Player Riley (Phacad3) was pearled 3 weeks ago due to a server-side bug. In this clip, Riley has desynced from the server. A desync is a server-side issue in which real-time movements of the hitbox are not registered by the server. From Riley's perspective, he has moved away but from the opponent's, Riley's player model is still there because his real-time movements have not been registered by the server. This bug is recreated in a second clip from Pirater's perspective. Here Pirater's movements have not been registered by the server and he suddenly "rubber-bands" to the top of the water. These two clips demonstrate a server-side bug which is caused by flowing water. Other players have experienced the same server-side bug on the live server but these are the most egregious examples.

The administration has no understanding of this. In mod mail, administrators clutched at straws. They first blamed mods despite a number of players with different mods experiencing the same problem. The admins then blamed his download speed as a cause. This shows a lack of understanding how TCP connections on Minecraft work. It can be seen in the clip that Riley is receiving server side data, while somehow the server is not registering their client side data. TCP connections ensure delivery of data and will keep retrying until the data is received. The fact that Riley continues to see server side data without freezing or rubber-banding proves the server is receiving data from his client with acknowledgement that the data is being received. The clip proves that Riley is sending and receiving data from the server just fine but that the server is failing to register his data.

Finally they admitted that there WAS a server-side bug at play and attempted to fix it.

Despite this obviously being a server-side bug and Riley NOT being responsible, the admins REFUSED to free Riley's pearl or refund his gear. They explained that a player could desync on purpose. That argument falls on its face because Riley is an experienced player, seconds away from the safety of his vault, and had a full inventory of potions. It makes absolutely no sense for Riley to intentionally desync here because he had little to no risk of dying.

The second argument they make is they "cannot guarantee perfect gameplay conditions" because "Civ servers run a lot of plugins and there's so many contributing factors". This would be fine if administration were consistent with this philosophy, however in prior dealings, when players have had pearls freed from a server-side bug, admins have re-pearled players. This highlights the inconsistency in the administrations treatment of players being impacted by server-side bugs, and if the administration expect us to trust their decision making they MUST free Riley to maintain consistency.

The final argument the administration have made is that they have failed to reproduce the glitch on their side, so they refuse to take any action. This creates an unfair precedent. In the future, if players are impacted by a server-side bug that the administration fail to reproduce, the onus is placed on the player to accomplish the next to impossible task of hosting a server locally with plugins and configs that are private. If the admins have in fact patched the bug as they claimed they tried, it would now be impossible to recreate.

The administration have failed Riley and other players that have been impacted by this server-side bug and been pearled. If the administration expect us to trust them to do their job fairly they must free Riley and other players affected by this bug.

#FreeRiley

TL;DR Gregy smells like onions