Guild Wars 2: ArenaNet wields a heavy banhammer

 

No warning notice. No smack on the wrist. Do not pass Go. Do not collect anymore of our gold. Do not go straight to jail. Get the hell out of our game.

Yesterday, ArenaNet meted out some stiff penalties for exploiters, banning them from the game. Gaile Gray, ArenaNet support liason, said in the forums:

We all are part of the game economy, and those who exploit it are hurting the rest of us.

Exploit closed.
Worst offenders terminated.
That’s what has to happen to make things right for all of us.

Why all the consternation? It seems ArenaNet made a teeny, tiny mistake when it introduced a new recipe during the Guild Wars 2 Wintersday event. They introduced a jewelry recipe with a bit of a flaw. You see, the piece of jewelry was really cheap to make, and, once you made it, you could salvage it for parts that were worth more than the mats needed to create the piece. Instant profits for you! Oh, joy! A holiday gift from ArenaNet.

Not especially bright of ArenaNet, but these things happen. And you know what happened next, don’t you? Yeps, that’s right. Players discovered this little recipe and made the pieces in bulk, reaping huge profits. Some of the less brilliant ones even bragged about it on reddit.

So what if it was an obvious exploit? Well… Hoped you liked playing the game. Yeps. You’re banned.

In case you missed it, Guild Wars 2 is not a subscription-based game, so ArenaNet takes it personally when you mess with their economy. Their economy is kinda critical to the continuing success of the game.

And that’s why they might have overreacted: You fuck with a person’s livelihood and that person might overreact.

No one’s going to cry too much for the exploiters, not any of them who reaped tons of gold. ArenaNet was within their rights to ban them (The TOS of an MMO gives the MMO company the right to ban you for wearing blue on Tuesday, so you don’t really have rights.). But ArenaNet might’ve overreacted a bit. Well, they did. And the unfortunate effect is the community is a little worried.

That hammer hit pretty hard and the blow of it could be felt by everyone. Is ArenaNet’s only response to offenses a banhammer? A more measured approach would’ve been more appropriate in this case, especially since the recipe was staggeringly stupid on ArenaNet’s part. But rather than handing out suspensions and taking away ill-gotten gains, ArenaNet slammed down its banhammer.

And the player community is left wondering who will be ArenaNet’s next banhammer victim?