Talk:Duping

Did duping ever exist in Guild Wars?

I was under the impression that the exploit in question allowed characters to craft free armbraces through a client hack, which was why the people abusing the exploit were buying rare miniatures with armbraces, but weren't selling duped rare miniatures or duped rare weapons. -- Gordon Ecker (talk) 07:37, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Yes, duping existed. It appeared just after the introduction of the Reconnect feature, which (initially) let you be connected twice at the same time (once in a outpost and once in an explorable area). It allowed the duplication of any item in the game, and "any" quickly became "the most expensive" for most dupers ; the most expensive item accessible to any customer being Armbraces, those were the ones that were duped the most. However, a few dupers got a hold on extra-rare minis as well, and many duped "only" ectos for a while, until they could afford buying an armbrace.

I see no reason at all for the move, by the way... However you could create a redirect from "Armbrace of Truth exploit" to this page, so that other people under the same impression than you were can get to the page where the correct information is.90.52.108.88 12:02, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

The ip is correct and I also agree that the move is unneeded not to mention inaccurate. -- Salome 12:15, 2 January 2009 (UTC)

Which wouldn't explain why there weren't any more rare miniatures in circulation. The article specifically says that the bannings which resulted from this exploit decreased the number of high-end miniatures in circulation. -- Gordon Ecker (talk) 07:30, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

I'm the IP above. As I said, a few dupers got a hold on a number of high-end miniatures (often buying them with duped armbraces), and duped them. Not only did the duped mini got deleted when ANet got a hold on what was happening, but some the "original" mini were lost as well, because they were in the inventories of dupers whose accounts were banned. In other words, the duping didn't create more high-end miniatures (all the duped minis were deleted by ANet), but it actually reduced their numbers (some of the original minis were lost with the inventories of banned characters).79.83.24.211 11:43, 3 January 2009 (UTC)

I've cut the move tag. Do you have a source for the claim that all duped miniatures were deleted? I was under the impression that ArenaNet did not delete individual items and only about a hundred accounts were banned for the duping, it seems implausible that none of the duped high-end miniatures got into circulation. -- Gordon Ecker (talk) 03:15, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

IIRC, back then Gaile explained that it was very easy for ANet to find duped items and that they had deleted every such item, in addition to other sanctions. I don't remember if she said so here or on one of the forums she posts on, and either way it was such a long time ago that finding it would be very, very difficult. The best if you need a source would probably be to ask her directly on her talk page...77.195.71.103 16:03, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Gordon, The IP is right. I can't remember exactly where I saw it, but I know that at some point Gaile said that the duped items had been removed from the game and everyone involved banned and with the banning of the individuals in question their inventory items were lost with them, thus meaning that the original high end miniatures that they had bought with the duped ambraces were lost at that time. -- Salome 16:35, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

I found these two posts from Gaile about the duping in her archives:

Because of really quick work by a lot of team members, we feel that the vast majority of duped items were identified, and the associated account(s) blocked, days ago. We're still reviewing a few cases, but we feel that most research is complete, and those items we intend to remove have been removed. If there are a few duped items out there, the potential damage to the game economy is extremely small. Therefore, for those who have been worried about trading, we've given the "all clear" on item trading. If you note someone with mass quantities of items, or if you see items offered at ridiculously low prices, let us know and we'll investigate the associated account. Thanks for asking. --Gaile 05:53, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

Let's be clear: ArenaNet does care, a great deal, about any incidents of economic manipulation, such as botting, duping, and so forth. We spend thousands of dollars a week paying the salaries of a number of support staff members so that they can remove bots. We had a number of key employees pulled off their tasks and moved to the duping incident, and that breach was shut very quickly, far more quickly than any incident of its kind that I've seen in other games. We then spent a large number of days researching accounts to find those who were involved, in several levels, and we acted upon the information that we acquired and the reports that we received. We continue to act upon reports, but not always in ways that the reporter believes we might, for reasons I'll explain below.

