News Valve to punish TF2 cheaters, reward others

AshT - that's obviously giving you a performance advantage though. Valve never said not to do this. That's why everyone is annoyed, they've been punished for something, labelled a cheater, had a strike against their account, all for something that they thought was fine - not hacking but powergaming, just like if you play WoW you might install UI mods to see where ores and herbs are (which actually does give you a performance advantage in a way).

There isn't logic to their action, that's what has people riled up.

 

Well yeah, that's just what I mean about jumping on the bandwaggon. One hopes that rather than just copy+pasting press releases bittech actually puts their own interpretation on news, makes their own informed comments, etc. So exactly, sure the idea comes from Valve - and I was just saying, rather than repeating it blindly bittech could consider some alternative interpretations (not that they're necessarily "right" by the way, but just that they exist.)


And yes, of course a level playing field is important. Though (if you don't play TF2) the hats are just cosmetic items; they don't give any in-game advantages or anything. And anyone was welcome to idle for them or not, play lots or play little, so everyone's chances of getting one was still 'fair' in that sense.

 

WoW Glider was destroyed because it gave people an unfair advantage over those who spent their own time grinding and because the WoW economy was getting ridiculously unbalanced.

Whats different about this and that?

I don't think people are getting strikes against their account ... did you make that bit up or did I miss it in the story?

It's always been the case that 3rd party programs are not to be used alongside Valves games. I'm pretty sure that is in the EULA ... unless someone can quote the bit in the EULA where they say its fine ... ?

 

No offense, but your response is a good one to highlight as it represents the mindset of the typical Cheat/Griefer.

There are those who just apply a basic degree of principle and sportsmanship to their gaming, and there are those that mindlessly seek to gain any possible advantage to up their score.

Which camp do you fall into, I wonder?

The latter "gamer", I use that term VERY loosely, also tends to also be the one who bitches and cries the loudest when anything changes.

There's only one logical reason why Cheats cheat; they have no oter option to be competitive in-game; simple.

Cheaters, campers, vehicle/weapon hoggers, griefers are all the same as far as I'm concerned. Bourne of the same ilk.

I sometimes just hawk said jokers in-game until they disconnect; nothing worse for them than to have someone in their face like a mirror image no matter where they go...

... Almost a game in itself

 

Anyways, bored now, I better depart the thread before I go off on one as usual. It's another interesting story to split the readers and give good debate.

I will always be against 3rd party apps because it always offers the user an advantage over those who choose to work towards a goal. And this will be the case whether its a 3rd party app to gain headshots, WoW gold or loot, pretty hats that offer no real advantage other than notoriety and fame for the time you may have put in ... it's all the same to me.

It's all an unfair advantage. Enjoy the rest of your debating lol

 

Just an FYI, this doesn't give you a competitive advantage. You can still do the same thing by joining an achievement_idle server.

 

I still have yet to get a hat and I play a bit every night just about lol.

 

Wait, so this is all about a cosmetic item that adds nothing to the actual gameplay?

So, people get overly competetive about said cosmetic item and find a way other than just playing the game to get one? Valve get fed up with what was supposed to be just a bit of fun, and put a stop to it?

And people are up in arms? Jesus, it's a sad world when someone can rant for half a page about a bleeding hat.

 

@Bauul My thoughts exactly

 

I'm getting pretty fed up of receiving items anyway, 10 bonks and no hat?! What's that all about?

 

Bauul - one of the things is a lot of players who enjoy the game have been labelled cheaters, and have a strike against their account now, when they didn't realise that they were doing anything wrong because as you say it's just a cosmetic item. Add to this giving a unique item to the other part of the community who didn't use the idle server, and you divide the community and have servers banning people outright for having a halo or not having a halo and loads of moaning on the voice chat. It's really (for the time being) ruined the in game atmosphere.

 

Reminds me of all the WOW players idling in battlegrounds to get free stuff, then wondering why normal players complained about them and wanted them banned.

Wish Blizzard took a stronger stance same as Valve.

Ok, so, the drop rate system might not be good. "Circumventing" it - i.e. cheating your way past it, just to get a hat, is pretty pathetic anyway.

To then complain when Valve stamp their feet on you for doing it is even more pathetic.

Correct action? Don't cheat, complain to Valve to improve the system on forums etc.

