My point is, there could be innocent people in that bunch. Obviously if I was intending to exploit I wouldn't be stating it here on the forums. Fortunately I never did the quest so I'm not at risk for getting banned. Literally I had no idea what was going on until bans started getting handed out.
sorry your not innocent just because you don't know some thing that's same in real life and internet that was point I was trying make yes we feel bad for people who don't know but there not innocent at all and any one who is truly innocent will get help from ringing the support.
An exploit is any mechanic that is knowingly used in a manner not originally intended.
So let's just say it was a bug/oversight it was still exploited and taken advantage of during the time that the server came up.
However if current information is correct and this was told about from the test server then this doesn't fall in the realm of a bug as someone informed about it well before the new content went live. Now an argument could be made that someone forgot to flip the Percent switch for drop rates when the new content went live but that didn't stop anyone from opening up multiple lock boxes and getting a half a dozen or more mounts.
And for others to get on here and be pi$$ed about the real money they spent opening lock boxes and didn't get anything weeks ago is full of it. If the percentage rate was messed up from the start why did no one complain weeks and weeks ago???? No they waited for this issue to pop up and then start complaining about feeling ripped off.
Lets look at this another way, let's say the I went to Vegas and played the slot machines and I won a few times, Now while on my way home the casino decides to put some new machines in and the O.P. arrives a week later and plays the machines and wins a <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> load of money now I get wind of this.... I can't run to the casino and say I want the money that I was supposed to win because they swapped out the machines.
It all boils down to the persons honor and who they are inside, if you go to the grocery store and and put a few packs of meat in your jacket and walk out , your a thief.
The same person goes and eats a few grapes or an apple while they are shopping, Ahhh.. no hram no foul.
Not in my eyes, your still a thief....
You have to be true to yourself, and you definitely can't eat your cake and have it to.
Cheers!
P.S.
I know one thing someone from Cryptic/PWE has to get on here and let people know that behavior, like what happened when the new content went live will not be tolerated!!!!! So we the community need to get our $hit together and start acting accordingly.
An exploit is any mechanic that is knowingly used in a manner not originally intended.
So let's just say it was a bug/oversight it was still exploited and taken advantage of during the time that the server came up.
However if current information is correct and this was told about from the test server then this doesn't fall in the realm of a bug as someone informed about it well before the new content went live. Now an argument could be made that someone forgot to flip the Percent switch for drop rates when the new content went live but that didn't stop anyone from opening up multiple lock boxes and getting a half a dozen or more mounts.
I agree with the first half but not the second because at the time the exploit occurred many people were calling for a rollback since something similar happened: Caturday. However, the response was simply there would be no rollback exploiters or not were simply lucky!
As for the Vegas scenerio, any lucky winners would not get the money if it was a glitch or malfunction(period) However, if op went and won because of the new machines they would investigate this and OP may not get to keep the money.
Now if the OP had some legit wins of course you can't complain because the odd of winning should not have changed because the machines changed. If the odd did change which they monitor up-stair as above OP would not get the money.
I'm pretty sure people knew with all the Nightmare spam occuring that the unusually high chances of getting a mount from a lockbox were not intended. I'm afraid that's where your otherwise sound logic falls apart.
These people were using completely legit game mechanics. They used key to open boxes. People <removed details> didn't. Logic.
That logic is soooo fail. Its like me saying its ok for me to fall under the world and then kill the boss while he can do nothing because "killing the boss was intended". Do you honestly believe anything you just wrote?
Of course not because you don't use intended game mechanics when you do that.
These people were using completely legit game mechanics. They used key to open boxes. People sharing quests are deliberately trying to gain an unfair advantage. People opening boxes used intended mechanics, sharandar exploiters didn't. Logic.
So using keys to open boxes is a completely legit game mechanic, but <removed details>?
Not really, <removed details>. So the premise for you logic fails there. However, the manner in which they used it may not have been intended, but something within the game still allowed the function to work in the manner that it did which resulted in the unfair advantage to player that did not use this mechanic. So no, INTJ, your logic fails but I don't want to go into depth explaining why. That would be boring.
