3D!Bee disqualified from RBW: Legacy for cheating

[LowEloNobody]

Bee seems very suspicious, but let's play Devil's advocate...

First thing first, where is the proof? Do we have anything else than testimonies of top players?
We are talking about 300K here and we already know what kind of shady things happened for 100K before... But I am happy to see that a drama is cooking, too bad that AOE4 players are not posting here, only fan boys.

Several of the recs and suspicious games are linked in the posts from ML and others
You can boot them up in AoE4 and watch Bees PoV for yourself

 

[malamadre]

Aoe4 drama is better than the gameplay

 

[felix.feroc]

The interesting thing for me in this scandal is how it intersects with recent issues about the lack of accountability of tournament admins in making decisions. They can say, "you broke a rule, you lose the match" (Daniel for no camera, Bugum for not playing his match on time), or "you left before interview, we'll fine you what we feel like" (MbL in BoA3), and now "you broke an unspecified rule in an unspecified way, you are disqualified from now to forever." And the recourse these players have is essentially non-existent.

The natural reaction to this lack of accountability or recourse is to describe it as a moral wrong and insist that some "fair" mechanism be put in place to arbitrate disputes. Like the commissioner for baseball or something. Or in this case, at least let us know what the actual rule breaking was and what evidence supports it. But I don't see such a thing as practicable in any way, given the complete absence of centralization of tournament organizing and the small size of the scene.

I also don't think this is really necessary. In all the cases I mentioned, it was not in the financial or reputational interests of the administrators to make the decisions they made, particularly in the one under discussion. Bee is a popular player, there is no practical reason for them to want him not to show up except for fear that his cheating would be later exposed and thus tarnish the event. They look like jerks. They demonstrate their ability to execute arbitrary justice and their lack of accountability. And for me, this is good enough to trust them. There is no reason for them to do this except because it is true.

 

[Potkeny]

They can say, "you broke a rule, you lose the match" (Daniel for no camera, Bugum for not playing his match on time), or "you left before interview, we'll fine you what we feel like" (MbL in BoA3), and now "you broke an unspecified rule in an unspecified way, you are disqualified from now to forever." And the recourse these players have is essentially non-existent.

The difference is that in this case, it seems like MS/Relic was involved in the decision, so its less of a decision of the tournament admin(s) alone.

 

[Judgin]

Hi guys. Exactly 43 hours earlier it was declared that 3D!Bee is banned on RBW event. And no one gave us exact prove about that, tournament organizers only informed us. There was no replay analysis, logs of cheats or any other kind of its confirmation. The only prove source that we could find with VOD and replay study is here (from 05h 43min to 06h 30min): https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1576933818 There’s also MarineLorD’s letter but it does not have its own graphical materials about Bee cheating.

I’m Judgin, CIS AoE4 co-caster. And I’m here to show that all these arguments may not be valid (as part of in-game mechanics) and give CIS-community counter offer about that.

First of all, Beasty (author of video up there) is describing Bee’s ladder situation. He has 25 games on his main account and is not streaming. Bee often loses to players which are not highly rated, doesn’t like to play there. There is one of his proxy accounts found with lots of games played against Garnath. But… There were more of them.

His 2nd account is Khakimova5. Now we reveal it and its match history. Anyone may check it. There are lots of games, played vs Garnath, myself (judgin_z), Vinchester, PsiArc and some other people. And, if you look through its match history closely, you’ll see one easy pattern – there are only Red Bull Wololo maps. Five, ten, twenty times in a row against one same person. With 2 or 3 matchups. Over and over again.

That was his strategy which was supported by all of us. Idea was to cut all the extra ladder games which won’t get him (and any of his custom partners) closer to the tournament results. More than that, this strategy worked. Most of us (especially Bee and PsiArc) improved really hard and became stronger than we were before. So, there was no point in playing ladder for us.

