Soldat now and tomorrow

[Vtg]

There is no "bug-free" (aside from the "hello-worlds"). You should know this with your programming knowledge.
Actually Soldat 2 could be realized as a mod for LD which is highly moddable.

Yea, I know, I meant here free of the major and annoying bugs, I don't expect fixing all the bugs, only those most annoying which I have been seeing for last few years.

Sorry, I still don't get what kind of "information hacks" you're talking about. Infinite jet/HP/ammo, mass caps, teleport, speedhack, aimbot, etc. - if I understand you right, you're saying that they're information hacks and therefore they're not worth fixing, right? But those are 99% of hacks that we actually see on the servers.

I thought that term 'information hack' is self-explanatory.

Information hacks are those who give you precious informations, like radars and ESP (information about health, ammo, etc) without making explicit modifications to the game's state. They are much more useful, and much harder to detect (BattlEye didn't catch them either) and comparing to exploits, easy to write. Thus they dominate in most FPS.

Even big games use 3-rd party anti-cheat software and usually 3-rd party scripting languages (at the time of writing, only one company comes to my mind, which uses its own anti-cheat - Blizzard with its Warden).

Let me say it one more time - MM has no time for embedding custom anti-cheat and no money for 3rd party. But bugs are things he CAN fix, this is why he should concentrate on it.

If he wants money from this game, he must give up LD for some time. I can't see any solution. It looks like he would like to get people who will do the job for him... but... for free... ?

From: November 16, 2010, 10:10:50 amSERIOUSLY, I entered LD site, and what I see is that to play alpha versions I need to ...
PAY ??
Is this a JOKE? Moreover, its not preordering the full version, so I pay only to help testing this game... but it's not even beta yet!

I have been always thinking that beta-testers are paid by companies, not companies being paid by beta-testers... but maybe I am wrong?

I'd love to take some of my time to help and test it but... sorry, I will not pay for my own effort...

[L[0ne]R]

Information hacks are those who give you precious informations, like radars and ESP (information about health, ammo, etc) without making explicit modifications to the game's state. They are much more useful, and much harder to detect (BattlEye didn't catch them either) and comparing to exploits, easy to write. Thus they dominate in most FPS.

Oh, I see. Still, I think they're not as bad as more obvious hacks. They do provide some advantage and let you predict enemy movements better, but you still have to aim, dodge, steal flags, work with other players and do a ton of other things by yourself. And considering that a lot of cheaters use hacks because they fail miserably at fair game - they'll still fail even with information hacks.
It would become a real problem if a good player starts using them, but that doesn't happen all that often. Personally I don't find information hacks to be that big of an issue (except in serious tournaments).

SERIOUSLY, I entered LD site, and what I see is that to play alpha versions I need to ...
PAY ??
Is this a JOKE? Moreover, its not preordering the full version, so I pay only to help testing this game... but it's not even beta yet!

I have been always thinking that beta-testers are paid by companies, not companies being paid by beta-testers... but maybe I am wrong?

I'd love to take some of my time to help and test it but... sorry, I will not pay for my own effort...

I'll just point out that MM is a single developer, not a company. But other than that - I agree. You shouldn't charge money (even a small amount) for a product that isn't even close to working properly.

I love to use Minecraft as an example, so I'll use it here too. Even though Minecraft is in an alpha state but still costs money - in this case it's totally worth it. The game has very few bugs, frequent updates, and overall is very much playable and working. Even though its creator consideres it as Alpha version - its quality is comparable to a final version. That, in my opinion, is more than worth its price.

[Veritas]

You're paying to play the game ahead of its release, not paying to test it.

[L[0ne]R]

You're paying to play the game ahead of its release, not paying to test it.

That's a good point I suppose. Looking at it that way makes it seem much more fair.
Though I got a different impression of MM's intentions from his post.

[Vtg]

Oh, I see. Still, I think they're not as bad as more obvious hacks. They do provide some advantage and let you predict enemy movements better, but you still have to aim, dodge, steal flags, work with other players and do a ton of other things by yourself. And considering that a lot of cheaters use hacks because they fail miserably at fair game - they'll still fail even with information hacks.
It would become a real problem if a good player starts using them, but that doesn't happen all that often. Personally I don't find information hacks to be that big of an issue (except in serious tournaments).

They let you dodge bullets easier too, I will not post any screenshot because it's prohibited. It depends on the information, for example maphacks are essencial in RTS, as well as wallhacks (seeing through walls) in FPS.

And yes, they are serious in tournaments, where telehacks are totally useless, and vice-verca, they are pretty useless in public servers, where fun hacks are not...
And one important note - soldat seems to have more old than new players, who care about gathers/tournaments rather random public servers, so in fact, these hacks are rather bad.

Regarding 'playable' alpha: when I see game marked 'beta' I suppose its incomplete, when I see it marked 'alpha', I suppose it's FAR from being complete. Thus, I'm not going to get deeply whether this alpha is more or less playable - the author released it to have it tested, rather give us fun...

From: November 16, 2010, 03:59:23 pmI haven't heard about anyone, who would already play this LD alpha. I googled and found a list of servers for Minecraft, and there is a pretty high number of them.

http://www.minecraft.net/servers.jsp

I haven't seen such a list for LD, maybe there is one.

