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Terra, prestige referral, and YOU!

Printed From: Illyriad
Category: News & Announcements
Forum Name: News & Announcements
Forum Description: Changes, patch release dates, server launch dates, downtime notifications etc.
URL: http://forum.illyriad.co.uk/forum_posts.asp?TID=6882
Printed Date: 28 Mar 2024 at 11:20
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 12.03 - http://www.webwizforums.com


Topic: Terra, prestige referral, and YOU!
Posted By: GM Rikoo
Subject: Terra, prestige referral, and YOU!
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 00:25
We love terraformers. We really do. 

Terraforming is a wonderful thing that allows players to play as they want to play, which makes us happy. BUT, terraforming has always been seated with the risk that some players will lose track and soon have several accounts.

....which can then get all of their accounts destroyed in a magical tidal wave of developer wrath.

Here's the deal: If you terraform, go for it. Enjoy! We love it! BUT, if you:

1) EVER have more than 2 accounts

or

2) Use your referral link over and over to gain extra prestige every time you make a new terra account

...we will send an army of invisible mammoths to destroy all of your accounts. In case my joking isn't making it clear: do not ever use the referral system to exploit for extra prestige and never go over having 2 active accounts, not even for a minute.

We have a list of terras who have been exploiting the system, and these people will be hearing from me soon. Exploiting the referral system and owning more than 2 accounts has always been against the rules, but let it be known that from now on if you are in the business of terra'in' and break one of these rules, you can have all of your accounts banned from the game.

It is getting to the point that we are considering either doing away with the ability to terra or the referral system, or both. While only a few people exploit it, they exploit it enough to be within the camp of unfair play.

Let me know if you have any questions!


GM Rikoo



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Illyriad Community Manager / Public Relations / community@illyriad.co.uk



Replies:
Posted By: Dungshoveleux
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 12:56
As a person who has terraformed twice in the past, I welcome the clarification of the precise rules, especially those involving the number of accounts and the fact that a terraforming account "counts" towards the limit of 2 accounts per player/ip address/email address.  I have to say that this wasn't clear before and somewhat of a grey area.  Now it is clear. Good.

So, if you have a TF account, you can't have a fully fledged alt account as this would mean you have *3* accounts.  That seems to be the main consequence.


Posted By: GM Rikoo
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 14:05
Originally posted by Dungshoveleux Dungshoveleux wrote:

As a person who has terraformed twice in the past, I welcome the clarification of the precise rules, especially those involving the number of accounts and the fact that a terraforming account "counts" towards the limit of 2 accounts per player/ip address/email address.  I have to say that this wasn't clear before and somewhat of a grey area.  Now it is clear. Good.

So, if you have a TF account, you can't have a fully fledged alt account as this would mean you have *3* accounts.  That seems to be the main consequence.

Yes, the rule has always said that having more than 2 accounts is bad. (Remember, we are not talking about sitting.)

"Terraform" is something that players have created, it's a "made up" word that basically means to use an account for something and then get rid of it. People can use accounts for all sorts of things, so all we care is that the player never goes over 2 accounts. :)

And remember that email/IP/etc is not important. What is important is the human player part. No more than 2 per human, no matter how they access the game.

GM Rikoo




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Illyriad Community Manager / Public Relations / community@illyriad.co.uk


Posted By: Artefore
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 14:09
Originally posted by GM Rikoo GM Rikoo wrote:

No more than 2 per human

What if you're a dwarf?  


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"don't quote me on that" -Artefore


Posted By: Tacardi
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 14:21
Originally posted by Artefore Artefore wrote:

Originally posted by GM Rikoo GM Rikoo wrote:

No more than 2 per human

What if you're a dwarf?  

To funny, what if you are an ELF, much better than a dwarf.


Posted By: Dungshoveleux
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 14:26
Since humans are say 6 foot high and dwarfs more like 4 foot high, surely 2 humans are equivalent to 3 dwarves Wink


Posted By: Yitshak
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 14:33
Or if you have schizophrenia - sorry, multiple personality disorder, sorry, dissociative identity disorder..
Tell us my precious, tell us.




Posted By: GM Rikoo
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 14:39
har har

Stay on topic. :)


Rikoo




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Illyriad Community Manager / Public Relations / community@illyriad.co.uk


Posted By: Rill
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 20:30
Originally posted by Dungshoveleux Dungshoveleux wrote:

I have to say that this wasn't clear before and somewhat of a grey area.  Now it is clear. Good.

As someone who has been in the game since terraforming came to be (with the introduction of Exodus in fall 2011), I can say that the fact that you can't have more than two accounts, including any terraforming account has ALWAYS been completely and abundantly clear and restated over and over by both the developers and the community.

