Different POV on the bans
![[SoCo] Matze](https://us.v-cdn.net/6030345/uploads/defaultavatar/nL5515UJH9DYJ.jpg)
[SoCo] Matze
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I was a very active player for a few years but im now on a longer break for almost a year with logging back in every now and then. So i have a healthier distance to the game and might be able to assess this issue more objectively.
There were so many "Claim once" or "Limit 1 per day" offers in the game working as intended that everyone should have known that this clearly is a bug. So if you used it many times (20+) it's clear that you have abused this bug.
Now there are some who say there was the "buy again-button" to justify their actions but if it it says BUY again and you claim it many times for free then again it is bug abuse at this point.
So in my opinion there's no question at all that this was a bug abuse / exploit.
The only "problem" is that TP is starting now to punish these exploits. In the past you were the dumb one if you didn't exploit the bugs because there were no consequences at all.
But at some point you have to start punish this and that is now. Maybe it has something to do with the change from DB to TP. We don't know. But it's justified and necessary.
It is unfortunate and i'm feeling sorry for some, but come on. You all play and have played other games and should've known about the risk of bug abuse. I've seen many players in other games getting perma banned for exploits that were far less obvious.
And don't blame it on TP. Bugs are unavoidable and even in AAA games you'll see many of them.
Was this issue avoidable with proper QA? Sure, but in the end it's your responsibility to not abuse the bugs. But if you do then it's on you. And 99.9% of you know that so stop your hypocrisy and move on.
In the long term it's good for the game and next time you might consider first if it's worth taking the risk and maybe TP is improving on their QA as well. At least i hope so.
There were so many "Claim once" or "Limit 1 per day" offers in the game working as intended that everyone should have known that this clearly is a bug. So if you used it many times (20+) it's clear that you have abused this bug.
Now there are some who say there was the "buy again-button" to justify their actions but if it it says BUY again and you claim it many times for free then again it is bug abuse at this point.
So in my opinion there's no question at all that this was a bug abuse / exploit.
The only "problem" is that TP is starting now to punish these exploits. In the past you were the dumb one if you didn't exploit the bugs because there were no consequences at all.
But at some point you have to start punish this and that is now. Maybe it has something to do with the change from DB to TP. We don't know. But it's justified and necessary.
It is unfortunate and i'm feeling sorry for some, but come on. You all play and have played other games and should've known about the risk of bug abuse. I've seen many players in other games getting perma banned for exploits that were far less obvious.
And don't blame it on TP. Bugs are unavoidable and even in AAA games you'll see many of them.
Was this issue avoidable with proper QA? Sure, but in the end it's your responsibility to not abuse the bugs. But if you do then it's on you. And 99.9% of you know that so stop your hypocrisy and move on.
In the long term it's good for the game and next time you might consider first if it's worth taking the risk and maybe TP is improving on their QA as well. At least i hope so.
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I do know how packs like that typically work, which is why the addition was so obvious to me. I honestly believed it was a deliberate change that obviously required different coding on TP's part.
I didn't mash a click-once button that accidentally didn't disappear after the first click as it was supposed to (and as I would have known it should have). I clicked a newly added button because I wanted to buy more, as the button suggested.
A new button being added isn't a pack being bugged and working incorrectly, it is a completely new function that TP designed and implemented.
The hell are you even talking about. Don't do that kind of nonsense and expect people to listen to your opinion just because you disagree with what I and a lot of other people have been saying. That's almost as disgusting as banning people for 3 days for what was an honest mistake - if you actually read anything that's been said here.
Proud Former Officer of The Gluten Empire
Retired 12-14-20. So long, and thanks for all the cat pics!
I do not believe employees of TP should be harrassed in any way. I do think they should look for other employment, since it’s clear that the playerbase should not support the game or its developers any further. The developer cannot be trusted.
Also, if TP can just ban people for bugged packs, what incentive do they have to improve quality?
But I assumed that the reaction would be to take away everything that I picked up. Because that is what they have done every single time that a situation like this has happened before. To your point, there has never been a punishment before so it would be stupid not to take advantage.
