ANN - Ghost Ships and Magic Treasure!

[Cosme12]

Reroll incoming? Can we spend everything in lotto?

[Dreki]

Well, I've read all the posts here and talked to a few people here and there, and yeah, a rollback would be damaging to the stability of the game, but doing nothing would be just as damaging

The cheaters, the ones who actually abused the exploit, should be undoubtedly banned and deleted so the unused hacked resources disappear with them

The players who got directly helped in an extraordinary way, like getting 10 cities or less but expensive cities, could be rolled back to before the incident, or rerolled/deleted

The members who got to city 10, or just small benefits from cheat money, could have their warchest deleted or enough money/resource = to the benefit as a penalty for being benefitted by cheat money, even if they were unaware about it. Another possibility is just deleting NR's bank.

What's been traded and is already impregnated in PnW's economy, like Frawley said, would even out naturally through free market, but also would be too much work to delete every single resource that was spawned in.

I wasn't a player when this happened the last time, but by what everyone is talking about, the game survived and went on, so I believe this won't kill it

Anyways, the Soup is Hot! And cheating is Not.

Edited May 31, 2019 by Dreki
Gramatical errors, sry, english isn't my first language :P

[Dio Brando]

1 hour ago, Leftbehind said:

I don't think anyone here believes Akuryo is a saint or what he done wasn't shady but with everyone trying to knit pick what he done is talking away from the real issue. Which is "did Pooball, NR by extension, use a bug to exploit the game?" And what needs to be done. 

This. 

---

Let me preface this by saying that I am neither part of administration nor someone who claims to know everything about this situation. I think I know enough to address some concerns brought to me, however. Take this with a grain of salt.

To those who are bold enough to question my intentions in my DMs: I don't claim to be a saint. I don't do things for 'good' reasons all the time. Often, I'm content to simply run things in the background. I enjoy organizing things and bringing new players up to speed, because there's a special type of joy to be found in those things. I've also engaged in some amoral activities, but never have I tolerated cheaters or cheating. Let me be very clear in stating that I don't "know" whether did it, or how he did it, but the fact of the matter is that everything we are aware of currently points to Nova Riata. Personally, I care very little for whether Pooball knew or not. The level of negligence required to not be aware of what your members are doing if the records are publicly available, and transferred through your nations at-least as an effective transit point is criminal. That alone disqualifies a complete absolution, but I digress.

In the past 12 or so hours, I have been approached by countless people who have expressed their discontent with how things have been proceeding. I will lay out some of those concerns in this post.

Let's see if I can keep this 'short'.

      I don't want to read a 7 page thread. What is going on?

Basically, there was a massive spike in raws and manufactured resources between 27th of April and 28th of April. This led to more inquisitive minds poking Sheepy about it. It was then ignored and passed off as an anomalous entry in the world-graphs due to VM'ers. Due to being tipped off about multiple nations residing on Pooball's (leader of Nova Riata) uID, Akuryo trawled through the records and found significant transactions, trade offers and the like that matched somewhat in magnitude as well as date. Logs implicated their off-shore AA, multiple nations, some of which have deleted since, and growth patterns of their gov suggest something malicious in nature. While the nations and the bank were deleted, the contents were clearly shifted elsewhere as evidenced by the lack of any meaningful dip in the world-graphs. You can check the OP or this post for more details.

      How do we know this was an exploit? And, how did they do it? Can it be done by anyone?

Short answer: I don't know whether it was an exploit, a bug. There is general consensus within the community that with the sheer magnitude of resource 'generation' (as evidenced by transactions, Pooball's own statement that he won't deny there was cheating, as well as world graphs), it wouldn't be a simple bug, but rather, an exploit used multiple times, climaxing in the 4/27 spike. This, of-course, is not fact, and should not be considered as such. What is fact is that resources were coming from somewhere, and, in the realms of reasonable doubt, the paper trail did go through NR. This doesn't mean we are 100% correct, merely that everything we know of suggests this strongly.

