Casual controversy

[Grandpa]

How about instead of wasting your time on finding things that may not even be there and mad theories (and even if it is there, there is nothing to gain here for anyone except tusic, and barely even anything for him) And actually practise so you CAN become this good someday, does jumping really have to sink this low? I mean, if you can't even think to yourself, maybe he is just really good and I'll just let it be instead of going on a witchhunt AGAIN, how long will it take before EVERY run is considered "fishy"

Most of these theories are just as ridiculous as pub players screaming "STOP HACKING, THIS CANT BE REAL" when someone hits a couple of headshots in a row.

and again
there is nothing to gain here for anyone

You're not contributing anything to the discussion at hand. Saying what is the essence of "git gud" isnt helping.

Some of us think it's a bit weird, whats wrong with discussing that? Maybe we're wrong, maybe we're right, who knows? Thats what some users here are talking about.

[Oatmeal]

How about instead of wasting your time on finding things that may not even be there and mad theories (and even if it is there, there is nothing to gain here for anyone except tusic, and barely even anything for him) And actually practise so you CAN become this good someday, does jumping really have to sink this low? I mean, if you can't even think to yourself, maybe he is just really good and I'll just let it be instead of going on a witchhunt AGAIN, how long will it take before EVERY run is considered "fishy"

Most of these theories are just as ridiculous as pub players screaming "STOP HACKING, THIS CANT BE REAL" when someone hits a couple of headshots in a row.

and again
there is nothing to gain here for anyone

I can understand, and maybe you can too, why people who compete with each other for the best speed run times on maps don't want to compete against cheaters. It would be extremely unfair if a cheater competes in let's say Beginnings 2014 or other contests where he might actually win prizes.

And if that guy really is involved with websites dedicated to cheating and posted guides about manipulating tf2 demos, then I would say it's actually a matter worth looking into and not just a "witch hunt" based on nothing but jealousy. 

[Shunix]

How about instead of wasting your time on finding things that may not even be there and mad theories (and even if it is there, there is nothing to gain here for anyone except tusic, and barely even anything for him) And actually practise so you CAN become this good someday, does jumping really have to sink this low? I mean, if you can't even think to yourself, maybe he is just really good and I'll just let it be instead of going on a witchhunt AGAIN, how long will it take before EVERY run is considered "fishy"

Most of these theories are just as ridiculous as pub players screaming "STOP HACKING, THIS CANT BE REAL" when someone hits a couple of headshots in a row.

and again
there is nothing to gain here for anyone

apart from the times that people wont be able to get now and potential loss of winnings from competitions :/

either way he could just prove he is real by jumping online or streaming him jumping live

[Bonafide]

[tyjle]

Im just sad that there are people who cheat like this, that we have to have this discussion. And when bonafire says there is nothing to gain, think of all the contests that could be cheated. And if these demos can be modified it becomes nearly impossible to tell what is real and what isn't. If this is a threat we have to have people to check to make sure the demo is legit. And even then, there might be people who have a legit run disqualified because it looks "fishy". I can't believe people have stooped this low for a few thousand views on a video.

[ReMaXeD]

I think most people still consider tusic the world record holder 

[obsidiian]

So this raises an issue for Beginnings 2 or Beginnings 2014, whatever you want to call it (I'm calling it BG2).  Should "fishy" runs be banned from the competition?  And if so, what qualifies a run as being fishy?  I think that banning a run for being "too good" would be degrading to competition and unfair to whoever may have played that map over and over to get a legit run, only to have it banned for being better than other people.

Currently I am leaning towards allowing all runs unless there is obvious proof or large amounts of evidence in favor of the ban.  Considering that there is a large amount of proof linking Casual to hacking and interesting in jumping while still developing hacks, I would ban any of Casual's runs from competition.  However, if the website had never been discovered I would allow Casual to run as there would be no proof other than people saying the run is too good to be true.

tldr - What would make a run fishy enough to be banned from Beginnings 2?

[Vexon]

So I got invited to join a IP casual put up....in STV, and cody was there watching him cheat runs, doing the same exact Skylight run with a shotgun or something (I was only in there for about 2 minutes so I don't have a full story)...evidently every tic teleports him, and damage indicators were edited into the demo. HE DID A FLAWLESS MAP WITH A SHOTGUN.

Guess I wasn't supposed to talk to cody but i did... just in case anyone is interested, I'll post the chat logs...not sure how balls deep cody is into this, or if he was going to say something about the demo itself.

