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"Disciplinary" action: TP banned from my wallet for 3 months (minimum)

=j= Zathras=j= Zathras ✭✭✭
edited February 2021 in The Bridge
After careful deliberation, I have decided to take the following action:

TP is banned from my wallet for a minimum of 3 months. It could very well be longer. I probably will at some point take the time to submit reviews that reflect my true and honest opinion on the quality of the product. In the past, I have been generous in my recognition of the difficulties in maintaining a property like this, but there's been no follow through by TP/WRG to show they are committed to putting out and maintaining a quality product.

I have no illusions about whether this will make any substantive difference; however, I feel it is an action I must take for my own self-respect. It is not a decision I take lightly.

While my monetary contributions to the game may pale in comparison to some, from my perspective, the resources are still a product of my own labor.

I was willing to let bygones be bygones, but for the following reasons and others I feel this is necessary:
  • TP's insistence on punishing players for their own mistakes and their doubling down on their missteps by not backtracking the assessment that their players (many paying customers) "cheated".
  • As part of their corrective actions, they've removed all legitimately acquired resources related to Crew Retrieval, not just the ones that were acquired from their bug. This underscores their insistence that players "cheated" and some penalty must be applied. Example: before the bug, I had polestars capable of acquiring a particular 5* I very much wanted, but couldn't get because I didn't have the quantum yet.

I want to keep playing (for the moment) because of the resources I've already invested, but I'm totally soured by TP's stance and actions. I don't know how long I'll keep playing Timelines, but it is likely I will never play another TP/WRG property.

This is not a call to action. It is merely a statement of my own intent. However, if you feel inspired to take your own similar (or more severe) action, I stake no claim to the ideas within. You are free to take the actions that give you your own peace of mind. This is my attempt to address my grievances.

LLAP
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Comments

  • +1
    After careful deliberation, I have decided to take the following action:

    TP is banned from my wallet for a minimum of 3 months. It could very well be longer. I probably will at some point take the time to submit reviews that reflect my true and honest opinion on the quality of the product. In the past, I have been generous in my recognition of the difficulties in maintaining a property like this, but there's been no follow through by TP/WRG to show they are committed to putting out and maintaining a quality product.

    I have no illusions about whether this will make any substantive difference; however, I feel it is an action I must take for my own self-respect. It is not a decision I take lightly.

    While my monetary contributions to the game may pale in comparison to some, from my perspective, the resources are still a product of my own labor.

    I was willing to let bygones be bygones, but for the following reasons and others I feel this is necessary:
    • TP's insistence on punishing players for their own mistakes and their doubling down on their missteps by not backtracking the assessment that their players (many paying customers) "cheated".
    • As part of their corrective actions, they've removed all legitimately acquired resources related to Crew Retrieval, not just the ones that were acquired from their bug. This underscores their insistence that players "cheated" and some penalty must be applied. Example: before the bug, I had polestars capable of acquiring a particular 5* I very much wanted, but couldn't get because I didn't have the quantum yet.

    I want to keep playing (for the moment) because of the resources I've already invested, but I'm totally soured by TP's stance and actions. I don't know how long I'll keep playing Timelines, but it is likely I will never play another TP/WRG property.

    This is not a call to action. It is merely a statement of my own intent. However, if you feel inspired to take your own similar (or more severe) action, I stake no claim to the ideas within. You are free to take the actions that give you your own peace of mind. This is my attempt to address my grievances.

    LLAP

  • IceCatIceCat ✭✭✭✭✭
    After careful deliberation, I have decided to take the following action:

    TP is banned from my wallet for a minimum of 3 months. It could very well be longer. I probably will at some point take the time to submit reviews that reflect my true and honest opinion on the quality of the product. In the past, I have been generous in my recognition of the difficulties in maintaining a property like this, but there's been no follow through by TP/WRG to show they are committed to putting out and maintaining a quality product.

    I have no illusions about whether this will make any substantive difference; however, I feel it is an action I must take for my own self-respect. It is not a decision I take lightly.

    While my monetary contributions to the game may pale in comparison to some, from my perspective, the resources are still a product of my own labor.

    I was willing to let bygones be bygones, but for the following reasons and others I feel this is necessary:
    • TP's insistence on punishing players for their own mistakes and their doubling down on their missteps by not backtracking the assessment that their players (many paying customers) "cheated".
    • As part of their corrective actions, they've removed all legitimately acquired resources related to Crew Retrieval, not just the ones that were acquired from their bug. This underscores their insistence that players "cheated" and some penalty must be applied. Example: before the bug, I had polestars capable of acquiring a particular 5* I very much wanted, but couldn't get because I didn't have the quantum yet.

    I want to keep playing (for the moment) because of the resources I've already invested, but I'm totally soured by TP's stance and actions. I don't know how long I'll keep playing Timelines, but it is likely I will never play another TP/WRG property.

