Ideas on goldsellers and ban that feels?
Caracarn
Member, Alpha One, Adventurer
Greetings all.
This post more adressed to the developers but can be interesting to read feedback from others.
I have been thinking of this for a long time and when I saw 'TheLazyPeon' video on banning I took the courage to type here.
If you havent seen that video it was mainly about if Intrepid Studios want to make this ultimate RPG MMO then it needs to be clean from gold selling and real consequences for those trying to cheat or break gamerules.
I can agree on this 100% when comes to not give like 2 weeks banning as a penalty because that wont stop anything.
What are your thoughts on this?
Also how will Intrepid prevent that different channels where you can type and chat wont be a non stop spamming on websites selling in game currency or items (not sure if they adressed it to be impossible to to this).
I have seen so many MMO's with just that spamming and it really takes away the fun of even using a general chat and with that takes away alot of this MMO aspect.
Another thing about economy. As I understand this will be a key element for the whole game and there will not be one auction house where people sit all day controlling the market. How will Intrepid prevent hic-ups when live so the economy wont be destroyed?
I will take one example. On numerous times things happened in a big MMO made by a huge company. Creative people "accidently" duplicated items or just some glitch made things happen for few lucky individuals. When it was discovered this it went offline but no real consequences happened to those who discovered it or "abused it". In game currency were not taken away from those and even items still there when it went online. As I understand some cases it wasnt really cheating so the company couldnt point on that.
If for example things like this would happen on a server with Ashes that could easily destroy the economy.
Would you call it fair to be banned for life if you discover something that the game itself do but wasnt really ethical?
I leave it at this and hope to get some input about this topic.
This post more adressed to the developers but can be interesting to read feedback from others.
I have been thinking of this for a long time and when I saw 'TheLazyPeon' video on banning I took the courage to type here.
If you havent seen that video it was mainly about if Intrepid Studios want to make this ultimate RPG MMO then it needs to be clean from gold selling and real consequences for those trying to cheat or break gamerules.
I can agree on this 100% when comes to not give like 2 weeks banning as a penalty because that wont stop anything.
What are your thoughts on this?
Also how will Intrepid prevent that different channels where you can type and chat wont be a non stop spamming on websites selling in game currency or items (not sure if they adressed it to be impossible to to this).
I have seen so many MMO's with just that spamming and it really takes away the fun of even using a general chat and with that takes away alot of this MMO aspect.
Another thing about economy. As I understand this will be a key element for the whole game and there will not be one auction house where people sit all day controlling the market. How will Intrepid prevent hic-ups when live so the economy wont be destroyed?
I will take one example. On numerous times things happened in a big MMO made by a huge company. Creative people "accidently" duplicated items or just some glitch made things happen for few lucky individuals. When it was discovered this it went offline but no real consequences happened to those who discovered it or "abused it". In game currency were not taken away from those and even items still there when it went online. As I understand some cases it wasnt really cheating so the company couldnt point on that.
If for example things like this would happen on a server with Ashes that could easily destroy the economy.
Would you call it fair to be banned for life if you discover something that the game itself do but wasnt really ethical?
I leave it at this and hope to get some input about this topic.
0
Comments
Also the banning aspect...I really believe they should accept only limited number of credit card issuers and credit card types, and ban not the means of the payment, but the identity associated if that is possible. No pre-paid bs.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/HLDwGT5aHP4
Sadly TheLazyPeon wasnt informed well enough or didnt research well enough before posting his video with his concerns. I commented this below his video, but that seems to have gone under.
In general you have to squash the demand so the price wont be high, then the botters will move on to a more profitable game and to squash the demand you have to ban players that RMT.
What can be difficult is when real humans who lock parts of the maps or raidbosses start to sell kills or loot for real money. Even if a crafter sells their items for real money.. this will be incredibly hard to detect and I am not sure how Ashes can/will handle this. How do you decide if the crafter got paid in cash or maybe the other player did something for him or a friend of him, maybe he is a friend.. or its one of thousands of other reasons why he might give him an item or several items for free.
I think if a crafter sells their product for real cash is really a waste of resources to go after because the loss of said item to the server is trivial. Now if guilds corner a rare component and sell that for cash this would be a serious problem but also would be easier to track. Other MMOs I have played had every item in game with it's own serial number so they could track items this probably could be implemented at least for rare coveted items.
I think Intrepid's idea of having paid GMs and volunteer GMs to be in game will make a huge difference and bans should be ip based not account based with an appeal system to help people who might have been banned wrongfully having a way to get back their account. Gold selling and gold buying should be permanent bans as well!
The tricky part will be acting on the much talked about heat maps and statistics without also affecting players who are farming in areas to earn currency or tradeable items legitimately for themselves.
It should come as no surprise that there will be people who will be cutting logs and skinning wolves all day long to push crafting mats into the economy while earning coin legitimately. I'll be one of the dedicated grinders, so I'm hoping for some finesse in the policing of the TOS not just automatic bans based on some poorly thought out algorithm.
How do you think gold selling and boosting should be dealt with. Perma-bans or suspensions?
gold Buyers should get get a month long ban the first time as a warning and the second offence should mirror the punishment of a gold seller.
