I wasn't hacked, mailman ate my mail =(...

#0 - July 10, 2008, 4:28 p.m.

This is my farwell post, Blizzard has shown me how much they care about me as a customer, so I've decided that it's time to find something else to waste my time and disposable income on. I haven't been here since the beginning, but I've been playing since December of 05, over the years I've been using the mail system as long term storage and I probably had anywhere between 500-1000 items 'floating' between alt's mailboxes. When I needed something, I'd go sort thru the mail and find it (I used possessions to keep track of who's mailbox stuff was in, etc), I mean it's my stuff that I've accumulated over 3 years, I should be able to save it and use it whenever I want, right?

NOPE, NOT SO according to Blizzard, since they decided to delete all my stuff without adequate warning or any mechanism in place to prevent customers from loosing everything they have worked for. I'm talking about the change to the behavior of unopened mail in your inbox (I tried to search patch notes to see when this happened, because apparently I missed it when it did, and I can't find anything in the notes that says when this change happened, can anyone else find it and let me know what patch it went into effect?

So all the mail that I had bouncing beteen my alts is just gone, perhaps it's my fault for not 'understanding' the change the way they described it in the patch notes (although I can't even find the change mentioned in the patch notes, so I don't know HOW I could have missed it the first time around), or perhaps it's all Blizzard's fault for thinking that saving a few cents on server space would be better than providing adequate customer service. I hope they are making enough money off this server space savings (like the 100+ million a month isn't enough to cover operations, so they have to start cutting down on usage to save money) to cover the lost customers.

I don't know about anyone else, but when a company says, 'your years of participation means nothign' (by deleting everything I've worked for over the years, with no means of restoring it), then it's time for me to find a new game to play. What's the point of farming and working to get items if Blizzard is just going to make one stupid little code change and delete all of it???

I'm not talking trivial amounts of items, I had hundereds and hundereds of mats (500+ adamantite, 500+ fel iron, 100+ khorium, 500-1000 of various herbs, hundereds of 'better' greeen items (bandit, beast, physician type stuff), lots of blues, darkmoon cards, crafted items.... If everything I had was converted to gold at current AH prices, it would have amounted to well over 50,000 gold worth of items (I'm probably underestimating the actual value of the goods I've lost), sure I still have the 26,000 gold that I have on my characters, but I've lost soo much stuff that it's not even worth it to continue playing anymore.

I would like an explanation from Blizzard on why this change was made and why there weren't better 'compensating controls' put in place to prevent people from losing their stuff.... even if the system sent a mail back to the character saying.... Mail from xxxx deleted, items xxx, yyy, zzz have been deleted (somethign that would have been simple to implement), this type of warning would have alerted me the first time things disappeared and I could have worked the mail (manually mailing stuff back and forth, since it was apparently too much work for the system to automatically bounce the mail back to the sender after 30 days) to prevent all my stuff from being thrown away.

So if my account had been hacked, and the hackers had emptied my mailboxes, sold the items and sent the told to their farming toon, I could have reported it and blizzard (after investigation) would have been able to determine what happend and restore my account back to the way it was (I haven't had this happen, but have heard other stories), BUT since it was blizzard developers emptying my mailboxes instead of hackers, they don't seem to care.... Read the patch notes..... give me a f-ing break

Can someone please point out which patch this change in mail behavior took place in, because I can't find it and I've just searched all the patch notes that are online..... So now I'm confused, the GM told me 'Patch notes are a good source of information', so I'm looking at the patch notes and I'm still not seeing it.

Oh well, Blizzard has made it blatently obvious that money grubbing is more important to them than customer service, so there's no reason for me to continue to stick around. I hope the 50 cents or so that they saved on server space by deleting my mail was worth the $15.99 they won't be getting from me anymore. Wow's been going downhill for a while now (and they know it), so doing things like this that piss off loyal customers isn't a very bright development move (but the developer who pointed out: Mail = Server space, Server space = money, money spent = less profit, delete mail = more profit, probably ended up with a raise and a promotion, while the customers get screwed again by the money grubbing corporation.

