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Goons 4x4ing through the Sandbox - Market Manipulation on a Grand Scale

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Vaerah Vahrokha
Vahrokh Consulting
#2981 - 2012-06-24 08:28:22 UTC  |  Edited by: CCP Spitfire
Please refrain from personal attacks. Spitfire

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Elysium Foxx
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#2982 - 2012-06-24 08:30:19 UTC  |  Edited by: Elysium Foxx
Yeh, maybe we should count the amount of posts in this thread.

a percentage of Goon+ goon supporter posts to others posts.

See how deep that pool of tears actually is.
Vaerah Vahrokha
Vahrokh Consulting
#2983 - 2012-06-24 08:32:36 UTC  |  Edited by: Vaerah Vahrokha
Darth Gustav wrote:
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:
Darth Gustav wrote:

I can't stress this enough: This only worked because the "Jewbal" developed a model based explicitly on CCP's design parameters precisely as stated in various press releases.


No, because the most basic design parameter for a moving average is to smooth fluctuations, while it has been subverted to amplify them.

By poor design, not by exploitation.


This difference matters, because it's why the players did not get banned.

But be it poor design or exploitation, the mechanic has been subverted and this is why they roll back the gains.

Anyway don't take my words, take CCP's ones and see how much you'll change their opinion.

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Darth Gustav
Sith Interstellar Tech Harvesting
#2984 - 2012-06-24 08:33:27 UTC
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:
Darth Gustav wrote:
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:
Darth Gustav wrote:

I can't stress this enough: This only worked because the "Jewbal" developed a model based explicitly on CCP's design parameters precisely as stated in various press releases.


No, because the most basic design parameter for a moving average is to smooth fluctuations, while it has been subverted to amplify them.

By poor design, not by exploitation.


This difference matters, because it's why the players did not get banned.

But be it poor design or exploitation, the mechanic has been subverted and this is why they roll back the gains.

You call this perfect and predicted functionality subversion.

I do not think it means what you think it means. Roll

He who trolls trolls best when he who is trolled trolls the troller. -Darth Gustav's Axiom
Dave stark
#2985 - 2012-06-24 08:35:34 UTC
Elysium Foxx wrote:
Yeh, maybe we should count the amount of threads.

a percentage of Goon+ goon supporter posts to others posts.

See how deep that pool of tears actually is.


it really has nothing to do with "supporting goons" at all.

the entire point is whether they were within the limits of the sandbox or not. to me, they were. ccp added the formula to reward lp on a sliding scale based on the isk damage inflicted upon an enemy when their ship went pop. ok, manipulating the average price on an item was a bit close to the line, but isn't that what people sit in jita and do all day every day anyway?

the only real difference between what goons did, and what your average player does on a daily basis is scale, and scale is the only thing that's caused an issue here. at least, as far as i can tell.
Darth Gustav
Sith Interstellar Tech Harvesting
#2986 - 2012-06-24 08:37:58 UTC  |  Edited by: CCP Spitfire
Offtopic post removed. Spitfire

He who trolls trolls best when he who is trolled trolls the troller. -Darth Gustav's Axiom
Elysium Foxx
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#2987 - 2012-06-24 08:42:50 UTC  |  Edited by: Elysium Foxx
Dave stark wrote:
Elysium Foxx wrote:
Yeh, maybe we should count the amount of threads.

a percentage of Goon+ goon supporter posts to others posts.

See how deep that pool of tears actually is.


it really has nothing to do with "supporting goons" at all.

the entire point is whether they were within the limits of the sandbox or not. to me, they were. ccp added the formula to reward lp on a sliding scale based on the isk damage inflicted upon an enemy when their ship went pop. ok, manipulating the average price on an item was a bit close to the line, but isn't that what people sit in jita and do all day every day anyway?

the only real difference between what goons did, and what your average player does on a daily basis is scale, and scale is the only thing that's caused an issue here. at least, as far as i can tell.


I actually agree with you to a certain degree, and think what these guys did is impressive and could really only be done effectively with massive amounts of collateral, however, the fact is they exploited a known vulnerability in a system and should get punished.

I personally think that removing any assets and ISK they made from this venture, leaving the offenders out of pocket the amount that they investeted, is enough of a punishment. But they did exploit the system, and CCP's own rules state that anyone exploiting the system will be subject to potential bans.
Vaerah Vahrokha
Vahrokh Consulting
#2988 - 2012-06-24 08:44:32 UTC  |  Edited by: Vaerah Vahrokha
Darth Gustav wrote:

You call this perfect and predicted functionality subversion.

