Let me clarify something

[CiRiON]

Good day everyone, I'll first introduce myself before I'm going to discuss.
I'm one of the admins of a Soldat community (registerd with an other nick), only our community is a bit different.
You see, we like Soldat in a different way, we'd like to go deep in the code and try to change this. (Better known as hacking)
Now, please don't judge me on this fact, since I'm here to talk about some problems.

First of all, hacking ain't a bad thing. It's basiclly what the soldat developers do, only then reversed.
Cheating is the bad thing, since cheating ruins the gameplay.
Creating hacks and cheating is WAY DIFFERENT.
Hacking is just a form of programming, and it's very educative.
Cheating is the use of created hacks for winning.
I hope you understand we do not support cheaters, only hackers.

Second is the way Battle Eye deals with hacks. I understand you want a "hack-free" server, but this has gone to far.
Not us, but Battle Eye is ruing the gameplay since people get randomly banned and the use off applications that hook onto soldat is forbidden. (X-Fire, winamp plugin).
Eventually, we (the hackers) will be able to bypass this, but soldat players won't.

Then the last thing I want to say. You guys (pointing to the development and managment team) think we hate you, we hate soldat and we'l love to destroy both.
That's NOT true. I see it more that we need you and you need us.
We help you improve the security system, while you help us to improve our skills.
It's a cat and mouse game we both play, but please be so fair not to cheat in this game...

I hope you guys understand us better now.
Kind regards.

[Sticky]

This was an excellent idea for a thread.

[InuYasha]

t thought chakra made the a thread similar to this in the sin bin

[Dascoo]

Why is this in the lounge? Go put this in general discussions since it has something to do with Soldat...

[InuYasha]

wtf y does his post count say 0?

[Dascoo]

Because this is probably his first post and it's in here where post count doesn't increase.

[echo_trail]

CiRiON, it is not you job to "improve" soldat, as you say. You know very well that it has been asked that you do not hack soldat in any way, no matter the intentions, so what you're doing is violating the trust of letting out the game free and open like it has been done. If you have some ideas for soldat, we have a forum for that. If you wanna take it further, talk to enEsCe or MM, just don't go around hacking as you have done.

Oh, and don't preach about hacking not being bad. You say you're not contributing to cheating and that you do not support it. however, the cheats I see used in soldat are all based on the work of hackers, hackers such as yourself. So don't be saying that, mate, no matter your intentions.

You might not be one of the bad guys, I wouldn't know. I suppose some hackers actually do produce hacking programs in favor of the greater good, but as I said, it is not your job to do so.

Hacking is wrong, no matter how you put it.

[frogboy]

ibtl

[InuYasha]

ibtl

Wtf does ibtl stand for? i nerver seen any1 use it b4

[Aquarius]

This post ensures me the BattlEye developer is doing a great job.

[Mangled*]

Fascinating, captain.

But what you forget, CiRiON, is that despite you claiming you you don't like cheaters then why do you hack Soldat in the first place? You are the ones that feed the problem, and yet you seem to think it is a good thing that you are able to hack into Soldats code.

Don't try and justify your cause. Especially to this community, who as it happens, does not appreciate this 'art' of yours. Why can't you go do something more constructive with your programming skills? Instead of adding to a problem that you claim to be apposed to.

I hate cheaters with a vengeance and I have never used a hack in my life.

What you fail to realise is that you are essentially promoting your diverse community simply by making this topic.

[CiRiON]

You guys still don't get it do you.
We eventually help you.
Since we're a community I can controll everything people are doing, and if it's going out of line (like soldat doom script for 1.3.1 wich has a massive DoS attack) I can stop it.
But I can't control freelance hackers.
If we create hacks, Battle Eye will improve and go on.

Hacking aint bad, it's considered annoying since many of you don't care.
If you want to learn programming, then reversing a program is the best way.
This is simply what we do. Ask any of the creators, nobody uses their own hacks.
Only test it, comment it, and try to do the same.
Cheating is something really different, cause with cheating you want to win by playing unfair.
With hacking you just want to program.

[Chakra]

It does beg the question though, why not highlight these loopholes and security issues directly to Michal and Sable themselves instead of creating applications that others can use to abuse them?

Think i'll just move this to Gen Dis too.

[Demonic]

Indeed: you seem like a reasonable fellow. You could just aswell join in on the developer team and help out, like Enesce did waaaay back.

[~Niko~]

:---===ANTI-CHEAT PROTECTION

The Soldat network Anti-Cheat Protection is based on two modules.

