Update Scholar Aiti's Message (When GW2 Stops Talking to GW1 About GWaMM or HoM)

tl;dr it's time to update Scholar Aiti's message regarding GWaMM and HoM. It no longer fits the likely circumstance which generates the mail.

This proposal does not suggest a change in mechanics, only a change in the wording of the automated email (and its relevant translations).

Background, in Brief: Currently, any time GW2 & GW1 servers have trouble communicating, the game revokes GW1 titles/achievements (GWaMM and Hall of Monuments) and Scholar Aiti sends a message explaining what happened. The email made sense originally, when the vast majority of people affected were those who hadn't earned those points (but had them in GW2 due to a bug). These days, it's more likely that those receiving the email have earned the titles/points and the situation is an accident of the new mechanic (which requires GW2 to validate those titles/points periodically).

The goal is to ensure that no one who properly earned titles/points thinks the game is saying they didn't. And to (hopefully) let folks know the situation is both temporary and will fix itself.

Proposed, New Text: I propose that AiTi's memo be updated to something like the following:

SalutationsI'm afraid I have some annoying news. I have temporarily removed "God Walking Amongst Mere Mortals" and "Hall of Monument" accolades from you and some of your colleagues. My golem, LOR-748 is supposed to check and double check periodically and... well, it's not my fault, it simply isn't working right now. The Eternal Alchemy is never wrong, but sometimes even the Durmond Priory has trouble interpreting what we see.

To clarify, the illegal innovative modifications I made to LOR-748's title-issuing sub-routines had absolutely nothing to do with this title-revoking confusion.

In our efforts to remedy this ...let's say, an ephemeral misconbobluation of data streams, we are temporarily removing titles and all points from the Hall of Monuments. This is regrettable, of course, but superior to the alternative of permitting the undeserving of gaining access to the praise and esteem which you deserve (not to mention the lucrative rewards). Needless to say, it also keeps the Arcane Council from incarcerating me until, as Phlunt so charmingly put it, "until your bones are turned to dust by Joko's scarabs." I'm sure you agree that this solution is better. Right?

To regain your points & titles, you need do nothing except wait. Once I restart LOR-748, re-validation is automatic and everything will be as it was.

With my most sincere apologies for the inconvenience

Scholar Aiti

Original Message

! > Greetings,! > My records indicate you are one of the recent recipients of the title "God Walking Amongst Mere Mortals."! > Congratulations!! > However, I have some unfortunate news. Your title was the result of my golem, LOR-748, believing you earned the honor and issuing the esteemed accolade. Now, there's no way my golem made any sort of miscalculation, which means there is only one explanation: The Eternal Alchemy itself is wrong.! >! > To clarify, the illegal modifications I made to LOR-748's title-issuing program had absolutely nothing to do with this title-issuing mistake.! >! > In an effort to remedy this erro-again, not mine-- your title and any other unearned Hall of Monuments rewards must be revoked. This is regrettable, but the Alchemy is a living thing that, if not corrected, corrects itself-- and one one wants to leave this up to the uncaring universe. This reversal will also keep the Arcane Council from incarcerating me until, as they put it, "your bones turn to dust."! > Apologies,! > Scholar Aiti

ANet Official Comments

ANet's Dornsinger wrote on Reddit

The solution for the HoM will be the same as always: Either simply wait and give it some time, or log into Guild Wars, visit Kimmes the Historian; then log into Guild Wars and and visit his spirit there.

Basically what happens: The server that handles account matters (creating accounts, logging in, what's in your guild list...) also handles the communication between Guild Wars and Guild Wars 2. If that bridge breaks, you lose the HoM connection. And the game notices that loss and reacts with a script from WAY back in the day, when we once did that on purpose to some players who should not have had the HoM rewards and sends you that in-game mail.

The solution really is to let the server communicate again, either by waiting, or by nudging the connection, once the main issue is resolved. :3

Additional Comments

• June 2016

Here's a list illustrating that this is (a) confusing & (b) frequent enough to warrant a change. This doesn't cover all the times someone has been scared enough to post that that think they lost their rewards — it's just the ones I managed to find quickly.

