Please do something about the cheating.

could take a bit of time before they actually boot him out. Taken care of means that character is getting banned. A bit surprising that it would take more than an hour to do after that message. You sure it's not a different alt he created?

Still it sucks you keep stumbling across him.

Do you remember what I said before? Either put some time and thought and effort into trying to insult me or just don't try. It's very obvious you're not trying to have an honest discussion and that in and of itself is enough of a reason to report someone. I don't report people very easily, but this has gone on long enough to be painfully evident you only want to chum the waters and not contribute anything of worth. I don't really want to but I will report you if you can't at least try to make things interesting. But for real, I'm fully serious. Please either stop trying to get a rise out of me with the petty playground-tier "insults" or give me something funny to read and I'll continue to look the other way.

Anyway, no. 3% always cheat but there will be more than just those 3% cheating at any given time. 12% is very fair because the 9% who regularly cheat will do so frequently in addition to the 3%, with all of the others possibly cheating as well. Statistically the actual number at any given point in time would likely be higher than 12%, but we have the highest confidence in 12% so we will stick with that. They may be somewhat subjective but they all imply the same metrics.

The company in question does a lot more than just controlling cheating in videogames, with part of what they do with videogames being anti-piracy. Regardless, I can find no connection to PlanetSide 2 or SOE/DBG/RPG at any point in time. They have no conflicting interested with regards to us and our plight. They commissioned the survey to demonstrate the importance of their services, which they do not extend to PS2 as far as I can tell and have provided a valuable look at the industry as a whole.

One cannot form a correlation between the groups because we aren't given the answers which each group submitted. We don't know what those who self-identified themselves as "gamers" or not answered and therefore we cannot make claims based on this. Nice try but no.

Can the survey apply to PS2? Of course it can, there is nothing to suggest otherwise. What information do you have that would suggest otherwise? In math and sciences, it is assumed there is no difference between observed and expected reality until it can be proven one exists. This is called a null hypothesis. We have nothing demonstrating a significance difference (or even any difference) between PS2's playerbase and that of any other competitive online multiplayer game. The data applies to PS2 perfectly.

A strawman is a logical fallacy used in an argument to create a point where one does not exist. It is done by creating a false argument which resembles an opponent's position but is substantially easier to refute, giving the impression of having the correct and reasonable argument. Why would this be irrelevant to the discussion? Because in short it would be arguing against a point no one ever made instead of the real positions held by the opposition. Thy're often used to simply distract from the argument made by an opponent when one cannot refute it.

An example of this is when you say I think "the game is infested with cheaters, and can't have a single session without people aimbotting, modifying hitboxes, or whatever crap invent to justify why someone didn't out-skill [me] in the game." Never once have I said either of these blatantly false things. I've stated time and time again most players don't cheat, they are uncommon to rare, and that the last few cheaters I encountered I either ignored without dying or outright killed them myself.

Cheating is a major problem when only 10% of players are guilty of it. This does not mean the game is "infested" nor that a player will encounter one every single day when I don't even see the same player twice in the same fight in half an hour during primetime.

I directly stated examples of anecdotal experiences which have resulted in my opinions and desires to rid the game of the apparent cheating which has gone on for far too long. Again, you're just trying to direct from all the things you can't refute.

Quotes are as follows: :I would pay money to play the game if it meant the game was better." "I know the player must have been cheating because these weapons are simply too weak and inaccurate at such extensive ranges to output the amount of damage the player in question did, therefore cheating exists in the game in ways which are not overt." "I did not keep old recordings of suspicious activity in an online videogame for no reason." These were really the best quotes you could find, and you're still acting like that makes you right somehow?

Again, this quote is an anecdotal experience indicating why I hold the opinions and beliefs on cheating that I do. II'm very confident subtle cheaters exist because I'e see players do things my guns simply can't do even in theory yet they aren't instantly headshoting everyone in the hex from 200 meters underground.

Regardless, you're still strawmaning me here. I still never made the claim they're "impacting my sessions" or that cheaters weren't uncommon. They are. ~12% is rare to uncommon.

