Status Check on the Third Party Cheat Detection

[Petra Fyde]

Petra, once the bannings begin, will you guys follow suit and ban any known Stratics accounts tied to UO accounts? Or will we have to sit here and listen to cheaters that we've all known were cheaters, as they spin their defense ? Personally, I would get more satisfaction out of sudden absences as the indicator of all who were banned because we won't be allowed to goof on them once they come a cryin...

Sorry, that's just not feasible, for various reasons.
Stratics RoC will apply of course.

 

[Voluptuous]

welp I know Baja is a tiny shard compared to others, but we got a lot of scripters. And they are so easy to spot...box on the step, over 6 million stones...and the scripters go at it morning, noon and night. They don't even care who sees em.

Lets assume what they mine is just plain ingots (even thou it ain't I'm sure)...6 million....times cost of ingot...wow...and thats just one out of the 25 homes I've marked as scripters.

Prob explains why a rare worth about 4 mil 3-4 years ago is now worth 50 mil. You can tell who doesn't script...they are the minority poor. And they are quitting in droves, totally fed up with all the years and years of broken promises and the dreaded phrase "we're working on it"

 

[Going Going Gone]

For my part, I have stopped playing on UO on EA servers in 2007 after holding two accounts for several years. At the time, there was three aspects of the game wich made me leave this world I enjoyed so uch playing in.

The first was the fact that "ghost cams" were rampant at champ spawns and by using free trial accounts, the guild getting a ghost account banned could replace it immediatly.

The second problem I had was the fact that being a very active pvper, I could witness daily speedhackers, auto heal program users and every cheat/exploit/dupe in the book. I was disgusted at the fact nothing was done for so many years; and 3 years later we are at the same point regarding this issue.

The third problem I had Is that I truely beleive that pets have no place in pvp. Sure that this beleif I have was greatly motivated by the fact that for at least two year, I had to deal with the nerve strike-deathstrike all kill hyriu/CuSidhe hybrid characters that would easily kill my 150 hitpoints char in one combo. From what I have red, players had to deal with the same non-sens for a while with some new pets like greater dragons and such. What is even more annoying is that most of theses taming one hit wonders would use that truely overpowered template in conjunction with speedhacks and exploits (havent I heard of the possibility to prep up the breath attack of the dreadmare and jump on him so the first thing that it would do when dismounted is that 55-60 breath damage?) True that one on one, it is possible to trick thoses pets that are not so fast. So as much as I am not a big fan of tamers in pvp, I can live with the idea of playing (fighting) against them if I am sincerly convinced that they are not speedhacking or exploiting.

Nedless to say I was not the most impressed when I red about the machin gun pot thrower template (wich could be used with uoassist, but worked really better in conjunction with an illegal 3rd party program according to some pvp boards that I visit).

That post wouldn't be complete without mentionning how annoyed I am when I look at screenshots on other pvp boards and see that the feilds that would lag me so bad or the tombstone and trees that made me have so much trouble targetting/moving are not present for them.

But to finish on a positive note, I have noticed that the ghost cam problem has been taken care of. And I am watching very closely the devloppments about this effort to monitor and react to the cheating. Of course, alot of the damage is already done as I will most likely never be able to have the same gear than theses cheaters/dupers will have accumulated over the years. But I can confirm right now that if/once I am convinced that the cheating is under control, I will reactivate both of my accounts.

Good luck to all

 

[Old Man of UO]

...
The third problem I had Is that I truely beleive that pets have no place in pvp. ...

And you didn't ride your pet into PvP? If you say no pets, that means you would have to walk.

 

[Llewen]

The first was the fact that "ghost cams" were rampant at champ spawns and by using free trial accounts, the guild getting a ghost account banned could replace it immediatly.

"Ghost cams" are long gone, and in fact I don't think "cams" of any sort are being used at champ spawns much anymore, if at all. At least I haven't noticed anything of the sort on my shard since I came back eight months or so ago.

The second problem I had was the fact that being a very active pvper, I could witness daily speedhackers, auto heal program users and every cheat/exploit/dupe in the book.

A lot of people disagree with me, but I don't think speed hacking is much of an issue anymore either. Speed is capped, as far as I can see, server side, and in eight months I have seen no one, absolutely no one, moving faster than I do, unless I was clearly having issues with lag and they weren't. And I don't speed hack. Some people say, well it only makes a real difference in close in combat. I don't buy that.

Nedless to say I was not the most impressed when I red about the machin gun pot thrower template (wich could be used with uoassist, but worked really better in conjunction with an illegal 3rd party program according to some pvp boards that I visit).

