Question - Buying Gold

DeaconX

Now this is of course harmful to MMO's and I know Patience came forward about having to ban a lot of accounts for trying to sell gold in game, but what about those who BUY the gold? Surely there must be a way to see who 'cheats' and supports the gold merchants... a large influx in a player's account perhaps?

Is this possible? I'm not all that familliar with it but I think they should consider this if it isn't being done.  If people know they could lose their account for buying gold, it should help put a stop to it... just like those who use bots, it IS cheating and hurts the game for players and the company.

Knightblast

Originally posted by DeaconX


Now this is of course harmful to MMO's and I know Patience came forward about having to ban a lot of accounts for trying to sell gold in game, but what about those who BUY the gold? Surely there must be a way to see who 'cheats' and supports the gold merchants... a large influx in a player's account perhaps?
Is this possible? I'm not all that familliar with it but I think they should consider this if it isn't being done.  If people know they could lose their account for buying gold, it should help put a stop to it... just like those who use bots, it IS cheating and hurts the game for players and the company.

Yes they can track that, but most companies only enforce against the suppliers of the gold unless the player has bought a tremendous amount.  You're always subject to being banned for it, and  it has happened, but it's much rarer than farmers/sellers being banned.



Why is this the case?  Because the buyers of the gold are most likely going to be happy playing and play for quite some time, generating sub income, whereas the Sellers are the ones who are "making money" off of the company's IP.

Decadentia

I think the tools are there, it just depends on how serious the company itself gets with gold farmers.



I would have to think that if you want to stop it, you have to start early, because when thinking of WoW, although they ban accounts, they don't take the extra step to sever the ties deeper. As we all know, the gold farming community is so deeply embedded in WoW, im sure the farmers have a reasonable amount of power that they could get around most of anything that Blizzard through at them.



I suppose, think of it like the anti drug administration in the U.S government, although the government has a huge amount of power, it continuously struggles with trying to compete with cartels with seemingly bottomless pockets.



Im guessing buying gold will be a viable option for those that dont mind going against the TOS nor the risk. Sadly

Sorrow

Pfft you guys are WAY off.

If you ban sellers, they run out and buy a new account or ten..

You ban buyers, they move on to another game.

Turbine doesnt care about gold sellers, it cares about generating more account sales.

Many game devs have learned there is a ton of money to be made of secondary markets and intentionally place loopholes in code to allow ease of farming, botting, in game mail spamming.

Gold selling could be stopped dead in its tracks if it didnt generate so many accounts.

Of  WoW's subscriber base, 85% of their accounts are generated in asia, nearly 90% of those are gold farmers. Are they really going to ban 2+ million accounts? Gimme a break.

 

Hoobley_deleted

Originally posted by Sorrow


Pfft you guys are WAY off.
If you ban sellers, they run out and buy a new account or ten..
You ban buyers, they move on to another game.
Turbine doesnt care about gold sellers, it cares about generating more account sales.
 

Exactly.

DeaconX

Originally posted by Sorrow


Pfft you guys are WAY off.
If you ban sellers, they run out and buy a new account or ten..
You ban buyers, they move on to another game.
Turbine doesnt care about gold sellers, it cares about generating more account sales.
Many game devs have learned there is a ton of money to be made of secondary markets and intentionally place loopholes in code to allow ease of farming, botting, in game mail spamming.
Gold selling could be stopped dead in its tracks if it didnt generate so many accounts.
Of  WoW's subscriber base, 85% of their accounts are generated in asia, nearly 90% of those are gold farmers. Are they really going to ban 2+ million accounts? Gimme a break.
 

While I can't verify your numbers to be correct or otherwise, I think you might really be onto something.

Kyleran

Originally posted by Sorrow


Pfft you guys are WAY off.
If you ban sellers, they run out and buy a new account or ten..
You ban buyers, they move on to another game.
Turbine doesnt care about gold sellers, it cares about generating more account sales.
Many game devs have learned there is a ton of money to be made of secondary markets and intentionally place loopholes in code to allow ease of farming, botting, in game mail spamming.
Gold selling could be stopped dead in its tracks if it didnt generate so many accounts.

Exactly.  Customers who buy gold tend to keep paying a sub fee, sometimes for a very long time.  And that's the real goal of the devs...keep the money flowing in.



Banning sellers means they have to keep opening new accounts and level up new characters to start farming, also extending subs.



They could easily write software routines to track the movement of money, items, but they chose not to because the gold trade generally benefits them, (WOW) unless it gets so out of hand that players actually quit over it. (L2)

.

They ban enough sellers to keep up appearances and control the flow of money somewhat, but they make no real effort to stop it.



Unlike the drug reference made previously, game companies have far more control over the points of entry and their user communities than the US govt has over its citizens.  There are countries in this world with a far smaller drug problem than ours (i.e  Sinagpore) because their gov'ts have tools at their disposal to track and punish more effectively.