NQ-Nyzaltar

@RedstarBunny Your post have been edited and an explanation has been given. As the only purpose of this thread is only meant to bash Customer Support and not finding a solution, it will be now locked.

Hi @Nightranger Thank you for standing up against misleading information. However, why it's understandable that you may be frustrated, there is an explanation for every point you've mentioned: 1) The difference in time to apply the punishment: A mod may not have seen immediately the rule broken by the other community member. It could also be a different mod who see the other player posts and yours. Moreover, until recently, we had a very relaxed policy in terms of moderation on the Discord. We are all (the Novaquark team and the Moderator team) for the freedom of speech. However, recently, with the populations growth and recent technical problems, some people abused clearly this freedom and made the Discord a lot less friendly that it used to be. The frustration is understandable when there are issues, but some community have crossed the line. So it has been asked to the Moderator team to enforce a moderation rules in a stricter way. The moderation has become suddenly heavy, maybe a bit too heavy, and some adjustments probably need to be made. Perfectly balanced moderation is not something that easy, especially on a Discord with thousands of players. Though they may have had a heavy hand in that case, The mods have done their job. 2) Regarding the fact that the other involved person was a backer: It was never taken into account in the sanction. If he was let free to speak as he did until now, it wasn't because he was a backer, but because he started to do it during a time where the moderation policy was more relaxed. A few backers started to have an unacceptable behavior on Discord, and they got heavily sanctioned (and among them were some backers with a much higher level than the one you interacted with. Being a backer is not a protection nor a freepass to have a toxic behavior, no matter the backer level). 3) The reason for the sanction: On a global level, calling someone "shitmongering idiot" fall into the profanity field. You were not really muted for the word "idiot", but more for "shitmongering". While it was probably deserverd this time, it's a slippery slope to allow it, as others may use in other context, provocative and not necessary deserved. Though it's totally understandable that you feel frustrated to have been pushed while fighting disinformation, the punishment (30 minutes) wasn't that strong, even if it was maybe a bit heavy, due to the context. A simple warning could have work too, but again, keep in mind that there are thousands of players on the Discord now and it's not always easy to make the perfect call on the spot. After discussing with the Moderation team it was clearly nothing personal. Also, yes, though your post were removed (and a bunch of others), there is proof as some bot is logging removed posts. 4) The 24 hours mute reason: Well, the rule you broke this time was pretty clear. It's the same on both Discord and the Forum, and it's a fairly common rule among internet communities: "Do not challenge/call out publicly a Mod decision." @Braddock512 is right: If you have an issue, try to talk in private with the Moderator or at least one Moderator who is available. If you're not convinced by the explanation and you have very solid reasons of not accepting the mod decision, then you can escalate to a Community Manger (NQ-Naerais, NQ-Nomad or I). By challenging/calling out publicly, it can be interpreted as a way to make trouble and not really a will to find an explanation or a solution. It never ends with a happy ending when done in public. Because of what has just been explained, this rule will never change. Ultimately, if you see someone starting spreading disinformation, if it seems the person cannot be reasonned, do as @blazemonger said: ping the mods. That's a valid reason to ping them. Do not take the risk of putting yourself in trouble by starting saying profanity. It's not because some around do that and haven't been moderated (yet) that it's okay to do it yourself in return. Moderators may not have eyes everywhere at any time, and again, keep in mind that the discussion flow is quite fast, making it difficult to spot everything, because the Discord hosts thousands of players. All in all, we'll try to improve the moderation of the Discord, to make it more adapted to the Community growth. We just ask you to be a bit more patient. Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

