Is banning a multi-client stupid?

[OldPoring]

There are servers where such a ban applies.
This is done by the owners ostensibly to stimulate the game in the party. But don't you think it's just stupid?
Now many people have powerful PC to run a virtual machine and a proxy for the second window, have a second laptop and alternative connection from the phone.
I want to try to play on one server, now it has a hundred plus players, but there is such a ban. But I do not believe that people there do not circumvent this ban, so if I play by its rules, I will be in a disadvantaged position with cheaters. And cheaters are definitely there.

There is even a rule on the server that you can write to the admin and lie that you are playing from the same IP with your brother or grandfather, and then you will be officially allowed two windows, it's just stupid.

I urge the admins of these servers to reconsider their ban, maybe just disable the  auto-follow, and that's it.
What do you think about it? Waiting for an answers

[Nova]

There are servers where such a ban applies.
This is done by the owners ostensibly to stimulate the game in the party. But don't you think it's just stupid?
Now many people have powerful PC to run a virtual machine and a proxy for the second window, have a second laptop and alternative connection from the phone.
I want to try to play on one server, now it has a hundred plus players, but there is such a ban. But I do not believe that people there do not circumvent this ban, so if I play by its rules, I will be in a disadvantaged position with cheaters. And cheaters are definitely there.

There is even a rule on the server that you can write to the admin and lie that you are playing from the same IP with your brother or grandfather, and then you will be officially allowed two windows, it's just stupid.

I urge the admins of these servers to reconsider their ban, maybe just disable the  auto-follow, and that's it.
What do you think about it? Waiting for an answers

Just don't multiclient. They don't want that there (in OathRO).

[OldPoring]

Nova
You must have read everything I said inattentively

[Sairek Ceareste]

There are servers where such a ban applies.
This is done by the owners ostensibly to stimulate the game in the party. But don't you think it's just stupid?
Now many people have powerful PC to run a virtual machine and a proxy for the second window, have a second laptop and alternative connection from the phone.
I want to try to play on one server, now it has a hundred plus players, but there is such a ban. But I do not believe that people there do not circumvent this ban, so if I play by its rules, I will be in a disadvantaged position with cheaters. And cheaters are definitely there.

There is even a rule on the server that you can write to the admin and lie that you are playing from the same IP with your brother or grandfather, and then you will be officially allowed two windows, it's just stupid.

I urge the admins of these servers to reconsider their ban, maybe just disable the  auto-follow, and that's it.
What do you think about it? Waiting for an answers

If you're talking about Oath (which I'm 90% sure you are), all it does when a player says that there is someone is in the same household as them, means we're not going to immediately start interrogating you when we see two of the same IP on at once; because they just told us to expect that. So it'd be redundant to interrogate them.
It doesn't mean that we just look the other way. Actually, I'd argue that it does the opposite. Anyone who tells us that is on my immediate watch list to make sure they are genuinely playing as two people. At all times.
There have been instances where both accounts are genuinely owned by two people, but one or the other logs into both at the same time, or the other one is conveniently AFK or "sleeping" for any period of time and is getting leeched. These are all no-nos. As the rule on the server states, if it looks, works or acts like multi-clienting, we're going to assume it is, and punish accordingly. Players who play in the same household at the same time as their partner are strongly encouraged to log off if they're going to be away in the field for more than a few minutes and especially so if they're playing in a party together.


Multi-clienting is usually fairly obvious. No one can reliably play on two (or more) accounts actively for a prolonged period of time at every second of play. Everyone simply plays better controlling one character than they would with two. Nobody is going to fool an entire server for long where everyone reports even the tiniest suspicious thing. Some people report other people for multi-clienting because they notice two characters are just too buddy-buddy with each other and get a gut feeling, and sometimes they are right. So even if someone was able to actively play well on two characters, they'd still get caught, because they are still not behaving as a normal duo who should be out socializing with other people because RO at its core is a social game. Many of the actual duos (or even trios) who play on the server actually split off time from time and are playing at the same time in two completely different parties, socializing, actively playing, etc.

Many people have tried and many of them have failed. The amount of multi-client bans is easily in the triple digits by this point. Some of them thought we'd just look the other way by saying they play with a family or friend in the same household, but it simply isn't the case.

