Feedback Pushing rule

[JawJaw]

Dear players,

As you know we have been enforcing a new pushing rule on this world consisting out of several layers:

- Account merges will not be allowed for the first 40 days of the world. If you intend to play together, join together.
- The market can not be used to freely send resources, at any point during the runtime of the world. Only 1:1 trades will be allowed. This will be enforced on a setting level.

This applies to all kinds of village gifting, certain types of merging, ...

As this rule is quite new to us, we would love to hear your feedback on it. We are aware that there are cases that we haven't noticed, or that just don't qualify under the current pushing rules. This, on an enforcement POV, is also quite new for us. We want to evaluate if it is worth expanding this rule towards new (regular) worlds as well.

Please let us know your thoughts on the rule(s)
1/ Have they improved gameplay
2/ Is this something you would like to see in regular worlds as well
3/ What could we do to improve even more

Please note that we received a significant amount of reports of pushing cases that does not actually qualify as pushing under the current rules. We will not be discussing those. This thread is not a "we reported X and Y and the team did nothing!"-thread.

Instead, please focus your feedback on if it improved (even if slightly, tell us) the situation and if there are any changes we can make to improve even more. Non constructive posts will be removed, as well as discussions about specific cases (that may or may not have been pushing cases).

Thank you in advance.

 

[Eakshow McGee]

Is this mainly towards the first rule, or both of the new rules?

 

[JawJaw]

Is this mainly towards the first rule, or both of the new rules?

Mainly the first, but if you have anything to say about the second - feel free!

 

[Gengar]

Well, in theory these kind of rules are good, and should be enforced. In practice it seems no one really knows what pushing exactly is, so lets take a look at the rule:

• Creating and/or using one or more accounts for the primary benefit of another account ("pushing"), as well as profiting from such behavior, is forbidden.

In reality though, it feels like everyone is focussed on one thing only: nobeling a free village.

But what about:
- cleaning players (especially in the early phase, where troop losses are very expensive)
- pre nobeling them
- pushing ressources for coin mining?

All these instances can be seen on en125 but it doesn't seem like there are any actions done towards it, despite it clearly going against the rule, as these bash accounts for example only exist for the benefit of one or more accounts.

The free trading rule is completely useless imo. Ban it for the first 30-45 days but after that it should always be open. (which is the default on normal worlds i think?).

Just my thoughts..

 

[Nocturne]

I would like the Rule to be more elabourate
Rules are supposed to be Crystal clear for everyone playing this game

Mostly focusing on this 40 Day stuff
To me and many Others it havent been clear if after 40 days its suddenly back to normal
Or Will you have to Contact support before merging and stuff (Since some players acctully Need it now)

You Always have co players quit or stuff happening in lite that suddenly changes the Time you can put into the game and im certain pretty much Every tribe has had some account that has suffered by this


And as discussed earlier
I like the resource stuff Early game
But in My opinion for mid/late game you Need to be able to send resources to each other for different reasons



But mostly we Need s clear Rule
What is "considered pushing" according to your new rules
And what is allowed to do

Since everyone can se there has already been a significant amount of bans on the world already People either dont understand the Rule or are just blatant trying to push anyways

My point Being that its Always lopeholes that People can take advantage of
IF the Rule is 100% clear then everyone can "Benefit" from the same expolits without Risking a bann
Insteed of some players finding a exploit and have THE balls to test it out and suddenly gets an "unfair" advantage beacuse the Rule itself leaves stuff Up to interpatation
Also makes it possible for mods to acctully manipulate the Rule a bit here and there to serve a specific purpose in different cases

I like the general concept beacuse i dont belive pushing should be part of the game
But the ruleset itself for this Needs to be updated more in order to acctully prevent pushing at all

Or removed to give everyone the change to use THE same expolits the game mechanics offer as it is

Its not Easy
But i belive you can find a better solution to this problem

 

[bobertini]

The rules need to be tightened, too many rule breaks that haven't been dealt with.

There's been situations where players have remained tribe less (but still have assisted attacking) to then gift over and continue to noble.

There's been situations where players have barbed and then the previous tribe has nobled (I.e. Hiding gifts).

There's been situations where players have been kicked and then nobled.

There's been situations where players have gained numerous villages with little oda gain.

Summary wise, I respect the hussle to attempt the rule addition, but it hasn't worked due to the amount of loopholes people have discovered.

Suggestion wise, making it last the entire of the world instead of 40 days plus stricter punishments/bans to help try and deter. Whilst I appreciate that sometimes pure black and white facts are needed to gather the evidence, it could be appropriate to ban based on suspicion (assuming it's fairly obvious but you might not necessarily have the gifter then join the other account).

