The real issue is not the gold dethreating it is the same issue i that has been slowly killing the game for years.

[AveragePlayer 21]

! hour a go the silver server had a peak of 20 enfs 18 crims.  and it had been flowing around there for a few hours.  Then a group of cheats got on, and within half an hour the crim pop dropped to 3 crims as people were tired of fighting the same cheats over and over. Some tried to quit the missions when pitted with the cheats but then a cheat clan came on an the only option was fight the cheats or quit the game,  I left when it was 3 vrs me.  

 

No new engine or even fancy content will bring players back or retain them until the cheat epidemic is fixed. LO look at the server stats, when you see it die of it is because a group(s) of cheats have logged on and ran off the human players.

 

Start using the /report system and actually ban the cheats or give up on the game as it is headed down the same rode as combat arms. 

 

The cheaters attitudes in not "I'll stop cheating when the new stuff is out" it is and I am quoting several "who cares if I cheat in a dying game, LO doesn't care if i cheat as long as I pump a few bucks into them"

 

Right now LO seems to be more worried about putting a fancy dress on a old pig thinking the the pig will be the bell of the ball and every one will return. Yes you will loose a lot of current income by removing the cheaters , however as is you are losing more human players and the ability to get more players.  Ban the cheats by making examples of some of the worst cheats and loose 60% of the current player base. Or continue ignoring the cheat epidemic and have no one to show off the new dress too. 

 

look at the sever stats and run the numbers.  

 

 

[Thial 176]

Very fresh, unique and original view on the situation... 

You do realize that it's impossible to stop the cheaters ?

Even gigantic companies which are running CS:GO, Overwatch, Apex Legends, PUBG and other games have exactly the same problem.

It's a constant race between cheat devs and anti cheat devs + a constant problem of where to draw the line between a legit pro and a cheater.

Edited October 17, 2019 by Thial

[TheMessiah 430]

cheaters..cheaters everywhere...

[KnifuWaifu 499]

I agree that cheaters suck and they kill FCs just as quickly, if not quicker, than Mission Districts. 

 

 But I only just read Matt Scott's post on cheating and what he says initially (even though it was said in Dec 2018) is a really good insight on how cheating in APB is done, how it is detected, and dealt with. I'm just saying that's it's a huge uphill battle and there's no "IWIN" solution to this problem. 

 

We can only hope that when Matchmaking is further refined it will at least keep the cheaters off the newer/inexperienced players (sorry deep Golds, it'll be a you-problem then).

[sneekface 87]

IMO cheaters are not the problem, the district lobby is. New players just push one of the big "Financial" or "Waterfront" boxes and get sent to empty districts.

 

Theres no good explanaition for how the threat in districts work, especially since its been broken for literally years, and silver district has become gold district! How can new players know that?

[CookiePuss 5379]

5 minutes ago, sneekface said:

IMO cheaters are not the problem, the district lobby is. New players just push one of the big "Financial" or "Waterfront" boxes and get sent to empty districts.

 

Theres no good explanaition for how the threat in districts work, especially since its been broken for literally years, and silver district has become gold district! How can new players know that?

^a very good point^

[Uhtdred 238]

1 hour ago, sneekface said:

IMO cheaters are not the problem, the district lobby is. New players just push one of the big "Financial" or "Waterfront" boxes and get sent to empty districts.

 

Theres no good explanaition for how the threat in districts work, especially since its been broken for literally years, and silver district has become gold district! How can new players know that?

yup, i have been saying this for years, remove the "advanced tab" and make it MAIN TAB (and remove main tab).

 

imagine playing another game like apex legends, you play the first 3 matches and u get sent against players that have been playing apex legends for 7 years (i know apex legends is a new game, im just giving an example), wouldn't you quit the game instantly? I would.

 

This is actually happening, new players play their first 3 or 4 matches in SILVER DISTRICT against veterans that have been playing the game for 7 or 6 years, they finish 0/20 every match, and quit the game because they think "it's full of cheaters!!".

 

[Kakalaki 65]

18 hours ago, Uhtdred said:

yup, i have been saying this for years, remove the "advanced tab" and make it MAIN TAB (and remove main tab).

 

imagine playing another game like apex legends, you play the first 3 matches and u get sent against players that have been playing apex legends for 7 years (i know apex legends is a new game, im just giving an example), wouldn't you quit the game instantly? I would.

 

This is actually happening, new players play their first 3 or 4 matches in SILVER DISTRICT against veterans that have been playing the game for 7 or 6 years, they finish 0/20 every match, and quit the game because they think "it's full of cheaters!!".

 

yes technically you are right, but this has been discussed to death last years.

 

Two Major Problems are the facts that you go to a lower threat disctrict and that you can dethreat

 

Golds are going to silver Servers to get easier matches, and so do silvers. That's a chain-reaction.

