Jeremy, could we have an official statement?

[classical]

they dont care news coming down thru the grapevine is there banning accounts that were connected for 19 hours or more scritping rumor truth who knows i do bod for lenghtly hours at a time but to be termanate for it wrong some people have that time to spend in game because they run home businesses or take care of children at home but if they banning accounts for using uo assists 1 of there allowed programs for being on for 19 hrs at time that is such a lame cop out and doesnt hold a bit of water as my b/f hadnt been on in months except to do the spring turn in other than that he wasnt playing because of my account being hit by this he checked his in low n behold they termanated his to for what not playing his char in uo for logging on for spring clean up as you can see if this is the excuse there going to use its a lame cop out so jeremy where are you i wonder the golf coarse cruise ship sportcar driving or are you in the nearest donut shop within uo why not show your self and explain your action were all waiting if osi would also get smart in start checking the charge cards numbers against account banned for duping in such they wouldnt have these problems as that where it all starts at before they hit the game but once again that to much work for are dev them may have to actualy work and go home exhuasted after years of doing nothing other then to apease a few of the whinners in game to keep them happy

 

[Revenant2]

I find some things to be odd about this.

I find it odd that they are deleting the houses instead of hanging onto them to see what may come down the line. Were they *that* sure in every single case? I'd have to feel HELLA sure to do it the way they are.

There's options available that are not so irreversible, such as clear all the house lists and take ownership and then delete the house in a few weeks if they were still sure.

I wonder why it was done over the weekend? Right now is obviously the time when customer service people are not in their offices and so on.

So, I'm sorta waiting to hear what might be said.

I have a friend who had bought a few hammers on off of a vendor on Atlantic and burned them and nothing happened to him. But he also didn't have a castle full of checks? It's hard to know what to think because I don't personally know anyone who got banned.

 

[jack flash]

Jeremy would be a "she". For future reference.

i know that, i have seen a piccy of her too, so this must be for someone else

 

[Ivan - MT]

A friend of mine has his account flagged for breaking rule 19 and had his account perma banned and his Keep deleted. He's another innocent caught up in this mess created by EA. It's very unfortunate to lose your main account for something you didn't even do. All he was told was that he broke rule 19, nothing else.

Seems very unfair and wrong to just perma ban someone with no prior marks and give you no chance to have your day in court to argue the fact, they say ban your account and delete your house on the same day and thats its.

The whole thing sounds very f****ed up and unfair imo. If that happened to me I would cancel the rest of my accounts and quit this game all together. I'm amazed he's still willing to keep playing on his other account after what EA did to him.

 

[Zofinur]

account flagged for breaking rule 19 and had his account perma banned and his Keep deleted.

Exactly the same happened to me.
And now try to get somebody on the phone to hear about the details ... Ah no, its weekend...

 

[Teufel_Hund]

I would be very upset but then quickly look at it as an opportunity to get rid of a bad habit - .

My thoughts exactly

 

[Teufel_Hund]

For those even lazier then me Rule 19:

You will not exploit any bug in the Ultima Online product or the Ultima Online service. You will not intentionally use or share any bug found within Ultima Online, real or fictitious, regardless of whether or not it grants an unfair advantage. You will not directly or indirectly communicate the existence of any such bug to any other user of the Ultima Online service. You will report any such exploit using the bug reporting methods as described by the Ultima Online web site at http://www.uo.com/mailBug.html.

If you note the bolded line you do not even have to be guilty of using the bug/exploit, just have knowledge of it and pass it on to anyone other then EA.....hmmm

 

[Coranthe]

So everyone that came on Stratics over the last few months saying there was a dupe out there, broke rule 19. They communicated the EXISTENCE.

 

[Faerunner]

Saying "There is a dupe" is like saying "there is a sky". If they ban you for that, I'd wonder what else they saw you doing because that doesn't seem bannable.

Now, if they said "There is an x-sharding dupe involving CCs" then I'd perk up and see if they got banned/questioned... because they obviously know more about it than just "it's a dupe". I'd be keeping quiet about dupes if I knew of them. Report once to EA, never try to use it, and keep it out of the ears of the rest of the community - how do dupers find new dupes? If I were doing it, I'd be watching to see what others posted as "bugs" and then see what I could exploit, as well as watching whatever "secret" forums exist...

