Glorious Alpha Two Testers!
Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
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Phase I of Alpha Two testing will occur on weekends. Each weekend is scheduled to start on Fridays at 10 AM PT and end on Sundays at 10 PM PT. Find out more here.
Check out Alpha Two Announcements here to see the latest Alpha Two news and update notes.
Our quickest Alpha Two updates are in Discord. Testers with Alpha Two access can chat in Alpha Two channels by connecting your Discord and Intrepid accounts here.
Comments
Actually banning the exploiters did not fix anything directly. Can`t see how it would as the damage done is not undone by banning the exploiters. However, banning the exploiters does send a clear message that exploiting is not tolerable which should reduce future repeat of that exploit and make the player base think twice before acting on the next exploit.
As for impact, I played NW right through several occasions where there were serious impacting exploits. The game's trading was suspended several times and for a few days at a time. This was frustrating but not a game breaker. The market recovered and shifted. But the market also changed and shifted when they introduced new mechanics and new items, so cannot say never recovered.
In an ideal world, yes issues would be discovered during testing.. but unfortunately testing will always be limited in time and number of players and is rarely comparable to the interactions of the players en mass.
Yes, there are certain exploits (like giving yourself near-infinite money in a single go) that are clearly exploits, but there are also a lot of bugs that aren't as clear, and in fact there have been times in the past where a developer has turned a bug into a feature. At the end of the day, it's up to the developers to decide whether something is a "hidden game mechanic" or a "bug" but then they need to communicate that decision to the players.
So wait, you were saying "don't ban exploiters before launch"?
There are several types of people in question, differentiated by their reactions to finding an exploit:
1. Realize that something's broken. Try it again to confirm the details, write up a test case and contact support.
This person isn't an exploiter. They're not exploiting the system for any form of gain. This is the type of person you describe as "your QA team". They respect the intended game systems.
No sensible company ever bans these players. It's not even a question. They don't exploit. If a company is the type to ban these players, you usually don't want to play their game anyway, because it's all down hill from there. (See: New World)
This is the most important thing to realize: These are not exploiters. They find an exploit, but they do not exploit it.
2. Find a bug. Realize you can get some benefit from it. Exploit bug for personal gain (with or without reporting it).
This is what an "exploiter" is. Someone who exploits a bug. Not someone who finds it, or even tests it to report. Someone who exploits it.
This person is not healthy for the game. They should be punished. Whether that's a wipe/penalty, or a ban depends on the philosophy of the developers. This is not a person you want in your game, but it is sometimes a person you tolerate. They are someone who chooses to actively disrespect and break the intended game systems to gain unfair advantage of some form.
The usual argument from these players is "everyone is doing it". This is rarely true. It's either just "everyone you notice" (or claim to), or simply means everyone is this type of player and your community is unhealthy in a specific way. Sometimes your game is so fundamentally broken that the community only can be that way, and at that point it's time for server rollbacks or truly severe corrective measures. See: New World.
3. Actively look for bugs. Try to break things and find bug or problems. Then just report them.
This person is a very active version of either 1 or 2. In the case of 1, they are practically your perfect alpha tester. They're not always healthy for a game, because sometimes the things they find (or their breaking efforts) may cause instability, but the response to these people is still GENERALLY the same as the response to 1. No sensible company bans these players. These are the ones that get a warning or get politely asked to stop, if the developers think that they're causing a problem.
4. Actively look for bugs. Try to break things and find bug or problems. Try to exploit these flaws for gain.
These people get the hardest ban hammer, as fast as possible, in all cases. These are #2, but the TYPE of #2 that you can't even afford to tolerate (and which give you no reason to).
No sensible company will ever NOT ban these users. It's not even a question.
In short: It's not about "everyone who touches a bug must die". It's about the health of the community and the quality of the game experience, in all cases. Some companies can be a bit over-zealous. Some can be a bit too lax. But that's always the goal:
- Get rid of toxic (to the game or the community) players who create a negative environment or experience overall.
- Prevent or reduce future harm from these players. You can't know in advance who is going to be a problem player, but once they show you, you can at least prevent them from causing harm in the future.