Cryptic increases the drop rates. It's their item, they are free to do whatever they want with it, including giving it away to people. The game and lockbox items don't belong to people buying lockboxes, if cryptic changes the droprates, players have nothing to say and can just suck it up.
Cryptic also decides what is the timer on repetable quests. I you try to circumvent the timer, you're breaking a rule, and i said earlier you have no say on rules. If you do it, expect to be banned.
All i see behind all this so called confusion is a desperate attempt to justify an unwillingness to follow the rules. Obviously, the rules won't be submitted to a vote, cryptic can and will decide what is allowed, what is not, if you can't deal with it, i suggest you either stop playing, suck it up or start fighting against private property.
This game is cryptic's property, you follow the rules, you accept them or you can leave or get banned. If you have a timer, you deal with it, if you have a glittertrail, you follow it, if you open a lockbox and get an item, it's yours as long as they decide you can keep it. Because the game is a business and not a democracy. As long as you guys don't want to accept that you'll never understand what is allowed and what isn't.
Clearly a cryptic employee. Don't think anyone is really this stupid.....
Cryptic increases the drop rates. It's their item, they are free to do whatever they want with it, including giving it away to people. The game and lockbox items don't belong to people buying lockboxes, if cryptic changes the droprates, players have nothing to say and can just suck it up.
Cryptic also decides what is the timer on repetable quests. I you try to circumvent the timer, you're breaking a rule, and i said earlier you have no say on rules. If you do it, expect to be banned.
All i see behind all this so called confusion is a desperate attempt to justify an unwillingness to follow the rules. Obviously, the rules won't be submitted to a vote, cryptic can and will decide what is allowed, what is not, if you can't deal with it, i suggest you either stop playing, suck it up or start fighting against private property.
This game is cryptic's property, you follow the rules, you accept them or you can leave or get banned. If you have a timer, you deal with it, if you have a glittertrail, you follow it, if you open a lockbox and get an item, it's yours as long as they decide you can keep it. Because the game is a business and not a democracy. As long as you guys don't want to accept that you'll never understand what is allowed and what isn't.
Welcome to the fray fellow "white knight". LOL
2/1 First Strike punks!! We totally need an Exorcist in here!
Clearly a cryptic employee. Don't think anyone is really this stupid.....
I'm definitely not an employee, a cryptic employee would be nice, would be trying to stop the fire instead of fueling it with hard but true facts. Private property is kinda harsh.
I will add something else: you're playing something you have no say about. It's your choice if you play such games. You're the only one to blame if you're frustrated.
The evidence in game suggests it was a text error and people weren't actually getting a mount from every other box. There are no more mounts on AH than there were prior to the patch; the price of mounts has not fluctuated in the way it would if there had been an anomaly of the scale some imagine there was.
So your saying the devs lied about people getting nightmare mounts at a much higher rate for about 40minutes? Then calling them lucky. And i never seen the chat windows saying buy keys blah blah i didnt because i thought it would be a waist thought sure they would get banned.
So your saying the devs lied about people getting nightmare mounts at a much higher rate for about 40minutes? Then calling them lucky. And i never seen the chat windows saying buy keys blah blah i didnt because i thought it would be a waist thought sure they would get banned.
The lockboxes are a serious money maker for the company. The droprate for what comes out of them is something that cannot be changed on a whim. There would be meetings, discussions, supervisor approval on multiple levels, all kinds of hoops to jump through. I had already decided to buy some zen and keys to give some boxes a shot because of the discounts for both zen and keys then. If I had logged in at that time and received 5 horses out of my first 10 keys, I would have stopped opening boxes. Not because I was afraid of exploiting anything, but because I would have thought that the company decided to let everyone get a horse since the boxes were being changed. Everyone having a whole stable full of horses would make them worthless monetarily. The fact that they reversed the droprate change so fast is the confusing bit. It makes me wonder if an employee changed some things without the proper permissions. I really think they should have left it dropping the good stuff at a silly rate for at least a weekend. Anyone dumb enough to spend $100s to get a giant stockpile of horses in that case would be the only one hurt by it.