We don't know how they did it. Even if we did, releasing said information publicly would be - frankly - idiotic for self explanatory reasons. Presumably, yes, but if it is an exploit requiring more skill than just stumbling upon a gap in the game's structure/code, it would be foolish to think anyone could.

      Who else was involved?

This is tricky. Let us consider this in two parts:

1. The problem with any 'investigation' like this, player-initiated that is, is that it doesn't have access to moderation/administrative prerogative. We can't know for sure whether x party committed something illegal. We can only deduce so from what we have access to. This much is recognized by everyone. The information is there, everyone in the thread had the ability to look at it, and most of everyone who has agrees there is something particularly concerning. This does not mean that we accuse people of cheating who we don't have solid, significant proof against. Even with respect to Poo, I'm still willing to give him some leeway in that I don't know he's done x things. We just have a ton of evidence that something is deeply wrong there.
2. These things are incredibly sensitive in that they have the potential to develop into full out witch-hunts. While that may be necessary for the most part, this matter comes down to mod prerogative, and should not be muddled overly so with politics. It is heartening to see no one has politicized this, but some concerns - senders shall remain anonymous - were brought up regarding this debacle. To that, what I can say is that this issue transcends narrow political considerations and effectively operates under an entirely different dynamic than traditional IC paradigms; in saying that, I highly encourage people to conduct their own searches. None of this from my part was, or is, meant to be an inquisition - it is an investigation of which's findings have been published. Arguments are encouraged as long as they remain respectful and do not cross boundaries.

That provides a good segue to my final point...

      Why post this publicly, doesn't this alert the 'cheaters'?

Ideally, the subject-matter would have remained completely private and handled by administration entirely, with a public announcement following Sheepy's findings. That was no longer viable due to the quick dissemination of information. It is known that we were neither the only ones conducting 'investigations', and after Pooball was confronted, the multis - whoever they may belong to - were deleted shortly afterwards. From that point on and the premature release of information a couple hours before the thread was published, it was decided that it is better to provide the community the full scope of 'confirmed' information. I believe we've been fairly effective in doing so.

      What's the solution?

Here's a problem we don't quite have the answer for. There are many different ways to go about this, but they all encounter three major problems:

1. The resources were sold widely, and disseminated so thoroughly that practically everyone profited from the influx of resources. Raws were sold at low rates; bulk sales at low rates are many an econ dept.'s wet dream.
2. We don't actually know how many resources were 'generated' - for lack of a better word - this way, nor is it known when it started. 
3. We don't know how many people were involved. It is a safe assumption to make that there were multiple persons involved, as is common in incidents like these. It is also a safe assumption to make that not all of Nova knew or was involved. That would have seen such a thing leaked ages ago. Undeniably, however, at-least some of them benefited.

There have been many solutions presented, the most frequent of which I will list below:

• Ban players who were involved (see problem 3);
• Ban all of Nova (see problem 3);
• Reset Nova (see problem 3);
• Delete resources in circulation (see problem 1, 2);
• Ban leadership, set Nova to 1 city (see problem 3);
• Thanos snap 1/3rd of all resources;
• Roll back (see problem 2);
• Delete Nova's bank (see problem 1);

I will address only one of these proposals: a suggested roll-back. For one, a roll-back would have to go back to the initial injection of resources. That can be months, potentially in Knightfall territory, or immediately after. Secondly, a roll-back would not just upset players but overall delete countless accounts and players who joined in the period being 'over-written'. Thirdly, it just isn't fair to anyone else, not everyone was complicit. Lastly, @Frawley brought up an excellent point in saying that the market has effectively absorbed much of the released resources; there is definitely a significant % of the injected resources that never got to the global market, so that will still need to be addressed.
 

---
 

As I type, I have a killer head-ache, and the less minor or more sensitive concerns were left out; the former because that would require individual addresses and they mostly came under the previous headings, and the latter because . As a reminder, there's a fine line between sowing discontent and keeping your membership informed.

