Team Fortress 2 F2P Ban mod WTH?

[quhouv vhqwiufv qwiu]

I just found out about this

... Really

and quite honestly I'm shocked it was even possible to be done.

... Again really?

but this is old news, it exists and we have to deal with it's existence as mindbogglingly as it is

Is it really that "mindboggling"? I'm not F2P (had the game for years) and anyone who is F2P can make a simple $2 purchase of a key to become premium.

here's my question though. Is it right to have a mod with this intent, in ANY game.

Is it moral to exclude someone from a service? We must consider the quandary, do players have a right to the service, or is it a privilege? A F2P player has not purchased the game so has not invested any money and hence their access is a privilege. Those players who are premium either through purchasing the game before it became F2P or by making a MannCo purchase intrinsically have the right to access the game since they have paid money. This doesn't mean they have access to all servers though. Server owners pay the bills and have control of the server. They have the right to ban anyone they wish from the service because the server is their own legal property (with the exception of rented servers but you see what I'm saying). This goes for all games, the server owners have the right to deny their service to anyone for reasons including hacking, cheating, or anything else they can think of to write in the message field when they click ban.

if you have a hard time trying to understand what I'm asking picture this. You heard of this mega awesome supergame, it's been out for years, and F2P has always been a part of it (Not a very big part, like say a week trial) and then suddenly say F2P players have unlimited access (With restrictions ofcourse).

Oxymoron.

These players find them selves being hunted down in this game and killed, then their char name added to a list of players that if any one parties with them, causes the party to be attacked.

This is a clear exaggeration. Please don't blow this out of proportion. This isn't a genocide.

Is it right for the playerbase to lash out on it self? was it just an overreaction? or am I rambling to my self and get warned for this post? Who knows

Indeed who knows? Morality is not objective and is purely subjective to the individual's perspective. As such there are some servers who impost this ban and others who do not. Personally I don't like playing with bad players, and free to play players are new so often unskilled. Bad players make everything difficult for the team, like a medic who only heals one heavy and if it's a class like spy bad players often screw up the other spies who know what they're doing.

One last point: The nature of F2P means that it is possible for players intent on cheating to do so without the disadvantage of paying money. While Valve say they are monitoring this, that does not rule it out and anyone serious about cheating then making a new account could most likely evade Valve.

 

[The Random One]

No, what's unfair is the 'premium' servers being shown alongside regular servers. That's what ruins my fun.

Plus, if you have that much trouble, just go to a Valve server. I find it unlikely you'd actually be hunted down in a FPS game.

This is for the newbies benefit too.
complaining about this is like saying"ITS NOT FAIR I WANT TO WALK AROUND COMPTON IN MY GOLFPANTS!"

"Shut up, MC Hammer!"

 

[Gralian]

I call it snark, it was really a way of saying "EULAs are a bunch of shit and meaningless"
but on the note of EULAs I like how you take a swipe at EA when the Steam EULA makes it perfectly clear that the only recourse you have if you find yourself at odds with steam is to either suck it up or close your account. it's been there for years.

To be frank, while i wouldn't quite use the term 'meaningless', EULAs are so loosely defined that it would be hard to prove beyond all reasonable doubt that someone had infringed upon them with cases that involve this sort of thing. Even things regarding tampering with your product aren't always easy to prove, just look at the GeoHotz case. If they have that much trouble proving him guilty how are you meant to prove someone swapped skin textures or that they are running their server inappropriately.

While i do agree the Steam EULA is fairly harsh regarding user punishment, EA was the only major example i could think of at the time of writing. This is probably due to EA getting the limelight not too long ago with the advent of Origin. I didn't mean to infer any bias in my argument or example. Not only that, but as far as i'm aware your account is closed if you are the one at fault. You actually have to of done something to break the EULA directly, whereas EA is more a case of "forced to accept or denied service". There's no breaking of agreement. It's you surrendering consumer rights on the spot. It's like if police decided to arrest you or seize your assets before you've even committed a crime (EA) as opposed to arresting you and chucking you in jail if you break the law (Steam). That's how i see it anyway.

