Paid Character Restoral
System
Posted by Simu-Antavian on 12/15/2004
Starting
December 15, 2004, we are announcing a new restoral policy for characters that
were permanently lost due to standard game mechanics, regardless of how they
were lost (i.e..Retiring/Rerolling or Permanent Death). The policy regarding
characters that were lost due to a system error still remain the same. This new
policy is to allow customers to have their prized characters they may have lost
in the normal play of the game restored at a cost.
For more information about this new policy, FAQ and a website form to fill out if you wish to restore your character, please go to https://www.play.net/gs4/cservice/permarestoral_policy.asp. Any questions that are not answered should be directed to restore@simutronics.com. To those who have passed through the Ebon Gate, we salute you.
Character Restoral Policy From Official Website
Criteria
Characters
restored must have been permanently rerolled or killed. If your character was
lost due to data corruption (such as a game crash or hard drive failure on our
part) then this form is NOT for you and you should see our data corruption
restoral page instead.
Lockouts and Billing Closures
Characters
which are locked out or forfeited for either billing or in game reasons are not
eligible.
Transferred Characters
Characters
which have been transferred to another player's account are considered under
the control of the receiving account, and are not eligible for consideration from
prior accounts.
Cost
The cost is
$250, which must be collected prior to the release of the character. If the fee
is disputed through their credit card company, the character is forfeited and
the account closed.
What is Restored
Restorations
will include character, items, lockers, money (on person, notes, and in bank).
Warnings and Lockouts
All
warnings/lockouts etc. will remain on the character -- subject to the same
timing effect as if the character simply had not been played in the intervening
time.
Timeframe
Earliest date
of eligible restorations is 3/6/2000. No earlier restorations can be done due
to a change in backup equipment/software as of 3/5/2000.
Disclaimer
Despite our
best intentions, it is possible that we will be unable to restore the
character, or the inventory, for which you are looking.
Expanded Paid Restoral Rules, Effective 8/1/2006
Starting on
August 1, 2006, we will be expanding the coverage of our Paid Restoral Process
to include characters that have converted professions. This means that any
Paldins (or Savants or Monks when they are released) which converted from a
Warrior or Cleric will be permitted to use the Paid Restoral Process to restore
their character back to their original profession for the cost of 250 dollars.
The following rules will apply:
1. Characters
who converted after this change in policy will be given 30 days or until
10/31/2006 (whichever is later) in which to request their character are
reverted to their prior profession. Any request to revert the character
received after 30 days or 10/31/2006 (whichever is later) will not be approved.
2. Characters which reverted prior to this announcement, but were upon a closed account at the time of this announcement, will be granted 30 days from the date of reactivation or 10/31/2006 (whichever is later) to request their character be reverted to its prior profession. Any request received after this time expired will not be approved.
3. Characters
which reverted prior to this announcement, but were upon a closed account at
the time of this announcement, will be granted 30 days from the date of
reactivation or 10/31/2006 (whichever is later) to request their character be
reverted to its prior profession. Any request received after this time expired
will not be approved.
Characters
requested to be reverted using this policy will be restored in the following
manner:
1. The
level and experience of the character will remain the same as the day they
converted to their new profession. This means that any level and experience
gains the character has made from the date they converted until the date they
are restored will be nullified.
2. All
inventory, locker and bank balances on the restored character will be removed
and the current character's inventory, locker and bank balances will be
transferred to the restored character.
3. All
skills (Artisan or Guild, where applicable), house affiliations and society
settings will be transferred to the restored character. Any experience gained
from the artisan guild skill advancement will be added to the restored
character.
4. Reverted
characters will be provided 7 days skill migration grace time, one FIXSKILL
attempt and 2 days stat adjustment grace time at the time of restoral.
Providing of
stat adjustment grace time is subject to review by the Restoral Department and
may not apply in all cases.
We understand that customers may make mistakes with their characters at given times. This expansion in policy is to provide those customers who regrettably converted their character the ability to revert that choice. Any questions regarding this expansion of policy should be directed to restore@simutronics.com.
Character Restoral FAQ
I lost my character prior to March 6, 2000,
is there any way I can get it back?
No, we do not
have the technical capabilities prior to March 6, 2000 to restore characters
lost prior. On March 5, 2000 we changed the type of equipment and tapes used
for backups. Four years later, we no longer have the previous equipment.
