Reading the forums, as a somewhat new player..

[Gehere]

I am scared.

Why? I'll admit it. Scared of being banned. Banned for reasons beyond my control.

Every day, before logging into the game, I visit the forums. Every day, when visiting the forums, I am met by numerous posts, from people having their accounts banned.

Some of these people seriously ask for it themselves. No doubt about that.

But a few of these posts, APPEAR to be posted by players, with no clue to what has happened.

Some have been caught in a Spam Detection program. Fair enough - that is reviewed and most often the ban is lifted.

Some have played with their friend, or friends, on a shared network, and end up accused of multiboxing. Most often they lose their appeal - and goodbye character, equipment and commitment.

But what is really scary - is the extreme case of hacking that has begun happening. I FEAR that. There is nothing to do. Nothing can reimburse the loss one would experience, if the account you play on, is compromised.

I try to think of myself as a fairly reasonable individual. Common logic. Common sense. Pretty average intelligence. I do not share my information. I do not boast my account name and/or characters. But this could happen to me. Easily.

Scary.

This has gotten me to the point of fearing logging in daily. Scared of what I might encounter. I would HATE losing what I invest my time on and in, if I should be an unlucky victim of someone elses prank or joke.

Right now I'm contemplating if it is worth my time, playing onwards. Risking it all - without a chance of getting it back, if I am a victim.

Just a few thoughts...

- A concerned player.

Ps. I apoligize for any uncomprehendable language or grammar. English is not my first language.

[Nelythia]

You should never believe too much in each appeal.

GM's can confirm Multiboxing and other stuff within seconds and on a lot of ways, they don't warn/ban you for doing that, just because someone accuses you for doing it.

If you have a unique password with between 10 and 14 characters, using numbers, letters and symbols, that you never used before anywhere else, you will most likely not get hacked.

Avoid suspicious emails, software, etc and keep your anti-virus up to date.

Never share your account or any information about your account (email associated, password, recent passwords, accountname) with anyone else.

You can still play on Nostalrius and enjoy your time here.

[notgunnahappen]

Then stop playing.

Know what else is scary? Crossing the street. I've read stories of people being hit by cars!

[Dr. Doom]

Whenever you start playing a private server, I think one of the understood risks is that the thing can blow up in smoke any second, and all your work on it will be gone.

Whenever I put in my username and password, one of the thoughts in the back of my mind is "let's see if my account still exists".

[Robotron]

There are close to 15k people online at the same time between both servers during peak hours. Consider that information, and then look at the ban threads. Only a fraction of a percentage of those players are banned.

[Colezz]

U should be more afraid of the intense levels of autism on the forums

[Mencius]

Also keep in mind that many of the people claiming "I didn't do anything wrong, ever, I swear! It's YOUR FAULT!" are lying and believing that if they just lie hard enough they can get their way. As Robo noted, only a fraction of a percentage of all players get banned, and of those players, only a fraction of a fraction of a percentage were banned without doing anything wrong or suspicious at all.

The vast, vast majority of players simply enjoy the game and don't ever post on the forums.

[Uzephi]

You should have been here at the beginning and all the banned people's "brother" did it... You have to take each appeal with a grain of salt. Just because Jimmy is a cool guy in guild chat doesn't mean he didn't buy his mount with real money. How often did you see Jimmy farming for that 1k gold?