 Software company's developing multiplayer games spend millions of dollars, hundreds of hours,
the work of thousands of people are wasted to invent the perfect anti-cheat systems. All those systems are as good
as nothing because they forgot about one tiny little thing. The author of Soldat got the idea after 4 seconds of thinking.
Now Sierra and other On-Line industry giants can't stand it that they didn't think of it first. The first
Anti-Cheat Protection module in Soldat is simply:

I.
 A request: "Please don't cheat while playing Soldat".

If that somehow doesn't work then please read this:

II.   
  Because of the Anti-Cheat protection system used in Soldat you
cannot use any hack tools like: memory finders, trainers, packet
editors, hex editors and dissasemblers while Soldat is running. It is
STRONGLY RECOMMENDED to CLOSE all programs running in
the background while Soldat is on. The use of hack tools will
degrade the game to a level it will no longer be playable.
Also editing the executable or other related files and cracking
the shareware protection will cause system instability and problems
with network play.
If this happens to you and you are sure you did not do anything
illegal please contact the author.

 Please remember that this is a small shareware game made by one man. If you try to break the game protection you
make harm to yourself because I can stop making the game if I'm without money and with overload of work making new anti-hack and anti-cheat systems all the time. If you want to hack something please concentrate on big company's like EA Games. Hacking a big commercial title will prove that you are good, please leave Soldat alone.

Extracted from Soldat's Manual[/size]

[urraka]

I guess I understand you... but... you shouldn't come here saying that you are a hacker. If you are a hacker and you like doing that because it's educative it's fine, but keep it for yourlsef, don't make that public. Also, I don't know if you publish the hacks you do or not... I hope you don't (if you do all you are saying doesn't make sense and you are an idiot).

[CiRiON]

@Chakra + Demonic

It's not the security holes we'd like to find, it's the programs we'd love to make.
As I said, we are nothing more then learning programmers.
Only instead of creating a new application, we add features to an existing.
I know many of mine community have forgotten this, and release their creations everywhere on the net not realising the damage they bring.
But the reason for this whole thread is that I'm tired of the endless ware going on, and especially now the players are suffering from it.
I would like to see that "Hacker" doesn't instantly means BAN HIM, and that the name of my community doesn't means "Bunch of retards ruin games".
We should solve this out.

By the way, I'm registered with my real IP, not with my real nick since I don't want to advert for my community. So I'm completely open to be reasonable, and I hope to retrive the same.

[Demonic]

And what different would helping the devs out be? To stick with Enesce's example, he was a hacker once, and he's been working on the server code and what not.

We can understand that you are learning programmers, but as you said, some of the retards from your community ruin our game. Some of us spent half of 1.3.1 reviewing demos with a hack to make sure if no one used it in-game, because of the ineffective anti-hack. With BE, our job is easier, because Sable is updating it as fast as he can.

And you can stay a hacker, but don't be naive and think you're welcome if you don't help actively. I'm pretty sure you can still learn and add to the game without making apps suitable for ruining the game of others.

[Chakra]

Well, what you say makes perfect sense and I can understand it. I'm not a programmer myself, but each to our own hobbies, and I imagine the act of creating, adding and modifying such a game is a fun little task.

I can also understand how you don't want your community and hackers to be mislabelled, but all this does beg another question. Why does the responsibility of these hacked creations that come from your community for all to use fall on Michal and BattleEye, when - if just a private task that you wish to do for your own benefit - the responsibility should fall upon the admins of your community? If it doesn't, then surely your forums promote this act?

[FliesLikeABrick]

The fact is that your "improvements" use a lot of the same methods that cheaters use to create their hacks for the game.  If we make allowances for your "good hacks"/imrpovements, then the people who want to create bad hacks/cheats for the game will exploit the allowances we made for the good things.

Personally I'd rather have the "good hackers" make suggestions to imrpove the games, and help find/report bugs to make the game better instead of them trying to go out and be heroes and fix the problems themselves.  Participate in Soldat the way we all do and make a difference for everyone.  Don't try to do things on your own and complain when they get blocked.  That is selfish.  Helping via the normal/official means helps everyone.

[{LAW} Gamer_2k4]

First of all, hacking ain't a bad thing. It's basiclly what the soldat developers do, only then reversed.
Cheating is the bad thing, since cheating ruins the gameplay.
Creating hacks and cheating is WAY DIFFERENT.
Hacking is just a form of programming, and it's very educative.
Cheating is the use of created hacks for winning.
I hope you understand we do not support cheaters, only hackers.

It seems to me that you're just trying to shift the responsibility for your actions.  Hacking may not be cheating, but it enables cheating.  It's similar to someone telling you "Hey, there's this guy that I want to kill" and you responding, "Alright, I'll drive you to his house and give you a gun."  You're not guilt-free just because you didn't actually commit the crime.