You have no evidence to suggest they do and continue to do so and have always done so and will do so under any instance of cheating. I pointed out the conflicting interests the game managers would undoubtedly have being a business. You're trying to make it seem like I said "SOE/DBG/RPG doesn't ban cheaters with memberships" when that's simply not true.

By the way, still waiting for that source on there being only 20 cheaters at the time. And let's make it double: Give a citation indicating there's only about six cheaters in game.

Oh no, bro, I thought you didn't want to see people replying to him!

Okay so we know it's reasonable for 1.5%-2.1% of accounts to be banned for cheating in other FPS games now. So that means - oh dear, fisu keeps timing out for me right now let's see uhhh...

According to https://ps2.nice.kiwi/#/ there's 4,525 players online right now as I'm typing this. Let's say PS2 has a similar cheater problem cause there's literally no reason to believe it doesn't after 14 pages, but also let's say DBG is keeping up with bans at the industry standard rate and asking them to do more is unreasonable, especially given their size. That means ~81 accounts that are currently playing right now will be banned in the future. So... how in the world are 20 players playing an average of 4 accounts at the same time?

(Yes, I realize the number of active players cheating is probably higher because figures like 1.5% include accounts that have 10 minutes of playtime, 0 kills, and whatnot from launch day, so the percentage of cheaters in the number of active accounts who are actually playing is probably higher. I'm choosing the lowest numbers I can most of the time and I can't get anywhere near spy's assertions...)

It's true, Planetside 2 has never had 3 million+ simultaneous players and we don't see 8 year olds doing the VS MAX crouch. So what? 1,000 out of 100,000 is 1% and 1 out of 100 is 1%. That's how percentages work. Again.

I'm sure you wouldn't. See, a summary of all your posts in this thread go something like this:
"I want evidence"
"Here's evidence"
"No, not like that; it's not 110% certain the person was cheating"
"Okay here's a different kind of evidence"
"No, that doesn't count; because they're banned now so the impact they had on players the entire time they weren't banned while getting up to BR 98 in extreme cases magically disappears!"

For me? Personally? I die about a dozen times a session. Assuming the same person never kills me twice, it'd take over a week for me to get killed by a cheater on average - and even then I, myself, might not recognize them as a cheater (but that doesn't magically imbue them with not-a-cheater properties and that doesn't mean they stop affecting players that don't even know the official forum exists...) So... you want me to record all my gameplay for weeks just to get one clip that you would just say "could be lag you know how goofy this game's code is" to anyway? Nah, that ain't fun.

Y'know, going into this thread I wondered if PS2 was worse than average. I've been around cheaters enough to get a feel for what they're about: they're not bad for cheating, the game is bad and deserves to be cheated at, etc. You want to be able to deny everything and make it hard to pinpoint what you're doing for the exact same reason no developer in their right mind would explain exactly when and how their anticheat caught someone, etc. I've never played a game that matches those things more perfectly. I swear, I remember seeing forum posts to the effect of "**** it I'm just going to cheat cause clearly everyone else already is" -someone who wasn't told about the netcode or shooting mechanics and just recently started playing. Etc. That's the kind of mentality that breeds cheaters!

'Course, a deduction based on personal experiences isn't proof! And now I'm starting to hope I'm wrong...

I also came into this thread thinking 1%-1.5% of players were cheating at all. Any degree of cheating. For any length of time. But the more this thread goes on the more I realize that's absolutely not the case

Maybe DBG's doing a really good job with what they've got after all? I was coming in here like "1% of players are cheating to some degree, there's suspicious stuff going on. It's DBG's responsibility to put obstacles in their way and resolve bugs that make legit players look suspicious"

But if it's more like: 12% of players are cheating to some degree, but it *feels* like only 1% are? Well. They're doing a damn good job, come to think of it!

hey, you're finally back! Took a while.

Still not a single bit of proof in sight!

I've already addressed everything you said, and even pulled out direct quotes from you where I guess you "forgot" what you were saying. Everything from my last post directed towards you still applies

As I've said many times, those percentages are estates. The 20 and 6 are numbers of individuals who abused hitboxes that came directly from DBG.

