Template Update by G1

Hey all,


Template Update:

Well, we are about to begin the restoration process of the second round of template characters (finally)! We will begin this either tomorrow, or monday, depending on what kind of events we decide to do for this weekend.

The process itself should take between 8-15 days, depending on circumstances that pop up in between. We will be going through the massive list we have, and doling out characters based on the information you have provided.

There are a couple of caveats that are worth noting. The 9Dragons team and I met a while ago regarding the number of people that claimed multiple high level templates. There were quite a few people that did this, either on one account, or over many accounts. The consensus was that we have to limit the amount of templates we give to individuals, and in some cases edit the levels of the claims.

Of the 3000+ template characters that were claimed, at least 500 were removed entirely and a handful (>50) of levels were changed. There was no good way to do this, so it was done manually by me, using my highly developed "BS" detector. This is not something that I wanted to do, it is in my best interest to give away as many of these templates as possible...because the more we give out, the more committed the player is to their characters, and the more committed they are to purchasing things for their characters. So, just to stem the rage of "OMG G1 DIDN'T GIVE ME THE 8 LEVEL 200 CHARACTERS I CLAIMED....I MISS ACCLAIM".

I took note of some of the edits I made so that I could show you the logic that I used to make the cuts. Most game managers probably wouldn't share this with you, because it opens me up to attacks on logic from the community, but honestly, I am less concerned with secret knowledge than most. We are allowing 2 (and only 2) template characters to be given per person, and did the best we could to find the people that claimed multiple characters from multiple accounts. As with everything though, some people will have gamed the system and come up. But we'll get you sooner or later, enjoy your victory for today.

I tried to keep things balanced, as best as possible, in most cases removing the claims for the lowest level accounts, or removing one character with the same role as another that is getting restored. For instance:

• someone claimed a 145 (White Clan) Nuker, a 112 (White Clan) Nuker, and a 128 (Black Clan) Warrior. I removed the 112 nuker, as the person is already getting a higher level white clan nuker.
  
• another persona claimed 4 characters: 126, 118, 95, 95. As we are only allowing 2, I removed the 118 and one of the 95's based on their clan/role/sex.
  
• Another person claimed 8 high level characters: 200,194,192,192,185,183, 165. I called BS on this and deleted 6 of the requests entirely and lowered the level of the 2 remaining templates down to around 150/140.
  

Chances are, a lot of legitimate claims are not going to get what they wanted/expected. And that is sad and I wish I could have avoided doing it this way. Honestly the only way we could have done it differently is if we had the DB from Acclaim, and if we had that, then none of this would have been necessary at all. So I apologize if you were as honest as possible and made the list of cuts. After we complete the second round, I will open up an appeal process to me, via the forums or tickets for you to state your case if you were denied a character that was meaningful to you.


Hack site = Destroyed

A "popular" black market site was taken down today by the hosting company that provided them with the server space. Additionally, we were able to trace a few hundred accounts connected to that site...and well, I suppose it goes without saying that we BANNED THEM ALL TO HELL.

I am certain that most of those characters/accounts we traded there on that site, and other accounts were ones the owner of the site had ready for sale to nublets that buy that stuff. So, a lot of people are going to be submitting tickets about "wrongful bans". Well, Ill shed a few tears for your poor character that was illegally acquired, but thats about it. We will not tolerate reselling our accounts and characters.

Here is a candid picture of me as I heard that the site was taken down and I gave the order to ban the accounts:





Finally, we got some new doodads to track hackers. So, more and more bans will be handed out. Keep in mind we are striving to get to the "1 Strike" policy on hacking. So if you hack, you WILL get banned.

Thanks all!


Oh, and patch 128 next week. Ill share the details about it on Monday.

-Hyperion.

L_A_D_Y wrote:i got my chars too but i was away for few days so could not check in timeXD