I'm pretty sure that if we had an option to disable email...or at the very least halt all email from anyone not on our friend list, this would screw over the RMT spammers.
I also think that email should be disabled by default for all characters at creation until you turn it on manually. Why make things easy for these turds? What are you thinking devs?
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Interesting. I have toons that have been logged out on Freedom for 30+ days and when I log them back in, I have no spam e-mails.
Matter of fact, I get so few e-mails that I simply had to see what this thread was about simply because I'd almost forgotten there IS an in-game e-mail system.
Of course one of the very first things I do when I make a new toon is to /hide from everything but global, friends and SG lists. So, when the bloody RMT'ers are searching for victims, I'm simply not listed.
(If I wanna team, I have never had a problem getting them through global channels or simply sending tells to players asking for teammates.)
Do what I do: Abandon the email function altogether, let it get 100% full with the spam mails and then leave it alone. Offline messages work just as well anyway if you need to send someone a note when he/she isn't around. Otherwise you'll be fighting a never-ending battle clearing the inbox, ignoring the spammers, getting your ignore list full and then eventually having to clear it.
Just stick to using browser emails if you need to. The game is very alt+tab friendly anyway so you can switch inbetween playing the game and reading emails/whatever else pretty quickly.
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I'm pretty sure that if we had an option to disable email...or at the very least halt all email from anyone not on our friend list, this would screw over the RMT spammers.
I also think that email should be disabled by default for all characters at creation until you turn it on manually. Why make things easy for these turds? What are you thinking devs?
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I guarantee you that RMT spammers would not, in fact, be thwarted. They would move on to more annoying ways of pushing their spam.
There is one way, and one way only, to get rid of all RMT spam permanently. It's even been proven extremely effective in the real world. Roll back the game to pre-Issue 9 days, before we had IO enhancements, Wentworths, recipes, and other such items of value. In those days, about the only thing influence was good for was giving away to newbies or in contests, or trading in at hideous exchange rates for prestige. It's no coincidence that before Issue 9, I don't think I ever received a single RMT spam e-mail or tell, even though all channels for RMT traffic were wide freakin' open. (This was also pre-trial account nerfs.)
Other than taking away the value of what RMT companies are selling, your only option is to get rid of all means of player-to-player communication. E-mail won't cut it. You'll also have to get rid of every single channel. Local, broadcast, team, request, help, arena, everything. Because the root of the problem has diddly to do with e-mail, it is all about there being money to be made off of the stuff they're selling. As long as that holds true, they will find ways to convey their spam to you.
Also, as I've posted before in threads that are exactly like this one, e-mail spam is a minor annoyance at best. No one ever promised you when you signed up that you will never, ever have to deal with minor annoyances. If they were to implement some kind of blocking system or option, it's one more thing that is already on a crowded screen, it is one more moving part that can break (or worse, break something else) during development, it is one more thing that they'd have to test, it's one more thing the developers could be spending time on working on other stuff instead. I'm not saying there is no room for QoL improvements, but there are a ton of others that would make a much more positive impact on the game than this one.
Last, but not least, I use the e-mail system. I know others who use the e-mail system. Global tells are not an acceptable substitute for several reasons, the biggest ones having to do with the lack of persistence and limited length. Just because you don't use a particular feature, just because you think that no one else does, is not a valid reason for getting rid of it or gimping it to the point of being useless, considering that doing so would not solve your particular problem.
We've been saving Paragon City for eight and a half years. It's time to do it one more time.
(If you love this game as much as I do, please read that post.)
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30 isn't too bad. I logged in to my defender I hadn't played in a long while and he had 187 if I remember correctly. Took forever to clean them out.
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What!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What sever are you on???
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Liberty. Bear in mind, the defender in question had not been played in over a year, so it took a while for all that to build up.
I am ready to fight to end this war against those stores who advertise,and wont stop advertising even if you ignore them.I feel your pain Tuter.I want them to go away as much as you,or anyone else does.
I recently posted in the "Suggestion and Ideas" section of the forums titled "E-Mail,Please,Please,Please,Please: )",and it had some ideas as to how to get rid of the advertisements all together,and I think it is a wonderful plan to do that.Get on that post,and read them,and if you support me on the ideas I cam eup with,Awesome!..If You don't,eh..cool.
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Last, but not least, I use the e-mail system. I know others who use the e-mail system. Global tells are not an acceptable substitute for several reasons, the biggest ones having to do with the lack of persistence and limited length. Just because you don't use a particular feature, just because you think that no one else does, is not a valid reason for getting rid of it or gimping it to the point of being useless, considering that doing so would not solve your particular problem.
