Valve bans Dota 2 team from The International for using programmable mouse. - Sensationalist Headlines

https://www.pcgamer.com/valve-bans-dota-2-team-from-the-international-for-using-programmable-mouse/?utm_content=buffer913d7&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&utm_campaign=buffer_pcgamerfb I... Dont know how I feel about this.

This is actually very retarded, as someone whose used them for years, the 'advantage' you get is pretty much nothing

Depends how extensive it is, I know the logitech programmable mouse stuff can literally use lua scripting. Looking at the footage it does look pretty suspect, but I'm pretty sure I remember being able to action group meepo clones and teleporting em in like that? Haven't played dota 2 in years though.

Funny, I would of thought using a Razer mouse would be considered a handicap

From another thread: Bit of a clickbait title here. They got banned because AtuuN used macros that let him do multiple actions instantly with a single key press, not because of the mouse itself. From the article: Thunder Predator's AtuuN is said to have selected Meepo—a Geomancer, who is billed as "one of the hardest carries in the game to play effectively due to his heavy reliance on micromanagement." Meepo can create clones of himself, and when each clone teleports, they deal damage in the surrounding area. And while this cloning method can be a powerful means of offence, said micromanagement means each clone must be instructed individually. Motherboard links to this YouTube clip of AtuuN effortlessly directing Meepo clones around the map during the third game. This caught the attention of the Dota 2 subreddit, who in turn accused AtuuN of leveraging a software macro—a process that lets players roll complex button combos into fewer/single clicks. Combat logs (see above) showed that AtuuN teleported Meepo clones at the exact same time. This process would normally take players several seconds—they'd otherwise need to instruct each Meepo individually—but Thunder Predator denied using macros. It did, however, concede that a programmable mouse may be at fault—a Razer Synapse 3.

That makes a lot more sense than the clickbaity title let on. It's a distinct advantage since it's something that is physically impossible by normal human inputs. You're playing in a professional tournament on a pro team, you have to know something like that would be illegal.

On the plus side, this is great advertisement for programmable mice.

Kinda surprised it isn't like a lot of CS LANs where you have to specify to the TO what gear you want and they provide it new in box from the manufacturer; as well as providing all your configs to the admins for examination. There's literally zero way this should have even been allowed to happen if he was using TO gear and someone had checked his configs.

Also, there is no such thing as a "Razer Synapse 3 Mouse" Synapse is the software used to configure pretty much all Razer peripherals. That'd be like saying "Nvidia's newest GPU- a GTX Geforce Experience."

What do they even do exactly

one example usecase of a programmable mouse is for the game 'Dota 2', with the Meepo hero you can 'clone' yourself into two and control them separately. Normally this is really hard but you could program your mouse to make it easier.

You can program in macros, which means you can click a button once and have the mouse send your computer a predetermined sequence of mouse movements, clicks and keystrokes.

In an alternate universe where Disney owns Nvidia this is real.

You literally ripped that from the article and didn't even answer his question at all. What AtomicSans said is perfectly accurate though

It's South America, they regularly throw games for fixed bets. They just do not care.

did you even read the article? lol i was being a tiny bit goofy but I still answered his question

Yeah I'm not unsatisfied with that answer at all

if valve doesn't want macros to be a part of the game then why do they allow players to use them? it just seems like a really weird rule for something that'd be really easy to prevent software side

This wasn't a LAN, though, this was an online qualifier - there'd be no way for the TO (FaceIt) to check their equipment. This team were also just dicks - they played a game vs Pain Gaming, and they were basically about to lose. Because of server issues (perhaps DDOS, who knows) all of Thunder Predator suddenly disconnected. The rules say that if a whole team disconnects, the other team doesn't have to pause (which is also a bit of a retarded rule, at least in the later stages of the qualifier). Nevertheless, Pain Gaming paused the game and waited for 15 minutes - and then they suddenly disconnected. Thunder reconnected and instead of waiting for Pain gaming they simply went and finished the game. Luckily Valve forced a rematch, but talk about being unsportsmanlike.

If they don't want people using macros they shouldn't make game mechanics that are abusable with macros. Otherwise they're creating a problem for themselves and everyone else. As a player I should have the right to use whatever input method and device I want, and that includes macros. Way back in TF2 you could use a macro to shoot much faster with pistols. Did they start banning people for using macros? No, they made the firerate a fixed interval so nobody had the advantage, and everyone was happy.

For example, theres this hero called Invoker, who has 20 different spells, and they require simple key combos with Q W and E followed by R to activate. You could probably program the mouse to shoot like 5 spells at once. Thats like 25 different key presses at once. It's a gigantic advantage because you'll most likely kill ANYTHING that it hits.

Invoker Meepo Tinker Techies Skywrath Mage Huskar All commonly used with scripts. I'd like to point out also that although this was a mouse macro, some of the above are very commonly combined with actual programmed cheats or scripts.

Macroing semi-auto fire is still an advantage for accuracy purposes Also idk if you've actually played dota 2. You can't "solve" the macro problem without significantly trashing the appeal of the game, which is its mechanical depth.

They're indistinguishable from a normal press though, what You would have to basically have software that times every button press and then compares it with other combinations of button presses.

Not sure what you mean by that, are you talking about some specific game? My solution would be to implement macro functionality as a default keybind, then nerf the ability to offset the newly gained advantage. I have not played Dota, but as I understand this macro doesn't let you do anything you couldn't do normally assuming very quick fingers. Does that really "significantly trash the appeal of the game"? When to use it is still a strategic decision.

You should probably try to understand what you're talking about before talking about it. The macro was doing things that are impossible for a human to do, and its not something you just need to fix.

Just on your last point; no, it is not possible to do what this macro lets you do by hand. Additionally, the difference between the macro'd inputs and the fastest possible human inputs can have a significant impact on how effectively damage can be put out. It'll only matter in certain situations, but the issue with this is both those situations, in addition to the ease of input that a macro gives you compared to doing anything approaching the same by hand.

Then you could easily implement a delay that ignores inhumanely fast actions, yes? I understand macros pretty well. While I don't see how this instance is decisively different from other cases of macros being used to gain an advantage, I'll gladly hear it. Not "just nerf", but nerf after implementing the functionality. The same way TF2 pistol's firerate was limited after it was turned into an automatic weapon.

If Valve were to add some in-game macro feature (which they won't and shouldn't) and then add some sort of nerf/delay to it so it wouldn't be a huge advantage, what's stopping people from still using third party software for the non-delayed macros? Besides, Dota's just the kind of game where macros ruin the point of the game, sorta. Doing the things this guy was doing are genuinely impossible without the use of macros, and doing them the actual, human way requires a lot of skill, which is a big part of the game; outplaying your opponents and communicating with your team to gain the advantage, instead of using software for it. There's also the fact that if this was simply a pub game, it wouldn't go anywhere like this. People would frown upon it and call the player out on being a bitch, but it wouldn't go anywhere. But this guy was using such a clear and unsportsmanlike advantage in trying to get to the biggest Dota tournament, the one directly hosted by Valve themselves. It's supposed to be a competition for the best players out there, what would it say if they just allowed people to use macros to close the skill gap, the point of the game?

There was recently a bane wave against script users so Valve are definitely against their use. I'm just not sure if macro users fell into this group.