Smurfing

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Comments

  • UncleCrunchUncleCrunch Mayonnaise land Join Date: 2005-02-16 Member: 41365Members, Reinforced - Onos
    Some of the smurfers are actually too good to be true. They never check any corner, but always find a way to avoid being taken by surprise. And other symptoms. It looks like banned players with new steam account.

    So the problem isn't if you are smurfing for fun or not. The question is : are all the smurfers possible suspects concerning cheats ? Even if it is one or two amongst many; it leads to that.

    So the best is to loose the smurfing.
  • amoralamoral Join Date: 2013-01-03 Member: 177250Members
    Some of the smurfers are actually too good to be true. They never check any corner, but always find a way to avoid being taken by surprise. And other symptoms. It looks like banned players with new steam account.

    So the problem isn't if you are smurfing for fun or not. The question is : are all the smurfers possible suspects concerning cheats ? Even if it is one or two amongst many; it leads to that.

    So the best is to loose the smurfing.
    Some of the smurfers are actually too good to be true. They never check any corner, but always find a way to avoid being taken by surprise. And other symptoms. It looks like banned players with new steam account.

    So the problem isn't if you are smurfing for fun or not. The question is : are all the smurfers possible suspects concerning cheats ? Even if it is one or two amongst many; it leads to that.

    So the best is to loose the smurfing.

    that's a pretty wild accusation, that i'm not entirely sure you're qualified to make.

    hackusations are pretty ridiculous at this point, considering the tiny player-base.

    also, command map is almost a wallhack.
  • rantologyrantology Join Date: 2012-02-05 Member: 143750Members, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Gold, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Gold
    There's a few reasons I think people smurf, from trolling to not having to worry about how they play in terms of their main handle's reputation (which seems silly but I know people do this). But the most 'legitimate' reason I've seen is to avoid stacking - if you are known to be a good player people are likely to stack your team - if they can't recognize you they can't stack. Or likewise a more devious application is TO stack without having anyone realize it... personally I never understood smurfing and I like games that discourage it.

    The protest about smurfing is kind of moot though because I can't imagine anything could be done about it.
  • YojimboYojimbo England Join Date: 2009-03-19 Member: 66806Members, NS2 Playtester, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, Reinforced - Shadow
    Some of the smurfers are actually too good to be true. They never check any corner, but always find a way to avoid being taken by surprise. And other symptoms. It looks like banned players with new steam account.

    So the problem isn't if you are smurfing for fun or not. The question is : are all the smurfers possible suspects concerning cheats ? Even if it is one or two amongst many; it leads to that.

    So the best is to loose the smurfing.

    Even though this is speculation I wouldn't say there are a high amount of smurf hackers but more so of players exploiting the system, which 275 patch apparently has fixed, so hackusations should come down quite abit.
  • BeigeAlertBeigeAlert Texas Join Date: 2013-08-08 Member: 186657Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Pistachionauts
    rantology wrote: »
    There's a few reasons I think people smurf, from trolling to not having to worry about how they play in terms of their main handle's reputation (which seems silly but I know people do this). But the most 'legitimate' reason I've seen is to avoid stacking - if you are known to be a good player people are likely to stack your team - if they can't recognize you they can't stack. Or likewise a more devious application is TO stack without having anyone realize it... personally I never understood smurfing and I like games that discourage it.

    The protest about smurfing is kind of moot though because I can't imagine anything could be done about it.

    That only works for one round though. As soon as "ygolotnar", the mysteriously good rookie finishes out a round with a 40:1 kdr, suddenly everyone wants to be on their team anyways.

    My main gripe is it breaks force even teams, and pretty much anything that relies on hive data. Yes yes, it's not perfect, but I think it actually gets it close most of the time. But there's no chance of getting balanced properly if the hive skill is completely misrepresentative of the player's skill. (eg someone who is good enough for 2500+ that only shows 300 would get balanced to a team that already has very experienced players).

