lol

Lol. Azogar calling someone else a multi? I'm on my phone right now, but can someone link the recent thread about him? It was started by me and was entitled something like 'my gunboat game had a player banned. '

http://webdiplomacy.net/forum.php?viewthread=565408#565408

http://www.webdiplomacy.net/forum.php?viewthread=565408#565408

I would really like to know why the hell Azogar isn't banned... IMO we did not get a satisfactory explanation in that thread.

Well apparently Azogar had his points docked. I suppose that's acceptable, but I'd prefer to see him have to start over from scratch and lose his preferred name.

I'm also (And I will say this again, for the umpteenth time) of the opinion that when a player is banned, any games they won should be retroactively canceled.

I was ok with how that turned out RLumley. I think the mods did a fine job.

Can that be done? If so that'd spare me a few defeats at the hands of a multi.

I take a pretty hard-ass approach to cheating Dingle. :-)

And I'm not sure if it can be done or not, but if it would actually be accepted, I might consider trying to write the code. I'm not sure how WebDip does data storage, but it's a simple matter of If Multi, and if Multi won, then Delete game.

Are multis a big problem here?

Not really, but they're probably the biggest problem. It's all relative.

Re: What I said above: I'd prefer he have to start over, also because he's probably cheated in other games, we just didn't catch him. ^^

rlumley, I believe the problem is that there isn't currently an automated way of changing the status of a game that has completed. Whether or not Kestas would want to have webdiplomacy be able to do such a thing is a question for the dev forum, so you might want to post it there.

Also, it is one of those slippery slope things. If the banned player won, sure, cancel the game and give the points back to the other players.

But what if he didn't win? Canceling the game takes away the victory from those that overcame the cheater. So let that game stand? What about a player in the game that was eliminated by the cheater ganging up 2 vs 1 before the others took him out?

why does this site allow cheats to prosper?

I would say that all games with a multi should be canceled, but I would settle for only those in which one of the multis soloed. This is because the cheater has disadvantaged some players to the advantage of himself, and one or two other players.

Consider a game where England and France are the same person. Would you say that Germany has an equal chance of winning that game as Turkey does? Surely not... The E/F multi will attack him first thing. Such a game does not reflect an accurate representation of the remaining five players skill levels, and should not be counted in statistics.

@Ebay - Stukus is right. not a big issue, but the main problem of those there are. More of an issue is the number of people hwo think its happening ot them.
@DJ - Well said, I'll pay you later
@rlum - As Ald says, its hard to decide. I try and cancel games or refund where I can, but often its hard to tell. Also, to some extent it doesn't matter. I know this is a deeply unsatificatory explanation, but suppose E&F were the same player and you never found out. You'd just feel it was a shame they made a strong alliance against you.
More important is that things are consistant, because over time you may loose out due to cheats, but you will also gain and overall the balance is maintained.

@fig:

Your fallacy relies on the principle in statistics known as the law of large numbers. It states, essentially, that as the number of trials increase, the proportion of occurrence approach the expected proportion. The thing is, the majority of users on the site don't have enough games to make this true. The smaller the probability of the occurrence, the more trials you need. I'll illustrate this by example:

Let's say the typical user has 20 games. (Probably above average for a user on this site, even after you take out all the people that play one game and leave) Let's say that 5% of games have a cheater. (Again, probably a generous assumption. In all likelihood, I'd say only 1-2%) That means that, for the typical user, only one of their games had a cheater. Either they benefited or they were hurt from that cheater, and in all likelihood, the cheater soloed. So lets say that there's a 50% chance they soloed, 25% chance I benefited, and 25% chance I was harmed. (Again, I think these numbers are more than generous. If you disagree, please say so.)

These numbers mean that, relative to other users, in 1.25% of their games, a user gets helped by a cheater, and in 1.25% of their games, they get hurt by a cheater. In 2.5% of their games, everyone gets screwed. 1.25% of 20 games isn't sufficiently large (In fact, it's only 1/4th of a game) to make things balance out. At most, the typical user will have only one game, and they can only either benefit or get hurt in that one game. (Remember, this is ignoring games in which the cheater soloed.)

And even if you break even compared to other people on this site, it makes our statistics un-comparable to those from, for example, diplomacy tournaments, because the majority of the time, the cheater will solo, which means the expected win percentage is lower.

Lastly, it's fair to remove those games, because anyone who thinks they've been cheated can report the game and get it removed.

