Comments on Bannable Offenses: Okay Already

... The thing with the IP addresses is it doesn...

2009-12-21T16:56:43.511-08:00

... The thing with the IP addresses is it doesn't ban you for multiple IP addresses in the same area.

If you've been playing from Japan, Canada, Europe and Australia, all in the SAME DAY...

Sure as hell they're gonna ban ya.

2009-08-25T05:31:10.847-07:00

This comment has been removed by the author.

Except what's not really fair is how people ge...

2009-08-25T05:31:09.997-07:00

Except what's not really fair is how people get banned for sending money from their mules to their main character, and then banning them without even trying to confirm that the player is RMT or not.

Now, this didn't happen to me, and I actually don't even know anyone that this happened to, but I really do believe that people should be allowed to defend their position if they were ever suspected of breaking the rules.

Which reminds me, why is no one banned for using the third-party Windower?

everybody lies. (except SE) everybody is retarded...

2009-08-21T14:40:37.969-07:00

everybody lies. (except SE)

everybody is retarded and deserves what they get. (except SE)

if anything, anywhere ever goes wrong, it can only be the fault of the player - because SE is never wrong. and if you hear any claims to the contrary, they are lies. because everybody lies.

except SE.

Thusly, you prove your retardism.

2009-08-16T17:27:17.551-07:00

Thusly, you prove your retardism.

Yeah, I don't support totalitarianism.

2009-08-16T10:13:16.873-07:00

Yeah, I don't support totalitarianism.

Yea... I guess it is a good thing you don't pl...

2009-08-16T09:48:16.406-07:00

Yea... I guess it is a good thing you don't play FFXI... You'd probably get fed to a dragon within your first week. :/

I don't know what a 'NM' Is, but it so...

2009-08-16T04:56:31.040-07:00

I don't know what a 'NM' Is, but it sounds like some kind of boss monster. I don't think its right to ban anyone for camping a boss, or any other thing. Bans should only be for hacking, and death threats and so on, nothing else.

FFXI, not FFIV. And no, you could possibly be ban...

2009-08-15T23:31:36.366-07:00

FFXI, not FFIV.

And no, you could possibly be banned for camping an NM day in, day out, over and over, keeping anyone else from having it. Going for a day of camping a mob is one thing. But if you are the only one to kill a certain NM for a week, then chances are, you deserve a banning.

I have never played FFIV, but from your post I gat...

2009-08-15T11:39:01.392-07:00

I have never played FFIV, but from your post I gather you can be banned for killing the same monster more than a few times? Fuck that, I will never play FFIV now.

I am also operating under the assumption that the ...

2009-08-14T16:37:35.537-07:00

I am also operating under the assumption that the customer is at fault in my statements. In the instance of a hamburger, per my previous example, that we did not make correctly, then that's our fault. Fine. We fix the problem with a smile, refund the money or give a free dessert. Something.

But if you order the Gimondo Burger then come and yell at me because it's not the Teensy Burger, then YOU are at fault for YOUR mistaken order. And while I will still fix the problem, I will not care if you don't return.

@PimpMidget Actually I have several years of resta...

2009-08-14T16:28:11.131-07:00

@PimpMidget Actually I have several years of restaurant management experience. Several company awards for customer service and a lot of regular customers who come in because they like how I treat them.

If someone is rude to one of my employees, I handle the situation myself. I do what I can to satisfy the customer and to add value. Because from my own PERSONAL ethical standpoint, I see it as the right thing to do.

But still, just because it's my job and my ethics tell me that I'm doing the right thing, still doesn't mean that I care. At the end of the day, if you're rude to me or to my employees and don't come back, I don't care. There's always a shmuck to replace you.

Dyamalos when you call SE up about a double charge...

2009-08-14T15:40:47.714-07:00

Dyamalos when you call SE up about a double charge they will insist that all the charges were legit and that you must have opened another account for 1 day that month and then canceled it or some similar bullshit.

You basically have the choice of disputing the extra charge and loosing your account or paying up the ransom to keep your character.

Nice little scam they have there.

Thanks Andrew - way up there ^ I guess my beef was...

