Sentinel is the most abusive staff member in the history of this server
The Anti-Cheat is currently a double-edged sword. When swung, it takes down a massive number of hackers. However, it also tends to hit its allies on a considerable basis. I understand that no Anti-Cheat is perfect, but there's imperfection and then there's Sentinel. Keep in mind that those who claim to have been falsely punished are just the people that have spoken up. What about all those that you don't hear about? There must be hundreds of players currently banned by Sentinel who just cannot be bothered to appeal, because there are other servers out there that offer the same experiences as Cubecraft, that they know won't randomly ban them. If this were a staff member and not an Anti-Cheat, would they retain their position?
Because I don't know how the Anti-Cheat works, I cannot really suggest anything to improve it. I know that it has an immense number of legitimate bans, so removing the Anti-Cheat absolutely cannot happen. However, I think the best step in the right direction would be to simply make it quicker and easier for those who are wrongly banned to get unbanned. It wouldn't matter quite as much if you're false-flagged by Sentinel, so long as you don't have to live out a portion of an undeserved punishment when it happens.
Ideas to make Sentinel appeals more efficient
I contacted the developer behind Sentinel the other night to try and get my friend unbanned, and he told me this:
"They go through staff, if staff park it as a false positive appeal, then I take a look at it
the process usually takes around 24 hours since most staff are not online since in the uk it's 1AM"
Why do ordinary staff receive the appeals? They don't know how the Anti-Cheat works, nor do they have any way to verify whether the flag was false or not. They can check past offences, but if somebody has a history of rule-breaking, then they'll most likely remain banned despite being innocent on this occasion. This step of the process works against the innocent, because the only person who knows how the system works, cannot be contacted unless staff handle your appeal first. If staff accept your appeal, then the developer behind Sentinel does his thing. If they deny your appeal, you contact the developer behind Sentinel, and he still does his thing. I believe this step should be removed, because it slows the process down.
This would also work in the favour of the innocent, meaning that they don't have to install / make an account on Discord, join the server, and then wait ten minutes before being able to ask who you're supposed to speak to. It also means that you won't have to wait eight hours or so for CrazymanJR to come online if he's asleep or not working. Perhaps I'm missing something, so please state otherwise if there's a reason for why staff handle these appeals, but the whole system seems to rule against the innocent in every way imaginable, trying to keep them banned for as long as possible.
As mentioned above, it could've taken around 24 hours for my friend to be unbanned. So... despite not having cheated at all, he's still being punished to some extent regardless? Not only would he not have been able to play any more that night, but he wouldn't have been able to play throughout the whole next day.
I'm not sure how easy this would be to do, but it might also be worth having Sr. Mods and Admins handle Sentinel bans, serving a role alongside CrazymanJR. If they're able to actually verify whether it was a false-positive or not, then appeals would be handled a lot faster, since it wouldn't just be one already overworked developer handling every Sentinel appeal.
Because ordinary staff cannot confirm for sure whether or not the ban was a false-positive, those banned essentially have to rely on the mood of the staff member at the time in which they check the appeal. Some might give you the benefit of the doubt and forward the appeal, however some might not. Take for example @Mikhail Gorbachev , whose appeal was denied. I'm not sure what their appeal entailed, but nonetheless I seriously doubt that they were cheating.
Tell us why we were banned and when we were caught
At the moment, Sentinel delivers only one line of dialogue when banning you:
'You are BANNED by cc_sentinel at Jul 30, 2017 8:27:13 PM for Sentinel caught you cheating! (Anticheat)'
This isn't very descriptive... like, at all. All it does is state the obvious and tell you that you were banned by the Anti-Cheat. My friend was banned within five minutes of logging into the server, in a game of Minerware. However, because Sentinel doesn't tell us why you've been banned or when you were caught, we weren't sure whether he was banned because of something he did in that Minerware game, or if he was banned for a past occurrence. After all, we know that "Sentinel bans in waves". However, because this is so vague, we don't know whether he was caught when he played Minerware, or if he was caught a week prior.
