Lots of Tunare Server Suspensions this morning. anyone else?

Are you going Scorched Earth on EverQuest? Imposing a chilling effect on the team trying to stop cheaters or wiping days of progress for thousands of people?

Either, you have unclean hands or you are serving a vendetta (against Daybreak). No rational person would advocate your position.

I am not serving any vendetta against anyone. I am just pointing out that if a business makes an error, they need own up to it, and not punish players who did nothing. It never goes well if they attempt to hide a mistake.

An 8 hour hold is not punishment. This is as much an inconvenience as a TSA or Border Checkpoint. Annoying but necessary for security. Everyone who plays agreed to their EULA and TOS.

And you think massive rollbacks would not be punishment (because of a select few who cheat)?

Dreamweaver responded to the Bug Thread. It's over. No one is complaining except for 3 people (which makes you think).

I bet many of those who got the suspension will not use the Loyalty Vendor for a while. Yes, it was punishment by definition.

If people think they got wrongfully suspended or banned, they can contact Dreamweaver on the forums (through a new account). He has said as much in the past.

If someone is innocent, they have nothing to fear. If someone cheated or exploited, I am glad that fear of the ban hammer lives in them.

Not happy with the rules? Find a 3rd-party EQ project or another game (which - by the way- have their own rules).

We still got at least two people who are still suspended

Hmmm, made me think.

Is there any chance far more than 3 people are complaining, but just not on the forums or discord?

Is there any chance people who used to post on the forums have even given up caring enough to complain?

Is there any chance someone who didn't even log in during this time period and was totally unaffected by the suspensions, is yet, very angry at the idea of blind suspensions without testing of the query/criteria used to suspend mass people?

Does it look like one more incompetent blunder on their part?

...

Nah, you're right. I'm sure only 3 people are actually upset, and that's just 'cus they have an agenda.

All the good guys are unsuspended so nothing to see here, eh?

I for one, have no idea WTF you are talking about.
What unnecessary risk specifically?

You keep saying this.. its wrong. IF you think its right ask yourself, how did players know this was bugged? was there a login message not to use this vendor? a broadcast warning players? No, there was nothing. No indication you shouldn't do this. So understand, aside from the cheaters, everyone else caught up in this was innocent and did it unknowingly.

So again, my analogy of the po-po arresting everyone who visited a store that day because at one point someone robbed is it far more apt. This is pretty much text-book how NOT to handle a situation like this.

You run a quick query of items sold since the server came up, and players total spent, and total balance. If spent is greater then balance you flag and suspend them, otherwise your adjust balance by spent and move on.

This? This is just a hot mess and is a lesson to other teams on how not to handle a similar situation. (again I didn't get caught up in this, just watching from the outside with disappointment)

If the minutes they used to suspend people where used to roll back the servers, none of us would be having this disucussion.

Bone headed move, is a bone headed move, period.

I make mistakes or worse all the time. Check my forum quest history, I immediately apologize for my mistake. I'm sure some of you have had discussions with me where I did just that.

"temporary precaution" was retconned. They were knee-jerk 7 day suspensions.

Even if suspensions were a good choice, using a fast automated method to mass suspend, and then have to manually adjudicate each one, is making un-needed work.

Spending the time to establish better criteria before suspending would have saved them tons of time, and customer grief. But that would require competence they keep showing they don't possess.

There is no such thing as civil liberties (Bill of Rights or Miranda Rights) in EverQuest.

They're a private company. You agreed to their EULA and TOS when logging into this game. These are the same rules you find on 3rd party forums (don't like their rules, don't use them). They could shut down EQ1 tomorrow and you would have no recourse (time to be mentally prepared). Do you feel wrongfully suspended or banned? Contact Dreamweaver. Don't like the rules or enforcement strategy? Find a 3rd-party EQ project or another game.

Do I support capricious and arbitrary enforcement? No. But if you look at the facts of the case, they didn't have any "good" choice. It was utilitarian solution to a moral dilemma (read Michael Sandel's works and concept of communitarianism). The decision tree was this:

• Allow dupped plat to escape into circulation while 2 GMs manually investigate. During this time, cheaters would "launder" the platinum (through dropped gems or Nobles resale on burner accounts). As ZenMaster mentioned, this could leave us paying 10 million plat for Kronos in perpetuity on all servers.
• Immediately enact massive rollbacks (12-24 hours for all players).
• Enact a containment strategy to prevent circulation (8 hour pause) while 2 GMs manually investigate and release.