This has been fixed as well.

That post wouldn't be complete without mentionning how annoyed I am when I look at screenshots on other pvp boards and see that the feilds that would lag me so bad or the tombstone and trees that made me have so much trouble targetting/moving are not present for them.

There are no tombstones in the enhanced client, and you run right through the tiles that have them. And you can legally turn of the desolation effect in Felucca in the classic client, which also removes the tombstones. I also haven't noticed anyone running through fields that shouldn't be, although it's a little hard to keep track of who's fields will block who in a big field fight with multiple factions and/or guilds involved.

As for tamers in pvp... Well, I play a pvp tamer, a pure pvp tamer (with all of the taming skills), and I am the only one I know of that plays that kind of template, so I don't think my template is an issue in pvp, even though my character isn't well liked. There are quite a few tamers in pvp, but certainly not out of proportion to the other kinds of templates, and that exploit where you could prep your dread warhorse's fire breath has been fixed.

The biggest issue right now in pvp in my opinion is scripting, and I think we are going to see that issue dealt with soon. Hopefully in spectacular fashion...

 

[Going Going Gone]

And you didn't ride your pet into PvP? If you say no pets, that means you would have to walk.

Obviously, I meant pets used to fight, the ones you say "all kill" and not all pets as in "mounts". For my part, i didnt use pets at all in pvp, as I used animal form and the occasionnal ethy, but I dont have a problem with mount such as swamp dragons, horses, faction horse, etc.

BTW, good job passing through a whole post where I say that i left for 3 reasons, that one is definitly fixed, the second looks to be on the way to get fixed and the third, i can live with it if the second is fixed. Search for taming controversy in PVP much?

Let me rephrase my whole post then:" I left this game 3 years ago because of things I really disliked. The lack of action taken against the cheaters and the scripters was one of them. In regard of this topic, if EA is going to finally do something about it, I will reactivate my accounts".

 

[Harlequin]

Here is a quick status ...
At this moment I have a massive spreadsheet to parse and gather data on player activity.

It has unique account IDs with the programs the account was running.

I will not share how the data was gathered, or the methods by which players will be ... prosecuted ... I almost used the term executed but that would have been a bit too dark even for my tastes.

However, please know the processes are alive and well. The application has been running for some time now, and we made a few changes offline to adapt for different types of accounts and how we can parse all the information.

We had publish to work on as well as the Housing DB, Login Server and conversion of the character DB as priority for a while. (In addition to some other wondrous nuggets you will hear about next week!)

As stated before this is an iterative process. Some players have mentioned how the mass bannings of the past are not the most just way of taking action. As many of you have stated ... moving forward on this is delicate ... But please know it's NOT been abandoned by any means.

And I will say ... it's nice to be able to look directly into player behavior in a simple format. I guess Excel isn't as evil as some might believe.

Hey wait a min, excel can only hold 65k records!

That's the spreadsheet of folks who use 3rd party apps and does not include the legit playing folks right?

Great update! That should let the cheaters know that they are being watched.

Edit : I see others have already mentioned the 65k thing

 

[Old Man of UO]

Obviously, I meant pets used to fight, the ones you say "all kill" and not all pets as in "mounts". For my part, i didnt use pets at all in pvp, as I used animal form and the occasionnal ethy, but I dont have a problem with mount such as swamp dragons, horses, faction horse, etc.

BTW, good job passing through a whole post where I say that i left for 3 reasons, that one is definitly fixed, the second looks to be on the way to get fixed and the third, i can live with it if the second is fixed. Search for taming controversy in PVP much?

Let me rephrase my whole post then:" I left this game 3 years ago because of things I really disliked. The lack of action taken against the cheaters and the scripters was one of them. In regard of this topic, if EA is going to finally do something about it, I will reactivate my accounts".

First of all, I did read your whole rant, and that was all I found worthwhile to comment on. I agree with your assessment on EA's inaction, but this whole thread is full of it and wasn't worth commenting on.

You want to be able to pick and choose which pets can be used in PvP. I'm just saying you can't make a general statement to remove pets from PvP and not consider how all of them are used. Pets, in many cases, are a tamers only defense, and you want to take that away from them. Your statement to remove pets from PvP was rather naive, and it just isn't going to happen.

 

[Llewen]

Are you using old Excel (2003 and earlier) or latest 2007/2010?

To anyone who wonders, there was rows limit around 65k and it increased to 1m later. We have some guess about active account numbers.

Hey wait a min, excel can only hold 65k records!

That's the spreadsheet of folks who use 3rd party apps and does not include the legit playing folks right?

