The Castle Doctrine Forums

Discuss the massively-multiplayer home defense game.

You are not logged in.

#51 2014-04-06 10:58:51

Lord0fHam
Member
From: California
Registered: 2014-02-11
Posts: 487

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

Also, while I understand that you want this problem solved, it does nothing to select certain people and put them on your list. Most of the talk in this thread is just those people refuting you. A list like that only alienates others and makes them mad.


It's a trap!

Offline

#52 2014-04-06 11:22:30

Kimenzar
Member
Registered: 2014-02-04
Posts: 183

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

I like to leave this here:

http://www.geistbraus.de/wp-content/upl … ranger.jpg

Discussions are ok, but not name-listing like that. It is as bad as DA Abuse.

Offline

#53 2014-04-06 11:59:07

JoyOfTrapping
Member
Registered: 2014-02-08
Posts: 158

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

Alright my turn to weigh in.  Don't expect anything interesting or fancy: I've already bent my d!#* halfway back over on itself trying to regulate this discussion and put some "forum chills" on it.  I feel that I've done that enough and my service to the community in that regard is sufficient.  I feel the same of many other players on the "List."

To defend myself, I have one account, and I have always had one account.  And I have never argued or proposed that 2 accounts gives no advantage over 1 account.  Duh, it totally does.  I just don't care about it all that much.

I read a ton of articles and watched a ton of interviews about the game the day that I bought it, and I got myself on board with the philosophical and creative spirit of the game from day 1.  Because of this, I have:

- Never expected the game to be fair
- Never expected the game to be "pvp-balanced"
- Never expected the game to be fully regulated within moral bounds
- Never resented Jere, Iceman, or JWG for having up to a year's lead time on me playing the game, resulting in tons more knowledge and skill, 1337 electronics skills from peering deeply into the source code, and basically the ability to cut my d!#* off 3 times over.

Do I think it's a little bit p*ssy?  Yeah.  Am I a card carrying supporter?  No.  Would I do it some day?  Well, yeah I guess, probably only if I had a specific objective though.

mmaster wrote:

I'm just quite fed up with this multi account non-sense going on on the forums. Even the russian spammers were more creative and each post contained different movie.

ROFLMAOOOOOOOOOO!  F yeah, +1000 points, MMaster you never fail to crack me the hell up.  Stuff like the above is basically why I made my own post questioning the legitimacy of our dual account discussion.

Now moving on, I was a little annoyed to see my name and a bunch of other peoples' on some "List."  But I did read your whole post.  Actually, after I thought about it, you know what, good for you.  I give you my warrior's respect for having the guts to call all of us out directly, and then to fight with your well-organized opinions.  That was pretty cool, and definitely in the spirit of the game.  Additionally, as a result you should not be surprised if this thread has gotten a little impolite or heated- that is what is going to happen when you make a post of that nature.  I did defend myself, stating that some of the premises on which myself and others were challenged are not accurate to what we have said in previous discussions.  But your post has validity and I like the way you organized your information and structured your arguments.

Your perspective is.. a perspective.  It is one of the perspectives on the situation and there is some validity to it.  Part of the main idea to my post was that we all see the game world "through a glass, darkly," and that all we can do about some things is hypothesize, generalize, and poorly synthesize information, and make conjectures.  If the real objective reality of the game right now, as seen by God/All-Seeing, All-Knowing Chaos Entity From The 7th Dimension is that this situation is actually hurting the game a lot and shrinking the player base, then I would hope for it to be fixed or changed.  The game is balanced and playable enough for me and for my purposes.  All I really care about as far as this goes is Jason- I used to victimize all of you on here with my griefing runs, often hitting 20-30 houses a night.  I expect this game to be brutal and unfair to players.  To continue, I respect Jason a great deal both as a designer and a person.  I am thankful to him for the creations he has brought forth into reality and enabled me to play with, and his honesty, accessibility, and absolutely outstanding quality of service.  He absolutely should have a "financial interest" in things, and no one should try to fault or limit that in any capacity at all.  I am highly offended at the entitlement of players who even begin to voice the argument that "Jason won't do anything because he gets paid either way, blah blah blah," and demand things hand over fist.  This man has gone far above and beyond the call of duty in serving his player base, and continues to do so.  He has designed these great products that we can sit behind our monitors with and escape our own realities for hours and hours on end.  $16 for hundreds of hours of entertainment is a f***ing smashing amount of value inside a product.  A movie costs $10 in some cities, and that nets you about an hour and a half for an emotional escape.  And Jason's game isn't just a buzzy, distracting click-fest of an online title.  Think of the emotional rushes this product is capable of delivering to you, and on a repeat basis.  People coming from this angle really need to step down, stop being blinded by their intensely moralizing, highly disconnected perspective, and get real about concepts in the real world.  We've been delivered a colossal amount of value for that $16, and if someone fails to see that in real-world terms, they are very ignorant, and highly entitled and childish.  "I demand that you entertain me, as and how I want that entertainment to be delivered, forever and ever and ever!  Now!"  Such is the nature of the wounded child in the digital age.  So in conclusion, if this situation is objectively hurting Jason's ability to sell copies and be compensated deservedly for his time and energy expended in design and service, I would hope he does something about it that benefits him.  But that's really all the further I care.