Well, quite frankly, no one has linked any proof to support the idea that there are more hackers in Planetside than other games, most of these hackers are subtle/never get caught, or that DBG doesn't take action against cheaters. I've seen some strange arguments that because there's this many psychopaths, there must be this many cheaters. After a bit of pushing, a guy was even able to cough up a remotely questionable survey, that would say 3% of people in online games are constantly cheating. Still nothing concrete, nothing that relates to planetside 2. The very few videos linked prove it's something rare, and that most "cheaters" are exploiting the game, and not guilty of using 3rd party hacks like the thread is about.

I mean, it's quite simple, you make bold claims, yet you're unable to back them up. If you're going to argue something that goes against common sense, it might be useful to include some sort of proof??? You don't have numbers or articles like was able to link. Your main way to support your claims would be to say: here's a video of me encountering __ hackers in __ minutes. This guys is a confirmed hacker and has never been banned. As you can see, he pays for the game. I think I even made a template to help you guys ffs.

Instead of giving the obvious, you continue to link bizarre "evidence" - that is when you finally decide to link something - that more often than not just reinforces my claim. You make wild statements, link nothing, and then are shocked when I ask for proof. Some people are just unbelievable right?!?

It's also not possible, because cheaters aren't as common as people make it seem. I fail to understand how you believe creating parallels and loose suppositions is more convincing than just providing some concrete evidence. You don't have numbers, you don't have anything other than videos basically. Even if I'm not convinced, it'll help me understand your perspective because cheaters have never been an issue for me in game.

You can either test out hacks and record yourself not getting caught/banned
You can record footage of hackers impacting your sessions. Based on how frequent some people would make them, over 1 in 10 people would be hacking this game. That would be quite easy to notice in play, yet I've yet to see anything. Oh, your shadowplay doesn't work, right?
Or, if you manage, you can get a cheater community to open up and share some information. However I think cheaters have other stuff to do than roam around in the forums, and I doubt the "subtle" cheaters would reveal their act. Still, surprise me!


If you have to be playing for weeks to encounter one potential hacker, and you don't realize you've overstated your claim here a little, I'm not sure what to say.

Innocent until proven guilty. If it's not clear the guys are cheating, or that your estimates of 15% of the playerbase cheats - nearly 2 out of 10 people who kill you would be cheating, does that make sense? Based on my in game experience, even my estimate of less that 0.5%, based on what little information we have disclosed would be overstating the problem. If you can't link any proof that will at least suggest your numbers aren't the product of delusion - and you admit yourself it would practically be impossible - it's likely because it is "impossible".

I didn't know you cared. <3 But yes I typed up a bit then when to do something else then my PC decided to be a little ***** and **** its **** up so it refreshed all my tabs and I lost what I wrote, so I was like "whatever I don't really care" and then played Vermintide 2 with a friend for the rest of the day instead. Was fun, good game.

That's what I said! *Cough cough* ...something about the numbers twenty and six *cough*

See previous reply.

With that number, I'd assume the cheater rate would be more along the lines of 8% on average (just cutting the amount of regulars in half before adding to reflct that even if all of them play at a given time, not all of them will cheat).

Thing is, people without the cheater mentality likely won't do that. Because they wouldn't want to cheat, even for a test like this.

I think it's a bit easy to sit back and claim that "you" don't have a cheating mentality, but others do.

The last time I cheated in a game I was maybe 8, it was on a game called Age of Empires: The Conquerors Expansion 2. It was an exploit that allowed me to get 1000 wood resources just by typing a certain keyword. I've never once cheated in a game with non-bot players involved, and I clearly remember the 3 times I did cheat as a kid, because I felt pretty guilty about it, as dumb as that might sound.

People have claimed there's tons of cheaters in this game, it's easy to get hacks for Planetside 2, most of these cheaters are "subtle" and DBG doesn't do anything against cheaters.

No one has been able to prove any of this. I suggested 3 simple ways to prove this. I like to think I don't have a "cheater" mentality, however if it's to prove a point, I don't think any of the 3 methods I suggested would conflict with me. You can't claim the cheats you've seen in 2 minute videos or on shady websites actually work/are undetectable if you haven't tried them out, no?

