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Enchanted Keys becoming Bind on Account

amenaramenar Member, NW_CrypticDev Posts: 90 Arc User
edited October 2014 in General Discussion (PC)
Greetings Adventurers,

Recently, there has been an alarming amount of reported issues surrounding Enchanted Keys. This has taken the form of people’s accounts getting hacked or stolen after buying keys from a 3rd party site, people spending money on 3rd party sites and not receiving their keys, and many other situations that negatively impact a player’s experience in Neverwinter.

In an effort to diminish the effectiveness of these individuals’ efforts, we have made a large but necessary change, to make Enchanted Keys Bind on Account. This change will be retroactive, meaning this will affect all keys in Neverwinter regardless of when they’ve been purchased. This is done to ensure that nefarious individuals will no longer be able to scam players using Enchanted Keys as bait.

Moving forward, keys will automatically bind to a player’s account when they have been purchased from the Zen Market. We also have a plan for keys contained within in communal areas like Guild Banks or the Auction house. Keys stored in Guild Banks will Bind to the account of the player that withdraws them. Keys currently for sale in the auction house will bind to the account of the player who purchases them.

We realize that this change may be seen as drastic, but know that we do it with the intention of protecting the safety and well-being of our players.

Thanks all,
-Chris Matz, Lead Designer
Post edited by amenar on
«1345678

Comments

  • tripsofthrymrtripsofthrymr Member, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 1,624 Community Moderator
    edited July 2014
    Key trading (and key splits) are an integral part of the game.

    Warn people clearly about the dangers of using a 3rd party site, let them suffer the consequences if they choose to ignore the warning... not the broader gaming population.

    PROPOSAL

    Give keys purchased for Zen a "trade cap" of 1. Once they switch accounts once, reduce the trade cap to 0 and keep them bound on that account. That would allow for key splits, but would require that the traded key have come directly from the Zen market. Credit: Overheard in NW_Legit_Community.

    FURTHER CONCERN

    If keys remained locked down (forgive the pun), another surrogate currency will just spring up to take its place. You need to solve the actual problem, not treat the symptoms. Third party sites already offer everything from R10 enchantments to Hero of the North packs. One of the many other traded items will become the new surrogate.
    Caritas Guild Founder (Greycloak Alliance)

    Sci-fi author: The Gods We Make, The Gods We Seek, and Ji-min
  • znudenejznudenej Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    Imho BoA keys aren't mean as way to fight AD sellers & scammers, its way how to make queue for AD -> ZEN exchange longer and force people buy more ZEN.
  • lewstelamon01lewstelamon01 Member Posts: 7,415 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    MOD NOTICE:

    Any and all discussion over the change in Enchanted Keys is to be confined to this thread. Any other threads will be closed and/or merged with this thread as necessary.

    Do not respond to or reply to this notice but use the PM system to address concerns. Thank you.
    ROLL TIDE ROLL

    Great Weapon Fighter: Because when is today not a good day to die?

    PC and PS4 player. Proud Guildmaster for PS4 Team Fencebane. Rank 5 Officer for PC Team Fencebane. Visit us at http://fencebane.shivtr.com
  • yesbro1yesbro1 Member, Neverwinter Beta Users Posts: 1 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    amenar wrote: »
    Greetings Adventurers,

    Recently, there has been an alarming amount of reported issues surrounding Enchanted Keys. This has taken the form of people’s accounts getting hacked or stolen after buying keys from a 3rd party site, people spending money on 3rd party sites and not receiving their keys, and many other situations that negatively impact a player’s experience in Neverwinter.

    In an effort to diminish the effectiveness of these individuals’ efforts, we have made a large but necessary change, to make Enchanted Keys Bind on Account. This change will be retroactive, meaning this will affect all keys in Neverwinter regardless of when they’ve been purchased. This is done to ensure that nefarious individuals will no longer be able to scam players using Enchanted Keys as bait.

    Moving forward, keys will automatically bind to a player’s account when they have been purchased from the Zen Market. We also have a plan for keys contained within in communal areas like Guild Banks or the Auction house. Keys stored in Guild Banks will Bind to the account of the player that withdraws them. Keys currently for sale in the auction house will bind to the account of the player who purchases them.