Btw.
I checked MM's last activity, it looks like he doesn't care much about this thread as well as his 'child', thus posting here does not make much sense, he will ignore all the posts.

From: November 16, 2010, 04:03:17 pmSo, you are right:

From http://www.minecraft.net/servers.jsp:

There are 3452 players playing on 1120 servers (351 of them private).

From soldat lobby: 879 players 369 servers

So, paying for minecraft alpha seems to be more reasonable than paying for soldat "full" and "stable" version.

[Illuminatus]

Why do you keep comparing Minecraft with Soldat? Yes, Minecraft has a nice new gameplay and an unique design (even MM itself admitted this, read this blogpost). It is in my opinion something which you haven't seen before as an online game. Now 8 1/2 years back in time - the first public Soldat version. It was mostly the same. People haven't known something like Soldat yet (pls don't start this discussion, yes, it is true) and it was highly successful. Now think of the fact that MM only was 16 back then (Notch is 31 and already worked for some (flash) gaming companies) and that people weren't that open to buy games online like they are nowadays.

I don't say that if Soldat would have been invented in 2010 with the same presuppositions it would also come like a bombshell or would be even better than Minecraft.
But stop comparing the games if you have no idea. Go f**king buy the LD alpha for some 1cent before you complain about the number of bugs which LD has at the moment. Did you play the very f**king first version of Minecraft which was released to the public? Do you know how many bugs this version had??

And don't start like: "But I didn't need to pay money to try the first version of Minecraft"
Notch wrote the code for about a week and then released the s**t. Actually Minecraft is even based on some older game (Infiniminer) which became open-source, so Notch had a basis to work with. For how long does MM work on LD again? 2-3 years? And you still have doubts to pay him a few dollars to play the game before it's first stable release?
We (as the ones who - surprise! - "bought" this alpha version) f**king followed his devlog for a very long time and have no problems to support him so he finally can write the game we became so excited about.

[Veritas]

We are

Most certainly arguing in circles at this point

[Bonecrusher]

Wow, you don't get it do you?
The hacks he mentioned ARE a problem, in fact they're the biggest problem. Do you really think some one is going to stick to the game with some random goof ball masscapping, mass killing, masswhatevering on the servers?

I know for a FACT that my server empties shortly after a hacker joins and admins aren't around to deal with them, I can see it on arsse.
I have yet to see a server die over bugs (of which I still can't think of many).

I would even assume your friends quit when battleye was still in place and hacking wasn't as big of an issue, meaning long time players are now quitting more because of hacks and less because of bugs they had to deal with ever since they started.

This and anti-flood protection is all I need right now. The dev team should focus on fixing bugs after it's done.

[Vtg]

Wow, you don't get it do you?
The hacks he mentioned ARE a problem, in fact they're the biggest problem. Do you really think some one is going to stick to the game with some random goof ball masscapping, mass killing, masswhatevering on the servers?

I know for a FACT that my server empties shortly after a hacker joins and admins aren't around to deal with them, I can see it on arsse.
I have yet to see a server die over bugs (of which I still can't think of many).

I would even assume your friends quit when battleye was still in place and hacking wasn't as big of an issue, meaning long time players are now quitting more because of hacks and less because of bugs they had to deal with ever since they started.

This and anti-flood protection is all I need right now. The dev team should focus on fixing bugs after it's done.

There is already implemented anti-flood protection, and MM CAN'T do a decent anti-cheat. You are saying that, because its all YOU need right now. Think about MM and what he can actually do at the moment.

[RafiPZ]

Wow, you don't get it do you?
The hacks he mentioned ARE a problem, in fact they're the biggest problem. Do you really think some one is going to stick to the game with some random goof ball masscapping, mass killing, masswhatevering on the servers?

I know for a FACT that my server empties shortly after a hacker joins and admins aren't around to deal with them, I can see it on arsse.
I have yet to see a server die over bugs (of which I still can't think of many).

I would even assume your friends quit when battleye was still in place and hacking wasn't as big of an issue, meaning long time players are now quitting more because of hacks and less because of bugs they had to deal with ever since they started.

This and anti-flood protection is all I need right now. The dev team should focus on fixing bugs after it's done.

There is already implemented anti-flood protection, and MM CAN'T do a decent anti-cheat. You are saying that, because its all YOU need right now. Think about MM and what he can actually do at the moment.

You need to stop your senseless arguing.  He never mentioned MM, in fact he mentioned DEV TEAM. If there even will be one. MM has already said he is not and will not develop for Soldat. And it's not just him that needs it obviously, unless your ignoring everyone else who's complaining about hackers.

[JFK]

Vtg, I must say you're having some good arguments, but two things I like to point out:

First I have to stand with mah buddy Bonechrusher. He and myself host some of the few popular public servers left in the lobby and we know that the current anti-flood protection is not sufficient. It's not really a secret, I think you can find something about it on this forum. So anyway, I also think there should come a solution for this ASAP.

