test content
Logo
What is the Arc Client?
Install Arc
Fair Warning: Random bans and no review
blackdogjet
Member Posts: 11 Arc User
I've been playing STO for a decade and have accumulated a number of accounts in that time.. last week all but 1 of them were perm banned, supposedly because an automated "routine review of records" showed I was botting... I have never botted in this or any other online game, so I appealed, as I haven't been botting any actual review of the records would show that...
The appeal was summarily denied, no evidence of my guilt given... tho they did offer to reinstate one of my accounts "as a courtesy" (Wut?)
I turned down the offer and insisted on an actual investigation... it was "escalated to the next tier" and two days later denied again, again no evidence given, again the offer to reinstate -one- of the banned accounts. (I can't imagine any actual investigation was done)
... Ok... If they have clear evidence that I'm a botter (they can't have any) why were not -all- of my accounts banned? Why offer to give the evil botter one of the accounts back? If they don't have clear evidence then they shouldn't be banning anything!
This is absurd!
One of my housemates sole account was also banned at the same time for the same reason (she wasn't botting either, and my other housemate's account, played on the same computer as the first's was not banned)... She was very upset at losing the characters she had put so much effort into for no reason and both of them quit the game altogether.
Now I've played this game so long and have become disillusioned with the direction it's been headed in recent years that I've only been logging in to play the events (and not even continuing to play the event after getting the prize to rack up the extra Dil... wouldn't an actual botter do that?)... so I don't especially care at this point, it's just the principle of the matter and the obvious lack of effort by the customer support people.
Fortunately I've always been a strict F2Per and have never spent a cent on this game (any other MMO for that matter), because I live on disability and don't have money to spend on frivolous things like virtual items, or I'd really be pissed... my housemates unfortunately did spend some money on the game... not a lot by Cryptic's standards I'm sure, but a lot for them.
So let this serve as a warning to my fellow players, if you go to log in one day and find that you've been banned, don't expect much help... and consider this before deciding whether the game is worth it and if Cryptic is trustworthy enough, to give your money to.
P.S. For anyone who missed it earlier this year: https://massivelyop.com/2021/01/10/star-trek-online-player-is-banned-following-lifetime-subscription-refund-bungle/ & https://www.reddit.com/r/sto/comments/ktjxi2/after_10_years_of_playing_sto_i_decided_to_opt/
Obviously Cryptic's customer service has not improved.
The appeal was summarily denied, no evidence of my guilt given... tho they did offer to reinstate one of my accounts "as a courtesy" (Wut?)
I turned down the offer and insisted on an actual investigation... it was "escalated to the next tier" and two days later denied again, again no evidence given, again the offer to reinstate -one- of the banned accounts. (I can't imagine any actual investigation was done)
... Ok... If they have clear evidence that I'm a botter (they can't have any) why were not -all- of my accounts banned? Why offer to give the evil botter one of the accounts back? If they don't have clear evidence then they shouldn't be banning anything!
This is absurd!
One of my housemates sole account was also banned at the same time for the same reason (she wasn't botting either, and my other housemate's account, played on the same computer as the first's was not banned)... She was very upset at losing the characters she had put so much effort into for no reason and both of them quit the game altogether.
Now I've played this game so long and have become disillusioned with the direction it's been headed in recent years that I've only been logging in to play the events (and not even continuing to play the event after getting the prize to rack up the extra Dil... wouldn't an actual botter do that?)... so I don't especially care at this point, it's just the principle of the matter and the obvious lack of effort by the customer support people.
Fortunately I've always been a strict F2Per and have never spent a cent on this game (any other MMO for that matter), because I live on disability and don't have money to spend on frivolous things like virtual items, or I'd really be pissed... my housemates unfortunately did spend some money on the game... not a lot by Cryptic's standards I'm sure, but a lot for them.
So let this serve as a warning to my fellow players, if you go to log in one day and find that you've been banned, don't expect much help... and consider this before deciding whether the game is worth it and if Cryptic is trustworthy enough, to give your money to.
P.S. For anyone who missed it earlier this year: https://massivelyop.com/2021/01/10/star-trek-online-player-is-banned-following-lifetime-subscription-refund-bungle/ & https://www.reddit.com/r/sto/comments/ktjxi2/after_10_years_of_playing_sto_i_decided_to_opt/
Obviously Cryptic's customer service has not improved.
Post edited by baddmoonrizin on
0
This discussion has been closed.
Comments
Whilst I have some sympathy, there is no reason to have extra accounts considering how many alt characters you can now have. The system will have seen you probably logging in to multiple accounts in a 'short period' of time, and that's the evidence they will look at.
As for your friends accounts, they should be easily be able to prove the accounts which are theirs via showing their purchases were made on their own cards/paypal addresses.
I have my wife and my son playing silver accounts, both from the same IP as my Gold (LTS since beta) account...
We have no idea what's really going on, but Cryptic might be detecting "bot-like behavior" (whatever that would be) that looks like a gold farmer auto-grinding credits and dil.