YT: www.youtube.com/user/JoyOfTrapping - The Bushido Code of Castle Doctrine:
Death  --> Observation --> Knowledge --> Power  --> Application --> Testing --> Skill
Seriousness --> Caution --> Deliberation --> Clearer Thinking --> More Success --> Less Frustration
Lack of Attachment to Results --> Lighthearted Play --> Respect for Enemies --> No Anger After Failures --> Faster Skill Building

Offline

#54 2014-04-06 12:43:04

crazyace
Member
Registered: 2014-03-24
Posts: 172

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

Hay girls, blip robbed me for 95k toolless, is this where I come complain?  No - I made the vault easy, Good Fuckin Job Blip, Grats. Someone smack these complaining girls please; they are really annoying. Don't you just feel weak going onto a forum and writing for an hour about stuff that doesn't matter?

Offline

#55 2014-04-06 13:20:25

xandalis
Member
Registered: 2014-03-14
Posts: 114

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

Lord0fHam wrote:
MMaster wrote:

This is only your assumption and you don't have any real proof. You currently see it as an issue and try to make it even bigger issue by stating things like this in the same way as I did when I said that posts like this are killing the game, because when someone opens the forum everything he sees is that everyone cheats by using multiple accounts.

Deep.


Yeah, valid point there. And again, talking of proof, you only have so much of that. Nothing than a person's opposition to your view as proof in most cases. Such assumptions usually will make a trainwreck out of any point a person tries to make, in the end. Which I see has begun.

Offline

#56 2014-04-06 17:18:29

AMWhy
Member
Registered: 2014-02-04
Posts: 435

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

Okay, I am beginning to understand.  Some of the forum users listed are not advocates of dual accounts and I apologise for labelling you in that way.  However, you are still part of the problem.

You are the people who say dual accounts can't be stopped so why bother trying.  This is akin to giving up and I feel sorry for you for that.

Regarding the cheater who reached my vault, I wish I'd never included that in the original post.  It has given you all an area to focus on that is irrelevant to the point I was making: That the comments made by the forum users listed are damaging the long-term potential of this game.

Cheating with dual accounts is happening and players are right to feel aggrieved.  What they need are supportive comments. Not to be told "It's in your head" or "It's not cheating".  If we won't stop dual account use, we can at least comfort the victims of it and give them the will power to keep on playing.

Offline

#57 2014-04-06 17:42:47

Blip
Member
Registered: 2013-05-07
Posts: 505

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

JoyOfTrapping wrote:

- Never resented Jere, Iceman, or JWG for having up to a year's lead time on me playing the game, resulting in tons more knowledge and skill, 1337 electronics skills from peering deeply into the source code, and basically the ability to cut my d!#* off 3 times over.

How come I never get mentioned? I built the bit counter before JWG was even on the forums!

crazyace wrote:

Hay girls, blip robbed me for 95k toolless, is this where I come complain?  No - I made the vault easy, Good Fuckin Job Blip, Grats.

Thanks! It's nice to see somebody who doesn't freak out about alts whenever they get robbed. And crazyace, that was a really nice house. It was pretty clever to hide the vault off to the side of a long path like that.

