PSA - You can be banned while following all the rules.

[LiterallyName]

@Hime @Juji

Guys, 

I played Lineage 2 from 2004 to 2008. Every single ban I ever witnessed during this time period was well-deserved, and if anything, there were far too many cheaters being allowed to roam free. The people that I would see getting banned in the past, were always people who had been botting for months, many of which were running full 9-man trains and not even trying to hide the fact that they were blatantly cheating.

When you hear people on the forums claiming they were banned for no apparent reason, I get it. You're applying Occam's razor as you should in most cases. The simplest explanation here is that NC is banning these people because they cheated, and these people are simply trying to do whatever they can to get their well-deserved ban overturned.

I get it.. I get it, because this is exactly what I thought about the people crying on the forums about unjust bans before this happened to me. It simply does not seem likely that NC would ban people for no apparent reason. This would be a terrible business move. The allegation that myself and others are making does not seem likely, based on NC's history of banning players, but please just think critically for a second. Things can change, and things have changed.

NC is now permanently banning people who are not breaking rules and these people have no recourse. As of Friday evening, I'm one of these people.

I'm not sure what is motivating this. I do not know if it's deliberate, or if there is some automated system that is causing this while the GM's are simply told to enforce the locks imposed by this system rather than properly investigating them, but the more I deal with NC support, the more I suspect there is something very wrong going on in this company and that investing anything into this game is an enormous mistake.

My own story is this:

I was very exited to play L2 Classic, because as I already stated, I played from 2004-2008, the true classic period. I wanted to rekindle some of the fun I had as a teenager playing this game. I had absolutely no intention of cheating or breaking any rules, all I wanted to do was to rekindle the fun I had in my youth. I'm 31 years old now, and I don't have much time for games, in fact, I haven't played video games in a long time, but I made an exception because Lineage 2 is special to me.

I invested in 3 chronicle packs for a nuker, an elven elder and a shillien elder. Playing 3 characters is not the easiest thing in the world, but I knew from past experience, that being self-sufficient in this game is essential to being able to progress. I'm fine with groups and everything, but a lot of the time, it takes more than half of the time I have to play just to find a group. Self-sufficiency is essential for me. I did not intend to make the same mistake I made all those years ago, being completely dependent on others to progress.

I invested in a lot of NCoin, because I really wanted to take advantage of the 50% XP rune that comes with the chronicle packs. A big part of why I invested so much is because I don't have much time to play, and I wanted to get a head start while the boosts were high so I could take it easy after October.

I sat around for hours on the day the game launched, waiting through delays, so I could secure some decent names for my characters (another lesson I learned from the past is that you need to be there on launch if you want a decent name). From the 3rd up to the 12th, I was grinding up all three of these characters using only the Lineage 2 client anywhere from 2-6 hours per day.

I have a fairly simple and effective play-style which enabled me to get three characters up to level 34 by playing only a few hours a day for 10 or so days. I have a macro which casts recharge a few times after targeting my nuker, I have a macro that casts basic buffs and I have a macro that autofollows my nuker, on the SO/EO. Before level 28 when I got recharge, I would alternate between characters, using windstrike to kill mobs. When one character ran out of mp, I would switch, and in this fashion I could essentially windstrike nonstop until I got recharge at 28. These in-game macros are the only tool I've used to automate any of my gameplay. Besides these macros, everything I am doing is manual and everything is done using only the L2 client. When my nuker starts running low on mp, I alt-tab to the rechargers and press the recharge macro, and then alt-tab back to the nuker and kill mobs while the recharge macros do their work. Sometimes I'll get full before the recharge macros finish, so I'll alt-tab and quickly cancel the macro on the rechargers. When buffs run out, I alt-tab over to the SO (who I'm using to buff), and press the buff macro. Occasionally, I may alt-tab over to the EO to toss a heal on the nuker. Other than that, I'm killing stuff on the nuker. There's no reason to cheat with a setup like this. There's no reason to risk my investment when playing legit is not terribly difficult. I've been spamming bsps for most of the 34 levels I got on each of these three characters, most of which were from the L2Store, bought with NCoin.

