In the game "PLEASE 1100+ scores only" Cabrao and Newfie1 played from the beginning in a secret alliance. How this can be fair totally escapes me, but they seem to think there's nothing wrong with it. I need to know if this is cheating or just a clever stratagy. If a good percent of players think this action is just part of the game I well go elsewhere. If it is cheating then I need to be able to exclude these players from any game I host. I don't want to play with cheaters. If I can't exclude these people from the games I host then I'm the one that needs to go. This needs to be resolved.

Looks like you all have a nice little history together. It also looks like they may have an alliance in a game (not sure if it was from the beginning, didn't look at your entire games list, might provide a link to the game in question), but that is not necessarily against the rules/guidelines, strategy sometimes involves creating truces/alliances so that you can take out a certain opponent. Now I imagine some of the language you've used in those public games are against the rules/guidelines, so that could come back to you IMO.

Looks like you've jumped them pretty hard and accused them quite a bit, so I can actually see why they may have created an alliance.

You can set them to an Enemy on your Settings and if they are Standard members they will be unable to join your games, they will also be unable to post messages on your profile and you can disable them from sending you private messages.

No Yertle, not in a game that excludes teams. Not when the attacked player has no prior knowledge of the 'alliance'. Read the whole message log. I tried everything civil to resolve this. If you are telling me that this type of play is 'not necessarily against the rules/guidelines' then the rules need to be changed. They are not Standard members so I can't exclude them from games I host. Make this work or your site will not succeed for the long term. I certenly will not be creating any further games until this is resolved.

It's tom's site, but from what I've gathered, secret alliances/truces are not against the rules.

Preconceived alliances (ie two people joining non-team games together as a team) is not accepted and also the same person playing two accounts is definitely not accepted and a bannable offense.

But again, secret alliances are not against the rules.

I read the full message list in game http://www.wargear.net/games/view/24404 and I see you having quite a few messages in a short period of time, then Cab said they weren't the same person and asking how they are playing together and then you busting out the "******* cheater" comment.

Yertle, do you want players doing this to you? Would you think it was clever? Is this play in the spirit of the game? Would you think you had lost in an honest game? Would you want your score affected by this 'stratagey'? I know Cabrao has been around awhile, but he and Newfie1 made a mistake. But Cabrao refuses to see how unfair this is. I am not interested in the technicalaties of whose is in charge. This is a situation that needs to be fixed. Make it a better place to play. Fix this problem.

I expect secret alliances/truces if that's what you're asking, especially if I have a troop/bonus lead. If I notice something super fishy, then I may note the players or something and watch out in the future, but unless it is a long ongoing obvious thing I probably wouldn't even notice it or bring it up.
But I also try and stay on people's good side so they don't attack me :).

Like I've said though, preconceived alliances are frowned upon so if they were there before the game began then the game could be terminated and the player's warned. Looks like some of the games have been voted to terminate at your request though too. So I personally probably won't be avoiding Cab/Newf as they seem to have handled it all better than some that I've seen being accused of cheating.

Mr. Yertle, you're defending the undefesable. THIS WAS AN ALLIANCE FROM THE BEGINNING. Of course two weak players in the middle of the game both attempt to attack the strong player, and not each other. Please don't mix these different situations. Yertle, 'stay on people's good side so they don't attack me' Is this where I type LOL. Why is it that no one else has responded to this? I need to know if a good number of players think this is fair, and are OK with this. I am absolutly against secret preplanned alliances. It is a waste of time to play in such games. I play this game for entertainment, if I have NO chance to win then the hell with it.

Conspiring to team up before the game even starts is against the rules, with egregious instances of this being punished by banning accounts.

Alliances within a game (team-play or not) in response to conditions within the game is normal and desired. The game is not all about roll roll roll, it's about diplomacy as well.

The problem is that is VERY difficult to tell the difference between a preconceived alliance and one decided on after the game starts.

This:

"If it is cheating then I need to be able to exclude these players from any game I host."

...sounds reasonable. Before threatening to leave if this isn't done, you might want to, you know, ask if that can be done. WG is very community driven in terms of rules and the admin is very cool with making changes.

I personally see no reason why Premium Members should be able to override the Enemy Exclusion. Anyone?

IRoll11s wrote:
I personally see no reason why Premium Members should be able to override the Enemy Exclusion. Anyone?

Yep I do.  Otherwise I'll just set the top 10 players to Enemies (with the exception of asm since he's actually easy :)) and then they can't join my games.  I would be HIGHLY against Premium accounts not overriding the Enemies unable to join games setting.  I'd even almost bring up that Standard accounts shouldn't be restricted (then Enemy would only be around messages/flagging), but I'll stop before I get there ;).

