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Something for those who claim EA and other gaming companies can't prevent cheating
- Thread starter Captn Norrington
- Start date
- Watchers 8
I guess that I'm torn. Even if I'm against cheating, although I admit that I have macroed skills attended in the past (maybe unattended too...it's too long ago to remember), I don't want to see the game that I played for 20 years disappear, even if in some ways, I hate what it's becoming from the cheating / multiboxing / RMT transactions...
I think a lot of people feel this way... tired of seeing these cheaters. Tired of trying to compete with them..... and unwilling to join them.
All good. I feel like that is an honest answer, and I am torn as well on occasion. I LOVE this game as well and have made close RL friends in it. I also hate what is becoming. I feel that the Developers should grow a pair and either do their job (as currently outlined in the ToS) or say hey, "the rules are changing" and come out and specify what will be and will NOT be allowed, rather than (IMO) sticking their collective hands in the sand, hoping it will "blow over".
Should the rules change, I think they will be shocked at the number of "honest" players who decide to just pack it in for good.
Yes... That's exactly what you should take from that.
Not that even these companies that employ punk buster, toss out bans, have millions of subscribers, and 100x the staff still can't achieve what you all wish would happen for UO.
And the majority of online games have things in place to make the game more enjoyable for the average player. You want Valorite ingots? You pay an Npc with tokens, he goes out and mines it for you, returns after a set amount of time and hands it to you. You can get these tokens through any number of methods, meaning that you can literally play the game doing what you want and then use the tokens to bring in resources.
HOW we haven't made a mining or lumberjacking mastery yet that spits out any level map with a cool down timer based on the level of resource is BEYOND ME. THE MAPS ARE ALREADY CODED.
Want end game gear? There are multiple ways to get it, one of which is character bound and just takes a few hours of your time each week.
Want to level up? OH here are different challenges you can complete every week that give you huge exp bonuses. And here are some daily things to promote players logging in and participating in the game.
The point is, yes these other gaming companies combat botters, but no matter what, botters still exist, so they make the game playable for everyone else.
Sadly the rules have already changed and we love our UO that we will allow it. If you were going to quit you would have already done it just like the majority of us have already not done.
I'm curious to know which official statement or quote from Mesanna you are basing this on. I went looking, and I couldn't find anything that supports that interpretation. I know Punkbuster was never integrated, and while certain question programs have been discovered and killed over the years, I don't believe UO has ever successfully had a period of no cheating. There is also a difference between programs that edit the data stream and those that don't. Mesanna's few comments on multiboxing have been somewhat vague or incomplete.
I have to disagree, I don't think the RULES have changed, only the Developers willingness to enforce them.
Because she is unwilling, for WHATEVER reason, to take a stand.
FYI, I DO like that this thread has stayed mostly civil!
Oh I already know that I won't quit because of cheating. I will occasionally be annoyed with the cheaters and disappointed in what UO is becoming but I won't quit because of it. Truth is that I enjoy the part of the game that cheating makes easier...mining, lumberjacking, gaining most skills, etc.
I think that he means that their lack of willingness to enforce them is tacit agreement to the way people are playing. I don't agree with this. I think that it's the combination of allocation of resources...development of the game vs preventing cheating or suing 3rd party sites and the question of how banning all the cheaters will affect the game's revenue base.
But rules without enforcement are utterly pointless.
You can post a speed limit sign till you're blue in the face, but if the cops say we aren't patrolling and we won't ticket you for speeding even if we do see it, then the signs are pointless.
Mesanna has said openly that as long as you are attended they aren't doing anything.
Heh. This actually happened in my state. The legislature decided to make a law stating that the school zone speed limits (20 MPH) were in effect 24/7 instead of just weekdays 7am-5pm. Police departments declared that they wouldn't be bothering to enforce that law outside school hours as there were more important things to address. The legislature eventually repealed the law.
BS enforcement of the ToS is a joke...at best. The cheaters run rampant at EM events and major spawns (Blackthorn's, Doom, champs, etc) reaping the benefits while angering honest players. They profit while we suffer.
With little but lip service given to the problem, how long until enough honest players quit in frustration to make UO unprofitable?
Which would be preferable:
UO closes due to cheaters being shown the door.
UO closes due to honest players leaving because cheaters always win.
The way BS is mishandling this problem, they're painting themselves into a "damned if you do, damned if you don't" corner.
