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Clear Notice
[Caveat to FM-I'm not sure in which forum this belongs, or if I should simply email a dev. If I have it in the wrong forum, please move it; if I should email it, simply delete the entire post and I'll email it. I post here after having to read repeated "But we never heard *details* of actual *exploits*, so you cannot blame *us*!"'s from guides, RE player bitching about Arolte's behavior. Rest assured, that excuse will not be given a leg to stand on again]
Today, the usual Arolte-related annoyances reoccurred. (1) Use of WH to spam n' sprint; (2) use of in-system, sector-to-sector jumps to S n' S; (3) use of faction system to engage in unmonitored space, warp into GR O3, then go "limp" and get his attacker to lose serco standing for killing him; (4) provoking attacks in an EC-101 in same station sector, again hoping to make attackers lose massive Serco standing, so he could then kill them in sector w/o damaging his own faction. Obviously, these were ongoing...tactics, if I dare to abuse the term that much...rather than one time instances.
NONE of these, to my understanding, are characterized as *exploiting*. I chose to kill him in his bus at one point, simply because I don't give a fig for my standing. Should I complain that I lost +960 standing with my own nation for offing a UIT dog that was attacking our BPing n00bs? No. That's a poor faction standing system issue; he was merely playing by some less than stellar rules, and I chose to play along. I want to make that point really clear: I CHOSE to lose faction, in exchange for popping his little bus. These tactics probably cannot be directly acted against by Guild according to some bright line rule, while at the same time preserving the pure PVP aspect that makes VO unique. We've come to accept this, while at the same time, hopefully highlighting the importance of Guild addressing such problems indirectly by (1) making such annoying escapes much harder, thereby allowing groups to police their own community; and (2) giving death, or several deaths in a limited time frame, real and negative consequences.
*HOWEVER* When a player does deliberately and grossly find a weakness and exploit it, intending to cause direct harm to another player by doing so, direct action is warranted, justifiable and part of what we're all paying for.
Arolte committed a deliberate exploit using similar tactics as above. He would take his damaged bus, and ram it into the ships of Serco BPers in GR O3. Being real ships, the rags of the BPing n00bs didn't budge, but instead inflicted sufficient damage on Arolte's pathetic bus to cause him to be killed by them. They received massive standing loss *with their own nation* as a result of this gross exploit. Note the difference from above: I was annoyed and chose to tank standing; these n00bs were FORCED to LOSE standing by another player's clever exploit of faction and damage systems. He did this ramming deliberately, and I would submit that it's pretty clear he did it intending to cause a non-consensual faction loss (I can't claim absolute knowledge of what, if anything, actually goes on in his head-thank the gods).
At some point subsequent, Relayer caused Arolte to be warped to Dau A-1, from GR O3. I'm not sure what the purpose of this was, other to get him out of the reach of Mecha and myself. If it was meant as some form of disciplinary action, perhaps *preventing* him from leaving and reducing his Serco standing, rather than whisking him out of the sector, would have been a better short term solution. Or, you know, a sun sector...
But I digress. I believe the deliberate gross exploit mentioned above, coupled with this player's heightened awareness (from recent events) of what an exploit is and the consequences for exploiting are, warrants serious disciplinary action. I'm not going to crunch the Rules of Conduct and Licensing Agreement for the relevant passages to cite, since, sadly, my VO time doesn't count towards billable hours. But unless those documents are totally toothless, they say something should be *done* in response here. Done, please note, not *said*.
Today, the usual Arolte-related annoyances reoccurred. (1) Use of WH to spam n' sprint; (2) use of in-system, sector-to-sector jumps to S n' S; (3) use of faction system to engage in unmonitored space, warp into GR O3, then go "limp" and get his attacker to lose serco standing for killing him; (4) provoking attacks in an EC-101 in same station sector, again hoping to make attackers lose massive Serco standing, so he could then kill them in sector w/o damaging his own faction. Obviously, these were ongoing...tactics, if I dare to abuse the term that much...rather than one time instances.
NONE of these, to my understanding, are characterized as *exploiting*. I chose to kill him in his bus at one point, simply because I don't give a fig for my standing. Should I complain that I lost +960 standing with my own nation for offing a UIT dog that was attacking our BPing n00bs? No. That's a poor faction standing system issue; he was merely playing by some less than stellar rules, and I chose to play along. I want to make that point really clear: I CHOSE to lose faction, in exchange for popping his little bus. These tactics probably cannot be directly acted against by Guild according to some bright line rule, while at the same time preserving the pure PVP aspect that makes VO unique. We've come to accept this, while at the same time, hopefully highlighting the importance of Guild addressing such problems indirectly by (1) making such annoying escapes much harder, thereby allowing groups to police their own community; and (2) giving death, or several deaths in a limited time frame, real and negative consequences.
*HOWEVER* When a player does deliberately and grossly find a weakness and exploit it, intending to cause direct harm to another player by doing so, direct action is warranted, justifiable and part of what we're all paying for.
Arolte committed a deliberate exploit using similar tactics as above. He would take his damaged bus, and ram it into the ships of Serco BPers in GR O3. Being real ships, the rags of the BPing n00bs didn't budge, but instead inflicted sufficient damage on Arolte's pathetic bus to cause him to be killed by them. They received massive standing loss *with their own nation* as a result of this gross exploit. Note the difference from above: I was annoyed and chose to tank standing; these n00bs were FORCED to LOSE standing by another player's clever exploit of faction and damage systems. He did this ramming deliberately, and I would submit that it's pretty clear he did it intending to cause a non-consensual faction loss (I can't claim absolute knowledge of what, if anything, actually goes on in his head-thank the gods).
At some point subsequent, Relayer caused Arolte to be warped to Dau A-1, from GR O3. I'm not sure what the purpose of this was, other to get him out of the reach of Mecha and myself. If it was meant as some form of disciplinary action, perhaps *preventing* him from leaving and reducing his Serco standing, rather than whisking him out of the sector, would have been a better short term solution. Or, you know, a sun sector...
But I digress. I believe the deliberate gross exploit mentioned above, coupled with this player's heightened awareness (from recent events) of what an exploit is and the consequences for exploiting are, warrants serious disciplinary action. I'm not going to crunch the Rules of Conduct and Licensing Agreement for the relevant passages to cite, since, sadly, my VO time doesn't count towards billable hours. But unless those documents are totally toothless, they say something should be *done* in response here. Done, please note, not *said*.
Yes. You should email me. john at guildsoftware dot com. See the other thread you started :).
well if nothing else it appears that the annoying dog (arolte) CAN learn new tricks.
me wanders over to the suggestions forum to reactivate the 10 exploits thread.
me wanders over to the suggestions forum to reactivate the 10 exploits thread.
Also, Inc replied on http://www.itanialliance.com/forums/viewforum.php?f=37 and adressed some of this.
Yes, I just sent the email to you, John. If appros, FM, please lock [EDIT...see below] this post as ye see fit.
if possible i'd prefer not to have it deleted as i linked to it in the exploits thread over in suggestions.
Works for me.
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Arolte was asked to stop disrupting BP. He didn't. He was removed.
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Arolte was asked to stop disrupting BP. He didn't. He was removed.
[relocked]