I do not think it means what you think it means. Roll


What *I* think about it does not matter, because if it mattered:

- T20 => everybody involved insta-perma banned.
- POS dupe => everybody involved insta-perma banned.
- Various T2 "scandals" => everybody involved insta-perma banned.
- PI magic => everybody involved insta-perma banned.
- Pax Amarria => everybody involved insta-perma banned after it got known, and reversed any transaction happened before that (but no ban).
- Unprobable T3 and nano ships and titans magic => fast formulas change to make it impossible, not waiting for months.
- This latest FW LP flaw abuse => reverse transactions and that's it. But any future attempt => everybody insta perma banned.

Only places where a developer should be "patient" and really dig a lot are those where it's impossible to have mathematical certainty something happened or not, i.e. when inference and heuristics flag something as suspicious but not sure.


But since what I think does not matter, then I have to look at what CCP believes. As owners of the game and it's entire assets and entire pool of characters they are entitled to do whatever they want.

Entitlement is what I see all over this thread, and not just by CCP. No, the players are not entitled to keep anything and are not even entitled to be left able to play if the game stakeholders decide so.

Know your place: Goons or not you are but end users, the bottom of the bottom of the bottom of the ladder. The bunch of end users a company milks to make their money however they want.

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Dave stark
#2989 - 2012-06-24 08:47:15 UTC
Elysium Foxx wrote:
Dave stark wrote:
Elysium Foxx wrote:
Yeh, maybe we should count the amount of threads.

a percentage of Goon+ goon supporter posts to others posts.

See how deep that pool of tears actually is.


it really has nothing to do with "supporting goons" at all.

the entire point is whether they were within the limits of the sandbox or not. to me, they were. ccp added the formula to reward lp on a sliding scale based on the isk damage inflicted upon an enemy when their ship went pop. ok, manipulating the average price on an item was a bit close to the line, but isn't that what people sit in jita and do all day every day anyway?

the only real difference between what goons did, and what your average player does on a daily basis is scale, and scale is the only thing that's caused an issue here. at least, as far as i can tell.


I actually agree with you to a certain degree, and think what these guys did is impressive and could really only be done effectively with massive amounts of collateral, however, the fact is they exploited a known vulnerability in a system and should get punished.

I personally think that removing any assets and ISK the made from this venture, leaving the offenders out of pocket the amount that they investeted is enough of a punishment. But they did exploit the system, and CCP's own rules state that anyone exploiting the system will be subject to potential bans.


and it could (and has been, repeatedly) argued that if ccp didn't want this to happen it shouldn't have left sisi.

goons say they warned ccp, ccp released it anyway.

it means either ccp didn't know [and goons lie] and didn't test it enough, or ccp did know [ccp lies] and didn't care. but hey we're going around in circles beating a dead horse, again. all we can really do is wait for monday's ccp dev blog/post on here/smoke signal/telegram
Darth Gustav
Sith Interstellar Tech Harvesting
#2990 - 2012-06-24 08:49:09 UTC
Dave stark wrote:
Elysium Foxx wrote:
Dave stark wrote:
Elysium Foxx wrote:
Yeh, maybe we should count the amount of threads.

a percentage of Goon+ goon supporter posts to others posts.

See how deep that pool of tears actually is.


it really has nothing to do with "supporting goons" at all.

the entire point is whether they were within the limits of the sandbox or not. to me, they were. ccp added the formula to reward lp on a sliding scale based on the isk damage inflicted upon an enemy when their ship went pop. ok, manipulating the average price on an item was a bit close to the line, but isn't that what people sit in jita and do all day every day anyway?

the only real difference between what goons did, and what your average player does on a daily basis is scale, and scale is the only thing that's caused an issue here. at least, as far as i can tell.


I actually agree with you to a certain degree, and think what these guys did is impressive and could really only be done effectively with massive amounts of collateral, however, the fact is they exploited a known vulnerability in a system and should get punished.

I personally think that removing any assets and ISK the made from this venture, leaving the offenders out of pocket the amount that they investeted is enough of a punishment. But they did exploit the system, and CCP's own rules state that anyone exploiting the system will be subject to potential bans.


and it could (and has been, repeatedly) argued that if ccp didn't want this to happen it shouldn't have left sisi.

goons say they warned ccp, ccp released it anyway.

it means either ccp didn't know [and goons lie] and didn't test it enough, or ccp did know [ccp lies] and didn't care. but hey we're going around in circles beating a dead horse, again. all we can really do is wait for monday's ccp dev blog/post on here/smoke signal/telegram


Good point.

