Possibly OT?: "Taint"

[DarkChaos1]

I don't have the time to comment right now, but I would like to say I have read all the posts in this thread thus far and I agree with Dash and Quickdeath. Quick's post was right on the money.

When (if) I get the willpower in the next day or two I'll add my own thoughts as an objective observer of the trade pool, who does not trade and cannot get tainted.

 

[sirpoopsalot]

I'm not sure if anyone would ever bother to hack in a bunch of duped gems, it seems that if you're going to cheat you usually go all out, but that would be an interesting situation for the mods to clear up. Glad I'm not a mod

IIRC, this is precisely why jantia was recently banned. From what my 12 braincells can also remember, he admitted this freely out of conscience (without being accused of anything first), and after Cat & Hrus discussed it with him, he was banned. But, they accepted jantia's word that he did not hack, dupe, or cheat any other time (which was important, because jantia was an active trader in the SPTF).

Again, that's what I remember, but I'm not positive I'm 100% accurate in the details. My 11 braincells are taxed to the max (I killed off #12 just typing this :tongue.



Sorry, I can't contribute much else to this discussion, but jantia's recent example sums it up for me: it's one of those 'shades of grey' things, where the best policy is to deal with it on a case-by-case basis when problems arise.

 

[Hp_Sauce]

And Hp, I understand your wanting to lump "tainted" players into a separate trade pool, but this would last until the next big hacking scandal. Especially if you use that many degrees of separation the entire SPF trading community would very quickly all be labeled IT level X, and the only people without that label would be those that do not trade and thus do not care.

At least people would know everyone was tainted, rather then just guessing 100% of the time, and I'm not convinced that it would be as out of control as you think it would be. However, it seems that the IT system is not the "hit" idea I had thought it would be, so I'm going to drop it.

I believe I have said what I feel, what I believe, what I think should be done about it, and concidering the fact that I don't trade or MP, that is probably plenty of things for me to say about the subject. So I'm going to remove myself from this subject and leave it up to everyone else to decide. Good luck!

I would however like to leave you all with a story.

<story>

I bought a car stereo off a fellow once. It was actually priced reasonable close to "market value" for its quality. It turned out the stereo was stolen. I was charged with "possession of stolen propery under $5,000."

It was not obvious the stereo was stolen. Certainly I could have wonder about it, but wondering was all I could have done because there was no proof either way really.

As punishment I was required to do 30 hours of community service. I had to pay a fine of $300, AND I had to pay $200 to the original owner of the stereo to replace the car window the thief had smashed.

I did not smash the window yet I still had to pay for it, I did not know the stereo was stolen yet I had to do community service and pay money to the government as punishment.

The thief/seller still has the money I paid him for the stereo as well.

</story>

It's a bit hypicritical of the system I was trying to set up which would not punish the bystandard, but perhaps that is why I felt that is how it should be, because I know how it feels to get completely shafted.

The purpose of my story is simple though.
- For those of you who think that "fair market value" could be used as a shield, or an excuse to pleed your innocense/ignorence, I beg to differ. The judge certainly did not give a rats *** in my case.

- The judge also didn't care that I could have bought the same stereo (but legit) from the next guy down the street.

- I will never forget the fact that I had to pay $200 dollars to the person who owned the stereo for replacing their smashed window, WHICH I DID NOT SMASH! It is insanity.

Now that I look back on it, perhaps it was more of an excuse to tell a story, rather then being relevent to this debate. but, meh! I've typed it now. Do with it as you please.

I will continue to read and see what you decided in the end.

again, good luck!
-hps

 

[pharaoh1]

Sure I could go wrong. Can't exclude that totally.
But then I made the decission to trade with someone and with that agreed to accept the consequence of maybe having to delete lots of stuff, if not everything.
I wouldn't call myself a victim.

Just figure I'd chime in here. Much of what I would have said has already been said by others, so I won't go into depth there (for those who care, I'm of a similar opinion to Serdash, Thyiad, and Hp_Sauce), but I wanted to make this point.

