Community Feedback on Ban/Ban appeals

[Shintegami]

This is an open letter to the Crema team regarding the automated ban system and appeal process in Temtem, with a particular focus on the issue of trade bans. We’re writing this following a recent spike in the number of wrongful bans of members in the community, and we would like to discuss some of the painful experiences they’ve had in proving their innocence during their appeals, along with requests we’d like to make to improve the ban and appeal process for everyone going forward.

We love Temtem and see its incredible potential on top of the amazing content it already delivers. We want to feel safe when we play, to have confidence in the process we follow when bans take place, and to know that we’ll continue to be able to play and support its growth going forward. To that end we’ll be putting forward some of the experiences players have had, and our requests to improve the experience for other players in the future.

The issue of wrongful bans has been addressed before in a post made by Tsukki 3 months ago (Tsukki's Post) that we will be referring to throughout the letter as we feel that a number of issues referred to in this post continue to be a part of the problem we face today. To begin with, we’d like to address Tsukki’s mention of the canned response sent to players for rejections to appeal an example of which can be seen here:

While we understand the importance of keeping some information hidden from cheaters, which was mentioned in the post, we feel that there can still be enough information made available for us to prove our innocence without revealing how it was obtained. As appeals are validated by humans, we only need to know what incidents have been seen as suspicious, and to have just enough information for us to provide what context and proof we have for these cases. Providing simple dot points with questions for us to address to an existing template would be an excellent start to this, while also not radically increasing the costs of personalized responses at scale.


A strong recent example of the problem with this canned response, and the example that sparked this conversation, was a community member who had their appeal denied with no information provided and then told that their case would no longer be reviewed. This is not uncommon unfortunately, but luckily while working on a second appeal they were later contacted by another member of the support team asking for information about a trade they’d made months before.

From this particular case we want to explore two major problems - the first being that there is no visible difference between the initial automated ban and this human reviewed ban, casting doubt on the processes involved in the human review and leading to concern about how an additional appeal would go, and second being that nowhere in the template was a trade even listed as potentially being involved in the ban taking place.

Had this trade been mentioned in the original rejection as a request for more information there would have been no lost confidence in the system, and the proof could have been provided immediately for the appeal to continue successfully. Information such as this would be of minimal use to cheaters, as the trade system is already widely known to be intensely watched for signs of cheating.

The second issue of trades not even being mentioned leads into one of the biggest problems for the community at large - fear of the core systems, such as making trades, within the game. This particular ban case is not at all unique, just the most recent within the community, and was even addressed quite heavily the original post from Tsukki:

Both of these paragraphs talk about this fear that the community faces when playing the game, but the examples within the community of players being banned for these same reasons since this post was made show these are still issues to this day, and that these issues need to be dealt with in a different way.

Within the trading system in particular, which was the reason for this ban, there are many grey areas in what is considered normal player behavior and what is flagged. While this is understandable given its importance, trades pose an unfairly large risk when we have no information about how severely it impacts ban requests or about what information is required from us in order to prove our innocence. Without this information it is hard to feel as though we can trust continuing our community giveaways, trading of Tems, items, and suns to each other, and all of the work we do supporting and providing for new players. Without trust in the system it is hard to tell new players that they can feel safe joining the community and playing the game, and that there is always recourse when mistakes are made. These behaviors and trust in the system are core to how a game like Temtem operates, and without confidence in them the community will fall apart.


Another recent example with another community member having their ban rejected, but then being separately contacted about a trade, was a ban that happened roughly 3 weeks before Kisiwa launched. At the time of their ban, there was a ban wave with specific dates that triggered many flags, and there were multiple players banned in the same way on the same day as the individual. They followed the advice provided by the support team, and thankfully were unbanned, but something odd happened afterwards; they received the canned response saying that their appeal was rejected and they would remain banned, 3 full days after being unbanned. The player decided to not question it as they feared that any further contact may lead the support team to follow through with the second decision of keeping the individual banned.

Both examples had the same experience of a ban due to a legitimate trade that led them to their individual negative experiences with the appeal process, both of which were resolved outside of the expected template. In both cases a simple and clear request for information, or an explanation of what the issue was, would have solved these issues and provided closure on these cases without the need for additional work after the case was closed. These cases also raise additional concerns that the guidelines, processes, and policies currently in use are not strong enough for players to have consistent appeal experiences, and that we often depend on support staff going outside of the normal template in order to receive the support we need.