The solution isn't simple, but I can see one... Stop adding/changing big systems for a few publishes and focus on bugs, balance, client shortcomings (mainly of the EC) and alleviating overly grindy/complex systems. Make an NPE (combining the old now-inaccessible pieces with new parts). Launch the "Endless Journey" WITH a moderate advertising push and additions to the in game store. Then enforce the ToS with a stepped punishment system that ultimately results in a permaban for recidivists.
Simply leaving us to wallow in the muck will lead to cancellation.
Herp!
Journeyman
Broad doesn't work in the court of law in the USA, especially when you are suing.
Multiboxing software was not derived from or created FOR Ultima Online, all programs have many uses aside from the UO capabilities.
Multiboxing software is not related to UO in any way.
No offense, but I don't see how it's illegal from what you have posted. Same thing WoW & Diablo 3 have.. This mostly refers to programs that are DIRECTLY related to the game being played. Such as a bot that just plays the game for you, drops specific loot in specific places, trashes certain crap, etc etc. Or a speed hack made specifically for use in X game. It is an anti-cheat mechanism in itself, but it doesn't do a great job because the way around it is too simple...
"Cheating" is allowed on Free servers and they stay open? They also police their own servers though, but I've never heard of a single one that tries to sell the game as "Cheat" free.
The game can survive without "legit" players.
Multiboxing programs directly interact with the clients to replicate mouse and keyboard actions. Thus making them an unapproved 3rd party program. EA/BS can ban any of us for any reason (or no reason) at any time and we have zero recourse. A court would't be involved, EA requires has mandatory arbitration.
This really isn't a difficult concept. You just want to obfuscate the issue for whatever reason.
No, really it can't. Saying so is delusional at best.
Free servers are irrelevant to this issue. They literally fly by the seat of their pants and can do whatever they want as long as they can code it. They are answerable to no one. Hence why they could be active one minute and permanently gone the next.
There is also a difference between enforcing a game's TOS by actually punishing cheaters when caught and being "cheat free" - a claim now being brought up to deflect from the actual issue.
Herp!
Journeyman
Oh we're just talking about banning people for it?(thread was originally about a lawsuit) Yeah, ban people for no reason, really makes for an excellent selling point for anyone new.
It doesn't replicate anything if you're using the right program to multibox. This is also possible by just connecting 1 keyboard/mouse to multiple computers or by using a large amount of virtual machines.... You press a button on 1 keyboard/mouse but it inputs through x amount of virtual machines/connected computers. I doubt that it's a reasonable ban for any development team to ban 2-10+ accounts that someone pays for monthly just because they are using their computer smarts to play a game their way because they can't make friends or can't be on when their friends are on... or maybe they just prefer to solo but they'd rather solo fast because they have little free time to play games but they still want to keep up with content.
I'm not obfuscating anything... You're considering someone using a multiboxing program to be a cheater and that's just not true.
Bull ****.
Herp!
Journeyman
Awww... I broke the civility of the thread again. Seriously, explain to me how it's cheating? How does it give a person any unfair advantage(because if you're cheating you get one of these) at all? I can solo anything right now on a sampire or a dragoon or really anything if I've got the patience.... Why would it be cheating if I just opened 9 more accounts and started soloing these things a bit faster? It's the same as if I were to join a guild and run things, but instead of having to rely on other people, I just have myself.... I'd still have to make 9 more sets of gear, 9 more sets of weapons, etc etc... What about that is cheating?
It's threads like these that show exactly who on Stratics are the degenerate cheaters harming UO.
Multiboxers gain an advantage at events and spawns by sheer force of numbers. Having more then one character under your control ups your chance for a drop significantly, whether that be an artifact or an multi-hundreds of million EM item.
But lets not pretend you didn't already know this. You couldn't possibly be that thick, though I'm willing to bet you will continue to blow smoke.
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Even with the huge decline in numbers those illegal sites selling gold and items are still around. That means that people are buying items from those sites, obviously a lot of people! I would bet that there are many people who would call themselves honest players, who don't run illegal third party software, who don't farm items while afk, but someone must be buying gold and items, these sites exist because they are still being used! If there was no market for UO goods then they would have closed down years ago.
Herp!
Journeyman
Nope, not thick at all. Yes, I will continue.
All I'm seeing from you is, "I can't do it so they shouldn't be allowed to!" It's a childish excuse for an argument. You can watch me on Legends whenever you want, you'll see that I run solo or with 1 friend, I don't do anything to gain an unfair advantage and it's quite rude to accuse with no proof. However, that doesn't change my stance that multiboxing isn't illegal. It gives a person an advantage, but it is NOT unfair. Everyone could spend up to an infinite amount monthly on accounts and play them all at once if they want... nothing unfair about it. Unfair is defined as not following the rules of a game or sport. The rules are being followed to the T.