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How is giving people the option to turn it off 'gimping' the system? You're not removing the function...only allowing it to be turned off for the people who don't use it.
Right now, whenever I see the email light up red...I know I got spam. No one on my Global or in my SG uses email to communicate. So what is the use of it to me except to get spam?
Removing inventions is a stupid idea. It's already too large a part of the game and there is no way to compensate someone for the work and influence they spent in obtaining the stuff they got for their characters. I proposed a simple solution where no one gets affected unless they want to...and you propose to remove and recode what has now become a central part of the core game. Smart...
we have email on CoX? lol
And why is there a limit on our ignore list? Every time I hit the spam button now, I'm removing someone from the ignore list to make room.
The current e-mail system is fairly useless. I would like to be able to send influence, recipes, salvage, enhancements, etc. to alts. That would be a useful e-mail system in my book.
Uber Talgrim - level 50 emp/dark defender
Uber Rod - level 50 dark melee/regen scrapper
Rod Valdr - level 50 invuln/SS tanker
Talgrim - level 50 ninja/dark mastermind
OMG!! Please add these costume designs now!
Right, because it makes perfect sense for me to be able to send myself a horse via e-mail.
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Right, because it makes perfect sense for me to be able to send myself a horse via e-mail.
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Change that to "send myself a pony" and you'll instantly have more people see the inherit sense in being able to do that. ^_^
my lil RWZ Challenge vid
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Liberty. Bear in mind, the defender in question had not been played in over a year, so it took a while for all that to build up.
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I get between a dozen and two dozen in 24 hours. If I didn't play for over a year, I think I would break the e-mail server. And 100 a week is why I hate the spammers. At least they are out of our channels and not /telling us anymore. >_<
There are no words for what this community, and the friends I have made here mean to me. Please know that I care for all of you, yes, even you. If you Twitter, I'm MrThan. If you're Unleashed, I'm dumps. I'll try and get registered on the Titan Forums as well. Peace, and thanks for the best nine years anyone could ever ask for.
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At least they are out of our channels and not /telling us anymore. >_<
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Agreed! I remember that shortly after I9 was released, I would receive about 10 spam /tells in the course of 2 to 3 hours of play, no matter what time of the day or night I was logged in. So having all that spam now converted to email is still annoying, but certainly less of a hassle. 
Guys, guys, guys, I think there's a lot of misunderstanding going on here. I see the email system as working just as intended. It's a honeypot, nothing more. By giving the spammers a nice, reliable, low effort way of getting their message out there they keep them away from all the other, more disruptive spam vectors such as broadcast or tells.
That said, there's certainly much more they could do to stop this behavior, but the question is "do we want them to?"
It takes time, money and effort to stop this stuff, and those things are going to come from somewhere else. Would you rather have 3 abuse specialists or 3 developers? RMT's are really (at least as far as I can tell) nothing more than an annoyance. I don't think we've got enough people using them that they skew the economy, so give them the email system.
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Last, but not least, I use the e-mail system. I know others who use the e-mail system. Global tells are not an acceptable substitute for several reasons, the biggest ones having to do with the lack of persistence and limited length. Just because you don't use a particular feature, just because you think that no one else does, is not a valid reason for getting rid of it or gimping it to the point of being useless, considering that doing so would not solve your particular problem.
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How is giving people the option to turn it off 'gimping' the system? You're not removing the function...only allowing it to be turned off for the people who don't use it.
Right now, whenever I see the email light up red...I know I got spam. No one on my Global or in my SG uses email to communicate. So what is the use of it to me except to get spam?
Removing inventions is a stupid idea. It's already too large a part of the game and there is no way to compensate someone for the work and influence they spent in obtaining the stuff they got for their characters. I proposed a simple solution where no one gets affected unless they want to...and you propose to remove and recode what has now become a central part of the core game. Smart...
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The only use I make of in-game email is to delete spam in order to make the annoying red text go away. That's it. No one I team with uses it...ever. But as Tony points out, there are people who make legit use of it, so removing it from the game makes no more sense than removing the Invention system.
I also concur that making email something you can opt out of would go a long way towards solving the spam problem. Not only would a very large portion of the player base have the problem disappear the moment they disabled email, I think the minority who left it on would suddenly become far too small a market to be worth bothering with. If a market currently consisting of about 250,000 people shrunk to 25,000, as I suspect would shortly be the case once opt-out was publicized, and that market converted at a monthly rate of 1% (which is probably high), then that's not a viable business plan. 250 conversions at an AOV (average order value) of I suspect around ten bucks isn't going to float an operation, even in China.
