Novaro & it's name pruning scheme favoring a certain player and how I was banned

Started by Lovely, Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Lovely

lol? she was in contact with Nova or one of the other GM's when my chars were being pruned, i've already stated that plenty of times that she was taking my char names as Nova was deleting them.

I'm sure it'll be a small slap on her wrist. but okay. bye!

Lai

I tips when handling cases like this....

Next time, if some "lover" wants a special name example Jesus that is taken....


  • Enter database
  • Check the name
  • If player is inactive...just rename it to Jesuzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
  • And tell the "lover" and she can make the Jesus char now ;)

Takes max 5 minutes ~

Special cases, needs special care ~


I doubt anyone has many "lovers", and cases like this happens rarely.

this was not worth a system to "auto prune" or hurt someone's effort to create 1500 chars with unique names.

Big kudos <3
I can't believe someone actually pulled this off, hahaha mad respect :D




Tokeiburu

Quote from: Lai on Apr 24, 2021, 01:53 PM
I tips when handling cases like this....

Next time, if some "lover" wants a special name example Jesus that is taken....


  • Enter database
  • Check the name
  • If player is inactive...just rename it to Jesuzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
  • And tell the "lover" and she can make the Jesus char now ;)

Takes max 5 minutes ~

Special cases, needs special care ~


I doubt anyone has many "lovers", and cases like this happens rarely.

this was not worth a system to "auto prune" or hurt someone's effort to create 1500 chars with unique names.

Big kudos <3
I can't believe someone actually pulled this off, hahaha mad respect :D

I'd like to clarify the autoprune system was not meant for this player at all, she was simply the one most affected by it. The previous query shown is simply the one which was used for this particular case because she was bypassing the default condition put in place by logging on every single character frequently.

Innomite

*deep breathes* I'm gonna go piecing this together so bare with me.

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
Being a long time player on this server it's not hard to get carried away and start making alt characters, especially on a server such as this one that has been online for this long, over 6 years I believe and with middle rates that provide for a suitable and enjoyable leveling experience. nothing too high or low. As I was used to low rates before coming into this server. the leveling and rates was just perfectly to get me up to speed and catch up with other players. ^^

This server used to do yearly prunes after new years maintenance, which were perfect because everyone had an equal chance of getting that specific name they wanted.

First of all, you're already trying to justify yourself by setting up a precedence that you are an old player (the rest of this argument will come after). I do agree, however, that the announcements about yearly pruns during maintenance were more public at the beginning.

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
Fast forward to the past 2 years, Nova decided to change how it was conducted and started doing ninja maintenances that only a selected handful of people (one if which will be relevant at a later point in my thread and is a bigger name hoarder than me) knew when they were going to take place, and thus diminishing the chance of everyone else getting the chance of getting unique names.

I don't know where you're getting this from. Even me, who is a very clueless player, knew BEFOREHAND about the risks of letting your characters below a certain level. It's called communication, you should've asked anyone, or a GM, if maints were going to prune character names since the precedent was already set: level 99 characters getting name pruned more often. It's totally your fault for not paying attention to these. Even if the announcement wasn't as public there wasn't really a feeling of "secrecy" between GMs and players, this sort of mentality is straight up BS that it baffles me how can you even come to such a conclusion. There was no such thing as "ninja" maints, as these are such big deals when done on the server since, you know, patch notes after every maintenance.
Of course this started with level 99, but as time passed they made the requirements harsher because people would keep hoarding tons of names like YOU with your 1500 names. Right now if I'm not wrong, the minimum level to keep a name is 180 if you don't login.

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
Time to get straight to the point; the reason of my post comes from my ban after Nova pruned my characters and banned my characters that of which I feel was strongly unwarranted for and I was given a very unfair treatment!

A few days ago I received this rather crude PM from him in-game. Notifying me that he had pruned most of my characters regardless of their level without any previous warning or consideration. (they usually prune chars under level 99 that have been inactive for sometime).

You were banned for repeated offenses. You weren't treated unfairly and most certainly you were warned or considered when your 1500 names were going to get pruned. The GMs might be clowns but they do try their best at keeping communication with players. I'm sure some of the claims you make in here are false. The fact that you still think only chars under level 99 are pruned is proof that you lack the communication skills to ask ANYONE if the requirements have been increased. I have a level 170 Ranger that got her name pruned for not logging it in for over 6 months.

