Your character data may be damaged.

[Marylyn]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

I got the same error on friday, of course 1 hour after the supposed tech helpline closed(not that they help anyways). I had talked to a couple GMs to try and get some information about error 3202 and though polite, about as helpful as GM's usually are ;(. I asked if they could move my char, said i had to be logged in. I also asked that if all else were to fail, if they could just roll back my char. They said they don't do it for error 3202 cases, but that tech would fix it cause they get these cases all the time.

Sooo on Monday i called, took 3 hours to get through -.-... It then took another 30 mins to get transferred to the department or w/e, even though i had specified that it was a tech prob. After mentioning error 3202, the tech told me to hold on, that he had to look it up. That took him about 15 mins. After that, he said he'd send the report, as Kotomo mentioned. He then took down information to get back to me and that was that.

Tuesday i called again to check on the status(I had already taken a look at this thread, so i decided it'd be a good idea to bug) and was another 3 hour wait, which i missed the first response so i had to wait another 2-3 hours XD... When i finally got to talk to someone, he said they lost my contact info and that he'd send in another report. So basically if i didn't call again, nothing more would have been done. He was also pretty rude and just outright ignored questions i asked.

I called again today and the representative at least was able to acknowledge the fact that a report was sent, so i guess that's good. I asked for a time estimate though, and he was unable to say.

Horrible customer service ;<

Edit:I was able to request a reference # on the report sent, might be a good idea to do so as well.

[Kotomo]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

So I called for a second time today and got a better idea of what's going on.

For one, this obviously a server side related problem and has to be handled by whomever maintains the games servers and or databases who of course, some Japanese IT monkey who either works closely with SE at a data center or is employed by SE to remotely manage all the servers, I don't really know. With that in mind, the people we call in California are not given any information about how the development process of the game works or how the actual servers are maintained. They should not have to be given that information, they are there to give you assistance in setting up an account, installing the game, using basic features of the game and lately, helping with SE accounts and security tokens. Any kind of extreme variable, which this problem is in this case, they have to forward a report to the developers and those that maintain the game.

I asked nicely if it was possible to get a status update on the progress of recovering my character and I said I was concerned if anything was being done at all. He of course told me he was not able to because of what I've stated above. Simply put: The representative does not know, his/her manager probably does not know, and their higher ups do not feel it necessary that service reps should know the exact process of developing the game and maintaining some form of SQL database at a data center. They should not need to know all of that.

I also mentioned that it would be nice if I had gotten an e-mail or something stating that a report was sent out for my account and that's when he told me the process that has to take place to the best of his knowledge and the fact that he truly does not know. He also re-assured me(since I was concerned) that as soon as he pulled up my account that it has been marked as being reported and has been sent out.

To sum everything up, this has basically given me a better understanding that this has to be handled by some group of the development team on top of all the other game fixes they have to make. Still, even if this issue is uncommon, I truly wish they could handle it SIMILARLY to rolling back your character if you report your character getting hacked. Just roll the character back by 1 minute, that's all it really needs.

[Durahansolo]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

What's even bigger bullshit is they can't be bothered to get an 800 number so that people don't get raped on long distance charges.

This. I've probably called SE 4 times before, and today was the first day I noticed that it wasn't toll free. I had called the number on my cellphone all the other times, it was a good thing I did.

[Aksannyi]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

What's even bigger bullshit is they can't be bothered to get an 800 number so that people don't get raped on long distance charges.

[hexx]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

Damn they seriously need to work on their customer service >.< I do customer service for State Farm and our hold time on our BUSY days is no more than 5 min >_> Its called being properly staffed..........idiots.

[Durahansolo]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

the guy ends up telling me that he's not sure if my issue was forwarded to the CORRECT DEPARTMENT OR THAT IT WAS FORWARDED AT ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So he'll resubmit it for me and see if that helps.......

I've been calling at LEAST 2 times a week every week. I always get the "this is our rarest error code..." bullcrap. I DON'T CARE HOW RARE IT IS!!! ROLL MY GOD DAMN CHARACTER BACK!