This is simply not the modus operandi of a cheater. Anyone can see this. Anyone who watched me play and knew anything about botting could see that I was not cheating. The movements of my rechargers were sloppy and erratic. I was using a combination of regular and blessed spiritshots, MANUALLY, on my nuker. Timing is always different, etc... And then there's the question of why? Why would someone in my situation use a third-party program specifically on the elven oracle, when all they needed to do to avoid risking an account lock (provided NC is just with their locks) is use the simple macros I made? All my EO was doing was autofollowing my nuker, using a recharge macro, and occasionally tossing a heal (I would heal with the EO since c.speed is better). There is simply no reason to resort to third-party software here. The L2 client gave me everything I needed and that is all I used. The idea that I'm cheating simply does not add up, when you factor in how I was playing and how much I was playing. Again, this is not the modus operandi of a cheater.

Nonetheless, on Friday night, my elven oracle (and ONLY the elven oracle) was disconnected after a ~2 hour grind in EG, and when I tried to log back in, I was told that the account was locked due to suspicious activity.

"That's annoying" I thought, but I figured this was just some kind of a mistake. I was still optimistic, albeit annoyed, at this point. I figured that maybe there was some issue with my CC, or perhaps I had been reported by salty people who lost the competition for a grinding spot, and fixing this was simply a matter of contacting NC so they could correct whatever mistake occurred. My main concern was expediting this process, and hopefully getting some compensation for lost time, because I didn't think for a second that I would be permanently banned when I'd done nothing wrong. I seriously thought this was just a simple mistake, and was annoyed that I would have to wait a few days for it to be corrected. If only...

Not only did I not cheat on this account, there's nothing I did on this account that I did not do on my other accounts, so I was pretty sure this would get sorted out and my account would be unlocked after a week or so in the worst-case scenario. It simply makes no sense that THIS account would be permanently banned when I had followed all the rules, and if I broke some rule, then it MUST have been broken on ALL my accounts, not just the elven oracle. Nothing here makes sense.

I've had two responses so far from GM's, both of which have told me that my account is permanently banned for using third-party software, that there is absolutely no error with this judgement and that the decision will not be overturned.

GM Therun Yesterday at 10:21

Hello,

Account Name: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX 
Offense: Use of 3rd Party Program
Penalty: Account Closure

We have reviewed and found the above action as well as the associated penalty to be consistent with our policies. We ask that you review our terms and rules of conduct, which are available here: http://us.ncsoft.com/en/legal/user-agreements/. This action against the account will not be removed and the penalty will stand.

Regards,

GM Therun
NCSOFT Support Team

and then again:

GM Platina Yesterday at 13:47

Hello,

The incident has been thoroughly investigated and we have found no errors or inconsistencies made on the review of your account. Furthermore, we cannot disclose any specific information regarding the verification of the said violation. The penalty for the account will not be revoked and will stand permanently.

Thank you for understanding.

Regards,

GM Platina
NCSOFT Support Team

The problem here, is that I have no idea what they are talking about. What third-party programs? I honestly don't know. I don't even have a decent guess. 

It's possible I have some program running they don't like, but I have no idea what that program is and they refuse to tell me anything more than the automated line about third-party software. It's possible this is also a result of being reported. I'm not sure though, because they won't tell me anything other than their automated "third-party software" crap.

 

Let's just suppose I was willing to overlook this completely unjustified account ban and continue playing and investing more money into this game.

I currently have two active accounts I can still play, my nuker and my SO, one with around 8k VIP points and the other with 6k. These accounts even have 800 active NCoin that I bought on the day my EO was banned. But the thing is, my EO was just banned for an unknown reason and since I have no idea what that reason is, it seems awfully likely that the same reason will be used to ban my remaining accounts, should I be foolish enough to invest anything else into these accounts.

