Now that my complaining is out of the way (see other thread) here’s the situation. We have lost a TON of the community, and a LOT of those players were not on ladder. I get that ladder is competitive, and should remain thus, but a lot of the players we lost (some friends of mine included) were never IN that competition and were old school open Bnet players that only played nonladder softcore. I repeat, THIS IS NOT ABOUT LADDER, I DONT CARE ABOUT LADDER, I AM NOT A COMPETITIVE PERSON. lol… Now that all the “but ladder!” are gone, I would like to suggest a few things to make this more fair and to make the FUTURE of the community both more fair and more free for those who wish it.
First, please make all the first offense bans (or at LEAST the non-ladder ones) a 30 day ban. I understand punishing an infraction, thats understandable, but a permanent ban to players who may have been paying customers for upwards of 30 years (yeah…we’re old, i know…) is just insane. This would make you be seen as merciful by the community, and would buy a lot of goodwill from a lot of people, and it’d have the bonus effect of bringing my friends back in a month to play with me again…
Second, PLEASE allow open-bnet to exist again. Allow us to download our characters off your servers, just like we used to be able to from the old online to open-bnet, and let the policy be that open battlenet is open to mods, hacks, whatever-etc as singleplayer is, and thus that “Blizzard takes no responsibility for anything players do on there”. Allow it to be the wild west that it used to be… I never botted or hacked or anything in the old days, but I had a TON of fun in the open bnet anyway. It was funny to see the people teleporting around as a necro before enigma existed, it was amusing to have someone dump their inventory and just have a giant pile of SOJs… a lot of us liked it. As a bonus, you won’t have to host us anymore, and even better…if memory serves anyhow… the games were hosted client-side so you’d reduce your server load and save your company a TON of money… like…millions potentially in hosting costs. If NOTHING else, this has got to be a good reason for you guys to give it back to us… If the equivalent of open battlenet is going to remain nonladder softcore, then please unban the people who didn’t play ladder.
I totaly agree with the 30 day ban (only as a warning ban). if the player is still found still at fault, the permanent ban is more than understandable.
I cannot agree with open bnet. That is where hacks/dupes crossovers were occurring. As Both open and closed bnet were on the same server and allowed this type of cheating. However, tcp/ip is a different story. It has no connection to bnet and allows players to play offline together. It was a huge mistake to disable tcp/ip.
Open battlenet and closed battlenet were separated early on. There was ONLY one way transport, from closed to open, not from open to close. Yes, thats the whole point. We NEED to give these people their sandbox back! Let them dupe, let them bot or mod, thats what open is FOR. You get people not doing any of that on the closed, AND the hardcore, AND THE LADDER, and we get ONE MEASLEY SERVER where freedom reigns supreme and i can leave closed and go join my friends THERE.
Honestly, if you object to that then its not about stopping people from doing it in YOUR server… because it would be completely separate from your server just like it was in 1.13. If you object to them having a place to do it you just want to control their actions… and that belies a deeper pathology than i can fix with a forum post or server creation.
I agree, should be 1 month ban to at least equalize the advantage people had for the time using map hack. Permanent ban is too much in my opinion, its not like automation software and bots were beeing used. Most people were simply missing working loot filter in most cases.
Yah, ive seen a LOT of people mention this loot filter thing. Is it really often that items get lost in a pile of loot? If its that bad then i REALLY cant blame them for using it.
… ive been playing for a long friggin time… long enough that i actually took good care of my original game disks and case and they still work… i wonder if ive left behind a bunch of important loot accidentally. I guess i always assumed that if it was on the ground the name would shuffle around into view, i just had to wander the loot pile to get them to shift around.
I don’t see Open Bnet happening but would love to see TCP/IP return.
The option of modded multiplayer would bring so much longevity to D2R just as it did for original D2, and it provides many other benefits like playing with a friend or two on any player count, less dependance on the Bnet servers so if Bnet is down you can still play multiplayer, etc.
I’ve never been on open bnet. But I think there needs to be more ways to play the game. You know, as many ways as there were in actual Diablo 2.
