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I'm sure it would go as smoothly here as the post-AE, anti-PL actions did.|
Originally Posted by Quatermain
Got linked to this article, its an interesting read. Its about how Eve Online tracked their equivilent of gold farmers for a while, then banned a bunch of paying accounts associated with them, and the results of that.
http://www.eveonline.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&bid=687 |
Snark aside, there's a bunch of interesting stuff in that article. Most notably that it didn;t affect the market-at-large in any meaningful way. In fact, it seems like after a temporary fluctuation--a drop in listed items and a short *increase* in price floowed by a sharp, one-day drop--the market returned to well within 10% of hte pre-ban average. (the article claims 10% drop, buthte graph shows otherwise). What *is* different is market volatility, which to me means that banning RMT accounts better enables market flippers.
@Ba'alat/@Zizka
"Plausibility is nothing compared to nerdrage." --PumBumbler
Or RMT'ers don't buy/sell much via its market, and the total amount of inf in the pockets of normal players didn't change quickly with the bans.
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So the fluctuations sould be perception based. The RMTers would be responsible fpr inflation only from increasing the money supply but not necessarily supply in the market. I;m not sure how drops work in EVE, but an increase in rare drops would be a natural side effect of farming in-game money.|
Originally Posted by Quatermain
Or RMT'ers don't buy/sell much via its market, and the total amount of inf in the pockets of normal players didn't change quickly with the bans.
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Economics aside, I'd be very, very interested in what kinds of "behaviors" they observed to warrant the bans and how they distinguished between temp bans for some accoutns and perma-bans for others.
I'm really impressed with the EVE team's efforts at transparency in this. I can think of several other development teams that have carried out similarly heavy handed management programs without making a similar effort at presenting the data to their player base(s).
@Ba'alat/@Zizka
"Plausibility is nothing compared to nerdrage." --PumBumbler
I liked the CPU graph, and the "Unholy Rage" code name.
I am not all that sure about the analysis they are trying to sell after that.
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I actually care far less about what it's doing to the internal market than I do about some other things. I don't really have an issue with players who are farming for themselves, but I do have a problem with the RMT people. They take up resources that someone else could be using to actually play the game for fun. They send me spam every day. They forced the Devs into a corner where they put extreme limitations on trial accounts to help prevent the RMT people from sending us annoying tells, spamming broadcast, etc. If they can be weeded out and actually banned for good without catching genuine players in the net, I'm all for it.
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Originally Posted by Baalat
...there's a bunch of interesting stuff in that article. Most notably that it didn;t affect the market-at-large in any meaningful way. In fact, it seems like after a temporary fluctuation--a drop in listed items and a short *increase* in price floowed by a sharp, one-day drop--the market returned to well within 10% of hte pre-ban average. (the article claims 10% drop, buthte graph shows otherwise). What *is* different is market volatility, which to me means that banning RMT accounts better enables market flippers.
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~Missi
http://tinyurl.com/yhy333s
Miss Informed in 2016! She can't be worse than all those other guys!
I try and deal with RMTers away from where my friends can see. Like in one of the back alleyways in KR or sometimes in Boomtown at night. Never been burned before but I always pack a couple of imps, just in case.
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Right. I wonder if they have people who go check the markets to see if things are worth selling or if they delete everything without knowing. Maybe they have one team "Mule" they trade all the $$$$ stuff to and he goes and sells them all.|
Originally Posted by Baalat
So the fluctuations sould be perception based. The RMTers would be responsible fpr inflation only from increasing the money supply but not necessarily supply in the market. I;m not sure how drops work in EVE, but an increase in rare drops would be a natural side effect of farming in-game money.
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Originally Posted by Baalat
Economics aside, I'd be very, very interested in what kinds of "behaviors" they observed to warrant the bans and how they distinguished between temp bans for some accoutns and perma-bans for others.
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Originally Posted by Baalat
I'm really impressed with the EVE team's efforts at transparency in this. I can think of several other development teams that have carried out similarly heavy handed management programs without making a similar effort at presenting the data to their player base(s).
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~Missi
http://tinyurl.com/yhy333s
Miss Informed in 2016! She can't be worse than all those other guys!
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I have no problem with the banning of paying accounts if said account holders are buying inf or services from RMT companies. If you cut off the source of income for the RMTers, they will go elsewhere.
