I don't know about contract, but, IMO, it certainly would be very bad customer service to have told him it did do something and then a short time later changing it. And Estarra has proved that she really cares about customer service.

That would depend on how he phrased it, I guess. If he asked "Would that help with forcefield", then it's more of a "right now" question. If he phrased it "Will it always help with forcefield", then you might have a point (although not being a lawyer myself, I'm not sure how well it'd go if it went to court).

I'd be very disappointed in Lusternia if they did change it. Regardless what the actual wording was, there's very good indication that the artie was purchased for that purpose.

Also, my guess that even a "right now" question would suffice for the creation of the contract, even if there is such a legal concept (I think there would be).

I definitely agree with you on that. Odds are that if they actually change it, it'd hit them back, PR-wise, meaning less players recommending, some players likely leaving in a huff, fewer credits bought etc.

I would not be disappointed if they changed it, because it's absolutely obscene that it does what it does. It's even outside of DMP.

However, I would be disappointed if they did not give him back the artifacts he traded in for it, plus the remaining credits.

(And, at that point, there is no way for 'legal recourse' either; he's lost nothing).

I am also disappointed that they just took the 'easy road' and just re-enabled it, knowing that it's absurdly overpowered.

I'd like to also point out that the announcement that listed the change was posted on April 1, 2010.

Edit: Xenthos beat me to it, so I'm moving this to a new post

I'd also like to point out that Ceren stopped playing for about 2 months after that until it was changed back, and even other Admins didn't know it had been changed back during some discussions.

They should've just given the artifacts / credits back to begin with, and never dealed with it again. Easy enough, and Estarra has demonstrated the willingness to "cut the Gordian knot" in the past for the sake of the game.

Basic economic theory would disagree with you. Trades only occur between items that are not equally valued. The fact that the trade occurred would indicate that Ceren valued the artie more than the credits he used to purchase it. So he would be losing something. If they were valued the same, Ceren wouldn't have the artie in the first place.

But I will agree with you that I would be much happier if he was reimbursed.

Yeah, that would fix the 'bad customer service' impression if the thing was changed right after he'd been told it had a certain effect.

Well, keep in mind that it was not fixed "right after". In fact, it wasn't touched for months and months until he went out of his way to abuse it.

As to Sahmiam; he paid that much for it, he gets it back, he's exactly where he started. He's lost no time, he's lost no effort, he's lost no work. In fact, he's gained all the benefit from having it for all that time, so he still comes out ahead. He made a trade for what he was willing to pay, it turned out that the thing was broken and needs to be redacted, so he is returned to the situation where he was. Financially there is no loss.

Now, if you're talking about the feeling of loss, sure; but there is no tangible damage at all.

That would depend if he was reimbursed actual US currency or credits, but I will say one thing: touche! (If he bought credits for the item, he should be reimbursed actual money in compensation for the credits.)

I'm a bit annoyed they changed it back, too. 25% outside of DMP is just... wow.

As for the arguments about him asking beforehand etc, consider the fact that we are constantly getting our skills rebalanced. For example, someone may contact the admins to confirm that a skill does what it does, spend many lessons/credits to learn that particular skill and then a few months down the line it gets nerfed. That's just a part of the process to balance the game.

Oh, it wasn't right after? Well, that changes things, IMO. I mean, if it was within, say, 30 days, then it = bad customer service. Much more than that though and you kinda get beyond that, IMO. I mean, it'd be like me trying to demand that Amazon give me the difference in price for my Kindle because, a year after I got it, they went down in price. When I first got it, they dropped the price two weeks later and I called and got the difference. And that was good customer service. Me expecting them to do the same now would just be me being ridiculous.

Of course they should fully reimburse him if they change it. And of course they should change it. If game balance is blatantly held hostage because someone paid a lot of money for something, it makes me not trust the admin with the health of the game, and makes me not want to play. It's the same way I have no problem with WoW selling cosmetic perks, but the day they sell actual gear people will leave in droves. IRE is pay for perk, and that's fine, but there's an understanding that the game is balanced around those perks.

It is admittedly a bit amusing that the same people defending a broken artifact (when used a certain way) tend to be the same kind of people who insist that certain skills (which people have paid credits/time for) are super broken (when used a certain way) and demand they be changed immediately.

It takes, what, 283 credits to trans a skill? So, multiply the rage of a skill being modified x10, then yeah, it'll be roughly the same.

Lessons are definitely not the same thing as artifacts. It's a good analogy, but it doesn't hold up to the fact that skills are known to be regularly changed on a monthly basis where as artifacts are not. In my time playing here, I think the only artifact change was to the teleportation/bixes under distortion. Their functionality was changed, but not their intended use (for the most part).



See above. Arguments by analogy hold when the analogy holds. This one doesn't.

Additionally, ad hominem moves are considered a logical fallacy.

We've had artifacts changed a few times.

Fire wand (though it was changed back a ways after).

Warrior weapon runes were nerfed for 2hers (needed to be done!)

Custom pets have changed (for example, they can no longer be invincible).

Elemental runes for warriors were changed from 50% to 33%.

Etc.

They do happen when it's needed for balance.

I'm not disagreeing that artifact changes don't occur. I'm just saying that they're rare. All of those (or at least most) changes happened before I started playing, which was over a year ago.