Ideas To Handle Rule Breakers
The game has a major issue with cheaters, smurfs, and bots. In a recent update from Respawn, they said they ban a ton each month. The number of bans is more than 100,000 per month, (where about 16k were bots, the rest were cheaters).
That's a lot of bans, but what could be done?
Dealing With Cheaters:
- Raise the requirement to enter rank to level 100 at the VERY least. Level 20, (and even when it was level 50), is TOO LOW! This requirement should also be enforced on every single instance of rumble.
- If a player gets reported for cheating, (especially when reported too many times), or is suspected of cheating, place them in another matchmaking que with only those who also been reported for cheating or is suspected to be a cheater.
The idea is that you'll keep the cheaters in their own lobbies and if someone got false reported, it should be clear after looking at the data that the player trying their best isn't cheating, so they should be sent back to the normal que. This should also NEVER be communicated to the players sent to the que, (meaning that one should NEVER know they're in this que), otherwise we'll get cheaters who would turn off the cheats and pretend they're not cheating. We don't want that, we want them to stay in lobbies where there's, (hopefully), no legit players to ruin the game for. After some time, issue a ban wave for those flagged as cheating.
- If a player is hitting most or all of their shots, they should be automatically flagged. Sure, there are several players who are just good at the game, however I mean flag the players who are doing things like:
1) Hitting mostly all head shots
2) Shooting around corners / walls / objects
3) Perfectly tracking other players
When a player is snapping from target to target, the game could spawn bots around the player. If the player then starts to beam the bots, they had confirmed they're aimbotting. I've seen this done in games like Minecraft, where a server called "Hypixel" has armor stands that would spin really fast around players who got reported for kill aura, (the melee version of aimbot). The idea is that if the player is locking onto these armor stands and is hitting them, they're telling the anti-cheat that they're cheating. The same could be done in Apex, where fake players are sent after the one cheating.
- If a player is easily "finding" other players, then wall hacks should be assumed to be in use. The game should then hide the bots in weird places in the next several matches, (and some could be in the wall). If the player suspected of wall hacking goes directly to these bots or "pretends" they don't see the player before "finding" them, the game should be able to safely assume the player is wall hacking.
- If a player has recoil that's too unnatural, throw in a random recoil pattern. If the player continues to shoot in the same way, then they could be flagged as using anti-recoil.
- To deal with teaming, the game should track:
1) How long players of two different teams have been near each other
2) How many times they shot at each other
3) How many times they healed, (especially in line of sight of each other)
4) How many times an ability, (like Lifeline's drone) was used by an enemy player, (especially at the same time as the team who's Lifeline had dropped the drone)
5) If a player got line of sight on another from a different team, but didn't shoot at them, (this one is tricky as sometimes we pick fights. The idea is to keep track of each time where players of different teams are just looking at each other and not doing anything to kill the other)
- Anytime a player gets reported for cheating, kill cams should be reviewed.
Dealing With Smurfs:
- A lot of the ways to deal with cheaters could be applied to smurfs as most "smurfs" are just cheaters on a new account. However, the only thing that could really be done about those who are only smurfing, (and not also cheating), is to place them into matches with others of their skill level. The problem is that these smurfs are already in these types of lobbies, so it should place them into another que meant for smurfs, (as they shouldn't be in the cheater's que unless they're cheating).
Both the cheating and smurfing ques could use bots that play like a real player so its not as obvious to it being a smurf only or cheater only lobby.
Dealing With Bots:
- The timeout limit for AFK players of 10 minutes should be lowered to 5 minutes and needs to require more input from the player to stop the timer.
The game should require a player to move a certain distance and to do more actions other than jumping, climbing a wall, shooting, and using an ability. Bots are mainly in Mixtape modes on any server, and in Battle Royal on most Asian servers. All these bots do is stand in place and punch every so often or to use an ability. Some of these bots also have cheats that only get turned on when being shot at. There's been a handful of AFK Lifelines in Mixtape, where when I shot at them, they snapped to me with aimbot. However, they were easy to kill.
Basically, if a player isn't doing much of anything at all, assume they're AFK or a bot. It would be nice to see some aspects of Overwatch's AFK mechanic to be implemented. Overwatch not only forces those who are AFK to move, but also forces the player to hit at least one enemy player in 15 or so seconds. If the player fails to hit someone on the other team within the time limit, they get automatically removed from the match. Apex needs something like this because most of the Mixtape matches that I've played, there would be on average 4 players just standing there doing nothing.
For the bots that shoot back when they get shot at, the game shouldn't count that as it should still require the bot to move far from where they are at and to do more than just that.
