From: keith@acsu.buffalo.edu (Hawk)
Newsgroups: rec.games.empire
Subject: On the alleged cheating in the UB game....
Date: 6 Apr 92 22:06:12 GMT
Organization: UB



Greetings... An explanation of what and why happened at UB...

First a few rebuttals:

1) LOF was in the top ten for the entire game. Since I had over 400 sectors
   when the game was taken down, and since that was approx 50-100 more than
   Mith and Dread had, I think it's clear that I was in first place.

2) After the Crybaby Whine and Snivel Over Victory Conditions, the
	deity (Rodina) quit. He left the running of the game to me.
	I suppose that left me with two choices, either stop the game,
	or run the game by myself. Now, it's not like I could really tell the
	world what I was doing. And it was NOT POSSIBLE to get another deity
	from outside this university, because if someone other than Larry
	logged into his account, it would have been terminated. 

	Now, as far as Dreadlands and the Elf's accusations that *I* changed
	the victory conditions, THAT IS A FLAT OUT LIE. *I* argued with
	Larry (Rodina, if you don't know) to change the victory conditions
	BACK TO WHAT THEY ORIGINALLY WERE! *I* DID *NOT* have ANYTHING to do
	with him deciding to change them. 

3) Dreadlands would have been done in the next few days anyway.
	Yes,  sorry to say, Mr Dread, but there was a co-ordinated effort
	to smoke you. Ask Mith, Cylamaron, Icehouse, or Commonwealth.
	The attack was laid on for today at 6pm. The plan was, with the number
	three country (and the ONLY COUNTRY OUTSIDE OF OUR ALLIANCE THAT COULD
	HAVE AFFECTED THE OUTCOME OF THE GAME) removed, we could declare the
	game over... Leaving, of course, anyone who wished to try and take us
	out to do so. And I'm sure there would have been MANY takers to that
	offer.

	The fact that Dread and the Elf were bungling the management and the
	running of their country to a point where they were out of contention
	and THEN CHOSE TO BLAME THEIR LACK OF SUCCESS IN THIS GAME ON *ME*
	I find HIGHLY offensive. In the context of the game, I *TOLD* dread 
	that if he, or anyone else in the game, could prove that *I* had 
	cheated,  then *I* would have removed LOF (me) or ANY OTHER COUNTRY 
	THAT IT COULD BE PROVED CHEATED. Dread then told me "Well, I don't 
	have any proof, how can you prove it." 

	Then he told me he was going to quit. So what am I supposed to do?
	Sit and watch Mith demolish everyone else in the game?

	And DO NOT even TRY to claim that you and Mith. were plotting to
	take LOF out... That's not likely in any Non-blitz game.
	NO, I am NOT tooting my own horn. I have been very good friends
	with Mith for three years. In fact, he taught me everything I know
	about playing empire. We also had an agreement in the game not 
	to attack one another. So there goes another theory..

3)  The "proof" Dreadlands had for me "cheating" was this: ( I will rebut 
	these in order after I list them)

1. I had over 400 planes, but my money remained the same
2. I was higher tech than he was
3. I "thought that ships were the greatest thing since sliced bread".


OK, here are my rebuttals:

1. YES, my money was going down. Maybe you didn't check to see if there
   were any loan announcements in NEWS.. Well, there were.. I was in the hole
   with Commonwealth and Ice-T (Who was paved by Icehouse) pretty deep.
   If they had not loaned me a large quantity of money, I would have been sunk.
   
   I also had several banks on line, and I had somewhere in the area of 10k
   bars. THAT serves to keep one's money delta manageable. But I suppose that 
   I simply edited my country to keep my money supply up.

   Furthermore, when you are SELLING A LOT OF PLANES, it's pretty easy to
   have a good cash flow... I sold Commonwealth 60+ planes, and I even
   seem to remember DREADLANDS!!! buying planes from me at one point. Strange,
   isn't it? 

2) Yes, I was among (but NOT) the tech leaders... If you really must know,
	(and I checked this about 20 minutes ago...) Icehouse was the tech
	leader.. his tech at this moment is 146.86 in the number two slot
	is Hanina, with 141.20... In the number *THREE* slot, is LOF with
	138.63 and in number four with 136.46 is Mithrilien. If I was cheating
	how come my tech was not number one? Why wouldn't I make my tech about
	250 or so? Oh, of course, I was just being SMART! Yes, that must be it.
	(Note HEAVY sarcasm here..)

	It is also true that I probably did have a big tech jump earlier on
	in the game (when I did NOT have access to the deity account.)
	well, when you run 10 tech centers, you kinda DO have a big jump,
	even when it's log base 2.75

3) I "Thought ships were the greatest thing since sliced bread".
	So what does that have to do with cheating? I like ships? I'm a cheater
	simply because I realize the value of an aircraft carrier?
	I fail to see the connection.