It was fun for a while, but now that blizzard has knocked me down and kicked me in the teeth, I'm not about to stick around and continue to pay for this type of abuse.

Malkorix

#40 - July 10, 2008, 7:03 p.m.

Gwainsford? The only change that has been made to the mail system in recent memory was an increase the amount of time that items remain undeleted after being opened - from 3 days to about 30. This was a relatively recent change. Otherwise, in the past, mail would be deleted or returned approximately 3 days after being read. You mentioned that there should be notifications regarding deleted mail in your post. While I hope that the countdown that appears on each and every piece of mail should prove sufficient for this purpose in most cases, it would be excellent if you could post a well reasoned thread regarding additional mail notices on our Suggestions forum.

The mail system was never intended to be used as storage, ultimately. Doing so is a substantial risk, as items that bounce from sender, to recipient, and then back to the sender are indeed deleted. Under our current system, whether the mail is opened or un-opened, an item will last about 30 days in the mailbox of the recipient, then an additional 30 or so in the inbox of the sender, for a total of about 60 days.

I do regret your loss, but once those items are gone, they are actually irretrievable. That you did not opt to educate yourself regarding the particulars of a system that you were ostensibly using for storage is ultimately not the fault of our staff. Claiming that we 'robbed' you, when you apparently did not make an attempt to understand the system that you were committing a large number of items to is hardly reasonable.

While we are more than happy to help in every circumstance that we can, we also expect our players to maintain a reasonable level of alertness, and to educate themselves about aspects of game play that are important to them.

All told, you had about 60 days, per item, to ensure that they were retrieved and stored properly. Everything else aside, I really am truly sorry that you lost track of what was getting deleted and when which resulted in some losses =(. Should you opt to remain with us, I genuinely hope that this kind of situation can be avoided in the future.

Malkorix

#60 - July 11, 2008, 2:56 a.m.

Q u o t e:

And just because blizzard doesn't want to admit/accept that mail IS a storage method, doesn't mean people don't use it as a storage method (considering the 'piddly' options available in game, even with the addition of guild banks).

I won't quote your entire post just in the interest of saving space (no pun intended). Here's the thing though: while using the mail as storage is something that some players do, it is an unsupported form of storage. We know that people do it, but the mail system operates the way it does for a wide variety of reasons and it is a very risky way to store items.

It is risky, and it requires close management, or significant losses can result. As a result, we're not generally in a position to help should things go wrong.

Needing so much storage that alts and guild banks are insufficient to contain all the items one may wish to traffic in is pretty rare. Also, one way or another, item management is indeed part of World of Warcraft. Providing more storage is a way to reward players for their efforts in-game (bigger bags, earning gold for bank tabs). It isn't an unwillingness to accommodate our players though.

With regard to whether suggestions find their way into the game? I'm not at liberty to provide a list, but hopefully another poster will be along to point out a number of inclusions that were reflected in player requests. The list is actually rather extensive.

Q u o t e:

It doesn't matter what explanations are given for this, it all comes down to the bottom line for blizzard, more storage space per player means more server storage is required, which meand they need bigger/more servers to handle the items, which cuts into the profits, and so the customers get the short end of the stick. How much storage space does it take to store an entire bank full of items? 5mb? 10mb? I'm being generous here, we are talking about a couple columns of numbers in a database, realisticly the size is probably more around 1-2mb for an entire bank full of items.

I guess this is just the 'straw that broke the camels back' so to speak. Time for me to move on.

I am sorry to hear that you'd opt to move on over this situation, but I can also empathize with how frustrating it must be for you.

Still, database alterations are not a simple matter, particularly since World of Warcraft is rather exponentially beyond complex =/. Additionally, the current system sufficiently meets the needs of the vast majority of our players. While we are more than willing to hear out the requests of all our players, some of the choices we make are indeed dictated by the needs of the many.

Malkorix

#86 - July 11, 2008, 7:23 p.m.

