Yo
I was a SK player from 2012 to early '13, mostly playing LD T2 and 3 as striker gunslinger.
Was wondering how the game evolved since - what ups and downs its gone thru, how the updates Ive missed affected the meta, the current state of things, etc.
...If anyone still uses the forums, ig.
1. "What are the ups and downs?"
Honestly, for the longest time the game's progression was moving at a glacial pace - stagnant in a way that was hard to ignore. But somewhere around mid-2025 (I could be wrong), it felt like Grey Havens finally started locking in on the feedback the community had been putting out there for years. And right now? They're genuinely delivering; consistently patching, revisiting old concepts, and actually auditing the player experience in a way that feels and shows that they care. Is it perfect? No. But it's a far cry from the radio silence that defined the post-2014 era, and that alone counts for something to acknowledge. My one real grievance, and I'd wager most people share this — is that server lag and the state of content, both on the PvP and PvE side, are still the two elephants in the room that need real, substantive attention.
2. "How the updates I've missed affected the meta?"
This might come across as personal, but it really isn't — it's just the reality of where the game stands. There are players who gave it a solid year, year and a half, and ultimately walked away once it became clear there was nothing pulling them back — whether that was life circumstances, finances, or just the dopamine loop drying up. And honestly? That's valid. We grow up. We learn. But what'll impact your experience more than anything else isn't the game itself. It's how you carry yourself within it and who you choose to engage with. Both the old guard and the newer generations aren't really operating on blind trust anymore. Everyone's got their guard up, and navigating that requires a level of awareness (party lobby specific) people do talk about (at least from what I’ve seen on the forums).
Players come in with a very specific agenda now when running PvE, arcade, or any challenge — a set playstyle, a time frame, and a compensation expectation of what they're getting out of a run. If you can't align with different individuals on that, finding a consistent group becomes genuinely difficult. It’s not because you lack the skill to adapt, but because the door for open, fun parties has declined heavily (player base, private parties, etc). People want efficient runs with people they already know and trust. That's just where the culture has landed.
And that's exactly where "don't hate the player, hate the game" flips on its head; because at this point (which I don’t get), the players in this game basically are perpetuating it. The culture of exclusivity and hyper-optimization is slowly hollowing out what made Spiral Knights feel like Spiral Knights in the first place. The soul of it is getting buried under progressive and increasingly exploitative meta trends.
3. "The current state of the game."
At its core? It still feels like the same game you were logging into back in 2012 and 2013 — and I mean that in both the good and the not-so-good ways. What's changed is the layering on top of it: more flavor in the gameplay (smooth), a cleaner UI, pet companions, and an almost excessive catalog of reskins that's hard to keep up with. The list is long. Grey Havens is making visible progress on a lot of the outstanding issues — just not always the ones the community has been loudest about (rather have something than nothing). The obvious pain points are still sitting there, and everyone can see them.
Now — with that context established — let me introduce you to something that tends to not really come up in conversations sooner or later within your new gameplay experience: Knight Launcher. It's a third-party client built to modify and ostensibly "enhance" your Spiral Knights experience. People will swear to you this as a “quality-of-life upgrade”, and on the surface it might even look like one. In practice, lol? Don't install it. That's really all that needs to be said right now and I’ll get into why.
4. "So you covered everything, but I'm very curious about Knight Launcher. Do you know anything about it?"
I'm familiar with it — but no, I don't have it installed. Not even a little. No interest. The reason I brought it up isn't because I'm advocating for it in any capacity — it's because Knight Launcher is the lens through which a lot of the "change" people are noticing in the game actually makes zero sense, and that's the point I want to build on. Easiest case to dismiss.
To cut straight to it — Knight Launcher is a ban-able third-party game client/launcher. Private pro-KL players can make the argument that Grey Havens is actively working on, fixing, and revisiting the exact gameplay issues that Knight Launcher claims to address or improve — and that's a fair observation. But the argument doesn't override the rule. The policy is clear on where it stands. What makes it particularly problematic is that any user can download this client and install their own custom, programmable mods with virtually no gatekeeping. You're getting a wide-open door to play around with LIVE game files. Property and assets that belong to Grey Havens. Altering or customizing any game development's property or assets is a legal issue that a lot of people who are under 30 don't understand. And that right there is where the OTHER real problem begins. I won’t get into the details on what happened to the owner and the consequences faced, but it is what it is (which you can search and find on your own).
5. "What are the signs that someone is on them? It takes one to know one, right?"
Keep in mind I don't use mods. At all. But the signs are the gameplay feels and looks insufferable and dull. The signs show up in three places almost immediately. Gameplay, feel, and the user interface. The gameplay itself starts to feel so damn choppy and unnatural, like the fluidity that's supposed to be there has been sanded down into something rigid and mechanical. The movement loses its authenticity. It’s ugly, it feels compressed, artificial — like you're watching a simulation of the game rather than actually playing it. And the f***ing UI? It’s altered beyond recognition in some cases. You have — blocky, lego-esque shapes and images swapped in where the original aesthetic used to live. It’s like a meme. It’s something you expect literally a inexperienced 13 year old to create for you if they had to guess what game design or development looks like. It’s amazingly horrible.
