A Small Victory for Competitive Games

[MishkaL1138]

As ohnickel mentions in his video about the best player rank for Overwatch, the Korean (the good ones) government has passed a law that renders any kind of program used to get advantage over other players, as well as creating and distributing them, illegal (we're talking aimbots here). This doesn't mean you get b&, or get a penalty, or whatever punishment the game masters would give you. It'd mean that you can pay up to $43,000 in fines, or face 5 years in jail. Let that sink in.

With PlaneShift's problem with botters - and I know there are some around, what do you think of this law? Should more countries adopt it? Should companies enforce it? Why do you think someone would use such a program to have that little extra edge, when there's no money involved? Doesn't it take the fun away from the game? Share your thoughts!

[Illysia]

I can't say I disagree with the idea of a law but it's a commentary on the state of games where cheating has gotten so bad that governments need to step in.

[Dilihin]

Well it would prevent botting so why not? Then again it shouldn't be so big issue that you face 5 YEARS of prison

[Rigwyn]

Didn't read the article. So what justifies this crazy fine? Are the losers being compensated for their butt hurt, or for lost of paid gaming time? If it's for paid gaming time that was ruined, then I guess this would be limited to pay games. But for free games, if this is about curing hurt feelings, then I'm not sure this is a step in the right direction  - for them, anyway.

Kowng Key Ho: Hey! You beat me at a Tic Tac Toh!
Kung Pow: You a lose ass ho. Pay up.
Kowng Key Ho: Hey! You make a ass feew terriboo! I sue your ass in court and kiiw your whole fam-ree!

[Illysia]

While I can see thinking the law is unnecessary, that "conversation" was needless and playing on some questionable stereotypes.

[Ecthion]

Lol, Rigwyn...

I have to say I think the law is inappropriate. Like Rigwyn pointed out, what's it trying to accomplish? Botters (and what's technically "botting") ought to be a matter of policy for each individual game. If an unpaid game has a problem with botters then its just a matter of irrate players who are pissed off at the botters. The government has no business imposing draconian fines and prison sentences on narcissistic @$$3$ whose only "crime" is pissing off other players. This is the real world, not kindergarten. On the other hand, if it's a paid game and it has a botting problem that causes players to lose real world money, they don't have to play it. The company that owns the game will deal with the problem, or they'll lose business (and risk bankruptcy). Let the free markets settle that one. This is a matter of business and dealing with jerks, not a matter of crime. Besides that, any punishment ought to fit the crime. Unless a cheater cost someone $40k and five years out of their life, then the government has no business imposing a punishment that harsh. I think this law is just another example of "I'm pissed! Let's use the government to MAKE everyone stop pissing me off!"

As far as PS goes, I've heard of two different things called "botting": using an actual modified client/bot program, and training while afk. As far as the second goes... I think it's silly to discipline players for it and even sillier to call it "botting." It's not using a bot, it's using the mechanics that were designed into the game for the purpose that they were put there: training your character. As far as it being unfair, with the current damage rates on dummies, you might get 20 - 30 minutes of grinding before the dummy dies and you have to come back and start a fresh attack. That's not giving anyone much of a training advantage at all. If you could get an hour or two out of a dummy then maybe it's a different story. As far as dealing with actual botters... 

[Emaline]

As far as PS goes, I've heard of two different things called "botting": using an actual modified client/bot program, and training while afk. As far as the second goes... I think it's silly to discipline players for it and even sillier to call it "botting." It's not using a bot, it's using the mechanics that were designed into the game for the purpose that they were put there: training your character. As far as it being unfair, with the current damage rates on dummies, you might get 20 - 30 minutes of grinding before the dummy dies and you have to come back and start a fresh attack. That's not giving anyone much of a training advantage at all. If you could get an hour or two out of a dummy then maybe it's a different story. As far as dealing with actual botters... 

This was just recently adjusted for this reason. They used to not take damage in full def but they do now to discourage people from logging on and starting to attack and going to sleep for 8 hrs and waking up having gained several levels.

[Eonwind]

The training dummies were designed in the first place to allow players to test their spells, new weapons and attacks in a safe (from damage) environment. They weren't designed to allow AFK training or "speed up" practice.
Let's try to use them properly without abusing this game feature, I would hate having to change it, removing lot of their HP or making them invulnerable. This would damage players that use them in a reasonable way and I don't like it.

[MishkaL1138]

You don't understand: you using the bot only gets you banned from the game at most. It's creating and distributing them, charging for it, that gets you in jail.

In hindsight I should've made that clearer.

[Venalan]

A possible way to help reduce the AFK training with dummies would be to implement an NPC behaviour which causes them to sporadically move (teleport) losing target lock and forcing the player(s) to move to where the dummy ends up to restart training.

[Rigwyn]

Would it be better to just make the dummies die and respawn at intervals that make them impractical for training, but still suitable for testing? I think doing that would eliminate the need to make sure people aren't abusing them and any bans and sore feelings that would stem from that.

Though I thought the dummies were implemented because of players who wanted an alternate path to training their characters since slaughtering every living thing under the Dome would be OOC in some cases.

[Venalan]

Though I thought the dummies were implemented because of players who wanted an alternate path to training their characters since slaughtering every living thing under the Dome would be OOC in some cases.

Thats along the lines of why I thought they were add too.

[Eonwind]

Though I thought the dummies were implemented because of players who wanted an alternate path to training their characters since slaughtering every living thing under the Dome would be OOC in some cases.

Thats along the lines of why I thought they were add too.

Yes and no.

I'm always up to provide more options to the player, however if we are speaking about OOCness and "IC reality", nobody will really get too much better just sparring against a dummy. In the end the only way to master a weapon is to train against someone able to put up a real fight, not just standing in place like a dummy.
Still speaking about IC there are other options available not to kill things: gladiators and mercenary will try to retreat when they're wounded enough (fleeing). Another option is to try to avoid the final blow and get out the arena pit, they won't chase outside the pit and you can spare their life.

From a OOC pov training these ways may be not practical, but then again just using dummies will only give half of the benefit from training: since they don't fight back, charaters won't get any armor training. So it's an "asymmetric" training in any case.

[MishkaL1138]

Though I thought the dummies were implemented because of players who wanted an alternate path to training their characters since slaughtering every living thing under the Dome would be OOC in some cases.

Thats along the lines of why I thought they were add too.

In the end the only way to master a weapon is to train against someone able to put up a real fight, not just standing in place like a dummy.

This here: why can't we train against fellow players? Is it because people will use alts to train? Isn't there a workaround to avoid this?

[Rigwyn]

PVP builds player skill which is not the same thing as your avatar's stats and skills. I wonder how that sort of training might work?

How would the game differentiate between you fighting a weak player vs a strong player, or would  that even matter?
Would player strength be determined by stats or win/loss history?
What happens if you grind up a character to max and then allow other characters to beat it in regularly exchange for tria?