Cheaters out of hand. Anyone having success with reporting?

why is it that Rare can only ban cheaters with video evidence? I thought they would have technology to check game files or some sort of measure to check on players being reported for blatantly cheating?

Just because a tech labels something your computer is running in the background as “cheat” doesn’t make it so.
That why evidence goes a long way.

And yes. I’ve seen few people I’ve reported get banned. But it matters not with how easy it is to simply have alt accounts

@astralenigma Ya, genuinely curious.. I feel like almost every other game I play you just report them. You aren't expected to record, write a report, etc. just a couple clicks and done. It just seems like conditions are very favorable for cheaters right now unless people are constantly recording, which is a shame.

People wrongfully accuse others of cheating for many different reasons. Bugs can appear that you may perceive as cheating, server desync etc. I've likely reported someone who wasn't cheating at some point, so video evidence is a safety net as you can't punish someone based of an allegation without proof.

Even without video proof simply reporting them I'm sure will be logged and is not entirely a waste of time. I stream for this reason alone to be able to confirm and submit if I feel someone was cheating. False reports happen a lot and can have negative impacts on the game for everyone.

I wish there was an easier system and a way to track it but taking the time to submit it has led to many cheaters being removed from the game. I can confirm they will respond and appreciate your efforts in keeping the seas safe. Sadly, they have alts and will likely be back as soon as they are banned, which is obviously not ideal but the unfortunate reality.

The blatant cheaters (disabling textures, floating in air, etc) I wish had an auto detect feature so you wouldn't have to report it because it could take a while before they are removed.

For profanity and abuse with text messages simply screenshot what was said and that is your evidence. I know sometimes it's hard in the moment to do this, so maybe having a way to access text logs would be beneficial

@cainbong I know the difference between server desync my guy. Someone flying around isn't server desync. My point still stands that it's crazy that they can track how many bananas are eaten, cannons shot, etc. but they can't track things like people flying around and being invincible or teleporting to ships. I just went up against a brig of cheaters yesterday in HG spamming their Discord cheats and offering it to us as they teleported to our ship and aimbot us and sank us. It was beyond blatant.. I did screenshot that thankfully. The night before, we had a solo cheater at the FoTD fight my brig crew and he was t-pose flying around and we had multiple times that we all three shot him with EoR at the same time and then hit him with multiple sword swings and blunders while he's flying and not eating.. Guess what, we reported him and not enough evidence existed to get him banned... simply because of no video.
I have played against plenty of people that seem like they're cheating simply because they're really good, but I wouldn't ever waste my time reporting them because you never know.. When someone is literally flying around and tanking massive amounts of damage and quick swapping and taking out all three of us, I would say that something has to exist on the dev side for them to simply check on it.

Making video evidence as a safety net is the wrong answer IMO, because I would wager most people don't record their gameplay and it should not be on us to do so. I'm happy you are taking the steps to do that, but if a game requires me to record and upload evidence simply to get someone blatantly cheating banned, then most cheaters will run free.

@thamb0

I'm not sure you actually read what I wrote or understand my opinion on the matter. My post history is mostly about how cheating is out of hand.

You are expected to record the instance. If you're on Xbox you simply hit record last 2 minutes. I'm sure it's easier on PC. I also said there should be an auto detect report for the obvious ones.

It took a week for an obvious cheater to get banned, from the initial response of 'need more evidence' to when I submitted the video evidence. This person had already been on a brand new account for days when I got a response saying they were removed entirely based on the evidence myself and others provided. They have hundreds of accounts at their disposal with the subscription package. I've met this person 10+ times over the course of 5 years on different accounts.

It's entirely your call if you want to submit it or not, but you still need proof as false reports are commonplace and they can't detect if someone is blatantly cheating without a human verifying it unfortunately.

@cainbong I did read it and I do understand it. I'm saying, again, that it should not be on the players to record cheaters to get them banned. That is not how it should work at all. Most games that have an in-game report option have tools to see that people used cheats or did something against the rules. When I report people in Tarkov, Pubg, League, CS2, etc. I don't need to fill out a report and upload video evidence. It's taken care of on the devs side.
I was just giving anecdotal evidence to agree that cheating is out of hand and that I'm not reporting people willy nilly because their shots seemed really good or something. My main reply is still that video evidence on the player's side is not the right answer for a game that wants to succeed. I still find it funny that SoT has an in-game report when nothing ever comes of it. I don't think I've ever had anything but a "needs more evidence" for in-game reports I've done. I have had success when I have recorded videos in the past and gone through their report a player on the website, but again.. that should not be the answer. It's very frustrating that a system isn't in place for them to check things or access text logs like you said. I would think that a massive game like SoT could go back and check player movement speeds and recent history to verify if they were using cheats, but I guess not.
Anyways, apologies for the response, was frustrated and mostly just adding to the complaints in my replies. Stay safe out there!