That's only if he is using an older version of Excel, which I very much doubt he is...

 

[Going Going Gone]

First of all, I did read your whole rant, and that was all I found worthwhile to comment on. I agree with your assessment on EA's inaction, but this whole thread is full of it and wasn't worth commenting on.

You want to be able to pick and choose which pets can be used in PvP. I'm just saying you can't make a general statement to remove pets from PvP and not consider how all of them are used. Pets, in many cases, are a tamers only defense, and you want to take that away from them. Your statement to remove pets from PvP was rather naive, and it just isn't going to happen.

If you red my whole "rant" then you might have missed the fact that I am happy about the announcment that EA made about stopping the cheaters and therefore I will reopen both my account as soon as its done. Hardly a rant. Go troll someone else.

 

[Harlequin]

Let me rephrase my whole post then:" I left this game 3 years ago because of things I really disliked. The lack of action taken against the cheaters and the scripters was one of them. In regard of this topic, if EA is going to finally do something about it, I will reactivate my accounts".

Actually, (depending on how you look at it) they did do something, they implemented a 3rd party detection engine and are gathering info on the cheaters now.

I expect the number of folks that use cheats to start dropping.

 

[Going Going Gone]

Actually, they did do something, they implemented a 3rd party detection engine and are gathering info on the cheaters now.

I expect the number of folks that use cheats to start dropping.

I was there when Punkbuster was considered by EA to stop the use of illegal programs. Then they decided not to go forward with that option. 4 years later, no concrete actions have been taken against the players who have abused the game for so many years. I say that what they announced looks good, but I will wait for concrete results (bans, stripping of cheater accounts, suspensions...) before coming back

 

[Harlequin]

I was there when Punkbuster was considered by EA to stop the use of illegal programs. Then they decided not to go forward with that option. 4 years later, no concrete actions have been taken against the players who have abused the game for so many years. I say that what they announced looks good, but I will wait for concrete results (bans, stripping of cheater accounts, suspensions...) before coming back

For me, it's looking quite positive. Main issue all this time IMO was that they weren't seen to be taking any action at all. There were still bans for dupes and such, but most cheaters grew bold thinking that they won't be caught and it started spreading. Others folks then began to think they have to use cheats as well to level the playing field.

I look forward to welcoming you back!

 

[Kojak]

does anyone have any good excel viruses jk hehe

 

[Picus at the office]

A lot of people disagree with me, but I don't think speed hacking is much of an issue anymore either. Speed is capped, as far as I can see, server side, and in eight months I have seen no one, absolutely no one, moving faster than I do, unless I was clearly having issues with lag and they weren't. And I don't speed hack. Some people say, well it only makes a real difference in close in combat. I don't buy that.

You must be smoking something really good if you believe that, or your running it yourself. How else can a dismounted player move at the same speed as a person on foot yet a group of people on foot? This might not happen on the one shard you play but it happens on the 5 I do. All this anti script in PvP is fine and dandy but here we are 6 months later and I still see little done. Fix the speeding so Llewen gets the ban stick pls

 

[Llewen]

I say that what they announced looks good, but I will wait for concrete results (bans, stripping of cheater accounts, suspensions...) before coming back

I'd say that is an understandable position. Myself, I came back anyway, and there have been a lot of positive changes. This will be a big one though, if and when it takes hold.

This is very different from what happened with the PunkBuster fiasco. That was a big flashy announcement, followed by months of silence, followed by Ella Fiztgerald and Louis Armstrong singing, "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off".

We've had pretty regular updates on this, and repeated assurances that the detection is live on the shards, and has been for months, and action will follow. Yes, the action has been a long time coming, but then they've got an entrenched culture of cheating that is the result of thirteen years of inaction to deal with. So it is understandable that they are proceeding with caution...

 

[Llewen]

How else can a dismounted player move at the same speed as a person on foot yet a group of people on foot?

I understand that you mean how can a dismounted person on foot move as fast as a mounted group? Well, I've read this over and over again, but I have never seen it. Not once in the last eight months. And during that time I've seen at least one guild transfer to the shard that pretty obviously uses all the current and popular cheats. So I don't think it's just that my shard is behind the times when it comes to the cheat scene.

That doesn't mean it doesn't happen, but I have never seen it, not once in hundreds of hours of pvp'ing. And I'm afraid I can only judge based on what I have seen. Another reason why I am sceptical is that I've seen many many people accused of speed hacking, when it is clear to me that they are not, including myself, many times.

So I'd love to be popular and go along with the crowd and do some ranting about those evil speed hacks, but based on what I have seen, I can't. I know that there are plenty of cheaters out there, but I remain unconvinced that speed hacking is the issue that so many have made it out to be.