They generally are - but these things are trivial to work around.
A bigger issue than what form the punishment should take is - how do you know it was gold buying/selling?
lets say for instance the anti cheat flags any character for suddenly gaining X amount of gold / glint suddenly ( ridiculous HIdden number), the GM can look at the log of the trade see who gave the gold and then check trade logs of that person etc and investigate down the rabbit hole. once a potential buyer / seller is flagged with all the data and logs GM's have access to they will be able to see if its a RMT situation or just a guildie / friend giving you a bunch of money. Logs are everything
Hardware bans shouldnt be IP bans, they should be MAC bans. IP bans just need a reboot of the router.
Sure you can still get around those with spoofing, but thats nothing your average joe will know how to do. Especially when they dont announce it how/why they are banned.
People were basically never punished for buying gold in games. Only very extreme cases were banned. In Ashes this will be different and Ashes will be different because you wont rush to max in a day or a week. Losing your account through a ban because you wanted to RMT is and should be a huge gamble which generally isnt worth it.
Rather, gold sellers are *generally* medium sized companies with dozens of employees, including a dedicated IT department.
Getting around a MAC address ban is trivial to a gold selling operation.
Sure.
But what about when I am giving someone a donation for their run at being Mayor of an economic node?
What about when I am handing someone coin for caravan protection?
What about when I am purchasing some information a node/guild?
What if I am bribing someone to betray their guild/node?
These are all things that are encouraged based on the games design, yet the discussion around them will mostly happen on Discord meaning the in game activity will look exactly the same as a gold transaction.
I'm just saying, it is VASTLY more complicated than you appear to be thinking.
Yes, ban gold sellers and buyers, duh.
But the best way is empower you own player base to take them down, as there are a hell of a lot more players then devs. In order to get the gold to sell, gold sellers use bots, loads and loads bots. And normally, as another player you can't to dick for shit about them, besides report them. But in Ashes, you can actually kill the bastards, anywhere at anytime.
Everybody know a bot when they see them. All we need is the to be empowered to kill them on sight.
Which is where Intrepid can step in, by flagging bots in such a way that they become corrupted, without the player controlling the bots even knowing it... well, until the bot is killed mercilessly over course.
Imagine the frustration of having your bots after spent hours farming materials, only to be killed and robbed of everything. All day, every day.
This is how you hurt the gold sellers. By wasting their god damn time and money.
Agreed. MAC and HWID bans are largely ineffective against the majority of RMT organizations, in general. Even account bans are going to be less effective (compared to a box cost model) due to there not being an initial purchase cost other than the $15/mo sub fee. And it probably doesn't even need to be said, but IP bans are a complete waste of time in today's world.
How to train the anti-bot tool:
If RMT or botting is spotted I am 100% for the immediate deleting of the characters and banning the gold sellers every bank account from making any money transactions with Intrepid again. Not just the one that pays the subscription fees, all others, too. I guess this should be possible if players would have to consent to such actions in the Terms of Service then this should be enforcable.
Dunno, possibly. I am not exactly sure how US banking services operate and how such penalty measurements are taken exactly, but I would think that this ban is something the financial institution (over which we transact with Intrepid) would be the one having to enforce the ban.
As for uncovering bannable offenses: The community can be, maybe even "should be", involved in this process, since we as players want to defend the functionality of the game. Intrepid might even consider paying a "head hunt" reward to those exposing gold sellers with embers or some additional play time.
With that being said: I am not too sure that the greater time expense on Intrepids side is actually an issue, live GMs are there for exactly such things to my understanding. Additionally a lot of the things I said strike me as automated procedures once triggered, which keeps work time to a managable/acceptable degree. And lastly to that point: The gold seller still needs to actually get their hand on the gold, which by no means is easy either.
For the most part, they use single use, pre paid cards. Intrepid can go out of their way to ban the card, but that card was only ever going to be used on that one account anyway.
The only way players will ever know a gold selling character is if they purchase gold from one.
Bots are different. Players can see bots, but bots are not gold sellers. Bots are much easier to deal with than gold sellers. Live GM's are so incredibly inefficient that this is simply not their reason for existing.
The nature of account bans in an MMORPG is that they happen infrequently, but with many at a time. This is the way it has to happen, for a number of reasons.
What live GM's do is they provide players with an amount of assurance that the developer is doing something in the middle of those ban waves.
In a game like WoW, live GM's ban an account at a time. The people out the back doing the real work ban tens of thousands of accounts at a time.
So yeah, a serious discussion about actually trying to keep cheating, botting or RMT out of an MMORPG really shouldn't be talking about live GM's - they are an ineffective tool that exit as a means of showing face.
Gotta be honest here: I don't know what a prepaid card is. But since it seems to be a fairly well established financial product, Intrepid could decide to not accept payment through these in the first place, right? Or to still require a registered bank account to be accepted into the game. I'm out of my wheelhouse here, but to me this doesn't sound like a very common method to pay your subscription fee.
Agreed, bots and gold sellers ought to be spotted through different means. But why would dealing with a gold seller be more difficult? Because they use third party applications to communicate?
I am serious, which is why I see them as part of the solution. Not the entire solution, part of it.