Anyone who tries to suggest that they were not aware of this is being disingenuous.


Posted By: Dungshoveleux
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 21:36
If the rules were abundantly clear then I submit the above announcement would not have been necessary, surely?


Posted By: Rill
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 22:27
It's true, the developers would have been completely justified in just bringing the hammer down on the rulebreakers.  Personally I think they're showing more mercy than people deserve.

Dang, so much for my resolution to be less judgmental.


Posted By: palmz
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 22:32
My understanding has always been you can have no more then two active accounts, but I have been playing less then a year. 

Now for the referral issue my understanding is you may use it once for your second account. As I have not seen any confirmation from the dev's I have stayed away from doing it as I don't think it would be worth the risk to use the link just to lose my account. 

If you had to get rid of the ability to terraform or the referral link my choice would be the referral link to be cut but not the ability to terraform. (If you believe this has becomes such an issue that one or the other has to be removed) 


Posted By: Mr. Ubiquitous Feral
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 22:55
Terraforming is a vital strategy in Illy. It allows players to place a city on an otherwise less than favorable tile near necessary sov or in an area strategically needed for war. I believe it is a needed profession and is in accordance with existing Illy rules and game mechanics. The problem of player referral codes and multiaccounting has been discussed openly in global chat enough to say it is now common knowledge not to do these things. Another advantage is all of those capital cities left after the terras abandon. They provide easy targets for those who want to practice sieges. Training alliances should be using them as targets for timing exercises. If GM StormCrow would please allow us to continue terraforming, I believe a solution would be to monitor the times a player uses the referral code. A more code involved solution would be to require players to license themselves as Terraformers, which would prevent them from using the code. Harsh, yes, but how many friends do we actually bring into the game? That would be worth it to me, since I have no friends.

I look forward to reading posts from actual terraformers.

btw, WTF is recruiting. We allow our members full autonomy, but demand they follow these simple rules.


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I am a Machine.


Posted By: GM Rikoo
Date Posted: 28 Apr 2016 at 23:08
Originally posted by Dungshoveleux Dungshoveleux wrote:

If the rules were abundantly clear then I submit the above announcement would not have been necessary, surely?

The rules have been clear; you agree to them when you sign up. This was not a restatement but an announcement telling whose who might be doing it that we will be talking to them soon, and that we are considering getting rid of the affected systems.

GM Rikoo




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Illyriad Community Manager / Public Relations / community@illyriad.co.uk


Posted By: Sun Tzu
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2016 at 00:11
I agree with Rill. Since Ive played if there is one rule that has been made perfectly clear prob over all others it has been the 'two account rule'. Ive had numerous past accounts, some terras some not. Ive had to abandon, Ive made the sacrifices to assure I dont ever have more than two accounts at once. Its a tad disappointing knowing that players are monopolizing on a heavy gold-making business while having a main and an alt. cheating the game. 
IGNORANCE IS NOT AN EXCUSE Angry


Posted By: GM Rikoo
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2016 at 02:44
/me is trying to look like he is not worried because he is not sure if it is affected systems or effected systems. 


GM Rikoo


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Illyriad Community Manager / Public Relations / community@illyriad.co.uk


Posted By: Mr. Ubiquitous Feral
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2016 at 03:28
Hmmm, i think the game is affected once a player has effected it?

Hope that helps...


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I am a Machine.


Posted By: Rill
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2016 at 04:00
A player affects the game, which is then affected.  Unless the player is a terraformer, in which case the player may effect a change that affects the game which will leave the game, in effect, affected.

The developers may soon effect systems that affect certain players in ways they do not like.

However, I personally see using effect as a verb as something of an affectation that is not effective as a tool of communication.


Posted By: KillerPoodle
Date Posted: 29 Apr 2016 at 05:51
Originally posted by GM Rikoo GM Rikoo wrote:

/me is trying to look like he is not worried because he is not sure if it is affected systems or effected systems. 

GM Rikoo


Affected is just fine.

Originally posted by Rill Rill wrote:


Dang, so much for my resolution to be less judgmental.


Lol.