@Kyllian @ToothlessRaider @LouHodo The current waiting queue for the Customer Support is exceptional and temporary The Customer Support had a decent response time in Alpha (around 48-72 hours). However, the surge of requests exploded with Beta Launch, and we are currently scaling up our Customer Support team to catch up with the amount of requests. Please be patient. If you have no answer yet, it's not because the Customer Support doesn't want to answer you. It's just that there are way too many tickets to handle each of them as quickly as the team would like. On a side note, this forum has rules: insults, provocations & flaming are not tolerated. I will put the posts above on the (understandable) frustration, but if this continues we will moderate without further notice. Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi @Anomalos @Morlock and @Verd_Mooring Welcome in the Dual Universe community! Just a kind reminder though: while it's perfectly fine to gather between players sharing the same affinities (whether it's religion, culture, or any other topic), keep in mind that no promotion of any religion is allowed on any platform managed by Novaquark (the Dual Universe forum, the official Dual Universe Discord server, the in-game chat, or any of the social media managed by Novaquark). Also please refrain to bump the topic if there is no new reply for a while (if everyone started to do the same, it would become really messy). We hope you'll understand our stance on the matter. Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Why adopt an anti-cheat system? It’s no secret: Cheating is prevalent in many multiplayer games. It’s an even bigger problem in a Single-Shard metaverse with PvP, like Dual Universe. Therefore, we needed to put several safety measures in place to ensure a fair game for all players. Our client anti-cheat implementation is one of these measures. The main goal of the EQU8 anti-cheat system we adopted is to prevent modification of the game client as a lot of cheats rely on these modifications in order to access hidden data, automate actions, or display extra information to the cheater. For example, a "wall hack" usually reads the other players positions in the game memory and overlays these on the game’s interface. The anti-cheat system has other roles too, but we don't want to enter into too technical details here. We’re no anti-cheat experts, especially client-side. On the other hand, EQU8 has a dedicated team working on it full time. They also gather experience from other games, so it makes sense to use their solution, which is already up and running, as well as their experience and availability to help us in that regard. Why using a client side solution instead of securing the Server ? Client-side security is usually considered a bad thing, as the computer is controlled by the player. Indeed. In an ideal world, all controls and all security measures should be server-side. However, there are two good reasons to also use a client-side anticheat: There are controls which are difficult to implement server-side, and which we don’t have any clever solution yet, nor the time to work on for now. For example, loading the game physics for all players at the same time, and ensuring no one is passing through walls, is nearly impossible to do in real-time. In security, there is also a notion called “in depth defense”. It acknowledges a system can never be 100% secured and thus requires several layers of security. If one fails, the second prevents further escalation. We know a client-side anticheat cannot be 100% bullet-proof. However, it does increase the technical requirements of any client-side attack. The better the anticheat solution is, the more skills and time are required… up to the point where the effort is not worth the gain. This means two things: less active cheats in the game, and more time for us to identify those who fall between the cracks. Of course, it does not mean we are leaving our Server unprotected; Another reason why we delegated the client-side anticheat to an external partner is that it leaves us more time to work on the Server. And just to be clear, what we’re saying is not a challenge to attract any sort of attack here ? Why EQU8? It’s less intrusive than other, similar third-party solutions, and aims to respect players' privacy. For example, EQU8 only gathers information when the game is running (and few personal data altogether). They also insisted to not get any personal data from us (like players emails or username); we only send an anonymous player identifier. You can check their FAQ at https://equ8.com/faq, and their privacy policy at https://equ8.com/assets/privacy.pdf for more details. It has low performance impact (actually, it’s almost imperceivable) and good reputation regarding false positives and potential crashes. The EQU8 team is very responsive and engaged. This is a big strength of theirs, and we greatly appreciate their unconditional support! The solution is very flexible and configurable, which is important because Dual Universe is a complex game that often requires specific tuning. Oh, and the most important: it detects cheaters efficiently. ? Launcher changes The anti-cheat needs to install a Windows service on its first run to work properly. This requires administrator privileges, which is why the launcher requests them. This service only runs with the game. If the game is stopped, so does the service. Please also keep in mind that stopping the service on purpose triggers a kick, as it’s interpreted as a cheating attempt. The launcher currently requests administrator privileges on each launch. This is a bug which will be fixed soon. With the introduction of the anticheat, the client will refuse to start if run directly from the binary (Dual.exe). This is expected and is a technical constraint. You need to start the game from the launcher every time. What is authorized or forbidden Modifying the game files is forbidden, (except for the "Game/data/lua" folder (this is the only location where you can add or modify files). Modifying the game cache is forbidden (by default it is located in the directory C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Local\NQ\DualUniverse\) ; Reading