Teach SSG a lesson

[Forzah]

DDO literally sells faster advancement. People exploited to get faster advancement without paying for it. Pretty clear cut and dry stealing.



Nope, just as I dont assume that every person caught shoplifting at the mall would have bought the item they stole. The fact that they wouldnt have purchased it doesnt make them "not a shoplifter"

The players did not bring their own XP. They took something the company sells (faster advancement) from their game, without paying for it. They didnt show up with their own drinks. They showed up with their own cups, and filled them with soda from the restaurants dispenser and then left without paying, then justify that because the restaurant manager didnt tackle every single person who did it, that somehow makes it bad on the company when they are charged with shoplifting later on after the surveillance videos are reviewed and the perps identified.

Even if SSG wouldn't sell faster advancement, exploiting like this would still be a bannable offense. This shows that the fact that faster advancement is also sold in the store is irrelevant. Hence, advancing faster than intended like this is not stealing, and thus the analogy is inaccurate.

The fact that people are repeatedly willing to debate which analogy best fits their viewpoint which exonerates the players who partook of the exploit as much as possible, shows how complicit this community really has become over the years, and is a testament to how enforcing the rules and setting the example years ago would have avoided the vast majority of this kind of stuff.

No, it does not show that.

[Throckmortonn]

So I read through a lot of this post, and I think many of the analogies used are biased on both sides. This deletion of toons is completely different than any reaction that any of the companies owning DDO had done before. I have two toons I am assuming are deleted, and that's fine. I cheated. I deserve a little punishment, but at the same time, this was my first ban, and I've been playing for over 10 years. I probably bypassed 5-6 lives across the two characters, so lets say 3 lives on each character since I learned about the "sploit" in December. I could've easily done those lives over the course of the last three months, but I used the "sploit" instead because doing heroic lives makes me want to blow my brains out. One of my toons that got deleted was a honest to god heroic completionist. Not only was it an honest completionist toon, but I did every past life back before Otto's Boxes, Xp pots over 20%, and Tomes of Learning. Back then, it took me and my dad, who played this game with me, 4 years playing on average 4 hours a day to get heroic completionist with pure lives. (Meaning pure class every life.) I think we were some of the first people to obtain completionist in this fashion, and we spent a whole lot of money on cakes, 20% XP pots, and hearts of wood (because these had to be bought for some time too). I enjoyed heroic lives back then, and when we were done, I didn't do a reincarnation until Artificer came out, because by the time we had finished I was sick of the same quests over and over again. But none the less, with another year passing, I did quite a few lives. I eventually got quite a few Epic past lives done, and many heroic lives done with the help of Otto's Boxes. And on my main character I did 3 Past lives with this "sploit". The amount of time I spent into that character probably doesn't deserve the deletion, but hey, it happened and I'll probably never play a SSG game ever again. Not because they deleted the character, but because the way they went about everything.

I try to log in and there is a failure. One week later, still no email. Find out I got banned for cheating, *sigh* and say oh well, I probably deserved it.
Find out my toon has been deleted when this is my first ban in 10 years. Not only that, but let's just go over all the Experience Exploits I can remember that practically no one got banned for.
Duping Otto's Boxes, Duping Saga end rewards round 1, Duping Stones of Experience, Duping Daily Dice Stones of Experience, Duping Saga Stones round 2, Talking to the Girl in the Rift between worlds to get all your epic XP back when you do an ETR, using a Macro to farm the optional xp at the beginning of The Crucible, and Farming the Optional XP in The Codex and the Shroud.

Those are not including exploits such as using Twists of fate in heroic levels to instantly kill everything up to around level 15, Using the Tornados from the cards to run through all the heroic content and get to level 20 in a day, using endless supplies of 50% XP potions to make heroic lives easier, etc..