Previous Reports, Current Forums

• May 2018 and here
• April 2018
• November 2017
• October 2017

Previous Reports, Forum Archives

• July 2015 & July 2015
• june 2017

Previous Reports, Reddit

• 2015
• may 2016
• june 2016
• july 2017
• oct 2017
• oct 2017

I completely support this idea.

How about 'You have been GWhammied'

Initially I thought it was mail from a scammer. I Checked and the achievement was really gone. What is worse the points for all the GW1 achievements was also gone. I could not find any major outrage on the forums as I assume will happen if A-net suspends the title.

Now the automated mail is written in some humorous style and I will suggest the same style: I suggest A-net places the GW1 and GW2 servers in the same room and remove any obstacles that can hinder communication such as routers and ISP’s between them. Communication is key to problem solving in any relationship. (kidding but close enough)

The text in the mail should have been more direct and less obscured to accommodate both the loophole and the legit earners of the title. But then which coder would have thought legit earners of the title would receive the message, or that coms might go down? No offence.

I relogged and the achievement was back and the points showed up in my recent achievements. Not the best workaround for commination error handling. I mean, someone had to go and code recovery while the code on the login server could have returned without action if coms with GW1 server could not be established. A-net is in control of both severs and can take action once it has been verified that the account does, or does not qualify for the rewards. Maybe it has a minor incidence but expect a lot heat if the GW1 server goes down and 100000+ GW2 players get this on their GW2 inbox.

What happened is that several years back there was a bug where if a player made a new character he immediately earned the 500 AP and titles from maxing out the guild wars 1 Hall of Monuments. The Hall of Monuments was immediately closed down by ANet to keep more people from getting the AP and titles and also keep them from going to the HoM in this game and getting access to the skins. It remained closed for some months and when the bug was fixed people who got the AP and titles from the bug were sent an email saying those things were removed because they got them by accident.

Every once in a while the link between the two games has a hiccup and when that happens another bug happens where players are randomly informed of titles and AP removal. They do temporarily disappear until the link between the two games is re-established, or the player swaps characters.

tldr: it’s a bug and it goes away by itself after a few minutes.

I agree, it would be a good idea to modify the message that goes out so people can stop worrying that their titles have been removed.

Even though I knew about the situation it still worried me when I got that mail a few months ago. I immediately checked my accounts were still linked and I did have all my titles and HoM skins.

@Danikat.8537 said:Even though I knew about the situation it still worried me when I got that mail a few months ago. I immediately checked my accounts were still linked and I did have all my titles and HoM skins.That's a good point. I've written about this any number of times, so it's hard to imagine someone being more familiar with the situation... and I get nervous when I see the email.

The dev team has things set up so this isn't really a big deal anymore. The text of the message should reflect that.

This condition represents an ongoing technical error with the network service, not a redress of lost game items being sent out by customer support. When the HoM server is down, the user should receive a clear and direct error dialog to that effect explaining what has happened to the service, not a mail message dressed up with in-game role-playing language.

"Your Hall of Monuments data could not be retrieved due to a temporary service outage. Any Hall of Monuments achievements that you have earned will be restored the next time you log in. [OK]"

@"Leablo.2651" said:This condition represents an ongoing technical error with the network service, not a redress of lost game items being sent out by customer support. When the HoM server is down, the user should receive a clear and direct error dialog to that effect explaining what has happened to the service, not a mail message dressed up with in-game role-playing language.

"Your Hall of Monuments data could not be retrieved due to a temporary service outage. Any Hall of Monuments achievements that you have earned will be restored the next time you log in. [OK]"

But that doesn't cause mass panic..... which is a lot more entertaining

@"Leablo.2651" said:This condition represents an ongoing technical error with the network service, not a redress of lost game items being sent out by customer support. When the HoM server is down, the user should receive a clear and direct error dialog to that effect explaining what has happened to the service, not a mail message dressed up with in-game role-playing language.

"Your Hall of Monuments data could not be retrieved due to a temporary service outage. Any Hall of Monuments achievements that you have earned will be restored the next time you log in. [OK]"

Agreed. The amount of creative effort for error messages would be better reserved for actual dialogue.

I've never seen this email and I've been playing since BETA and have a maxed HoM.