We would like to have more confidence in the systems that we depend on in the game, with reduced risk in using these tools as well as confidence in appealing bans for them if required. We ask for more trust in the community when providing ban rejections up front, as there are surely many cases like the above where users have simply given up and quit the game without a separate follow up that would have allowed them to prove their innocence. We want to know that there are stronger internal guidelines and more training for support staff to ensure that cases like the initial rejection never happen again, and instead that cases like the additional follow up become a standard that we can depend on for our appeals.

With our problems detailed we’d like to suggest for 3 changes to be implemented that we believe would drastically reduce the community fear of wrongful bans, and improve the experience of those caught in the process:


1. Introduce a “trade restricted” state

By temporarily disabling trading on an account during the initial ban, the value of botting accounts can be reduced to almost nothing, while only partially impacting the experience of legitimate players. Being able to interact with the community and simply delaying trades would be a far better experience for players, but also prevent any valuable Tems or Suns being used for RMT or other illegitimate purposes.

2. Standardise adding additional context to appeal rejection

This will require some time to determine exactly what information is safe to be made available, but we need to be confident that any particular incidents that we might have information about are available to us to trust this process. Additionally having some less explicit evidence sent to those who are legitimately banned will reduce their ability to influence the community into supporting them after their cheating. More consistent guidelines for how these cases are handled with more information made available will be invaluable in making real change.

3. Reduce the danger of “old” flags to an account

While the flag count implementation makes sense it comes with some painful edge cases, namely where a “suspicious” case is present on an account for several months before an unrelated minor flag triggers the ban. This leads to cases where a player must remember and find proof of an incident from entirely too far back to be reasonable, especially for those who do not log their every move, and this system needs to be changed. We ask that flags that are seen as too high risk are addressed early, and those that aren’t seen to need immediate addressing be reduced in impact to prevent wrongful bans being made too difficult to address. If implementation can be added for less serious flags to have a fall off period, then that provides resolution for both parties.It allows a reasonable time frame for the player to have a personal memory without the need of record/documentation of their interactions.

Thank you for your time, and for allowing this discussion to happen. We look forward to hearing your response on the matter.


Yours truly,

Shintegami97 & Members of the Temtem Community

 

[Solmy]

Additionally having some less explicit evidence sent to those who are legitimately banned will reduce their ability to influence the community into supporting them after their cheating.

I want to focus on this part specifically. Not revealing behind the scenes information to make it harder for cheaters and botters is a good thing, but you also make it very easy for people that might be rightfully banned to rile up the community and enhance the problem of fear in the community. By revealing some evidence those shenanigans would be made a lot harder.
It would even be possible to make ban responses public on request (maybe for specific members in the community, like public streamers or community figures) to dismantle rightfully banned people that try to rile up community support against their ban.

 

[TMTrainer]

I'm going to be watching this thread closely, if anybody wants to debate or discuss anything in this thread, please do so respectfully.

 

[Silber]

I honestly can't see additional context being a good thing here or the solution. The flags obviously do need some tuning around trades, that much can't be denied, but regarding information disclosure I've got some relevant experience. My master thesis is on the topic of anonymization of network captures, and the methods which have been developed to discover information about devices in a network from seemingly innocent details is impressive.

Likewise, tiny contextual clues provided as information to banned players can help tune operations to prevent future detection in ways that are difficult to predict and defend against. Even seemingly innocent tiny bits of information can be an issue if sufficient context is present. From my experience, disclosing more details isn't the right approach.

This suggestion however:

1. Introduce a “trade restricted” state

I feel this has massive potential. You are indeed correct that for RMT or botting an account that can not trade is worthless (or nearly so). For somebody looking to play this is a massive inconvenience, but not a complete loss of the ability to play. I could see this as a good middle-ground kind of solution. I imagine most organized RMT and botting groups would consider those accounts burned and abandon them anyway.

 

[Shintegami]

I honestly can't see additional context being a good thing here or the solution. The flags obviously do need some tuning around trades, that much can't be denied, but regarding information disclosure I've got some relevant experience. My master thesis is on the topic of anonymization of network captures, and the methods which have been developed to discover information about devices in a network from seemingly innocent details is impressive.

Likewise, tiny contextual clues provided as information to banned players can help tune operations to prevent future detection in ways that are difficult to predict and defend against. Even seemingly innocent tiny bits of information can be an issue if sufficient context is present. From my experience, disclosing more details isn't the right approach.

This suggestion however:



I feel this has massive potential. You are indeed correct that for RMT or botting an account that can not trade is worthless (or nearly so). For somebody looking to play this is a massive inconvenience, but not a complete loss of the ability to play. I could see this as a good middle-ground kind of solution. I imagine most organized RMT and botting groups would consider those accounts burned and abandon them anyway.

