Windows Cinemania 2020 messed up rankings: finished 2 after been ahead 2000 tickets all day last day !?

[Tiberiu]

Hi everyone, sadly my first post on this forum is about the absurd ranking in the latest airport city event. I was top 1 with about 2000 tickets ahead the second place the entire day but this morning I got the message that I finished in position 2! I have good internet connection and it was up the entire day. Also the game was open the entire day.
The 2000 tickets advance requires a few hours continuous effort from my competitors to catch me up if I sit idle which was not the case.
I have participated in the previous competitions with the new format having won 2 of them and finished on pos 2 in another one. I do have the experience (and the unfortunate investment of time and money) to compete in this game.
I filled a support request with little hope for the problem to be fixed - maybe my display was wrong, maybe it was a raining day, whatever.

Please be aware, the competitions on Airport city events are not organized by professional people. A ranking displacement of this magnitude when everything is counted digitally does not happen in any other online games. I, for one, after investing +$100 in this game will not pay for anything with real money and will not consider the events competition. If I want to play the lottery, I know where to find it.

Also, many thanks to the forum contributors, I have regularly read the forum in past months to bad I found this problem to make the effort to join.

 

[VdW]

2000 is easily gained if your competitor didn’t collect the rewards from completing tasks. So, 2000 pts difference is really nothing.

If I were the position 2, I’d do exactly the same thing. Scope the competition out, with the points from completing tasks, I can take over the 1st easily (or at least try).

 

[Tiberiu]

All of them had all the rewards completed, I saw their raking jump when it happened in the first 2 days. My total tickets count was +18000 one doesn't get there without the rewards

 

[VdW]

Then contact GI and tell them your story, if the 1st indeed cheated, you probably will get your reward.

To be fair, I don’t know how your league looked like and how they progressed each day. But to be honest, I don’t think 2K difference is that much

 

[Tiberiu]

I did not have the inspiration to take a screen shot at the end. I do have all the winnings though. As I said, I know how to compete in these. I carefully do the math, choose the strategy and execute it. I monitor competition to see what's throughput and I know when I can be beat and not. And this time was not, I had all the buildings and I have a fleet of gold planes (from my winnings so far). None of them did more than 330 tickets per hour all week long and none seem to had any better plane than silver (maybe a couple of those) when visited (not sure though if it shows their real fleet). And I was ahead consistently (+1000 tickets) since day 2

 

[Teboho]

I did not have the inspiration to take a screen shot at the end. I do have all the winnings though. As I said, I know how to compete in these. I carefully do the math, choose the strategy and execute it. I monitor competition to see what's throughput and I know when I can be beat and not. And this time was not, I had all the buildings and I have a fleet of gold planes (from my winnings so far). None of them did more than 330 tickets per hour all week long and none seem to had any better plane than silver (maybe a couple of those) when visited (not sure though if it shows their real fleet). And I was ahead consistently (+1000 tickets) since day 2

Maybe that person's strategy was better than yours, has that ever crossed your mind?

 

[MikeH]

@Tiberiu - as much as I understand your anger, 2000 points in last event was not that hard to do in couple of hours. Pity that you didn´t made a print screen minutes before the event ended.

 

[DexCare]

Hi everyone, sadly my first post on this forum is about the absurd ranking in the latest airport city event. I was top 1 with about 2000 tickets ahead the second place the entire day but this morning I got the message that I finished in position 2! I have good internet connection and it was up the entire day. Also the game was open the entire day.
The 2000 tickets advance requires a few hours continuous effort from my competitors to catch me up if I sit idle which was not the case.
I have participated in the previous competitions with the new format having won 2 of them and finished on pos 2 in another one. I do have the experience (and the unfortunate investment of time and money) to compete in this game.
I filled a support request with little hope for the problem to be fixed - maybe my display was wrong, maybe it was a raining day, whatever.

Please be aware, the competitions on Airport city events are not organized by professional people. A ranking displacement of this magnitude when everything is counted digitally does not happen in any other online games. I, for one, after investing +$100 in this game will not pay for anything with real money and will not consider the events competition. If I want to play the lottery, I know where to find it.

Also, many thanks to the forum contributors, I have regularly read the forum in past months to bad I found this problem to make the effort to join.

That’s not a big problem, I had done this in the first event (Valley of the King curse)

You can see that I get a lot of event pts in the last 6 hours without cheating, I just collected all the tasks reward at that time (3k pts), I was happy with the 2nd place but the 3rd guy want to pass over me with lucky ticket and a bunch of flights with fuel from the warehouse, so I need to do the same to keep my position and I realize that I can get 1st after having competed with 3rd guy so I burned up all my fuel, you can see in the last picture, if the 2nd guys hafn’t collected all the reward (+3k pts), I would have been beaten with only 2k7 pts ahead. So the strategy for the ranking sometimes make the thing different, you can see this happens always in every kind of rank (alliance rank, destination rank,...)

