with any automated defense turret collateral damage happens, Sure it sucks and if it was me I'd probably be writing a very different post, But come on people they have to do something
So basically, according to you, its ok to auto-ban players who use customized chat windows? Is it ok to ban fleet officers who send warnings about ec scams? Because this is what happens. Only players hurt are those with real accounts. Banned spammer will just create a new account and wait 20 hours before sending another portion of spam, this time re-worded to avoid keywords.
May 2013, automatic permanent ban for mentioning gold-seller sites pwebranflakes: this system is currently in place and working the way it should. moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
I will pass along your feedback, but this system is currently in place and working the way it should. If you see anyone trying to trick others, please report them to a GM immediately so an investigation take place and appropriate action taken.
> this system is currently in place and working the way it should
Well, congrats, you've convinced me to *never* give a single cent to this company. Thank you for saving me time, money and potential frustration.
I was really digging the atmosphere, the gameplay and was considering subbing.
Nope. Not now. Not with an enforcement policy like that. You can keep it. I will absolutely make sure people know about this policy too.
Why are you locking accounts on player that have spent $300 on the last week and not responding to their emails? The leader of my guild now has his account locked and cannot get anyone to respond to his questions on why it would be locked. He is a wounded, disabled Afghanistan vet that needs things like this game to keep his mind going. Why in the world would you lock account when there are so many other things going on with this game right now?
Gotta wait in line for CS like everyone else. I've been waiting for 12 days to hear back (and their customer support doesn't work on Weekends/holidays)
I am not affected, but two very friendly and helpful members of a public channel got auto-banned for mentioning this WORD, they did not endorse nor promote this but just stated that they were surprised that gold sellers rear their ugly heads again.
Come on, automatic ban upon mentioning a specific WORD?
This is going too far and i honestly cannot believe that this auto-ban is in place.
And don't expect to see a response to this posted on the Forum. As private account details are considered 'private' and not to be publicly disclosed...
WHAT!!!!!!??????
couldnt just have the system pop up a message saying "the word "yluvy" is listed as spam. posting more than 3 messages with this word in 6 hours will result in a 48 hr chat ban"
Its 2 uses of that word actually. And there is a high probability that you will never see any warning. They didn't inform us about that "solution" because apparently they didn't want to warn the spammers.
Plus it flags you as spammer when you type "don't visit x, they are scammers", "what type of spam you got? x?", and so on.
May 2013, automatic permanent ban for mentioning gold-seller sites pwebranflakes: this system is currently in place and working the way it should. moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
This is beyond ridiculous. First they corrupt the system channels by spamming the lottery winners there all day, so everyone is either turning the channel off, or if not, you'll just learn in the very Pavlovian fashion to totally ignore anything in yellow text - and then some meager message thrown to that dysfunctional channel is supposed to be some kind of warning to not mention one of the many 5-letter words.. or get a permanent ban?
Well... glad I don't generally use the in-game chat.
I wonder how many people will make a character with some variation of those 5-letter words, so just chatting to them will get you a ban.
Well, the eula does mention they have the right to ban you for any reason, or no reason, with or without notice.. so I guess it's withing the scope of eula.. basically banning people for no reason, without warning.
@n0t0ryczny his the leader of the Talos fleet he is one of the few active fleet officers who is active and sets project in our fleet. He was helping out a fleet mate with a question about spam mail. How can he administer the fleet holding and the fleet he is banded for helping out a fleet member who asked about spam mail. it would help if we as players new the list of banded words or phrases that the cryptic as set up.so we don't say the banded words in chat. a chat ban would be better punishment for first time offenders than a full account ban. Account bans should be a for multiple violations of the rules,
@n0t0ryczny his the leader of the Talos fleet he is one of the few active fleet officers who is active and sets project in our fleet. He was helping out a fleet mate with a question about spam mail. How can he administer the fleet holding and the fleet he is banded for helping out a fleet member who asked about spam mail. it would help if we as players new the list of banded words or phrases that the cryptic as set up.so we don't say the banded words in chat. a chat ban would be better punishment for first time offenders than a full account ban. Account bans should be a for multiple violations of the rules,
Not to mention, a 24 hour chat ban would be just as effective basically, for the actual reason for the system.. since it's easy enough for spammers to bring in new accounts to keep spamming. And once they get one account banned, they can just dodge the system by using any of countless variations of the word. It's just.. stupid.
