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Cheating in multi player games
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blitzkrieger

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blitzkrieger

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I have been in two free-for-all games recently that showed very suspicious patterns of collusion.

One was a 3 player, where it was clear the other two players were clearly working together to pick of anyone that signed up to their game. Even more disturbing was an instance of 8 player game where 4 people were clearly working together (small players kept alive by the bigger ones, never attacking each other, etc.) They even go as far as terminating the game by peace as soon as they killed of everyone else.

Clearly this is unsporting behaviour, but what cane be done to curb this? Few ideas come to mind:
1) Disable peace option in free for all games with more than 2 players.
2) Can uniwar team do something to detect this? And punish the perpetrators appropriately? E.g. turn games non-rated when cheating is detected.
3) Any other ideas?

P.S: I have no probelm with people teaming up ... but if you do that you should set the game up as a team game, not a free for all!
magic molly

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magic molly

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Perhaps the best way to solve this is to make the rankings for 1v1 games only. That way, people can't just use team games with really good players to rank up. I've seen quite a few games where a pair of high ranked people invite each other to a team game, and then slaughter whoever shows up since those other two, even if individually more skilled, have no coordination.

I hereby foward the motion that all non-1v1 games be unranked. Or have their own, separate rankings.
colin

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colin

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I may be wrong, but you might be referring to the Peninsula game you and I are both in. In that particular game you had quickly taken over half of the map, and it simply became a matter of strategy and an application of game theory for the rest of us to stifle your dominance by refraining from in-fighting amongst us weaker players and seek to disrupt your growth. Without a certain level of collusion all of us would easily be wiped out by your units.

Cooperation to that extent, I believe, could hardly be called suspicious. There being no agreed upon point at which our temporary cease-fire would expire, we weaker players have to be mindful that at any point another collaborator may turn on us. In this particular game, one player who would likewise benefit from targeting the strongest opponent has, instead, decided to indulge in his personal vendetta against me.

In the end, each of us are basing our actions on self-interest, realizing that allowing you to capture more bases would only jeopardize each of our positions. I am a fan of your gameplay and am sorry if the game won't end as quickly as you may like, but the fact that this kind of strategy unfolds only adds to my enjoyment of the game, and I don't think it's that different from you offering second-place finishes to those who help your cause by leveraging your strong position.

See you on the battlefield, blitz.

On the topic of cheating, there are definitely issues that should be looked into. In Peninsula, has anyone else gotten suspicious of anonymous players dropping out of a match as neighbors of a Titan player who, at that point, can quickly gain control of 6 more bases by teleportation?
Anonymous

Anonymous
Hi Colin,

Glad to hear from you. I was not talking about our game - which I believe is completely above board. The cooperation in that game is perfectly reasonable as it is in everyone's interest to stop a fast growing player - even if it's me .

In the instance I refer too, a large player in the full planet map is keeping too small players alive in his backyard, and those players are moving units with impunity to reach me. I have never been anywhere close to being dominant in that game, but I believe I earned a hard fought 2nd or maybe 3rd if really unlucky. As it is I will be relegated to 5th because of a-priori cooperation between a group of players. And that just plain sucks.

As to peninsula, it is certainly unbalanced towards Titans ... unless there are absolutely no drop out. I recently won a game of peninsula where the player exactly on the opposite side of the board dropped out. I was still able to gain an advantage despite not being next to him. So I guess the moral is play Titans, play with competent buddies who don't drop out, or something needs to be done to make the map less favourable to Titans. But that is getting into game balance as opposed to cheating. I am still interested in more ideas on how to control collusion where it's not supposed to exist. Should we Uniwar put in place system like the poker rooms? Or is there anything simpler that can be done? I like the idea of having 1-1 ratings only ... or at least separate 1-1 rating from the free for all games.
Anonymous

Anonymous
Erm ... that last post was mine.

-- blitzkrieger
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Gargoyle

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Gargoyle

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I haven't seen much cheating yet, but I don't dispute that it can happen. If there is an easy way to spot it, it should be dealt with. As I build up my list of Friends, I find it easy to set up or join games with people I trust to have good sportsmanship.

That said, I don't think limiting ratings to 1v1 games is the answer. My few victories in 6- and 8-player games took a long time and were hard fought, and I believe I deserve the ranking points that go along with those victories. I would hate for the larger maps to become unrated.
Anonymous

Anonymous
I've been invited to "cheat" from another player. I turned them down — it's not fair and it's not fun.

The proposal was to start a 3/4 player game, gang up on others, then declare peace, that way they would lose points and we would win.