He who trolls trolls best when he who is trolled trolls the troller. -Darth Gustav's Axiom
Elysium Foxx
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#2991 - 2012-06-24 08:49:39 UTC  |  Edited by: Elysium Foxx
Agreed (flogging dead horses makes the meat more tender though), will be very interesting to see CCP's response to this whole mess. Respect will be both earnt and lost whatever they do. Who's respect do they value the most?
Vaerah Vahrokha
Vahrokh Consulting
#2992 - 2012-06-24 08:52:41 UTC
Dave stark wrote:

it means either ccp didn't know [and goons lie] and didn't test it enough, or ccp did know [ccp lies] and didn't care. but hey we're going around in circles beating a dead horse, again. all we can really do is wait for monday's ccp dev blog/post on here/smoke signal/telegram


Unlike others, I don't want to spread rumors. But for what I can recall from past posts, CCP did see the potential for a vulnerability but it was too late to take a decision like they did for this latest patch (i.e. delay it for 1 week to squash the last minute bugs) so they had to push it out anyway.
The true mistake on CCP part in this case, would be to under-stimate how emergent players would immediately use the vulnerability at their advantage on huge scale.

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Darth Gustav
Sith Interstellar Tech Harvesting
#2993 - 2012-06-24 08:57:22 UTC  |  Edited by: CCP Spitfire
Please do not spread rumours. Spitfire

He who trolls trolls best when he who is trolled trolls the troller. -Darth Gustav's Axiom
Ghost Xray
Hedion University
Amarr Empire
#2994 - 2012-06-24 08:58:52 UTC
Darth Gustav wrote:

Those LP cost literally dozens of ISK per unit. That is far from free. Roll

When there is a cost incurred, how is a player to inherently know it's out of whack? Blink

What other store doesn't honor their price labels? Cool

How's this for buzz? Smile


Guy, even the OP knew it was broke/out of whack/plain goofy and game breaking, which is why he was tweeting CCP in the first place, leading to all this terrible posting.

He wrongly thought it'd be cool for him to break it just a "little bit" for his own gain. I guess that's why he's known, even amongst your own rank, as a sociopath.

Take off your Goon goggles for a second and try and look at this objectively.

Dave stark
#2995 - 2012-06-24 09:02:14 UTC
Darth Gustav wrote:
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:
Dave stark wrote:

it means either ccp didn't know [and goons lie] and didn't test it enough, or ccp did know [ccp lies] and didn't care. but hey we're going around in circles beating a dead horse, again. all we can really do is wait for monday's ccp dev blog/post on here/smoke signal/telegram


Unlike others, I don't want to spread rumors. But for what I can recall from past posts, CCP did see the potential for a vulnerability but it was too late to take a decision like they did for this latest patch (i.e. delay it for 1 week to squash the last minute bugs) so they had to push it out anyway.
The true mistake on CCP part in this case, would be to under-stimate how emergent players would immediately use the vulnerability at their advantage on huge scale.

I won't spread rumors. I'll state facts.

Here's one:

CCP Soundwave hoped this "feature" would fail miserably.

Here's another one:

CCP Soundwave got what he hoped for.


haha yes, i saw that interview too.

be careful what you wish for.
Darth Gustav
Sith Interstellar Tech Harvesting
#2996 - 2012-06-24 09:04:07 UTC
Ghost Xray wrote:
Darth Gustav wrote:

Those LP cost literally dozens of ISK per unit. That is far from free. Roll

When there is a cost incurred, how is a player to inherently know it's out of whack? Blink

What other store doesn't honor their price labels? Cool

How's this for buzz? Smile


Guy, even the OP knew it was broke/out of whack/plain goofy and game breaking, which is why he was tweeting CCP in the first place, leading to all this terrible posting.

He wrongly thought it'd be cool for him to break it just a "little bit" for his own gain. I guess that's why he's known, even amongst your own rank, as a sociopath.

Take off your Goon goggles for a second and try and look at this objectively.


What he knew is that CCP put it in aware that it worked the way it was designed to work and that CCP quite mistakenly thought it could/would stand on its own merit.

So he tried it out, it worked so well that he then told CCP how broke it was.

There's a difference.

He who trolls trolls best when he who is trolled trolls the troller. -Darth Gustav's Axiom
Pisov viet
Perkone
Caldari State
#2997 - 2012-06-24 09:06:07 UTC
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:
Richard Desturned wrote:

so you're saying that market manipulation should be bannable


I would not, I actually applaud at their genius.

But the game companies usually don't like this kind of genius played on their products, so - regardless of me or you liking it or not, they go very heavy handed.

Point in case, in WAR in the last months there have been:

- Mass people banning because they discovered they could get an health buff thru a pet by going in certain zones. Developers used a flawed formula... rings you something similar?