While you might choose not to call yourself a victim, that is your choice. However, remember that others may very well approach the game differently. Multiplayer capability and the trade system were put into the game by its creators, and not by accident either, so I don't think it's going too far to infer that making use of them is playing the game as it is intended to be played. Can you pay the game without them, while also playing it as intended? Yes, certainly, but that does not mean that it's the only valid approach.

Since everyone else is giving analogies, I will too. Imagine I see an ad in the classifieds for a used car. I call up the owner, go to see the car, and end up buying it, as I need something to cummete to and from work. Two months later, the police come to my house, inform me the car is stolen property, confiscate it, and proceed to question me.

• Am I at fault? I think we can all agree that the car needs to go- in this case, back to the original owner. Should I go to jail, though? Most jurisdictions that punish someone for possession of stolen property only do so when it can be shown that the person was aware the property was stolen, or should have been aware. Diablo II: Most, if not all, will agree that the hacked/duped item should go. However, I would argue that it's not fair to punish me for making a good-faith bad trade; the loss of the item I traded for is punishment enough (especially if I can't recover the item I offered in exchange, as is likely the case for trades that happened some time ago).

• What about the person who sold me the car? They might be as much a victim as I am. If they acquired the vehicle in a good-faith manner, and were unaware of its history, then they should be innocent. On the other hand, if they stole it in the first place, then obviously they are guilty of a crime- two, probably, as stealing and then selling will likely be separate offences. Diablo II: Like me, the seller/trader's culpability depends upon knowledge and intent. If they traded something they knew (or reasonably suspected) was hacked or duped, then they ought to be put in the stocks for a fortnight while rats from the Kurast sewers nibble upon their tender parts. Otherwise, the consequences for them should not go beyond returning the item offered in trade, or (if this is no longer available/able to be isolated from others) an equivalent item.

• What about my job? Since I would have lost my job if unable to show up for work, so should I now be fired because I (unknowingly) used a stolen car to get there? Should my employer's profits be adjusted to reflect sales, production, etc that I may have been involved in securing? Diablo II: Do I need to toss items found while using the hacked item, and do people who traded/played multiplayer with me need to likewise rewind (or delete) their progress? Personally, I don't think so. While I might well choose to, I don't think it should be mandatory.

Back to my original point, yes, I could have opted not to buy the car. I could have chosen to take the bus, my bike, whatever to get to work, but does the fact I made the choice to buy a car mean I cannot be a victim? What about a woman who walks home in 'provocative' clothes, and gets raped while doing so? Was she not a victim, because she was 'asking for it', 'made the choice', and 'should have known better'? I guess what I'm saying is that while choosing not to trade is a perfectly valid way to play the game (it's how I play), it's not the only way, and it doesn't mean that people who choose to play otherwise deserve what they get when they run afoul of bad trades. Is it a possibility if you trade? Yes. Is it deserved? Only if you're an idiot or willfully blind. This last point needs clarification. Remember that it must be placed within the person's experience. Remember, too, that many people play the game quite casually, and do not have detailed knowledge of what items are and are not possible, or relative rarities. If a brand new player finds a SoJ after havin the game for 3 weeks, and then finds another within a week, it's perfectly reasonable for that player to conclude it's not too rare (especially if they weren't playing heavily). If they get offered one in trade, they might not even suspect it could be a dupe, even if they are aware of the existence of such dupes. My dad, for example, played the game at one point; I am confident if someone had offered him a powerful item, he'd have taken it without thinking overmuch on its origins.

[edit] On the topic of 'taint' being conferred by playing games with people using such items: I don't think it transfers, any more than the hitchhiker I pick up in my car should be punished for riding in a stolen vehicle, unless they know it is stolen (regardless of what I know). If the host of a game is running drop mods, etc, then obviously, items that drop in the game need to be deleted to maintain purity, but the characters should not need deletion. The only time I think it would be warranted to demand the characters be deleted would be if there was a mod that increased the game's exp rewards (through higher rewards per kill, or easier kills). [/edit]

 

[Spearthrower]

HPS.... that's almost unbelievable that story!!

