Anyone think the burden of proof for "cheating" ought to be lowered?

I won't name any names so as not to violate forum rules, but there are a few people around here who are almost certainly playing on multiple accounts and have probably been reported, yet they have not been banned. I think many of the regulars could give examples if asked.

So, what should be done? Are we all happy knowing that the majority of people don't cheat, but every now and then we're going to run into a jackass? Or should we push the mods to start banning more aggressively, possibly at the expense of a couple non-cheaters? Maybe a warning system should be put in place to give a person an opportunity to shape up?

I'm content to have people report suspicions through the link at the bottom of the page. Let Tom do the investigating since he has the right tools to do so.

I think what erastus is implying is that Tom's standard regarding what constitutes cheating could be raised.  This is one of those areas where it's hard for members to even get a sense of what the standard is.  Any evidence we have is going to be from personal experience only because debating the merits of any specific case is frowned upon.  That said, I have to admit that I personally don't get the sense that people are cheating in my games.  I for one am not hearing much in the way of generalized concern (except from erastus25), but I think it is a valid discussion if approached in general terms.

I notice you are a premium member @erastus.  I would encourage you to see if your grievances can be settled satisfactorily by contacting tom directly. 

M57 is right about what I was proposing.

My motivation is that I've had private talks with a few other players who agree that there is some cheating going on and that the burden of proof is a bit out of whack. I figured I'd mention it here and see if anybody else agrees, or if this feeling is just a very small minority. If others do agree, perhaps constructive suggestions can be generated. If nobody replies then I'll drop it.

And, to be clear, this post is NOT a criticism of tom or his policies. It's just intended to be an open discussion.

have you marked them as enemies?  Not a complete solution, but it's still worth doing.

I've reported a few cheaters that were banned.  Since you can look at people's most played opponents and their win/loss and play history with those opponents or games in general you have pretty decent tools to view their play.

Looking at my own play history some of my stats would look fishy without context, but that context is easy to see.  I have one person I've played where I have a 90% win rate in 1v1 games.  But then look at their overall winrate and they have only 38% winning in 1v1 games, and really if you do the math, it probably takes me 9 wins against that player to balance the points I lose in 1 loss to them.

Just do your homework on those players and certainly you could share your suspicions with another player who may have run into your "suspicious" opponents.

I don't want to disclose everything that I look for or all the data that I have access to, but I'm looking for fairly conclusive evidence that convinces me that they are a multi account user.

If someone has enough time (playing with lots of different accounts to defeat the check against common opponents, playing every game with multiple accounts convincingly enough so as to not arouse enough suspicion) and is sufficiently sophisticated about how they access the site (e.g. through proxies) then it's very hard to build that level of evidence. The vast majority of multis don't fall into this category - they are easy to spot and ban.

The trickiest to differentiate from multis are friends sharing a computer. Even if they are not deliberately forming a pre-game alliance they can play in a way which suggests this because they now each other well and may gang up against common enemies.

..unless it's my me and my brother, in which case the opposite occurs - we knowingly or subconsciously - try to beat the crap out of each other - throw caution to the wind.

tom wrote:

The trickiest to differentiate from multis are friends sharing a computer.

I'm glad that you look at each of these cases individually and decide.  Before joining Wargear I wanted myself and my kids to join another gaming site, but they only allowed one account per computer.  That was frustrating.

I found out about Warfish through my son.  He continues to work internationally and so we do a lot of stuff through the internet.  However, a couple of times a year he is home and of course uses my computers and until just now it never occurred to me how that might look if the "investigator" wasn't really sharp and looked carefully at the evidence.  Personally, I would be extremely upset to be banned incorrectly due to using a "lower standard"  what ever that means? to weed out cheaters.  I have complete confidence in how Tom goes about this as I have looked closely at several cases brought up by name players.  So, I would prefer we err on the side of caution which in some cases may permit a cheater to stick around for a few extra games to be sure that when someone is banned we know it is correct.

I'd think that (I'm making an assumption here) Tom doesn't just drop the hammer on a suspected cheater and disallow them from providing a rebuttal if they would want one.

I'd predict that people who are cheaters, likely just walk away when they are caught, because they know they're guilty.  But if you were to get accused of malicious behavior, and you know that you're innocent and you pursued Tom to request reinstatement (with some evidence to show that things you did were on the up and up), based on Tom's past behavior, I'd predict that he'd be lenient in reinstatement

BorisTheFrugal wrote:

I'd think that (I'm making an assumption here) Tom doesn't just drop the hammer on a suspected cheater and disallow them from providing a rebuttal if they would want one.

I'd predict that people who are cheaters, likely just walk away when they are caught, because they know they're guilty.  But if you were to get accused of malicious behavior, and you know that you're innocent and you pursued Tom to request reinstatement (with some evidence to show that things you did were on the up and up), based on Tom's past behavior, I'd predict that he'd be lenient in reinstatement

Agree, It wouldn't be that hard for you to show that your son's 'normal' IP address has him at a different location.  Not to mention, there's nothing wrong with same address users - there are a lot of families that play, but then care must be taken that there's no collusion. 

What amazes me is that people who cheat must do so because they gain some sense of satisfaction. But how? It's so easy and pointless of course you will win if you control 5 players in a 7 player game. But where is the fun? The satisfaction? To simply run up your ranking on a site that provides no financial incentive? So you can look at it and feel superior? Superior knowing that the rank was achieved via cheating? Clowns

Aside, but related:  I'm trying to find someone who will assume my user name, now that I am hoping to retire.  It's just for private Colossal Crusade games with a group of friends.  I am currently the all-time wins leader of our group and I just want the mantle/identity to be passed down.  Someone responding to this post called it cheating.  The thread is here: http://www.wargear.net/forum/showthread/3479/Can_Someone_Assume_My_Username_for_Colossal_Crusade_games  

Is this cheating if it's only for private games with friends?  No collusion or anything.  I think it's more like an assignment and delegation of my rights and responsibilities to someone else; like a novation.  It's also like when Bruce Wayne passed on the Batman identity... Batman (or my user name: "DeadMenOfDunharrow") could be anyone.  If you make yourself more than just a man...if you become a symbol... then you can become a legend.

Thoughts? 

I don't see that there's anything stopping you from 'retiring' and giving your user name to someone else. Once they have it, they can make it theirs - change the related e-mail address and password, and assume your on-line identity. There are however, rules that forbid players from playing with multiple accounts.  I didn't say they couldn't 'have' multiple accounts.  Designers use multiple accounts to test their boards, and the use of multiple accounts to play certain types of boards is the subject of a recent/current discussion.

And as I believe I mentioned in your other thread, as long as all the games a second or third account plays are private, I don't see that it breaks the spirit of the rules.  On the other hand, I don't know that anyone would want to play games that don't count in addition to their regular games - but I could be wrong.

Andernut wrote:

Looking at my own play history some of my stats would look fishy without context, but that context is easy to see.  I have one person I've played where I have a 90% win rate in 1v1 games.  But then look at their overall winrate and they have only 38% winning in 1v1 games, and really if you do the math, it probably takes me 9 wins against that player to balance the points I lose in 1 loss to them.

Sorry folks, this was too much to resist. I'm suspicious of my technique, but basically, I converted Andernut's 70% to a z-score and did the same for 38%. Turns out that in normal distribution, Andernut is 1.9 standard deviations above this player. Converting back to a percentile, we, with some hesitation, conclude that he should win 94% of his 1v1 games against this opponent. You're welcome.