Has XSV changed the face of tournament Paintball forever?

[PSPLane]

You guys are the ones that make all the young players in the lower divisions cheat like mofus, because they keep hearing how much the Pros cheat... and mistakenly believe that is what they need to do, to reach the highest level.

Five years ago, I agreed with this 100%. I still believe it for the most part.

I am somewhat concerned that the damage has already been done and lots of the pro players of today are the ones who bought that BS 3 or 4 years ago.

 

[Chicago]

As Baca is getting at, addressing the 'morals' of sport is ineffective - because you assume that everyone should share your morals. And maybe they SHOULD, but they WILL NOT.

If you could get desired results with morals, nobody would steal from anybody because everyone would agree stealing was wrong. But people steal anyway, that's why we have laws against it and penalties for it, so at least GREEDY people might not steal, regardless of whether it's moral to do so, because they don't want to go to prison.


Now, you can sit there and say it's wrong to cheat, and in your value system, that may be the case. But I can also believe that it is wrong to be cheated. And in my value system, if someone is cheating me, I'm going to cheat back. Frankly, I don't think that's wrong. I would much rather have the league penalize the cheaters so I could play a fair game of paintball, but since I can't play a fair game of paintball, and I still want to play paintball, cheating is the ONLY moral choice I have. Because letting myself be cheated is wrong.


That's the problem with moral arguments - they only work on people who share your morals. If you want people to act according to your morals, regardless of whether they share your morals or not, well, that's what guns are for.


There is nothing 'moral' about saying "This guy keeps hitting me in the face, but it's wrong to hit him back." That's just stupid. Some people would say the moral thing to do is to leave, and some people would say the moral thing to do, after someone insists on continuing to punch you in the face, is to take whatever action necessary to make them stop. But no one would expect someone to just stand there and keep getting punched in the face.

Expecting players to keep playing the events and keep playing honest is like expecting someone to stand there and get punched in the face. Some players will stop playing and some players will do what it takes to get a fair chance at winning. Blaming the players because they don't want to keep getting cheated is stupid.

 

[manike]

That gets me back to needing certified chips though - not just because of BPS, but because it is harder to consistently measure FPS, and you need certified software to prevent dwell ramping and other velocity increasing software tricks.

But that's just not reality, so let's ignore it and move on with something that might actually work, and might actually be implementable...

Thats your only regret?
What about that goatee beard?

Honestly, the only reason for it, is that my girlfriend likes it. I give in to her now and then.

 

[Chicago]

You guys are the ones that make all the young players in the lower divisions cheat like mofus, because they keep hearing how much the Pros cheat... and mistakenly believe that is what they need to do, to reach the highest level.

I don't know how I missed this the first time around, but this is the biggest crock of **** ever.

In *EVERY* sport, Pros will do whatever they can get away with. The only difference is paintball is still in a place where the pros can get away with almost anything, while other sports keep people in line by, you know, having good rules, good officiating, and good penalties.

And to say that the 'perception' is young players need to cheat to make it to the top is BS - if you want to be successful at the top, YOU CHEAT. I'm sorry, do you actually WATCH these tournaments? Pros cheat all the time. It's even on ESPN2! They're not cheting for no reason, they're cheating because it works.

It's just ridiculous to say that this perception of cheating is 'manufactured' when actual pros actually cheating is highlighted with a circle on ESPN2.

 

[Chicago]

But that's just not reality, so let's ignore it and move on with something that might actually work, and might actually be implementable...

Certified chips are trivial to implement. The hardest part is getting the league to decide to do it.

 

[Rabies]

Certified chips are also quite straightforward to circumvent. Unless you are able to seal the whole circuit, trigger switch, solenoid and all, in a tamperproof package, there will be a way to piggyback cheat electronics on one side or other of the "certified" circuitry.

 

[manike]

Certified chips are trivial to implement. The hardest part is getting the league to decide to do it.

Do you really believe this?