I'll call the most recent xp exploit "Duping Saga Stones: Round 3". So for about 5 years, any XP cheat nets someone a ban and a slap on the wrist (if that, because many people never got banned). Now the EULA or TOS, I don't really care which one, states that SSG has the right to do blah blah blah. Fine doesn't matter. I accept that my toons are gone. However, I do not accept that they would do this to a % of their playerbase and think nothing is going to come of it.

Back to the analogies. This isn't like going 10 over on a highway and finally getting caught, and getting punished.

This is an entire civilization being overtaken by a new King. Old king was set in his ways of letting people pay for **** to possibly duplicate, letting people do whatever they wanted, and not passing really any judgement on it because he just didn't care enough. Then the New King Steps in and doesn't say anything about the old kings ways, or how his is going to be different, or that the actions of the civilization were not condonable, but just waits a year, and when he has witnessed enough crimes being committed, he gathers all the people that did any crime, and kills every single one of them. No warning, no slap on the wrist, just cuts their heads clean off.

Now I'm not saying what they did was wrong, because they probably have the right to destroy my character I spent 10 years of my life developing. I'm obviously not a lawyer lol, so I can't say if they did or not. I'm just simply stating the fact that they did this with no real warning, and without much cause. I would've never spent money to do the past lives I did, because I would've never done the past lives in the first place because I hate heroic leveling.

Anyway this is probably my last post on here lol. I don't think I'll ever play this game again. I kinda spent too much time playing it already.

Lol, I think they had to move toons to scrub them of what was gained by exploit. The deleted toons are reappearing, so folks should just relax.
The sun will come up tomorrow.

[Livmo]

So I read through a lot of this post, and I think many of the analogies used are biased on both sides. This deletion of toons is completely different than any reaction that any of the companies owning DDO had done before. I have two toons I am assuming are deleted, and that's fine. I cheated. I deserve a little punishment, but at the same time, this was my first ban, and I've been playing for over 10 years. I probably bypassed 5-6 lives across the two characters, so lets say 3 lives on each character since I learned about the "sploit" in December. I could've easily done those lives over the course of the last three months, but I used the "sploit" instead because doing heroic lives makes me want to blow my brains out. One of my toons that got deleted was a honest to god heroic completionist. Not only was it an honest completionist toon, but I did every past life back before Otto's Boxes, Xp pots over 20%, and Tomes of Learning. Back then, it took me and my dad, who played this game with me, 4 years playing on average 4 hours a day to get heroic completionist with pure lives. (Meaning pure class every life.) I think we were some of the first people to obtain completionist in this fashion, and we spent a whole lot of money on cakes, 20% XP pots, and hearts of wood (because these had to be bought for some time too). I enjoyed heroic lives back then, and when we were done, I didn't do a reincarnation until Artificer came out, because by the time we had finished I was sick of the same quests over and over again. But none the less, with another year passing, I did quite a few lives. I eventually got quite a few Epic past lives done, and many heroic lives done with the help of Otto's Boxes. And on my main character I did 3 Past lives with this "sploit". The amount of time I spent into that character probably doesn't deserve the deletion, but hey, it happened and I'll probably never play a SSG game ever again. Not because they deleted the character, but because the way they went about everything.

I try to log in and there is a failure. One week later, still no email. Find out I got banned for cheating, *sigh* and say oh well, I probably deserved it.
Find out my toon has been deleted when this is my first ban in 10 years. Not only that, but let's just go over all the Experience Exploits I can remember that practically no one got banned for.
Duping Otto's Boxes, Duping Saga end rewards round 1, Duping Stones of Experience, Duping Daily Dice Stones of Experience, Duping Saga Stones round 2, Talking to the Girl in the Rift between worlds to get all your epic XP back when you do an ETR, using a Macro to farm the optional xp at the beginning of The Crucible, and Farming the Optional XP in The Codex and the Shroud.

Those are not including exploits such as using Twists of fate in heroic levels to instantly kill everything up to around level 15, Using the Tornados from the cards to run through all the heroic content and get to level 20 in a day, using endless supplies of 50% XP potions to make heroic lives easier, etc..