A better line of dialogue would be something like this:
'You are BANNED by cc_Sentinel in Skywars, for: The Anti-Cheat suspects you were cheating at Jul 30, 2017 8:27:13PM (Autoclicker)'
This tells us both when the player was first caught cheating, and what they were suspected of. If people need to check when the ban itself occurred, they can do so when they go to appeal. This would allow the person to provide information that's actually relevant to the ban in their appeal. For instance, using my friend as an example again, if he was caught say, three days prior to the ban, then everything mentioned in his appeal would've been irrelevant, since he explained only the instances leading up to the ban itself. Also, by telling us where they were caught cheating (i.e. Skywars), it allows the accused to recall the last time they played said gamemode, thus further helping them to provide information that's actually relevant.
Show off a bit more
Obviously the management team are very proud of Sentinel, so why not show it off a bit more? Here's an example that I made with my MLG-Superstar Microsoft Paint skills:
It just seems like an appropriate thing to display on the front page, especially to demonstrate that despite the false-positives, it does do its job more or less. It will also make the server look cooler :cool:
Potential issue with Minerware(?)
Perhaps this has already been done, but the Anti-Cheat's Auto-clicker detection should be disabled in Minerware. As some of you might be aware, there is a minigame that sees players throw stacks of chicken eggs to hatch eight chickens. Whether you win or lose in this game is decided by three factors: How much time you have, how fast you click, and RNG. Because two of these factors are out of player control, anybody with the intent to win will naturally click as quickly as possible, to compensate for the two factors that they have no influence over, and might be working against them.
Because it's so easy to forget that "butterfly clicking" can result in bans from Sentinel, and easy to not know this completely if you're in the 99% that don't use the forums, I would bet that a lot of bans for auto-clicking come from this gamemode, this micro-game specifically. The game itself essentially encourages you to do something that can get your account banned, since otherwise, you're probably not going to win.
Rename 'Sentinel' to 'Aegis'
:rolleyes: I'll give you £2 if you do, lol :rolleyes:
The Anti-Cheat is currently a double-edged sword. When swung, it takes down a massive number of hackers. However, it also tends to hit its allies on a considerable basis. I understand that no Anti-Cheat is perfect, but there's imperfection and then there's Sentinel. Keep in mind that those who claim to have been falsely punished are just the people that have spoken up. What about all those that you don't hear about? There must be hundreds of players currently banned by Sentinel who just cannot be bothered to appeal, because there are other servers out there that offer the same experiences as Cubecraft, that they know won't randomly ban them. If this were a staff member and not an Anti-Cheat, would they retain their position?
Because I don't know how the Anti-Cheat works, I cannot really suggest anything to improve it. I know that it has an immense number of legitimate bans, so removing the Anti-Cheat absolutely cannot happen. However, I think the best step in the right direction would be to simply make it quicker and easier for those who are wrongly banned to get unbanned. It wouldn't matter quite as much if you're false-flagged by Sentinel, so long as you don't have to live out a portion of an undeserved punishment when it happens.
Ideas to make Sentinel appeals more efficient
I contacted the developer behind Sentinel the other night to try and get my friend unbanned, and he told me this:
"They go through staff, if staff park it as a false positive appeal, then I take a look at it
the process usually takes around 24 hours since most staff are not online since in the uk it's 1AM"
Why do ordinary staff receive the appeals? They don't know how the Anti-Cheat works, nor do they have any way to verify whether the flag was false or not. They can check past offences, but if somebody has a history of rule-breaking, then they'll most likely remain banned despite being innocent on this occasion. This step of the process works against the innocent, because the only person who knows how the system works, cannot be contacted unless staff handle your appeal first. If staff accept your appeal, then the developer behind Sentinel does his thing. If they deny your appeal, you contact the developer behind Sentinel, and he still does his thing. I believe this step should be removed, because it slows the process down.
