Admit it VTnub, you're a (semi) useful tool for the establishment now.
You got the quote wrong:
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/we...=synd_facebookQuote:
Originally Posted by John_Stewart
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Admit it VTnub, you're a (semi) useful tool for the establishment now.
You got the quote wrong:
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/we...=synd_facebookQuote:
Originally Posted by John_Stewart
I just love seeing people get deleted.
Of course, it's a given they'll replace the real cheaters with pretend-cheaters, just so they have someone to delete, and pin the blame on.
In fact, they already did this.
'Abusing' petty bugs, or bugs that are obvious, and will lead to resets because they're that horrible, means you get smacked with three days of lock-out.
Their game, their rules, by creating an account, you choose to abide by those rules. Do I care, no not really. (shrugs)Quote:
Originally Posted by Shaman5
Actually Bishop we were just told we suffered one of our deletions because a guy went from europe to china on business. He had to show a plane ticket and still thundergore said it was too late to reinstate his province. One would think a competent programmer would put something in the deletion system that lets him bring innocent players back, but instead we have to throw away a valuable move code. Essentially, it seems like omac wants everyone to notify OMAC every time they log in from somewhere other than their homes.
Question to all: Is there anything the programmers have done to 'improve' the game that doesn't make it worse?
for the record - i am going to nyc soon -- so what starbucks should I avoid? dont want to get anyone deleted --
I have written support about my traveling a few times times - support has never responded to that or to the fact that i have brothers and people living in the same cities playing in my kd even though they wrote omac ---
so yeah since they dont reply - should I also send in plane tickets before I go?
Better play it safe and cancel the trip :)
What CW said!Quote:
Originally Posted by Bluefaerydust
Btw, i am going to Crete for 1 month this summer, i better kiss this game goodbye..
Can you get a refund on that ticket Anri??
If you have time for playing utopia while you are there you are doing something wrong!Quote:
Btw, i am going to Crete for 1 month this summer, i better kiss this game goodbye..
Avoid the 3 starbucks in Union Square ... I already login to them last weekQuote:
Originally Posted by Bluefaerydust
and the one in Chelsea by the ice rink ... I also login there
err ... Brooklyn, 18th Ave 65th St, avoid that one
Broadway and Spring ... done
W55 8th Ave ... did that
Yea ... Those are the one I can recall login from ... =)
Oh yea ... East Side Cafe and Ciao Now avoid these area too... =)
Bayside Bar, Connolly Bar, Patty Pub, Green Spa, and The Coffee Shop ... they got free wifi ... login from my phone there ... =) Be careful =)
and the 50s other places in K-town and Little Saigon ... =)
unless you think there is a good chance that the Starbucks you randomly choose also has a kdmate playing from it i'd say you'll be fine. No-one is saying you cannot travel and log in from different places.
These mechanisms are put in place to stop people that are cheating - you know, they ones that say "oh, did i forget to mention that i frequently make a 3k mile roundtrip and that i stay with a kdmate who runs a gnome province. It is purely co-incidence that i only attack after he has intelled a province".
It is extremely unlikely that a legitimate player will tick all those boxes in a normal situation.
Seeing that I am <checks username> Thundergore and you're directly referencing myself here, on these boards, I thought I'd wade in pre-emptively (I'm working on the matter as a whole right now - I want a trademark 'Thunderbore' post on the matter, thorough and comprehensive i.e. long). Put very simply - the quoted writing above is just one of several fabrications that have emerged. It is a multi-faceted piece of fiction...Quote:
Originally Posted by Cheech
I'm going to allow for a certain 'mass-hysteria' here. A form of 'Chinese Whispers'... but basically I have not (I think it's excessive) directly asked for any 'proof' of travelling. Now there is a backlog - so there may be some keen player who has included a scan of such a document. That's a backlog though - i.e. we haven't reached it yet. So can't have read it and therefore cannot have responded with the no reported here.
We have indeed said that preemptive word on intended trips would be beneficial. We have not however forced a player to show a plane ticket then denied a reinstatement.
So yes, you, Cheech, have openly lied on this public board about a CM.
I'm going to assume it's the previous options, 1 or 2 - maybe both. Hysterical Chinese Whispers.
If anyone else fabricates information on this delicate matter I will - because lying really gets my goat - perma-ban them from the boards and (if the lie is really bad) the game. I've no time for this sort of attempted manipulation
Now to touch on a point above - Yes, I think it is excessive, I did type that in brackets there. It doesn't mean I don't think that it's a problem that: innocent player A can claim he regularly flies around the world (and it's true), cheating player A can also claim it (and it's false) and it's nigh impossible to tell the difference.
Importantly it's also but one tiny fragment of the deletions some are talking about. I assure you we aren't in the business of deleting someone just because it appears they play from two locations.
