Character and Item Restore for Daybreak Cash

Aye, when I'm already paying for a game that is F2P with actually quite minimal extras for the privilege, I resent extra fees for what was always included in my sub, or for things I feel I should get as part of my sub. The charge for instant respawn (which LOTRO gives you one for free ever few hours - would be nice in EQ2), for unlocking merc slots etc - these are all things subs should have included (even if limited per day or per account).

If your account was hacked this bothers me. You can use an extremely secure, unique PW and still get hacked. There is an increasing trend (and not just in gaming) for companies to refuse to accept any responsibility for hacked accounts and blame the user without any proof the user did anything wrong like using a weak PW, re-using one or telling someone. The company holding your account has a responsibility to look after it too, especially if it is a paid for service.

If you are hacked you shouldn’t have to pay to get stuff back, and especially so if you are a subscriber.

They keep asking for ideas for Gold perks to get people to sub, a free toon restore and 5 free items restores a year or something (numbers just examples) would be a start.

Not sure how my monthly fees, buying expansions, buying adventure packs translates to a free lunch, but sure friend.

Obvious Money Grab, is obvious. But not unexpected amiright?

It's better than gone forever, though. And we should get a 'reverse transmute' one in there as well.

Honestly...I think this is one of the kind of things that should be charged for. Also...charge for a service that frees up names that are on level 5 toons on accounts that haven't been played in 7 years.

Wow such hate. What I expect for my money is a company to make a good product and fix things when they are broken. SOE did an OK job at it, better years ago, but they did ok. DB has done nothing but cut staff, cut benefits to customers (no more CS pretty much) and begin charging for everything they can think of. This is not how to build a business, it is how you run one into the ground. As for paying the staff? NOT MY PROBLEM. They have been paid with portions of my 10 years worth of subscriptions, so sorry Kander et all, if you want a raise I can't help you.

And please, don't call people idiots for giving their opinion. If Radarx were still around he would smack you

If you want the game to survive, we have to support it monetarily. That means that they DO need to charge for everything they can. If the cost bothers you, then be careful what you delete.

Eh. Don't want to pay? Start paying attention when deleting items, and don't delete characters if you become emotional over something in a video game.

A character restore is 1350 DBC (1500 for FTP).
An item restore of a level 95 fabled item I discarded, was 90 DBC (100 for FTP).

Each year, a subscriber gets 12 lots of 500 free DBC (12 * 500 = 6000).
That allows a subscriber to restore 3 characters (1350 * 3 = 4050) and 21 items (21 * 90 = 1890), with their complimentary DBC (4050 + 1890 = 5940).

If someone is smart enough (and/or mentally stable enough) to avoid these unnecessary expenses, they can save their DBC for other things. In the cases of loss due to legitimate game bugs, or a limited one-off account hacking, they should send in a ticket, and I would expect DBG to investigate and assist. People found attempting to lie to avoid appropriate fees should lose their account, forever.

Since 2004, I have only ever sent in 2 petitions for item restores. One was an accidental delete, the other was when an item was revamped (massive upgrade) weeks after I deleted it. If I maintain the same rate over the next 10 years, I will only need to use 1/300th of my free DBC on restorations. I see no reason to complain.

The problem with this is so many folks use the "I was hacked" excuse. In the 10 years I've been gaming neither myself or my husband have EVER had our accounts hacked. Account security is mainly the responsibility of the user. Yes, today many companies are being hacked, and many are working hard to keep that from happening. I feel sure that DBC is working to ensure that doesn't happen to them as they also have a great deal to lose from it happening.

Niether my husband nor I have ever been hacked, but two long-time members of the small guild I'm in have been. I noticed both of the toons/accounts in question behaving oddly emailed the two guild members. SoE was prompt about restoring (most) of what was lost, including some of the theft from the guild bank as the toon's behavior was clearly 'deviant' from the players' normal behavior.

Just because some players may abuse a feature, it isn't a good reason to penalize the majority that do not.

Most Asian MMOs. And as far as free to play games not locking content behind pay walls there's a lot, anything from Team Fortress 2 to Path of Exile and League of Legends. (Yes I am aware those aren't MMOs but they still update often and don't lock content behind paywalls) As far as actual MMOs that don't lock content behind paywalls again you have mostly Asian games like Tera.