 

[Teufel_Hund]

So everyone that came on Stratics over the last few months saying there was a dupe out there, broke rule 19. They communicated the EXISTENCE.

lol don't shoot me I am just the messenger!

 

[Lucy of Kenton]

I can't judge whether or not they're dupers based on a few posts and someone saying that they're friends with the banned person.

Honestly as trusting as I am, I am more inclined to say that anyone posting here and screaming for an explanation is either really dense and completely missed whatever was wrong (in which case, I sympathize with their ignorance but I don't think the ban should be removed - they can start over with a little more common sense this time), or they are trying to cover their backsides and leave the community wondering instead of simply accepting that they were wrong.

It really doesn't matter to me whether or not they were dupers or hacked or simply mis-targeted, the point is that most of the posts I've seen against the bannings are vehemently anti-EA in their tone, are poorly written, are generally attacking the wrong things/people or seem misinformed, and to me signal that the posters are just having a childish fit.

The few people who have had the grace to post here calmly, report their ban and what they are doing now, and move on without screaming for poor Jeremy to come explain (when she probably has NO way of knowing anything about a specific ban and even if she could know is not allowed to discuss it publicly!) are fine. I just can't see the point in trying to defend your innocence by annoying half the forum. Especially when it also includes childish demands to the devs or community team, who don't work for the players (I don't care how much money we pour into UO, it doesn't go directly to our dev team), to give someone special treatment and explain things.

ok faerunner, its easy to start over so pm me and tell me where and when you will give me all your stuff, checks and items?
or will you say, no i earned mine honestly so why should i? well thats how i feel, ive done nothing wrong.
i shall wait for the pm to give me what u own. but im guessing that pm wont be sent.
i dont want special treatment i simply want justice, that shouldnt be hard to understand surely?

 

[Coranthe]

not shooting - I said that purely in jest. should have thrown a smiley on I guess

 

[Cynic]

Personally. I'm glad EA is doing something. Whether they are doing it the right way is questionable, I could care less though.

What I do care about is whether or not it is safe to buy anything in game anymore. I could use a few items but I am not about to buy anything with the risk of being banned for buying an item that may, or may not, have been duped.

This would be something that Jeremy or another dev should shed some light on.

 

[Beldon]

i dont want special treatment i simply want justice, that shouldnt be hard to understand surely?

Justice equals taking this issue to UO customer service or canceling all remaining accounts to stop them from getting any more of your hard earned money. Special treatment equals bringing this issue to Stratics and making a spectacle of yourself... which did you do?

 

[NuSair]

It's the weekend, there probably won't be a statement until Monday...
oh wait, Wednesday, it's Mythic.

(yes, I am hopeful with these bannings, but I remain a skeptic, I've been playing this game to long to get my hopes up that much)

 

[Teufel_Hund]

not shooting - I said that purely in jest. should have thrown a smiley on I guess

No worries

 

[Redxpanda]

Personally. I'm glad EA is doing something. Whether they are doing it the right way is questionable, I could care less though.

What I do care about is whether or not it is safe to buy anything in game anymore. I could use a few items but I am not about to buy anything with the risk of being banned for buying an item that may, or may not, have been duped.

This would be something that Jeremy or another dev should shed some light on.

Thats exactly how i feel. I am left wondering if it is safe to buy items from other players and/or report bugs without fear of getting caught up in the storm when the hammer falls. My characters are still poor but i may one day be able to afford stuff like val hammers and bkits and i would like to feel safe doing so.

 

[HD2300]

It's the weekend, there probably won't be a statement until Monday...
oh wait, Wednesday, it's Mythic.

(yes, I am hopeful with these bannings, but I remain a skeptic, I've been playing this game to long to get my hopes up that much)

EA nets $10 million each year from subscribers, most of which play on the weekends. Is it really too much to ask that they employ an extra person to communicate at these peak times with the community on the weekends?

 

[hawkeye_pike]

all I did was buy maybe 3-4 verite and 1 val hammer a month the last 3 months or so , if thats something one gets banned for , how the hell can we buy anything worth more than a few 100k without fear of getting banned ???

I guess, that answer speaks for itself. I don't accuse you or abusing bugs, but I claim that you knew about the dupes going on, and I am pretty sure you would have been able to suspect that the items you bought were probably foul.

Still, I do not believe you (or anybody) was banned because of buying a duped runic kit from a vendor. There probably was more. Unless everybody has gone crazy, EA will closely look at the accounts who are involved with duped items (and yours obviously is), and examine your previous actions.