This matter is important - I don't want to play it down. At the same time I'm not going to give amnesty to a certain type of lifestyle (that resembles cheating) in this game because that's what a free democracy has to do. This is an online game. We need to keep it clean and it has not been clean in a long, long time.
So while you can provide feedback about how to improve our approach, and we'll take your concerns onboard, this process isn't going to stop. We're not going to begin overturning investigations that highlighted bucket-loads of evidence against certain Kingdoms/provinces/partnerships.
If we get real harsh decisions, some poor sod is deleted for having two IPs logging on to one province and a support worker, in a hasty zeal of anti-cheat action, catches him - then this is the kind of case where I can see an easy reinstatement. That's clear cut.
However we won't bow to pressure to be lenient to those who claim innocence. Someone (again warping the truth) said we've a policy of 'guilty until proven innocent'. This is ridiculous pseudo-legal talk. What we have is a policy of investigating cheat reports (and alarms raised by cheat detection) without regard for the in-game rank of the individual reported. Without regard for their public forum persona. Without regard for their private circumstances. Without regard for their physical location. Without regard for their lifestyle.
This is unbiased action. We don't want to stop people from jet-setting to Asian internet cafes to play Utopia. Or from having a real life Kingdom meet up. We do want to stop these legitimate excuses being used as a cover for cheating.
With forewarning (emailing us to let us know of these rare events) you'll have a better chance of convincing us that your excuses are valid. There is no surefire way (for you scheming cheats out there) to access a list, or an excuse that will 100% prevent your deletion.
The whitelist stops automated acts against your account. If a whitelisted pair are reported and we identify with the myriad of evidence we can now gather, that they're behaving, in essence, like a single user - they're gone. I don't care if they've been whitelisted in Mehul's age, in the early 'OMAC' years. Last age. This age.
There is no protection against illegal activity and this is the crux of the matter. 'Illegal' activity. In spite of intent, in spite of claims of innocence, in spite of excuses... we can now (better than before - though far from perfect yet) identify 'illegal activity'.
Bottom line (and the reason that this isn't the planned, even handed response I was going to create) - don't misrepresent support publicly. I'm not going to tolerate lies about what we've asked for, nor the individuals beating their chests with innocence in the boards when privately we've seen some shocking evidence of cheating (those individuals I refer to now know who they are in spite of their claims to the contrary).
If you've evidence of a mail or link where I have contradicted what I've talked about (with specific regard to the plane ticket fabrication) then please present it so I can correct myself and tone down my VERY irritated stance - I will also apologise for jumping the gun (if I've done so - I doubt it at the moment because I think I'd remember a plane ticket) but I am very busy.
PS - I am not directly accusing any poster of lying (I know better than that) publicly. I merely point out that of all the 'reinstatement requests' we receive - a large portion are from players who were cheating and we know it (but can't name and shame them) but who are trained (due to the previous approach to support) to contact us and bellow about innocence.
PPS - My PM door is always open (though as of late I seem to direct a lot of folks to the mail queue as their queries, reports or complaints are better tracked/responded to there).
... I guess it did become a trademark Thunderbore post after all...
Desperate times call for desperate measures, and desperate measures yield desperate designs.
If people weren't so corrupt they can't even play by the rules, this wouldn't be necessary.
VT2 there are alternatives, tracking IP addresses is a fairly primitive approach. For instance, I was worried since the beginning about a very high rate of false positives. Although, I have to say it seems every case is being reasonably human analyzed and that they are using the system more for proof gathering upon reports than for the automatic cheating detection. Which qualms my fears quite a bit.
Sadly, though it is cool that we have better proof mechanisms. I appear to have been right that the system doesn't work very well for detection, something anyone can tell by the sheer number of scripters in the game.
There are lots of scripts? im not seeing that myself, game numbers seem to be pretty constant.
Don't use the wifi in Madison Square Park please, I log in from there sometimesQuote:
Originally Posted by Darkz Azn
Also, avoid Starbucks in the Gramercy area
If you're going for business, let me know so I can tell you which offices I log from
Also, I log in from an AT&T phone, so if you're going to log from your mobile, please let me know so we can coordinate this with OMAC. Actually, for everyone - I call dibs on AT&T, if you must log from a phone please a different mobile network
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bishop
How would most people know?
Also, I happen to know that 12% of my kingdom lives or works within 5 blocks of my apartment. I've already reported this to OMAC though, so hooray for whitelisting!
how would most people know that a kdmate logs in from the same place as them - is that what you are asking?