@thamb0

Your post is reminiscent of things I've said many times and others as well here. If they can track everything and even tell us after a community event the exact number of storm fish eaten by a pirate then it's strange they are not able to have a metric which would flag or mark the egregious cheaters as suspicious activity. It is sad to see because each community weekend I see an influx of cheaters with a vendetta against Rare looking to target and clear the entire stamps for all. Some people are on targeted lists and know when you are on a server. I'm playing less these days and don't bother stacking loot or continuing hourglass streaks because of this. People are quitting entirely, and some I know with 500+ IRL days at sea who can't tolerate it anymore.

Even with exploits, I've had a ton of players shoot over to my ship out of a their cannon while carrying a keg. It leaves a lot to be desired that the team hasn't come out and made statements immediately regarding these things. Ladder launching was prevented because it is bannable and while it's still possible to do, most people have stopped doing it from my experience because of the stance they made (although months too late).

My main reason for joining the community was to offer feedback regarding the state of the game in regards to cheating. The bugs can be tolerated (to some extent) as everyone deals with them, it's just icing on the cake with the egregious cheaters that ruin the experience and turn new and day one pirates away from the game. The same posters who barely play the game in comparison to the ones saying things need to improve in this area are the vocal ones and I question some people's motives in defending this. I've seen enough here to know which posters will be first to downplay the seriousness of the issue.

I wish more could be done like other games. Stay safe out there as well matey and hopefully things improve

@cainbong said in Cheaters out of hand. Anyone having success with reporting?:

@thamb0

Your post is reminiscent of things I've said many times and others as well here. If they can track everything and even tell us after a community event the exact number of storm fish eaten by a pirate then it's strange they are not able to have a metric which would flag or mark the egregious cheaters as suspicious activity.

An algorithm to determine if someone is cheating is quite different and more complex than the one that determines the number of fish eaten and is not comparable.

@lem0n-curry

Fair enough it is different. Having this knowledge though you could determine as an example off the top of my head:
'10,000 flameheart events completed during community week' and there's '50,000 Wraithballs fired from cannons' the numbers don't correlate and foul play is at hand.

@cainbong said in Cheaters out of hand. Anyone having success with reporting?:

@lem0n-curry

Fair enough it is different. Having this knowledge though you could determine as an example off the top of my head:
'10,000 flameheart events completed during community week' and there's '50,000 Wraithballs fired from cannons' the numbers don't correlate and foul play is at hand.

Really ?

1. Does the number of wraithballs fired only include those by pirates or also the ones done by Flameys crew ?
2. There was a community event with Pop-Up plunder - you could get a supply crate that included wraith balls.

@lem0n-curry

If they can determine the exact numbers of certain things by a player such as stool interactions, players fired from cannons then I'm assuming they can decipher if it was an NPC or an actual Pirate doing these things We have exact metrics not ballparks. Maybe I'm wrong in assuming that though.

On the original point of the thread, some of the egregious cheaters will make a day one account using NAL sails or unlocked cosmetics as a Day 1 player with a name like 'BanEvasion101' admit to cheating spamming walls of text, admit by voice comms to cheating and the reasons for doing it and advertise the cheats they're using, then those players should be removed faster without the need for video evidence

@cainbong said in Cheaters out of hand. Anyone having success with reporting?:

@lem0n-curry

If they can determine the exact numbers of certain things by a players such as stool interactions, players fired from cannons then I'm assuming they can decipher if it was an NPC or an actual Pirate doing these things

Oh, I'm sure thay could, but it doesn't say what they counted (all or Pirate only, though I assume the latter), also, see my point #2 for why the number of wraitballs shot was higher than the number of Flameheart events times 3.

We have exact metrics not ballparks. Maybe I'm wrong in assuming that though

To be fair, they could also have made a mistake.

But counting number of balls shot and number of events doesn't have anything to do with telling who cheated.

@lem0n-curry

That was a poor example as I do remember the event. There's countless others that are outliers that would show a discrepancy which would only be attainable through foul play

@cainbong said in Cheaters out of hand. Anyone having success with reporting?:

@lem0n-curry

That was a poor example as I do remember the event. There's countless others that are outliers that would show a discrepancy which would only be attainable through foul play

Countless others and still you picked a poor example ?

I'm sure there are some simple statistics that would point Rare to people who are cheating or exploiting in a certain way, but one that would be able to catch all cheaters ? I don't think so. Reporting with evidence is necessary to identify methods for cheating and catch people who cheat.

