I won't pretend to not know why I was banned, it was simple. I made a decision to AFK in Gambit prime and Bungie felt a permanent ban was a fitting punishment. Their ban information page makes it seem as if first time offenders receive temporary bans, which can later escalate to permanent bans after multiple offenses, so I made my decision with that in mind. To anyone AFKing or thinking about trying it, it's one strike and you're out. Why did I do it? A combination of a serval factors. Before deciding to AFK, I received over 20 duplicate exotics but not the warlock blink helmet, the one thing I wanted most from this season, and the only exotic I was missing on my warlock. Another factor is Spare Rations and Last Man Standing. I've done hundreds of T3 reckonings last season and earned the Dredgen title (3 infamy resets in G Prime), zero AFK, and all I got were [b]two[/b] Spare Rations and [b]one[/b] Last Man Standing. I have a couple hours to game per night and have been spending those gaming hours on D2 consistently since Forsaken came out. There was no light at the end of the tunnel at that drop rate. We've established the items I wanted from AFK, and also established that I put in a reasonable amount of time chasing them by hand, but that doesn't answer why. What made someone go from saying they'll never AFK, to farming while they sleep? After getting Mountaintop, Hush, and basically all of this season's goals accomplished, I circled back to Spare Rations farming. The matches were unengaging, usually at least 2 bots per match and the rest of the human players were farming out quests and not banking or trying to win the match. Even the matches without bots were lackluster. I would go into autopilot during these matches anyway, because almost nobody was trying to win. I noticed a lot of the AFK bot farmers had titles (Rivensbane, Dredgen, Unbroken, Shadow, Blacksmith etc). How is it that the most hardcore players of this game feel a need to AFK farm to get the items they want? Were they also chasing Spare Rations and Last Man Standing? Do they somehow know it's safe to AFK? This is a widespread issue, all you hear about in regards to Gambit lately are the AFKers. At least once a night, I'd get stuck in a match where all 8 players were AFK. Is Bungie going to permanently ban all of them? That's a lot of upset paying customers who were unsatisfied with the game and tried to take matters into their own hands. Duplicate exotics and Season of Drifter weapon drop rates have been an issue since Season of Drifter. Over five months of hardship, one can only endure so much disappointment. I felt safe taking the plunge into AFK after seeing many other players with titles, and an awful lot to lose, doing AFK Gambit Prime farming. I would stop after a temporary ban or getting the warlock blink exotic. For a couple weeks, I could play Crucible and actually have fun during my gaming time, farming AFK Gambit Prime while I slept, hoping to wake up to items that realistically should have dropped by now considering my time spent. I didn't AFK because I don't enjoy playing Destiny 2, quite the opposite, I AFK because the items that would make the game even more enjoyable, were locked behind oppressively low drop rates in my least favorite activities. Sometimes when you wait at a red light for over 3 minutes you wonder if the system is broken. You see other people lose their patience and run the red light, there's actually a part of our brain that lights up and tells us to follow them. It was the most fun two weeks of D2 I've ever had, getting to play the mode I wanted and not feeling like I was spending my time the "wrong" way. Fast forward to this week. A perma ban wave goes out to players AFK farming Gambit Prime, and today they announce significantly increased drop rates for Gambit Prime and Reckoning. They finally solved the main problem which made many of us, even the hardcore players with titles and thousands of hours logged, resort to AFK farming, but it's too late for many of us. Forge AFK farming has been all the rage lately, it would appear to me that players want to minimize their time in tedious activities and maximize their time in activities they enjoy most. Can you really blame the players for trying to have more fun in the game they love? Would Bungie perhaps consider lessening these permanent bans to temporary bans? I think when the most hardcore players are resorting to AFK farming, that should highlight an issue with the game, not the players. This issue was indeed highlighted, Bungie admitted the problem today, so will you think about lessening the punishment on those who decided to AFK on behalf of this problem Bungie created? I can assure you those of us who felt the sting of the ban will never AFK again, we've learned our lesson and the punishment doesn't seem fitting for a first offense. People who get warned to stop and then continue doing it are the ones who should lose all account access. People who DDoS should be permanently banned. People who use aimbots etc. should be permanently banned. People who tried to get their 1/1,000+ odds god roll Spare Rations while they slept, to fight back against a broken system, should get a warning and then perma ban on the next offense. I know everyone says they'll never AFK, I was one of those people. Sometimes endless disappointment can lead to desperation. Consider the starving man who steals bread for his hungry family, except he's been showing up to work for months and never got a paycheck. Today they announced an accounting error, and his paycheck is in the mail, but it's too late because he's now serving a life sentence in jail. I received my 38th duplicate exotic of the season the day I was banned. Sadly I'll never get to try the Warlock helmet. Perhaps Bungie can also consider looking at the duplicate exotic weighting algorithm, had I gotten the helmet within the first 5 weeks of this season then I wouldn't have AFK or gotten permanently banned. If the drop rates for Spare Rations and Last Man Standing weren't oppressively low then I wouldn't have AFK or gotten permanently banned. Don't get me wrong, this could have all been avoided if I didn't decide to AFK, so I point the finger at myself. I felt it might be helpful to the developers and other players to explain why I did what I did, in hopes that the game won't be so frustrating for future players. My individual feelings don't matter much here, but when there are a significant amount of good guardians out there sharing the same feelings for the same reason, perhaps Bungie can have a heart and look beyond the black and white situation this appears to be. Feelings aside, you've forced the decision between spending our $ on Shadowkeep and beyond vs buying and playing other games towards the latter. It's been a great 5 years with the Destiny series but this is too big of a loss for me to continue. Stay strong and don't AFK, guardians. [spoiler]Moderator edit: This thread has been updated with tags that are more appropriate. Feel free to private message the moderator who moved your post, link to topic, for further clarification about why this topic was moved.[/spoiler]