A big "ban" is coming

[Mechanic Pig]

@photokool I agree with everything you said.

[Birdy]

It’s possible that a cheater can also have a very high star level. Even a couple of years ago, hacks and exploits existed, so if a long-time cheater went undetected, they could have potentially achieved a high star level.

[Photokool]

And I agree about the situation with clans, too. Our clan was doing well at first, but now we are going up against impossible clans. Their flock power is supposed to be close to ours, but they have 6 or 7 players with max flock power. We have ONE player with max FP. They take 6 or 7 spots in the top 10, which makes it impossible to win against with way the points that are currently weighted in the clan battles. The matchup needs to not just be about overall FP, but how many members are max FP — or above 500. Otherwise, not a fair match in any way.

I think the whole system of rewarding flock power in the arena, clan battles and boot camp is causing the cheating. Take flock power out of the equation and see how skilled the players actually are. Divide the score by the flock power and rank THAT number instead.

 

 

[Birdy]

I think that the cheating arises from a psychological need by cheaters to accumulate “wealth” and “power”. Is it a coincidence that max FP players are Russian, and the game equivalent of “oligarchs”?

[cognitive]

the top fp guy from our clan, an admitted 2 device user, got banned (fp: 550’s)…

 

[Birdy]

Playing across multiple devices is allowed. He must have been banned for a different reason?

[ryan-kochie]

There are a lot of skilled players who are honest and don’t cheat to increase their flock power. Rovio sorting out the cheaters and hopefully fixing the glitches isn’t them getting rid of the skilled players, just the cheats. There are skilled players who cheat and who don’t cheat.

Multiple devices is allowed, but if you intentionally use it to abuse glitches and exploit the game that would not be allowed.

[Birdy]

@ryan-kochie

True!

Players who legitimately earn their FP and pay into the game deserve a cheat-free game environment. Rovio needs to respect their honest/paying player base by sidelining cheaters. If enough people complain/report, hopefully Rovio will pay attention.

Also, Rovio needs to get “smarter” in ferreting out exploits and cheaters by surveiling chat boards, etc.

@hank, I hope you read these posts.

[Jon S]

Here’s my rant.

They banned me on Tuesday.  I’ve been banned once by accident.  It was lifted.  No problem  Second time was for real because I was placed 38th in boot camp.  Like seriously? Of course they wouldn’t reinstate my account and wouldn’t release me with specific details as to why I was banned.   Their typical generic response.  They said I can restart over a new… To play 1440+ levels…What if I’m banned again?  Restart another new game?  No thanks. Not going through the trouble anymore.   I find it peculiar that Rovio bites the hands that feeds them.  I entrust a game company with some of my income for the last 2.5 years and can’t be honest with me.  The game is stated “fair” but it’s beyond fair with the arena messed up with 50-100+ FP differences and the players scoring astronomical scores in bootcamp.  Yes, glitches were found because the game crashes all the time.  Rovio is aware of them, but can’t be bothered to fix them so a  permanent ban is the cost effective solution then to hire a programmer to fix the game properly. Lazy. You have already lost loads of players, and now you  lost me as a long-term veteran customer. AB2 is  my last Rovio product I’ll download.

 

[RIP Piggies]

Jon: so what cheats and exploits were you using?

What I think is so ridiculous is:

– there’s a pile of known cheaters who just get to carry on, i.e. the selective banning is patently unfair. And it’s completely ineffectual at “cleaning the game up” because so many cheaters remain.

– there’s only “banning” as a repercussion. Much better to remove all loot (hats, BPs, gems) from those they’ve identified as cheats in the first instance, perhaps banning for any second offence.

[Birdy]

Cheaters on AB2 are a slap in the face to players who play the straight and narrow and who don’t cheat.

Rovio first and foremost must respect players who honestly play the game, and pay into the game, by keeping a fair and level playing field.

Rovio themselves have employed cheap and underhanded tactics to milk honest players of money, like Arena mismatching and the Viking Hat event. Players should complain to Rovio about those cheap tricks. Rovio is far from innocent.

But cheaters are spoiling the fun in clan battles, and honest players deserve a fair playing field. Therefore cheaters should be sidelined by Rovio. Sorry cheaters, but you’re ruining the clan vs. clan battles for honest players.

[Jon S]

@rippiggies

Back up and restore

[Pls6482]

Jon  – sorry that you were banned. Have read your posts and always appreciated your comments.  Don’t understand Rovio and their tactics at all. They just keep making it harder and harder to play their games. Makes no sense.

[Chopsting]

Hillarious :D

Jon admits to back up and restore cheating and yet some of you are saying “Sorry that you were banned” – bye Jon!

[Yue]

again, for those who complaining about cheating, why you don’t write a letter to rovio to actually “fix the glitch”. They knew the glitch long time ago and have not put resources to fix it.

If you search “exploit”, you would always find 2 different of view about utilizing glitch.
Some said it’s unfair, some said it’s game nature. Well, I will not argue with that.

I am sorry for Jon, too. He is a very skillful player and he actually spend hard earned money into this game.

[Yue]

For those who is murmuring “unfair, cheating”. Show your score and power in MEBC. Let’s know how skillful you are. It’s totally fair/doable by Rovio to create a MEBC taking out hats and slingshots/card level. But greedy Rovio will not do that, they just want you to pay more and then… bang….ban

[Photokool]

@ryan-kochie – I don’t think you and your clans (AB2 Gamers) get to take the high road in this discussion.