I phrased that poorly. I should have said that your argument is a fallacy because of the principle of statistics etc...

i think games with multis shouldnt get removed from the stats. its a lot of work and what about the games where someone who wasnt a multi won and had a player banned for multi-accounting? what about draws? i do think that multis should have their names stricken from the ghost list, however, if thats not already the case.

RLumley, I don't like your questionable use of statistics. All I know is that if I won a game without cheating, if it got cancelled after the fact because there was a multi, I'd be pissed.

Agreed Dingleberry. The bottom line is that for those of us who don't cheat the victories are well earned and rewarding. Those of you who do cheat ( I am not accusing anyone ) you know you are not good enough to win on your own so you bump up your stats for what? Points and GhostRating mean nothing. This is a free site with no chance to win anything but games. I suggest you play more, practice and you will get better then you will not need to cheat.

You can say you don't like it, but it doesn't make what I said anything but valid. If you think my use of statistics is questionable, say why. You're not making an argument, you're just saying "I feel like you're wrong."

The bottom line is this, and it's undeniable: Some people get helped by multis and some people get hurt by them - and letting games in which a multi gave another person an advantage stand is unfair to the rest of the players.

Rlumley, its like knowing that some death row inmates are innocent. You can execute them all, but know that some innocent people are going to die.

You can cancel all multi games, but some innocent people are going to be affected.

Your use of stats is questionable because you admit you are making them up. Second, using your made up statistics, if 50% of all games with multis have the multi solo. Taking the other 50%, if the multi DIDN'T solo, I now have a 1/6 chance of having won, which is better than the normal 1 in 7. In those games, where I have a higher chance of winning, you want to discount that game. It seems to me just cancelling the game the multi won would make more sense then cancelling games in which I have a higher percent chance of having won.

That is true rlumley, however to remove all games with multis would not be fair to those who won games with multis in them. I actually won one with a player that was banned, I would hate to lose that win.

@Dingle:

I recognize that some people soloed despite multis. The majority of the time though, that's going to be for one of two reasons: The multi was banned, and that allowed the soloer to take over his vacant territories (hardly deserving of a win) or the multi was on the other side of the board, and let the soloer grow while his neighbors focused on the multi. (E/F multi and a Turkish solo, for example)

And I was incredibly generous with the statistics I made up. Do you actually think more than 5% of games have a cheater in them or that the average person has more than 20 games?

The only other two assumptions I made were that the solo rate of a multi is 50%, again this is probably much higher, and would only help my case, and that in a game with a multi who does not solo, 50% are hurt and 50% are harmed. If this ratio were anything but equal, (It's probably not, it's far more likely that 75% are hurt and 25% are helped) it would only help my case.

You're begging the question when you say you have a 1/6th chance. That's my entire point: You don't. Some people have a 1/4th chance because of their relation to the multi, and you have an 1/8th chance. And that's unfair.

The best way to deter crime is to make examples. Ridiculous that these multis aren't made examples of.

They often are

@ Dingle: "All I know is that if I won a game without cheating, if it got cancelled after the fact because there was a multi, I'd be pissed."

But what if, in that game, YOU didn't cheat, but the actions of a cheater nonetheless affected the moves of one (or more) of the other players who you defeated on your way to victory?

I am totally in agreement with rlumley on this issue. ALL games involving cheaters are tainted. They should be cancelled the instant the cheating is proven.

... of the other players WHOM you defeated...

That drives me insane, sorry. :-P

Way to nitpick when I was supporting your side of the argument, lumley.

The other point is trying to decide when it has been affected and when it hasn't, can be hard to solve

Rlumlwy seems to have a zero tolerance on just about everything. :P

@ figle: "The other point is trying to decide when it has been affected and when it hasn't, can be hard to solve"

That's why I feel we have to take the view that ALL games where a player has cheated are tainted.

Yes, and with multi's thats true.
However, meta's? Often players who do end up meta-ing played fairly together for games as well.

I think metagaming is a different issue. It's bad, but it's not as common, and it's certainly more fair than blatantly multi-ing.

And yeah, DJ, I do. I'm a grammar Nazi. Believe me, I wish I weren't. It bothers me to no end.

Others didn't rlumley

I think metagaming can be taken on a case-by-case basis. But I'd generally be pretty harsh. After all, friends playing together in face to face would be similar - out of game friendships affect things.

But multi-ing is blatant cheating. If you control two accounts in one game, both accounts should be banned, and the game should be retroactively canceled.