Patch 5.3 interview with Ghostcrawler
Mystery of the Unborn Val'kyr
The latest patch 5.3 news
All of the latest Mists of Pandaria news[1.Local]: The theory, debate, controversy and scandal edition
by Lisa Poisso 
May 3rd 2009 at 12:00PM
The [1.Local] PuG was in rare form this week, postulating theories and pontificating on issues ranging from the Martin Fury scandal to whether or not Ulduar difficulty and loot is on target. We highlight not one but two in-depth posts on the lore behind the Horde/Alliance relationship, each with extensive reader reaction.
This edition of [1.Local] also spotlights fresh reaction from Karatechop, the player at the epicenter of the Martin Fury brouhaha. What does he think about all the hullabaloo over his banning in the wake of his use of a GM-only item that came into the hands of a guildmate? Karatechop responds to the pages of comments on our exclusive interview with him about the incident. All this and more, after the break.
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Loot rationality We begin this week with a couple of posts focusing on endgame raiding. First up for debate: Should loot tables for 10-man raids remain superior to loot tables for the 25-man versions? "You are missing the most obvious compromise between both positions," writes Nikkodemus. "That is to say, make 10-man raiding provide a limited selection of BiS (Best in Slot) gear. This would let 10-man-only casuals get something that is BiS and give 25-man raiders an incentive to do both. Alternatively, bring in some kind of hard mode based on casual questing. For example, I was a casual in vanilla WoW, and frankly, the quests for Tier 0.5 to upgrade the blue dungeon set into dungeon set 2 were pretty tough. Why abandon that line of thought?" "I am a 10-man raider, because my guild simply does not have the people for 25-man content," adds Robert. "I would be fine with having two separate but equal progressions, with 10-mans one tier lower -- but that's not how it is working out. I think it is highly unfair that while I am raiding Ulduar, I cannot buy Ulduar gear with my badges, only Naxx25 gear. That makes no sense to me. "I still think that if they awarded the same loot but 25-mans provided MORE loot (above the increase granted by having more people), then people would still do 25-mans because they would have a better shot at more gear." "... I don't know why you're so focused on the actual item levels," interjects AShadowPriest . "You're complaining about your badge upgrades being six item levels lower than the gear that drops in the instance you're progressing in. Would you rather you find that the boss you just killed after a week of wipes dropped sidegrade or even inferior quality gear to the gear you just purchased with badges? I wouldn't. Boss loot is supposed to be superior, to reward the raid for progressing. If anything, it's the 25-man raiders who get boned with the badge loot this time around, as it's all sidegrades from normal-mode 25-man boss drops. "Besides, if your guild is progression-oriented, you should be getting Conquest badges from the 10-man hard modes anyway. It's only a matter of time before you get Ulduar on farm and eventually the hard modes as well. Enjoy rolling around in 25-man badge gear in your 10-man guild. "What was the problem here again?" |
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Is Ulduar too easy? Next up on the raiding debate menu: What do players think of Ulduar tuning? Too hard and in need of more nerfs and tuning – or too easy? "... I honestly don't think Blizzard can make the content any harder on normal mode," says Julie. "Because if they do, they are risking resetting things to how they were before (ie. only top guilds will see the content). The way things are right now, I can almost guarantee you a big chunk (maybe 20-50%) of the people who cleared Naxx will not clear Ulduar. "I actually think the encounters are a little too hard for casual players. That's not QQ, that's just an observation. If you're not in a set group with the right composition, then basically you are having to adjust the fight every time you do it because the people/classes are different. That is much harder to coordinate than having the same group that always runs together. So any fight that requires precise coordination, is already going to be harder on the casual player. And that's what 'normal' mode should be, i.e. casual." "My guild is in the same category as Julia's," adds ChiperSoft, "casual players, some better skilled then others. Our GM picked the best players in the guild for the Ulduar-10 group, and they just this past weekend finally got to the antechamber. We've had to re-prioritize gear distribution in the Naxx-25 run to make sure our best players are well equipped. "Memzer says that 'most' guilds are working on Yogg-Saron. On my realm (Khaz Modan-US), no one has even SEEN Yogg-Saron. There is only one guild that has defeated all the Keepers on 25-man and only a handful that have accomplished it on 10-man. And these are guilds much more hardcore then we are, guilds that regularly kill Sarth 3D. "The difficulty is right where it needs to be. Let it be." |
