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Update regarding Multiboxing and input automation

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Zoya Talvanen
Section 23
#4381 - 2015-07-09 17:32:08 UTC  |  Edited by: Zoya Talvanen
Strata Maslav wrote:
The SMUG in this thread is pretty sickening not very conducive for discussion. I play and love the same game you guys do and unfortunately I will be removing some of my monetary support from this game as a result of a decision that CCP has made out of the blue.

This change will not effect my over all eve game play. I am not a heavy user of the broadcast function of the Isboxing software. I mainly use it to manage my windows and have used the controversial 'Isboxer broadcast + bomber' combination with 5 characters only once.

Recently and before this u-turn by CCP, I did invest in a couple more accounts but this recent change has pretty much condemned them to be immediately unsubbed. Even with this action the 'investment' of time and money that I have put into these accounts feels like it has been wasted.

I purchased these subscriptions from CCP to play their game in a specific fashion which at the time was considered legitimate by CCP. I have liked the direction that CCP have been moving towards with EVE Online and I will by no means be quitting the game due to this change but I do have a bad taste left in my mouth.

I cannot speculate CCP's reasoning for announcing this today but the delay on making this statement has caused some people supporting the game to feel they have been deceived.


I am as guilty as the next of not reading EULAs and contracts, but I have been saying in local for a while, after reading the EULA in June of 2014 that it appeared Input broadcasting was probably illegal and notwithstanding the decision by one senior GM in 2010 over a special case which was one input-one action, that there was a potential for this action. I am glad it happened, because I get a chance to try out some new moves, and possibly fleet doctrines which might someday rise in effect enough to get attention with a nerf bat.

Anyway< i was away from the game for several months though still subscribed. I do note fewer online now, so it is quite likely that we have real players to deal with rather than a lot of acounts run from a Master Control Program, so I am happy. I have adopted a practice of helping new players a little to balance their positive and negative experiences early on, in the hopes that we will eventually have more players.

Great Game and it was a good decision.
Zoya Talvanen
Section 23
#4382 - 2015-07-10 00:09:05 UTC
Charadrass wrote:
sorry. forgot EFT.

evemon is calculating the best remap.
i dont see you filling the skill queue for a year and calculating manually what should be the best remap. really i dont see it.

and even though.
evemon is violating the new eula directly.
ccps statement that this violation is ok ....erm... will not be a bannable offense is rendering the whole eula useless and greyzoned.
cause ccp can flip their statements each and every second. plus youre getting different statements based on the ccp employee you are asking.

and the best thing is.
one gm is accusing another for lying.
i am not kidding.

so ccp, balls to the walls. state clearly what is allowed and what is not.
regarding to the forums and eula statements: videofx + manuall multiboxing one key per box per command is allowed.
so stick to that and stop banning players for beeing fast.

or post here in the forums. from a dev, a gm, or from hilmar himself. that isboxer + videofx + manual multiboxing is forbidden.

easy for everyone. the whole problematique is there because ccp dont get it done to publish a clear statement.

we were happy as ccp stated: broadcasting and multiplexing is forbidden. we adapted and still got banned a few.

we want to stay in eve as customers. so if you want us to stay. erase the grey areas. its not that hard.


Erase the grey areas... Masterful use of Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. EFT, Pyffa, EVEMon, wonderful straw men. The post is polemic, vehement, repetitive and artful. Why then am I unconvinced?

Perhaps it is because you left out dotlan EVE maps and Eve-Survival and that online POS planner and http://www.ellatha.com/eve/T3.asp, no, that cannot be it.

The examples you mention do not interact with the game client--they may draw information from the game but it is the human receiving the information who benefits in better planning his/her stratagems, or not. Not all the software is that good at its purpose and there may be corner cases or even whole, unanticipated scenarios that human creativity can discover.

So there are tools, even tools you pay for that can create an advantage. The programmable calculator where you set up a collection of buy orders with information which you took from an EVE market is an example, and someone had to buy that calculator. In my case, I had to buy internet time to download Python or Pypy to write my own programs to plan my POS and to schedule my shipbuilding. Or I could have bought paper and pencil to do the same.

But those are all straw men. I cannot denounce my own knowledge of advanced mathematics and refuse to use it because the habit is automatic. And I paid for that knowledge and understanding, with real money and my own struggle to comprehend. And that, too, is a straw man. All of those things I mentioned interact with the game to extract information and interact with me to allow me to (usually) improve my decisions about actions I will take. They DO NOT help me take those actions by interacting with the input of the game client.