I myself was a SP player. And I’d play my SP chars with my friends over TCP/IP. Those were good times. There were entire communities of people who played this way. We had characters that were years old. So much time invented in them. D2R is missing several features from D2. Blizzard should implement them already.
Not really. It’s about the item drop notifications which allows people to forego ever needing to hold “alt” to display loot. This allows them to spend more time killing monsters aka winning more and finding more loot than a legitimate player.
Sorry I have to keep reiterating for you that maphack and its features are all about having an advantage over legit players.
No, cheating in video games is RAMPANT. No matter what game you play, ARPGs, FPS, MMO, MOBA, etc… do you know how many people back in classic d2 who only got a temp ban continued to bot or use MH? Probably the far majority. And this was 20 years ago when hacks and cheats weren’t as prevelent. I am glad blizz has put their foot down. Cheaters need to be severly punished, it is not a behavior video game fans want to encourage at ALL. Look at all the disgraced speedrun cheaters, nobody wants to associate with them after getting caught.
100% this. OP is too dumb and naive to recognize that open bnet caused many problems during classic d2 but he expects current dev team to figure out a way to reimplement on current bnet and to figure out how to completely block all exploits.
TCP/IP being removed is the real crime here, bringing that back should shut up open bnet cry babies…
Open bnet was very close to SP, you could even convert your characters from single or closed to open bnet (but after a while they closed the ability to go from open to closed) … the whole point is it was open multiplayer. No rules, the player PCs hosted the games themselves (pretty sure thats how we ended up with a lot of the server code used for the community projects) and the blizzard servers ONLY really handled connecting people together, matchmaking essentially. It would require very little if any additions to architecture and would allow all the maphackers, modders, etc a legitimate place to play THEIR way. If you want complete strict authoritarianism, thats every OTHER server… if you want freedom and possibly anarchy thats Open’s best feature.
And Guitars, if Blizzard’s devs cant figure out how to make code that has ALREADY BEEN WRITTEN AND RUNS FINE work to run a server that has one of the exact same functions of their current servers and can literally omit 90% of the other functions then they do NOT deserve to be considered a professional game development company. That would just be embarassing.
That won’t happen. It was still in the Alpha version which got hacked and then distributed. Open Bnet allows easy hosting of modified versions of the game as well as distribution of cracked versions.
That code is already loose, cats out of the bag, theres no reason we couldnt use that to make project d2r, the ONLY reason it hasnt been done is A. It will cost 130k to get going and B. The moment the big modders started talking about it Blizzard threatened to sue them into the ground.
Yah, except its fair use pursuant to the copyright act as long as they dont sell it, its considered a fan made parody, a fan modification, etc… so in realty its what is known as a “slap” suit, intended not to win, but to cost someone with low resources more resources than they have to fight back.
Blizzard knows that, they know we know it, and they know that we wont make it until they either let us or piss us off too much. Theres no reason to not release open
No, it is not fair use. Using ANY of the art, music, code, or anything else and putting it online, free or not, is a lawsuit waiting to happen.
You might want to read the EULA you agreed to.
Right up front under prohibited activities (the line right before all the cheating stuff)
License Limitations. Blizzard may suspend or revoke your license to use the Platform, or parts, components and/or single features thereof, if you violate, or assist others in violating, the license limitations set forth below. You agree that you will not, in whole or in part or under any circumstances, do the following:
Derivative Works: Copy or reproduce (except as provided in Section 1.B.), translate, reverse engineer, derive source code from, modify, disassemble, decompile, or create derivative works based on or related to the Platform.
Matchmaking: Host, provide or develop matchmaking services for the Game(s), or intercept, emulate or redirect the communication protocols used by Blizzard in any way, for any purpose, including without limitation unauthorized play over the internet, network play (except as expressly authorized by Blizzard), or as part of content aggregation networks.
Unauthorized Connections: Facilitate, create or maintain any unauthorized connection to the Platform including without limitation (i) any connection to any unauthorized server that emulates, or attempts to emulate, the Platform; and (ii) any connection using third-party programs or tools not expressly authorized by Blizzard.