So your saying the devs lied about people getting nightmare mounts at a much higher rate for about 40minutes? Then calling them lucky. And i never seen the chat windows saying buy keys blah blah i didnt because i thought it would be a waist thought sure they would get banned.
There are at most 500 "lucky" mounts on dragon. I've logged in right after the patch, saw the nightmare spam, it was going fast but not that fast.
So, they had two options. They could spend one or two days tracking those mounts, since many were on the AH, rollback everything, and then having a lot of people complaining because cryptic "has stolen my mount, i didn't know about the drop rate, blah, blah, blah" + a lot of people complaining about the insane downtime. The second option was saying "ok guys we made a mistake and you can keep the spoils", getting the servers back early, and getting all the people who quitted playing the game one or two months ago back in game. That was one of the major purposes of the module. I think they thought a few mounts was a fair price to pay for this.
They made a good business decision imo. That was the right thing to do to get some players back. Since i have very little emotional involvement in my games, i don't care at all. I bought my "unique" nightmare 15 days after the OB launch, i don't care if some other people got it for less ADs. It's just an item, and that's just a game and i have more interesting problems to solve, like understanding how and why people blame others for the choices they do, why do people keep trying to cheat and complain they got a ban, for instance.
There are at most 500 "lucky" mounts on dragon. I've logged in right after the patch, saw the nightmare spam, it was going fast but not that fast.
So, they had two options. They could spend one or two days tracking those mounts, since many were on the AH, rollback everything, and then having a lot of people complaining because cryptic "has stolen my mount, i didn't know about the drop rate, blah, blah, blah" + a lot of people complaining about the insane downtime. The second option was saying "ok guys we made a mistake and you can keep the spoils", getting the servers back early, and getting all the people who quitted playing the game one or two months ago back in game. That was one of the major purposes of the module. I think they thought a few mounts was a fair price to pay for this.
They made a good business decision imo. That was the right thing to do to get some players back. Since i have very little emotional involvement in my games, i don't care at all. I bought my "unique" nightmare 15 days after the OB launch, i don't care if some other people got it for less ADs. It's just an item, and that's just a game and i have more interesting problems to solve, like understanding how and why people blame others for the choices they do, why do people keep trying to cheat and complain they got a ban, for instance.
Of the available options on how to handle it, not rolling back wasn't the best choice but I understand why they may have thought it was the best option at the time. What's much more difficult to understand is why they chose to congratulate those people who got several mounts during that time labeling them as "lucky". If the person who made that decision really didn't know how much that would <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> people off, they're frankly too stupid to be in charge. A simple apology would have cost them nothing and prevented much of the fallout that's since transpired.
Of the available options on how to handle it, not rolling back wasn't the best choice but I understand why they may have thought it was the best option at the time. What's much more difficult to understand is why they chose to congratulate those people who got several mounts during that time labeling them as "lucky". If the person who made that decision really didn't know how much that would <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> people off, they're frankly too stupid to be in charge. A simple apology would have cost them nothing and prevented much of the fallout that's since transpired.
They truly believed those people were innocent?
Let's just say, if they're banning people for sharing a quest, they can ban people they think took advantage of the bug.
Of the available options on how to handle it, not rolling back wasn't the best choice but I understand why they may have thought it was the best option at the time. What's much more difficult to understand is why they chose to congratulate those people who got several mounts during that time labeling them as "lucky". If the person who made that decision really didn't know how much that would <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> people off, they're frankly too stupid to be in charge. A simple apology would have cost them nothing and prevented much of the fallout that's since transpired.
Well it may be the very first time it happens to them. They also probably underestimate the the amount of emotions the average forum poster (which is often a paying customer, but not always) can put into the game. I don't think they congratulated anyone, they were just saying "you got one, you've been lucky". I'm not trying to justify their decision, it's their business. I think they knew many players had a lot of feelings for their in-game uniqueness (they are selling a lot of vanity stuff after all), but they didn't know how much feeling that was. There are many touchy people playing NW apparently. Now they are aware of this and they will make sure they won't make the same mistake twice. In both cases (rollback or ignore) the company doesn't win.