You can only stop by changing threatlevels and / or restricting Gold Districts for Gold players and so on.

 

Another Problem is that many Players are pending between Gold and silver because of the broken threats, so they only have two possibilities to Play.

Play in Silver Server als "FakeGold" and getting rekt by Veterans or "Cheaters" or dethrat and go to bronze Server and at least have fun playing.

And honesty most of the "FakeGolds" are too good to Play in bronze which is again ruining the fun of those who are bronze and real silvers.

[Fortune Runner 796]

23 hours ago, AveragePlayer said:

 

yeah sure a much needed engine upgrade that can open the doors for real fixes to APB  is only dressing up a pig you hillbilly lol

 

23 hours ago, AveragePlayer said:

Ban the cheats by making examples of some of the worst cheats and loose 60% of the current player base

 

23 hours ago, AveragePlayer said:

No new engine or even fancy content will bring players back or retain them until the cheat epidemic is fixed

 

some do cheat that's why anti cheats exist and why APB has a new one to continue to ban cheating , but 60% are cheating by your numbers?

I highly doubt 60% are cheating

I honestly also doubt you understand business gaming practices and why your objectives are flawed.

[wHisHi 206]

Maybe its finally enough, devs already understood these issues 1 year ago and mentioning them AGAIN wont make any difference?

Spread some positivity to this forum, people are already fustrated here

[safdfsgkjhdgsjkhs 140]

hopefully the district phasing can better separate the good/or hacking players vs the new/lowskill players... this is what has been ruining apb since forever. if hackers would only fight vs hackers then there would be no problem really... it might actually make some of them stop hacking to get normal players as op again.

[Nymphi--DoubleDee 83]

On 10/17/2019 at 3:26 AM, AveragePlayer said:

Ban the cheats by making examples of some of the worst cheats and loose 60% of the current player base.

"Everyone that is better than me cheats."

 

 

[Fortune Runner 796]

22 minutes ago, Nymphi--DoubleDee said:

"Everyone that is better than me cheats."

 

 

that reminds me this past year or so you technically didn't cheat but you didn't play fair when you did an emote to flirt with some guy and he blew himself up a block from double b near the park and gas station lol

[Kakalaki 65]

6 hours ago, safdfsgkjhdgsjkhs said:

if hackers would only fight vs hackers then there would be no problem really... it might actually make some of them stop hacking to get normal players as op again.

And how do you think shall an AC (i mean Anticheat not AirConditioning)  detect cheaters and let them Play against each others instead of ban them when it cant even seperate who is cheating and who isn't?

The Problem is that the hackproviders are always on to update their hacks, so they are not being detected by any anticheat 

now we have the Problem that if it doesnt detect a cheat / hack it can only think that a Player is legit and very good, and if we are talking the truth in APB the gap between cheating and being pro is very small

Also there is a difference in how People are using their cheats.

Some are ragehacking (180s snaps, prenading anytime, triggerbotting with instant hits) others are closets and want to look like pros by for example just using wallhack, or very limited aimbotsettings which are more like an aiming assistant and some others who dont even know the game are cheating and still get rekt because of the missing knowledge about how game and guns working

 

Also we have the Problem that you can build hacks easily in AutoIt which isnt even supported by EAC

if you want to know more you can send a pm to me, maybe i can help you to understand how These and anticheats are working

[Fortune Runner 796]

10 hours ago, Kakalaki said:

The Problem is that the hackproviders are always on to update their hacks, so they are not being detected by any anticheat 

only some get updated. some cheat makes gave up on APB since its too small of a player pool and they cant make money off of it like they used to.

theres a lot of old threads talking about this lost in the abyss of duplicate threads.

[Offline 7]

the problem is no one cares i guess

[AveragePlayer 21]

"some do cheat that's why anti cheats exist and why APB has a new one to continue to ban cheating , but 60% are cheating by your numbers?

I highly doubt 60% are cheating

I honestly also doubt you understand business gaming practices and why your objectives are flawed."

 

Actually it is much higher as there are only a few players reminding the cheaters that are cheating, that is a lot of the cheaters do not understand they are cheating as they are not bothering to read the EULA or rules.

 

Of you think that there are a low amount of cheaters, or that the number of cheaters are inflated then simply look at the bannable cheat types, think of your last to matches:

 

Hacks: Did the enemy or some one on or team, pre-fire, track players through walls, spawn on top of you or out of range of where the spawns should be. Snap in midfire to a new target. Always know where you are. 

Hacks is the use of modified game files.

 

Bots: Did the enemy or some one on or team, See a player swap a gun from one hand fire switch to other hand fire repeat. Stand then fire, squat, stand then fire ... repeat. Grab an item run/jump fire catch.. repeat "fast carry and item". Jump shoot, jump shoot... repeat.  Drop their case and swap weapons in under 2 seconds. 