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
Which shocked me because,
1. There wasn't a written rule anywhere, not on your website, or the wiki nor discord that said how many chars one could have or how many names one could get! and
2. It had never been a problem before! I had been making alts and afking with them for years without any warnings.

You literally answered yourself here. The rule wasn't written because it was never a problem before! It had to take two name hoarders to start having this problem because apparently this is such a big deal. Why do you want 1500 names anyways? Do you have identity issues? This is an honest question. It really doesn't feel right that you should take 1500 names, some of which are very suggestive (Orgasmic, Sensuality, Hypersexual [Really?]), for the whole sake of keeping them. It feels like you're taking away something other players have THE RIGHT to have.

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
At this point I was terrified and told him that I'd start to delete the rest of my pruned novices which I did and how I felt it was so unfair for him to prune my lvl 99+ chars that I've put so much effort and care in lvling. chars that I used to log in regularly too. I usually style and dress my chars according to their names.
And told him he could've approached me before and given me a warning instead of just pruning some of my characters right away! All of my lvl 99+ characters were never inactive to warrant being pruned!

Please stop using the victim card in here. You're not a victim, you're just a symptom. You're not the only one who's been hoarding names and when you got your little scheme threatened you resorted to these strategies. Again, I am pretty certain the staff had enough tolerance with you. Besides, prunes are done automatically now after each maint. Many people knew about this, how come you didn't?

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
At this point I felt deflated and slowly started to realize how the server owner doesn't care about the efforts and time of a long time and loyal player like me has put into his server. I decided the best course of action was to take a break from this server.

I love this. "I'm an old and loyal player so I deserve some sort of respect and special treatment!!! Please let me take everyone's names as a token of your gratitude for playing YOUR server."


Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
Please note: The following person also know as Enya/Rain has been envious of my character names from the day I met her!
And everyone I've spoken to tells me she's closely in contact with the admins!
Also, she somehow always knows and manages to get the most unique names after every maintenance unopposed, that is until earlier this month where I managed to get some characters for myself during a pruning maintenance that pruned all inactive chars under lvl 175. It must've really struck a nerve somewhere when she saw me leveling them in gramps earlier this month and decided to run to Nova or other GM to do something about it and thus my ousting of the server began:

She was taking my names right after they were pruned despite the fact Nova telling me he's monitoring other name hoarders, how is she in close contact with the GM being a regular player and one of the biggest name hoarders?

Have you ever considered the possibility that Enya might have just made reports about low level characters having names and not being logged on for a long time? And since you claim that she wanted those names so bad, she might have just been very patient and waiting for every maint to grab the names after they were pruned. Again, this seems to be your fault, for not levelng your characters above the minimum requirement. Before this prune thingy I asked Nova about one of the names I wanted (Clear) and he said it was used by someone who had not logged in for too long, afterwards I made a report myself. I understand your point but since I was also looking to get this name for so long, I understand Enya as well.

I don't approve of her hoarding names like you do but it just seems to me that she was waiting for every maint to grab names that you failed to take care of.

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
You tell me you took my longstanding names so others could have a chance, why is it only the same person(Enya) that's getting most of them? you're basically giving all of my names to Enya/Rain and you act like everything is fine. This is daylight robbery.
She immediately started grabbing my names like a leech after my characters got pruned and banned. It's either she working behind the scenes with Nova or he's telling her the moment my names got pruned.
gm favoritism and biased much?

I really don't think this is favoritism. I think this was just Enya paying attention to each maint so she could grab the names as I said before. It's not robbery. I don't know Enya very well but I really doubt she's out to get you out of envy or something like that. I was also paying attention to maints to grab the names I wanted for myself since those were the names I used for previous servers. I didn't read the full list of 1500 names you had but I'm sure you had some of which I wanted. And I had to pay attention to those maints to finally get the names I WANTED because PEOPLE were hoarding them as if they were some sort of currency. Do you not understand the damage you were doing to this server by hoarding almost literal thousands of names?

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
Why am I being punished and banned when all I ever did was take the time and effort to level up my chars! I earned those chars myself!
Regardless of what you say, my chars didn't warrant being pruned much less banned!
Do you have any idea how much care and effort I put into those chars? it is simply not fair! It's not fair for you to simply to take my char names away to others on a silver plate. when I had to work so hard to get them! Most of my char names went to her and her friends! Not even giving others a chance to get them. You should be ashamed of yourself Nova!