The dev's know they messed up with that you are the lucky ones BS. And they know they wouldnt ban those players that gave them money. They made money of this exploit. They knew about it before launch.
I feel something should be done about it.
So when something like this happens again. YOu all know cryptic will make even more money next time from it. Cause more people will do it next time. I still wont ever give money to them even for an exploit
I do not really think anyone innocent got banned. I am sure they were able to tell the difference between someone and their pal sharing quests innocently and getting a days worth of goods and whole teams working in tandem to speed up the process of getting their boons.
There's probably a million people playing this game who'd like answers to those questiosn, but I'll bet you a dozen Nightmare mounts no answers are forthcoming. My advice is to enjoy the game while there's still fun to be had. The people making the decisions at Perfect World Entertainment on how these incidents are handled clearly aren't thinking long term, which means there probably isn't going to be a long term. So, we may as well enjoy what time we have in Neverwinter in the short term.
watch out, this guy makes sense.
This game is designed to make as much money as possible on a day to day basis. It is not designed to be a great long term game.
Okay, clearly the question about whether or not these things were/are an exploit is not resolved, primarily because everybody has their own pet definitions on what is and is not an exploit, so let's look at another side of this, and pardon me while I recount some things that we already know and/or saw.
Regarding Nightmare Thursday, first off, I was there, too, online almost as soon as the servers came up, and on all three shards. The amount of spam from admin about the mounts was so enormous that something was clearly wrong. There were multiple individuals that got "lucky" many times each, according to those messages. The people discussing what was happening in zone chats also demonstrated a widespread, common knowledge of what was happening, just from the evidence in front of us. We knew what was going on.
Then we had a new emergency maintenance for a couple hours to "fix" the issue, after which the spam stopped. Coupled with this was a forum message from a community rep stating that this was unintended and was being fixed, and because Cryptic were the ones that messed up the drop rate (how could it be anybody else?), they would let this one slide. They called the people who got all the mounts that morning "lucky" and basically congratulated them.
There was no suggestion that they had any problem with the behavior, and there was no apology to the people who had, for months prior to this event, worked for and bought (in some cases) hundreds of dollars in keys trying for it. Heck, my roommate spent close to a hundred and isn't the most hardcore person for that stuff. The company failed to address all these people who were retroactively wronged by this event. Because the company chose not to roll back when it was most prudent to, and because the company PRAISED the people who got an unfair advantage (whether they knew it or not), they were basically saying that everyone who had already attempted to get that mount and failed were losers.
It is those people, who had already supported the company even when the chances were known to be very very slim, that were spit on by the company. And they did not even get a simple apology.
Okay, clearly the question about whether or not these things were/are an exploit is not resolved, primarily because everybody has their own pet definitions on what is and is not an exploit, so let's look at another side of this, and pardon me while I recount some things that we already know and/or saw.
Regarding Nightmare Thursday, first off, I was there, too, online almost as soon as the servers came up, and on all three shards. The amount of spam from admin about the mounts was so enormous that something was clearly wrong. There were multiple individuals that got "lucky" many times each, according to those messages. The people discussing what was happening in zone chats also demonstrated a widespread, common knowledge of what was happening, just from the evidence in front of us. We knew what was going on.
Then we had a new emergency maintenance for a couple hours to "fix" the issue, after which the spam stopped. Coupled with this was a forum message from a community rep stating that this was unintended and was being fixed, and because Cryptic were the ones that messed up the drop rate (how could it be anybody else?), they would let this one slide. They called the people who got all the mounts that morning "lucky" and basically congratulated them.
There was no suggestion that they had any problem with the behavior, and there was no apology to the people who had, for months prior to this event, worked for and bought (in some cases) hundreds of dollars in keys trying for it. Heck, my roommate spent close to a hundred and isn't the most hardcore person for that stuff. The company failed to address all these people who were retroactively wronged by this event. Because the company chose not to roll back when it was most prudent to, and because the company PRAISED the people who got an unfair advantage (whether they knew it or not), they were basically saying that everyone who had already attempted to get that mount and failed were losers.