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The state of the Horde and the Alliance Another topic to hit the chopping block of debate this week was lore – in the first instance, the state of the Horde/Alliance relationship. "It's about time we had somebody like Varian," claims Narakku. "It's one thing to work together toward some common goal, but let's not forget that the Horde has savaged not only Azeroth but Draenor as well. I say it's fine to put off the cleansing, but payment is going to have to come some day. The Forsaken and Orcs at least have to be put down. They are a danger, and the Alliance should not forgive what they have both done. "I think Garrosh only proves what the Horde is, and the Forsaken want nothing better to wipe all living off the face of Azeroth. We might not be pure as driven snow, but neither did we try to commit genocide -- and we, frankly, were here first. It was the Horde who started this fight, not the Alliance. If Varian goes up against the Horde, then he will have my mace and shield. "P.S. That whiny sympathizer Jaina has her day coming. She messed up a perfectly good chance to retake Lordaeron. I doubt she even considers herself Alliance anymore." "Narakku, your honesty is refreshing and appreciated," replies dpoyesac. "To my fellow Horde: this is exactly why I'm thinking Thrall has to go ... and we loyal Horde ought to install Garosh as top dog. "Thrall and Jaina and their bleeding-heart commitment to 'peace' are commendable, but how can there ever be 'peace' with people like Narakku? How can we justify putting the future of the young orclings and Troll-pups at risk in the pursuit of a shiny tantalizing pipe-dream when warmongers like Narakku won't be satisfied until they've spilt rivers of blood? We Horde have to defend our way of life! And if the only way to do it is to raze Stormwind AGAIN, then that's what the Horde will do! "(I'm really hoping the next expansion is full-on, complete Horde/Allaince WAR across a new, phased version of Azeroth.)" |
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Varian Wrynn is right The debate about Varian Wrynn continued on this post. Kylenne jumps right in: "@ Alc: Good kings don't escalate a conflict with a crucial ally at the doorstep of a mutual foe, particularly when said foe has the ability to raise your dead as cannon fodder to then be used against you. Good kings are not ruled by their emotions. They calm the hell down and wait for all the facts to come in on a given situation before flying off half-cocked on some vigilante mission like this is an episode of the A-Team. Good kings think before they act, something that would probably give Varian an aneurysm. "Varian was so blinded by his CAPS LOCK OF RAGE that he apparently missed the fact that half the corpses on the ground at the Wrathgate were wearing Horde colors, and that while he lost Fordragon, we lost the son of one of our most cherished leaders. Obviously something was amiss, there, and if Captain Emo was remotely paying attention to what was going on -- or, hell, listening to Jaina and probably Alexstrasza, too -- he would have seen that. Hell, if Varian was at all smart, he'd have been fighting Varimathras in the Undercity alongside those 'green skins' instead of showing up a day late and a dollar short and jumping to conclusions, his favorite past-time. "This guy is going to get half the Alliance killed and the other half doing the Thriller dance in front of Icecrown if he keeps this up, mark my words. If I still played Alliance, I would not be trying to prop him up; I'd be looking for any way possible to get rid of him and set up Jaina as Regent Lord or something." Gannar despairs over the entire post: "No, damn you, Daniel! Your entire argument has made me lose the will to play Horde; I can't play a faction that is proven to be bad! I liked the 'blood and honor' ideals, but I always thought that, in the end, the Alliance was as good/bad as the Horde (and that Varian was a jerk). "Now I can't pick up my Horde chars (and I find all the Alliance races' models hideous -_-). I would've preferred to remain an ignorant T.T." |
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The Martin Fury scandal: Karatechop replies And finally, we bring you a reply to our exclusive interview on the Martin Fury scandal from the player at its epicenter, Karatechop himself. "First off, I would like to apologize if any of this is incoherent," he writes. "I've been writing it for about 30 minutes now and my head is spinning. "What do you want to know? Where is anything I have said inconsistent? I never claimed it was sent to Leroy as any kind of thank you, rather we thought it was sent to him as a 'We are sorry for your account issues we ignored for four months.' Leroy admitted that he thought it was a mistake, to which I responded how the hell could someone make that kind of mistake? Then we justified it due to the limited charges on the item and Blizzard's neglect of Leroy's account for over four months. "Granted, in hindsight, any of these justifications were apparently extremely naïve, according to a lot of people here. And to the comments of the 14 times we used it, I would've used it 100 times as those were the number of charges the item had. IF a GM had contacted me at anytime in the game or even via email and said 'WTF are you doin'?', I would've promptly cooperated with them, as I am still willing to do so. But I didn't honestly think it was something that was so far from believable, I never thought to open a ticket and obviously didn't think about being banned. I seriously justified this as customer service. "In the aftermath of all this, I