A better question is if “Greedy Goblin” no longer plays the game, and openly says “DONT PLAY EVE”, how much of his data can you take as unbiased or factual?
Sorry but while I agree there is a bot problem in Eve, to say CCP does nothing, is a bit crazy. Just like any MMO the developers can only do so much without information from actual players.
That is quite enough heretical counter-narrative out of you little missy!
Pretty much this. Every time I read a Gevlon blog post it vaguely reminds of something a character in a Lovercraft story would write. One of those characters on the verge of insanity.
There is most likely a lag between when a player stops playing and his account becomes inactive. CCP may have changed their definition of “inactive” with alphas which can make comparisons problematic. And the assumption of not keeping large amounts of ISK on a PVP account.
There is a lag time, for some reason I’m thinking it’s 90 days, but people seem to think it’s 30. Some fuzzy writing in my brain says the first MER after alpha launch said it was 90. So yeah, lag time.
CCP has said in the past the typical amount of isk on hand is equivalent to the value of the most expensive ship the player owns. Not sure if that’s still true, but I somehow suspect it’ll be higher now.
Dont you think hes looking tired these days?
ITT: 90% of replies focused on author, rather than article/issue.
Probably because the issue is the author not getting things right. Active ISK Delta goes down when a player is no longer considered active. Probably this happens when his account data are transferred from Tranquility to the backup server keeping long term data from former users. This used to happen after 90 days but maybe now it is shorter.
(IIRC, a long term backup is taken during downtime, and accounts not accessed for n days are removed from Tranquility and preserved only in the backup; when the player logs in back, the data from the backup is loaded into Tranquility storage for easier access in further logins, and the cycle restarts. It makes sense to not task TQ with holding securely the data of millions of inactive accounts)
This is a valid question but does not change the fact 90% of replies focused on the author, and not this one single question in validity regarding his process/conclusions.
Brb, re-reading the article.
Imo he is validly pointing out some discrepancy/irrationality in how this data is collated/presented by CCP.
I dont jump to the conclusions he has, which are lamentably unsupported and ambiguous at the end of the article.
I think his method, however, has been sound and he builds a valid argument that something stinks in the stats.
How do we explain the positive isk delta spikes after such significant negative spikes/trend?
My heuristic (amateur) first impression, would be that isk was moved off of banned accounts, before they where banned, and re-appear on a re-activated wallet/bank account, in the positive delta spikes.
IE: CCP is not tracking isk revenue from botting for confiscation on/from banned accounts., nor confiscating isk along the paper trail.
When that isk is transferred to an inactive wallet/bank account, it doesnt appear on the delta, because the account it is transferred to is not active, until it becomes active, and a positive delta spike occurs.
It has been speculated that it takes 3 months for the data to be updated. But these graphs dont show a congruity of an positive delta spike in that period. On this point btw, 2 months should be sufficient to allow for account lapse time, between MERs, without undo overlapping.
It is possible, that whomever is causing those positive delta spikes, is periodically re-activating those wallet/bank accounts so as to re-finance/re-construct a new wave of botters pending their next banning, or for RMT product.
The fact there even ARE positive isk delta spikes, is a cause for concern. They shouldn’t be happening. That alone validates investigation on this, regardless of authors conclusions on why they occur.
Wth can so radically swing such deep negative isk deltas, into a positive? That is enormous amounts of isk/value suddenly re-appearing ingame.
My initial impression, is CCP is not tracking and confiscating isk moved off of botter accounts. They arent following the paper trail, and instead just banning accounts as they are without further investigation as to how much isk/value they moved to another wallet/bank account, before being caught for botting.
TLDR:
-CCP may not be following the paper trail to confiscate isk/value generated by botters.
-That isk/value is moved to inactive accounts, and thus “dissappears” off the delta, until it re-appears as a positive delta, when the botters re-activate the wallet/bank accounts to re-finance/rebuild a new botting network AND to re-stock their RMT stores.
The inactivity has to be at least 90 days.
Otherwise you end up with market orders still active on an account that is considered ‘inactive’ as far as isk delta goes. Which is just silly.
However jumping to wild botting conclusions just because of positive isk delta is silly. Positive Isk delta totally can happen, and there is no reason for it not to happen.
Isk from botting is represented in isk delta, only as a positive effect.
IE: The more botters create isk, the more positive the isk delta, as a factor of more isk introduction vs sunk.
What is at question here, imo, is where did the bot isk go.
Was it transferred to an inactive account, and not traced for confiscation?
If so, this would explain the sudden positive delta spikes, as the wallet/bank accounts are re-activated to source the bot supplied isk/value off them for creating a new bot network and to re-srock RMT stores.
Explain what can suddenly cause a positive isk delta after a deep, consistent trend of negative delta.
It’s Gevlon. I doubt there’s much of a coherent process in that blog post.
Maybe you should actually read it.
His process is valid, despite his conclusions.
I did read it and only saw the typical Gevlon thinking process of jumping to wild conclusions. What a waste of time.
You are confusing process with conclusions.
His conclusions may be wrong, but the process was valid and corroborated by stats.
PS: No, you didnt read it. You skipped right to the bottom.
Because the world doesn’t perfectly follow trends & averages.
Also when for the last 5 months 2 have been positive I’m not sure you can point and say ‘deep consistent trend of negative delta’, just to use sources from the current discussion report.
Sure the mean is negative if you take it over the whole timeframe, but it’s a highly volatile figure that shows a lot of movement. Some positive movement in that time is to be expected. Especially when most of the isk is in the hands of null groups, which means there are alts sitting on a lot of isk who just sit inactive, because they are an alliance level asset type character, or are a titan alt with spare isk for new titans in case of loss etc.
So no, positive isk delta is not a sure sign of botting. There are plenty of other explanations.
In saying that I do hope CCP do look at characters who suddenly reactivate after a long time inactive and isk from their wallet suddenly goes places, because that is a sign of a potentially hacked character as well. But it’s again not the only posibility.
I can and do.
Explain those sudden positive delta results, after deep negative delta results.
If anything, the more rapid fluctuation between deep negative and sudden positive over the last months, as compared to the preceding period, shows something big is happening.
He started with a valid process and then let his conclusions flow into that process and drew more conclusions out of it. So in the end both are wrong.
That’s not how it works.
That his conclusions may be wrong, does not mean the process and data issued in it was wrong.
I completely agree he made an unsubstantiated leap to his stated conclusions.
But I do not agree that the stats he posted and his method was unsound, or false.