"Rule" about number of accounts?

Vinat - Sanctuary

So I was told today that there is some relatively new (as in not from the start of the game in 2008) rule stating that we can only have 3 accounts and that there are level restrictions on some of those accounts. Is that true? What about the people who had more than 3 accounts with play-able characters prior to this rule? What about people who have spent money on said accounts?

Would like a GM/CM answer. It isn't worth the time or frustration to write a ticket and attempt to decipher the vague not-taking-a-stance response that is typical of such exchanges.

Xainou - Sanctuary

Should be 2 accounts per person actually, unless the account was made before the multiclienting rule was changed o,o

The old announcement: http://pwi-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=1052691&highlight=multi

Mayfly - Dreamweaver

Your informant got it wrong. As of the rule change that allowed dual clienting on the same machine, not more than 2 accounts are allowed (I haven't seen anything about level restrictions on alt accounts.) People who had multiple accounts prior to this rule change are grandfathered in, but you're only allowed to have 2 accounts active at a time.

Psytrac - Dreamweaver

http://pwi-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=529672&highlight=accounts

http://pwi-forum.perfectworld.com/showpost.php?p=5596482&postcount=20

Mayfly - Dreamweaver

Psytrac's links are from prior to the rule change.

Xainou - Sanctuary

Is this like a new form of "retro trolling"? Acting as if the game was still the same as years back? o_o;

ovenusarmanio

Mayfly - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Your informant got it wrong. As of the rule change that allowed dual clienting on the same machine, not more than 2 accounts are allowed (I haven't seen anything about level restrictions on alt accounts.) People who had multiple accounts prior to this rule change are grandfathered in, but you're only allowed to have 2 accounts active at a time.

Mayfly - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Psytrac's links are from prior to the rule change.

These. And by active, they mean online at the same time. If you want to level up a different toon on a third account, you can sign out of one account and login into the third one no problems. So they can all be up-to-date and whatever level you feel like doing. Notably, catshops count towards this two online at the same time rule. So you can't have 2 accounts and a catshop.

Psytrac - Dreamweaver

the rule was only changed to allow 2 per IP regardless of pc restrictions. that's all that was changed. Iwas here at the time as well. and that was MY question that I asked back then. the only thing that changed was how many are allowed on at once.

and I know, search was too hard too?
http://pwi-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=1061761

Praxalis - Archosaur

Ok then...

what about a household with multiple players? That LEGITIMATELY happens (non of those power mrch 24/7 catshop excuses) So say if I had my and my bf and then a friend comes over and plays, we'd all get banned if people ticket en mass and then PWI re-traced the IP? Sounds pathetic to me. Unless your saying we find a way to set up multiple IP addresses at one location (if thats even possible) which is still asking for trouble...b:shutup

Mayfly - Dreamweaver

All you have to do then is prove (to the GM's satisfaction) that there are multiple players in the household.

ovenusarmanio

Psytrac - Dreamweaver wrote: »

the rule was only changed to allow 2 per IP regardless of pc restrictions. that's all that was changed. Iwas here at the time as well. and that was MY question that I asked back then. the only thing that changed was how many are allowed on at once.

and I know, search was too hard too?
http://pwi-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=1061761

You know it's easy to come across the outdated links you posted rather than ones Frankie posted depending how you framed your search.....Anyway, according to the URL's you posted, this is incorrect.

Psytrac - Dreamweaver wrote: »

http://pwi-forum.perfectworld.com/showpost.php?p=5596482&postcount=20

According to this link Old Rule=as many accounts as you want, in order to logon more than one you need more than one PC.

So the entirety of the rule was changed. You can't have as many accounts as you want, you can only have 2. You can login to those 2 accounts however you so choose to do so.

A little bit of background with this rule change is needed here, since the old rules were brought up. Back in the olden days, when Spoons was CM, it was not possible to login to more than one client through the patcher. IIRC, Since they didn't want people poking around in the element files, they restricted it to one per PC. This changed when Frankie was the CM, and he changed the multiclient policy accordingly. OFC, that changed back and now you still have to go into your element folder to multiclient but PWE exercised some common sense and didn't change the rule back when it reverted back to the old way.

So the rule got changed into:

1)You can only have 2 accounts per person (NOT PER IP. If you are incorrectly banned for having too many at once, when really it's multiple people in your household, you will have to submit proof that more than one person plays the game. The CM did not elaborate what this proof would need to be.)

2) You can have them both logged in at the same time however you please. Either through two computers (multiboxing) or through 2 windows on the same pc (multiclienting)

Any older players who already had more than 2 accounts are allowed to keep them, however they still have to follow rule 2.