even tried to call Blizzard on Tuesday of this week, to offer my help with the investigation so that my guildies who weren't involved in this 'scandal' would stop being punished as well by Blizzard's blanket ban. But you can't speak to anyone except for Billing at Blizzard, and so I spoke to several people in Billing for a long time. Very nice people, too, I might add. But they couldn't help me. "So I had to wait for email responses from people with names like Absinia, Tokimanthu and Sycronis who were not so nice or understanding. They have snippets of conversations from private and party chat, but this reflects at best half the conversations we were having at the time, as most of my guild's communication was done on Vent. And if you read those snippets, it does seem pretty dastardly. But the rationale on Vent was always Blizzard sent this item to him. Period. They sent it to him. "And as for punishment for me, I think a perma-ban is a bit over the top. I've been told by Blizzard that 'This account will not be reactivated under any circumstances. We hope this has cleared up any concerns you may have had and expect no further communication on this matter.' So I guess that's that. But I wouldn't have skipped a beat if all of my achievements and gear even the ones I came by legitimately were stripped and I logged in as a naked Gnome (no one wants to see a naked Gnome, mind you). Because it was an awesome story. And I did love this game. "We never meant to upset people, anyone, by personal gain of loot or achievements. That's never how TMF rolled. It was simply a ridiculous amount of fun. That's all. "I cheated. I know this. The item said 'Cheater.' I justified it, to be sure, and it was an easy thing to find justification for. "But I did learn some things: "1. If something is too good to be true and you use that something to its fullest potential, then you might get perma-banned for it. "2. If you are given power by those who have the ability to give you power and you share that power with your guildmates, then you might get people in your guild banned who had nothing to do with any of it. (Granted, I think most of them have been reinstated now.) "3. Don't trust anything that shows up in the mailbox. I'm going to very skeptical about my cable bill this month. Surely Comcast is going to trick me with something. "I didn't hack anything. We stumbled upon it, and to be sure, it was as if Blizzard had given us the 'Sword of a Thousand Truths.' And sure at times during the eight days, EIGHT DAYS, it was in my possession, I was uncomfortable. But I never thought I needed to hide anything from Blizzard. I wore the shirt as I logged out, which is why this story broke at all, because people would be able to find out what it was on the Armory by the item ID. Never thinking once that there was a reason to hide it, I just left it on. "I was not forthcoming with my guild, because we had picked up a lot of newer people and we were already having a bunch of 'I just joined yesterday and I'm wearing greens. Why am I not invited to raids?' The only people I asked to keep it from were guildies who I hadn't gotten to know yet. "And we did do some things that apparently no one else in the world had done. Well, that was a mistake. We never cleared anything; we were just having fun. We never meant to steal glory from anyone else. So, if you take a moment there to see that, the truth as it is, it is pretty plain. Fourteen uses in EIGHT DAYS. Surely we were out to destroy game content and enjoyment for everyone and get the most we could out of this blessing/burden as soon as we got it. Fourteen uses in eight days. Or maybe in eight days of time, we had a little bit of fun on a couple of occasions beyond the tons of fun we would have had on any other week. "I have also been accused of hacking the game to get my professions to insane levels. This is not true, either. I have no idea why one of my secondary skills was 900. The most I know about computers is some basic -- I'm talking the stone age of HTML. Otherwise, this shiny new computer I bought four weeks ago with an awesome video card so that I could play WoW maxed out for the first time ever (oh, the irony) is little more than an internet box. Well, now that's what it is. But these comments look amazing on this 64-bit box with 6G ram. /cry. "I'll answer any question anyone has, just make it a recent comment and don't nest it in a reply, because some of those comments are just to painful to read again. I loved this game and I will miss it, but more so, I will miss the friendships I had built over the last four years and the people I respected who helped me learn to be a better player. "I'm sorry if anyone is truly upset by this, but I feel I'm getting more then my share of ridicule over things that only about 23 other people could even possibly comment on or truly understand. I hope that you people who have insinuated that I'm somehow comparable to a bank robber, a murderer or child molester, never have to struggle with a problem like this. It's easy to say what you might have done without ever having been in this situation. I don't think you are thinking this through; instead, it seems like a lot of reactionary responses. Because that's all any of you can do, is react to what happened to us (receiving Martin Fury), and what we then did with the result of what happened to us (using Martin Fury)." |
Until next week!
