The "Mega Cities" / "Trade Cities" server abuses reset API

[bits-orio]

Dear devs,

I would like to report an issue which is kinda in the grey area. Devs probably doesn't care about it, but it puts a sour taste in my experience of multiplayer lobby.

There is this server that goes by "Mega Cities" or sometimes as "Trade Cities". It abuses the `reset_time_played` API to artificially remain in the top of server list when sorted by time played.
This api: https://lua-api.factorio.com/latest/cla ... ime_played

This API must have been meant to be used when a server that has a map cycle like Mountain Fortress or Biter Battles gets a reset.
Like every time Mountain Fortress run ends or a Biter Battles match finishes, it should reset the map and that should reflect in the time played.

But "Trade Cities" doesn't have a regular reset system (but they do reset sometimes too), and they have some logic to wrongfully use this API randomly every 30 mins to stay on the top of the server list artificially.

Screenshot 2024-06-29 141208.png (24.74 KiB) Viewed 1319 times

Screenshot 2024-06-29 141223.png (19.05 KiB) Viewed 1319 times

Why is this an issue?

Because I along with a lot of online Factorio players sort servers by time played. And this comes up on top every time and then it turns out that its not a new map or a new game.
Its annoying as hell. It feels like that the server is abusing the API and nobody does anything about it.
There should be a way to report servers that does something so wrong. And hopefully some action gets taken against it.

regards,
bits-orio

[sOvr9000]

Oh! That was my server. That must be part of the scenario code, which I didn't write. Sorry. The new scenario that my server runs is written by me, so it won't have any weird "time played" exploit.

[Tonkers]

there was no "EXPLOIT" for this. When I made MEGA Cities, although i no longer host it, the scenario was designed for when players join the server, they start as their own team, so your research and time in the game is effectively ZERO, starting from beginning. No one had the same server start time. Just because you assume it was "abusing", it wasn't abusing, it was an effective way to indicate that the server was timeless. And if a player doesn't log in for a while, their entire civilization and everything they built was destroyed within the server, so each player had their own start timer. So the reset timer was used in a proper way.