or modifying the game memory is forbidden. Disabling, modifying, or attempting to evade the anti-cheat in any way is forbidden. Playing at the same time with two or more accounts is authorized, but please note, that any form of automating multiple accounts is forbidden Helping someone, or driving someone, to do forbidden actions is obviously forbidden too. Discovering or knowing an issue, bug, or exploit and benefiting from it instead of reporting it to Novaquark is forbidden. Sharing accounts between different people is forbidden. Any action performed on your account is the responsibility of its owner. The Customer Support team won’t be able to help regarding any issues happening due to account sharing. The owner is responsible for any action made with the account. Trying to degrade the game performances of other players for any reason is forbidden. Creating new Lua files for debugging purposes is authorized as long as these are new files imported from in game scripts. In this case, you should put the files in the Game\data\lua\ folder to be able to import them. Using macro programs (like AutoHotKey) or similar hardware tools is authorized as long as you don’t automate gameplay. We consider gameplay as automated (and, thus, forbidden) when the macro or script: - Takes decisions based on game feedback - Executes actions for more than a few seconds - Executes without any user input or when not actively playing the game. For example, using a macro to keep a button pushed instead of maintaining it is authorized. But using a macro to send a message every hour is forbidden, especially if you are not even in front of your screen. What happens to cheaters ? Our policy is to not issue automatic bans. There is always a human review when the anti-cheat system detects any unauthorized behaviour. Nonetheless, you may temporarily be kicked out of the game if the anti-cheat cannot initialize correctly. Sanctions include (at the discretion of the Novaquark team): - Removing access to the game, temporarily or permanently (aka ban), - In case of recurring offenses, the player may get a hardware ban (in this case, the player won’t be able to play the game with any current or future account, even if those accounts were never used for cheating). - Plus any action required to revert any change made to the game world (removing Quantas or items, restoring constructs state, etc.). - This list is not exhaustive and may be updated by Novaquark as the team sees fit. Why is it forbidden to modify Lua files or import custom DLL ? We know some players or organizations have used local libraries (aka. DLLs) with great success and with good intentions. However, this option gives unfair advantages compared to pure in-game scripts (extra CPU capabilities, the ability to execute Internet requests or load/store data on the computer disk for example). Moreover, we don't want players to massively share and use these custom libraries because it has severe security and privacy implications that we cannot control and we want to protect our players (for example, a player in an organization would need to install the organization library to use its scripts and constructs, but this library may as well read all his/her files without his/her knowledge nor consent on the disk, and send them to the author or do almost anything on the computer). Keep in mind that libraries could contain malware too. You don’t want that. Finally, adding or modifying a DLL allows users to modify the game behavior in an arbitrary way, which directly leads to heavy cheating. For example, it allows access to the game’s memory and to escape the anti-cheat verification. We can't secure this at all, so player-made libraries are clearly a no-go security wise. Therefore, after careful examination, we decided to forbid any modification to the game files. This restriction also includes the local Lua files as they contain security measures to ensure the game integrity and players privacy (for example, you could load a library by editing the global.lua file; this file is also responsible to make sure in-game scripts cannot read personal documents on your computer). The exception to this rule are files found in: "Game/data/lua" folder (this is the only location where you can add or modify files Developers may still create new Lua files for debugging purposes if they want to (these files will be under control because global.lua is loaded first and sets up safeguards for any file loaded after itself). Could player-made libraries be integrated after NQ’s validation ? Having a process to submit, review, and integrate libraries looks good on the paper. However, code review is a tedious process. It is a lot harder than checking an image. There would be technical challenges to integrate them into the game too. Also note that we don't want to transform Lua scripts into full-fledged operating systems. They are simply supposed to be lightweight scripts, not full-fledged operating systems. ?️ Thus, we don't want to engage this process, at least in the near future. We simply don’t have the time or resources for this at the moment. EQU8 is not compatible with Linux / consoles Unfortunately, EQU8 does not work under Linux, even with Wine. This is due to the Windows functions it uses to protect the game’s integrity, which are different from other operating systems. This is a trade-off we had to make between having a fair game (without cheats) and compatibility. Most players and games are on Windows. Thus, very few anti-cheat solutions support Linux (even less with good support). Because of this, we did not find an anticheat solution which works on Linux and suits our needs. However, please note that this decision doesn't prevent us from adding an alternative anti-cheat solution in the future, in case we decide to officially support Linux systems or consoles later on. Nothing prevents us from having a different anti-cheat for each platform. ? We hope you found this FAQ about anti-cheats useful and helped to understand better why we chose EQU8. Best Regards, The Novaquark team Last updated: October 5, 2020

