>Seems the main concern is gold farmers. The easiest way to get rid of gold farmers is to not buy their gold<
Actually a classic way of eliminating gold farmers has become for the developer to become the biggest gold seller of all and make it easier and safer to buy gold from it than from the independents.
Either outright sale of in-game currency for real world cash or sale of items like kronos for real world cash and allowing the players to set the market for how much in-game money they go for.
I suspect 99% of us consider an in-game store anathma - myself definitely in that number. I wonder if a game website selling ancillary services such as server transfers, race or gender changes, etc and also selling items that could be traded in-game and that were good for playime - maybe with different denominations (Panite - one day playtime, Panerite - one week playtime, Holy Panade of Antioch - one month playtime) would get that number down to 90%. Then we wouldn't need to worry about goldspam in designing the mechanics for free trials.
Offhand I suspect that VR as a goldseller isn't the best idea in the world but it would reduce goldspam dramatically and raise money to support the game without having a store. If someone else threw the idea out I would have reflexively attacked it as inevitably leading to inflation and even hyperinflation in the game economy. First choice - VR comes up with a way of limiting gold farmers e.g. a very effective filter making it hard for them to sell. But if they become a plague despite VR's efforts maybe VR should keep a NON-STORE way to compete with them in mind. Since gold sellers will also cause inflation or hyperinflation without the profits benefitting the game.
Let it never come to this. Crom curse all gold spammers. Set curse all gold spammers. Mitra curse all gold spammers (yes I'm trying Age of Conan again while I wait for Pantheon).
Dullahan said:Free trials should definitely not have very few restrictions. In fact, it's imperative that they have many restrictions. Not so much as far as getting the experience of the world and gameplay, but anything else that can be exploited should be limited. A real restriction to me is an instance or trial island completely separate from the proper world. That does not make for a real trial of the game, but to allow trial players into the open world means restrictions to keep things above board.
That means free trial should get their starting city and surrounding starting area, no more. That way free accounts don't become mules or a tool to grief others in dungeons, esp in higher lvl areas.
No invites or tells to non-trial players (only reply or /accept).
No trading or trade chat, no ooc, no shouts. Even say should be reduced to a few times a minute max, with spam detection and triggered mutes. A /trial chat channel is all trial players should need along with /reply and the occasional /say.
None of those things are imperative for getting a feel for the game. All of those things will absolutely be abused if they aren't restricted.
Trial players names should also be released after 30 days if the account doesn't activate a subscription.
Also:
You can simply do this by making it to where Trial accounts have their own shard that they can't change from with a level cap, that way they can see whatever we can but cant talk to us or harrass us at the same time. unless of course we go to their shard than we are merely asking for it if that is where they are at. So, this is a big restriction as in they cant come to our shards but a small one simply becuase they can go anywhere where their level will allow it,
Riahuf22 said:Dullahan said:Free trials should definitely not have very few restrictions. In fact, it's imperative that they have many restrictions. Not so much as far as getting the experience of the world and gameplay, but anything else that can be exploited should be limited. A real restriction to me is an instance or trial island completely separate from the proper world. That does not make for a real trial of the game, but to allow trial players into the open world means restrictions to keep things above board.
That means free trial should get their starting city and surrounding starting area, no more. That way free accounts don't become mules or a tool to grief others in dungeons, esp in higher lvl areas.
No invites or tells to non-trial players (only reply or /accept).
No trading or trade chat, no ooc, no shouts. Even say should be reduced to a few times a minute max, with spam detection and triggered mutes. A /trial chat channel is all trial players should need along with /reply and the occasional /say.
None of those things are imperative for getting a feel for the game. All of those things will absolutely be abused if they aren't restricted.
Trial players names should also be released after 30 days if the account doesn't activate a subscription.
Also:
You can simply do this by making it to where Trial accounts have their own shard that they can't change from with a level cap, that way they can see whatever we can but cant talk to us or harrass us at the same time. unless of course we go to their shard than we are merely asking for it if that is where they are at. So, this is a big restriction as in they cant come to our shards but a small one simply becuase they can go anywhere where their level will allow it,
Like I said before, separate trial servers do have some drawbacks. Most importantly, it does not give the trial player a real window into how things work on a normal server. No higher level players going about, very little activity in the cities and starting areas, less interaction with players in general, and eventually, a limited number of people to group with during the first few levels.