If you can't link videos of you encountering multiple cheaters (because that's what numbers like 10-15+% would mean), if you can't link videos of you hacking for long periods undetected (while the profiles of hackers are deleted in a day), and can't prove through any source that Planetside 2 is in fact riddled with undetectable hackers, there's no point in arguing - you literally don't have anything to prove. It's all assumption, assumption, assumption as another guy mentioned.


In summary, there are hackers, however nothing would suggest they account for more than 1% of the community, in game sessions would in fact place that number much lower, closer to 0%. Many of these cheaters are in fact exploiters, or simply have lag advantage. The few "hackers" that roam around are quickly dealt with by the team, it's unfair to say they don't do anything. The little hackers encountered and linked are often deleted in less than a day. The "subtle" hackers would account for a minimal portion of these hackers, if they exist at all. Subtle hackers by nature have little to no affect on the game, hence why they are classified as "subtle". One of the hackers linked explained that the game isn't very interesting to players - which would include hackers into the mix. Judging by population levels, it's clear the game doesn't attract many people, and the "hackers" typically steer towards newer, more popular/attractive games.

There's yet to be anything to prove otherwise, and so far there's been an inability to display any necessary proof to accommodate for some of the pretty disturbing, rampant accusations I will not bother quoting again.

As I said, there's 3 really simple and efficient ways to prove your point.

1) Record videos of your session, point out where each player is cheating. I believe someone said above 12% right? So a little over 1 out of 10 people you encounter would be cheating, I don't see how difficult it would be to point that out in a little video. Unless of course, I have the only working shadowplay in the forums. If that's the case would you like me to dm you some raw footage of my sessions and you can point out who's killed me through hacks?

Edit: There's actually tons of good montages on youtube, I like this one in particular, but feel free to pick others, although I don't really see why you'd have to do so.
https://www.youtube.com/user/Moukass1

Take a video of his montages, he kills/dies to a lot of dudes. Now point out where you find your suggested percentage of hackers in his video. Don't argue he cut them all out, he's got scenes with tons of players, which given your estimates would have a huge chance of having at least one cheater in the bunch, if not more.

2) You could cheat yourself, to demonstrate that "subtle" cheaters exist, and that hacking is a huge issue in the game. Again, I'm not gonna accuse anyone, but I highly doubt everyone here is an angel. I'm confident at least one person accusing the game of incorrectly dealing with cheaters could record a video of him hacking on the same character for a week or so. I'd say it's more likely the fear of getting banned and the fact that many of the "available" cheats don't work/are scams that is stopping people from resorting to this.

3) You could get the "hacker" community to speak out.

On a more complicated note:

You could ask DBG if they can disclose the recent information regarding "hackers" in the game Planetside 2 (I have to specify that, because today someone accusing everyone of hacking claimed fortnite was a much safer fps, which it's not). Don't compare apples to oranges, get us relevant information on the game we're discussing (no psychopaths please). Considering it's unique in it's genre, and every game has a unique situation, pulling out numbers from one questionably relevant source isn't going to give us concrete information about the state of the game. Of course, considering some people have said the company was giving inaccurate numbers in the past (without any evidence to support that, ofc) I fail to see how this would be a good method, even if by some miracle the company did disclose the numbers.


I've mentioned many times, the best thing to do if you seriously believe there's that many hackers in game would be a linked video(s), where you point out everyone that killed you through cheating. It would give a much clearer picture, and would be much harder to disprove if you are indeed correct.

But that's precisely the difference. I'm fine with cheating in Single Player games, personally (would do in Warcraft 3 revamp to skip parts of the campaign after my PC reset deleted my progress, as it turns out the saves are not in a cloud...*sigh*). And ever since my second playthrough, I have no-clipped through the infamous gates in TESIV Oblivion, because I think they suck. And that's fine, it doesn't ruin other peoples day, and it enhances my fun by skipping parts I do not enjoy, seeing as there is no actual "fast-forward to after the thing" button. Same thing for basically every dungeon in Skyrim and calling it a game I don't particularly like (WAY too dungeon-heavy with bad quests, but that's beside the point). But I'd NEVER cheat in a multiplayer game, not even for testing. Because even "for science", it hurts the experience of other players.
May be leaning too far out the window here, but I'd assume of the people who actually cheat (overt, subtle, whatever) only a small percentage does it to intentionally annoy others. Most probably do that to enhance their experience by playing with training wheels, essentially, and disregard the effect that has on others who also want to enjoy the game.