Every program that was running while my EO was ingame, was also running while my other two characters were ingame and is probably still running right now.

What assurance do I have that my other accounts will not be banned for some unknown reason?

Absolutely NONE.

How can I avoid what happened to my EO?

I have absolutely NO IDEA.

NC refuses to tell me what third-party software led to this lock, and I have absolutely no idea what they're talking about. How can I avoid using "third-party software" if I have no friggen idea what software they're talking about? This is beyond a joke. This is beyond insane. It's simply WRONG.

How on Earth could anyone play under these conditions?

What assurance does any player have they will not be banned for an unknown reason?

ABSOLUTELY NONE.

You need to trust that NC will not screw you, but I ask you, why should you trust them when they can ban you for allegedly cheating, and refuse to tell you what program you cheated with? Mind you, their anti-cheat software is extremely intrusive and should provide them with this information. Not only this, but why not at least provide a list of banned software so that players could avoid situations like these, unless of course, this is a desired outcome?

This is like sending someone to prison for "breaking the law", and not bothering to tell them what law they broke, or provide any evidence that they broke it in the first place. Ridiculous!

I trusted this company based on my past experience with them, but it seems they're taking that reputation to the bank and using it to extract as many resources from people as possible before simply kicking them from the game to allow more suckers onto their servers which have limited capacity.

One interesting aspect of this, is that my 3 characters had JUST gotten to the point where I no longer needed to buy bsps from the store. I was finally able to turn a decent profit while buying bsps and regular sps from players, and then BAM, BANNED. How strange. This is bordering on conspiracy theory territory though, so I'll leave this point alone going forward.

I'll finish with this:

I am truly, truly disappointed in NC. Never in my wildest dreams, did I think I could be banned while following all of their rules, until it happened to me. Due to the fact that I have no idea why my EO was banned, there's no way I can justify continuing to play or invest anything into this game.

The only logical option for me is to withdraw future financial support for this game, and to warn everyone I can by sharing my story. As far as I'm concerned, NC has stolen hundreds of dollars from me and this fact needs to be reported far and wide to prevent NC from being able to steal from other players as well.

I am not threatening chargebacks or anything like that, I'll quit with whatever dignity I have remaining, and I am even willing to continue playing and to continue maintaining VIP4 status on all three of my accounts if this issue can be resolved (largely because I was playing with an old friend who I would like to continue playing with), but at this point, I've lost hope and have accepted that this is most likely the end of my classic experience.

I've come to the forums in one last-ditch attempt to get this overturned. My last hope is that @Juji or @Hime can investigate what happened and correct the mistake that was made.

Juji or Hime, if you can fix this, please do, and I'll sing your praises from the rooftop, but sadly, I'm not holding my breath. It seems almost certain that this is the end.

How utterly disappointing.

[ogre]

its because of your name. Literally.

[beleaua]

is there a tl;dr version f it? only read the very first part and it seems you missed actually not once but two times in the history of l2 when they accidentally banned thousands, bans which were recognized as accident, restored later but only if you contacted support.

[LiterallyName]

3 minutes ago, beleaua said:

is there a tl;dr version f it? only read the very first part and it seems you missed actually not once but two times in the history of l2 when they accidentally banned thousands, bans which were recognized as accident, restored later but only if you contacted support.

I can only speak for the bans I witnessed, which were always just when I played.

Had I known they had unjustly banned thousands, I likely would not have invested so much into this game, although you say they were restored? I don't feel so hopeful in my case based on the two GM responses I've gotten.

Also, before Friday, like a fool, I would be reluctant to believe those people were unjustly banned, because it just doesn't make sense that NC would do that. I know better now.

tldr is the title of the post. If you're interested in more details, it's all there.