I'll call the most recent xp exploit "Duping Saga Stones: Round 3". So for about 5 years, any XP cheat nets someone a ban and a slap on the wrist (if that, because many people never got banned). Now the EULA or TOS, I don't really care which one, states that SSG has the right to do blah blah blah. Fine doesn't matter. I accept that my toons are gone. However, I do not accept that they would do this to a % of their playerbase and think nothing is going to come of it.

Back to the analogies. This isn't like going 10 over on a highway and finally getting caught, and getting punished.

This is an entire civilization being overtaken by a new King. Old king was set in his ways of letting people pay for **** to possibly duplicate, letting people do whatever they wanted, and not passing really any judgement on it because he just didn't care enough. Then the New King Steps in and doesn't say anything about the old kings ways, or how his is going to be different, or that the actions of the civilization were not condonable, but just waits a year, and when he has witnessed enough crimes being committed, he gathers all the people that did any crime, and kills every single one of them. No warning, no slap on the wrist, just cuts their heads clean off.

Now I'm not saying what they did was wrong, because they probably have the right to destroy my character I spent 10 years of my life developing. I'm obviously not a lawyer lol, so I can't say if they did or not. I'm just simply stating the fact that they did this with no real warning, and without much cause. I would've never spent money to do the past lives I did, because I would've never done the past lives in the first place because I hate heroic leveling.

Anyway this is probably my last post on here lol. I don't think I'll ever play this game again. I kinda spent too much time playing it already.

Based on what you wrote, this may or may not be an area of growth in your personal development.

On a side note (rhetorically), does society have to give reminders not to break the rules or cheat? What responsibility do you hold for not reading and following the terms of service that you agreed to, to play the game?

I would see the experience as positive, rather than a negative. You may find something more worthwhile to do in your spare time in real life that will have more benefit to you, than playing a video game.

[Chai]

Even if SSG wouldn't sell faster advancement, exploiting like this would still be a bannable offense. This shows that the fact that faster advancement is also sold in the store is irrelevant. Hence, advancing faster than intended like this is not stealing, and thus the analogy is inaccurate.

Again with the lawyering of semantics. Using your own logic here, the "executing a jaywalker" analogy you agreed with never has relevance in the first place as it compares real life execution to deletion of a video gamer character, a mere avatar of time investment - not analogous to a living thing.

Waste of time =/= Loss of life.

Furthermore, many (including you) in the past have made "time versus money" arguments equating the two, where someone can choose to invest one or the other in order to get PLs. This refutes your above statement that selling faster advancement is not relevant. This is refuted with the understanding that if they DID NOT sell faster advancement, revenue generation would be directly tethered to the amount of time players spent playing the game (while they pay subscription fees to keep playing), and as it would be expected to take more time to do an ETR without the exploit in place, the exploiters stealing time (faster advancement) by your own logic, equates to the company making less money. Thus validating the shoplifter analogy and refuting the absurd "executing a jaywalker" analogy.

No, it does not show that.

It absolutely does. The MMO industry hasnt seen a community that makes arguments supporting recently disciplined exploiters to the degree the DDO community does, where they create word-smithed analogies (example: executing a jaywalker) which attempt to minimize the negative impact the exploiters have while appearing to maximize the negative impact the punishments have. If you know of one or more MMO communities which engage in this behavior to the degree the DDO community does, and can site examples, feel free. Im happy to have an equal footing discussion on this topic. There are multiple iterations of this in DDOs history, and the overlap in which the same usual suspects make this same exploiter-supporting argument is significant.

In most (likely all) other MMO communities (which I have been a guide/GM in a few, and have moderated more than my fair share) constant posting of support of exploiters as if they have zero or minimal negative impact while at the same time constant argumentation from the same crowd that the company's actions always have maximum negative impact, would be cause for investigating those who engage in this pattern based behavior to observe how far down the rabbit hole their individual complicity each goes. Lets just say that when any of them are found to also be active participants in the fight club antics they so widely and rampantly verbally support with increasing levels of impunity, it is not remotely surprising.

