The following article was submitted by one of our users, and reflects his own personal experiences and opinions. It does not necessarily reflect the views of Tip.It or any of its staff, and we cannot vouch for the accuracy of its content.
Firstly I'd like to thank Tip.It for letting me give voice to this issue. The issue of cheating is a big problem, both in real life, and on the internet.
I’d like to tell you all about my personal experience with cheating. I have had the RuneScape account Lord-Kain1 since February of 2001, a month after the game was publicly released, from my understanding. From the very beginning, I was big on skills, working to get my levels up as best I could. Fast forward to the following year… my skills had become moderately respectable, and P2P was released. And despite its many benefits, I did not jump on the bandwagon, vowing never to pay monthly for a game. That sentiment was short lived, because I joined in about May, with a full year’s subscription.
Now, you’re probably wondering how this applies to cheating.. well here’s how... mining. Like I said, I was big on skills, and one skill i enjoyed was smithing. At the time mining rune was a major way to make cash for this expensive skill. I had been power mining in various places, to the point where I literally developed a nasty blister on the wrist of my right hand from where it was rubbing on the wood desk and mouse pad! During this time, I was hearing a lot about macros and other programs that are easy to use. I didn’t use any of these, but the funny thing was I was already being getting reported for doing it. I noticed several threads on the board saying things like "OMG Go to East Varrock, Lord-kain1 is there macroing and getting all the iron!". And this was despite the fact that I was talking to people while I mined. I eventually deleted my friends list and turned on my privys because it was slowing me down in my leveling. After seeing several of these threads, though, I was convinced I was going to get banned no matter what I did.
At this point, I did the stupidest thing in my entire RS career. I tried an autoer program to mine for me. I won’t give you the name of the program, because that’s not the point. Using the autoer was slower than myself personally, but it could play while I was sleeping. And yes, shamefully, I used it. I regret it to this day, and not because of what happened next. The very next morning I opened RuneScape and saw the News headline about a massive crackdown on cheaters. My pulse started to race as I read the overview... I clicked the link to the list of “cheaters” and there, among the jumble of other names was "Lord-Kain1". I was in shock and denial. I logged on and got the biggest shock one can imagine… my moderate character with decent skills was now a newbie character. I ran to the bank to check, and everything was gone. My green party hat that my friend gave me for Christmas, everything. I had been Stat-Wiped.
Most of the people that had this happen to them quit. But I am much more stuborn than they were. And i still had 11 months of members left, and I wasnt about to just let that money go. This lead to many funny (and not so funny) screenies of my level 3 character in the Heroes’ guild, getting harassed by other players and reporting me for talking about what had happened to me. Of course I had already been punished, but that didn’t make any difference.
Why I am writing about this now? I have been debating why I did it, and why anyone else does these things. Why does the person playing D&D say they rolled a 20 when they really rolled a 13? For recognition? For glory? If it’s for either of these, any “recongnition” or “glory” you get is tainted. It gnaws at you for a long time, because deep down you KNOW it’s a lie. The fact that you did something so cheap will always be with you.
Cheating ruins the game for you. There is no longer any challenge. It’s like playing a game in godmode -- you can’t lose, the game loses its flare. Sure it would be fun to run into a room full of bad guys like Superman and have nothing be able to hurt you, but eventually this loses its novelty. Cheating will always leave a void with you wanting more.
So why do people macro or cheat? So that they can sell whatever they are collecting to make a real life profit? Okay, I suppose that could make sense. It's wrong and against the rules but could make sense, depending on how you look at it. But then what about the people that are cheating at training skills like combat? Like those who would macro to 126 if they were allowed? Again, tainted glory. Not to mention all the friends you could make if you were training for real. I invite everyone who is reading this article to take a hard look at yourselves. If you have done any of these deeds, you know, deep down, that what you have is nothing more than a tainted shadow of what you could have. If it's a small offence, you should try to make it right somehow. If it's a large offence, you could start over completely with a fresh character and clear your conscience. If you've never cheated, you can stand proud with a clear conscience and declare proudly "This is MY victory!"
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