"Feeding"/Selling Naq, Serious Issue?

[Leader Isaac]

Hey guys. I know it's not really my business, but I took a look at the market, having a thought to sell my Planets, or offer some Naq (Not sell it really, maybe, but not $$, ingame stuff). I noticed a discussion started by Jack (Neimenljivi). I saw people have over 400 quint of naq. Now I may not delve into math like many people, but that sounds way over my head, and 1 Trillion is a lot to me.

I started reading and looking at his prices and what his bank was and such and it was massive, and scary, makes me think twice about the top dogs now... But the thing is, SuperSaiyan did "split topic" and I was confused from what it was... so I went to look at it. Apparently Jack was selling Naq and Teyla and others were massing people because they were purchasing Naq from Jack for real money. And then others, especially Teyla, made it a 100% goal to mass and pillage people who purchased Naq with cash. Now... just a question... don't you guys think that if someone purchases Naq with cash in a game that has no real life effects on, no serious, just for fun and do as you wish, is the persons own business? If I'm playing a MMO that has a secondary ingame currency bought with cash, isn't it my business whether I do it or not? omg teyla went like all haha u nub With someone elses business, and then makes it like their one true destiny to nerf these people?

Well personally, it seems almost pathetic as to what it lead to...

[Leader Isaac]

For everyone's general information, the situation he refers to was in Quantum.

Simple discussion of buy and sell of Naq for cash
Where the issue (so I see) appears

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Also SS get in the roleplay group nao.

[Bromas]

Feeding is an issue and is AGAINST the rules, Selling naq is not allowed on forums however it is not going to be punished. If you post a topic buying/selling naq for cross server stuff it will be removed but as I say, its not going to be policed off-forum

[Juliette]

Again, this only applies for Quantum. Andy! hits the bulls eye though.

[Bromas]

Moved

[Kikaz]

Feeding is an issue and is AGAINST the rules, Selling naq is not allowed on forums however it is not going to be punished. If you post a topic buying/selling naq for cross server stuff it will be removed but as I say, its not going to be policed off-forum

Since when is it not allowed on forums? The only thing ever against the rules was cross server trading I.E. trading quantum NAQ for main resources..

[Bromas]

Feeding is an issue and is AGAINST the rules, Selling naq is not allowed on forums however it is not going to be punished. If you post a topic buying/selling naq for cross server stuff it will be removed but as I say, its not going to be policed off-forum

Since when is it not allowed on forums? The only thing ever against the rules was cross server trading I.E. trading quantum NAQ for main resources..

Thats precisely what my post says...

[Kikaz]

Feeding is an issue and is AGAINST the rules, Selling naq is not allowed on forums however it is not going to be punished. If you post a topic buying/selling naq for cross server stuff it will be removed but as I say, its not going to be policed off-forum

Since when is it not allowed on forums? The only thing ever against the rules was cross server trading I.E. trading quantum NAQ for main resources..

Thats precisely what my post says...

I was refering to the bold part, thats never been true, unless it's a brand new rule, which is why I asked since when?

[Bromas]

Feeding is an issue and is AGAINST the rules, Selling naq is not allowed on forums however it is not going to be punished. If you post a topic buying/selling naq for cross server stuff it will be removed but as I say, its not going to be policed off-forum

Since when is it not allowed on forums? The only thing ever against the rules was cross server trading I.E. trading quantum NAQ for main resources..

Thats precisely what my post says...

I was refering to the bold part, thats never been true, unless it's a brand new rule, which is why I asked since when?

This topic was originally an NG topic, then to main, now here, where it should apparently be. My post meant it is against the rules, however it can't/wont be policed if you do it off-forum

[Kikaz]

Well the post refers to names used soley in Quantum... and if you look at the first post in topic by SS before your post it also says quantum.
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Then like I said, selling for cash was never against the quantum rules. Admin Jason has always allowed this, trading main resources for Quantum resources was banned in wave 7, when the two people with this highest incomes in main at the time were trading their chump change to win Quantum.

Unless this 'rule' was introduced in the last wave, which is why I asked "Since when?"

[Leader Isaac]

I was never speaking cross server? Well, I don't believe Jack was either? He was giving Naq to someone in his server after they gave him cash right? That's not against the rules, is it?

[Scenester]

It is illegal since last era Kikaz.

One cannot trade naq for anything, period.
Wheter you get something in return or not, feeding is illegal and ingame cops will ban thee.

[Leader Isaac]

It is illegal since last era Kikaz.

One cannot trade naq for anything, period.
Wheter you get something in return or not, feeding is illegal and ingame cops will ban thee.

Wait what do you mean? People trade Naq for planets and such all the time I see it.

[Bromas]

It is illegal since last era Kikaz.

One cannot trade naq for anything, period.
Wheter you get something in return or not, feeding is illegal and ingame cops will ban thee.

Thank you

[Neimenljivi]

This is how it was:
A long long time ago, 2 specific guys basically bought their win in the first week or so of the game. They sold a lot of main naq (as they had big incomes and prices for selling naq were way better back then) and bought a LOT of USSs in the first days. They spent a lot of their own money as well. Back then UP wasn't linked to top UP, which is the case now and allows for a much easier catch-up game, there was also no raiding and, as far as I recall, no techs yet (apart from the basic techs of course).
This is when admin decided, after being persuaded by several of us, to limit $ spending by limiting the amount of USSs bought to 8 and no more than 1 per week.

Then in era 7, again, 2 specific guys bought their win by trading resources they got on main, due to their huge income and UP, for resources on Quantum. No one could compete with them and afterwards admin had to ban cross server trading.

