Cheaters Don't Exist (a PSA about the game's bugs)

[Wolfeye]

Dear Lovely Community of Quidditch,

I've been seeing a lot of people, both in-game and in-forums, making the claim that there are cheaters. I think this is a wonderful testament to just how bad the current game state is. Not because there are genuine cheaters; in fact, I do not believe there has been a single cheat devised for this game to date. But rather, because it showcases the constant, frequent bugs that are so bad that the casual new player interprets them as cheats. These include:

-Players turning invisible (This is a known bug with no consistent way to replicate it that I believe involves players filling slots)
-Players getting in games where there are multiples of a specialty role (i.e. two keepers, two seekers, two beaters. Once again, another backfill bug)
-Players appearing to shoot quaffles from absurd, unreal angles that make no sense (this shows the severely poor server quality and desync, as this often looks perfectly normal on the player's screen but to outside observers it looks ridiculous). This also ties into keepers making saves that look impossible.
-Ball steals getting retconned (#Desync again)
-Bludger warnings getting perma-stuck on screens (Known bug that the devs claimed to have fixed last patch but it appears it was only half-fixed).
-Midgame disconnects (#Desync).
-Match making literally putting level 500+ players in games with level 10s (and because I saw a post referencing this earlier: No, it's not an unreasonably high level. I'm in the mid-200s and I've barely been playing lately. Dedicated players who play every day can VERY easily level up fast, especially during XP boost weekends and such).
-Probably anything else you see that makes you say "Wait, is that a hack?" because with a combined playtime of 618 hours in this game across playtests and release version, I've not seen a single thing that wasn't easily explained by either server quality degradation or a known bug.

To the newer players: I'm sorry that the experience is bad. I'm sorry that it's been unpleasant to play. But please, don't try to frame this as a player-base issue with cheaters or the like. The correct place to put the blame here is on the game's makers, because they have failed to address these issues for months.

Sincerely,
-A player in Diamond (for what little rank even means in this game... it took about one full day...) who is tired of seeing people equate broken mechanics and bugs to a player problem rather than a game problem.

P.S. Those of us who keep getting called cheaters make up pretty much the entire competitive community for the game... Don't you think we'd be up in arms too if these were really cheats? Do you really think we'd be queue sniping each other every day to get competitive games going against cheaters? Lol. We're posting every day on Discord and in the bug reports to try and get these game issues fixed.

[Wolfeye]

(Pretty please be sure to report what you see to their bug reports, though...! We could use all the help we could get getting them to fix these issues so competitive play isn't a joke and new players aren't deterred by false beliefs of cheating! That's kind of what is REALLY killing this game right now.)

[Ahadra]

And Dragons are Real. This Game is full with Cheaters

[Wolfeye]

You'd have to give me an example of what you believe to be a cheat, because I can assure you, it's almost definitely explainable with a bug or glitch the game currently has.

[Ahadra]

Bug and glitch abuse is still cheating and must be penalised.

[Warthog]

1) Players turning invisible has nothing to do with filling. I've had my PC's turn invisible, disappear and even be replaced by other characters. This happened in a game that was fresh, with no backfilling happening.

2) Never seen this one happening so can't confirm or deny.

3) The desync is absolutely real but can simultaneously occur alongside cheating and thus isn't a point of contention.

4) The levels do not really serve as a "claim" of skill per say. But the fact that the playerbase is so low it can't put low level players with low levels is absurd.

Finally. Claiming or making the claim that just cause these issues exist equals no cheaters(which is what you are saying: "Never seen a thing that can't be explained by a bug") is borderline insanity.

I've absolutely met cheaters in ranked on top of griefers. For example: There was zero server desync but this one keeper kept flying between all three goal posts at insane speeds. Speeds that are absolutely impossible to achieve with a MnK or controller, It physically cannot be done yet it happened in game.

[Wolfeye]

Originally posted by Ahadra:

Bug and glitch abuse is still cheating and must be penalised.

Except most of the time, you can't even tell when you're bugged. Sometimes enemy players will see you as invisible but you won't see yourself that way. For all you know, you've been invisible and scoring on someone else's screen, unaware that you were exploiting the bug lol.

Same for the cross-the-map ridiculous shots that look like they come from a different planet to score.

[Wolfeye]

Originally posted by Warthog:

I've absolutely met cheaters in ranked on top of griefers. For example: There was zero server desync but this one keeper kept flying between all three goal posts at insane speeds. Speeds that are absolutely impossible to achieve with a MnK or controller, It physically cannot be done yet it happened in game.

This is caused by poor server prediction. In essence, the server tries to predict where a player will go to account for the time delay between frames (the server runs at 30 frames per second (FPS) whereas can run at 240+ fps). However, if I'm holding Left, and suddenly switch to the Right, the server will still be predicting that I'm moving left and have to adjust-giving an appearance of faster-than-expected movement. Against keepers who frequently switch directions to try and keep chasers guessing, this actually gives the false appearance of super-speed motions.

This is only amplified if there is desync or high ping, due to the further delay in frame info. TLDR: That isn't a cheat. Its poor netcode. The server itself is lying to your client so that you can hopefully have more accurate knowledge of where the opponent is, but the result is that it has to correct the false predictions and quickly update to where the player actually is.

[Wolfeye]

Originally posted by Warthog:

Finally. Claiming or making the claim that just cause these issues exist equals no cheaters(which is what you are saying: "Never seen a thing that can't be explained by a bug") is borderline insanity.

