Another bad behavior

[Jimmy V.]

Hello,

I am sad to report another example of unacceptable behavior.

Sad because this is a very rare case and I know that the vast majority of our players don't try to toy the system.

A player deliberately lost a large series of games in order to get a very low rating and be able to win easily a long series of games as a result.

I am very angry at the situation because it generated a surge in aborted games in our statistics and I was certain that it was linked to a supposed instability of the platform, many people voicing concerns about it lately. You can read a few threads on this (in particular this one: http://www.happymeeple.com/forum/tips-polls-updates/game-freezes-explained/).

In reality, the surge in aborted games was directly linked to this one behaviour. After checking this accurately, it appears that there are actually no more aborted games now than 2 months ago.

Of course, please don't try to imitate that player or your account will be closed!

Thanks for your understanding and for the vast majority of players who play fair, let me wish you to have fun for years on Happy Meeple!

Nicolas.

[Mike A.]

Have you ever heard of communicating with someone before making rash judgments? We all play for different reasons. I never did anything to help or hurt other players. That would be something entirely different. Saying you're nice while chopping off someone's hands doesn't make you nice. Starting an accusatory conversation after you've done that doesn't help. Now I'll make the accusation--your sense of customer service is warped. Good riddance. There are plenty of other game sites out there.

[Jimmy V.]

Mike,

Your Migrato and Finito ratings and achievements did not mean anything. It is only fair to reset these.

You earned a lot of gold by doing these long series of losses followed by long series of wins. It is only fair to take it back also.

I don't think I could do less than that. And that's just what I did. Nothing more. Maybe I could take less gold. But you will surely understand that I have other things to do than to compute accurately how much gold you got in this way.

So if my judgement was wrong, what do you think I should have done, besides contacting you in the first place?

Nicolas.

PS: you are right. You did not do anything to hurt anyone.
PS2: The intention was not to lock you out of Migrato and Finito. You probably need to do the tutorial again, that's all. If not, let me know!

[Mike A.]

I had no idea I was causing you to spin your wheels. All I was trying to do was add excitement and drama to my solo games. I would drop down to a certain, but random, range and then see how many I could win in a row. The intensity and angst would mount as my streak continued. When I got to 20, then 25, then 30, then 35, it was incredibly fun for me. Each play was tortuous, which I thoroughly enjoyed. It's too bad you didn't give me the chance to explain that before judging me so harshly.

[Jimmy V.]

Mike,

I have to agree with you. I can see the fun in what you were doing and it even tells me that it would be a fun challenge to implement on the platform: start with Lobotomo and try to win all 12 bots in a row.

Unfortunately, I am sure you will understand that we cannot allow anyone to lose games on purpose, whether to make successive wins later or to inflate another account rating. It is simply not possible.

In your specific case, I now understand that you probaby had genuine fun by doing so and had no intention to cheat.

So, yes, maybe, I should have contacted you before applying any correction to your account and I would have been less harsh in my comments. I am afraid that I would still have needed to apply the corrections anyway.

I am ready to give some of your gold back of course. You'll have to let me know how much is fair.

As I  said, people who don't play by the rules make me waste my time. They imply manual action and this is very time-consuming. So I am usually quite irritated when I see that someone loses game on purpose. And this time, this was all the more true as I had been receiving complaints about aborted games and I was checking regularly the appropriate stats.

I am not sure that on big gaming platforms, customer service takes 30 minutes to deal with offenders' account individually. It is simply more cost-effective to just close down accounts. And that's why I said I was nice not to close your account. I did take time to apply some corrections to your account when closing it down would just be a matter of pushing one button.

I hope this closes the matter. Please get in touch via email for final details!

Thanks for your understanding!

[Mike A.]

Thanks. And I'm sorry about the misuderstanding.

Peace.

P.S. Who is this Andrew character? He's a riot.

[Liallan G.]

P.S. Who is this Andrew character? He's a riot.

Yes, he is. :-)  I've seen some of his chat messages.

[Jimmy V.]

Hi guys,

Just had a look at urban dictionnary. I am surprized to see that "he is a riot" is positive. I expected the opposite. Do you confirm?

[Mike A.]

Yes, indeed. I would translate it to something like, "he is incredibly funny."

[Jimmy V.]

OK. Thanks!

Then his jokes are not international audience friendly I'd say. I often miss the point to the extent of removing his messages altogether.