That being said, I think there's probably been cases where people haven't realised so potentially more advertising of the rule is needed especially around the period where people are starting to get nobles.

 

[Eakshow McGee]

Banning free trading isn't really doing anything, normally its disable for ~30 days (free tribe trade) and ~60-90 days outside of tribe.
Outside tribe doesnt have to be active at any point imo, but Free Trade within Tribe later on has it advantage to help some accounts to catch up, or to help a Frontline account to get resources to push more nobles to noble the enemy.

There is always the risk of boosting new accounts etc, but this could easily be fixed by both players having to been on the world for a set amount of days, Like 60 days. After this point, getting boosted isn't gonna have that much affect except help accounts to push nobles. You also are able to help an account which get completly nobled to get back in the game.

 

[Boris The Shopkeeper]

I like no res gifting all world changes things up, and would enjoy it on more worlds.

for the 40 day rule In theory, I liked the no merging pre 40days rule. But in practice, it just means the non-merging pushes are even more advantaged than before. So the equalizer of having co's start on different accounts is gone.

To execute this there need to be stricter anti-pushing rules for this rule to work. Especially when it comes to clearing/pre-nobling for others.
Like obviously it's a tactic used in tribes and wouldn't want it removed but having some set rules like

x clears for y, x quits within 40 days, then y gets punished.
x is repeatedly clearing for others without getting anything in return.
x has 1-2 village, y has 4+, but x is still prenobling/nuking for y. then something is off.

 

[Sinful Angel]

The rule needs to be tightened. It is incredibly unclear - I don't know how this rule as it stands got through to an actual world. I'm sure the mod team would have told you they can't enforce this rule in a way that is equitable to all players.

Make it tighter and the rule would be great. As it stands it's terrible.

 

[Deleted User - 848968328]

Appreciate the effort in trying to stop pushing. I'm sure the rules will be tightened up as we get more information. At least the mods are actively trying to make the game fair.

 

[sidd 271]

40 days is counted from day of world opening or from a players joining date

 

[Sharky White]

Eh the rule has a good intention, but in addition to what others said about making it clear what the criteria are, I honestly think that the difficulty in enforcing the rule is the real issue. Mods are being bombarded with fake claims in hopes ppl get their enemies banned (even though they're hypocrites doing push accounts themselves), and then the magnitude of loopholes involved make it pretty much an inefficient method of ensuring fair gameplay.

The best way to counter this in my opinion is to remove the ability for people to relocate near their "friends". You join the world and get spawned around your tribe's Duke(s)/baron(s), and the duke gets to only choose the cardinal locations to spawn at. Or something of the sort. The main mechanic that allows pushers is the relocation possibility that let's me spawn endless accounts around me. Yes this would screw up with tribe's ability's to customize their startup spread...etc but maybe some solution/mechanic can be done to address that (if at all deemed worth the effort). But even if the startup spread is not mitigateable I think it is an acceptable compromise for a fairer gameplay.

On top of the above, you could also still implement a similar no pushing rule as an icing on the cake and additional assurance of fairness.

 

[Eakshow McGee]

40 days is counted from day of world opening or from a players joining date

World opening, not joining date

 

[One Last Shot...]

Too many rule breaks that haven't been dealt with.

I don't agree with this at all. When there is a rule breach, it does get dealt with. If tickets don't get sent in, there is a chance something gets missed. But when a ticket is sent in, then an investigation shows up one of two things:

• A broken rule
• No rule broken

And our investigations then result in action or no action taken, depending only on our objective investigations.

Please do note I deliberately used the word ours to avoid including people who are not moderators, as outside of the w125 moderating team nobody can actually see the full picture and so can only share suspicions which we then do investigate. Any accusations / suspicions are purely speculation. If someone doesn't get banned, people should be accepting that as them not breaking the rules.

_____________________

More general feedback:

I can't comment on it 'improving game-play' and I think it's hard to judge on No Haul worlds regardless. I'd personally like to see it on a Haul world (in its current form OR altered) and see the impact on a world that plays in a similar way to the vast majority of worlds on offer

Regarding the rule itself, I do feel that some additional specifics might be good for the player base (who as moderators we all volunteer specifically to try and make the game as fun and within-the-rules as possible). But...I'm also very aware that the more specifics that players have, the more loopholes some players try to create.

In my mind, there always needs to be a balance of 'enough information for players to know how make the right choice' and 'enough vagueness for the moderators to be able to deal with users who are breaking the rule deliberately through a loophole'. Which is a very tricky balance to find. It just isn't possible to openly close down loopholes without having a list of rules so long that it becomes impossible for players to remember. I don't have a personal answer to this as it's a bit of a Sophie's Choice situation from my perspective.

