Players manipulating Elo/EAS by stockpiling Wins in turn-based mode

[sprockitz]

Recently a player vaulted themselves to the top of arena rankings (and all-time Elo rankings) by playing over 100 turn-based games simultaneously, ending all the losses first, then finishing all the wins. By finishing all losses first, the Elo dropped to 100 and EAS to 1100. Then they catapulted up to 500 in Elo and almost 2000 in EAS (in a highly luck based game where highest ranked legitimate players are around 1700).This isn't any skill and shouldn't be awarded, it is taking advantage of a flaw in the system.

[nmego]

I'm not sure why you aren't including that player's name, if you think that it dishonors them or something, it is well-earned anyway that they should be exposed for gaming the system, and therefore ruining the competition aspect for a lot of players.

[whatshisbucket]

Recently a player vaulted themselves to the top of arena rankings (and all-time Elo rankings) by playing over 100 turn-based games simultaneously, ending all the losses first, then finishing all the wins. By finishing all losses first, the Elo dropped to 100 and EAS to 1100. Then they catapulted up to 500 in Elo and almost 2000 in EAS (in a highly luck based game where highest ranked legitimate players are around 1700).This isn't any skill and shouldn't be awarded, it is taking advantage of a flaw in the system.

Oops yeah I went a little overboard; didn't think my rating would get quite that high. 150 games was the exact number, probably could have gone with just 120. Anyway, it should be clear that the current system does not work for turn-based games. Unclear what the best solution is, scoring games based on start time would definitely work, but could be a little clunky.

I'm not sure why you aren't including that player's name, if you think that it dishonors them or something, it is well-earned anyway that they should be exposed for gaming the system, and therefore ruining the competition aspect for a lot of players.

The competition in Yahtzee is already a farce; last season's winner and the 3 people after me have only gotten to where they are by cheating.

I'd like to credit an unnamed player in an unnamed game as my inspiration; I had thought of this meta-strategy previously but didn't execute it until I saw that someone else had done so somewhat effectively.

[sprockitz]

The reason I didn’t feel the need to name was seeing the player was active on the forum and hoping they’d comeforward...and applaud whatsisbucket for doing so. This isn’t explicitly illegal anywhere but is clearly not in the spirit of the game.

I agree yahtzee last season was a complete farce to have a winner convicted of multiple accounts used to push themselves to the top and go unpunished is an absolute joke. This type of thing is happening in a lot of the games and is really unfortunate. Fighting one type of cheating with another type though is not improving the situation.

Hopefully what can come of this is the need to better the EAS scoring system. A better way to determine winners. A way to limit the same people setting up matches in arena mode to push themselves to the top.

1 idea for the first is that all games arecomputed simultaneously with an iterative spproach. I can detail this later if people are interested but it eliminates the meta advantage of determining finish order.

[Jest Phulin]

I'm not sure why you aren't including that player's name, if you think that it dishonors them or something, it is well-earned anyway that they should be exposed for gaming the system, and therefore ruining the competition aspect for a lot of players.

The public forums are never the right place to call out someone by name. If someone thinks someone else violated the terms of the site, it should be reported to the moderators to have them decide. The practice of "this specific player is (fill in the blank, derogatorily)" tends to lead to flame wars which benefits noone. The way sprokitz posted focuses on raising awareness of the problem, not the player.

As far as "this person was convicted of cheating, but still retains their title"... It is a difficult process to take a title back from someone, even when there is enough evidence to show rules were violated. Deflategate and sign stealing are two recent major events in US sports history where the teams were found guilty, heavily sanctioned and fined, but still kept their titles.

As far as the ELO/EAS manipulation... I am reminded by something a sports commentator said. The number of people trying to find loopholes in the rules far outweigh the number of people making the rules.

[nmego]

The public forums are never the right place to call out someone by name. If someone thinks someone else violated the terms of the site, it should be reported to the moderators to have them decide. The practice of "this specific player is (fill in the blank, derogatorily)" tends to lead to flame wars which benefits noone. The way sprokitz posted focuses on raising awareness of the problem, not the player.

The problem is that I've seen many mentioning of "specific cheating behaviors" on the forums, on threads that go ignored for ages, giving the impression that, in some cases, the thread owner never reports these players, and since their names were never mentioned, they go unreported forever. And the competitive scene keeps getting negatively affected by that.

Yes, calling players by name does lead to flame wars sometimes, but I've yet to see that happen with "sufficient evidence". There are threads that have mentioned replays to discuss an issue about a particular cheating action (I.e. kingmaking), guess what, you cannot censor the player's name while linking replays. When the issue is "Cheating" and "proper evidence" is present. I've yet to seen a flame war happen till now.

Though I guess it'd be safer to just report directly, just in case you're wrong. The forums should only be focused on raising awareness of key problems. If every cheater was discussed in the forums we'd run out of space (and time too).

As far as "this person was convicted of cheating, but still retains their title"... It is a difficult process to take a title back from someone, even when there is enough evidence to show rules were violated. [blank] are two recent major events in US sports history where the teams were found guilty, heavily sanctioned and fined, but still kept their titles.

That is the case, because of several reasons, including politics, relations, money, fame and other stuff. I think that most of these reasons are absent on a site like this. Especially since "retaining a title" here, with no name or credentials is not really as big as a deal as in real life. If someone got their title revoked on here, I'm quite sure at least 90% of the players won't notice. Why do you think it is such a difficult process?

As far as the ELO/EAS manipulation... I am reminded by something a sports commentator said. The number of people trying to find loopholes in the rules far outweigh the number of people making the rules.

This also works as a safety mechanism if you think about it, the more players trying to find loopholes, the higher chance the loopholes are exposed, the higher chance they get fixed.

[nmego]

I apologize for double-posting, but I've noticed this after posting and I believe this deserves another post of its own.

The competition in Yahtzee is already a farce; last season's winner and the 3 people after me have only gotten to where they are by cheating.

This is a passing-remark that isn't acknowledged as it should. It basically means that there's the possibility of 3 more cheaters.
Also, why don't you submit a detailed report with evidence that shows that these players have been cheating?
What makes you think they cheated?

If cheating is taken lightly, and is not met with strict punishment, it will spread and go out of control.

[whatshisbucket]

Recently a player vaulted themselves to the top of arena rankings (and all-time Elo rankings) by playing over 100 turn-based games simultaneously, ending all the losses first, then finishing all the wins. By finishing all losses first, the Elo dropped to 100 and EAS to 1100. Then they catapulted up to 500 in Elo and almost 2000 in EAS (in a highly luck based game where highest ranked legitimate players are around 1700).This isn't any skill and shouldn't be awarded, it is taking advantage of a flaw in the system.

you're such a hypocrite lol
should never have put the idea in your head

[juss100]

What do people get out of this? Satisfaction? ... what?

I don't worry too much about my ELO but when it does go up I know it's because I've been playing well, which has some rewards I think. Knowing I got there by cheating wouldn't do much for me.

[sprockitz]

What do people get out of this? Satisfaction? ... what?

I don't worry too much about my ELO but when it does go up I know it's because I've been playing well, which has some rewards I think. Knowing I got there by cheating wouldn't do much for me.

Hopefully gets admins to fix the metagame. Tournaments prestige got fixed this way. And now it looks like arena is getting fixed with the turn based issues. Hopefully Elo is next.

Yes it was bad judgment to do this meta game (which benefited both myself and 2 friends).