Regarding the view of the dev team - we are fairly certain there is no actual cheating going on.
However, we have noticed certain groups of players repeatedly showing the same approach to whatever realm they happen to be in at that time, and that has us worried because they are powergaming. Not speaking specifically about Fontan, we don't like it when an entire realm works like clockwork with almost no internal messages, no conflict, no nothing. Playing a piece in a machine is not what BattleMaster is about and more importantly, organizing the whole thing OOC whether amongst friends on the school yard or on IRC is borderline abusive because it excludes the other players who aren't members of your gang, clan or whatever you want to call it.
This is why we keep our eyes on certain realms.
I had to explain this to a couple of well-intentioned players in Minas Thalion who wanted to use IRC for planning as a way of team-building. It just isn't necessary for a realm to work that way and I think players who believe otherwise are missing much of the fun to be had from interacting via the lens of their characters.