Heck, why DO you support the Luna vendor crap, including sites listing vendor items, after all what was going on?? Why DO people STILL buy UO gold for real money? It is one thing that EA isn't able to solve those duping issues quickly, but yet another that the players complaining about it, secretly support those dupers by buying their stuff.

Hypocrisy!

 

[Redxpanda]

Why DO people STILL buy UO gold for real money? Hypocrisy!

Because things are so insanely expensive that by the time you are able to afford it (legally) you prolly don't need it anymore. While i have never purchased gold myself i can completely understand why people do it. A few bucks spent and they can enjoy their ORNY, HOM and CC in no time. Me? After years of playing i cant even afford one of em and have a nice suit that could use em.

 

[Lucy of Kenton]

the economy overheating is partially down to these people. as for the crimson hom etc well wear other stuff thats cheaper.

 

[aarons6]

after reading all of these "my account got banned" posts i have one thing to say..

everyone that doesn't find a problem with is is blind and dumb.. this is not a proper business way to handle a obviously unavoidable game flaw that they must not have the proper skills to fix...

i completely understand the must punish the rule breakers mentality.. but at what cost?

me, joe average, logs in one day to find an item on a vendor that is usually sold for a ridiculously completely outrageous price being sold for a much more fair price..

i am now to automatically believe this item was duped and to pass it up???? to keep from being banned???

what happens if he just mistakenly forgot a 0 and was going to sell it for 10m but put 1m instead?

that cant ever happen right??

now i am to play this game in fear of being banned for no reason that i can think of?

i have no idea how to spot dupe items, i just play.. maybe about 2 or 3 hours a week..
I'm not a super player so i dint throw around everything i have. i shop for what i can afford.

i have in the past gotten some super deals on a few items that should have been many times more expensive then i paid for them...

maybe they were duped, ::rolls eyes::

everyone says, "you guys should have known they were dupes"
i have no idea what duped things would be and what to look for..

i don't want to be banned from playing the game within my means..
i don't go out and purposely abuse the game "features" that they cant fix so they say don't do them or else.. maybe once or twice these "features" just happen to fall in a place you cant avoid, like one time i recalled into ice and an artic ogre lord was sitting there facing the wall, he never turned to attack me.. i killed him, maybe i should have recalled out and logged for the night instead....

you know, my next door neighbor has a ton of gems on his vendor..
rubies, sapphires, emeralds, they are usually pretty cheap..

hmmm.. i guess i better not buy them anymore.
::rolls eyes::

 

[hawkeye_pike]

My opinion:

As I said, Aarons, I don't believe someone was banned for buying a duped runic kit. People got banned for trading with dupers deliberately and repeatedly. All this panicking about "not being able to buy from vendors anymore" is nonsense. EA may make serious mistakes with handling UO bugs, but I cannot imagine they are that stupid banning harmless players. Nobody gets banned because he bought an item from a vendor. Claiming that is nothing but a cheap attempt to alienate and influence the player base.

All people who got banned seemed to be merchants with high total item revenue. And hey, they weren't naive players who "bought an item off a vendor once".

 

[Inspector]

Yep, and i dont think i am alone when i say i wont return if not everything of the follwing is restored

• My chars
• My home
• My items
• My reputation

Cant remember so many ppl complaining to be banned innocent.

This way they will loose a lot of (honest) customers.
This way they will loose a lot of (paying) customers.

Can this be the end of UO?

If u r interested in my case i will post any details i get from EA in the europa-thread. But for now there is no agent avaialble on the weekend.
Who did the banning on the WE then, if nobody is working?

Buh bye. They aren't giving back anything and you know it. Probably not even your account.
I have been caught cheating a few times(minor cheats) never duped nothing like that and i was banned, they don't ban for just no reason. I have never heard of anybody being banned for no reason and I doubt that they would start doing things that way now.

 

[Soulstomp]

i say same all players banned where , either shopowners,rarecolectors, no naive players , i think they first must try and think what they did in the past mayby had good deals x sharding , name it . or even bought things from friends there must be some involvement else you wont get banned. most stupid thing however is reading these posts is that you can get banned on 1 acount and that the other acounts are still available , thats typical cos it will let dupers continue their playstyle, i say if ea bans ban all acounts of that player.

i am not talking about if someone thinks hes inocent or not , thats something they must deal with ea , neither am i acusing anyone of duping/or trading selling those either for uo gold or rl cash.

where there is smoke there must be fire somewhere ,

 

[Lady_Mina]

In a way i agree with the idea of banning all the account of dupers based on given info.

problem is a lot of people share the same visa..with their family.