I think I would have politely told the judge where to go and to send me to prison instead. Don't you guys have a system there where if you have committed no previous crimes then you basically get a slap on the wrist and bound over for x period of months? Sounds absurd!

Anyways... /agrees with the rational and sensible level of debate here - good points being made with need to demonise all recipients of hacked/duped items.

 

[Serdash]

Hey guys, sorry I haven't been around to post in this thread, but I just got back from work and I've had a chance to read everyone's comments thus far.

I have quite a few things to say, but I'm lacking the willpower to do write them right now, so I'll only comment on one thing that jumped out at me as some kind of misunderstanding, or at the very least a very wrongly put comment.

Lastly, let me put out a vote against damned or I.T. classification. It sounds kind but is ultimately a way to allow hacked items into an SPF supported trading pool

How exactly is an item found when using an unknowingly hacked item, automatically turned into a hacked item? I'm still questioning this "taint" thing that it might be infected with, but from what I gather taint != hacked. Maybe I misunderstood your comment, possibly you wrote it in a strange way, but I think the "damned" or the "I.T." title or whatever it is would be for someone who had been burned but didn't want to get rid of tons of progress that happened because of that +2 to strength large charm in their inventory.

Also, on a slightly different note, I'm curious as to what everyones opinions are on all of these lines being drawn for certain situations.

When I say lines I speak of things like drawing the line at someone who was burned entirely without their knowledge versus someone who was burned but got "caught" with an item they should have or possibly already did know was bad.

Or lines drawn such as, "Well if he was given an Enigma, bankthx" but "If he was given a few PGems, whatever. It's just PGems."

My question on the "lines" is more on the "rarity" of items portion rather than the "knowledge of the trade" one. Since knowledge of the bad trade is somewhat edgy on a, "Yeah, that was stupid, you deserve to delete everything you own." type of scale.

I'll make more comments later, but I like the way the discussion has developed and I'd like to thank those of you who have kept it civil and have been typing more than one line replies.

@Spearthrower: You'd be surprised at how much I pwn things like this with... coherent posts when things spark my interest.

@Thiyad: Don't worry, agreeing with me on some things is often good. I'm not an idiot, you know. I gots me an edumacation that lets me think about things good. ;P

@Hp_Sauce: Trust me, if I was mocking you, I would outright let you know. The similarity between the way my post was formatted and the way your post was formatted is completely coincidental, and I'm sorry if it made you feel like I was personally attacking you, because I wasn't.

@Everyone Else: I've noticed a few mentions of Suiling in this thread, some of them probably a bit... eh... for a lack of better words, "out of line". Read the quote on the first line of my post that states, "Let Suiling be for now", because I included that for a reason. This subject wasn't brought up just because of what recently happen, but it's been in my mind for a while now. I didn't want this thread to seem like it was completely based off of recent events, and since previous mentioned thread seemed to be quite the thread to bash Suiling in, I want none of that here. In fact, try to not even mention that member's name in your posts unless necessary. We're not here to name names or point fingers at any situations. Let things in the past rest a bit.


Well. I suppose that's it from me for now. A quick shower and I'll continue reading the thread and such. Keep it up guys, I like it when my rantings turn into good things.

 

[Cormallon]

Well, Hrus said in another thread, that most people support this taint concept. Maybe he's wrong... there are quite some people like me who don't trade and usually stay out of these discussions.

Serdash made some very good points here, and this thread in my opinion shows how ridiculous the taint concept got. I said before that with such a concept the victim of a hack gets heavily punished, deleting all kind of stuff including very high level chars, while the hacker gets away with just a ban. The ban disables him from posting and playing tournaments, and just here in the SPF. He can continue playing his chars and items, even go to other forums. The victim loses everything.

Drawing imaginary lines to distinguish different cases of 'taint' doesn't make it better, just more complicated. And it opens all kinds of discussions if a special case is on this side or on the other of such a line. Not good.