When I saw they had initially wiped my ISM to 0, I was surprised by the harshness of that move, because it was so inconsistent with previous responses. But I figured that was fair punishment since I knew what I was doing. And while there would have been pitchforks if that was the punishment, the game would have moved on as if nothing happened.
The 72 hour ban, on the other hand, is an extreme overreaction and has done irreparable damage to how I perceive the company and the faith I have in them. I've gone from being an apologist for the company to someone who probably won't accept an apology from the company.
We'll see if they can make a strong enough apology to stop me from uninstalling the game.
As we like to say in the South, Bless your heart...
You actually think there is going to be a next time for a bunch of players.
I've edited my original post to not discredit eXo. Sorry for that. But my point still stands.
This i what im refering to. I know it's worded as a question but i read it also as mentioned as a indirect threat.
...how the **tsk tsk** is that a threat? He's saying people are going to lose their jobs over this, either from getting fired or the company shutting down from firing its customers.
I read this as open mockery of TP. Which, I think is referencing Les Miserables.
How is that a threat of any sort? It's simple fact - if we stop spending, they stop getting paychecks.
Source, please. ‘Cuz I ain’t seen it. Thanks.
edit: But thanks for removing the unnecessary ad hominem.
Proud Former Officer of The Gluten Empire
Retired 12-14-20. So long, and thanks for all the cat pics!
FFS. That's not a threat.
A threat wouldn't even be "I hope their families starve", even though that would be a reprehensible thing to say.
A threat implies intent. Such as "I'm gonna kick your pet tribble down the stairs."
I don't know how you could interpret threat from that.
If TP doesn't do what we the players want (in this case lift the bans) we'll stop spending and their children are going to starve.
That's how you can read it. Of course everyone can stop spending for whatever reason they like. I did myself months ago. Imo the bans are not the right reason because i think they are justified. Maybe a one day ban would have been enough with an announcement that it will be longer in the future but TP decided it's going to be 3 days.
That's not a threat. That's the definition of "economy"
1) Giving away virtual currency has no real world impact; or
2) Alienating paying customers has a real world impact.
Neither of those involves a threat. The word you are looking for is "consequences."
Proud Former Officer of The Gluten Empire
Retired 12-14-20. So long, and thanks for all the cat pics!
That could easilly be considered libel.
The actual "threat" you claimed to have taken place was "So how many STT employee families and children will go hungry for using a button for free virtual items? Hmm..."
That is clearly to any reasonable person not a "sick and disgusting" threat but in fact a statement questioning the value of the items misclaimed and the considered real world value of such items.
You do not have a healthy distance nor any reasonable objectiveness if you are that blinded to the simple fact that no direct or indirect threat was intended or made.
If anybody has blown anything out of proportion it is you and your ridiculous statement claiming a threat has been made. Not an opinion of yours but something offered as factual.
You might wish to consider deleting your claim or at least making a more factual edit that does not libel another user.
Dude, read the room.
You made a mistake. You misinterpreted what was said. It happens to the best of us. Don't double down on it. That is exactly what TP is doing and what caused this kerfuffle in the first place!
I don't want to use this as an excuse but english is not my mother tongue so it might be a bit harder to get the gist or the real intention of such statements. Nonetheless i want to apologize for that.
Im also not against using whatever means you have as a customer to influence the decisions of the company you're dealing with. The opposite is the case actually. I guess this decision was made by just a handful people in the company but all the employees plus their relatives are going to suffer from a decision that i think is not wrong. Maybe a shorter ban would have been better because it's the first time they are doing this.
I guess we all want a level playing field from what is delivered to us by TP. So how should they react to a situation like this where some get an unfair advantage over others?
