, then, fixable by other means than capricious suspensions.

But you seem fine with capricious, summary, inconsistant suspensions.. because you have preordained that anyone who gets one.. is “offensive” and deserves it, no matter the circumstances. GG.

You missed the part where I said to debate whether or not Anet intended for people to be rewarded for doing nothing. Once you get away from defending the AFKers, and ask yourself that primary question, you’ll find it much harder to defend your position. Just because it’s “coded” that way, doesn’t mean it was “intended” that way. Same as saying “Anet didn’t specifically say it’s not ok, so it must be ok.” That, my friend, is a fallacy.

Now back to the GM. It’s been said that he didn’t suspend anyone for AFKing. That’s fine. Getting kicked isn’t much of a punishment, save for not being able to get rewards. If someone was suspended by mistake, Customer Support will fix it.

Refer to my screenshots. He did ban people.

Blade Syphon.4325:

TheFool.4589:

Jamin.6528:

TheFool.4589:

Again, who’s to say she didn’t afk during the duration of the event? You don’t know what she truly did or did not do. No one tells the truth when asked. Again, there’s possibly something your friend isn’t telling you. Just saying.
Point again being is they kicked afkers due to them hindering progress towards the events goal. Anyone caught doing so was reported. Enough reports, means gms take actions. Also of coarse devs have powers. That’s like saying retail workers don’t get discounts for working at their store. End of story.

Let me try to be more clear…

Her and I were in the same party. Her and I were in the same server [Lion’s Arch Blackgate]. Her and I were travelling together, farming heirlooms, events, and rescuing citizens where we could. Her and I were talking via voice chat on Skype. She suddenly disconnected. She reconnected, and then disconnected ~2 minutes after joining. She got back in, was kicked off ~2 minutes after logging in because “Someone else had logged into her account”. Now she is banned.

Even if she lied to me about anything, which I don’t think she did, I was there for the whole thing. The only thing she did that would have caused her to stop moving for a while is change her play list on plug.dj, which did NOT take longer than 5 minutes.

My conversation with Qt Spy was less than satisfying as well. If ANet isn’t going to be clear about this, then I can post my entire chat log with him and show everyone what he said to me. First he expressly said that people WERE NOT being banned for AFKing. Then, after more prodding, he said something along the lines of “But really, if she was banned for offensive behavior, then she knows that she was doing something bad”. Meanwhile my friend is still on Skype and in tears because she STILL doesn’t know what she did wrong. All we have to go off of is this one guy, acting like a vigilant, making his own laws. This isn’t DC, he can’t go around being the kitten Batman.

Post it then. And again who’s to say she didn’t do the event without you and went afk for it? You’re gonna take her word for it of coarse, but you don’t really know what she did. That’s all I’m saying. People are good at begging and complaining rather then confessing they did something wrong. It’s human nature. Side note, do you know her in RL? As in person? Or is she a guildy? If you don’t know her in RL then you really don’t know who she is or what she would do.

Dear lord, I’ve heard of people blindly defending Anet’s decisions for anything, but this takes the cake. Hell, this takes the entire kitten ed bakery.

He said he was playing with her The Entire Time, he was with her When She was Disconnected, He was there with her On Skype, talking about the entire thing, during the entire duration of the event.

And yet you still proceed to call him and her both a liar, and that Anet is perfectly alright with banning her. Even after a Anet Employee in this topic has out right said they don’t have the power, or the privileged, to use their GM commands without kitten ed good reason.

There are no words for you. You are literally arguing against the facts as they’re shoved right in your face, because heaven forbid a company you worship for whatever ridiculous reason is revealed to have a few rotten eggs in it that abuse their power.

Don’t worry. As his name says, he’s a fool, and I was a fool for trying to argue with him. He’ll just drag me down to his level of stupidity and then beat me with experience. Instead, I’ll just link my screenshots of Qt Spy camping, as well as my conversation with him.

