PvP An Investigation Into Frontier's Actions on Combat Logging, Part 2

[Martian Successor]

And since it's just bits in a computer, who should really care if someone clogs or not. It's not like it's real life. It's just a game.

I used to get really upset about griefers and gankers and all the crap going on at CGs, but I learned to live with it. Now, perhaps it's time for PvP players to learn to live with the cloggers.

Actually the PvE side of the game is way more abusable via c-logging than anything PvP related.

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/398295-It-s-Totally-Fine-to-Task-Kill-on-Thargoids

Some people can decide to not care and others can try to get that problem addressed. To each their own.

 

[Stigbob]

They are, but as people constantly say in all the mode exploit discussion threads, there's only one opinion that matters, and that's FDevs.

I agree that that should matter, but disagree that it does for low level things like griefing or clogging. FDEV are not going to come down on anything like that in any significant way. That's just how the game has been since pre-launch and how FDEV do things. They seem very nice, which causes this issue I think. Luckily there's always block or I wouldn't bother with open at all.

​

Except that a player can prevent a high-wake by slapping their target with either a Grom missile or one of those engineered FSD interrupt dumbfires, whereas you can't prevent someone from combat-logging

If they can hit yes high wake can be disrupted, but that's a legit gameplay tactic as is a speed build so fast it leaves missiles behind and shouldn't really be compared with a cheat.

Clogging like other cheats works by granting artificial advantage, exploit space-cash rebuy doesn't matter, use the station invulnerability cheat incoming fire doesn't matter, exploit god-modules gain an overall advantage, combat log and you gain effectively infinite lives/rebuy money.

​

Well as an predominately open trader, I think we can cross those hyperbolic bridges when we come to them. At least it'll give us something new to discuss.

People are already complaining about menu-logging (which I agree is lame, but real life takes first place), and some already complain about high/low wake. It's already here, so not really something new.

​

In which case they should conceed that for clarity, rather than mumbling incoherently about super-secret ways of knowing if a disconnect is legitimate or not.

Rock and a hard place. They can't give any specifics without cheats/exploiters taking advantage of the specifics, they also don't name and shame or allow naming and shaming. They'd have to do both to satisfy the players bothered by clogging, and they can't actually do either.

There was a similar hoo-hah a couple of years ago about hackers, people complained and said nothing was happening I got a forum holiday for posting a video of a cheat and being super critical of FDEV. I then found that FDEV were playing banhammer whack-a-hacker because I found the complaining banned players on an external site, I can't give you the link due to cheats but it's out there if you look.

Clogging could be the same, unless the banned talk about it we will never know because FDEV are too nice to name and shame.

Now I feel bad for saying FDEV are rubbish at dealing with cheating, in case I'm wrong about that (again).

 

[raymondo the great]

Oh I agree with you on that one - indiscriminate player killing is not cheating, but Frontier have acknowledged that whilst it's not cheating, it represents undesirable behaviour which in many cases can be not within the spirit of the game. Frontier's fault entirely, of course. Which again proves my point that Frontier can't address combat logging in isolation - it has to go hand-in-hand with discouraging some of the factors (e.g. indiscriminate player killing) which can cause some players to combat log.

So lets put this another way

The IRS shouldn't go after tax cheats unless it fixes other "undesirable behaviour" like people legitimately minimising their tax bill first yeah?

The simple fact is that people want "undesirable" stuff dealt with first because they think a certain group are undesirable and frontier should pander to their wants, rather than fixing actual problems with their games.

Players doing the indiscriminate murder the game pretty much advertised may be undesirable, but its pretty rare and isn't somthing that needs "fixing" The constant attempts to shovel the subject off into "legitimate" behaviour (ie not cheating) punished in game for its undesirability is transparent

What you are basically saying is "i support cheating if it is to escape fights they don't want"

You may as well stop after the 3rd word!