I will not say that we found every individual who had duped items, but we were extremely successful in finding the large majority, even down to the third degree of separation from the actual duping, even down to secondary accounts of those involved. I think that's a good record -- fast action to close the breach and swift justice on those who were engaged in abusing it. At this point, we still get the occasional support ticket, email, or PM saying, "This person has too many armbraces, he can't be legit." We do investigate those. If we find that someone has duped items, that person will be actioned. But for the most part, we're not finding that there is a clear connection with the duping incident and therefore we usually are not choosing to action that account. That is a natural progression of any sort of problem-solving: You find the vast majority of people who were involved in an incident like this in the early days, and that number drops over time.
Armbraces and ectos have become a form of currency, as Stones of Jordan became a form of currency in Diablo II, and for the same reason: The GW inventory holds less gold or fewer platinums than players need for trading, so players have devised a higher-value currency through armbraces and ectos. Now, suggesting that anyone who has a large number of armbraces is obviously a duper is just wrong, just as it would be wrong to suggest that anyone with gems, plats, or ectos is doing something scurrilous. That player is simply using the current high-end currency. And for some people, as suggested above, buying low and selling high, or trading for armbraces, is a major part of their GW experience. And there are people, we all know, who put a lot of time into Guild Wars! With time, the amount that players have to spend rises, and therefore prices adjust in the free market. (Just as salaries rise and movie tickets that were once $5 are now over $10. You have more money, the prices rise accordingly.)

I appreciate that not everyone can afford a boatload of armbraces, but focusing on the armbraces themselves seems short-sighted. Look, instead, at the amount of time spent in acquiring any sort of currency and consider how that impacts pricing. The market within the game is based on supply and demand, and exchanges within it are predicated by nothing more than the choices of the willing seller and the willing buyer. -- Gaile 19:03, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

She does not claim in either of those posts that they got everything. Maybe they did get all the duped miniatures, but they never claimed to have gotten all of them, and we have no way of being sure that there are no duped miniatures in circulation. -- Gordon Ecker (talk) 07:00, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

Good job in digging up her archives. Indeed, based on these posts, it seems they didn't actually delete every duped item. One can expect ANet would consider a duped high-end miniature as an item they would want to delete and one with an important impact on the economy, but that would be just an assumption without any other source. I'll look into the archives when I get some free time, as I remember something more specific from her about how easily it was for them to find a duped item, but maybe I'm mistaken, of course.77.195.71.103 00:47, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

There's no way they got everything not with people still willing to pony up so many braces as a trade swap. What they should have done back in '07 was a currency wipe plain and simple rather than what they seem to have done, target only the most egregious cases. Adding Torment to the HoM given the past history of this item is comical at best. They legitimized braces yet again as a trading commodity and in the process raised their value to a rock solid 40-50e range. Gaile is full of shit in that quote too. If the market really was based on supply and demand ecto would be down in the sub 3's but thanks to trader resets (both hard and soft) it always manages to jump right back into the high 4's low 5's regardless of how supersaturated the market is. For those paying attention, under normal circumstances when you have a lot more of something (maybe an increase of a factor of 10 from planes-sin and uwsc?) they are generally worth less not the same amount. 98.219.48.111 01:12, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

elaborate?

"It appeared just after the introduction of the Reconnect feature, which (initially) let you be connected twice at the same time (once in a outpost and once in an explorable area). It allowed the duplication of any item in the game" *from 90.52.108.88 above

Can anyone elaborate on this? Kinda break down how duping worked? the_decline 03:38, 12 February 2012 (UTC)

basically trade from 1 account to the other, disconnect while in trade and voila the trade partner gets the items without you loosing it. They solved this in the end, by implenting code that made sure the item would rather be deleted on both accounts then duplicated. This has later on caused much dismay because of items lost due to server instability. In short, ANet replaced 1 fuckup with another. And people got away clean with thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of armbraces. Personally know people that managed to get away with 10 000+. Not to mention the effect this had on the high end market because of people selling for fair prices and getting to keep their items and armbraces, over time this funneled massive values over to high end traders. 84.48.54.253 12:33, 27 March 2012 (UTC)

Aaaaaaaaand, it's back

Items are apparently customised to characters (all items) after duping this time. Bramblefeet 17:22, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Funny how i didn't notice this amongst all the rc spam :> File:User Chieftain Alex Chieftain Signature.jpg Chieftain Alex 22:12, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

i dont quite understand what you mean by customised to characters, you mean every item has a code for example and it says character a has one so character b cant have it?Spark-TBa 11:27, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

No, I mean they were customised like weapons/armour are, even items that can't normally be customised. Seems it's been fixed now though, hopefully Anet do a decent job of taking duped items off the market. Bramblefeet 14:52, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

lol, customized Armbraces and Ectos? ^^ schweet Gaudy Gourd God 15:40, 12 May 2012 (UTC)

Anet didn't fix it yet, and yes, all duped items are customized - I've seen screenshot of customized stack of diamonds --87.205.140.140 14:32, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

ok so duped items are customised as a way of us identifying that they are duped and can report?Spark-TBa 15:36, 17 May 2012 (UTC)

See this support forums post from Gaile regarding this. --Silver Edge 07:18, 27 May 2012 (UTC)