 

[Tiberiu]

Yes it does crosses my mind they can have a better strategy that's why I monitor their progress.

The 2000 tickets advance lasted up until the very last minutes. I know there's a lag in updating the stats, so when I say it's not possible to overcome this gap I mean it cannot be done hidden away in the lag, it'll take hours with normal run. From owl destination one could get 6 tickets + 6 with the bonus that's 60 tickets per 13 mins (with vintage weathervane) with gold planes as I had (but no one else had). That's 360 per hour from flights. With oil acceleration you get get over 2000 tickets if you do 125 speeds up (of owls) so yes possible. Similar math for bigger planes. However, last time I check (like 4 mins to the end) I was still ahead with the same amount - no drastic change from anyone. However, burning +2500 oil for just one more chest doesn't seem reasonable but who knows.

I do not have the hard proof that it was that way. I could only provide screen shots to support my experience and results so far. I totally understand there's a different world beyond level 80 where most of guys are, but at 50-60 the competition is not the case.

I opened a ticket, I'll post the answer.

 

[Tiberiu]

The keypoint in @DexCare post is that he saw that progress happening. I didn't see any of it. [EDIT]: and you can see in his screenshots we're talking about hours. I would have seen any "boost" in tickets from anyone within minutes

 

[DexCare]

The keypoint in @DexCare post is that he saw that progress happening. I didn't see any of it.

This ranking is updated every 10mins

 

[Madge59230]

Yes it does crosses my mind they can have a better strategy that's why I monitor their progress.

The 2000 tickets advance lasted up until the very last minutes. I know there's a lag in updating the stats, so when I say it's not possible to overcome this gap I mean it cannot be done hidden away in the lag, it'll take hours with normal run. From owl destination one could get 6 tickets + 6 with the bonus that's 60 tickets per 13 mins (with vintage weathervane) with gold planes as I had (but no one else had). That's 360 per hour from flights. With oil acceleration you get get over 2000 tickets if you do 125 speeds up (of owls) so yes possible. Similar math for bigger planes. However, last time I check (like 4 mins to the end) I was still ahead with the same amount - no drastic change from anyone. However, burning +2500 oil for just one more chest doesn't seem reasonable but who knows.

I do not have the hard proof that it was that way. I could only provide screen shots to support my experience and results so far. I totally understand there's a different world beyond level 80 where most of guys are, but at 50-60 the competition is not the case.

I opened a ticket, I'll post the answer.

Speed Up and Lucky ticket could easily get past you. Someone might be level 50-60 but very savvy with it. Fly mid size planes. Instant return in the last 15 mins of the event. 2000 points easy.

 

[Tiberiu]

This ranking is updated every 10mins

I'm not sure what happens at the end of the competition, maybe there's more lag? Within 10 mins doing what @Madge59230 said means 200 tickets per min or 33 per 10 seconds. Doable with a destination that yields 16 tickets but that will require considerable more oil and pax. At level 50-60 with a small airport I don't know I just doubt it very much. I have a big airport for my level and I couldn't have done it simply because I had consumed a large amount of oil the entire week just to be up there. I was left wit 10x150 and around 15x50 oil reserves having bought the 2000 oil offere as well. But again, who knows

 

[imdcaptain]

My support game is in the 50s, would have no trouble adding 2000 event points in 10 minutes (with or without cashing in task rewards until the very end), it’s possible GI messed up or someone cheated, more likely someone did a last minute burst to overtake your position

I play for first occasionally and run some of the same calculations you mentioned to keep track of the competitors in my group, rule of thumb I use to increase (not guarantee) the likelihood of a 1st place finish is to create a buffer before the last day of the event equal to total task rewards + greatest observed 1 day move of those competing for a top 3 finish. Using the most recent event as an example for my group, task rewards were around 3k, greatest observed 1 day move was 6k, so I built a 9k buffer going into the final day.

I will not get into all the possible ways 2k points can be covered in the final 10 minutes, but it can be done without cheating. That said, if a mistake was made by GI or someone did cheat, you deserve a a just reward. Good luck!

 

[Tiberiu]

My support game is in the 50s, would have no trouble adding 2000 event points in 10 minutes (with or without cashing in task rewards until the very end), it’s possible GI messed up or someone cheated, more likely someone did a last minute burst to overtake your position

I play for first occasionally and run some of the same calculations you mentioned to keep track of the competitors in my group, rule of thumb I use to increase (not guarantee) the likelihood of a 1st place finish is to create a buffer before the last day of the event equal to total task rewards + greatest observed 1 day move of those competing for a top 3 finish. Using the most recent event as an example for my group, task rewards were around 3k, greatest observed 1 day move was 6k, so I built a 9k buffer going into the final day.