- Mass people perma banning with no recourse allowed because they discovered they could increase their stats a lot by clicking on certain NPCs, which applied a formula that could be gamed.

The comparison is wrong.

In both the cases you quoted, the players were performing an action that had an unexpected and unwanted result, disconnected from the game's design.

Here, the players did what they were supposed to do. They enroled in militia, they blew ships up, they gained LP for it. Then they figured how that LP was calculated, and made sure it would be as high as possible.

Unless the function calculating ship cargo value on the exchange price SOMEHOW wrote itself during the development, SOMEONE in CCP thought "Well, let's just calculate the average price at which it was exchanged.", and, apparently, nobody cared about that part, or nobody thought "hey, there are a fuckton of people running margin trading scams by labelling useless items higher than what they're worth. This may mean that average market prices is not representative of the item value".

A similar thing may have happened if someone in a FW was running such a scam, hauling a hundred of items he buys 1m and sell 1b, got blown up and the killer received LP based on 100*500m. He, too, would have received a huge amount of isk. And it wouldnt have been "exploiting a bug".
Darth Gustav
Sith Interstellar Tech Harvesting
#2998 - 2012-06-24 09:08:13 UTC
Pisov viet wrote:
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:
Richard Desturned wrote:

so you're saying that market manipulation should be bannable


I would not, I actually applaud at their genius.

But the game companies usually don't like this kind of genius played on their products, so - regardless of me or you liking it or not, they go very heavy handed.

Point in case, in WAR in the last months there have been:

- Mass people banning because they discovered they could get an health buff thru a pet by going in certain zones. Developers used a flawed formula... rings you something similar?

- Mass people perma banning with no recourse allowed because they discovered they could increase their stats a lot by clicking on certain NPCs, which applied a formula that could be gamed.

The comparison is wrong.

In both the cases you quoted, the players were performing an action that had an unexpected and unwanted result, disconnected from the game's design.

Here, the players did what they were supposed to do. They enroled in militia, they blew ships up, they gained LP for it. Then they figured how that LP was calculated, and made sure it would be as high as possible.

Unless the function calculating ship cargo value on the exchange price SOMEHOW wrote itself during the development, SOMEONE in CCP thought "Well, let's just calculate the average price at which it was exchanged.", and, apparently, nobody cared about that part, or nobody thought "hey, there are a fuckton of people running margin trading scams by labelling useless items higher than what they're worth. This may mean that average market prices is not representative of the item value".

A similar thing may have happened if someone in a FW was running such a scam, hauling a hundred of items he buys 1m and sell 1b, got blown up and the killer received LP based on 100*500m. He, too, would have received a huge amount of isk. And it wouldnt have been "exploiting a bug".

This post is absolutely brilliant.

Thank you for the /thread.

He who trolls trolls best when he who is trolled trolls the troller. -Darth Gustav's Axiom
Elysium Foxx
Republic Military School
Minmatar Republic
#2999 - 2012-06-24 09:15:24 UTC  |  Edited by: Elysium Foxx
..........blah, blah

A similar thing may have happened if someone in a FW was running such a scam, hauling a hundred of items he buys 1m and sell 1b, got blown up and the killer received LP based on 100*500m. He, too, would have received a huge amount of isk. And it wouldnt have been "exploiting a bug". [/quote wrote:

This post is absolutely brilliant.

Thank you for the /thread.


no it would not have been exploiting a bug, since he had no knowledge the bug existed. Thats if your implying he got unintentionally blown up. You obviously have no idea what you are talking about.
Vaerah Vahrokha
Vahrokh Consulting
#3000 - 2012-06-24 09:19:11 UTC
Pisov viet wrote:
Vaerah Vahrokha wrote:
Richard Desturned wrote:

so you're saying that market manipulation should be bannable


I would not, I actually applaud at their genius.

But the game companies usually don't like this kind of genius played on their products, so - regardless of me or you liking it or not, they go very heavy handed.

Point in case, in WAR in the last months there have been:

- Mass people banning because they discovered they could get an health buff thru a pet by going in certain zones. Developers used a flawed formula... rings you something similar?

- Mass people perma banning with no recourse allowed because they discovered they could increase their stats a lot by clicking on certain NPCs, which applied a formula that could be gamed.

The comparison is wrong.

In both the cases you quoted, the players were performing an action that had an unexpected and unwanted result, disconnected from the game's design.


In both the cases I quoted they were using an action that is valid for the whole rest of the game: whole categories of buffs stack. They just used the intended game mechanics to stack a lot of buffs, more than the developers thought they'd do.
Basically the developers should have capped the amount of those buffs but they did not put such safeguard in their formula.

How's this different than this EvE instance?

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