One thing that I am guessing is that speed hacks are being used, but all they are really doing is compensating for lag. They aren't actually allowing anyone to move faster than the maximum movement speed. Are they illegal? Of course. But are they the huge issue that so many think they are? I rather suspect that the answer to that question is no.

Having said that, I do think that there was a time in UO's history when speed hacks did allow player characters to move faster than the client would allow under any normal conditions. But I don't think that is the case today. I don't know when that changed, but sometime in the past ten years, I'm pretty sure it has.

 

[Llewen]

*snip*

I'll let you in on another little secret. Accusing other players of speed hacking has become such a deeply ingrained part of UO's pvp culture that at this point if there is a real problem, it wouldn't matter even if it was fixed - and as I said, my guess is that this problem has already been largely fixed.

It doesn't really matter at this point what the devs do to address the "speed hacking" issue. The accusations and complaints are going to continue, and probably not even miss a beat, no matter what they do. And I think the devs are well aware that this is "the way it is".

 

[Picus at the office]

I'll let you in on another little secret. Accusing other players of speed hacking has become such a deeply ingrained part of UO's pvp culture that at this point if there is a real problem, it wouldn't matter even if it was fixed - and as I said, my guess is that this problem has already been largely fixed.

The bolded part I would agree with but the rest I still do not believe. This all said I will be both shocked when the "fix" comes in and, I suspect, banned but that is fine if the game improves. Yet if nothing comes about I don't know what all to expect....either way time will tell.

 

[Gellor]

One thing that I am guessing is that speed hacks are being used, but all they are really doing is compensating for lag. They aren't actually allowing anyone to move faster than the maximum movement speed. Are they illegal? Of course. But are they the huge issue that so many think they are? I rather suspect that the answer to that question is no.

I bolded two important things you said that my experience shows otherwise.

Background: I ping west coast servers at a solid 15-20ms and my computer is solid. Even when new, my computer was upper end. And I did all the fun optimize for UO tricks.

First, speed hacks do more than "compensate for lag". When I PvPed, some known speedhackers would go flying by me even though they were in Hawaii and east coast. This was PRE enhanced client days. This was both guildmates and opponent guilds.

Second, if all they did was "compensate for lag", if someone pinging in the teens in NOT hitting the server movement cap, I'd say the server cap is way to high then.

Personally, I'm MORE worried about speed hacking than all these "evil" scripts. As has been mentioned, the true good PvPers aren't using scripts. Scripts are too easy to trip up and throw off timing.

While I don't like the scripts to much, I worry more about things directly in EA's influence:

• Graphic "hacks"... the dreaded stump, field, etc used by people with the classic client. I use the word "hack" but it is a "simple" graphic modification. It is also the world's easiest problem to fix. A few lines of code verifying the integrity of files is all it would take. Could be as simple as a size/date check or as "complex" as running a hash function... MD5 for example. In client/server programming, the first rule I was taught was "if you don't have the client on your computer, don't trust ANYTHING coming from it".
• Timely bug fixes... I'm sorry, there is NO reason a just added bug should take weeks, months, or never be fixed. Add in banning people for incidental use of these bugs. I can think of several cases of unjust bannings related to this: Halloween decorations and house customizing comes to mind.
• Timely balance fixes... again, same as above. If you add in something and people are yelling how screwed up it is, does it really take weeks or months to balance the issue? Take deathstrike when ninja was added... take mysticism when it was just added in... pets in PvP anyone?

The last two items are 90% of the reason I stopped playing with any regularity about 5 months ago and finally closed my accounts last month.

I know more people who have quit over the last two items than I do who quit over scripting and speed hacking.

 

[Llewen]

take mysticism when it was just added in... pets in PvP anyone?
[/LIST]

The last two items are 90% of the reason I stopped playing with any regularity about 5 months ago and finally closed my accounts last month.

I know more people who have quit over the last two items than I do who quit over scripting and speed hacking.

Somehow I doubt that. But you are entitled to your opinion.

Mysticism was "fixed" within weeks as far as I can see, and it is pretty balanced now. As for pets in pvp. I've had that discussion many times, I'm not sure I feel like having it again, and not in this thread, but I'll just repeat what I've said. I don't see a disproportionate number of tamers in pvp.

I rarely see a greater dragon in pvp, except at spawns, and even there, they aren't all that common. There are quite a few dread warhorses, but certainly no more tamers total than any other template type, and that includes those with dread warhorses. And I see mages with demons, and dexxers with orc brutes.

