multihunting

[Kal]

I had a random idea the other day, and spoke to both Mit and A2 about it, we found that there were possible problems with it. So i challeenge u to dfind the problems and their solutions

here we go:

Alliance HCs get in game multihunter tools with which to monitor/investigate their own alliances. Reports of cheating would be forwarded to them and the full time multihunters. The idea is that the alliances hcs can take some of the work loads off the full time hunters and can have a greater say in catching cheaters.

There are of course problems, this could be abused for instance. Abusing could have pentalties though

EDIT: by multihunting i mean hunting cheaters of any type. the tools could also be used to look for spies etc by alliances.

[Andy_r]

Ok, this seems like a good approach to me...

Problem 1) The Webangel Effect

Problem 2) The traditional excuse for not letting people know what the tools actually do, which is that once people know exactly what the multihunters can and can't do and what evidence they rely on, they can work out ways to cover their tracks better.

Problem 3) An unscrupulous HC could warn cheating players that they are under investigation

[Phil^]

Ofc the more data people have about how the tools work, the easier it is to cheat. so i`m opposed to that idea.
leave it to those of us who have no alliance ties
alliances should report planets they suspect of cheating rather then being forced to investigate them themselves

[ronnie]

can u trust all HC's ?

[Chax]

Just disband any alliance whose HC abuses the tools.
Make the disbanding public.
Other alliances will swoop in while they can't defend themselves .
Instant policing

[Tomkat]

Make the multihunting more strict.

IE: no using proxies without filling in a form telling PA team exactly when you'd be using them, which ones you use, and the reasons why.

[Kal]

ok, lets think about the sort of tools it would be and the fact that it wouln;t need to be all of the tools.

Firstly any alliance hc would love to be able to monitor the ip access of its members for the following reasons:

a) u can see if they are cheating possibly
b) u can use this info to look for spies - if u suspect a memebr u can compare their ips with ips from irc logs etc

it woudl also be nice to know where member planets attack and defend, both for checking for cheating and to see if members are attacking when not allowed to, or defending none alliance members etc.


And phils comment about only multhunters not in alliances can be trusted.... i'm not sure anyone believe that anymore no single person can be unbiassed in any case. this woudl merely be another level of checking etc.

the problem that hcs might warn members is not neccesarilyl a problem - after all if they stop the people from cheating, isn;t that the syetm working - prevention rather than punnishment.

[gzambo]

Originally Posted by Tomkat

Make the multihunting more strict.

IE: no using proxies without filling in a form telling PA team exactly when you'd be using them, which ones you use, and the reasons why.

probably the easiest solution giving those that use proxys to get past work or school firewalls with legit reasons a chance to play rather than completly banning proxys

[Ace]

IMHO it would already help if alliance HCs can get info from the multihunters about suspected members of their alliance.
Information sharing is the most important thing PA Crew need to pick up ASAP.
I doubt PA Crew will hand alliance HCs the tools to help the multihunters, but like I said before....All alliance HCs are more the willing to help out if it get's PA back to the great game we want it to be again.

Ace

[gzambo]

havin the internal affairs HC help multihunters in removeing cheaters from the game would help but to be totally honest is it fair to say that all HC of all alliances can be trusted not to abuse this for their own benefit

[mist]

an interesting idea, with pros and cons.

the main pro is that HC are going to know their alliance members better than we do. if someone turns up offering defence from multiple different races, HC or BCs can instantly tell that something fishy's going on, however it's a lot harder for us to spot (unless they're really quite stupid, but the problem's usually catching the more intellegent cheaters).

there are however a few cons. the main one is that i think we'd be warey about giving information out to hcs that they don't have anyway. for instance, giving out the IP that people logged in to to the HC. this is all well and good, but could be constrewed as a breach of the individual's privacy. the HC doesn't need to know their ip to do their job. we could possibly give hc info on fleet movements, after the fact at least, but it seems that most alliances collect that kind of info anyway, so i'm not convinced it would be of great value.

also, as pointed out HCs could use the info for spy hunting. while i'm sure HC would love to do so, would that be good for the game? that asside, the most useful things for spy hunting would seem to be things like names and addresses. in order to be given access to those HC would need to sign an nda, which would stop them playing the game - not being able to play or pass on the information would seem to make it rather useless.

personally, i think the way forward is HC reporting anything suspicious they spot to the hunters. however with the current climate of finger pointing at alliances found to have cheaters, i'm not sure how feasable that is.

-mist

[Ace]

Mist,

Reporting by HCs was done last round too.
IMO its more important at this stage that PA Crew and the multi hunters start trusting the alliance HCs and talk to them on a regular basis.

This way the finger pointing will be less.

And your point on using the tools to see their IP........most alliances already know their members IPs.


Ace

[Kal]

Originally Posted by mist

there are however a few cons. the main one is that i think we'd be warey about giving information out to hcs that they don't have anyway. for instance, giving out the IP that people logged in to to the HC. this is all well and good, but could be constrewed as a breach of the individual's privacy. the HC doesn't need to know their ip to do their job. we could possibly give hc info on fleet movements, after the fact at least, but it seems that most alliances collect that kind of info anyway, so i'm not convinced it would be of great value.

-mist

alliances have ip info anyway... forums log ips, many allaince tools have ip based access... thsi woudl simply be an extension.

[Appocomaster]

Originally Posted by Tomkat

Make the multihunting more strict.

IE: no using proxies without filling in a form telling PA team exactly when you'd be using them, which ones you use, and the reasons why.

I go to my friend's house, and want to check to see if my planet is doing ok.
I'd then have to fill a form out, find his IP, etc, just so I could do this.
I go to school, my school has a different IP.
my anytime dialup at home doesnt work, I have to use my pay as you go dialup.

all dialups have different IPs, I've seen my hostmask change while still having the same dialup account multiple times in a WEEK (ok this only happened once, but still..).
how much lieniency do we give dialup accounts? their IP's change each time they connect... some change the last two digits (mine does). Then if they want to cheat they can sign up twice with the same ISP and just disconnect / reconnect to do it.

This sort of thing has been suggested in the past, and it was thrown out.
It'd be too much work to organise and implement, then you'd have to have 2-4 members of the PA Team keeping it running, monitoring it and sorting out ALL the complaints / problems that arises from it

[Appocomaster]

Originally Posted by Ace

Mist,

Reporting by HCs was done last round too.
IMO its more important at this stage that PA Crew and the multi hunters start trusting the alliance HCs and talk to them on a regular basis.

This way the finger pointing will be less.

And your point on using the tools to see their IP........most alliances already know their members IPs.


Ace

Firstly, define "Alliance HC".
If this coming round, as with previous rounds, ETA benefits are not given for alliances + eta's change for ships or whatever, there's not such a big benefit to be all in the same alliance - people won't care so much.
People can set up their own smaller alliances, and hey pretso lots of HC's. They may only have alliances of 10 members, but they are _still_ HC's. You're giving all these people power.
Secondly, with all these people, how many of them will put planetarion above their own alliance?
I'd let the internal affairs HC have some limited ability at most, where he just gets told possible offenders who he has to investigate personally, and after say 3-5 warnings of someone being a possible offender it gets passed on to a pa team multihunter.

[mist]

HCs getting hunter tools
This isn't going to happen, for the privacy reasons stated previously.

IP changes, forms etc
This has been considered, however as Appocomaster stated there are a lot of problems with them. However, on the flipside, there are benefits as well. Rather than using them as a reason to close people, they could be useful as a reason not to - if you go to your friends and login from there, fair enough, been there done that etc. If you go to a lan party or something and log in from there (along with multiple other players), odds are you know you're going in advance, and letting us know saves the 'mess' when your account gets closed and you have to explain it afterwards.

this seems a win/win type solution

currently, proxy use is seen as evidence of cheating. odds are you'll not get closed just for that, but it's not going to do your case good. i doubt that'll change, so this filling in a form type idea would seem to be in proxy users interests.