If your family is playing the game normally it seems unlikely they would trigger a bot detector.
Youtubers need multiples in order to have privacy. There are other reasons for multiple accounts. I only have one but there are reasons.
And have they ever had a rule about not having multiple accounts? I've always known people with multiple ones. Isn't it wrong to not enforce and then enforce something like this is it's taking away someones money or stuff? People have safely used multiple accounts since the beginning of the game. A lot of people use it to run guilds safely and stuff I think.
(and the link to the ban-for-chargeback SNAFU does not apply to this other than showing customer service can bungle things.)
...THEN THE WINGED HUSSARS ARRIVED!
They can't banned by IP, cause is really stupid. Some home/flat networks have the same public IP (inside networks they are different ofc). If someone have few active accounts and they belongs to the same person, ban them make no sense. If this person not using 3rd program ofc.
If someone have strong PC and he/she have possibility to log 3 accounts on 1 PC by launcher, what's problem?
Statements like this are why you really don't gain much by posting about things like this on a public forum. I mean, I'm sorry, but this statement is ridiculous.. there is no reason for you.. but I am sure many people have perfectly valid reasons including multiple people in the same house all with their own accounts. Using multiple accounts for one person or having multiple accounts from the same location are not violations and bans should always be issued on the accounts specific behavior and never a metric like X number of Logins over Y period of time.. that's a ridiculous way to handle.. well.. anything.
Yeah, that and a VPN just bypasses the ban. I believe they ban by account name, IP banning is pretty much completely ineffective.
All three of my STO accounts are silver; I have them because it was cheaper than buying new character slots when I wanted to experiment with new concepts, and I frequently don't have money. I've never had an issue with this, nor has Cryptic ever expressed an issue with this, perhaps in part because I've never used those accounts to attempt to evade the Terms of Service.
I suppose I will learn one day.
That had an happy end:
So: Be persistent.
Yes, and I'd expect any mass automated bans of duplicate accounts to show up on the gaming news sites by now.
So far we have one person claiming to be an innocent victim. Maybe it was a mistake by Cryptic, maybe not. We just had another player claiming they were suspended for no reason but it turned out they got a vacation for hate speech.
(I'm not saying Cryptic doesn't mess up and lock accounts for "suspected fraud", suspend players, even ban them incorrectly sometimes. Just that we know nothing yet.)
I'd THINK I'd not be worried about those with 1-3 accounts within a Household; I suspect those with problems had far more, and are always doing the same TFO's missions and such as they say grouped together.
My housemate who was banned think's they're just using botting as an excuse to gradually get rid of players with multi accounts who have a lot of dill... rather then you know fix the economy... I'm not much into conspiracy theories but given we didn't bot or do anything particularly bot-like, I kinda have to wonder.
Then again I've always been a firm believer in the old axiom "Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by simple incompetence." I suspect the "higher tier" people just didn't even bother to examine the banned accounts and simply took the automated system's word for it.
For anyone who's interested here's the screenshots of my interactions with CS:
REMOVED because the TOS apparently forbids you showing their own incompetence; I'll post it on the STO Reddit later
Just a bunch of boilerplate posts and politely worded non-answers.
Ugh now I have to go fill out all those complaint forms, yet more fun.
If you ever have any problems well... this is what you can expect... good luck; I've had it with Cryptic and Perfect World.
normal text = me speaking as fellow formite
colored text = mod mode
This forum was like that in the past. One particular mod anyway. I posted a famous quote and got a warning for 'hate speech' from another mod but this one then sent me a DM saying he would have banned me. I stopped visiting the forums because of that. Thankfully they're long gone now.
The OP won't like this... but even if this is a false positive all well. Nothing was lost to any of us. I admit myself I don't spend a ton on this game anymore... I mean I subbed for as long as that was an option, and I throw them 20 or 30 bucks a year on average. So I'm no big spender. Having said that... ya some of the F2P farm accounts are an issue for the game. I don't really care if its a Digital BOT doing the botting or a flesh one. See ya.
normal text = me speaking as fellow formite
colored text = mod mode
We still have no idea about OP's innocence or guilt, but by now it is very unlikely that it is a general problem affecting people with multiple accounts. So either way, people in general don't need to worry.
I tried that MMO Runescape not too long ago.. game isn't for me, but on topic.. I played it twice. I logged on and made my character, ran around a bit and logged off. I played it again about 2 weeks later, did a little mining, made some armor decided I was bored logged out. A couple weeks after that, I go to log in and I was permanently banned for 'botting.' Unlike Cryptic though Jagex doesn't allow any appeal or recourse, they just say 'learn the rules and make a new account' so at least with Cryptic you can discuss it.
I obviously don't care about the Runescape ban, I had about 2hrs into the game and didn't like it that much anyway.. but obviously, I would never actually invest any time into it knowing I will just be perma banned like that. Crytpic may not always get it right, but at least when they do, they will talk about it with the 'offender.' Many much bigger studios do it far far worse.