Bots are the use of a macro or ANY thing that mimics a macro

 

Glitches: Did the enemy or some one on or team, place an obj some place it can not be reached normally, Destroy an enemy objective do that they can not complete the objective. Use Bots to gain access to areas they shouldn't be able to reach (top of roofs). 

Glitches are the use of other cheats and exploits to gain an unfair advantage.

 

Exploits: Did the enemy or some one on or team, group with a cheater. Use the mechanics of the game to jump a car onto a roof so the OBJ is unreachable. Have a friend or clan member ghost, block the objective, interfere in any way such as ramming your vehicles. Or in any way influence the match externally.  Have an enemy or team mate dethreat, team kill while there is OP, prevent there team from completing the objectives.

 

While glitching uses, or is a byproduct, of exploits. Exploiting is using any thing that gave you an unfair advantage that you did not /report.  While being matched with a cheater is not avoidable and is not  exploiting as long as you /report the cheat. Grouping with one is a direct exploit of their cheats, not /reporting the cheat is double cheating. 

 

There are many more examples of players cheating, but this is the main one players forget: If you see a cheater that benefits you and do not /report it you are exploiting. 

 

Now remember your last 10 matches, how many of those had no player  doing any thing from the list of bannable cheats? That will give you a baseline of just how bad the cheating epidemic really is. Some years back one of the lead Devs estimated that the pop of cheats was at 90% because there was 30% of the player base that did not know the rules and assumed that only cheats were hackers. The 10% not cheating were the players playing by the rules and  /reporting the cheaters. 

 

So even if LO are putting the report system on the back burner, If you believe you do not cheat answer one question, are you  /reporting cheaters?  If not then you are cheating (exploiting).

 

 

OH, as far as the business model, I understand very well. Cheating is bad for business and will affect the bottom line. Game Developers create games to make money. That is their job and how they can continue to exist.  Cheaters are the equivalent  of a shoplifter as they are stealing from the company and turning away customers.  Why LO are not making cheating their number one (1) concern shows that they do not have any long term goals or plans to save the game.

That being said, I was there dancing in social when the RTWcb ended, I was there dancing in social when RTW closed the severs and hopefully LO will allow us to go out dancing in social when they have sucked out every penny they could.    The funny thing is, it is just a matter of adding or activating some  lines of code to remove 80% of all the cheats.  Moving to a new version of the engine may make the game better looking, however it doesn't fix anything.

Edited November 7, 2019 by AveragePlayer

[Lign 361]

On 10/19/2019 at 9:56 AM, Kakalaki said:

Also we have the Problem that you can build hacks easily in AutoIt which isnt even supported by EAC

if you want to know more you can send a pm to me, maybe i can help you to understand how These and anticheats are working

The only thing you can make with autoit or ahk is triggerbot and macro. 

 

Merged.

 

10 hours ago, AveragePlayer said:

Bots: Did the enemy or some one on or team, See a player swap a gun from one hand fire switch to other hand fire repeat. Stand then fire, squat, stand then fire ... repeat. Grab an item run/jump fire catch.. repeat "fast carry and item". Jump shoot, jump shoot... repeat.  Drop their case and swap weapons in under 2 seconds. 

Bots are the use of a macro or ANY thing that mimics a macro

Never heard about Bots in apb. And everything you mentioned is usually done even by average players. 

Edited November 7, 2019 by Lign

[StraaZi 34]

what planet do you ppl play APB on ????.....the players did not leave the gold district to get easier mm on silver. they left because all the cheaters played on the gold districts at that time. now nobody plays on the gold district not even the cheaters stayed assume that H vs H is not fun BOO HOO . the game was completely dead around 30 to 60 people playing apb before it came out on steam. why ...cheaters destroy the whole game no one wanted to stay or they started cheating themselves. then all the districts began to get locked up to protect all new players from the cheaters then the people who were tired of the cheaters began to dethreat to get rid of the cheaters again..it was gold players who left gold because it was too much cheats not new players that were completely destroyed..and the cheaters have far too many people in the forum who dont want any change on this problem just look at all the dislikes AveragePlayer got

 

 

i agree with AveragePlayer 100%

Edited November 7, 2019 by StraaZi

[Spy 152]

On 10/17/2019 at 12:59 PM, Thial said:

Even gigantic companies which are running CS:GO, Overwatch, Apex Legends, PUBG and other games have exactly the same problem.

That maybe so but what about copying the CSGO method? CSGO went f2p but paying for a csgo key would allow you to play on servers where only paying customers play. I know with the current APB population wouldn't be able to handle such system but if, for some miraculous reason, APB attracks a sh!tload of players after the engine update, inplementing the 'CSGO system' where special servers allow real big money Armas spenders to play vs eachother would defenately reduce the amount of cheaters. At least for the paying customers who are the reason that APB still exists as a game.

