Marion of RPG Bay in regards to banning

[Rex]

Posted on Tradespot:

Dear all,

Last week was quite a tumultuous one for most of the UO sellers as the majority of the industry's biggest traders, from whom many of you used to innocently purchase gold and artifacts, had their accounts banned for possession and trade in duplicated items. The list of sellers that were banned is long and the names that I know of include Detox, Icy Raine, Leo, Luna Brokers, Malkor, MMORPG Warehouse, Nalithra, Parkay, Ultimas, UOResources, UOTreasures and Vita Drakonia. The only sellers who were unaffected were in fact those that did not choose to buy all the cheap artifacts that were being sold.

I'm sure most of the UO community will commend such a move on the part of Electronic Arts (EA). The banning and deletion of the duplicated items will go a long way to restoring the integrity of the game and accordingly our gaming enjoyment. The massive multiplication of currency and items has undermined, to an intolerable degree, the value of seeking them out for ourselves, winning them in battle or finding them in the strange and glorious parts of this fantasy world that we so love to inhabit. Duplicating items and the selling thereof undermines the very essence of gaming.

And, on that note, I would like to offer my most unreserved, wholehearted and sincere apologies to the entire UO gaming community and Electronic Arts because I was one of those sellers trading in duplicated items. In all honesty, it was a strategy adopted in line with the capitalist fundamentals of maximising profit. But it was also borne of necessity. As the proliferation of duplicated items in the market grew, it became impossible to remain competitive. In short there were too many sellers trading in duplicated gold and artifacts - a scenario that led to the price per million plummeting, squeezing profit margins to unsustainable levels if you weren't able to get your hands on the duplicated stuff.

Nonetheless, after eight years of trading I have lost all my accounts, believe me this has been a sobering experience and I have been forced to re-examine my motives. If the sellers of in-game commodities want to see our industry gain greater acceptance and credibility among the purist gamers and even the game developers themselves, we have to all have to resist and oppose such short-sighted tactics. There is a clear and justifiable demand for the sale of in-game goods and accordingly, I would like to see our 'industry' become a legitimate and sustainable means of doing business. And, so I offer my apologies not only to those in the community who have been prejudiced by my actions, but as a means of challenging all sellers to resist selling duplicated items. The legitimacy and sustainability of trading in virtual items is dependent on our integrity - we need to put the enjoyment of our customers first, not profits. Instead of trying to undercut each other by sourcing duplicated goods, we need to stand together in resisting the hacking of code. Let's meet customer's demands ethically. It can only be to our long-term advantage and those of our fellow gamers and customers.

So, to those I've prejudiced I offer my pledge not only to pursue ethical trade but to promote it too. And I'd like to ask your co-operation - be a discerning buyer and challenge your broker or re-seller to sell you items that haven't been duplicated. Competitors and colleagues - I hope you'll accept the challenge in the spirit in which it is intended. I'm feeling as devastated as you all by the daunting prospect of having to begin acquiring stock from scratch all over again. But more importantly, I share your concern that EA's informal tolerance of the sale of in-game commodities may be swinging in the direction of prohibition. Let us not give them reason to question the value of in-game trade and rather work with them to meet the needs of their gamers, our customers.

Sincerely

Marion

RPG-Bay.com

[Tracy]

Good stuff there

[wild flower]

Nice to see them see the good side of things instead of just the anger for them being punished for what they did wrong.

[Sir William]

I'm glad to see someone who still believes in honesty. But I as all ways look at the possible downfall. This honest person will obtain and sell items the right way (thru game play) but unfortanetly selfish people will continue to hack and cheat because of the basic fact that they don't care who they hurt as long as they get what they want.

Me personally, when the time comes and I have money to spend (HAHA!!) I will buy from this vendor. But to tell you the truth I don't see gold going to the $15-$20 per mil that it is worth. (For me thats how long it takes me to obtain that much)

I think UO should do what lindon does and moderate the price of the gold via a website. And ban all e-bay sellers that are trying to under cut the UO website. Although I don't believe it is in EAs interest to spend that much money on such a small portion of thier buisness.

All in all I'm glad to see a positive trend. I only hope it continues and people don't fall to thier previous mistakes. I like the point he made about how the buyers need to ban together to support the honest sellers if this were to happen it may bring about a nice revolution.....in a positive way.

*news update* it appears EA did not ban all of the dupers or did not fix the dupe completly cause I am still seeing a few vendors selling "100mil and 250mil 10 AVAILABLE ANYSHARD" on e-bay. I'm sorry but that is impossible to obtain that much gold with out dupeing. Not to mention the same vendors are also selling incraments of 5mill, 10mil, 20mil, 25mil, and 50mil also 10 available for any shard. If I do the math correctly thats 1.6billion in UO gold, so that means they played everyday since UO was created and obtained 1.4million in gold everyday!! Ummm I don't think so. These people should have been banned as well. If they did not dupe the gold the are still responsible for the fact that they knew they were buying duped gold.

