http://www.inven.co.kr/board/lostark/4820/577
Everglas and Beatrice were added (bringing the total server count to 11) along with increasing the capacity for existing servers in order to help alleviate the login queues during Korean prime time hours (off peak, the login queues are non-existent).
Two weeks in, they’ve managed to get the situation under control (part of this is also from a portion of the non-hardcore players dropping off after hitting max level) after nearly letting it get past them last week. According to those working on the infrastructure backend part of Smilegate, the last two weeks have been a logistical “shit show” in terms of the entire server expansion operations (which makes sense to me since a huge portion of this was the logins from China which invalidated their original capacity requirement plans). So it has been sort of a bandaid fix with having to scale up the number of servers as well as the amount of characters per server.
They have made character names unique across all servers which will make it easier to merge servers in the future. Many dungeons also have cross server matching such that as the population decreases on a particular server, players there won’t have longer wait times. It should be interesting to see what the highest CCU will be after the first month of service (I’m guestimating 425K peak which would be way more than what I originally thought it would be).
As I noted before, those playing from outside really should just appreciate being able to experience any part of the game play since we’ve just been adding to the load on their original capacity planning. It’s why I mentioned not bothering to try playing again (after losing my prior account) given they didn’t seem to have a complete handle on stabilizing the login situation last week (even though a friend/colleague created a re-verifiable account for me to replace the non-verifiable one I had previously). Maybe I will tackle leveling up characters again but only during off-peak Korean hours.
Also, there is debate going on whether or not the community created English language patch is causing some players to have their accounts permanently banned. The game uses XIGNCODE (in the CBT’s, they had previously used Gameguard) which depending on how it is configured, may not detect the file changes made (which would require it to be actively scanning game files while the game is running which it is not doing). I’m not really sure what the patch actually does though (I know it is an executable which runs after the STOVE launcher is run so that it can do what it needs to do before it launches the game).
Some players have reported on the LOST ARK community Discord of being permanently banned (the “Access Restricted” message normally contains a restriction period with the year 2999 or 3000) with the reason being “illegal program use”.
UPDATE: I’ve now read up a bit more on the patch and the way it works is #1) clearly against the terms of service, #2) detectable. There’s a lot of erroneous assumptions (pure garbage actually) being bandied about like; so long as you don’t stream/post videos or screenshots with your character info while using the patch will reduce your chances.
Those who live stream with the patch are essentially easy targets (since the proof is in the video; it’s how Chinese streamers were banned 1.5 weeks ago with the Chinese translation patch (basically not the smartest thing to do). But there are a few players who weren’t publicly streaming their play who were using the English language patch that claimed they were banned. Right now, there isn’t any consistency since there are also some folks using the patch that haven’t been banned. Basically, anyone playing from outside Korea could see either re-verifications or account suspensions regardless.
The thing with account suspensions and bans is there is a formal appeals process. Any competent company will have a well defined standard operating procedure for issuing such suspensions/bans including a documentation trail. I think Smilegate has proven by their product, their tendency to fall on the side of competence so I do believe they have a process in place for account suspensions/bans. Something like that does take up resources (because you need a team to manage that process).
So while they may be detecting this patch (as an illegal program), it’s something they are going to have to prioritize (easiest targets are live streamers since they have actual video proof). After that are those cases where a player didn’t perform the right sequence running and then ending the patch. And then there are the other cases where they can continue to fine tune detection while logging information to potentially perform a larger ban wave (which is how most companies prefer doing them in order to keep actual cheaters who may be using more malicious third party apps).
tl;dr: if you need to ask if the patch is safe (in light of knowing the terms of service which is pretty clear about it), then you know the risks of using it. Same with the fact that we’re not supposed to even be accessing the game using a VPN and accounts that aren’t created under our own personal information (impossible since you need Korean credentials). Re-verifications aren’t permanent either per their service; 1 time then after that, re-verification plus 7-day ban, then after that, it increases to 30 days. After the third strike (and 3rd re-verification), it’s a permanent ban. And if you had a friend/family or someone else create an account under theirs (5 per), it puts their own account (if they are also playing) at risk. This is sort of why I’m just not jumping back in myself (since Smilegate is going to be way more vigilant during OBT).