[Playtester]

I like the rule as it support partying.

Most people will obey such a rules as they wouldn't want to risk all their progress when they are found it.
Even if the staff doesn't programmatically enforce it, just having such a rule is usually more than enough.

[OldPoring]

Sairek Ceareste
to begin with, thank you as the admin of the continuing to work server.
What I meant, in my opinion, such prohibitions are stupid, because they simply cannot work for everyone. Anyone who wants to circumvent this ban will easily circumvent it.
If such a ban is in effect, then it is on the contrary more pleasant for the cheater to get an advantage over other law-abiding.
Moreover, it can't even be called a cheat, you don't need to be a software expert for this.

Example. My second acc Sage putting an enchant on my other character. for 30 minutes. And I can even quit the game, 30 minutes is a long time. Or how do you prove that my grandfather does not like to help his grandson? )
Or as I said, it can be a second computer with a different IP or from a virtual machine and proxy, and my Priest will Heal, Buff and then Warp in the dungeon. And he will be waiting for me in town, you will not be able to prove anything even theoretically if there is another IP. In 2022 it's very easy.

At the same time, allowing for example two open windows at the same time on one IP would be a fair competitive move, because it would be an equal position for everyone and I can not think that the other player gets an advantage over me very simply right now.
I suggest you just think about it, anyway, for the MVP or Bio Lab 3 you will have to play with real people party.
And probably you can disable auto-following programmatically, then it will be difficult to provide full-fledged support on many maps without real players party.
I would like to try your server, but the potential inequality puts me off.

[distilled1]

I think you make a decent point, OldPoring.

With a rule in place, like Playtester said, it's already enough to deter many people from attempting to multi-client. Also having this rule can create a community for such a server which attracts the types of players who don't want to multi-client. Furthermore, not everyone wants to bother setting up virtual operating systems or using two devices to play RO, or bother getting a VPN, or whatever else.

That said, the RO community overall is rampant with players who do not care about the journey, the adventure, the roleplaying, etc, etc, but instead strive to get ahead of others as quickly and as efficiently as possible, even to the point of lying, manipulating, and cheating to get ahead. The RO community overall always been like this.
It's because of this that I don't even bother playing RO anymore, but if I did, I'd at least want auto-following disabled. I still can't get over playing OriginsRO years ago and seeing how many people happily multi-cliented their way from level 1 to 99 with their personal train of characters following eachother. It was legitimately soulless and ruined the experience.
The auto-follow feature does little for legitimate players, but it potentially helps multi-clienting abusers a LOT.

[OldPoring]

That said, the RO community overall is rampant with players who do not care about the journey, the adventure, the roleplaying, etc, etc, but instead strive to get ahead of others as quickly and as efficiently as possible, even to the point of lying, manipulating, and cheating to get ahead. The RO community overall always been like this.

Absolutely. I've known this game and this people for a long time. roleplaying is good for some, but 90% of RO is grind, grind and grind, especially on the x1-1.5 rating. And if it's so easy to get an advantage over others, they will do it. It's better when you know that everyone has equal opportunities at least.

[Oathkeeper]

Sairek Ceareste
to begin with, thank you as the admin of the continuing to work server.
What I meant, in my opinion, such prohibitions are stupid, because they simply cannot work for everyone. Anyone who wants to circumvent this ban will easily circumvent it.
If such a ban is in effect, then it is on the contrary more pleasant for the cheater to get an advantage over other law-abiding.
Moreover, it can't even be called a cheat, you don't need to be a software expert for this.

Example. My second acc Sage putting an enchant on my other character. for 30 minutes. And I can even quit the game, 30 minutes is a long time. Or how do you prove that my grandfather does not like to help his grandson? )
Or as I said, it can be a second computer with a different IP or from a virtual machine and proxy, and my Priest will Heal, Buff and then Warp in the dungeon. And he will be waiting for me in town, you will not be able to prove anything even theoretically if there is another IP. In 2022 it's very easy.

At the same time, allowing for example two open windows at the same time on one IP would be a fair competitive move, because it would be an equal position for everyone and I can not think that the other player gets an advantage over me very simply right now.
I suggest you just think about it, anyway, for the MVP or Bio Lab 3 you will have to play with real people party.
And probably you can disable auto-following programmatically, then it will be difficult to provide full-fledged support on many maps without real players party.
I would like to try your server, but the potential inequality puts me off.