Hi Doomslayer and welcome in the Dual Universe community! There has been a temporary authentication issue yesterday so it might be the reason. Did you try to log in with you email address as login ID? Have you tried again since then? Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Dear Alpha testers, The Beta launch is coming in just a few weeks and as you might expect it, so is the pre-Beta wipe! You will have 2 last test sessions before the wipe, during which we ask you to save all the Constructs you want to keep under the form of a Blueprint. We know that this official announcement comes on short notice, but as you can imagine, the whole team is on a tight schedule to deliver the Beta at the end of the month and we’re trying to inform you as much in advance as possible with the time constraints. The last test sessions before the wipe will occur will be: From Thursday, August 6th at 14:00 UTC To Monday, August 10th at 14:00 UTC From Thursday, August 13th at 14:00 UTC To Monday, August 17th at 14:00 UTC Remember, everything will be wiped following this session, except the normal blueprints located in your Player Inventory (Nanopack), so be sure to keep those previously on your character, and not anywhere else (like in a container). Last but not least, we also want to apologize for the inconvenience regarding the very short notice about the extended PvP zone and the issues that may have resulted from the situation. However, if you’re in a situation where some of your Constructs have been damaged before you can make an up-to-date blueprint of the said Constructs, please contact our Customer Support as soon as possible so you can get help from our team before the next test session. If you’re in such a situation, please read carefully the process described in the previous announcement published here. Best Regards, The Novaquark team.

Hi everyone, With the Alpha 3.2 deployed, the PvP Zone size has now been significantly increased: Construct vs Construct mode is now possible anywhere in space, except in a radius of 500km around each planet. Note that this is not the final version of the PvP design, as it will be progressively iterated during Beta. This announcement comes on a very short notice, but don't worry: The team has taken preventive measures against Construct damage or loss if you haven't already made up-to-date blueprints for all your creations and if some of your Constructs are now in the extended PvP zone (read below if you're in this situation). The wipe for the Beta is not far away, and if we want to test a bit the extended PvP Zone before Beta Launch, very few opportunities of test sessions remain: it's now or never! All the Constructs with a Space Core Unit, or a Dynamic Core Unit (which is not located on a Planet), have been saved under the form of a Blueprint on our side, before server opening. If you currently have Constructs in the extended PvP Zone, we suggest to move as much of your assets located there as possible to the nearest Planet as soon as you will be able to log in the game. If you can’t log in soon enough before your assets have been attacked / damaged, please follow the process below: Contact our Customer Support. Give the name of the damaged / lost Construct(s) and its owner’s name. The involved Construct(s) will be deleted. You will receive in your Character Inventory a Special Blueprint* for each Construct deleted this way. Expect to get the said Blueprint(s) for the next test session, not the ongoing one (if you contacted the Customer Support during one). Please, read carefully: How a Special Blueprint* works: a Special Blueprint* is one time use only, but doesn’t require any material. However, no resource located in the Containers of the Construct is saved and RDMS is reset as well. Warning: Special Blueprints* are deleted during a wipe! So if you don’t have a proper save of your Construct, use the Special Blueprint* in a safe area and once your Construct is deployed, make a normal Blueprint of it, to be sure to be able to make it again after the wipe for the Beta Launch. * "Special Blueprint" is a temporary name. It has been called a few time "Magic Blueprints" in the past. It may be called under another (final) name later, to fit better into the lore. The Novaquark team.

Hi everyone! The new character model is an artistic re-imagining of the original design, and is one of many steps we’re taking to update the look and feel of the game. The goal of this redesign was not only to create something functional and realistic for interstellar travel, but also come up with something memorable, appealing, and instantly recognizable. The Novaquark team.