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Cheats, Features, Raiding, Interviews, [1.Local]
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 13)
furrius May 3rd 2009 1:08PM
This is ridiculous. I understand Blizz rents us this game and everything, and has an iron chokehold on its content, but this is damn near dictatorial in how they are handling their own mistake.
When WoWinsider covered the DK Booty Bay boat glitch, I made the lives of nearly 20 Horde miserable before being contacted by a GM and being told to stop, and that it was a bannable offense. So, I stopped.
Why was this same consideration not shown to Karatechop? Is a dead boss with loot pixels that can be removed at a later time REALLY more serious of an offense than the wasted time of 20 actual players? This boggles the mind.
Blizzard could have easily said in a tell to K, "stop that, until we remove the item, you'll face a permaban." And then gone ahead and removed their ill gotten achievements, their ill gotten loot, and said no more on the matter. Instead, they banned a loyal customer and proved to me that their time > ours.
This is like taking your little brother to an R-rated movie against your parents wishes, and having your parents find out...and then grounding your own brother for a mistake YOU made but refuse to own up to. Maybe that's a weak comparison, but I believe I've made my point.
Hmmm May 3rd 2009 12:49PM
Personally I'm very disappointed in blizzard for planned futrure nerfs to ulduar. We finally get some content worth playing and everyone has to QQ about it being a challenge? Get real people the encounters will get easier by the week as you gear up from the bosses you are downing. There is no point in having content that everyone can clear a month after it's released. You were spoiled with naxx, enjoy the fact that ulduar is quite a bit more pressing and stop QQ'n about it being to hard...wahhh! I also strongly believe that some content should be reserved for the top end guilds, once again not ever joe schmoe from Idaho should be able to blow through the content. The talented players need to be rewarded as well not just all the noobs who are geared from naxx but still don't have a clue.
Tylenoljones May 3rd 2009 1:18PM
Typical Blizzard bs imo. How many damn players does this game have again? 7 or 8 million? Youd think a company that had that many people all over the world. WOuld at LEAST have a 24 hour phone line. This is just one of a HUGE amount horrible customer service problems this company has.
What happened to KC is crap. Their typical response of "Its your fault. Not ours" Its his fault an item like that even existed in the game anymore. It's his fault saftey measure were never put in place for that item. It's his guildmates fault that it took Blizzard FOUR DAMN MONTHS to fix an account.
What KC did was wrong but not game breaking by any means. Everything he did could easily have been fixed. After all if I had gotten it, I probly just would owned all of Ogrimmar for a couple hours.
I know Im ranting and everything I ve just said doesnt matter. In the end, Blizzard wont have to change its treatment of its clients. Not as long as we all keep paying them.
Jyotai May 3rd 2009 1:20PM
As a casual I agree with some of the above.
Back in early Kara I could get guildies and even repeat PUG members to come back for week after week after week of wiping on the exact same boss - we counted percentages of health left, and noted improvements, and finally downed it. All on a casual schedule, raiding once or twice a week, if that.