"We do not support cheaters." So why do you release your hacks for everyone to use? If this is purely a programming exercise, as you claim, than there should be no reason to distribute the hacks.  You know that by allowing other people to use the hacks, you're ruining the game for the Soldat community.  Do you care? Obviously not.

"Hacking is what the Soldat developers do, only reversed." Yep.  While they're working to create a balance that makes the game fun for everyone, you're trying to destroy the balance and make the game fun for only yourself.

Second is the way Battle Eye deals with hacks. I understand you want a "hack-free" server, but this has gone to far.
Not us, but Battle Eye is ruing the gameplay since people get randomly banned and the use off applications that hook onto soldat is forbidden. (X-Fire, winamp plugin).
Eventually, we (the hackers) will be able to bypass this, but soldat players won't.

Then the last thing I want to say. You guys (pointing to the development and managment team) think we hate you, we hate soldat and we'l love to destroy both.
That's NOT true. I see it more that we need you and you need us.
We help you improve the security system, while you help us to improve our skills.
It's a cat and mouse game we both play, but please be so fair not to cheat in this game...

Total BS.  If it weren't for you, Soldat wouldn't need any security at all.  Cheaters clearly aren't intelligent enough to write their own hacks, meaning that they wouldn't exist without you.  You're the reason BattleEye was added.  You're the reason that xFire and Winamp don't work.  Playing your "cat and mouse game" with the developers disrupts the progress of the game.  They're busy fixing the problems that you create instead of adding more features.

Continue making hacks if you want, but realize that as long as you do, you're ruining Soldat for the rest of us.  And is the gaining of a small amount of programming skill really worth hurting hundreds of players?

[Slazenger]

Dude have you even read his post? He's trying to communicate with us, and he made clearly he isn't the one promoting cheaters, au contraire, he wants to help improving the game.
Just try to understand him.
Hackers are truly robinhoods ^^

[CiRiON]

Hmm, I understand you guys.
The problem is, that I stopped hacking Soldat since 1.4, cause Battle Eye was to hard for me.
I would like to learn more then simply reversing code, like EnEsCe as example.
Only EnEsCe was more skilled like me.
Anyway, in these few post I've noticed you guys aren't pricks at all, and that you DO understand us.
To me, lack of communication has always been the problem.

But now, we have a serious problem and that's the reason I came here.
We've pushed the limit to far and I'm aware of it.
The problem is, I don't want to be the cause of ruin gameplay for tons of people, neither want to be a traitor to the people on my community.
In my opinion, we need to discuss a lot.
Thanks for your time btw.

[a-4-year-old]

You guys think you are doing something all good or whatever you think of yourselves but you guys are just as bad as the people using the programs you make. The only way to justify any form of hacking would be to come up to MM and say "Hey we at ______ found an exploit that you might want to look into."

But no, you don't do that, instead you let the exploits go unfixed. That is why you are an assmunch who I cannot respect.

[Laser Guy]

just stfu a-4-year-old... I guess u didn't read it all

[Duck Boi]

just stfu a-4-year-old... I guess u didn't read it all

He probably did read it all
But there is 2 different arguments to this thread.

I personally agree with a-4-year-old, as you really should have reported it to MM.
I know you're only trying to make things better, but look where it has gotten things, we wouldn't have had to gone to such extremes like BE to stop hackers.

I know where you're coming from, and I know it isnt all your fault. But the tiniest thing can help add up to the major problem.

[Chakra]

Well Cirion, you're going to have to realise that theres a large fence between Average-Player(1) and the 'Baddies' (hacker community) for a good reason, and such a barrier exists simply because of what everyone's illustrated here. Your community makes and distributes programmes that allow anyone to ruin other people's competitive fun.� 

Not really much else to it or anything to be discussed between the two sides, and for either to be friendly with one another would require a large sacrifice from your community. No public distributions or no hacks that get around BattleEye specifically.
For hacking to be non-threatening to gamers it'd have to be kept contained and made towards non-BE'd servers or older versions of Soldat, or restricted to a very private community that isn't gonna leak such items to the public, who could go on to enjoy your changes to Soldat on a private server with other like-minded people.

[Aquarius]

But now, we have a serious problem and that's the reason I came here. In my opinion, we need to discuss a lot.

No, only YOU have a problem. IMO we have nothing to discuss about with people who write hacks. The more problems they have the better. MM asked them to stop writing the hacks but they didn't listen. Now they are crying that writing hacks is to hard? Gimme a Break!