A lot more effective system would probably be to make it so people can't use the global chat until one of their characters reaches level 10. Sure it's a bit frustrating for new players, but it would go a long way to reduce the spam.. since getting to level 10 actually takes a bit of time and effort. Combine that with a less trigger-happy banning, and maybe it'd actually work.
Guys you have to realize even Brandon is out this weekend spending time with his family and yes, a lot of staff are out due to the fact it's the memorial day weekend. PLUS they just launched a major expansion they deserve a little free time :P
I get it sucks being banned by an auto system however in my personal opinion that is the best option. It'll get the majority of spammers (and no just doing spaces or _ or / in between words most likely won't help since they've probably used a regex) and yes sadly there will be some people hit on accident. But unbanning those accidentally hit is faster than having to deal with the spammers. However, yes they should have mentioned this was going to go in to the chat system but really and to be totally fair, most people wouldn't read that it was added and still be in here complaining :P
The staff DO read every forum and the gameplay bugs do get developers attention, regardless if you think they post a lot in here or not. This has been said numerous times and been proven. All I can say is just be patient it'll get handled next week (and I know that isn't really comforting.)
Yes, I'm that Askray@Batbayer in game. Yes, I still play. No, I don't care. Former Community Moderator, Former SSR DJ, Now Full time father to two kids, Husband, Retail Worker. Tiktok: @Askray Facebook: Askray113
Please let n0t0ryczny back in to STO. Talos Force misses him and guidence through STO. He was only acknowledging spam that a fleet member was bringing to his attention.
I get it sucks being banned by an auto system however in my personal opinion that is the best option. It'll get the majority of spammers (and no just doing spaces or _ or / in between words most likely won't help since they've probably used a regex) and yes sadly there will be some people hit on accident. But unbanning those accidentally hit is faster than having to deal with the spammers. However, yes they should have mentioned this was going to go in to the chat system but really and to be totally fair, most people wouldn't read that it was added and still be in here complaining :P
It won't get majority of the spammers. They will just spawn new accounts over and over, like the guy who joined my fleet to get a copy of the roster and then spam people from secondary accounts.
Its not hitting people on accident - spilling coffee is an accident. In BranFlakes words, its working as intended. Introduction of this "security measure" was unannounced, warnings are most likely to be disabled and/or unnoticed because they are posted in a channel that most players turn off, finally it does not check the context of the ban-triggering word.
I was banned because I asked my friend what type of spam he received recently FFS!! How on Earth is that a security measure? Moreover, soon it will be 72 hours since it hit me. I didn't get ANY message explaining what happened. I can't even check my ticket because your site is badly designed and when I try to reach support page it gets stuck in redirect loop! How is that a fair conduct?
May 2013, automatic permanent ban for mentioning gold-seller sites pwebranflakes: this system is currently in place and working the way it should. moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
It won't get majority of the spammers. They will just spawn new accounts over and over, like the guy who joined my fleet to get a copy of the roster and then spam people from secondary accounts.
Its not hitting people on accident - spilling coffee is an accident. In BranFlakes words, its working as intended. Introduction of this "security measure" was unannounced, warnings are most likely to be disabled and/or unnoticed because they are posted in a channel that most players turn off, finally it does not check the context of the ban-triggering word.
I was banned because I asked my friend what type of spam he received recently FFS!! How on Earth is that a security measure? Moreover, soon it will be 72 hours since it hit me. I didn't get ANY message explaining what happened. I can't even check my ticket because your site is badly designed and when I try to reach support page it gets stuck in redirect loop! How is that a fair conduct?