Edited May 31, 2019 by Dio Brando

[HannaH]

58 minutes ago, Cosme12 said:

Reroll incoming? Can we spend everything in lotto?

Time to blow everything on Keno!

[True King]

A rollback without even figuring out how they duped resources (if that is what happened) seems kind of pointless.

[Edward I]

17 minutes ago, Noctis Anarch Caelum said:

A rollback without even figuring out how they duped resources (if that is what happened) seems kind of pointless.

Yes. A perfect fix to the exploit unaccompanied by a removal of resources on the same scale as they were illicitly introduced - via a rollback or another mechanism - would also be half a solution.

[Micchan]

Ban Pooball

Ban Akuryo

Ban Nova

Ban new players

Ban banks

Ban alliance

Let's move to the test server to play War & War

[Edward I]

17 minutes ago, Micchan said:

Let's move to the test server to play War & War

Actually, they cheated there too.

Source: http://test.politicsandwar.com/world-graphs/graphID=19

[Adrienne]

For those of who who have already reached out to me, thank you. I appreciate you doing so. In the interest of transparency and keeping the community in the loop, I thought I'd comment here as well.

When we were presented this information shortly before it was released, both myself and Pooh reached out to Alex with it and any other information we thought relevant. We at TKR don't condone cheating/exploiting of defects and are doing everything we can to support Alex's current investigation. Upon completion of the investigation, we will take appropriate action regarding those individuals and/or alliances involved. If anyone would like to talk to me further about this, please feel free to send me a DM.

[Buorhann]

I just find it weird that Pooh would reach out to Alex now after he most definitely benefitted from it (See previous screenshots of his growth, unless he spent some mad cash and stored up credits).

[MinesomeMC]

This is like a Catsby 2.0.

[WISD0MTREE]

From 2015:

On 7/9/2015 at 7:25 PM, Alex said:

As for those who abused this exploit or knowingly received funds, we will continue to root you out and remove you from this community. The exploit may be fixed, but our investigation is not over, and we will continue to catch and reprimand the abusers. It's only a matter of time before you're caught - if you enjoy playing Politics & War and participated in this abuse I strongly recommend you come forward and turn yourself in immediately. A number of players have been banned and removed from the game already, along with quite a bit of spawned resources and cash. Like I said in my other post, we can't get rid of it all, but it's spread so thin and the economy of the game is so dynamic that the effects of the exploit will dissipate quickly over time. I'm looking forward to a new era of exploit-free Politics & War! Keep on enjoying the game, guys!

And from the other 2015 thread:

Quote

The players that are behind the exploit are the likes of Sith/Pol Pot, Ghost (who was banned some time ago, though I left his nation in an effort to entice him to divulge information about the exploit to me), Death, and NMA. There are others, such as Last187, that have been receptacles of some of the spawned cash. He has been banned as well. Let me make it clear right now, that I will track down anyone who has conspired with the cheaters, and they shall be banned and removed from the game, forever.

From 2019:

1 minute ago, Sphinx said:

Which according to your numbers they sold off $86 billion of the $209 billion generated. So that only 8% of their illicit gains removed, They still profited enormously from this scam, but thank you for at least taking the community advice, I hope they receive far more punishment than that though. 

But hey, at least it wasn't $210 billion.

[Vemek]

[CapnFahQ]

Greetings friends!

I just want everyone to know I did my part. While I was not aware of any wrong doing in my time at Nova, I felt the community would rest easier knowing that some of their wealth has been seized by operatives of Not A Scam LLC. and will be put towards building a successful, community oriented trading group. Stay tuned for details!

(don't worry, I changed it from Nation to Alliance before I sent it)

To my friends at Nova - I am sorry, but you got Fraggled.
I also want Orbis to know that I'm quite sure 99% of Nova had no idea this was going on, including the high gov. Our offshores and such were not discussed. Please go easy on them. 

 

 

Edited June 1, 2019 by CapnFahQ

[Zei-Sakura Alsainn]

You might as well have taken it and deleted it, considering where you sent it off too, tbh.

