Account Adjustments

Share:

Stephen Cooper of the Mafia Wars Examiner has written an excellent article about another in-game message that players are receiving.  2 days ago I wrote about the "MWPauseFightGift" message.  Today Stephen writes about another unappealing in-game message referred to as "MWStatsAdjustment".  This one is aimed at players who have an unusually high number of certain loot items in their accounts.  Unfortunately not all players who got this message acquired their loot through any TOS violations.  The article comments can be found by clicking on the link above.

I was unable to enlarge the screen shot contained in this article so here is the copy/paste version.
ACCOUNT NOTICE

Dear Mafia Wars Player,

We are dedicated to providing an excellent game play experience for all of our players.  To achieve this goal, we must maintain a level playing field to ensure fair competition in the game.  Recently, our systems detected an irregularity with your in-game stats.  As a result, necessary adjustments have been made to your account to protect your game play and the integrity of the Mafia Wars combat systems.  If you have any questions, please visit this FAQ or contact our Customer Support team and reference this message, "MWStatsAdjustment", in your e-mail.


Thank-you for being a devoted Mafia Wars Player


Sincerely,
The Mafia Wars Team

Stephen Coopers article to include all the comments can be found by clicking HERE.

 

Rumors about MWStatsAdjustment and MWPauseFightGift messages have been floating around recently. This particular MWStatsAdjustment message concerns the presence of Lotto Collection items in a particular player's inventory.

The player in question was in possession of many sets of the Daily Chance Lotto Collection items.  And while it is easy to cry foul out of jealousy, all sets were obtained LEGALLY within the confines of Zynga TOS, i.e. by TRADING

Let us take a look at the wording of this message:

"maintain a level playing field to ensure fair competition" - Keeping a fair and level playing field is something anybody should be able to endorse.  Introducing new features that help balance the presence of older ones can be a good idea when instituted properly.  Graduated tiers of job costs based on level is another way to allow lower players to have fun without hindering those who have struggled to climb the peak they now stand on.  This is different.  Although Lotto does allow the person in possession to trade away for other loot that could conceivably benefit them, if they received this Lotto from fair trading in the first place it hardly constitutes an unfair advantage.  Any advantage inherent in the amount of inventory traded for is a direct result of ingenuity, hard work, and an economic understanding on the part of the trader. No need to take what they rightly traded for, especially when trading is part of the paradigm of social gaming.

"to protect your game play" - Difficult to envision how taking something from its rightful owner will in fact protect them.  Then again, I suppose robbing a bank would prevent it from going under as a result of investing in bunk sub-prime mortgages.

"and the integrity of the Mafia Wars combat systems" - Not exactly sure what this means.  Was this person's Lotto invading Zynga's airspace, thus constituting a breach of security and an act of war?  In this case, the best way to ensure ANY game integrity is by letting people keep what they earned.  Arguments could be made for and against the block on trading energy boosts recently.  A player with too many energy boosts could affect a decided advantage over others in his or her progression.  Of course, they still traded for them legally.  But in this case, the Lotto in question does not provide that advantage.

So here is hoping that this player gets their many Daily Chance Lotto Collection items returned to them in a timely manner.

For ongoing discussion of this, visit Mafia Task Force.