Nova is anything but biased, lmao. He's an idiot, a clown and might be short-fused sometimes but he knows what's best for the server, and right now what's best for the server is to have 1500+ freed up names. Since you claimed at the beginning of your topic that you barely got in contact with the staff, and your most important interaction with them was through an offense which was holding tons of names hostage, of course you will think he's biased because you think it's normal to have such an outrageous amount of names under your "ownership".

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
Above we see him claiming how he can't see how can anyone need playing more than 100 chars and playing dumb when I point out how he only caters and listens to a certain few individuals.
It's called having alts, friend. Especially on a server that has been up for so long with rates this high and how fast you can level up with gramps.

There's also something called common sense. Nobody is stopping you from making hundreds of alts but when you begin taking names that others might want, especially on a server this old and with such a high amount of players, you have to stop making countless alts and saving up names for yourself at some point. It's decency, it's being not selfish.

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
Do not try to dictate how I play this game! if I wanted to afk in town or at the main office with my lvl 1, 99 or maxed out char I should've been allowed to do so, without being warranted name prunes. Why are you looking down on me and want to prune my chars for afking in town with, regardless of my characters levels? let me afk in town with as many chars as I want without prunning them.
But you're okay with a single player having more than 50 autotraders on inflating your player count beyond the stars, though right?

What does afking in town with countless alts have anything to do with autotraders when they have designated spaces to do so while you're allowed to afk literally anywhere? These autotraders automatically disconnect after a week and you have to re-set them up. You're being so selfish you think YOU deserve some sort of special treatment which at this moment I haven't really seen at all from either part in this thread.

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
The next part is about me finally pointing out the person that's been taking my names. (sorry about the caps, emotions were running high :D) and his refusal to admit that she's taking my names. when it's pretty clear he's giving her my names. completely bias!
He keeps pointing out 1500 despite that I've already deleted all of the novices the previous day which made the majority of them! and how somehow her having close to 400 characters is fine, despite telling me earlier how he doesn't see how anyone would ever need more than 100 chars. can you start notice a pattern now? double standards.

Double standards is believing that you should have no punishment for doing something as nefarious as taking such an insane amount of names for yourself, thinking you're ENTITLED to them and then making a whole rant about how the staff had enough common sense so strip you out of SOME of them. You could still have a lot of them, but not that many. They had so much patience with you and didn't ban you straight up but you decided to keep on doing whatever you were doing. The staff doesn't ban you out of the blue unless you are doing something incredibly stupid like botting, scamming or cheating. Maybe you should've stopped looking at Enya, who in this situation is really no better than you, and look at yourself, question why do you think saving 1500+ names were that important to you?

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
And yet, she's still running on his server, unscathed, why? because GM's are bias and cater towards her.
You complain about how I take some names but yet, this person is the one responsible for taking almost all the unique names after every pruning maintenance and you let her be because she's either a very close friend to you or donates a lot.

Didn't Tokei say they're gonna review that case? Maybe she doesn't have as many names as you had, which is why it went unnoticed. But I can assure you, there are players everywhere waiting to grab names after each maintenance, myself included.

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
If you were completely unbias, you'd also prune her names, no matter their level & give a ban similar to just as in my case.
but knowing you. I don't see that happening. since you clearly have a blatant bias and favor certain players that go unpunished no matter what they do.

Didn't you just say you barely knew the staff? I'm pretty sure one awkward interaction with the staff where clearly you were at the wrong doesn't mean that you know them very well. You're contradicting yourself at this point, and are throwing tantrums like a kid who can't have their way with things.

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
I guess being friends with the server owner and other GM's has its perks eh? You can have innocent people you don't like being banned if you're close enough to this biased server owner.

This is such a delusional statement from players who obviously don't fully understand the special rule in the site that has been in there since the beginning of time. Basically, not having common sense is against the rules, and you broke that one, most important rule. You think you're special, you think you are above the rules and clearly you think you were treated unfairly when you were doing something wrong. You were abusing your rights to have alts and names, there's a limit to everything and you should have understood that from the very beginning.



Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 02:27 AM
I know this won't bring my accounts back but should serve as a warning for anyone out there looking to play this server to be wary for how rampant gm favoritism and bias can be on this server if you get on the wrong side of the GM's or their friends!