1.) Keep it as it used to be. Ressource heavy and long effort to revert the advantages with some players probably getting overlooked and being able to keep their advantage. If it's reverted at all
2.) Doing it like most other games by delegating some responsibilities to the customers with consequences for those who took advantage of bugs
3.) Do a rollback and revert all those advantages for everyone but also taking away things players might have gotten in the meantime not affected by the bug
4.) Don't fix the bugs and let all players benefit from them
5.) Don't release bugs. Unrealistic but in this case should have been easy with some testing.
They went from 1.) to 2.) now which i think is ok if they stick to it from now on.
I myself would prefer 3.) but whenever a rollback happened in any game i played there was huge drama almost everytime. When people got used to #2 it might cause less drama in total.
#3 would also be best because there was no need for discussion of wether something is abuse / exploit or not.
Maybe you have better solutions.
Thank you for your apology. It is appreciated. Sometimes communicating via text is challenging, particularly when tone and body language are important missing elements in communication.
It's even more difficult when English isn't your first language. Again, thank you for your effort in clearing this up.
I agree that anyone obviously exploiting it should be penalised. Otherwise, there's no incentive to play fairly, or not exploit things in the future. The issue is that it's very hard to discern intent.
I think this whole situation has been made needlessly ugly by both sides. TP messed up badly, but some people are using that as an excuse to violate basic principles of decency, respect and are acting like spoiled children. Neither side is looking particularly good right now.
What I don't understand is how some are claiming they didn't claim more than a couple and got banned, while conversely, some who spammed the claim button got off scot-free. Even taking into consideration some exaggeration and outright lying, there's probably truth to that. Which makes absolutely no sense. That is extremely frustrating.
If any of this is remotely true, it's inexcusable. There needs to be consistency and fairness in any handling of a situation like this. Not only is this is a masterclass in how not to handle it, this has turned into a full blown PR nightmare. And for no good reason either.
TP had to do something, but it should have been a measured response, erring on the side of caution. Instead, they took a blowtorch to the weed in the front yard, and burned down the house.
The longer they maintain radio silence, the worse this is going to get. People are going full nuclear and it's going to have a lot of collateral damage I fear. This is truly a dark day, not just for this game, but the Star Trek community as a whole.
When I first saw the Buy Again, I clicked it. "Sweet! They're giving us extras!!" I clicked Buy Again again. This time it didn't do anything. The night before, I had a bizarro bug that gave me two Groom Worf crowns (at full cost for both) where it didn't show up as having been replicated. "Another STT graphics bug..." I assumed that something similar was happening. I kept clicking it figuring it would run out just like the other offers that have multiple claims per day.
Once it dawned on me this wasn't a graphical glitch I stopped.
Didn't claim any additional crew. Didn't spend my dilithium to speed up the quantum (or whatever it's called). I decided to not try to hide it by claiming crew and burying it. I just put down the game and didn't log in. Even while I was having one of my better starts to an event that I've ever had. I figured they'd need time to clean up the mess and didn't want to spend time on it if things were going to be reset or reverted.
You will never be able to separate the people who used this maliciously vs. those who didn't.
And as I said, I agree. It is almost impossible to discern intent. To use a tenet of law, better ten guilty go free than one innocent be punished. That also applies here. So their hands are tied.
Thanks for owning up, Matze, but... In the words of a one-time great warrior, 言葉というものはよく咀嚼し吟味してから口に乗せるように.
This was not necessary. Matze owned up to their mistake, and there was a language barrier. People whose first language is English have done far worse and never apologised. You're out of line.
Lighten up, brother.
Google Translate is never that far away.
And Matze wrote a treatise on their topic.
I work with plenty of people who's first language isn't English and it's more an insult to them to imply that they can't take a joke because of a language barrier.
Proud Former Officer of The Gluten Empire
Retired 12-14-20. So long, and thanks for all the cat pics!
I'm aware. I used it. I'll save others the trouble.
Be sure to chew and scrutinize words before putting them in your mouth.
Your comment feels needlessly antagonistic. The fact you were joking could be lost in translation.
Pardon the pun.
Matze probably feels bad enough. And as someone with a lot of experience with people who've had language issues like these, all someone rubbing it in their face like that does is lead to further isolation and embarrassment.