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Originally Posted by Quatermain
Got linked to this article, its an interesting read. Its about how Eve Online tracked their equivilent of gold farmers for a while, then banned a bunch of paying accounts associated with them, and the results of that.
http://www.eveonline.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&bid=687 |
@Arwen Darkblade
Proud Member of Hammer of the Gods and Sanguine Syndicate
Arc ID #86194 "Cry Havoc"
Arc ID #103934 "Dr. Thomas' First Day"
[URL="http://tobyfife.blogspot.com/"]Hero Girl[/URL] - my geek culture blog
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"Real friends help you hide the bodies"
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Originally Posted by PumBumbler
I try and deal with RMTers away from where my friends can see. Like in one of the back alleyways in KR or sometimes in Boomtown at night. Never been burned before but I always pack a couple of imps, just in case.
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*Packs a Maribelle, just in case*
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Originally Posted by Maribelle
"Real friends help you hide the bodies"
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Way back (like i8), when farmers (er, RMTers) used to occupy all the RV Hero heavies for hours, grinding turrets, I used to get on my corr, recruit a posse of villain pvpers, and mercilessly hunt the farmers... at the same time, I arranged for some heros to be in-zone who would be positioned to grab the Hero heavies when they respawned. There was one farmer I particularly loathed (Dirty Pig or Unclean Pig... something Pig) so he always got special attention.
Spreading good-will between villain and hero and gaining rep in the process was nice.
Reading the farmers' frustrated, semi-literate tells was the cherry on top 
I remember that MM, Greedy Pig was his name I think, he had some really good broadcast and tells if you bothered him. I'd forgotten about that, heh.
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I'm curious how they differentiated RMT'er vs normal player farming as well, it sounded like they spent some time researching it, several weeks/months, which I think is what it would take to really do it right. | Economics aside, I'd be very, very interested in what kinds of "behaviors" they observed to warrant the bans and how they distinguished between temp bans for some accoutns and perma-bans for others. |
They did point out the market for some things got hit pretty hard, like 100% increase in price and 100% decrease in availability. Assuming those were more desirable items in some way, but I don't really know how their market works or what is on it.
As a side note, I like this line:
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| We feel violated, but we still understand that we must address this in the manner of the FDIC not the SWAT. |
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There were RMTers pre-i9?
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Originally Posted by Phantastik
Way back (like i8), when farmers (er, RMTers) used to...
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You could find sites selling influence, power leveling, etc before I9, yes. They weren't aggressively after people in the game, but they had websites up. I think they didn't do much business before I9. I remember checking out one site because I couldn't believe anyone would spend actual money for influence. They listed the servers influence was available on and the pickings were pretty slim. That was before City of Villains was out, so before I6. |
Originally Posted by Gaderath
There were RMTers pre-i9?
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Early on in the game, one guy was even busted by players for selling his Hami raiding "guide" on ebay. That had to be around I3? Something like that?* People also sold Hami Enancements online back then.
I guess we shouldn't be surprised, really. In a world where people pay for dirty underpants, it's pretty clear there's a market for anything.
*Edit - I remember that the Hami raid on ebay guide thing happened before Hami was defeated on most servers, including Justice. Maybe Q, Arwen, or some of the other longtime Hami raiders would have a better idea of when that was. The players who busted the guy were apparently mad about two things: 1) he was selling a Hami guide on ebay 2) he claimed it was his method and others said he didn't contribute much to it, someone else deserved credit for the strategy, AND this guy was the one selling it and claiming credit.
~Missi
http://tinyurl.com/yhy333s
Miss Informed in 2016! She can't be worse than all those other guys!
Step 1:
/em sprinkles catnip on RMTers.
Step 2:
/em waits for Katfood to solve our little problem here 
Post Comic book Fan Films that ROCK!
Fight my brute
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no pk was my favorite line, there was a fire tank out there too i used to have fun torturing in rv on my corrs.|
Originally Posted by Phantastik
Reading the farmers' frustrated, semi-literate tells was the cherry on top
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to the op: i dont really have a problem with rmt, as long as it doesnt affect availability of things i need to buy(cant generate myself). i have no problem just using SOs either so its all relative.