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"This is a bad idea and we shouldn't do it." - endorsement by HM

"a little name-calling is a positive thing." - Rill


Posted By: Oldelaf
Date Posted: 22 May 2016 at 23:07
Originally posted by GM Rikoo GM Rikoo wrote:

The rules have been clear; you agree to them when you sign up.
Actual terraformer here (well, amateur terraformer, since I only terraform around my own cities and don't offer my services to other players).
The rule about not having more than two account have always been very clear, but not the one about the buddy program vs. terraforming. I can totally understand why GMs don't want it, but I assumed that it was allowed the same way terraforming was allowed.
When I read what is said in game about the buddy program:
Quote Share the link below and you will receive 100 free prestige for each person who signs up for Illyriad using your unique referral link and reaches 450 population. The link may be used an unlimited number of times, but remember that each player is only allowed 2 Illyriad accounts.
Reading that quote, I understand that it is implicitly allowed to use the buddy program for the second account (with or without using that second account for terraforming). Although I might have missed the rule that forbid it.
I don't really care about using the buddy program when I terraform: it was more an easy bonus than the reason why I was terraforming. Obviously now that I'm aware of the rule I will stop using the buddy program with my second account, and I can even give back the prestige that I won that way to show good faith, but please make that rule more clear.
Originally posted by GM Rikoo GM Rikoo wrote:

It is getting to the point that we are considering either doing away with the ability to terra or the referral system, or both. While only a few people exploit it, they exploit it enough to be within the camp of unfair play.
An other solution could be forbidding the use of the buddy program for the second account. It shouldn't be much harder to detect than players having multiple account, and the rule is more precise that way.


Posted By: mjc2
Date Posted: 23 May 2016 at 02:49
when i first started terraforming the buddy system used a much lower pop threshold(100 pop i believe), but then the threshold was bumped up to 450 which is the same pop requirement for a terraform.  i am pretty sure i mentioned this in an IGM or GC to one of the DEVs before the bump to 450 but i could be mistaken, that was awhile ago.  i think if the buddy system threshold is bumped up a little more to say 500 it would be much clearer that you shouldnt use the buddy system with terraforms and honestly the difference between 450 and 500 pop on an account that is going to stick around is negligable.


Posted By: GM Rikoo
Date Posted: 23 May 2016 at 03:20
This rule has been in effect for actual years:

"Serial creation and abandonment of secondary accounts in order to exploit the "buddy referral" prestige bonus is an exploit and bannable offense."

Players agree to these rules when they sign up. When and if I catch someone doing it, I will likely just ban the accounts or -- depending on how much they do it -- give them a chance to stop.

We cannot force the players to read the rules, but we CAN force you to agree to these rules when you sign up. You cannot play the game without agreeing to this, so we have to take it on faith that you have read them.

Using a referral link is something you do on purpose; so there is no excuse like "oops, I didn't mean to."

Again, if we continue to see it happen we might just take away the ability to terraform. If you or anyone else knows of someone doing it, tell them to stop and let me know.

I appreciate it when someone comes forward, but this rule is nothing new.


Rikoo




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Illyriad Community Manager / Public Relations / community@illyriad.co.uk


Posted By: Mr. Ubiquitous Feral
Date Posted: 23 May 2016 at 05:07
I would hate to see terraforming banned. It is a way for me to earn gold in order to grow my main. I just deleted a very involved post right here>>>

Instead, I will say that I agree completely with GM Rikoo and the Devs. Abusing the Buddy Programme is no different than any other exploit. There may be ways to end most of the problem but someone will eventually find a way around them. 

I will be ending my terraforming as soon as my current contract is filled. I enjoy playing Illy and don't want to be involved in a mechanic that has the potential for abuse. I may return to the business after the Devs have decided how they will deal with it.


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I am a Machine.


Posted By: Oldelaf
Date Posted: 23 May 2016 at 13:24
Originally posted by GM Rikoo GM Rikoo wrote:

Using a referral link is something you do on purpose; so there is no excuse like "oops, I didn't mean to."
Well, it might be: I just deleted my secondary (terraforming) account to create a new one without the buddy program, and it has been linked to my main account by the buddy program without me doing anything. I did it again to make sure and used the account creation link on the login page, and again it has been linked to my main account. The third time I tried with my browser cache and history cleared, and that time it created an account not linked to my main one. But even for the first two times I never used the referral link explicitly, not meant to use the buddy program.


Posted By: flatfisher
Date Posted: 20 Jun 2016 at 09:19
I am one of those that used the buddy referral when terraforming... I started doing so as with the text written at the illy-site around the buddy referral link. There it says:
Quote The link may be used an unlimited number of times, but remember that each player is only allowed 2 Illyriad accounts.  
This made me think its ok to use the link unlimited times as long as one person only olds two accounts. I must say I added the idea of having 2 accounts simultaneously, not 2 accounts ever.
Please bear in mind some of us (like me) are non-native English, so reading up all kind of rules may be difficult, time-consuming and may lead to misunderstanding of what is actually written.
I understand your point of view (if that is appropriate to say), Rikoo. And I will stop using the buddy referral for terraforming.
Please hold your magic mammoths...


Posted By: GM Rikoo
Date Posted: 20 Jun 2016 at 17:44
I understand your misunderstanding, but you agreed to the rules when you signed up, meaning you read and understood them.