[Dio Brando]

6 minutes ago, CapnFahQ said:

snip

What did you think this was going to achieve? Might as well have just sent the resources to a 1 city nation about to go into VM.

Edited June 1, 2019 by Dio Brando

[CapnFahQ]

9 minutes ago, Dio Brando said:

What did you think this was going to achieve?

#1 - I didn't want to be associated with an alliance that was known for cheating
#2 - I wanted to express that the majority of Nova players didn't know about the exploiting and that the community should go easy on them
#3 - I wanted to give a small amount of potentially ill gotten gains to a resource sink that won't really affect the balance of the game.
#4 - I talk to Fraggle lots and TBH I was waiting for a good time to do this right from the start.

Plus, maybe some good memes?

Edited June 1, 2019 by CapnFahQ

[Dio Brando]

5 minutes ago, CapnFahQ said:

#1 - I didn't want to be associated with an alliance that was known for cheating
#2 - I wanted to express that the majority of Nova players didn't know about the exploiting and that the community should go easy on them
#3 - I wanted to give a small amount of potentially ill gotten gains to a resource sink that won't really affect the balance of the game.
#4 - I talk to Fraggle lots and TBH I was waiting for a good time to do this right from the start.

Plus, maybe some good memes?

Just to be clear, this was your AA bank, correct?

[CapnFahQ]

1 minute ago, Dio Brando said:

Just to be clear, this was your AA bank, correct?

Yes

[Dio Brando]

6 minutes ago, CapnFahQ said:

Yes

So, your alliance, which you believe was largely innocent of this activity, just lost it's off-shore bank, and you felt that the appropriate course of action was fricking them over further by taking what little they had left, which may or may not have been illegal in nature? All this for convincing people of which they aren't going to be convinced about from this display? Not gonna talk about how you left for Resplendent first?

Brilliant maneuver mate. You have fun with this one, Nova.

Edited June 1, 2019 by Dio Brando

[CapnFahQ]

12 minutes ago, Dio Brando said:

So, your alliance, which you believe was largely innocent of this activity, just lost it's off-shore bank, and you felt that the appropriate course of action was fricking them over further by taking what little they had left, which may or may not have been illegal in nature? All this for convincing people of which they aren't going to be convinced about from this display? Not gonna talk about how you left for Resplendent first?

Brilliant maneuver mate. You have fun with this one, Nova.

Like I said I was planning doing this for some time. Now seems like a pretty good time to move on don't you agree?

I left for Resplendent first because I was pretty nervous lol and I forgot Fraggle had created the new AA.

. Good chance I'm gonna re-roll anyways, but I'm in a bunch of wars so I'm gonna finish them.

Edited June 1, 2019 by CapnFahQ

[Dio Brando]

Just now, CapnFahQ said:

Like I said I was planning doing this for some time. Now seems like a pretty good time to move on don't you agree?

No, I'm saying you should stop dressing it up as anything but a crappy move:

22 minutes ago, CapnFahQ said:

#1 - I didn't want to be associated with an alliance that was known for cheating
#2 - I wanted to express that the majority of Nova players didn't know about the exploiting and that the community should go easy on them
#3 - I wanted to give a small amount of potentially ill gotten gains to a resource sink that won't really affect the balance of the game.
#4 - I talk to Fraggle lots and TBH I was waiting for a good time to do this right from the start.

Plus, maybe some good memes?

You wanted to get away and maybe get some PR. Own up to this shit. 

[CapnFahQ]

9 minutes ago, Dio Brando said:

No, I'm saying you should stop dressing it up as anything but a crappy move:

You wanted to get away and maybe get some PR. Own up to this shit. 

Oh yeah its a dick move for sure. All is fair in politics and war though. Its going to a better place IMO.

Edited June 1, 2019 by CapnFahQ

[Dio Brando]

Just now, CapnFahQ said:

Oh yeah its a dick move for sure. 

I am glad we could reach an agreement. Much more reasonable than the rest of your AA mates.

[Sketchy]

Boy this thread went downhill while I was asleep.