The scope of what people are doing with these mods is genuinely broad, and the proof isn't hidden — it's sitting right there in plain sight if you know what to look for. Pull up video footage of people running Lockdown or doing arcade and mission runs, and once you know what you're looking at, it becomes hard to unsee. Those are your tells. That said — and this is important — it's a difficult case to make without concrete evidence to back it up. So before you go pointing fingers or making the argument to anyone (like me), make sure you have something tangible in hand. Screenshots, recordings, receipts. Because without them, it's just talk. Don't do this if you can't take the heat for it later.
6. You mentioned Lockdown, so I'll mention how Knight Launcher becomes an issue to the PvP experience:
If you still carry any love for Lockdown, Rmanami — I'd approach it with serious caution, if not outright skepticism. At least relative to what it was when it first launched. One of the most consistent patterns I've observed from spectating is that a significant portion of players running these clients make Lockdown an actively miserable experience for everyone else in the lobby. We're talking 50k+ damage outputs, inflated hitboxes and ranges that defy the game's intended geometry, movements and aim that feel mechanically artificial — and the worst offense of all, tampering with the net-code itself. The moment you hand a player or a community that level of unchecked access, you don't have a match anymore. You have a room full of impossibilities.
One name I'll put on the table — Communism-Works, also known as Dranzerex, Xowy, or Epic-Legend-Knight; I won't dedicate more real estate to that individual than they deserve, because frankly there isn't much substance worth dissecting; but what I will say is that their contribution to the deterioration of Lockdown was nothing short of drastic. Not once has this player been banned at all. Zero. When you have a player who is visibly and repeatedly out-computing the server by manipulating game files and exploiting core functionality, what follows is inevitable — a cascading wave of like-minded individuals who see the blueprint and replicate it, further depreciating whatever integrity and enjoyment the mode had left. That's the damage.
My opinion lays here; He wasn't a respectable player. At all. Just a player finding gruesome ways to feed their ego with damage numbers and not strategy. Lockdown is what it is because this moron thought what he did in Lockdown would have long-term effect in bringing more players. It didn't. Now, lockdown is a complete ghost town.
Skill doesn't enter the equation anymore. Server ping doesn't either. You simply cannot compete on a level playing field against someone operating on a moded client — and more often than not, the root of it isn't technical. It's moral. It's a player base problem dressed up as a game problem. And right now? There are virtually zero organic Lockdown games running — none that aren't quietly orchestrated by alts. That tells you everything you need to know about where it stands.
Lockdown will remain dead until the issues with Knight Launcher is fixed.
Now yes — there's Crucible. A Lockdown variant mode that gives players the autonomy to build/customize and curate their own lobbies by inviting specific users (open) rather than waiting on the traditional queue to fill out. On paper, it sounds like a reasonable solution. And in some ways, it is — the intent behind it was clearly to give the player base more control over who, when and how they engage with other users in Lockdown, removing the dependency on assembling a full party of eight or more before anything gets off the ground. Practical in concept. But even that has its ceiling. There's no demand for it for the same reason there isn't demand for regular Lockdown lobbies. The same culture, the same people with a modded client follow you right into those lobbies — the format changes, the problem doesn't. So yeah. There's that.
> what's up guys! Returning player here, just wondering how the game is doing-
> I HATE KNIGHT LAUNCHER!!!1!1!11
> ???
Edit: Rmanami, the replies above seem to be AI generated, so I wouldn't take any of it at face value. (Half of it is straight up misinformation)
Ah yes — the troll himself.
The troll that makes absolutely cringe-worthy Crucible maps with zero-substance. Surely this guy knows what's up right? I'm definitely generating AI-like comments and don't know about your activities in regards to Lockdown, right?
1. Read. You'd be surprised how far you get if you just took 30 minutes a day to learn to read (a book, an article, essays, etc.)
2. I mentioned Knight Launcher as one of the biggest changes to the user experience.
3. Obviously you didn't read the post so commenting that it's AI generated is expected from someone with a comprehension level of a golf ball.
Try again Spark.
Jarvis generate me a 20 page paragraph describing the game in general. invent some drama for extra flavor. create a negative review impacting knightlauncher and describe how it and modding is the sole reason nobody plays LD in the slightest. make it extra convincing and post.
jarvis someone pointed out what im up to, insult them, make them look illiterate and be contrary to what they said, post and repeat.
Try Again? Uhh yeah? What about him?
And for the record I actually prefer shrimp
Ramani to answer YOUR question: I recall getting a few updates in the past couple years;as an on and off player for the past 10 years, the biggest up is that these servers are still up and running, keeping this GEM alive. The player base as far I know is pretty supportive. Lockdown is barley even a thing anymore altough Ive been able to play a couple games of the new 1v1 mode. I think the meta has remained the same. Vangaurds run Vana with combuster/glacius, blitz needle, and a vortex bomb. As for the cuurent state of the game the experience is pretty well preserved for how you remember it back in '12. So yeah... also AI slop make me go brrrr.
Epic-Legend-Knight and his minions from Enrage found great advantage from modified game files before Knight Launcher existed, so I would not put the blame on it. The file they modified is projectx-pcode.jar specifically, and it was unrelated to KL.
The meta right now for anything related to Vanaduke is to make sure you have Combuster, Arcana, Blitz Needle, and Electron Vortex. If you see players with this type of set, most of them are modded.
Lockdown again, still remains a ghost town.
Maybe. Could be what he was on. But a player on full BK/BKR hitting 60-80k damage randomly is cheating and on macros/KL/ or any exploitive file.
But not even surprised. As of what I know and read, there's people who can imitate what ELK did on Knight Launcher as well.