First round of pictures: http://imgur.com/O4wgqMW,JTgDnrq,IvJ1M4Q,86MZ5vI,pkittenXyL,NHIRhMv,xlJhmJf,4tA8il4,IZ6eOX5,6LlfolH,BbosT4e,XseWl82,1pmuKAL,zGheXlr,vpwFUX1,gZxxOpd,xpswf45,L5XYE1P

The second round of pictures, which includes me talking to my friends and warning them that they’re not allowed to AFK… Even though there are no rules about it:
http://imgur.com/kShbFs9,T7VA97k,AXSmuIC,DFABo70,wdaB537,HO1TsWr,cHaDaep,3vN0uOI

ANet, if you want to save face at all, get your darling Chris Clearly, Qt Spy, or whoever in here and get him to explain his actions. I’ll just keep linking these screenshots, and I would hate to take them to NCSoft. You guys may enjoy your power trip, but you’re still under them, and they still want to make money. It’d be a shame if a big guild like [HC] up and moved to another game… Along with many other people.

Maybe this isn’t the proper forum to talk about our complaints of Qt Spy/Chris Clearly and ANet’s approach. Maybe we should direct the complaints to NCSoft directly?

TheFool.4589:

Again, who’s to say she didn’t afk during the duration of the event? You don’t know what she truly did or did not do. No one tells the truth when asked. Again, there’s possibly something your friend isn’t telling you. Just saying.
Point again being is they kicked afkers due to them hindering progress towards the events goal. Anyone caught doing so was reported. Enough reports, means gms take actions. Also of coarse devs have powers. That’s like saying retail workers don’t get discounts for working at their store. End of story.

Let me try to be more clear…

Her and I were in the same party. Her and I were in the same server [Lion’s Arch Blackgate]. Her and I were travelling together, farming heirlooms, events, and rescuing citizens where we could. Her and I were talking via voice chat on Skype. She suddenly disconnected. She reconnected, and then disconnected ~2 minutes after joining. She got back in, was kicked off ~2 minutes after logging in because “Someone else had logged into her account”. Now she is banned.

Even if she lied to me about anything, which I don’t think she did, I was there for the whole thing. The only thing she did that would have caused her to stop moving for a while is change her play list on plug.dj, which did NOT take longer than 5 minutes.

My conversation with Qt Spy was less than satisfying as well. If ANet isn’t going to be clear about this, then I can post my entire chat log with him and show everyone what he said to me. First he expressly said that people WERE NOT being banned for AFKing. Then, after more prodding, he said something along the lines of “But really, if she was banned for offensive behavior, then she knows that she was doing something bad”. Meanwhile my friend is still on Skype and in tears because she STILL doesn’t know what she did wrong. All we have to go off of is this one guy, acting like a vigilant, making his own laws. This isn’t DC, he can’t go around being the kitten Batman.

Malediktus.9250:

I hope Anet will review the GM/dev in question and take actions if neccessary.

I hope so as well. If not, other games are coming out soon. The last thing any of us need is to be bullied by devs…

TheFool.4589:

Jamin.6528:

Yeah, I saw Qt Spy as well. I actually followed him and another ANet employee around named “Permapan”. The majority of the time, those two were also standing at the exit to Gendarran fields, not participating in the event.

I don’t know why some of the players here are jumping to ANet’s defense so quickly. This is clearly an abuse of power. One of these employees told me that they ban people based on a “three warning system”, where they will disconnect you from the game. If they disconnect you from the game, and you reconnect, and they disconnect you a second time, and you reconnect, then their third disconnect will be a ban.

I can testify, from personal experience, that my friend was disconnected. She tried to reconnect and figure out why she was being disconnected. She ran over to me to participate in the Black Lion Dolyak event, and then she’s disconnected again. She gets in again, and right after she joins she is kicked with an error along the lines of “someone else has logged into this account”. We go to her account on the forums to check the account security and see what IP logged on, and to see if we could disconnect it, because we thought she was being hacked. Nope, turned out to be a ban.

My conversation with an ‘anonymous’ ANet employee was less than satisfying at first. The employee in question tried to dodge as many questions as possible, and expressly said that they were not banning people for AFKing. After some more prodding though, he actually admitted to banning people for AFKing, because AFKing in an event like this is ‘degrading to the experience of others’ and constitutes ‘offensive behavior’.

This is nothing more than an abuse of power. You can’t go and ban your player base like this for utilizing mechanics that you, ANet, established. We’re playing the game as it exists. If there is a problem with it, then fix it, but let me inform you that banning people like this is a very good way to lose customers… I’ll be sorely disappointed if one of the following does not happen:

- An individual review for each case, and compensation awarded where warranted.
- Someone getting fired for this.