- Send a message to others who are maybe not actively toxic, but would follow them if not discouraged.
Banning these players does not reverse the harm they have already caused. It's not supposed to. You HAVE to use other tools or methods for that (server rollbacks, patches, "world edits"), and sometimes you never can. But you still have to ban them to prevent the harm they will cause the next time there's a bug. You can never get to 0, but 1000 exploiters is less harmful than 2000 exploiters, and sending a message that exploiting will not be tolerated discourages the player base as a whole from shifting to a culture of exploiting and counter-balances the "might as well" and "everybody's doing it" mindsets, at least as much as a developer can.
Every game company should ban exploiters without question. It's just important to understand what 'exploiter' means, and understand that companies will occasionally choose to tolerate the least impactful ones to prevent non-exploiters from being caught in their nets. Sometimes there are bugs that aren't obvious, and you don't want to call people exploiters just because they happened to follow the path (because they aren't, even if they've happened to profit from an exploit). But every game company should ban exploiters without question.
People who exploit and report the bugs get banned in every game I've played. I'm saying that people who exploit shouldn't feel afraid to reveal their exploits. If you want to ban people who exploit and don't self-report I'm less against that, but people who exploit and report what they found should never be banned even if they benefited from the exploit. If exploits become meta than people should be exploiting until it gets fixed, it's the best way to bring attention to the issue.
many players does this, for free, AND without exploiting what they find.
They find bug, try to reproduce one or two more time to do a report as full as possible to make the work of devs easier. and then leave... not doing it 1 or 2h if not more
The bug exploiter will report sure... after abusing it, and getting unfair advantage from it.
People who reports the bugs are not banned in every game i've played...
3/4 of mmorpg i played, i reported at least one bug i could exploit to get mass money (directly from generating money/components, or indirectly by having stupidly easy kill of some ennemies)
I never got banned.
The problem is not finding a bug, but exploiting it. Many players don't want to exploit, and risk a big sanction is often enough to avoid people exploiting bug... and just reporting them.
The "hey, ok, i abused the bug hours long, and got as much money in those 4 hours that what i get in one month farm... BUT after those 4 hours i did report, i am good guy no ? " is not how it works.
What kind of take is this? Exploiting is a type of cheating. I'd permaban proven exploiters on first offenses and have them appeal it if they wanted a closer look taken. Anyone cheating/using bots, instabanned. People that exploit and cheat ruin games.
Thank Shor Intrepid are keeping to a clean line of developmental stages.
Regardless of reporting, that action of exploiting the bug is what should result in a ban. Just dont do it.
I mean, most players I know have come across bugs in MMO's, and they are always reported. Most of them are associated with some sort of advantage that could be had, yet none of my friends from 20 years of playing MMO's have ever been banned.
This is simply because we chose to not exploit the bugs we find - a concept that isnt exactly hard to understand.
If you exploit a bug, in a game with good management, your account will be banned. It doesnt matter if you report the bug or not - if it results in accelerated progress, it will show up on the servers log file.
I disagree. Fortunately, so does Steve based on the rhetoric we've heard so far.
While I do agree with the idea that these things need to be sniffed out and fixed before launch, I think it's safe to say it's impossible to find everything.
So yeah, there's a pretty big difference between discovering an exploit and reporting it - and discovering an exploit and then taking advantage of it. The moment a player crosses that line, I lose all sympathy for them and hope for a speedy and very permanent ban.
ban exploiters for bad game designs?
lmao now that's a reach
Are you suggesting that exploiters are somehow forced to exploit when they find a means to do so?
I am of the opinion that people have free will. If someone sees an obvious exploit, according to me, they have the choice to just not exploit it.
In order to state that banning exploiters is banning people for bad game design, you need to assume that these exploiters do not have basic free will - that they are unable to not exploit a situation should they come across one.
So, I am really curious now, why do exploiters not have free will? Are they being coerced? Blackmailed?
Yeah I'm only referring to people who exploit and report. Even if you exploit I think your ONLY responsibility is to report it, I think abusing a bug after reporting it is totally fine. It sucks that it exists but if you have to exploit to beat other exploiters than that is just the meta. Better than not being able to play because of the bad exploiters that actually want to ruin the game, but those are not all exploiters.