 

[Han Zulu]

Actually the PvE side of the game is way more abusable via c-logging than anything PvP related.

https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/398295-It-s-Totally-Fine-to-Task-Kill-on-Thargoids

Some people can decide to not care and others can try to get that problem addressed. To each their own.

So? Some players get more money or ranking by cheating, is that new? It's been in the game for the past couple of years, and most of those exploits I missed. I didn't make 50 billion credits in the game by exploiting Robigo and super-stacking missions and such. I managed to make some before they were nerfed, but not much. I never used the engineering exploit either (1-5 it's called I think). But there were griefers/gankers out there using the weapons achieved by that exploit. And if someone complained about these issues, they were considered carebears.

In reality, that another player makes money and ranks in PvE bothers me ... zero, zip, nada, nothing. There are plenty of exploits that I don't know about, I'm sure, and I'm not crying for not knowing them or other players use them.

 

[Ian Doncaster]

there are next to no consequences for endlessly murdering other players Just Because

That's certainly true, but opinions vary about what reasons for attacking another player are legitimate.

Plenty of people will happily argue, for instance, that if I happen to come across a known murderer, I shouldn't attack them unless they presently have a bounty. (And possibly a large bounty, at that. Not some tiny 20,000 credit thing). Others argue that because piracy is currently economically unviable it's automatically griefing to try it anyway ... And so on.

On the other side, dead is dead. I've never particularly been concerned about the motivations of the people who attacked me, because it gets in the way of running and/or fighting. Sure, most of the current random murderers do it because they like murdering. On the other hand, if the game actually had a framework to allow people to register in-game their support of various legitimate reasons, the random murderers could almost always pick one to use as a flag of convenience, and get on with their killing after a few second's delay.

Anyway - I reckon this thread has been created WAY too soon. I reckon we just have to wait and see what Frontier comes up with, with Karma & C&P, then react to that.

Shall I be paraphrasing this to anyone who complains about the basic state of exploration or the beige plague, because Frontier have hinted that they may be improving those in some loosely specified way sometime this year? (I think they've actually put more public detail into how they'll fix the beige plague - there was a picture, even - than into how they'll sort out combat logging with the Karma system)

For what it's worth, I read Frontier's C&P proposals in details, and think they'll do basically nothing to sort out random murder. (Some other good ideas, certainly on balance better than the current situation in many respects ... random murder? No.) So, presumably, by your argument that CL can't be fixed until murder is fixed, I should believe that it won't do anything to sort out combat logging either?

 

[raymondo the great]

Anyway - I reckon this thread has been created WAY too soon. I reckon we just have to wait and see what Frontier comes up with, with Karma & C&P, then react to that.

Yeah...lets just put it off another year, continue to pretend its not a problem that the devs aren't enforcing their rules and are actually outright lying to us about it because....well some people like to do it when it suits yeah?

I mean I see on the forums daily people admitting they clog v NPCs. but NOTHING is ever done - I have even reported posts for suggesting cheating and the mods won't remove them! Literally you can tell someone "just combat log on griefers" and the mods will do NOTHING to someone telling a new player who doesn't know better to cheat!

And that is bloody shameful!

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

Shall I be paraphrasing this to anyone who complains about the basic state of exploration or the beige plague, because Frontier have hinted that they may be improving those in some loosely specified way sometime this year? (I think they've actually put more public detail into how they'll fix the beige plague - there was a picture, even - than into how they'll sort out combat logging with the Karma system)

Frontier have shown what they're doing to de-beige-ify the galaxy so there's that..

For what it's worth, I read Frontier's C&P proposals in details, and think they'll do basically nothing to sort out random murder. (Some other good ideas, certainly on balance better than the current situation in many respects ... random murder? No.) So, presumably, by your argument that CL can't be fixed until murder is fixed, I should believe that it won't do anything to sort out combat logging either?