KL is still a useless and extractive client. It contributes to why players can get away with cheating without consequences.
jarvis pull out most commonly used meta sets and a crazy low number. add k to inflate that number so it seems crazy high and adds credibility to my point. increase my ego and click post
Since OP referenced 2012-2013, I believe black kat armor was introduced sometime in 2014, and that's been the main meta since. Using BK set, you'd have Dmg Max + MSI M, which was a crazy combo to have and it felt like more players started using guns a lot more due to having dmg max on every weapon type. Pair this with guns like arcana or other elemental blasters, and you'd be dealing decent dmg
I played from 2013 to '15 and would pop back in around 2019 and so on. I was still able to find games back, so I'm not exactly sure when LD died or the causes, but I wouldn't be surprised if BK + arcana/heavy gunplay was one of the causes. The devs have been working on the game and mentioned possible balance changes, it'd be cool to see some changes to the meta.
Black Kat was indeed introduced in 2014, maybe mid?
> It wasn't the meta entirely because it was too expensive to acquire and the grind for it wasn't fulfilling or compensative.
Only a few individuals were able to take advantage of the damage max + MSI increase.
> So yes, Arcana was popular, but gradually (over time).
2012-15 were the last prime years for both the game and Lockdown.
> On average there were tons of games (somewhere between ~50-200 players in lobbies)
> Lockdown died in early 2016. Inactive accounts, boring matches, Jemp fallout.
Lockdown died because of cheaters + the inactivity of players from 2015.
> The first individual to abuse cheats on a high scale was Epic-Legend-Knight (Xowy, Dranzerex, Communism-Works, Lost-Incarnation, etc.)
> The new meta for lockdown is full BKC, KL/modified client, and UVs.
> People have spammed weapons for a majority of this games existence. It wasn't the weapons, but the player's morality and exploitative intentions that killed the game together.
>jarvis give me a conversation and some stats from a community and call it cheats with no explanation
on a serious note, can you actually give evidence or detailed explanation with proof about WHY you're calling that a cheat?
not to mention everything else is complete garbage spewed to make yourself actually look smart, ever tried facing at a mirror?
>So yes, Arcana was popular
COMPLETELY UNRELATED TO THE POINT IN THE SUBTITLE YOU MADE
>Lockdown died in early 2016.
You sure?
>Lockdown died because of cheaters + the inactivity of players from 2015.
Oh so now it's no longer 2016?
>The first individual to abuse cheats on a high scale
Again, proof? Like, any actual damn proof whatsoever?
>Epic-Legend-Knight
Damn do you have a grudge about this guy?
>The new meta for lockdown is full BKC
False, never has been. Do you even know the game?
>KL/modified client
Irrelevant to the notion of "meta". Also false
>and UVs
You mean farm a lot (or pay) to get good stats so you can fight in a player versus player situation?
Gee, I wonder what game also contains that same notion... (spoiler: all of them)
>People have spammed weapons for a majority of this games existence
....that's how games work bro, ever tried it? or rather, ever fought against any player in any game whatsoever?
>the player's morality and exploitative intentions killed the game together.
or... have you ever considered... not wanting to play anymore for no reason? or literally ANY other reason? also proof?
I've wasted my time replying to your bullcrap statements that I feel like my neurons died by the millions. Thanks.
On a different note, please do keep replying with your AI slop, you're giving me a way to vent.
Cheers and do better
1. Interesting, can I see the "AI" chat history for this? Want to see something.
2. Can I give evidence? Knight Launcher? YouTube? Private Discords dedicated for modifications and Vanaduke runs. Do I need to list more? How many do you want?
3. Every thing that seems garbage to you is just proof that you are either the problem or the people abusing it. There's nothing new with your vague and generic response. All of this crap typed on your behalf is just cope.
4. No fucking shit, right? It's like NO ONE plays the game to know that Arcana is popular. My subtitle wasn't a response to what the original poster was asking. It was to another player adding value to the conversation.
5. Okay, what's that AI engine crap you use? Jarvis? Care to use that to debunk my statement? If it wasn't 2016, when did it become inactive? Surely you know, right?
6. Damn it. What a fact checker. You caught me. Seems like reading just isn't for you like Spark-Of-Kill. Okay, I got you; LD started to die slowly in player count in 2015 and went on it's way to be completely dead in 2016. Does that sense? Do you want me to ChatGPT the meaning of any of this for you? I could if you like. Let me know. I know some people don't do good in the comprehension department.
7. Oh, proof? Me? PROOF? You thought I would just type all of this with NO PROOF? The proof is online. In the game. On YouTube. Grey Havens posts. Private, unlisted, shared and organized Discord groups outside the game. What else is the proof? The bans? The terms of service? The issue with messing and altering in-game files? Lucas and Grey Haven situation? I don't know... am I missing more to this? Can you ask Jarvis for me Gremlin?
8. Grudge or truth? Let me educate you. Facts don't care about your feelings. A truth is a truth. If it walks like a duck. It is a duck. You get it? It's been proven on video that he's a modded player. What is the grudge, tell me? Do you need Jarvis? The problem here I see is delusion and cope. Instead of looking at the situation for what it is, you CHOOSE to be ignorant and oblivious. You're not trying to learn, you are trying to put a barrier in having players get caught. Sorry, but again, facts don't care about your feelings.