If an exploit exists, exploiters will exist. You either join them and exploit until it's fixed, or you let them ruin your experience while you wait for them to be banned.
If exploits don't exist (which is the case for most online competitive games) than exploiters play fair.
Cheaters on the other hand should always be permanently banned without exceptions, because there is basically zero fault for the developer. Even if your anti-cheat sucks, actively looking for ways to cheat is not exploiting, is it cheating.
Basically, I want a game with ZERO exploits. If exploiters show the devs all the big bad exploits during the alpha and betas we should be fine.
Not using said exploit, knowing full well that those that do use it will have their account banned before long is the option the vast majority of people take. This isn't something that will inherently ruin your experience, and the satisfaction when these players get banned and you do not more than makes up for any perceived slight you may feel.
Why is it that you didn't even consider it? To you, it's either have a shit time, or join in on the exploit.
As I said, people like this (people like you, if you are saying this is you) do not deserve to play online games.
This suggestion is - as you can no doubt tell - abhorrent to most gamers. This is because the knowledge that an account will be banned for exploiting is the remedy most people seek when others have used exploits against them. Without that punishment, there is no remedy for people that have had exploits used against them.
Yeah, we all want that, but we also all know it won't happen.
I have yet to play an online game of any type where I have not reported at least three bugs, most of which have potential exploits associated with them.
Now, I have a question for you.
Imagine Intrepid said they won't ban exploiters in the live game. They won't do that, but just imagine it.
Now imagine you are in the alpha or beta, and you find an exploit. What incentive do you have to report it to Intrepid, as opposed to waiting for the game to go live so that you can gain from this exploit without fear of an account ban?
The answer is that you literally have no incentive.
Bugs are way different from actual exploits. League of Legends has hundreds of bugs, but when something can actually impact your ability to win the game? It's hotfixed within 24hrs. Same with CS:GO, Dota 2, StarCraft 2, Smite, Fortnight, Valorant, and any competitive game I can think of. They even patch duplication bugs in Minecraft by the next patch usually, and that game isn't even competitive.
The reason this occurs is because people abuse exploits. If no one abused the exploits developers would have ZERO incentive to actually fix them. Why waste money solving a problem that isn't a problem yet?
Exploiters are bad, yes, but I believe they are a necessary evil to prevent lazy game design.
Why are you talking about non-persistent games?
Exploits in the games you are talking about pale in comparison to exploits in a persistent world.
It is literally not the same thing - those games have absolutely no place in this discussion at all.
The repercussions in the games you are talking about basically last until the end of the match. Someone exploits, you lose, you move on. In an MMO, the repercussions of an exploit can literally last years - even if the exploit was only active for a matter of hours.
So yeah, ban exploiters, they are scum.
You make it sound simple. I also agree that a ban should not be permanent. However, a non-perma ban, depending on the severity of the offense, I'd support. i.e. If a player repeatedly abuses a system/bug that is deemed to obviously be one, then at minimum, yes, remove what they've gained from certain activities.
However, how to judge when to apply the ban, and what items/impacts have occurred isn't always that simple.
i.e. if the offender made multiple sales and transfers of any gained benefits. If the advantages impacted the node and other players around (i.e. progressed the node noticeably without other players' involvement, you can't just remove the progress of the node due to one bad apple, can you?)
That's why I think it's a bit more complicated determining what to remove and what impacts were created, which, may have no resolution without penalizing anyone else who gained collateral benefit.
Absolutely not, fuck them. The punishment should range from deleting all characters in that account up to permanently banning the accounts who exploited the bug and also investigate and punish people who knowingly took advantage of it with the perpetrators accordingly.
If someone finds a bug, they'll have to make a simple choice: risk exploiting it and getting their account permanently banned or be rewarded for reporting the bug. And I really think Intrepid should generously reward people who report bugs, depending on the severity of the bug.
If a person thinks it's better to exploit a bug instead of helping Intrepid fix it ASAP to avoid damage to the only good game in years and definitely be rewarded for reporting it, I would love if that person lost their accounts and hopefully never play it again.
