Cheating in Elite Dangerous

[Mangal Oemie]

I don't think it is helpful to let people's opinion of SDC - correct or not - interfere with their opinion of the issue of cheating, hacks and botting.

Don't shoot the messenger, and all that. SDC and others raising this publicly or privately are doing a service to the entire player base.

BTW, hacks and bots are related, as the bots use these hacks... Fix the hacks, you probably impact botting as well

 

[Schmack]

Everything you do in solo would also impact the other instances, just as is now.
The only reason I picked "physical" impact is because it would have a visual effect. Nothing else really does. Leave a system in famine for 3 months, you'd expect population to decline. Does that have a visual effect? Any effect on the BGS? The answer is a big fat NOPE!
Let a system starve for a year, don't supply ANY food at all. The system will remain exactly the same as it is now.
Even prices for food won't go through the roof, as there is a limit to that. Besides, if you'd deliver 700t of food to a starving system, you should be the one dictating the prices, not them. Don't want to pay 1m for a ton of food? No worries, feel free to starve. And they'd gladly starve to... oh wait, no they won't because 6bn people will remain 6bn, even after 3 months of famine.

There have been instances of extreme market variation based on oddities like proximity to other stations and such, but the HOGs ate it. (Hands of God). They change these things and create a cardboard galaxy where everything is as much like everything else as possible, because players cry that task A in system A should pay exactly the same as task A in system B, or task B in system A. So intstead of randomly generated market swings that entice trading, it's just a HOG wave moving around the bubble artificially raising prices here, lowering them there.

The tourism station I'm at now has 500K passenger missions for Colonia. 22000Ly away, for 500K. Meanwhile the bouy next door pays 2 million if you go there to see it and back. It's really become a game of ignoring the silly and focusing on the entertaining. Instead of blazing your trail, you're avoiding the FD government intervention effects as much as possible. There are a lot of things in the game, thousand different paths it seems, but these days it feels more like a caricature of the galaxy it was when things were more chaotic. It could just be that I am too familiar with it now, not as magical as it was.

 

[Rob At Work]

I am starting to feel the "what is the point" syndrome..

What is the point of contributing on the forums...
What is the point of playing anymore...
etc...

anyone else?
is it dead yet?

 

[PaxtonNewt]

After a cursory glance over the cheating malarky in none the wiser as to how you do it.

 

[Midian Cabal]

Flawed analogy.

No it isn't.

 

[Midian Cabal]

I'm a member of HackerOne, and we protect more than just your bank account.

I know you are, and I think that HackerOne is a very good example of employing white hat hackers. Many companies do it, they even leave notes hidden with instructions how to contact the company.
Such white hat hackers could be employed by FD as well, as I already suggested it. I'm sure that many of us would gladly do it for a paintjob or ship kit.

 

[Midian Cabal]

And that's a consolation prize to all the other 8 who will never see their car again?
It would be more impressive if it'd be the other way around: 8 out of 9 cars are found again. Then I feel sorry for the 1 guy who loses his car this way.

Well it's not me that claims that both FD and Berlin police do their job.

 

[Phisto Sobanii]

Changing who controls the system isn't really an impact.

rings doorbell

Hi! My name is Elder Phisto. Do have a few moments to talk about the majesty of Anarchy?

 

[Riverside]

It is possible to be extremely irritating while remaining entirely within the rules

 

[Sir.Tj]

Sadly the insults and arguments have continued, please discuss the post not the poster.

 

[IndigoWyrd]

Do you know what the likelihood of being murdered is?
Do you know how likely it is that a murderer will be apprehended?
Do you know what process is involved in prosecuting a murderer?
Do you know what happens to convicted murderers?
Do you feel relatively safe living in a society with the current murder rate?

All this information, and more, IS available to you so that you can assess how well the police and justice system deal with murderers and then form an opinion about whether or not you're happy about the risks associated with murder in your society.

You see the analogy, right?

I tried, but no, I’m not seeing the analogy here. I suspect you might be over-analyzing, since we have no access to statistics regarding how many people are cheating, or something along those lines, which is skating around the point I’m trying to make here - that point being regardless of what the rules are, be they the rules of the game or the rules of life, there are always those who not only believe they need not follow them, but act on this belief.

This isn’t because the rules have failed, or were in some manner vague or lacking, but because someone has opted to act in violation of them, for whatever justification they’ve told themselves - anything from “I’m too wealthy and important for this” to “Someone who shared a characteristic with an ancestor of yours oppressed someone who shared a characteristic with an ancestor of mine, so I’m entitled...”

These are People Problems.

 

[Vasco Sapien]

"Don't cheat. Well, that kinda cheating I mean specifically."

Seriously though: don't mean this as a jab to you. It is just that while I personally find all cheating sad, the whole Righteous Crusade Against Cheaters by prominent PvP players is kinda comical when you see how selective they mean that.

