As this seems to have went off the rails the last few days, and the HD recruiting “exploit” has been made public knowledge, I feel like we need to address the community sooner than I had hoped.
As of this morning 11/2/22 at roughly 10am EST we have patched the now known “exploit” as well as potential others. Before going into the details of our investigation, I want to make it clear that given the nature of the "exploit", the patch will directly impact and change what
EVERYONE has come to expect from some of recruiting actions (some for better, some for worse).
Investigation into recruiting “Exploit” Findings:
Negative recruiting actions (inform of redshirt, withdraw scholarship, mins, start) are not tabulated appropriately compared to their inverse actions. (withdraw inform of redshirt, offer scholarship, start, min). Most cases this is not an issue, but particularly for inform of RS and then withdrawal provides a large advantage as it can be done from the start of recruiting. This provides a free equivalent boost of as much as 80 or so AP depending on recruiting action multiplier, where a scholarship offer can be locked up within a few cycles.
I don’t think it’s a surprise how recruiting works. Every “action” has a base value, and things like division, prestige, and recruiting preferences are combined to create a multiplier, that higher or lower these base values and how they are perceived by a recruit.
The reason this “exploit” is possible, is the previous development team appears to have wanted to put a limit on the amount a negative recruiting action can take you in the eyes of the recruit. I believe this was done to actually help non elite programs, be able to recover from changes in recruiting without being totally buried negatively on recruits, with limited resources to recover. However, the limit was applied in the opposite direction. Allowing teams with higher recruiting boosts to have a limit placed on negative recruiting actions, while lower rated teams take on the full penalty.
Given how this limiting factor was designated, it is an exploit that would have been available to most of Div2 (with decent prefs) and basically all of Div1. However, this is very unlikely to work in Div3.
As a patch, everyone is now on more equal footing relative to their recruiting multiplier rather than playing by different rules. I will admit, this has been updated sooner than I would have hoped, with only a few days of testing, but the exploit being made public forced our hand. We will look to make adjustments accordingly, but I believe this is the most fair for now. (certainly more fair than before).
However, as I stated, be aware many of you will have what you have come to know and expect in recruiting changed. For instance, jumping out ahead on a recruit and dropping mins promises, or removing a scholarship offer (waiting for it to play out) then re-applying will not have the same end result as before (
for many of you).
For situational awareness, here is what the end result was for utilizing the “exploit” before the patch and after.
Before:
(low rating) inform redshirt, take away redshirt end result: -1700AP
(high rating) inform redshirt, take away redshirt end result: +80AP
After:
(low rating) inform redshirt, take away redshirt end result: -30AP
(high rating) inform redshirt, take away redshirt end result: -30AP
I also want to clear the air on some confusion regarding RS promises in recruiting. Some have suggested the “withdraw inform of redshirt” is the same as guaranteeing the player you will not redshirt, hence a net positive action. That is not the case. Even after withdrawing the inform, after they join your roster, you may still redshirt them. This is the equivalent of having a team interested in you saying they are going to “guarantee they redshirt you” and then changing mind to “Not guarantee they redshirt you” maybe slightly better for you as a recruit but still a net negative action. You still have same chances of getting redshirted as any recruit/signee but they already screwed around with you saying they were gonna RS you. -30 ap (or base points) seems fair to me for a penalty for everyone to recover from.
Our findings for users utilizing the “exploit”
Going back through recruiting actions this year, thankfully there are *only 6 players that “stand out” in terms of number of negative actions used and reversed just this year. (Since jan 2022)
# of times Redshirt exploit used since Jan ‘22
Swenske04 – 665
Robinhood410 – 109
Bdashkiwsky – 52
Cimmy426 -46
Doogan-14
*the next highest and several hundred users did this 4-5 times (so probably not aware of exploit but normal use).
The initial ban was just including
Swenske04, Robinhood410, Bdashkiwsky, cimmy426. Even though
doogan was using it 3x more than the average user, it was low enough that maybe was anomaly or strange last few recruiting cycles. So we planned to ignore. It was discovered that
Robinhood410 and cimmy426 were related (somehow). In the next day or so there was also made aware that
doogan was also a “family member” or same person. Which unfortunately directly implicated them in knowing about the “exploit” so we decided to then take action on all accounts. For right now, an indefinite ban is in place on these accounts.
