Steam auth error 403 Discussion.

[Insonia]

If you played Steam recently and got a 403 error, Please go to your DCS profile page. If your Steam account state shows binded, it doesn't matter if you transferred or not; you have to click unbind, and then you can use Steam again.  or Just use standalone client.

In recent days, some users keep getting 403 steam authorization error. I thought it's a steam issue. A lot of people don't know what's wrong with their games. until someone mentioned there's changes in the ED profile page , now it displays:

It seems only people who have bind their steam accounts before will get the error, and the problem remains until users unbind their steam accounts.

But ED didn't make any announcement, and your FAQ and pined post still remain the same. 

Quote

Please note that the transferred products will now be available in your Standalone install and also remain available in your Steam Version.

It is mind boggling and disregard for the customers.

Edited October 2, 2023 by Insonia

[fox_the_apprentice]

Thanks for this - I was just entering a ticket to support for this very issue.

 

Note, for people like me who only ever use Steam, pressing the `unbind` button in my profile (https://www.digitalcombatsimulator.com/en/personal/profile/) and leaving it unbound fixed my issue.

Edited October 1, 2023 by fox_the_apprentice

[BIGNEWY]

Hi all, 

Sorry for the late reply. 

If you want to use stand alone DCS version you can bind your Steam account to your DCS account and use stand alone, but you will no longer be able to use the steam version while the steam account is bound to stand alone. 

If you unbind your steam account your stand alone version will no longer fetch your steam modules, but you will be able to use steam version again. 

thank you

 

 

 

1 hour ago, Insonia said:

But ED didn't make any announcement, and your FAQ and pined post still remain the same.

we will get it added to the FAQ

[kablamoman]

There should be some official announcement.

 

This is a pretty silly change to make without notifying customers, as it looks like the same old authentication failures that have happened sporadically over the years. Unless somebody thinks to check here, they would never know.

[BIGNEWY]

10 hours ago, kablamoman said:

There should be some official announcement.

 

This is a pretty silly change to make without notifying customers, as it looks like the same old authentication failures that have happened sporadically over the years. Unless somebody thinks to check here, they would never know.

agreed, the change happened over the weekend, we are updating our FAQ's currently and will post news about the change.

Apologies for the inconvenience 

[Temetre]

vor 12 Stunden schrieb BIGNEWY:

Hi all, 

Sorry for the late reply. 

If you want to use stand alone DCS version you can bind your Steam account to your DCS account and use stand alone, but you will no longer be able to use the steam version while the steam account is bound to stand alone. 

If you unbind your steam account your stand alone version will no longer fetch your steam modules, but you will be able to use steam version again. 

thank you

 

 

 

we will get it added to the FAQ

Gotta be real, this feels like a really trashy way to treat your customers, by the ED leadership.

 

First, we dont even get told about this change at first and had to learn it the hard way. Thats unacceptable from the get go and shows a blatant disregard for customers and community.

And secondly, this is ED arbitrarily changing how we can access the game. This is some kind of "pray I dont alter the deal further" moment. We have no choice, we werent asked, not told. Just ED changing such a fundamental thing, a principle of access the game was sold on, and we have to suck it up.

This is only made worse becasue we already put up with so much. We pay silly amounts of money for modules, we accept a deeply buggy game, and we crowdfund eternal early access modules with often questionable road maps. If anything, ED should give back more to the community, rather than treat us like this and take away features.

 

I planned to purchase more modules, eg the F-4E instantly at release, but Im gonna put those on hold. Not just because Im treated badly, but because this makes clear that I cannot trust ED to not make changes against my interest. If they did a decision like this as if its nothing, what else will they do in the future?

Edited October 2, 2023 by Temetre

[Temetre]

Why did we have a newsletter on friday, but it doesnt tell that ED just changed over the weekend so we cant use steam accounts anymore when they are connected to standlone accounts?

[BIGNEWY]

23 minutes ago, Temetre said:

Gotta be real, this feels like a really trashy way to treat your customers, by the ED leadership.

 

First, we dont even get told about this change at first and had to learn it the hard way. Thats unacceptable from the get go and shows a blatant disregard for customers and community.

And secondly, this is ED arbitrarily changing how we can access the game. This is some kind of "pray I dont alter the deal further" moment. We have no choice, we werent asked, not told. Just ED changing such a fundamental thing, a principle of access the game was sold on, and we have to suck it up.

