I did not take my account ban very well, nor would or should anyone who suddenly found themselves banned for a glitch in the game. This has been happening at an increasing rate for many players over the past month for various reasons but in most cases it seems the culprit is lag- a temporary lag spike causes packets to build up, flood in at once and the automated security system regards it as hacking. We've seen this with various skills, runes and other causes.
First you need to know a bit where I'm coming from. I started playing the game around... 2006 or 2007, I can't quite remember. It was before NLC was patched in, around version .32-.33, long before Big Bang. I remember the days of keeping the game open overnight to run a Free Market store, taking hours to gain a level when you were around level 70, 4th job at level 120, level 200 being a far off goal, having to use ships to get around because the Pantheon portal did not exist, and when squeezing out every bit of stats you could was a big deal because the best you could manage were small gains. Earning a few hundred million to buy that flashy new Bosshunter armor set for the +300 HP gain seemed essential for a bowman class.
The game has changed a lot. Leveling 1-200 is trivially easy. The plot is more important. The game encourages playing multiple characters. Auction House is far more convenient than Free Market. The focus on solo play seems to be stronger, even most "party" areas only require you form a party but you can be the only one in it. I also see far fewer players running around, in a way the game does feel like a single player adventure. Outside of towns in channel 1, I rarely see other players. It's kind of annoying when the only the players I might see in a day are botters.
I took a break for a couple years, after a point the game started to feel a bit redundant around 2015 or so. It further didn't help that I was diagnosed with a serious condition after suddenly bleeding uncontrollably in late 2016-
https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health-topics/immune-thrombocytopenia
I had to undergo two rounds of chemo as well as the steroids to treat this and even "cured" I am only in remission, it may come back and I need blood tests to keep an eye on things and to check my own body for signs daily. Stress can also set this off if I'm not careful. In a way this condition has led me to value what I do have and to want to hold onto it, but on the flipside it's caused me to develop certain defenses, in which I feel safer letting something go rather than stress over losing it if I see the fight as unwinnable. I am also more prone to colds and infections than normal due to the chemo drugs altering my immune system, in fact I just got over a 6-day severe cold, I've suffered these frequently the past 2 years.
I like this game. If I didn't I wouldn't be playing. It's escapism. It's fun. It's something where I feel I can accomplish things. If I wanted to play any random video game I have access to hundreds. I've played hundreds of them already, I've been playing since the 80s.
My account is now unbanned, the 30-day period expired. Somehow my characters seem to be back on ranks, even though ban policy says all bans are off ranks forever? I'm not sure why. Even so I still likely have a flag on the account marking it as a hacker, rendering me ineligible for certain events.
Others are still banned. They got permanent bans instead of 30 days. I'm not sure why I was so "lucky" but mine happened on Dec 9, before the massive pickup in the ban rate.
To say Nexon's customer service needs an overhaul is understating it. Ban appeals really are iffy. It's why I didn't bother to push tickets, from my own initial experience with it and from what google turned up on other such bans, automated responses are the norm. The system largely brushes us off. Even if we request a senior GM investigate and they listen, that could take weeks. Live chats seem to offer the same results from accounts of many who have used it- they're told the same thing as the ticket system. Even then it seems these "GM" responders have no ability actually lift a ban if they even wanted to or even have access to anything other than a single bit of info on why the ban was issued, rather than actual data logs. This system needs to be reworked massively, because a high ticket "solve" rate may look good on paper to someone on staff but means nothing when 98% of customers are getting stock replies.
I'm aware that actual hackers abuse the appeal system and flood it, but when those who are caught in fake bans are getting brushed off and regarded as guilty from the start then the system isn't doing its job and doesn't help those it was set up to help. The botters & meso sellers don't really care either, they make new accounts instead of appealing. I bet some normal hackers probably don't care either since they know they can make a new account and hack away, while those of us who invested many years into honest play are getting brushed off.
Even unbanned I still don't feel safe playing the game. The automated security is still randomly issuing permanent bans to players for the slightest things- skills, runes, being in a map, lag, whatever. It does me no good to play if I get permabanned within 15 minutes of logging in. I feel my account is safer not using it, and that's no better than being banned, now is it? I've monitored the subreddit, bans are still ongoing and others say they're staying out just to avoid the risk.
Nexon needs to fix a lot of things. Clearly something went funny around December, if necessary they need to revert the security to a version from before then and fix things before reactivating the new system. Yes this may mean hackers get a temporary pass, but it seems what we have now is a danger to legit players while the hackers don't really care. Botters make new accounts. we know they bypassed the rune security system quickly, the hack developers admitted that much. If Kanna and Ark are really such big deals for the hackers, disable their creation until you can implement fixes.
We're at a point where we have a unique event going on that many of us have waited a decade to see, and are forced to miss out because they were banned, or are afraid of being banned. This is ruining the game for a lot of us. If this is not fixed they'll find a lot more long-time players get fed up and walk off, customer service should not be disregarding its player base. No other MMO company seems to be doing that right now.