We've had a pretty strong intolerance against attempts to multiclient. While the technology has evolved to mask it, it is still largely detectable by means we've set up in the backend. Of course, I won't go into those, but I strongly believe that the community aspect is the thing that breathes life into an MMO and once you start providing means to erode that community, the server will slowly die off. People are given the opportunity to send a message to the staff that they intend to play with a relative in the same household. We actually keep a close eye on these people to ensure that their claim was in good faith. However, we also know that for some individuals, this is a way for them to bond with their significant other or children and the last thing we want to do is strip that opportunity from them. So at risk of letting a few people slip past the rule, we rather provide that opportunity of a safe place for people to gather and enjoy a game.

At this point we've banned nearly 100 people for dual clienting. Some have remade their characters and now adhere to the rules, others don't respect the rule and have moved on. However, we do remain vigilant and the community is quick to point out individuals suspected of violating the rule. The rule is enforced not only by staff but reinforced by the members of the community.

[Xellie]

It's stupid.

A lot of people dislike 24/7 socialisation and I honestly think of wonderful things like "lets brew and need 12 people for it" or the guild that has a "friend or friends" who barely play but are good to log a warper/endower occasionally (My guild literally has an army of barely active but willing to support friends) which tips things in a horribly unbalanced direction.

Lack of partying is a symptom of older servers/aged playerbase; they get gear they don't need to party at low levels. Players get burned out so they don't make new chars (which happens irregardless of multiclient/no multis).

Later content tips the game heavily toward soloing. I won't talk about linkers, we all know the deal.

I'm a HP main at heart, I play it when I want parties and on no server ever have I ever had to BEG to party my priest. I don't play no multi servers because frankly I value not having to be around people too often, and I see a lot of horrible priests blaming multiclients for parties rejecting them. (btw I kind of love the dynamic of seeing players shun priests that want to half afk and building a blacklist, but I'm also a jerk because it means more parties for me on priest when they do that).

A lot of the "parties are destroyed by leeching" is more about a lot of that kind of play not being fun. Very few people enjoy priesting for a pure melee for long. Low level play is only fun if you're in a group screaming on voice at each other. There are flaws in the game, multiclienting isn't it.

My preferred solution to the problems people talk about, is to encourage and reward partying. Exp boosts in a group, Hunting quests that are shared to partymates (so long as everyone is a unique player) and my biggest gripe of all, take away the grindiness of hunting consumables so there's more time for actual party play. Nothing feels worse than saying "nah, not today I gotta hunt stems".

Partying has tons of issues in RO, but I think blaming multiclienting is a very lazy and narrowminded placement of blame.

No, I don't feel bad about anything I just said.


I respect what Oath does though, that's why I don't play there. Don't enter people's houses to break their rules - if you don't like it, find something that caters to you.

[distilled1]

Wow. Time to rip into Xellie I guess. What a load of crap.

A lot of people dislike 24/7 socialisation

No one said you had to socialize 24/7. Just when you want the most efficient party you should have to because it's a MMORPG and meant to be a social genre.

things like "lets brew and need 12 people for it"

You mean the way the game was meant to be originally? Wow. You realize that if a group of individuals is required to make the best potions, because people can't multi-client, everyone is still on the same playing field, right? There's nothing wrong with the best potions being more difficult to make than they would be from a spoiled multi-clienter's perspective. Just means they'll be used more sparingly by everyone.

or the guild that has a "friend or friends" who barely play but are good to log a warper/endower occasionally (My guild literally has an army of barely active but willing to support friends) which tips things in a horribly unbalanced direction.

Sure you do. The reality is that players who have lost that much interest in RO aren't going to jump on at a moment's notice, every 30 minutes, to warp or endow others. They'll be playing something or doing another hobby they are actually interested in. Nice bad faith argument.
Besides, can still do that without multi-clienting by switching to your priest/sage, or having a friend switch to their priest/sage for you. This issue has absolutely nothing to do with multi-clienting. If you're against people abusing that aspect of the game, you should be advocating for literally one character per IP address (I'd be down with that personally).