@Lem0n-Curry

If they can track the exact number of consumables used, valuables attained, events completed, player ships sunk, I would assume they can track individually who has done what and if so they could see any outliers where the numbers seem questionable and flag to review the players activity.

I'm more specifically talking to OP discussing blatant cheaters. Like ones who would end going through your cannon to board, or hovering mid air on an invisible tightrope, or the ones who would have a box of wondrous secrets in less than a minute of joining a server.

@cainbong said in Cheaters out of hand. Anyone having success with reporting?:

@Lem0n-Curry

If they can track the exact number of consumables used, valuables attained, events completed, player ships sunk, I would assume they can track individually who has done what and if so they could see any outliers where the numbers seem questionable and flag to review the players activity.

They didn't even count the number of player's ship sunk by a crew during Arena. That's one statistic they won't count (it's water that sink ship, if ship gets attacked by two other crews, one shoots canons, the other boards to keep them from repairing - which of these did sink the ship ?)

I'm more specifically talking to OP discussing blatant cheaters. Like ones who would end going through your cannon to board, or hovering mid air on an invisible tightrope, or the ones who would have a box of wondrous secrets in less than a minute of joining a server.

Which of the stats you mentioned in the first paragraph would help in determining who used the cheats mentioned in the second one ?

Box of Wondrous secrets could be picked up by someone who doesn't fancy sailing to Morrow's Peak (perhaps an early rise tomorrow or enough gold already) and left it on an outpost. You really want to ban someone for cheating (or flag them) for being lucky to be the person to spawn at the outpost and the first one to spot it ?

Yesterday my regular crewmates came upon a FoF, with the key just lying there. Should they be flagged for getting loads of treasure from a vault without firing a shot a the fort or at the crew(s) who completed the FoF ?

There was a time that when you completed a Gold Hoarders Vault, it would count for 2 in the commendations, so I'd rather Rare used video evidence for banning players.

@lem0n-curry Well my example would be that if they can track how many bananas we eat, why not how fast someone is moving at all times or how many hits someone takes before dying? Like, if someone is using a cheat to triple their health or something to float above the ground and move really fast, you would think they could easily track that, just like most major games seem to do. So, if I happen to report that player, they can look at the files for that player when the in-game report was made and see "oh, wow, this person was moving all over the place going 3x faster than normal and they got hit with 5 EoR shots before eating."

I find it weird that when they added the function where in game reports generate a reference to allow supportive evidence to be added via support ticket. I got spammed with a load of 'evidence needed for xyz ticket' without any info on who I had reported like I would know. They retrospectively added the references lol.

Only thing I have a problem with is the in-game report on console which has very few options which means do i put them one blundering me from a ship away as a movement exploit or an aiming exploit. What about when they make my ship fly movement exploit, aiming exploit or profanity lol. I just feel like there isn't the "right" options such as just generic cheating

I really do not understand how they don't even have text chat logging in this game. Literally every other multiplayer game with even a hint of pvp in it has mastered having at least a semi-competent in game report system, yet Rare with debatedly more experience in game design can't make it happen? How is that even possible? And better yet, what other game requires you to submit video evidence of cheating before your report is even looked at? How is this excusable?

@sharkfire75 there's a reason, it's because cheating needs evidence that's why it isn't a category in game. Things like pet name ship name etc they can access that data. Dunno why they bothered adding categories like movement exploit etc to then require evidence. Should just point you to website

@felix-ashur It shouldn't be excusable. It's frankly somewhat pathetic. I love SoT, but the fact that we need to record, save, go onto their website, upload, fill out a report, etc is just way too many steps for most people (that shouldn't even be expected to do that) so cheaters will continue to roam free unhampered by what they do, which is ruin a game we all love.

@thamb0 I agree, I play on console and in the middle of a session (even if I sink) I don't really want to take a recording then have to go find it in my OneDrive or Xbox app then submit the file that's probably too big to the sea of thieves' website, then because it's probably too big I have to add it as a link or upload it as a YouTube video or something. Because of this no matter how many cheaters I suspect I probably will never upload evidence

@thamb0
Oh, absolutely. There's zero excuse for it (even the one that's parroted most often here of "Sea of Theives is unique in every way and can't be held to the same standards of games from it's time!") and it is most certainly pathetic. There is some serious incompetence going on with this and other aspects of the game.

I mean, kinda?

like @BurnBacon said, cheaters have been reported and banned, but they can just use an alt account. Nowadays the only one that are affected are innocent players who when they got banned by false reports would simply quit.