Yeah... Other people who run the same exact base game, usually have a larger development team, and keep customers playing and make a living doing it is completely irrelevant. Some freeservers have been around for a long time, and a lot of them make damn good money when done properly.
In response to them being here one minute and gone the next, and yet people still keep joining new ones? Which still allow "cheating"..... Ever seen a well advertised free server on launch?
They join because of the Nostalgia of the era that the servers are based around, and because it's usually a fairly active development team working on them and interacting with the customers on a regular basis. But guess what, unattended macroing, especially training skills is the norm! Go Figure. HELL they even give you incentives to go into dungeons by making skill gain faster, Power hour, Crazy things to promote daily gameplay and help players get past the tedium that is leveling.
As UO is about to be moving towards more of a F2P Model, I think what the other Free to play servers do is completely relevant. And the one thing they all have in common is they allow unattended macroing to an extent.
Even Mesanna has made cracks about how few people aren't flagged as using 3rd party programs and you think that's a delusion conclusion? Evades/deflects questions when asked at meet and greets. This is the person who KNOWS exactly how many accounts are flagged.
Magical Spreadsheet is coming with all the cheaters, OPE never mind.....
Punkbuster turned on, OPE nm, shut that down......
I think it's delusional to not think that beyond the majority of players in this game use 3rd party programs in some form or another. And when I say the majority, i'm talking 90%+ of the paid accounts.
Its humorous when these threads pop up. People that are or have been involved in RMT white knight, others play naive and act like theres zero problem with banning people, no reprecussions for the game.
Its pretty damn simple folks. If they could (READ: ban without putting the game in the red) they would. However that is not the case. If they took a hard stand you wouldnt be playing Ultima Online.
So...keep playing as you are, or cancel your accounts and move on.
I have no problem saying, yes ive bought gold in the past. Yes ive macroed skills. Im sorry this isnt 1997. I am not a teenager with unlimited amounts of time to devote to a game anymore. But the game still provides me enjoyment. So...i play, and if i need something, ill buy it, gold or otherwise.
Its pretty damn simple folks. If they could (READ: ban without putting the game in the red) they would. However that is not the case. If they took a hard stand you wouldnt be playing Ultima Online.
So...keep playing as you are, or cancel your accounts and move on.
I have no problem saying, yes ive bought gold in the past. Yes ive macroed skills. Im sorry this isnt 1997. I am not a teenager with unlimited amounts of time to devote to a game anymore. But the game still provides me enjoyment. So...i play, and if i need something, ill buy it, gold or otherwise.
That is quite the unsupported assumption there. B+ for effort, D- for originality. This is the kind of false correlation that shows how legless your argument is.
I, nor most of the people I know, have any desire to multibox or run script-enhanced characters.
No matter how many times or ways you phrase it, that doesn't make it true.
Defending cheating only makes you look like a fool.
Captn Norrington
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Imagine that you are a pvp'er. You and two of your guildies go to the local pvp popular area to fight a bit. You find a random person and challenge them to a 1 on 1 duel.
The duel starts.
BAM you're dead in 1 second.
BAM both of your guildies are dead 3 seconds later.
Turns out even though you were using 1 account, the person you were fighting was multiboxing 8 accounts which are all archers and all shot you at the exact same millisecond right when the duel started, clearly making it totally impossible to win against them no matter what you (or even your entire guild combined) do about it.
You wouldn't call that cheating?
(That was a real example by the way, there is a guy on Atlantic who does this exact thing).
Now apply this situation to a scenario like VvV where the more you kill people the more points to buy items you get, therefore the more profit you make by selling those items. Now that person has a way to get an unlimited amount of gold while simultaneously ruining pvp for everyone else since no one will ever be able to beat them.
Ok Pope Dot. So why dont you just keep playing your game? Cause if EA/Broadsword took your public stance, you wouldn't be playing Ultima Online. Sooo....what did all that white knighting get you? A negative return on enjoyment thats what.
Herp!