I didn't know i owned PWE YAY ME! FREE COOKIES FOR ALL! :P
However, I'm just a volunteer and as such not an employee of PWE or Cryptic Studios. I know about the redirect loop as I've been hit with it a couple of times and a quick cache clear normally helped. That's the best I can help you with. Once they do reply you will get it via e-mail as well though.
Yes, I'm that Askray@Batbayer in game. Yes, I still play. No, I don't care. Former Community Moderator, Former SSR DJ, Now Full time father to two kids, Husband, Retail Worker. Tiktok: @Askray Facebook: Askray113
Guys you have to realize even Brandon is out this weekend spending time with his family and yes, a lot of staff are out due to the fact it's the memorial day weekend. PLUS they just launched a major expansion they deserve a little free time :P
I get it sucks being banned by an auto system however in my personal opinion that is the best option. It'll get the majority of spammers (and no just doing spaces or _ or / in between words most likely won't help since they've probably used a regex) and yes sadly there will be some people hit on accident. But unbanning those accidentally hit is faster than having to deal with the spammers. However, yes they should have mentioned this was going to go in to the chat system but really and to be totally fair, most people wouldn't read that it was added and still be in here complaining :P
The staff DO read every forum and the gameplay bugs do get developers attention, regardless if you think they post a lot in here or not. This has been said numerous times and been proven. All I can say is just be patient it'll get handled next week (and I know that isn't really comforting.)
If it was going to be read or not doesn't matter really. This amongst the ninja changes with the mailsystem, i assume it's a change since it hasnt been acknowledges as a bug yet, should've been in the patchnotes when they where rolled out.
Any responsible fleetleader or SO in my knowledge reads patchnotes and as such fleets could've been warned.
I know for sure if had been in the patchnotes my friend Blunt would not have been banned for it now.
As for Branflakes, sure he deserves his time off. On that note though this is just a plain GM job, or chore even. No need for Branflakes to break his head over.
I know about the redirect loop as I've been hit with it a couple of times and a quick cache clear normally helped.
I tried modifying/resetting privacy settings, cookie settings, cache clearing, session settings and all things I could come up with in Firefox, Opera and even IE. It didn't help. It has to be an issue with ISP or with your page. I had that issue with Atari when they still used Cryptic to manage their ingame currency selling. Couldn't make it work back then too. All I can get is http://www.perfectworld.com/login/?src=rn&returnTo=0&error=7&lang=en
May 2013, automatic permanent ban for mentioning gold-seller sites pwebranflakes: this system is currently in place and working the way it should. moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
I get it sucks being banned by an auto system however in my personal opinion that is the best option.
Really? The best option? How is autobanning better than forcing the word that shall not be spoken (and variants thereof, just whatever detection system they have in place for the autobans) to be automatically hidden by a variant of the profanity filter (that cannot be disabled)? Or if you want to be more draconian, apply a chat ban? Or put in some basic safeguards to ensure that any accounts that look like real players (active characters, maybe a subscription, zen purchases, ...) get GM review before going for account bans?
Banning your loyal users for typing a name (non taboo, non offensive or vulgar) in chat is the worst piece of "bandaid" solution to a problem that I have seen till date, anywhere, ever. This is disgraceful.
Guys you have to realize even Brandon is out this weekend spending time with his family and yes, a lot of staff are out due to the fact it's the memorial day weekend. PLUS they just launched a major expansion they deserve a little free time :P
I get it sucks being banned by an auto system however in my personal opinion that is the best option. It'll get the majority of spammers (and no just doing spaces or _ or / in between words most likely won't help since they've probably used a regex) and yes sadly there will be some people hit on accident. But unbanning those accidentally hit is faster than having to deal with the spammers. However, yes they should have mentioned this was going to go in to the chat system but really and to be totally fair, most people wouldn't read that it was added and still be in here complaining :P
The staff DO read every forum and the gameplay bugs do get developers attention, regardless if you think they post a lot in here or not. This has been said numerous times and been proven. All I can say is just be patient it'll get handled next week (and I know that isn't really comforting.)
