Suspended for "Cheating"...? Huh?

Discussion in 'Player Support' started by DJames, Jul 31, 2020.

  1. Veteran_BetaTester PIZZA!

  2. DJames New Member

    And this is what my life looks like frequently. I have my 3 kids with me at home most days where I am the sole provider. Now they are old enough now to take care of themselves. However, from time to time accidents and the occasional need for parental oversight is necessary. Sometimes without notice. And sometimes that means I have to leap from my chair and go see what happened. Or, as you stated, go get something to eat. Or use the restroom (I have IBS so I can sit on the toilet for 15-25 min at a time). It sucks that coincidentally I come back to my keyboard logged off, and suddently...BOOM I am suspended. Like what?

    FYI: I was playing today on some of my other accounts. And I get this random tell from a player. He basically says something like "Reported you again". So when I asked for what? He said for "AFK leveling". He then proceeds to just tell me he's been following me around for weeks to different zones, and sees how I like to stay in those spots for long periods of time. Uh...I like certain spots for grinding. Everyone does?! Anyway, I didn't go into it with him. Essentially I figured he is following me around, and when he doesn't like that I "took his spot", he reports me. Probably hoping that a GM will get me at an "unlucky moment". Which happened. If you read into this a little...if I was replying to his tells, how could I be "AFK leveling"? Nice try kid (BTW I never got tells from him before today). So I told him this is harassment since he is just following me around and reporting me. And I reported him for Toxic behavior and attached a screenshot of our convo. Hopefully he gets slapped with a suspension as well for being a royal you know what. Oh and another FYI, he did try and train me as well before he sent me that tell. Now I know why time to time i'd get a butt load of extra mobs in my camps. I did add that to my petition for help in this case as well.

    Well there you have it. Now I know what's going on. This person probably reported me several times until I got unlucky with the GM's. Now I have to be hyper vigilant as to where I go hunt because at any time, I might have to /q in an emergency AFK situation and hope I don't log back on, dead. :rolleyes:
    Woodmistress likes this.
  3. DJames New Member

    BTW, thank you all who commented on this post. :)..Especially those that can sympathize with me.
  4. Veteran_BetaTester PIZZA!

    DJames, without me scrolling through comments, what server are you on?
  5. DJames New Member

    Firiona Vie
  6. fortuneteller Augur

    Now b4 this post I would have agreed with what someone else said, keep in corner, merc off and such, otherwise if pet/merc attacks a mob, and you do nothing, you yourself is to blame for a ban.

    You yourself have to ensure there is not happening a situation where you are suspect.

    Now about this post...

    I think there might be 2 persons who should be suspended

    You for what appears to be multiple afk killings, I am sure gm have keept watch of if you do something suspecious, and suspend you for your behaviour over several weeks, you yourself says so a bit.

    Him for that harassment, but I actually cannot see harassment, he might have followed you, but you have not noticed him, so he did nothing to interrupt your game, so harassment is hard to see. The tells is just to inform you that he has reported you.

    Him for training you, for sure is harassment.

    Now you prob not going to like what I say, but I dont think your post here has helped your cause, quite the other way.

    Would I have reported you, if you looked like afk killing, yes
    Would I follow you, no.
    Would I report you again, if I saw you afk killing again, yes.
  7. DJames New Member


    It's fascinating how you read the post, and yet didn't process what you have read.

    There was not "multiple afk killings" over several weeks. The person followed me around for weeks for what I am guessing was because I took his favorite spots. Not to "AFK Kill", but to hunt in general. Either because he is a bully or is a plain ol' troll. You completely misread what I said here. I merely said he was following me around for weeks while I played. And I am insulted that you are ASSUMING that you think that to mean that I had an admission of guilt to what this player "thought" I was doing. Not so.

    He did interrupt my game. He was training me each time I was in a different zone as I was playing. I just did not realize why I would get a lot more mobs than usual from time to time as I stated. So, you also did not process this info correctly. Him informing me of him reporting just exposed his harassment to me all those times. Period

