Most players who awaken reach a point where they consider creating a second, alternate, account. The reasons vary. Some create an account on the other team to friend opposition players for chat, or to switch sides if they feel the forces are uneven in their battle group. Some simply want a new user name or a fresh challenge.

If you are considering an alt account, there are some ethical challenges you will face. Playing honorably will maintain your status on your team and keep you from getting your accounts shut down.

Switching Sides:
● Ideally, close your old team account and never log into it again. One way to enforce this is to tell a handful of high level players on both teams what you are doing, and make sure they keep your old account friended. They will then be able to see that you have not logged in for many weeks. (Obviously, if you are tracking an account like this, do not drop it for being inactive!) You will be discouraged from logging in because then they will see that you have been active, and will justifiably suspect cheating.
● If you cannot do this, then you probably are headed down an ethically-challenged route of play. If you insist, here are some further guidelines:
○ Don’t spy in chat: Switching to check the other team’s chat for plans or to see how the team is reacting to the shifting fortunes of the round is wrong. Even minor information you may pick up can influence your play and that’s wrong. It’s best to make a permanent switch and never check your old, opposition account. If you wish to contact old friends, use private messages from your new account.
○ Don’t spy on beacon locations: Checking cloud view for opposition activity, ABCs, or AHCs is never honorable. Seeing them will influence your play, no matter how hard you try to ignore the knowledge.
○ Don’t spread disinformation: Switching to your old chat to mislead, even in fun, isn’t right.
○ Don’t farm: Using one account to create wards, spirit catchers, dominators, or beacons for the other account to destroy and get mission credits is nothing less than the worst kind of cheating. Using an alt account to let other teammates banish you for missions is also cheating. It’s often called “alt farming” and honest players will work to get your accounts terminated if you do this.

Duplicate Accounts on Same Side:
● Anything that cannot be accomplished with one account is cheating. That’s the guideline to follow. If you are ever wondering if you should do something, just ask if you could do it with one account. If not, then don’t do it.
● Do not harvest two sets of doms. Ideally, only one account should have doms set up at any time. If you must set up both, then do not harvest one account unless doms from both accounts are full. If you are ever harvesting a full set while the other account is not yet full, you are cheating.
● Do not set up and use beacons from your other account. If you must do this (say you have a beacon you left somewhere on vacation that you can’t bear to part with), then the total number of beacons from both accounts must not be more than you could power from one account. Obviously, this gets complicated, so just don’t do it.
● Don’t play two at a time: Rapidly switching accounts to take advantage of fresh mana while the other account recharges or to harvest multiple sets of dominators to boost team scores isn’t winning, it’s cheating.
● Don’t beef up your defenses: Adding wards and spell catchers from your alternate account to your main fortress isn’t right.
● Don’t manipulate spawns: Using a low-level alt account to generate easy spirits for teammates or for your own main account is a cheat. Obviously, if you are moving around for normal gameplay reasons, this is OK, but deliberately spawning spirits for others with a sham account is not.
● Don’t use protected status to spy: You can’t use a protected 15 to watch battles or opposition manipulations, so why would you think it’s OK with a level 5?

Things That Are OK:
● Using alt to track and bump statuses from your main account. Many high level players have such active status lists that they miss replies to their own statuses. You may want to make a low level alt that only friends your main account to solve this problem.
● Realm purchases: Using both accounts to purchase realms is fine. If you bought the potions, it makes no difference how you allocate them. It’s your money. If you earned the potions and divide your realms between the two accounts, it’s your time spent (as long as you didn’t play two at a time).
● Scoring: The aim of the game is scoring, so of course it’s OK, within the guidelines above, to score with your alt account. Whether you battle, hunt spirits, or chase bonus spirits, this is time you are not using your main account to score, so have at it!
● Having fun: If an alt account lets you create a different gaming style or chat persona, or simply allows you to relive the fun of leveling up again, the real goal of the game is to have fun.


This document was written by SerottaCSi, with the collaboration and input of many other players. We do not present this in an attempt to regulate how other plays the game, but rather as a guide for what we hope will become accepted as ethical and fair play.

We, the undersigned, have affixed our marks in support of this document and the principles therein.

SerottaCSi of the Animators Gabriel of the Architects
Giant Dong of the Animators Anvar of the Architects
Bardfinn of the Animators Shekkara of the Architects
Raelyne of the Animators Seldon of the Architects
Teknik of the Animators
Masterplaid of the Animators
Kieri of the Animators
Ulysses of the Animators

Edited by GiantDong (Nov. 8, 2011 20:40:52)

reserved for more info

>● Don’t use protected status to spy: You can’t use a protected 15 to watch battles or opposition manipulations, so why would you think it’s OK with a level 5?

Technically, this is incorrect. It is possible to adjust your attributes so that a level 15 has protected status.

for what its worth i support this document.

I have multiple accounts, on both sides.
Do I use them in for anything in particular? No. If I did, what business is it of yours?

Stop trying to police the game, let players do what they want and stop sticking your oar in, GD.
If any rules or guidelines need to be set up its GA's job to do so, which they have.

Talking about ethics is a free mini-game on the iPhone, you're a bigger tool than I thought.

Thank you GD and everyone else! Thank you for taking the time to think through this problem and come up with some standards for play. It may be a "mini-game" but lots of here are addicted to the game and unethical play is making/(has made) the game less fun recently. I hope many Mages take this to heart! :-)

True, this guide alone won't stop players from gaming the system, but what does do quite well is put forth a clear statement from long-time committed and respected players which asks the community at large to think about your motives and how your individual play-style may or may not affect your fellow player, whether for good or bad.

"I'm JxRK and I support this fair-play statement."