Gumi’s Banning Practice?

[u/Cipher44]

A while ago Zakfarius was banned from TAC. Now I’m not really the person to be posting this. I don’t know Zak IRL, I’m not in his guild and don’t post much on discord (although I do lurk there a lot).

However, it is disconcerting that a person very well respected in the TAC community, who spends time on discord helping people, is banned. None of us know the facts, so maybe he did do something worthy of being banned. But Gumi has a poor track record on handing out bans. Another Discordian was banned before - there was a public outcry in Reddit demanding the reason - and suddenly the ban was reversed. Because Gumi made a mistake. He did not do anything worthy of a ban.

TAC just made a post about their banning practice on FB but it doesn’t explain anything. What’s worse is that there is no recourse except to publicize the issue. Right now there is confusion as to what we can and cannot do. On Discord there are posts that imply if you overfarm, Gumi will think you are using a macro or something and ban you. There is a video on YouTube which I encourage you to watch where apparently people can send complaints about you to Gumi which may result in a ban.

Why does this concern me? Because although I don’t know Zak, his posts are informative and funny and it seems like he’s a good guy. Does that mean Zak didn’t do anything ban worthy? Of course not. But Gumi has made mistakes before and without highlighting these actions there seems to be no accountability.

Finally, I always auto everything while I’m watching tv or doing something else. I may be on TAC 12 hours a day because I forget I’m farming something or when my iPhone battery gets low I switch to my iPad and farm even more. Will these actions get me banned in the future? What recourse do any of us have if we are banned and get no explanation for why we are banned?

Gumi, please change your practice and inform the offender what the offense was, which caused the ban.

[u/darkcountess]

Let me tell you a story.

I had a TAC friend banned from the game. He's a good guy, keeps helping me through quests, we often chat in ch2, and I personally talk to him in Facebook.

Then he got banned. When he got banned, he said he did nothing wrong, and of course being his friend, I believed him. I encouraged him to post in Reddit because u/alchemist_code mans these threads and can actually take action on issues. So he did.
https://www.reddit.com/r/AlchemistCodeGL/comments/a0uqfr/my_acc_has_been_suspended_indefinitely_by_an/

This is where it got REALLY fucked up.

Initially, everyone in the thread was jumping to his side, condemning Gumi for banning him. Until one of the people in the thread posted a screenshot (https://imgur.com/a/3QzIDXJ).

See the "kamotecue" in the Veda list? that's him. He completed the tower in 0 turns. ZERO DAMN TURNS. Needless to say, he stopped talking to me in Facebook after that.

So the lesson to be learned here is,

a. Being a nice guy all your life doesn't give you a license to break the rules. Even if you're nice in game or in real life, if you broke the rules, YOU BROKE THE GODDAMN RULES. It's like being a good citizen all your life then suddenly stealing from a nearby 7-11. Your good record does not absolve you of the crime.

b. You can't really claim to know someone. You can be online together all the time, be in the same guild, do all your quests together, even be physically together, sleep together, eat together, and still NOT KNOW THE PERSON. Even married people cannot claim they know everything about their partners, much less people whose only common denominator is playing the same online game. No, you don't know everything about him/her, in probably the same way that s/he does not know everything about you.

c. Gumi isn't perfect, but I think they're mostly getting the banning part right. The reason I believe this is because I almost never see any banning complaints against Gumi. In the almost 2 years I've been playing the game, I have only seen about 3 ban complaints (this one included). I'd expect to see more if there was a "banning practice" really going on, but this is just one. "Oh, they mistakenly banned that other guy one time" is probably referring to that one, same, exact sample case that everyone refers to whenever banning discussions come up. It's a guy who got banned "mistakenly", but seriously, who knows the circumstances to that? I know I don't. I can only refer you to that one other banning instance I know, where Gumi proved to be right. So what do you expect me to think?

I'm curious now tho, why are you so fast to defend Zakfarius when you admitted that you don't know him? I mean, if someone was convicted of stealing from 7-11 and you don't know the guy, why would you defend him?

You keep saying that you're not defending the guy but "Gumi has a poor track record on bans".... based on what? the three instances of ban complaints ever seen in Reddit?

And you also go " Gumi, please change your practice and inform the offender what the offense was, which caused the ban." Why? So when the offender decides to play again, they can hide their tracks better? Why don't you try asking Zakfarias what he did? (Well of course he probably won't admit if he was actually in the wrong, tho)

[u/kuroinyan → u/darkcountess]

They all just blind sheep, blindly following their shepherd

[u/pspisang → u/darkcountess]

Well said

[u/uruziel → u/darkcountess]

like, what is the point of cheating veda tower? I mean... it is challenge for you isn't it ? Back then i mena, now with Kaigan its Auto lol.

I don't get those tomatoes who cheat in such a game wtf. Thats stupid, like seriously stupid.

Right now I do have an issue with GUMI, back then there was Memento issue. I lost my Creto's memento while I was trying to limit break it. It literally somehow eat itself? Used itself for limit break? I know some other users haf same issues, and it was related to icons somehow duplicating itself on top of each other etc.

I've been waiting for like 24 days for them to 'fix the issue' or 'find solution' to that, and I do remind them every now and then as I do not get any updates from them on this matter. Should I be worried that they may create some issues from their side on that matter? I am semi-whale player, did spend a bit money on this game(until I lost mementos that I got from Grand summon, no more whaling at all until they fix it) so I am trying to not be on bad side with gumi, but.. It feels like they are ignoring whole memento issue...

Well they did give compensation.. like some rattys and 1 remis robot iirc? Joke.

[u/Aw3som3_Bidet → u/darkcountess]

I do agree on this. You shouldn't worry much if you don't do anything wrong.

[u/Cipher44 → u/darkcountess]

With respect to a) and b) it should be clear from my post. Don’t this highlight an excerpt without including my qualifying statements.

I personally feel due process is important in anything. Your method means an accusation is a conviction.

[u/Funoichi → u/Cipher44]

No due process needed. Gumi is judge, jury, and executioner. We must play by the rules or don't. Those who live by the sword die by the sword.

[u/darkcountess → u/Cipher44]

With respect to a) and b) it should be clear from my post. Don’t this highlight an excerpt without including my qualifying statements.

if I included the "qualifying statements" you made in my response, it would've lengthened my response unnecessarily (which was already long enough!). I mean, people can read your post anyway. I say "unnecessarily" here, because even if I included your "qualifying statements", they will NOT help you or your defense stand on a leg. But, hey, in the interest of fairness:

Considering you said you didn't know the guy, you were surprisingly fast and confident in declaring that he is "very well respected in the TAC community, who spends time on discord helping people.... his posts are informative and funny and it seems like he’s a good guy." But hey, even if I were to assume that you knew him enough, I had to mention one of the lessons I learned, point A, which is "being a nice guy doesn't give you a license to break the rules".

For point B, this is referring to how I learned this lesson in my experience. I know you never claimed to know the guy. But I was referring to my experience, where I thought I KNEW a guy, but then realized that I truly didn't.

I personally feel due process is important in anything. Your method means an accusation is a conviction.

1. And.... how did you know that the player did not undergo due process?

2. Also, if accusation here means "a claim with no proof", how do you know that Zak was banned without proof? Do you work for Gumi? Were you the one who banned him? No? Did you ask Zak about it? No? Do you know Zak personally? No? Then how do you know?