    We realize that this change may be seen as drastic, but know that we do it with the intention of protecting the safety and well-being of our players.

    Thanks all,
    -Chris Matz, Lead Designer

    Yes all good and well that you have made it more safe for the users side and i see that hacked accounts can make allot of stress on the GM community *** well but to make all the key's bound will make the whole game trading system unbalanced and thus the game trade will completely fail. You have already made a huge difference to beginner people with making coalescent wards and other wards bound but with this change the whole trade system will fail totally. Good and well you are making all the accounts safer but the trade system will fall and plummet and at the rate of these drastic changes you are making this game more of Buy to play rather than free to play this game is nice because it has allow of features that other online games dont have but Neverwitner is moving Into a Buy to play State and this will make by my calculation a loss of about 80% of all your Clients but its is not up to me this is only my opinion on the games state Now
  • fantasycharacterfantasycharacter Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 675 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    If an "alarming" amount of people are going to 3rd party website, it should tell you that your goods in-game are way too expensive.

    If people are using a 3rd party website to purchase goods for the game, outside of the game....and you are setting up measures to "protect" them...i don't know what to say, totally speechless.
  • ulvielulviel Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 741 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    yesbro1 wrote: »
    Yes all good and well that you have made it more safe for the users side and i see that hacked accounts can make allot of stress on the GM community *** well but to make all the key's bound will make the whole game trading system unbalanced and thus the game trade will completely fail. You have already made a huge difference to beginner people with making coalescent wards and other wards bound but with this change the whole trade system will fail totally. Good and well you are making all the accounts safer but the trade system will fall and plummet and at the rate of these drastic changes you are making this game more of Buy to play rather than free to play this game is nice because it has allow of features that other online games dont have but Neverwitner is moving Into a Buy to play State and this will make by my calculation a loss of about 80% of all your Clients but its is not up to me this is only my opinion on the games state Now

    Except, they didn't make anything safer. Those 3rd party sites still can sell plenty of items. Everything that is tradable actually.
  • lewstelamon01lewstelamon01 Member Posts: 7,415 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    Quick and only reminder: We get that you're upset over this change. However, Rules of Conduct are still in force. Do please remember to keep your concerns free from rants, threats, ultimatums, implied (or outright) insults, and other forms of non-constructive discussion. Failure to do so will result in moderation or removal of your post as deemed appropriate by moderators and staff.
    ROLL TIDE ROLL

    Great Weapon Fighter: Because when is today not a good day to die?

    PC and PS4 player. Proud Guildmaster for PS4 Team Fencebane. Rank 5 Officer for PC Team Fencebane. Visit us at http://fencebane.shivtr.com
  • djarkaandjarkaan Member Posts: 883 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    I Guess we'll see if the profit loss from 3rd party sites outweighs the profit loss from zen sale for keys when they are untradable. So I guess 3rd party sites have one less reasons to hack accounts and it's a little bit safer to buy from them now...

    As always players get screwed in an attempt to make 3rd party sites less efficient, the nodes efficiency cap did not work what makes you think this will work? They don't care if they are less efficient as long as one player buys 1 item or currency from them it's a profit. They will just open the boxes themselves and sell the content. Unless you make everything BoA or BoP they will not go away.
  • reiwulfreiwulf Member Posts: 2,687 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    I couldn't care less to be honest, I've never bought keys and never plan to. When I bought zen and wanted to sell it I always used the ZaX because I knew there were lots of people wanting for zen, i don't care if I didn't get the max profit for it.
    I really really hope it can fix the ZaX exchange though. But I don't see what prevents them to stat using another random item as a new pseudo currency.
    2e2qwj6.jpg
  • chrcorechrcore Member Posts: 329 Bounty Hunter
    edited July 2014
    reiwulf wrote: »
    I couldn't care less to be honest, I've never bought keys and never plan to. When I bought zen and wanted to sell it I always used the ZaX because I knew there were lots of people wanting for zen, i don't care if I didn't get the max profit for it.
    I really really hope it can fix the ZaX exchange though. But I don't see what prevents them to stat using another random item as a new pseudo currency.

