A Controversial Post

my point exactly you have to think of this logically not personally how you feel botters can see bigpoint arent going to stand for this anymore so this is giving developers ideas on how to make the game better and players dont feel the need to bot so when the players are unbanned they dont feel the need to bot to catch up they feel like they dont need to bot. i for one know if bans were made permanent this game wouldnt run for a week from that point. bots are getting things for free but the main cannons you cant get them for free so all this unfair advantage i can see a point from a lower players perspective needing castles and skills but when you have them done pearls are only for ammo so boats that are maxed out have spent money on the game not made it all for free. my guess is that when you started botting you didnt even really need pearls cause your castles were probably complete and same with skills

 

Well that was part of what I would have like to hear ...you still don't get the other part...hahaha..i guess you never will...I see bp change your title in this form to old hand..haha..really should be cheating hand

 

If the game dies because they permanetly ban botters who spend money on this game, that speaks volumes to how much trouble this game is in. Lollll...

 

Its quite refreshing seeing someone actually making a 'realist/ straight forward post, from/on the bot problems/reasons, specially without hideing in a fake name,
My thoughts, or impressions dont change on said person, nor am i surprised about finding out anyone useing, people being surprised that anyone cheated(by described in terms) are being nieve, weather its, bots, glirchs,bugs,autoclickers,mouse recorders, macros,useing gold from a gold cheat boat u boarded or tapeing your F key and Enter key down with a penny, so u can map jump and attack fast. everyone has peeked under that forbidden dress in some form. This post is more or less whats needed to understand/fix the problems. Especially because des' is not crying, or rambling on about some 'corporite greed shtict' like some crazy american ufo/goverment conspiracy weirdo.

 

You cheats raised the prices of the game, no more did anyone buy pearls, no longer do they buy ammo packs, no longer do they have to spend anytime on playing the events, no longer do they spend on event packs, etc, etc, etc.
To maintain cashflow now all good items and attributes are $$$ only, why would they sell voodoo cannons for pearls when u bots are getting them for free?
You cheats cry the game is too expensive? You screwed us all!!!
Back in the day u could buy the best of the best be it cannons or ammo with pearls, then you bots got ahold of the game, now it takes thousands of dollars to stay relevant let alone flourish in this game.
Just leave forum and game for good.
Please just do us a favour, no more from you.

 

... lol. kyloe. i'm sorry your wrong, normal natural inflation and such changed your prices, and because the botters bot, it keeps them playing the game, and spending alot of $$. not sure if you realise majority use the bot to fill in the empty spaces, lets say. bmap buffs,mojos,elpbuffs..etc.. they still are spending lots to get there ships full. so this would actually keep prices lower.. and come on lets be real... no one buys pearl pacs, except after those first few mistake learning purchases we do starting out.

 

A lot of players have left the game the last 5-6 years since the booting started, because of all the cheaters.

If BP could guarantee 100% that ALL cheaters were banned permanently, maybe a lot of the players who have left the game over the years would return.

And also a lot off honest players have drastically reduced the amount they are using on the game because off all the cheaters. I am quite sure, that the majority of the money, BP will loose by banning all cheaters, would come back again by honest players start using more money on the game and by old players returning to the game. And also many off the former cheaters would start new accounts again and using money on these accounts to get their new ship competitive.

So my clear opinion is: Ban all cheaters permanently after caught 2nd time. First time cheating should give min. 6 months ban (also from forum) and 2nd time caught should give permanent ban, even if it means that 75% of the players would have been banned.


Des, If you regret what you were doing and want to play with open cards, why didn't you come forward earlier? - Why did you wait until you were caught? - If you had not been caught, you would most likely have continued booting.

 

Maybe I have missed the other part, however this is just getting a bit patronising and we're going round in circles achieving nothing. Forum titles are chosen based on the number of posts and comments you have made. As a regular forum user, this is why I have this title.

You can continue to call me out as a cheater as if its something I didn't confess to in my opening post, but without actually adding some kind of constructive criticism this isn't achieving anything, you're just reiterating a point I've already made.


Ffffffffff

Hi Kyloe,

Did cheats cause prices to rise? Yes, of course, with cheats spending less money on pearls this money has to be made up elsewhere, however it is not the only factor that has caused people to stop spending as much money. Gravy mentioned inflation which is true, but there are also the fact that this game has become much more expensive to play regardless of the cheats. The introduction of Level 4 Doomhammers that cost thousands of pounds for example. These weren't brought out because of cheats, but they also had a large effect on players leaving the game due to prices. Your points that players no longer spend on ammo packs and event packs though, and that they don't spend time on events, is just incorrect. I know many players that do and to be honest when most of these packs come out the vast majority of stronger players still buy these regardless of whether they bot or not.