    I don't think simply changing the name and hiding the badges actually resets the hive skill, so I'm primarily talking about players with alternate steam accounts.
  • YojimboYojimbo England Join Date: 2009-03-19 Member: 66806Members, NS2 Playtester, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, Reinforced - Shadow
    BeigeAlert wrote: »
    rantology wrote: »
    There's a few reasons I think people smurf, from trolling to not having to worry about how they play in terms of their main handle's reputation (which seems silly but I know people do this). But the most 'legitimate' reason I've seen is to avoid stacking - if you are known to be a good player people are likely to stack your team - if they can't recognize you they can't stack. Or likewise a more devious application is TO stack without having anyone realize it... personally I never understood smurfing and I like games that discourage it.

    The protest about smurfing is kind of moot though because I can't imagine anything could be done about it.

    That only works for one round though. As soon as "ygolotnar", the mysteriously good rookie finishes out a round with a 40:1 kdr, suddenly everyone wants to be on their team anyways.

    My main gripe is it breaks force even teams, and pretty much anything that relies on hive data. Yes yes, it's not perfect, but I think it actually gets it close most of the time. But there's no chance of getting balanced properly if the hive skill is completely misrepresentative of the player's skill. (eg someone who is good enough for 2500+ that only shows 300 would get balanced to a team that already has very experienced players).

    I don't think simply changing the name and hiding the badges actually resets the hive skill, so I'm primarily talking about players with alternate steam accounts.

    I don't pay attention to hive skill much but more so on KDR, thats more a reliable source of information than hive skill, theres a plugin that forces KDR teams anyway so that should help alittle.
  • SantaClawsSantaClaws Denmark Join Date: 2012-07-31 Member: 154491Members, Reinforced - Shadow
    edited June 2015
    BeigeAlert wrote: »
    rantology wrote: »
    There's a few reasons I think people smurf, from trolling to not having to worry about how they play in terms of their main handle's reputation (which seems silly but I know people do this). But the most 'legitimate' reason I've seen is to avoid stacking - if you are known to be a good player people are likely to stack your team - if they can't recognize you they can't stack. Or likewise a more devious application is TO stack without having anyone realize it... personally I never understood smurfing and I like games that discourage it.

    The protest about smurfing is kind of moot though because I can't imagine anything could be done about it.

    That only works for one round though. As soon as "ygolotnar", the mysteriously good rookie finishes out a round with a 40:1 kdr, suddenly everyone wants to be on their team anyways.
    I don't play anymore, but when I did I smurfed (not with the green name thing). If I got a ridiculous kdr like that, I jump servers immediately. I have no interest in games like that with no resistance. So the nick can work significantly longer than one game.
  • MauvaisVitrierMauvaisVitrier France Join Date: 2014-04-10 Member: 195291Members, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond
    edited June 2015
    I've met this one guy btw on a pub the other day. 8 KDR, 75% marines games. He's funny. Almost 99% sure he/she hacks. We had a good laugh. He definitely doesn't use a smurf, that would be counter productive to him/her. Just for bragging purposes
  • YojimboYojimbo England Join Date: 2009-03-19 Member: 66806Members, NS2 Playtester, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, Reinforced - Shadow
    edited June 2015
    I've met this one guy btw on a pub the other day. 8 KDR, 75% marines games. He's funny. Almost 99% sure he/she hacks. We had a good laugh. He definitely doesn't use a smurf, that would be counter productive to him/her. Just for bragging purposes

    Careful about name and shame, might wanna edit that lol, yeah I saw him on server today, he knows I like to spec him so he deliberately sandbags and plays rubbish, its not a hack its an exploit. I just laugh at him as he now knows he's being watched lol
  • ZavaroZavaro Tucson, Arizona Join Date: 2005-02-14 Member: 41174Members, Super Administrators, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Silver, Subnautica Playtester, NS2 Community Developer, Pistachionauts
    No name and shame, dudes. I've got my eyes on you.
  • YojimboYojimbo England Join Date: 2009-03-19 Member: 66806Members, NS2 Playtester, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, Reinforced - Shadow
    edited June 2015
    Zavaro wrote: »
    No name and shame, dudes. I've got my eyes on you.

