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Does the IAmPicardTool violate the Ts & Cs?
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[SJ] Admiral Aki
✭✭✭✭
in The Bridge
Apologies if this has been answered before but I was wondering if the IAmPicardTool violates the Ts & Cs of the game.
The tool is awesome - I’ve been using it to help to pick my Voyage crew and also to play the odd gauntlet round when I’m focussing on building streaks rather than going for first place.
The recent in game message talks about automated game play, and while IAmPicard doesn’t really automate anything, it does give a pretty big helping hand to those that use it.
Thoughts and views from the player base are welcome, but I’d really like to see an answer from a DB Rep.
The tool is awesome - I’ve been using it to help to pick my Voyage crew and also to play the odd gauntlet round when I’m focussing on building streaks rather than going for first place.
The recent in game message talks about automated game play, and while IAmPicard doesn’t really automate anything, it does give a pretty big helping hand to those that use it.
Thoughts and views from the player base are welcome, but I’d really like to see an answer from a DB Rep.
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It gives anyone using an edge picking possibly a better choice for voyage (better chron rewards, 4-star cards, rep rations, etc.).
I didn't realize it also plays gauntlet rounds for you.
However, everything the app does requires human intervention. There is no long term automation involved.
This is probably not a popular view, but I believe that it should be against the Terms of Service. I have never used the application, but have heard others who do describe the functionality.
Regarding the Gauntlet functionality, it lets you choose opponents and play them from the application cutting out the animations and making each match faster. This could save someone several minutes of time each round of not watching the score animations. As someone who chose gauntlet as something to cut out of my game for a 2-3 month period to spend 15 minutes less playing the game each day, I made a decision to give up those rewards to get real life time back. The app lets people short circuit part of the gauntlet time requirement and I don't believe it is fair to those not using the application. Not to mention short circuiting animations could provide an advantage in a close gauntlet in the last 5 minutes.
Regarding the voyage functionality. I don't believe that choosing optimal crew is the part that violates the TOS, what I do believe does it is the automatic slotting of the crew and starting the voyage. Even if I knew the exact crew I wanted and the slot for each of them, it could still take me 5 minutes to load them since I have to choose the crew member in 12 different drop down boxes. This again is five minutes less per voyage people using the app have to devote to game play to get the rewards of voyages. Imagine if a similar program did this for an expedition event and choosing crew to start a away team mission, I think everyone would agree that it is a violation. Just because something is not during an event doesn't make it any less of a violation.
There is also the username and password aspect. Even with the open source aspect of Iampicard, it isn't exactly an IT best practice for DB to sticky a link to a third party webpage that asks users for their email address and DB password right at the top of it (this is another TOS provision, I can't imagine how the webversion of iampicard doesn't violoate this but could see possible arguments for the downloadable version not doing so since it is open source)
I think it is also horrible precedent to allow game actions to be taken outside of the DB user interface. If we expect DB to be able to track down people using long term automation programs, they first need to be able to make sure that all actions are taken through their program. The fact people can take any sort of game action without using DB's software is really worrying to me, and I don't know why any developer would allow it.
You made some legit points. Thanks for posting. I totally agree here. @Paladin 27
(Emphasis Mine)
This is misleading. The application bypasses the front end application and directly invokes the back end APIs. That is still DB's software. Lots of games, especially ones as in depth and complicated as this, provide support for 3rd party add-ons. Why WOULDN'T DB want people in the community to grow their game and make certain it easier to use? I agree that there are aspects that DB would not automated (scheduling when to send out shuttles, for example), but other applications are completely benign.
Being that it is the 3rd announcement in the ready room subforum, I would assume that DB has no problem with it.
Do not post private exchanges between you and Support, thanks. ˜Shan
And yes, I'm totally against any automation of the game and will never add any features to my tools that automate game-play. This was at the top of my readme since day 1 as a core principle and will never come down.
You're being a bit overly dramatic. There is no advantage in saving a couple minutes cutting out animations. This isn't what determines a gauntlet victory or defeat. All it does is saving 2 minutes of my life. Same thing for voyages. It doesn't prevent anyone from playing the gauntlet until the very last second, and that's how you can get some points without going down in ranks.