Yeah I already stated earlier that Karma/C&P will not stop random murder - of course that's still going to happen. But it'll be more discouraged than it is now, and that's better than the sweet flip all in the game at the moment.

My argument, which I thought I'd made clear, is that combat logging is going to be addressed by their Karma system.

Look, thing is, I can empathise with those players who get completely frustrated at the combat loggers. But looking at combat logging in isolation can't be right, as the caauses of cambat logging - wrong though it is - are many and varied, and some reasons for combat logging include issues to do with the lack of meaningful in-game discouragement of some kinds and methods of murder which could be validly described as being against the spirit of the game.

I'm unsure of how much clearer I can make this point

 

[Martian Successor]

So? Some players get more money or ranking by cheating, is that new? It's been in the game for the past couple of years, and most of those exploits I missed. I didn't make 50 billion credits in the game by exploiting Robigo and super-stacking missions and such. I managed to make some before they were nerfed, but not much. I never used the engineering exploit either (1-5 it's called I think). But there were griefers/gankers out there using the weapons achieved by that exploit. And if someone complained about these issues, they were considered carebears.

In reality, that another player makes money and ranks in PvE bothers me ... zero, zip, nada, nothing. There are plenty of exploits that I don't know about, I'm sure, and I'm not crying for not knowing them or other players use them.

That's fine, you're entitled to your opinion. I'm just pointing out that there are people who do care about these things and don't want to just "live with it".

 

[raymondo the great]

Frontier have shown what they're doing to de-beige-ify the galaxy so there's that..





Yeah I already stated earlier that Karma/C&P will not stop random murder - of course that's still going to happen. But it'll be more discouraged than it is now, and that's better than the sweet flip all in the game at the moment.

My argument, which I thought I'd made clear, is that combat logging is going to be addressed by their Karma system.

Look, thing is, I can empathise with those players who get completely frustrated at the combat loggers. But looking at combat logging in isolation can't be right, as the caauses of cambat logging - wrong though it is - are many and varied, and some reasons for combat logging include issues to do with the lack of meaningful in-game discouragement of some kinds and methods of murder which could be validly described as being against the spirit of the game.

I'm unsure of how much clearer I can make this point

This reads to me very simply:

I don't want combat logging removed till the reasons I combat log are "fixed" because I don't want to get in trouble.

Quite simply there are no justifiable reasons for cheating. None! I don't care if your kid falls down the stairs mid fight and breaks their legs! You leave your desk, run to the kid and take your rebuy simple as that! Otherwise people need to learn how to play the game properly. Odds of you being killed by a "ganker" after an interdiction are basically 0 if you have the first clue what you are doing and haven't got a moronically stupid outfitting of your ship...but you know, the shieldless cutter crowd have to be able to go to the CGs and scream when they are opposed don't they?

 

[Ian Doncaster]

But looking at combat logging in isolation can't be right, as the caauses of cambat logging - wrong though it is - are many and varied, and some reasons for combat logging include issues to do with the lack of meaningful in-game discouragement of some kinds and methods of murder which could be validly described as being against the spirit of the game.

The thing is, you could make exactly the same argument with exactly the same validity about the 5-1 cheat.

Pretty much everyone agrees the engineers are really grindy if you want a fully-optimised ship.
The only thing the 5-1 cheat did was significantly reduce the amount of material collection grind needed to make G5 rolls. You didn't get better modules from it, you just got the same modules much faster.
Frontier are in Beyond proposing to bring in Engineering changes which will significantly reduce the grind (for god-quality modules, definitely, even if opinions vary on the effect on a random G5) so everyone can get those modules fast.

So was everyone demanding that Frontier do something about the 5-1 cheat being premature, and was Frontier wrong to both fix it and to punish those who cheated with it? There were understandable reasons to do with the game design for people to use it, after all. Should it have been left open until 2.5 later this year? If not, what's the difference?

 

[Han Zulu]

That's fine, you're entitled to your opinion. I'm just pointing out that there are people who do care about these things and don't want to just "live with it".