I'm not sure why tamers are being singled out here, other than the typical UO pvp'r anti-tamer prejudice...

 

[Llewen]

One thing that probably is worth saying. If the upcoming measures against those using scripts are effective, we may find that this affects the balance between template types in pvp, and it may well be that there may need to be some changes made to restore that balance. That will be interesting to see.

 

[Lefty]

I'll let you in on another little secret. Accusing other players of speed hacking has become such a deeply ingrained part of UO's pvp culture that at this point if there is a real problem, it wouldn't matter even if it was fixed - and as I said, my guess is that this problem has already been largely fixed.

It doesn't really matter at this point what the devs do to address the "speed hacking" issue. The accusations and complaints are going to continue, and probably not even miss a beat, no matter what they do. And I think the devs are well aware that this is "the way it is".

I will be sure to fire up camstudio to record the next speedhack instance I encounter.

When a person who is in last place in a group chasing me instantly zips through past his guild mates, pass me, and time enough to throw up a e field there is something fishy going on.

 

[Lord Chaos]

For me, it's looking quite positive. Main issue all this time IMO was that they weren't seen to be taking any action at all. There were still bans for dupes and such, but most cheaters grew bold thinking that they won't be caught and it started spreading. Others folks then began to think they have to use cheats as well to level the playing field.

I look forward to welcoming you back!

Just because some totally new account just "happens" to come across this topic, doesn't mean its a real player, smells more like an alt account.

 

[Lord Chaos]

I'll let you in on another little secret. Accusing other players of speed hacking has become such a deeply ingrained part of UO's pvp culture that at this point if there is a real problem, it wouldn't matter even if it was fixed - and as I said, my guess is that this problem has already been largely fixed.

It doesn't really matter at this point what the devs do to address the "speed hacking" issue. The accusations and complaints are going to continue, and probably not even miss a beat, no matter what they do. And I think the devs are well aware that this is "the way it is".

And thats the biggest problem...Mythic will implement this, ban people, other people will quit and they'll lose lots of accounts (between 25-40% if Stratics polls are any indicator).

Then ontop of that, people will STILL whine that other PvPers cheat and other players cheat and speedhack, so those people will stay away and keep quitting.

Lose - lose situation for Mythic here.

 

[GreekHero]

[*]Timely balance fixes... again, same as above. If you add in something and people are yelling how screwed up it is, does it really take weeks or months to balance the issue? Take deathstrike when ninja was added... take mysticism when it was just added in... pets in PvP anyone?
[/LIST]

The last two items are 90% of the reason I stopped playing with any regularity about 5 months ago and finally closed my accounts last month.

I know more people who have quit over the last two items than I do who quit over scripting and speed hacking.

DUDE YOU NAILED IT! I am not sure what others say but the only time i seriously actually thought quitting UO was upon introduction of AOS and when people figured out after a couple months that FC/FCR was unlimited. To all those newer players here, imagine having to deal with FC 6 mages in Fel 24/7. Hell even some of them had protection on when it was not capped. I remember characters getting ganged by 5-6 players and staying still and just absorbing damage - immortals, they would heal away. Oh, and the worst is that it took them how long (8-12 months) if I recall correctly to fix the FC and protection-on issues?

 

[popps]

But to finish on a positive note, I have noticed that the ghost cam problem has been taken care of. And I am watching very closely the devloppments about this effort to monitor and react to the cheating. Of course, alot of the damage is already done as I will most likely never be able to have the same gear than theses cheaters/dupers will have accumulated over the years. But I can confirm right now that if/once I am convinced that the cheating is under control, I will reactivate both of my accounts.

You are correct, thanking to wde spread cheating which was not stopped early on as it should have been, a limited number of players has been able to screw up the game for a much larger number of players thus, also hurting the game subscriptions, IMHO.

They were able to gather a large wealth and in an item based game use that wealth to become uber powerfull and dispel all competitors (sometimes kick them out of the game as quite a few players I have known over the years left the game and closed their accounts due to the widespread and rampant cheating left unchallenged).

Basically, as I see it, the inhability of the various dev teams to get rid of cheating screwed up the game for many who left, perhaps upset with the game and who knows, maybe even disgusted with what UO had become.

This said, now there is imbuing and faction artifacts which can provide "some" help to catch up with uber powerful existing players.

At least, it is "something" and some light at the end of the tunnel.

I would have much preferred to see this years and years back, though......

Had this been done much earlier on, who knows, perhaps Ultima Online would now have more active players..........

 

[canary]

To be fair, most people don't quit over cheating... they quit because they are bored and want to try other venues.