Trial servers would probably only be a good idea until the number of trials begins to decrease several months into the game.
Beefcake said:According to you all, most trial accounts are all gold spammers and harassers. So, why would any legit trial account want to start paying if they were on a separate shard where all they ever saw was spammers and harassers?
The fact of the gold spammers and harassers would be stuck in a shard where they could only go so far and not be able to get in contact of people paying would make them stop playing, or get a sub, which in turn would make it to where the people actually doing the trial accounts are there to actually see if they like the game. this might not exactly stop the gold spammers to a point but it definately would stop the harassers cuase they could just harass on other games for free, but i think would also weed out enough gold spammers to make it not worth it. I'm hoping anyway, but like someone said before the best way to stop gold spammers is to have people not buy from them I guess we will see what happens but im hoping harassers/goldspammers is something we can deal without ever bothering us.
Dullahan said:Riahuf22 said:Dullahan said:Free trials should definitely not have very few restrictions. In fact, it's imperative that they have many restrictions. Not so much as far as getting the experience of the world and gameplay, but anything else that can be exploited should be limited. A real restriction to me is an instance or trial island completely separate from the proper world. That does not make for a real trial of the game, but to allow trial players into the open world means restrictions to keep things above board.
That means free trial should get their starting city and surrounding starting area, no more. That way free accounts don't become mules or a tool to grief others in dungeons, esp in higher lvl areas.
No invites or tells to non-trial players (only reply or /accept).
No trading or trade chat, no ooc, no shouts. Even say should be reduced to a few times a minute max, with spam detection and triggered mutes. A /trial chat channel is all trial players should need along with /reply and the occasional /say.
None of those things are imperative for getting a feel for the game. All of those things will absolutely be abused if they aren't restricted.
Trial players names should also be released after 30 days if the account doesn't activate a subscription.
Also:
You can simply do this by making it to where Trial accounts have their own shard that they can't change from with a level cap, that way they can see whatever we can but cant talk to us or harrass us at the same time. unless of course we go to their shard than we are merely asking for it if that is where they are at. So, this is a big restriction as in they cant come to our shards but a small one simply becuase they can go anywhere where their level will allow it,
Like I said before, separate trial servers do have some drawbacks. Most importantly, it does not give the trial player a real window into how things work on a normal server. No higher level players going about, very little activity in the cities and starting areas, less interaction with players in general, and eventually, a limited number of people to group with during the first few levels.
Trial servers would probably only be a good idea until the number of trials begins to decrease several months into the game.
okay, i see what your saying and hopefully they do something like this or anything to make it to where gold spammers and harassers are to a mininum, i have faith in them
The biggest argument that I have seen in this thread for trial players to be on the same servers as sub players is to be able to "see high level people".
I have done a lot of free trials and seeing high level people that don't talk to me, can't group with me, and largely are uninterested in my existence has had little impact on whether I continued to play the game. Trial account people are much more interested in people their own level that they can go do things with. So having them on a separate server by themselves seems to have a couple positives: discouraging goldseller spammers since spamming free trial accounts doesn't get them much business, and letting the free trials be unrestricted in terms of communication and other interactions which is critical to people getting a feel for a social game such as this.
The main downside that I can see was also mentioned earlier, lower numbers of people to group with. This is because they would be segregated from the population of new characters made by subscribers. If the trial server population got low enough, some kind of fast travel system connecting newbie areas might be created to help alleviate this, but early on this would not be necessary.
I also agree with one early poster that if the free trials are on a separate server, they should be able to move that character to a regular server if they buy the game.
Without bothering to go back and reread all the posts in this thread (which was dormant for half a year) I would say that the best reasons for having trial players on a normal server do NOT include the ability to see high level players. I agree with Rolador that this is almost irrelevant to most trial players. Far better reasons IMO are:
1. Ability to see what guilds are active, talk to members of the guilds, and pick one to join upon becoming a subscriber even if guild membership is not allowed until then. This assumes some limited ability to communicate. While we do not want trial accounts used by gold farmers to spam we DO need them able to talk to other players. Saying Panthon is primarily a social game, try it out, oh by the way you have to be mute while you try it is not ...wise.
2. Ability to group with other players that aren't trial accounts and actually know the game. Including higher level parts of the game, to let trial players know what treats will await them later on. Some of of us will maintain lower level characters to be able to group with new players and help them out if they want help - whether out of niceness, to help the game or to recruit for guilds.