To address your second post, why would a dev allow it? Because it has no impact on what matters: server stability, the experience of other users and monetization. The (few) people using it don't care about a fancy interface and animations, they want to do action x and y on their accounts and that's one way to do that. Saying that only one app should be able to connect to a server is a very backwards design, it's usually what people who understand nothing about computers think because they don't care, but some do, and it's important to allow that kind of freedom in how we use our hardware - it's nobody else's business as long as we're following the server's rules. For instance it lets me play the game when I'm on the computer without using a virtual machine and dedicating an entire CPU core and 1Gb of ram to it.
All I see is that you have decided that it wasn't right to use it because you don't use it. That's a very weird way to provide an answer. You're better than that. I suggest you either give it a try in spite of your preconceptions or live and let live.
But ultimately, there is no right or wrong on that matter. Customer support said it was abiding the rules and that's all we need to know.
If any in my fleet used a macro thing to gain an advantage over someone else, they know they would be booted. This Picard program if it does cut out the animations and such on the gauntlet and or voyages tells me that it is also being given an advantage over most players. Outside help such as wiki is fine, because it does not run the game. But this Picard program appears to do that, running the game. I won't use it, and for right now I am not sure of the Picard tool. Thank you for pointing out some of the things it does @Paladin 27
Trista
The main reason I’ve never used the app is because I don’t make it a habit of giving out passwords to any third parties.
Regarding the customer support exchange, is that an actual DB is employee or one of the outsourced support reps. If it’s one of the outsourced reps, I think we’ve seen plenty of examples where they don’t know what they are talking about.
The system authenticates by using DB's API and/or Facebook's login page to generate a long-lived token (same way the games themselves keep your login info.) I haven't looked at that part of the codebase in a while so I'm not sure how they're handling that for the web version.
RE Voyages, I don't think it takes 5 minutes to set up a crew if you know who you're going to use. Having used both my spreadsheet and the Picard tool to then hand-set-up my crew, it can be done in about a minute.
I'll also throw in here that if DB just made the default sort on voyages a 'weighted score' option (kinda like how they try to for bonus crew in events) we wouldn't all have to be messing with spreadsheets, calculators, and tools nearly as much.
As for Gauntlet.... yeahhhhhhhh I'm kinda torn on that one. It can speed up the process, but unless you don't actually care about how you do at the end (i.e. achievement grinding) it's still going to take some time to consider your options on each move.
And for the 'last 5 minutes', Most people either gun for 1, 2-3, or 11-15. I don't see this helping much in those cases. You don't see rank in the tool and 11-15 are easy to overshoot, so you would have to keep looking at the game screen anyway to see where your opponents are. Top 3 require enough strategy and grinding the timer that I don't see a big difference in how long it takes.
Besides, Right now it's our best bet to unstick a voyage without having to go through CS.
Edit: To be clear, what would be *really nice* right now is some sort of notification that the tool is still fine and will not result in any banning. Or a conversation on what needs to happen for it to be OK if it is not.
And since then, how many other new stuff has been added or old stuff improved? Pretty sure DB isn t really aware about all new or improved functions?
Trista, don't fall for the ominous-sounding (and completely unsubstantiated) accusations about this tool. DB has obviously given it their blessing. And as far as booting anyone from your fleet who uses it, you'd lose quite a few good players, as I know of several SST players who make use of the Crew Management Tool.
Could you please continue the petty bickering? I find it most intriguing.
~ Data, ST:TNG "Haven"
I don't and also wouldn't recommend that anyone blame anyone using it as it seems to be "blessed" by DB with the sticky in the ready room. I'm simply questioning if it should be approved or not, and providing my thoughts and perspectives about that.
The voyage thing has largely stayed the same. You are welcome to contact customer support and they could look into it. But it doesn't automate anything, you have to manually click everything. Saying that cutting out animations is some kind of cheat is ridiculous. Calculating percentages is also not automation (or maybe you think that someone with a calculator is automating the game as well), you still have to press the engage button to start voyage, do a dilemma, return voyage, do gauntlet rounds or whatever else. It even has a thread on this very forum linking to the tool and since it's open source, DB can look into it. If they think that it's not kosher, they could easily contact the developer.