"You cheats cry this game is too expensive"... Currently you are the one complaining about prices... We did not screw you all by ourselves. Bots are a factor but not the only one by a long shot.

Lastly, by insisting that I remove myself from the game and the forum wouldn't help anything. All you'd be doing is silencing the one player you have with botting experience who is willing to share his experiences at his own risk to try and help the community. If anything your actions are just helping those that still bot by keeping their methods and mindset quiet. Methods and mindsets I am trying to cover here for everybody's benefit.

 

Maybe I have missed the other part, however this is just getting a bit patronising and we're going round in circles achieving nothing. Forum titles are chosen based on the number of posts and comments you have made. As a regular forum user, this is why I have this title.

You can continue to call me out as a cheater as if its something I didn't confess to in my opening post, but without actually adding some kind of constructive criticism this isn't achieving anything, you're just reiterating a point I've already made.

Hi Kyloe,

Did cheats cause prices to rise? Yes, of course, with cheats spending less money on pearls this money has to be made up elsewhere, however it is not the only factor that has caused people to stop spending as much money. Gravy mentioned inflation which is true, but there are also the fact that this game has become much more expensive to play regardless of the cheats. The introduction of Level 4 Doomhammers that cost thousands of pounds for example. These weren't brought out because of cheats, but they also had a large effect on players leaving the game due to prices. Your points that players no longer spend on ammo packs and event packs though, and that they don't spend time on events, is just incorrect. I know many players that do and to be honest when most of these packs come out the vast majority of stronger players still buy these regardless of whether they bot or not.

"You cheats cry this game is too expensive"... Currently you are the one complaining about prices... We did not screw you all by ourselves. Bots are a factor but not the only one by a long shot.

Lastly, by insisting that I remove myself from the game and the forum wouldn't help anything. All you'd be doing is silencing the one player you have with botting experience who is willing to share his experiences at his own risk to try and help the community. If anything your actions are just helping those that still bot by keeping their methods and mindset quiet. Methods and mindsets I am trying to cover here for everybody's benefit.

Hi Sea-Sea,

There is no denying that players have left the game due to hots and cheating. There are other reasons too but yes this is definitely a big one. Perhaps these players would come back to the game and I am sure there would be an increase in clean players should all the cheats be banned.

Whether they would be able to make up for the loss Bigpoint face? I honestly doubt it but it would be nice. The issue is if this were to happen, it wouldn't happen over night. Bigpoint have employees that need to be paid and I don't think they would he able to keep this up until the sales start to increase again from the clean players returning. Its possible, but you also need to take into account that with the prices these days, regardless of if you think this is purely down to cheats or not, it's not an attractive game for players to come back to now. They'd be looking at spending a couple of grand getting themselves back up to scratch and although there would be players that do this I am personally doubtful that it would ever make up for the amount of money they would be losing from the bans.

I agree morally that bans should be permanent. We have broken the rules, but this is Bigpoint's choice. Your idea of banning botters temporarily the first time and permanent the second time is an idea I agree with strongly and one I have suggested numerous times despite my own uses.

Why didn't I come forward earlier? A few reasons, but the main one honestly being that I simply hadn't been caught. I was benefitting nicely and by coming forward it would just be asking for a ban that I expected would be permanent. No player wants to be banned and lose the money they've placed on the game even if coming forward would be the ethical thing to do. However now that the ban has been placed anyway I am no longer fearing a ban for admitting to it. I was caught, the jig is up, and so I've now come forward and would like to help. If I had not been caught would I still be doing it? I expect so, nothing had stopped me up until the recent ban and nothing changed that would have prompted me to stop. I benefitted well and it allowed me to play the game when I wanted without having to commit all of my free time to keeping the boat going.

Thanks,

Des

 

As i have never cheated i can only repeat what i have said since 2011 dont ban ppl for a week/month. DELETE ALL their accounts permanent.If bp had done this when the bots started instead of playing ostriches we would not have all these little pleaders now.

 

Hello everyone,

My suggestion is way simple : LEGALIZE THE BOT.

As you said, BP can't solve the problem, there are too much botter (which most of them spend a huge amount of money in this game), banning them permanently is equal to close the game. But as long as we're in this situation, the game isn't fair anymore, because the non-bot users are not able to be at the same level as botter, that spend money, are, even by paying 1000$/month.

So to make the situation fair and just : legalize the bot, allow all people to use bot ==> no more complain, every one happy.

