square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

[lionx]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

I am going to make a few statments of fact then state a Theory, and I will alow the fourms to think for themselves.

1. On Midgardsormr server, the Gusgen Mines Gillsellers Secrer, Shadk, and Wond have been missing seince the update. It is presumed that they were banned.

2. The supply of Darksteel Ore in Jueno has dropped Dramatically.

3. Miners in Gusgen Mines comment on increesed difficulty obtaining Darksteel Ore in Gusgen mines. They say that the droprate has halved.

4. The price of Darsteel Ore and Darksteel Ignots have skyrocked seince the update.

5. These events seem to have been repeated in detail on all servers.


Theory: as much as we complained about gilsellers. They did a service: They provided a steady income of supplies for compeditive prices. They also removed Gil form the player economy, which also stalled inflation. As most players dont buy gil, the prices stay compeditive.

Between the IGE Xmas Gil sale, the holiday event which pulls normal miners out of the mines, and with the gilsellers banned. All servers suffered form a severie shortage of Darksteel. The prices then just cascaded upwards in result.

Unfortunatly short of making a huge modification to the auction house system, this cant be reversed. Even if gilsellers were to return to the mining scene, they would now sell at the inflated prices.

I have a feeling that this reicent inflation will catch SE's eye and force them to attempt to do somthing to lowere the prices back down. After all such problems like this would make it uncomftrable for new players that woudl come with the Xbox360 releace.

You are my hero. I completely agree. Gilsellers are a problem but nowhere near what people are stating the trouble they are casuing. Ultimately, people are refusing to point fingers at themselves(best scapegoat => Gilsellers, everyone will rally behind you as well), everyone including me has done some effect to the inflation. So long as you use it, you are causing part of the inflation too, not JUST gilsellers...thats ridiculous...

If SE actually banned all of them do you really think things will go back to the way they were? I seriously doubt its that simple..only certain items are overpriced, however the others usually do match up to the inflation as to how much gil is going around...otherwise how can anyone even afford it?

[Crode]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

Just a thought: maybe SE could monitor the accounts of ppl reciving mass amounts of gil in a certain time frame, compare where the gil came from, and how many times that peticular person has sent mass amounts of gil to other accounts.

[aegina]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

it would be so simple for them to monitor the transfer of gil, and use that info to find the gs accounts, that they clearly don't do it on purpose.

se leaves the gilfarmers/sellers alone because they choose to, not because they can't find them.

[WishMaster3K]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

Oh I forgot to mention this, but I remember Sage Sundi being posed a similar question.

As far as I know, GMs, per se, can't monitor the logs of whose money goes where.

Any even more so, Gilsellers funtion similarly to many Sky, HNM, Dynamis LSs operate, where one or a few characters hold the gil. The fact that the nature is similar poses a problem, because simply basing banning on the transfer of money isn't enough to ban someone.

SE is a corporation, and like any corporation, if there isn't enough evidence, they can have a class-action suit brought against them. We agree to the ToS, and SE abides by it, because they need to cross international barriers to be able to function properly.

So with that said, simply monitoring who gets what money isn't enough. . . For all we know, it's highly likely that much of this communication takes place outside of the game, making things hard to trace. Unless SE catches someone in the ACT of violating, not simply banning someone based on speculation, it makes the situation hard.

Personally, I think they should have a clause in their ToS stating "If SE feels like it, they have the right to ban you for no apparant reason other than that you smell funny, or you need to get a life."

That would make things much easier, and GMs would be banning ppl left and right.

[Aeni]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

Oh I forgot to mention this, but I remember Sage Sundi being posed a similar question.

As far as I know, GMs, per se, can't monitor the logs of whose money goes where.

Any even more so, Gilsellers funtion similarly to many Sky, HNM, Dynamis LSs operate, where one or a few characters hold the gil. The fact that the nature is similar poses a problem, because simply basing banning on the transfer of money isn't enough to ban someone.

SE is a corporation, and like any corporation, if there isn't enough evidence, they can have a class-action suit brought against them. We agree to the ToS, and SE abides by it, because they need to cross international barriers to be able to function properly.

So with that said, simply monitoring who gets what money isn't enough. . . For all we know, it's highly likely that much of this communication takes place outside of the game, making things hard to trace. Unless SE catches someone in the ACT of violating, not simply banning someone based on speculation, it makes the situation hard.

Personally, I think they should have a clause in their ToS stating "If SE feels like it, they have the right to ban you for no apparant reason other than that you smell funny, or you need to get a life."

That would make things much easier, and GMs would be banning ppl left and right.