I lost my character to a game bug and/or
they were corrupted, can I get them back?
Yes, if your
character has been corrupted, it can be restored. If your case has never been
reviewed before and it is verified it was lost to a game bug and/or corruption,
the character restoral fee may be waived. One instance where the fee will not
be waived is if you have been warned about too much inventory and have been
told that your character is not eligible for a restoral if your character is
corrupted due to too much inventory.
I have submitted a character restore
request in the past to Feedback and it was declined, can I still use this
feature?
Yes, you can.
However, your case will not be reviewed again, for purposes of restoring
outside of this policy and will be charged the $250 character restoral fee.
I had my character/account forfeited due to
an in-game policy violation or billing issue, can I get those characters back?
Characters
forfeited due to policy violations are not eligible to be returned. Characters
which were permanently killed or rerolled into a character that has been
forfeited are not eligible. Characters on accounts which have been forfeited by
the billing department will need to be reviewed by the Billing Department to
determine eligibility.
My character is on a closed account, can I
get it back?
Yes, if your
account is simply closed, the account can be reopened by the Billing
Department. You can submit the account
reactivation form to have the account reactivated. Reactivating an account
has no fee beyond the monthly subscription fee.
I deleted my character on the website, can
I get it back?
Yes, please
contact the Billing Department at access@simutronics.com
stating the name of the character that you had deleted. If you do not have
enough room for the character, an additional character slot will be added for
you. A deleted character is not gone, it is simply not visible on your
character list.
I don't like what happened to my character
today, can my character be restored to yesterday?
No, we are not
offering this as a save game feature.
How much is this going to cost me?
The charge for
this service is $250 per character. Some cases, such as valid game bug or
character corruption, will find this fee waived. There is a $50 non-refundable
deposit before we start looking through the character backup tapes and logs and
the remaining $200 is due before we return the character to you.
How long does this process take?
The time that
it can take will vary depending on a number of circumstances. The largest
factor is how easy it is for us to determine the exact date of the character
loss. Another key difficulty is if you have created and lost a number of
characters with the same or similar names. Two weeks is likely to be an average
time, but more difficult cases may take a month or more to complete.
How long after we have found the correct
character will it take to have them returned to me?
Once both
parties have agreed upon the correct character file, the character restoral fee
will be charged to your account. Once the charge successfully processes, the
character will be available for use on the account within 3 business days.
Can I get all the items I had on that
character back too?
Characters will
be returned exactly as they were during the most recently backed up character
file prior to their loss. If it had the items at that time, then yes, if not,
then no. There may be some exceptions to this in cases where the character
handed off items to other characters prior to their loss.
Do I need to know the character's PIN?
No, the PIN is
not necessary.
What if I transferred my character to
another person's account?
No, once a
character is transferred off of your account, you are no longer the player of
that character and cannot request their return. Any previous characters lost
and rolled into the same character slot will not be returned to you.
What if I want that character restored to
an account different from the original one it resides upon?
Yes, but you
must be the account holder of both accounts, even if one of the accounts is
closed.
What will happen to my character if their
backup file was prior to GemStone IV?
There were
significant changes in the characters when GemStone IV was released. Many of
the characters are of different levels and have different skills than when they
were in GemStone III. More information on the changes that characters may
experience can be found throughout this website. The first time you log the
restored character into GemStone IV, they will automatically be converted into
the GemStone IV systems. The things that will happen are as follows:
1. Character's
stats will be re-assigned by the system automatically to the current stat
placement system of 620 points + 10 to the profession's primary two stats.
2. Character's
skills will automatically be re-trained, based upon the character's prior
training, using the new skill sets and training point allocations for GemStone
IV.
3. Each
character has a 30-day grace period starting from the first time that they log
into GemStone IV to readjust their character's stats and skills more to their
liking.
4. Characters
will have the use of one FIXSKILLS, as described in NEWS 2 41 in-game to
immediately set their skills.
Will my Premium/Auction home be restored
with my character?
No. These items
are benefits to the account. As homes are not lost with the character's demise,
if the account had remained valid for this benefit, it would still be upon the
account.
What will happen to any bonded items I may
have had on my character prior to its loss?
In most cases, there should be little to no effect with them. However, in the cases that we must restore the character with a new name over-writing a different file, additional work may be necessary to re-sync those items back to the character.