(Also, this is a valid point for larger games with larger datasets where we couldn't have reasonably ever ran into every player or situation, but not really applicable here. The ONLY "cheats" people keep bringing up are game bugs--the vast majority of which aren't even intentionally exploitable. Every person that keeps getting called out in-game or in-forums I also personally know and have played extensively enough with to know they aren't cheaters as well... I mean, given how tiny the community is, we practically all know each other by now lol. It'd be really easy to tell if someone was using exploits at this point.

After hundreds of hours of competitive play, I can confidently say I've never lost a game that seemed like there was a cheater of any type on the opposing team. Just poor game quality from Unbroken. And that's really the point I'm trying to make here: Not that there couldn't be cheaters in the future, or that cheats aren't possible somehow, but that there currently are none and all the claims to the contrary are simply false flags from lack of information.)

[Ahadra]

Originally posted by Wolfeye:

Originally posted by Warthog:

Finally. Claiming or making the claim that just cause these issues exist equals no cheaters(which is what you are saying: "Never seen a thing that can't be explained by a bug") is borderline insanity.

(Also, this is a valid point for larger games with larger datasets where we couldn't have reasonably ever ran into every player or situation, but not really applicable here. The ONLY "cheats" people keep bringing up are game bugs--the vast majority of which aren't even intentionally exploitable. Every person that keeps getting called out in-game or in-forums I also personally know and have played extensively enough with to know they aren't cheaters as well... I mean, given how tiny the community is, we practically all know each other by now lol. It'd be really easy to tell if someone was using exploits at this point.

After hundreds of hours of competitive play, I can confidently say I've never lost a game that seemed like there was a cheater of any type on the opposing team. Just poor game quality from Unbroken. And that's really the point I'm trying to make here: Not that there couldn't be cheaters in the future, or that cheats aren't possible somehow, but that there currently are none and all the claims to the contrary are simply false flags from lack of information.)

So either you yourself are one of the people who cheat and are trying to justify it and make it sound nice, or you're just closing your eyes because you don't want to see the problem. The game is losing more and more players and more and more people are complaining about cheaters, but of course they don't exist according to you. Anyone who does a quick search on YouTube will find videos in which such cheats are offered and what is shown in the video strangely matches what has already been described here. I don't know what's worse that the developers don't do anything and cheating has become the new normal in this game or people like you who I assume cheat themselves or at least cover their eyes and ears and shout I can't see or hear anything.

[Nixilius]

The players you take for cheaters are just experienced players who play in teams of 6, in vocal. (and who will become, or already are: pro teams)
(so yes the matchmaking is messed up because there are not enough players...)

but it is not impossible to beat them. You still have to build a team of 6, in vocal and train, create strategies.
(it does not make sense to go in ranked in soloQ, like on a League of Legends or any other competitive game of this style)

I am level 170 at platinum rank 1, and I learn every day about the game. My team is washed by the diamond players but it is not that I call them cheaters.

The mechanics of this game are super rich. There are a lot of things that the game does not explain to you. If you go and have a look at the discords of the communities of players of this game, you will learn a lot of things... This game has an unsuspected potential.

(Personally I hope that it will end up becoming free to play to attract a maximum of players and "smooth out the level in ranked")

[TehOldeFighter [Best Tag]]

There are some keepers who can kick seekers 90-100% of the time, I find it hard to believe that's just skill.

[Tommysonic5]

Originally posted by Ahadra:

I don't know what's worse that the developers don't do anything and cheating has become the new normal in this game or people like you who I assume cheat themselves or at least cover their eyes and ears and shout I can't see or hear anything.

Personally, I think the worst thing is players that are so bad at losing they need to resort to calling others cheaters. Stop spreading misinformation.

I have about 200 hours in-game and have not seen any of these mythical cheats. Invisible player bug yes, which makes it look like the quaffle is being scored from midfield by the invisible chaser, but no actual cheats.

Anyways, there's a patch targeted for this week. Hopefully it has server improvements and fixes the invisibility bug so we can stop arguing about whether people are cheating or not.

[DarkFlux]

the game has bugs being a chaser and throwing the quaffle only for it to miss or just fly half way across the pitch the game need some more refinement with the passing and throwing system charged throws really don't do much

[Djape]

There are cheaters, I have confirmed it many times, even got into their chat. There are cheaters, stop defending them

[Ahadra]

Originally posted by Tommysonic5:

Originally posted by Ahadra:

I don't know what's worse that the developers don't do anything and cheating has become the new normal in this game or people like you who I assume cheat themselves or at least cover their eyes and ears and shout I can't see or hear anything.

Personally, I think the worst thing is players that are so bad at losing they need to resort to calling others cheaters. Stop spreading misinformation.

I have about 200 hours in-game and have not seen any of these mythical cheats. Invisible player bug yes, which makes it look like the quaffle is being scored from midfield by the invisible chaser, but no actual cheats.

Anyways, there's a patch targeted for this week. Hopefully it has server improvements and fixes the invisibility bug so we can stop arguing about whether people are cheating or not.

Exploiting a bug is still cheating, thanks for confirming my point even though you are not aware of it. Many developers ban people who exploit bugs and glitches. Blizzard is a very good example of this and they do it with PVE content as well.
You can call it what you want, but in the end these people gain an unfair advantage over others and that's why there are fewer and fewer players. A game is supposed to be fun and it's not, as you can see from the number of players and the progression. Try hard and maybe you'll make it to 400 hours before the servers are shut down because there are only 10 people left :)