Very incorrect and Sage Sundi, if he explicitly stated this, made a mistake or for security reasons, did not want to divulge what they can or cannot do. SE will not publicly make a statement in fact that would have everyone know in what manner that they gather their reference and information which will ultimately decide on how best the game should be run.

All transactions are kept in a dump file, which any solid enterprise class database will have. You can have a 3rd party interface or a "home-built" function which then interprets this "garbage output" and put it into a pdf or other such readable format and then have this backed-up in routine fashion along with all the other data to a system or back up format.

From here, you can see - just about everything - that is happening in a zone. A GM can tell if a player has a 3rd party speed hack simply because when an ability like flee is activated, you should see the log entry of what time this took place and figure out the duration.

12:00:01 JonnySample activates Flee ability.
12:00:01 JonnySample uses Flee ability.
12:05:35 (Jonny Sample still has Flee on ....)

This will already make a GM suspicious on what this player is doing. He observes that this player is still running around really quickly in the game and can verify with the chat log that apparently the flee ability is still active. Something that is legitimate would read:

12:44:05 Someone uses Last Resort
12:44:34 Someone's Last Resort effect goes off

Which is what it should be.

How about them transactions? You need to go to the back end for this, since a GM can't see this in real time. But when you're trying to catch gil sellers, this is the best method.

01/10/06 05:22:51 [DELETE] $GILSELLER_GIL_VALUE(150,000,000)
01/10/06 05:22:51 [INSERT] $GILSELLER_GIL_VALUE(130,000,000)
01/10/06 05:22:52 [DELETE] $JOHNDOE_GIL_VALUE(23,252)
01/10/06 05:22:52 [INSERT] $JOHNDOE_GIL_VALUE(20,023,252)

Something like this, from a parsed log of database transactions on the recordset level will show a programmer than 20 million gil from someone got transferred to someone else, who apparently looks dirt poor. Note the nice round numbers and the increment this money was sent.

There are ways to track EVERY SINGLE TRANSACTION. Why do you think that everytime the Feds raid a shady financial institution, the first thing they go for are the logs and transaction records?

[WishMaster3K]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

I'm sorry if that's what was implied from my post or what you took, but I didnt mean to say that there was no way of tracking transactions. All I argued was that the transactions of gilsellers are no different, in essence, than what goes on in Dynamis/HNM/Sky LSs.

It is VERY possible for this all to be traced: Look at gil transferred, then find out, to maybe within 2 or 3 degrees of seperation, whether or not the transferees have any sort of contact with each other.

I can get 10mil from someone I've never seen in LS, never was in the same area at the same time with, and never held a convo with, nor do i know them through a friend, being that i possibly needed a loan, and THAT'S suspicious.

It's very possible to trace things, it's very hard to get concrete evidence.

That's what I believe Sage Sundi was saying.

[Aeni]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

I'm sorry if that's what was implied from my post or what you took, but I didnt mean to say that there was no way of tracking transactions. All I argued was that the transactions of gilsellers are no different, in essence, than what goes on in Dynamis/HNM/Sky LSs.

It is VERY possible for this all to be traced: Look at gil transferred, then find out, to maybe within 2 or 3 degrees of seperation, whether or not the transferees have any sort of contact with each other.

I can get 10mil from someone I've never seen in LS, never was in the same area at the same time with, and never held a convo with, nor do i know them through a friend, being that i possibly needed a loan, and THAT'S suspicious.

It's very possible to trace things, it's very hard to get concrete evidence.

That's what I believe Sage Sundi was saying.

Yet, I believe those 2,000 accounts or whatever it was (Maybe it was only 500) that they deleted at the beginning of 2004 in response to RMT complaints were also deleted on circumstantial evidence. Yet, they went ahead and did it.

Alas, those 500 accounts are laughable. Considering just how many accounts an RMT company may have on just ONE server ... even deleting 1,000 accounts may not do much.

[aegina]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

i'm sure if there's an account sending money by the millions to random accounts, with no connection between them you can start to figure it out.

an ls storage mule? come on someone on that account will have a pearl, and will be trading mostly with people from/to your own ls. you wouldn't be sending money to random people not on your ls, friend list, etc, without recieving anything in return.

hnm ls's and their storage mules would behave much, much differently than a gilseller storage ls >.>

[WishMaster3K]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

It is VERY possible for this all to be traced: Look at gil transferred, then find out, to maybe within 2 or 3 degrees of seperation, whether or not the transferees have any sort of contact with each other.

It's very possible to trace things, it's very hard to get concrete evidence.

Yes, I know, I know, I've even said it. But the problems are a little harder than we mention. People I knew who used to buy gil (there was an entire LS of them, only a couple were ppl I personally knew) made note of the different "vendors" I suppose you can call them, and between the entire LS, they came across 40 or so different accounts that trade money.