Not to say cheating is cool... it is obviously not.

edit: I will say I will gladly print out this page and eat it if Cal ACTUALLY does anything with the information they allegedly have regarding cheaters. This game's treatment of crackdowns is worse than many f2p games.

 

[Kaleb]

To be fair, most people don't quit over cheating... they quit because they are bored and want to try other venues.

Known cheats are quitting on my shard.... coincidence?

 

[Lord Chaos]

Known cheats are quitting on my shard.... coincidence?

No, though what he likely meant is that very few quit over cheating going on. Its just an convenient excuse.

 

[UOKaiser]

welp I know Baja is a tiny shard compared to others, but we got a lot of scripters. And they are so easy to spot...box on the step, over 6 million stones...and the scripters go at it morning, noon and night. They don't even care who sees em.

Lets assume what they mine is just plain ingots (even thou it ain't I'm sure)...6 million....times cost of ingot...wow...and thats just one out of the 25 homes I've marked as scripters.

Prob explains why a rare worth about 4 mil 3-4 years ago is now worth 50 mil. You can tell who doesn't script...they are the minority poor. And they are quitting in droves, totally fed up with all the years and years of broken promises and the dreaded phrase "we're working on it"

Numbers are a bit wrong. Average ore weights 12 stones if perfect.(Thats if you don't count tools,granite,gems,blackrock and all ore that you need more of to get a ingot) 6 million stones weight= about 500k ingots If all iron 60k goes for average 500k. 500k/60k= 8.3* 500k=4,166,666 mil worth of ingots. Barely enough to buy anything worth while.

Also rares worth 3-5mil 4 years ago arent worth much unless they don't spawn anymore. Only rares that stopped spawning and are still useful increase in price. Any rares that continue to spawn or are made useless lowers in price.

Also the inflation of gold has increased in 3-4 years ago so the same amount of gold is worth less now in value though items have also droped in prices so it's harder to get to the next class of wealth.

 

[HD2300]

edit: I will say I will gladly print out this page and eat it if Cal ACTUALLY does anything with the information they allegedly have regarding cheaters. This game's treatment of crackdowns is worse than many f2p games.

Even if they ban a token 4 cheaters, say 'Mission Accomplished', come back again in 2 years time????

 

[Harlequin]

DUDE YOU NAILED IT! I am not sure what others say but the only time i seriously actually thought quitting UO was upon introduction of AOS and when people figured out after a couple months that FC/FCR was unlimited. To all those newer players here, imagine having to deal with FC 6 mages in Fel 24/7. Hell even some of them had protection on when it was not capped. I remember characters getting ganged by 5-6 players and staying still and just absorbing damage - immortals, they would heal away. Oh, and the worst is that it took them how long (8-12 months) if I recall correctly to fix the FC and protection-on issues?

Are we still talking about cheating here? Because the reason you gave above tends more to game design balance rather than cheating.

I believe at that time the devs didn't consider the uncapped fast cast as a cheat. It was how they intended it to work.

You need to remember that at the beginning before the multitude of arties were available, the only fast cast items were from rings, bracelets and weapons. If using a mage, the fast cast on a weapon was quite useless, leaving 2 sources of FC. So that effectively capped FC at 2 for mages.

Protection reduced FC then too, but you can offset it with fc eqm. It's in the patch notes.

Necros and pallies had FC 3 since their spells do not require spell channelling to work (sc has a -1 fc penalty).

This is still pretty balanced.

When more folks started getting things like ornies and arcane shield, it started to tip the balance in pvp.

It wasn't a cheat by any 3rd party program. It's how they intended it to work. However, they gradually recognized that there was indeed a balance issue and decided to put in caps.

Also, those immortal healing mages you were talking about, do you remember if they were using magery or chivalry to heal? Because that was another game design balance issue and not a cheat.

Cap magery at fc2, done. Cap chiv at fc4, done. There, that should fix the balance issues.

What? What do you mean mages are using chiv to heal themselves!? Damn...those are some sneaky players...

And that's how they also put in an fc 2 cap for chiv if the player has more than 70 magery.

Yes, it took some time to convince the devs that there was a balance issue, but it was by no means cheats or bugs.

2 other invul methods at that time like the 100% block chance via dci+parry and the 100% reflect were also game design balance issues and not cheats/bugs.

Most real cheats like duping, selling things you shouldn't, stealing things you shouldn't, stabling things you sgouldn't, starting out as an npc char etc were stamped out rather quickly once they got wind of it.

 

[GreekHero]

Are we still talking about cheating here? Because the reason you gave above tends more to game design balance rather than cheating.