I am sorry but my fleet member was trying to help others in our fleet on OUR OWN private channel... This is not acceptable.
Banning people for saying certain words isn't a route we should be going down. I have seen people in zone recently mocking and almost encouraging the events that happened in Woolwich earlier which I found very upsetting. Were they autobanned for it? No and that is clearly grounds for a ban over saying to avoid *goldseller* company etc.
The chat system at the moment from what I gather prevents you sending the message with that gold sellers name in. Why not just leave it at that if you really feel the need to enforce censorship on us?
I hope you do get unbanned soon mblunt, we're all aware of what's happening and spreading the word.
Also I do hope the devs and everyone at Cryptic do get to have some time off till Tuesday. While we're all getting heated I'm sure most of us know what it's like to be under pressure and criticized at every turn with no rest. So please can we have less complaints about them not doing anything till Tuesday, it sucks but so must their work life at the moment and a little compassion and understanding on both sides would go a long way.
Edit: druhin brings up a valid point below. If someone has paid a subscription fee to this game and is being prevented from accessing this content, through a fault of the system, is some form of compensation going to be granted, especially as no ToS violation has happened?
I tried modifying/resetting privacy settings, cookie settings, cache clearing, session settings and all things I could come up with in Firefox, Opera and even IE. It didn't help. It has to be an issue with ISP or with your page. I had that issue with Atari when they still used Cryptic to manage their ingame currency selling. Couldn't make it work back then too. All I can get is http://www.perfectworld.com/login/?src=rn&returnTo=0&error=7&lang=en
Again, i'm a volunteer and not an employee of PWE or Cryptic Studios and as such it isn't my page. :P (thus the comment of i didn't know I owned PWE) All I can do is tell you how I've gotten it to work (and how others have gotten it to work) and go by that. They know it's an issue and I know it's something they're looking into but when it's just a subset of people that are having issues it becomes a problem tracking down the specific issue. Beyond that I can only say the e-mail is the best option and it WILL get resolved as soon as possible.
And remember folks, my comments are my own and not that of PWE or Cryptic Studios. I do feel it's a good option as it deals with the THOUSANDS of spam accounts that get created. Does it suck for those that get accidentally banned? Yes, I am in no way saying it doesn't nor that the account ban should be lifted very swiftly. That said, even if I got one of the bans in question as long as I understood the reasoning I'd be okay with it and yes I do agree (as I've stated) that there should have been some type of notice this was going to happen instead of it happening. Though I still believe in the simple fact no one would have noticed it in the patch notes or on the front page and still got swept in the autoban and we'd be still having this conversation.
Yes, I'm that Askray@Batbayer in game. Yes, I still play. No, I don't care. Former Community Moderator, Former SSR DJ, Now Full time father to two kids, Husband, Retail Worker. Tiktok: @Askray Facebook: Askray113
Not to mention, a 24 hour chat ban would be just as effective basically, for the actual reason for the system.. since it's easy enough for spammers to bring in new accounts to keep spamming. And once they get one account banned, they can just dodge the system by using any of countless variations of the word. It's just.. stupid.
A lot more effective system would probably be to make it so people can't use the global chat until one of their characters reaches level 10. Sure it's a bit frustrating for new players, but it would go a long way to reduce the spam.. since getting to level 10 actually takes a bit of time and effort. Combine that with a less trigger-happy banning, and maybe it'd actually work.
This sounds like a good idea in the making. Block global chat until level 10 and have a "newbie" channel which is moderated in order to help those genuine new starts and which also at the same time means capturing any attempts at gold selling. It has rightly been pointed out how easy it is for the spammers to just create a new account and therefor ultimately the ones you are hurting most are the real players Cryptic. I must have reported over a 100 sellers in my time in the game as it is easy with the "right click" option (something I was grateful for) so why on Earth has this epic fail happened in the first place? I hardly ever see spammers now and you can be sure I would have been just as hot on the right button had I seen anymore. Please give the players what they want and remove this auto-mated disaster and replace it with something involving a real person's decision making before action as drastic and as damaging as a ban is taken. The old excuses that the game was not making enough money to support this kind of consideration for your player base will simply hold no water anymore.