    This is not a call to action. It is merely a statement of my own intent. However, if you feel inspired to take your own similar (or more severe) action, I stake no claim to the ideas within. You are free to take the actions that give you your own peace of mind. This is my attempt to address my grievances.

    LLAP

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  • MiT SanoaMiT Sanoa ✭✭✭✭✭
    BarnBurner wrote: »
    https://forum.disruptorbeam.com/stt/discussion/15201/achievement-glitch#latest

    That was the achievement glitch that gave everyone ~200k honor. While its not exactly the same as what happened this week, its similar in several ways.

    It is similar in the not so important aspects: There were buttons that people clicked despite assuming that it was a glitch, and people got free stuff.

    But it is the contrary in the most important aspect: It did not create any imbalance between the players. Everyone who logged in within a week got the same.
    Wir, die Mirror Tribbles [MiT] haben freie Plätze zu vergeben. Kein Zwang und kein Stress, dafür aber Spaß, Discord und eine nette, hilfsbereite Gemeinschaft, incl. voll ausgebauter Starbase und täglich 700 ISM.
  • MiT SanoaMiT Sanoa ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited February 2021
    BarnBurner wrote: »
    BarnBurner wrote: »
    https://forum.disruptorbeam.com/stt/discussion/15201/achievement-glitch#latest

    That was the achievement glitch that gave everyone ~200k honor. While its not exactly the same as what happened this week, its similar in several ways.

    It is similar in the not so important aspects: There were buttons that people clicked despite assuming that it was a glitch, and people got free stuff.

    But it is the contrary in the most important aspect: It did not create any imbalance between the players. Everyone who logged in within a week got the same.


    Its contrary in this important aspect:

    Disruptor beam accepted the responsibility.
    Tilting point didnt. They called people cheaters and banned them.

    The rest of it is all fixable through global gifts and inventory adjustments.

    I guess that is a question of POV.

    Perhaps inventory adjustment was what they tried in panic and then realized that it sh breaks the accounts.

    From my personal experience I am under the impression that figuring when someone got how many ISM and constellations from where exactly is time consuming for them. And I felt like they lost track on the step constellation -> polestar entirely. So if people quickly transformed all constellations into polestars TP maybe could not differ any more what was there before the pack went live, and what was not. Let alone which ones were legit and which were not.

    It might have taken weeks to sort that out (if even possible at all) where people recovered Qs to consume some of the illegit polestars.
    Wir, die Mirror Tribbles [MiT] haben freie Plätze zu vergeben. Kein Zwang und kein Stress, dafür aber Spaß, Discord und eine nette, hilfsbereite Gemeinschaft, incl. voll ausgebauter Starbase und täglich 700 ISM.
  • MiT SanoaMiT Sanoa ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited February 2021
    But it is the contrary in the most important aspect: It did not create any imbalance between the players. Everyone who logged in within a week got the same.

    It wouldn't have created imbalance anyhow. Even if I had every Polestar granted to me by a poorly coded button, I can't utilize them due to the extremely steep credit and quantum costs without having to spend ludicrous amounts of money on buying credits and dilithium to refresh quantum. So at the end of the day, even if the free constellations were unintentional and some of the whales got their hands on a ton of constellations all it would have done was given TP more income and the whales would have still been whales. There would have been virtually a net zero change. Instead, TP pulled a "Who killed Hannibal" meme on themselves when they cried "Why would the players do this?"

    And this is how I know Shan's post was insincere. She said that the bans were necessary this time and you can't compare it to any previous times because this time was so much worse or some such nonsense when in the past you had a pack that literally gave you free dilithium when you opened it. And you could open it as many times as you could until they disabled it. And nobody was disciplined and the dilithium gained wasn't even removed. There was the honor glitch that gave copious amounts of honor to people. There were no mass bans. I missed both of those windfalls. The dilithium one because I was unavailable to log in at the time and the honor one because I was worried about being banned. And there were no bans, so when the Buy Again button happened, the line of thinking is "I'm going to be left behind if I don't get in on this because everybody else will be doing it just like the other times."

    But getting a few extra constellations that you could use to gain maybe two or three total stars on two or three cards that would have made absolutely no difference in game balance was just a bridge too far, apparently.

    People have a lot of negative things to say about DB and to an extent they deserve a lot of it, but in the end they were not excessively punitive. A lot of the time when something this happened, instead of punishing those who pushed a button, we were all given free things as compensation. The term "sorryton" was coined because of how generous DB was with making sure the players remained happy. Since TP has taken over, I've seen certain aspects surrounding this game start on a gradual downhill slide. The reaction to this event was an end to this slide by an abrupt drop off of a cliff.

