Aloha all,

Just a quick update from me while there's been looked at the updating, and better clarifying, of our game and category rules (as ever a big thanks to Xeenon for the push again).

One thing that has been standing out in particular to me, is extending the use of "warp accounts" for more than job warps. Previously (pre 1.68) using external accounts in such a way was not allowed to make (PC) job warps marginally quicker, as it wasn't a thing a thing "needed" unlike for console to make job warps comparable/accessible. The change of job warping coming with patch 1.68 made it logical to start allowing it for PC job warps too anyhow.

Though in the past year it started getting used for more, without it ever been cleared, as well our moderation team working from different standards. I.e. joining on external (or internal for that matter) players of a run to get out of cutscenes, loads and into a new session faster, is something that has been denied and rejected more a handful of times in the past. I've denied it as late as on if April of this year as well around last Christmas, the few recent times I've been asked in DMs. While not being well enough aware that there's been runs getting through with it.

I could've, should've, properly caught and acted on this earlier and that's all on me. I'm a bit sad how this goes back to last summer, while it just a couple months ago I've been asked if it's was okay or not.

I'd like to keep enforcing this, as this has been a limitation that plenty of old runs have been run with. If that's me veto'ing this or not, it may very well be - a point has been made that not allowing it (something already not allowed), may not sit well with our runners (because it's been slipping through the past X months), thus I'm writing this message to shed some light on the topic. And of course getting this properly added in the updated rules, to remove any doubt - the fact that warp accounts are limited to job warps, the only thing they were allowed for in the first place. This will void some runs that have been wrongly okay'd, and that'd of course be more than a big bummer of some runners and teams.

Does this now eliminate 0.0 warps, or can they continue to be used?

Curious to hear what everyone else thinks. Personally, I don't think we should start enforcing new rules (not just clarification of old rules) on something that's been allowed to slide for this long. This whole situation is a perfect example of why we need clear, written rules to begin with. If people have to ask for clarification in DMs, hinting at that the current rules aren't clear enough.

So yeah, I'm happy as long as the new rules just add clarity for future runs and don't affect anything that's already happened. Hope they get posted soon.

@Creamsyss Yes this would eliminate 0.0 warps / deathwarps. Part of which why I'm not in favor of such a change.

@Creamsyss That'd eliminate 0.0 too, as that involves warp accounts(?) and exceeds the limit of using them for more than job warps.

This Change brings more consistency to rules. Main rule being player join alert confirmation screen cannot be used for anything other than job warping. Since it started as the cutscene skip glitch. Rather than just this getting out ruled, The decision was made to make the rule include other glitches related to it which were already partly skeptical on ones use.

Should other exploitable tricks which use such show up, they will also be prohibited.

Welp sad too see 0'0 warp being banned, but lots of runs are gonna be easy wrs

Hello I have a question regarding a part in the prohibited glitches/strats section, “black screen skip at the end of missions”. There is currently 2 runs on the leaderboard (28m33s prison break time and the 35m10s pacific standard time). These two runs both seem to use glitches that fit the description of “black screen skip at the end of missions” in the rules. I’m just curious if the people who are able to remove/reject runs aren’t aware that those two runs use the glitch, or if I’m mistaken in what that part of the rules are referring too. Just want some clarification on this thank you.

@Mattifie We were well aware, but thank you. We'll be looking through recent runs to weed them out today and probably the few coming days as well.

Yeah, goodbye my Prison Break run D:

Ah ok thank you for the response and the clarification.

I just got back from some time away from the screens and I didn't feel like having this discussion while sat on a camp chair on mobile, so I didn't get to give my 2 cents before getting axed so here we go.

The whole reason I started the warp account/keep a friend online 24/7 project was a band-aid to not kill any leaderboards that used job warps during freemode activities, since r* patched that in the chop shop DLC in 2023. Of course this was already what console runners did before that, so it finally brought some parity between platforms in that sense.

It's important to know this context to judge the usage of these accounts for purposes other than job warping.

I get the desire to restrict usage to only job warping and nothing else and probably agree too, but what the real issue is is that this had been allowed for months, which is why we (the PB run team) used this strat, assuming mods were aware of this, having verified it before.

I don't think it's unreasonable to assume all strats in a run that's already verified can be considered legal.

We (as runners who aren't part of the mod team), aren't aware of runs which get rejected for illegal stats, so only have accepted runs and the rules to go by.

I think I've said it before, but it is unfair towards runners to apply rules and restrictions which are not defined in the rules and only (select) mods know. we spent I think around 2 months trying to beat the PB WR, all of which is now for nothing.

We could've clarified it with the mods before using this strat, but again, there were already (WR!) runs that used this, and so assumed this was considered legal.

That said, WITT (being lead mod) has done the adult thing and taken responsibility, so in my opinion we move on, just as long as we learn from our mistakes.