Myself as an example..i share the same visa with my bf , mom and my stepdad..
So if any of them would do something ''wrong''..i would get perma banned aswell.

(not that i think they will..but you never know someone tricks them into buying duped stuff or something)

+ i share the same IP with my BF...since we have one connection and 2 computers.

That's the problem...EA could ban people on IP or visa...but the problem is..the people who share the same visa or IP that have done nothing wrong that will have to pay aswell.

 

[weins201]

If you share an IP or a credt card you are obviosously very close but you are not close enought to share a expoilt.:loser:

 

[Lady_Mina]

If you share an IP or a credt card you are obviosously very close but you are not close enought to share a expoilt.:loser:

If only they would throw visa's at people like they do in the US and the UK.
Then i could have my own visa.

Over here you need a fulltime steady job...and you need to give your bank proof on how much your income is and how long you've been working there and your employment contract to proof it's not a temporary job.

LOL and right now it's not looking good for me...i switched jobs 3 times the past 6 months.
LOL but this time i'm going to try to be good and stay...
And after a few months i might ask the bank if they want to give me a visa.

 

[Flora Green]

Uh.....It's Sunday. I doubt Jeremy is at work, much less have contact with the Devs & Mgmt.

At least now we know why they pushed off the ending of the current event arc. Draconi was too busy with his flamethrower.

 

[Lady_Mina]

LOL

yeah the weekend gives people time to cool off or kill themselfs.

 

[drinkbeerallday]

what movie is that from

 

[Flora Green]

Office Space.

 

[Speetz13]

OfficeSpace.

Rogue post, had to do it, one my favorite movies, watched it about 6-8 times one day on Comedy Central.

Oh and um...Yeah i haven't formulated a sold opinion or conclusion on the whole duper/banned/innocent thing. But if these people are innocent, that would be insane. And after everything I've read the past hour or two, it seems there is some sort of mistake, something very very ridiculous done by EA/Mythic, or there's a real problem with their method of banning or the people banning are drunk with POWER!!!

Or people are really good at playing innocent.

 

[Connor_Graham]

My favorite part was when they took out their agressions on the fax machine (or was it a copier?). It's been quite a few years since I've seen that movie.

 

[Speetz13]

Hehehe...It was the copier. I just quit a crappy cubicle job and I'm gonna watch that movie now. In fact, i think the premise of that story could be aplied to UO's duping situation. You know, codes, hacks, screwing the company then coming clean.

Well...maybe not.

 

[Flora Green]

My favorite part was when they took out their agressions on the fax machine (or was it a copier?). It's been quite a few years since I've seen that movie.

Copier.

 

[Connor_Graham]

Copier.

Thanks.

If I only had a dime for every time I wanted to do the same thing myself....


I'd be joining Garriot on his space flight.....

 

[bokke]

Yep, and i dont think i am alone when i say i wont return if not everything of the follwing is restored

• My chars
• My home
• My items
• My reputation

Cant remember so many ppl complaining to be banned innocent.

This way they will loose a lot of (honest) customers.
This way they will loose a lot of (paying) customers.

Can this be the end of UO?

If u r interested in my case i will post any details i get from EA in the europa-thread. But for now there is no agent avaialble on the weekend.
Who did the banning on the WE then, if nobody is working?

When someone like Zofinur gets banned then you know EA made a huge booboo somewhere along the line.

 

[bokke]

Buh bye. They aren't giving back anything and you know it. Probably not even your account.
I have been caught cheating a few times(minor cheats) never duped nothing like that and i was banned, they don't ban for just no reason. I have never heard of anybody being banned for no reason and I doubt that they would start doing things that way now.

Last year they banned Manticore and he appealed and got his account, home and rares back. Wrongfull bans occur all the time. Get your head out the sand and consider whether EA deserves all your faith.

 

[hawkeye_pike]

See this thread, post #32 by Piotr:

http://vboards.stratics.com/showthread.php?t=93796

I think any further discussion is needless.

 

[o2bavr6]

EA may make serious mistakes with handling UO bugs, but I cannot imagine they are that stupid banning harmless players. Nobody gets banned because he bought an item from a vendor.