This is only made worse becasue we already put up with so much. We pay silly amounts of money for modules, we accept a deeply buggy game, and we crowdfund eternal early access modules with often questionable road maps. If anything, ED should give back more to the community, rather than treat us like this and take away features.

 

I planned to purchase more modules, eg the F-4E instantly at release, but Im gonna put those on hold. Not just because Im treated badly, but because this makes clear that I cannot trust ED to not make changes against my interest. If they did a decision like this as if its nothing, what else will they do in the future?

 

Sorry you feel that way, and apologies we did not get the news out quicker over the weekend when the change was made. Sadly some people were breaking the EULA and steps had to be taken. 

Thank you

[Beirut]

How much confidence should we have that our Steam accounts will still work at all in a year? Will there be a notice that all accounts must be changed to stand alone? Will all new modules be available on Steam in the future?

 

I load up my Steam wallet over the summer during the heavy work season so I can buy modules during the winter without hitting the credit card. I don't want to have a couple of hundred bucks siting on Steam for nothing.

[BIGNEWY]

3 minutes ago, Beirut said:

How much confidence should we have that our Steam accounts will still work at all in a year? Will there be a notice that all accounts must be changed to stand alone? Will all new modules be available on Steam in the future?

 

I load up my Steam wallet over the summer during the heavy work season so I can buy modules during the winter without hitting the credit card. I don't want to have a couple of hundred bucks siting on Steam for nothing.

Your steam purchased modules will always be on steam. That is the point of sale. 

If you bind to stand alone you can only use them on stand alone DCS. 

If you want to use them on steam unbind steam from your DCS account. 

We have no plans to stop using Steam, it is a great platform for reaching millions of people.

thanks

[Beirut]

1 minute ago, BIGNEWY said:

 

We have no plans to stop using Steam, it is a great platform for reaching millions of people.

thanks

 

That was my concern. Some developers have dropped Steam in favour of their own services.

 

Thank you. 

[BIGNEWY]

37 minutes ago, Temetre said:

Why did we have a newsletter on friday, but it doesnt tell that ED just changed over the weekend so we cant use steam accounts anymore when they are connected to standlone accounts?

Because we did not have that information on Friday. 

[AdrianL]

You just need to unbind your steam account from standalone and you will then still be able to use steam.  Assuming people are exploiting something here.

Curious as to why you would want to have both running? 

See

 

[BIGNEWY]

1 minute ago, AdrianL said:

You just need to unbind your steam account from standalone and you will then still be able to use steam.  Assuming people are exploiting something here.

Curious as to why you would want to have both running? 

See

 

Yes some people were breaking the EULA sadly, please use the link you posted to discuss, leave this thread for the newsletter discussion. 

thank you

[Temetre]

vor 1 Minute schrieb BIGNEWY:

Because we did not have that information on Friday. 

Im obviously not blaming you or anyone else working on the community side.

Im blaming the ED leadership or whoever made that decision. Im sure this has been coming a longer way, its not something you do one day to the other normally.

 

And it just feels bad to be treated like that. Nor do I know how else ED might restrict our access to the game in the future.

[BIGNEWY]

threads split and merged

[Temetre]

vor 31 Minuten schrieb BIGNEWY:

Sorry you feel that way, and apologies we did not get the news out quicker over the weekend when the change was made. Sadly some people were breaking the EULA and steps had to be taken. 

Thank you

Im aware you didnt make that decision, its the ED leadership, tho im gonna say "im sorry you feel that way" is a pretty bad thing to write. Coulda been sorry about ED making a change thats objectively punishes me without any doing of my own. Thats the problem, and not my feelings over it. 

And "someone broke the EULA and thats why we punish you too" is not a justification. ED just made a change limiting how I can access a game I put like 200-300 bucks into. ED just decided to push the problems onto players, rather than to deal with it.

 

Maybe it wont change anything, because ED has more power than players, who also tend to have a short memory. For me I can say, I was planning to dive into helicopters and get the Hind or Apache on christmas sales, but now I have zero interest in giving ED money for them.

vor 15 Minuten schrieb AdrianL:

You just need to unbind your steam account from standalone and you will then still be able to use steam. 

And then I cannot use anything from Steam together with stuff I got on the Standalone. I basically just cannot use DCS World on Steam anymore.