But the best part is, by allowing bot, you can controll it and place real sanctions that would be effective.

To say legalize the bot, it means BP has to do an official "bot way", with its own limits. For example : you can use the bot 12hrs/day as prenium or 4hrs/day as not, on every map or not, payable or free, set-up as a real programm or through the website etc. The conditions would be respected, because the official bot system would respect them itself as it would have been created & set by BP theirselves. Actual non-bot users would of course go this way (it would be the best opportunity for them to use bot and to keep respecting Terms & Conditions), by using the official bot, and the other bot user would also, because with the official bot they don't take any risk anymore & you can put real sanction : if you don't respect the botting time/day or even use a non-official bot, you get bann immediatly and permanently by the system. But the official bot's limits have not to be too restrective, or it will do the same as it is now, a large number of player would choose to still use the non-official bot, and we would have the same problem as now : too much player concern to take real punishment.

If you tell me that my system isn't fair because you've to pay, to have a good computer, etc... then it's the whole game that isn't fair, we've all accepted I guess, that players who pay or who have a good computer get an advantage on the game.

And also, actually, to counter the bot as it is right now, you've no other option than bann them all, which is IMPOSSIBLE (too many players concern, and so much income loss).

 

Hi Fire,

I'll be on WAR teamspeak tonight, happy to discuss this is more detail if you're around, otherwise I'll just be repeating what I have said to other posters

~Des

 

A man who understands! Does get a little annoying when you get all these people saying to ban them all but not thinking about how that would actually work in practice, so its good to hear some constructive feedback matey

Legalising the bot though, I think there are better ways to address it. I doubt BigPoint would allow it even if they did want to go down that route they wouldn't want to be seen as giving in to the botters. It would however be a good option. It would satisfy the current botters and legitimate players and level the playing field by allowing everybody to do it within the T&C. There are many games out there that support similar features as intentional legal aspects of the game.

I know it wouldn't be an ideal result, and in a perfect world BigPoint would be able to track every botter, ban them all, and then repopulate all these lost numbers overnight whilst facing no other issues (It's funny how many people think this is genuinely a feasible option...) but I guess this could be a viable fall-back should they be unable to mitigate the bot presence.

Thanks,

~Des

 

Then it appears you may have found the appropriate career in life working for a bank whilst having a past self confessed history of fiddling. This should come in very handy and will get you far in the corrupt banking world!


Des - I shall try to keep my sentiments short and truthful. As you already understand and have yourself acknowledged in the past, I have always played this game with total honesty and can pride myself on that integrity and on my achievements, especially considering that I am a one man solo guild and have struggled along for long periods to acquire distant goals within this game. Granted, it has taken me large amounts of my time but if that is the required method of gameplay, then I would sooner end up in Fifth position by being completely honest, rather than finishing in First place by cheating. Any other mindset or delusional self belief is simply fooling one's self, whilst cheating the company and other fellow players who remain honest. This has degraded the game, ruined moral and deprived the company of vital revenue, which loss has to be passed onto fewer remaining honest players. This has caused a vicious downhill spiral which has lead to a mass exodus of people who have lost interest in this game, as is evident from the past.

The results achieved by dishonesty are not real true or accurate results, except in the heads of the misguided cheaters who delude themselves and deprive honest fellow players. You are a likeable good player who has a fantastic wealth of knowledge on how the mechanics of this game work. That in itself gives you a great advantage over most average players, that advantage removed any need for you to have to resort to lowering yourself to the practice of cheating in the first place.

The same principle applies in sport i.e taking performance enhancement drugs by athletes, or any walk of life where fraudsters dishonestly obtain what the honest person struggles to achieve. It is good that you repent your sins, but to be totally honest I believe you will find more forgiveness by attending Church on Sunday than you may hope or deserve to expect on this forum. Any other sympathetic response from myself would make me feel hypocritical, as you have always understood that I have protested that cheats should be banned permanently in line with what Bigpoint once advertised. Had Bigpoint in fact carried their promises out early enough this game would have been perhaps rescued by now maybe before it had got this bad.

Any player feeling that they are short of time should simply look for more suitable kinds of gaming that do not require such long term devotion as Seafight does, this has always been a longer term type of game. There are plenty of other games in abundance that are more suited to the shorter type of strategy which provide faster results, this does not justify running outside programmes on Seafight to try achieve one's goals quickly. It's good that you show remorse but in my opinion it is too little too late. This game could have already reached a position that is irrecoverable due to the cheating being allowed to slide out of control for so long, you are correct in your reasoning that Bigpoint have allowed this to slide out of control. Whether it is recoverable now is anyone's guess. To address your point of improving this game or reversing the damage already done, my simple and honest answer is I just don't know?