I will not get into all the possible ways 2k points can be covered in the final 10 minutes, but it can be done without cheating. That said, if a mistake was made by GI or someone did cheat, you deserve a a just reward. Good luck!

Thank you, that's quite useful. I thought my buffer of 2k was enough as long as I monitor them continuously maybe I was wrong.
Have you ever done the last-minute burst, or had someone else done it to you in the exact 10 mins before end (not last day or last hours)?

 

[Husam]

Thank you, that's quite useful. I thought my buffer of 2k was enough as long as I monitor them continuously maybe I was wrong.
Have you ever done the last-minute burst, or had someone else done it to you in the exact 10 mins before end (not last day or last hours)?

I was 1st then someone came and took 1st from me and then between me and him about 3000 but in the last day the and last 4 hours i change the result i took 1st again and he was shocked of course how 3000 between me nd him and i pass him this is normal and easy i know your feeling this happen to me when i start the game for taking 1st place in flight destination or launches and someone come and take it from 2 weeks back my alliance was in 1st place and then some alliance take 1st from us last day.

 

[PunisherUS]

I usually don't compete but this time I did because I noticed I was up there. I was in there the last 15 mins watching and ramping up tickets. 400 tickets behind 1st.
Somehow I ended up 3rd. That's fine, what gets me is that I couldn't see the final ticket numbers for everyone. Did my final 10mins of tickets count? who won? etc..
Odd black hole on this. Kinda feels sketchy.

 

[Husam]

I usually don't compete but this time I did because I noticed I was up there. I was in there the last 15 mins watching and ramping up tickets. 400 tickets behind 1st.
Somehow I ended up 3rd. That's fine, what gets me is that I couldn't see the final ticket numbers for everyone. Did my final 10mins of tickets count? who won? etc..
Odd black hole on this. Kinda feels sketchy.

The server is counting for the last 10 minutes after that no ... so if you play for the last 5 minutes it will not count for the competition score the same with alliance and flight weekly rank.
But if there is drop you will get it but counting the pax or flights it will not counted.
Always in the last hour its you chance 10 minutes gone and 50 minutes will be recorded.
Also if you think something wrong take a screenshot and send it to Gi they will check the record and if you deserve 1st they will send you the award chest

 

[V_421]

2000 points is nothing.
During all event I stayed in top 4. Watching the other 3, and seeing them doing jumps in points. That made me think they added task points at some point, because they went up quickly (i lookup the ranking a lot every day).
At other moments, they went up, but at each refresh, which made me think they where using lucky tickets.
I payed a visit on each of there town, to have a close look at their capacity. None of them had any visa in their city. So doing many points at once would be hard for them.
All that time, I did not collect any task point. But I flew using weatervane and catalyst speed-ups. It made me able to stay at max 2000 points from the person who was 1st. Last day he event flew less, thinking he had already won.
45 minutes before deadline, I added my task points and added 50 quick fuel returns with hawk.
I ended 1st in ranking.

The person in 1st might have had the same idea you had. thinking he was ahead with enough points.
If you want to be certain you will not be overtaken, you should always think your opponent did not add any task point.
And with this, you should still have a margin in case he starts doing quick fuel return. Otherwise, you are never save of another player overtaking at the last moment.

 

[Vikas Rana]

Hi everyone, sadly my first post on this forum is about the absurd ranking in the latest airport city event. I was top 1 with about 2000 tickets ahead the second place the entire day but this morning I got the message that I finished in position 2! I have good internet connection and it was up the entire day. Also the game was open the entire day.
The 2000 tickets advance requires a few hours continuous effort from my competitors to catch me up if I sit idle which was not the case.
I have participated in the previous competitions with the new format having won 2 of them and finished on pos 2 in another one. I do have the experience (and the unfortunate investment of time and money) to compete in this game.
I filled a support request with little hope for the problem to be fixed - maybe my display was wrong, maybe it was a raining day, whatever.

Please be aware, the competitions on Airport city events are not organized by professional people. A ranking displacement of this magnitude when everything is counted digitally does not happen in any other online games. I, for one, after investing +$100 in this game will not pay for anything with real money and will not consider the events competition. If I want to play the lottery, I know where to find it.

Also, many thanks to the forum contributors, I have regularly read the forum in past months to bad I found this problem to make the effort to join.

Same thing happened with me, I had 2nd place and was monitoring who else was close and below me. DadAbide jumped 2000 points just before an hour and took my place. Whereas Cahek was always had 2000 or more point than me or who so ever was at 2nd place. Both of them had small cities and do not have much of land or items to look at.
I sent 3 owl planes, 4 hawk and a Giant S1 to event fights. Along with that I also used 3 lucky ticket bonus, fuel bonuses and flight speed bonus to get these points.