Journeyman
Sorry. I guess I should have said all I'm seeing is, "I don't do it so they shouldn't" I didn't mean to insult you by making it look like I assumed you couldn't do it. I understand that playing legitimately is fun, I agree completely. However, that doesn't change the fact that other people don't find playing the way we do to be fun. They play their way for fun & they break 0 rules doing it if they are just multiboxing. I've spent more time appealing bans and suspensions in games(for myself and friends) than I should really admit to... It's not cheating to multibox, it gives no unfair advantage & it actually assists in supporting the game more than 1 'legit' single-2 account holder.
There are players that are on these boards that had a meeting with Mesanna and during that meeting she informed them of the programs that they had run while playing UO and she herself admitted using one of the programs. UO knows exactly what you are doing in UO, do not kid yourself. And what is so vague about her stance on multiboxing when she stated as long as you were at your computer it was ok and that was at the last M&G.
Free servers aren't particularly germane to this discussion because they aren't UO. Sure, they may emulate some nostalgically rosy era that people claim to pine for...so what? Their dev teams consist of people willing to rip off an IP to make a buck. Not exactly paragons of gaming virtue.
Implying that because free servers allow cheating real UO should is fairly insane.
I'm not overly concerned with people macroing skills in their homes, they aren't necessarily "hurting" anyone. I'm more concerned with the people going out of their way to profit (whether it be gold or $) from events and high-end content and ruin the experience of others.
Honestly, I remain unconvinced in their ability to detect squat. As you pointed out, they've backpeddled nearly every time they've said they were poised to do something.
Mesanna says a lot of things that are simply cringe worthy.
Herp!
Journeyman
Been there, done that. That's not cheating at all.
Say you and 2 guildies go to the local pvp popular area to fight a bit. You find a random person and challenge them to a 1 on 1 duel.
BAM you're dead in 1 second.
BAM both of your guildies are dead 3 seconds later.
Turns out even though you were using 1 account, the person you were fighting had 7 friends with him which are all archers and all shot you at the exact same millisecond right when the duel started, clearly making it totally impossible to win against them no matter what you (or even your entire guild combined) do about it.
That is just as much cheating as 1 guy doing it alone.... should those 8 separate people that cheated at a duel be banned as well?
But the rules have changed because the refuse to enforce the ToS. The rule was if you cheat we will ban you, now it is regardless what the ToS says we will look the other way because we want to keep our jobs. Sadly that is a huge change.
I'd rather UO shut down because they did something about cheaters, thus ending on a high note. Rather than letting the game continue its slow spiral into ignominy by pandering to the lowest denominator.
Or, better yet, the devs pull their head out of their asses and do something to enhance and promote the game while at the same time making it abundantly clear that high-level cheating isn't welcome here.
There is a HUGE difference in actually CHANGING the ToS and someone refusing to do what they are supposed to do.
Yeah, because saying others shouldn't cheat is just so wrong...
If you think that multiboxing doesn't confer an unfair advantage you are either deluding yourself or are morally bankrupt.
They really do not need a lot of people buying from them because they really have zero operating costs so any cash they take in is basically pure profit.
Herp!
Journeyman
The lowest denominator is the legit low quantity account holders.
High-level cheating isn't welcome here. They allowed old bans to come back, and it was made abundantly clear that people who had speed hacked, double cast, machine gun potted, etc, were not to do this anymore because they will be banned again. Policies have become more lenient, but the high-level cheaters are actually punished.
OK Now you are truly trying to pull a rabit out of your whatever because there is zero chance that all those players could do that and you know it. Try keeping this in the real world please.
Herp!
Journeyman
LAN party.
So do you still play? If you do then where is your integrity?
I think many of you all and sadly even DEVs have this delusion that all these people cheat... but no I don't think they do. Most of us can spot the offenders right away why GMs and DEVs can't is beyond me.
It's a public stance that should have happened 19 years ago... is it too late now???
Honestly a large number of people I know don't cheat. They don't multi-box and they don't use 3rd party apps... I know a few that do... we all do.
Does it make it right? No.
Who does it hurt when someone cheats? Everyone. Where do you draw the line?... if some folk are just great sales people and buy and sell things in-game making multi-billions and want to sell the gold is that "cheating" is that bad? What about the farmers who afk script gold gathering by killing troglodytes 24/7??? Is that Cheating??? What about the guy down in Blackthorns scripting in the mages room 24/7 to get drops??? Does that hurt your gameplay??? Hurts mine... means I can't be down there working on the mages getting drops while I'm actually attended because he's down there scripting afk... but go ahead and delude yourself some more... Does it hurt that people script ore and wood??? While it drives the price of these things down to "reasonable" levels... it also means that you can't make an in-game living anymore off mining and lumberjacking... it has also forced the DEVs to make silly concessions to stop this cheating by randomizing the material so that NO ONE can get the amounts of Frostwood and Valorite that they need when they need it without paying a bot farmer for it because the "average" player doesn't have 4,000 game hours to harvest every tree in the game looking for the 10 that might have frostwood at any given moment... but that hasn't hurt anyone else no??? but you go on with that delusion...