    *runs and hides*
    200_s.gif
  • MauvaisVitrierMauvaisVitrier France Join Date: 2014-04-10 Member: 195291Members, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond
    edited June 2015
    What if I put a @ in front of the name. So that he gets a notification xD

    I've met this Zavaro guy the other day, and he seemed really great.


    Post not edited by the Illuminati at June 24
  • amoralamoral Join Date: 2013-01-03 Member: 177250Members
    BeigeAlert wrote: »
    rantology wrote: »
    There's a few reasons I think people smurf, from trolling to not having to worry about how they play in terms of their main handle's reputation (which seems silly but I know people do this). But the most 'legitimate' reason I've seen is to avoid stacking - if you are known to be a good player people are likely to stack your team - if they can't recognize you they can't stack. Or likewise a more devious application is TO stack without having anyone realize it... personally I never understood smurfing and I like games that discourage it.

    The protest about smurfing is kind of moot though because I can't imagine anything could be done about it.

    That only works for one round though. As soon as "ygolotnar", the mysteriously good rookie finishes out a round with a 40:1 kdr, suddenly everyone wants to be on their team anyways.

    My main gripe is it breaks force even teams, and pretty much anything that relies on hive data. Yes yes, it's not perfect, but I think it actually gets it close most of the time. But there's no chance of getting balanced properly if the hive skill is completely misrepresentative of the player's skill. (eg someone who is good enough for 2500+ that only shows 300 would get balanced to a team that already has very experienced players).

    I don't think simply changing the name and hiding the badges actually resets the hive skill, so I'm primarily talking about players with alternate steam accounts.

    :) god i don't know what's up with force even, but some server thought that a 700 vs 1400 match was balanced the other day. we all got a good laugh out of it, then one team got facerolled.... i'll let you guess which.

    keep in mind, there were something like... 30 percent vs 70 percent rookies vs normal hive values and it was i think 18 man. plenty of material to work with so to speak.
  • meatmachinemeatmachine South England Join Date: 2013-01-06 Member: 177858Members, NS2 Playtester, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Supporter
    BeigeAlert wrote: »
    As soon as "ygolotnar", the mysteriously good rookie finishes out a round with a 40:1 kdr, suddenly everyone wants to be on their team anyways.
    .
    that cursed ygolotnar, why must she covet all the good meat :o
  • nemonemo Join Date: 2003-01-05 Member: 11908Members, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Shadow
    edited June 2015
    Smurfing means you cannot balance teams with hive scores, or by manually doing it.

    Smurfing means people are free to act in a way that would normally ruin their reputation.

    Smurfing allows players who are banned for whatever reason to rejoin.

    Smurfing can also be used by a skilled player who doesn't want to reveal their tactics.

    So three negative things, one positive and tbh it sounds flakey at that.

    If I find a player smurfing they get banned. Sure its possible to smurf without doing anything wrong. However if I ban them, i've not really banned the person have I, they can just come right back with their normal account.

    Therefore the default least harm action is to ban smurfers on sight, if they are smurfing for nefarious reasons you stop them. If they are smurfing for other reasons they can still come back on their main account.



  • WobWob Join Date: 2005-04-08 Member: 47814Members, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
    It's funny cause I got banned from the Team Work And Tactics servers for smurfing back in 2013 when it really was my first 10 hours. Equally I get called a smurf/hacker in csgo with 150 hours.

    Don't assume that people who are good with few hours are smurfs. It is entirely possible to be good at games and pick things up quickly.