We have to accept the fact that we can't be sure, ever. We may take all kinds of actions, supervising the creation of high end runewords and such, but there will always be a risk. My solution is: accept that risk, and trade, delete the hacked items if such an item is detected, and thats it. Or don't trade if you can't take the risk. Otherwise, you WILL be burned one day.

I know there are some things that may seem hard to accept, like FBobs 9999MF bow (obviously hacked and to be deleted) which allowed him to find all kinds of stuff easily, and that stuff is according to SPF rules 'tainted'. But what the heck... use these or not, it's your own decision. The found items are in no way different than others found without the hacked item. They shouldn't exist after such a short time of playing ... or should they? Every individual item could have been dropped anytime, even with 0 MF. The collection of items is what is questionable, not a single one.

Just my opinion, of course.

 

[Gaz]

So, I've now read the last five pages of this and have decided to put my opinion on the matter down on paper.

First, a little background. I started playing diablo 2 when it was released. a mate of mine was also playing and he'd found a hack/character editor that you could use to reset the charsi quest. At the time it was all single player and I'm of the opinion that whatever you want to do on your computer is fine as long as it doesnt affect me.

Later, after the expansion came out I decided to try and find some character editors. This was mainly so I could see how certain builds played without going through the lengthy process of levelling them up. To do this I needed the items for them as well, and as a result I got hold of an item pack, containing everythimg. now clearly this was not legitimate, and I knew it. But is was mainly for testing purposes and I didn't really play with the characters. Of course testing characters like that doesn't work, because you haven't developed the strategy required for the build.

Then I found this forum, and lurked for a bit trying to get a feel for what the community was like (a practice I generally do). Having now seen that I had been doing what was effectively cheating, and that I wanted to get involved on the site, I did what was necessary, I deleted all the editor/hacks/item packs, and did a reinstall of diablo 2 so that I could trade/give away stuff with a clean conscience. Of course I soon realised that even though I was trading in good faith, some people might not be. and so I stopped trading.

[/end background]

So, here is the opinion part. Because of the nature of the community - being based on integrity - a line has to be drawn somewhere. It doesn't matter what the line is, or what your personal views on the matter are. There has to be some line that is universally applied. And it is up to the mods to make sure that it is applied with an even hand (not a task I envy)

In the case of duped/hacked items, any item found using such item needs to be removed from the trading pool, along with the dupes/hacks. This is applied to everyone, and the reason for it as I see it is the following. If you allow these items to stay in the trade pool, even if found legitimately, but while using a hacked item, you are basically condoning the use of the hacked item. Whether you were aware that the item was hacked or not. To use the analogies given earlier:
For the athletes - the one who took the substance knowingly will probably be banned for life. The one who was given the substance by his coach/doctor will still receive a ban and be stripped of his title, although the ban may be a little less severe. For the Diablo 2 version. Knowingly using a hacked/duped item is inforgiveable and you should be banned from the community, end of story. The fact that you have done this once speaks to the fact that you will probably do it again. Unwittingly using a hacked or duped item doesn't necessarily mean you're innocent, but it does mean that any items found while using said item should be removed, and depending on the nature the characters should be deleted from the community.

For the stolen property argument - again the person who knowingly bought or sold stolen property should be banned for life. However, and this is the problem, if there was not a market for the stolen goods, the items would not be stolen. No Market = no value, and it is this that the law enforcement officials (cops, judges etc) are trying to get right, hence the fact that posession of stolen property is illegal. Whether you were aware that is was stolen or not doesn't change the nature of the item. The diablo 2 arguments are the same as above.

The problem with allowing "Levels of taint" is that there is nothing to stop someone knowingly using a duped item, and then proclaiming innocence that they weren't aware that is was duped and being allowed to continue. This is the practice that is trying to be stopped by removing "tainted items"

Admittedly, if you are going to trade, there is always going to be some risk, because of the market for the high end items, and by trading you knowingly take that risk.

