... wait...

I don't understand how banning 30-40% of the current player base would be good for the game; remember it wasn't just any one alliance or any one corp, there were many people that did this. Zoom only posted a few of the corp names of the biggest winners, but they would have to ban EVERYONE that did this if they banned anyone.

Please stop calling for bans, not that the devs would do it, it just looks like you don't care about the survival of the game.

Here's something I don't understand in all of this. Either people have severe reading comprehension problems, or they're willfully ignoring a crucial part of this situation.

Many players have specifically said that the Devs were not only aware of the problem, but told the players who reported it that it was an acceptable action. If you have Devs condoning an action, how can it be considered an exploit?

Because its not true. It was an open secret since beta - and DEVs said to not spread the info and keep usage to a minimum.

Ohh, self righteous hero who has grudges from the past. Since I've never bothered with Neocron, who/which clan you was on MO? Wonder if you'll have the balls to answer, since in MO 0 clans of any significance had clean hands. Starting with Myrms dupped cronite back in beta, to Prophepcy dupes, CIRs pocket HCs, continuing to Bizzies gold and ghost boulders, to AQ/Reign duppes to TOP molvas. Yes, my own is in that list as well. Hopefully I will not have to break ELUA signed with SV back in the days to point a finger at you.

I'm sorry I couldn't read through all of this, I'd just like to react to one serious misinformation that's floating around here, namely that we sanctioned insurance frauds.

Since all my information is based on what I know versus what you are stating here, I'm kinda stumbling in the dark.

First off, I don't know which one of us DEVs said that "yes, please go ahead and exploit the insurance system and ruin the economy", but please provide any log or at least something because if this is true I'd like to have a serious "WTF WERE YOU THINKING!?"-talk with him.

Secondly - and this is more likely - some players probably asked DEVs or GMs whether insurance was considered an exploit. And they probably said no because at that time we were not aware of the extent of the money that one could make with frauds.

In my eyes, telling "yes you can use insurance for what it was meant for" is nowhere the same as "yes you can use insurance and exploit it to make billions".

Again, at that time we were not aware of the size of this problem. And if players came to us being well aware that they can make that amounts of money with it, asking only "Oh hi DEV, is insurance an exploit? - Umm, no, why would it be? - Ooh nuffin', just askin', carry on... *blows up 50 robots*"... then well, that would be disappointing.

Also, we never said it wasn't our fault too, that's one of the reasons we didn't start banning. But I'd like to kindly ask those running around screaming "It was the DEVs fault!!" - what do you expect from us? That we give back the fraud money and pat your backs with "We're sorry, carry on destroying the game."...?

*sigh* in private, obviously.

Haha Saha.

Ok, thanks Dev. So in light of their assessment of responsibility shared, and the corrections they have meted out ... perhaps the baying mob can move on to wail about something else?

I think a 30-day time code may be in order -- awarded to all members of the corps named in your blog post for their troubles and the libel issues presented in your selective generalized representation of the perpetrators.

Thanks.

Eh. Regardless everyone would blame M2S; server bad guys and all

I empathize as well with the need to quell the tin foil brigade. However, you've set a dangerous precedent for future issues by now trying to make excuses for yourself for your mistake and unprofessionalism.

TBH, you should have continued to not acknowledge those accusations as it's not really your place as developers to do so... especially when so unfounded.

Off to the rumor mill to start the tinfoil hats about the Dev's involvment on norhoop and dom.

In order to release a full list, they would also have to release the exact criteria they used to determine if someone was Frauding.

For instance, when we were at HHO, one of our players bought a mech off the market insured it and started to drive it to HHO... where he promptly got pwned by the NPC swarm off HHS and died.

This would certainly look like fraud, since he had no modules other than a lwf, and the bot died shortly after purchase.... but if you look at the cost vs. payout I'm sure he lost NIC since he didn't get any discount on either the bot or the insurance.

Edit: So there wasn't any false allegations for border line offenders on the 'full list'

Well, after my statement yesterday, about Mancs, after a long convo, agreeing that I was correct and that the NIC i had was legitimately earned, turned around today and arbitrarily removed it again, after a 2 hour convo trying to show that even though I had not personally earned NIC or advantage thru this, because of my association to the corp and the activity, i was guilty.

Of course, he proceeded to remove that NIC again.  Trolls, have your fun, I know the "Umads?" are coming...

People, all of us, the entire customer base, need to be concerned how these issues are dealt with and resolved.  When an individual can arbitrarily set a criteria, unpublished, and state that a paying customer violates that criteria, THEN ALL OF US ARE AT RISK!

Anyone of us, ANYONE, can have this applied to them.  There needs to be clear definition of what are exploits, communicated in a visible way, and transparent review and resolution process, that assures fair and equitable resolution of issues.

We pay RL money to be here, and at the same time we are the ones that provide the content to make it interesting, that draws more people to this game, and we need to know that issues will be handled objectively, in good faith, and fairly.

WE ARE ALL AT RISK IN THE FUTURE TO THIS BEHAVIOR, EVERYONE OF US, AND WE NEED AS PAYING CUSTOMERS TO KNOW THAT WE WILL BE TREATED EQUITABLY AND IN GOOD FAITH.