9. Do you have access to internet or something? Are you playing the Chinese version of the game by any chance? It seems like you're either an alt or you've never played lockdown before. And that's okay, but don't act like you know anything about the meta of PvP. You don't. 95% of players who even touch the game mode to get good or try-hard use full BK. Stop the bullshit.
10. At this point, I realized you're either a player breaking the terms of service or a troll. And to be honest, it's ironic and funny. You're typing all your crap on here, but you have not corrected me on quite anything. Why don't you actually play the game and see for yourself? The meta is no longer what it was in 2012, 13, 14 or 15. Get your head out of your ass and start playing if you even care to see the changes right now. Don't come here picking a fight with no weapons.
11. That really isn't my point. Is it? Did you read or no? This has been part of the recommended status you should strive for if you want to be good at the game. This game that game doesn't matter. It's part of why every player is good or abusive at PvP. Everyone can grind. Everyone can buy. What point are you making? My statement is just emphasizing what the community knows.
12. If I haven't why am I typing it? Again, are you playing the game or you trying to type for the sake of it? Abuse or not, is it part of the game?
13. Why is Lockdown dead today? Can you tell me? Why can't I find lobbies that aren't orchestrated by the same players? Why are people farming Krogmo Coins on alts? Why?
AI slop? Neurons? I'm not here to talk about that crap with you. You probably have alzheimer disease or diagnosed with agnosia. That's not my problem. How about you save your time in typing useless crap to a post that had nothing in concern for you if you can't comprehend it? You interpret information as AI slop? Go do yourself a favor and use your time to learn to read or play the actual game. You sound like a bozo just typing for the sake of it.
Well then, looks like someone got salty.
idgaf, you're still contributing nothing relevant to the conversation
>Can I give evidence?
...we've been trying to tell you to do that for the past few replies, sir
>what's that AI engine crap you use? Jarvis?
that went over your head spectacularly, i love it
>You thought I would just type all of this with NO PROOF?
....you did do this tho?
>The proof is online. In the game. On YouTube. Grey Havens posts. Private, unlisted, shared and organized Discord groups outside the game.
sir, in every documented discussion, the proof or references are posted via links, cited and footnoted or otherwise. all you've done is paraphrase it with no added value whatsoever.
>Why is Lockdown dead today?
I don't know, maybe because mainly the game was dead for quite a while now? because the game doesn't become fun when you're up against the only players in the game, which are also the ones that tryhard and make the experience for others not fun? maybe because it became boring for them too, which resulted in nobody playing the 4v4+ gamemode afterwards?
>95% of players who even touch the game mode to get good or try-hard use full BK.
well that does contribute to that huh
GH did try to revive the game with a few fixes and additions, mainly adding the the ability to zoom in (https://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/123672), the Crucible (https://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/124911) and Super Brawl (https://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/124981), so it does show that the devs and (a part of) the community care about the PvP aspect to some extent. Other than the devs adding the zoom-out as an in-game feature (which allegedly was a cheat long before the change), you kept blaming Knight Launcher as a cause of cheating which led to Lockdown not being played anymore. The claims in these posts are of the years 2014-2016, but KL didn't appear until early 2020 (according to the commit history of the project, actual usage of the project allegedly june 2020), and even then, in oct.2020 the zoom-out feature was added, so I cannot imagine what "cheats" you are claiming to have impacted that experience at all. Sure, the servers until very recently were very laggy and problematic as such, so other players closer to the server location with less lag/latency had better response, which *felt as if they were cheating*, but isn't the same as actually cheating. So, unless you can name these alleged cheats and prove they were a problem, I won't give an ounce of credibility to your claims.
If you want another reason why LD won't be played anymore (or hasn't been), is that because this game is mainly PvE oriented, the only few weapons/recipes that are locked behind the Coliseum have to be farmed somehow, and long games of LD would be inefficient, so the best next things are Blast Network and the newly appeared Super Brawl, since they're much faster to complete.
Actually let me go back to one of your previous points:
>BK/BKR hitting 60-80k damage randomly
There's NO realistic window of this happening in a serious match, probably only when you get all players on the other side to let themselves get killed by the same player over and over in order to get the high funny number...
Another thing you failed to mention is, among others, why arcana is a popular choice for a weapon. Surely, as someone who's played the game, you would know the obvious answer to this one, right?
I haven't responded seriously in a while, but I do hope you actually start being serious about it instead of being vague and projecting your insecurities and flaws onto others and insulting them when they're not licking your bootstraps. I've given you enough information to correct your incorrect slop, but I doubt you will.
Cheers and do better, but I know you won't.
I know you don't like reading. So I'll shorten it to avoid wasting my time; you're a troll.
1. Accusing and still not debunking me. Typical. Next.
2. You didn't. Next.
3. I don't care. Next.
4. None in this thread. Next.
5. Your typing just to type. Next.
6. I already typed that. Re-read the post. Next.
7. I typed that as well, next.
8. Just a bunch of nonsense that I already covered.
I don't know why you woke up and thought you did anything with the reply. It holds zero substance.
- I don't care about what claims you can cope with or not. Credibility or not, you just paraphrased what I wrote originally except you added in extra unnecessary crap.
Few notes:
> Zoom out feature wasn't in the game. One of the cheats KL had that I was referring about.
> There's players with better connection due to proximity to the server in the past who were still good. Irrelevant to the core subject.