Like I said in another post somewhere on this subject... they need to start giving out punishments based on the offense...
Scripting skills in your house AFK: take 20 points of each skill away and make them work them again ATTENDED.
Script farming: Remove all ill gotten gains.... from their homes, from their bank, from their pack, from their vendors..... they'll get the message.
Multi-boxing: If it's at an EM Event take away their ability to get drops... put them in jail for the duration of the Event.... If it's for PvP move them to a cheaters shard where they can PvP with the rest of the cheaters... drop their house on regular shards... and be done with it.... they can still play there... they will just have to rebuild. If they are doing it in dungeons again ..... take away the ill-gotten rewards... this includes GOLD... Again they WILL get the idea... Might be a hard pill to swallow but they will get it.
Find someone advertising sale sites etc... BAN THEM or move their characters somewhere like a jail and make it so they can't log any others in... While yes they can go make a new account keep them having to do that. There are things that can be done that wouldn't necessarily have to be the end.
Honestly I can say for certain that if the DEVs actually did take a stand on cheating and acted like they cared about it... honest players would return. Most of them loved UO... they hated the cheating and refused to try to compete...
I just wish the DEVs would act like they run the game.... and run it. I still feel like I'm somehow paying to play on Mesanna's personal free server .... not an actual paid game server run by a professional team... and while that may sound cruel .... that's exactly how I feel.
There is no difference. You either enforce the law/rule or you do not. Laws/rules without enforcement aren't worth the paper they are written on all they are is appeasements.
I played with 8 people in the same room and there is no way in hell that all 8 people can do the exact same thing at the exact same time. Give it up and stop saying stupid doodoo
Herp!
Journeyman
And they are supposed to know that I'm multiboxing, how? Multiboxing doesn't inject anything in to the clients being used, so it can't be tracked other than by IP, so if I'm at my house & me, my girlfriend, my mom, my dad, my brother, my sister, and my entire family are on UO at a single EM event, we couldn't be allowed drops?
Git gud? I really can't say anything else... I've played in the same room as up to 25 people and we were all capable of doing everything within milliseconds of each other on command. The instance given was 8 v 3: In order for them to kill all 3 enemies at once, they'd have to have split damage ahead of time, set up a countdown, and would have been perfectly capable of just shooting all at once, allowing many shots to hit multiple targets within milliseconds. It's completely possible.
If you think that you and 8 people can do the exact same actions at the exact same time then you are a fool... anyone with half a brain and two eyes can see multi-boxers... and it IS cheating....
In your belief. Which, to be perfectly frank, is rather sad.
They didn't allow all old banned accounts to come back. Anyone booted duping wasn't reinstated. So there was at least a some line they wouldn't cross.
It's not insane,
On one hand you have a Tos that says all programs other than these are illegal and you can be banned simply for using them irregardless of what you do with them, but nothing ever happens and if you can respond to a gm literally nothing happens. And Gm's ONLY show up if a player pages.
On the other hand you have F2P developers who just say that macroing is okay within reason, but that there are anti scripting counter measures in place to protect the economy of the game, and gm's have tools to see the duration of clients logged into the game and tracks things like resources,runics,quests, etc for them to see. And they police the servers irregardless if a player pages.
One of these is insane, and it's not the freeservers. Your stance on it is exactly what freeservers stance is too. Not trying to advertise freeservers here, but what the majority of players want as far as policing goes is already done by people who aren't paid with a subscription model.
*Note, I'm not saying this is how all freeservers work, but this is usually how the more successful ones are done.
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Herp!
Journeyman
I'll say it again. It doesn't give any advantage you cannot take for yourself under the ToS. It is not cheating because it is not unfair in any way.
The average auditory reaction time of a human is 170 milliseconds. It is 100% possible. It takes practice, but it is possible to refine that reaction time down a bit. In reality though, there is also the fact that it's a game, over the internet... so everyone hitting a button within .17s of each other will appear as all hits at once once the server handles all the data. I can keep going about it all day.... It's no different from being with a group of folks. Multiboxing isn't cheating at all, it's just a different way of playing than some people prefer or see as 'right'