Then Beasty describes him as a person who used VAC cheat in CS:GO and tells us that Bee is accused in cheating in sc2 (even though it was not confirmed). Of course, he doesn’t show any info. I have no info about CS, but through all CIS sc2-community Bee is well-known as one of the most mannered and logical players of all time. You may ask any of us, russsians or ukrainians – it doesn’t matter. You’ll get the same answer. Anyway, this can’t be considered as prove of any side.

Then we switch to stronger arguments. Beasty tells us that he plays against “different” Bee’s on ladder than in tournament matches. Easy explanation – every tournament game via Bee is played 50 times against weaker opponents (custom partners). While on ladder Beasty played over 50 times against weaker opponents while Bee comes up there once upon a month. So, it doesn’t mean anything.

After that we switch to four lakes’ games (6h 13 min in Beasty’s video). He shows us strange vill movement. Bee pulls one villager to the corner where Beasty builds proxy dock. Then, suddenly, Bee takes eight vills and builds a rax even before scouting his own dock. And it is easy to explain.

One vill comes to build a wall and starts from the further side of the lake. When Bee moves his camera – suddenly he sees red walls on his screen, unintentionally. These are traces of opponent’s walls and dock, and it is easy to spot (picture1 and picture 2)

When Bee sees these red things – he instantly pulls eight vills and builds a rax. Easy reaction. This experiment is easy to recreate on any hybrid map. More than that – if opponent proxy docks you a lot, you may check it all the time unintentionally, just building walls all over the place starting from the further ones.

Last argument: Bee often tries to check through fog of war to get deer vision. And some pros believe that it happens too often. But Beasty shows only two games (obviously not enough). More than that, strong players always try to switch their scout patterns as Rus when they see that deer pack is not able to cover all area of the map ahead. At least, I was talking with Bee long ago and he explained his scout patterns (when I again got no bounty on 4 lakes) exactly like that.

After that Beasty declares that Bee was not using his extra tools to get in-game advantage in last week. And… Bee wins the whole weekly again! How is it even possible, maphacker without a hack beating strongest of the strongest?

And the day after that disqualification happens.

I think that all of you understand that these proves are not that strong to ban a person without further explanation. So here is what we (as a CIS AoE4 community) are asking for:

1. Beastyqt and MLorD declared that there was a Microsoft investigation which led to logs of some kind of cheat being found in Bee’s AoE4 copy. Show these logs to us, AoE4 community. If they can do it and prove that they were taken from him – yeah, Bee is accused in cheating.
2. Ok, I see RBW-organizer message from 12:00 GMT 31.08 (about non-sharing further details of the case). Maybe these logs are not from Microsoft – they have their own materials. Or they can’t show these materials due to the NDA issues. But they can explain us how it is supposed to happen and give us any prove that Bee was using some type of mechanisms to cheat. If so – Bee is accused in cheating.
3. Ok, maybe info about such investigation is a misunderstanding, RBW banned him for lots of strange in-game moves. Then create a list of in-game moments which are really strange for you (more - better). After that we (or any neutral caster if they don’t believe us) create stream via any link you wish and let Bee speak for himself (as a caster’s point of view, I can remember one strange moment through all the July cups, while I commented all his games since ro16). If Bee shows that he is capable of explaining himself and there is no other evidence – they shall reestablish him as a Red Bull Wololo player. If he can’t - he is accused in cheating and remain banned.
4. RBW-organizers don’t do any of those moves and decline our request, leaving Bee as banned person. Then they put under threat trust between authors of this letter as a pro, amateur players and casters in the CIS region and them as a tournament organizer.

We kindly ask RBW organizers to think it over one last time and show us details of their investigation. At least, if Bee is really cheating, we want to be sure that we have all info we need to ban him from our future events to keep sportsmanship in our own tournaments clear.