(Apologies for the slightly rambling nature of the post, and if the mods want to take any action against me for my admitted past actions then so be it. It's a risk I'm willing to take)

Cormallion goes on about the victim taking all the punishment, but here's the choice part. If you are the victim the choice is to remove all the tainted items and continue to be part of the community, or not and leave.

[highlight]The rules are not there to protect the individual, but rather the SPF community as a whole.[/highlight]

 

[Cormallon]

Cormallon goes on about the victim taking all the punishment, but here's the choice part. If you are the victim the choice is to remove all the tainted items and continue to be part of the community, or not and leave.

Well, what a choice is that? Take a ban instead of destroying your chars? Remember, you did nothing wrong!

What about placing some hacks / dupes everywhere, and when you have enough of the SPF, blow the whole thing by revealing these dupes? In that case, these rules don't protect the community, just the opposite. And even if we don't talk about this kind of attack, the fear and suspicions are slowly killing the community, too.

Ban the hacker / duper (and those who knowingly use hacks / dupes), delete hacked / duped items, but don't force the victims to delete more.

 

[Mursilis]

Just a small point. The unwilling victim of receiving a hacked and/or tainted item is not "forced" to delete. That is more a personal choice than anything else.

You will notice that some members of the forum have multiple installs of Diablo, one Vanilla and one RWM (or maybe a different mod). These installs are completely seperate and have their own sepearate ATMA stashes and such. This is accepted and if the person is trusted then people will trade/MP with them knowing said individual is using the correct items/characters.

In the same vein the unwilling victim could do the same thing. Retain all characters and such instead of doing a full delete or leaving the community. However to continue to interact with the community and trade/MP they would need to create a completely seperate set of characters/stashes.

Said victim would still be able to play with and use the old characters and have fun doing so, even if they are tainted. These characters could not MP or trade but they would still be enjoyable(and isn't that the point of playing?). In the same light the brand new characters would be starting from scratch but would be able to trade/MP. Granted this does require the victim to go the extra step and does hurt them in a way, but they aren't forced to delete their favorite characters. That is simply one choice among many the victim may make.

 

[Gaz]

Like I said. It's my opinion on the matter. Basically, what you choose to do on your computer is up to you. However I think Mursilis has it right, if you choose to interact (trade etc) with the rest of the community then you have to abide by the mods decision, or your own conscience whichever is the harsher.

The whole dupe hack thing is the main reason that this time I'm going completely self found. That way i don't have to worry about a thing.

 

[FlimFlan]

Excellent posts Cormallon. You touched on something that no one else has, and Sint is the perfect example. He unknowingly played for a number of years with a duped/hacked item (not sure which) and I am sure he found lots of nice stuff. If you set up some scoring system, he would go from a "revered" member, to someone using a tainted item. A huge portion of his items are now tainted and he would have to restart to get back into the good graces of the community. Now, EVERY SINGLE PERSON who traded with him after he received the item would also be the beneficiaries of the taint. They would have to do full restarts because they Sint might not have found an item he traded with them if he had not been using his tainted item.

How far do you take this? Pretty soon, no one would be able to trade unless they all did restarts.

PS Sint, I hope you aren't offended by my use of your situation. I just think it perfectly illustrates what the consequences can be. Things have certainly gone way off how dupes/hacks were originally handled here.

 

[Uncle_Mike]

Excellent posts Cormallon. You touched on something that no one else has, and Sint is the perfect example. He unknowingly played for a number of years with a duped/hacked item (not sure which) and I am sure he found lots of nice stuff. If you set up some scoring system, he would go from a "revered" member, to someone using a tainted item. A huge portion of his items are now tainted and he would have to restart to get back into the good graces of the community. Now, EVERY SINGLE PERSON who traded with him after he received the item would also be the beneficiaries of the taint. They would have to do full restarts because they Sint might not have found an item he traded with them if he had not been using his tainted item.

How far do you take this? Pretty soon, no one would be able to trade unless they all did restarts.

This is slightly OT but I find it ironic how many threads laughing at bnet are made in SPF yet it is even easier to dupe items in single player and SPF trading is a lot more trust dependant i.e. inefficient.