    This won't fix the zax. If anything it will hurt it further.
  • neberwinterneberwinter Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    Personally I think this as a good move.

    They should make all items from the zen store BoA.
  • ulvielulviel Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 741 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    Personally I think this as a good move.

    They should make all items from the zen store BoA.

    I do not think this is good, but making keys BoA only makes sense if the same happens to all zen items.
  • korollakorolla Member Posts: 25 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    Wonder how this will effect the next time they have a sale that discounts the keys? I would funnel any zen I had into buying keys since even if I didn't want anything from the boxes keys have always been a valuable trading commodity and I'm absolutely sure I wasn't the only one who did that. Now it's a case of thinking that if there is nothing I want in a box then there is no point in buying any keys at all.
  • sexwax45sexwax45 Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    **** i guess i should have sold all my keys instead of playing it smart, keeping for when i need the AD due to inflation reasons, guess i will be opening some lock boxes when i get home.
  • ysil6969ysil6969 Member Posts: 42 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    For people whining about buying zen and selling keys, this is probably one of the reasons they're binding to account. Instead of selling the keys, exchange your zen on the exchange! People right now are turning AD into zen, buying keys with the zen, selling them on AH for more then the exchange, turning around to the exchange again, buying keys... etc. This is creating the backlog in the exchange and the high prices on the AH.
  • sexwax45sexwax45 Member Posts: 0 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    ysil6969 wrote: »
    For people whining about buying zen and selling keys, this is probably one of the reasons they're binding to account. Instead of selling the keys, exchange your zen on the exchange! People right now are turning AD into zen, buying keys with the zen, selling them on AH for more then the exchange, turning around to the exchange again, buying keys... etc. This is creating the backlog in the exchange and the high prices on the AH.
    I agree its nice to stop those people from using ZAX only to make more AD but they will just find another item instead of keys, if they want to stop that all items in Zen store need to be BoA.
  • pointsmanpointsman Member Posts: 2,327 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    Well the ZAX backlog is going down. Pre-patch it was over 7 million Zen. Now it is just under 6.5 million.
  • lordmentallordmental Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 26 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    I think that this change makes a lot of sense, and hopefully it solves more problems than it appears to cause.
  • vscoutvvscoutv Member Posts: 19 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    All this is going to do is drastically reduce the number of keys bought from the Zen market ( having the exact opposite effect of what is probably the true intention for the change.), and obstruct the Neverwinter economy. Often keys were used as currency and as a tool for trading gold for AD. In other words. (1.) One needs AD (or gold). They buy keys for Zen ( bought with real money) and sell on AH for AD or maybe to player for gold. (2.) I have a bunch of gold. you have a bunch of ad.You buy keys for AD or maybe and sell them to me for gold and I turn around and use the keys to purchase other items from players. Maybe some where along, someone uses to open boxes

    BTW It doesn't really bother me one way or another. I have a bunch of Keys (which I had no intention of selling) and a bunch of Zen and AD. And as it stands right now, I pretty much only log in, invoke, run dread ring hoping for Eye of lathander, log out in disgust when I dont get it, and log in and play a different game.
    As a young boy chasing Dragons with your wooden sword so mighty, You're St. George or you're David and you always killed the beast
    Times change very quickly And you had to grow up early. A house in smoking ruins and the bodies at your feet ~Iron Maiden
  • zebularzebular Member, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 15,270 Community Moderator
    edited July 2014
    I personally feel this is a good move and one that needed to happen a lot sooner. No, they don't need to give any warning for any changes, especially on something of this scale that has been so deeply abused by unscrupulous players. Giving advanced notices would have benefited those that this change directly affects. Well done Cryptic, well done indeed. Now let's see more things make it to BoA, like tarmalune bars! :cool:
  • saini50990saini50990 Member Posts: 309 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    hoping for trade bars to be BOA too.
  • rayrdanrayrdan Member Posts: 5,410 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    Im here!! The prophet!!!!
  • tripsofthrymrtripsofthrymr Member, Neverwinter Moderator, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 1,624 Community Moderator
    edited July 2014
    zebular wrote: »
    I personally feel this is a good move and one that needed to happen a lot sooner. No, they don't need to give any warning for any changes, especially on something of this scale that has been so deeply abused by unscrupulous players. Giving advanced notices would have benefited those that this change directly affects. Well done Cryptic, well done indeed. Now let's see more things make it to BoA, like tarmalune bars! :cool:

    My guild has 710 Enchanted Keys in the guild bank that are used as rewards during guild events. This change his horrible beyond belief, and will not solve anything. Instead of Enchanted Keys, it will be R7 enchants or something similar next week. Will those also become BoP?
    Caritas Guild Founder (Greycloak Alliance)

    Sci-fi author: The Gods We Make, The Gods We Seek, and Ji-min
  • charononuscharononus Member Posts: 5,715 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    The entire Cash shop should be boa. Right now people are using cash shop items to get more than 500:1 ad:zen. Because the higher demand for zen because of c. wards from boxes and t. bars being boa, this has broken the system.
  • ulvielulviel Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 741 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    charononus wrote: »
    The entire Cash shop should be boa. Right now people are using cash shop items to get more than 500:1 ad:zen. Because the higher demand for zen because of c. wards from boxes and t. bars being boa, this has broken the system.

    Which is a symptom, not a cause. The real cause is the lack of AD sinks, like, you know, reasonable priced cool stuff you could buy with AD.
    You can't blame people for not wasting money (and currently selling Zen via ZAX is a waste).
    Also, making everyting BoA will kill trade and therefore the whole game.
  • charononuscharononus Member Posts: 5,715 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    ulviel wrote: »
    Which is a symptom, not a cause. The real cause is the lack of AD sinks, like, you know, reasonable priced cool stuff you could buy with AD.
    You can't blame people for not wasting money (and currently selling Zen via ZAX is a waste).
    Also, making everyting BoA will kill trade and therefore the whole game.
    Trade doesn't make or break games. D3 made everything but the equivalent of greens and blues bound to account on acquire. It did anger some people but the game is still there and in some peoples opinion better for it. It's all from your point of view.
  • ulvielulviel Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 741 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    charononus wrote: »
    It's all from your point of view.

    I'm not saying it is not, however, what you say is also "only" your point of view.

    There other factors that decide if a game can survive too, but let's be honest, NW could do better with, like, the every aspect of the game. For example, foundry - the coolest and most unique feature you have here is more neglected than both DC and GF classes combined.
  • rickcase276rickcase276 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 1,404 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    I have no issue with them making them BOA. If people are playing the game to make "money" (which is property of cryptic anyway, anything in the game is), then really they are playing the game for other than developer intended reasons. To me that is the way everything in the game should be, thus taking away the need for astral diamonds etc. The game is here to be playing the content and leveling through it and getting our items from it. Yes to some the content is boring, but that is their opinions and the way they play. I only buy keys from the zen shop when I want to open boxes, and I will continue to do it. It is why I do not really understand all the arguments about the game economy, as it is in truth not real economy.
  • query523query523 Member Posts: 1,515 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    Suppply and demand. The only supply for zen is people spending money on the game. Final. If farmers sell zen it was because someone opened up their wallet to create that zen. The situation on the ZAX is inherently rooted in people's desire to spend money on NWO. No internal market manipulation will affect that demand.
  • loboguildloboguild Member Posts: 2,371 Arc User
    edited July 2014
    I think making the keys BtA is not that big of a deal as we are "only" losing an additional currency that soon will be replaced with something else from the ZEN shop probably, but this whole retroactive thing is one big pile of [muted]...

    I give them that there might be technical difficulties to only make future keys BtA or maybe the problem was already that much out of hand (like accounts with a key-count north of 100k+) that they thought there was no alternative.

    But from where I stand passing on the retroactive change would have achieved the same thing, just with a delay. Totally uncalled for.
This discussion has been closed.