AMWhy wrote:

Cheating with dual accounts is happening and players are right to feel aggrieved.  What they need are supportive comments. Not to be told "It's in your head" or "It's not cheating".  If we won't stop dual account use, we can at least comfort the victims of it and give them the will power to keep on playing.

For the last time dual accounts are not cheating. Please, I've said this already:

Blip wrote:

May I please clear one thing up? Dual accounts are not cheating. Here's why:

cheating - to violate rules or regulations (that's the dictionary definition).

Video games are nice because they have very set-in-stone, nearly unbreakable, rules, unlike, say, cards, where cheating is easy. The Castle Doctrine has some very well-enforced rules; for example, stepping on a deadly tiles kills you. There's no way around it. There are no rules that prevent dual accounts, and thus it is not cheating.
If I was an "advocate of cheating", I wouldn't be wasting my time with two accounts, and just write a full map view client and wipe the list clean.

Dual accounts exist. They give an advantage, and nobody is refuting that. But they are not breaking any rules of the game. Here I would like to note another definition:

rule - one of a set of explicit or understood regulations or principles governing conduct within a particular activity or sphere.

There is no explicit rule banning dual accounts, obviously. If there was, you couldn't have them without hacking in some way. As there is no consensus on whether they should be allowed (I would guess that most people are fine with it), there is no "understood regulation" either. Therefore dual accounts break no rules of the game, and are not cheating. I don't like to waste my time on these discussions, but I can't stand you labeling me a cheater when I'm not.


Current life: Not dead, but I have no clue who I am
The Life and Times of Christopher Alvin Harris
Record: 149 Paintings!

Offline

#58 2014-04-06 17:45:43

xandalis
Member
Registered: 2014-03-14
Posts: 114

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

AMWhy wrote:

Okay, I am beginning to understand.  Some of the forum users listed are not advocates of dual accounts and I apologise for labelling you in that way.  However, you are still part of the problem.

You are the people who say dual accounts can't be stopped so why bother trying.  This is akin to giving up and I feel sorry for you for that.

Regarding the cheater who reached my vault, I wish I'd never included that in the original post.  It has given you all an area to focus on that is irrelevant to the point I was making: That the comments made by the forum users listed are damaging the long-term potential of this game.

Cheating with dual accounts is happening and players are right to feel aggrieved.  What they need are supportive comments. Not to be told "It's in your head" or "It's not cheating".  If we won't stop dual account use, we can at least comfort the victims of it and give them the will power to keep on playing.

I'm getting tired of your polarized "you're with us or against us" attitude here. Very tired. Stop putting words in our mouths/making up things we've said through pretend paraphrasing.

Offline

#59 2014-04-06 18:46:28

JoyOfTrapping
Member
Registered: 2014-02-08
Posts: 158

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

Blip wrote:
JoyOfTrapping wrote:

- Never resented Jere, Iceman, or JWG for having up to a year's lead time on me playing the game, resulting in tons more knowledge and skill, 1337 electronics skills from peering deeply into the source code, and basically the ability to cut my d!#* off 3 times over.

How come I never get mentioned? I built the bit counter before JWG was even on the forums!

Poo!  Sorry Blip.  Those were just the names that came to mind due to prominence on electronics threads.  I've always been aware you were a top tier player, don't worry.  Also, I've only played since release- I don't know the whole history of things.

Last edited by JoyOfTrapping (2014-04-06 18:47:05)


YT: www.youtube.com/user/JoyOfTrapping - The Bushido Code of Castle Doctrine:
Death  --> Observation --> Knowledge --> Power  --> Application --> Testing --> Skill
Seriousness --> Caution --> Deliberation --> Clearer Thinking --> More Success --> Less Frustration
Lack of Attachment to Results --> Lighthearted Play --> Respect for Enemies --> No Anger After Failures --> Faster Skill Building

Offline

#60 2014-04-06 19:14:01

JoyOfTrapping
Member
Registered: 2014-02-08
Posts: 158

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

AMWhy wrote:

... However, you are still part of the problem ...  I feel sorry for you for that ... What [players] need are supportive comments. Not to be told "It's in your head" or "It's not cheating".  If we won't stop dual account use, we can at least comfort the victims of it and give them the will power to keep on playing.