Thanks for the input, I expected that there will be individuals who try to exploit and take advantage regardless of the circumstances/changes made. These are just things that have been brought to my attention to well known community members and their experience with the current system in place, and it does pose as a concern, unfortunately.

 

[Tao]

The second issue of trades not even being mentioned leads into one of the biggest problems for the community at large - fear of the core systems, such as making trades, within the game.

Ironically, you didn't post an issue with the ban system, but with believing what banned users claim. It's the most common response to bans, most of which were correct: "All I did was trade". Remember, cheaters are petty enough to make Crema look bad as response to getting banned, and they have no issue with coordinated efforts to make normal game functions look like they're getting normal players in trouble.

 

[Ignoritus]

I will remind those in this thread suggesting false bans are not happening and are purely the falsified claims of botters that the OP has provided two separate anecdotes of players being falsely banned for trades that Crema themselves allegedly admitted were false after being provided additional evidence.

If you chose to accept those anecdotes as true you cannot in good faith deny that players are at a risk of being penalized for legitimate trading when it's already happened at least twice as the people you're claiming to trust over the "botters" are themselves saying it's true.

 

[Shadowzs]

In addition to what was said, i think they should start implementing temporary bans too, so far every single offense triggers the same level of response, which is a permanent ban , no questions asked, no info shared, and as much as i agree with Silber point of view, i think that depending on the scale of things, not providing any kind of info can, indeed, cause more harm than good, as cheaters will continue fine tuning their tools regardless of what happens, and detection systems of said tools should be improved alongside anyway. But again, not providing any kind of info wouldn't be a problem if the ban detection or appeal system didn't had any flaws, so providing some sort of hint could be just an temporary solution until cases like these stop happening.
People who are actually RMTing will always try new methods of avoiding detection every day , and some of those were already reported , but some of the people who are not trying those methods of are the players who are feeling safe about their trades knowing that they are legit, and possibly getting hurt in the process, and i don't think that first offenders who are supposedly suspected of doing said actions should be receiving an permanent ban with no context provided to begin with.

In my honest opinion I'm more worried about the grand scheme of things, so far were in a very small and controlled environment , with less harm to be done, and less cases showing up due to a smaller playerbase, with examples (including my own) which can be used to fine tune those systems , i had 3 appeals denied with my ban case , and since i knew i never cheated , i went straight on showing proof of trades after i already knew about other people who got banned/unbanned for the same reasons, but only got accepted on my 4th after providing proof about trades which imo shouldn't be an issue to begin with, that also were months old, stuff that by the way, i was informed on my first appeal responses, that i couldn't be banned to begin with by this sentence "No player is banned for playing multiple accounts at the same time or for trading with other players" But apparently ended up to be the case.

So for now, were working with a much more managable numbers of players compared with what we will have on launch time, about issues that could hurt the game's popularity depending on how many people end up being affected, so the "it's only happening with a small percentage of players" argument doesn't work for me, as the same small percentage could be much more vocal once the game is out on all consoles and we have a much larger playerbase.

But also a part of me doesn't even care about numbers, if were in a situation where a single player could be falsely banned and not have the tools to get his problem fixed, it's enough to raise awareness and for some things to change.

 

[Shadowzs]

Ironically, you didn't post an issue with the ban system, but with believing what banned users claim. It's the most common response to bans, most of which were correct: "All I did was trade". Remember, cheaters are petty enough to make Crema look bad as response to getting banned, and they have no issue with coordinated efforts to make normal game functions look like they're getting normal players in trouble.

We are specifically targeting issues with players who were actually unbanned, and the fact that some of them had to made multiple appeals, or be reached out by crema and asked about proof of trades, which based on the data we have, all cases were due to trades, we have yet to see someone who were mistaken by a bot, and about the players who are still banned, well, that's another problem because they could be indeed guilty, or maybe they just made a single appeal and gave up, which was already been shown bo be a bad call since we had more than one case of people who had to make more than one appeal.