Absolutely. There are only like 3-4 Starbucks within walking distance from my apartment, how am I supposed to know which one they go to for coffee? How can I be expected to know if they are going for lunch at Shake Shack and use the wifi in the park?Quote:
Originally Posted by Bishop
If I was not such a vigilant social networker (read: talk way too much), it wouldn't be unreasonable not to know that my kdmates and I don't live so close to each other. As it is, I expect Big and Stormi2ider have no clue that they will go to school and work about a block away from each other.
This may come as a shock to you, but so far, I've not heard of any real players, who only play their one account, getting deleted for anything.
Maybe you all shouldn't have gotten so used to breaking the rules.
therock: a net cafe should be fine - i mean, what are the chances of a Uto player (of which there are 7k out of what, 6 billion?) interacting with another uto player at that same cafe?
This is all starting to annoy me, Bishop.
I play on a wireless 3G/4G network that (apparently) assigns IP addy's anew each time I log on, and often switches from one to the other in mid-session due to signal issues.
SO am I gonna be in trouble with that?
it could happen, there were around i dunno 10 players in the college i was at, and by chance i ended up in a kingdom with 2 of them, i didnt know them and never met or talked to them before that, but we ended up in the same kingdom for a point and only found out afterQuote:
Originally Posted by Bishop
Quote:
Originally Posted by WolfysBack
as i've already said, not unless you interact with someone on that IP in a suspicious manner.
What I haven't seen mentioned and will also probably result in many more un-deserved deletions is changing IPs. Many people have ISP providers who use dynamic IP addresses, myself included, do the morons who came up with this plan need to know about that as well? Are these people conjsciously TRYING to kill this game completely? Because that will be the end result. I do cheater searching on another site, and the majority of players there do not have static IPs, I assume the same is true here and if simply logging in from a different IP is considered "suspicious" then I forsee about 75% of utopia being deleted within the next couple of months.Quote:
2. I should not have to email you my friggin itinerary every time I travel internationally or interstate. That is too much to ask. Hell, even logging in from a wi-fi cafe is a huge risk under your current system, in case some player I don't even know logs from there.
same thing applies Zermoid - its the interaction that is investigated. A legitimate player will not have issues. Obviously dynamic IPs are not new. Logging in from another IP is not usually suspicious by itself.
As I explained to you on IRC, when two Utopians on opposite sides of an alliance war (TheRock and PhiWha) are in the same office building, or three Utopians live/work/study within a five block radius (TheRock, Big and Stormi2ider), it's certainly not unreasonable to have it happen once or twice.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bishop
People also travel and log on at airports. If any Utopians are flying through London, they'll probably use Heathrow's wifi. Does that mean any two players who happen to go on Heathrow's wifi get banned if they hit each other?
Like I said on IRC, I'm fine with there being issues, I appreciate that you guys are making a good-faith effort to clean up the game, but if there's no real appeals process, and nobody has shown or said anything to me beyond "email support and get the boilerplate response with no real request or standard for proof of innocence", then it's not a good system.
I know of two other players who are friends in real life. They play in the same kd. One player visited the other (they live very close) and logged on to his account there. Frozen. Yes, he's probably innocent, but there's basically no shot at proving that. I think we can all agree that the players have no hope of getting the prov back. It's when there are longer stories and legitimate issues that are being ignored, that can be proven but aren't getting the opportunity to do so, that I take issue with, especially because I recognize that I am likely in the line of fire here.
You ever played any random, korean, 'free' MMO?
They all have the same rules as OMACtopia. Most games do, actually.
Since you all now know for a fact that you can't share IP's, why is it so hard for you to stop doing it?
It's not the game that needs to change, but your supposed 1337 style of play.
Exactly.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bishop
Nice to know that it's not an issue, yet I know of at least 1 deletion that happened because of '14 IPs in the manner of 2 weeks' for a legitimate, non-cheating player with seemingly no chance of account restoration. Not only that, the player recently bought $20 of sitting credits which is much more valuable than being reinstated into the game.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bishop
no meeni -you heard that dudes side, not supports side. i suspect its a lot different.
I do admit it's something that could've been mentioned to admins earlier, I believe he mentioned that his workplace has some special setup that probably raised some flags. Still, even if the province is deleted what happens with the newly bought credits, and the account, and banned IPs?
I sometimes change IPs very frequently, like every hour, to get around Megavideo time restrictions. Obviously I also login to utopia every hour.
So I've gone trough 14 IPs, or more, not in a week but (watching full seasons) in a day.
Never had any problems so I am calling bull**** on that one Meeni.
dunno about the credits, id imagine they are still tied to his account - he cant send them to someone else?
Oh never mind, found out he got money back and able to create a new account.
Jeez, dude! I dont mean to be critical, but did ya ever think about getting a RL?Quote:
Originally Posted by lichemaster
<deleted>
It's called sunday hangover and watching full tv shows seasons in bed is a great way to cure it.Quote:
Originally Posted by WolfysBack