3. Ability to talk with other players that aren't trial accounts - see above.
4. Ability to see what people are doing and what they are saying and, Gods willing, see that the community is more mature and less trollsome than the games they may be used to. Even if a trial player can't talk in a particular channel he or she may be allowed to read it and probably should be able to read most general channels.
5. Interaction with higher level characters. Just seeing a high level may mean little but if she buffs you and helps heal you and kills a mob that is about to kill you that is a different matter entirely.
This is not to say that there are no reasons to segregate trial players but let's not understate the reasons NOT to segregate them.
Rolador said:The biggest argument that I have seen in this thread for trial players to be on the same servers as sub players is to be able to "see high level people".
I have done a lot of free trials and seeing high level people that don't talk to me, can't group with me, and largely are uninterested in my existence has had little impact on whether I continued to play the game. Trial account people are much more interested in people their own level that they can go do things with. So having them on a separate server by themselves seems to have a couple positives: discouraging goldseller spammers since spamming free trial accounts doesn't get them much business, and letting the free trials be unrestricted in terms of communication and other interactions which is critical to people getting a feel for a social game such as this.
The main downside that I can see was also mentioned earlier, lower numbers of people to group with. This is because they would be segregated from the population of new characters made by subscribers. If the trial server population got low enough, some kind of fast travel system connecting newbie areas might be created to help alleviate this, but early on this would not be necessary.
I also agree with one early poster that if the free trials are on a separate server, they should be able to move that character to a regular server if they buy the game.
There is another factor to this is if you are in another server then once you are done you have to transfer to another server and the people you met may not pick the same one as you so you lose connections there. Its also fun to run into someone who you grouped with at levels 1-10 and you are now 30-40s.
There there is the other view point. The higher level people. As a higer level person I liek to go back to the noob areas and chat and help out people. Back in EQ like right after Velious dropped, there was a 40ish druid who would bring back the vendor Velium weapons back to Kelethin and he would do a live quests for the lowbies for 5 bat wings and they would get a weapon. it was awesom.
So I'm not for a seperate server, it breaks the social aspect completely. I cant imagine going into a major city on first spawn to see no higher level people, or even peopel to ask how to do something or where is a certain npc.
Zeem said:There is another factor to this is if you are in another server then once you are done you have to transfer to another server and the people you met may not pick the same one as you so you lose connections there. Its also fun to run into someone who you grouped with at levels 1-10 and you are now 30-40s.
There there is the other view point. The higher level people. As a higer level person I liek to go back to the noob areas and chat and help out people. Back in EQ like right after Velious dropped, there was a 40ish druid who would bring back the vendor Velium weapons back to Kelethin and he would do a live quests for the lowbies for 5 bat wings and they would get a weapon. it was awesom.
So I'm not for a seperate server, it breaks the social aspect completely. I cant imagine going into a major city on first spawn to see no higher level people, or even peopel to ask how to do something or where is a certain npc.
Yeah the player given live quests were a pretty wonderful experience for a lowbie/new player. I remember quite a lot of those going on in Kelethin at all stages of classic EQ and it felt pretty awesome having people gift things like that as a new player, you felt like a king being the first to complete the player quest and get a full set of bronze or chainmail.
When I first started the game I made a paladin (after spending quite a lot of time being lost/stuck in the Surefall cave with a blind human ranger), and an extremely kind 40-something paladin gave out the quest to bring him 10 patches of gnoll fur. He gave me a full set of blackened iron armor (black chainmail), a barbed leather whip, and a Qeynos kite shield. I felt like a million bucks.
Trial accounts should be able to be on regular servers, I think having limitations on what they can do is the more important thing. Limited only to /say but can respond to players who message them first via /tell, can't use any AH or mailbox (if there are any) and no ability to trade with other players OR drop items on the ground (can only sell or destroy). If it still became an issue somehow they could also put in low gold/platinum caps for trial accounts.
Just like the PLEX discussion in another thread, I like the idea of trial accounts.
Offering possibility, options, and opportunity for potential PLAYERS who are interested in actually playing the game. It just needs really strict rules that don't totally eliminate game play, but still doesn't have full access or even enough access to be abused. But it could also just be trial and error. Impliment it, if there's an error, let it be fixed right away.
I sure hope we have super active and efficient GM's. That's what will really make this game good. Community Matters.