 

[Cemillion]

In addition to what was said, i think they should start implementing temporary bans too, so far every single offense triggers the same level of response, which is a permanent ban , no questions asked, no info shared, and as much as i agree with Silber point of view, i think that depending on the scale of things, not providing any kind of info can, indeed, cause more harm than good, as cheaters will continue fine tuning their tools regardless of what happens, and detection systems of said tools should be improved alongside anyway. But again, not providing any kind of info wouldn't be a problem if the ban detection or appeal system didn't had any flaws, so providing some sort of hint could be just an temporary solution until cases like these stop happening.
People who are actually RMTing will always try new methods of avoiding detection every day , and some of those were already reported , but some of the people who are not trying those methods of are the players who are feeling safe about their trades knowing that they are legit, and possibly getting hurt in the process, and i don't think that first offenders who are supposedly suspected of doing said actions should be receiving an permanent ban with no context provided to begin with.

In my honest opinion I'm more worried about the grand scheme of things, so far were in a very small and controlled environment , with less harm to be done, and less cases showing up due to a smaller playerbase, with examples (including my own) which can be used to fine tune those systems , i had 3 appeals denied with my ban case , and since i knew i never cheated , i went straight on showing proof of trades after i already knew about other people who got banned/unbanned for the same reasons, but only got accepted on my 4th after providing proof about trades which imo shouldn't be an issue to begin with, that also were months old, stuff that by the way, i was informed on my first appeal responses, that i couldn't be banned to begin with by this sentence "No player is banned for playing multiple accounts at the same time or for trading with other players" But apparently ended up to be the case.

So for now, were working with a much more managable numbers of players compared with what we will have on launch time, about issues that could hurt the game's popularity depending on how many people end up being affected, so the "it's only happening with a small percentage of players" argument doesn't work for me, as the same small percentage could be much more vocal once the game is out on all consoles and we have a much larger playerbase.

But also a part of me doesn't even care about numbers, if were in a situation where a single player could be falsely banned and not have the tools to get his problem fixed, it's enough to raise awareness and for some things to change.

Exactly.
If someone in your family was given the death penalty wrongfully. You would be angry, you wouldn't care about the "numbers".
You are paying for a product here. I paid 37$ for this product, and if I was banned from using it suddenly, I would expect to hear a solid reason on why, and I would want my ban appeal answered.

 

[Tao]

Except this isn't a death pentalty, this is losing access to a videogame account. There's no court hearing and you contractually agreed to Crema being able to do whatever the hell they please with your account, laid out in the Terms of Use.

The ban appeal system exists for false flags, and they're checked manually with a response from Crema - perhaps not an informative one regarding the reason for the ban, but no shit, that just allows cheaters to avoid detection. If there is no solid evidence against you, you get unbanned. And in most cases, you don't get banned in the first place.

 

[Pink G]

The ban appeal system exists for false flags, and they're checked manually with a response from Crema - perhaps not an informative one regarding the reason for the ban, but no shit, that just allows cheaters to avoid detection. If there is no solid evidence against you, you get unbanned.

This is not true at all. We know several users who have appealed multiple times, and they were "checked manually with a response from Crema" and no information was given. Somehow, because they are streamers and have proof of all their trades, they managed to get the support team to see their proof of innocence (discord screenshots, etc.) and got unbanned. The biggest problem with this is that Crema's appeal system was flawed, and the player had to on their own think and provide proof (which is not always possible) of previous trades.

It seems more like If there is no solid evidence of your innocence, you will not get unbanned.

 

[Shadowzs]

Except this isn't a death pentalty, this is losing access to a videogame account. There's no court hearing and you contractually agreed to Crema being able to do whatever the hell they please with your account, laid out in the Terms of Use.

The ban appeal system exists for false flags, and they're checked manually with a response from Crema - perhaps not an informative one regarding the reason for the ban, but no shit, that just allows cheaters to avoid detection. If there is no solid evidence against you, you get unbanned. And in most cases, you don't get banned in the first place.

I wonder if you actually took time to read the thread, were specifically talking about both the ban detection system, and the ban appeal process flaws, and the fact that you can remain unbanned even if there isn't solid evidence against you, actually even after you showed solid evidence that you're legit but there is remaining stuff in there for you to clear, so i honestly don't see your point. and like a said, "on most cases you don't get banned" is not an valid argument, especially when there are problems in the appeal system.

 

[Cemillion]

Except this isn't a death pentalty, this is losing access to a videogame account. There's no court hearing and you contractually agreed to Crema being able to do whatever the hell they please with your account, laid out in the Terms of Use.

The ban appeal system exists for false flags, and they're checked manually with a response from Crema - perhaps not an informative one regarding the reason for the ban, but no shit, that just allows cheaters to avoid detection. If there is no solid evidence against you, you get unbanned. And in most cases, you don't get banned in the first place.

People have been wrongfully banned, that's the bottom line, and that IS a problem. No two ways about it.

