BanID #2819 - requesting answer from M_M God

[Vys]

Star fox has basically nailed it.

[Shaddowknight]

If it were JUST about the cheating/hacking thing, I would agree. Star Fox, to continue to use the US law as a means of comparison. If you try to escape from jail, and get caught, do they not extend your sentence, how about for REPEATED escapes and escape attempts?

On top of that there were other things that I am not able to discuss that I notice listed in bancomments. I don't blame you all for thinking based on the information you have, but you do not have the whole picture either. If they decide to lift his ban and let him in then so be it, I don't really care either way. I would not expect that to happen though.

[2pac]

good point starfox. I just pity staff like shaddowknight who continue to fight and won't be the better person. Unjust, unfair I explained it in detail and you yet to see faults in Left_Eye who failed at her position as BanG Op.

It's not just US LAW its plain and simple I over-served my ban PERIOD. Whoever didn't ban me properly should be treated with loss of their staff position or suspension as it outline in SSC Netops site.

Thank you

[roxxkatt]

Explain to me why we let Mythril, Delectable, Vys, etc (I honestly forgot half the players at this point) off the hook from their LIFEBANS (due to cheating inside TW multiple times) and only served a few months to a year at most? Explain to me why we can let one group of players off the hook (they had a large community support group, me included) but cannot let 2pac off, when he clearly states he won't cheat anymore? Is it because we don't like the player, or because we are following some unwritten rule? Pick one or the other, but not both.

so if the good ol boys club lets 3 faggots who murdered people out of jail, we should let more murderers off too?

• You cheated in SSCU Trench Wars and, as a result, were banned in August of 2013. This netban was originally for 90 days, however after L_E found out this was your second netban offence for cheating, it was increased appropriately.

and this is why we shouldnt be stupid enough to cheat, kids


its too bad he didnt cheat in tw both times so we can up it to a lifeban

[PapaRaazi]

Staff is so stubborn they can't just admit they are wrong, they have to continue posting useless, irrelevant arguments which just manage to make them look more and more retarded. shaddowknight and roxxkatt both have the mentality of 5 year olds. Remove them both from the game because they are making a bad name for staff. If you "good" staffers are wondering why you get shit on all the time, it's because of people like this.

Free 2pac

Axe shadowfaggot
Axe roxxnewbie

PS) ph is a nerdy hipster weirdo with serious issues

[Mythril]

I don’t know anyone who has ever actually relied on CE or any other cheat program to be good at this game. Most of the people who cheated in the past did it to get a rise out of other people or just to have fun and go against the rules during an elim, dd or just pubbing. When viewed from that intention, how is using a speedhack or flying through walls or whatever the hell you’re doing different from TKing in pub or spamming racism? It’s not like he was in the TWLD finals and started going through rocks and prizing himself super. He was in Gatez 2 with 5 people playing.

Cheating on subspace isn’t the same as cheating in sports where steroids and PEDs have a lasting impact on a player’s performance. How does 2pac using speedhack for shits and giggles in Desert Storm affect anything about his skill level in DDs or wbduels? I’ve never been under the impression that he had an unfair advantage from playing against him.

The guy got caught using CE in a TW event and got banned for 9 months.. How does that warrant anything more than a 2 week ban? Star Fox nailed it on the head when he said we need to start accounting for circumstance when coming up with reasonable punishments. Even the staffer who was hosting the event said he felt like 2pac's actions were harmless for the most part. Unban 2pac and give him 5 million pub bux and grant him infinite shields the next time he plays Gatez 2 for the inconvenience.

[Exalt]

If it were JUST about the cheating/hacking thing, I would agree. Star Fox, to continue to use the US law as a means of comparison. If you try to escape from jail, and get caught, do they not extend your sentence, how about for REPEATED escapes and escape attempts?

On top of that there were other things that I am not able to discuss that I notice listed in bancomments. I don't blame you all for thinking based on the information you have, but you do not have the whole picture either. If they decide to lift his ban and let him in then so be it, I don't really care either way. I would not expect that to happen though.

Shadow... I respect you as a staffer... and so I respect at least SOME of the transparency you just showed in WHY staff seem to be unmovable on this subject...

But is there any specific reason why you cannot disclose some of the ban comments that basically lead you and more specifically, dezmond/lefty from lifting his ban? Trenchwars has a history of lifting bans early for cheaters, such as Vys/Ivf who was once lifebanned, and is clearly not still lifebanned. Staff in the past have shown the ability to be lenient, so why is this such a big deal here that staff cannot due so now?