> PvE is oriented, but I am discussing about the variants of modes or activities to do outside of the PvE spectrum. The original poster asked about the meta and Lockdown.
> ELK has hit 70k in lockdown. Cope harder.
Certain-Gremlin: I haven't responded seriously in a while, but I do hope you actually start being serious about it instead of being vague and projecting your insecurities and flaws onto others and insulting them when they're not licking your bootstraps. I've given you enough information to correct your incorrect slop, but I doubt you will. Cheers and do better, but I know you won't.
Maybe this quote will help you; "A clever person takes notice of everything; a stupid one makes a comment about everything."— Heinrich Heine
you're actually proving my previous jabs at your bullshit right lmao
your points about what "bullshit I spew" are irrelevant, the "few notes" that you've made are bogus, KL does have an anti-cheat protection so that players don't just insert cheats willy-nilly given that you don't know how to look up how it works, you have cherry-picked the better connection part and called it irrelevant still,
>PvE is oriented, but I am discussing about the variants of modes or activities to do outside of the PvE spectrum. The original poster asked about the meta and Lockdown.
...whatever the hell THIS is supposed to mean,
>ELK has hit 70k in lockdown. Cope harder.
Other than 1 message dating 2017 ("LOL elk dropped his 70k dps"), and other 3 ones up to 2020 referencing the same one, all of which in The Arcade discord server, I have yet to see a screenshot proving that 70k damage you mentioned whatsoever. btw stop using only that server for your AI slop it bores me
I've consistently asked you to actually provide the proof instead of just making the claims, but maybe I am wrong in thinking that you're ever going to do it if asked nicely.
maybe I am the fucking idiot in this conversation for arguing with someone using obvious AI responses.
@Pqbp Let me break down this entire forum thread real quick:
You left four blatantly AI generated responses with incorrect and hardly relevant information in regard to OP's questions.
You got called out for both the usage of said AI and misinformation
Everything after is a whole lot of yapping from both sides.
You can insult the "reading comprehension" of whoever you'd like, that's not going to change the fact that you used AI to generate 16+ paragraphs of mostly incorrect and irrelevant information.
It also hasn't occurred to you that Certain-Gremlin and I have been pulling your leg for months now. Better late than never I guess.
I'm done adding fuel to this dumpster fire. Peace.
What did you prove exactly? Tell me?
1. Knight Launcher should not even exist. The fact that you have to tell me they have an anti-cheat protection should be a reason why I, the community, the developers, and the company shouldn't trust you or your word. You should not play the game if you need to rely on a third-party software. My point is it's not useful, use the original client provided (Steam or the downloadable). And you still keep telling me there are not cheats when that software has a "protection" feature to prevent it? You not only lied there aren't cheats, but that there was INDEED people cheating and that the owner of the software had to enforce that feature. Stop being a smartass.
2. No one cherry-picked. I had never mentioned anything in regards to connection until you brought it up. If you don't live next to the server so what? That's a geographic problem. Not a game, morality, or exploitation problem. It's irrelevant because the community knows exactly where the servers are operated.
3. The game is orientated around PvE first bozo. I am talking about the meta and state of the game. PvP, Knight Launcher, party formations, and other concepts implemented by players or the game itself. What is that difficult to understand?
4. What. The. Fuck? Do you have schizophrenia? I have not given you a source of where my statement came from. So 3 people have stated this? You know what that means? It happened. YOU don't need to believe it or be there for it to happen if players have commented on it. As of now, I'm not in any Discord group regarding Spiral Knights. I know this simply because I was in the lobby on an alt watching. You we're not there. Sit this one out. Thank you.
5. I've given you examples. Those are the proof. You can find them OUTSIDE of this thread/forum. I told you YouTube, Discord groups, forums, in-game etc. What are you not comprehending? Are you actually slow? Wake up?
You are an idiot. No one is using AI but you. None of my responses are AI.
You don't need to break down anything to me baby boy. You are the community's most useless troll.
Please highlight anything that is "AI" generated in my response and give me a reason how they are. What information exactly is irrelevant or misinformation to OP's question?
What part of the conversation is yapping? What did I miss? Tell me.
Please do leave and never comment nothing on the game's meta. Stick to being a nerd and a nuisance.
You're so salty about it instead of providing actual proof, please entertain me more i love it
If someone got found to be stabbed/shot in the back 47 times and three people say that it was a suicide, then is it a fact that it was a suicide?
btw you wanted me to prove your texts were AI-generated, have a few reports down here:
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1lSGgrCLmAKRBJ5aHKGGM4aMWUYN8Io61...
Pqbp is right in everything he is saying btw
Pqbp is right in everything he is saying btw
No need to worry anymore, I killed the file
Nice alts bro
still waiting for actual proof btw
pics or didnt happen
That is alright but first I will need to make sure you are trustworthy. Please show me proof that you have not voted for Pedro Sanchez
aight bet, here it is:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1kgsqEhQxx5EHoJISWncMX_3bzUDQT8qu/view?u...
@Certain-Gremlin - I think this will probably be my last response to you.
> https://www.humanizeai.pro/ is a fake AI site that uses other sites which those sites use other AI tools to determine AI usage. It is a back and fourth workflow. I can put any vocabulary word in there and it will still be labeled as AI (including yours). You should probably do more research on what is AI and what is not because the reviews for that site scream fake and inefficient.
> Bad analogy, but I could debunk that; If there's no investigation, there is no proof.
- There was proof that people used a Zoom mod before the developers caught on.