I have less issue with them than most people, likely. Majority of them seem to be from 3rd worldish countries. Farming gold has to be better work than a shoe factory for them. If the silly Americans want to send some cash their way, I don't really have issue with the farmers taking the money. They sure wouldn't be farming it if someone wasn't buying it. The spam can be fairly annoying, but now that its just in game email, it doesnt bug me too much. The people buying it are the ones who deserve most of the blame for the annoyances, imo.
That's a pretty interesting read. It's nice to see an example where the devs specifically have an interest in the impact of changes on their markets. Of course, from what I understand of Eve, it would be fairly hideous of the powers that be to ignore the impact of things on their market, as trading and in-game currency earning are fairly fundamental. Far more so than CoH, where market goods are generally luxury items that so far we have no formal need of.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
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.:fap attack:.
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Originally Posted by pumbumbler
i try and deal with rmters away from where my friends can see. Like in one of the back alleyways in kr or sometimes in boomtown at night. Never been burned before but i always pack a couple of imps, just in case.
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Cho the Fro -- F I N -- ShuTheFrontDoor-- Whosenwatcher -- RoboCho -- Don Wanton -- Wonder Cho - Spam Man - Cho - Dupa - Shelitababy - Emo'd - Flossy - Soviet Garden - Choalee - zaploid - Ko'Tain - Frine - Trower - Choake - Mr. Trashy - i r n00b - Mr. Class E - Mr. Stabbens - Beta Cay
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My guess is that they arranged a number of RMT stings to identify what accounts were selling the EVE equivalent of influence, then analyzed who gave those accounts the original stuff, following the whole unholy chain back to the suppliers.|
Originally Posted by Quatermain
I'm curious how they differentiated RMT'er vs normal player farming as well, it sounded like they spent some time researching it, several weeks/months, which I think is what it would take to really do it right.
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Once you identify the accounts in the supply and distribution system you have a good idea of which accounts to ban. Monitor their activity for a time and conduct several more sting operations to be sure and you'll have a very good idea of who to ban.
If you're a regular player farmer, you'll keep all your influence, give it to friends, or spend it on the market. You'll never have given anything to an account that has sold stuff for real money. So the odds of regular players getting banned accidentally are vanishingly small.
The people who pay the RMTers to PL their characters are involved in that distribution system. Their accounts will be among those to be banned if a similar sting operation is conducted in CoX.
I just can't understand why people willingly give their account passwords and credit card numbers to thieves. Why not just play the game?
I would also be very worried about credit card fraud.
You're giving your credit card number to an entity that has been openly breaking the EULA?
You want to trust a company that you have no way of verifying that they are genuine?
I have never visited their web sites but I am sure they are not verified by Verisign.
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That made me curious. You can't even connect to their main site via SSL, and it looks like the login actually redirects you back to the main page, so that's where it would need the encryption if it had it. Not very inspiring securty - it implies you log into their site with your password sent in cleartext.|
Originally Posted by Maribelle
I have never visited their web sites but I am sure they are not verified by Verisign.
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Then again, if you're actually giving game log-in info to such folks, I suppose one shouldn't worry greatly about potentially giving your sign-in to their site to the wider internet.
Blue
American Steele: 50 BS/Inv
Nightfall: 50 DDD
Sable Slayer: 50 DM/Rgn
Fortune's Shadow: 50 Dark/Psi
WinterStrike: 47 Ice/Dev
Quantum Well: 43 Inv/EM
Twilit Destiny: 43 MA/DA
Red
Shadowslip: 50 DDC
Final Rest: 50 MA/Rgn
Abyssal Frost: 50 Ice/Dark
Golden Ember: 50 SM/FA
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They use paypal...I've heard...
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Originally Posted by Maribelle
I have never visited their web sites but I am sure they are not verified by Verisign.
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@Ba'alat/@Zizka
"Plausibility is nothing compared to nerdrage." --PumBumbler
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I Thawte they were using something else.|
Originally Posted by Baalat
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They use paypal...I've heard... |
If the game spit out 20 dollar bills people would complain that they weren't sequentially numbered. If they were sequentially numbered people would complain that they weren't random enough.
Black Pebble is my new hero.
Got linked to this article, its an interesting read. Its about how Eve Online tracked their equivilent of gold farmers for a while, then banned a bunch of paying accounts associated with them, and the results of that.
http://www.eveonline.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&bid=687