Okay, let me propose an idea that assists new potential players with their decision:
- Create a seperate Trial Server for the new players to create a character and play for a few levels and experience the world. The new players will create a new character on a Live Server when they decide to subscribe to the game as the "trial account" characters will NOT be transferred to a Live Server at the end of their trial.
- There should be plenty of Guides online to assist the new players with questions about the game. They should also have the power to eliminate any problems that popup. Free game play, albeit on a restricted server, will attract a wide audience including a few trolls. However, a one-way teleport to a small room with no doors should alleviate the problem.
- Trading will NOT be allowed on this server. This is a place for the new player to experience the world, NOT build longterm characters. No trading should also eliminate the "gold farmers" from disrupting the experience, since they can't off-load their harvest.
- Allow current players to create a copy their character(s) to the Trial Server. These characters will be de-leveled/mentored to an appropiate level for playing with the "trial account" characters. Besides NO trading, these "copied" characters would NOT be able to loot corpses, harvest nodes, nor pickup ground spawns since this server is all about showing off the world to the new players not the current players. The current players could meet and play with the new players whether they be old friends or complete strangers. The new players would be able to see, speak, and group with the current players about their experiences in the world. Guilds could host events, raids, and recruit new players or just be sociable. As an incentive, maybe the current players/guilds earn points towards housing/guild decorations (or some other cosmetic item) for their participation.
- The Trial Server should have a lockout on the high level zones. It's better for the new players to remain in level appropriate areas. This is a trial, not a place for people to do extensive exploring. We don't want any guild to get creative and explore/mapout a raid zone without fear of losing XP on their main characters.
I'd agree with the idea of making sugestions and naming pitfalls where specifics are not puslished yet.
sugested reads:
http://gamestudies.org/0902/articles/ruch (a bit old, but related on the In-Game: Rules, Laws and Code section)
But don't take limitations too far. Personalization and user experience during trial period is the moment you create that bonding feeling of personal, ownership and relate to product.
So the progeny taking the higher players into the low fields will make good accounter more likely.
(and mushiness will also feed on the repulsive feelings of gold sellers; reducing, all bits help)
Maybe a tell has a range? would make it more immersive in a way.
Yelling for help would carry so far; why not an ooc tell too?
Make those evil ppl run for their money =)
Good ideas Laeril and nicely explained.
On a quick read I see three primary problems.
1. It will not give the true experience of being on a "real" server. Trial players won't be able to see or talk to current players, see how world or zone chat works (more or less trollsome or mature than other games matters to many people), talk to guilds, group with current players etc. Having clones of a few current players will help but it isn't the same especially since the copies are likely to come from multiple servers so the trial player may not get a feel for the culture and attitude of any one server.
2. Most people will not want to spend much time on copied characters where nothing they do will in any way help the character or its alts. So trial players will see a very atypical group of people.
3. Most importantly IMO many people will not be happy "wasting" time for a week or two on a trial with a character that can't be used. I like to start over and understand very very well that redoing level one and two and three is quick and easy and should be even in Pantheon. Many feel differently.
I prefer trials to be on a live server with significant restrictions on communication to prevent them from being used to spam and annoy. Of course this causes other problems which your approach would avoid. Trade-offs.
On my point 3 - this is entirely obviated if the trial character can be transferred "as is" to a live server. Why not allow this (with a level-cap so that a trial player cannot bypass too much from the live server)?
Trial accounts are not lesser people. They should not be segregated from the rest of the population. Limit their functionality, if you must. But, don't banish them to separate server where they cannot play with their subscribed friends.
If trial accounts were as awful people as many here claim, then putting legit trial account players on a server full of spammer trial accounts is not a positive introduction to the game.
Let's not segregate players based on their subscription status. Let's welcome new, interested players with open arms and give them a reason to quickly join the community.
I roughly estimate 550, $15 subscriptions a month that to pay a single VR employee around $100k per year in pay and benifits. (Quick rough estimate, if you have another I would like to see it)
How much damage could one skilled guy, working 40 hours a week do to gold sellers, on how many servers?
Say monitoring. ...3 maybe more servers at a time
VR created monitoring software runn8ng on easch server (built it) watching for key words so this guy could use the Ban Hammer based on reports.
If all is calm on the server then set up Web Site's to find the accounts there using...Ban Hammer!
Other built in VR ONLY software say monitoring cash transactions where Ban Man could.do his thing.