Sure, Tappin wants massive rollbacks (because it exists on some theoretical moral high ground). You know how many more "hate" threads and complaints would have spawned as a result of massive rollbacks (12-24 hours for all players)?

This matter would have never been resolved in a completely satisfactory manner for everyone. They chose the option that would impact the least amount of players. This debate is a matter of personal political philosophy (libertarianism vs communitarianism) and will continue as such.

It was a matter of manpower. We don't have 1 full-time GM per server anymore. This is not peak EQ1 of 2004.

The suspensions were necessary to prevent circulation of dupped plat (emergency situation with time sensitive element) while 1-3 GMs investigated a fairly smaller subset of the total population.

They picked the option (rough justice) that impacted the least amount of players.

Not sure why you'd point this out.

Are you unaware of my conquering multiple exploiters, in multiple threads? Do you honestly think I am unaware of the EULA and how exploits are handled around here?

They had many better options:
-Rolling back (right away) was a much better option they had.
-Removing the loyalty vendor stopped the bleeding. They could have suspended nobody at that point, sucked up the blip in the economy THEY CAUSED, and gone about investigating and then suspending exploiters manually.
-They could have brought the servers down, and kept them down until they fixed their own mistake. And removed any ill gotten gains.

Ding ding ding, you got ONE right so far.

Are you daft man? An option that didn't suspend a single innocent player is the option of "least impact".

They impacted people who did nothing wrong, even 1 is 1 more than none. Can you even do basic math now?

It is pointed out because Daybreak has carte blanche do whatever the heck they want. This is what any private company can do (short of federal and state laws, FTC and SEC regulations). Welcome to the real world.

You're making assumptions (that is beyond the logical flow of events):

a. You're assuming that they were immediately aware of the exploit (timing). From the facts, it looks like the suspensions occurred a ways out (several hours).

b. You're assuming the capabilities of the exploiters (third party software, number of accounts). These could have been folks in China, India, or Nigeria on an operation.

You and Tappin keep framing it as if there was a perfect option. There was a trade-off to this scenario. There was evidently a need to contain or halt circulation of dupped plat.

I know others have already asked but what unnecessary risk was taken?

As I already pointed out to you. I am fully aware they are allowed to, and in fact always have done, whatever they want, because it's a business.

I've never indicated anything otherwise in this thread or any other on these entire forums.

Your attempt to act like I'm arguing against their 'carte blanche' is quite weak, and you lead with it because you have nothing.

You are wrong, and I am proving you wrong. And you are squirming by trying to bring the implication that anyone said "they couldn't do" what they obviously can do at any time.

I assumed nothing of the sort. Again you squirm.

They SHOULD have taken a DIFFERENT ACTION as SOON as they knew of the exploit (that they mistakenly caused). I assume nothing about the timing.

The economy and whatever capabilities anyone may have to exploit it are their problem to address and keep their customers the least impacted possible. I assume nothing about capabilities.

NO.

I acknowledged you were correct in saying "there were no good solutions", and someone would be left out upset.

I simply state, and it doesn't seem that hard to understand to me, THEY HAD BETTER OPTIONS. You are wrong, they did not take the best of the bad options they had.

Just a heads up before you engage with this poster anymore, but they're in "law school." Take it for what you will, but it's why you're getting nonsense replies from them with Miranda or Bill of Rights or Boston Bombings.

The entire premise of your argument ("better" options) hinges on the assumption of Daybreak being immediately aware of the exploit. The facts say otherwise. Suspensions occurred several hours out from /uptime.

What it boils down to is this: people will choose between "perfect justice" (scales must be perfectly balanced no matter the damage) or "rough justice"(communitarianism: utilitarian solution to a moral dilemma).

The tone is shifting to ad hominem attacks. I think we should end this debate. I appreciate what you've done for the game as an artist.

There's really no point in generating a grudge or ill will.

Goodluck.

After watching people compare this to marathon bombings and bring up civil liberties over a ban wave to stop the company from losses, I'm just bewildered. Decades old complaints, and quips about the same age.

Thank you for the compliment, you are very kind. I am just a hobbyist, and it sometimes feels funny being called an artist still. Player Studio was just so much fun I can't even explain.

All that being said.

/bow Lancelot stays undefeated.