Here's what I found out, to a degree: . . .the orders come across the internet almost instantaneously, that much is granted, and there is a main account that passes money to another account . . .that passes money to another account. . . that passes money to another account and so forth. Not sure how many people this goes through, but it is a business model, so it can't be more than 3, if not for expedience.

Also, keep in mind that people sell their accounts, and not everyone has uber gear, meaning that you may get some mediocre player who quit and wanted some change to go drinking. A lot of ppl who allegedly quit have been seen running around, but not talking to anyone.

Now in hindsight, my statement is flawed because you can look at logs of randomly exchanged money and still trace that back, but this act of boomeranging gil across the server makes things complicated. . .

At any given time there are at least 1600 ppl on my server (the average is more in the 2000 range, with peak being 3000ish, I believe) making tracking an ordeal if you have multiple transactions happening simultaneously. . .

The government has ways of tracking real life issues, but similar manners are outside the power of SE. It's nothing for the gov't to spend a few thousand taking down a CEO that was stealing millions from the nation, it's not the same for a game company like SE to employ similar manners to catch one gilseller at a time.

I dislike gilsellers because they are at a point in the pyramid that is easy to extrapolate. Regular players won't change their ways unless something drastic occurs (Dusk trousers were 6 mil in OCtober, still on the AH logs btw, and my friend I mentioned in this same thread, I believe, sold them for 12 mil and they sold in 2 mins *I rechecked what he sold them for yesterday*).

If we remove gilsellers from the environment, we'll cause the entire ecosystem to change: Less money circling means that people won't be able to pay retarded prices forever, and things will gradually drop once it becomes impossible to simply sign online and buy another 2-10 million to get some overpriced Scorpion Harness.

One thing SE can do is make multiple dummy accounts, go to IGE, buy gil with each character, see who sends what then sue the fuck out of them. Seeing who was at the end of the chain will allow them to gradually, one by one, trace who the money is coming from.

Of course, if they notice that a character they sent a gil order through get's banned, they'd catch on. . .I think this is a bad idea, because once you light a fire on one end, those on the other end will run, so in turn, SE may be losing more money by doing this, but at least it's better than nothing

I wouldn't mind seeing some HL GS being banned, meaning that there is more work that needs to be done to get to sky and steal the mobs like Zippy, Faust and Ulli -.-

I don't think there are any reasonable solutions other than simply letting things take their course, and making a new game that is designed from the ground up to be prepared for character price jacking and gilsellers trying to manipulate the market for their own means.

[aegina]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

i think se lets the gil sellers run the way they do, IS because to stop them would cause more harm than good.

se can do things to slow down or minimize the damage they cause, but they really can't fix this one all the way without breaking it further.

[Ninnin]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

I agree with aegina.... SE isn't doing a thing, because they simply don't want to lose their money. They already put "Gaming experience changes everyday" on our login screen, so they can basically do nothing, and just say "The community is player based, if there is a problem, fix it yourself, we can't control the gaming experience of each individual".

However, I don't quite think "Punishing" normal player is a way to "stop" RMTs. Putting a cap in gil trading between players will only hinder the normal players more than RMT, they can still split the gil up into 20 acct, each sending the buyer 1mil, assuming he bought 20mil. They definately have more than 20 acct... can always use the on sale account as well; or if they only have 1 acct, they can always pay the buyer 1m by 1m each time til they reach the amount bought.

[Anaki]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

One thing SE can do is make multiple dummy accounts, go to IGE, buy gil with each character, see who sends what then sue the fuck out of them. Seeing who was at the end of the chain will allow them to gradually, one by one, trace who the money is coming from.

that can very well work but dont dmmy account buy ban. instead many dummy accounts. many buying. and then a nice long list. and own fowl swoop. also monitoring of em i bet the accunts taht send the gil have 0 gil on em and just receive then send as a way to prevent the this person sent gil and thus they are the gil seller /delete

[bikkebakke]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

that can very well work but dont dmmy account buy ban. instead many dummy accounts. many buying. and then a nice long list. and own fowl swoop. also monitoring of em i bet the accunts taht send the gil have 0 gil on em and just receive then send as a way to prevent the this person sent gil and thus they are the gil seller /delete

what?!

[Balfree]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

what?!

Quoted for emphasis, what the hell did you just say?

[aegina]

Re: square enix and their infamous gilseller problem

that can very well work but dont dmmy account buy ban. instead many dummy accounts. many buying. and then a nice long list. and own fowl swoop. also monitoring of em i bet the accunts taht send the gil have 0 gil on em and just receive then send as a way to prevent the this person sent gil and thus they are the gil seller /delete

was that english? can anyone speak this guy's native language, and please translate it for me?