I've been a lifer since day 1 and have been trying to convince a fellow trekker friend of mine to join this game since then. The recent expansion did interest him and I decided to buy it partly to continue my support of a game which I never have to pay for. You are lucky I did not see this thread before then as I am appalled at this fiasco and would most likely have been put off altogether. I doubt if this example will go any way towards convincing my friend he should join.
That said, I am encouraged by the recent improvements and additional content so please don't think I'm trying to be completely negative here. Just please, please have a little more consideration and think a bit more before doing something. Also, I think a very sincere apology (if not compensation) is in order for those wrongly affected.
I do feel it's a good option as it deals with the THOUSANDS of spam accounts that get created. Does it suck for those that get accidentally banned? Yes, I am in no way saying it doesn't nor that the account ban should be lifted very swiftly. That said, even if I got one of the bans in question as long as I understood the reasoning I'd be okay with it and yes I do agree (as I've stated) that there should have been some type of notice this was going to happen instead of it happening. Though I still believe in the simple fact no one would have noticed it in the patch notes or on the front page and still got swept in the autoban and we'd be still having this conversation.
Honestly, there are multiple issues with it. Both with the general idea and with the way it is executed. Banning accounts by automated system, without verification by a human. Using a keyword system which is easy to get around it (in mail messages at least), yet does not differentiate in what context the keyword was used. "Warnings" sent in spammed system that many, many players move to a different chat tab or disable altogether. As is, the "anti-spam filter" is a disaster.
Mancom already gave an idea for far more workable solution: variation of un-removable profanity filter. Thats both neat and efficient - no human supervision required, no rageposting players.
Moreover, changing the zone chat/mail access requirement from playing for 20 hours to, for example, playing for 20 hours AND reaching level 10 would significantly reduce number of spam account, since those guys just fire up multiple copies of game client and wait through that 20 hours while spamming from remaining accounts. It would require some effort from them, and as we know, effort is not time/cost effective.
Finally, when it comes to patch notes - if someone reads forums, there is also a good chance that he checks patch notes. If someone reads patch notes and there is some kind of interesting addon, its widely discussed in zone chat (on ESD mostly). Plus, most fleet leaders DO check patch notes, if only for information regarding ability changes, mission updates and/or new content. So the info from patch notes does leak to general player population.
May 2013, automatic permanent ban for mentioning gold-seller sites pwebranflakes: this system is currently in place and working the way it should. moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
The staff DO read every forum and the gameplay bugs do get developers attention, regardless if you think they post a lot in here or not. This has been said numerous times and been proven. All I can say is just be patient it'll get handled next week (and I know that isn't really comforting.)
Those players who were hit by permanent bans due to this foul up, should be compensated for lost (potential) income such as Fleet Marks and Dilithium, as well as reinstated into being allowed access to the game, and a formal apology from whomever had the intelligence to install this method of auto-banning.
Will any of this happen? More than likely, not at all. Players may get their accounts unlocked, but more than that, all we'll hear is "Ooops, we screwed up. But the system is working as intended.". In other words, pretty much what Brandon wrote earlier in this thread.
Understandably, the devs deserve some time off. But what about the players who are unjustly permanently banned from the game, for a system which is inherently flawed and which doesn't give sufficient warning before hitting you with a perma ban?
And remember folks, my comments are my own and not that of PWE or Cryptic Studios. I do feel it's a good option as it deals with the THOUSANDS of spam accounts that get created. Does it suck for those that get accidentally banned?
Banning reputable and important fleet members and even leaders in return for squashing some spammers (which should be the job of real in-game GMs by the way...) is not a good deal at all.