One other thing that I neglected to mention earlier, but that could be critically important:

Some Addons that influence mail and auction house interactions can and have caused items to be deleted out of a player's in-game mail unintentionally. I'm reasonably sure that this is not the intent of the writers, but personally, I strongly discourage the use of mail management addons.

You can consult our UI & Macros forum to consult with other players regarding how some Addons can interact with your in-game mail.

Q u o t e:
Many people have said this is how the mail system works..... (nobody has proved that the mail system is working fine, they just continue to repeat the same thing over and over)
I'm saying NO IT ISN'T, SOMETHING CHANGED LATELY AND MAIL IS BEIGN DELETED INSTEAD OF RETURNED.

Actually, I pretty much always research prior to responding, but I'd like to help you if I can. Can you remember any particularly notable item that you are certain was deleted, rather than returned, recently? It will aid my investigation if you can name something that you only had one example of, but I'll happily try to use whatever information you can provide me.

Q u o t e:
I'm also not simplistic enough to assume that this is a blanket problem with everyone's mail, for all I know it could only be effecting mail that was in transit during patch 2.4.1 patch, if you didn't have any mail intransit when the patch was put in place? Perhaps it only effects mail that has items removed in the recipients mailbox or mail that was sent on Tuesdays? There are a TON of variables that could have an impact on the issue, but until someone with the appropriate access and knowledge actually takes a look at the issue, we'll never know. And the people saying there is no problem are just toeing the party line, 'Nothing to see here, move along folks'.

Please understand that *every* issue that we deal with is similarly complex. There are always dozens, if not hundreds of variables to potentially account for. As a result, we approach each and every report with the perception that it could be isolated, and subject to unique circumstances =/.

I'm offering to take a second look, just on the off chance that I'm able to find something that could have been missed during the initial investigation.

Malkorix

#89 - July 11, 2008, 7:31 p.m.

Q u o t e:
Hey, I just said that! Hi, kitty! *scratches Mal behind ears*

Edit: Will add that addons causing these problems are by no means Blizzard's responsibility. Blizzard approves the use of addons, but they accept no liability for their performance considering that they are independently written outside of the company. That said, problems you have with addons you choose to use with mail are still your problem if this turns out to be the issue.

Hola, Niddy.

And you are correct - while we are happy to allow our players to write and make use of Addons, we are unable to support them, and are not responsible for losses caused by them.

This, of course, makes me no less willing to investigate and help if I can regarding this situation.

Malkorix

#93 - July 11, 2008, 8:43 p.m.

Q u o t e:

Mal,

Now that I am keeping a detailed log of my characters' mail transactions I will have some definite data for you soon.

As a precautionary measure, I also returned all the mail in the inbox of my long-term depository character and will in the next day or two compare what was actually in his mailbox with what should have been in his mailbox (or should have been returned from him). I may be able to provide the names of a few specific items that cannot be accounted for, although I won't know the dates of when I mailed the items.

Thanks! The more specific the information is, the easier and more detailed my investigation is.

Edit: These investigations can take considerable time - I'll return with as much information as I'm able to provide as soon as I can.

Malkorix

#94 - July 12, 2008, 2:56 a.m.

Q u o t e:
Not to turn things around, but as long as you are going to be looking at things, can you give me an example of the last e-mail in my account that did correctly get returned the sender? Something showing that X items were sent from Gwainford to Alt A on 5/1/08, and was returned from Alt A to Gwainsford on 6/1/08 and is sitting in his mailbox? I would just like to see what the last couple successful returns were.

No worries. Unfortunately, everything that is currently sitting in Gwainsford's mailbox, and remains un-deleted, appears to have been sent directly to that character and had not been returned. Which is to say, that it seems that each of these is a newly composed mail containing items to Gwainsford.