It's funny Dread... I send you a telegram from Rodina, and all of a sudden,
	"Now I KNOW you've been cheating" (direct quote). Yes, I realize that
	it was probably wrong for me to continue to play, and also take over
	Deity duties. But what was I supposed to do? Let the game die? 
	I thought that was the worst thing I could do. I figured that I
	could trust myself NOT to do anything to alter the outcome of the game,
	and I still feel that I did nothing wrong.. I at NO TIME EVER IN THE
	GAME DID *ANYTHING* THAT COULD REMOTLY BE CONSIDERED IMPROPER.

	I DID NOT edit my nation levels. I DID NOT edit ANY OF MY SHIPS
	OR PLANES. I DID NOT "give" any commodity to myself. I ALSO DID
	NOT (this is for you Elf, the "super deity", the one that's 
	"deitied more games than I have played in") GIVE COMMODITIES
	TO A DEITY CONTROLLED SECTOR AND THEN EXPLORE (you were wrong Elf,
	you don't have to attack into the sector, you can explore into
	it.. Trust me. I know this. I *have* played with the code a good bit)
	INTO IT TO GAIN THE COMMODITIES. 

	WHAT is the POINT of cheating? Especially in Empire. Where's the thrill
	of winning with a super country? Maybe I'm just being an idiot, but I
	don't see the logic in it. I am HARDLY that hard up that I have to
	assauge my ego by CHEATING in a  FODDER game! Face it, there were
 	*MAYBE* five countries in the game that had a chance of winning them.

	If the players in the game want me to remove LOF, and have the game
	continue, then I will do so. It doesn't matter to me. After all, it
	*IS* only a game.


	I spent about 45 minutes on Sunday getting lectured by Elf and Dread
	about how it is possible to cheat in empire and get away with it.
	Not that they told me anything I didn't already know. It's
	AMAZING how much the Deity can get away with. But contraty
	to what Dread and the Elf think, The Deity in the UB game has to this
	point gotten away with NOTHING, simply because he has DONE nothing.

	Yes, at certain points Rodina (larry, at the time) DID aid
	newbie players that had done stupid things. Like the guy that
	landed his planes in the water. There are other circumstances also,
	NONE of which affected the outcome of the game.

	Now, some of you may be wondering about the one news headline that 
	read: "Rodina sells goods to Land_Of_Faa"

	This was done because there was a glitch in the game. What happened
	in THAT circumstance was this:

	I (LOF) had build an aircraft carrier, loaded it with planes,
	and sailed it down towards Chaotica (whom by that point had stopped
	playing and was already a Visitor country, and whom I proceded to
	take out). I got the ship down there, flew a few missions from it,
	and then all of a sudden it's a GODDAMN FISHING BOAT! Losing 50 planes
	naturally pissed me off. So sensing trouble, I go into the deity
	account, and look at the ship (which by this point exists at
	the deity 0,0... So I edit the ship, and find that it's a 20% efficient
	fishing boat with 54545543534 rads on it! I tried to scuttle it
	(from Rodina), I tried about 80,000 other things, and I thought that
	if I sold it to LOF, I could scuttle it then. Alas, to no avail,
	and ship 175 (which later turned into ship 16780) STILL EXISTS
	(but it doesn't exist, in that charming virtual way that Empire
	has.) in the 0,0 sector, which was an lcm factory owned by h2s.
	As it turns out, there were a bunch of non existant ships
	there..
	When the space problem in the deity acct became acute, Larry
	(At my behest) edited the ship file, and he there found over
	2,000,000 bytes of null space, so he removed the space.,
	and the non-existant ships went away.
	

So, ANYWAY, all this is in the way of saying this:

1) I did NOT do anything with Rodina that gave LOF an unfair advantage.
   (And I really don't care if anyone believes that or not, it's the truth
	and people that KNOW me, know I would NOT do that.
2) The game is back up. I am still running it, but if enough people have 
	a problem with me being a player/deity, I will remove LOF
	AS I FUCKING TOLD DREADLANDS I WOULD IN THE FIRST PLACE!!!!!!!!
3) *I* took the game down, Larry killed the processes. Why did I take the game 
	down? Becuse with the number three (and Dread had a SOLID lock on
	number three) nation gone, and most of the other countries in the
	top 10 allied to Mith and LOF, there was no one that could affect
	the outcome of the game. Mithrilien almost quit over the victory
	conditions. I would have taken the game down then too...

Any of you have something to say, say it to ME.

				C. Keith, LOF.