I want it to be known that all banned users have came forward and have been very cordial during our investigation. Long before any of our current staff have been on board, (3 years ago) cimmy had actually sent in a ticket to the previous development team suggesting they believed they witnessed this exploit occur. Unfortunately, HD clears recruiting actions at the end of recruiting so it is really difficult to spot check. I believe the previous dev team had chalked it up as a high rated team going after a low level recruit and was able to win them over quickly, and couldn’t really investigate the matter, and as their had been no prior reports probably didn’t think to investigate much further.
However, the CS team did note that if they witness this during recruiting again to please reach out so that the data could actually be looked at. Unfortunately, it appears that this was continued to be used, and there was no notification to CS. Not only was it used, but appears to have been kept secret within “family” (or alt accounts) and used 20X+ more than an average user stumbling across it.
Given the shear numbers, I can’t bring myself to accept user ignorance or the concept that it was risk/reward game. Anything in D1/D2 with decent prefs would provide these benefits. However, having said that, the fact that it was (sort of) brought to CS attention is noteworthy. So we are still investigating and evaluating penalties on some users.
And lastly, I want to thank the community for their passion. You guys are truly the heart of WhatIfSports and we are lucky to have a fantastic user base like you all. We are extremely fortunate to have users such as Benis that have the desire and thoughtfulness to go through the data and bring things that “seem off” to our attention to ultimately improve the games and experiences for all.
Having said that, I do want to caution against this approach in the future, and approach CS solely and allow us to investigate and have time to do so. Sometimes with their passion, also comes large emotions from the community. I think if we let emotions lead way before facts are established, we can fall off the rails and quickly, and cause hysteria. As it is now, our CS team gets at least a couple accusations of cheating a week. Including against some of the top players that were leading the charge against this “exploit” (likely because they are strong coaches that beat another team). However, if we set the precedent of causing an 20+ page forum before facts are presented, we are going to tear this great community and game apart. And it might just be a mob coming for you next time before facts are established. That was just an aside an my two cents.
We as staff just want to have the time to do a and investigate a few things when something like this happens. 1) is there indeed an exploit 2.) if so, how do we fix it 3.) How wide spread is it 4.) what was intent of users 5.) assess penalty.
I believe it is fair to all in the future to allow us to step through this process behind the scenes and take appropriate action.
Thank you again to all, for your passion and keeping this game going.
P.S. Due to his efforts, Benis has been officially enshrined in our great game, by placing the stake in the heart of one of the larger cheating scandals in HD history. Check out the PG for Swenske04s old team.
https://www.whatifsports.com/hd/PlayerProfile/Ratings.aspx?tid=0&pid=5185517
*****[UPDATE 11/3/22]
After reviewing all aspects of the situation and having candid conversations with r
obinhood410, cimmy4226, bdashkiwky, and doogan, we (site staff) have agreed on a final solution. We are reinstating the aforementioned accounts *but all of the accounts have been reset and all previous HD accolades removed. The users are starting from scratch. These users have had multiple other site users come forward on their behalf and vouch for them, and particularly their positive impact on the HBD community. Although we believe there was wrong doing on their behalf, it is something they have taken full accountability for. They have been willing to have open dialog explaining and owning up to the situation with all members of the community. We believe this this "punishment" is just and fair. They are still able to continue being positive influences and pillars in the HBD community (if they choose), and if they choose to return to HD it will be from the beginning. (same position they would be in if they created a new account to start over).
Lastly, one other thing that has come out of this all is the question regarding family members. We completely understand (in fact are happy to hear) the desire to share your WhatIfSports passion and experiences with family and friends. However, I also want it to be clear, we should be upfront about all our relationships to other users (particularly same conferences, worlds in HBD, etc). As site staff we take accusations of collusion very seriously, however, they can be very difficult to investigate, particularly by those who "know" each other offline, or are in fact users with multiple accounts. Its very hard for staff to validate father/sons who use same computer and billing information in same house are different people, or family/friends aren't talking or texting about colluding during recruiting. We have been overly cautious in these circumstances forcing users to remove themselves from teams, or banning accounts, and lettings community know. We want you to be able to play competitively vs family and real life friends but we have to make sure the many players you are competing against online are at least aware of these relationships.
Again thank you everyone for your passion and willingness to allow staff to properly review all facts and make a ruling.
****[END UPDATE]
Regards,
-Chris
WhatIfSports