He does have a point holy shit, i'm in a live anon game now and it's the same shit

http://webdiplomacy.net/board.php?gameID=25766&msgCountryID=0
all are cd'd but me and the cheating nations of austria and italy

France and England work together to kill Germany, never worried about each others builds. When Germany is dead, France CD's and England wins. The Mods are overworked as it is, so just avoid these games if you value your time.

oh. Now I see it.

If it makes you feel any better we could have a fair game when that one is finished? We can password it.

I disagree. Most live anon games that I have played were fine (and I have played more than a few).

then you got lucky.

I agree with Bardouche's disagreement. It's very simple-

When cheating occurs in gunboats, it's essentially a 'permanent alliance' (so one player is dictating to the other what moves to do to in order to better his chances of winning). As a result, you're playing against an extra person. To battle this, you either try and form an alliance in one of your other opponents through signs, you either step up and bring your a-game and take the challenge head on, or you imitate Barn3tt's frequent strategy by crawling up in the fetal position.

Not saying it's right, just saying it's an added challenge.


gameID=25773

@ottovanbis
a very similar thing happened to me in a real world diplomacy game. I was france and was unable to expand because of italy, while austria consumed the other countries that had stopped playing. it wasn't cheating because it was the real world and the other players just were bored, but by the time i got through italy, austria had taken all of russia, turkey and some of germany, and couldnt be stopped.
as to the game that started this thread, i can see how much of a problem that is. you play a whole game, spend a few hours, only to loose and find out that a multi cheated you.

I see a lot of accusations flying around on this site. Just because players play horribly or quit as soon as they are turned on, does not mean they are cheating. Obviously, it can be quite frustrating. I would rather have the mods focusing on legitamate leads than on accusations based on frustrating games.

what about if this same player, always leaves the game or stops moving just at the right time to mysteriously give a nation the upper hand?

and idealist, I seriously doubt it.

Barn3tt you are the root cause of frustration in games (a point that has already been established by I forget who). Ergo, the mods should focus on you).

Bazinga.

xoxo.

frustrating does not equal cheating, yet it could still be cheating. (im just putting it out there, barn3tt) i can vouch for this: there are several games i left early in, not because i wanted to give someone an advantage, but because my computer crashed. It is when you find people who have played together several times, and one quits while the other stays, that cheating should be suspected and a mod brought in, or at least alerted.

That's fair, let's test it in this new gunboat: gameID=25775

These two players have played together twice in some 20 or more games. Serioussham, that looked like a rather frustrating game for you. But I don't see cheating, just my two cents.

@5nk
cut down the starting time of that game and I will join
@Barn3tt
Ya sure they haven't played that many times, but when you look at just a few of the games you see alot of the same people showing up, fulfilling their role as the fall guy. And yes it was a bit frustrating.

serioussham is right. nearly every game with that "sir" guy has a suspicious aspect, either multiple noob acounts that leave, or a lower rank player that keeps showing up...etc. im up for a live game right now too, btw.

1. Let's keep talking about this and it will facilitate cutting down the start time
2. Barn3tt, myself, and others have played in a kajabilliontrillion games together and they all fulfill their...destiny...by falling to my feet. Are you calling me a cheater?

Well, when you win 5nk, it's hard to believe you aren't.

This is a semi-serious issue, so please don't drag it down with stupid questions. I bet your game would fill up quicker if you just made a new one.

Oh heyyyyy buddy how's it gooinnnngggg?

Join up Rappy

no. also, note that alexthegreat, a person with many games with the "sir" guy joined and left the current anon game.
the thing about plying multiple times with others is that it is unavoidable. the only way to tell for sure that the people in question arnt cheating is to look at each game and see if the play between them is legit looking, and that can be difficult to be sure of.
in short, there have been, will be, and are cheaters in webdiplomacy. we must simply try to rid ourselves of the few that we can convict for sure, and only the ones we are sure of. as maimonides said: it is better to let 1000 guilty persons go free, than to convict a single inocent one. here in diplomacy the ration must be smaller, but the point still holds.

the "no" was in reference to is 5nk a cheater.

Awwww xoxo

this is totaly irrelevant, but who wants to be italy? is there anyone who would acctualy choose italy? i know italy can win in theory...

Hi. I wasn't going to bother responding to these accusations, but since someone mentioned Alexthegreat I figured it would be good to clear things up.

Alexthegreat is my brother, and as you've noticed we've played in three live anonymous games together during the last two days. We didn't let each other know who the other one was, obviously. In one game we fought each other (I won), in the other two we never came near each other. I believe we played in one game together before that a long time ago, maybe two (and we've both played in quite a few games). If you still want to accuse us of being cheaters now, go ahead, that's your own time you'll be wasting.