Ok now I'm pissed.  It's a one in a thousand event when I drop some serious truth hammers on a thread like this that anyone will acknowledge or respond to them.  That is infuriating.  I put thought into my posts (as do others!), and when I drop them on topics like these, it always ends up pearls before swine.  You're allowed to disagree, but don't waste my time speaking that off the mark of any points made.  This is partly why I said in my own dual account thread that we should stop dignifying these community crisis threads with responses at all.  Thanks for the "response" AMWhy.  Your ideas at this point have descended into the completely inane and ludicrous.  This is an ffa-pvp game.  What do you have, some forum-mom/therapist/Jesus complex?  Are you stepping up to tackle the "big issue" because you're under some illusion that "the poor abused new players need you?"  This is totally insane.  You are coming here and spending all of our time and mental energy to tell us that we have some kind of ethical responsibility to hand-hold other players, coddle them, and give them a pat on the back?  Give them the "will power to keep on playing?"  I don't know if this is hilarious, or just completely baffling.  You are pompous, egregiously rude, and patronizingly moralizing, delusionally so.  We don't owe it to other players to wipe their behinds like we're the nurses of helpless infants in a playpen.  If you want to help players, you make them stronger, and teach them by making useful threads about strategy, building and robbing.  This however is little more than a waste of everybody's time.  You are weak, and your perspective is weak, and the best you will be able to do is elect yourself caped crusader to fight for all other weak players by making these whine-threads.  It is truly pathetic.

That is why threads like these always have been and always will be traps.  Bottomless pits.  I'd like to vacate this thread.  I would advise anyone else to do the same.


YT: www.youtube.com/user/JoyOfTrapping - The Bushido Code of Castle Doctrine:
Death  --> Observation --> Knowledge --> Power  --> Application --> Testing --> Skill
Seriousness --> Caution --> Deliberation --> Clearer Thinking --> More Success --> Less Frustration
Lack of Attachment to Results --> Lighthearted Play --> Respect for Enemies --> No Anger After Failures --> Faster Skill Building

Offline

#61 2014-04-06 19:19:41

Blip
Member
Registered: 2013-05-07
Posts: 505

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

JoyOfTrapping wrote:

it always ends up pearls before swine.

Completely unrelated to the topic, but I really like the comic Pearls Before Swine. How about you guys?


Current life: Not dead, but I have no clue who I am
The Life and Times of Christopher Alvin Harris
Record: 149 Paintings!

Offline

#62 2014-04-06 19:24:54

Lord0fHam
Member
From: California
Registered: 2014-02-11
Posts: 487

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

Blip wrote:
JoyOfTrapping wrote:

it always ends up pearls before swine.

Completely unrelated to the topic, but I really like the comic Pearls Before Swine. How about you guys?

That is one of my favorite comics. Here is one of my favorite. Now this thread is useful!
ff4f5b109a0f012e2f8200163e41dd5b


It's a trap!

Offline

#63 2014-04-06 19:29:47

Blip
Member
Registered: 2013-05-07
Posts: 505

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

I like the pun ones, personally. Here's one of my favorites:

groan-pearls.jpg


Current life: Not dead, but I have no clue who I am
The Life and Times of Christopher Alvin Harris
Record: 149 Paintings!

Offline

#64 2014-04-06 19:33:58

Lord0fHam
Member
From: California
Registered: 2014-02-11
Posts: 487

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

whaaa?


It's a trap!

Offline

#65 2014-04-06 19:38:56

AMWhy
Member
Registered: 2014-02-04
Posts: 435

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

@Blip, I'd love you to point out where I said having a dual account is cheating.  No one has said that anywhere on this thread.