@Devlin_Vinderkarr The pack with 12 months of sub is the Patron pack at 180, not the Contributor Pack at 60. Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Dear Community Members, We have some very exciting news to share. Many of you who have been here for a long time probably already know Yamamushi. As one of the co-founders of the official community Discord and an early Kickstarter backer, Yamamushi has been around as a very active and well known community member for almost 4 years now. We are excited to have him joining the team. With him coming on board, a few important things are going to change and we wanted to be transparent about this with you all. We have always valued neutrality for our employees and we try to avoid any conflict of interests. Like all other employees he is bound to some important communication restrictions. Yamamushi must discontinue being a community figure while he is employed with Novaquark. This means stepping down as a moderator on Discord and our public forums, while retaining some limited administrative rights (precisely to maintain the DU Bot). He is also bound by an internal NDA contract and won’t be able to share everything as a Novaquark employee. For those who are friends with him, we ask you to avoid attempting to get behind-the-scene information from him, regarding the game or the company. He won’t be able to communicate or play anymore as Yamamushi, but his love for the community is strong and he will continue to follow the community from the Dev side. He will also not be permitted to be a part of a player-run organization. We know this can be hard to face for such an integral part of our community and this has been a hard decision that may feel frustrating (at least it is for us and for him) but a necessary step to avoid any suspicion of favorizing any group of players in the community. We would also like to take this opportunity to explain what are our internal rules when a member of our community becomes a Novaquark employee: His/her personal accounts are suspended for the time he/she is a Novaquark employee. He/she is given an anonymous player account so he/she could still continue to play the game, however, some specific rules apply to such an account: a. The Novaquark employee behind should not reveal his/her real identity and/or he’s part of the company. b. He/she shouldn’t join a player-run organization with this account either, for neutrality reasons. He/she is given a NQ account, mostly to test things, and occasionally to communicate with the community in-game (if such opportunity arises). Nothing done on this account (coming usually with more powers/rights than a player account) will be transferred on any personal account. Thank you for taking the time to read this, please join us in welcoming Yamamushi to the team here! Best Regards, The Novaquark Team.

Congrats Yamamushi for joining the Novaquark team! If you want to join us in congratulating Yamamushi (and/or give your feedback on the Novaquark Employee Policy), you can post below in this topic! Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Dear Noveans, As we want to prepare properly the NDA Lift and give some spotlight for those among you who want to open a channel (or use an existing one) to talk about Dual Universe, we would like to know who, among you, plan to talk or showcase the game once the NDA will be lifted. Even if you have a very small number of followers, or you haven't started, please let us know, so we don't forget anyone once we will start our YouTuber/Streamer program! To do so, please click on this link to fill the Survey containing 8 questions We thank you for the love and the commitment you have shown and continue to show regularly for our game! Best Regards, The Novaquark Team.

Dear Noveans, We launched the Space Station Building Contest at the end of last year. The constest has ended in March this year and we can only say that we are absolutely amazed by the space stations that have been submitted! Kudos to all contestants. We really have a hard time to choose the winners among all the participants. In order to share with the whole community a glimpse of what has been accomplished, we just made a quick showcase of the best Space Stations on our official YouTube channel! Best Regards, The Novaquark team.

Dear Community members, As announced in the news available here, we are glad to welcome a new Community Manager in the team! She will be the Community Manager at Novaquark Montreal, which means we will now be able to cover more time zone. We are really happy to have her on board! Give a warm welcome to NQ-Naerais! Best Regards, Nyzaltar

Dear Community members, A few changes are happening in the Community Team at the moment and it's necessary to make some clarifications about it: - For those who remember NQ-Nunc, if it wasn't clear, he has left the team for quite some time now. - NQ-Nomad is still there, but is investing a significant amount of time in many internal tasks related to live operations and project management. - I'm still there, obviously, but I have to divide my time between reporting the community feedback, working on some internal tasks, as well as working on some projects for the future that should lead to some QoL on tools at the disposal of the Community (more info on that later ). - NQ-Naerais has joined the team this week! If you want to say "Hi", you can do it in this forum thread. We know a fair number among you wanted more interaction with the Community Management team, and some changes are planned in the (very) near future on that topic! Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi Jonesy, Welcome in the Dual Universe community! Regarding your statement "I will never pay to play a game in alpha test for $60.00 ever": It's totally fine, really. If you don't want to support a game in development and prefer to buy and enjoy games only when they are in a more or less complete state, we - at Novaquark - totally understand: those who currently support us do so in order to help us finance the game. In return, they got a fair amount of months of playtime that they will be able to use at official release, and they have access to early stages of development, where they can give their feedback and help to improve/shape the game. We totally get it's not for everyone. If you just want to enjoy a finished game, we respect your choice and it's indeed better to wait until official release. Regarding the statement "Nerf should not even be a word admitted in the gaming community": That's your point of view and we respect it, but we tend to disagree on that topic. "Buffing" or "Nerfing" is part of the continuous challenge of having a well balanced game. No dev succeeded (and probably never will) in making a game perfectly balanced from the start, because games nowadays can reach such game depth and/or complexity that it is virtually to anticipate every situation. Starting from there, buffing and nerfing are necessary adjustments that need to be done during the game life. Not nerfing overpowered features/skills/talents might just make flee more players from the game than addressing the issue, because the game might feel then too easy and the players become bored if there is no challenge anymore, or because it might feel unfair in a PvP game for players not using the said overpowered features (and don't want to use the same Meta that everyone else) feeling disavantaged. We hope you'll understand Novaquark's stance on those topics, just as we respect yours. Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi everyone! With the Alpha 3 deployment around the corner and the RDMS implementation, we had to make significant changes in the background by connecting organizations data available on the Community Portal to the organizations data that will be available in-game. As it is a "Work in Progress", the Community Portal will switch in "Read Only" mode for the time being, to limit the probability of technical issues. During this transitional period, All management actions for the organizations will be done in-game. You will also note that the number of legates per organizations isn't displayed anymore. We are aware the situation isn't ideal, but it's a temporary and necessary step. Update: Wednesday, January 22th, 16:15 UTC What's the current situation? To be clear: - Posting/Editing News have been deactivated on the Community Portal. - It will still be possible to post/edit News on the Community Portal through the in-game User Interface (assuming you have the proper rights to do such thing). - Posting/Editing News will remain in a minimal state for the time being (only simple text. HTML code for formating options and image insertion will came back later). - Posting/Editing News directly through the Community Portal should come back at a later stage. - The "Join Organization / Accept application" feature remains active. - The applications pending before the maintenance today should still be there after. - Features such promoting or demoting a member will now exclusively in-game (as the process may now involve other game mechanics). - Displaying the number of legates on the Organization Ranking page has been deactivated (as an intermediary step of the coming changes in the future). What's coming in the future? (please keep in mind that the features described below are work in progress and might change before their release) Organization Ranking by the number of Active Members. As the Community Portal will evolve, we plan to display the number "Active Members" and the number "Honorary Members" for each organization in the future. The Organization Ranking will be done by the number of Active Members in decreasing order. What will be "Active Members" and "Honorary Members"? "Honorary Members" accounts will be accounts that have joined an organization on the Community Portal but haven't access to the game. "Active Members" accounts will be accounts that have joined an organization on the Community Portal and have access to the game. Accounts joining an organization directly in-game will be automatically validated as "Active Members" in an organization. Only "Active Members" will be eligible to legate status, as most organization management actions will be only possible in-game. Why planning this? This is planned for two reasons: 1) To give a better visibility for newcomers regarding the activity potential of each organization (which can impact the decision of joining one organization or another). 2) To discourage unfair practices such as creating ghost accounts and making them join an org to inflate artificially its size (and get undeserved visibility). Best Regards, The Novaquark Team.

Alright. Things are getting a bit out of hand here. @xlDvSlx @DvS_UK Thinking that the DAC system is "Pay to win" is your opinion and it's your right to think that way, even if many people here disagree with you. However, it's strange that you start a crusade right now on the monetization model as you claimed to be a long time follower of the game. If you are a long time follower, then you know we never hid what the monetization model was going to be and said it right from the beginning (the Kickstarter Campaign in 2016). If you disagreed on the monetization model, it would have been perfectly understandable to not support the game. Why starting a crusade on this topic now? If you realized what the monetization model was going to be just now or recently, then maybe the real issue here might be "this game is not for you". In that case, please contact the customer support at support@novaquark.com for such kind of topic. The monetization model has been debated many times, and the Novaquark team has already explained in length why we were going with this one. For the record, this monetization model has also been adopted by some of the biggest MMORPG, such as World of Warcraft (through the WoW token system, which is exactly the same thing as the DACs) and as far as we know, there hasn't been a huge uproar stating this system is "pay to win". The original definition of "Pay to Win" is the following: it implies you have a