[Slazenger]

Actually Aquarius, it still is bouth our problem since he will continiue hacking our already be-shit-game

[darkangel]

man there is always a guy who is far for the community and can do thing that are dangerous � for the game and us(no hacking players) � anyways let the improvements to the pros or the guys with the legal license to improve the game, is fine if u made mod but u don't messit up whit the normal soldat f11

[mxyzptlk]

I completely agree with Cirion. Thus the distinction between White-hat and Black hat hackers; however, if you make the programs and release them, you are no better than those who use them.

I don't hack and haven't used a hack, but I am an amateur programmer, and I see what you are talking about when it comes to the challenge; however, keep it to yourself or within a certain group and don'tdistribute it further than that.

[Aquarius]

Actually Aquarius, it still is bouth our problem since he will continiue hacking our already be- -game

So we should help him in writing hacks because otherwise he will continue to write hacks? Where is the logic? He should have been banned right away, people who write hacks for multiplayer games are like terrorists who create bombs for others - there should be no discussion with them. The only White-hat hacker here is EnEsCe, because he doesn't do it any more (or at least he said so) and using his skills to do something good.

[mxyzptlk]

Actually Aquarius, it still is bouth our problem since he will continiue hacking our already be- -game

So we should help in writting hacks him because he will continue to writing hacks?

Listen, he has said that he isn't hacking soldat anymore, not since 1.4.0, and is just here, as the title says, for clarification.

[Aquarius]

He isn't hacking 1.4.0 only because he can't do it. And we shouldn't help him in doing this. If he want to test his skills he may choose one of 908490252 other applications to hack.

[mxyzptlk]

Who said we were helping him hack?

[Aquarius]

I dunno, not me.

[mxyzptlk]

He isn't hacking 1.4.0 only because he can't do it. And we shouldn't help him in doing this.

You seem to be implying that we would be helping him hack, which isn't the case; simply understand, that's all he asks.

[Aquarius]

Is it a psychotherapy forum? Anyway, I will never understand people who crate hacks for multiplayer games, spoiling the fun of hundrets of people.

[The Philanthropist]

Just mess around with 1.3.1, make all of your more disingenuous programs there, and when if you want to do something to improve the game, do it in 1.4 and release it with consent through the fan apps board.

[{LAW} Gamer_2k4]

Dude have you even read his post?

No I haven't; I just included quotes from it to make my post look pretty. =P

Date Posted: October 09, 2007, 05:19:15 pm

Just mess around with 1.3.1, make all of your more disingenuous programs there

That's an excellent idea.  You can get all of the benefits of learning a programming language without causing problems for players.

[a-4-year-old]

just stfu a-4-year-old... I guess u didn't read it all

I did actually read it, and I still come off with the same mindset. Hackers are people who make cheats for idiots who ruin games, by the transitive property, hackers ruin games.

Second, his post had some little one sentence whine about how hacking is hard and BE is bad. To which I say BE is great because it does its job exactly the way it was made to do it.

MM doesn't want people hacking so anyone who thinks they have a good reason for doing so is kidding themselves.

[sneakyg]

Just mess around with 1.3.1, make all of your more disingenuous programs there, and when if you want to do something to improve the game, do it in 1.4 and release it with consent through the fan apps board.

Thats an excellent idea they should do that

[Avkon]

Hackers are people who make cheats for idiots who ruin games, by the transitive property, hackers ruin games.

There's a difference between hackers and crackers.
I'm sure everyone who's played a game has heard of cracks (like no-CD crack, no-registration crack, whatever).
When I was learning assembly code, I used to "crack" too, for no reason other than for the heck of it.

But whereas hackers do it for pastime and valid legal reasons (like, for eg. they find a loophole, they notify the developers), crackers either keep their findings to themselves or make the "hacks" that you find and download.

CiRiON didn't make this clear, and most people never get this part, as they all think hackers are just out to ruin everyone else's lives - so I thought I should try and make this understandable.

Also, CiRiON's post was pointless - he himself said it's a cat-and-mouse game, it's never going to stop.
Hackers/Crackers are going to be around as long as there is something to hack/crack, so it's a waste of time arguing about it.

And a P.S. to everyone who was like oh-my-god-hackers-are-bad-and-should-be-wiped-off-the-face-of-the-earth: Enough with all that, I don't hear anyone complaining when they install that registration crack that saves them a couple of dollars.

[EnEsCe]

That's NOT true. I see it more that we need you and you need us.
We help you improve the security system, while you help us to improve our skills.
It's a cat and mouse game we both play, but please be so fair not to cheat in this game...

What orifice did you pull that from? We (Michal and I) do not need you at all. Soldat would be better off without "you". If it weren't for hackers, our time could be spent focusing on improving the GAME fun for the masses, but no. One day you will realize, much like I did almost 3 years, that creating "Hacks" is a complete waste of time and extremely immoral. It doesn't look good on a resume. Ever since the day I first downloaded Visual Basic, I have never had the need to "reverse" my own program or another, thats what an IDE is for. Reversing is not a form of programming, nor is it a path to becoming a programmer.