So, very nicely worded, but irrelevant, argument. I do not plan to abandon study of EVE or the freely available tools to plan better. I do not plan to adopt third-party software to make my interaction with the EVE client physically easier. I occasionally have more than one instance of the client on my screen, as in running Logi support for my own freighter, but my computer is not strong enough to support three instances, and I doubt I would use three if I could.

I am sure I will see more of your posts, but less certain I will read them.
Lucas Kell
Solitude Trading
S.N.O.T.
#4383 - 2015-07-10 07:18:14 UTC
Zoya Talvanen wrote:
Erase the grey areas... Masterful use of Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. EFT, Pyffa, EVEMon, wonderful straw men. The post is polemic, vehement, repetitive and artful. Why then am I unconvinced?

Perhaps it is because you left out dotlan EVE maps and Eve-Survival and that online POS planner and http://www.ellatha.com/eve/T3.asp, no, that cannot be it.

The examples you mention do not interact with the game client--they may draw information from the game but it is the human receiving the information who benefits in better planning his/her stratagems, or not. Not all the software is that good at its purpose and there may be corner cases or even whole, unanticipated scenarios that human creativity can discover.

So there are tools, even tools you pay for that can create an advantage. The programmable calculator where you set up a collection of buy orders with information which you took from an EVE market is an example, and someone had to buy that calculator. In my case, I had to buy internet time to download Python or Pypy to write my own programs to plan my POS and to schedule my shipbuilding. Or I could have bought paper and pencil to do the same.

But those are all straw men. I cannot denounce my own knowledge of advanced mathematics and refuse to use it because the habit is automatic. And I paid for that knowledge and understanding, with real money and my own struggle to comprehend. And that, too, is a straw man. All of those things I mentioned interact with the game to extract information and interact with me to allow me to (usually) improve my decisions about actions I will take. They DO NOT help me take those actions by interacting with the input of the game client.
The point that he was making is that all those tools create an advantage which is the supposed reason this change was brought in. What was being stated is that any third party tool is banned if it given an advantage, whether you make it yourself of not. That you know how to write it is irrelevant. I could rewrite key broadcasting using nothing but excel scripts, that still wouldn't make it legal. I use hand built tools to manage my trading and manufacture. Without those tools there is absolutely no way I would be able to trade at the level I do. How is that any less of a tool-based advantage?

The real issue is though that this change was not because of some questionable unfairness in people's ability to control their alts, which is why this is completely allowed under the new rules (that's eve-o preview, and it's actually more efficient to use than isboxer in most cases). This was a passive attempt at nerfing bombers after a direct nerf was rejected by the crying masses. It didn't work, which is why they are taking a second stab at it by destroying fleet warp (which FYI will also fail).

The Indecisive Noob - EVE fan blog.

Wholesale Trading - The new bulk trading mailing list.
ShadowandLight
Trigger Happy Capsuleers
#4384 - 2015-07-10 13:02:45 UTC
the changes worked for me, i pretty much have stopped playing and unsubbed all my accounts save for a couple.

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Marsha Mallow
#4385 - 2015-07-15 22:56:42 UTC
ShadowandLight wrote:
the changes worked for me, i pretty much have stopped playing and unsubbed all my accounts save for a couple.


op success

Ripard Teg > For the morons in the room:

Sweets > U can dd my face any day
Johnny Riko
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#4386 - 2015-07-16 00:32:27 UTC
What a complete embarrassment. If this happened to any other MMO there would be law suits. Sort yourself out CPP

I wanna join up. I think I got what it takes to be a Citizen.
ShadowandLight
Trigger Happy Capsuleers
#4387 - 2015-07-16 12:02:39 UTC
Marsha Mallow wrote:
ShadowandLight wrote:
the changes worked for me, i pretty much have stopped playing and unsubbed all my accounts save for a couple.


op success


daily users are starting to fall below 30k on a regular basis, how long can this company survive with a staff reflecting 2013 but a player base that is 2006?

Legacy - An EVE Online Blog

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Lady Rift
His Majesty's Privateers
#4388 - 2015-07-16 14:23:43 UTC
ShadowandLight wrote:
Marsha Mallow wrote:
ShadowandLight wrote:
the changes worked for me, i pretty much have stopped playing and unsubbed all my accounts save for a couple.


op success


daily users are starting to fall below 30k on a regular basis, how long can this company survive with a staff reflecting 2013 but a player base that is 2006?




at the peak of summer, while there's major changes being made in the fall.

its known as the summer slump.
Maenth
The Thirteen Provinces
#4389 - 2015-07-18 10:04:30 UTC
ShadowandLight wrote:
Marsha Mallow wrote:
ShadowandLight wrote:
the changes worked for me, i pretty much have stopped playing and unsubbed all my accounts save for a couple.

op success

daily users are starting to fall below 30k on a regular basis, how long can this company survive with a staff reflecting 2013 but a player base that is 2006?

