EVE Online Rolls Back Exploiters' Accounts

[Greg Tito]

EVE Online Rolls Back Exploiters' Accounts

The moral of the story: Don't profit on a bug for two weeks before reporting it.

The market in EVE Online is basically simulated piracy. Manipulating the system for fun and profit is pretty much the whole point of the game, so it can hard to determine when players cross the line into exploiting the game's code. Recently, five players reported such an exploit to developer CCP, but only after they had been using it to gain massive amounts of "Loyalty Points" in the game. Today, CCP finally made the decision that even though the players reported the bug, the rewards they reaped were ill-gotten and have been removed from their accounts, but they were not banned from the game.

"The people who sought to benefit from this exploit will receive no gain from this system," read a post on EVE Online's official website. "Because the players made efforts to inform us about the issue their accounts will remain in good standing."

CCP accidentally introduced the exploit in the last update to EVE Online. Loyalty Points (LP) reward players for PvP, and the code calculates the number of LP based on the average value of the property destroyed. The exploit came from these players buying tons of ships that rarely are used and conspiring to blow each other's stuff up, thereby driving up the price and netting them a very large amount of LP. Incidentally, LP can be converted into ISK, the currency of EVE, which in turn can be converted into real world game time, meaning the exploit made them the equivalent of $175,000 US.

"Once we're done determining how much each person has benefitted we will remove the LP gained value in LP and items and return the ISK invested in the purchase of items to them," continued the official report. "This essentially will set each of them back to the original point at which they began this activity."

Even though this punishment is a mere slap on the wrist, I think it was a good decision on CCP's part to erase the gains made from the exploit, but not ban these players indefinitely. In a cutthroat game world like EVE Online, you can't blame these guys too much for trying.

Source: EVE Online blog [http://community.eveonline.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&nbid=72972]


Permalink

 

[kajinking]

As a player of EVE I can understand the desire to get an advantage over the other guy, lord only knows I would LOVE to be able to get a nice Navy issue ship for almost no effort or cost. But also being a player makes more than familar with what can happen if you mess with the EVE economy so I'm going to have to agree with CCP on this one. I don't even want to imagine if this exploit spread and suddenly all PVP is being done in faction ships fit with faction gear.

 

[RvLeshrac]

As a player of EVE I can understand the desire to get an advantage over the other guy, lord only knows I would LOVE to be able to get a nice Navy issue ship for almost no effort or cost. But also being a player makes more than familar with what can happen if you mess with the EVE economy so I'm going to have to agree with CCP on this one. I don't even want to imagine if this exploit spread and suddenly all PVP is being done in faction ships fit with faction gear.

I like how they weren't banned, so they can continue to look for less detectable ways to cheat.

 

[WaysideMaze]

That honestly seems like the best option really. Can't think of a better way to handle it.

Surprised the players figured out the exploit, but didn't think they'd get caught.

 

[David Nary]

A bit of a long read, but for anyone who wants a first-hand account of what happened, here's the forum thread.
https://forums.eveonline.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=124145

 

[Pandalisk]

I've always wanted to try out EVE but every news post about it makes me think more and more that i'm far too naive and innocent for it. Maybe that Dust 514(?) is more easy on me.

 

[David Nary]

Trials are free.
From what I understand, the introduction and tutorials etc are far more helpful than they were when I first started.
I highly recommend at least giving it a shot.
I'm quite interested in 514 myself, but it's a Ps3 exclusive. I can't really justify buying a console for a single game. If it was PC I'd be all over it.

 

[thisbymaster]

Well there you go, that is the last time anyone reports bugs to the dev if they can make money on it. Next time make as much money as you can, don't say a word. Cash out, and run.

 

[Tamrin]

Well there you go, that is the last time anyone reports bugs to the dev if they can make money on it. Next time make as much money as you can, don't say a word. Cash out, and run.

On one hand I agree with the way CCP handled this. On the other hand ^ this ^ right here.

Would CCP have actually found out who was benefiting from this bug had they caught it themselves?

 

[Evil Smurf]

this game sounds awful, full of greedy selfish trolls. *le sigh*

 

[Yureina]

this game sounds awful, full of greedy selfish trolls. *le sigh*

It's not as bad as people think it is. Sure, they are plenty of psychos and malcontents, but the game honestly is kinda endearing for it. What you have in Eve is a MMO world where, unless it is an exploit like what these people did or is otherwise hacking the game, anything goes. It is, in effect, exactly what a sci-fi space game world ought to be: a place with a great amount of freedom, which can lead to people doing either great or terrible things. It's just that the evil things that people do tend to get covered more often by news outlets, just like in the real world.

Annnd... if anyone cares, I can toss out 21-day trials for this game, which is a week longer than what you would get if you just went to their site directly.

 

[shintakie10]

Well there you go, that is the last time anyone reports bugs to the dev if they can make money on it. Next time make as much money as you can, don't say a word. Cash out, and run.

On one hand I agree with the way CCP handled this. On the other hand ^ this ^ right here.

Would CCP have actually found out who was benefiting from this bug had they caught it themselves?

It would have taken them longer to find, but I doubt that CCP would be so horribly inept that they would never notice that a group of people somehow made 100 times the amount of money they would normally have made in a day.

 

[renegade7]

I've always wanted to try out EVE but every news post about it makes me think more and more that i'm far too naive and innocent for it. Maybe that Dust 514(?) is more easy on me.

I know of a few solid corps that will take new players if you're interested. EVE-Uni and Red V Blue come to mind.