For me, I do feel that having Casual worlds opening shortly after a new world opening is a major part of the challenge. For those who don't know how it works, in the first 14 days you can only join Casual by being rimmed. After that, you can move across at any point with your largest village. This I think should be adjusted:

• Remove the 'join Casual when rimmed' element entirely
• Reduce the time between a new world starting and being able to move your village over to the Casual world

 

[Mintyfresh]

I think trying to tighten the rules is well intentioned but ultimately pointless if there isn't more **capable** mods who are available to spend more than a cursory 30 second glance at a report to determine if the reported parties are guilty or not.

People often hide their pushing behind the grey area of bashing. A lot of what is discussed doesnt really cover people pushing smartly by doing things like the following (as an example)

1) having a basher tribe of friends playing short term for a month or two
2) have them nuke your local rivals
3) noble for free food
4) then in a month or two internal your bashers.
5) gg no re you successfully outgrew all your opponents with zero effort. Now you get to laude yourselves as "top tier players"

Like the sole purpose of the basher tribe is to feed the main players in the main tribe. This is illegal according to the definition of the rules:

1. Creating and/or using one or more accounts for the primary benefit of another account ("pushing"), as well as profiting from such behavior, is forbidden.

The entire basher tribe is for the primary benefit of the main tribe so clearly that should be covered by this rule. However good luck proving that any of this is illegal because it mirrors genuine scenarios very closely. There very often is genuine basher tribes that are not created for the primary benefit of the main tribe. No amount of extra rules or regulations are going to be enough to cover these scenarios. And saying

"pLaYeRs ShOuLd JuSt RePoRt pUsHiNg"

is a fallacy in itself because regardless of how much detail i put into reports its a waste of time if the mod reading it capable enough to understand the nuances of what im saying. It would be a full time job to spoon feed all the little details required to prove the pushing isnt bashing to the mods. The only way to legitimately solve this problem is for dedicated mods spending hours of their tribe trawling through stats over several worlds to identify links that players wont be able to see when all we have access to is a useful but flawed twstats third party platform.

I am not bashing any of the mods but rather the mod structure. I dont want a revolving door of well-meaning and well-intentioned but ultimately incompetent mods (through no fault of their own). I want a paid + trained mods like literally every other decent game in the industry has that its their job to hunt down cheaters. Discussing what minor amendments can be made the rules is an exercise in futility when that conversation doesnt cover the root cause of the issue.

 

[Registeredonline]

The way i say it no matter what rules you have regarding pushing there will always be a way to play around it. Basically no reason to try to enforce this since there will always be a loophole due to how the game is played

I think you should stop this whole hunt for push/bash account and focus on the anti merging thing. After nobling someone make it so their ip adress cant show up on your account (or anyone in tribe)

Lets stop kidding ourselves and focus on whats actually possible to do and enforce with reasonable rules

 

[=Bit Cloud=]

I appreciate Inno and the mods trying to cut down on the amount of cheaters/pushers in the game but sadly the rule has not had its intended effect. The only people the rule seems to disadvantage are those who are trying to play legally within the spirit of the rules. While those who have found loopholes or grey areas have benefitted the most even though everyone can see they're pushing.

I would not recommend the use of the 40 day rule again as stated it has had no positive affect on the world. Those that wanted to push have pushed and those that haven't can't even merge and coplay without being worried of catching a ban. I would recommend Inno looking into how they can catch players using VPN's that is if they truly want to catch pushers.

 

[Bygg byar med Mulle Meck]

For me, there are two "parameters" that rules should be created to satisfy. The first is making the game fair. And the second is making the game fun. It might sound obvious but I am fairly sure that keeping the balance between these two parameters is quite hard as they might be somewhat counter productive in some situations.

If you look at the parameter fair, I think one of the main problems with the pushing rules, both the old and the additions, is that they are to vague. Don't get me wrong. I completely understand why (at least I believe I do) Innogames have chosen to keep them vague. Keeping the rules vague probably scares the majority of the player away from even considering cheating. However, doing so makes the game very unfair in my opinion. The fewer people who are able to find and abuse loopholes or simply get away with cheating without being reported will benefit more from their cheating as less people cheat. On the other hand, just removing the pushing rules would instead remove a lot of fun aspects of the game, as it would instead force a big majority of the player base to adapt to a new meta where the early game literally only would consist of pushing, and getting tons of friends to help boost you. In my opinion, that wouldn't be a very fun meta. Enforcing the rules even harder would probably be what most people would want to see, but could in my opinion also be quite deterimental when the rules are vague as this could result in people being banned for things they did not realize was a breach of rules, or simply missunderstandings/weird situations.