There are, I'd say, three kinds of stances in regards to cheating:
1) Would never do it.
2) Would do it if it doesn't harm anyone else.
3) Would unconditionally do it (doesn't mean they do cheat all the time, just that they'd be ready to do it if they saw a reason to).

That's true, most cheaters just do it to annoy others. Apparently kids of this generation love "salt" and get amused thinking the other dude is raging due to their crap on the other side of the screen. The video linked about that cheater explained there's some game like Planetside 2 where he rarely logs on, but when he does it's to make a character and cheat to piss people off for a bit. I would assume these are the "blatant" cheaters, because IMO it would be hard to get mad at a dude who's cheating to be bad, or simply to mimic the average player.

I fall in category 2 I would say. I've cheated a few times as a kid in old single player games. Based on the research on the matter, it's clear most people fall in the first 2 categories. Logically too, most people play games to relax, maybe feel a bit of accomplishment. Very few people would find causing others to "rage" through cheating or simply playing with an unfair advantage is a fun and interesting accomplishment.

This thread was originally about "hackers". A minority of cheaters are "hackers". As we've already discussed through or two short stories, people usually don't "hack" games, they mostly skip what they find boring, repetitive. Planetside 2 is a game about killing, if people find that boring/repetitive, they likely aren't going to bother hacking (at least not for extended periods of time). Exploits would be a way some people cheat to "spice" things up. It's more present than hacking, especially in this game that's littered with many bugs. Exploiting is much easier to do (few people want to modify files, run third-party softwares from shady sites, most people also don't want to risk money for hacks), and some people don't believe it's necessarily cheating.

So it's important to remember what cheaters we're referring to. For this conversation that was originally centered around "hackers", it's fair to assume the total number of cheaters in the game is very, very, very small - close to 0.
In terms of people who "cheat" in general - remember "cheating" can be interpreted differently - I would say the number is larger, closer to 1%, surpassing it based on certain definitions.

I think many people are thinking people cheat, same as me due to poor hit detection relay (Made that up but fits). Meaning you shoot at a guy empty a mag, but you appear to die in just a few shots. Vets have gotten used to this, us newbie's not so much. But the effect is the same. They get frustrated and quit. This game is full of vets that have no life and play 1000's of hours. Good for them they found a game they like. The rest of us move on to other games that don't have these issues. I seriously have no idea how anyone still plays this game. It is redundant and boring. Same crap over and over and over. It's not that hard to "git gud" when it is a completely mindless rotation requiring very little skill. Just find the gun and setup that works which vets have and waalaaa your good. For me I started this game 1st year got bored pretty fast. Came back year 17 and lol the game has changed so little. Devs have not done anything to make this game worth continuing to play. 4 days played and time to move one, was just waiting on EFT to wipe (which requires actual skill to play and sadly a crap ton of gear to git gud) but I can't wait that long playing this game. I for one have never gotten gud, I am an older player and actually enjoy games that require skill. Planetside 2 has never required that, it requires you to input time to get the guns and accessories to get gud and nothing more, evidenced by the fact mentioned in the beginning, emptying a mag in the face of a guy only to die anyway. Google says the beginner guns are just as good as the rest. Maybe true, but without the implants and other items requiring certs them same guns aren't as good. Plus as mentioned in the beginning the hit detection. Having hit detection client side is the issue. Makes you feel as if your doing something when your actually not, it causes you to think you hit a person when actually you have not, even tho the game registers it as a hit. Then take the fact that if you don't kill the person even if you did hit them, you get no credit, further frustrating new players. (If your supposed to get credit, I don't 100% of the time, and only get credit for assist if they die and I hit them more then a few times). You know a game is not very popular, when you google the game and there is very little new information, or many live streamers on twitch. This is not flaming the Daybreak Devs as much as letting them know they dropped the ball. FTP or not. Considering how little effort has been put into this game, it's obvious it's making money for them over time, but not enough to actually make the game good. The issues with CN and the lay-offs have obviously had a negative effect on this game property and others. Welp enjoy the game i am sure this will be deleted way faster than any hackers will be banned lol.