The most recent email that was returned correctly, however, was a mail from your Mage.
It appears that it was sent to your mage on 05/04/08 and it contained 6 Superior Mana Oil.
It was returned to Gwainsford on 06/04/08 with all 6 Superior Mana Oil intact.
On 06/06/08, 2 of the 6 were removed, but the mail was left in the mailbox.
On 06/24/08 2 more were removed, leaving 2 Superior Mana Oil in that mail, in the mailbox.
On 07/04/08 the mail expired and was deleted, along with the two remaining Superior Mana Oils it still contained.

At least as far as my investigation was able to determine - it seems that almost every mail that was deleted, had been deleted because it had been returned and expired =(. I know that isn't exactly cause for celebration, but I strongly encourage you to seek out alternative means to store your items in the future =/.

There is a silver lining though! You'll note that I said 'almost', in my preceding paragraph. I did find two mails in particular, sent by your Warrior, that appear to have had some associated irregularities (most likely related to the Addon issue I mentioned earlier). One of which contains some of the gems you mentioned in your post.

While we are not typically in a position to provide support on an issue that is most likely related to the interference of an addon, I will attempt to send those mails to you regardless. Please let me know if you have any issues viewing them. Also, if you do, please consider performing a full user interface reset. Here are the instructions that I use - they contain steps by which you can preserve your Addons, Key Bindings and Macros:

Q u o t e:
Note: Please be aware that upon completion of these steps, all in-game user settings will be reset to default value, and all customized macros will be removed.

You can save your macros and key-bindings by preserving your macros-cache.txt and bindings-cache.wtf files. These are found inside the Account folder, which is within the WTF folder.

Addons may be preserved by moving the Addons folder from the Interface folder to a safe location. Please attempt to test the issue you were experiencing before restoring either of these folders.

1) *IMPORTANT* Exit the World of Warcraft to your desktop by logging out of the game and exiting. If World of Warcraft isn't closed, then these steps won't have the desired effect.

2) If you used an "installer" for a custom UI, see if it has an "uninstaller" and use it.

3) Inside the World of Warcraft Program Folder, delete the "WTF," "Cache," and "Interface" folders.

4) Restart your computer.

5) Please do not reinstall Addons prior to testing the issue you were experiencing.

6) Make sure that you are using WOW.EXE or LAUNCHER.EXE to start the game. Please do not run any UI installers beforehand, as we want to eliminate them as part of the issue.

7) Upon launching the game, you should see the Intro cinematic movie and be prompted to agree to the Terms of Use. Once you authenticate past the login screen, the “AddOns” button should no longer be visible at the lower left corner of the character selection screen. Both points mentioned previously must hold true if you should complete the aforementioned steps correctly.

Vrakthris

#145 - July 14, 2008, 1:07 a.m.

Q u o t e:
I don't remember reading anything indicating that players were expected to not use the mail for storage back then, although of course that doesn't mean that such posts weren't made. But nowhere in the knowledge base, nor on the official Web site, nor in the user manual have I found any admonitions against using the mail system for storage. So how is a player expected to know that he or she is not supposed to use the mail system for storage until he or she is forced to research this very issue on the forums?

Actually:

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/basics/mail.html

Q u o t e:

You cannot send mail to yourself. This would be considered an exploit, since it would allow players to unfairly have additional storage space.

Now I will grant you that it does not specifically say: The mailbox is not intended for an additional means of storage but it is certainly implied by our reason as to why we do not allow you to send mail to yourself.

I am sorry for any confusion that may have been caused, Garranu, many aspects of a game must be learned by the players themselves. We have always maintained the stance that although the mailbox holds a great number of items is should not be used in lieu of a proper storage means like a Bank or personal inventory.

Q u o t e:
And assuming the least desirable scenario, do you think it would be appropriate for Blizzard to introduce unannounced changes to the mail system that they know will lead to massive losses of player-held assets?

The mail system has not changed much over the years, the only addition as Malkorix mentioned earlier was to extend the time before the mail deleted/auto-returns once the mail has been read.

Vrakthris

#148 - July 14, 2008, 1:24 a.m.

Q u o t e:

Given that, would you be kind enough to explain what you perceive to be the case here with items not auto-returning when they should?