Lack of partying is a symptom of older servers/aged playerbase;

Not the case. I've seen plenty of older players prefer partying when they don't feel the need to multi-clienting just to be on par. It's very liberating and fun.

Later content tips the game heavily toward soloing.

Only when you can multi-client. No one is soloing endless tower and sealed shrine. No one is hunting any MVP that can use Earthquake to 1 shot them except maybe an Asura spamming monk, but that's actually a map/class design issue allowing them to portal in, spam the skill, then tp away. Not a multi-client issue.

I'm a HP main at heart, I play it when I want parties and on no server ever have I ever had to BEG to party my priest.

So only priests should be able to experience fun parties? A social game mechanic the game was built around? Oh yeah cool multi-player game philosophy. "Hey let's play some D&D but every class has to solo except if you duo with a Cleric." Another bad faith argument from a priest no less.

I don't play no multi servers because frankly I value not having to be around people too often

Well again, there's your problem. You're playing the wrong game genre then aren't you? You don't have to socialize "24/7". You can go chill, craft, quest, spam dead branches, etc, do your own thing while in the game but doing the more difficult content and leveling to 99 should require partying in a good MMORPG.

and I see a lot of horrible priests blaming multiclients for parties rejecting them. (btw I kind of love the dynamic of seeing players shun priests that want to half afk and building a blacklist, but I'm also a jerk because it means more parties for me on priest when they do that).

Oh right cause the internet isn't yet tired of hearing Xellie fluff up her "mad priesting skills". I think you should go make another obvious priest guide to show us all the things we totally wouldn't have been able to figure out.

There are flaws in the game, multiclienting isn't it.

It's definitely one of the major flaws. The original game had a subscription fee per account for a good reason.

My preferred solution to the problems people talk about, is to encourage and reward partying. Exp boosts in a group, Hunting quests that are shared to partymates (so long as everyone is a unique player)

It's a good idea to limit party exp boosts to unique players, yes, but it doesn't need to completely replace multi-clienting, because many other problems arise when people can multi-client. The exp boosts work great alongside banning multi-clienting.

Partying has tons of issues in RO, but I think blaming multiclienting is a very lazy and narrowminded placement of blame.

Yeah partying has some issues in RO, but banning multi-clienting helps to encourage people to play together, literally alleviating one of the most prominent issues in most RO servers where people don't play together because it's more efficient to solo with yourself. What is "lazy and narrowminded" about that? Do you not understand this very basic player psychology?

No, I don't feel bad about anything I just said.

You probably should. You're an anti-social person playing a social video game genre and saying you don't enjoy socializing, and assuming no one else wants to.
You couldn't be more wrong about many of your bad faith arguments.

[Butt Force]

Ah, yes!  Rolls-on-server-with-ruleset-he-doesn't-like guy.  Good to see you, old friend.  Glad you're still doing your thing.

[CryingBabies]

HeY, LoOk At Me MoM! I'Ve GoT TwO HaNdS, So i wIlL PlAy 2 RaGnArOk cLiEntS!

I bet you want @autoloot as well, don't ya champ? Imagine if you were an octopus, how many clients would you play at the same time?

Oh, I dream with that server. A server full of zombie characters controlled by the Master Multi-Tasker. Beautiful. I want to play on that server!!!!

Also please, SP iteMs FoR SaLe On NPCS!!!! 

Baby boy can't follow the rules, so he comes cry on RMS.

muah, muah! 

[Sairek Ceareste]

Sairek Ceareste
to begin with, thank you as the admin of the continuing to work server.
What I meant, in my opinion, such prohibitions are stupid, because they simply cannot work for everyone. Anyone who wants to circumvent this ban will easily circumvent it.
If such a ban is in effect, then it is on the contrary more pleasant for the cheater to get an advantage over other law-abiding.
Moreover, it can't even be called a cheat, you don't need to be a software expert for this.

Example. My second acc Sage putting an enchant on my other character. for 30 minutes. And I can even quit the game, 30 minutes is a long time. Or how do you prove that my grandfather does not like to help his grandson? )
Or as I said, it can be a second computer with a different IP or from a virtual machine and proxy, and my Priest will Heal, Buff and then Warp in the dungeon. And he will be waiting for me in town, you will not be able to prove anything even theoretically if there is another IP. In 2022 it's very easy.