[BodybuilderIRL]

I'm pretty worried about my accounts now tbh. I have quite a few and I play the same way. I invested a lot into NC Coins and use in-game macros to exp with only the l2 client. If my friend who I've gamed with for 15 years can get hit for being legit it is quite demoralizing to continue playing a game that has staff who supports such behavior. In my 15 years of gaming I've never witnessed an actual legit player being mistakenly banned. This is a definite first for me.

IIRC NCSoft got a brand new anti-cheat system. I hope this brand new anti-cheat system didn't come with a few flaws that ban users who have free anti virus software running or something else in the background.



 

[SumTingWong]

Man, that is a whole lot of words from a guy named LiterallyHitler about how he got banned for third party programs.

But of course, you wouldn't actually do something so nefarious, LiterallyHitler. 

[LiterallyName]

1 minute ago, SumTingWong said:

Man, that is a whole lot of words from a guy named LiterallyHitler about how he got banned for third party programs.

But of course, you wouldn't actually do something so nefarious, LiterallyHitler. 

Well I've seen you going hard against the other people like me, who claim they've been banned for no reason.

Your response to my post is much nicer.

Are you starting to suspect something is up? Or am I misreading your intentions and you're actually still a skeptic. 

Honestly man. I just want to play the game. That's it. I don't want to cheat. I would quit if it became apparent that botting was required to compete, rather than bot. I just want to rekindle the fun I had as a teenager and I've invested a lot to make that happen.

I have no idea what they are referring to when they said "3rd-party programs". No friggen clue. I would happily provide a demonstration of how I play if I was permitted to do so... Anyone who watched me would see that I wasn't botting based on how erraticly my rechargers behave.

Anyway... this is really messed up and this is my last chance to play classic before I say goodbye. Hopefully Hime or Juji can do something.

[Miles]

AFAIK the anticheat checks processes and possibly the contents of your harddrive. If there's anything "suspicious" it might get triggered. Open a powershell and type Get-Process to see if there's anything running you don't know about.

[beleaua]

4 minutes ago, Miles said:

AFAIK the anticheat checks processes and possibly the contents of your harddrive. If there's anything "suspicious" it might get triggered. Open a powershell and type Get-Process to see if there's anything running you don't know about.

while this anticheat software might scan for that, it is not legal, at least not in my country and many more.

[Devoid]

1 minute ago, beleaua said:

while this anticheat software might scan for that, it is not legal, at least not in my country and many more.

Scanning is most likely legal, transmission/storage of the results is what will be illegal. Also, in that case the CS definitely cannot tell you the cause, since XIGNCODE decided on your computer and only sent the 'flag' that 3rd party software was detected.

[Miles]

Whatever rules you have in your country, they are a US company and you have accepted their TOS.

[Devoid]

3 minutes ago, Miles said:

Whatever rules you have in your country, they are a US company and you have accepted their TOS.

GDPR applies globally and cannot be opted out, unless you explicitly refuse to provide service to any EU/EEA nationals and residents.

[beleaua]

6 minutes ago, Devoid said:

Scanning is most likely legal, transmission/storage of the results is what will be illegal. Also, in that case the CS definitely cannot tell you the cause, since XIGNCODE decided on your computer and only sent the 'flag' that 3rd party software was detected.

well, i'm not really know what laws are over there in u.s. but if you go through an airport they seems to have the right to search through your laptop, hard drives, copy data, even confiscate. this is illegal here, or at least some european countries.

[Miles]

GDPR applies to europeans only. but i'm not a lawyer, i explicitly said "possibly" and "might"

[Aniol]

The macros you used were those from the game? Is it with a mouse or keyboard? If it's the latter, that's why you got banned

 

 

Change this idiotic nickname 

 

 

[Cruniac]

11 minutes ago, Devoid said:

GDPR applies globally and cannot be opted out, unless you explicitly refuse to provide service to any EU/EEA nationals and residents.

While I;m in favor of GDPR, I don't think it holds true when you agree to NCwest's user agreement each time you enter the game. I mean, did anyone ever really took the time to read it?