I hope with the new mods that got added recently as well as Xeenons effort (I know you've been working on this a long time!) to better define the rules around the game we love and play, this situation does not repeat itself.

Going forward it's important we all, as a community get to have visibility on what's allowed and what's not, meaning up-to-date rules and a public discussion if a new strat is discovered and it's legality is in question.

The GTAO channels within the GTA Speedrunning discord are somewhat active but not everyone uses it, in future I think we should have threads on speedrun.com such as this, but then the moment such a new strat/rule change comes up, and if a run is rejected for something that's not in the rules, add it to the rules so there's no confusion.

As for myself, I think there's still a desire within the group to attempt more PB runs, so I hope to still get that record.

(part 1 of 2)

Actually, the this is not sitting well with me at all

Losing 2 more 7 month old runs because I forgot the host was doing black screen skip is rubbing salt in the wound so here here's where my problem is.

What is legal?

The line from WITT seems to be that using warp accounts for anything other than job warps was always illegal, as some runs were rejected for it and he would answer that if asked.

I would argue that's not the case. Just like a crime must be written down in law before a judge can pass a sentence, so must the rules. Because that's what this is, the strat is the crime, the rules are the law and the mods are the judge.

The rules are there so that anyone can get into participating and we have an equal playing field.

Just like a new player can be expected to read and conform to the rules when submitting a run, so should the rules be expected, better yet, required to be written down before they are enforced.

It should not be possible for a run to be rejected for a rule that doesn't exist (only in the first intance, but it should lead to community discussion, not immediate acceptance/rejection).

Consider the following scenario:

• A rules section which has the basics as defined by sr.c guidelines, rules specific to the game and categories and no indication they are incomplete.

• Other (WR!) runs using this strat

• This strat being openly discussed on public spaces (the GTAO speedrunning discord is linked on this page)

• No visibility on rejected runs or why they're rejected.

Any reasonable hypothetical person just trying to get into speedruns of GTAO would conclude alternative warp account uses to be legal, given there's documented precedent in verified runs from months before, open discussion without raising objections on legality and most importantly no rule regarding this.

You might argue they can clarify it with the mods, but I think that argument is moot. We might as well throw out the rules section and DM mods about everything. The rules are there specifically so every one doesn't have to clarify everything and get a different answer from each member of the mod team.

So, which is it:

Is it legal because this hypothetical reasonable person can in no way be aware of this rule and there are runs on the leaderboard using it.

or

Is it illegal because part of the mod team knows this rule and has rejected some runs using it, meanwhile:

• not clarifying it in the rules when it first came up

• not engaging in public discussion - either starting it or weighing in when it was being dicussed

• accepting other (WR!) runs which use this

I don't find it particularly fair we (I actually, I'm just speaking for myself here) get to throw out 2 months of attempts because of a rule that didn't exists and could not have reasonably known about.

I do have to admit, in DM's with WITT, it seems one person from our group did ask about alternative warp account uses at some point and was told no, but this was in the context of skipping cutscenes done by another team in another run, not escaping to freemode faster. It seems there was confusion on what was meant with "no, warp accounts is for warps, their purpose to fix job warps" and an assumption this wouldn't include black screen skip owing to previously being allowed.

That said, this wasn't shared in the group, and I'll reiterate my point that it shouldn't be required to contact mods in regards to rules which are already being used to reject runs, those should just be in defined in the rules.

(part 2 of 2)

Conflict of interest

I think we should address the elephant in the room, WITT has been the (often sole) mod for a long time now, and so I think has gained credibility in that sense. But it seems he has a clear conflict of interest in this case.

With him being the sole super mod for this game as well as the world record holder, a sudden rule change which makes a run beating his 4 year old record illegal should be viewed with skepticism.

From what I gather in this thread, the GTA Speedrunning discord and private conversations with community members, there doesn't seem to be a whole lot of support for this rule change aside from WITT himself, who has a conflict of interest.

I myself have a conflict of interest too, being on the other end of this, same goes for Xeenon and Agent, who recently became mods, but not super mods, it seems their input didn't weigh up against the super mods. We're all tied up in conflicts of interests.

Instead of one guy deciding what to do here, I think all those who have a conflict of interest should step back from this discussion. Instead we should follow speedrun.com moderation rules, in particular this entry: "The users moderating a game should represent the consensus of the players of the game."

Leaving me, Agent, Xeenon and WITT out of it and let the community speak their opinion and from there formulate the rules, with remaining mods such as Bitsau, Send & Hiroriks leading the discussion, but obviously taking into account responses from the wider community.

Some general observations

I know I keep hammering on about the rules and there's been a big push to improve this already, so I just wanted to acknowledge the work that's already been done.

We're a bit of a unique case as speedrunning goes, not only being multiplayer, but also not having the luxury to choose which version we want to run on, meaning we have to cope with updates which break the game and make runs/strats slower as well as new content allowing for new strats which makes things faster.