Sure.

 

[Martian Successor]

Nah I disagree with you. I still maintain that you cannot address combat logging in isolation. Combat logging is a gameplay issue - as has been pointed out in this very thread as one of the justifications for stamping it out (can affect BGS/PP). Along with indiscriminate player killing (which Frontier have stated can be considered in many situations as being against the spirit of the game). Both have been issues causing threads like these on every forum connected to a multi-player game, and for years.

It's especially horrible in Elite: Dangerous, because for one, there are next to no consequences for endlessly murdering other players Just Because - such being a factor in causing some players to combat log whether it's a legal move or not (it's not, of course. I think 99.9% of people agree with that.) C&P is going to be more of an in-game thing, and Karma is more for policing the technical issues like combat logging.

Anyway - I reckon this thread has been created WAY too soon. I reckon we just have to wait and see what Frontier comes up with, with Karma & C&P, then react to that.

You make a lot of valid points. A lot of people are tired of waiting on FD to address these problems however, just as the frustration levels concerning the beige plague until FD showed that they would be doing something about it. It's the amount of time it takes combined with the lack of communication that exacerbates the situation in my opinion and thus we end up with members of the community trying to take matters into their own hands in order to at least force a reaction from FD.

This thread is no different than the multiple threads on the beige plague. The goal was/is the same: force a response from Frontier on an issue many would like resolved. Frontier is not fond of giving updates or in communicating frequently or adequately with its community, therefore that chasm becomes a breeding ground for frustration levels to rise and as a result we get different sections of the community frequently left to forceably extract a simple update from FDev by any means they have at their disposal.

 

[Stigbob]

You make a lot of valid points. A lot of people are tired of waiting on FD to address these problems however, just as the frustration levels concerning the beige plague until FD showed that they would be doing something about it. It's the amount of time it takes combined with the lack of communication that exacerbates the situation in my opinion and thus we end up with members of the community trying to take matters into their own hands in order to at least force a reaction from FD.

This thread is no different than the multiple threads on the beige plague. The goal was/is the same: force a response from Frontier on an issue many would like resolved. Frontier is not fond of giving updates or in communicating frequently or adequately with its community, therefore that chasm becomes a breeding ground for frustration levels to rise and as a result we get different sections of the community frequently left to forceably extract a simple update from FDev by any means they have at their disposal.

I agree I only started using block due to being bored of waiting for anything from FDEV on station griefery. The advantage of that being I can put it in place myself and choose my own criteria for using it.

One thing though, force doesn't always work. Some people (and organizations run by those people) will simply push back by ignoring you, take whatever you are asking for and chuck it straight to the back of the waiting list or even onto the never pile. As for openly trying to drum up bad press about a company, that's never going to have a positive effect on your requests to the same company other than vague assurances through gritted teeth.

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

This reads to me very simply:

I don't want combat logging removed till the reasons I combat log are "fixed" because I don't want to get in trouble.

Quite simply there are no justifiable reasons for cheating. None! I don't care if your kid falls down the stairs mid fight and breaks their legs! You leave your desk, run to the kid and take your rebuy simple as that! Otherwise people need to learn how to play the game properly. Odds of you being killed by a "ganker" after an interdiction are basically 0 if you have the first clue what you are doing and haven't got a moronically stupid outfitting of your ship...but you know, the shieldless cutter crowd have to be able to go to the CGs and scream when they are opposed don't they?

I've never, ever, combat logged in this game, and this response demonstrates a complete non-understanding of everything I've been saying

In fact, at one point I deliberately set out to get ganked in order to make a video, which I showed to Sandro, and the result was a brilliant conversation, and starport weaponry getting a massive increase in power and effectiveness. (And that Cutter in my video was RNGineered btw ).