Offline

#66 2014-04-06 19:43:47

JoyOfTrapping
Member
Registered: 2014-02-08
Posts: 158

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

Don't do it, Blip.
garfield.jpg


YT: www.youtube.com/user/JoyOfTrapping - The Bushido Code of Castle Doctrine:
Death  --> Observation --> Knowledge --> Power  --> Application --> Testing --> Skill
Seriousness --> Caution --> Deliberation --> Clearer Thinking --> More Success --> Less Frustration
Lack of Attachment to Results --> Lighthearted Play --> Respect for Enemies --> No Anger After Failures --> Faster Skill Building

Offline

#67 2014-04-06 19:45:53

AMWhy
Member
Registered: 2014-02-04
Posts: 435

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

@JoyofTrapping all you have achieved with your post is a personal attack on me.  Not a mention about what's I have said as you know I am right.  In fact you've more or less said as much by acknowledging that there are 'weak' players who do need help.

Last edited by AMWhy (2014-04-06 19:48:33)

Offline

#68 2014-04-06 19:47:46

cullman
Member
Registered: 2014-03-21
Posts: 424

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

If I made a version of the game that prevented dual account funding (not dual accounts) and ran my own server, can I get a count of the number of people that would come over and play?  I am capable and able to do this.

Offline

#69 2014-04-06 19:50:15

Blip
Member
Registered: 2013-05-07
Posts: 505

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

AMWhy wrote:

@Blip, I'd love you to point out where I said having a dual account is cheating.  No one has said that anywhere on this thread.

Please, please let this be sarcasm. Because if its not:

AMWhy wrote:

Cheating with dual accounts is happening and players are right to feel aggrieved.  What they need are supportive comments. Not to be told "It's in your head" or "It's not cheating".  If we won't stop dual account use, we can at least comfort the victims of it and give them the will power to keep on playing.


Current life: Not dead, but I have no clue who I am
The Life and Times of Christopher Alvin Harris
Record: 149 Paintings!

Offline

#70 2014-04-06 19:51:04

JoyOfTrapping
Member
Registered: 2014-02-08
Posts: 158

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

AMWhy wrote:

@JoyofTrapping all you have achieved with your post is a personal attack on me.  Not a mention about what's I have said as you know I am right.  In fact you've not

Edit that to read "In fact you've not."

Edit: Thanks for the edit.

Last edited by JoyOfTrapping (2014-04-06 19:51:25)


YT: www.youtube.com/user/JoyOfTrapping - The Bushido Code of Castle Doctrine:
Death  --> Observation --> Knowledge --> Power  --> Application --> Testing --> Skill
Seriousness --> Caution --> Deliberation --> Clearer Thinking --> More Success --> Less Frustration
Lack of Attachment to Results --> Lighthearted Play --> Respect for Enemies --> No Anger After Failures --> Faster Skill Building

Offline

#71 2014-04-06 19:51:39

Lord0fHam
Member
From: California
Registered: 2014-02-11
Posts: 487

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

AMWhy wrote:

Dual accounts need to be stopped.  They are stifling the game.

Please read to the end before posting your reply: A lot is covered in this post.

I hate to write this post as I love this game and the forum as well.  The members of the forum are always helpful and, aside from the odd Russian invasion, the conduct on the forum is excellent!
I, personally, have only been affected once by dual account cheaters, and that was a few weeks ago.  However, I feel strongly enough that the problem of dual accounts and how they are discussed on this forum has to be addressed.

As one of the majority of players with only one account, my enjoyment of this game was diminished by a dual account user CHEATING their way to my vault.  I am still playing as I believe I am good enough to prevail despite the cheaters.  From the low number of houses available now, compared to steam launch, many other players have quit.  This trend will continue and the user-base will fail to grow as long as cheating with two accounts remains a viable option.

Furthermore, the rot of cheating has spread over to this forum.

Crazyace
LordofHam
Storm
JoyofTrapping
Epfel
TheRealCheese
Blip
Xandalis
Gyuri
Colorfusion
MMaster
Iceman

The listed forum members, including many respected and popular posters, are all advocates of dual accounts.  All of them have refuted claims that dual accounts are any advantage over single accounts.  Every time a player complains about dual accounts, these forum members reply in kind belittling the problem as nothing.  I suspect that every one of them has two accounts.

Now let's look at this further:

Cheating:
Some forum users have claimed that using a second account for gain in ways that a single account couldn't be used is not cheating unless Jason says it is.  Clearly this is a childish suggestion. We each have a sense of morality and know that every time we use our second account to refinance our main, we are cheating.  We justify it as just saving a little time as we could have waited for a fresh 2k 0:0 house to show up and get back in the game anyway.  While that is true, it's still cheating. You are removing the time constraint from that part of the game for your advantage.