It is those people, who had already supported the company even when the chances were known to be very very slim, that were spit on by the company. And they did not even get a simple apology.
I understand where you're coming from. I too spent money trying to get a nightmare and never got one. The one question I have is this. Would it be fair if you logged in, had or bought keys that day, unknowingly opened a lockbox, got a nightmare, just to have it taken away from you? Would that even be legal? I honestly don't know. Perhaps that's where Cryptic is at this point (though they probably know the legality of it). I really think they're just trying to take the positive approach (and the safe approach).
It's a young game. I myself haven't been here long, but I can tell you I wouldn't be this up-in-arms over a game that's only been out for what... 2 months? Some things you just need to roll with. There's only 1 other D&D MMO out there and it's ... pretty dated...
I understand where you're coming from. I too spent money trying to get a nightmare and never got one. The one question I have is this. Would it be fair if you logged in, had or bought keys that day, unknowingly opened a lockbox, got a nightmare, just to have it taken away from you? Would that even be legal? I honestly don't know. Perhaps that's where Cryptic is at this point (though they probably know the legality of it). I really think they're just trying to take the positive approach (and the safe approach).
It's a young game. I myself haven't been here long, but I can tell you I wouldn't be this up-in-arms over a game that's only been out for what... 2 months? Some things you just need to roll with. There's only 1 other D&D MMO out there and it's ... pretty dated...
It's not exactly just taking things away that I advocate. a reversal of the situation to place these boxes/keys/horses/etc back to how they were prepatch is what I think is most right. thursday morning, that would have been via rollback, and many of us online at the time expected/hoped that there would be one. I suspect that even was part of what made some people decide to exploit the bug, since they figured it would have no consequences.
is it fair? I believe it would be most fair to revert the winnings and give everyone who opened a box that morning a chance to start over and retry those boxes with the same drop rates that everybody else had previously. Would there be people mad over that? a few, certainly, but I am absolutely certain that it would not even come close to the outrage that did erupt on these forums, because a lot of people would understand the reasoning behind an action like that. I'm willing to bet that the majority would accept it, especially given how many people were expecting it at the time. This might be a positive move for some, but it turned months of other people opening the boxes into a negative experience when it didn't have to be.
you are right, though, that it's a young game, and the people producing this one are still figuring out where they stand on a lot of things, but these people are not inexperienced. This is at least the fourth MMO that this studio has produced and run that I'm aware of. There are individuals working on this game that I recognize from some of their other games as well, including former executive producers who've been at the top. I've followed these people around for years now, and they make games with ridiculous amounts of potential, but there are some mistakes that I see crop up a lot. Miscommunication and lack of communication is one of them.
Comments
Ah, so you're a troll then. Very well ... I won't engage you further.
sorry your not innocent just because you don't know some thing that's same in real life and internet that was point I was trying make yes we feel bad for people who don't know but there not innocent at all and any one who is truly innocent will get help from ringing the support.
People why don't we try and use our common sense,
An exploit is any mechanic that is knowingly used in a manner not originally intended.
So let's just say it was a bug/oversight it was still exploited and taken advantage of during the time that the server came up.
However if current information is correct and this was told about from the test server then this doesn't fall in the realm of a bug as someone informed about it well before the new content went live. Now an argument could be made that someone forgot to flip the Percent switch for drop rates when the new content went live but that didn't stop anyone from opening up multiple lock boxes and getting a half a dozen or more mounts.
And for others to get on here and be pi$$ed about the real money they spent opening lock boxes and didn't get anything weeks ago is full of it. If the percentage rate was messed up from the start why did no one complain weeks and weeks ago???? No they waited for this issue to pop up and then start complaining about feeling ripped off.
Lets look at this another way, let's say the I went to Vegas and played the slot machines and I won a few times, Now while on my way home the casino decides to put some new machines in and the O.P. arrives a week later and plays the machines and wins a <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> load of money now I get wind of this.... I can't run to the casino and say I want the money that I was supposed to win because they swapped out the machines.
It all boils down to the persons honor and who they are inside, if you go to the grocery store and and put a few packs of meat in your jacket and walk out , your a thief.