At the same time, allowing for example two open windows at the same time on one IP would be a fair competitive move, because it would be an equal position for everyone and I can not think that the other player gets an advantage over me very simply right now.
I suggest you just think about it, anyway, for the MVP or Bio Lab 3 you will have to play with real people party.
And probably you can disable auto-following programmatically, then it will be difficult to provide full-fledged support on many maps without real players party.
I would like to try your server, but the potential inequality puts me off.

I'm not an admin, just a moderator, but thank you.

Like I said, it is easier to get away with some things more than others, but logs exist. If for any reason we become suspicious of someone, then look into their history, and see them logging in and endowing their own character, well, you get banned and just lost everything. A lot of people wouldn't want to entertain that risk as the risk outweighs the reward. Someone who managed to reach level 99 early on in the server's life and was playing around 8+ hours a day got punished for doing just that and lost everything. Most people who want endows ask for it in #trade chat and other sages can make an economy off of that -- something that I don't believe would be possible if multi-clienting was allowed. At least I never saw it in servers that allowed it very often.

As far as sitting-as-a-Priest-in-town thing goes, again, as our rules states, if it looks, works and acts like multi-clienting, we ban for it. The rules specifically are designed in regards to multi-clienting that we don't need to proof without a doubt someone is multi-clienting, just enough evidence within a reasonable doubt. If we can get direct proof, great, but if it is extremely suspicious, we will 'ere on the side of caution. As you said, it is easy to obfuscate that it looks like two different people by changing IPs or using a virtual machine. People have tried that and we still found them out because the 30+ people who may be active in town will all wonder why this priest that is otherwise AFK in town is only actively buffing this one character over and over again and ignoring the rest after an extended period of time and will report it because they find it suspicious -- and so would we. Again, it is very difficult to actively play as two or more characters at the same time for an extended period, no matter how far someone tries to obfuscate the data. The life of a city priest on Oath can have little to no down time. At some point, it becomes easier to just play one character anyways than trying to multi-client and keep up a legitimate appearance. The "reward" for cheating this way isn't worth the risk and effort for the vast majority.

Somebody else tried setting up a network and it ended up with 11 of their accounts full of characters reasonably high-leveled characters and millions and millions of zeny in total accumulated net-worth going down the drain as one thing tipped us off after weeks of us being suspicious and the whole thing crumbled. Hundreds of hours of cheating to get ahead gone to waste and all voided. They didn't come back to try again. Is it worth the risk?

Finally, as Oathkeeper said, there's back-end things we can see as well. There's more than just someone's IP and play patterns that gives multi-clienting away that we can look into, and our tools and security will only improve over time. I'm not gonna claim we catch everyone 100%, because it's probably not true and no security is perfect, but it is the same on every other server, or hell, game out there, no matter what you do or how tight your security is.


As far as servers and equality goes, I'd argue that no server is safe from inequality, multi-clienting or not for one reason or another. Whether it be exploits used, corrupt administration, duping, RMT under the hood, pay 2 win/cash shop, etc. Ultimately I suggest you try to find a server that just looks good and trustworthy to you with a good history and go for it, but even that isn't a guarantee. All I can say is that we try our best to make sure that the server is as fair, safe and fun for everyone as much as possible, for free. Everyone on the staff at our server loves the game and we want it to be the best we can make it be, which is why we volunteer our free time to the project and why Oathkeeper pays for the server's upkeep out of pocket.

[Rayeth]

Multi-client is the reason why people get too ahead of the game and why there is no sense of community on most RO servers nowadays. The argument of game has been "dying" for over a decade now, and I believe it will be "dying" for a decade more, since I see no replacement for it on the market, since there is no effort to make one because they allow things such as multi-client... don't even get me started with bots. If you break simple rule as multi client then you wont hesitate to bot as well.

This is about giving yourself an unfair advantage and invalidating the existence of many classes. It's about social interaction; the point of MMOs is to interact with other players.  Players who choose to abuse this are playing in their own bubble, treating our beloved MMO as a fully solo experience while reaping the benefits of party mechanics. Don't give me that "you can do it too so its fair!" garbage...you know there is absolutely no challenge involved, only tedium for alt+tabbing and maybe 20 hours tops to leech your priest to a respectable level.