miscellaneous

why was this thread closed so abruptly. why not let discussion about this subject happen. by closing a thread that contains the text below makes it appear like things are being hidden and talk about the subject is being squashed and censored. just because some people dont like it that doesn't give them the right to close it. thats the way it seems.

people have opinions on things and if you do not want free speech to happen in this game then close the main forum or let ender say his piece about the subject of cheating. a non player and only a part time forum moderator should not have the power to be censoring anything because he doesn't like it. ender should be the one doing that.

actually it does seem like cheating is rampant in this game and it seems to have been going on for a long time with nothing being done about it. what wild4 said sounds very true.

there was other stuff in the original thread that was closed apparently just because someone didnt like it and you can find it here. http://bots4.net/forum/8/7385

why are you afraid of talk about auto clicking cheaters. no body was being accused of anything so why not let it go on. wilds opinion sounds very true so why try to silence someones opinion.

N wild4 [51] 2019-03-21 05:55:12 [63 days ago]

It probably happens more than you think, but people miss it because their auto clicker selects to “train again†before they view the battle.

N Champion LX [60] 5 2019-05-23 07:51:59 [8 hours ago] Loled at wild4 reply. Ecouses is still playing the game, but I remember him autoclicking since I did and got caught multiple times. We were basically using the same tool made by the same Croatian guy. The fact that he is still playing makes me giggle.

~Skipper

N Jesmo21 [179] 2 2019-05-23 07:59:52 [8 hours ago]

i guess there are more ppl using sc atm...but it seems that Ender cant find way to catch them

N wild4 [51] 2019-05-23 08:33:18 [7 hours ago]

i'm a firm believer that he knows people are scripting.. but doesn't do anything about it as all those players donate money back to the game and he would lose what little revenue he makes off this thing.

also, going on a mass spree stopping people that script would destroy the integrity of the game.. as just about every clan win the last couple years was majorly influenced by scripters.

N Fishwick [135] Moderator rank 9 70 2019-05-23 10:11:34 [6 hours ago]

Standard reply of "if you think people are cheating, tell Ender about it privately so he can catch them". Pretending you know things but never clarifying exactly who your conspiracy theory covers is lazy and malicious.

guess this should be an open for debating issue, aye..

i feel about fish' remark about coming up with proof tho. i hear a lot of accusing, but never with any prove.

having said so, how can you even tell? besides a very few obvious ones being online for ages without break and no answering bmails etc, i cant say i ever have been able to be sure.

tho as a not-so-very-computery-guy i wouldnt even know how to look for someone using a script. so.. how can i/you/him tell if anyone is cheating, what should i look for? or is it just indeedy checking online bots like every few mins?

oh and i believe you are not-ot posing as ot?

N Champion LX [60] 5 2019-05-23 07:51:59 [8 hours ago] Loled at wild4 reply. Ecouses is still playing the game, but I remember him autoclicking since I did and got caught multiple times.

Got caught once, not multiple times, when flor went on deletion spree and deleted everyone suspicious. Soon after, bots 2 was no more. Tbh, that was way too obvious cheating from me, i used ac whole day and night, while sleeping, with broken equipments, you name it. Dont think i ever used ac on bots4.

having said so, how can you even tell? besides a very few obvious ones being online for ages without break and no answering bmails etc, i cant say i ever have been able to be sure. tho as a not-so-very-computery-guy i wouldnt even know how to look for someone using a script. so.. how can i/you/him tell if anyone is cheating, what should i look for? or is it just indeedy checking online bots like every few mins?

Ac behaves differently from human. It "clicks" after battle ends within fixed intervals (lets say 0-3) sec. It refreshes showroom instantly every 60 sec and buys/swaps equipment you need. Those things are visible on server side.

Be that as it may, a/c's have probably evolved enough at this point. Having options to set click time anywhere between 0-60 sec or more would pretty much make it undetectable except manually where ender places different link onto "train again" that leads you to new window which says "if you are human go to documentation to confirm it" etc.

