Blacklist of Cheaters/Hackers

[aza77]

Just an idea.. but what about starting a new sub about hackers and cheaters. Peoples could send the account names to eg Mattmeck or whoever else administrates it, together with a proof like a log file, picture or whatever and the account will be added to the list. Other server administrators will than be able to ban certain accounts/players that cause more harm than fun before they even log in at their servers.

We would need some controle over what usernames are posted, we wouldnt want someone who is just mad at someone else to give there name.

There must be proof, and every one will be reviewed, and if someone is a big enough problem we can always IP ban them too.


Most server owners dont realize they can IP ban people too, just disallow there IP from accesing the server box.

[bufferofnewbies]

aza sounded like he volunteered to lead the review committee to me, Matt.

[eq4me]

I cant comment for the USA but here in Europe the vast majority of people are using dialup accounts with variable IPs. So there is no use in banning on an IP basis. Moreover a normal Player without Guide/GM rights on an Emu server cant see the underlying accout name of an char. Since the char itself is only managed on the Emu server it is played on nobody but an Guid/GM can complain effectively to the maintainers of the login server.

But be aware that a new account is created in little time and the cheater is back in business. Yes, he will loose his old toon but imho this is of little conseqence since he most likely got booted from the server he last played on(and which GM complained) anyway. In banning him he might be even motivated to prove that you cant stop him. At least that was my impression from my time managing an Action Quake2 Server way back.

[RangerDown]

I don't feel it's the project's place to get involved in affairs with any individual server. That used to happen a lot, and I never saw any good come out of it. All that came out of it were blemishes on the project and dev team's reputations.

[John Adams]

Originally Posted by RangerDown

I don't feel it's the project's place to get involved in affairs with any individual server. That used to happen a lot, and I never saw any good come out of it. All that came out of it were blemishes on the project and dev team's reputations.

Totally agree...

[CrabClaw]

Hmm, I'll have to vote no on this one. Policing a server should be the server owner's responsibility and theirs alone. There is no real way to verify any evidence anyone could provide. Since a server owner could virtually create any evidence in the database, screen shots or log files (which really are just plain, un-encoded text files), it is too easy to fake. The only thing you can do ban them, delete their accounts and post it up in your own forums.

[iamjooish2]

Originally Posted by eq4me

I cant comment for the USA but here in Europe the vast majority of people are using dialup accounts with variable IPs. So there is no use in banning on an IP basis. Moreover a normal Player without Guide/GM rights on an Emu server cant see the underlying accout name of an char. Since the char itself is only managed on the Emu server it is played on nobody but an Guid/GM can complain effectively to the maintainers of the login server.

But be aware that a new account is created in little time and the cheater is back in business. Yes, he will loose his old toon but imho this is of little conseqence since he most likely got booted from the server he last played on(and which GM complained) anyway. In banning him he might be even motivated to prove that you cant stop him. At least that was my impression from my time managing an Action Quake2 Server way back.

Not quite how it works.

IMO, the whole point of hacking/cheating in EQ is to derive virtual profit from your illegal trade. Creating new accounts sorta defeats that purpose, because the banned accts never really get a chance to finally 'beat the curve' if ya know what I mean.

Unlike many FPSs, a person can't just jump into EQ with an AIMbot and speedhack and make the server damn near unplayable for everyone else. What they can do is break a fragile economy/atmosphere of fairness for everyone else. Some players might know how to dupe on the emu, and duping sometimes involves crashing the server.

That would get old pretty fast