So you can imagine them making more important mistakes like poor code that allows for duping, but you cant imagine them making mistakes in the ban process?

Who knows what facts EA actually has on these accounts. They may have all their facts correct, we will never know.

They should also take any action they want, since it's their game and we are just sheep.

But I do believe a warning would have been appropriate, if and only if, they were going to ban people for buying duped items off of vendors.

I've heard that they banned people for having too much gold, who knows if its true.
I also know tht ther have been times in the game that I have had over 100Mill in gold from selling spawn scrolls. Would I have been in that group of bans if I didnt spend the gold? would they have mistook me for a duper?

Is there an acceptable amount of gold a player shuold have in his bank after 10 years of playing, before that amount becomes too much and they ban you?

 

[hawkeye_pike]

I've heard that they banned people for having too much gold, who knows if its true.
I also know tht ther have been times in the game that I have had over 100Mill in gold from selling spawn scrolls. Would I have been in that group of bans if I didnt spend the gold? would they have mistook me for a duper?

Is there an acceptable amount of gold a player shuold have in his bank after 10 years of playing, before that amount becomes too much and they ban you?

Those people mislead you. Don't believe every nonsense you hear. See my link above.

 

[o2bavr6]

Those people mislead you. Don't believe every nonsense you hear. See my link above.

Heh, ya, but Wilki's gone now

I hope EA follows what his email said

 

[Faerunner]

ok faerunner, its easy to start over so pm me and tell me where and when you will give me all your stuff, checks and items?
or will you say, no i earned mine honestly so why should i? well thats how i feel, ive done nothing wrong.
i shall wait for the pm to give me what u own. but im guessing that pm wont be sent.
i dont want special treatment i simply want justice, that shouldnt be hard to understand surely?

PM'd. If you can prove (ie, give me a statement directly from EA) that you are innocent, or if you re-start with nothing, and you play on my shard, you're welcome to whatever is mine to give. Sadly I don't have much on other shards to help everyone out.

 

[Xrenos]

My opinion:

As I said, Aarons, I don't believe someone was banned for buying a duped runic kit. People got banned for trading with dupers deliberately and repeatedly. All this panicking about "not being able to buy from vendors anymore" is nonsense. EA may make serious mistakes with handling UO bugs, but I cannot imagine they are that stupid banning harmless players. Nobody gets banned because he bought an item from a vendor. Claiming that is nothing but a cheap attempt to alienate and influence the player base.

All people who got banned seemed to be merchants with high total item revenue. And hey, they weren't naive players who "bought an item off a vendor once".

I could not imagine that EA could ban harmless players. Until I got banned lately. Ask yourself, are you 100% sure that you wont get hit by ban for reason they deny to specify? I dont know what item of mine was illegal, they didnt explain. Do you know the legality of your items in UO?

 

[hawkeye_pike]

I could not imagine that EA could ban harmless players. Until I got banned lately. Ask yourself, are you 100% sure that you wont get hit by ban for reason they deny to specify? I dont know what item of mine was illegal, they didnt explain. Do you know the legality of your items in UO?

No. But then again, I have maybe a handful of valuable items (artifacts) and otherwise I'm rather poor.

 

[kelmo]

Do you know the legality of your items in UO?

Yes. I do.

 

[Ailish]

Do you know the legality of your items in UO?

Yes. I do.

Sure, I know the legality of my items. The legality of my CHECKs, however, I may not be so sure of. I have conducted more than one face-to-face sale of 120 scrolls recently .... (and yes, it was to people I assume have clean gold, and to my knowledge have not been banned at this point, but can you really know that about anyone??)

Unless we know WHAT ITEMS were duped (I have to assume it was more than just runic hammers, knowing the nature of people) we dont know what to be cautious of.

 

[Darghan]

You find the fact, that EA is finally banning dupers, a state you cannot support??? I am astonished! People have been complaining massively about dupes and bug abuse, and now that EA takes action people are complaining AGAIN??????

Have you all gone crazy!?!

Or do you actually believe those people who are stating to be innocent on this board? Do you really believe EA is banning random people just because they accidentaly bought one duped runic kit, without monitoring user behavior thoroughly? You must be quite naive then!

Yes I do. I watched it happen to my noob friend new to the game.

 

[Jeremy]

The willingness of people to take secondhand protestations of innocence at face value appalls me.