I believe at that time the devs didn't consider the uncapped fast cast as a cheat. It was how they intended it to work.

You need to remember that at the beginning before the multitude of arties were available, the only fast cast items were from rings, bracelets and weapons. If using a mage, the fast cast on a weapon was quite useless, leaving 2 sources of FC. So that effectively capped FC at 2 for mages.

Protection reduced FC then too, but you can offset it with fc eqm. It's in the patch notes.

Necros and pallies had FC 3 since their spells do not require spell channelling to work (sc has a -1 fc penalty).

This is still pretty balanced.

When more folks started getting things like ornies and arcane shield, it started to tip the balance in pvp.

It wasn't a cheat by any 3rd party program. It's how they intended it to work. However, they gradually recognized that there was indeed a balance issue and decided to put in caps.

Also, those immortal healing mages you were talking about, do you remember if they were using magery or chivalry to heal? Because that was another game design balance issue and not a cheat.

Cap magery at fc2, done. Cap chiv at fc4, done. There, that should fix the balance issues.

What? What do you mean mages are using chiv to heal themselves!? Damn...those are some sneaky players...

And that's how they also put in an fc 2 cap for chiv if the player has more than 70 magery.

Yes, it took some time to convince the devs that there was a balance issue, but it was by no means cheats or bugs.

2 other invul methods at that time like the 100% block chance via dci+parry and the 100% reflect were also game design balance issues and not cheats/bugs.

Most real cheats like duping, selling things you shouldn't, stealing things you shouldn't, stabling things you sgouldn't, starting out as an npc char etc were stamped out rather quickly once they got wind of it.

By all means, I was not referring that the above had anything to do with cheating but were a product of an unbalanced game. I have to admit I got carried away from the original topic but Gellor above mentioned that took forever to fix those issues and this is what I was trying to emphasize.

 

[Kratos Aurion]

I'll explain later why you're so wrong its not even funny. Quit thinking about regular scripting or programming, its not at all comparative in this regard to the program which shall not be named.

Um.. what? It uses a very generic scripting language, and considering I've even tinkered with it in the past (ok, I've worked with some smart effin programmers), I'm highly aware of what this harry potter program is capable of doing.

But I guess admitting to being curious about scripting in general gets you the ban stick anymore these days

But as the dev team has brought to our attention, they ARE gathering information on users using the software and investigating the usage of it.

 

[Sergul'zan_SP]

You are correct, thanking to wde spread cheating which was not stopped early on as it should have been, a limited number of players has been able to screw up the game for a much larger number of players thus, also hurting the game subscriptions, IMHO.

QFT.

Example? Factions.

 

[Llewen]

And thats the biggest problem...Mythic will implement this, ban people, other people will quit and they'll lose lots of accounts (between 25-40% if Stratics polls are any indicator).

Then ontop of that, people will STILL whine that other PvPers cheat and other players cheat and speedhack, so those people will stay away and keep quitting.

Fear mongering.

You are basically saying it isn't worth telling the truth, because people are going to lie anyway, or it isn't worth doing anything good, because people are going to continue doing bad things. It's like a smoker saying it isn't worth quitting because the air is polluted anyway. There's a grain of truth there, but it's being used to prop up a whopping lie.

Even if it doesn't end accusations of cheating, it is still worth fighting the cheating behaviour. Even if it doesn't completely end the cheating behaviour, it is still worth fighting that behaviour. It's a matter of degrees. Yes the air may be polluted, but you greatly increase your chances of living to a ripe old age if you stop smoking even if the air is polluted.

There may still be accusations of cheating, but I guarantee if the cheating monster is beaten into submission, fewer people will successfully cheat, the game will offer a much more fair playing experience for all players, and there will be fewer accusations of cheating. The cheating monster will never be slain and buried, but cheating behaviour can be greatly reduced, and their will be benefits derived from that success, and the war is worth fighting.

What you are doing is fear mongering - spreading the same lies that the devs that cancelled Punk Buster several years ago obviously listened to. Subscriptions will be cancelled by the thousands! If you try to fight the cheating, it will only get worse! It will be the end of UO! All lies, and apparently this time the devs aren't listening.

Go Mythic Go!

You are doing the right thing and the end results will be a better gaming experience for the majority of your clients, and a healthier subscriber base. I absolutely guarantee it.

 

[Lord Chaos]

Fear mongering.

Yes, you guys are fearmongering, trying to paint it into a bigger problem than it is.

