It's not paranoia if they really are all out to get you.
Getting sniped while streaming is a pretty common problem across all games, and not just Hearthstone.
If you’re unfamiliar with the term, sniping is when streamers find themselves dealing with an opponent who seems to know everything about their strengths and their weaknesses, and gains an unfair advantage as a result.
How are they getting this information though? By watching the stream themselves, of course.
Popular Hearthstone streamer Octavian “Kripparian” Morosan experiences more sniping than most, and in a game like Hearthstone (where limited knowledge of an opponent’s assets is so crucial for maintaining fair play), it can cause a great deal of frustration. Even more so, when you suspect that there may in fact be an entire guild of players conspiring to ruin your gaming experience.
Despite taking preventative measures such as adding a delay to his stream, Kripparian continued to see the same player, shamelessly sniping his games, day in and day out.
After purging his friends list and inviting one such sniper to be his friend, he gained access to their friend list, which in turn led him to discover a group of similarly-named players, all dedicated to collectively targeting his matches.
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Here’s a chat log from the guild. It confirms that someone on Kripparian’s friends list was instructing snipers when they should queue, so as to bypass the stream delay that was in effect.
In his own words – and in the very same video posted above – Kripparian self-deprecatingly describes himself as a “paranoid asshole”, and he’s certainly gained no small amount of fame for the frustration he expresses with the game.
Given the hard conspiratorial truth that’s been uncovered here though, it’s not hard to sympathise with his predicament, and share his frustration.
Is there more that can be done to counter this kind of problem with game streaming though? It seems like exercising a certain amount of discipline around friends list maintenance is the most important starting point, and being extremely wary of who you accept friend requests from.
Certainly that would have been a better choice for this particular sniper and their friends…