[HungarianRhapsody]

Nope, just as I dont assume that every person caught shoplifting at the mall would have bought the item they stole. The fact that they wouldnt have purchased it doesnt make them "not a shoplifter"

The RIAA loves people like you.

[Forzah]

Again with the lawyering of semantics. Using your own logic here, the analogy never has relevance in the first place as it compares real life execution to deletion of a video gamer character, a mere avatar of time investment - not analogous to a living thing.

Waste of time =/= Loss of life.

The character has been deleted, which is equivalent to being executed. The player of course has not been executed. However, on no level (character or player) this type of exploiting equates to stealing. Hence, the execution analogy has some merit, the stealing analogy has none.

Furthermore, many (including you) in the past have made "time versus money" arguments in the past equating the two, where someone can choose to invest one or the other in order to get PLs. This refutes your above statement that selling faster advancement is not relevant. This is refuted with the understanding that if they DID NOT sell faster advancement, revenue generation would be directly tethered to the amount of time players spent playing the game (while they pay subscription fees to keep playing), and as it would be expected to take more time to do an ETR without the exploit in place, the exploiters stealing time by your own logic, equates to making less money. Thus validating the shoplifter analogy and refuting the absurd "executing a jaywalker" analogy.

Sure, the company makes less money, but they're not being stolen from. Deciding to forgo a sale is not stealing.

Arguably, it would be even a worse crime to exploit like this when faster advancement is not condoned through store sales. By selling it in the store, SSG shows they don't have a fundamental problem with people progressing faster.

It absolutely does. The MMO industry hasnt seen a community that makes arguments supporting recently disciplined exploiters to the degree the DDO community does, where they create word-smithed analogies (example: executing a jaywalker) which minimize the negative impact the exploiters have while appearing to maximize the negative impact the punishments have. If you know of one or more and can site examples, feel free. Im happy to have an equal footing discussion on this topic. There are multiple iterations of this in DDOs history, and the overlap in which the same usual suspects make this same argument is significant.

You'll see things like these in pretty much any moral discussion about cheating.

[Amundir]

The character has been deleted, which is equivalent to being executed.

I must put this in my signature...

[Caarb]

This would seem to say that there is potential for SSG to lose but are they only provider of this service? No plenty of MMO's out there. Okay lets go a step further, it's dungeons and dragons there is not other source...wait..there are other sources of Dung and Dragons.

I would expect the EULA we all agreed to would hold up just fine.

Still not air tight and I stand by my assessment that SSG would probably win vs US players but lose in some other countries particularly those with strong consumer rights.

[Scrapco]

I must put this in my signature...

Yeah, it wasn't long enough already...

[Heathir]

Sure, the company makes less money, but they're not being stolen from. Deciding to forgo a sale is not stealing. Finding a way to avoid paying for something is stealing. The definaition of stealing = take (another person's property) without permission or legal right and without intending to return it. ( the person is SSG, the property is fast advancement. SSG has monetized fast advancement, a group of players figured out a way to obtain fast advancement without paying for it. That is stealing.

Arguably, it would be even a worse crime to exploit like this when faster advancement is not condoned through store sales. By selling it in the store, SSG shows they don't have a fundamental problem with people progressing faster. SSG has shown they are OK with monetizing faster advancement. They have never came out and said we believe faster advancement for free is condoned.

[Chai]

The character has been deleted, which is equivalent to being executed.

Only in the land of make believe.

The player of course has not been executed. However, on no level (character or player) this type of exploiting equates to stealing. Hence, the execution analogy has some merit, the stealing analogy has none.

Again incorrect. I already outlined how it is literally stealing. Not going circular on this one.

Sure, the company makes less money,

DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING!!!!

but they're not being stolen from. Deciding to forgo a sale is not stealing.

Wrong, due to....

Deciding to forgo a sale is not stealing.

...Yet another incorrect analogy.