That is odd. Let me do some research, if I can confirm the send/delete date I may be able to help get those back to you.

Besides the Winterbite were you missing any other items?

Vrakthris

#150 - July 14, 2008, 3:06 a.m.

Just so you know, Garranu, this may take awhile to look into. I just don't want you to think I forgot you.

Malkorix

#157 - July 14, 2008, 8:05 p.m.

Q u o t e:

Gidgie,

I have already done everything I possibly can to demonstrate that whether or not a package is opened does not affect whether the item will be auto-returned. It used to be that way; it has not for many months. Please, please, please re-read posts #40 and posts #119.

Thank you for at least conceding that there may be an issue that warrants investigation.

I was able to demonstrate that something unusual is most likely occurring. I thank you very, very deeply for your invaluable assistance documenting this issue, and the detailed information that you provided. This is exactly the kind of information that helps us isolate and determine issues.

It does indeed appear that the mails you mentioned to me in post 105 and post 123 did delete on the first 'bounce', rather than returning appropriately.

Unfortunately, I was also able to determine almost conclusively that this does indeed seem to be linked to the use of the 'advanced' version of a popular auction house related add-on. While you may have taken steps to prevent its interference when documenting the mail from Rokthar, it is clearly visible that the add-on was still active despite those efforts =(.

I strongly, strongly encourage you to immediately discontinue use of this addon. If you opt to continue to make use of this addon, it will be wise not to count on mail to continue to 'bounce' properly and to handle mail management manually, as it appears that this addon is interfering heavily with the process. I've forwarded a report on the situation personally.

Malkorix

#161 - July 14, 2008, 10:50 p.m.

Q u o t e:
If it's at all possible, could you confirm in what manner that the mail in question was handled?

Based on the results of my investigation, that mail appears to have been a 'bounce' and was deleted at the appropriate time. I can see that it originally contained:

4x Twilight Cultist Cowls
1x Twilight Cultist Mantle
1x Eternal Sarong
1x Stack of 10 Soul Dust

This piece of mail was originally sent in May from Shardy to Scrimshaw, expired, and was returned from Scrimshaw's inbox to Shardy's.

That return occurred on June 8th 5:38:28 GMT. On the same day (at 9:51:29 GMT), you pulled out the Sarong, and the Soul Dust. The 4 Twilight Cultist Cowls and the Mantle remained in the mail until it expired, and was destroyed, on July 8th at 5:38:28 GMT.

Malkorix

#162 - July 14, 2008, 11:01 p.m.

Q u o t e:
I understand that your investigation may still be in progress. Can you provide more specific information as to how the add-on is interfering with the ability of mail to be auto-returned? I would like to bring this information to the attention of the add-on developers.

Unfortunately, the details of the situation remain information that I'm unable to reveal publicly. I understand that's probably a bit frustrating, and I do apologize for that =(. Keep in mind that this is a preliminary investigation, and that there's still a lot of work to be done.

Q u o t e:
Edit: I wasn't sure if you meant that you had forwarded a report to the developers of the add-on, or if you had forwarded a report internally within Blizzard.

I haven't been in contact with an addon author - such a thing would typically be outside of our purview. The information I researched is currently in the hands of our QA team, who will proceed with a more in-depth investigation and testing.

Essentially, at this point I can only urge caution. If you find that it is still necessary to keep items in transit, it may be best to work out a system that doesn't depend on returns - even if that means pulling items and sending them 'fresh', rather than allowing them to expire and return normally.

Malkorix

#165 - July 15, 2008, 1:04 a.m.

Q u o t e:
Would you think it best to allow the QA team time to pursue their investigation further before alerting the add-on developers?

While I'm unable to do so directly, it can't hurt to alert them to a potential issue.

Malkorix

#195 - July 15, 2008, 10:03 p.m.

Q u o t e:
Upon logging in this afternoon, Garranu had in his mailbox a great many items returned from my alts - items that it appears were "lost" as a result of this issue. I read a report from another player who had indicated something similar had happened to him, so it appears that some work was done to repair the damage caused by the issue.