You never answered my questions Yertle. Please do. As for listing the top 10 players as enemies, you know that any player with pride in beating the best players isn't going to do that. Hell, I've even set up games for only 1100+ score players only, and they are becoming as popular as regular games. But, please, back to the subject at hand. As to Iroll11s point, I agree that it would be very hard to prove a game alliance if it didn't show itself intil the middle of the game. But two players who OBVIOUSLY, from the beginning, not attacking each other is easy to spot. I just maintain that very few players would be OK with this kind of 'stratagy'. It WILL ruin this game if not checked.

pechin... dude... take a day off and come back to this. I respect you too much as a player to listen to you when you're like this. I respect both Cabrao and Newfie too. I promise you, they were not in a secret alliance from the beginning of that game. And I went through that history turn by turn. I can come up with a justification for every player's decisions all through the crucial stretch. You way overreacted with very little evidence, first of all, which is already going to make people behave differently towards you. But I didn't even see any evidence of a secret/temporary (legal) alliance in that game, much less a teamup from the beginning (illegal). Take a step back, a few deep breaths, and go back to that game history in a couple days and I think you'll see as well as I do that every one of the 4 of you was playing to win.

These questions? Dunno what I'm missing so here goes.
No I don't like when people have alliances against me (ummm who does though? :P). Sometimes it is clever. Secret alliances are part of the game. I accept losses when people have secret alliances. I'm okay with my score being affected by secret alliances.

I haven't seen significant ongoing full game preconceived alliances between Cab and Newfie to accuse them as hard as you have and to be ready to throw them out. Secret alliances can form at the start of a game (ie you get Australia, I get Asia for the time being) with it still being "legal" IMO.

Interesting discussion:

On the one hand, we discourage players from opening two accounts and using them to pad the stats and rankings of one, but if two players decide to collude in many of their shared games (maybe not all) to form alliances in order increasing both of their stats, this is much more acceptable.

It certainly is difficult to prove, but I think there are more "natural" mechanisms that can take care of this problem. If the behavior is consistent, and the community at large (or even a small portion of it) gets a sense of what's going on - turnabout is fair play.  I'm not putting these two players on my enemies list yet, because I haven't looked at the games and there doesn't seem to be a consensus regarding what's been going on yet. ..but for the above reasons, I'm not too worried at this point.

I've had issues with these two players a couple of months ago AND let them know I brought in senior players to view the game and they agreed with me. With that said, I didn't make a formal complaint with Tom as I was talked off the fence, but I have kept an eye on them since and I also let them know they were being watched by others. Pechin, the crowd writing here isn't following you strong enough at this point to bring it to Tom. My suggestion is to let them know you have brought in people to view their games and the next time you will (and others may) block them.
I was in a 3 person game with them with them and I told them I felt honored as it took both of their efforts to beat me....LOL
Just be careful, as it is a Razor's Edge here....
Dud

didn't look to me like there was anything terribly out of the ordinary in that game.

red didn't poke green out of aussie as green didn't poke at red AND he wasn't strong enough to, yet. green didn't poke at red earlier cus red didn't have a bonus yet.

then red finally actually GOT asia, and all your posting BS started. Seriously more than a half dozen posts in 10 minutes demanding an instant reply? ALL of your posting issues happened BEFORE green even had a chance to play his turn. and you don't think THAT played into their taking you out before attacking each other?

hell, after 3 pages of bitching before i got MY turn, i sure as hell would have taken you out too. and if you noticed as soon as he played he DID attack red 6v3, which should have worked. unfortunately for green it didn't!

M57 wrote:

but if two players decide to collude in many of their shared games (maybe not all) to form alliances in order increasing both of their stats, this is much more acceptable.

I'm not sure anyone has said that is more acceptable...

I wouldn't be happy with it.

i'm pretty sure the exact opposite was mentioned. that once in a while it was ok, indeed expected. but if it was a regular occurance, they would need to be talked to.

..so we're talking about the line between "many" and "once in a while"?

I'm just kidding.. Point taken. I retract my statement (without being able to actually delete it).

The most important factor to consider when talking about alliances in risk is that only one player can win the game. This implies that a legal alliance between two players is by definition temporary. This in turn implies that breaking alliances is not morally reproachful and, in fact, that it is wrong NOT to break an alliance at the appropriate moment.

If two of my opponents do not end their alliance at the point where one of them would clearly benefit by doing so, then they are either bad players or cheaters.. and I dislike playing with either.

If the same two players regularly make this decision, then I would consider them to be cheating.