I would think he could easily monitor more than enough servers to pay for his keep.
If the game went .."Viral! ?" Then it really shouldn't be a problem having a small team monitoring all the servers reports.
To my knowledge we gamers have NO right to privacy on their servers, playing their game and agreeing to their EULA
Something like this is the key to giving a Trial Account the REAL Pantheon experience, on a REAL Pantheon server, with real Pantheon players. This would also give The Devs the game they want...pretty sure they don't want gold spamming eather.
The Gold sellers are storing the gold someplace... so even if they do just keep making new accounts.. bait them till you find the stash.. Ban That account.
They need to build in a good set of survalince tools for use by Terminus Department of Homeland Security. TDHS
Edit: a behind the scenes Dev Tracking Device to reroute flagged accounts to a special log. Once they know the bank they set a tracker on the account to monitor all incoming and outgoing transactions and who there with. Ban Hammer on accounts purchasing the gold.. if it's incredibly risky to buy gold people would be less willing to risk their account.
A lot of games have a feature where you can "report" a player. This seems like it should be really effective... let the community decide who doesn't belong. The problem is that these systems are often rendered ineffective because it gets handed over to a human GM to interpret. Human GM's are basically incapable of figuring out if someone is a griefer because griefing isn't a single action, but a pattern of behaviors and interactions and GM's are an expensive resource. Basically, assholes can hide behind a slow bureaucratic process.
What I think is that you could do is design a system of reporting that makes automatic decisions based on statistics that would use a players history of reports to determine if they are an outlier from the rest of the population. If more people than average are taking offense at you more frequently than average... something is objectively wrong. You are an outlier, and it really doesn't take a GM to review this. This could result in automatic temporary bans.
This would greatly reduce GM workload and let them focus only on the worst offenders, perhaps making permanent bans in those cases.
endylendari said:A lot of games have a feature where you can "report" a player. This seems like it should be really effective... let the community decide who doesn't belong. The problem is that these systems are often rendered ineffective because it gets handed over to a human GM to interpret. Human GM's are basically incapable of figuring out if someone is a griefer because griefing isn't a single action, but a pattern of behaviors and interactions and GM's are an expensive resource. Basically, assholes can hide behind a slow bureaucratic process.
What I think is that you could do is design a system of reporting that makes automatic decisions based on statistics that would use a players history of reports to determine if they are an outlier from the rest of the population. If more people than average are taking offense at you more frequently than average... something is objectively wrong. You are an outlier, and it really doesn't take a GM to review this. This could result in automatic temporary bans.
This would greatly reduce GM workload and let them focus only on the worst offenders, perhaps making permanent bans in those cases.
I must disagree. A human GM is far preferable to a an automatic system. The same person griefing you can easily grief you further by reporting YOU as part of the grief actions. Then, the griefer gets YOU banned until a human looks at it.
Often, a griefer is part of a griefer guild that would have no moral qualms over the entire guild falsely reporting you, the griefed party.
Human intervention, however slow, is better than an abusable system.
I think controlling griefing is now your turning away from the Real problems of Trial Accounts. Free Trials are expected to be 5-10 levels... there is little griefing at this point. And I think what is there, should be obvious and in the face of the new user, for them to see how it is actually handled in Pantheon. The REAL experiance
The problem with the FREE trial accounts is just their use by gold sellers.
Beefcake said:endylendari said:A lot of games have a feature where you can "report" a player. This seems like it should be really effective... let the community decide who doesn't belong. The problem is that these systems are often rendered ineffective because it gets handed over to a human GM to interpret. Human GM's are basically incapable of figuring out if someone is a griefer because griefing isn't a single action, but a pattern of behaviors and interactions and GM's are an expensive resource. Basically, assholes can hide behind a slow bureaucratic process.
What I think is that you could do is design a system of reporting that makes automatic decisions based on statistics that would use a players history of reports to determine if they are an outlier from the rest of the population. If more people than average are taking offense at you more frequently than average... something is objectively wrong. You are an outlier, and it really doesn't take a GM to review this. This could result in automatic temporary bans.
This would greatly reduce GM workload and let them focus only on the worst offenders, perhaps making permanent bans in those cases.
I must disagree. A human GM is far preferable to a an automatic system. The same person griefing you can easily grief you further by reporting YOU as part of the grief actions. Then, the griefer gets YOU banned until a human looks at it.
