Cheater Boards (How to Stop Them)

[Miscue]

Originally posted by SlartyBartFast
Given an effective test of one pull one shot, I think an ROF cap is pointless.

Need a computer operated solenoid/ram to fire the markers over the chrono.
Without paint you could fire a string of varying speeds and compare to the sound signature for number of shots fired.
With paint, you could fire a rapid burst to veryfy speeds in game situations.

That's the whole point. There is no fool-proof test to test for one-pull/one-shot. A board could be made to turn cheating on and off, in a manner that only the person using it knows how. A ROF cap keeps it reasonable... if they cheat to hit 13... who cares. It's easy to obtain legit and not a ridiculous ROF to today's standards.

[RRfireblade]

I think they should switch to handloading only.

Jay.

[QUINCYMASSGUY]

other sports

Other sports like baseball don't allow aluminium bats, which are superior to wood, certain enhanced golf clubs aren't allowedin the PGA, and other sports have similar guidelines. Basically cheating got so out of hand they had to set a mark to even the playing field. I think mech only tournies is right where it should be as it emphasizes skill and is a plus towards the game and easier to test markers. So now AGD, AKA, WGP, etc need to use their power, finances, etc, to create it because if they aren't up to doing that, good like persuading NPS, SP, DYE, and the other electronic fathogs from switching their formats.

[yeahthatsme]

this would MAYBE be applicable in the NXL considering the small amount of teams and the fact that they all have heavy sponsorships.

[Miscue]

Originally posted by RRfireblade
I think they should switch to handloading only.

Jay.

That's right, and you have to use a rod to shove ammo down your 4' barrel!

I didn't mention this earlier, forgot to:

Let's say you have a standarized chip. Ok, trigger input line is high... shoot. Low, trigger was let go... you can shoot again once the line goes high. Simple?

Ok, now what prevents you from sending this standardized chip false inputs? Are you going to inspect my switch? Are you going to trace my board to see what line goes to what pin?

[cledford]

Re: Re: Just limit the ammo

Originally posted by Muzikman


Seeing as most of your events make their money off paint, there is no way this will happen.

Good point

[JEDI]

I wont go as far as saying its impossible to illiminate this type of cheating. Just highly unlikely. But, lets be reasonable:

A) Limiting paint will NEVER work, so drop that idea. Its an aspect of play that a lot of people like best about the sport (shooting tons of paint)

B) Limiting type of marker. Again will not work, because its highly favorable for a lot of people to shoot electros. As long as they're not illegal, people will form tournies where electros are used.

Just because shooting a butt load of paint out of an electronic gun is not favorable to you, doesn't make banning it a reasonable solution.

Changing an aspect of the game that people have come to love, will not solve the problem of cheating. Look elsewhere.

[JEDI]

Besides... even if limited paint was the answer, whats going to stop a guy, WHO ONLY HAS 50 ROUNDS OR SO from running past you and drilling 30 balls into you and your teammate. So what, he has no more paint, but he still did his job.

[FriedRicE2]

Just some idea from a newb and wannabe airsmith currently persuing a Electrial Engineering/Computer Science Degree

Chip with an external port and inspection software idea:

I really think we can have a standardised chip with some sort of port on the grip of your gun. This way a tech Judge can plug it into a computer real quick and inspect the chip's software for any tampering or code violations.

This ofcourse would take a lot of work to do; first, for the standardized chip and then for software that will inspect it quickly. Plus, the inspection software needs to be updated quite often to counteract any new ways of fooling the software and be able to dectect any imitaion or clone chips that somebody might make. You could also design the code in the chip and the chip itself so that it would be hard to code somthing that the inspection software could miss. This also means we need a dedicated organization of honest people to constantly monitor and test the chip for anyweaknesses and update the software accordingly.(upkeep) It would take alot of work and research. but believe it can be done.

Shure this upkeep step of this idea seems dauting, but it can be a small thing if a lot of thought is put into addeind preventative mesauseres in the design of the chip. Basically make it harder for people to tamper with it or create a copy of it. This way the upkeep organization only has to test the chip and add things to the inspection software every once in a while because the basic design is good.

I think this would be a quick and easy solution so you don't have to seal the chip or trade chips at the competition. Also, this way people can keep settings that they have put into their guns.