I honestly can't stand how any western MMO does free to play but EQ2 is by far one of the worst in my opinion. How you guys can justify locking Customer Support behind a paywall is beyond me.

Edit: I forgot free accounts can actually use the petition function now, my bad.

I got hacked some years back. As now (although obviously different), I had a long unique password I used for nothing else, had numbers, letters, symbols and random capitalisation. I never gave it to anyone, not even my hubby, and although one of my cats may have seen me type it I doubt he was able to log into EQ2 unaided. We have a secure wireless network with an equally tough and unique PW. What more could I have done to protect myself? Thankfully back then SOE noticed something wasn't right and sorted it all out quickly, efficiently, cheerfully and for free. I couldn't fault their customer service getting my account and stuff back.

Nowadays I doubt I'd even get my account back, let alone my toons and gear. And now certainly not without giving DBG money for everything deleted which could result in a remortgage with my hoarding habit. Doesn't seem fair.

There's a lot of focus on how seldom this service might actually be used. And, for the most part, that's very true. In all the years I've played eq2, I never once accidentally deleted a character or item that I wanted to keep. I don't think I would ever utilize this service. I know that's not the case for everyone, but I think we can all agree that this isn't something that happens daily.

But the point that I think is being overlooked here, is just how important it is to have that feeling of security and knowing that if something did go wrong, they'd take care of you. I was always amazed at the level of customer service SOE provided when compared to other games. My experiences were night and day. And that made me feel like this company cared. I knew that if I had a problem, I could count on it being resolved...and quickly at that! Because of this, I gladly made subscription payments for two accounts, purchased expansions, and even purchased a good deal of station cash.

Whether or not this feature is ever used by a given customer, charging for it can leave a sour taste in a loyal customer's mouth.

If the cost of coding the tokens was greater than the combined salaries of all the customer service reps they laid off I'd agree. But it most likely wasn't, not even close, so they still made a profit through changing to this system, so I reject the argument they "need" to charge to recoup losses.

Not worried about being charged, but I do object to paying twice. My Allaccess accounts are SUPPOSED to include access to a now non existent Customer Service. Absolutely no objection to automating stuff to reduce costs, in fact I welcome this, but these automated customer services should be free to Allaccess players.

And I agree with you! I think it should be taken on a case by case basis. It seems, however, that won't be happening anymore. But I get what you are saying.

Not saying it doesn't happen, but seriously how many times have you heard that as an excuse. I do think it should be part of customer service and should be looked at on a case by case basis. However, it seems they feel it is easier this way. I'm not happy about it myself especially as a subscriber.

I'm fairly ambivalent about this addition. I was a bit disappointed when I logged in and clicked to show deleted and didn't see anything. I was actually hoping to be able to restore some old deleted characters from a long time ago, but I guess the GM was telling the truth the last time I tried to restore them when he said the files were gone (the character in question was created back in 2005 and probably deleted in 2008 or so). I was also a bit bummed to not see a level 95 dirge I'd deleted a couple months ago, not that I really wanted to play her. I deleted her for a reason.
I learned a long time ago to never delete anything that I might regret later. It's cheaper in the long run now to just buy an additional slot.

And the portion I bolded in red is exactly why I do not have a problem with this. In the past there was absolutely zero guarantee that you would get anything back. Personally I had the one item I've ever deleted restored without issue. However, I know at least 2 other people who were told too bad. Now you can absolutely retrieve your character or your item.


Now, how they choose to handle a case where hacking is suspected, that would be a different issue all together and as far as I've seen the red names have stated nothing regarding that. It's something I'm curious to hear about.
However, the SC payment system is more then sufficient to deal with your typical careless mistakes.

We know they had to downsize and it hit the customer service hard. There are less people to do things. It does no good to complain about it not being like the "good ole days" of customer service. It costs money to run a business and personnel cost the most.

If I ever need the items to restore something I did, then I'm very glad they are there. That is much better than having no recourse to get items or characters back.

And as far as other free to play games doing this type stuff for free. Well, I've not seen those games. I do know that the other game I play the most that is free to play sort of (you buy the game and then it has a big marketplace). You do not get characters restored or items restored. You can't even pay to have things restored.

This is much better.

If the service was totally free, someone would probably try to use it a pseudo free character slot. Just delete the character, create another, and swap back and forth when they wanted their eg ranger/swashbuckler instead.