This would also work in the favour of the innocent, meaning that they don't have to install / make an account on Discord, join the server, and then wait ten minutes before being able to ask who you're supposed to speak to. It also means that you won't have to wait eight hours or so for CrazymanJR to come online if he's asleep or not working. Perhaps I'm missing something, so please state otherwise if there's a reason for why staff handle these appeals, but the whole system seems to rule against the innocent in every way imaginable, trying to keep them banned for as long as possible.
As mentioned above, it could've taken around 24 hours for my friend to be unbanned. So... despite not having cheated at all, he's still being punished to some extent regardless? Not only would he not have been able to play any more that night, but he wouldn't have been able to play throughout the whole next day.
I'm not sure how easy this would be to do, but it might also be worth having Sr. Mods and Admins handle Sentinel bans, serving a role alongside CrazymanJR. If they're able to actually verify whether it was a false-positive or not, then appeals would be handled a lot faster, since it wouldn't just be one already overworked developer handling every Sentinel appeal.
Because ordinary staff cannot confirm for sure whether or not the ban was a false-positive, those banned essentially have to rely on the mood of the staff member at the time in which they check the appeal. Some might give you the benefit of the doubt and forward the appeal, however some might not. Take for example @Mikhail Gorbachev , whose appeal was denied. I'm not sure what their appeal entailed, but nonetheless I seriously doubt that they were cheating.
Tell us why we were banned and when we were caught
At the moment, Sentinel delivers only one line of dialogue when banning you:
'You are BANNED by cc_sentinel at Jul 30, 2017 8:27:13 PM for Sentinel caught you cheating! (Anticheat)'
This isn't very descriptive... like, at all. All it does is state the obvious and tell you that you were banned by the Anti-Cheat. My friend was banned within five minutes of logging into the server, in a game of Minerware. However, because Sentinel doesn't tell us why you've been banned or when you were caught, we weren't sure whether he was banned because of something he did in that Minerware game, or if he was banned for a past occurrence. After all, we know that "Sentinel bans in waves". However, because this is so vague, we don't know whether he was caught when he played Minerware, or if he was caught a week prior.
A better line of dialogue would be something like this:
'You are BANNED by cc_Sentinel in Skywars, for: The Anti-Cheat suspects you were cheating at Jul 30, 2017 8:27:13PM (Autoclicker)'
This tells us both when the player was first caught cheating, and what they were suspected of. If people need to check when the ban itself occurred, they can do so when they go to appeal. This would allow the person to provide information that's actually relevant to the ban in their appeal. For instance, using my friend as an example again, if he was caught say, three days prior to the ban, then everything mentioned in his appeal would've been irrelevant, since he explained only the instances leading up to the ban itself. Also, by telling us where they were caught cheating (i.e. Skywars), it allows the accused to recall the last time they played said gamemode, thus further helping them to provide information that's actually relevant.
Show off a bit more
Obviously the management team are very proud of Sentinel, so why not show it off a bit more? Here's an example that I made with my MLG-Superstar Microsoft Paint skills:
It just seems like an appropriate thing to display on the front page, especially to demonstrate that despite the false-positives, it does do its job more or less. It will also make the server look cooler :cool:
Potential issue with Minerware(?)
Perhaps this has already been done, but the Anti-Cheat's Auto-clicker detection should be disabled in Minerware. As some of you might be aware, there is a minigame that sees players throw stacks of chicken eggs to hatch eight chickens. Whether you win or lose in this game is decided by three factors: How much time you have, how fast you click, and RNG. Because two of these factors are out of player control, anybody with the intent to win will naturally click as quickly as possible, to compensate for the two factors that they have no influence over, and might be working against them.
Because it's so easy to forget that "butterfly clicking" can result in bans from Sentinel, and easy to not know this completely if you're in the 99% that don't use the forums, I would bet that a lot of bans for auto-clicking come from this gamemode, this micro-game specifically. The game itself essentially encourages you to do something that can get your account banned, since otherwise, you're probably not going to win.
Rename 'Sentinel' to 'Aegis'
:rolleyes: I'll give you £2 if you do, lol :rolleyes:
