Punish Harder. Delete items.

[Jamuraan]

Here's an idea: Don't buy their Fungis when they come back. One person with 50 fungis can't wear all of them at once. Buy from people who are known to be non-hackers, reputable and trustworthy. Black-balling these cheaters is just as effective as wiping their accounts.

Items are worthless if they can't sell them or trade them.

[Felwithemagi]

Agree with Maze513, or at least a big red 'C' in their name. Like The Scarlet Letter.

[Demetrium]

Originally Posted by Jamuraan [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Here's an idea: Don't buy their Fungis when they come back. One person with 50 fungis can't wear all of them at once. Buy from people who are known to be non-hackers, reputable and trustworthy. Black-balling these cheaters is just as effective as wiping their accounts.

Items are worthless if they can't sell them or trade them.

This isn't feasible. People sell items on alts or could just as easily have a friend auction it. Furthermore, a full list of cheaters was never published (unfortunately).

[cobykoby]

Originally Posted by Runningfish [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

TR still seemed to have a shitload of members on today and they are pretty much the number one raid guild on server. Point being if they weren't hacking or at least if it wasn't very prevalent in the guild and are still number one was MQ making that huge of a difference?


Everyone on both sides needs to chill out.. It's a game I hope you have bigger problems in your life.

You know if members of the same guild are cheating, chances are the guild then had/has an unfair advantage, I'm sure many of the guild members have items gained through the cheating that was used by the suspended members. it's made a difference.

Also, you're allowed to get upset about this sort of thing regardless, stop acting like being upset about a hobby is childish, People were dicks and they should be treated like the flacid members they are, Ridiculed and belittled.

[mala]

It is a legitimate question. Perhaps because the cheating wasn't as game breaking as you want to believe and the plat being removed wasn't due to gaining it "illegally", but simply part of the punishment for getting caught?

ANY amount of cheating on our server is "gamebreaking". Knowing that these people are using tools to help them make this game easier, while everyone else actually plays the game, is a slap in the face to everyone in the community. People claiming that "oh i wasnt hurting anyone else" are simply lieing to themselves, you hurt EVERYONE when you break the rules here.

And furthermore, any defense you have against cheaters using "non-gamebreaking" tools, is utterly retarded. You think that having a map that shows you where every mob in the zone is up, and paths, isnt an advantage?

Im for deleting ALL of these peoples gear, they didnt aquire their gear legitimately, and shouldnt be able to keep it.

And lastly. Im sure 90% of these people caught cheating were waiting for progression and more content(just as we all are), which has now digressed even further due to the fact they are trying to get ahead of the curve, and GM's are having to police that. This also effects everyone, so simply saying "oo i dont cheat what do i care" is irresponsible at best.

[stormlord]

Originally Posted by Maze513 [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Give them all the title "Cheater" so when they return we will always know their shame

+1.

I agree. Put a cheaper tag on their name like "CHTR Bob Smith [Orios]".

Or release the names of the characters on their account.

This way people know who they're and if they make other accounts they will be recognized.

Every single one of these guys/gals knew that they were taking a chance when they were running MQ2 or whatever it was. They did it for the thrill and the potential for an advantage in their game. IF we don't properly apply justice to the matter then it will encourage them to take an even bigger risk. Remember, life to these people is about risk. Lots. If there's no BITE then there's no risk. Therefore, with no risk, there's no fun. They will increase the stakes if the bite is too small. Increasing the stakes will increase the risks for them, and US.

But more important than that, they must know that their actions harm ALL OF US. That's the heart of the matter and it's the current approach some people take to dealing with cheaters. Let me just say to them: you harmed game balance. Game balance is at the core of all games. It ensures that progression and competition are present. It's kind of like a basketball hoop being 10 feet up. That's the game of basketball. But what if each person that plays can make the hoop be at whatever height they want when they take a shot? Every shot in the game would take a minute because they'd have to readjust the height of the hoop for each player. The game would be a lot less competitive because everyone would be playing by different rules. It would be a very different game, one in which everyone can win. Let me ask you: how can a game be competitive and also allow everyone to win? Furthermore, progression is a defining characteristic of games. If you're able break the rules then that means you can skip progression altogether. Your ability to skip progression, via the economy, allows others to skip it as well. This is like a shock wave that spreads all across the game world. Eventually, progression would become zero as the economy is filled with loot that was acquired illicitly. If you could skip from level 1 to 60, then I ask you, where is hte progression? Because that's essentially what cheaters are doing to the game. If there's no 1 to 60 then there's no game! Do you get it yet? You're destroying the game.