It's sad that we have this going on already.
Anonymous

Anonymous
I think there should be a section of the forums where we post the names of known cheaters as well as people who do other things like exploit races or drop out of games early. That way the rest of us will know not to play with them.
zCRP

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zCRP

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  colin wrote:
Cooperation to that extent, I believe, could hardly be called suspicious. There being no agreed upon point at which our temporary cease-fire would expire, we weaker players have to be mindful that at any point another collaborator may turn on us. In this particular game, one player who would likewise benefit from targeting the strongest opponent has, instead, decided to indulge in his personal vendetta against me.


That would be me but I think the situation is different from how you are telling it.

In many multiplayer games, I have found that aiming for second is much better than being crushed by two strong neighbours. In our case, I was attacking red when you started attacking me from behind. For a short while I tried to fight on two fronts, but as soon as I realized red's advantage, I tried to take on the only possible adversary, at the same time removing myself as a threat to the dominant player. In this case the incentive to gang up against the strongest opponent is very low. I have had a similar game where this course of action allowed me to build a small force and give a decent fight to the dominant player when there where only us two.
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_jnc_

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_jnc_

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I just became victim of cheating for the first time. Not nice.

In a three player game I had opened, two players joined. That they both would come straight against me is not an evidence of cheating yet, but when they left each other completely in peace and always did their turns at the same time it became quite obvious. I say "they" because I openened chat and told them to enjoy their rating, *%!§% cheaters. The answer:
"I'm not a cheater, it's my brother". Ah. So no cheating then. After defeating me his "brother" surrendered and I lost 22 points.
I know it's just a game and it's just ranking but unfair playing makes me angry.

So here's the suggestion: Instead of a place to mention names (which could also be abused for personal vendetta), how about an e-Bay-like rating system? At the end of a match, ask "Do you want to add X to your friends list?" yes/no, "Do you recommend player X?" yes/no. Then his positive / negative balance would display in the player's profile. Very easy to use, very big effect.
MacDuke

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MacDuke

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Very insteresting to read all this. I was wondering about a multi player game I was in too, cheating could be a reason for what happened there...

I will from now on look at the player-profile and his statistic of peace. Players with a great amount of peace could be suspicious, and multi-player-games with several player like this, I wont join.
colin

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colin

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I experienced a similar 3-person game wherein the two players would attack my units regardless of the strategic advantages of attacking each other. I left the game upon seeing that these two players had only a couple of friends, including each other. I'm also noticing team games with same pairs of players where one is an anonymous/1500 player who ends up timing out of a game, leading to an advantage for the other player (whether because he is on the opposing team, or because the disappearance of an adjacent enemy gives him some breathing space).

I am trying to avoid games with anonymous/1500 players, but often enough you can't tell who will be joining an open game after you. Of some help would be allowing easy access to user profiles from within a join-game screen where players are listed so you can consider the players' friends list and win-loss-draw stats.

Can anyone explain the rationale behind allowing anonymous accounts? I understand why the devs might wanna allow multiple accounts per device, but perhaps something as simple as email verification would cut down on the level of cheating.
rebelxt

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rebelxt

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_jnc_, pretty good idea regarding player recommendations. However, cheaters will probably find a way around this as well (i.e. creating multiple accounts and "recommending" their other accounts...).

I no longer play rated FFA or team games with people I don't know. It's much more fun to play with players you know well.
colin

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colin

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  zCRP wrote:That would be me but I think the situation is different from how you are telling it.

In many multiplayer games, I have found that aiming for second is much better than being crushed by two strong neighbours. In our case, I was attacking red when you started attacking me from behind. For a short while I tried to fight on two fronts, but as soon as I realized red's advantage, I tried to take on the only possible adversary, at the same time removing myself as a threat to the dominant player. In this case the incentive to gang up against the strongest opponent is very low. I have had a similar game where this course of action allowed me to build a small force and give a decent fight to the dominant player when there where only us two.


There's some truth to that strategy, specifically the part about aiming for second when one player is clearly on the verge of victory (as it happened in our game when my ally finally surrendered). But to say that blitzkrieg was the definite winner at the point that you made this decision is too defeatist, and to argue that your strategy was completely optimal and not a bit indulgent in what I called a "personal vendetta" is a little fallacious, especially in light of the fact that you can't truly remove yourself as a threat to an adjacent titan player in a peninsula game without fog of war.

I might have done something similar had I felt there was a clear winner, but in our case where 3 players were already banding together, I was disappointed you had given up so soon.
magic molly

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magic molly

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I find that some of the best games i play are 8 player FFAs, as long as no one drops out. Even if not as part of a plan to cheat, it causes major issues.

One way to prevent this is to only do FFAs by invite. One of my favorite matches was actually a 'team captain' match, where a buddy of mine picked three of his buddies and i picked 3 people and we faced off in a team game and a FFA.

One thing i find annoying though is when a person carries over a grudge from game to game. I might beat someone in another game, fair and square, but then they might join a multi-player game i join and then just attack me, and only me. Still, as long as they don't cheat, it's within their rights.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at Jul 08, 2009 20:18

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