Often, a griefer is part of a griefer guild that would have no moral qualms over the entire guild falsely reporting you, the griefed party.
Human intervention, however slow, is better than an abusable system.
Indeed. Human referees aka Game Masters are the absolute best for keeping things in check in these types of games. Relying on a system without any human oversight always ends in the abuse of said system. Also what some people consider griefing others consider fun so it is absolutely critical to set the rules and let players know what they are from day one. I've noticed newer MMOs seem afraid to actually intervene period, or they are so understaffed they cannot do anything. They also tend to get confused as to what their own rules are which can really screw things up. Or you can be like ArcheAge where they literally said it's ok to scam players. The current MMORPG market is downright terrible when it comes to "law enforcement" and I say it's mostly due to being cheap and refusing to hire enough trained staff.
With GMs a scarce resource, a related question is to what extent you can rely on non-VR people to help out. Keeping in mind that you will never do a perfect job picking these people and a bad Community Assistant can do a lot more harm to the game than a griefer.
This may be workable, however, if you limit their authority to the most clearcut cases. Outright goldspam. Outright racial slurs (asssuming these violate the ToS as I assume they will). Various other clear violations that go well beyong "he said" "she said" debates over who griefed whom. Any action appealable to a GM but not suspended by an appeal. If a Community Assistant mutes you you stay muted until it is reversed. Only limited penalties allowed (muting yes but an outright ban of the account could only be recommended to a GM not actually applied.
An expedited appeal process - if you feel a Community Assistant is screwing you over you can submit a special ticket that will be flagged for priority review. With consequences to your account if you repeatedly use this process and it turns out the CAs indeed were acting properly.
Termination of CA status for misuse of the power or even excessive honest mistakes in the hands of the GMs without appeal - there is no "right" to keep this position.
On the very specific point of whether you can automate sanctions - absolutely not. Bad apples can get friends and guildmates to join in and vote you off the server, so to speak. So reporting *their* misconduct will be riskier than just ignoring it. 30 people clicking "she is a racist homophobe who eats meat and wears furs" does not make it so. Maybe all I did was say I agreed with Trump or Clinton or Saunders on an issue. Sadly, today, there is little sense of humor or tolerance towards those who disagree with us and a feeling that if someone is of a different political view they deserve any harm you can inflict on them by any means.
One method to help with policing the abuse of gold sellers/spammers is to have a generic reporting feature along the lines of simply "gold seller." Upon sending the report the server and zone will be noted and automatically logging of all shouts is done in the background for a very brief amount of time (undetermined). This doesn't need to affect gameplay and can be separate from the game, itself. A second algorithm can be implemented to parse the data file for certain keywords related to gold selling. If there is a hit then a message sent to the dev team with the information to be processed when it can be processed (undetermined). Human intervention at this stage can wield a big hammer if it is shown to be true. Data files are purged after a period of time of no action taken. It may not happen instantaneously but it may help alleviate the strain on those policing servers by having some parsing going on automatically in the background.
If these spammers are generally from trial accounts the number of zones where this may occur will be significantly smaller than the potential number of zones due to simply the restrictions that may be placed on trial accounts. This doesn't really address griefing but it should address possible abuses and abusers in an automated fashion simply to identify. Human intervention identifes (player or players in the zone with a simple generic report), human intervention confirms (after an algorithm identifies a positive hit and sends it on up the chain) and human intervention wields a big hammer (verification) - everything else is automatic. No one needs to know what is actually being done in the background upon sending a report - VR can keep that proprietary and unpublished. It's possible that there will be too much time elapsed that a gold seller gets their money before the big hammer is wielded - that leads to a completely bigger problem in the user base - one that I haven't addressed in this post.
I think play for free accounts should be only until level 20 on a special ruleset server for people to test the game out. No cross server /tells etc... just play and spam your own f2p game server that way there will be no auto creation accounts again like we had in EQ.
It was bad back then, really was when first introduced.
Content only goes so far. This might avoid all kinds of problems to the backers, and new generated accounts we will get after launch.
If people wish to play with guilds on live servers? they may have a special denoted site they can access to list all current guilds and contact info via email or something that they are interested in joining on the live server.
When there is the will there is always a way, to change the existing "old" F2P system.
Basically the Live servers pay for the F2P server, to get new people to join the live servers. Just saying this might be safe and less hassles.