The Mimic Fiasco.....

 Wow, there hasn't been an issue as hotly debated and flamed about like this in a while... The inherent problem is that affects that percentage of the Fiesta community that has the most to lose, those diehard players that leveled up and into the high 9x and into the 10x levels.  if this had been a low level issue, there wouldn't be much if any debate about removal of the quest or banning/suspending of any players that took advantage of the 'exploit'. 

there has even been debate all day over whether this issue even qualifies as an 'exploit' as some people see it as a feature of the party-centric style of the game.  while others argue that they were abusing the system in a style never truly intended.



i have friends and guildmates that have done the quest and taken advantage of the 'exploit' (i'll continue to call it that for lack of a better word), that i really can't support.  for the record, i never did the quest, but i had some inner moral discussions with myself about it and was, honestly, tempted to do so.

i find it really ironic that even the "Mimic" mob that u have to kill for this quest looks eerily similar to some artists' interpretation of Pandora's Box...

but getting back to the quest itself... i currently have two characters that are in that level range, a Warlock at level 100 and an archer at level 95, so you can see where my dilemma was.  i had considered leveling my archer to 96 and possibly taking advantage of the quest since, honestly, i'm low on sparkcash, the new Swamp of Dawn layout is a little tricky to find suitable grind spots, and i'm not looking forward to kiting another 5 levels since that bores me to death.  so i considered it, and then reconsidered it.  at the same time, it would be really nice to get to 100 quickly, and if OutSpark does nothing to punish those that did the quest, it in a way punishes me because i chose the moral high ground and chose not to complete this quest as many others have, but had i completed and spammed the quest knowing full well that this is not as the developers intended, it would weigh heavily on my soul.  so now i will have to grind it out like before.... oh well.

i quietly decided to wait for official word before i proceeded, unfortunately it took OutSpark 6.5 days since the quest was released to say anything about it... and this is what was said:

Mimic's Box Exploit

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We are aware that some players have been exploiting this to artificially level their character/s. The game developer is aware of the matter and taking steps to remedy it.

Please note that ANY account found to be participating in this exploit WILL be actioned, up to and including termination.

So there you have it, it was deemed 'illegal'.  Nobody really knows what will happen to those that chose to exploit the quest/party dynamic to complete this quest, there is only rampant speculation and outrage.  but really, are those that defend the exploit just doing so to clear their own conscience?  did they not truly believe that what they were doing was wrong and not by design?

i would hope that the accounts of those that chose to exploit the quest aren't banned, but i think a rollback of the experience gain they received and maybe a short suspension would be in order.  a permanent ban on something that OutSpark dragged their feet in acknowledging seems too harsh in my opinion.