Wait so they can quickly set up an auto ban but not fix the in game email so you can delete something. So I guess an in game spam filter is to much. but really this is just stupid.
Comments
So basically, according to you, its ok to auto-ban players who use customized chat windows? Is it ok to ban fleet officers who send warnings about ec scams? Because this is what happens. Only players hurt are those with real accounts. Banned spammer will just create a new account and wait 20 hours before sending another portion of spam, this time re-worded to avoid keywords.
pwebranflakes: this system is currently in place and working the way it should.
moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
> this system is currently in place and working the way it should
Well, congrats, you've convinced me to *never* give a single cent to this company. Thank you for saving me time, money and potential frustration.
I was really digging the atmosphere, the gameplay and was considering subbing.
Nope. Not now. Not with an enforcement policy like that. You can keep it. I will absolutely make sure people know about this policy too.
Come on Branflakes, its my fleet mate we are talking about here, and you know me! I advertised your game for free at the convention!!!!
All over the BBC news I was, and I did not even say anything nasty about it, like the server issues, always patching and a lot of down time.
So please mate can you get Mblunt back online, he is a good chap...
Regards
@KirkRyder
Fleet Leader, Elite Defense Starfleet.
www.EliteDefenseStarfleet.com
Best fleet in Star Trek Online...
We even have our own merchandise!!! Come join us today...
www.cafepress.com/elitedefensestarfleet
I am not affected, but two very friendly and helpful members of a public channel got auto-banned for mentioning this WORD, they did not endorse nor promote this but just stated that they were surprised that gold sellers rear their ugly heads again.
Come on, automatic ban upon mentioning a specific WORD?
This is going too far and i honestly cannot believe that this auto-ban is in place.
My God that system is abhorrent! It's childish... Downright bullying infact!
Don't you Americans have this thing called a Constitution that allows free speech???
Its 2 uses of that word actually. And there is a high probability that you will never see any warning. They didn't inform us about that "solution" because apparently they didn't want to warn the spammers.
Plus it flags you as spammer when you type "don't visit x, they are scammers", "what type of spam you got? x?", and so on.
pwebranflakes: this system is currently in place and working the way it should.
moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
Well... glad I don't generally use the in-game chat.
I wonder how many people will make a character with some variation of those 5-letter words, so just chatting to them will get you a ban.
Well, the eula does mention they have the right to ban you for any reason, or no reason, with or without notice.. so I guess it's withing the scope of eula.. basically banning people for no reason, without warning.
Not to mention, a 24 hour chat ban would be just as effective basically, for the actual reason for the system.. since it's easy enough for spammers to bring in new accounts to keep spamming. And once they get one account banned, they can just dodge the system by using any of countless variations of the word. It's just.. stupid.
A lot more effective system would probably be to make it so people can't use the global chat until one of their characters reaches level 10. Sure it's a bit frustrating for new players, but it would go a long way to reduce the spam.. since getting to level 10 actually takes a bit of time and effort. Combine that with a less trigger-happy banning, and maybe it'd actually work.
There hasn't been free speech since J. Edgar Hoover
Throwing us to a wall and see who sticks... we're not pasta!!! :mad:
Hang on Blunt, i'm sure this will be sorted.
moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
http://www.elitedefensestarfleet.com
I get it sucks being banned by an auto system however in my personal opinion that is the best option. It'll get the majority of spammers (and no just doing spaces or _ or / in between words most likely won't help since they've probably used a regex) and yes sadly there will be some people hit on accident. But unbanning those accidentally hit is faster than having to deal with the spammers. However, yes they should have mentioned this was going to go in to the chat system but really and to be totally fair, most people wouldn't read that it was added and still be in here complaining :P
The staff DO read every forum and the gameplay bugs do get developers attention, regardless if you think they post a lot in here or not. This has been said numerous times and been proven. All I can say is just be patient it'll get handled next week (and I know that isn't really comforting.)
Former Community Moderator, Former SSR DJ, Now Full time father to two kids, Husband, Retail Worker.