 

[Atmos Duality]

This mod aint got SHIT on anything related to original Counterstrike.
If you wanted to see IP and screen name blacklists as long as some war casualty lists, look no further.

Or heaven help you, if you were actually GOOD at the game, and got banned for it...

 

[Char-Nobyl]

I just found out about this and quite honestly I'm shocked it was even possible to be done. but this is old news, it exists and we have to deal with it's existence as mindbogglingly as it is, here's my question though. Is it right to have a mod with this intent, in ANY game. if you have a hard time trying to understand what I'm asking picture this. You heard of this mega awesome supergame, it's been out for years, and F2P has always been a part of it (Not a very big part, like say a week trial) and then suddenly say F2P players have unlimited access (With restrictions ofcourse). These players find them selves being hunted down in this game and killed, then their char name added to a list of players that if any one parties with them, causes the party to be attacked.

Is it right for the playerbase to lash out on it self? was it just an overreaction? or am I rambling to my self and get warned for this post? Who knows

Nah. It's a rather...disturbing issue, for lack of a better word.

A significantly greater number of F2Pers are shitheads than those that aren't; most people don't want shitheads on their servers. Therefore, as a shithead preventing method, F2Pers are banned.

I see. And I suppose you distrusted a comprehensive shithead survey among F2Pers? Because otherwise, I don't see how you can make the assumptions you're making.

It's not childish, it's reasonable.

...damnit. Whenever this topic comes up, the parallels I can see to racism are astoundingly clear, and I have to fight the urge to point them out because doing so would just trivialize actual racism.

I'll at least make it political: you're from the US, no? Remember the law that passed in Arizona that obligated "all" immigrants to carry passports with them at all times? And that law enforcement could ask for said papers at any given time, and failure to present adequate verification of citizenship would lead to arrest?

See, the government of Arizona decided that it was too hard to tell illegal Central American immigrants from the legal ones, so they just decided that they would assume that all Latin-looking people with hints of accents were illegals until proven otherwise. It's textbook racial profiling, but more relevant to this situation, it's sweeping up innocent bystanders because you were too lazy to find a better way to deal with a group they share a trait with.

Also, far too many F2Pers are under 16, and nobody likes kids except moms.

Ah, that answers my question. I know that you wouldn't be listing things like age demographics without the support of corroborating data. If you could post those survey results, that'd be great.

I don't see the big deal, people who paid money for the game don't want to play with those that got it for free. People who are F2P have no right to complain, as they didn't pay for the fucking product.

Since when has getting something "for free" ever been an excuse to abuse it at the expense of the recipient? Soup kitchens aren't magically exempt from the approval of the health inspector, and people who buy bottled water don't roam about during the day cutting the water lines to drinking fountains.

Long-time players are annoyed by the upswing in random retardation of their fellow players, they associate it with the influx of new users since TF2 went F2P. You are annoyed because as a F2P user, there are servers out there that will ban you for it.

...yeah, that seems to be about the gist of his argument.

How annoying do you think it is for people that spent $40 for a product to have to share it with new users that got it for free?

Oh, really? Sorry, mate. I had the situation completely wrong. I was under the belief that purchasers of TF2 bought it along with Half Life 2, Episode 1-2, and the original Portal, and that F2Pers only got TF2 for free and none of the others.

Ah, wait, nevermind. I just momentarily forgot that you were blatantly misappropriating prices.

Especially when those users then proceed to ***** and whine about how they are entitled to just as much as those that paid for access.

When was this ever about getting more than Valve gave them? It's not "entitlement" to get pissed when other people start arbitrarily restricting your access to public commodities.

I hate to go back to the immigration thing again, but if you get hissy over a newly-accepted citizen having a vote that counts exactly the same as yours even when you had family in this country for generations, that's tough luck.

Individual server bans is nothing, you still got the game for free.

I'm a bit confused here. You call it a 'game,' but then you say that it's other peoples' right to take away your ability to enjoy it if they paid for their own version of the game. Again, even if you buy soup from the same outlet that donates to a soup kitchen, you're not allowed to go down there with your purchased soup and forbid people from eating theirs in arbitrary ways.