But ofcourse this means the big companys have to meet in a symposium and agree on a standardized chip and the software.
I don't see why we can't do it if enough people will start caring and by this it seems that caring people are growing.

It would take a good amount of work, but i think its the one quick way to keep these electric markers honest. I think there are enough honest people out there that can make this happen also.

(correct me if im wrong on any of this and i will be happy to edit it)

If you think this is too complex you should see what things are pulled off in other industries.

[FallNAngel]

Originally posted by SlartyBartFast

But the manufacturers are also the sponsors of teams. At the introduction of electros SP made the Turbo mode work for their factory team during tournamants even when the tournament lock was on.

There's one thing I can think of that may work. I don't think it'd be ungodly difficult, but perhaps I'm wrong.

Generally, the code to run the markers can be held on 1 PIC chip. I can't see the frame needing more than that honestly, but I'm sure it can be dealt with if it has to. Anyway, 1 PIC chip for the program, and 1 for settings such as dwell, or in the case of EBlade/Race the bolt open/close, eye settings, etc.

The program chip is flashable and is only flashable by a physical handheld connection (eg palm pilot/computer) When the teams get on the field, all similiar markers are flashed the same. User settings aren't affected as they're kept on a separate chip.

Although this doesn't eliminate cheating, it will even the field. eg. Pretend Smart Parts want to give Dynasty cheater boards because they know their Shockers suck and they want to give them insane bounce after 10bps. Smart Parts would be required to give the head ref a Shocker compatible program image before the event starts. All players on all fields will have their markers flashed with this image each time they walk on the field. No PIC's to worry about getting stolen, no worrying about having to worry about players copying the look of the PIC, either the program works or it doesn't.

The only two problems that I can see with this are:
A) Refs being bribed to not flash particular teams or players or flash particular teams with different PIC images.
B) The markers being re-engineered to allow *A* chip to be programmed, just not the right one. This would more than likely require a decent amount of modification to the board and would probably be noticeable to someone looking at it.

[GT]

I cant read all this crap so I am just going to post.



I would love to see a limit on paint per game tourney but lets be honest tourney producers are seriously greedy and selling less paint=less money in some folks pockets. Its just so sad that paintball has become so cut throat in its infancy.

[Butterfingers]

Hmm Have tourney officals install a "e-mode eliminator" aka. (kiddie pool). Have players line up for the "software" cleansing ritual (dunking). This will prevent all cheater boards from ever being used. :)

In all sereousness there should be a ROF limit on guns wheres the skill when all you are doing is putting 20+ balls in the air to hit sombody. It gets real expensive real fast.

[speedyejl]

Ok here we go, the crazy but practical and easily implimentable idea.

Simply attach a device similar to hand chrony to each players barrel for the duration of the game. It would contain a chronograph and a bps meter. In addition a wireless transmiter. A laptop feild side would recieve information of everyone playing and if a device showed ramping fps/bps the player could be quickly checked by a ref. Each device would have a unique number as so not to cause confusion between devices. It would also be nesscary for the person monoriting the computer to make sure jumps in bps/fps are not because of the chrono picking up a stream of balls from a different player.

A cheaper method would be this device without a transmiter that beeps loudly when it senses the fps/bps jumping

For both of these devices it would be nesscary for the devices to be able to tell an axpromiatley close time between shots, because its hard to tell if a gun is ramping bps but if its obvious after ramping that the balls are the exact same space apart its obvious we have a cheater.

This may seem expensive but relistacly it would only be around $100 for unit. At a bulk rate the hand chronos would cost 50 add on a transmiter and you got it.

A league like NPPL would only need 100 of them
(70 actually 5 feilds 14 men per feild, but 30 incase someone drives into the ground with it)

The cost of this could easily by subsided by increasing the price for each event by as little as 20 per team.


The only flaw in this plan is favoritism and judges disregarding the data readouts. Maybe if the data was on a screen spectators could observe this would be completely eliminated. In addition ejecting all teams found to have a cheater board from tournaments.

[RRfireblade]

Hee Hee,


I just have to chuckle at some of these "solutions".

[Miscue]

Originally posted by RRfireblade
Hee Hee,


I just have to chuckle at some of these "solutions".

Agreed. They are not solutions at all. Too complicated, impractical, doesn't solve the problem because it can be circumvented.