2009-08-14T15:11:32.949-07:00

Thanks Andrew - way up there ^ I guess my beef was with POL CS ^^;

@Chris - you would make a terrible manager. Of course the average guy at a counter doesn't care about the customer himself but the managers do. In fast food restaurants you have comment forms that can be sent to HQ to rat out the joint. If they get many bad complaints they will get a nice telling off.
Recent event in fast food was a manager of burger king telling a woman to GTFO because her baby had no shoes on ( 6 months old ). She made a comment on it on facebook, people reacted, Burger King apologises publicly, including the manager who at the time was totally appauled by it and was going to call the police PWNED. Most places want to avoid that thing happening in the first place, which is why they have customer service questionnaires.

As for the lady I spoke to on my first call, she's most likely getting into some kind of trouble as she told me the GM's were at fault and she doesn't know why they did it, that it was some random thing. The GM I spoke to was highly pissed about this and asked for her name so he could lay down some smackdown and file a report on her for blaming them.

Bad customer service has a huge negative impact on a business and on the representitive if they mess up too bad.

As for the bannings, if the person is banned and not coming back they had to of done something. I said my little story of why i was banned but once you are perma banned they do an investigation on it. If they find concrete evidence it stays, if not ( as in my case ) they deactivate your account and reactivate it for you so you can start playing again.
I was just peeved at the way they went about it.

You know why people complain about being banned? B...

2009-08-14T12:57:30.125-07:00

You know why people complain about being banned? Because it's the internet! Most of the complaints get to SE through the internet, and occasionally, the phone, but that's just about as bad. Think about it.

The internet allows us to be assholes anonymously. If you went to the home of one of these whiners, knocked on the door, and said "We are banning your account because of suspicious activity", the stupid twelve year old would probably piss himself. On the off chance it ISN'T a twelve year old, the "adult" would probably mumble and say a few choice words, but that's about it. He'd be scared shitless.

But that's just my opinion. Most people are spineless unless they are on the internet, then they are the biggest assholes you can imagine. Why? Because my fist can't fit through my ethernet cable.

http://www.playonline.com/pcd/topics/ff11us/detail...

2009-08-14T09:24:46.442-07:00

http://www.playonline.com/pcd/topics/ff11us/detail/4008/detail.htm

Page not found GG

http://www.playonline.com/pcd/topics/ff11us/detail...

2009-08-14T07:20:49.644-07:00

http://www.playonline.com/pcd/topics/ff11us/detail/4008/detail.html

Ummm... If there's no RMT-PWNER software, then what's this?

As much as I enjoy the bannings, I can't help but think on this.

If you want to talk about SE being unfair, lets lo...

2009-08-14T01:33:52.637-07:00

If you want to talk about SE being unfair, lets look at the widower.

Before the game gave it's own mode of being windowed, you had to use a hack to do other things while playing. Most people who played on PC used it. Now sure, you would get banned (usually temp) if you were retarded and mentioned you were using it in game.

First rule of fight club.

But for the most part, it was a 'don't ask, don't tell' rule.

Hell, I'm sure you could go to the widower forums right now and see more than 75% of the accounts that have information for server, characters, jobs, crafts, etc.

As long as it didn't upset the balance or break the game, they didn't seem to care.

Fast forward to a few months ago, I remember hearing about a user run survey about FFXI, one question was if you used widower.

Big shocker: Most people prefer the hack over the official. And while yes, some do like the little tools that give you information overlays (Most of which the game gives you, but you have to dig though menus to get), most use it because it runs better than the official one.

I know the original guy that created the widower was hired to help them make it, but he was still under some restrictions on how to do it. Where as the hack gives you pseudo full screen and lets the game use more graphical resources than SE's windowed mode.

They still turn a blind eye to it.

I've not heard of anyone getting banned for widower.

Sure, they kind of have to if they find out because of the third party thing, but they don't hunt them down.

And as far as the charge backs go, before you do a charge back, why not call up SE and explain the problem?

Think about it, they can look it up, say, 'Oh, we're sorry, we'll supply a refund as soon as possible' and no one looks like a dick.

If you issue a charge back, they just get the information about the charge back, not about the doubble charge, so they think you are going to screw them out of money. If you were in their position, what would you be doing?

Here is the thing that people never seem to realiz...

2009-08-13T22:33:05.269-07:00

Here is the thing that people never seem to realize, whether it's in chain retail, fast food, or online gaming...

No one cares if you leave. That's right. No one gives a damn about you. Customer Service is something that is lip-service only. The CSR you speak to is matching your account circumstances to a list of things on a script. If your issue deviates from the script, then guess what? They really don't care. now, some might, of course. It's bad to paint with a broad brush, but by and large, they don't care. The company doesn't care. They have your money. They'll try to help you, sure, because they're paying that CSR whether they're actually helping you or not, so they might as well try. But that's all it is.

