Since its release last August, Guild Wars 2, as with most massively multiplayer online games, has seen issues with the buying and selling of gold through gold “farmers” or “bots.” What’s more is that some legitimate players are experiencing wrongful bans on their accounts, being told that they have been buying and/or selling gold.
Upon logging into Guild Wars 2, it is common for players to find spam mail from bots, attempting to sell them gold. Participating in this practice, whether it is botting, buying or selling gold, or using third-party programs that give the player an advantage over others is prohibited.
The Guild Wars 2 Rules of Conduct can be seen below:
“You may not buy, sell, transfer or auction (or host or facilitate the ability to allow others to buy, sell, transfer or auction) , or offer to transfer, sell or auction, or buy or accept any offer to transfer, sell or auction, any game Account or game Content, including (without limitation) game characters, character attributes, items, objects, currency, credits or copyrighted material, or any other intellectual property owned or controlled by ArenaNet, Inc., NCsoft, the Service, or our licensors, nor may you encourage or induce any other player to participate in such prohibited transaction(s), except as may be specifically authorized by the Service and by ArenaNet or NCsoft, without first obtaining our express written permission.”
This is per usual for MMOs.
Some players, however, have found that their accounts have been banned simply for sending other players (friends, spouses, guildmates, etc.) gold through the game’s in-game mail system (the only system for trading items between players), forcing some users to wait upwards of several days to see their accounts restored. Others that have been waiting at least three days have been directed to a 62 page forum thread and told to post their customer support ticket number with a description so that their status may be updated.
The trouble with so many players claiming to have been wrongfully banned from playing the game is that some of these claims are false. Many of them are simply attempts by “RMT (real money trading) workers who are trying whatever means they can to get back onto their accounts or even lie and try to steal new accounts by claiming them through a support ticket,” said ArenaNet Support Liaison Gaile Gray.
“Many cheaters and RMT workers [that] are filing bogus appeals that, sadly, need to be weeded through and responded to before the agents can get to your legitimate request for help,” Gray said.
Other ways of appealing a violation include going to the Guild Wars 2 support page, clicking “How do I contact the Guild Wars 2 Account Admin Team to appeal a violation?” and following the appropriate steps.
It’s a shame that a game that had such lofty goals to change the MMO genre has been riddled with one of the most common and biggest problems that plague the genre. What’s more is that, as it appears, legitimate players have been banned from their accounts with no word from ArenaNet as to when their account will be restored.