-mist

[Kal]

Originally Posted by Appocomaster

Firstly, define "Alliance HC".
If this coming round, as with previous rounds, ETA benefits are not given for alliances + eta's change for ships or whatever, there's not such a big benefit to be all in the same alliance - people won't care so much.
People can set up their own smaller alliances, and hey pretso lots of HC's. They may only have alliances of 10 members, but they are _still_ HC's. You're giving all these people power.
Secondly, with all these people, how many of them will put planetarion above their own alliance?
I'd let the internal affairs HC have some limited ability at most, where he just gets told possible offenders who he has to investigate personally, and after say 3-5 warnings of someone being a possible offender it gets passed on to a pa team multihunter.

rememebr it woudl only be power over their own alliance, i guess the probelm is that any old peon coudl form a new alliance to see what the tools were like. I think perhaps the allaince system needs to be formallised a bit more so that alliances maybe after register with pa team or something.

[Ace]

Originally Posted by Appocomaster

Firstly, define "Alliance HC".
If this coming round, as with previous rounds, ETA benefits are not given for alliances + eta's change for ships or whatever, there's not such a big benefit to be all in the same alliance - people won't care so much.
People can set up their own smaller alliances, and hey pretso lots of HC's. They may only have alliances of 10 members, but they are _still_ HC's. You're giving all these people power.
Secondly, with all these people, how many of them will put planetarion above their own alliance?
I'd let the internal affairs HC have some limited ability at most, where he just gets told possible offenders who he has to investigate personally, and after say 3-5 warnings of someone being a possible offender it gets passed on to a pa team multihunter.

Appoco you know very well what the defenition of a Alliance HC is.

As you seen in previous posts of mine on this topic I think the tools will not be given to HCs too but I suggested that it can be solved easier IF PA Crew would communicate with the alliances on a regular basis.

[Kal]

it would be nice to at lest know if your allaince memebrs were ebig investigated, then u could investiagte yourself. problme then is that bad hcs might warn their members to clean their acts up.. a;lthough of course they shoudl be convictable based on old information

[Tomkat]

Originally Posted by Appocomaster

I go to my friend's house, and want to check to see if my planet is doing ok.
I'd then have to fill a form out, find his IP, etc, just so I could do this.
I go to school, my school has a different IP.
my anytime dialup at home doesnt work, I have to use my pay as you go dialup.

all dialups have different IPs, I've seen my hostmask change while still having the same dialup account multiple times in a WEEK (ok this only happened once, but still..).
how much lieniency do we give dialup accounts? their IP's change each time they connect... some change the last two digits (mine does). Then if they want to cheat they can sign up twice with the same ISP and just disconnect / reconnect to do it.

This sort of thing has been suggested in the past, and it was thrown out.
It'd be too much work to organise and implement, then you'd have to have 2-4 members of the PA Team keeping it running, monitoring it and sorting out ALL the complaints / problems that arises from it

So you fill in 4 different IPs, one with a range. When dialling up, only the last few numbers change. The entire amount doesn't. So long as you give some reasons, and can't go "oh, I happened to be in Norway that weekend, and India the next", it would be more legit.

People should have a limit as well. I can't think of any case where someone would only log into their planet through a proxy. Sure, if you're at school or work and you need it, then that's ok. But at home, why would you need one? So you could give a 10 hour space (say; 9am to 7pm) where there's a chance it'd be used.

It'd just limit it. And it'd make multihunting simpler. If an account is logged into with a proxy, when the form hasn't been filled in, it's a simple close, no excuses. It's their own fault for not filling it in and not notifying anyone in PA Team. No bollocking around, a simple closure.

[Appocomaster]

Originally Posted by Ace

Appoco you know very well what the defenition of a Alliance HC is.

All i meant was that atm anyone can create an alliance of any size, if a few multis got together and created their own alliance, would they bother to investigate themselves? and what about those not in alliances? if you are going to give them to HC in alliances, at least change the way alliances are formed

[Kal]

what about vetted multihunters who are allowed to be in allainces, but can only investigate their own alliances. that way pa tema can still control the team, but it can have a greater reach.

[Tomkat]

Originally Posted by KalVirtus

what about vetted multihunters who are allowed to be in allainces, but can only investigate their own alliances. that way pa tema can still control the team, but it can have a greater reach.

Too much bias there.

There'd be too much temptation to lend a blind eye to friends, etc.