Our clan has had the misfortune to play one of your clans twice in the last month, and we have seen first-hand how your group manipulates the play so you can win every time.

I’m responding to this because you have rationalized the way you are playing and feel you are not causing harm. But you are causing harm to the other clans who play fair and lose to your clans due to manipulation. It is disheartening to the point that we don’t know if we want to continue with CvC at all.

This is what we have figured out after playing twice against you. You have three clans that are coordinated through a Facebook group page. You boot high-level players (or remove hats) right before the start of CvC so you start with open spots. It allows you to reduce your FP and drop below Diamond.

After the CvC begins, you load up with high-level and max FP players, adding players back in. I know that for a fact because I checked the FP of your players when it began, and the next day there were high FP players that suddenly appeared. You went from being an Amethyst-level to Diamond, with a huge overall difference in FP AFTER the clan battle began.

I think you coordinate where your max FP and high-level players go on your Facebook page, where you can easily message players individually. It allows high-level players to come and go easily within your three AB2 Gamers clans.

After you have manipulated your chances, you congratulate each other on your Facebook page and talk about how “skilled” you are.

We have only three players above 600 and ONE player at max FP. Playing against your clan with 3 or more  players with max FP and five 5-600+ makes sure your clans will get most of the top 10 spots. Last time, we had 11 of the top 20 spots, but only 3 in the top 10. It was impossible to win, and certainly not fair. We could have played all day, but we would never win. With scores based on FP, there was no way to overcome your manipulation. But go ahead and think that it is your “skill” that is allowing you to win.

@hank please read this post.

[CaptSternn]

That is really messed up, Jon. After everything you put into this game and the forum it iust isn’t right. Rovio should be paying you to play and give you quite a bit of immunity as long as no hacking software is used.

Their bans are not consistent and catch people that are not cheating while excusing others as long as those others keep spending money, real money.

You will be sorely missed, my friend.

[CaptSternn]

Yue, some have been writing Rovio for years about the glitches. Like myself. I found the backup and restore method by accident, mainly because of that Easter update a long time ago. I contacted Bankler right away, then continued with Hank, and nothing. Now instead of fixing it they just ban long time players that have given so much time, effort and real money to this game.

Not sure how much longer it will last. With Jon being shot down, that is major. Guess Rovio has millions of players and doesn’t care about dedication, and this forum is pretty limited and obscure. But for us long time players, it is really serious.

[Vogel Birdson]

I hope Rovio are planning to release some update to the CvC system – one change could perhaps be to ‘lock’ in clan members and their FP at the time the battle commences, to stop people being removed or added or changing hats etc. Whatever state the clan is in at the start should be set in place for the duration.

Amazing to think how CvC has triggered huge amount of frustration and volativity amongst the AB2 community.

[Yue]

@photokool and @ryan-kochie

I personally believe hats-off is a strategy, not a skill.
My associated clan used to think of doing so, but unfortunately, most clan members don’t check clan chat. Since then, no one bring this “hat-off” strategy on.

We do face ABDP-1 twice and lose twice. No regret. They do have a bunch of skillful players. No matter how hard we played, eventually we lose. Then, we have one word only- Good game. Admitting they are better players is not that difficult.

Think about your top player. He/she is also a max-power one, right? Had he/she scored more than abdp-1’s top player? Compareing score of player with similar level, did your clan member score better? all those question need your clan to accumulate data during battle, and seek improvement among team.

Don’t complain they have more high power players. That’s advantage all clan leader should create.

[Yue]

@captsternn

I have been banned three times.

The first time is totally insane and I don’t know why, might be cause of my restart method. The second/third time is what I intended to. Well, regret or not? I don’t mind anymore. I just want to test how many glicthes they have…

Today, I do see a clan with “clone” players, sleeper1 and sleeper2. They are at same max-out level, same star level. In addition, those data is the same as the other members (might be clan leader). This is truely “cheating”. Just share with you.

[ryan-kochie]

I can assure you gamers strive to be an honest clan. We have experimented with hay dropping and found its ineffective in regards to matchmaking for the clan battle. We in no way move players around after a battle is matched. After the match is made its impossible to join if you are not in the clan. Some players choose to play with hats off for arena, but I assure you there is no coordinated effort between the clans to move players around. We communicate well amongst each other, share videos and tips between the clans and work together. We try not to stack our clans with only high level players, we find a mix performs better. Lower level players lower the average and who we match with, causing our higher level hitters to have more “punch”. More so it’s that we don’t believe in flock power requirements and try to be a clan for everyone.

[ryan-kochie]

Yes Yue I loved our battle with the nest, very hard fought and always hope for a rematch. A hard battle right until the end.

[ryan-kochie]

Looking into our history is your clan “Serious Players”? 02 has had 1 of it’s members banned and kicked one of the top players since the last battle, we do strive to keep the clan fair, and if we find something out we do not promote cheating within our clans, and usually hope Rovio will be fair and know who to ban and not to. Besides that the battle was on the up and up I assure you, Rovio’s matchmaking claims clan rank between clans can vary as much as 10-20% depending on factors, but there is no way to add players when the battle begins.

We do open for better matched games in the future, and hope to play against you again in what I hope is a hard fought battle.