Minecraft Name: AdmiralD Suggestion: It seems to be time to re-evaluate hacks and cracks usage. Reason: For those of us who choose not to cheat, it seems this issue is just getting worse every day. So many players are using hacks it is ridiculous. And many of these players would not even get caught if not for their own stupidity. In addition, it seems there is no real penalty for cheating anyway. I link this suggestion (one of many) that has been around for over a year to increase consequences and very little has been done: https://www.ecocitycraft.com/forum/...ity-of-punishments-towards-sg-hackers.121628/ Any Other Information: Has it ever been considered to just allow hacks and cracks so that at least everyone has a level playing field? I realize the economy would need adjusting due to increased profit. I also would love to close this suggestion if penalties for cheating would be a true deterrent. Finally, does anyone else remember when the use of X-Ray, or even acting like you had it resulted in what was called a "perma"(which we all know does not exist) ban? Thank you for your time and consideration. Link To This Plugin/Is this a custom addition?:
first of all, xray doesn't even net you very much in profit in the first place, and it's incredibly easy to get away with if you have half a brain. sg hacking is far worse cause you make more money and you affect others, and it's easier to catch
ECC has an anti-xray plugin that obfuscates/hides ores that are covered up. While xray can and will net you extra profit, it's almost negligible. (though, fastbreak is a different story.) Also.. I have no idea what you're actually suggesting here. What do you want to change?
Thank you for that info. Has it ever been considered just to go ahead and allow it for everyone (at least providing a level playing field)? As for SG, is it not a simple math problem to figure out who cheats? If players a thru y earn from 3k to 20k per hour playing and player z earns an average of 40-60k per hour, does it not seem worth investigating? Of course my numbers are hypothetical. Thank you in advance for your consideration in this matter.
There is too much difference in earnings, too many variables. Anyone who makes a lot less could be a cheater, and someone who makes a lot more isn't necessarily a cheater. It just needs people who can look at SG in-game. Video evidence is difficult to get, most people can't record. So staffmembers should be able to make live decisions, or even just record a person throughout a game
I think if the consequences of being caught using hacks were actually in any way severe, it would probably make a lot more people reluctant to try to get away with using them. That's my personal thought. I think yeah, first offenses shouldn't be so bad, but they should be bad enough to not make you want to ever get caught to the point you're unwilling to take the risk. Otherwise the economy is really sort of busted by this. I don't wanna keep people off the server either, but either hacking is terrible or it's not, you can't really have a fair middle ground where we ask that you don't cheat but if you do you will just get a short time out. I don't think this is the solution but I'm not happy with the situation at the moment and I get where you're coming from because yeah, at what point is there a balance here?
1st offense - 1 week temp, balance wipe (first offense should be light, repeat offenders are the problem) 2nd offense - 30 day temp, balance wipe, SG stat wipe 3rd offense - Permaban and account wipe, towns go up for immediate claim, if the user manages to return they will be builders, have nothing except for previous donation features, and will be permanently blacklisted from the SG leaderboards. Not sure whether this should be a soft perma (appeal to andrew) or hard perma (no appeal anywhere). It should not be profitable to hack.
In my opinion, just go back to permabanning x-ray hackers (and other major hacks) and at least balance-wiping and 30-day tempbanning PvP hackers. That seemed to get the point across before, but now, people are appealing "permabans" and getting away with hacking without balance wipes. If more strict punishments are restored like a couple years ago, that should help send a message to those who hack that they can't get around it.
I do not envy our staff having to balance being too strict vs. being too easy. I do agree with you that stricter seems to get a better message across. There was a massive "let every hacker cheat and scammer" ban appeal approval. Some of those have shown great promise of improving our community. The problem seems that now there is no fear of consequence as the attitude is "I will get to come back in a while so no issue here".
My point here is if Xray impact is "almost negligible", then why do we ban for it? Why not allow everyone to use it that wants to?
While almost negligible in the sense of the whole economy, it's still a considerable unfair advantage compared to other players. While it's not as exaggerated as triple/quadruple profit (fastbreaking melons = a good 60k+ an hour), it's still a good 10-20% increase in profit. Due to the way the anti-xray works it greatly reduces the impact of xraying and will probably stop most people from making any extra profit from it, but anyone with a bit of knowhow can work with the mechanics of the anti-xray to still get extra profit out of it. I won't go in the details of how it works, but believe me when I say I can make a good 20% more money with xray than without. This means instead of 15-18k an hour I can make 18-21k an hour on average. (with an eff5, xraying with eff7 is as useless as it gets, because you can't exploit the anti-xray mechanics with it) Xray is neglible because you still make less than with an eff7, but it's still a considerably unfair advantage towards other players. Not punishing those people is stupid. Another thing I have to say: Even if you allow hacking, only a small portion will actually do it. The majority of the playerbase doesn't know, care, or want to hack. So you'll still have the problem where some people are disadvantaged. Allowing hacking for everyone doesn't improve a thing.
Thank you for such a detailed explanation. I understand now although it just seems we spend so much time with this process, and many times over and over again with the same players. I will admit that hacking holds no interest to me, too hard to figure out and I am just too old to care anymore. It would be awesome if everyone could just play games without feeling the need to cheat. I appreciate everything that you have done and the time you spend helping to make this a better community.