Players can forego the sale by not buying whats sold, while still not exploiting the system to get whats being sold free of charge.

Arguably, it would be even a worse crime to exploit like this when faster advancement is not condoned through store sales.

LOL no...not in the eyes of the company, whose revenue generation system is being cheated and stolen from.

By selling it in the store, SSG shows they don't have a fundamental problem with people progressing faster.

You just put the nail in your own argument's coffin with this one. The very reason why they design a higher amount of grind into the game is to sell you the ability to get through it faster. They did not design the higher amount of grind into the game so players could find a way to exploit the system and get faster advancement for free.

You'll see things like these in pretty much any moral discussion about cheating.

Or any factual discussion on cheating which excludes the moral part of the discussion.

Equating "forgoing a sale" to exploiting a system to steal something the company intends to sell you but does not intend to give you free of charge serves to identify an increased level of complicity.

[HungarianRhapsody]

Equating "forgoing a sale" to exploiting a system to steal something the company intends to sell you but does not intend to give you free of charge serves to identify an increased level of complicity.

They do give us all of that free of charge. It just takes longer.

[Amundir]

They do give us all of that free of charge. It just takes longer.

I don't understand the point that this is countering. I'm not saying it is false, just within the context of exploiting, stealing, losing sales, it's kind of an odd statement.

[Riddle_of_Steel]

I don't understand the point that this is countering....

There isn't one any more. Chai & company have effectively salted the earth here and directed all discussions into mind numbing games of semantic bull ****.


Long and short is that people used an obvious exploit, they got caught and SSG is dealing with that however they want to as is their right. They can complain and whine about semantic BS all day long and it doesn't change that.

Was it "fair" for SSG to take the game from an "Exploit early exploit often" mentality straight to an "exploiters will be shot on sight, survivors will be prosecuted" mentality, well that is debatable. I would say probably not but at the end of the day it's their game and they can do whatever the hell they want with it.

The EULA appears to be correctly presented and written to hold up in court so all the lawyer BS is frankly noise, most players here do not have the resources to take on a company like SSG even as small as it is. Even if you do you would be highly unlikely to win any sort of judgement.

The only say we really have is with our wallets (which is the point of the OP I think) and frankly I suspect most players are not exploiters and most players spend some money so it's highly unlikely that they will sink the ship with their decision. That being said, even if they do, it's their company, their rules, their choice and we can't do squat about it.

Personally I think it would be funny if the toons of the cheaters had some sort of graphic on them that let everyone know they were cheaters (say a golden hand making an L over their head). Toss in the burden of guilt effect and the ability for other players to PvP them in all public instances, with them being unable to do anything but run back and it would be a lot more effective punishment.

The mark of the cheater would last say x2 the length of the current ban with it being permanent for repeat offenders. Also it should apply to all toons on their account. Hell make it really interesting and give some XP for killing them (say 100/current level + 2k/ past life) and there's a deterrent. Sure some would wear that like a badge of honor, I say go for it .. free XP's for me.

[HungarianRhapsody]

I don't understand the point that this is countering. I'm not saying it is false, just within the context of exploiting, stealing, losing sales, it's kind of an odd statement.

Partly it's the fact that when somebody says something that's inaccurate, it bothers me even when I have sympathy with their broad argument. Mostly it's the fact that almost all of the analogies that everyone on either side of this argument is using is just idiotic. And now ajeez are rate Ford explaining your thought process but they're terrible at justifying a position. This is very similar 2 when people pirate music. That's not an analogy that's just saying that this situation is very similar to when people pirate music. I have an ethical problem with pirating but I also have an ethical problem with idiot content producers who do a poor job of providing music in a format that people can easily use. I'm not in favor of the exploiters, but I am not a fan of turbines reaction here. A pox on both their houses.

[Chai]

They do give us all of that free of charge. It just takes longer.

When the product they sell is "faster progression" saying "I could have gotten it slower anyhow so its not stealing" is a fail argument. Put it into any other context and it becomes obvious.