Allowing/disallowing a glitch then becomes a though decision, because the developer has an incentive to patch glitches, which if allowed, might result in a category completely dying (cluckin' bell & prison contract are good examples).

Other glitches have been disallowed out of caution, but have been in the game for a long time now.

We cannot look into Rockstars roadmap or bugtracker and so will always be left guessing if something is going to get patched, we can only make observations from past patches.

If it wasn't clear already, the rules should be clearly defined, and there should only be one instance where a run (any run) can get rejected over something which wasn't in the rules yet, which is the first time a run is submitted using a new strat.

That's when you have a discussion, maybe internally at first, but definitely with the community too.

Then when there's consensus we add it to the rules.

Finally the dead train has moved. After that Xeenon77 is a legend to me :)))

But of course I'm still grateful to Witt for finally waking up and doing something.

Even though: leaderboard gtaforums.com died; even though the rules that were not on the site were stored in someone's private messages, instead of updating them on the site and there were not the same questions again; even though new categories in which players are interested did not appear for months; even despite the fact that allowed prohibited runs, prepared before the mission transport for use in the mission in the lobby or changing game files; even though people spent much time on runs, only to have them canceled because of sudden rule changes that didn't happen before the run was published, and that's even though the runs were accepted first.

Things were so bad that people stopped focusing on these leaderbords for runs. Since there was no relevance and clarity to the rules.

Some people even started to think that runs were being deleted to keep the first places for admins xddd

I once thought of complaining about all this to the site administrators, but I realized that I do not want these conflicts, and just left everything as it is.

I really hope that in gta 6 online this will not happen.

I'm glad that there is such a good atmosphere, but if we talk about business, it was very bad. That's why I wrote this message and put some negativity. Sorry for sharing this, thanks for your attention and have a good day :)

The "unwritten"-ness of it all boiling down to a run with e.g. 4 players = 4 players, no outside players (e.g. warp accounts). Then and now*.

Warp accounts then got allowed and created a fix to maintain comparability and fairness for job warps getting changed, and it's literally within the name and term runners use.

But yeah nothing seem to be self-explanatory of course.

I'm not sure how much I can reword my previous messages.

I get where you're coming from with only allowing warp accounts as a band-aid to keep leaderboards with job warping alive, and it must feel like a slippery slope allowing it in other instances.

Though it must be said that today's GTAO isn't exactly the same as dec. 2023's. I think the playerbase as a whole has gotten used to the prescence of warp accounts, outside of a speedrunning context too, most people using my accounts are just grinding the game.

I'm not planning on giving up this project any time soon and have always privileged speedrunners to enable them.

And I'm not just one-guying this, there are others with warp accounts online 24/7 too, looking at the chinese steam group that's like 5000 strong as well as anawack and all his accounts for various consoles.

This seems to be just a part of modern GTAO.

At some point in the future my accounts will go offline, and the others too, but I think when that finally happens we can look back and say we delayed the inevitable for a few years.

I'm not doubting warp accounts going anywhere, and I/we welcome them too (as a band-aid or not, that's just how that part of the game works now, you say as well).

I've plenty desires to get some more official, and accessible for all, warp accounts up and running myself - while I haven't managed that, I'm just glad you and others are able to have accounts up.

Though this part is getting a bit sidetracked, isn't it?

Well my intention with that last comment was to explain why allowing usage of warp accounts outside of job warps may not be a bad thing. With them being a big part of the more dedicated playerbase's experience as well as my own policy to always provide speedrunners with my services, it doesn't make too much sense to keep it as a band-aid only, and so relates to my reasoning on why we should consider allowing it.

I mentioned it in the first reply, but I started this project to support speedrunning and keep job-warp-dependent leaderboards alive. Even though it started with 250 friend slots, it has since grown to 1000, mostly due to casual people grinding the game, but I've often said if GTAO were to get 1000 active runners tomorrow, I would trade them all in favour of those.

That said, let's not get side tracked too much.

I myself would like to hear from the rest of the community on the issue of allowing warp accounts alternative uses as well as the decision to retroactively remove runs from the board.

I totally agree with Haezee, these are literally my thoughts :)

Bravo my friend, bravo :applause:

1 - If the community wants something, the mods should just accept it (since the site is just for the players, it's not a city administration or something).

2 - The rules should be clear, no second thoughts or private conversations, that's what they are all about.

3 - It doesn't matter if warps are used solo or 4p if that's what the players want.

4 - There is always a division on versions of the game, and complete fairness is impossible to achieve, because this is an online game and everything changes here, both for better and for worse.

5 - There should be a discussion of these or those things with the players, because making decisions only to the admins, or even just one admin loses the meaning of the site as a whole, it will turn into a leaderboard of one person/persons.