That's not the first time I've heard of that happening TGM. I had to call them earlier about my Security Token AND THE LINE WAS BUSY! MFWTF! So I called back about 5 times and the line was still busy. I eventually somehow got the automated service and then was on hold for about 45 mins. I was on hold so long that when the Sandoria theme started playing I got hyped and started whistling and dancing.

[hexx]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

Goodness gracious, they STILL haven't recovered your character TGM?

[TheGrandMom]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

I wish I knew that answer DarkHound.

Today's update is............

My hubby had to call about his security token because their website was getting slammed and his password wouldn't work after he made the account. So I told him "when you are done talking to him, I want the phone!" So I got on the phone and in the end the guy ends up telling me that he's not sure if my issue was forwarded to the CORRECT DEPARTMENT OR THAT IT WAS FORWARDED AT ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So he'll resubmit it for me and see if that helps.......

I've been calling at LEAST 2 times a week every week. I always get the "this is our rarest error code..." bullcrap. I DON'T CARE HOW RARE IT IS!!! ROLL MY GOD DAMN CHARACTER BACK!

[Darkhound]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

Why can they jsut simply restore you char¿

[Durahansolo]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

I have a couple lawyer friends, and though there is little I can do legally at this point, they did suggest that I let them draft a letter on their letterhead and send it. I think I may take them up on it.

You could....But....Playonline is just gonna laugh at it and then toss it...Since we agree to TOS to play the game and we technically have no ownership of our characters, they don't have to do anything.

[Kotomo]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

Interesting thing I noticed as soon as this happened. About 15min to a half hour after I could not get in, Fenrir appeared as Partially Down in the server status page on the website, and there was no news posts about it at all. I don't recall seeing any message about emergency maintenance either in the game before I disconnected into oblivion. I wonder what that was about. Perhaps Fenrir is about to implode one day.

A co-worker of mine has also mentioned that he was out of WoW for a whole month because the servers lost track of a lot of data that had to be recovered. A good handful of people however were affected by the problem.

What I truly wish they would do is send me an e-mail at least saying they have sent out a report for my account. That would be 10 times better than having absoluteley nothing at all.

Edit: I've tried to log in today after I got home from work, still no luck. So that emergency maintenance has done absolute jack for me.

[TheGrandMom]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

I still can not access my character. I was told earlier this week that they would call me sometime this week and no call. I've really been extremely patient. I haven't gotten overly anxious about all this but I'm starting to. I have a couple lawyer friends, and though there is little I can do legally at this point, they did suggest that I let them draft a letter on their letterhead and send it. I think I may take them up on it.

[Aksannyi]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

Think everyone had a maintenance in Whitegate last night. Was a quick one - about 5-10 minutes - but wasn't just one server.

[Raydeus]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

We had an emergency maintenence on Fenrir last night (Whitegate), I wonder if it's related to this because it doesn't even show on POL's site.

[Kotomo]

Re: Your character data may be damaged.

Sorry if I'm digging this up at all, but I also came across this thread through Google. It also the ONLY thing I find about it as well. So does not seem to be all too common but this happened to me on April 12th, this past Sunday night as of this post. I couldn't call of course until Monday night and it took about 45min to reach someone.

Interesting thing is the guy I talked to started to guess the error code I was getting, FFXI-3202, made me wonder if there have been a good handful of other people getting the same problem, but it still seems rather uncommon. For me, I was sitting in my mog house in Whitegate and went to exit it. I got the downloading data screen like usual, but it started to hang. Being impatient I crashed the game to simply restart it and log back in. That's how it started happening to me. Usually you can do that and you'll just be in the area you came from or in the next area, either of the two. Most unfortunetely this happened after the update, as it seems possible server resets, reset location of your character or the database entry for where your character was last reported before logging out.

So as of this post I still can't get in of course and have not heard anything from them. Big surprise. This in all honesty is absolutely atrocious in the amount of time it takes to report and fix the problem. I do not see how it takes 1-2 weeks if not longer to send a damn e-mail to the database monkey or some GM and have them reset my character location. Regardless of whether they're in Japan or not.