Are there security reasons for why we, the general public, are refused to be told these "secrets" in his ban comments? Why are we keeping secrets from the public anyway? What is gained by this form of thinking? Seriously, how is this productive in gaining trust and respect towards staff? This IS a dying game, and as far as I've seen, staff have acknowledged that fact enough to allow more transparency and open discussions with the regular non-staff players because of it. Staff are finally opening up and allowing players to gain a lil bit of power back, due to this game being ALL OF OURS. It is NOT just staff's, and let's be real here and ADMIT that NOT ALL STAFF should actually BE staff, and NOT ALL STAFF have made great decisions either in hiring staff members, promoting certain staff members, or even generally been mistake-free themselves as GOOD staff members. EVERYONE makes mistakes. The reason staff are so hated is because the perception is largely that staff refuse to ADMIT making mistakes. They act like they are ABOVE the regular player, and that is simply not true in any regards beyond some chip on the shoulder of certain staff members. Let us also agree that the hiring requirements and hiring process of staff has been fucked up for years, which is why Demonic and co have basically decided the entire structure of staff needs to be shaken up. A lot of players have personally stated that EVERYONE should be fired and everything should be started from scratch. This is impossible due to logistical reasons, and also because it would be bad due to there truly being at least a few GOOD members of staff, you included. That being said, there are a lot of BAD staff members, and staff generally have been let off the hook with every fucking offense, and that is also a double standard I for one dislike.

For instance... Paradise cheated blantantly inside of Trenchwars. Why is he not netbanned for 90 days? Cheating and abusing a bug in the system is generally under the SAME rule in trenchwars, so why was Paradise not only NOT axed from staff, but why is he not banned for 90 days (since this was his FIRST offense?)

Also, why was Sheriff NOT banned for a year, considering he has had multiple offenses?

Get my point here? You guys ban regular players like 2pac while ignoring the offenses of players like Paradise, simply because one seems to be generally abrasive and disliked as a person and he isn't/wasn't staff, while a player like Paradise/Sheriff both simply get a suspension from staff (and sheriff was axed), while receiving no actual BANS due to their blatant cheating.

How was anything different? One was using CE, while another was abusing a bug in the system for months that gave them unlimited amounts of pubbux.

Was pee pee sock banned btw? He wasn't staff. He also cheated.

See my point here? I don't like double standards. I don't like hypocrisy. I don't like that a lot of staff members are simply unable and unqualified for their positions. I also don't like that a staff member makes a mistake, yet we ignore that fact and we punish the PLAYER instead of the staff member. That is morally WRONG to me. Do you not agree with this at least on SOME level?

Beyond that, what exactly is the reason you cannot disclose this "inside" information that you give as reasons why you cannot be lenient with 2pac in his ban situation? I am NOT defending 2pac as a player for what he did to earn that ban, nor what he didn't do to possible get staff to take his side in alleviating the harshness of that ban. I am simply debating where he justice is in this extending of the original ban when the JUDGE who sentenced him had given a 3 month sentence. After that 3 month sentence was fulfilled, that JUDGE decided to give ANOTHER sentence (yes, american judicial system) in double-jeopardy. I would try to escape from jail too after that illegal form of punishment. So to use that excuse of ESCAPING jail is ridiculous Shadow.

So for real... what is the reason we are not allowed to know his bancomments? Why are we not allowed to know this inside information? You can't really claim security concerns, so what is the real reason? Give me a real reason for things like this, and perhaps I wouldn't actually be debating this stuff with you. You even agree that you understand why we all disagree with this ban based on the information we do know. If there is other information that leads you to believe this ban-extension is actually justified, beyond the fact that Lefty screwed up the first time (which wasn't 2pac's fault at all), tell us what that information is. Otherwise, I could simply say you are lying to protect Lefty. I fail to see why you cannot disclose this information in lieu of transparency

[Shaddowknight]

If it's important enough to let others know anything else he had done, it should be by the BanG Ops (or with their permission). Simply put, It's not my place to disclose that information just because I have access to it.

Abusing a bug is not the same as hacking/cheating. As is fairly commonplace, people in positions of power (staff) are often given less harsh punishments, but not completely left off the hook (it's VERY common unfortunately). As for why none of them were banned? It was not cheating or hacking. It was exploitation of a bug. There was a loophole, and people used it. Their punishments were more fit to that than cheating/hacking. To again make an analogy to US law, it's the difference between manslaughter and second or first degree murder. While not a great analogy, the punishments for each are quite different, as the situation for each is different.
IMO Sheriff SHOULD be banned for everything he has done, but I think I also know why he wasn't. I will not speak on that though. If he/the deans want to explain, they may. (I wouldn't expect them to, nor do I think they should need to.)