Players and casters who agreed to put their signature under this text:

aTTpaktoPTV (CIS caster of AoE4)

Judgin (CIS co-caster of AoE4, RBW ro64 player)

Garnath (RBW ro32 player)

Deimos (RBW ro64 player)

Itarossa (RBW ro128 player)

Tosic (CIS-organizer of AoE4 tournaments)

Deneris (CIS-organizer of AoE4 tournaments)

Dark (ro24 AoE2 RBW player)

 

[fenrir5]

These opaque directions really are bad for the future of the game. Especially in a game that is still technically "unfinished". In AoE2, for years we've been hearing casters constantly talking about Viper getting favourable maps and yet he is a legend(no questioning it of course).

All these recent issues of "Guilty until proven otherwise" are just absolutely wrong. In AoE2, there are so many unique players who just came into the game and made a difference to how people thought of the meta.. Vivi, Hoang, MBL, Lyx, Tatoh, Rubenstock to name a few. A few top player giving their perspective on whats not norma in a game that is still being developed cannot be proof of wrong doing. Give the players the benefit of doubt unless there is clear issue of breach. Wrongdoers always tend to go all the way (e.g., ertug in AoE2) Bee!3d has been shown and backed as a hardworking guy with real ability to stay at the top. Know the difference

 

[plfan]

I don't know the game that well, but I heard interview with Bee. He told that he didn't use map hack and all he was doing was hearing sounds behind fog of war. Is is possible in aoe4? and does that clear up all doubts about him? Or there is something else.

Anyway, EGCTV or Redbull really should show some evidences. It's too big event for suspicious bans. Besides, this ban can destroy his career, so it's better to be 100% sure when making such decisions

 

[_Andrew]

Some controversy to boost interest. Noice

This was my initial reaction too.

 

[TheShaunPlays]

Transparency is key IMO. I can't think of a reason why you can't show the proof unless exposing the evidence will make the method obsolete for future cases. Even then I think it's important to explain this to fans. Not, this player got banned, source trust me bro. AOE is a great community but there's been a lack of transparency lately in certain areas that's been nagging at me.

 

[oozkan]

Several of the recs and suspicious games are linked in the posts from ML and others
You can boot them up in AoE4 and watch Bees PoV for yourself

 

[Seahorsegallop]

Very little interest in AOE4 but I do invest a huge amount (too much) time watching and enjoying AOE2.

My issue here is that I want to watch fair games and would hate to find out later that x was cheating when they won. That would leave a very bad taste in the mouth and take away the great pleasure of watching pros play.

To ban a player and accuse them of rule breaking is extremely serious, for top players it is more than "just a game" it's a way of life and possibly sole or main source of income.

Therefore before publicly labelling a player as a cheater the proof must be there, must be available - if not publicly at least to someone or some body to confirm. In a small eSport like this that may just be a panel of players/tournament organisers - I don't know. Or if Microsoft/Relic confirm they have proof of cheating that is code based, not just seeing funny game-play or weird moves.

If there is no proof of cheating and palisade scanning or "listening" in the fog or war is the crime - then that's rule breaking, needs to be called as such and punish the player accordingly, but don't label them as a cheater.

I don't know Bee, never watched Bee and have no axe to grind. I just want him to be banned permanently for a VALID reason or reinstated and receive an apology if he was not cheating.

 

[TopperHarley]

Considering how boring it is to play aoe4, I can understand why Bee preferred using maphacks rather than grinding this game to get better

 

[Giuseppe551]

For BOA we were told that players' POVs and immediate surroundings were being monitored during the games. Is that not an option for this tournament which has 10x the prize pool? I really don't see how you could maphack if those measures were in place.

 

[Hunyadi_]

Imagine cheating in a dead game

 

[RAY]

The AOE4 Fog of War hack looks like it's receiving constant updates, it's unfortunate how it will make players distrustful of each other, whether it's true in this specific case or not.

 

[Tempires]

For BOA we were told that players' POVs and immediate surroundings were being monitored during the games. Is that not an option for this tournament which has 10x the prize pool? I really don't see how you could maphack if those measures were in place.