Second, I wouldn't underestimate the positive effect of a server-sided anti-cheat. Since it should be able to get rid of the most 'obvious' cheats, many players would be assuming that there is no cheating at all, so less hard feelings. As you point out, this kind of anti-cheat works mostly for pubs, not organized matches. But aren't we a bit in need of new players?
I agree that the development team has many priorities and an anti-cheat might not be on the fist place. I see no reason why a server-sided anti-cheat could not include more developers, or maybe even be open sourced. Even with the source of the anti-cheat itself, it could not be hacked. And any weird work-arounds that hackers come up with can quickly be fixed and probably won't require knowledge about the deeper workings of the PC. I'm pretty sure I suggested this somewhere before and might suggest it again once the development team is assembled (if I'm still a little bit optimistic).

[Vtg]

Anti-flood is implemented and I think it's only matter of setting its sensitivity, number of packets rejected and so on. But it is implemented, if you say it does not work as it is supposed, it's rather bug, or too low sensitivity. If you say so, of course I agree, it should be fixed.

About anti-cheat: I said that server-side passive protection was the only anti-cheat MM can do (MM, or actual "dev team", I don't give a sh*t RafiPZ) and of course, he should implement it.

But from my point of view, fixing bugs at first is a better choice, but I won't be arguing here, since I do not have soldat's source code and I don't know how it is related to its netcode (probably it is much). Thus fixing bugs can be combined with changing netcode which can result in making more parts of the game server-side.

I said that there was no means to start creating new anti-cheat system (working on both sides). Obviously, you can call server-side passive protection an anti-cheat too, as it does prevent hacking, but for a better understanding, let me call 'anti-cheat system' a module working on both, client's and server's machine. Why? Because I do not consider server-side-protection kick as a proof of hacking (at least in these cases).

[Falcon`]

Think about MM and what he can actually do at the moment.

Um... Choose one of 3 proposed options already?

[Vtg]

I see no reason why a server-sided anti-cheat could not include more developers, or maybe even be open sourced. Even with the source of the anti-cheat itself, it could not be hacked.

Such kind of protection is strongly connected with the game's engine. It's passive protection working 'by nature', so I don't know which parts of such an "anti-cheat" could be released. Surely including more developers would solve it, but the problem is, MM does not want more developers...

Um... Choose one of 3 proposed options already?

I've already chosen saying this in the first post - let Shoozza (and others) do the job. Apparently MM will not do this.

From: November 18, 2010, 08:44:27 am@RafiPZ
Instead of trying to catch me in my words, try to post some arguments. For me: MM = "dev team" now.

From: November 18, 2010, 08:56:05 amCan you see how much time he is wasting right NOW?

[chutem]

the problem is, MM does not want more developers...

Where did you get that idea from...

All of the options MM laid out require more developers.

As I see it, bugs need to be fixed first, they affect the game a lot more regularly than hackers, and we actually have tools to deal with the hackers (vote kick, admins), what can we do about bugs, man up?

[Vtg]

the problem is, MM does not want more developers...

Where did you get that idea from...

That was irony...

Btw, he could have had more developers long time ago.

As I see it, bugs need to be fixed first, they affect the game a lot more regularly than hackers, and we actually have tools to deal with the hackers (vote kick, admins), what can we do about bugs, man up?

I agree about fixing the bugs, this is what I'm trying to say all the time. But actually, we have no tools to deal with the hackers, since vote kicks and admins can work for obvious hacks only.

[chutem]

So we can kick the obvious hackers, how many obvious eats can we deal with?

[Veritas]

Um... Choose one of 3 proposed options already?

I've already chosen saying this in the first post - let Shoozza (and others) do the job. Apparently MM will not do this.

except Shoozza is working on it so yeah

[Mercury92]

Um... Choose one of 3 proposed options already?

I've already chosen saying this in the first post - let Shoozza (and others) do the job. Apparently MM will not do this.

except Shoozza is working on it so yeah

He might dropped that AntiCrap months ago.

[Snow]

I'll never understand hackers and cheaters, especially in Soldat.

-You're lucky if you can get on a server with lots of people playing.
-If you're playing Soldat vs. all of the other games that you could play and cheat in... why Soldat? If you play Soldat, obviously, you like it because it's an awesome game... so why ruin an awesome experience by being a douchebag? There just aren't enough other people or hackers that you could possibly impress (if you could even)... all you do is annoy the hell out of anyone who is trying to enjoy a good game. To think that, even now after all this time, of the few truly dedicated fans of the game that cheaters are still a plague to servers.

I like Soldat because it's hard and it's fun to pwn even with moderate skills, because every so often I pull some awesome moves and survive a barrage of gunfire or get a sweet knife kill. If you had an aim-bot... why bother having fun and pulling awesome maneuvers? All you would be doing is running/flying around hitting the mouse button and racking up kills. I don't get it.

Maybe that's it. Don't count kills anymore and maybe no one would bother cheating . Really, who cares who kills more than another, if the game isn't DM. If it's CTF (for instance), only flag count matters.

It would be a cool experiment to try... for real. If it was possible, have a server where kills weren't counted.. no matter what, not even in the server logs. See if people would just get on, play and have fun... as that is the purpose of a game: FUN.