EDIT: I'm not talking about banning players who find "harmless" bugs like being able to dance while running or glitch inside a rock. I'm talking about people who find ways to dupe, glitch NPCs, lag the server, etc.
I'll therefore ask the harder question that might actually give IS fresh opinions on something they don't have a set answer to already.
Scenario:
User comes across a ring of herb harvesting points. They feel fortunate. It's in an obscure part of the map on a plateau they don't see people in usually since it's such rugged terrain with few mobs. So they pick all of the resource points, and then realize that the harvest point respawned at this specific spot again (probably due to terrain detection.) So now they could keep harvesting these herbs basically until their bag is completely full.
As a gatherer with a game that's told you repeatedly how important exploration is to their game design, and how they want to reward exploration, it would be very reasonable to assume this might be intended by the devs. You are also disincentivized from talking about it or showing it to other people for obvious reasons.
Now if you know anything about systems design you would know this was probably a bug. With enough time it can bend the intended economic model of the mats those harvesting points generate The reward for exploration almost certainly SHOULD have been the ring of herbs, not them respawning there. But most people aren't going to think about the larger implications of some gathering point respawning in harmony with the respawn timer. Especially in a game where getting home with those goods is already a risk.
Prompt:
Would this player be an exploiter if they kept picking at all? If so what should their punishment be?
Does the number of times the player pick them matter to your feeling of this gatherer being an exploiter of this type?
I personally think they should be given a warning if ever found out without having ever reported. I think they should be given a reward for finding the bug of some small value. But I also don't think the punishment should go further than that. No taking the money or mats they earned from the exploit in this case. But I'm sure there are some people who might want this to be the case.
This is a bad take, so its fine to exploit a bug that makes you immortal and destroy a city?
No, if there is proof someone is exploiting there needs to be a ban. That sets to tone so people will know not the purposely exploit.
Else you have people exploiting with it being unclear on what is ban able and what is not, when it comes to people purposely exploiting in game for gains.
There are different levels of exploits, If this person harvested those mats, went back harvested again, went back told their guild and had them all spamming it that would be more ban worthy imo.
If they do it once where it isn't effecting the whole economy that isn't as bad.
When we say exploit, it is in lines with fully exploiting in a larger way that will effect the server . Not they did something once so that should equal a ban.
Based on how fast IS react to things though i expect pretty quick results upon issues, mixed with their strong stance against people cheating to have a large effect on what people do in thinking of using exploits, etc.
It sounds like you are saying 'if they repeat the thing it's ban worthy'. This seems awfully extreme to me. But how many times do you have to repeat something you don't know is an exploit to warrant a ban? Surely it can't be twice.
In a game with open world PvP a guild exploiting this sort of thing will almost surely get noticed by other players and then people will start fighting over this 'bugged' spot. That leads to more content being generated technically even if it was an unintended spot. So in a way the fact that MORE people are exploiting it sort of changes yet another parameter that may make it ok to some people and less ok to others.
Should we treat this sort of thing as an exploit at all if it suddenly becomes user generated content? Is it only a problem to others if it's just one person exploiting it on the down low? Many good questions to consider.
1. Going back and forth for hours while knowing this is not a required or normal (this should be thought of in relation to how long the game is out and the experience people have Game+account time)
2. Getting their guild or friends to all go there and gather infinitely
3. The percent impact they have on the market.
Devs will be able to track and log things and decide the level of what they are doing if it is actual exploit or mistake/ accident.
If a bunch of players know the spot is bugged and are fighting over it trying to get infinite resources, that would be a red flag. Second would be who knowingly gathered a lot (ie a guild). If a group locked down the area to gather insane amounts that would be ban worthy imo as they are purposely exploiting.
Literally akin to knowing you are duping items.
If someone gathers a whole inventory and didn't know anything about the game on a fresh account and did not trade that to someone or start listing to the market and giving all their gold to someone. That wouldn't be ban worthy, simply remove what was gained on their account.
Intent and results are key information if they are exploiting or someone stubbled upon a bug without knowing.
So you ban exploiters, and then what?
In New World, they had a massive duplication exploit.
They proceeded to ban the exploiters.