Also, whats next? Will the bind be removed, will we not be able to transfer licenses anymore? If ED makes a changes like this without telling us, theres no knowing whats their next step. Even if they dont intend to do anything currently, they might just change their mind in the future.

ED has control over the platform, so it kinda matters if we can trust them. And with this we clearly cannot trust them to not make changes against our interest.

Edited October 2, 2023 by Temetre

[BIGNEWY]

6 minutes ago, Temetre said:

And "someone broke the EULA and thats why we punish you too" is not a justification. ED just made a change limiting how I can access a game I put like 200-300 bucks into. ED just decided to push the problems onto players, rather than to deal with it.

Sadly it was not just "someone" it was more widespread

6 minutes ago, Temetre said:

And then I cannot use anything from Steam together with stuff I got on the Standalone.

correct you will need to make a choice between stand alone and steam.

 

We have no plans to stop using steam or stopping the binding of accounts, this step was needed to close an exploit of the EULA. 

 

[draconus]

5 minutes ago, Temetre said:

And then I cannot use anything from Steam together with stuff I got on the Standalone.

Since you apparently have modules on both platforms it's obvious you should bind the Steam account to DCS and use DCS standalone with all your modules.

[BIGNEWY]

1 minute ago, draconus said:

Since you apparently have modules on both platforms it's obvious you should bind the Steam account to DCS and use DCS standalone with all your modules.

Correct, if you have modules on steam and stand alone purchased modules, continue to use the bind option and stand alone. 

You just will not be able to use the steam version at the same time. 

[Temetre]

vor 53 Minuten schrieb draconus:

Since you apparently have modules on both platforms it's obvious you should bind the Steam account to DCS and use DCS standalone with all your modules.

I basically got one thing on the standalone.

And yeah, now I just cannot use DCS steam at all anymore. Should be pretty obvious whats the issue.

vor 53 Minuten schrieb BIGNEWY:

Sadly it was not just "someone" it was more widespread

I get that. ED had a problem.

But then ED decided to make it the communities problem instead. You know, the community that already puts up with all the game bugs and crowdfunding. 

And ED didnt even tell us, until people started asking why theres an issue. This kind of change takes weeks of testing, its not something you do from one day to the other.

vor 53 Minuten schrieb BIGNEWY:

We have no plans to stop using steam or stopping the binding of accounts, this step was needed to close an exploit of the EULA. 

ED also didnt have plans to make impossible to use connected steam accounts. Until they had a plan to do so.

Thats the thing, theyve changed the rules of usage, so why wouldnt they change it again in future?

Edited October 2, 2023 by Temetre

[Shaundale46]

BigNewy,

Thank you for all the support, your help and advice has always been amazing thank you.

(I bet you wished today  you would have rolled over and kept holding the duvet though.)

After seeing the posts I felt confused at first, if we "UNbind" it's a one shot deal so if we choose wrong that's it. That's the only issue I have, maybe would it be possible to revoke the change from Bind to Unbind 3 times possibly? just my thought.

But thank you ED for an amazing product and the community (& BigNewy) for all the support. 

[BIGNEWY]

2 minutes ago, Shaundale46 said:

BigNewy,

Thank you for all the support, your help and advice has always been amazing thank you.

(I bet you wished today  you would have rolled over and kept holding the duvet though.)

After seeing the posts I felt confused at first, if we "UNbind" it's a one shot deal so if we choose wrong that's it. That's the only issue I have, maybe would it be possible to revoke the change from Bind to Unbind 3 times possibly? just my thought.

But thank you ED for an amazing product and the community (& BigNewy) for all the support. 

Hey no problem, some people were confused and I am answering wherever I can. Sadly the option you suggest would still allow our EULA to be exploited. 

thank you

[Beirut]

Is there a limit on the bind/unbind thing, like the way some games limit installs?

 

I have no plans to bind my account, I'm just curious if there is a self-destruct feature built it where after three or four bind/unbinds your account ends up in North Korea never to be seen again. 

[BIGNEWY]

10 minutes ago, Beirut said:

Is there a limit on the bind/unbind thing, like the way some games limit installs?

 

I have no plans to bind my account, I'm just curious if there is a self-destruct feature built it where after three or four bind/unbinds your account ends up in North Korea never to be seen again. 

There is a time delay if you want to rebind a steam account after it has been unbound.