 

Hi GM,

I hope you are well. I will start by saying that cheating in an online game and correupt banking are comletely different scales. I'm not trying to say that makes it okay, but I don't appreciate the implications that I am a corrupt worker just because I do the same as 90% of this game. I've just had the balls to actually admit it as opposed to others in this forum that ask for rewards for their cleanliness just because they weren't caught.

I always have and always will acknowledge and respect that you have reached where you have legitimately. I'd like to believe that at the time you had your Ruler of the Seven Seas rank you were most likely the only person in the game that had this without breaking a single rule on the way. I've mentioned in various comments that I am not trying to condone botting and so I agree with your first paragraph. I will say though that not everybody has the time/money/will power to be able to follow in the footsteps you have left. It's not an excuse but from my view it shouldn't be that players have to spend every moment of their waking life outside of work farming away so that they can do the only thing in this game that is fun, fighting. I hate scrolls with a passion, I think they are the most sinfully boring invention this game as ever introduced and I am amazed there are people out there who can repeat them by hand time after time.

"The results achieved by dishonesty are not real true or accurate results". The result I get from botting is the ability to be able to log in once or twice a week for an hour or so and actually enjoy the game for what it should be, a fighting game. I would also point out that the knowledge doesn't give me quite the edge you may expect. This gets shared quickly and when it comes to fighting it adds no value at all.

"I believe you will find more forgiveness by attending Church on Sunday than you may hope or deserve to expect on this forum." I did mention as a disclaimer before I wrote the rest of my initial thread that this isn't a plea for forgiveness or sympathy. Nobody in their right mind could expect to post what I have posted and be sympathised for their role in damaging the game. This is me holding my hands up to what I've done and now wanting to help those that have been negatively effected. That said, their suggestions to now ban permanently all of the bots just simply isn't feasible regardless how I or anybody else on the game would feel about it. It's too difficult for BigPoint to track them all and if they did then as I stated before the company would not be able to continue after facing the inevitable dentrimental losses from these banned players expenditure they will not be receiving. This would have worked if action was taken earlier but that was not the case and it is more than just the fault of my own that this problem then escalated into the epidemic it is today.

"Any player feeling that they are short of time should simply look for more suitable kinds of gaming that do not require such long term devotion as Seafight does". For newcomers that makes sense, however not everybody's situation is the same. I played this game legitimately for a long time (that itself was a long time ago but still), and was able to keep myself strong and competitive whilst still at school and having little money. The issue comes when you've invested a lot of time and money into building your boat and then due to either changes in your life or changes to the game you are unable to put in the time required to stay competitive. As this is a gradual change there is no significant point (for me at least) where you want to pack it what you enjoy greatly and what you have spent a great amount of time or effort on, which is why I then resorted to botting. If I was new to this game however and straight away realised I needed to bot before I had any kind of attachment or investment in the game then I'd probably just close the page and not open it again, but due to my ties to this game since 2008 it has become for me more than just a game as it has for many players, and an entire separate social group. These too keep you in the game. I do play plenty of other games *edit*.

It is too little too late yes, both from myself and from BigPoint. We shouldn't have been abusing said programs, and BigPoint should have taken action years ago and not implemented countless features to benefit the bots whilst showing no real intent in punishing them. Personally I don't see any way this game will come back and yes I do understand that I have played my role in that. The common misconception that botters don't pay however is so blind-sighted that it is almost cringeworthy. If I take the 10 biggest spenders on this server that I know of, 7 of them are botters. I won't be specific as to who but for players to say the bots don't spend anything is just ludicrous. I know you haven't said that but I'm just venting there.

I shall see you on the water when I am back. I'm not offended by what you've said as I've asked for this feedback so I wish you the best my friend.

Thanks,

~Des

[edit - removed other game names]

 

i will not be wasting my time with a self confessed bot user.

 

The option is there, but seeing as I will be using your guild's TeamSpeak daily when I return I feel this conversation will probably happen in due course anyway. See you in TS soon

~Des

 

considering you have more than 1 account which most will know you are doing the same thing on as the 1 which is banned. Not on my watch.

 

Oooh I have another account? Would you happen to know the details to it because I didn't know I had one... But I'll be back on the 23rd. Your watch may be out of time then, as your leader and major council members have asked me to actually join multiple times. But I'm not here to argue about that. As I said I'll be around in TS if you would like to talk about it, if not then I suggest you mute me.

~Des

 

Tell you what we let all the botters back on the very next day.... but the ships are wiped clean and if caught again DELETED.