An automated system wont be able to accurately identify them every time, in such cases having a live GM help with the investigation can be a step towards making things clear. As for waves of banning: There is no need to do it in a wave unless the technology has made a jump forward in identifying illegal activities and uncovers a lot of gold sellers or bots at once.
Many players from many parts of the world use this kind of card for all online purchases as an additional form of security. Gold sellers are hard to see because their activity in game appears to be that of a regular player.
Keep in mind, gold sellers have decades of experience in making their activities go unseen. They really aren't a part of that solution. They have their place, but that place isn't being a real force against cheating, botting or RMT. They are there for the rest of the players in the game - and quite honestly that is what they have always been there for.
Their original purpose 20+ years ago was to run in game events and such. Honestly, they aren't worth being a part of this conversation.
As to why bans happen in waves - why they have to happen in waves.
Imagine you are running a business that is selling gold, selling or operation a cheat, or some other neferious thing. Everything is fine, things are running how you want. Then, one day, accounts start getting banned. Just a few, so no major issues - but you obviously need to do something about it.
So, you figure out what the game developer changed, and you alter your software/systems so that they can no longer catch your activities. You then just go on about your way.
However, if the developers wait for a few months, gather information on all the account that are using what ever neferious activities you are providing, and then ban all of them at once, you have no way at all of knowing when they detected your activity, and thus no idea at all how they were detecting it.
Thus, it is in all of our best interests that account bans happen in waves.
But they might not be made available for payment options, if they cause an influx of gold sellers.
Might be a lead to finding a solution.
And digital security companies as well as gaming companies have an equal amount of experience. With Intrepid having had some pretty seasoned staff members, I assume they are not going into this entirely green.
Got it. I see the point in the waves now, assuming they do not prepare for them, they run dry entirely and cant keep up the operation.
I hope they have and will keep a reasonable amount of GMs to help suppliment the other detection systems in place, but as already said, GMs are more of a reassurance.
I think you should also have systems in place that desentivise buying gold in the first place.
Making the game fun to play even without the power of endgame gear for example. If the journey is so fucking fun, that you NOTICEABLY rob yourself of a fun experience by skipping it through boosts and stuff, then a lesser percentage would do so. Consequently lessening the profit goldsellers can make.
Trading gold could be taxed by a percentage, making it inherently bad to trade large quantities of money.
(Maby not percived well by the playerbase)
Informing the player-population about the negative aspects of buying gold.
There could be tooltips explaining the consequences of buying gold like inflation.
Ingame Public announcements of banned players that bought gold/cheated.
This all would combat another percentage of players to think twice before considering illegal activities because the consequences are prominant.
Also... immagine the laugh you have if you get the message
"(insert ammount)players have been banned for buying gold" after a ban wave. Then having a button to view a list and scrolling through it to see Timmy from your guild that bragged about his shiny new armor-set in the weekly raid. Now your guild has a blast about what a looser Timmy is. If Timmy just makes a new account and joins the guild he wont live that down very fast. If that guild even wants him back.
Dont know what they will do, but if its possible to flag in cities, i certainly know what i would do if i saw someone repeatedly manipulating the market to inflate prices. If they overdo it, they will be having repeated visits of the local goon squad. If they buy protection from other players, good! Now the money is back in circulation and we have got a nice PvP scenario on our hands! Win, win. Ether they leave your town or they learn their lesson not to meddle with your local economy. If you think you'd loose that war, then you got another directive. Try to beat them at their own game and when they are out of money, you distribute that money back into the hands of the people! Maby become a spy in that persons guild and begin a war that will cost his guild immense ammounts of money?
Regardless whats the outcome, you will have had a selfmade story! A quest of your own.
It is a social game after all. Expect social repercussions.
Better to put resources where it matters.
But devs to scared to make the hard choices.
No need to fight disease, doctors! There will always be diseases, focus on the stuff that matters.
Are you serious?
Do you know how fast a game would be dead if you didn't do anything against bots and goldsellers?
Some of these groups even create puppet guilds or alliances, using the same players under different names. This allows them to manipulate which guilds or players are seen to be in charge of certain territories or resources. By pooling their resources, influence, and power, they dominate the game, ensuring that only their circle controls key areas and activities.
These groups often include gold sellers or engage in RMT, and because they dominate through large zergs or gang up on individuals or smaller groups for control, it becomes nearly impossible for independent or smaller guilds to compete. I’m not talking about typical underdog scenarios where it’s just 100 players versus 50—because skilled players can still overcome larger, unorganized groups. The issue here is far more insidious: it’s about lies, deception, and control. These cartels manipulate the game’s economy by inflating or deflating prices and manipulating zones and resources for their own gain. This extends beyond gameplay and into the real world, where they profit off the game by monetizing their guild or alliance’s in-game assets.
There should always be fair competition for resources, territory, and PvX content like raids or world bosses. However, the problem is when these groups fake independence, pretending not to cooperate when they actually are, destabilizing the game’s economy through RMT. The challenge is how to expose and stop this "fake handholding," where alliances secretly work together under the guise of competition, ultimately ruining the game’s integrity for everyone else.