 

[Altio]

It's not a dick move by "self entitled" people. If these private servers want to use the mod, let them, it's perfectly within their rights, being that they own the server and all. There are probably at least 20 F2P Valve servers, and hundreds of other servers that do not use this mod, so go play on those, and ignore the ones that ban F2P. I don't understand why you people make a huge deal out of nothing. It really shouldn't irritate anyone because you can just go to a different server, simple as that. Move along. Eat a bagel. Be happy.

 

[Awexsome]

It's just a typical move by the "nice" TF2 community.

Some part of that community has always thrown a hissy fit over every single update, change, tweak, and overhaul made to the game. There's a good community rooted in there but it's very, very alike to Halo's in that regard.

Bad and unfriendly on first impression, but a deep long lasting friendly group if you get past the large, asshole filled appearance and find the right spot inside of it somewhere.

 

[Sectan]

Valve put TF2 F2P for a reason. I'm guessing the community was shrinking or something. FUCK YOU VALVE FOR..UM? MAKING MORE MONEY ON A 4 YEAR OLD GAME AND UM YEAH THAT! It's a 4 year old game that was sold in a bundle with other games. TF2 itself wasn't worth that much to begin with. BTW if I'm not mistaken can't servers ban by IP instead of accounts?

I'm a F2P "noob" who constantly gets Friend Requests for being a medic with more than half a brain. Haters gonna Hate. Or in this case Hatters gonna Hat.

 

[AtheistGuy]

oh yea spending those .79? on an item really is a set back
Fuck, atleast pirates don't cry like babies when their free shit doesn't work

You do realize some people (myself included) are just incapable of using a credit card due to bankruptcy or other economic circumstances?

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

I just found out about this and quite honestly I'm shocked it was even possible to be done. but this is old news, it exists and we have to deal with it's existence as mindbogglingly as it is, here's my question though. Is it right to have a mod with this intent, in ANY game. if you have a hard time trying to understand what I'm asking picture this. You heard of this mega awesome supergame, it's been out for years, and F2P has always been a part of it (Not a very big part, like say a week trial) and then suddenly say F2P players have unlimited access (With restrictions ofcourse). These players find them selves being hunted down in this game and killed, then their char name added to a list of players that if any one parties with them, causes the party to be attacked.

Is it right for the playerbase to lash out on it self? was it just an overreaction? or am I rambling to my self and get warned for this post? Who knows

You do know that most people use it to get rid of cheaters right? Not because of some spiteful bitterness towards F2P players.

How does this work you might ask? Well, if someone is VAC banned, what do they do? Oh right. Make a new account and play TF2 for free on that.

 

[AtheistGuy]

Yea, I don't b

oh yea spending those .79? on an item really is a set back
Fuck, atleast pirates don't cry like babies when their free shit doesn't work

You do realize some people (myself included) are just incapable of using a credit card due to bankruptcy or other economic circumstances?

.79? is not even a liter of milk, I've lived on the poverty line for 19 years and even I managed to pay

Not poverty . I mean credit issues. Bankruptcy destroys any hope you have of using a credit card, and even without that credit cards aren't exactly something you can get just like that.

Last I checked you need those to buy on steam or TF2.

 

[JohnReaper]

*snip snip*
What your friend experienced is not problems because of a mod, but problems with people being assholes. Her guild blacklisted her, not the mod.

When did I say the Mod blacklisted her? my point in this example was the fact that her guild forced her to change her char's name not once, not twice but five times. She's a paying customer to Blizzard and as such doesn't she deserve to enjoy the product that blizzard provides? after the second name change she should have be able to ask blizzard for a server change or something to be done (A free name change with no way of finding her old name). I get people are assholes and people try to ruin other people's experience, my question is though when does it step over the line of nothing we can do and cause reaction from the company?

Edit: F2pers are not a collective mind like the borg, each person is a person P2P or F2P I understand banning hackers, greifers, etc. and f2p accounts can be abused to do this, doesn't make every f2p account everywhere an alt to cheat with, and last I checked Vac IP bans for cheating. So saying cheaters can easily make a new account after their current one is banned holds less weight