Dual account users:
The forum members above may have dual accounts, but that doesn't in itself make them cheaters. It is, of course, how the second account is used that determines whether a player is cheating or not. If the dual account user has never used that second account to deposit 2k of tools into their main then they haven't cheated.  Anything else and they have.  While a minor way, it still affects the balance of the game and gives that player an unfair advantage.  However, this way of cheating doesn't affect other players directly: It only aids the cheater themselves.

Bad Dual account users:
The biggest problem is dual account users who cheat in ways that directly affect other players.  I'm specifically talking about players who use their alt account to explore with 2k of tools on any house without consequence.  Then, if they find the vault, commit suicide in that house before returning with their main account to sweep the vault.  It is this that is killing the game.

Excuses:
The forum members above have excused this heinous crime as 'perhaps coincidence'.  If this were true, then Castle Doctrine must be the most serendipitous game in history.
The form members excuse the crime as 'perhaps two brothers'.  More possible, yet still cheating (using two accounts for gain one account couldn't) and also very unlikely.  Unless those brothers were specifically working together (when, from the experience of having three brothers myself, they would more likely be competing to make the best house), the precision and speed with which these robberies are committed suggest that it is a single player doing the crime.
The forum members also say it is our fault that we were robbed like that!  Our house was too easy to rob.  Insulting!  Just because the forum members have been playing the game for longer, that doesn't mean they know more than every other player out there.  I wonder how far up the rankings these forum members would get without two accounts.

"You should make your house 2k safe," they say.  Once you have a house that can't easily be robbed, it is easy to make these claims.  However, as it costs 2k minimum to decent house, you need to either rob others or wait before you can afford such a house.

The reality is that there is no such thing as a 2k safe house: Every unbroken house can be solved for nothing.  The likelihood of that happening is what is important. I created a cheap house that, by luck alone, only one in 1024 people would get through.  With some luck, one 2k robber got close enough to see the vault.  The next robber in brought exactly 2 water and 2 wire cutters into a house he had never set foot in before and correctly risked his account and completed a magic dance to reach the vault.  All to successfully rob 4k.  The robber himself had a 35k house.

Jason:
What is actually making things worse is that Jason has not frowned upon dual account users.  Perhaps this is a throw back to when the community for the game was smaller.  What this is doing is stagnating the game.  While the chills have made some difference, dual accounts still cause major problems.  Until this is acknowledged as a problem, the userbase will continue to shrink.

The player base:
There are the old players, the forum kings who have two accounts and can do anything they want.  There are the new steam users who threw their money at the game to become the best. Then there are the honest players who play the game as was originally intended with just one account.  Finally there are the newest players, those just starting out for whom the learning curve will be the steepest.  As time goes on, the new players will dry up, the single account players will quit, and the new dual account players will merge with the older players into one group.  The game will revert to pre-steam days and never grow.

Solutions:
*First, the problem of dual accounts MUST be seen as a problem that needs solving by Jason.  Until he acknowledges it and asks for help, things will not get better.

*Second, dual accounts should NOT be banned.  I am NOT calling for a ban on dual account ownership.  Dual accounts IS a way to support Jason and can allow you to both build a house and go robbing without consequences.

*Third many forum users have already written many solutions to the problem of dual accounts.  Just search 'dual accounts' for a list of forum threads where the issue is discussed.  The simplest solution is to have one account per IP address, but this causes obvious problems where two brothers genuinely both have an account.  The best solution would be a complaint system and monitoring system.  If a player suspects multi-account cheating, they report the two player names.  Jason (or staff) check the player names and if they share an IP address, they are punished (banned / suspended... another discussion).  Obviously this also has problems as it would mean Jason would need to spend money or time monitoring this.

Finally:
I return to the forum members listed in this thread. While what I have written is harsh on you, and some of you will feel victimised (perhaps because you have just one account or you haven't abused your second account) and to those of you I am sorry.  However, I would like you all to think about the possible ways you could exploit your second account.  YOU need to acknowledge that they can be used to exploit the game.  Perhaps then, something will actually be done that could save this game.