Road to Wololo series are B-A tier tournaments with 2k-4k price pools. Weekly ones can have +300 players over 3 days so might be bit time consuming for kidy EGC to monitor everything. on LAN there is no issues as everyone is in person so visual cheating is very hard.

 

[SuperskinnyBLS]

Imagine cheating in a dead game

You should have seen CodUO 1.4.....

 

[Zbyszek]

Having said that, even if we take Bee at his word and he was "only" palisade scanning and listening to sounds through the fog of war, he still should have reported the bug or asked one of the admins if using it was allowed. Just feels weird that he'll now be known as a convicted cheater instead of someone who abuses bugs (if that's indeed true).

If you apply that logic to aoe 2 then you would need a list of allowed bugs. otherwhise players would have had to ask every game if they could use mangonel delete or palisade scanning.
so ye i think this makes no sense.

 

[robo]

If you apply that logic to aoe 2 then you would need a list of allowed bugs. otherwhise players would have had to ask every game if they could use mangonel delete or palisade scanning.
so ye i think this makes no sense.

If either of those bugs were newly discovered today I would ban them from events and expect players to report them, but as they have been around for many years they were grandfathered into allowed play.

 

[Whitecourt]

They need to check him pc

 

[nimanoe]

Bee's statement:

 

[malamadre]

From what I heard from some videos of pros and interview it seems that all this situation could be avoided if there werent so so many bugs and exploits in the game.

Also there was some Kasva drama which involved exploits...
Lmao instead of releasing new civs why dont you fix the stupid game.

 

[TopperHarley]

I havent see clear proof that Bee cheated, so we should really treat him as innocent until proven guilty.

Most likely, he will remain banned from RB Legacy, however we should stay away from treating him as a persona non grata.

Punishing/banning someone without proof of his wrongdoing just smells very much like witch-hunt to me

 

[Tempires]

From what I heard from some videos of pros and interview it seems that all this situation could be avoided if there werent so so many bugs and exploits in the game.

Also there was some Kasva drama which involved exploits...
Lmao instead of releasing new civs why dont you fix the stupid game.

These same things have been in aoe2: palisade scanning(fixed lately), straggler laming, seeing trees being cut in fog of war(fixed lately), Depleted resources dissappearing in minimap(fixed in latest update), deers and boars running in fog of war...

Note that palisade scanning is not considered(at least not yet) bug/exploit by dev team in aoe4, only by redbull/EGC. Meanwhile hacking is another thing that happening in both games

 

[felix.feroc]

I havent see clear proof that Bee cheated, so we should really treat him as innocent until proven guilty.

Most likely, he will remain banned from RB Legacy, however we should stay away from treating him as a persona non grata.

Punishing/banning someone without proof of his wrongdoing just smells very much like witch-hunt to me

While I respect the feelings behind these comments, I am a little confused by their implications.

First, who is "we", and what does it mean for "us" to not treat him as guilty? As far as the commentary I have seen, Bee has been treated with kid gloves, and the worst said about him is that we trust the admins and sponsors to be acting in good faith and with due diligence. What are you seeing that makes you feel like "we" (however defined) are treating him as guilty? Refusing to allow him to register for the AoE IV tournaments that none of us are organizing?

Second, the I find the idea that Bee is the object of a witch-hunt to be a little implausible. The closest thing to an explanation (outside of genuine rule-breaking) I have heard is that he is Russian, but Vinchester's invitation seems to contradict that theory. The idea that there is some hidden reason, and that the fact that we don't have any idea what it is because it is so well hidden, strikes me as unproductive, as it is consistent with no hidden agenda. If a pattern develops of admins disqualifying popular players for cheating, then I might be convinced that a sinister conspiracy exists, but this is the first time I have heard of such a thing happening. I hear more often that someone should be banned for cheating but are not.