Now, to 2pac: we were using US law as an ANALOGY, to make it easier to understand, as something a number of our players can relate to. What happened is that you served a time, then thought that you should be free, so you broke yourself out of jail, with the phrase "My ban should be up and I should be free." waving behind you on a banner. What you forget is you still "broke out of jail" and got caught. IF your ban was truely served, then it's at the mercy of the BanG Ops to forgive you for breaking out of jail, and it should be up to them if they decide you deserve your netban reduced/removed as well.


Now I would like to say I am NOT speaking for the BanG Ops or anyone else on staff or off staff. These are just my opinions and thoughts given the information I have on my own.

[M_M God]

Alright, just to clarify some things concerning/surrounding this particular ban: 2pacz was banned in 2008 for a year because he cheated in Desert Storm; simple enough, ban was over, he continued to play in TW. Then in august 2013, he was caught in Star fox' event cheating AGAIN; because it was his second netban/offense, another year ban followed. This was approved/set by the SSC Netops, Left_Eye has nothing to do with this. The local ban was matched with this netban in terms of days he is banned, thus, normally, he would be unbanned in august 2014, when his ban is over. Anyhow, during this current netban he is serving he decided it was wise to evade his current netban TWICE, we banned him on his other (evading) names again and did NOT add any time to his current netban. Now, he's asking for leniency, while during his ban he already managed to evade twice, has shown no respect/only anger towards staff for something he has done wrong (especially on forums) and tries to get support from his friends while they don't have full knowledge of his ban history, nor how he has disrespected us so far. Despite all of this, after he left me a ?message (we're even nice enough to allow him into EG right now so he can actually TALK to us), I talked to him online, and told him that the first step would need to be to stop being such a hater, show some respect to everyone and behave on the forums. This kind of behaviour will not help you; it will only put our guard up even more. We're not bad guys here on staff, we try to show support for your case/how you might feel and are actually willing to listen to your side of the story here. However we can't ignore the facts, nor the history/your recent behaviour on forums, towards other players and towards staff recently, so that's something we have to take all into account. I also already told 2pacz that if we would be lenient, which might very well be the case (looking at past cases of CE/cheaters), that this would be his LAST CHANCE. I will be discussing this case with my banG Head Op and with Demonic (co TW Net Op) and then we will decide if we will allow you to return to TW before your original ban time has been served. Also, Exalt, I find it funny that you seem to keep having different opinions about this whole Paradise/Sheriff case; I remember you saying you could understand why they weren't banned for this, why Paradise could continue to be staff (be it in a limited way) and now you're trying to use this SEPARATE case to start discussions about that Paradise/Sheriff case again. Just FYI, that bug they 'had been exploiting for months' was only around for a week or so until we found out (the fruit bet) so please ask for more information first before you decide to keep changing your story/opinion concerning them.

[Vys]

Give him a last chance and 2pac be nice when talking with them.

[Ephemeral]

This is a difficult topic, historically and geographically justice systems have vacillated between ‘punishment’ and ‘reform’.

Those that look at justice as a form of punishment see its value as being to deter others. There is little compassion for those who have offended, they are used as an example to show what can happen when you fuck up. Whether or not you subscribe to this perspective you have to acknowledge its effectiveness; the greater the punishment the greater the perceived risk. Having examples of those who are held responsible for their actions is indeed a strong message to others.
On the other hand you have those who see justice purpose as being that of reform. They believe that the objective of punishment should be to ‘teach the person a lesson’ and that people can emerge from the other side of their punishment as being a better person for it. Of course while this is certainly a more compassionate approach its detractors have piles of real data that shows that this rarely works.

SubSpace, and its subset of TW, have traditionally been a lot about deterrence. Few people gave a fuck about the handful of dickheads who exploited a free online game for whatever warped reasons and excuses they had. This was an easy when the community had plenty of population but now it appears that this is being reconsidered. We could debate the wisdom of trying to retain every single player no matter how they behave and its impact of the community but let’s just assume that this is what the direction is. (And this is certainly appears to be true over the last few years with the lifting of the bans in some cases).

So we come to reform. A case can be made by using a person like Vys. Here is a guy who fucked up, paid the price, and now appears to be a contributing member of the community. Maybe the guy matured and no longer feels the need to break the rules or maybe he enjoys playing the game and doesn’t want to risk being caught/punished again. Only he can really tells us what he was thinking and how he sees things now.