- There was proof that Lucas got DMCA'd by Grey Havens.
- There was proof that KL is a third-party software used to mod or enhance the code logic of that game and its files (GitHub).
All of these issues have been reported on here.
Unfortunately, I don't think I can continue entertaining your troll any further. It's draining and you need to find other productive ways to get attention. Doing that with me isn't one of them.
When you're ready to actually take this discussion seriously, I'm all eyes and ears.
- Pqbp
I'm not done with you,
Of course you would know how AI sites work, after all, you can confidently say that those have false positives. Okay, I'll take that at face value, let me bring my own arguments to your AI speech usage:
-unnatural speech patterns (i.e. "Wild to see you were there from the jump")
-sophisticated word choices ("buried under progressive and increasingly exploitative meta trends", )
-self-contradicting opinions ("I won't dedicate more real estate<...> frankly there isn't much substance worth dissecting", followed by an entire paragraph's length of text about him, and more in the replies still)
-a shit ton of em-dash " — " characters being used instead of normal dashes " - ", let's be for real nobody has that character on a keyboard even by choice
-it's not X it's Y "This might come across as personal, but it really isn't — it's just the reality of where the game stands."
-tons of "short" successive sentences ("And honestly? That's valid. We grow up. We learn.", "Grudge or truth? Let me educate you. Facts don't care about your feelings. A truth is a truth. If it walks like a duck. It is a duck. You get it?")
-confirmation bias ("And honestly? That's valid. We grow up. We learn.", "you've never played lockdown before. And that's okay")
-exaggerated claims ("If you see players with this type of set, most of them are modded.", Point 6 of the 4th reply in this thread [https://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/125000#comment-1076486]) - this one requires the game context to be known in order to tell whether someone's bullshitting or not
-the entire texts you made look like polite corporate/AI slop that make political debates have more substance by comparison
I could go on and on and give all the examples needed, and even point out every mistake you said and did, speech pattern or context, with corrections and whatever. just one small issue: whenever I did any of that, all you kept repeating like a parrot is "shut the fuck up you cant read you stupid troll, im right and ur wrong" (Replies 6, 17, 20, 23, 34). I will give you credit, your replies have gotten shorter and a bit more concise. Just a bit, tho
On another hand, you keep replying to me, so yes, I do enjoy your attention when you're so worked up like this <3
But hey, I'm not that bad of a person, I do want to find some common ground with you, so I want to try again, properly this time. Here, let's discuss this point you made about a player:
"Communism-Works (...) is visibly and repeatedly out-computing the server by manipulating game files and exploiting core functionality"
This is telling me a few things:
- this is not his first offense, and stuff like this would have had to been brought to the game masters, unknown to me if that happened;
- "out-computing" would mean that his machine(s) are stronger than the ones from the server, thing which couldn't possibly be able to give him any advantage whatsoever in my opinion;
- "manipulating game files and exploiting core functionality" yep that's a cheating accusation, fair
I have no issues with the first and third point, they just sound to me like something wasn't resolved and it shouldn't be my problem.
The second point however does sound a bit ridiculous, which I am attacking here, so I'd like to know what did you mean by that. Furthermore, after I challenged this claim you made, you replied to me that "There's players with better connection due to proximity to the server in the past who were still good." which doesn't really add anything. I have taken your advice and searched about this guy, and I did find people talk about him playing as if he has "zero ping", but I do find that hard to believe to be caused by cheating, so I really want to see your point here, especially when you made the point " worst offense of all, tampering with the net-code itself", because in my experience, no amount of mods/code manipulation should be able to drastically improve the latency between client and server.
Cheers
Irontech — it's not only a Bomb — but also a Destroyer — perchance.
I've been using em-dashes since 1998. I've always used it to insert either additional context or to emphasize a specific focus on a topic (think of when you highlight a word in a book/document). It's part of my typing/writing grammar.
So yes, I use the 3 key combo because it's effective—for me. If you know the history behind the em-dash you'll know exactly why I used it.
It's not that I know how AI sites work. I'm using the source you have in your previous reply. It's just a fake website trying to cosplay as a "plagiarism" or "detective" checker.
- "Wild to see you from the jump" - is my way of stating that he's been a loyal knight from the beginning. How many people do you know stay after only 1 year of no content? Attention is very scarce and if you don't supply it with something, people will leave. I learned this expression in 3rd or 4th grade (I can't remember); You use this expression as an idiomatic phrase. You ever heard teachers telling their students to "break a leg"? You don't break a leg exactly. It just means good luck. The same applies to that source. You have to be intelligent to comprehend figurative language. It's not unnatural, this is part of the English learning language.
- "buried under progressive and increasingly exploitative meta trends" - There's always meta trends for any game of its own category you engage with. I’m just saying that over the years, as the game’s progression got more dull, it’s been focused on pushing loot boxes and reskins to make more money.(nothing wrong with that, it's business, but not fulfilling on the consumer side). Progressive and exploitative are not new or "sophisticated" languages. Many, many, many users in-game, online (forums) have used these words loosely or interchangeably.
- "I won't dedicate more real estate<...> frankly there isn't much substance worth dissecting", followed by an entire paragraph's length of text about him, and more in the replies still" - You are sort of right and wrong here; Knowing that this game runs on kid puns, I should've framed it this way. I'm simply using "real estate" and "spending" interchangeably to make a point because I don't "want to spend more words or time" on the player but on the problem. There was indeed no time or substance about the player other than them exploiting bugs and unreleased mods/features. This went above you and Spark's head and I should've known better.