    If you want to hound out smurfs, encourage mods where you have to keep your steam account public or you can't join a team.
    Then you can look at public accounts and make a decision.
    If they have multiple games with 100s of hours, they are likely not a smurf.
    If they have 1 game (ns2), with few hours, they might well be a smurf.
  • BeigeAlertBeigeAlert Texas Join Date: 2013-08-08 Member: 186657Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Pistachionauts
    edited June 2015
    nachos wrote: »
    It's funny cause I got banned from the Team Work And Tactics servers for smurfing back in 2013 when it really was my first 10 hours. Equally I get called a smurf/hacker in csgo with 150 hours.

    Don't assume that people who are good with few hours are smurfs. It is entirely possible to be good at games and pick things up quickly.

    If you want to hound out smurfs, encourage mods where you have to keep your steam account public or you can't join a team.
    Then you can look at public accounts and make a decision.
    If they have multiple games with 100s of hours, they are likely not a smurf.
    If they have 1 game (ns2), with few hours, they might well be a smurf.

    Usually... if a player is that good, they've got at least 500 hours between ns2 and cs:go, or some similar games. I do encourage public steam accounts, otherwise there's no way to check that. Problem is, one of the biggest benefits of making your profile private is that you can't get spammed anymore. I just recently got spammed by some trading card asshole relentlessly last week. Sure, I can block them, but the notifications still popup! (So what's the point, really???) Still, I encourage public profiles.
  • UncleCrunchUncleCrunch Mayonnaise land Join Date: 2005-02-16 Member: 41365Members, Reinforced - Onos
    Yojimbo wrote: »
    Some of the smurfers are actually too good to be true. They never check any corner, but always find a way to avoid being taken by surprise. And other symptoms. It looks like banned players with new steam account.

    So the problem isn't if you are smurfing for fun or not. The question is : are all the smurfers possible suspects concerning cheats ? Even if it is one or two amongst many; it leads to that.

    So the best is to loose the smurfing.

    Even though this is speculation I wouldn't say there are a high amount of smurf hackers but more so of players exploiting the system, which 275 patch apparently has fixed, so hackusations should come down quite abit.

    Let's hope.
  • amoralamoral Join Date: 2013-01-03 Member: 177250Members
    nemo wrote: »
    Smurfing means you cannot balance teams with hive scores, or by manually doing it.

    Smurfing means people are free to act in a way that would normally ruin their reputation.

    Smurfing allows players who are banned for whatever reason to rejoin.

    Smurfing can also be used by a skilled player who doesn't want to reveal their tactics.

    So three negative things, one positive and tbh it sounds flakey at that.

    If I find a player smurfing they get banned. Sure its possible to smurf without doing anything wrong. However if I ban them, i've not really banned the person have I, they can just come right back with their normal account.

    Therefore the default least harm action is to ban smurfers on sight, if they are smurfing for nefarious reasons you stop them. If they are smurfing for other reasons they can still come back on their main account.



    Do what you want. I'd just say, I think you're tossing the baby.

    Also, don't try and justify it. You're banning people arbitrarily, the least you could do is own that fact. Your server, your rules. Just don't pretend you're right.
  • LamboLambo Iceland Join Date: 2012-08-07 Member: 154915Members, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, Reinforced - Shadow
    your arguments are flawless, burn all those who smurf.

    Kappa
  • 2cough2cough Rocky Mountain High Join Date: 2013-03-14 Member: 183952Members, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Supporter
    Lamb wrote: »
    your arguments are flawless, burn all those who smurf.

    This pleases Gargamel...
    tkOkdzR_schtroumpf_gargamel.jpg?bc

    Perhaps if we catch all the smurfs, we can make a potion to turn anything to gold...

    gold = money = development = long live ns2

    So in a way, we can thank the smurfs, right?
  • BeigeAlertBeigeAlert Texas Join Date: 2013-08-08 Member: 186657Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Squad Five Silver, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow, Subnautica Playtester, Pistachionauts
    Wyzcrak wrote: »
    For anyone looking for less "who is that?" and more "I actually know everyone here", TGNS makes it very easy for any regular to view the tracked aliases of any other player on the server, and we promote fixed player names in our reserved slots implementation. I'm surprised "community and fellowship" hasn't been more cited as the strongest argument against dynamic identity. For many (not all!) players, knowing your teammates and opponents adds depth to the game's enjoyment, both socially and competitively!