 

[Tao]

People have been wrongfully banned, that's the bottom line, and that IS a problem. No two ways about it.

That's what the ban appeal system is for. There is no 100% failproof ban system other than never banning anyone which would ruin the game.

It seems more like If there is no solid evidence of your innocence, you will not get unbanned.

Is that a feeling or is there substantial evidence in support of this claim? Legit wondering, because if there is, that would change the situation drastically.

 

[Pink G]

Is that a feeling or is there substantial evidence in support of this claim? Legit wondering, because if there is, that would change the situation drastically.

It's a feeling (hence, "it seems"), but considering those that got unbanned had their appeals be the typical reply that they are cheaters, and they only got unbanned by providing evidence themselves.

 

[Shadowzs]

Is that a feeling or is there substantial evidence in support of this claim? Legit wondering, because if there is, that would change the situation drastically.

There is substantial evidence but that's sensitive for you or the general playerbase to see, we don't want to give tools for people potentially with malicious intent to use, that is for Crema alone, this thread is aimed to raise awareness to the situation for those who are responsible, not to change player's minds.

 

[Tao]

It's a feeling (hence, "it seems"), but considering those that got unbanned had their appeals be the typical reply that they are cheaters, and they only got unbanned by providing evidence themselves.

What evidence did they provide specifically?

There is substantial evidence but that's sensitive for you or the general playerbase to see

That's too easy, isn't it? Might as well say Crema has substantial evidence for their bans, nullifying the point of this thread.. I frankly don't believe there is any such evidence, but feel free to DM me. As a dedicated member of the Crema Defence Force, you can be assured that I will not publicize your findings for cheaters to possibly use to improve their tactics.

Edit: The *Crema Defence Force* was a joke... obviously. Perhaps not make a mockery of people for disagreeing with you, and they won't make a mockery of those attempted insults.

 

[Solmy]

That's what the ban appeal system is for. There is no 100% failproof ban system other than never banning anyone which would ruin the game.

Is that a feeling or is there substantial evidence in support of this claim? Legit wondering, because if there is, that would change the situation drastically.

We have already been through this @Tao your argument is besides the point. You either haven't read the whole post or didn't understand what was said. As described in the first post the problem is not that the ban system might have the occasional false alarm, but how it is handled afterwards.
In the case described (you even get screenshots of the messages), the appeal to the ban was declined and the ticket closed, but after that they contacted the person again and reinstated the account.
If your system is that incoherent it hints at bigger problems behind the scenes, and criticizing a company for something they should do better, because you like the game is a very positive thing.
Jumping into the fray to defend Crema as if they are infallible is simply foolish, absolutely not necessary and even hurtful to a company that wants to improve their product during Early Access (something made for exactly that).

And because you don't seem to understand, maybe Crema staff might be able to get through to you.

 

[Jay Winters]

What evidence did they provide specifically?



That's too easy, isn't it? Might as well say Crema has substantial evidence for their bans, nullifying the point of this thread..

I Fail to see how giving you this information helps things As there is nothing saying you are part of Crema. So how does us giving you this information help the conversation?

 

[Shadowzs]

That's too easy, isn't it? Might as well say Crema has substantial evidence for their bans, nullifying the point of this thread..

I think you're missing the point, this post was a request from Crema themselves, that cointain data what can be reviewed by them and also discussed between members (which can also provide with additional data) and not by the players, hard evidence which contain sensitive information will be provided to them (the people who can actually do something) and not to anyone else.

 

[TMTrainer]

I think you're missing the point, this post was a request from Crema themselves, that cointain data what can be reviewed by them and also discussed between members (which can also provide with additional data) and not by the players, hard evidence which contain sensitive information will be provided to them (the people who can actually do something) and not to anyone else.

I think phrasing it as a request from us is a little incorrect. I stated that, if you wanted to bring this issue up publicly, the best way to go about doing this would be to put together a solid post in an as professional way as possible and post it on the forums and/or Reddit. That's all I said to both Shintegami (on stream) and Sebile (in DMs) when it was brought up to me. Edit: Sebile, actually, was already in the process of doing so, so I just confirmed it as the best course of action.

 

[Shintegami]

I think phrasing it as a request from us is a little incorrect. I stated that, if you wanted to bring this issue up publicly, the best way to go about doing this would be to put together a solid post in an as professional way as possible and post it on the forums and/or Reddit. That's all I said to both Shintegami (on stream) and Sebile (in DMs) when it was brought up to me. Edit: Sebile, actually, was already in the process of doing so, so I just confirmed it as the best course of action.