Now, on a single night, first time seeing a boss, if it isn't downed after three wipes or less, I have some people looking to jump ship. For PUG mates, they'll usually jump out after the second wipe, even though it means they're locked out for another week.
Half the the time the ones jumping are the worst skilled players, but half the time they're skilled players - but in both cases they're players with a lack of patience to work for and learn content.
Making raids accessible to casuals is good, but something in it has also really hurt the patience of people.
The hard part of building raid roster today is patience. People ding 80 and expect to go into a raid and succeed right away or get carried by others - despite not yet knowing what they themselves are doing.
Gear locked people out in Classic and BC, patience locks them out now.
Borderguard May 3rd 2009 1:41PM
how are raids even fun if you know you are going to complete them basically without fail? I never really made it past T5 in BC, but knowing that we probably wont finish it and that it was up to us to make it as far as possible was what made it fun. With the reward being that we got new content if we completed it.
Now its just like riding on a conveyor belt with a tour guide showing you the sights.... not fun
Matt May 3rd 2009 2:20PM
All I gotta say is... if an item says "Cheater" in the description, its not something you should start using. Cause Blizz don't like cheaters.
Abyddon May 3rd 2009 12:59PM
I feel for Karatechop. I would have rationalized the item as "We're sorry we took four months to provide the customer service that you expect, have this nifty toy." I probably would have tried to nuke Wintergrasp with it, or used it in a raid when things started to look pretty overwhelming.
I think Blizzard needs to investigate if they may have indeed sent this item in error. If the item was sent by Blizzard staff, it can very easily be taken as tacit approval for the items usage. If there is a chance that Blizzard sent the item, I think it only appropriate that they reinstate Karatechop with the caveat that he's on a short leash. I should think that he learned his lesson in this matter.
Hopefully everyone learns that if something seems to good to be true to petition it and get some sort of confirmation from Blizzard employees that things are proper. If not, at least you're trying to make amends before things get out of hand.
Zeplar May 3rd 2009 1:02PM
Several higher-ups at Blizzard, including Ghostcrawler (not sure if devs have any power concerning bannings), do read Wowinsider (Not sure they read Local, I didn't until this epic drama). Perhaps they will lift the ban. He had the thing for over a WEEK before they noticed. If he had kept it off the armory, he could've used it the full 100 times and f*cked up the game by killing NPC's too.
Jyotai May 3rd 2009 1:06PM
Every player who did a daily this week has learned that the daily achievement for Children's Week is bugged and can be completed in 1 day if you simply do the same dailies you've always been doing.
Are we all going to get perma-banned for it?
The people who used Martin Fury didn't get it illegitimately. It was given to them by Blizzard, and they then used it. Frankly, the people deserving discipline for that are not the gamers, but the employees of Blizzard who voluntarily gave that item to players.
Yeng May 3rd 2009 1:20PM
*laugh* It's not bugged. Blizz hotfixed it so you could complete it in one day.
Deadly. Off. Topic. May 4th 2009 10:59AM
It wasn't bugged, they forgot to correct the tool tip.
Cheshire May 3rd 2009 1:10PM
Karate, its easy and somehow empowering for people to judge and ridicule impulsively, especially after the fact. Just try and see the hundreds of messages condemning you as hundreds of people celebrating a chance to ride their high horse, and not much more. Certainly don't take it personally. I can't imagine anyone having any real injury as a result of your actions.
Honestly, if it were me, I wouldn't even have considered opening a ticket. I don't know what I would have done with it, but I wouldn't have opened a ticket. First of all, I've never opened a ticket for anything--I have a (probably unfounded) doubt that anyone reads those things at all. Second, I have a (probably unfounded) great faith that Blizzard is in control and not in the habit of making mistakes. It wouldn't have even occurred to me that some foolish employee would have the power to give me such a weapon (errr...shirt). In fact, I would have probably messaged my closest buddies and waited for peer pressure to inspire me.
Hoggersbud May 3rd 2009 1:41PM
Well, now you know that if it ever happens to you, that the proper response will be for you to open a ticket instead.
Cheshire May 3rd 2009 1:51PM
Well yes, now I do.