    Honestly, maybe if you actually did witness someone "AFK Killing" for maybe a couple days in a row, sure go ahead and report. However, people like yourself need to realize that people like me who have a family, medical conditions, and other responsibilities have a need to suddenly leave the keyboard with no real way to move the characters or log off. It's so unfair for dedicated "single" game players to throttle us family guys, and those with health issues with such non-sense. "OOOOO, I saw this guy AFK killing for like 20 minutes. I think I will report him". What kind of immaturity is that anyway? And honestly, with how massive the game is these days, there is absolutely ZERO reason to grief / harass people in this way anyway? Like..who cares? Really? I don't. And I am a veteran player. Been playing since BETA. This game is so emptied out until what, level 100 + that players wouldn't even be able to level that high without mercs and/or box playing at this point anyway. When was the last time you saw ANYONE in the "LFG" tool under lvl 100? With that said, I couldn't care less if someone is cheating if they really are. I have seen it quite a few times myself. But I am not so insecure that I need to "do something about it". If it doesn't hurt my goals, who cares. If you don't like a person who you "think" is cheating (and let's be honest here, how do you really know for sure...not responding to your tells? Maybe the person isn't good at typing, and chooses not to reply with a tell? ..just a thought) in the same zone as you, go to a different zone. Not that hard. lol. If this were EQ Vanilla, yeah different story as there was what like...2 zones you could go to for high level content. L Guk and Sol B? Not so anymore. Maybe you, and all others who get offended so easily over something like this re-assess how you feel. Because guys like me will end up getting run over by guys like you due to your immature game ethics. And it just...isn't...fair....SO Relax!! -- Oh and FYI to you or anyone else who might say something like, "Well sometimes it takes a couple days for a GM to even respond to something like this, so if you aren't "AFK Killing", then how come when the GM checks you are not responding?" This is because I don't just go AFK for a minute once every couple days. I go AFK suddenly many times a day sometimes due to my medical problems. I do not know when it will hit, but when it does I have to leave the keyboard quickly. And this isn't considering my kids suddenly need me either. SO there are AFK's for that too. So, chances are greater someone like me ends up AFK when a GM is actually "checking" for unattended gameplay. Make sense?

    Anyway, this is getting pointless to monitor this thread. It's a done deal as suspension has happened, and I have formulated a new AFK plan to hopefully not have to deal with this in the future when I need to leave the keyboard in an emergency, since so many sensitive players are out there these days. :rolleyes:

    Unsubscribing to this thread now. Thanks again for all who constructively responded. I appreciate the input and the responses, and / or sympathies.
  8. Veteran_BetaTester PIZZA!

    Ironic I just read another post about players being trained and stalked too.

    Seems in those situations, a LOT of petitions were made complaining about 'known trainers and stalking'.

    I see a pattern.

    DJames, send a PM to Dreamweaver.
    Skuz likes this.
  9. KermittheFroglok Augur

    Hi all,

    I understand that the thread hasn't been locked , but I would suggest we all be cautious because some are close to indicating GM favoritism which violates the rules of conduct. To be clear, I'm just broadly commenting on this to thread participants in general so the handful of people on this thread that are returning players also know this and to help them avoid accidental violations.

    Rule Excerpt:
    Implying Favoritism by Game Masters - Stating that employees of Daybreak Game Company LLC or members of the Guide program will show favor towards one or more parties involved in any given situation. This includes, but is not limited to, using threats of retribution or inferring that you will not be held accountable for your actions due to special consideration.

    https://help.daybreakgames.com/hc/en-us/articles/230629007-What-are-the-EverQuest-Rules-of-Conduct-

    Also, let's remember that DBG is starting to extend discipline to "all related" accounts related to ___ TLP. "Related" is a pretty broad term so I would be cautious that an alt. account violating the rules of conduct in a discussion around disciplinary action on ___ TLP could potentially push an associated main account that has a 1st strike warning into a suspension or a main account with a warning + suspension into a ban. Just something I think all of us should keep in mind when posting about these matters on the forum.

    https://www.everquest.com/news/eq-rizlona-aradune-progression-server-launch-2020
  10. Flatchy Court Jester

    I am glad i play a fd class mostly. I need to hit the can I just hit the old FD button and damn the torpedos!
  11. Xerzist Augur


    AFK killing, gonna see you on the next episode of EQ cops hopping the fence :p
  12. Andarriel Everquest player since 2000

    Which is stupid to anybody that has done the old world hunters. can get spawns every 15-30 depending on zone. i would kill mob and alt tab to my trader and do stuff til next spawn and if i got suspended or ban for something as silly as afk killing i would quit. They probably go after someone like me over the bot players and thats stupid. Ive done many mobs that were 24-40 hrs to spawn. when will eq ban people who are botting its like they dont even care anymore.

    Andarriel
    Woodmistress likes this.
  13. Qbert Gallifreyan

    Whether or not you agree, those are the rules. If you choose not to follow them, you run the risk of being penalized. It really is that simple. If you want the rules to change, post to that effect as some form of feedback; good luck in your crusade.