OK sorry back to the subject at hand......Cool post Rex

[Tracy]

Yes, that is seemingly impossible.

I filled bods for a long time before I got my first barbed kit. Months, even.

If I spent a couple months at doom I might get an orny, or I might not.

You don't make gold from gold farming. You cover for insurance from gold farming. To make the gold you have to sell stuff...

It does seem impossible that they would be selling that much gold legitimately. But you could get close to it.

If I had no life whatsoever, I could make that much in a day from gold farming, at the rate of about 150k per hour...that would take approximately 9 and a half hours per day. Nobody has that little of a life, I don't think...

The only other way I can think of that is quicker is buying and selling.

If you have a seller that sells items cheap, you sell them for more (over a longer period of time) at luna or wherever, it's possible I suppose.

[Sir William]

I could see someone with no life doing that but considering both of these vendors are new (new as in just appeared in the past year) I don't believe it is possible......but #$@! if it is possible to do it legally how the $@#! are they doing it cause I wanna know.

But I see your point someone with no life may be able to get a mill or more a day = 365mil a year but still that is a long way from the 4.6 billion in gold they are selling....but then again it could just be false advertisement they could only have 250mil and just be hoping not to sell 4 sets of 250mil......I don't know but it does look fishy to me hence I will never buy from them.

[PrinceCaspian]

Said individual had a hand in the duped wares trade and got said hand cut off.

Not interested in anything they have to say, no matter how penitent. I don't need them in my game. They deserved what they got, no matter how much they rationalize or stand supplicant.

And there were PLENTY of duped rares brokers who didn't get clipped, EA went after the particularly greedy, 5-shrouds-stocked-in-a-day ones.

[Sir William]

I think they should have got them all not just the greedy ones

[wild flower]

I think a lot of people do the lumberjacking thing and sell the bigger pieces and then there are those that buy high end things (find them cheap) and then resell them for a good profit. Another thing that can be done too is tame the rare cu's and sell them for good money.

[kyra]

I would ask you to please keep in mind ....

Everyone makes mistakes, it seems that none of us are exempt. Some mistakes have far greater consequences than others.

The day someone acknowledges and carries the burdens of their mistakes, is the day they start turning things in a better direction.

We make a choice .... we can let someone fall under the weight of that burden ... or help them step up to a better path.

I wish Marion luck in stepping up ... the most important person you can disappoint by falling backwards again, is yourself.

[Rex]

You're far too forgiving Kyra, I personally would love to believe that people are honest and they all make mistakes and they want to make them better, unfortunately "I'm so sorry, I want to make this better, yada yada" is often a tactic used by people in order to re-gain peoples "nice feelings" toward them. Unfortunatly the nature of the beast is people as a whole are not honest, not kind, and not trustworthy. I believe Marion is no exception to that, that is clear above.

Marion blatantly violated the TOS and exploited both the game and peoples trust. Marion was a "trusted" broker and seller of items in which she claimed to have acquired legitimately. I know MANY brokers from over the years who used to be supplied by Marion. You can break the rules day in and day out and for the most part people will forgive you, however when you violate peoples trust and potentially put their accounts in jeopardy is when you don't deserve a second chance or support anymore.

I don't buy it, I give her 6 months and she will be back up to her old tricks again. It may be my military mentality but I don't have much patience for people who don't follow the rules, you and I have butt heads about this before Kyra.

[Sir William]

My question is htw do these people learn about these dupes? I mean is there a website or something that all these vendors go to and read "todays article how to dupe a tomartie". I mean come on htf is it that there are so many people on UO that dupe

[Rex]

My question is htw do these people learn about these dupes? I mean is there a website or something that all these vendors go to and read "todays article how to dupe a tomartie". I mean come on htf is it that there are so many people on UO that dupe

I'm not really sure honestly, if I had to speculate I'd guess someone pays a "real hacker" to break code for them, it's a game so I'm sorry but the code can't be THAT tough in comparison to breaking the code of a major program. Again it's only speculation, and yea I am sure their is a website somewhere that tells you how to do, I don't want to know so I won't look for it.

[Tracy]

There is a website out there, I've never looked at it but from what I understand you pay a monthly membership and hackers, lamers, cheats tell the latest scams, exploits, bugs, hacks, etc for commonly played MMOs.

I don't know the website but I don't want to either.

[Sir William]

There is a website out there, I've never looked at it but from what I understand you pay a monthly membership and hackers, lamers, cheats tell the latest scams, exploits, bugs, hacks, etc for commonly played MMOs.

I don't know the website but I don't want to either.

Wait so there is a subscription site WTF. This is @@#!#@ up. That's like opening up a college and teaching people how to become a bank robber. The site should be shut down!!

OK I'm going to stop posting on this subject cause it is just going to P!$$ me off.