Whining and complaining about how this or that is bad customer service really won't do much unless it happens in a volume so overwhelming that the company's profitability is affected. And you, yes, you there, the whiner, do not have that kind of power. Odds are that you will never achieve enough of a following to cause any lasting damage to the company you're fighting.

Let's use the fast food example:
If I serve you a bad hamburger and you bitch at me, you might get a replacement hamburger, sure. But do I really care if you don't come back? No. I don't. In fact, I wouldn't care if you walked out into the street and died, because you were bitch to me. And neither do my McMasters, because there is always some other shmuck waiting to come aboard.

It's time people read their EULA's and stopped thinking that somehow THEY are a special case.

IP = Internet Provider not Internet Protocol Ad...

2009-08-13T22:13:13.194-07:00

IP = Internet Provider

not
Internet Protocol Address

@ Andrew Seriously, lol to you good sir. Using m...

2009-08-13T22:08:04.112-07:00

@ Andrew

Seriously, lol to you good sir. Using multiple IPs is just a brilliant idea when playing a MMO. No..doesn't cause a red flag at all to SE. Did you ever think that maybe....just frickin maybe..that the gil sellers use PROXY SERVERS SO THEY CAN'T BE TRACKED AS EASY??!!! Again, bravo to you sir and using a proxy server to play FFXI. (don't do the whole, its my ISP's fault. sorry doesn't work with me)

You're a bloody idiot. I already believe one of the previous commenters mentioned how the game was meant to be playable from Dial-up, which assigns a new IP every time you dial up. And many DSL providers change your IP from time to time, for various reasons.

But, in general, while I'm glad SE's policing the game, the service and the manner they go about things is out right ridiculous. Yes, it's clearly stated that they don't have to provide a reason for banning, and that they can essential do whatever they like with your character, whenever and for whatever reason. But just because they can doesn't mean they should. Such clauses are included in ToS contracts for a reason, but abusing them hardly seems any different then abusing the game.

I mean that in the since of non-gamebreaking exploiting. Things such as using multiple mules (But not for purposes such as RMT), but that still gives you a benefit. You can do it, but that doesn't mean you should. If Playonline wants to treat they're customers in that manner, its their own business. But if I were to be banned without being given a good reason, I certainly wouldn't be so gung-ho about giving them any more of my money.

Why, I think I'd go play WoW... I hear you can alt+tab in that game...

@Atomic: If I'm reading this law correctly, th...

2009-08-13T20:55:04.489-07:00

@Atomic: If I'm reading this law correctly, the only information they will be entitled to under that Act is their personal information. Anything behind the scenes, S-E is perfectly within their rights to keep confidential because that is not related to their personal information at all. So in essence, this person paid the lodgement fee and they will get, if they push hard enough... Their personal information.

We don't own our characters. We don't own the servers. We pay to access the game and that access can be revoked, without question or hesitation, for whatever reason S-E deems fit. It's a standard caveat across all MMO's and one that, if I recall correctly, has stood up in Court.

They don't have to tell you why they banned you because they don't promise that. You could be banned for having too many vowels in your name, for example, and you'd never know.

This is a misunderstanding of the term IP. He was...

2009-08-13T20:46:58.430-07:00

This is a misunderstanding of the term IP.

He wasnt banned for using differant IP addresses. As he would have said IP addy. The ban was for using multiple

I-nternet
P-roviders

Comcast/AOL/Ect

Regarding my multiple IP addresses, I do not use t...

2009-08-13T18:02:03.230-07:00

Regarding my multiple IP addresses, I do not use technology to achieve this, I travel quite a bit around the world and play. I specifically asked SE staff years ago and weeks ago if this was allowed and they indicated that multiple IP addresses in this manner was acceptable and not a banning issue. However this is from customer server, and they were clear that they did not understand the STF techniques. Alot of this is speculation between myself and customer service, since the STF does not actually put helpful comments on the account that has been banned, for the reasons stated by others.

Duting the recent wave of bannings a player in the...

2009-08-13T16:19:41.361-07:00

Duting the recent wave of bannings a player in the UK was told by SE that it's policy not to provide specifics on why players have been banned.

That person then submitted a Subject Access Request to SE asking for all logs and specifics about his banning. SE said they were refusing.

Square Enix is in for an ugly wake up call once the 40 day deadline passes and they start racking up fines under the Data Protection Act.