Guess what, the damage had already been caused, and banning the exploiters didn't do anything.
They also banned the exploiters but never actually fixed the exploit, so all the exploiters just made new accounts and did it again.
So no, banning exploiters has genuinely ZERO impact.
If you don't fix the exploits, they will ALWAYS be exploited.
The only solution is to fix the exploits, banning exploiters literally never solves the problem ever.
In every game I've played with exploiters, banning them has never fixed the issue.
The point I'm trying to make is not that exploiters are good players, but that the actual problem with exploits is not the exploiters, it's the exploits themselves.
Because some people cheat/exploit games. I guess OP wants to be able to do it, without getting punished
yes BEFORE launch. A big difference
That isn't the only reason New World died. Now you are just talking BS. The game had so many issues. Saying it dosen't work, because it made New World fail, or didn't in that game, tells me you aren't to bright. There were so many things wrong in that game. There are also people in the real world that breaks the law. Should we just remove the laws? Of course not
And do YOU realise there is a huge difference between exploing in a testing phase, and in the released game. I recall there were people in APoC that did try to cheat etc. But it was to find the issues and they did report them, if i remember correctly. Again, a difference. Part of testing can be to "break the game". Find bugs and exploits
I have no idea why people think the average player can find ANY of these exploits. Who do you think finds exploits? Exploiters.
It is crazy to me that people think the average player just randomly encountering an exploit will someone reveal every exploit in the game before launch.
If you do not have experience in exploiting games, I am sorry but you are genuinely not useful when it comes to discovering and reporting these issues.
Not only do you have to find the exploit, you need to be able to reproduce it, and understand why and how it works.
People complain about exploiters, but it's purely an emotional response.
How do you deal with exploiters? By hiring exploiters.
Criminals do bad things, but sometimes they can get their charges dropped because they can actually help stop more crime by working with the feds.
I'm sorry but your average Joe will simply never be able to do what exploiters can do, so if exploiters are stigmatized why on earth would they fix your game in alpha?
If you choose to make exploiters your enemy, they will sit on all the exploits and abuse them on launch, this has happened in a few games I've seen through development.
The real issue is the exploits, not the exploiters. And that is literally just an objective fact. If we ignore the exploits and focus on exploiters the only thing that suffers is the game. Exploiters can always get a new account and quickly get ahead through their exploits.
Fix the pipe, don't put duct tape on the leak.
But PermaBan all intentional exploiters, slam them down, we don't need them in the game and we don't want them in the game. If someone duplicates an item, remove all those duplicated items from the game including those purchased 'honestly' from the duplicator. The buyer probably got a great price and should have known from the pricing that it might be a duped item.
If a guild is full of exploiters, disband the guild. Set a new standard for the game industry for how you deal with cheaters. Better to have a smaller population of good players than a larger population of crap ones.
I mean, bad game developers are bad game developers.
Banning exploiters isnt the action a developer takes to fix the issue, that is the action the developer takes to punish the exploiters. Fixing the exploit is a different thing.
As to New World, if they are banning players for exploiting and not also banning their credit card, IP address (if static), and MAC address, then they are not really banning them. The fact that they didnt fix the exploit BEFORE taking action on player accounts (going by what you said) just points to how bad they are.
The only thing I care about is minimizing the damage exploits cause as much as possible. To do that, you have to first know what exploits exist, this is where exploiters are the best for the job. I don't care about exploiters for any other reason. If exploiters didn't help reveal flaws in a game than go ahead ban them, but that isn't the case.
You talk about banning players through different methods. None of those work for the type of exploiters I'm talking about. It's so easy to fake every virtual identification and it's completely free to do so. Sure for someone that watches a YouTube video and copies it yeah that works great, but I'm not even defending those people. I'm talking about the people who find the exploits and abuse them.
If Ashes of Creation has massive game breaking exploits, sure ban all the exploiters, but the game will already be broken beyond repair at that point, so literally no one wins and the game dies. I don't care about justice I just want the game to be safe.
When a father murders someone who hurts their kid and goes to prison for the rest of their life, they did more damage to their family than the actual bad guy, the justification doesn't matter at all in terms of what actually matters.