@juno.1840 said:I've never seen this email and I've been playing since BETA and have a maxed HoM.

Scroll up to the top to see the a fraction of the number of times people have posted about receiving the message and being concerned (or aggravated or both) about their HoM scores. It never affected everyone, just large groups of people unlucky enough to have the system verification taking place at a time when one of the communication systems was miscommunicating.

@Illconceived Was Na.9781 said:

@juno.1840 said:I've never seen this email and I've been playing since BETA and have a maxed HoM.

Yup! Hell ive gotten this message and i dont have GWAMM, but hey maybe i should get it so i can panick more often!

@Dante.1763 said:ive gotten this message and i dont have GWAMM,Right! I forgot; that happens, too.

And again confusion when GW1 was lagging/unavailable:

• https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/59417/god-walking-amongst-mere-mere-mortals-title-vanished
• https://old.reddit.com/r/Guildwars2/comments/9teyx9/hall_of_monuments_broken_again/

I lost this title again this week, and the below solved the issue.As this happens quite often (for some people), LOR-748 's message should suggest the fix if people receive this message in error.

@"Illconceived Was Na.9781" said:

ANet Official Comments

ANet's Dornsinger wrote on Reddit

The solution for the HoM will be the same as always: Either simply wait and give it some time, or log into Guild Wars, visit Kimmes the Historian; then log into Guild Wars and and visit his spirit there.

Basically what happens: The server that handles account matters (creating accounts, logging in, what's in your guild list...) also handles the communication between Guild Wars and Guild Wars 2. If that bridge breaks, you lose the HoM connection. And the game notices that loss and reacts with a script from WAY back in the day, when we once did that on purpose to some players who should not have had the HoM rewards and sends you that in-game mail.

The solution really is to let the server communicate again, either by waiting, or by nudging the connection, once the main issue is resolved. :3

• June 2016

It happened to me on April 1st and I thought it was a joke.

Ew this happened to me a couple months ago. I was 3 achievement points away from getting a reward chest (the ones you get every 500 AP), and suddenly BAM this message is in my inventory and I'm missing a few hundred AP. I freaked out--I'd been farming AP for the past week to get that reward chest, and then minutes before getting it my AP were docked. I sent in a ticket, and by the time someone responded the issue had fixed itself but jeez... made my blood pressure go up a bit.

Reminder: this continues to be an issue. Two more cases (that we know about):https://en-forum.guildwars2.com/discussion/72634/hall-of-monuments-titles-vanished

Again! after 2 years i keep getting this crap...

"Scholar Aiti
LOR-748 Title-Issuing Error
Greetings,
My records indicate you are one of the recent recipients
of the title "God Walking Amongst Mere Mortals."
Congratulations!
However, I have some unfortunate news. Your title was
the result of my golem, LOR-748, believing you earned
the honor and issuing this esteemed accolade. Now,
there's no way my golem made any sort of
miscalculation, which means there is only one
explanation: the Eternal Alchemy itself is wrong.
To clarify, the illegal modifications I made to LOR-748's
title-issuing program had absolutely nothing to do with
this title-issuing mistake.
In an effort to remedy this error—again, not mine—your
title and any other unearned Hall of Monuments rewards
must be revoked. This is regrettable, but the Alchemy is
a living thing that, if not corrected, corrects itself—and
no one wants to leave this up to the uncaring universe.
This reversal will also keep the Arcane Council from
incarcerating me until, as they put it, "your bones turn
to dust."
Apologies,
Scholar Aiti"

I agree. The original bug which lead to this is long gone, but the mail still gets sent whenever the two games lose connection with each other and makes absolutely no sense, especially when it comes to someone like me who never got the GWAMM title in the first place. (I keep meaning to finish it.)

If that can't be prevented it would make sense to change the mail to address the current problem instead.

I also just got this  mail in game and lost my God walking title. Whats going on here??? Will it be restored? I earned this title probably when most of today's Anet members were no doubt in grammar school.

It happened again, and my AP was reduced. Whenever I get the email, it really feels like a "kick in the teeth" as a vetern GW1 and GW2 player. Come on Anet, change the mail and maybe fix the problem... (if you haven't already done so)