Are you really going to make me do that to every post?

Last edited by Lord0fHam (2014-04-06 19:52:13)


It's a trap!

Offline

#72 2014-04-06 19:54:37

JoyOfTrapping
Member
Registered: 2014-02-08
Posts: 158

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

Lord0fHam wrote:
AMWhy wrote:

Dual accounts need to be stopped.  They are stifling the game.

Please read to the end before posting your reply: A lot is covered in this post.

I hate to write this post as I love this game and the forum as well.  The members of the forum are always helpful and, aside from the odd Russian invasion, the conduct on the forum is excellent!
I, personally, have only been affected once by dual account cheaters, and that was a few weeks ago.  However, I feel strongly enough that the problem of dual accounts and how they are discussed on this forum has to be addressed.

As one of the majority of players with only one account, my enjoyment of this game was diminished by a dual account user CHEATING their way to my vault.  I am still playing as I believe I am good enough to prevail despite the cheaters.  From the low number of houses available now, compared to steam launch, many other players have quit.  This trend will continue and the user-base will fail to grow as long as cheating with two accounts remains a viable option.

Furthermore, the rot of cheating has spread over to this forum.

Crazyace
LordofHam
Storm
JoyofTrapping
Epfel
TheRealCheese
Blip
Xandalis
Gyuri
Colorfusion
MMaster
Iceman

The listed forum members, including many respected and popular posters, are all advocates of dual accounts.  All of them have refuted claims that dual accounts are any advantage over single accounts.  Every time a player complains about dual accounts, these forum members reply in kind belittling the problem as nothing.  I suspect that every one of them has two accounts.

Now let's look at this further:

Cheating:
Some forum users have claimed that using a second account for gain in ways that a single account couldn't be used is not cheating unless Jason says it is.  Clearly this is a childish suggestion. We each have a sense of morality and know that every time we use our second account to refinance our main, we are cheating.  We justify it as just saving a little time as we could have waited for a fresh 2k 0:0 house to show up and get back in the game anyway.  While that is true, it's still cheating. You are removing the time constraint from that part of the game for your advantage.

Dual account users:
The forum members above may have dual accounts, but that doesn't in itself make them cheaters. It is, of course, how the second account is used that determines whether a player is cheating or not. If the dual account user has never used that second account to deposit 2k of tools into their main then they haven't cheated.  Anything else and they have.  While a minor way, it still affects the balance of the game and gives that player an unfair advantage.  However, this way of cheating doesn't affect other players directly: It only aids the cheater themselves.

Bad Dual account users:
The biggest problem is dual account users who cheat in ways that directly affect other players.  I'm specifically talking about players who use their alt account to explore with 2k of tools on any house without consequence.  Then, if they find the vault, commit suicide in that house before returning with their main account to sweep the vault.  It is this that is killing the game.

Excuses:
The forum members above have excused this heinous crime as 'perhaps coincidence'.  If this were true, then Castle Doctrine must be the most serendipitous game in history.
The form members excuse the crime as 'perhaps two brothers'.  More possible, yet still cheating (using two accounts for gain one account couldn't) and also very unlikely.  Unless those brothers were specifically working together (when, from the experience of having three brothers myself, they would more likely be competing to make the best house), the precision and speed with which these robberies are committed suggest that it is a single player doing the crime.
The forum members also say it is our fault that we were robbed like that!  Our house was too easy to rob.  Insulting!  Just because the forum members have been playing the game for longer, that doesn't mean they know more than every other player out there.  I wonder how far up the rankings these forum members would get without two accounts.

"You should make your house 2k safe," they say.  Once you have a house that can't easily be robbed, it is easy to make these claims.  However, as it costs 2k minimum to decent house, you need to either rob others or wait before you can afford such a house.

The reality is that there is no such thing as a 2k safe house: Every unbroken house can be solved for nothing.  The likelihood of that happening is what is important. I created a cheap house that, by luck alone, only one in 1024 people would get through.  With some luck, one 2k robber got close enough to see the vault.  The next robber in brought exactly 2 water and 2 wire cutters into a house he had never set foot in before and correctly risked his account and completed a magic dance to reach the vault.  All to successfully rob 4k.  The robber himself had a 35k house.