This has been a rule for a long, long time:

"Serial creation and abandonment of secondary accounts in order to exploit the "buddy referral" prestige bonus is an exploit and bannable offense."

I will see about tweaking the in-game description, but from now on check with the rules if you are not sure, or ask me. 


GM Rikoo




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Illyriad Community Manager / Public Relations / community@illyriad.co.uk


Posted By: Det
Date Posted: 11 Mar 2017 at 15:37
I am reasonably new to the game and have tried one terraform which was fun and profitable.

Obviously I am not as bright as others here as I didn't even know about the option to claim prestige so missed that chance completely as now I know I shouldn't, I wouldn't.

I have a different problem though. My son wants to join the game and I will not let him as, although we have separate computers, we both use the same IP address and I want to terraform some more for the cash. I am loving the game and don't want to break the rules and lose my account.

However I promised I would ask to see if there is a rule in place that allows this.


Posted By: jtk310
Date Posted: 12 Mar 2017 at 05:06
I am not sure about the official rules on this, Det. However, when I was in college my roommate and I both played illyriad and each had 2 accounts and neither of us was banned. I hope you get a more definitive answer from someone else, that's the best I have for you. Hope it helps!


Posted By: Yitshak
Date Posted: 12 Mar 2017 at 05:25
GM rikoo used to be the man to talk to about such matters, however he has left for pastures new. 

GM cerberus has replaced him in this role. I suggest dropping him an igm. I find the GM's here very helpful and I'm sure he will clarify things as soon as he has time.

I believe he does a quiz in GC an tuesday nights illy time - usually when I'm in work :(  - you may catch him there in person.


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Remember to be nice to the squirrel.


Posted By: flatfisher
Date Posted: 13 Mar 2017 at 08:53
I am not an IT-specialist, but are you sure you use the same IP-adress? As far as I know, each connected device in my wifi-network gets an individual IP a-adress, which in my case is not a fixed IP-adress but rather changing in order of login.
Like more people replied earlier, we never had any problems or comments on the fact that sometimes three Illy-accounts run at the same time from our house, one is owned by my son (Lasco) and the other two are my main (Flatfisher) and my terraforming account.
So I would say stop worrying and if that is not enough, than write an IGM directly to GM Rikoo.
This is the best advice I can give you here!

Flatfisher

-edit-
I read the former post and noticed it isn't GM Rikoo anymore to talk to, but rather GM Cerberus....


Posted By: eowan the short
Date Posted: 13 Mar 2017 at 18:36
I used to play with my brother in the same house. Not banned yet....
I have also heard of various husband/wife and parent/child combinations playing illyriad without problem. I think the devs look at more than just IP address when sorting out multi-accounting


Posted By: Miklabjarnir
Date Posted: 14 Mar 2017 at 19:25
I remember some years ago a GM mentioned that they use an advanced behaviour filtering mechanism to find out if two accounts were run by the same person or even by a robot script. Going solely by IP address is not viable since many users will be logging in from a place where there is one or a few public IP addresses shared by a large community. Even some ISPs do this in countries where IP v.4 addresses are very scarce.


Posted By: Det
Date Posted: 16 Mar 2017 at 11:06
Thanks for all the help everyone.

It seems I was worried about nothing.

I now have no excuse for banning my son from the game.

I can't have anything without someone wanting to muscle in.


Posted By: IKnight
Date Posted: 19 Dec 2017 at 03:39
I have my referral link on my profile, as far as I know, that's not illegal. I've had a bunch of people use it to make a 2nd account. I usually send these players a gift in return for this. Haven't been told to take it off by the GMs yet, so I figure it's safe.

See, I always figured the rule was 2 accounts per person. Since there is no way to actually 100% prove who is behind the screen (at least legally), I figured that was enforced with IP (same device, probably same person) and Email(definitely same person). This is why I've never allowed anyone to play Illyriad on the same device as I (I just can't risk losing my accounts). I have a few family members that want to play as well, but they are stuck using an iPhone to do it (And Illyriad just doesn't work on mobile devices the same way as a computer) However, lately I've heard of people allowing their spouse to play on the same computer. I have a sibling who I'd gladly let play after I'm done checking in, how do I prove it's my sibling and not me though? 


Posted By: Celebrant
Date Posted: 19 Dec 2017 at 09:30
If I say what I think, I could earn a ban forever.



Posted By: Bill Cipher
Date Posted: 19 Dec 2017 at 15:51
Why not just get rid of the Terraforming?

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Posted By: Web
Date Posted: 05 Oct 2021 at 23:06
So just to clarify, the buddy programme can be used by each player on their alternate account once, but not multiple times if they decide to terra. Or can it only be used when an entirely new player joins the game? I have never used the link before and was not sure if I could use it on myself once or not. Thanks!



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