If it's like that then 2006 people just need to grow up, and stop trying to make the best of broken systems that can't or won't be exploited equally by everybody What?

Johnny Riko wrote:
What a complete embarrassment. If this happened to any other MMO there would be law suits. Sort yourself out CPP

Apparently, they updated the EULA - which you agreed to - long before this thread, which described the input multiplexing as cheating. You should be thanking them for making a thread&announcement like this so you can react appropriately, instead of just weilding the banhammer against all of your accounts.

Drones. Drones are a means to an end. An end to the ruthless Caldari 'progress' machines. An end to the barbaric 'redemption' proposed by the Amarr. What they see as chaos shall be my perfect order, merely beyond their comprehension.
Maenth
The Thirteen Provinces
#4390 - 2015-07-18 10:34:20 UTC
The spirit of the ruling and CCP's position about all sorts of issues is very clear if people would just stop trying to worm their way around particular wordings and technicalities. It can be summarized in two points:

1) data collection along with the manipulation and presentation of that data is all fine and good
2) automated and augmented control in the game via non-human interaction with the EVE client is not acceptable in any way

This is really all you need to understand and know about the topic.


The rules about this have already been in place for a while so if you have a problem with it then that's your fault for not reading the EULA and learning about it sooner. If this were any other MMO then it would have been a lot more clear much sooner and they would have been harshly banning people for years already for all kinds of input multiplexing and botting. Anybody who is unhappy with this announcement should be thanking CCP for being so lenient on the matter and being so soft against offenders.

Drones. Drones are a means to an end. An end to the ruthless Caldari 'progress' machines. An end to the barbaric 'redemption' proposed by the Amarr. What they see as chaos shall be my perfect order, merely beyond their comprehension.
Lucas Kell
Solitude Trading
S.N.O.T.
#4391 - 2015-07-18 17:13:17 UTC
Maenth wrote:
The spirit of the ruling and CCP's position about all sorts of issues is very clear if people would just stop trying to worm their way around particular wordings and technicalities. It can be summarized in two points:

1) data collection along with the manipulation and presentation of that data is all fine and good
2) automated and augmented control in the game via non-human interaction with the EVE client is not acceptable in any way

This is really all you need to understand and know about the topic.


The rules about this have already been in place for a while so if you have a problem with it then that's your fault for not reading the EULA and learning about it sooner. If this were any other MMO then it would have been a lot more clear much sooner and they would have been harshly banning people for years already for all kinds of input multiplexing and botting. Anybody who is unhappy with this announcement should be thanking CCP for being so lenient on the matter and being so soft against offenders.
Swing and a miss. This is the spirit of CCPs ruling:

We tried to fix bombers by nerfing bombers and everyone went nuts, so we stopped that and instead tried to nerf them by nerfing multiboxers. That didn't work either so now were going to fix them by nerfing fleet warp.

That's what all of this boils down to. With the exception of the 2 or 3 players who ran 50+ accounts, people are still multiboxing just as easily as ever. CCP have even given the OK to EVE-O preview which makes it ludicrously easy to control fleets of ships.

And no, the rules of this weren't in place which is why tickets had been raised by the users of ISBoxer and OKed for use. There was even a thread about it which stated that as long as a player had to click for each click, it didn't matter how many clients that hit. Further, your over simplistic summation of the rules above leave things like videoFX and round robin as legal sine they are in no way non-human interaction yet we now know them to be against the rules. It does amuse me so when someone with such profound lack of knowledge of either multiboxing software or CCPs reasons for implementing this change try to come in with their 2 cents. Please continue.

The Indecisive Noob - EVE fan blog.

Wholesale Trading - The new bulk trading mailing list.
ISD Decoy
ISD Community Communications Liaisons
ISD Alliance
#4392 - 2015-07-19 23:15:36 UTC
I have removed an off-topic/troll post.

Quote:
5. Trolling is prohibited.

Trolling is a defined as a post that is deliberately designed for the purpose of angering and insulting other players in an attempt to incite retaliation or an emotional response. Posts of this nature are disruptive, often abusive, and do not contribute to the sense of community that CCP promote.

27. Off-topic posting is prohibited.

Off-topic posting is permitted within reason, as sometimes a single comment may color or lighten the tone of discussion. However, excessive posting of off-topic remarks in an attempt to derail a thread may result in the thread being locked, or a forum warning being issued to the off-topic poster.

