Hi, Players! I’ve compiled some data from the forum, covering around 5,964 ban appeal cases from 2014 to 2025. Only “Closed” cases were included in this analysis — appeals that are still “Open” or unlabeled (especially in earlier years) were not considered. The way I categorized ban reasons is based on my opinion and text matching, so there may be some errors. e.g. i classified people wrongfully banned from IP ban as false ban. MapleRoyals Game T&C is referenced for this. There are 324 cases that I couldn't categorize due to complexity — please ignore those. Also, keep in mind that this is just the tip of the iceberg, since not every banned player submits an appeal. I hope this serves as a helpful reminder to all players - not to break any rules! The Royals staff are always watching and working hard behind the scenes. Salute to the staff for handling such quantity of cases thoughout the years. All data and reasons were publicly sourced from the Ban Appeal section. Please find the chart and data file attached. Regards, Scotty Data File: P.S. The forum doesn't seem to allow Excel uploads, so I've uploaded the file to Google Sheets instead.
Surprised there's more ban appeals for hacking than RWTing, I figured most hackers didn't bother appealing since it's pretty obvious
I've always believed its out of arrogance that they appeal. No shot the elite version of the "undetectable" hacks they were sold for 25$ were actually detected so they think its due to another reason. I also think its a game to some of them. Id assume a lot of hackers are repeat offenders, so they make a ban appeal to make staff have to waste time looking up information to be told what they already know and then they go use a new account and vpn to hack on
The amount of false bans is pretty low compared to others so that's really good. Means they don't make many mistakes. Surprised it's vote aboose, totally thought rwt would be first
I stole your data to make some more graphs by feeding the data into ChatGPT. For these I stripped any ban reason under 75 counts for readability. Bans by year Bans by year as a percentage of that year's bans. Bans by Moderator by year (If over 100 bans) Ban type by Moderator (If over 100 bans) I also asked for ChatGPT to look for patterns, common months, patterns, and key insights. MapleRoyals Ban Analytics: 2014–2024 — What You Didn't Notice We all know May is wild — but there's way more under the hood. Here's a deeper look at the patterns, peaks, and oddities from over a decade of ban data. ――――――――――――――――――――― Top-Line Summary • Most Common Ban Reason: Game Hacking — 1,175 bans • Top 3 Busiest Ban Months (All Categories): May – 546 August – 531 June – 512 • Quietest Month Overall: February — just 365 bans. If you're going to test your luck, apparently that's the time. ――――――――――――――――――――― Peak Months by Ban Reason Most people focus on Game Hacking or Vote Abuse, but here’s a look at the actual top 2 months for each major offense, plus their quietest. Top Months by Category • Game Hacking – May, then July Lowest: February • Vote Abuse – May, then September Lowest: April • Botting / Macroing / Automation – May, then September Lowest: February • Ban Evasion – December, then May Lowest: June • Account Sharing – March, then June Lowest: May • Objectionable Behavior / Harassment – May, then June Lowest: February • False-ban – September, then November Lowest: April ――――――――――――――――――――― What You Might've Missed • Vote Abuse and Botting both spike again in September, possibly tied to back-to-school login activity. • Ban Evasion reaches its highest point in December, likely from banned users returning for holiday events. • Account Sharing and False-ban don’t follow the usual cheating pattern — neither peak in May. • February is the most common low point across multiple categories — likely due to post-holiday cooldowns. ――――――――――――――――――――― Insights You Might’ve Missed • Not Everything Peaks in May: Game Hacking, Vote Abuse, and Botting spike mid-year, but Account Sharing, False-ban, and Ban Evasion follow different seasonal curves. • Vote Abuse is the Steady Drumbeat: It's the most evenly distributed category. Only 29.3% of its bans come from its top 3 months — it's always happening. • Account Sharing is a March Thing: The biggest month for this is March, not summer. Possibly due to post-winter account trading. • False-ban tags spike in Fall: Peaks in September and November — likely staff catching up on appeals from summer bans. ――――――――――――――――――――― Recommendations (for Staff) • Prioritize enforcement in: - May (across all types) - December (Ban Evasion) - September (Botting and Vote Abuse) • Vote Abuse enforcement should stay consistent — it's always present, just quiet. ――――――――――――――――――――― Yearly Ban Trends (2014–2024) • Most Active Year: 2018 — 842 bans issued, the highest on record. • Least Active Year: 2014 — Just 35 bans. The early era of enforcement. • Category Peak Years: - Game Hacking: 2018 - Vote Abuse: 2024 (ongoing) - Botting / Macroing / Automation: 2020 - Ban Evasion: 2023 These trends show how cheat styles evolve as the community and detection efforts change. ―――――――――――――――――――――
great data! very well done and i love the insights. idk if you're up for more work (and some of the following might be a LOT of work), personally i'm also super curious about these: - correlation between "number of forum posts by forum account" against "ban reason" (aka 'Are active forum users less likely to be banned for particular reasons?' my guess: RWT) - average "ban appeal date minus forum join date" per "ban reason" (aka 'Are new players more likely to get banned for certain things?' my guess: vote abuse, but i want to know by how much) - distribution of "original ban reasons" within "false ban" (aka 'Which ban reason is most prone to error?' my guess: RWT) - distribution of "original ban reasons" within "ban evasion" (aka 'Which ban reason feels the most unfair?' my guess: vote abuse) - correlation between "thread length" against "ban reason" (aka 'Which ban reasons are the most popcorn-worthy?' my guess: RWT) - correlation between message tone (via sentiment analysis) against "ban reason" (aka popcorn-worthy part 2, my guess is objectionable behavior is the most heated, account sharing most polite) - distribution of which GMs/Admins sent the most messages in ban appeals (aka 'Which Staff loves doing ban appeals the most?') anyway, the part that most surprises me is that there are only 39 self bans? i feel like i've seen 20 of 'em happen live or maybe it was trendy in 2020 and died off after that
I'm surprised vote abuse is so close to RWT. I thought vote abuse would be way ahead. I also wonder if RWT gets disproportionately more ban appeals? Maybe the banned person feels like there is more on the line, so they are more willing to try to appeal it. Interesting data!
Only 37 self bans seems very low, or do these threads never get closed? Either way nice data, false ban percentage seems pretty low too especially considering non-appealers are less likely to be falsly banned.
Won't we naturally get more and more ban evaders coming through? I'm super curious what the percentage of returning players vs new players would be in that case considering this is a super duper old game and kids won't know about it.