system where you can get a specific advantage only by paying. If an advantage can be obtained by playing the game, then, by the original definition, it's not "Pay to Win". Of course all is question of common sense and equilibrium here: if the way of obtaining the said advantage is grinding an incredible amount of hours, making it virtually impossible or irrelevant to get it by playing then yes, it might be considered pay to win in disguise. But we are nowhere near this situation in Dual Universe (or else, you're welcome to give very specific examples, and not vague assumptions. The examples you have given so far are just too vague to be considered as such). On the opposite side of the spectrum, the expression "Pay to Win" have been used and exaggerated many times over the years. There has been excess on both sides. In any case, starting to say "some people should be shot down", for whatever reason it may be, is a no go and a direct breach with the forum rules. Also, resorting to personal attack and/or provocations toward those who don't agree with you is just an invitation for trouble and another breach of the forum rules. This is the first and last warning. While your post started in an attempt to convince people from your point of view (which is fine), it quickly escalated in provocations and nothing really constructive. So we ask you to change the way you discuss with other community members on the forum (stop being provocative), or your posting rights may be removed (temporarily at first, and possibly in a definite way if you insist in this behavior). This topic has derailed enough and will now be locked. Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi everyone. As some of you may wonder why this topic has been locked, here are some clarifications: As much as it is unacceptable to spam/derail an org recruitment thread just to taunt/harass the one who posted the said thread, it's also unacceptable to start a forum thread with the global idea of "You don't know what PvP is, let me teach you" (because this is how it can be interpreted). It's a highly provocative way of starting a discussion (whether it's intentional or not), and it clearly does not invite to constructive replies. @Daphne Jones You should really have stick to your point 1 (explaining what is your vision of PvP is totally understandable) and refrain of posting your point 2 (even if you put "imo"). PvP vision varies from one player to another. You have a vision of PvP. Other players may have a different one. Don't put all PvP Combat players in the same bag and give them the nastiest intentions they don't necessarily have, or it will become a self fulfilling prophecy: if you put everyone in the same bag, why would they act differently as you already put them in the same category? If you want to unify them against you, you're indeed using the best manner to achieve this goal. If it's not your goal, now is probably the time to reconsider how you communicate with them. Furthermore, we already asked you to stop provocating PvP players by calling them "sociopaths". Calling them "mentally ill" fall in the same category. It's just as provocative as PvP players calling "Carebears" those who are not interested in PvP. This is a the second warning (for people from both sides). Next time, we will start give temporary forum bans (and permanent ones if a temporary ban doesn't prove to be enough to some people involved). We are totally aware that on some other game forums, it's something normal to taunt each other, and "bathing in carebear tears" is a common activity. This might be a deliberate choice and/or became one goal of those forums. We won't judge or comment on this topic here. It's a choice like any other and the dev teams are entitled to manage their platforms as they see fit. That's why we will give here a clear reminder of what is exactly the current goal of the official Dual Universe forum: As stated in the forum rules, you're not supposed to be provocative, meaning: this forum is a neutral ground. This is a platform to have constructive discussions to help improving the game, not to impose one's vision and/or denigrating others' visions. You are free to expose your vision, of course, but not to attempt enforcing it by denigrating the others. You may also have some (in-character or out-of-character) grudges with some community members, but if this is the case you're expected to leave all this at the forum's doorstep. If it's too difficult, just ignore the people you don't like and don't reply to their topics. Don't start provocations or add oil on an already existing fire, or you might be affected by moderation actions (even if you're not the one who started the trouble). We hope you'll understand Novaquark's stance on this matter. One final note regarding the narrative that "PvP Players will hunt players who are completely unprepared" is kind of a biased way of presenting the real situation: Players not interested in PvP will have safe zones where they will be able to have various activities without risking being bothered by PvP Combat players. If they want to explore outside of the safe zones, they are implicitly accepting the risks and should prepare accordingly. If they don't, and get caught, it's on them. If they don't want to take any risk of being engaged in PvP, then they shouldn't go outside of the safe zones. On the opposite, if they're taking risks and prepare accordingly, bigger rewards will await for them. In the end, it's their choice, and the choice they made comes with consequences. Because players will have a choice, it's not accurate here to say that PvP Combat will be "non-consensual". On that topic, Dual Universe is already far more Non-PvP friendly than games like EVE Online (where you have to explore space even to mine the most basic ore, and where you can be attacked). Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi everyone! Sorry for the late reply! So to answer your questions... @Vyz Ejstu 1) and 6) Aphelia is dematerialized in the simulation. She doesn't forbid anything as long as it is not an attempt to impact/attack her own integrity. However, she won't facilitate nor encourage any violence. That's also why colonists haven't any hand weapon given to them once you "wake up" in the simulation. Consider that a loophole exists as colonists really wanting to resort to violence can bypass this interdiction by making constructs with weapons. It's up to you to take into account only everything you had so far in-game, or to include in your story what will be possible/available with Alpha3 coming soon. 2) Alpha team members can interact to the limit explained in the 2nd special rule for this NovaWriMo Contest: "The contender can write about conflicts, however, it should only involve fictional opponents/organizations, not real players or organizations run by real players (to avoid any disagreement between the players mentioned about how the narrative direction is going)". At the very least, if several Alpha team members interact in a story, you must make sure beforehand that all the involved ones agree with the direction taken by your story. 3) No, pets aren't included in the Alpha simulation. 4) It's a bit like the film Matrix: They don't "log out". They sleep in the simulation to be fully immersed in it. 5) You can consider that if wildlife is in the simulation for storytelling purpose, it would be quite similar to what you find on Earth (don't go overboard on that point though, as it's not something that will get a very strong focus in the game, at least for now), based on Aphelia's database knowledge. 7) Physical limitations in terms of travel would be the whole Helios system. Players can't go outside this solar system in the simulation, just as it is currently in-game. @Keejhle Many things currently in game are subject to change a lot until the official release. You can present that by adding a narrative disclaimer about "Aphelia's virtual simulation" not being representative of the "real world" in which the players will land once the official release is reached. Regarding "mysteries"... Yes, they are mysteries in the virtual simulation, and that might be obviously source of many questions: are those "mysteries" really put there by Aphelia just to test the colonists adaptability skills (in any case, it will be the official answer she will give them)? Will there be similar mysteries in the "real world" they will land on? If so, how can Aphelia know so much about said mysteries without having been over there first? We hope this answer your questions. If you have other questions, don't hesitate to ask! Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

... Or maybe because we did what we promised (try our best to help solving this situation) ? ? Xsolla staff doesn't read this forum and solving payment issues can take several days. To our knowledge, you were the first to experience this kind of issue among thousands of pledgers. We can understand the situation was frustrating but it was an exceptional case (despite what you may think). Sometimes there are a series of issues that lead to unbelievable situations and you were just very unlucky. Anyway, we're glad your issue has been solved. The topic is now going to be locked. P.S: Yes, we already know that making a MMORPG is a huge undertaking. Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi @Lepus You received an answer here on Saturday (two days ago), that we are investigating on the incident. We understand that is probably not the answer you wanted, but you did receive one nonetheless. Moreover, as you can imagine, investigating during a weekend is not the best moment to get a quick answer. In the meantime, could you send to our Customer Support a proof of your payment from your bank, mentioning the company which received the payment (it could help in the discussion with Xsolla) ? Last but not least, we don't want any backer to feel frustrated or cheated and we will do our best to solve the problem. However, you have to understand, that no, Novaquark is not responsible for the issue and here is why: - Novaquark has no involvement in the payment process and has made a partnership with Xsolla precisely due to the fact that Novaquark is a game development studio and has no expertise in payment solution development (we would have handled this ourselves if we could). - Xsolla is in charge of the whole payment solutions and is responsible if any issue occurs on that level (if the issue doesn't come from your bank). This company is paid in exchange of that service. They offered you to use Multibanco and an issue came out of it. So yes, the responsibility is fully on their side, not Novaquark. It's not putting the blame on them, these are just facts, and responsibility regarding transactions is part of their contract. That being said, as mentioned above, we will try our best to help in solving this situation. Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Hi @Lepus We're sorry to hear about your transaction problem. The Novaquark team doesn't "pass the blame" to Xsolla. Xsolla is just in charge of processing all the payment transactions for Dual Universe and their customer support is in charge of solving issues related to the said transactions. Novaquark's customer support can't - unfortunately - solve this kind of issue. Moreover, it's Xsolla's policy to interact directly with the customers who might have a transaction issue. That being said, we will investigate on our side about why your payment went to a company called PPRO Financial Ltd. It's the first time we hear about this kind of issue and as far as we know, it should have been a direct transaction between your bank and Xsolla... On your side, could you please check if the payment going to PPRO Financial Ltd has nothing to do with a possible agreement with your bank for transactions going outside Europe or online payment? Best Regards, Nyzaltar.

Dear Noveans, NovaWriMo is back this year, with a new theme! You can find the complete rules here, and ask your questions (if you have any) in the same topic ! Best Regards, The Novaquark Team.