Tiktok: @Askray Facebook: Askray113
It looks like its still in beta.
It won't get majority of the spammers. They will just spawn new accounts over and over, like the guy who joined my fleet to get a copy of the roster and then spam people from secondary accounts.
Its not hitting people on accident - spilling coffee is an accident. In BranFlakes words, its working as intended. Introduction of this "security measure" was unannounced, warnings are most likely to be disabled and/or unnoticed because they are posted in a channel that most players turn off, finally it does not check the context of the ban-triggering word.
I was banned because I asked my friend what type of spam he received recently FFS!! How on Earth is that a security measure? Moreover, soon it will be 72 hours since it hit me. I didn't get ANY message explaining what happened. I can't even check my ticket because your site is badly designed and when I try to reach support page it gets stuck in redirect loop! How is that a fair conduct?
pwebranflakes: this system is currently in place and working the way it should.
moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
However, I'm just a volunteer and as such not an employee of PWE or Cryptic Studios. I know about the redirect loop as I've been hit with it a couple of times and a quick cache clear normally helped. That's the best I can help you with. Once they do reply you will get it via e-mail as well though.
Former Community Moderator, Former SSR DJ, Now Full time father to two kids, Husband, Retail Worker.
Tiktok: @Askray Facebook: Askray113
If it was going to be read or not doesn't matter really. This amongst the ninja changes with the mailsystem, i assume it's a change since it hasnt been acknowledges as a bug yet, should've been in the patchnotes when they where rolled out.
Any responsible fleetleader or SO in my knowledge reads patchnotes and as such fleets could've been warned.
I know for sure if had been in the patchnotes my friend Blunt would not have been banned for it now.
As for Branflakes, sure he deserves his time off. On that note though this is just a plain GM job, or chore even. No need for Branflakes to break his head over.
moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
http://www.elitedefensestarfleet.com
Huh? Whats that about?
I tried modifying/resetting privacy settings, cookie settings, cache clearing, session settings and all things I could come up with in Firefox, Opera and even IE. It didn't help. It has to be an issue with ISP or with your page. I had that issue with Atari when they still used Cryptic to manage their ingame currency selling. Couldn't make it work back then too. All I can get is http://www.perfectworld.com/login/?src=rn&returnTo=0&error=7&lang=en
pwebranflakes: this system is currently in place and working the way it should.
moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
Elite Defense Stovokor
I am sorry but my fleet member was trying to help others in our fleet on OUR OWN private channel... This is not acceptable.
www.EliteDefenseStarfleet.com
Best fleet in Star Trek Online...
We even have our own merchandise!!! Come join us today...
www.cafepress.com/elitedefensestarfleet
Banning people for saying certain words isn't a route we should be going down. I have seen people in zone recently mocking and almost encouraging the events that happened in Woolwich earlier which I found very upsetting. Were they autobanned for it? No and that is clearly grounds for a ban over saying to avoid *goldseller* company etc.
The chat system at the moment from what I gather prevents you sending the message with that gold sellers name in. Why not just leave it at that if you really feel the need to enforce censorship on us?
I hope you do get unbanned soon mblunt, we're all aware of what's happening and spreading the word.
Also I do hope the devs and everyone at Cryptic do get to have some time off till Tuesday. While we're all getting heated I'm sure most of us know what it's like to be under pressure and criticized at every turn with no rest. So please can we have less complaints about them not doing anything till Tuesday, it sucks but so must their work life at the moment and a little compassion and understanding on both sides would go a long way.
Edit: druhin brings up a valid point below. If someone has paid a subscription fee to this game and is being prevented from accessing this content, through a fault of the system, is some form of compensation going to be granted, especially as no ToS violation has happened?
It is through repetition that we learn our weakness.
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Has damage got out of control?
This is the last thing I will post.