And don't make out those "idling" are not gaining over those who play normally. Of course you are...your increasing your chance to get one of these hats by what...let's think...8 hours sleep? +10 hours working day? = 18 hours extra every day?

Now then..replace "does nothing but looks cool hat" with "extra damage weapon" or something.

Not so harmless then is it?

Valve are right to come down hard on cheaters, in my opinion. The harder the better. Wish more companies acted in this way, and more gamers would grow the f*** up and play games in the spirit they were meant to be played and not constantly look for ways to get one over on others by cheating or "circumventing" what the devs feel is right for the game they designed.

 

TomD22 and NickCPC make good points
At no point was the action of idling ever condoned as cheating. The days after the hats were first released there were THOUSANDS of "idle" tagged servers people joined just to stand there and do nothing. The idle program took horrible system Valved drove players to in order to "earn" the elusive hats, and refined it, so that literally 10's of thousands of players could idle away without having to use the underspec'ed home pc's that were flooding the server lists.

Valve drove the user community to idle in some form in order to get the hats they flaunt in updates, the creator of the Idle program worked out that the actual drop rate is something like... every 4 hours 35 mins you get to roll a 84 sided dice, if you get a 1 you get a hat, if not you have to wait another 4 hours 35... (im not sure if this is correct, as some one else did the maths and said it was 0.5% chance every 25 mins)
Valve turned a fun jump in and play game where you were rewarded by skill into a grind fest. Then they punished players who were economical.



Additonal points -

The changes to the EULA where made just after the blog post - there for players who idled were not doing anything against the rules, stop labeling them as cheaters.

robyholmes - the drop rate is increased for everyone, not just halo wearers. re-read the blog post.

Joe Martin - i haven't seen an article this one sided in a LONG time from bit-tech, its quite a shame. maybe a little less negative terms such as "cheaters" "dishonest" "exploit" and more facts might help.

 

You were doing stuff you damn well knew you shouldn't have, you've been caught. Do the decent thing take it on the chin put your tail between your legs and accept you've been pwned.

The fact that valve were slow in the smack down shouldn't surprise any one, valve are slow in all things. Its not like this smacking is not with out president, they did the same thing to folk who fiddled the weapons a couple of updates ago.

 

People talking about returning the game need to read the EULA on all Valve games, You don't 'own' the game, you paid a fee up front for a subscription to access Steam and any additional software, which Valve have the right to withdraw or change at any time.

 

The problem is DraigUK is they didn't say it was cheating. The reason people idled was because it was the only way to maximise their chance to get horrendously rare hats especially because there is no trading system.

There have been threads for months petitioning valve to fix the system. Also plenty of threads asking whether idling is ok, never once did someone official say no, until today when they enact a retrospective rule.

I think a better system would be similar in feel to eve's skill system. Every day at midnight it rolls 3 random items (hats would be rarer), and if you log in the next day you get to pick one. This would reward players for playing frequently i.e. once per day, but wouldn't necessitate farming or idling, because you can only get one item per day.

Today, you can still legitimately load up the game and join an achievement_idle server and sit there all day while at work. It was merely people using this particular program that emulated TF2 so you didn't have to have a full screen app open who got targeted (this time ....)

 

they WERE gaining an advantage, they were gaining items that could be spent on bettering their character, TF2 hats have no value attached

Correct, the drop rate is "bad" to put it lightly. However, the drop system was never circumvented, and it was never gainst the EULA and there for not cheating.

See my comment above, the hats have no value, and you cant make your argument work just by pretending to add value.

Angry much ? Im guessing you have played a few hours every other night and not got a hat? well same here, i played for many hours every night every weekend until i realised i shouldn't be stooping to the grind Valve wants me to do in order to get a hat.
Then i went and played another game and left TF2 for casual game play.

 

I didn't lose any hats but you know this isn't something that popped up overnight. They could have just said that we frown upon the idle server and we will be taking action in the future against it. But no they decide to let it go for several months as a honeypot style trap so they could get as many people as possible. That's the only explanation for letting it slide for this long.

But that's not really what bugged me, us idlers WERE increasing the number of chances for hats so I think the action that valve took was fair. It's these halo hats that have ruined the game, its basically pitting people without halos against halo wearers. Hopefully this shitstorm dies down soon so I can play some TF2.