[Lign 361]

1 hour ago, Spy said:

That maybe so but what about copying the CSGO method? CSGO went f2p but paying for a csgo key would allow you to play on servers where only paying customers play. I know with the current APB population wouldn't be able to handle such system but if, for some miraculous reason, APB attracks a sh!tload of players after the engine update, inplementing the 'CSGO system' where special servers allow real big money Armas spenders to play vs eachother would defenately reduce the amount of cheaters. At least for the paying customers who are the reason that APB still exists as a game.

The method valve decided to use in csgo would not fit apb because of low pop and how strongly players stay for no paid stuff. The only thing that could be potentially useful is to locking some copies of the districts to the players who connected their phone number and if you get banned every your account that is connected to that phone number will be banned as well and you can’t share that phone number to other accs anymore.

Edited November 7, 2019 by Lign

[Spy 152]

On 11/7/2019 at 11:49 AM, Lign said:

The method valve decided to use in csgo would not fit apb because of low pop and how strongly players stay for no paid stuff.

I already said that it won't work on a low populated game, my statement was based on an engine upgraded large populated game.

 

Also, locking a phone to an apb account for 'cheat protection' will not work either, loads of uncharged simcards are free these days so it will defenately not stop cheaters. Besides that, I'm pretty sure lots of people in general will be uncomfortable with sharing their personal phonenumber with any smalltown gamepublisher. The 'CSGO method' has a better chance of succeeding with a $10 Armas spending. It will make cheaters think twice before they reroll and spend more $. 

 

 

Edited November 12, 2019 by Spy

[KnifuWaifu 499]

I just want to use this opportunity to plug my "Player Blacklist" idea - basically works like the /ignore list, but instead of ignoring their themes/banners/chat, it tells the Matchmaking system "Hey, I don't want to be matched against this player ever again." and then it removes them from your matchmaking queue for as long as they are on the blacklist for that player. 

 

It's a double-edged sword I know, especially with such a low population - but it does stop the "constantly being matched against the same toxic group" issue that ruins district pops. Sucks for FC though where there is no matchmaking but since we're talking about genie wishes here - if Player X joins a FC and which has the majority of players who have Player X on their Blacklist, then Player X gets infinitely stuck as a neutral player in "Waiting for Players" mode. 

 

It'll probably take a wizard to code all that in, but I can dream!

 

 

Also I know that most cheaters can just reroll - but then it works just like the /ignore list where you've got to be vigilant and delete/cycle names/players who you haven't seen in a while because no doubt those throw away characters are long gone.

Edited November 12, 2019 by KnifuWaifu

[vsb 6171]

17 minutes ago, KnifuWaifu said:

I just want to use this opportunity to plug my "Player Blacklist" idea - basically works like the /ignore list, but instead of ignoring their themes/banners/chat, it tells the Matchmaking system "Hey, I don't want to be matched against this player ever again." and then it removes them from your matchmaking queue for as long as they are on the blacklist for that player. 

 

It's a double-edged sword I know, especially with such a low population - but it does stop the "constantly being matched against the same toxic group" issue that ruins district pops. Sucks for FC though where there is no matchmaking but since we're talking about genie wishes here - if Player X joins a FC and which has the majority of players who have Player X on their Blacklist, then Player X gets infinitely stuck as a neutral player in "Waiting for Players" mode. 

 

It'll probably take a wizard to code all that in, but I can dream!

 

 

Also I know that most cheaters can just reroll - but then it works just like the /ignore list where you've got to be vigilant and delete/cycle names/players who you haven't seen in a while because no doubt those throw away characters are long gone.

i can’t wait to never get opp again because everyone blacklists anyone who beats them

[KnifuWaifu 499]

4 hours ago, Solamente said:

i can’t wait to never get opp gain because everyone blacklists anyone who beats em

That’s part of the double-edged nature of the solution, it could be mitigated by maybe having the blacklist a small list so a single player can't have the entire district blacklisted. Or maybe having the blacklist reset every week? Day? Or on log out? 

 

But if a player has gotten to the point where they can't find any OP due to having the whole district blacklisted - the issue probably exists with that player and not the district, like everyone in this thread has stated the whole game isn't full of cheaters it's just a couple of toxic ones that ruin the fun, so we should have the choice to not play against those since detection and prosecution of toxic players is a long and difficult process.

 

*IF* players want to abuse the blacklist by putting players who simply beat them on the list rather than were being toxic - that's their issue imo, you reap what you sow.

 

I do see another exploit thinking about it - a gold puts all the golds on the blacklist and now they only get matched with silvers/bronzes once the matchmaking goes into "find any player" mode. But that can be solved by removing the "find any player" mode. Again, if a player is blacklisting so many other players that they run out of OP - the issue is them, not the game.