Yes, "request" is not the best word of choice, as that may have been misconstrued, but it was expected and they were already made aware that this post was coming to the correct appropriate channels, they acknowledged that this does give them insight on community feedback, regardless. (This was on stream to confirm my statement, if that provides any proof).

 

[Shadowzs]

I think phrasing it as a request from us is a little incorrect. I stated that, if you wanted to bring this issue up publicly, the best way to go about doing this would be to put together a solid post in an as professional way as possible and post it on the forums and/or Reddit. That's all I said to both Shintegami (on stream) and Sebile (in DMs) when it was brought up to me. Edit: Sebile, actually, was already in the process of doing so, so I just confirmed it as the best course of action.

You are correct , wording it "requesting" wasn't right, but i honestly had the impression that this was at least "expected" to Crema from how they acted on stream, and that the intention of this post were to provide info that could potentially be useful when reviewing this situation, and that's all.

 

[Ashlington]

Good to see this is being talked about, I'd like to provide some of my own feedback and fears to help open the mind of some and support the information of others.

Some of you may know me in game, I go by Ashlington on every platform and I would say I am a very involved member in the community. Pre-inserting pansun era (oh man my finger still feels the pain) I would assist a streamer that I moderator for during auction houses in large trades just due to the massive amount of time it would take to complete large trades. I've traded over hundreds of people, I've traded over millions of suns, expensive lumas, items, you name it. I have never received a ban and honestly I'm shocked. I feel like I've done super sketchy trades, maybe buying things from RMTers or even having people who do bot or RMT trade me their lumas to sell on auction/collecting their payout/if they bought something.

On the other hand, the person that I help with auctions has been falsely banned twice now. He is a streamer and has footage of probably 99% of all trades he's done and he is able to prove his innocence against those flags.

But what about the people like me? I'll be honest besides just discord DMs if I do decide to buy something off the discord, I havent taken any screenshots at all. I have probably 0 "solid" screenshot/video/clip evidence that I could use to defend myself if I do get swung by the ban hammer. What do I do then? How do I prove myself as innocent without logging every single trade I do with screenshots and time stamps and dates? But on the contrary, why should I have to do that? I'll be the first to say I don't really have any interest on logging every trade I do and saving in a folder titled "proof for appeal."

This is what we're scared of. On one hand tsukki says don't be afraid to trade, we can easily tell. To the next the false ban happens BECAUSE you made those trades. I hope you logged every trade because you gotta prove your innocence against those flags, baby.

I think I have a good understanding about how the ban system works. Flags stack up on your account and when you hit a certain amount you get smited by the gods themselves. From what I understand, you have to proof every flag to get your account unbanned. From what I also understand, the flags don't expire, I could have made a trade 4 months ago to some random guy and thats a flag I'll have to prove my innocence on. Some people are unable to do this and I'll be honest, I would be unable to do this! I fear some may still be falsely banned because they don't have proof of every flag. They also don't know how many flags they have or when they're from because when you do get banned, there is no information given to you. Prove your innocence, but what did I do wrong? How many flags do I have? From when? What do I do?

You guys have value and I respect your decision on making bans "give as little information" as possible to prevent the cheaters from knowing they specifically got banned. But I feel like there is something I am missing here. If I was a botter or an RMTer and I got banned, I know WHY I was banned. I don't need information from an appeal saying oh well you botted, botters know they get banned and they change the bot anyway. I know there are scumbags who do appeal anyway even though they know why they were banned and I get that.

This being said every other game I have played tells you a reason why you were banned. To have a blanket response of "well you cheated" when there are false bans happening is extremely frustrating and unfair to those banned. There's no way to know what triggered your account, you have to play that guessing game on your appeal.

I think this inevitably needs to be addressed, updated, or fixed in a way to let innocent players have the chance to prove themselves like hey, I really am innocent and let me show you why. I think the trade lock was a good idea, at least you can actually still play while you appeal, it also makes bot accounts and RMTers useless. Also maybe it just my opinion on it, but permanent bans feel very.. harsh? Especially for a game that is quite expensive for EA. Most games I play have the standard 2 weeks ban then to permaban, and in obvious cases of cheating it's a permaban.

I think Crema has come a long way since that tweet where they said no ban appeals will be done. You guys lost a lot of support from your community on that but I am glad you realized the value on why ban appeals are needed. I am excited to see the progress on the system as we grow in size and knowledge and I do believe you guys are trying to figure things out.

Thank you for letting us give feedback.