Addressing Community Concerns

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Firefly Staff
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Joined: Wed Apr 24, 2019 1:27 pm

Addressing Community Concerns

Post by Firefly Staff »

Greetings to all concerned Stronghold Kingdoms players,

We’ve been following the conversation on these topics closely – contrary to popular belief, while we don’t respond to every forum post we more often than not do read them! – and we wanted to take this opportunity to address each of these points respectively in an effort to clear some air and put some potentially damaging rumors to bed.

TL:DR
• No sensitive player data is at risk. Any data collated by these services is readily available in the client and its handling breaches no privacy or GDPR laws. We have no interest or intention to block these systems but do not officially encourage their use.
• We may investigate the possibility providing this data directly in the client in future updates to Stronghold Kingdoms, as the data is available in the client already
• Botting is not at all condoned and we are actively monitoring and banning players by the hundreds for its use
• Community information flagged a Card Point exploit that allowed card-selling to be exploited in a specific manner to generate large volumes of card points and individuals sold this process as a service. This has been patched in the client and server, is no longer possible and further attempts are being tracked and acted upon.
• Paying to ban players is not possible and popular scam used to trick players. Nothing presented by the community so far proves this process actually exists or works – please report any players offering you this service to support immediately.

1. Bots – We’re aware these exist, just as you guys are. We’ve been following player reports, following up on tickets and monitoring game data – a result of this is nearly 400 players have been banned for using third party automation software this year alone and that will continue to rise if players continue to use them. We do not condone them, we can detect their use and we will ban you if you use them. Period.

2. Discord Alert System – We investigated this system when it was originally brought to our attention to ensure that it was not mishandling any sensitive data or ‘hacking’ our game client in anyway. We can confirm that no sensitive data is at risk with this API and all the data it collects is readily available in the client. This is no different to third party websites that exist for many Online MMO games like Destiny’s Item Manager or World of Warcraft's REST API. While we do not plan to officially support this kind of API, we also have no intention to stop its use and are actually exploring ways in which we could potentially implement these kinds of statistics directly in the client for our players in the future.

3. Data Analytics (or ‘StrongholdInfo’) – Again, this system was investigated immediately after being brought to our attention. This API accesses the same client-available data as the Discord system but presents them in a distinctly different manner and charges for the privilege. We do not recommend purchasing anything relating to Stronghold Kingdoms that is not officially supported and you do so at your own risk. Similar to the Discord system, we have no intention to stop its use and it presents a use case for us to investigate ways we could incorporate it into the game client. To confirm, this system also does not handle any sensitive data and only utilizes data readily available through the game client.

4. Selling Card Points – We investigated claims that players were able to purchase card points as soon as we received credible and actionable evidence. Our investigations brought to light an exploit that was allowing certain individuals to sell certain cards in large volumes on behalf of those paying for this ‘service’ – thus generating vast numbers of card points for a fee. We have blocked this exploit and it is no longer possible, any individual now offering this scheme or similar is scamming you and you explore it at your own risk. We humbly thank the community for flagging this and providing the evidence necessary to close the exploit.

5. Paying to Ban Players – This process is simply not possible and anyone offering this service is scamming you and any proof is likely coinciding with the player being banned for other offenses such as using a bot or running multiple accounts. We have not received any tangible evidence that suggests otherwise, nor have any data suggesting players are being blocked from the game illegitimately.

We appreciate your concern for the longevity and security of Stronghold Kingdoms – we hope this clears up your points of concern and addresses some of the so-called elephants in the room. As always, if you believe someone is breaking our terms of services please contact support with as much supporting evidence as possible and it will be investigated. We are a small team of human beings, just as our game doesn’t allow for bots, neither does our Support so please bear with us.

As usual, for support regarding Stronghold Kingdoms, please contact the Stronghold Kingdoms Support Team by submitting a ticket at support.strongholdkingdoms.com using your in game login details. Alternatively, you can send an email to support@strongholdkingdoms.com and as ever, thanks for playing.

Lord Elegance (Ben)
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