So, regarding the mARTy threshold...

[OpMegs]

I don't think it'll be a problem for our regular folks, given that Spud, V, Uni, and myself essentially powered four newbie alts to level 20 in a single day (4 sewer trials, Posi 1 and 2), and weren't hit with it.
---
"Oh, silver blade, forged in the depths of the beyond. Heed my summons and purge those who stand in my way. Lay
waste."

[Ransan]

It's not. I frequently run +4x8 on Nam and aren't hit by MARTy. Terr's farming hasn't triggeed MARTy to my knowledge. They only time I've seen it, thusfar, is a bug when I logged on just after a patch, and everyone was getting throttled by it.
So unless you are an uberhax exploiter, it's not a concern.

[Ankhani]

They devs really weren't kidding.

While we won’t reveal the exact formula behind what makes MARTy tick, any one of the following circumstances would qualify as “too fast”:
- Simultaneously defeating every, single enemy in Perez Park.
- Simultaneously one-shotting the entire Freedom Phalanx, Arachnos Patrons *and* Praetors.

---

The Master said: "It is all in vain! I have never yet seen a man who can perceive his own faults and bring the charge home against himself."

>Analects: Book V, Chaper XXVI

[ECSNorway]

*headscratch* I assume you're speaking of the anti-power-levelling algorithm?
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

[OpMegs]

Basically, the "anti-exploit" system that throttles rewards if you bypass a certain threshold, yes.
---
"Oh, silver blade, forged in the depths of the beyond. Heed my summons and purge those who stand in my way. Lay
waste."

[dark seraph]

I know people on the cape radio that have been maing AE farm afte AE farm, just to find out how to hit MARTy.

they are still trying.

[Bob Schroeck]

Okay, somehow I missed this during the last round of patching. I can gather what's up from context, and if I weren't at work right now I'd go to the COH site and try to track it down. But until I get home and do the lookup, can someone give me the executive summary?
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

[Niteflier]

Copypaste from the news archive:

Issue 21 - MARTy

Posted On September 12 2011

As part of our ongoing efforts to ensure that City of Heroes remains an environment where everyone enjoys a safe and fun online experience we will be introducing a new anti exploit detection measure in Issue 21. We'd like to take a few moments of your time to answer some questions about this new system, MARTy.

What is MARTy?

MARTy stands for Metric Activated Reward Throttle (Y? Because exploits are bad!)

What is the goal of MARTy?

The primary purpose of MARTy is to automatically detect and prevent exploitative behavior by constantly analyzing the rate at which players gain rewards in game. This applies to many different rewards such as INF and Experience.

A secondary goal is to throttle only the worst offenders; those who exhibit truly exploitive behavior that ruins the game for everyone. If you trigger MARTy you are going to know that you are doing something abnormal and exploitive.

Will MARTy affect my gameplay?

The system runs entirely in the background on the game server and will have no impact on your in game experience.

Is MARTy installed on my computer?

No. MARTy is a server side function.

What about things that augment how quickly I gain Experience, such as XP Boosts or Patrol XP Benefits?

MARTy is aware of and takes into account all of these systems.

How fast is too fast for MARTy?

While we won't reveal the exact formula behind what makes MARTy tick, any one of the following circumstances would qualify as "too fast":

Simultaneously defeating every, single enemy in Perez Park.
Simultaneously one-shotting the entire Freedom Phalanx, Arachnos Patrons *and* Praetors.

How will players know that they've triggered MARTy?

If a player's actions have triggered MARTy they will stop receiving rewards for a variable amount of time. Additionally, a log of the player's activity is recorded for review.

It is important to note that MARTy is not aimed at one specific playstyle or Mission type. The threshold at which MARTy is triggered is such that, through normal, or even aggressive, gameplay, a player should never be impacted by any penalties. We have been vigorously testing MARTy against live server and Beta server metrics and have ensured that even the most aggressive normal gameplay will not be impacted. We will, of course, continuously monitor this new anti exploit measure to ensure that it is effectively performing its task.

Thanks for your continued support!

[Bob Schroeck]

Thank you. From the sound of that, it's pretty obvious that Terr's BP Farm is never going to trigger this -- insofar as my experiences with the farm are concerned, he/we aren't doing anything more than just running through the mish as designed, except we're not actually finishing it.

If those examples are serious, at least as to scope/scale, then there have to be some godawful exploits out there, and they have to be orders of magnitude above anything any of us are doing.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

[Matrix Dragon]

Hell, I've seen even worse things not trigger it. I encountered a guy on the weekend commenting he got to 38 in about two hours from sewer trials. mARTy is for the really obscene stuff, it seems.

[Bob Schroeck]

The sewer trial is absolutely obscene. Since it's become available, I've been able to level starting characters so fast that they never even see the initial content, they just hop to Talos when they're done and get their SO enhancements.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.