    Like I mentioned in a different thread: I am convinced that the problems would have started with future additions to Crew Retrieval. Our current knowledge is not sufficient to assess the situation TP was in.
    Wir, die Mirror Tribbles [MiT] haben freie Plätze zu vergeben. Kein Zwang und kein Stress, dafür aber Spaß, Discord und eine nette, hilfsbereite Gemeinschaft, incl. voll ausgebauter Starbase und täglich 700 ISM.
  • wasn't really something that TP/WRG could let stand

    Nobody said it was and overall I find your shortsighted Strawman rebuttal somewhat lacking. It really only nitpicks some semantics on my part and doesn't address any of the issues at hand.
  • "It wouldn't have created imbalance anyhow"

    1. It allows you to to have more ability to focus on a card that you want than other players who did not take advantage. This would (rightly) be perceived as unfair and wasn't really something that TP/WRG could let stand. And even the perception of unfairness is bad for games.

    2. I find the idea that "it wouldn't have created imbalance anyhow" to be seriously flawed after-the-fact rationalizing. If it didn't make a difference, you wouldn't have kept clicking away to get more.

    "All it would have done was given TP more income"

    Potentially true. In the short term, perhaps anyway. But, as I noted above, even the perception of unfairness is bad for games. But it was actually the right thing morally and probably in the business sense (long-term) to do something to correct or adjust for those who had taken advantage of the glitch. Was what they did the right response? Certainly reading the forum suggests, no, it was too punitive, and, as with unfairness, perceptions matter here as well. If it is generally perceived in the player community (not just forum respondents, I would argue) as too punitive, then it is too punitive.
    Me [AUS] wrote: »
    So wait now it's our fault for their mistake? I am glad i don't spend money anymore for 8 months already.

    Their mistake was their fault. Maybe remember though, the button the previous day worked just fine and the mistake was corrected in less than 5 min, even if the consequences of the mistake may persist forever. People taking advantage of it (knowing full well what they were doing) is their fault, at least in part. People taking advantage out of ignorance or inattention is understandable, but doesn't excuse them entirely.

    Yea i agree that we should know better on how this game is developed and how many bugs it has.
    If they wanted to revert the mistake by taking back whatever we got from that pack i see no problem with that but how you do it matters. By blaming your customers for your mistake is never a good way of doing business.
  • MiT SanoaMiT Sanoa ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited February 2021

    From my personal experience I am under the impression that figuring when someone got how many ISM and constellations from where exactly is time consuming for them. And I felt like they lost track on the step constellation -> polestar entirely. So if people quickly transformed all constellations into polestars TP maybe could not differ any more what was there before the pack went live, and what was not. Let alone which ones were legit and which were not.

    It might have taken weeks to sort that out (if even possible at all) where people recovered Qs to consume some of the illegit polestars.

    Assuming this means the developers have not respected the very basic rules of database design.

    I think from history we know that this has been the case, yes, given the incapability of the system to upscale the inventory limit.

    It is an optimistic view that this feature, which might as well have been started years ago and parked in a drawer in between, is any better.
    Wir, die Mirror Tribbles [MiT] haben freie Plätze zu vergeben. Kein Zwang und kein Stress, dafür aber Spaß, Discord und eine nette, hilfsbereite Gemeinschaft, incl. voll ausgebauter Starbase und täglich 700 ISM.
  • at least they realized they messed up

    Does coming to the right realization but for all the wrong reasons still make it right, though?

    It's a philosophical dilemma.

    Indeed, I agree! it's entirely the wrong message to send to TP:

    You messed up, blamed the players for your mistake, and didn't apologize for it. This resulted from your lack of communication and lack of quality control, TP, neither of which you have addressed nor have you shown any indication that you'll improve upon in the future. Bad TP! Here take $30 out of my wallet every month.

    talk about mixed messages!
    01000010 01101001 01110100 01100101 00100000 01101101 01111001 00100000 01110011 01101000 01101001 01101110 01111001 00100000 01101101 01100101 01110100 01100001 01101100 00100000 01100001 01110011 01110011 00100001
  • =j= Zathras=j= Zathras ✭✭✭
    edited February 2021
    Squirrel--that's a factor of ten. Good on you. Here's to hoping you stick to that goal. :)

    Cheers.
    I know myself too well, so i won t be able to not spend at all.

    BUT, i will reduce my monthly spending even further
    (already had reduced it by a huge amount even before this incident).

    There was a time i spent 400-500$ a month on this game.
    Now my new limit will be a max 50$.

  • I will probably make periodic comments in here highlighting purchases I've made instead of spending on the game.
  • Sounds like a thread I'd be checking out.
    Maybe we should start a new thread for our non STT purchases made with money we would have spent in game?
    I will probably make periodic comments in here highlighting purchases I've made instead of spending on the game.

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