We don’t own our Bnet accounts, our game, our chars, our items, or anything else.
Blizzard’s Ownership
With the sole exception of the Licensors’ Games, Blizzard is the owner or licensee of all right, title, and interest in and to the Platform, including the Games that are produced and developed by Blizzard (“Blizzard Games”), Custom Games derived from a Blizzard Game, Accounts, and all of the features and components thereof. The Platform may contain materials licensed by third-parties to Blizzard, and these third-parties may enforce their ownership rights against you in the event that you violate this Agreement. The following components of the Platform (which do not include content or components of the Licensors’ Games), are owned or licensed by Blizzard:
All virtual content appearing within the Platform, including the Blizzard Games, such as:
1. Visual Components: Locations, artwork, structural or landscape designs, animations, and audio-visual effects;
2. Narrations: Themes, concepts, stories, and storylines;
3. Characters: The names, likenesses, inventories, and catch phrases of Game characters;
4. Items: Virtual goods, such as digital cards, currency, potions, weapons, armor, wearable items, skins, sprays, pets, mounts, etc.;
All data and communications generated by, or occurring through, the Platform;
All sounds, musical compositions, recordings, and sound effects originating in the Platform;
All recordings, Game replays, or reenactments of in-game matches, battles, duels, etc.;
Computer code, including but not limited to “Applets” and source code;
Titles, methods of operation, software, related documentation, and all other original works of authorship contained in the Platform;
All Accounts, including the name of the Account and any Battle Tags associated with an Account. All use of an Account shall inure to Blizzard’s benefit. Blizzard does not recognize the transfer of Accounts. You may not purchase, sell, gift or trade any Account, or offer to purchase, sell, gift, or trade any Account, and any such attempt shall be null and void and may result in the forfeiture of the Account;
All Moral Rights that relate to the Platform, including Custom Games derived from a Blizzard Game, such as the right of attribution, and the right to the integrity of certain original works of authorship; and
The right to create derivative works, and as part of this Agreement, you agree that you will not create any work based on the Platform, except as expressly set forth in this Agreement or otherwise by Blizzard in certain contest rules, Blizzard’s Fan Policies, or addenda to this Agreement.
Bottom line is your friends agreed to the rules, then broke the rules. It is what it is. No amount of argument is going to change that nor can you just rip off a game and make your own version of it.
I know thats in there, but the “derivative works” clauses in EULAs have lost in court every single time its been tried that im aware of. They can put that they own our soul in there, legally, but that doesnt mean its enforceable. INCLUDING, might i add, Project Diablo 2, which blizzard LOST against.
Here… since i know we wont agree about it being something theyre WILLING to do, and ignoring that Guitar seems to think theyre completely incompetent. Lets just say what im wanting them to allow open battlenet play, COMPLETELY SEPARATED from closed bnet, except possibly a one way, permanent transfer of characters from closed to open, that way if we prefer to be there, we can.
You guys would LITERALLY have ALL the other servers with less modders on them. I cant guarantee how much, but i know for a fact anyone who wants to play multiplayer but wants to use mods, or wants to play with those players, would move to open, else theyd get banned permanently, and i wouldnt care because they HAD an alternative and didnt take it.
Of course not. They can’t break the law using a EULA.
A short video parody of Blizzard games is fair use. See Carbots for an example.
Drawing a character yourself (fan art) is fine.
Making a derived version of a copyrighted game and putting it online, free or not, is a civil infraction that the company can sue for and win. See Disney for an example of aggressive copyright enforcement. Nobody can take their art assets, characters, etc and make some derivative game or product without getting sued to heck.
It is not 20 years ago anymore. What people got away with in 2000 they can’t get away with anymore.
Did they actually sue them? There was a reddit thread speculating that maybe Blizzard would, but to my knowledge Blizzard never did. If you have a source for that I would be interested to see it.
Blizzard tends to win lawsuits about things that use their code/content these days.