"Well your honor, I could have saved up for 10 years to have the amount of money I would need to buy my dream car, but instead I robbed the bank and bought the same car the next day, straight cash." In the next room over in the courthouse, another criminal is explaining how its easier to just take the car than save the money to buy it, and doesnt understand why its against the law to do so. "I could have earned it more slowly anyhow."

Does community complicity stack additively, or multiplicatively?

[Amundir]

Equating "forgoing a sale" to exploiting a system to steal something the company intends to sell you but does not intend to give you free of charge serves to identify an increased level of complicity.

They do give us all of that free of charge. It just takes longer.

The thing Chai is saying they are selling you is the method to bypass that longer amount of time to achieve "X". Not the ability to achieve "X" in and of itself.

[Chai]

The thing Chai is saying they are selling you is the method to bypass that longer amount of time to achieve "X". Not the ability to achieve "X" in and of itself.

I dont think anyone is misunderstanding this, but they are intentionally dodging it. Theres no way this could possibly be misunderstood as the way the company makes its money by selling faster progression is not new.

Also, there's almost a 70% overlap in folks who are behaving like gaming the system to get what the company intentionally sells free of charge has zero-to-minimal negative impact, and folks who repeatedly posted the "money versus time" argument when the impact of the current revenue generation system was being debated back and forth in a polarized fashion. Its very clear the negative impact this had is well understood to be much more than they are letting on. Either that or its beginning to smell like a waffle house in here.

[tuanter1]

"The only say we really have is with our wallets (which is the point of the OP I think) and frankly I suspect most players are not exploiters and most players spend some money so it's highly unlikely that they will sink the ship with their decision. That being said, even if they do, it's their company, their rules, their choice and we can't do squat about it."

Wheesh man, some of you people need to wake up.

Your the consumer, you have all the power.

Its called money. With out money the game cannot exist, nor can this company exist with out its costumers.

I wish you people would stop support this Bull **** ancient old technique to divide and conquer, through the use of intimidation, something similar to Romans to dominate and manipulate people to conform to rules. So we will pay taxes and bend to there will for capitalism. Didn't work for them, didn't work out for Napoleon, Hitler, or the America's today, as most of you people won't realize this, till your little brains are choking for the air you breath is so toxic that you just roll over and die. Any how "All Hail SSG".

This Forums reads "Teach SSG a Lesson", not "Lets get our pointy hats on".

So many of you so single minded on the fact if you just start erasing all these people accounts and intimadate the cheaters, it well fix everything. As if you weed your garden, the next day you find more growing.

So lets slither out of your holes, and line up like your supporting another dumb ass "Trump" idea to bring Capitalism back and make America GREAT AGAIN. Throwing your little bags of coins out, while you ware your mask, so the next day you crawl back to what ever hole you came out. And just forget that there are actually REAL things you can do that can bring change. You feel the need to have your voice heard on this thread, but your really just shooting your self in the foot. Cause your support is short lived, has no presidence on the actual underlining issuse that cause you the GRIEF you think your experiencing.

Tomorrow your going to back to the broken game, the same ladder you couldn't climb up in waterworks 12 years ago well still throw you off. Game is going to freeze up, your raids wel fail, you well waste your time and money on pots, and all you did was support SSG on playing a very poor business platform of destroying what some people have worked on for over a decade. In hopes it may "fix" and solves your little peoples lives. Well good luck! not going to work......

And in all honestely you will never actually Fix anything, your still getting half of what you pay for, your still taking the short end of stick, all the meanwhile SSG reaps all the benifets of your support, well totally avoiding walking the Harder, more expensive, and actually do what needs to be done. Just to bring up another quater in sales, that are going to dump like a sack of **** if history should dictate!

[HAL]

Personally I think it would be funny if the toons of the cheaters had some sort of graphic on them that let everyone know they were cheaters (say a golden hand making an L over their head).

This would be a great punishment if the majority of DDO players cared if they played with cheaters or not.