 

[JosiahD]

You need to read again what punishment happened (it was not "merely a removal of affected modules") : https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php/358986-Community-Update-Engineer-Exploit-Action-Taken
Btw, do you know who reported this exploit (many times) and explained/helped FDev to reproduce it ???

About combat logging. Directly banning players seems too harsh i agree. Until it gets fixed and impossible to use, there should be graduate response from e-mail warning to ban.

No bans or account wipes, not even short suspensions, that I can see listed in those measures actually dished out, despite the clear repetitive use of that exploit/cheat over a significant period of time by a significant number of people. Some people are insisting on outright bans or account wipes for combat loggers. Whether that is justified or not is not up to me. However, if combat loggers were to be outright banned or have their accounts wiped, that should have also happened in the case of the engineer exploit/cheat. Simple as that. In most of the cases where someone has reported a combat logger and then seen them in game again, they would not know if the offender had in fact recieved a warning or short suspension yet they automatically assume nothing has been done because it's not the automatic ban they seem to believe is warranted.

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

The thing is, you could make exactly the same argument with exactly the same validity about the 5-1 cheat.

Pretty much everyone agrees the engineers are really grindy if you want a fully-optimised ship.
The only thing the 5-1 cheat did was significantly reduce the amount of material collection grind needed to make G5 rolls. You didn't get better modules from it, you just got the same modules much faster.
Frontier are in Beyond proposing to bring in Engineering changes which will significantly reduce the grind (for god-quality modules, definitely, even if opinions vary on the effect on a random G5) so everyone can get those modules fast.

So was everyone demanding that Frontier do something about the 5-1 cheat being premature, and was Frontier wrong to both fix it and to punish those who cheated with it? There were understandable reasons to do with the game design for people to use it, after all. Should it have been left open until 2.5 later this year? If not, what's the difference?

Again, all good points.

The difference is that Frontier have already stated that they are working on C&P and Karma, right now - there have been numerous threads over the years about combat logging and now Frontier have stated they're doing something about it. Whereas for the 5-1 exploit/cheat, Frontier didn't announce in advance that they were going to fix it. Rather, it was brought to their attention as you said, and only then did they mention it was a cheat/exploit and would fix it. And fix it they did.

tl;dr : Combat logging is going to be addresses and Frontier have already told us how - it's basically going to be in the upcoming C&P and Karma additions.

 

[raymondo the great]

I've never, ever, combat logged in this game, and this response demonstrates a complete non-understanding of everything I've been saying

In fact, at one point I deliberately set out to get ganked in order to make a video, which I showed to Sandro, and the result was a brilliant conversation, and starport weaponry getting a massive increase in power and effectiveness. (And that Cutter in my video was RNGineered btw ).

For me there is no logical reason anyone would defend or excuse cheating if they weren't doing it themselves. Simple as that.

And you have at the very least excused cheating on this thread!

I will say again: There are no legit reasons to combat log. None

And I say that as a person who plays open who has never initiated PvP. I don't care who does it, I don't care where they do it, or the reason they do it.

Combat loggers are cheats

And cheats are the lowest of the low in the gaming world!

 

[Shackram]

As I mentioned earlier, it comes down to when the 'cheater' committed their act.

5-1 was never regarded as an exploit, and pretty much ignored by FDev for a fair old while before they clamped down on it. Naturally, it seems reasonable to only take accrued assets off them, in the same way that the idiots who exploited the founders world discount to amass early credits had just the credits taken off of them (as it wasn't acknowledged as an exploit till after the fact, and Frontier plugged the issue in a similar manner to the 5-1).

If however, a player was to find a way to repeat the 5-1 after it had been acknowledged as exploitative and cheating, then I think bans are justifiable. Which is where the issue with comparisons with combat logging lies.

Frontier have acknowledged combat logging as cheating/exploiting and players are continuing to utilise it as a tool in their arsenal in the exact way it was highlighted as being cheatey/exploitative, which is why it should carry severe penalties.