And remember folks, my comments are my own and not that of PWE or Cryptic Studios. I do feel it's a good option as it deals with the THOUSANDS of spam accounts that get created. Does it suck for those that get accidentally banned? Yes, I am in no way saying it doesn't nor that the account ban should be lifted very swiftly. That said, even if I got one of the bans in question as long as I understood the reasoning I'd be okay with it and yes I do agree (as I've stated) that there should have been some type of notice this was going to happen instead of it happening. Though I still believe in the simple fact no one would have noticed it in the patch notes or on the front page and still got swept in the autoban and we'd be still having this conversation.
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This sounds like a good idea in the making. Block global chat until level 10 and have a "newbie" channel which is moderated in order to help those genuine new starts and which also at the same time means capturing any attempts at gold selling. It has rightly been pointed out how easy it is for the spammers to just create a new account and therefor ultimately the ones you are hurting most are the real players Cryptic. I must have reported over a 100 sellers in my time in the game as it is easy with the "right click" option (something I was grateful for) so why on Earth has this epic fail happened in the first place? I hardly ever see spammers now and you can be sure I would have been just as hot on the right button had I seen anymore. Please give the players what they want and remove this auto-mated disaster and replace it with something involving a real person's decision making before action as drastic and as damaging as a ban is taken. The old excuses that the game was not making enough money to support this kind of consideration for your player base will simply hold no water anymore.
I've been a lifer since day 1 and have been trying to convince a fellow trekker friend of mine to join this game since then. The recent expansion did interest him and I decided to buy it partly to continue my support of a game which I never have to pay for. You are lucky I did not see this thread before then as I am appalled at this fiasco and would most likely have been put off altogether. I doubt if this example will go any way towards convincing my friend he should join.
That said, I am encouraged by the recent improvements and additional content so please don't think I'm trying to be completely negative here. Just please, please have a little more consideration and think a bit more before doing something. Also, I think a very sincere apology (if not compensation) is in order for those wrongly affected.
Honestly, there are multiple issues with it. Both with the general idea and with the way it is executed. Banning accounts by automated system, without verification by a human. Using a keyword system which is easy to get around it (in mail messages at least), yet does not differentiate in what context the keyword was used. "Warnings" sent in spammed system that many, many players move to a different chat tab or disable altogether. As is, the "anti-spam filter" is a disaster.
Mancom already gave an idea for far more workable solution: variation of un-removable profanity filter. Thats both neat and efficient - no human supervision required, no rageposting players.
Moreover, changing the zone chat/mail access requirement from playing for 20 hours to, for example, playing for 20 hours AND reaching level 10 would significantly reduce number of spam account, since those guys just fire up multiple copies of game client and wait through that 20 hours while spamming from remaining accounts. It would require some effort from them, and as we know, effort is not time/cost effective.
Finally, when it comes to patch notes - if someone reads forums, there is also a good chance that he checks patch notes. If someone reads patch notes and there is some kind of interesting addon, its widely discussed in zone chat (on ESD mostly). Plus, most fleet leaders DO check patch notes, if only for information regarding ability changes, mission updates and/or new content. So the info from patch notes does leak to general player population.
pwebranflakes: this system is currently in place and working the way it should.
moradum: I got banned for saying "I started my day with cutting off 3 MM off of the bottom of my cabinet"
Those players who were hit by permanent bans due to this foul up, should be compensated for lost (potential) income such as Fleet Marks and Dilithium, as well as reinstated into being allowed access to the game, and a formal apology from whomever had the intelligence to install this method of auto-banning.
Will any of this happen? More than likely, not at all. Players may get their accounts unlocked, but more than that, all we'll hear is "Ooops, we screwed up. But the system is working as intended.". In other words, pretty much what Brandon wrote earlier in this thread.
Understandably, the devs deserve some time off. But what about the players who are unjustly permanently banned from the game, for a system which is inherently flawed and which doesn't give sufficient warning before hitting you with a perma ban?
Banning reputable and important fleet members and even leaders in return for squashing some spammers (which should be the job of real in-game GMs by the way...) is not a good deal at all.