All that being said, triggered dogs will always be here to accuse someone of cheating. I personally dont mind. Someone might. That is probable the reason why previous thread was locked.

ty for explaining, personally i hadnt even pondered the possibility of scripting showroom items, but it sounds logically enough now :)

that thing about the different link to a 'train again' that leads you to a different page telling you go to go another page like documentation or such, thats not happening now, right? Cause that sounds like a wonderful option in my opinion, where somewhere every 30-60 minutes the right link doesnt lead to a fight/train but to a confirmation page if thats doable it would be like the captcha idea, but more fun and kinda foolproof (unless that would be scriptable too).. i like that idea!

Its not happening, no, it would have to be done manually to someone suspicious.

ooh kk.. such a thing wouldnt be possible to make automatically?

lets make it a contest: someone that can build a thing like that, be awarded with some stars or so..

Checks not being automatically done is kinda the point. If you make them happen every now and then, ac makers could see what is happening and make scripts go around them. A/c's already did captchas on their own.

This way, ender can make it happen only once for someone suspicious and see if a/c continues behaving like it never happened. If thats the case cheating is pretty much confirmed and further actions can be done.

This only works because there arent seven thousand cheaters in game. Few of those who maybe are using it can be caught this way. Otherwise it would take too much effort.

dream.. shattered.. lol ^^ but yeah i understand, thnx

I think that the main reason the last thread was closed was because it was making strong accusations with no proof whatsoever. It's one thing to say you have suspicions that some people may be cheating, but another to suggest that the majority of clan wins over the last few years have been tainted by cheating. To also suggest Ender is corrupt and not banning those who cheat simply because they donate to the game is similarly malicious.

Having said that, I do believe that cheating is still an issue in this game, and one that has likely worsened since the removal of captcha last year. The biggest red flags to me are players that are consistently active for many hours a day with no long term breaks. Personally, I've been playing bots longer than I'd like to admit, but even I can't fathom how people can put up scores of 1 mill+ for months on end and still have the energy to come back every month to do it all over again. Hell, even neps had the odd break or two back in the day.

a non player and only a part time forum moderator should not have the power to be censoring anything because he doesn't like it.

Me closing threads like that is nothing to do with me "not liking it". The only thing I don't like is cheaters. We have a history of malicious players that like to throw AC accusations around with no names and no proof just to attempt to tar their reputation. These threads are very lazy, Russian-style propaganda basically that just attempts to drag everyone down.

If anyone has literally any AC complaints, they should take them to Ender and spam him to do something. I've probably been the one to complain the most to him about them over the years, even trying to give up my mod because I felt he wasn't doing as much as he can. If he doesn't do enough, I'm happy to take your side and push him to do something. Saying "there are tons of cheaters, but I won't tell you who or how I know that" is a load of old bollocks.

Cheaters ruin the game, and when they get banned they like attempting to continue to do so by making more bots and calling everyone else a cheater because they're upset they got ousted from the community. It's incredibly sad, you'd think they'd be able to move on and be scum elsewhere.

This thread is kind of pointless like the last one a weak accusation and a waste of time. Some people could be suspicious but probably not acing

The accusations being tossed about are coming from former cheaters that have been banned from the game (and if you've been around awhile, you may have seen some pretty nasty behavior from them where they've scammed legitimate players out of significant amounts of money). They resurface every so often to try to undermine the game and generally provoke discussions like this. I agree this kind of stuff shouldn't be brushed under the rug and it's definitely something that's not ignored. The nature of cheating unfortunately requires some amount of secrecy and lack of transparency with my work against it - I'm generally reluctant to talk about too much of what I do in this area publicly given that it can end up serving as hints for bad actors. As for what player's can do, there's not a lot of definitive evidence that you can obtain, but as the game's admin, I have a lot more that I can do in terms of manual/automated testing to convince myself beyond a reasonable doubt (which is my threshold for taking action) that someone is cheating. As Fish said, I encourage anyone that's observed suspicious behavior to reach out to me directly so that I can investigate further (ideally without the player knowing they're being investigated). Posting vague/malicious statements like "all the top players are probably cheating and Ender doesn't do anything because they donate frequently" is counterproductive. And I hope anyone that regularly reads my forum posts and understands my mindset with how I approach things understands I have a bit more integrity than that.

Given that I don't really have much more to say on this topic and that stirring up drama is exactly the intent of these sorts of baseless accusations, I'm going to lock this thread now. Please reach out to me if you have additional concerns, or more concrete/specific observations of potential wrongdoing - I'm happy to chat more if it creates cleaner competition.

*click*