As for the live game today, Serioussham, I just got lucky that France decided not to fight me (not that France and England don't ally often in non-gunboat games). And I was as surprised as you were when the French player left. I can't even say I'm pleased, it made the game much less interesting (I think I would have defeated France eventually anyway). So that's what I've got, if the mods think it's suspicious I'm happy to let them do whatever they do to check if people are cheating.

well. thats lucky. same ip adress too, right... frankly sir, i dont care. you look suspicious. there is no way for us to confirm a lack of communication between you and your 'brother' during the anon games. making it possible metagaming at least. i suggest not playing any more games with him, even checking to make sure you join different anon games. to be sure, you are inoccent untill proven guilty, and as i said above its better to let guilty people go than to convict the inoccent. so just be cautious in the future. im not going to dig through your account any more, but you should know that several of us are watching you more carefully now.

(i hope so at least, in regards to my last sentance)

As i have said countless times live anon games are conducive to people cheating, or friends IRL play without letting people know in the forum, and this is also cheating when they ally... and of course there's those who create several accounts and suddenly one or more drop out of the game giving advantage to the other.

AVOID LIVE ANON GAMES UNLESS U KNOW WHO IS PLAYING IN ADVANCE

Newguy--I actually agree. We always tried not to play in the same games precisely because there's so much paranoia about metagaming around here. Last two days we were just really bored and thought it would be fun to play some live games, and decided that since we wouldn't be cheating it would be obvious that no cheating was going on. However, I guess that even the fact that it's obvious that there was no cheating, isn't enough to please people around here. So you can rest assured we will not play in any games together in the future.

Interesting that some players are involved in a LOT of the obvious cheating games. And they continue to get points from these games.
How rife is cheating in these games i wonder?
90%>?

Call me naive but I'm sure cheating is in reality at quite a low level on this site for the simple reason that there is so little to gain. The only two major motivations I can think of for playing Diplomacy is enjoyment of the game (which is lost if you resort to cheating) and to gain the respect of the community (which due to the eagle eyed nature of many of the active players and forum users would plummet if you are suspected of cheating). I would expect a lot of what looks like cheating is down to noobs making foolish mistakes, for which I myself have been guilty on a few occasions, and coincidence.

Octavious, sorry i believe you are a little TOO naive.

A lot of children on this site cheat for the fun and competition amongst friends i am sure, to see who can get the most points, and as a result ruin the game and this site for all.

octavius is largly right. but there must still be a deterent against cheating. the eagles must continue their watch, though i wouldnt bother making as many of the forum threads. watch your own games, collect your own evidence, then tell the community, and/or a mod. that being said, if you've got the time, (like me) to check out threads like this one, do it.

mel, you have a point as well, in another possible motive. and i can think of another: some people probably like the attention they get from the "eagles" of diplomacy, and the people who rant and rave about cheating at the slightest provocation.

Don't get me wrong, I'd be against lowering the level of vigilance that is currently maintained by players, otherwise cheating may indeed develop into a mjor problem. I was recently in a 24hr per turn game that involved a player with a 97% defeat, 3% resigned record who didn't turn up. It arose my suspicion so a spent more than a few minutes going over his games to see if there were any players he's been up against a few times. Ironically the first suspect I found turned out to be me, and after giving myself a stern talking to I decided to be a little less quick to jump to conclusions.

1. Do not, on any account, post these accusations in the forum. Its just stupid and annoying. I'd have hoped that people could just respect this rule as a rule, but it seems as though some kind of enforcement may be necessary.

2. The original accusation appears to have been wrong.

3. From what I've seen, I don't think sir692 and Alexthegreat have been metagaming, and them being different people checks out.

In conclusion, some people need to blow off some steam. For the majority of these things, there is no evidence of multi-accounting.

Ghost

Don't forget the prestige of being in the Hall of Fame:

http://webdiplomacy.net/halloffame.php

(tho i admite Ghost rating is the new 'shit')

The last game I played in I think I cheated myself. Therefore, I am officially banning myself from live games. I obviously need time t think because I've never won a live game and the overall quality of the games suck. Plus, as I said before, I cheat myself.

Ohh. Let me clarify that last statement. That sounds wrong now that I read it. I mean that I hurt my chances to win, not that I also cheat. Is that clearer?

http://www.webdiplomacy.net/profile.php?userID=22540

The same guy, tmg996 admitted to me he (germany) and england are friends from school...

as indicated from there immediate movement towards myself.. now just cop it on the chin but noticed he has done it to a lot of people... also interesting they both just 'drop' out... i think we allied against them both - so tmg dropped to give his stuff to england but we worked against him...

sorry
http://www.webdiplomacy.net/board.php?gameID=25407

umm yea i know they guy that doesnt mean i cant attack him if i wanted to we talked on web dip i see no problem.

You know him from where?

We both go to the same school, we did this for a american history project and now about 80% of my class has an account, yea me and him play games that doesnt mean if it came down to it we would draw if i had to kill him to win i would not hesitate