But here is the rub. To consider reform you have to start thinking about ‘intent’ of the person. Perhaps in Vys case his intent was only to enter a near empty arena and ‘test’ a known hack. If true then perhaps his was a good case to consider for reform; his actions since then have appears to verify that this is probably true.

So what are other possible ‘intents’? Well, a person could break rules with the intent of winning, of being ‘better’ than other players. I guess for some folks they can set aside logic and just focus on making themselves feel better. Is this type of person going to be reformed? If so, how do you tell? If the approach is to give them the benefit of doubt then how many times do you allow them to ‘reform’?

What about a person who’s intent is simply that of ‘attention whore’? You know, someone who originally broke the rules so be noticed. Can they be reformed from this behavior or will a attention whore always be a attention whore? A typical example is someone who loves to push the boundaries of the anti-racism policy in the zone. Anyone have any examples of a player who used to be this way but now has reformed?

And now to 2pac. What was his original intent? And has he reformed and shown that whatever drove him to previously break the rules is now no longer an issue? Or has he shown more contempt and no remorse?

And speaking to using ‘real world’ examples. No one gets a free pass in life, once you are convicted of a crime you pay a price the rest of your life. In this country you might be forced to wear a electronic ankle bracelet, report for years to probation officer, lose the right to vote, lose the right to carry a firearm, or not be allowed to live within 500 yards of a school, etc. Point is, we simply don’t just turn offenders back into the community with a pat on the back and a ‘good luck’. What does TW have to ensure that the cheater has indeed reformed or to help the player become a good member of the community?

The reality is that you would have to be a fucking dumbass to further alienate TW staff since they are some of the few that might be able to help you with the Billing involvement. Look at LF, here was a guy with a proven track record of contributing to TW on virtually every level (time and money) yet he got tangled up with Billing and TW staff can only do so much. Yet we think that TW staff should help 2Pac?
eph

[Ephemeral]

Here is my prediction. 2Pac is an attention whore who has no remorse and only his intention is to stand out in a crowd. He has made no contributions to the zone and will not make any moving forward. He will, in fact, continue to suck resources by trying to draw attention to himself in any way possible. He will continue to push the boundaries instead of just playing the game for enjoyment. We will wait a year and revisit this thread; I truly hope he proves me wrong.
eph

[Exalt]

Okay, this makes much more sense. Thank you for taking the time to clarify the situations MM God and Shadow. This kind of stuff, where you upper-staff guys in the know, explaining to the rest of us on the outside (looking in), is what I respect the most about this current crop of staff. This is the kind of transparency that basically allows these kinds of situations to die down. The communication aspect between staff (especially upper-staff) and players was always.. well, to put in lightly...BAD... in the past. I can at least see a large difference in that communication these days, and that's refreshing to say the least. This kind of stuff gives me hope that the current crop of staff members actually do give a fuck about the rest of the community. I'm not saying that they didn't in the past, but they certainly didn't want to tell the rest of us about their plans or what they hoped to achieve in the past, and that seems to be changing. I for one appreciate that. SO, for someone like me that consistently seems to be on staff's case so much on various issues, I also would like to say thank you for allowing things to be different on that level, at least in the communication and attempts at transparency aspects. I still don't agree with everything, but that's to be expected. At least I can now know your side of the story as well, so it isn't completely one-sided based on either A) 2pacZ's side or B) Lefty or whoever banned him's side of the story. This whole bout of communication can only be a good thing. Thanks for that.

If I may nitpick just a lil bit though, here's a few things I do not agree with:

1. While Desert Storm was an SSC zone in the past, how long has that zone been dead for? Does anyone know exactly how many years? Beyond that, why do we trust the opinions of old staff members from that dead zone, when they were not recruited by anyone in Trenchwars (which in my opinion, even with how bad some staff members have proven to be, has always had the BEST group of staff compared to any other zone), and so their standards could have been completely screwy. We simply don't know what those standards were, do we? 2pac stated that even he was staff in that zone at one time. There have been many players that I've talked to from other zones that were former staff members of those zones (usually dead ones), and they were axed from staff and possibly even banned from those zones due to power struggles within those zones. Actually, the only player I've ever seen kicked out from my current squad (Lightning Strike), which tends to recruit almost anyone and everyone due to the mission statement of trying to help new players A) get better and B) enjoy TWD/TWL when they probably wouldn't be accepted by other squads, was a player named 17.5. That player came from EG, and he was a former SMOD of EG apparently. Now, I won't get into details not only because my squad captains (vermillion flame and company) are nice people, and I highly doubt they want to let dirty laundry of any member/former member getting out. Besides the details, the reason this player was axed was due to this player being pretty much being horribly mentally ill. I won't get into details further than that, but the guy was simply psychotic. This player was actually a high-ranking staff member of a popular zone like EG. That alone kind of shows me that another SSC zone, which is fairly popular even, has some horrible recruiting practices of their staff members. I can't imagine what would happen in EG if a player that is obviously psychotic/mentally ill (for real, he's sick in the head) would have banG powers. I imagine it would've been quite easy to be banned in EG by a player like that, and possibly people could've been innocent, yet that stigma still is attached to them. Trenchwars would take that old ban into account with their own bans? I fail to see why this is a good thing.