There will never be any way to justify hacking online games. Ever.

[Avkon]

Lol.

That part sounds like it was taken straight outta a whitehat-description.
And to be honest, this whole thing is pointless - a hacker would never post this topic, not to hide anything, but he just wouldn't.

[{LAW} Gamer_2k4]

But whereas hackers do it for pastime and valid legal reasons (like, for eg. they find a loophole, they notify the developers), crackers either keep their findings to themselves or make the "hacks" that you find and download.

And apparently CiRiON, by his explanation, is one of the latter.  I have a feeling that if he was doing it for the good of the community, no one would have a problem with it.  However, CiRiON instead says "Well, I'm not at fault; blame the guys who use my hacks," admitting that his hacks don't actually help anyone.

And a P.S. to everyone who was like oh-my-god-hackers-are-bad-and-should-be-wiped-off-the-face-of-the-earth: Enough with all that, I don't hear anyone complaining when they install that registration crack that saves them a couple of dollars.

Didn't you JUST say that there's a difference between hackers and crackers?  Make up your mind.

[Avkon]

Hmm? I said THEY say "hackers" - they don't know the difference. What they mean is "crackers".

[X-Rayz]

You guys still don't get it do you.
We eventually help you.
Since we're a community I can controll everything people are doing, and if it's going out of line (like soldat doom script for 1.3.1 wich has a massive DoS attack) I can stop it.
But I can't control freelance hackers.
If we create hacks, Battle Eye will improve and go on.

Hacking aint bad, it's considered annoying since many of you don't care.
If you want to learn programming, then reversing a program is the best way.
This is simply what we do. Ask any of the creators, nobody uses their own hacks.
Only test it, comment it, and try to do the same.
Cheating is something really different, cause with cheating you want to win by playing unfair.
With hacking you just want to program.

(i didnt read the 2nd page, too tired)

Isn't this kind of like that family guy episode where Rhode Island(?) gets blown up? They build their little town and there's a part where they say:

"Hey you're right! We don't have guns! We're completely defensless!"
"Guns only lead to trouble"
"Exactly, and when that trouble comes we'll blow its head off".

BattleEye wouldn't even need to improve if you hadn't made hacks in the first place. Their wouldn't need to be a battleeye at all.

Hmm? I said THEY say "hackers" - they don't know the difference. What they mean is "crackers".

I think he meant, you said that hackers make the cracks that save us a couple of bucks. You just called Hackers Crackers.

[yv3]

@Avkon:
hmm, not bad, 15 years old and reverse engineering � . It surely take some skills to make a hack for soldat and your "friends" think youre a cool guy. If you want to be a programmer that earns some money honestly in the PRESENT employment market, you should learn C# or Java rather than assembler. It's a natural instinct that leads every hacker to show off what he had done and could be done. So it's unescapable that the n00bs will use the hacks.

Sometimes i play a 1vs1 with barret and im very angry. I have the feeling that i can't win because the other has a shortended shoot delay or an aim bot. I think its rather unrealistic since BattleEye, - but thats why i mostly hate the hacks � . On the other hand, on every fourth server or so, someone calls me a "cheater" because of my pwnage - i like that � .

I used many cracks in my life, hope god will forgive me � 

A Soldat with honor don't cheat - he feels his enemy and presses the f*** mouse wheel for a *** good long-range throw. I love that feeling.

[Avkon]

Lol.

I started coding and stuff at 13, and who says I don't know C or Java? C#, no, but I'm comfortable with good old C.

And X-Rayz, please read my first post.

And yv3, I've heard it's tough to crack Soldat, but I never tried in the first place. I honestly don't care much for cracking, it was just one of those things you get into while doing something else.

And one more thing: try telling any of your teenage friends that you sat in front of your computer for hours on end to make a crack, and see if they think it's 'cool'.

If they do think so, then give me their contact details. :p

[a-4-year-old]

And a P.S. to everyone who was like oh-my-god-hackers-are-bad-and-should-be-wiped-off-the-face-of-the-earth: Enough with all that, I don't hear anyone complaining when they install that registration crack that saves them a couple of dollars.

you are an idiot. Of course nobody complains when they exploit hacks/cracks/cheats, its everyone else.

[Avkon]

What I meant is, a lot of people do that, I'm sure even you have some cracks on your comp, even if you don't use them.

What if Soldat was a pay-to-play game? There'd be cracks everywhere.

And a-4-year-old: it's pretty obvious that you don't know a sh*t about hacking or cracking from your previous posts, so please stay out of this.

