MP Cheaters/Griefers

[Ubercat]

Gandalf Parker said:
I monitor the connections to the games running on my servers. I havent seen any blatant effort at that particular type of cheating but I do consider it worth continuing to watch for.

I give my orders and then discover later that they've been changed. I can't tell if the person has some strategic plan that differs from mine, or if they just think it's funny to do. I don't care. I told the other players in a message what was happening and that I'm going AI. Next turn I'll do so.

Is there any way to tell who your opponents are in one of your blitz games?

-Ubercat

[Gandalf Parker]

I did have one game where two people were playing the same nation. It was a miscommunication. They both thought they were the proper player and we never did figure out a way to answer it since neither had "called" it in the forum and neither had passworded their file. To make it worse, both had used the same god-build that was recommended in the forums.

As far as seeing who is playing who, I would have to declare that to be "impossible". Of course I consider impossible to be tech jargon meaning "I can do it but its more time and trouble than its worth". Any server can watch and record activity. I can record IP numbers that upload a file, compare the serial-code (a CRC, I cant really see their CD key but I can compare them), and with some effort I can pin down who's login on the forums is sending what files. But thats mostly more trouble than its worth unless it turns into a major problem. So for the moment, I do not run those watchdogs continually. I just spot-check.

So far I have done spot-checks to see if
A) the same people are filling up most of the games
B) if the same person is playing multiple nations in blitzes to stack the wins in their favor by having dumm2 always help real-name to win
C) if an expert player is playing the same nation/tactic to pad the end-game reports to prove their particular favorite bug report
D) if the same person keeps dropping out of games within the first few turns

So far I am happy to report that every nasty action I can think of to check on has come up with nothing worth taking action on. But I will try to keep my white-hat hacker mind working to stay ahead of the black-hat possibilities. (its part of my job and what I do all day anyway)