🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <virtuallD...@netcom.com>, virt...@netcom.com writes:

> I'll say this slowly so its clear.  There are NO cheats in network or
> serial mode in any version of Descent.  Nor will there be.  

Yes, it turned out that my opponent had not used a cheat sequence, but
had simply patched the executable to give himself an extremely large
amount of initial health.

> However we disclaim all responsibility if people modify the programs
> we shipped.  This is not only unfair and unsportsmanlike, it is a
> violation of the software licensing agreement and thus illegal.

Quite right.  Nevertheless, it would be nice if you had just a little
bit of protection to allow one to know if someone else cheated; for
example, my executable could send a 32-bit hash h based on the current
time to your executable; then, your executable would go through itself
in 32-bit chunks a, accumulating the sum of all h mod a, mod 2^32.
You'd return that number to me, and I'd verify that your executable
was the same as mine by performing the same operation on myself.  If
they weren't the same, my copy would relay the message, "JohnDoe has a
modified copy of Descent, and may be cheating."

Now, of course, this could be defeated by someone who patched the code
around to read an unmodified copy of the excutable (from disk, etc.)
but this would at least provide a little deterrent.  As I understand
it currently, it's just a matter of looking through the interpreted
code for hex 64 00 (100 health) and replacing it with something
larger.  I haven't seen the "Equalizer" patch, so I'm not sure how it
works; but I'll bet it's similarly simple.  (Equalizer is a misnomer,
but I suppose whoever created it didn't quite feel comfortable calling
it "Cheat against your fellow humans like the dirty scoundrel you are,
taking all the fun out of the game.")

I understand that you don't want to waste your time getting in a
battle with cheaters; but, faced with the evidence that they're out
there, I think you would be well-advised to use something like the
above method to deter all but the most determined of them.

Joev                            <URL:"http://www.math.harvard.edu/~joev/">

  "What we ought to do is scan RFDs into a JPEG and post it to the
   alt.binaries groups. "Hot, pumping, RFD-muscle" or something like
   that.
   *Everyone* will download it -- the problem is solved!"
	  -- Andrew Hackard, on voter apathy