And also, I never advocated cracking, did I? Go find your crackers, rage at them, not me.

[Clawbug]

Why not to jump to the right side, to help $able, MM and EnEsCe to deal with the bad people, instead of making tools for "noobs" to ruin the game?

If you, so called hackers, want to help Soldat, then why are you people making it so easy to ruin a good game? What about making it hard to ruin the game? Wouldn't that help Soldat more? In my opinion it would, alot. Though, you people wouldn't really get credit for that, so you think it useless, right? As EnEsCe likes to say, world lacks respect, aye? The main reason I dislike NSC, and one of the reasons I dislike alot of you.

Change the attitude, please!

[Slazenger]

F.f.s. h.e. d.o.e.s.n.t m.a.k.e h.a.c.k.s. f.o.r. p.e.o.p.l.e t.o. u.s.e

[{LAW} Gamer_2k4]

F.f.s. h.e. d.o.e.s.n.t m.a.k.e h.a.c.k.s. f.o.r. p.e.o.p.l.e t.o. u.s.e

But people still use them.  If he didn't make them for people to use, they would stay on his computer and no one would have access to them.  Obviously that's not the case.

[CiRiON]

Alright, now would all noobs who doesn't really understand what I'm talking about please STFU.

I'll try to explain it 1 more time, so read carefull.

I think we (the soldat dev team and some members of my community) need to talk since BE is ruin the gameplay more then us. We don't randomly kick people and stop them from using applications.
Now, what I want to reach is that BE still detects the hacks, but doesn't bother other people.
And maybe we have to do this by releasing sources of the created hacks, so Sable knows what to block.

[Avkon]

F.f.s. h.e. d.o.e.s.n.t m.a.k.e h.a.c.k.s. f.o.r. p.e.o.p.l.e t.o. u.s.e

But people still use them.  If he didn't make them for people to use, they would stay on his computer and no one would have access to them.  Obviously that's not the case.

They do stay on the computer, it's the guys who make cracks who irritate others so much.

And CiRiON, like I said, it's a waste of time, give up - your talk is pointless.

[Nijez]

IMO you need hackers. Just like you need to catch a cold to create an antibody for it.

If they didnt release hacks or exploit the exploits they would still be out there for the taking.
If im not correct that is sort of how BE works, no? As soon as you get the hack it can be detected.

This unamed community has been keeping ALOT of its stuff private; more so than ever (For obvious reasons); and are restraining (quite considerably) from abusing their/others creation quite a bit.

While having hackers around helps improve a games immunity; I dont agree with any hacker justifying his/her actions with such self righteous excuses. If hackers wanted to help, they would find exploits/create hacks, send them to MM (WITHOUT RELEASING), and explain how to fix the problem.

Having hackers abuse exploits and hacks will bring said hacks and exploits out in the open, into the publics eye. This will not only allow the dev. to get his hands on the hacks or find out how the exploit works, but the abuse of the exploit/hack will pressure him to fix it before it gets out of hand. Pressure is a good motivator. One of the members of mentioned community, in one case, did notify MM about an exploit and nothing was done about it. Not until this certain somebody released the hack; did the exploit get fixed.

People sort of have a problem when it comes to tending to issues. If there isnt a shark biting people on the ass; they wont swim faster.�  Example: Global Warming

 
Although I believe this; I dont believe hackers can use this as an excuse to justify their actions.
Plain and simple; they do it for fun. Its a hobby. Who can make the most fun/screwed up/powerful hack.
If anyone had the games best interests in mind; they would keep it private and send the hack to MM, like I stated above.

-Zenji

[Veritas]

Alright, now would all noobs who doesn't really understand what I'm talking about please STFU.

I'll try to explain it 1 more time, so read carefull.

I think we (the soldat dev team and some members of my community) need to talk since BE is ruin the gameplay more then us. We don't randomly kick people and stop them from using applications.
Now, what I want to reach is that BE still detects the hacks, but doesn't bother other people.
And maybe we have to do this by releasing sources of the created hacks, so Sable knows what to block.

Alternatively, you could do something else with your time, something that isn't cracking a 2D freeware game. There is a hell of a lot of useful software that you could write, which would actually make you some money, and you choose to mess with a 2D freeware game.

I don't even know.

PS: Dear admins and mods, why isn't this locked yet?
We all know talking about hacks is banned in this forum, and posting it in the general section doesn't foster serious discussion.