Those of us who didn't want to spend our own money on the game due to personal reasons (I for instance have never spent any of my own money on any game, because I think I can use my money better for RL stuff, although I did sometimes sell some stuff for $ and then used those $ to buy something other in the game, but those reinvestments always paid off and I got more out of it in the end), but wanted to support the game anyway, have given naq to people in exchange for them buying us USSs. No one said anything about this, even though they could actually get more naq than 8 USSs worth throughout the era by buying USSs for others. Bare in mind, though, that some people didn't even have FSS and those, whose countries don't support paypal, - even if they are the wealthiest of them all, they couldn't buy it. So this was the only option to get FSS or USS so you could trade on ingame market (resources for other resources) as soon as it opened, if you hadn't had FSS or USS, you wouldn't have been able to trade straight away, but you had to buy MSS first.

Some have always sold some change for $ as well, I, too, have when I didn't play an era either because of lack of time or because it didn't look appealing. However, it wasn't a problem because no one got such huge advantage over others because there simply weren't enough resources to go around compared to what USS and FSS were giving.

Please notice that the majority of us, even those of us who have been selling naq for $ wanted to make Quantum as little influential by real money as possible, to ensure it really is a test of skill and that everyone stood on equal ground. However when we tried to stop money influencing the game, the time wasn't right just yet and the game wasn't ready for a change like that.

I think it was era 17 when feeding became a real problem, leading to SeiJuRo HiKO's victory as he had a few friends working for him. Note - feeding was always there, since era 1, however it only became as evident in era 17 and afterwards when you only needed friends, nothing else, to be able to win. Before then, sure it was easier with having a few friends feed you, however you still needed to know the ins and outs of the game to be able to win. But between, probably, top 10 players, the feeding factor could decide who wins and sometimes it did, other times it didn't. Nothing was done against feeding, even though it was always considered as low and cheap way to win, without any skill needed, feeding continued throughout era 18. In era 19 admin added Galactic Attack Logs to help identify the feeders.
It took until era 25 to make some counter-measures against feeding which meant limiting the max naq gained per attack to limit the feeding, although the feeding still wasn't illegal. It was still considered, by admin, legal. A lot of us tried to change this in the 8 eras after feeding became such a problem, but to no avail. The biggest problem was that admin didn't have the time to monitor the feeding, and while GAL did provide the community the way to monitor feeding, it was only there to embarrass feeders and the fed really. The max naq gained per attack also nerfed all those lucky hits when someone had a lot in the open, to buy a spy level or something, and someone else took it. Now people couldn't take all that money, still a pretty neat hit, but nowhere near all naq being taken.
In era 26 admin finally made feeding illegal, after being pressured by the community (it took a whole of 2 years, mind you). However, since he couldn't monitor it, the feeding was still there. Yes some feeders did have their resources stripped, but it usually took very, very long time until the resources were stripped and sometimes it was too late by then.

In era 30 the game gave A HUGE amount of naq to those who were buying USSs/FSSs. Such an amount that it would actually take you from a guy who didn't even touch their account for even a month, to top 5 ranked guy. The cost of ATs on ingame market was ridiculously high, no one, bar USS/FSS buyers, could afford it. It would take about 2000 turns of farming, possibly even more, to be able to buy 480 turns (that doesn't seem right now, does it?). Those who bought even only 1 USS, however, could afford it with probably less than 5 turns of their income. When it finally was nerfed, about half way through the era, a non-$ spending player could compete again. Well it is a terribly loose term, a non-$ spending player still couldn't aim for a top 10 finish.
Then I decided I'll try and create imbalance in the short run, but hopefully force admin to make $ have less impact on the game itself. I sold a huge amount of naq for $$ as the inactives were now flooded with naq and the USSs didn't give such huge advantages any more. It wasn't feeding - it was selling for $. Most of the people who knew me knew that much, but some argued it opened the door to feeding. Fair enough, however I wanted admin to make something against it. I continued selling insane amount of naq for $ and knew that if admin was to ban selling naq for $ so people who could afford spending a few hundred $ per era couldn't get such insane advantages compared to those who couldn't afford spending money on the game, he'd also have to make USSs and FSSs give a lot less so people would actually buy them to support the game (which is what it says), not to get advantage over others by spending $$ on the game (otherwise the community would have known he banned trading naq for $ only to have more people buy USSs - ergo more money in his pocket, while money would still influence the game as much as it did before). Teyla, who wanted to prevent people from buying naq with $ from me, only succeeded in me lowering the prices so the people who bought naq would still cover even the massing and all and it would still be cheaper for them to buy from me, but her big contribution was in starting a petition throughout the game to ban selling naq for $. She gave the names to admin and after this and after me demanding to make USSs and FSSs give a token amount of resources as a 'thank you for supporting the game' admin banned feeding completely and stated that selling naq for $ is feeding. He also made USSs and FSSs give a lot less. Don't get fooled - it still gives you resources, and a lot more resources than I want(ed) it to give, but now no one can buy their way to the top with buying USSs as you still need some skill. The amount of ATs and UUs it gives stayed the same (which is what I am against, I must say), but the amount of naq it gives is A LOT smaller. This happened right at the start of era 31.

As admin couldn't quite police the feeding and some people were still being fed greatly, he appointed myself, Hippy, and GhostyGoo as Quantum Game Cops. We are there to monitor the activity in GAL and, should someone get fed, we are the ones with the authority to ban the player for conducting illegal ingame activity. The ban lasts as many days as someone's ban count is - so if someone was banned twice already for having been fed, that player's next ban will last 3 days.
Since we were appointed and after a few bans, we haven't really noticed any feeding. However if we, somehow, miss a feed, anyone can give us the information about the feed and after we see the evidence, we can ban the feeder and the fed.

Hope that answers all of your questions about feeding and selling naq for $. Sorry for long post, but I wanted you to know all the history that led to it and a few things behind the scenes.

~Jack