You are basically saying it isn't worth telling the truth, because people are going to lie anyway, or it isn't worth doing anything good, because people are going to continue doing bad things. It's like a smoker saying it isn't worth quitting because the air is polluted anyway. There's a grain of truth there, but it's being used to prop up a whopping lie.

Might have had a point if any of this had anything even remotely to do with cheating in UO on any level.

Even if it doesn't end accusations of cheating, it is still worth fighting the cheating behaviour. Even if it doesn't completely end the cheating behaviour, it is still worth fighting that behaviour. It's a matter of degrees. Yes the air may be polluted, but you greatly increase your chances of living to a ripe old age if you stop smoking even if the air is polluted.

Funny enough the smokers in my family are those who lives to the age of 90-100+ Go figure.

Either way, again, completely invalid comparisons.

There may still be accusations of cheating, but I guarantee if the cheating monster is beaten into submission, fewer people will successfully cheat, the game will offer a much more fair playing experience for all players, and there will be fewer accusations of cheating. The cheating monster will never be slain and buried, but cheating behaviour can be greatly reduced, and their will be benefits derived from that success, and the war is worth fighting.

No, it will mean that more people will quit, more resources will flood the market, the game will slowly completely die off until not feasible to run anymore.

What you are doing is fear mongering - spreading the same lies that the devs that cancelled Punk Buster several years ago obviously listened to. Subscriptions will be cancelled by the thousands! If you try to fight the cheating, it will only get worse! It will be the end of UO! All lies, and apparently this time the devs aren't listening.

I have millenia of human history and years of MMO history to back me up, not to mention real life facts and all polls going the same way too...what do you have? Nothing whatsoever other than you running around barking in a circle like a chihuahua dog.

Maybe the devs won't listen and UO will be the worse of by it. I don't give a flying fig if you feel the game will be better for you, but it won't be for me or anyone I know. Events are cancelled, essential people quitting, fewer and fewer people around, etc.

Dead game...Where exactly do you think this magic uprising of tens of thousands of players will come from to replace the accounts lost?

You are doing the right thing and the end results will be a better gaming experience for the majority of your clients, and a healthier subscriber base. I absolutely guarantee it.

Empty promises are easy to make. Oh and its not for the majority of players. The majority of players cheat, even YOU cheat. You use the search site for instance, as does many others. You just play high holy anyway.

 

[Lord Chaos]

Um.. what? It uses a very generic scripting language, and considering I've even tinkered with it in the past (ok, I've worked with some smart effin programmers), I'm highly aware of what this harry potter program is capable of doing.

Uhm yes, it is. But you have to remember that it interfaces with the game and THAT is what makes it slow. The script language and program is slow enough as it is (some 1500 times slower than a more modern script program, as per their own benchmarks), but then it also have to synchronize with a running game and read the data stream of an ancient game as well. It just becomes really slow over all.

Its no where near as fast as human reaction in the UI can be, ontop of it not being able to anticipate or know anything.

I've seen many of these scripts in action and they're horribly slow. Ever seen a mining radar or script? it draws the tiles ONE at a time, about 4-5 tiles per second (and there are a lot of tiles in a screen). Its just horrible. But it works.

But as the dev team has brought to our attention, they ARE gathering information on users using the software and investigating the usage of it.

Yes, indeed, hopefully they'll get to the truth of the matter and also remember that many people that use cheats, don't use them all that often and some don't use them ever since this was first announced, simply not playing. So the immediate appearance will be of not so much cheating going on, but its there.

Actually honstly, if the cheat detection worked. They should make a brand new shard with the cheat detection on, to keep it completely fair. Instead of rewarding those who exploited and cheated their way to success in the past as they'd be doing now.

 

[Llewen]

*snip*

You don't seem to realize how unoriginal, and completely predictable the s*** you shovel is. I've read everything you've ever posted, a thousand different ways, in a thousand different places. The same thing cheaters say everywhere. I have no idea if you personally cheat, but you certainly do regurgitate the Company line with great faithfulness.

I posted a thread about all the lies cheaters tell themselves, I think you've used every single one, plus a few common ones that I don't think I mentioned.

Just a sample:
- I only cheat to "even the playing field".
- It's not really cheating.
- Everyone cheats.
- I don't cheat anywhere as bad as *insert random name here*.
- If you stop the cheating everyone will quit - the game will die.
- If you stop this cheating, something worse will follow.
- Attempts to destroy the credibility and reputation of those who expose the behaviour.

And so on, and so on. All so very predictable, all used a million times before probably dating back as long as humans have been playing games, and all lies on some level.

 

[Petra Fyde]

Since Cal has given the requested status check I think we can dispense with the rest of the accusations, counter accusations and general trolling for a while.