    I wholeheartedly agree that there are myriad cheaters/botters/people using programs to their advantage in contravention to the EULA/Terms of Service. We have seen that the powers-that-be have, for many years, not enforced these rules effectively. Now that they are starting to penalize some of the low-hanging fruit violators, I take that as a sign that perhaps some of the more egregious offenses might be next up to be monitored.

    With regard to your specific example; I have done/worked on all of those hunters myself. I have roughly 30ish named left to kill in various original/Kunark zones to be done with all available hunter achievements through ToV. Not once during that time did I ever afk-kill, there is simply no need. I can understand the argument of tabbing out/not paying attention for the period when no mobs are up, but there is no reason to do that in the middle of mob spawn locations. If for some reason I fell asleep/attended to an emergency/whatever and received a warning/suspension similar to your proposed scenario, I would be that much more careful not to put myself in that position in the future. It takes all of a millisecond to /q or /ex or a massive 30 seconds to /camp desktop.
    Thunderkiks likes this.
  14. Andarriel Everquest player since 2000

    kinda hard to believe you killed some of those hunter without being afk. sorry but i know there are alot of 30+ hr mobs and im talking the old everquest. i did eok faster than i could do 3/4 of sk. another thing i hate is people using scripts to auto price there traders!

    Andarriel
  15. Andarriel Everquest player since 2000

    Not worried about being banned if they did they lose 4 accounts and the people in the baz would miss me because i keep people in check with there pricing. this patch needs to go faster.

    Andarriel
  16. KermittheFroglok Augur


    Originally some, including myself, thought that if that were the case you were out of luck but... some people camping on one monitor and trading on another have been suspended but to my knowledge those suspensions have been reversed.

    https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/index.php?threads/unjustified-suspension.268863/#post-3945540

    From what I gather if you can prove with logs and your accounts login data (maybe they look at the IP address?) that you were boxing & just missed the tell, you should be fine. (Still no guarantees as one GM might be more lenient than another and appealing can be nerve racking.)

    I think the fact DBG has lifted/reversed some suspensions in these instances adds credibility to the argument that they really are trying to be fair and aren't just blindly suspending/banning with little investigation as some imply.
  17. Miss_Jackie Custom Title

    This is why I like playing a wizard.. wizards have insta-evac. :p
  18. CCheo New Member

    You dont even have to be AFK to be banned anymore. You just have to miss the needle in a haystack say message from a random GM. I dont know about the rest of you but I have my say messages going to my spam tab, and in my 21 years of playing everquest I have always ignored say due to the large amount of spam. Using say to test if someone is afk is completely unacceptable.

    Its like the cops utilizing a well known spammer to delivery highly important information. Oh... we are sorry your house burned down and took your family with it... we sent your evaluation notice via the random Nigerian prince... oh you didn't get it? We really need you to be going through those 10000 spam emails manually, it is your responsibility to be readying our emails...
  19. KermittheFroglok Augur

    Except, the recent threads have been people receiving tells, which pop up a new window by default. The other thing I want to suggest is that someone likely reported you or you left your <AFK> tag on since it doesn’t sound like the GMs have the time to “patrol”.

    I would recommend double checking your chat settings, again most other threads indicate the GMs are using tells, not “say” anymore. So you’re likely filtering them out or dumping them off to the wrong tab. That’s a teachable moment and on you, not the GMs if you’re filtering other players messages to you out, especially in a social game like EQ. But, if you weren’t AFK you could probably just share your logs in your appeal ticket, that’s worked for others in getting their suspensions reversed.

    I disagree with your comparison, your chat settings sound more like you cranking up your car stereo and ignoring anyone on the road l, including the cop pulling you over.
  20. Rulah New Member

    I was sitting in Laima room (GD). I had a break (afk), would start preparing the food at home. By pure coincidence, I checked the computer. Then I see:

    Doex says, Hi There! This is GM Doex. If you're at your keyboard, please send me a tell. This is an AFK check. Thank you!

    I responded and said.

    -Hey whats up? Im here.

    Then I sent him a tell saying, -Im not always reading / say because it's in another window with more spam.

    Doex tells you, "No problem, you saw my character and answered. Watch /say chat just in case :)

    I was in a spot that dont aggro mobs, I didnt cast or had any chars active everyone was invis vs undead. So that could have been a suspension. So be aware, log out /q if its and emergency or face a 3 days suspension. Also I added gina triggers in say now, dont want to miss something like that.
    Duder likes this.