AH exploit allowed to generate more revenue?

zkalsorren

I have to wonder if the AH exploit was allowed to continue because it artificially inflated the zen->Ad rate. I know that I blew my 600,000 AD on about 1500 zen which means I was robbed of about $40 value by this exploit. I spent an extra $10 over my pack because I could not get enough AD to get what I wanted in the ordinary course of events. If it had gone on as intended (i.e. no massive exploit pumping trillions of AD into the market suddenly as opposed to billions over time as would have been desired by the PWE folks) we would all have been induced to spend more real money because we could never HONESTLY get enough AD to get bags, bank slots, etc. Just sayin. Now with the economy ruined for the forseeable future (zen-> AD is at 400 on mindflayer) there is no way I would ever spend real money for Zen again. It would be totally stupid to buy any more. Looks like the greed backfired on them. By the way, as a VP for R&D of a company that deals in 24x7x365 must run software, I would never hire anyone from a group who could not fix a minus sign error in less than a day, if not less than an hour. So I have to assume they let it go on purpose since no actual programmer could be that stupid or inept. I bet this post gets deleted!

korttiapina

Give them a break. It's just a beta and besides, it's an ongoing success.

unimatrixalpha1

Robbed? You made a conscious decision to buy zen at the rate you bought it at. Also, there is a hard cap of 500 AD/zen, which keeps it from getting out of hand. The economy is no way ruined. The rates are all based on supply and demand. Even the exploiters proved this. They drove up the rate of Zen because they could supply endless quantity of AD, leaving sellers unable to satisfy that demand. Please show us any evidence of how it's currently ruined in the game and not just add on conspiracy theories.

This sounds similar to the other guy who was left crying that he only got paid 1 AD for an epic item that he listed with starting bid of 1AD.

redlance

korttiapina wrote: »

It's just a beta

So there will be a wipe of all the characters at the end of the beta? Otherwise it's release... in fact NWO is in release state, only they call beta to be able to say "eh, there are bugs, it's beta, there is rollback, eh, it's beta"...

tenkuro

300 AD/zen is the average when there were only exploiters that used 1 shot exploits on bosses. 500 AD/zen was the average when the AH exploit became known.

I bet if everyone was truely legit and there were no exploits at all, the ratio would be around 150 AD/zen.

Lower Supply + Higher Demand = Increase in price (when people have tons of AD from exploits, they buy out the zen which causes a shortage of supply which causes the price to rise)

korttiapina

redlance wrote: »

So there will be a wipe of all the characters at the end of the beta? Otherwise it's release... in fact NWO is in release state, only they call beta to be able to say "eh, there are bugs, it's beta, there is rollback, eh, it's beta"...

That's your definition of beta and while I see your point, I can only say PWE have done all they can to make you know what you're getting into while playing a game that's still in a beta testing period.

tully1

Here's the problem, they don't deserve a break. I don't know if you realize the insanely trivial nature of the AH exploit or not so I'll explain anyway. The person/team who developed the gateway site forgot to sanitize his inputs. This is entry level programming. Second, there should have been checks within the auction house code itself to ensure that this didn't happen. I understand that this is beta and that mistakes happen. Fine, I'm good with that. Here is the problem though, they are fervently against a wipe and have clearly stated that there will be no more. So, any new influx of unnatural AD into the market is simply going to increase the disparity between Zen and AD values. Sure, players will lose interest/quit and that AD is removed from the economy, but how long will it take? Weeks, months, several months? There is proof circulating all over this forum and others that the bug has been prevalent and known about since day one of the open beta. This means that there is an unknown and copious amount of AD inflating the economy unnaturally. The only fixes I've seen recently are shoddy hotfixes that do more damage than good. The only way the "its fine because its in beta" excuse works is if they wipe before the live release. This way, every afk farming, AD duping, raid exploiting, AutoIT foundry botting, kids with their crafting macros will lose the clear advantage they have over the rest of the community. If this were a live release you'd call it a bug addled piece of **** filled with half thought out ideals and just another cash crop to show off on their webpage. The reason they won't wipe is because they'll have to refund zen. They won't do this because of short sighted idiocy. Everyone will get more zen, which means they won't be spending money on zen. In reality players will simply spend the refunded zen on bags and profession kits to get back the necessary gear they lost in the wipe. This game isn't an ongoing success. It's being held together by duct tape, half assed hotfixes, and by a presumable overworked and understaffed group of people. In a year, given that it doesn't die, or that cryptic/pw don't go under, it will probably be a pretty decent game. For now, it's half assed and untested <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>.

korttiapina

tully1 wrote: »

Here's the problem, they don't deserve a break. I don't know if you realize the insanely trivial nature of the AH exploit or not so I'll explain anyway. The person/team who developed the gateway site forgot to sanitize his inputs. This is entry level programming. Second, there should have been checks within the auction house code itself to ensure that this didn't happen. I understand that this is beta and that mistakes happen. Fine, I'm good with that. Here is the problem though, they are fervently against a wipe and have clearly stated that there will be no more. So, any new influx of unnatural AD into the market is simply going to increase the disparity between Zen and AD values. Sure, players will lose interest/quit and that AD is removed from the economy, but how long will it take? Weeks, months, several months? There is proof circulating all over this forum and others that the bug has been prevalent and known about since day one of the open beta. This means that there is an unknown and copious amount of AD inflating the economy unnaturally. The only fixes I've seen recently are shoddy hotfixes that do more damage than good. The only way the "its fine because its in beta" excuse works is if they wipe before the live release. This way, every afk farming, AD duping, raid exploiting, AutoIT foundry botting, kids with their crafting macros will lose the clear advantage they have over the rest of the community. If this were a live release you'd call it a bug addled piece of **** filled with half thought out ideals and just another cash crop to show off on their webpage. The reason they won't wipe is because they'll have to refund zen. They won't do this because of short sighted idiocy. Everyone will get more zen, which means they won't be spending money on zen. In reality players will simply spend the refunded zen on bags and profession kits to get back the necessary gear they lost in the wipe. This game isn't an ongoing success. It's being held together by duct tape, half assed hotfixes, and by a presumable overworked and understaffed group of people. In a year, given that it doesn't die, or that cryptic/pw don't go under, it will probably be a pretty decent game. For now, it's half assed and untested <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font>.

And you forgot to press enter. We all forget something now and then. You're letting a couple of minor glitches get in the way of enjoying this awesome game and instead of having the time of your life, you're complaining about some small bugs that were already fixed with the rollback. Well, you have fun with that and I'll go see if I can get another nightmare mount from my lockbox.

skalt112

korttiapina wrote: »

And you forgot to press enter. We all forget something now and then. You're letting a couple of minor glitches get in the way of enjoying this awesome game and instead of having the time of your life, you're complaining about some small bugs that were already fixed with the rollback. Well, you have fun with that and I'll go see if I can get another nightmare mount from my lockbox.

I would hate to see what you consider a major glitch.

Also, there is no malice intended by the company here. The devs simply made a mistake. The severity of that mistake is yet to be established.

ambisinisterr

Conspiracy theories are less than productive and have more holes than swiss cheese.

Let's not make accusations which serve to cause pointless bickering between the community members.