XXOGCaliXx - Heavens Tear

as understaffed at pwe is i doubt there is anyone sitting around and watching ip addresses for multiclienting infractions.

Krel - Heavens Tear

Well since you said that lol consider yourself marked hahaha

Grelda - Dreamweaver

Psytrac - Dreamweaver wrote: »

http://pwi-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?t=529672&highlight=accounts

http://pwi-forum.perfectworld.com/showpost.php?p=5596482&postcount=20

Haha, I remember MagicHamsta.

Good times.

Psytrac - Dreamweaver

oVenusArmanio wrote: »

You know it's easy to come across the outdated links you posted rather than ones Frankie posted depending how you framed your search.....Anyway, according to the URL's you posted, this is incorrect.

omg really? FRANKIE is the one that DID post that one..

Praxalis - Archosaur

oVenusArmanio wrote: »

You know it's easy to come across the outdated links you posted rather than ones Frankie posted depending how you framed your search.....Anyway, according to the URL's you posted, this is incorrect.



According to this link Old Rule=as many accounts as you want, in order to logon more than one you need more than one PC.

So the entirety of the rule was changed. You can't have as many accounts as you want, you can only have 2. You can login to those 2 accounts however you so choose to do so.

A little bit of background with this rule change is needed here, since the old rules were brought up. Back in the olden days, when Spoons was CM, it was not possible to login to more than one client through the patcher. IIRC, Since they didn't want people poking around in the element files, they restricted it to one per PC. This changed when Frankie was the CM, and he changed the multiclient policy accordingly. OFC, that changed back and now you still have to go into your element folder to multiclient but PWE exercised some common sense and didn't change the rule back when it reverted back to the old way.

So the rule got changed into:

1)You can only have 2 accounts per person (NOT PER IP. If you are incorrectly banned for having too many at once, when really it's multiple people in your household, you will have to submit proof that more than one person plays the game. The CM did not elaborate what this proof would need to be.)

2) You can have them both logged in at the same time however you please. Either through two computers (multiboxing) or through 2 windows on the same pc (multiclienting)

Any older players who already had more than 2 accounts are allowed to keep them, however they still have to follow rule 2.

Ok that was worrying me since too much activity outbound from one IP might look like a massive multi-client merchanter. I myself am guilty for leaving 2 accounts logged in 24/7 sometimes (myself in RoR and then a shop) and sometimes my bf gets on to lvl his BM so I didnt want it to get all wiggy. b:cute ty for clearing this up

Kitkate - Dreamweaver

Honestly i dont think they are concerned about how many accounts you own, just how many you have online at one time. I find it unfair to treat older players differently than new players on this matter. As long as you stick to the only 2 online at a time rule i dont think they care. They have more important things to be checking.

Vinat - Sanctuary

Sigh.

Thank you all for posting, but I said GM/CM for a reason.

Kitkate - Dreamweaver

Vinat - Sanctuary wrote: »

Sigh.

Thank you all for posting, but I said GM/CM for a reason.

You rarely get answers from them that are not vague. I feel the answer that they would give you would be vague, if you even get an answer.

Vinat - Sanctuary

Kitkate - Dreamweaver wrote: »

You rarely get answers from them that are not vague. I feel the answer that they would give you would be vague, if you even get an answer.

Yea, I agree. I just don't want to end up having one of my MANY accounts banned when I have playable characters on X different accounts and storage or cat shops on X more, all created in 2008 or early 2009. I also don't want to be expected to re-roll characters that I already have to condense the number of accounts I use.

ovenusarmanio

Psytrac - Dreamweaver wrote: »

omg really? FRANKIE is the one that DID post that one..

Was referring to the first one you linked, with eatwithspoons confirming the old rule, that Ninnuam - Sanctuary posted. You linked two the one with eatwithspoons is now out of date, the one with Frankie is the correct one.

Vinat - Sanctuary wrote: »

Sigh.

Thank you all for posting, but I said GM/CM for a reason.

Vinat - Sanctuary wrote: »

Yea, I agree. I just don't want to end up having one of my MANY accounts banned when I have playable characters on X different accounts and storage or cat shops on X more, all created in 2008 or early 2009. I also don't want to be expected to re-roll characters that I already have to condense the number of accounts I use.

I was restating what the CM response was, the link provided you posted by Frankieraye is the current ruling on the matter. It is also listed in the official announcements. If you click the links provided you will see the CM/GM response. And as stated in that link, as long as your characters were created on or before 4-6-2011 they are grandfathered in. So if that is the date they were created, then you don't have to give up your characters.

Kitkate - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Honestly i dont think they are concerned about how many accounts you own, just how many you have online at one time. I find it unfair to treat older players differently than new players on this matter. As long as you stick to the only 2 online at a time rule i dont think they care. They have more important things to be checking.