Lastly:
- The game could also give players errors that sends them to the main menu. We already get errors like code: net and cloud. The idea is to kick cheaters, smurfs, bots, and those boosting and/or teaming out of matches without telling them they got banned. When they get back into a match, it would be a lobby meant for cheaters, smurfs, and bots respectfully. The idea here is to disrupt them from ruining the current match they were in any further and to keep them from bypassing with a new account.
- Players marked as cheating, smurfing, botting, teaming, etc. should be on their own leaderboards in rumble, (and not counted towards the top players percentage) and could have longer que times overall to keep them out of matches as much as possible.
- Rewards "earned" by those cheating should be removed or unequipped to keep cheaters from displaying things they didn't earn on their own. (Most don't even display these items anyways, unless its a masters or pred badge).
- Players who abuse the text or voice chat should get shadow muted, (not banned). This means that they can see their own messages and see that the game is picking up their mic, but they're muted on their teammate's side of things.
- Players who:
1) Get reported for cheating should never be placed into the same match as those who reported them. No one wants to see the same player again and again if they're suspected to be cheating.
2) Get reported for sabotaging, being AFK, leaving the match early, (that sort of thing), should be placed on other teams and never on the same team as the player who reported them.
- Add a new UI to the match summary that displays everyone who was in the match. This summary needs to be visible in the lobby. The idea is that if a player was cheating, but you couldn't report them because the server crashed, you crashed, the game sent you back to the lobby, etc., you'll still be able to report the player.
When hovering over a name, it should display the banner card of that player and their game stats that was recorded up to the point where you were sent back to the lobby to help you find the player you're wanting to report. The UI can also just be used as a general summary to see how well others had played and could be used by players to help them learn how to improve.
The summary should also be available for your last 10 matches or so.
- Add gameplay recording similar to Fortnite's match replay.
- Maybe use AI to help detect those cheating.
- Ban players who are teaming with cheaters or are being boosted by one.
The "Nuclear" Option:
- It sounds like the opposite of what players want, but just stop banning accounts.
Its been proven time and time again that if a player is cheating, they will bypass the ban, if a player wants to smurf, they'll smurf, and bots are everywhere. The idea is to just send these players into a shared lobby. If the game keeps them out of the normal que, then legit players won't have to deal with them. This is something I think Call of Duty does with its cheaters.
Yes there is a problem with cheaters etc. and in todays world of online gaming there is no one (or fifty etc.) solution/s that will completely rid gamers of this problem.
Could EA do more, yes. Is EA doing a lot vs them, yes they are, as the numbers do not lie.
One has to look at things not as an individual but take into account what is not only good for the gamers/players/community but what is also good for the company and the game in and of itself.
Raising the level requirement above 50 to play ranked would be bad for the game as this would lower playability.
"If a player gets reported for cheating, (especially when reported too many times), or is suspected of cheating, place them in another matchmaking que with only those who also been reported for cheating or is suspected to be a cheater." This is not a solution, this would only breed Toxicity, getting reported by a player that is just doing it to be Toxic and the reported player lands in separate lobbies when they have done no wrong. NO way, if a player is good they should not get punished based off of just a report or a few reports. They should only be actioned on if the report is reviewed and found to be correct. Only then should something happen to them. Not before and not without proper scrutinized review.
Your comments on teaming, again no that is why there is a report system. NO one needs to get automatically flagged especially when there are way to many situations where a player can be one or two teammates down and they need to play it safe, pic their positions and when or when not to engage. I have won fights/games by hiding under a building and letting the other two teams above me fight it out for 2-3 minutes and then jumping on the wounded leftovers to get the win. No way should I automatically be flagged and sent into some sort of shadow lobby for playing fairly and smartly.
Smurfs hmm. New accounts that play well should be reflected in the MM and only that. I think you need to re-read EA's definition on Smurfing.
AFK players and bots are two different things and should be dealt with separately again there are report functions for this.
Most of the suggestions here leave way to much error for fair players to get put into shadow lobbies or punished otherwise and that would not be good for the game or the player base or the company.
Bans should happen after proper review by EA. The suggestion of "Its been proven time and time again that if a player is cheating, they will bypass the ban, if a player wants to smurf, they'll smurf, and bots are everywhere. The idea is to just send these players into a shared lobby. If the game keeps them out of the normal que, then legit players won't have to deal with them. This is something I think Call of Duty does with its cheaters." I fully disagree, those who break the rules should go to the house of pain (be banned) they should not be allowed to continue to play in some sort of fake lobby in fact this type of action could open EA and or Respawn up to legal actions which would be bad for the game and the players and the community that enjoy it.
IT professionals get paid big money to figure this stuff out, "Us layman" should not be messing with that, we should be actively supporting them with providing substantiated reports (not just reporting everything and anyone).
As we all know this is always and always will be a game of cat and mouse a never ending cycle so we as the players have to do our proper part and let the Pros do theirs.
