After reading the rules posted as per regulations regarding the use of the forums, acceptable post guidelines etc, and having failed to reach a CM or a GM in game after attempting to via whisper/world shout as suggested, I'm hoping to get some answers here.
Let me preface this by saying, I have been playing this game for about two years. I have never, in game or via forum or world chat, decried RoM itself, Frogster, customer service, or spent any amount of time complaining about the multitude of glitches, bugs, losses of items(housekeepers, trunks, etc), random crashes, or any of the other "problems" that have been encountered by many players over this time period, myself included. I figured all of that was part of taking your lumps with a free game-that while not perfect, has certainly been enjoyable to play. What is about to follow, is not merely some rant, I genuinely want to know the reasoning behind the action that was taken. And since no CM/GM was available to do that via game, I chose to come here.
A friend and fellow guildmate of mine, who has been playing as long as I have, recently was banned for SELLING (not buying) items (gear and stats) to a player that was, according to the banning email, in possession of gold purchased through an illegal gold seller. My friends alts have also been banned. In addition, the email stated that his gear would be stripped, as some of it he bought with the gold resulting from the sale of the gear to the illegal gold using toon. Now, my question is, how is it acceptable to ban and strip someone for selling gear to a player in good faith, when they had no idea the purchaser had gotten their gold through illegal means? How is anyone supposed to know that? Short of seeing a simple repair hammer on the auction house being sold for 120mil (which I've seen more than once, and I'm sure others have seen things like that as well) how can we tell if the player buying what we're selling got the gold in a legit way? Is it our responsibility now to try to root out the gold buyers from the server? From now on, when we sell things, should we stop first and ask the purchaser, "Hey, you earned this gold right? You botted dog meat all day or sold 500k diamonds to get this right? You didn't get this gold off an illegal website, didja?". And even if we were to do such a ridiculous thing, I don't think the guy is going to actually come clean about it. How is it acceptable to punish a player who plays by the rules, who UNKNOWINGLY sold to someone who doesn't? Especially to that degree of severity. I've bought overpriced things before out of desperation, hell I've paid 600k at one point for a stack of hero pots, should I start mailing all the people I've bought things from and make sure they check out? Hope they tell the truth?
Seriously though, I want to know how to protect myself, because if this is the standard operating procedure now, I'd hate to lose my toon because of something I had no way of knowing.
I've never had beef with Frogster. I did try to contact a CM or GM through other means. I'm not trying to start a riot. I AM however, trying to get some answers, and in the process stick up for someone I've been playing with for 2 years who I know is a good, honest player. A player who has earned his gold and gear through legit means, but made an apparently unfortunate sale to someone he had no idea was a cheat. I fail to see how he did anything wrong. He sold gear to another player he didn't know the life story of or the exact details of how that other player had gotten his gold. If that's how bans are decided, better ban 99 percent of the server, because I'm pretty sure most sales don't come with interviews and background checks. With as many people leaving this game as there are, I would think you'd be wanting to hang to on to as many loyal players as you could, not throwing them to the wolves for a mistake they didn't know they were making and stripping everything they worked hard to achieve by your rules.
Anyhow, here's hoping this doesn't get me banned as well. If it does, at least I stood up for a friend for something that just isn't right. Hoping I get some answers....