Despite what I've written, I believe that being less vague with the rules would potentially make it easier to keep the balance between fair and fun a bit easier than it currently is. To begin with, it would potentially open up for loopholes to be abused, but it would also be easier for those who set the rules to adjust and find the balance between fun and fair. By listening to feedback rules that would be needed to destroy boring meta could be added, and rules that potentially ruines the fun could be removed. It wouldn't fix the issue right away, but would be an investment and be a solution that could potentially make the game a bit more fun in the future.

 

[Tueur De Roi]

This was largely useless and ineffective rule, Deep Family and Win Family have completely circumvented the intent of this rule, using accounts to build large number of scouts to scout players, while others only built nukes (didnt even bother building high smithy / academy). I'm sure there are plenty of other tribes that exploited the limp wristed rule this was.

If you're going to implement this rule, implement it like .de or don't even bother.

To clarify, I am fully in support of this rule, but you need to push the rule to its limits to create a fair game, otherwise it doesn't do anything. Plenty of people played within the rules set forth while others were more than happy to exploit all the grey / undefined levels of "pushing" and "profiting other accounts" you left open. I'm actually kinda pissed that you would waste people's time with such obviously exploited rules.

I think trying to tighten the rules is well intentioned but ultimately pointless if there isn't more **capable** mods who are available to spend more than a cursory 30 second glance at a report to determine if the reported parties are guilty or not.

People often hide their pushing behind the grey area of bashing. A lot of what is discussed doesnt really cover people pushing smartly by doing things like the following (as an example)

1) having a basher tribe of friends playing short term for a month or two
2) have them nuke your local rivals
3) noble for free food
4) then in a month or two internal your bashers.
5) gg no re you successfully outgrew all your opponents with zero effort. Now you get to laude yourselves as "top tier players"

Like the sole purpose of the basher tribe is to feed the main players in the main tribe. This is illegal according to the definition of the rules:

1. Creating and/or using one or more accounts for the primary benefit of another account ("pushing"), as well as profiting from such behavior, is forbidden.

The entire basher tribe is for the primary benefit of the main tribe so clearly that should be covered by this rule. However good luck proving that any of this is illegal because it mirrors genuine scenarios very closely. There very often is genuine basher tribes that are not created for the primary benefit of the main tribe. No amount of extra rules or regulations are going to be enough to cover these scenarios. And saying

"pLaYeRs ShOuLd JuSt RePoRt pUsHiNg"

is a fallacy in itself because regardless of how much detail i put into reports its a waste of time if the mod reading it capable enough to understand the nuances of what im saying. It would be a full time job to spoon feed all the little details required to prove the pushing isnt bashing to the mods. The only way to legitimately solve this problem is for dedicated mods spending hours of their tribe trawling through stats over several worlds to identify links that players wont be able to see when all we have access to is a useful but flawed twstats third party platform.

I am not bashing any of the mods but rather the mod structure. I dont want a revolving door of well-meaning and well-intentioned but ultimately incompetent mods (through no fault of their own). I want a paid + trained mods like literally every other decent game in the industry has that its their job to hunt down cheaters. Discussing what minor amendments can be made the rules is an exercise in futility when that conversation doesnt cover the root cause of the issue.

They could hire actual mods instead of relying on volunteers, but lets be realistic Innogames is a small indie company that is barely able to stay afloat! No way could they afford such luxury! /s

Realistically they just need to make bashing a punishable offense.

 

[grave maker]

Boosting/pushing is difficult to prove with certainty. It’s difficult to prove without knowing the player’s intent. You can be 99% sure someone is boosting someone else, but it is hard to ban someone without being 100% sure.

For example:

I start a world with a friend
I clear a target and my friend nobles the village
I don’t feel like rebuilding and will be too far behind if I do, so I decide to stop playing

From the outside, it looks like I am pushing/bashing for my friend, when in reality that wasn’t my intent. How can you be certain that I didn’t join the world just to use my account to clear for my friend? Does my friend get banned because they were the primary benefactor of my account even though that wasn’t my intent? Even if this happens world after world, that is not easy to ban someone for it, unless you have a way to prove that’s what they’re intentionally doing (even if on the outside it looks obvious).

One possible way to track this specifically could be if an account gains x amount of ODA over x period of time but does not grow their village or expand over that period of time. This could be defined as breaking the integrity of the game, but again, feels a little weird/hard to define. Maybe TW could test a "battle royale" type of ruleset where after x amount of time, any accounts that have not met a growth threshold get barbed. This could be harsh for new players, though, and wouldn't necessarily solve early game pushing where it is most significant.

I agree with others that it does need to be clearly stated that x and y is not allowed (for example, making an account for the sole purpose of clearing others & be nobled later), because it is illegal, and is bannable.

In general, the boosting rules need to be focused on provable, observable offenses. The 40-day rule is a good one. Even if there are ways around it, if someone is found to be circumventing it, it is an easy ban.