ISD Decoy

Captain

Community Communication Liaisons (CCLs)

Interstellar Services Department
JustinD Snodgrass
The Scope
Gallente Federation
#4393 - 2015-07-23 17:36:16 UTC
Am I allowed to assign an extra programmable button on my keyboard to F12 and use that to broadcast for shields?
ShadowandLight
Trigger Happy Capsuleers
#4394 - 2015-07-26 16:32:51 UTC
JustinD Snodgrass wrote:
Am I allowed to assign an extra programmable button on my keyboard to F12 and use that to broadcast for shields?


technically, no, its a macro even though its not anything more then a key re-assignment.

will you get in trouble for it? probably not unless you are caught on video or something using it.

sorry, its a crap answer but thats really how it is now.

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Globby
Never Ignorant Gettin' Goals Accomplished
Gimme Da Loot
#4395 - 2015-07-27 19:23:19 UTC
I'm glad these changes went through, definitely fixes the people who were botting and using this as a cover as well, so it's great to kill three birds with a single stone.

+1 CCP

Regards,
Globby
Soldier of the New Order | Liason to the Executor | CODE. Treasurer
Sgt Ocker
What Corp is it
#4396 - 2015-07-27 22:02:42 UTC
Globby wrote:
I'm glad these changes went through, definitely fixes the people who were botting and using this as a cover as well, so it's great to kill three birds with a single stone.

+1 CCP

Regards,
Globby
Soldier of the New Order | Liason to the Executor | CODE. Treasurer

Ahhh, the stupid never ceases to amuse.

PS; Being treasurer, I hope you better than math than your above comment would indicate. Although, it is Code,who cares.

My opinions are mine.

  If you don't like them or disagree with me that's OK.- - - - - - Just don't bother Hating - I don't care

It really is getting harder and harder to justify $23 a month for each sub.
Lucas Kell
Solitude Trading
S.N.O.T.
#4397 - 2015-07-28 07:44:47 UTC
Globby wrote:
I'm glad these changes went through, definitely fixes the people who were botting and using this as a cover as well, so it's great to kill three birds with a single stone.

+1 CCP

Regards,
Globby
Soldier of the New Order | Liason to the Executor | CODE. Treasurer
Many botters will use multiple single miners spread over mutliple systems. I can't imagine many botters thinking it's a good idea to pile 50 accounts in one blob and hope to not get reported, and the additional difficulty of managing accounts spread out across systems is removed by the fact they are botting.

Mass multiboxers still exist though, so not sure what you're other 2 stones are. I'm guessing you're one of these that was hoping multiboxing would die, probably so your easy carebear ganking really pushed ahead in terms of isk made.

The Indecisive Noob - EVE fan blog.

Wholesale Trading - The new bulk trading mailing list.
Globby
Never Ignorant Gettin' Goals Accomplished
Gimme Da Loot
#4398 - 2015-07-28 16:06:59 UTC
Lucas Kell wrote:
Many botters will use multiple single miners spread over mutliple systems. I can't imagine many botters thinking it's a good idea to pile 50 accounts in one blob and hope to not get reported, and the additional difficulty of managing accounts spread out across systems is removed by the fact they are botting.


Lots of people did this hoping to not get reported. I'm just glad botting in all forms are much less prevalent now that input broadcasting is not allowed.
Lee Sin Priest
Republic University
Minmatar Republic
#4399 - 2015-07-28 16:37:19 UTC
Globby wrote:
Lucas Kell wrote:
Many botters will use multiple single miners spread over mutliple systems. I can't imagine many botters thinking it's a good idea to pile 50 accounts in one blob and hope to not get reported, and the additional difficulty of managing accounts spread out across systems is removed by the fact they are botting.


Lots of people did this hoping to not get reported. I'm just glad botting in all forms are much less prevalent now that input broadcasting is not allowed.


Botting is not synonymous with input broad casting, could everyone please staph
It may make it more efficient, but since they're botting it won't matter whether they're spread or together (also no links)

CCP cracked down on botting slightly before Jan 1st (more so) so that may also be what you're seeing
Globby
Never Ignorant Gettin' Goals Accomplished
Gimme Da Loot
#4400 - 2015-07-28 16:41:43 UTC  |  Edited by: Globby
I always felt that it was super easy to broadcast with some of these programs, but now I feel that this change is good for the game because it is no longer super easy to solo bomb an entire fleet. You actually have to be good and use more than one person now.

In no way was one guy bombing with 40 accounts in any way, shape or form fair, and I think even the people arguing otherwise realize that.

edit: I'm also glad that botting is surprisingly down by such a substantial amount since the broadcasting nerf.