[Henito Kisou]

Dualistic theory of world (for ex. good not exist without evil and evil not exist without good) failed since 2005 but people still can be able to living with this old idea.
Hacker = Hacking = Hacks = Cheaters = Cheating =Ruined gameplay and all of fun. These things are for idiotic lamers worster sometimes than noob players who just cant or dont known how to good play, mindless vegetables without skill.
But yes, if hacks are developed, then anti-cheat or anti-hacks also, about co-op... there's no of guarantee, that hacks sources will not be just old inactive worster fake, just toy, and hidden, stronger weapon against game is in development, no one is black'n'white and crystal so always have hidden motives like idea never trust anybody at ~50% or 100% your family, strangers, nobody.
Most of famous or infamous hackers, crackers later rearranged their form of thinking and now working at safety systems, anti-piracy, anti-cheat, anti-hacking stuff, they used learned skills to prevent hacking, just as fun fact about this.

[Nijez]

Dualistic theory of world

What I said is not even related to Dualistic Theory of World.
I never stated that anti hack protection could not be done without hackers.
Hackers just help pressure devs to fix hacks.

And by the way, the assumption with the "Hackers are bad players" are quite often wrong.
Long time ago (Few years ago..) EnEsCe had a server when he was a hacker and ran a forum. No hacking was allowed and most of the time when members were in the server, they were on top.

Some do it out of boredom or just for laughs.

[Henito Kisou]

I dont mean people who maybe are hackers and can be good at playing but immature people who whining and crying because they cant play Soldat good and at start give it up and just use hacks than doing to fair by skill and hard work, so they ruining all skill and pro of experienced players by waste time or fun from game without chance to fair play

[X-Rayz]

"IMO you need hackers. Just like you need to catch a cold to create an antibody for it."

More retarded logic. If theres no colds, theres no need for an antibody.

[Henito Kisou]

Exactly! But in that way most or all world is insane so cant thinking different, but some people really wants excuse what hackers and similar doing and make them neccessary to exist in gaming or programming.

[Avkon]

"IMO you need hackers. Just like you need to catch a cold to create an antibody for it."

More retarded logic. If theres no colds, theres no need for an antibody.

True.

But the fact is that there ARE colds, and there's nothing you can do about them, except alleviate the consequences.

[.Ryan.]

Just keep your hacks to yourself, hell.. if you want to learn programming go read a c++ book.

[Chakra]

As logical as this 'system' is, creating hacks to help pressure a dev towards securing his product, it has in the end harmed soldat and brought BE to this inevitable conclusion.

Michal could've messed around with bugs, balance, new game modes or features, all things that he wants to do with his game, but instead the past few versions have been about introducing and stabilising BE. He was pressured into doing that due to the abundance of hacks in Soldat, as it required an effective 'antibody'. And like with so many anti-hack systems, sacrifices eventually get made from the user towards the security of the game.

Theres a much simpler way to help with the bloody ecosystem of Soldat, and it's right under your noses. If hackers don't like BE, I suggest that instead of improving the virus, they help improve the antibody more directly than passively. It really doesn't get simpler than that, and theres no real justification not to.


Cirion, if you have some bright ideas to render this scenario to a better conclusion, theres nothing stopping you e-mailing or using the forums to PM Michal and/or Sable, both of whom respond to both promptly. You can even come on Quakenet IRC if you like as they're often found on there. Good luck to you either way.

[Nijez]

"IMO you need hackers. Just like you need to catch a cold to create an antibody for it."

More retarded logic. If theres no colds, theres no need for an antibody.

There will always be colds and there will always be other people to abuse exploits in games.
If it wasn't for one group of people hacking soldat; there would have been another group
to have come along and hack it up.

And Chakra, I agree. I said there is no justification; but hackers still offhandidly help. Hacking the game in private
and reporting vulnerabilities to MM would be the best way. The only unique way hackers would help as opposed to the the nicer alternative listed above is; by causing hell and releasing hacks, they are holding a tourch under MM's ass, thus they get fixed faster

Like you said though, there still is no way to justify it.

And while MM could have been adding in features, I think a good antihack is the best thing for a game above all. Good features
dont keep players if everyone else runs around turning good features into game ruining hacks.



Thats bout all. Sayin anything else would be repeating myself. I got my piece out there.

[$able]

As logical as this 'system' is, creating hacks to help pressure a dev towards securing his product, it has in the end harmed soldat and brought BE to this inevitable conclusion.

It has nothing to do with pressure or anything like that, I am just trying to add effective detection methods and as I already said numerous times, the current D3D hook detection is the only effective one.

[LtKillroy]

I tell you what, hacks = bad.
Even if you don't release them for the general public, the general public WILL get their hands on them.
BE = Good. People don't get randomly kicked if they have it d/led (usually). And I have seen 1 hacker since it was released. And who cares if you can't run like a music program or Xfire in the background, too bad. Will no background music ruin your game as much as a hacker?
In conclusion, if you want to ruin the game for your own enjoyment, do it on bots. They don't get mad.