Whether the issue has been resolved is of course a key question.

It's actually still under investigation.

Also, I made this post in a related thread, and I felt the same comments have a place here:

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=7736886869&sid=1&pageNo=4#61

Q u o t e:
Additionally, you'll note my use of the words 'almost conclusively' in reference to the addon. While it certainly seems to be a considerable factor in these cases, it's also entirely possible that the conclusions I drew as a result of my initial investigation were incorrect - hence why I forwarded a report on the issue for a far more in-depth investigation. Should those conclusions ultimately prove to have been incorrect, then please accept my apologies in advance.

Regardless, if there's an issue on our end taking place, our intent is to get to the bottom of it and resolve it as speedily as possible. If I find that there's been a change in functionality, then I'll certainly relay that as well.

Malkorix

#217 - July 16, 2008, 7:03 p.m.

Q u o t e:

Ah, right you are then :) Sorry, as I suggest I'm tired and emotional and don't want to revisit earlier pages of this thread as.. I'm a bit ... touchy atm ;)

Yeah, I'm suspecting the issue still may exist. It'd seem as though the missing stuff was tracked down, that it's also known to have hit EU realms as well, and that the GMs seem to have had no knowledge of a pre-existing issue with missing mails... and that there has been zero time between 'identifying' the problem and the release of a patch by Blizz,..... I can only conclude the issue is likely to still be there somewhere. The mails turning up today smells more to me of a manual push of some type than flushing of queues after a restart. Many realms have been restarted over the past 6-8 weeks and I would've thought stuff would've popped in the meantime.... then again, maybe it actually was a server patch flushing mail queues. In that case, we won't really know until either more mail goes missing and it turns up in the next point patch, or maint.. or... after WotLK because certain preconditions need to be met before stuff fails like this or... ugh... ;)

Eeek, internet email's a fairly horrid thing, I can only begin to imagine what goes on inside of Blizz's code base. No wonder they don't support it as a storage medium and tell folks 'that's what banks and GV's are for'.

First, I'd like to apologize to you, Norganna, and the rest of your team personally, Kantankerous. While full results of the complete investigation being done are not yet available to me, it would seem as though I may indeed have been mistaken about some of the data I gathered from my preliminary investigation =(. If there was an error, then it is mine, and mine alone.

If any doubt was cast on your abilities or your efforts, then I am doubly sorry - such was certainly never my intention. You guys do excellent work! If you are interested in continuing an investigation on your side to help ensure that everything is 100%, then it may be worthwhile to focus efforts on any plug-ins or functionality related to assembling or sending mail.

With regard to the mail returns - some of these returns were very likely related to database issues being rectified, and some of them were the direct result of Game Master efforts. Unfortunately, there is much that remains unknown at the moment, so I'm not in a position to provide more detail than that. To clarify further - until more data becomes available, I'm not absolutely certain that an issue like this won't occur again, and I stand by our assertion:

The mail is not a safe storage medium. Please, please, do not use it for that purpose.

Regardless, our investigation will be ongoing to make certain that everything is as it should be.

Malkorix

#227 - July 21, 2008, 9:07 p.m.

Q u o t e:
I can also confirm that this issue is still occurring. Garranu sent Elyndrae a message with two attachments, a 5-stack and a 2-stack of Scroll of Intellect III, on 06/19/2008. The message expired in Elyndrae's inbox on 07/19/2008, and should have been returned to Garranu between 2 AM and 3 AM PDT on 07/20/2008. It has yet to be returned.

Thanks for the information, Garranu. Please continue to keep an eye open for that message as it may yet be returned to Garranu.

Also, may I ask if you had opened that message when it arrived in Elyndrae's mailbox, or if it had remained unopened for the entire duration? I can see that no items were removed.

I'm still awaiting further information on this topic, but there's a great deal of activity so it may yet be awhile. I appreciate your patience and dedication in the meantime.