Anyone of a not-dishonest disposition would realise that 5-1 was as much of exploit as CLogging is (and it can be argued that 5-1 in was a much more consequential exploit).

Blatant double standards like that (plus constantly trying to blow things out of proportion) are why certain PvP players and groups don't get as much respect as they think they deserve and why the community at large and likely FD doesn't take their complaints seriously.

You are your own worst enemies.

 

[Genar-Hofoen]

For me there is no logical reason anyone would defend or excuse cheating if they weren't doing it themselves. Simple as that.

And you have at the very least excused cheating on this thread!

I will say again: There are no legit reasons to combat log. None

And I say that as a person who plays open who has never initiated PvP. I don't care who does it, I don't care where they do it, or the reason they do it.

Combat loggers are cheats

And cheats are the lowest of the low in the gaming world!

You are incorrect - I have not excused cheating on this thread, anywhere. I have observed that for some players, they might have excused their cheating due to some in-game circumstances which Frontier themselves consider not being in the spirit of the game. That's an observation, and I never condoned such actions - if you can show me where I actively encouraged players to combat log because they were being indiscriminately murdered, then I'll take that back. But you won't find anything like that.

Combat logging is cheating, as it's an out-of-game method of escaping death.

But this thread is screaming for something to be done about combat logging in isolation of the game's other problems, and once again I repeat that Frontier cannot do something about combat logging in isolation, and, again, Frontier have already stated what they'll be doing - and it's a combination of the C&P and Karma systems they are developing.

 

[raymondo the great]

You are incorrect - I have not excused cheating on this thread, anywhere. I have observed that for some players, they might have excused their cheating due to some in-game circumstances which Frontier themselves consider not being in the spirit of the game. That's an observation, and I never condoned such actions - if you can show me where I actively encouraged players to combat log because they were being indiscriminately murdered, then I'll take that back. But you won't find anything like that.

Combat logging is cheating, as it's an out-of-game method of escaping death.

But this thread is screaming for something to be done about combat logging in isolation of the game's other problems, and once again I repeat that Frontier cannot do something about combat logging in isolation, and, again, Frontier have already stated what they'll be doing - and it's a combination of the C&P and Karma systems they are developing.

hahahaha!

"I didn't excuse cheating, I just listed reasons others might for no real reason other than I thought it would add somthing to the thread"

!

As is your insistence that nothing can be done about combat logging without fixing other issues! The Devs are supposed to have systems to deal with it RIGHT NOW, they aren't. they are not enforcing their own rules, they are letting people cheat to gain advantages at CG's, in PP and playing the BGS, why? Probably because they know that so many people do it if they took action they would decimate the playerbase! They act all tough on cheating when its a small group, but when it's a big group? As I said the mods won't even remove advice telling people to cheat!

It's not that it's "on their list they'll get round to it"

It is quite simply tacitly condoned

As for your constant insistence the C&P and Kama system will deal with it. I won't. Not in the slightest! The only thing it will deal with is the reasons you claim others - most definitely not you - might sometimes try and cheat. It has been pointed out by many players over many months to the devs that their plans for that won't work. But they refuse to acknowledge it because to do so would be to admit they have a problem with a cheating playerbase! And they don't want to do that do they? No no they don't!

Honestly if you think it is beyond the devs capability right now to send a stern email when a ticket is raised and they are shown video proof of cheating then frankly I wonder at your insistence they are capable of doing any future development! This is BASIC stuff that anyone running an online game should be getting right, from the start. Not the end of year 1, or the end of year 2, or the end of the 2nd expansion, or a year after the end of the 2nd expansion, or even longer when they realise that what the players have been saying all along is right! Its a disgraceful shambles that it's gone on this long is what it is!

And people like you constantly insisting that some update at some unspecified point in the next year will fix it when it clearly won't are simply aiding and abetting the devs in their whitewashing the issue!

Don't bother replying....I block people who condone or excuse or advertise cheating. You are now on that list!