[CiRiON]

Hmmm, we'll see. I woke you guys up, that was the whole idea behind this.
I hope that BattlEye will improve.
Succes here everyone, I'm out again.

[ChiefBlackFoot]

For those of you who think true hackers actually hinder the security instead of helping - let ME clarify something.

Remember that vulnerability with the server file download system in 1.3.1?  I found that with some common sense and a bit of knowledge about delphi strings and c-style strings.  It was literally possible to download ANY file on ANY computer hosting ANY version of soldat server.  What did I do with this?  Play with it for a while until EnEsCe and Chrisgbk saw it.  That was probably one of the biggest security vulnerabilities that soldat has ever seen, which could have been exploited to do some pretty awful things.  Instead, me and a couple friends just screwed with it a bit until it became known that it existed.

Or how about that ARSSE bug that I found and helped fix?  I could have ran rampant throughout soldat getting admin access to every single server, but I chose to help the developer of ARSSE fix the bug.

Or, how about that other vulnerability I found that let me host a fake soldat server where everyone that joins downloads a dll from me?  That could have been used for the most evil purposes of all: spreading a massive trojan throughout soldat.  What did I do with it?  I waited until the day before 1.4 came out and simply uploaded a version of my hack to some people as a prank, because I wanted that bug to become known.
I have been accused of exploiting vulnerabilities numerous times, but the problem is that I INFORMED Chrisgbk, EnEsCe, and some other soldat devs about this last vulnerability about a month before this time.  The problem is, nobody listened or took me seriously at all because I am considered the "evil hacker of soldat".  Sometimes we have to screw around with the vulnerabilities that we find in order to make sure that they get noticed, since nobody takes us seriously when we just tell the developers about them.

[.Ryan.]

It's a shame soldat is like this. It's always been a vulnerable game to hack which is a shame.. Why pick on a small game that was created by 1 guy.

Anyway, thanks.. to the very small minority of exploiters who atchually helped in the development of Soldat.

I played against a guy the other week who created his own aimbot app, he lost the match then he even offered it me!! that's the shi* that's not acceptable --keep it to youself, dont spread your cancer around

[BondJamesBond]

This is stupid. You guys need to create hacks in order to inform the developers of game vulnerabilities and problems. While you're creating these hacks:

A) We've found out already
B) Someone is already exploiting the vulnerabilities
C) MM is working is ass off to repair the problem

When you decide to release the hacks and show everyone, "Oh look: there's a problem. Use this hack to tell you what the problem is":

A) Someone gets a hold of the hack and uses it.
C) MM has to work harder now because you just split the vulnerability wide open.

This is what I think:

[echo_trail]

Since we're a community I can controll everything people are doing, and if it's going out of line (like soldat doom script for 1.3.1 wich has a massive DoS attack) I can stop it.

...later:

I know many of mine community have forgotten this, and release their creations everywhere on the net not realising the damage they bring.

Pissing in the wind, anyone?

Also seems to me like you start out by stating that BE has gone too far, that it has become too effective. End up with you trying to defent he very point of hacking..

Nah, mate. I don't think it's under control, not one bit.

[Chakra]

Nice little drawing. Can't see anything I disagree with Bond.

Another little thing to remember is that Michal, Sable, and Enesce only do what they do as a hobby essentially. Its something done in their spare time out of personal interest. Theres no money to offer incentive. It's unfair to 'demand' these vulnerabilities be addressed when what you're demanding is they work to make you happy when they've their own lives and jobs to lead.... except Michal, who lives in his mother's basement playing Guitar Hero on expert mode until 2 in the morning. But the principle still stands.

The difference with commercial titles is that money is an incentive. Money plays an important role in suggesting further support on a title. Is it cost effective to further support a game? That varies completely on circumstance and those involved.

So, really...no matter the game, there is always a better way to expose vulnerabilities than by introducing them to the public. Pressure in such a situation does not get things done sooner and better. Highlights the problem, maybe, but it really doesn't speed up or improve matters.




...I can see it now, Michal sitting at a smokey bar in Poland, his 330ml bottle of cheap beer rattling in his hand as the stress gets to him. "Right now, even as I drink, theres people hax0ring in my game and making players unhappy." He thinks to himself.
The glass in his hand shatters under the pressure! He storms home and turns on his PC without so much as a thought and declares to the world with a booming voice that they should worry no more, he is here. He is here! He is here to be our beacon of hope, and to make Soldat the most secure gaming experience known to man, and all those that dare stand in his path shall quake in fear and hide in shadows, for he shall not eat, drink or sleep until his work his done. Amen.


It just doesn't happen, does it.