- I've been using em-dashes for as long as time. You probably weren't born when I did these, but it's been there before AI. I've been in corporate for 15 years and this is what I am used to. You can 100% do em-dashes by either enabling options on your computer system or using 3 key combo (modern computer technology from 2018+).
- it's not X it's Y > I typed that sentence with the intention of assuming why the game is in its current stage looking at the player base age, what they may/might be doing, the inactivity rates, etc. It wasn't to be generic, but to give you an idea in how games, life, and updates follow with people in the activity of the game.
- "tons of successive language" > That doesn't even make sense. I used analogies and phrases kids like you grew up hearing in school. The grudge comment is coming from you, not me. I didn't mention anything about grudge until you did. The duck, the facts, the everything is all understandable and simple truths.
- "exaggeration and claims" > All been proven by Enrage and Tokyo players. Don't know what to tell you. Anyone reading my posts can see there's been zero false information posted.
- I shorten my responses because you do not having enough forbearance or thinking capacity to actually read. You need to be in metacognition mode if you want to learn or understand anything I type to make sense.
- "like he has zero ping" > Key word "like". Simile. He didn't have zero ping. It feels "like" he had zero ping. Ping had nothing to do with my argument and neither is it a problem with the game. If you live near the servers that's a location problem. You mentioned it earlier which brought no relevance or argument to what I was actually elaborating on.
"out-computing" in this context is about the software and development of the game. When you are dragging files and mods into the game folders, you are out-computing and utilizing code that runs faster, scales larger, or uses fewer resources than the competing program (SK vs. KL). This is the manipulation and exploitation I'm referring to.
If it isn't your problem what I am typing about or whatever the scenario with the game is, why engage with it?
You say you don't know how it works, but are bold enough to claim that it's demonstrably fake with (predictibly) zero evidence or reviews. I'll save you the prompt for this one, there are hundreds more that are easy to fool into not detecting something's AI-generated or paraphrased, while this one atleast bothered to use multiple sources to check if it's wrong or not. You would've known if you had entered the website. I have yet to get a link for anything you want to prove.
Thanks for the random English lesson, but I didn't ask you to explain what that phrase I attacked you for meant. I called out how unusual it is to see that phrase in an online game forum where most users aren't fluent in English. Seems like things do go over your head. Not surprising given that you didn't get most other puns that I did against you earlier...
I'm not going to bother answering each point you've tried to make earlier because you didn't even answer the shit I've asked you about. It is pointless to try to argue with you but I do love the attention you're giving me. And please, I don't know what school you did over wherever you lived but nobody heard so many short sentences one after another from the same person.
I lied, I am going through most of your points because this is some new bullshit. "forbearance", this the first time I've seen this word, and I do know what "to bear" means, but what the fuck. call me illiterate all you want but this ain't merriam webster, nobody uses that word in our previous context
speaking of context, i've tried to explain to you that there is no way client-side modifications can make the responses from the server be faster, but you can't fucking comprehend what any of those words mean without asking your AI to answer. Also, I've explained what out-computing means as a term, but you kept going about "you are out-computing and utilizing code that runs faster, scales larger, or uses fewer resources than the competing program (SK vs. KL)". Are you braindead? Are you actually lacking braincells? If you had actually tried to disprove anything, you would've at least looked up or even tested that software yourself. You're worse than a corporate shill because even those have a clue about what they're attacking. I'll explain why you're making the infinite monkey theorem look better by comparison: Spiral Knights is the game and client through which you communicate with the server. Knight Launcher is NOT a separate game client, and cannot run independently from the game client. Because of that, you can't alter the game in such a way that actually makes the server respond better and quicker compared to everyone else.
I've asked you multiple times to atleast provide something worth looking into, for instance WHAT cheats you're claiming that player is being accused of. I've searched for that, and the only thing I have found, which isn't even an accusation, the "zero ping" part which *could be compared to a cheat, but isn't*, I have explained why that wouldn't work as a cheat accusation, and you shrugged that off as "nothing to do with (your) argument".
Yet everytime you prove me right... I'm still waiting for you to give any actual proof, like a link, an image, something of substance. Do the search for me if you think I'm incapable of doing instead, despite the times I have actually done so. Come on, "Anyone reading" and "You should probably do more research" aren't actual proofs.
Cheers, and shit bricks, pal.
Eh.
For the sake of time, I'll keep this short. I won't cover the jargon because I want you to take the precious time you have to re-read. It will help.
But I will respond to the KL part:
Yes, by mistake I did state it was a game client. I meant software (I stated that somewhere before). A third party software you use to enhance the performance of the game client. I'm talking about the game files and not so much about the "server". Game files do enhance the experience of other players which is why YOU don't know about it. People are doing this behind your back. Examples are below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DhCOHJV--w
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJFjgJMr-h8
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CkNtLnH9vRU
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8XBBOZUL2A
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pp6MDOqJ1tc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKTAGvj7zVI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7kAhJhBoWo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=riqyPqI2ZIk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNApxkOvxHk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4S1miDetY8
So please. Stop being retarded. Read. Think. Then try to comprehend what you just wrote and what I wrote. Can you do that?
Thanks for the links, finally we have something to work on.