I’m not going to play a game where we have to fear the developer as if they are like Big Brother. If you don’t like the way players are playing, then revamp your EULA so that it is articulate and transparent [as opposed to broad, unspecific, and overreaching] and fix your actual game so that people can’t ‘degrade the experience of others’ like this. Overflows have always been a problem when it comes to big events like this… We told you this when Tequatl came out. That was back in September of 2013. You’ve had time to fix the overflow system since then, but you haven’t, so this is all on you.

TL;DR – Don’t punish the players for mistakes made by ANet.

You just said it yourself they were kicking people for being afk in the event. Maybe your friend was one of those reported for afking in the event. Did your friend afk in the event at all? Is she telling the truth? You know what’s going on. People want those bags, and what better way to get them then sit in the event and let others do all the work while they reap the rewards. I’m not assuming your friend did. But I am saying there’s a reason for everything and most of the time it’s because someone not telling the truth.

I was in Skype with her throughout the entire event. We thought it was due to lag. Turns out it was an ANet employee kicking her.

Do you want to know the ironic part? Qt Spy actually died, and my friend resurrected him LOL. How does he return the favor? Bans her of course.

Yeah, I saw Qt Spy as well. I actually followed him and another ANet employee around named “Permapan”. The majority of the time, those two were also standing at the exit to Gendarran fields, not participating in the event.

I don’t know why some of the players here are jumping to ANet’s defense so quickly. This is clearly an abuse of power. One of these employees told me that they ban people based on a “three warning system”, where they will disconnect you from the game. If they disconnect you from the game, and you reconnect, and they disconnect you a second time, and you reconnect, then their third disconnect will be a ban.

I can testify, from personal experience, that my friend was disconnected. She tried to reconnect and figure out why she was being disconnected. She ran over to me to participate in the Black Lion Dolyak event, and then she’s disconnected again. She gets in again, and right after she joins she is kicked with an error along the lines of “someone else has logged into this account”. We go to her account on the forums to check the account security and see what IP logged on, and to see if we could disconnect it, because we thought she was being hacked. Nope, turned out to be a ban.

My conversation with an ‘anonymous’ ANet employee was less than satisfying at first. The employee in question tried to dodge as many questions as possible, and expressly said that they were not banning people for AFKing. After some more prodding though, he actually admitted to banning people for AFKing, because AFKing in an event like this is ‘degrading to the experience of others’ and constitutes ‘offensive behavior’.

This is nothing more than an abuse of power. You can’t go and ban your player base like this for utilizing mechanics that you, ANet, established. We’re playing the game as it exists. If there is a problem with it, then fix it, but let me inform you that banning people like this is a very good way to lose customers… I’ll be sorely disappointed if one of the following does not happen:

- An individual review for each case, and compensation awarded where warranted.
- Someone getting fired for this.

I’m not going to play a game where we have to fear the developer as if they are like Big Brother. If you don’t like the way players are playing, then revamp your EULA so that it is articulate and transparent [as opposed to broad, unspecific, and overreaching] and fix your actual game so that people can’t ‘degrade the experience of others’ like this. Overflows have always been a problem when it comes to big events like this… We told you this when Tequatl came out. That was back in September of 2013. You’ve had time to fix the overflow system since then, but you haven’t, so this is all on you.

TL;DR – Don’t punish the players for mistakes made by ANet.

I talked to an ANet employee on Blackgate. I can confirm, from their mouth, that the AFKing is the offensive behavior in question, as it “degrades the experience” of others.

Oh no! Lion’s Arch is going to blow up tomorrow. Whatever will [HC] do without their famous AFK lounge? Maybe you should come find out!

I was under the impression that Lion’s Arch was going to be like any other explorable area. It will no longer be like a main city. With that being said, expect zerg fests and many overflows.

Marcello the Bard will now be Hero-Tron’s sidekick, Bard-Boy!

WvW elitism too good.

PigGee.7426:

Jamin.6528:

Got a lovely little dance lineup going on while we were waiting for Marionette. Afk times are fun times!

We even had a dance lineup in our undies in a snowy covered Lions Arch!.

I think I remember that lol. I miss snowy LA.