Jason:
What is actually making things worse is that Jason has not frowned upon dual account users.  Perhaps this is a throw back to when the community for the game was smaller.  What this is doing is stagnating the game.  While the chills have made some difference, dual accounts still cause major problems.  Until this is acknowledged as a problem, the userbase will continue to shrink.

The player base:
There are the old players, the forum kings who have two accounts and can do anything they want.  There are the new steam users who threw their money at the game to become the best. Then there are the honest players who play the game as was originally intended with just one account.  Finally there are the newest players, those just starting out for whom the learning curve will be the steepest.  As time goes on, the new players will dry up, the single account players will quit, and the new dual account players will merge with the older players into one group.  The game will revert to pre-steam days and never grow.

Solutions:
*First, the problem of dual accounts MUST be seen as a problem that needs solving by Jason.  Until he acknowledges it and asks for help, things will not get better.

*Second, dual accounts should NOT be banned.  I am NOT calling for a ban on dual account ownership.  Dual accounts IS a way to support Jason and can allow you to both build a house and go robbing without consequences.

*Third many forum users have already written many solutions to the problem of dual accounts.  Just search 'dual accounts' for a list of forum threads where the issue is discussed.  The simplest solution is to have one account per IP address, but this causes obvious problems where two brothers genuinely both have an account.  The best solution would be a complaint system and monitoring system.  If a player suspects multi-account cheating, they report the two player names.  Jason (or staff) check the player names and if they share an IP address, they are punished (banned / suspended... another discussion).  Obviously this also has problems as it would mean Jason would need to spend money or time monitoring this.

Finally:
I return to the forum members listed in this thread. While what I have written is harsh on you, and some of you will feel victimised (perhaps because you have just one account or you haven't abused your second account) and to those of you I am sorry.  However, I would like you all to think about the possible ways you could exploit your second account.  YOU need to acknowledge that they can be used to exploit the game.  Perhaps then, something will actually be done that could save this game.

Are you really going to make me do that to every post?

OMFGROFL!!!


YT: www.youtube.com/user/JoyOfTrapping - The Bushido Code of Castle Doctrine:
Death  --> Observation --> Knowledge --> Power  --> Application --> Testing --> Skill
Seriousness --> Caution --> Deliberation --> Clearer Thinking --> More Success --> Less Frustration
Lack of Attachment to Results --> Lighthearted Play --> Respect for Enemies --> No Anger After Failures --> Faster Skill Building

Offline

#73 2014-04-06 19:55:49

Lord0fHam
Member
From: California
Registered: 2014-02-11
Posts: 487

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

ok now i'm on a roll. get ready


It's a trap!

Offline

#74 2014-04-06 19:56:14

AMWhy
Member
Registered: 2014-02-04
Posts: 435

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

@Blip @LordofHam, wow, sorry, I didn't realise English isn't your first language.  Let me explain.  Every instance you've highlighted is cheating WITH a dual account.  Nowhere does it say that just HAVING a dual account is cheating.  If you can't understand that then I see why you're having trouble grasping the other basic points.

Last edited by AMWhy (2014-04-06 20:02:19)

Offline

#75 2014-04-06 19:57:14

Lord0fHam
Member
From: California
Registered: 2014-02-11
Posts: 487

Re: Dual Accounts AND The Forum

AMWhy wrote:

@Iceman, I nearly didn't include you on the list as I didn't find a quote from you directly condoning dual accounts.  However, you did share in the expense of the user CircleofSorrow who quit the game over dual accounts.

@Xandalis, you are here for this line: "it's only cheating if Jason says it is."  It is this attitude that is part of the 'rot' within the game.  Until we can all admit this the problem will never be solved.

For the record, I have only been affected by dual account cheating once and moved on from it.  I'm more concerned with the attitude by forum members towards dual accounts.

Edit:
@Iceman, having re-read your post, I apologise for including you on the initial list.  However, having you say your disliking for dual accounts out in the open is a good thing.  I just wish others would follow suit.

@Crazyace that attitude doesn't help at all. Using 1 account is like gambling.  Using 2 accounts is just cheating.


It's a trap!

Offline

Board footer

Powered by FluxBB 1.5.8