OT: $175,000? That's 50 trillion isk if my maths are correct. Alliance wallets don't have that much money, so I think that may be a bit off...

But I think it's a good thing CCP takes such a hard line stance on cheaters. Like when about a year and a half ago when the market was saturated with minerals, miners and manufacturers couldn't turn a profit, and all the power ended up in the hands of the largest alliances with the power to mass produce, which was a big factor in creating the huge "0.0 blocs" we see today. It was a mess, but fortunately things are slowly recovering now.

 

[Firia]

I've always wanted to try out EVE but every news post about it makes me think more and more that i'm far too naive and innocent for it. Maybe that Dust 514(?) is more easy on me.

The game, at its heart, is all pvp. the market is pvp. The ships are pvp. Sure you can devote your entire gaming experience to PVE, but it's a pvp game at the core. It sounds cut throat and unrelenting because by and large, people don't understand their situation, or try to understand the situation. If all you ever do in a day is mine, you're not going to know what a blinking yellow box means vs a blinking red box.

It's worth giving a shot. It's a good game. But it doesn't hold your hand, and you usually have more fun finding your own fun. It's a game unlike any other I've played. It has its problems, but what game doesn't.

Just... don't do what Yahtzee did. He ignored the social side of the game when he first started playing, and therefore didn't find anything to do. A terrible mistake.

 

[Firia]

Well there you go, that is the last time anyone reports bugs to the dev if they can make money on it. Next time make as much money as you can, don't say a word. Cash out, and run.

They were already onto the scent. It was a matter of time, really.

 

[Saulkar]

All this sounds very, very fun but because I cannot actually control the ship directly I have no interest in it. Mechwarrior: Online on the other hand has me salivating.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

As a player of EVE I can understand the desire to get an advantage over the other guy, lord only knows I would LOVE to be able to get a nice Navy issue ship for almost no effort or cost. But also being a player makes more than familar with what can happen if you mess with the EVE economy so I'm going to have to agree with CCP on this one. I don't even want to imagine if this exploit spread and suddenly all PVP is being done in faction ships fit with faction gear.

I only agree with you in part. Faction issue ships are powerful, yes, but they are also inordinantly expensive. Sure, a Navy Raven has more firepower than the standard model by a fair margin but not enough to justify a fitted cost ten times that of the base hull. The extreme cost of such vessels ensures they are rarely used in combat and even then largely because someone forced such a player's hand.

And, lets be honest - does one need to attach a billion isk price tag to a ship that offers a mere 25% more firepower? My chimera only cost marginally more than my navy raven. While we're at it, my Cerberus cost more than a standard issue Rokh with full fitting and rigs. My harpy hull cost more than any four cruisers I ever fielded in PVP before I put gear on the damn thing. Such moves ensure that only the wealthiest or the stupidest field such vessels. Even at an income sufficient to purchase and field a carrier the idea of losing my comparatively cheap HAC was enough to ensure I was never willing to try slugging it out with anyone should things turn grim.

I suppose that my point is simply that Eve is a game that could stand to offer less risk. Fielding T1 ships of appropriate size is sufficiently risky that most players avoid PvP at any cost. And that's a terrible shame considering PvP is the best part of the game.

 

[Eclectic Dreck]

this game sounds awful, full of greedy selfish trolls. *le sigh*

Eve's singular rule has always been that you never fly what you can't afford to lose. LP give access to some powerful tools. A navy issue missile system is vastly superior in many circumstances over the basic model yet it's market value is easily ten times greater. Considering the difference in DPS in general cases is a mere 12% or so and further considering insurance does not cover such parts means you generally only see such things in PvE.

To put it another way, of all the ships I lost in three years of playing - several dozen at least, the actual loss to my wallet as a player should I lose my Navy Raven is greater than all those other ships combined by a fair margin. That includes at least a dozen frigates, cruisers and five battlecruisers in addition to several covert ops ships and two assault ships. The cost associated with purchasing a Navy Raven (or any navy issue battleship really) is enough that, when I played, it would take me thirty hours of play to replace in isk. Longer if I went the cheap route and used LP.

Thus, Eve isn't really about greed. It's risk management. My Navy Raven has never left high security space. My Carrier has only been flown once without other carriers in escourt. By contrast, I'll take a battlecruiser anywhere without worry or an assault ship because such things are readily replaced. Eve has generally been friendly to endavors that allow enterprising players to reduce risk.

Perhaps the best example of this occurred several years ago when a great many types of ships could be outfitted such that they could fly at speeds making them nearly invulnerable to return fire. While such ships were undergunned and ultimately flimsy if you could consistently lay damage on them, the enormous speed meant that short of catastrophic error on their part, a player using such a ship could engage in what was normally a high risk activity (pvp in space occupied by the enemy) at no real risk to themselves.

Some reduction in risk would be useful to the game. Many players avoid PvP because of the cost associated with it. Others like myself refuse to take the best toys out to play because the risk (and when I say risk I mean the real human hours it would take to replace) is too great. It is such that entire classes of ships, easily dozens of vessel types are never seen intentionally engaging in combat. Heavy assault ships (most of them), electronic warfare ships (most of them), black ops ships, faction ships above the weight of cruiser - none of these are seen in pvp with regularity.

Of course, to play devil's advocate, the current system helps ensure a level of fairness in pvp. The veteran player will have an advantage in player skill and character ability but at least they tend to play with the same set of toys as the relative noob.