I still stand firm and believe my chars didn't deserve this unfair treatment you've given them. And you know it, as it can be seen from you saying sorry multiple times in those screengrabs Nova.
It's not like I was bug abusing or botting, I got all my characters the legit way, just as anyone could've gotten them. But you still decided to punish me unjustly.

Thanks for reading everyone!  /lv

You were banned temporarily, another proof that you didn't read and you thought it was perma, which is why now you play the proud player and ask for a perma ban. All I saw in here was someone who couldn't have their way with the insane hoarding they had and when they were caught, they thew a tantrum. Enya is no better than you at this, as I personally consider having more than 100 names is really dumb.
Your case is completely different from bug abusing or botting, it was outright selfishness and a sort of damage that hurts other players' originality and creativity, and I think that should be punished as well.

Anyways, thanks for showing the problems you have with yourself. I hope you get better soon. I wish you the best. Stay safe.
For the love of Ragnarok Online!

onlyplayer

Okay, I'm not here to personally attack anyone nor the server, but I wanted to leave my two cents on the case.
As reported by Lovely, it looks like another player, named Enya, uses a similar approach of the "name hoarding" (even though it may not be on the same scale of 1.5k chars gosh).
And some here mentioned she is staff (denied by Tokeiburu) or "close to staff".
So far, some questions remain not answered and some proof of actual measures are missing, i.e:

- How did a player know about the availability of the same names within less than 24h? Did he/she report and got an answer like "yo, the names are clear, you can use them mate". That doesnt look like a professional way to handle tickets, but who knows.

-If that other player is accused of hoarding names too, how many "active chars" does that player have? screenshots, proof?

-If he/she is doing the same, why is "similar punishement" being dealt with only after the case went viral?

-Is there proof that corrective measures were taken? And what happens next? After 1 week/1month, Lovely will be out of her names so, eventually Enya can take back the names again? Looks like thats the most likely scenario, a case that was "forgotten" and people move on. That doesnt look like an effective punishment but maybe I'm not the one to judge.

Again, this is not a personal attack. Regards to the staff and hopefully the case is settled

scrollLock

I've never heard of someone hoarding names (hundreds/thousands) in my 15 years of RO experience. This is something new.  /omg

Tokeiburu

As an update, I looked at the dates to verify. The OP got her names pruned roughly at 2021-04-20 12:45:00. The maintenance happened at 2021-04-22-16:14:28. The names were taken by Enya at 2021-04-22 16:16:47. While I initially assumed Enya knew about the prunes, it appears she in fact didn't and I was wrong there. So I wanted to at least clarify this part.

As for the other questions, it'll be handled in a staff meeting in the coming days. I can't tell you what will come out of it as a result until then because I do not know.

Lovely



Look at the date! 2021-04-22 21:09:22, I'm 2 hours ahead of server time, so around 19:09:22 server time, but I probably took this screenshot several minutes later after I had been banned.

She took that same name almost within 5 mins of being pruned! I was using the novaro newsig to track my names as they were being taken!! they turned into lvl 1 novices within 5mins of having my chars being pruned & banned!

which is now this:

Tokeiburu

You are confusing your dates there. You got banned for renaming all your characters back at 2021-04-22 21:09:22 or whatever date. Your character names were initially pruned at 2021-04-20 12:45:00 regardless, that is when the query was ran. You were pruned again after your temporary ban because you just did the same thing. In either case, Enya took the names after the maintenance well past your characters were initially pruned.

Lovely

They were pruned aswell, not just banned.

Doesn't change the fact that she still did it.

Tokeiburu

Quote from: Lovely on Apr 24, 2021, 08:06 PM
They were pruned aswell, not just banned.

Doesn't change the fact that she still did it.
Indeed, it doesn't change the fact that she's been hoarding names too. That is something that we will handle on our end during a staff meeting, not in a RMS drama thread. Your favoritism accusation is what I'm concerned about here and what I take seriously. (I don't give a crap about character name hoarding personally, it's childish and makes me sad this is even a thing).

Lovely

I apologize, I know you're trying to be as impartial as you can be. I was planning on deleting most novices, because I realized I was going overboard with the amount chars I had, and I was going to start deleting them as soon as I had a break from finishing leveling some of my characters during this week.

yC