Restrictions to bonds between players

[Hyperionkhv.1978]

Today I met some nice character in norn start location (Wayfarer Foothills). Whispered to player to praise choice of boots and dress.

Character disappeared while I was typing. Maybe ported.

And I got system message: "This player cannot whisper you back unless you are on the same map or you add them as a friend."

Why it was implemented?

Should I add all players as a friend before whispering them to get back response now?

Should I stay still some time on same map waiting if player wants to port back to same map to answer?

 

Players can make less new bonds in game. Why? What the point of such restrictions?

 

[Mordachai.1896]

They (or you) were on a free to play account and those are limited to prevent misuse. 

Edited May 21, 2022 by Mordachai.1896
Reasons

[Jukhy.2431]

48 minutes ago, Mordachai.1896 said:

They (or you) were on a free to play account and those are limited to prevent misuse. 

Yes, and I'm guessing this limitation on free accounts is to prevent gold seller spam. There was a time when those whispers were quite constant. Investigating the reported cases likely took too much game master hours so they needed less time-consuming way to deal with it.

[Danikat.8537]

The OP can't be on a free account, or they wouldn't be able to post here.

And yeah the restriction is definitely to prevent gold seller spam. It used to be very common to get whispers advertising gold selling sites in towns, the Heart of the Mists, starter maps and other places lots of people congregated (and randomly anywhere in the world). I think that's also why free accounts can't use map chat. I know some of the sites still exist, and I can't believe they just decided to stop advertising in the game, so I assume whatever measures Anet is taking to stop them are working because I haven't seen that for a long time.

If they're bothered by the restriction then they can remove it (and all the other free account restrictions) by buying the game, but there's nothing you can do to get around it.