    I love this feature!
  • WobWob Join Date: 2005-04-08 Member: 47814Members, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Shadow, WC 2013 - Shadow
    Wyzcrak wrote: »
    For anyone looking for less "who is that?" and more "I actually know everyone here", TGNS makes it very easy for any regular to view the tracked aliases of any other player on the server, and we promote fixed player names in our reserved slots implementation. I'm surprised "community and fellowship" hasn't been more cited as the strongest argument against dynamic identity. For many (not all!) players, knowing your teammates and opponents adds depth to the game's enjoyment, both socially and competitively!

    I'm afraid the smurfing "problem" (which is very small imo), is done by newly bought accounts through sales. It's not as simple as 1 account just changing names.
  • babblerblingbabblerbling Join Date: 2015-05-27 Member: 204951Members
    Turns out, once you pay attention to beiges find, there are a quite a few. People do -anything- to be able to stack. But this method ruins the most commonly used defense: hive stat team balance.
  • WoehlerWoehler Join Date: 2013-10-13 Member: 188684Members, NS2 Map Tester, Reinforced - Supporter, Reinforced - Silver, Reinforced - Gold, Reinforced - Diamond, Reinforced - Shadow
    Why people smurf I can't say.
    But I can explain why I myself have and for some time played on a smurf account.

    I have several NS2 keys left from a sale. So I chose to use one at a time where I started to get bored of NS2. The reason I got bored of NS2 is that my skill rating was and is above average. My elo is around 1700 to 2100 and the average skill is usually around 1000. Meaning a lot of people have an elo below the 1000.
    So with the constant obsessing of even elo and Force Even Teams. Then I would always have to carry my team in order of having a chance of winning the round. So with my smurf account my intention was not to stack. But to play gorge. And when it happened. I would also be able to counter stack if needed. Making the game a lot more fun.
    I pretty much continued this until my elo on my smurf account was the same as on my normal account.
  • WyzcrakWyzcrak Pot Pie Aficionado Join Date: 2002-12-04 Member: 10447Forum Moderators, Constellation, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue
    nachos wrote: »
    Wyzcrak wrote: »
    For anyone looking for less "who is that?" and more "I actually know everyone here", TGNS makes it very easy for any regular to view the tracked aliases of any other player on the server, and we promote fixed player names in our reserved slots implementation. I'm surprised "community and fellowship" hasn't been more cited as the strongest argument against dynamic identity. For many (not all!) players, knowing your teammates and opponents adds depth to the game's enjoyment, both socially and competitively!

    I'm afraid the smurfing "problem" (which is very small imo), is done by newly bought accounts through sales. It's not as simple as 1 account just changing names.
    I understand. It is, of course, easier to change a player name than it is to purchase the game again. We limited the former and benefited considerably. We've not been compelled to act on the latter at all, FWIW. Alt accounts just haven't been that disruptive for us. That's likely due in part to our complex reserved slots logic, which goes out of its way to protect only a limited number of unknown accounts when the server is deluged with regulars.
  • IronHorseIronHorse Developer, QA Manager, Technical Support & contributor Join Date: 2010-05-08 Member: 71669Members, Super Administrators, Forum Admins, Forum Moderators, NS2 Developer, NS2 Playtester, Squad Five Blue, Subnautica Playtester, Subnautica PT Lead, Pistachionauts
    Woehler wrote: »
    Then I would always have to carry my team in order of having a chance of winning the round. So with my smurf account my intention was not to stack.
    These sound like contradicting statements to me.... ?


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