But millions of wow players do not read WI and are not aware of the Martin Fury Scandal. If it were to happen again (haha), these people should not be expected to know. I, being a relatively non-computer or game-savvy person, didn't even know what a developer's item was for years after I started playing--probably others don't either. There's no requirement or disclaimer on the game when you buy it that you may be banned if you don't read up on computer game development culture and process. I don't think Karate can be banned for doing something that he was never warned about, especially when he payed money for the service of game access. Generally, I assume everything the game lets me do is legal, otherwise, why would the game let me do it? Call it simplistic, but its a fair assumption to make. If a large number of people would have acted the same way without intended malice, Blizzard must either make their rules clearer or their punishments slacker.
Eversor May 3rd 2009 1:56PM
Had I received an item like this, a ticket would be the first thing I would make. I may be sitting on a high horse here, but I can grasp just what would happen, had I used the item in the game, nevertheless on freaking Ulduar bosses!
Yes, it sucks that he got permabanned, the ban should've been 24-72 hour one, but exploiting is a bannable offense. Especially on progression content.
Hoggersbud May 3rd 2009 2:06PM
From his prior postings, several people in his guild/raid did inform him that they thought it was a bad idea and inappropriate to use the item, so sorry, but the innocence excuse doesn't fly. He was told, and he should have listened, not willfully chosen to cheat.
I suppose there might be somebody so ignorant and uninformed that they wouldn't be aware of this, or the consequences of using what to me is an obvious cheat, but that doesn't apply in this case, so it's really a moot issue.
Ultimately, the lesson you should take from this is that it's not a fair assumption to make that you can do whatever you want in an MMORPG, and if you choose to remain ignorant of the terms of the TOS and the EULA as well as the principles behind them, that's your problem. Blizzard can only make so much effort to help you learn and if a large number of people would choose to act the same way, then I do not see that as excusing Karatechop. I see that as making it even more of an imperative for Blizzard to ban him, so these people realize that the consequences of such actions will be harsh. If people think they can just play around, and not have to pay a serious price for when they do something wrong, then that's a problem that requires discipline to be imposed.
It's like spoiled children whose parents let them get away with minor things, they never learn to evaluate the consequences of their actions.
Now this isn't to say that there isn't a need to consider the circumstances, but there are times where somebody does have to pay the piper. And in this case, excusing Karatechop falls flat. If anything, the circumstances put him in a more negative light...and we don't even have Blizzard's side of things.
Cheshire May 3rd 2009 2:12PM
I still can't get passed this glitch though:
How is it exploiting if I don't know it's exploiting? Sure, there are many that would know it was a developer's item or overpowered GM item (hence "Cheater"), but not everyone would. Some might even see "Cheater" as a joke, some (like me, until now) inherently trust that things one gets from Blizzard are intentionally given.
And if you are one of these people you probably don't know its wrong to use it. So of course you want to try it out on something tough enough to have a good laugh at--why not end game raids?
I don't say it was the smartest move, or one that showed the greatest spirit of game equality, but its not something he can be faulted on based on a specific clause. Even the Terms of Use's
(i) Using or exploiting errors in design, features which have not been documented, and/or "program bugs" to gain access that is otherwise not available, or to obtain a competitive advantage over other players;
doesn't clearly apply to it if you don't KNOW its an error in design. After the fact, when you are informed it was an error, then you can see how it was a mistake. Still, its wrong to ban someone (remove a paid for product) for something not clearly stated in a rule book somewhere that a fool couldn't have predicted (because, as you know, many fools play the game, and as such, rules should be designed for them as the lowest common denominator).
Cheshire May 3rd 2009 2:23PM
Hoggersbud,
If he was told by other players, it's unfortunate he didn't listen to them. It would have saved him some trouble. However, their advice does not come from authority. Blizzard has still failed to warn or notify him before removing his privileges. In fact, the last interaction he had with them was them giving him the item!
If it were me, (I am a cautious person) if I'd had any idea I could be risking my account by using it I wouldn't have. I would have listened to my buddies. But I shouldn't be legally held responsible if I don't.