When trading on bnet you can at least assume that only elite items/high runes may be duped. Yes, MAY, not everything is duped. Also, contrary to the public believe duping is not performed by regular players and requires third party software or exploitation of glitches. There was a public method out a while ago but items copied were, so to speak, unstable and most if not all of them have since poofed which is obviously a good thing. Runes can never be trusted, neither on bnet nor in sp for they have no fingerprint (sp) and get permed when socketed (bnet).

The post quoted is a perfect example of a situation that would lead the entire forum to "reset" and start from scratch.

The only solution to this imo is not to trade at all or trade only with selected members whom one considers trusted (and might be proved wrong as well). Tainted items IMO are those that were duped/hacked. If they are proven to be not legit simply delete them without restoring items that were exchanged for them. In fact that would be similar to battlenet. I bought an item, it poofed, i will not get the runes I paid for it anyway.

Mike

 

[Hp_Sauce]

Sorry, could not resist myself.

He unknowingly played for a number of years with a duped/hacked item (not sure which) and I am sure he found lots of nice stuff. If you set up some scoring system, he would go from a "revered" member, to someone using a tainted item.

Thyiad is a RWM/RRM user. Is he a revered memeber or a hacker? Seems like he is a well liked and well respected person.

So whats the difference between choosing to use some distant tainted items instead of deleting 2 years worth of work compared to using RWM/RRM because you don't feel like playing on b.net, or because you don't feel like missing a rune the falls on the gound?

-hps

 

[noobintraining]

Sorry, could not resist myself.



Thyiad is a RWM/RRM user. Is he a revered memeber or a hacker? Seems like he is a well liked and well respected person.

So whats the difference between choosing to use some distant tainted items instead of deleting 2 years worth of work compared to using RWM/RRM because you don't feel like playing on b.net, or because you don't feel like missing a rune the falls on the gound?

-hps

I thought Thyiad is a she?

 

[xGDx]

All the philisophical discussions are interesting but to me seem to miss the bigger picture. A few times its been mentioned that was trading comes down to is trust. You have a community here, and you set up rules by which you all agree to abide by. When trades happen within the community, then all these philisophical discussions seem fairly applicable to how to treat all the parties involved.

However since folks play MP, and trade on open bnet, its not just this community thats involved now is it? You make agreements here, but then you involved folks in the transactions that have made no such commitments.

Another thing that has been mentioned often in these discussions is the idea of "victim". This tends to suggest that most here believe members here do want to follow the rules, and sometimes end up in situations where through no intention of their own, they do break the rules. From this I gather that those who intentionally spread hacks/dupes are seen as the greater villain in these situations.

So now you have folks in this community, talking about how to appropriately rake a member over the coals, though the real villain in likely not even a member of this community.

With lack of a villain to point to, in my opinion more attention and accusations are being thrown at the victim.

To finish up, if you want to truly have a safer trading community, then you need to make a rule that says you can only trade with folks who are part of your community, and therefor bound by the rules the community has set up. If you are going to continue to allow trades outside your community, then I think a healthy regard for the realities of the open bnet should mitigate the kinds of repurcussions some of you suggest should befall the victims of your community.

 

[Bandit]

Forgive my ignorance, I've never even played open before, but if someone got a hacked item and gave the correct trade value for it....what's the problem, really? They sacrificed the right amount of items / charms / runes / whatever and get a hacked item that they didn't know about, does that really put them in the wrong? To me it seems rather harsh to have them delete everything when they already went through the trouble of trading legit items for an illegit one. How about instead we figure out who traded them the hacked item and put them on a no-trade list or something?

 

[Hp_Sauce]

I thought Thyiad is a she?

It makes no difference, it was just an example and I picked the first person I came across whom I could confirm was using RWM/RRM

I could just as easily have used Aerwynd, AJK, nebux, sirpoopsalot, jjscud, Milb, Frozen Orb, Dark Matter, etc. The list goes on and on.

