Accept Your Quest. Collect The Fallen. Win an XBOX360 or PS3!

[s0osleepie]

For those concerned about cheating, yes we check for shenanigans, and will check again before picking winners.

For those reporting problems with clicking not registering, we've tested with Firefox, Chrome, and IE. As some of you have guessed, it's similar code to the red button, and that was found to have successfully worked (afflicted, most would say) on a great many browsers. While I don't recommend testing your browser via the red button, that might be one thing to try.

 

[Kross]

If you hit my servers with a bot that doesn't respect robots.txt, I will firewall your IP range indefinitely. I don't enjoy having to deal with one user churning multiple pages a second for hours at a time.

Sorry, please do it the hard way.

 

[s0osleepie]

That can't be legit. D:

Now, it was funny when S0osleepie made herself be at +2000 points for a few minutes at first, but they are not mods.

We should pester Kross to look at their browsing histories for proof of something not physically possible under legit means.

Do not worry. If we find ANY cheaters, they will be disqualified and the leaderboard will be adjusted before we pick winners. Thankfully, it doesn't take any pestering to get Kross to find someone messing with our servers


(And, yes. I am funny. Hehe.)

 

[s0osleepie]

on an badge related note, I'm curious about the "7 badges" that are supposedly available for this contest. So far I only see the four fallen angels, unless the remaining three badges are going to the console winners. I'm just curious.

There are a total of 5 badges. Only 4 of them are the Fallen Angels. Everyone is able to collect all 5 badges. There will be no "winner only" badge.

I hope this helps clarify

 

[Erana]

That can't be legit. D:

Now, it was funny when S0osleepie made herself be at +2000 points for a few minutes at first, but they are not mods.

We should pester Kross to look at their browsing histories for proof of something not physically possible under legit means.

Do not worry. If we find ANY cheaters, they will be disqualified and the leaderboard will be adjusted before we pick winners. Thankfully, it doesn't take any pestering to get Kross to find someone messing with our servers


(And, yes. I am funny. Hehe.)

But...
I'm averaging .7 (gone through over 100 now) for badges per page of the user search. I am able to get through eleven pages in an hour. There are 276 pages of American users in the user search alone. That averages to 25 hours and 193.2 badges.
Even if Psau went at double my rate, that would still be 12 hours for less than 200 badges. And then she claims to have gotten 250 from the user search and about 250 from looking in "whose online."
Which means she's went through more than every American Escpaist.
In a maximum of 35 hours, (assuming she had joined exactly at midnight) though she had +625 before making this post. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/6.303473-Accept-Your-Quest-Collect-The-Fallen-Win-an-XBOX360-or-PS3?page=4#12169792] That's at about 18 badges an hour, with no rest whatsoever.

I'm not saying it is physically impossible, but what could make someone that efficient?

My hits per hour don't even get half that.
What am I doing wrong?

 

[s0osleepie]

That can't be legit. D:

Now, it was funny when S0osleepie made herself be at +2000 points for a few minutes at first, but they are not mods.

We should pester Kross to look at their browsing histories for proof of something not physically possible under legit means.

Do not worry. If we find ANY cheaters, they will be disqualified and the leaderboard will be adjusted before we pick winners. Thankfully, it doesn't take any pestering to get Kross to find someone messing with our servers


(And, yes. I am funny. Hehe.)

But...
I'm averaging .7 (gone through over 100 now) for badges per page of the user search. I am able to get through eleven pages in an hour. There are 276 pages of American users in the user search alone. That averages to 25 hours and 193.2 badges.
Even if Psau went at double my rate, that would still be 12 hours for less than 200 badges. And then she claims to have gotten 250 from the user search and about 250 from looking in "whose online."
Which means she's went through more than every American Escpaist.
In a maximum of 35 hours, (assuming she had joined exactly at midnight) though she had +625 before making this post. [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/6.303473-Accept-Your-Quest-Collect-The-Fallen-Win-an-XBOX360-or-PS3?page=4#12169792] That's at about 18 badges an hour, with no rest whatsoever.

I'm not saying it is physically impossible, but what could make someone that efficient?

My hits per hour don't even get half that.
What am I doing wrong?

As stated, we're actively checking. We may or may not remove offenders immediately, depending on how much rope we want to give them before hanging themselves. ISP abuse departments like large reports to append to a file before taking action, so occasionally we'll wait until we gather a decent size one to throw at them.

 

[gradiusman]

I can't access the site with my computer anymore. I'm using my phone and 3G right now because when I use wi-fi it won't connect to The Escapist.

As near as I can figure my IP is being blocked by The Escapist, but I haven't done anything to warrant that. So I don't want to jump to conclusions.

And it is really hard to do this all on an iPhone.

 

[Kross]

I can't access the site with my computer anymore. I'm using my phone and 3G right now because when I use wi-fi it won't connect to The Escapist.

As near as I can figure my IP is being blocked by The Escapist, but I haven't done anything to warrant that. So I don't want to jump to conclusions.

And it is really hard to do this all on an iPhone.