I responded to this yesterday and my reply has been deleted.

Whats the point on taking part in this thread or any other if what you say gets erased.

Pointless.

i wonder what else vanished over night.

 

[Micha]

These are People Problems.

Yes, they are People Problems. But they are much worse if there is no visible punishment.

If you can just shoot people that annoy you, to ensure they never do so again, with very little to no risk of consequence, who wouldn't use that "solution" (morality aside)?

But since there are very visible and almost certain consequences, relatively speaking, very very few people take that approach.

Ditto with cheating. The incentive is obvious. The more moral people resist, the less moral ones embrace. For the latter, the only reason not to would be if there was not only a high chance of getting caught, but also of being punished. And the only way you'd know is if that was publicised.

That was, I believe, the point @Stealthie was making.

 

[babelfisch]

No it isn't.

Let's see...

When they'll steal your car in Berlin and it'll never be found, I'll tell you that the police is obviously doing something because every 9th is found again...

First you are comparing Frontiers efforts to fight cheats to the police searching for stolen cars. The police doesn't search for stolen cars, if they stumble upon it by accident they'll return it to the owner but they don't investigate. Frontier however actively added anti cheat tools to the game and searches for cheaters and bans them. That's what they've done in the past, which clearly was my point. So the situation isn't comparable at all.
Next you suggest that only 1 out of 9 cheaters get caught by FDEV over their lifetime or the lifetime of the game which is a number you just made up since no facts are available.

That's a flawed analogy, just like I said.

 

[00nutzy]

The problem is

Fdev has directly posted that they do catch and punish cheaters.
We have reports from outside sources that say cheats have been caught and punished.

So it is clear that something is being done, at what point is it enough to call off the pitchforks?
Can/should more be done, most likely.
Is more being done than we can see (or even be allowed to see) certainly.

If too much information is given that in and of itself gives the hackers/cheaters more ways to cheat.

 

[Phisto Sobanii]

Yes, they are People Problems. But they are much worse if there is no visible punishment.

If you can just shoot people that annoy you, to ensure they never do so again, with very little to no risk of consequence, who wouldn't use that "solution" (morality aside)?

But since there are very visible and almost certain consequences, relatively speaking, very very few people take that approach.

Ditto with cheating. The incentive is obvious. The more moral people resist, the less moral ones embrace. For the latter, the only reason not to would be if there was not only a high chance of getting caught, but also of being punished. And the only way you'd know is if that was publicised.

That was, I believe, the point @Stealthie was making.

What's the viability of going the vigilante route?

We have the names of people using these chests, yes? What groups do they run with? What assets in game might they value? How can we act against them and hold them accountable?

Why wait for FDEV if we don't have to?

 

[starman]

What about the cash for credits website. It's a kind of gold farming where your whole account is handed over to a third party who grinds for you millions of credits for a cash sum. That should also be fairly obvious. It automatically breaks the Eula to. Reported but Still going on. They even post feedback so you can partially see their email Address.

So suddenly every one can have a rated anacondas. But then what. You never earned them so didn't gain the skill and knowledge that goes with it. Its like drugs do you have to go back to the supplier for more? This obviously must have a impact on game balance.

 

[Phisto Sobanii]

They can just cheat. You can't. They win.

That's absolute garbage. Period. Dot.

This community has enough talent and intelligence to hand them their butts no matter what they try.

 

[Cmdr Nemo]

So much high, that FDev refused this approach once and forever.
They sold more than 3 millions of game copies so far. Even if just 10% of players are still playing actually - this means kind of up to 300,000 players per day (at least on weekends).
Now, assuming that these players are mainly from 2-3 main timezones, and play each one plays up to 2 hours within 6 hrs window in his timezone, that will mean about 50,000 concurrent players.
Now, each player performs well, let's say 2 actions per second on the average in combat zone - like fire and motion.
So, FDev would need to upkeep servers farm, capable of processing 100,000 requests per second 24/7. And not just log them, but analyze them intelligently on the fly in search of evidences of cheating.
How much would it cost? Is there any chance FDev will be ready to spend all those real money to just decrease cheating in digital videogame?

I don't think so! IF I owned the company, my question to any and all "Salter's" would be: "What part of the titles word "Dangerous" do you not understand.

Besides the supposed cheating aspect everyone is talking about, I'd imagine that if one can access and edit the code. Then one can alter the various number of materials need to engineer also.

Hence the reason PC's will NEVER be allowed to cross play with consoles.

 

[Phisto Sobanii]

You assume they care about assets. If I were cheating I'd just be flying around invincible having fun, not running the BGS.

Everyone cares about something. Find out what and gut it like a pig. Ask me how I know? Been doing this in game for going on three years.

Alternatively, one can always stick their head back in the hole of naysaying.

More fun to try though, I bet.