Jeez, it's almost like RWM/RRM is infesting the forum, taking over? Yet it is allowed, the Vanilla people have no problems talking to us or sharing ideas with us. Hell, some RWM/RRM users are probably respected by Vanilla user's because of their accomplishments.

So why is it so horrible for tainted people to have their own title?.

Vanilla
RWM/RRM
Tainted

The tainted people are not evil, they are not the spawn of Diablo himself. They are normal people who did not wish to destroy years of work because some prick gave them a tainted +2 Strength charm.

-hps

 

[noobintraining]

It makes no difference, it was just an example and I picked the first person I came across whom I could confirm was using RWM/RRM

I could just as easily have used Aerwynd, AJK, nebux, sirpoopsalot, jjscud, Milb, Frozen Orb, Dark Matter, etc. The list goes on and on.

Of course it makes no difference what gender Thyiad is, I was only asking for clarity's sake.

Jeez, it's almost like RWM/RRM is infesting the forum, taking over? Yet it is allowed, the Vanilla people have no problems talking to us or sharing ideas with us. Hell, some RWM/RRM users are probably respected by Vanilla user's because of their accomplishments.

As for the entire "taint" issue, I have no opinion since I don't trade or MP. But I would like to say that, yes, as a vanilla player I have a lot of respect for the RWM/RRW crowd. You (and mostly all SPF members) amaze me with your finds and patience.

 

[Thyiad1]

Definitions time:

• Closed bnet - the realms
• Open bnet - taking single player characters onto the realm
• Single player - LAN/TCP/IP or single player games
• She would be the correct word to use in relation to myself

The forum does not regard Open bnet as legit. Characters who have been on open would not be welcome in MP/trade here. This discussion pertains to single player only.

@HP - You're right I play RWM/RRM. I also play Vanilla. Would I want to play as 'tainted'? No. Why? Because I am being punished for something I didn't do.

I appreciate that you may be trying to eliminate the necessity of deleting a load of stuff but I cannot agree with it because it is still punishing the victims. The implication is we hack. We don't; we got swindled by someone who (might be) hacking. And that 'might be' is very very important.

Simplicity has to be the key. You cannot regulate for every situation; discretion has to be there. Common law is the most important and flexible law; it can cover a wealth of situations that Statutory law cannot. By making a simplified set of rules with the abilty for Mods to be flexible, everyone wins.

@all - In my post on page 1, I clearly make a distinction between deliberate haxxoring, not obvious but haxxored items and items which look perfectly legit but come from someone suspected/found to be hacking.

Many of the posts in this thread are missing are the third category. Why am I deleting items which look perfectly legit?

I fully appreciate the need to keep the trade pool clean. But if I trade a perfectly legit looking grim shield from <a later banned member> and use that for sixty levels, why do I have to delete it and the character and either whatever else he found (if I can remember) or everything (if I can't)? The shield looks fine, no one can say it isn't. I could just have easily waited and grabbed one from the floor somewhere but I didn't. So why am I forced to restart when the item in question looks perfectly normal?

Scenario 2: same as above but the shield turned out to have the wrong number of sockets (IE less obviously haxxored). Delete the shield and replace it with a legit one but the characters/characters' finds and stashes should stay. A bit of an overreaction to have to restart because of an item that may not be that important (EG rhyme shield).

My caveat in my first post still stands. If that item is an Enigma then the boundaries change.

It is erroneous in my opnion to relate these situations to real life. It isn't. It's a computer game. BUT we all put effort and care into our characters and unless we respond with sympathy to those who have had a bad experience at the hands of morons, the temptation is that they will keep quiet; and then the trade pool doesn't even get rid of the haxxored items.

Let me ask you all how many people do you think have kept quiet about a trade with a later banned member because they didn't fancy a restart? And I don't mean a trade in the Trade Forum, I mean trades done by PM? Think about it. Only one person admitted to moving items 1.11 to classic. Doesn't mean no one else did it; it means they didn't want to have to delete the runes they rushed and everything traded for those runes.