You've been a mighty fast clicker. You were firewalled for hammering the site in a manner multiple times a second for several thousand page views (you were actually at the bottom of my list of worst offenders).

It looks like you got caught for hitting it over multiple time periods that together looked like an attack. I've removed the block for now (on everyone who may have been firewalled today - about 7 ip ranges), and will review my records tomorrow.

Psau is super disqualified however. He wrote a crawler that was hitting our user profiles at an egregious rate, and then started trying to use proxies when he got blocked.

 

[gradiusman]

Oh, thank you for reinstating me.

I was honestly just opening multiple tabs at once and going through them sequentially.

 

[Catolf]

Psau is super disqualified however. He wrote a crawler that was hitting our user profiles at an egregious rate, and then started trying to use proxies when he got blocked.

.. .. What? Are you serious?? I literally thought maybe there was a chance the User was cheating but I didn't want to jump the gun to assume anything. But, to find out that the User was cheating?? Why..? Wow, that's pretty low because while us Users worked our butts off trying to find Users and take hours to do so- this User uses a 'crawler' or whatever the crap that is.

Thank you Kross and paulgruberman for looking into this to make the competition fair. I mean, seriously.. I was really upset with myself thinking that how could the User find over 700 while I couldn't find more then 2-3 within an hour or so. So yeah, even if this sounds like I am kissing butt, I am just saying thank you for making this fair for everyone.

Holy crap, I knew something was up, thanks for telling us this, makes me feel a little better that i have a chance again.

 

[Jhoomaso]

Thats the same thing I do, Gradiusman, I pretty much have been going through the user search, opening 50 tabs per page, and going through each and every single profile looking for those damn badges, my comp doesnt like it though from all the ads, so it sometimes freezes up, lol. I've spent so many hours doing it. Im just glad Im a night person, so when Im doing it, Im not really seeing anyone elses numbers changing constantly lol.

 

[8bitlove2a03]

Psau is super disqualified however. He wrote a crawler that was hitting our user profiles at an egregious rate, and then started trying to use proxies when he got blocked.

[color=008080]JUST1C3 1S S3RV3D.[/color]

 

[UltraDolphins]

Oh, thank you for reinstating me.

I was honestly just opening multiple tabs at once and going through them sequentially.

Yea same way I do it which is why I'm a tad worried. They seem to really be working to clear this contest up so if you're not guilty you should be just fine.

On a lighter note I'm curious what console the other users want if they win and why they want it so bad. I know 8bit there needs to replace his xbox for skyrim which is quite the reason to want to win. My cause isn't so noble really. I'm just a pc gamer looking to get a ps3 and stop getting left out of all the console only games.

Well everyone... what are your reasons?

 

[CoreInversion]

At this point, I'd like to disqualify myself as well. I made a crawler that explored based on the friend network (mostly as a coding exercise and for my own amusement). I apologize to Kross and whoever else for hammering the servers. I won't do it again.

Chances are the mods already knew all this, but I figure honesty's nice too.

EDIT: I'm pretty impressed by the other people who got to ~200-300 legitimately. I tried that as well to see how fast it was, and even using an extension that let me open a bunch of tabs at once, it was only maybe 20-30 badges per hour.

 

[Alpha1Niner]

@UltraDolphins & @gradiusman: That's how you get it done efficiently. And for my reason, my last two Xboxs have broken down (Red Ring of Death). I'm left with several controllers, a dozen games, and no Xbox to play them on.

@CoreInversion: You have restored some of my faith in humanity. I thought taking responsibility for one's own actions had been extinct. I thank you.

 

[matthewgarcia]

Thats the same thing I do, Gradiusman, I pretty much have been going through the user search, opening 50 tabs per page, and going through each and every single profile looking for those damn badges, my comp doesnt like it though from all the ads, so it sometimes freezes up, lol. I've spent so many hours doing it. Im just glad Im a night person, so when Im doing it, Im not really seeing anyone elses numbers changing constantly lol.

Same here, though I'll probably slow it down a bit now so I don't overload their servers with my mad Command+click skills haha, besides we're fairly safely in the top 20 anyways so I can probably give my trigger finger a rest

 

[8bitlove2a03]

Oh, thank you for reinstating me.

I was honestly just opening multiple tabs at once and going through them sequentially.

This is how I've been doing it too. I'm surprised I haven't been disqualified as well, if that's what got you bumped off

 

[UltraDolphins]

@Alpha1Niner I was going to post something similar but I didn't want to sound like I was speaking for the group. I agree with you on that one.

Also your xbox troubles make me sound a little greedy haha. Seems like some pretty good reasons to click around for hours... well besides mine anyway.

 

[matthewgarcia]

@UltraDolphins as with you my cause isn't quite so noble I already have a 360 I want a PS3 so I can play some games with my other friends that only have PS3's since their 360's red ringed hah

 

[gradiusman]

My reasons for wanting the Grand Prize aren't all that noble either. I want the PS3, but I already own one. It just happens to be an original 60GB model that is still going perfectly after however many years.

I want a newer PS3 just to use for current games so I don't risk breaking mine so quickly, but I'd be perfectly happy to just win a copy of the game.