First video is only a tribute, nothing of substance
Second and third one show lockdown gameplay with reduced textures, zoom and comments claiming "recons are visible". In order: those reduced textures only make the game easier to load/play, but not really affecting stuff enough to consider it cheating; Zoom was added officially in LD in 2020; In the third video, at minute marks 4:00-4:03, if you put the playback in x0.25 speed, you can see the moment someone actually holds down the recon shield for just enough time to actually turn invisible, because all other times, shield cancelling to switch/fire the weapon faster doesn't allow for invisibility to take effect. It pisses me off a bit to see people call that out as cheating when they didn't see how the game works first.
4th video is a vanaduke run with less stuff to load, still putting the guise of "optimization" because, while that is modifying of how it works, we can't really call that cheating.
7th video is someone with modified sounds and textures in a way that makes it more appealing to them, so can't call that cheating either;
All other videos you linked are vana runs that do, in fact, use less textures and some stuff that is unironically cheating. The only thing I will argue is that it doesn't negatively affect anyone, and players doing this usually have done vana runs so many times to the point it's become boring and time-wasting. I'm not defending or condoning cheating, keep that in mind.
Edit: one of the videos that I didn't mention had a "POV" mod and forgot to say that it was both funny and made the game arguably harder, even with the same cheat mods you've seen.
So what am I trying to argue? The posts you made have tried to (maybe inadvertently) put the blame on both KL and ELK for firstly, ruining the PvP experience, and second, ruining the entire game experience. While I can only foolishly claim that, for the LD videos, your argument looks like "mad cuz bad", for the super brawl one, "I hate fun", and for the vana runs, "i hate speedrunners", do note this: if someone wants to cheat at this game (or any), they will do so regardless of using KL, whether you like it or not. I have also seen players do some very insane movements, and while those look very hard to reproduce, it doesn't look like it's not human reproducible at all. It upsets me when people blame possible scapegoats instead of going out of their way to actually do something about it, like suggest changes or actually look into how it works.
I have also re-read what you first said, and I am attacking the following point you made: "a significant portion of players running these clients (are causing) inflated hitboxes and ranges that defy the game's intended geometry, movements and aim that feel mechanically artificial — and the worst offense of all, tampering with the net-code itself". This point is why I've called your posts bullshit: It is impossible for this game respond to "hey I've hit this player/enemy even if I'm too far" and agree with a client, given that all action is done server-side at any given time; I've already discussed the movement and aim, those are not impossible by any standards; and I've already talked about how you can't possibly manipulate netcode so that the server favorably responds to you faster than anyone else; and while we agreed that ping is a non-issue, the term "out-computing" used earlier, when read in any context, makes one believe/think that the client can be somehow made to answer to the server faster (which, while true, still has to transcend the barrier of the data the server sends and ping). Either that or somehow having a better PC and internet connection magically makes the server run faster for one specific individual only. It feels stupid when I say that because, in most other contexts outside this game, when your specs/connection are actually slow/faulty, that is an actual solution.
Thanks and keep it going pal
Edit 2: "Game files do enhance the experience of other players which is why YOU don't know about it." why do you think we're arguing in the first place about netcode and other problems smartass?
...I wont lie, I had completely forgotten I posted here, and must say I'm unsure what I have stumbled upon by this point
Ig Ive been busy playing SK for a bit - leveling a new char from scratch, building some useful stuff, farming to buy other things... recently it'd been Kats and whatnot (I did find a book! =D)
So far its been fairly enjoyable, but I still miss Lockdown. My time back then had been strongly built around it - aside from actually playing it, hanging out with guildmates, farming for new gear and heating it up for new loadouts, and so on. I can see that a lot of the community aspect still exists to the game, albeit in a *much* smaller scale...
Saddening to think that those experiences are likely not ever coming back, but it does give me hope that theres people around still. I am happy that both the remaining playerbase and dev team seem to be interested not only in the maintenance of the game, but its development, however slowly
EDIT: Just noticed the forum node for this thread, 125000! lol
To summarize, this guy Pqbp gave you an answer which may or may not be correct and/or be related to the contexts, but used AI to paraphrase so it can give you an extensive answer, and then what followed was basically a back and forth of me calling out his bullshit (mainly the fact that he didn't back up anything with a source up until his last reply, saying that cheats can manipulate how fast a server can answer to a cheater in favor of other players which is a ludicrous claim from someone who said didn't touch mods at all, and blaming the entire cheating problem on one guy and knight launcher) and him calling me back names, illiterate, troll etc. also some other shenanigans
Welcome back and hope u had fun lol, if you want to read through these replies just get some popcorn while you're at it
pvp beef in the current year of big 2026, welcome back Spiral Knights I missed you o7
Hey Rmanami!
Wild to see you were there from the jump — back when Lockdown and the whole PvP scene was still finding its footing. It's been a long time. Spiral Knights has come a long way in terms of how people actually move through it day-to-day — the Jelly King grind, Vanaduke runs, Shadow Lairs, farming the arcade for recipes — and the meta has shifted considerably, both in how the game gets played and what people are actually running. Context matters now more than ever, because what was true in '12 and '13 barely resembles where things stand in '25 and '26. The player base isn't operating on blind optimism anymore (nowadays at least) — there's a real literacy that's developed over time. That being said, there's still a fair amount of dysfunction on both ends: the game's got its own unresolved issues, and so does the community consuming it.
I want to address each comment in turn, then follow up with my own observations and perspective.