Chatlogs:

5:37 PM - cody alle's cheerleader: hello
5:37 PM - Not Vexon: hey so what just happened??
5:38 PM - cody alle's cheerleader: what do you mean
5:38 PM - Not Vexon: i got told to join the IP of the STV or whatever
5:38 PM - Not Vexon: and i guess it was casual cheating or something idk
5:38 PM - Not Vexon: i was only there like 10 seconds
5:40 PM - cody alle's cheerleader: lol
5:40 PM - cody alle's cheerleader: he doesnt cheat
5:40 PM - Not Vexon: he did a map with a shotgun i heard
5:40 PM - Not Vexon: cause every tic tele ports him or some shit
5:41 PM - Not Vexon: y are you tryna save his arse?
5:43 PM - cody alle's cheerleader: i guess the jig is up huh
5:43 PM - Not Vexon: i guess
5:43 PM - Not Vexon: lol
5:43 PM - cody alle's cheerleader: LOL
5:43 PM - Not Vexon: just tryna find out why you are covering for him u kno
5:43 PM - Not Vexon has changed their name to Vexon.
5:43 PM - Vexon: either way idgaf
5:43 PM - Vexon: even though he had a ot run his strats or w/e, was a fun run to watch
5:44 PM - cody alle's cheerleader: mmhm
5:44 PM - cody alle's cheerleader:
5:44 PM - cody alle's cheerleader: who told you
5:44 PM - cody alle's cheerleader: to join the stv
5:44 PM - Vexon: im gonna say one thing, i aint about to be involved is some stupid ass jump drama, so this is the last ill say about it and the last we talk about it.
5:45 PM - cody alle's cheerleader: its not drama
5:45 PM - Vexon: its gonna b
5:45 PM - cody alle's cheerleader: just a bunch of mad nerds
5:45 PM - Vexon: lol

[Vexon]

A couple of people got some demos I guess, so we'll just have to wait or something.
I mean if CasualHacks.net didn't give it away in the first place..lol

[Lockeguy]

I caught him and Cody on a server doing a few jump maps before they shut down the STV; he was doing the first jump terribly like a minute prior to when I started the demo, but after I started the demo, this is what I got: https://www.dropbox.com/s/pgz58uykwgqz6k7/casual_air_beta2.dem?dl=0 It's kind of obvious that he has some kind of hack he's doing, but still getting away with it.

[RNC1839]

Well casual beat the beginnings rotw's by 1:15.3 (ultra) and 52.8 (skylight) that's basically a 30% increase on both maps. If we have a bunch of high level jumpers all running the maps and the gap between 1st and 2nd is more than 10% of the total time I would call that really fishy. Unless 2nd place really fucked the run up.

I wouldn't ban casual from the competition unless he can manage this kind of run. Another thing to note is that these maps have been out for months so he's had time to perfect his runs. I'm not sure he could perfect a run in 1 week.

I  started typing before Vexon's post so I will reply.

That does explain the bizarre viewmodel fps drop half way through the demo and his config having cl_autoreload 1 but his actual run having cl_autoreload 0

IMO Casual and Cody should be banned from beginnings. Casual for cheating, Cody for corroborating.

[obsidiian]

I'm talking with Casual himself as I type this.  He's currently writing up an explanation of his runs and the tools used in them.  In the meantime, I will be locking the thread until he has finished explaining to prevent a huge blow-up of false information and speculation.

[Casual]

Well, so much for that.

First, I'd like to apologize for not being entirely honest about the speedruns.

When Beginnings happened I was really excited (I donated a bunch of metal to the prize pool) to see some really good speedruns on brand new maps. As the competition advanced I was kind of disappointed, I was hoping for more crazy strategies, so the idea came to me that I could make a plugin that could allow the 'perfect' runs to be created.

While developing I went back to the beginnings maps because that's where it all started. They were designed for speedrunning and designed with shortcuts that could be exploited to their fullest potential. Void was the first for being my favourite map of the series.

At that point nobody knew, but after finishing the void run I asked some people what they thought about it. I wanted to release this TAS tool so anyone could create an amazing speedrun. If I can do what you've seen in the videos, imagine what really good jumpers could come up with!

They really liked the idea of TAS! Unfortunately they didn't like the idea of releasing this tool because it would somehow 'ruin the jumping community' even when I assured them that I'd take as much measures as possible to prevent someone from trying to pass off TAS as legit speedruns.

However I was still sitting on the void run and had no intention to let all this work stay in the dark. The only alternative was to release the speedruns passing them off as legit. And thus the demos were released and the rest is history.

The void run, the ultra run and the recent skylight run are tool assisted. These runs are 100% possible in vanilla TF2. I was able to go back to a previous state and keep trying to get the jumps just right. I would never make the TAS slower on purpose just to make them more legit (as this would violate everything TAS stands for) even though this would raise a lot of questions.

With this I intend to publicly release the plugin so others may use it to create TAS. I will do everything within my ability to prevent people from passing TAS for legit speedruns but I believe it is worth it as this plugin could bring much needed refreshment to the TF2 jumping community.

In the end, TAS is about entertaining the viewer while pushing the game to its limits and beyond and I hope  I was able to provide a glimps into the potential future of TF2 speedrunning.

[Melon]

so it's gonna be released....i'm looking forward to seeing where this goes

[Zigzati]

Same. I'm really excited to see the kind of crazy shit that people come up with.