[Ace]

Originally Posted by Appocomaster

All i meant was that atm anyone can create an alliance of any size, if a few multis got together and created their own alliance, would they bother to investigate themselves? and what about those not in alliances? if you are going to give them to HC in alliances, at least change the way alliances are formed

I know m8 and kal just tried to get the discussion going I think.

I think what kal meant was....How can the alliance HCs help the multi hunters to get rid of the multies.
His idea is a good start for a discussion.
I feel a weekly meeting between PA Crew/multi hunters with alliance HCs (1 from each alliance) could be a good start to get to know eachother a bit better and might get the show on the road.

I offerd my help to PA Crew more then once but all you hear is "your a alliance HC so you will not do things against your members"

Thats bullsh*t

Cheating kills a lot of the fun for all.

[dabult]

Originally Posted by Tomkat

Make the multihunting more strict.

IE: no using proxies without filling in a form telling PA team exactly when you'd be using them, which ones you use, and the reasons why.

Anonymizers already are illegal and grounds for punishment in the EULA, dont recall if it says proxies aswell but I think so.

[Appocomaster]

Originally Posted by Tomkat

It'd just limit it. And it'd make multihunting simpler. If an account is logged into with a proxy, when the form hasn't been filled in, it's a simple close, no excuses. It's their own fault for not filling it in and not notifying anyone in PA Team. No bollocking around, a simple closure.

I don't think it'll be ever as simple as that. Perhaps repeated logging in with an obviously different internet connection?

I still want to know who is going to do the workload for all this? the multihunters? Or maybe if it happens once or twice the alliance HC's (assuming more than say 10 members in an alliance) look it up and sort it out / remind the individual to fill in forms.

But there has to be some sort of form approval, because if there isn't people are just going to sign up as many forms as they want for certain ISPs, so they can account share anyway. So who approves all the forms? and who tells all the non internet literate people how to find out their IP (or how to find out the network IP if they're on a network, especially if they can't get on IRC) and fill in all the forms?

I'm still standing firm on the position it'll probably end up being more trouble than it's worth, or it'll be useless and not catch actual account multis because it's not strict enough.

[Kal]

surly the point about multiple ips shoudl be they are accessed qith a short time between access eg. 1 second i am accessing an aco**** from the uk, the next i'm accessing it form the US.

Also on the subject in general, I find it out to beleive that people are trusted as being impartial because they are allianceless, they can still ahve friends. IF multihunters in geeneral were allowed to ahve alliances I think you would find that they might actuilly be harsher towards their own alliance so that their impartiality cannot be questioned, thats certinaly what I have found from my experiance with say real life sporting events.

Basically it shoudl be about the individual hunters not what alliance they ahve and not what friends they have. There are many peoiple in the pa community who wnat to help ut more, but they are in alliances, so what they can do is highly restricted. With a declning player base can we really afford to be this picky?

[Appocomaster]

Second wise, yes. If someone uses a dialup UK ISP at home, and an american / some other proxy at school / work etc, then they will be different.
and they'd have to fill in the form for it.
the only time i can think of a rapid change in IPs logging into 1 account would be with people testing different proxy servers to find out which one works the best.
When logged in btw, to help out, how about a "you are logged in with the IP: <>"
ALSO no IP logging, or whatever, until round starts (have a week delay or more) so that people can work out what IPs they'll be using. and no punishment for 1 off offenses without a form filled in, if people can justify it with changing ISP/ etc and then fill a form out for that IP, which subsequently gets accepted.

fair?

[Remy]

Originally Posted by Tomkat

Make the multihunting more strict.

IE: no using proxies without filling in a form telling PA team exactly when you'd be using them, which ones you use, and the reasons why.

Nice thought, but it wont work. The internet is too complex to classify IPs as proxy or non-proxy. Thats a grey area. Also, there is different kind of proxies: company proxies, ISP proxies, anonymous proxies, etc.

And if u (need to) use proxies, then you have the problem of proxies stopping functioning constantly. You wanna fill in a form every 2 days because you need another proxy?

As always, and ive said it before, cheating isnt something you can do much about. It's the ppls mentality that can solve this, not rules.

I think that the current hunting tools arent bad. Its the lack of ppl who can act on logs and the lack of rules that make it difficult.