Er, yes...I am an online marketer. Why do you ask...?
"And in this moment, I will not run.
It is my place to stand.
We few shall carry hope
Within our bloodied hands."
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we have email on CoX? lol
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This. The word email is in red.
Big whoop.
I haven't opened up that tab on any character in over a year.
Blazara Aura LVL 50 Fire/Psi Dom (with 125% recharge)
Flameboxer Aura LVL 50 SS/Fire Brute
Ice 'Em Aura LVL 50 Ice Tank
Darq Widow Fortune LVL 50 Fortunata (200% rech/Night Widow 192.5% rech)--thanks issue 19!
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Yeah those RMT'ers make me sick.
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RMT'ers are bad, that goes without saying. But you know what is worse? The players who make it all worth it for the RMT'ers.
"The one thing that can stop a full team of MasterMinds dead in its tracks... a doorway!" --Frogfather
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I also concur that making email something you can opt out of would go a long way towards solving the spam problem. Not only would a very large portion of the player base have the problem disappear the moment they disabled email, I think the minority who left it on would suddenly become far too small a market to be worth bothering with.
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Except that if they make it something that can be turned off, they'll "helpfully" add a warning to the sender that the recipient has opted out of email. Then the next step is for the spammers to grab your global handle, and send you global tells at all hours of the day or night. What do you do then?
Freedom: Blazing Larb, Fiery Fulcrum, Sardan Reborn, Arctic-Frenzy, Wasabi Sam, Mr Smashtastic.
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I also concur that making email something you can opt out of would go a long way towards solving the spam problem. Not only would a very large portion of the player base have the problem disappear the moment they disabled email, I think the minority who left it on would suddenly become far too small a market to be worth bothering with.
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Except that if they make it something that can be turned off, they'll "helpfully" add a warning to the sender that the recipient has opted out of email. Then the next step is for the spammers to grab your global handle, and send you global tells at all hours of the day or night. What do you do then?
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Yeah, they'd definitely need to not send such a message to the sender, if the opt-out is intended primarily as an anti-RMT-spam measure. Not that's its a huge deal to /ignore tell spammers, but still...
"And in this moment, I will not run.
It is my place to stand.
We few shall carry hope
Within our bloodied hands."
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I also concur that making email something you can opt out of would go a long way towards solving the spam problem. Not only would a very large portion of the player base have the problem disappear the moment they disabled email, I think the minority who left it on would suddenly become far too small a market to be worth bothering with.
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Except that if they make it something that can be turned off, they'll "helpfully" add a warning to the sender that the recipient has opted out of email. Then the next step is for the spammers to grab your global handle, and send you global tells at all hours of the day or night. What do you do then?
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Send them a trojan in retaliation?
Seriously though. Why not make the mailing system cost influence to use? Maybe they won't be bombarding people if it's eating away at what they're selling.
Spamming is so freaking stupid. The one game where I did buy gold(FFXI) I found a site to get it on my own, I didn't need some mook to spam mail me about it. Even with IOs, CoX would be the dumbest game to buy money in.
Ahh it is all clear. The MA farms are the anti RMT. Need money jump on one of the hundreds of boss farms. We have nothing to worry soon there will be no more emails.
I have never seen any point to the in-game email system. But some people seem to like it, and I suppose tis certainly not as if its an unsurmountable obstacle to click "delete as spam" a half-dozen times.
I use the in-game email system to play the minigame, "Who are you knocking off my ignore list today?"
Click <spam> <spam> <spam> <spam> vwah-lah, done.
--NT
They all laughed at me when I said I wanted to be a comedian.
But I showed them, and nobody's laughing at me now!
If I became a red name, I would be all "and what would you mere mortals like to entertain me with today, mu hu ha ha ha!" ~Arcanaville
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Seriously though. Why not make the mailing system cost influence to use? Maybe they won't be bombarding people if it's eating away at what they're selling.
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Still not a viable solution. Either the amount is so low that it doesn't matter and they send the emails anyway, or it's so high that legitimate use is seriously hampered and the RMTers just switch to tells. Lose-lose.
We'll always have Paragon.
Should be a "If account X sends more than Y emails in under Z minutes, ban" feature.
I use the ingame mail, and do not want to see it go away, but all the crap clutter is sooo annoying.