How does the community feel about one player running two or more accounts? It’s something that I enjoyed doing in Life is Feudal in order to better run a farmstead with the limited skill cap.
I can see that being something that I’d enjoy doing here as well, I’d just need to buy the game again on my spare steam account. But I wouldn’t bother if that kind of thing was frowned on here.
External link →It is the most severe rule violation on all official servers after typical -ism violations, leading to an instant ban for all involved accounts. Most of the bigger private servers I know aren't dealing much different with that, but especially smaller servers or unadministrated ones don't seem to care a lot.
I personally dislike it heavily, given the advantages it gives that have already been explained by other people here - in the end I'd check the rules of the server you are intending to join and / or ask an admin there and go with the individual rules of the community you actually want to play with. For me, it's the same as cheating and always warrants a permanent ban.
That seems…. extreme and not at all on par with bigotry and toxicity in my book. But they’re your servers, so they’re your rules.
I’ll just seek out more casual servers so as not to upset anyone. And yes, I will check the server rules before hand.
The effects (and in nearly all cases the intention) are the same - one is trying to get an unfair advantage over others and is doing so by methods the developer (in this case we) did not intend, basically introducing "Pay to Win". That is exactly what cheating is, no toxicity or bigotry is involved in day-to-day cheating, only unsocial behaviour. Most cheaters you don't even notice, as they have no desire to brag with their results, they're just trying to get that edge over everyone else.
In the end the goal of these rules is to provide a fair playing field (and as such a protection of everyone else, not a punishment of the single one), so the punishment is tied to the effects and the intention, not the moral wrongdoing which definitely is not on the level of cheating. The effects - in opposite to most griefing - extend to many players on the server though, especially if such methods are used to 'win a meteor race' or 'government-' or 'market domination' - don't forget you get an additional vote as well. How would you feel if someone can vote twice in real life?
It's not a ToS violation though, at least as long as it's not used to actively damage servers in extreme ways against the will of the server administrators, circumventing their measures, so it's fair game on any server that allows it :)
I can somewhat see your point of view, and am definitely not arguing for it to be allowed on servers that prohibit it.
Since I’m not competitive, I’d never even think of it as ‘cheating’. For me, these kinds of things are just a chill way to amuse myself off in my own little corner, while still being able to go see what other people have accomplished over in their corner.
I’ll leave the serious servers to the serious people. You guys can have it, I already have a job.
Oh, don't get me wrong - I specifically avoided saying 'you', but 'one'. The problem is that as soon as other people are involved on a server - even just a few, there guaranteed is someone that does play competetive or would not like other people to have an unfair advantage, they probably also cannot 'balance odds out' themselves, as they don't have the money for it. What is 'amusement' for you, might be a severe hit to their gameplay that they expect to be on common, fair grounds without shenanigans. Hence for me it's the same as cheating - do happily in your single player and co-op games where everyone knows, but as soon as public servers come into play, don't do it. (Other than if everyone is fine with it)
The hermit living on it's own just liking to have a bit of interaction with others, but mostly playing for themselves without any ambitions for any of the made up 'winning conditions' by other players does exist, but they're extremely rare. The typical case of multi-accounters is people that want that advantage for themselves and pretend to be a group, e.g. - as I said for cheaters - do not really have any intention to brag about their use or being toxic, just doing it for their own sake of winning. Which causes problems when others wanted to 'win' as well, but legit.
I'm not saying you'd be any of these people. I totally see where you come from, but as server administrators we neither have the time to filter between each type and intention of doing it nor is it relevant, as the effects will in most cases ultimately be the same - other than if you are not participating in trade, government or anything else, which is the point where most people start to wonder why playing on a public server at all.
This also is amplified a bit, as Multi-Accounters cannot only pretend to be a group but also (in limited ways) act like one, and groups by nature of the game have insane advantages in this game (for example the record on Coast Redwood official server is a group of 4 or 5 shooting the meteor alone within 4 days - making the rest of the game for the other 200 people totally uninteresting, them leaving and having wasted their time) that some servers (like White Tiger) try to restrict severely, due to massive negative feedback by 'stomped' solo players. It's also one of the most common complaints about the game on reviews, next to technical issues. Group play has a very negative connotation for many players in this game, especially when groups are self-sufficient, not actively communicating and voluntarily investing themselves into public good. It's an issue we need to tackle, somehow, though.
What one can take from this, though: It's not the servers that are serious. It's enough if a number of players are 'serious' - and most of our playerbase are, at least if the feedback we get is any relevant indication.
I'd like to point out that you let customers buy multiple copies of the game right from your own store.
For friends. They can only be gifted to other e-mails.
Using the licenses in a ToS and rule-abiding way is up to the user, not us.
devtrackers.gg