It's on github and under a GPL 3.0 license, that would be a very poor way to propagate malware. If you want you can clone the repository and write your own "login" script, but I doubt it would be safer than what they're doing right now.
Agreed, it's open source. Anyone can look at the changes and the source code, it's not malware. But if you are so paranoid as @Paladin 27 then maybe you could use a secondary account to test out the program or you don't even need to install anything, test the web version.
I reckon that's a massive cheat and surely also breaks the terms of service.
Check out our website to find out more:
https://wiki.tenforwardloungers.com/
Also, fwiw, I detest macros and automations in this game. I think it's cheating. I am extremely glad that DB is taking better measures to detect and punish macro users in the upcoming event.
There was obviously an enormous amount of time, love, and care put into building this tool and all other player-generated resources for this game, of which there are many. Is using the wiki or a discord bot cheating? I'm a proud funder of the wiki, and I am of IAmPicard too.
As long as IAmPicard requires me to interact with it in order to accomplish tasks, I don't see how you can say it's automating things. The day it automatically saves a voyage low on anitmatter or lets me send shuttles is the day I'll stop using it. But... Here you have it, folks, from the very creator saying that's not something that he's interested in doing. In fact, he's said it's against his core principles. That's good enough for me.
Also, frankly, while I love it... It often tells me to do things I don't want to do, like send no engineering crew to an engineering gauntlet, or load up on a gold skill in a voyage and neglect the others. I use it as a resource, which is what it is.
If you're not using it because you think it might be against the TOS, you now have proof in an exchange with DB that it isn't. If you're not using it because you're afraid of giving out your email, that's on you.
Proud Former Officer of The Gluten Empire
Retired 12-14-20. So long, and thanks for all the cat pics!
You are part of a fleet that has a private bot that you call fleet bot. You even advertise it on your wiki page. Then you hypocritically come here and talk bad about a public tool that is open source. May I ask you, has DB approved your fleet bot?
The wiki page: https://stt.wiki/wiki/Fleet_Second_Star_To_The_Right
I don't think you understood what he was saying. I do believe it's on him though, you don't use technical words among profanes. Basically he is saying that the tool is innocuous as it's directly asking to log in to DB's servers but the app doesn't know what the login and password are.
His bot is fine too, that's what you can find on the wiki.
I may or may not have just done that with an account I don't actively play anymore. I don't believe i misrepresented any of the voyage or gauntlet functionality.
As an example for gauntlet, I would suspect it takes someone using the Timelines iphone app about 15-25 minutes total over the course of a day to play 6-7 gauntlet rounds.
I would suspect it takes someone about 5-10 minutes a day on the iampicard app.
That may be a reason to use the application to some, but to me its a shortcut to doing things the way they are intended by the developers.
Ok. Then it's fine. The term bot is then misused because if it was a bot then it would by definition not be fine.
@Data1001
Regarding booting:
Trista was talking about macros! And she also stated that she is unsure about the IamPicard app. She never mentioned that she will ban every member that uses the IamPicard thing, at least not as long as the app is „approved“ by DB.
And i still wait for an official response of DB in here, since only having a CS giving an approval to something when u started it(with less functions), doesnt prove it still is.
If this is fine with DB then it is. Still won t use any 3rd party app that needs me to enter my log in data. If ppl feel good about doing so, ur welcome. Its ur account.
I think it counts as automation -- whether you turn 7 clicks into one (playing a single gauntlet match in iampicard) or 6,000 clicks into one (possible with a macro you've set to repeat), that's automation to me.
However, it's minor automation that doesn't negatively impact the playing experience and the community. It's also DB-approved.
So does it matter to me that it's automated? No, it doesn't, because automation isn't inherently evil. I mean, that's basically what the warp feature does, right?
It's what you do with automation that matters.
The way I see it, automating typing out my crew's stats (by using the google sheets add-on) is a solid use of automation, and not unfair to other players.
Feel free to tell me if I'm wrong.