Who's going to write the code for all the different guns, and make sure the settings work for all the different guns? No 'one series' of settings will run every gun. No 'one series' of debounce values will work with all mechanical trigger geometries or gun operating systems.

And find me someone with that ability that wouldn't be influenced/corrupted or that isn't linked to a manufacturer or team.

If you can name me anyone who makes electronic chips that isn't linked to a team or manufacturer or similar to the point he would be biased, and that has the skills required, you'll match the one name in my head. And he's busy and expensive, and probably would be hard to get to do it.

And then tell me why it won't make any difference whatsoever because it is so easily circumnavigated by any of the other board manufacturers who already produce cheater equipment.

If you don't take apart every gun running such a chip to inspect it for other electronics, your chip is absolutely useless. Want to know how easy it would be to hid another small chip, purely designed to get around your 'safe' chip? Now that's the trivial part...

Want to inspect every gun? Every time there is a 'concern' on what it is doing?

Heck most events never even find the cheater switches hidden on many guns.

Most events never even check to see that the guns are in tournament locked mode. And you expect them to be sure that only this 'safe' chip is running the gun?

Sorry, but I don't see this idea ever making it. It just doesn't have any basis in reality, even if the idea 'looks good on paper'.

And anyway, what you REALLY need to do is to catch the cheats, and penalise them so it stops it being done at all levels. Some one big needs to get caught and penalised big.

 

[Baca Loco]

1. Of course 1. is a 'should' and I can give you a ****load of reasons why it should happen, but I think we're already boring people so I'll keep it to this: Yes, like cinema, sport is a fantasy. of a different kind for sure, but it fulfills a similar role. When sport ceases to fulfill this function then (like Paintball has and, judging by the recent World cup, football is going to) people begin to drift away and the sport will suffer from reduced interest and participation. And none of us want that.

2. See 1.

3. Game separation from real life - see 1 again.

4. Not at all, it suggests that virtue cannot be legislated for - there are sporting conventions that are respected (still, just) in football that would not be in a busines environment because sport is still not (quite) commerce.

1. Like castor oil, it's good for you but I promise not to drag this out. Indefinitely.
Hmm, this sounds vaguely like, oh, I don't know, pragmatism?! Which, at least in my insular little universe has very little to do with morality but as a practical matter I will agree most folks prefer their sport to at least have the appearance of being black and white.

4. "Sporting conventions" is a loaded term in this dialogue but I'll let it pass. And I will close with the observation that the capacity of everyone to compartmentalize their morality is, regardless of which side of this particular fence you sit, the principle contributing factor in this equation. Now there's some irony for ya.

 

[Chicago]

Certified chips are also quite straightforward to circumvent. Unless you are able to seal the whole circuit, trigger switch, solenoid and all, in a tamperproof package, there will be a way to piggyback cheat electronics on one side or other of the "certified" circuitry.

What's your point? You don't understand the problem.

We call agree that, prior to the introduction of electronics, we could fairly well check and control whether a gun was legal semi-auto or not. Then electronics got introduced, and things went to hell.

Now, WHY did they go to hell? Was it because any electronics were introduced? No - it's because we allow electronics with UNDETERMINED BEHAVIOR, i.e., secret software.

Once you remove the secret software, and your electronics behave in a known manner, you can enforce gun rules the same way we used to before electronics.

The problem is that because we allow hidden, secret software, we can't detect illegal software. We *CAN* detect extra chips, different circuits, etc. So yeah, I can give you a certified chip, and you can add extra electronics around it, but as soon as we open up your gun the gig is up and you get DQ'd and banned.

 

[duffistuta]

1. And I will close with the observation that the capacity of everyone to compartmentalize their morality is, regardless of which side of this particular fence you sit, the principle contributing factor in this equation. Now there's some irony for ya.

I concur.

And will leave you with this:morality and pragmatism are not very different things - what do you think morality is rooted in, if not pragmatism?

And if you say religion, we can just get Ockham's Razor out and reduce things down a lil and get back to the same point.