They are treating older players different than new players, because it would be completely unfair to make older players delete legal accounts they had before the rule was changed. New players wouldn't have to delete anything or lose anything in order to come into compliance to the rule. It would have been unfair to treat people like they had broken the rules, when they had not. I think that ruling is the only fair way to have gone about it, if they were going to restrict people.

Kitkate - Dreamweaver

oVenusArmanio wrote: »

They are treating older players different than new players, because it would be completely unfair to make older players delete legal accounts they had before the rule was changed. New players wouldn't have to delete anything or lose anything in order to come into compliance to the rule. It would have been unfair to treat people like they had broken the rules, when they had not. I think that ruling is the only fair way to have gone about it, if they were going to restrict people.

I meant it is unfair to the new players to be restricted to 2 accounts. Most people have a main and alt account, along with one as a bank or shop. I see no harm in allowing owning more than 2, as long as only 2 are online at a time. I see no point in drawing a line between a new and old player.

Zanryu - Dreamweaver

Shouldn't everyone be treated equally? "Older players are being treated because it would be unfair to have them delete accounts to comply". I'm sorry, I think I missed the part where it's fair for new players to be limited to two accounts while older players are allowed to keep theirs. Limiting the amount of accounts one can have is a dumb rule in the first place, what purpose does it even serve? There's already a limit of two accounts per computer (it can very easily be bypassed with no consequence, you can blame PW's lack of rule enforcement for that.)


The only reason I could think of for limiting accounts is so that people can't reserve names or so that they can't log in a ton of accounts all at once and gain some kind of "unfair" advantage on other players. Reserving names is hardly worth a rule to prevent it, so I'm betting it's the latter. Of course, like I said, we have the two account per person per computer rule. Whether or not it's enforced.. well that's not really up to me. Of course, were a new rule to be introduced stating you may only own two accounts, I'm far from confident it would actually be enforced to any degree.

KrittyCat - Dreamweaver

Zanryu - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Shouldn't everyone be treated equally? "Older players are being treated because it would be unfair to have them delete accounts to comply". I'm sorry, I think I missed the part where it's fair for new players to be limited to two accounts while older players are allowed to keep theirs.

It's called a grandfather clause. They can't justify taking accounts that people have spent time and money on away, so they grandfather them into the new rules as long as they comply with the guidelines of the new rules.

It works that way with any business changing the way things work - take Twitch for example. All of the older (beta) subscriber buttons block ads on the channel that the viewer is subscribed to. However, anyone who got a button after they officially released the feature no longer has that option. This is because Twitch realized it would be bad business for them to allow all sub buttons to have the ad block capability.

Same concept here... PWE believed it was bad business to take all the hard work people put into the game and render it completely moot by removing accounts from people who had more than two, but felt it necessary to limit the accounts of new users for reasons only they know.

Zanryu - Dreamweaver

KrittyCat - Dreamweaver wrote: »

It's called a grandfather clause. They can't justify taking accounts that people have spent time and money on away, so they grandfather them into the new rules as long as they comply with the guidelines of the new rules.

It works that way with any business changing the way things work - take Twitch for example. All of the older (beta) subscriber buttons block ads on the channel that the viewer is subscribed to. However, anyone who got a button after they officially released the feature no longer has that option. This is because Twitch realized it would be bad business for them to allow all sub buttons to have the ad block capability.

Same concept here... PWE believed it was bad business to take all the hard work people put into the game and render it completely moot by removing accounts from people who had more than two, but felt it necessary to limit the accounts of new users for reasons only they know.

Still quite stupid sir.

Especially when using "fairness" as an excuse.

_dblazen_ - Dreamweaver

It doesnt matter anyway because good luck to them trying to prove you aren't lying about the following statement in the new policy:

*Example: If you're a family of 3 playing PWI, then you can have 2 accounts for each member of your family. You WILL have to prove this though if we notice any suspicious activity from your household.

HOW are you supposed to prove this? Send pictures of your sister/brother/father/mother playing PWI to them?

You could just "forge" evidence that it's someone else in your household that owns the other 2 accounts and they'd still be unable to do a thing because of it.

ovenusarmanio

KrittyCat - Dreamweaver wrote: »

It's called a grandfather clause. They can't justify taking accounts that people have spent time and money on away, so they grandfather them into the new rules as long as they comply with the guidelines of the new rules.

It works that way with any business changing the way things work - take Twitch for example. All of the older (beta) subscriber buttons block ads on the channel that the viewer is subscribed to. However, anyone who got a button after they officially released the feature no longer has that option. This is because Twitch realized it would be bad business for them to allow all sub buttons to have the ad block capability.

Same concept here... PWE believed it was bad business to take all the hard work people put into the game and render it completely moot by removing accounts from people who had more than two, but felt it necessary to limit the accounts of new users for reasons only they know.

Pretty much this. When you create a new rule, it'd be unfair to retroactively punish people for breaking that rule when it wasn't a rule at the time they did whatever they did. I'm not arguing for or against restricting accounts, I'm saying that since they decided to create a rule that restricted people from having tons of accounts because of some unspecified abuses. It would be unfair to punish older players for creating multiple accounts before the rule existed, retroactively punishing them for breaking a rule that did not exist. This concept is nowhere near new or restricted to business. Heck, the US constitution has a grandfather clause in it (that is now ofc no longer relevant) that let anyone who was around at the time of the US creation to become President of the United, although all future candidates would actually need to be born in US soil. Because obviously people who fought for it's independence should have been eligible to become President, and when they were born there wasn't even a US (technically) so they couldn't of been born there. Sometimes a grandfather clause is just common sense being applied and the necessity of one shouldn't determine whether or not you create new rules to adapt to the reality of your environment. I have no idea if the rule is fair or not to new players. It would really depend on heavily it's enforced, and what abuses it's there to prevent. Neither of which, I know. For all I know, they only enforce when they notice it's being abused. Like Jaywalking laws. In which case I'd be fine with it. They could be enforcing with extreme prejudice whenever someone does like send in a ticket, in which case I would think it needs revisiting. I have no idea. But I do find it perfectly fair there is a grandfather clause in this situation, some of these older players had spent thousands of dollars on their old accounts.

Zanryu - Dreamweaver wrote: »

Still quite stupid sir.

Especially when using "fairness" as an excuse.

They didn't, they said it was to prevent mutliclient abuses. Which they claimed were excessive enough to create the rule. I used the word fair to describe not having to delete a character that the OP had worked so hard on, when it was created before the rule even existed. I think it's fair that OP gets to keep their character. And that would be unfair to treat the OP the same as a new player, when the new player isn't giving up anything to be in compliance with that rule. Kitkate then clarified that she didn't mean the grandfather clause was unfair, but that she finds the 2 accounts only rule unfair since new players can only legally have accounts.

Zanryu - Dreamweaver

>Playing PWI
>Realize I want to play on three accounts at once
>herewego.gif
>Type in all the info
>About to log in on the third account
>Oh god I haven't been playing since the start
>I better follow the rules because PWI is very strict on rule enforcement
>Close third client
>Look for openers for TT
>Cry because if I had logged that third client I would be banned
>Wake up
>Boy that dream was spooky
>Feel like playing PWI
>Log 6 accounts because it's common sense nothing will happen to me for it
>Run 6 man TTs all day
>Make bank
>Logout
>Laugh at silly 2 accounts logged in rule
>Laugh at sillier 2 accounts per person rule
>Never get banned


That's about all that's gonna happen to anyone. They'll ignore the rule because of the severe lack of rule enforcement that goes on here. A restriction on the amount of accounts one can own will do nothing to prevent multi client abuse, if it could be prevented it would already be. One more rule that nobody will care enough to follow because if it's not a big enough deal for PWE to actually take action now, then what makes you think they'll take action if you break what is essentially the same rule posed for the exact same reason?

Selak - Dreamweaver

Laughing about multiclient rule.

Wondering why some people are not aware how its cheating,
just as much as hypers/FC or any other method of cheating when playing an MMORPG.

Ok its not against the rules I hear you all say,
But its clearly against the spirit of the game for players like me.

Proud single client user only for the whole time playing. b:victory

FaceRolI - Sanctuary

Zanryu - Dreamweaver wrote: »

>Playing PWI
>Realize I want to play on three accounts at once
>herewego.gif
>Type in all the info
>About to log in on the third account
>Oh god I haven't been playing since the start
>I better follow the rules because PWI is very strict on rule enforcement
>Close third client
>Look for openers for TT
>Cry because if I had logged that third client I would be banned
>Wake up
>Boy that dream was spooky
>Feel like playing PWI
>Log 6 accounts because it's common sense nothing will happen to me for it
>Run 6 man TTs all day
>Make bank
>Logout
>Laugh at silly 2 accounts logged in rule
>Laugh at sillier 2 accounts per person rule
>Never get banned

in general what you posted sounds pretty accurate.

However, new form of "PK" is to mass ticket GMs w/ complaints about a certain player violating a certain "rule". it seems that GMs dont mind occasionally enforcing their rules when it is brought to their attention with enough outcry.

Grindata_ - Heavens Tear

ive never had to go into my element file to open a 2nd client since i have it pinned to my start bar i just start up pwi then just right click the image again and it opens a new screen