The same person goes and eats a few grapes or an apple while they are shopping, Ahhh.. no hram no foul.
Not in my eyes, your still a thief....
You have to be true to yourself, and you definitely can't eat your cake and have it to.
Cheers!
P.S.
I know one thing someone from Cryptic/PWE has to get on here and let people know that behavior, like what happened when the new content went live will not be tolerated!!!!! So we the community need to get our $hit together and start acting accordingly.
" May The Wind be Always At Your Back "
I agree with the first half but not the second because at the time the exploit occurred many people were calling for a rollback since something similar happened: Caturday. However, the response was simply there would be no rollback exploiters or not were simply lucky!
As for the Vegas scenerio, any lucky winners would not get the money if it was a glitch or malfunction(period) However, if op went and won because of the new machines they would investigate this and OP may not get to keep the money.
Now if the OP had some legit wins of course you can't complain because the odd of winning should not have changed because the machines changed. If the odd did change which they monitor up-stair as above OP would not get the money.
These people were using completely legit game mechanics. They used key to open boxes. People <removed details> didn't. Logic.
Of course not because you don't use intended game mechanics when you do that.
Centurion maximus92
12th Legion, Romulan Republic
12th Fleet
=\/= ================================ =\/=
So using keys to open boxes is a completely legit game mechanic, but <removed details>?
Not really, <removed details>. So the premise for you logic fails there. However, the manner in which they used it may not have been intended, but something within the game still allowed the function to work in the manner that it did which resulted in the unfair advantage to player that did not use this mechanic. So no, INTJ, your logic fails but I don't want to go into depth explaining why. That would be boring.
Set up for one who lives under a bridge. *shakes head*
*salutes you*
Not if you<removed details>. This should be obvious to anyone not being an hypocrite.
It should also be obvious that if you open 5 Lockboxes and come away with 4 Mounts something is amiss ...
Clearly a cryptic employee. Don't think anyone is really this stupid.....
Welcome to the fray fellow "white knight". LOL
2/1 First Strike punks!! We totally need an Exorcist in here!
I'm definitely not an employee, a cryptic employee would be nice, would be trying to stop the fire instead of fueling it with hard but true facts. Private property is kinda harsh.
I will add something else: you're playing something you have no say about. It's your choice if you play such games. You're the only one to blame if you're frustrated.
So your saying the devs lied about people getting nightmare mounts at a much higher rate for about 40minutes? Then calling them lucky. And i never seen the chat windows saying buy keys blah blah i didnt because i thought it would be a waist thought sure they would get banned.
40 Minutes what are you joking?
There are at most 500 "lucky" mounts on dragon. I've logged in right after the patch, saw the nightmare spam, it was going fast but not that fast.
So, they had two options. They could spend one or two days tracking those mounts, since many were on the AH, rollback everything, and then having a lot of people complaining because cryptic "has stolen my mount, i didn't know about the drop rate, blah, blah, blah" + a lot of people complaining about the insane downtime. The second option was saying "ok guys we made a mistake and you can keep the spoils", getting the servers back early, and getting all the people who quitted playing the game one or two months ago back in game. That was one of the major purposes of the module. I think they thought a few mounts was a fair price to pay for this.
They made a good business decision imo. That was the right thing to do to get some players back. Since i have very little emotional involvement in my games, i don't care at all. I bought my "unique" nightmare 15 days after the OB launch, i don't care if some other people got it for less ADs. It's just an item, and that's just a game and i have more interesting problems to solve, like understanding how and why people blame others for the choices they do, why do people keep trying to cheat and complain they got a ban, for instance.
Of the available options on how to handle it, not rolling back wasn't the best choice but I understand why they may have thought it was the best option at the time. What's much more difficult to understand is why they chose to congratulate those people who got several mounts during that time labeling them as "lucky". If the person who made that decision really didn't know how much that would <font color="orange">HAMSTER</font> people off, they're frankly too stupid to be in charge. A simple apology would have cost them nothing and prevented much of the fallout that's since transpired.
They truly believed those people were innocent?