Can you quote specific lines from the Terms of Use or EULA that could have fully informed Karatechop he was about to commit an infraction? If so, I'll be partially subdued. I still think, however, that because it is so obvious that Blizzard erred first, they should be apologetic and understanding to the guy.
Hoggersbud May 3rd 2009 2:25PM
>I still can't get passed this glitch though:
>How is it exploiting if I don't know it's exploiting?
Well, for one thing...he did know. Yes, he did. Stop acting as if he didn't. Even his own words indicate he was told by others that it was a cheat. If you ignore the warnings of other people, and go ahead and cheat by plowing through end-game raiding, then I'm sorry, any protestations of "I never realized officer that I was doing wrong" are going to ring hollow.
For another, I can only say if you are so naive and trusting that you think an item which automatically kills raid level bosses, then you have a problem you need to resolve, and I hope you realize that now, before something similar happens to you.
Besides, I could maybe accept somebody who did it once, and stopped. But they didn't just stop. They switched to 25-man mode.
That's the sort of thing that tells me this wasn't just somebody playing around.
This was somebody hunting for an advantage.
>I don't say it was the smartest move, or one that showed the greatest spirit of game equality, but its not something he can be faulted on based on a specific clause.
That's why the lawyers include non-specific clauses, because of people who try to defend themselves on technicalities, and the idea of "If it's not forbidden, it's allowed" .
I've run into these people before, in my pen and paper RPG games, and I see them in sports. I rarely find their protestations of innocence to be justified.
>Still, its wrong to ban someone (remove a paid for product) for something not clearly stated in a rule book somewhere that a fool couldn't have predicted (because, as you know, many fools play the game, and as such, rules should be designed for them as the lowest common denominator).
Unfortunately for you, the problem is, that requires Blizzard to be fools, and not read exactly what Karatechop and his guildmates said, what was transcribed in an earlier post by him, where he was informed that it was a cheat item, and that he argued for its use, despite others warning him about it.
Sorry, but he may be a fool, but he's not an innocent one.
If you can find me an innocent fool who is naive enough not to realize that it's a problem, I will gladly inform them otherwise, but don't act as if it was the case here.
Hoggersbud May 3rd 2009 2:40PM
>If he was told by other players, it's unfortunate he didn't listen to them. It would have saved him some trouble. However, their advice does not come from authority. Blizzard has still failed to warn or notify him before removing his privileges. In fact, the last interaction he had with them was them giving him the item!
Actually, they gave it to somebody else, who gave it to him. And if you don't listen to good advice, warning what you're going to do is wrong, then I'm sorry, but you're going to learn the consequences of your actions.
I know I've told many people before that something or other wouldn't work, that it was a bad idea. Or that they were wrong with regards to their facts. Sometimes they don't listen to me. And they live with the consequences of their actions.
In this case, it's clearly willful cheating. Sorry, but the idea that it's accidental doesn't fly. That defense isn't going to work here.
>If it were me, (I am a cautious person) if I'd had any idea I could be risking my account by using it I wouldn't have. I would have listened to my buddies. But I shouldn't be legally held responsible if I don't.
He is not facing any legal consequences for his actions. He has simply had his account terminated for cheating. That is something entirely within the discretion of Blizzard.
>Can you quote specific lines from the Terms of Use or EULA that could have fully informed Karatechop he was about to commit an infraction? If so, I'll be partially subdued.
The ToU and EULA have been repeatedly quoted and cited in the threads discussing this, the result has simply been more argumentation, so you'll pardon me for not engaging in what I'd consider to be nothing more than a waste of my time.
If you want to look them up, go ahead, but I see no reason to argue over them further on my part.
> I still think, however, that because it is so obvious that Blizzard erred first, they should be apologetic and understanding to the guy.
You would think that, but you don't know their side of the story. Perhaps if you could read the chatlogs, you'd feel different. I suggest you go look for Karatechop's prior posting where his transcribes some of it. They might put a new light on his actions, and get rid of your illusions that he somehow innocently broke the rules.
This isn't some random glitch in the code causing his damage to spike, this is a massive and obvious cheat, an exploit that was done, and done in a manner that was an attempt to get advantage out of it.