That's not really true. The default guns are typically the best, regardless of implants (they can only reward you for kills), and the default guns also come with free attachments for newbies. Problem is many new player's aren't used to the game's shooting mechanics. There's bloom, first shot multipliers, odd recoil patterns, etc that just throw off aim unless you're familiar with how to compensate for it.

Means while the new players are spraying half their mags into the player's chest which typically has the 20% nanoweave reduction equipped) and into the nearby bushes, the veterans just look, send 4 shots into the guys head and get back to their business.

Still, many people share your opinion and don't enjoy the game; it's a long discussion for another thread.


I didn't think the game was going to die for a few more years, but now, given the direction it's taking, I wouldn't be surprised if I woke up one morning to a dead game. It's too bad, because the game had a lot of positives despite it's obvious flaws, but instead of building on its strengths, the team has decided it would be better to make it near unbearable to play. It remains the only game that was able to deliver battle on such a scale (despite the obvious server issues) - a game concept truly ahead of it's time.

I think that's really the main issue: we don't posses the hardware for the game to be server-side. The game runs client-side and the servers still can barely handle it.

yup, during the first few years the game wasn't generating any profits if I recall correctly, which is why SOE had to sell the game to DBG. It's a vicious cycle. They did put a lot of effort into the game (at the beginning), but weren't able to generate good enough revenue to justify continuing doing so.

8% is reasonable given the respective 3% & 9%, but it doesn't take the remaining 13% "sometimes" and 12% "rarely" into account. It is likely that most but not all of the "often" cheaters will be cheating at any given time, but it's also quite likely that a good chunk of the "sometimes" cheaters will be cheating as well. Even if only 10% of the 12% total of "rarely" cheaters were cheating on top of that we'd still expect to see closer to 12% than 8%.

Found the following in another thread, thought it might be neat to import.

That, I'd say, is a good middle between overt and subtle. Because while noticable to those who count along, it won't immediately attract attention by itself.

Just for funsies and off-topic: A guildmate found an old Wrel video on the Gauss SAW earlier this day. In that he says something to the effect of "if it were my decision, I'd give something else as the NC starter LMG, because while good, it's not really a beginner friendly weapon". Joke's on him, he's in charge for quite a while now, what weapon do NC players get as a starter LGM again?

Wrel brought up a lot of (good) ideas, but failed to implement any one of them. Reminds me of elections lol.

That said they actually lowered the recoil on the saw. The godsaw too, they made it way more easier to control, it's a laser now basically, when before no one could control it. I would say the EM6 would be a better starter weapon though. Still, the starter weapons do a nice job at introducing the faction traits and the downsides. Once you've learned to master the carv, the saw, the trac-5...any other weapon becomes easy to control.

That said, no one is going to mention the trac-5 and tracshot have some of the harshest recoil in the whole game? I would prefer the trac-5 be traded for the jaguar as starter.

This would sound more of an exploit than a hack. Seriously I highly doubt anyone would actually come up with a hack for something as useless as this. A video would've been cool, but I guess we can't have everything.

Next time I see him, I'll be on the lookout for that.

I would guess he's an idiot who abuses bugs every so often, although since there's no proof of anything, it's just assumptions on top of assumptions.

Even with people "subtly hacking" like this, does it really seem like 1 in 10 of the people you encounter in game are actively cheating? Even with the 8% you suggest, it would mean there is at least always 1 cheater in every fight - dozens in the large ones - and the likelihood of you dying to multiple cheaters in a row would be quite high. Based on my experience, and those around me, I do not find this to be the case. Obviously, any video proof you could link regarding this would help everyone understand the extent of the cheating problem.

No, they didn't.

Please provide the patchnotes indicating so.