Let's just say, if they're banning people for sharing a quest, they can ban people they think took advantage of the bug.
Well it may be the very first time it happens to them. They also probably underestimate the the amount of emotions the average forum poster (which is often a paying customer, but not always) can put into the game. I don't think they congratulated anyone, they were just saying "you got one, you've been lucky". I'm not trying to justify their decision, it's their business. I think they knew many players had a lot of feelings for their in-game uniqueness (they are selling a lot of vanity stuff after all), but they didn't know how much feeling that was. There are many touchy people playing NW apparently. Now they are aware of this and they will make sure they won't make the same mistake twice. In both cases (rollback or ignore) the company doesn't win.
I feel something should be done about it.
So when something like this happens again. YOu all know cryptic will make even more money next time from it. Cause more people will do it next time. I still wont ever give money to them even for an exploit
watch out, this guy makes sense.
Regarding Nightmare Thursday, first off, I was there, too, online almost as soon as the servers came up, and on all three shards. The amount of spam from admin about the mounts was so enormous that something was clearly wrong. There were multiple individuals that got "lucky" many times each, according to those messages. The people discussing what was happening in zone chats also demonstrated a widespread, common knowledge of what was happening, just from the evidence in front of us. We knew what was going on.
Then we had a new emergency maintenance for a couple hours to "fix" the issue, after which the spam stopped. Coupled with this was a forum message from a community rep stating that this was unintended and was being fixed, and because Cryptic were the ones that messed up the drop rate (how could it be anybody else?), they would let this one slide. They called the people who got all the mounts that morning "lucky" and basically congratulated them.
There was no suggestion that they had any problem with the behavior, and there was no apology to the people who had, for months prior to this event, worked for and bought (in some cases) hundreds of dollars in keys trying for it. Heck, my roommate spent close to a hundred and isn't the most hardcore person for that stuff. The company failed to address all these people who were retroactively wronged by this event. Because the company chose not to roll back when it was most prudent to, and because the company PRAISED the people who got an unfair advantage (whether they knew it or not), they were basically saying that everyone who had already attempted to get that mount and failed were losers.
It is those people, who had already supported the company even when the chances were known to be very very slim, that were spit on by the company. And they did not even get a simple apology.
I understand where you're coming from. I too spent money trying to get a nightmare and never got one. The one question I have is this. Would it be fair if you logged in, had or bought keys that day, unknowingly opened a lockbox, got a nightmare, just to have it taken away from you? Would that even be legal? I honestly don't know. Perhaps that's where Cryptic is at this point (though they probably know the legality of it). I really think they're just trying to take the positive approach (and the safe approach).
It's a young game. I myself haven't been here long, but I can tell you I wouldn't be this up-in-arms over a game that's only been out for what... 2 months? Some things you just need to roll with. There's only 1 other D&D MMO out there and it's ... pretty dated...
It's not exactly just taking things away that I advocate. a reversal of the situation to place these boxes/keys/horses/etc back to how they were prepatch is what I think is most right. thursday morning, that would have been via rollback, and many of us online at the time expected/hoped that there would be one. I suspect that even was part of what made some people decide to exploit the bug, since they figured it would have no consequences.
is it fair? I believe it would be most fair to revert the winnings and give everyone who opened a box that morning a chance to start over and retry those boxes with the same drop rates that everybody else had previously. Would there be people mad over that? a few, certainly, but I am absolutely certain that it would not even come close to the outrage that did erupt on these forums, because a lot of people would understand the reasoning behind an action like that. I'm willing to bet that the majority would accept it, especially given how many people were expecting it at the time. This might be a positive move for some, but it turned months of other people opening the boxes into a negative experience when it didn't have to be.
you are right, though, that it's a young game, and the people producing this one are still figuring out where they stand on a lot of things, but these people are not inexperienced. This is at least the fourth MMO that this studio has produced and run that I'm aware of. There are individuals working on this game that I recognize from some of their other games as well, including former executive producers who've been at the top. I've followed these people around for years now, and they make games with ridiculous amounts of potential, but there are some mistakes that I see crop up a lot. Miscommunication and lack of communication is one of them.