I mean, if you want an example that's far more close to home... remember oo.oo? Was he not a sysop of DSB or something like that? We let him into staff in TW due to his credentials as staff in another SSC zone. How well did that turn out? That guy went batshit crazy himself trying to ban people for no reason. Can we admit that other zone's staff members are not the same quality as Trenchwar's staff? As much as I complain about staff in our zone, even at our worst times with our wost group of staff members, I will willingly admit that our absolute worst/most abusive staff members were probably saints compared to some of the upper staff members of other zones. This is why I don't understand why Trenchwars even CONSIDERS bans in other SSC zones as having any legitimacy inside Trenchwars. I mean... cmon guys! Our staff is night and day better than any other group of staff in any other zone. I mean all of those other zones are seriously too thick-headed and egotistical to even merge with each other to make their zones viable and not completely dead, let alone work with Trenchwars and actually help the game of subspace survive and perhaps possibly thrive. They would rather let their zones DIE completely rather than at least let their legacy live on inside Trenchwars. I just think that the stupidity of those staff members in other zones proves that we shouldn't trust them whatsoever on any decision, let alone bans on players.

2. As far as I've been able to understand it, SOMEONE in TW (if it wasn't Lefty, than someone else did it) netbanned 2pac locally from TW for 3 months. They apparently made the mistake of not checking his previous bans (in Desert Storm, a dead zone, which I already pointed out why this is stupid to care about the bans that happened in other zones already in my 1st point), and so they assumed this was his first offense. Due to that, Lefty (or whoever it was) banned 2pacZ for 3 months. As far as I DO know, 2pac did NOT evade that 3 month ban. He served his time. On the day that his ban was up, he tried to enter TW and discovered that Lefty had added MORE time to his ban after finally deciding to check up on his previous offenses. To ME this means double-jeopardy, and it is cruel and unusual punishment if we are going to make more American Judicial System analogies. Yes, I realize that TW is not a democracy or based on any American Judicial System (it's more like the Uniform Code of Military Justice, which basically means you have no rights whatsoever), but we've been apparently making this analogy quite a bit in this thread, so I continue to do so. This is the reason OJ Simpson is not in prison for murder, even though it was obvious he did it. He was acquitted in a criminal court of law, and therefore he cannot be tried again legally for the same crime. Yes, he lost in civil court, but that is entirely different. My point there is that you already sentenced 2pac to a 3 month ban. After the fact, you decided to add a NEW punishment to his original crime, which seems morally wrong in my eyes. It goes against almost every judicial system in the world, beyond dictatorships and backward 3rd world countries, and I don't think TW should consider itself either a dictatorship or a 3rd world country.

3. As far as I understand it, 2pac didn't evade during his original 3 month ban. IF he DID evade during his ORIGINAL 3 month ban, then I understand why staff added time to his punishment. IF he evaded AFTER his 3 month ban (meaning after he was given ANOTHER sentence based on his original crime), then I don't believe this should be used as a legit reason for adding time to his sentence. Do you get my point here? Everyone keeps mentioning that he tried to escape from jail and so he was given more time to his sentence, but if he didn't try to escape until he was basically let free and then the judge in the case decided to wrongly add another year to his sentence, then how is that not understandable? I'd try to evade to if that happened to me. I think anyone would, due to it being pretty ridiculous.

I have to go for a bit, but I'll probably edit this post and add a few more numbers to my list. Like I said, it is nitpicking, but overall I am impressed and proud of staff for being able to finally communicate with the general public in ways that NEVER used to happen in the past, and also for the general transparency that you guys have been trying to show for the rest of us. Thank you for that.

[Zeebu]

my thoughts, 2pacz is being a dickhole. since he is being a dickhole, i could give a flying fuck if he is ever unbanned.


this is my take on the situation

[Zeebu]

moral of the story, dont cheat then be a dickhole to the only people that could help you get out of it.