By destroying the game, you're reducing the fun you can have in it because you're inevitably eating away at the player base. This reminds me of pvp servers. They have a similar mentality. They think they can remorsely kill each other and that there will be an eternal flow of players to the server. Unfortunately, their careless behavior inevitably adds to server decline in much the same way that hacking or cheating can ruin the core elements of a game and contribute to its eventual decay. When a game decays, YOU will decay too, along with it! There's no thrill or risk when a game is almost dead. That's like winning a match with nobody to cheer.

My guess is a lot of the cheaters are sociopaths/psychopaths or anti-socials. If you research these terms on google you will see what they actually mean. No, psychopath is not a crazy genocidal murderer. Neither is an anti-social a shy person. Rather, these people are smooth criminals that have no shame or guilt when they cheat or lie or steal. The true meaning of anti-social is that of a person whom breaks the social rules and trust without remorse. A pscyhopath can be a serial killer just as much as he can be a kingpin or a car salesman.

Learn more here:
http://www.hare.org/links/saturday.html

It will open your eyes to more than you might have bargained for.

Here are my two favorite sections in the link:

It's also found practical applications in police-squad rooms. Soon after he delivered a keynote speech at a conference for homicide detectives and prosecuting attorneys in Seattle three years ago, Hare got a letter thanking him for helping solve a series of homicides. The police had a suspect nailed for a couple of murders, but believed he was responsible for others. They were using the usual strategy to get a confession, telling him, 'Think how much better you'll feel, think of the families left behind,' and so on. After they'd heard Hare speak they realized they were dealing with a psychopath, someone who could feel neither guilt nor sorrow. They changed their interrogation tactic to, "So you murdered a couple of prostitutes. That's minor-league compared to Bundy or Gacy." The appeal to the psychopath's grandiosity worked. He didn't just confess to his other crimes, he bragged about them.

The most startling finding to emerge from Hare's work is that the popular image of the psychopath as a remorseless, smiling killer -- Paul Bernardo, Clifford Olson, John Wayne Gacy -- while not wrong, is incomplete. Yes, almost all serial killers, and most of Canada's dangerous offenders, are psychopaths, but violent criminals are just a tiny fraction of the psychopaths around us. Hare estimates that 1 percent of the population -- 300,000 people in Canada -- are psychopaths.
.................
Hare has co-developed a new treatment program specifically for violent psychopaths, using what he knows about the psychopathic personality. The idea is to encourage them to be better by appealing not to their (non-existent) altruism but to their (abundant) self-interest.

"It's not designed to change personality, but to modify behaviour by, among other things, convincing them that there are ways they can get what they want without harming others," Hare explains. The program will try to make them understand that violence is bad, not for society, but for the psychopath himself. (Look where it got you: jail.) A similar program will soon be put in place for psychopathic offenders in the UK.

[Extunarian]

I was surprised the devs didn't strip droppables along with coin, but they probably thought about it a lot more than I have, or care to.

Someone with an RBG in the bank is gonna come back from their suspension and make more plat selling that item than I will make before Velious. It does seem unfair to the guy who happened to sell his RBG on Friday.

[Prahadigm24]

I've got to agree with OP. We have to assume that those cheaters gained an advantage of much more than the (average) 8,000 plat which have been removed from the game. Those 8,000 plat only correspond to 1 or 2 rare items, and I don't want to know how many of the cheaters' items have been collected with the help of ShowEQ. After their suspension they will still wear many "cheated" items.


I understand that the devs don't want to drive away all those 365 players, because the server needs a healthy population. That is why a permanent ban or character deletion would have been too much. Nevertheless, they should not be allowed to keep (all of their) items.

You should have stripped them of all their items and equipped them with a full set of cloth armor and a rusty short sword / dagger. This would give them a "clean", new start.

[Kevlar]

I can see not doing an ip ban, sort of.

But why such a lienient punishment? Just coin and a couple levels? Even item wiping seems a little soft.

Should have done a complete character wipe. Let them start over at lvl 1 with a practice sword. Make them think twice about firing up that macroquest zone map.

[inyane]

right? why not perm bans, as per the rules of the server?

so what, the server loses that many accounts. according to posts i've seen since i've been playing, the devs have stated many times that they would have this server up if only 5 people played on it.

so why do they care if the server population takes a hit? why do these people get a pass?

we can only assume that many of the players caught are in raiding guilds, and god knows we can't mess with the raiding guilds!