Some thoughts about cheating on P1999
 

I'll start by saying that I've thought about the various cheats and hacks for EQ both to see what they're like and to see how they work. As anyone who runs into me online knows, I ultimately chose not to do this.

The notion of getting caught wasn't a deterrent for me earlier (although it certainly is now). The allure of hacks and cheats for me was not making the game easier so much as revealing more about how it works. I have no doubt that hacks and packet sniffers have been instrumental in reverse-engineering EQ Emu and similar projects. Ultimately, I decided that hacking would spoil the challenge of the game, and chose not to do it.

I enjoy EverQuest, and appreciate a wide range of design decisions that went into it. I find myself occasionally fascinated by little details, such as the way that mana ticks up, then back down by one a few seconds later, then up again. Setting up my own server at some point in the future may be necessary in order to answer obscure questions such as these. Should I ever do this, I'll likely be using client hacks as diagnostic tools. I'd certainly best do this on a separate machine than what I currently use, however.

Knowledge is amoral, and is also good to have. Seeing the fallout of the temporary bannings is also kind of neat for me - there's a lot of human nature in both sides of this drama.

I tend to agree with you on the knowledge aspect. But another thing you must realize is that this server code is like their brain baby and they don't want that leaked, from a development and competition standpoint.

For the record, nothing a client can install can get at the "server code". At the very furthest stretch, it can get at the result of the server code (what gets sent to the client over the IP connection).

Also not to derail the thread above - but to maybe answer a little mystery for the OP.

The reason mana "tic's" up, and then back down, as well as health, and endurance, is because the server has a set "rate of increase" per tic, the client has a "expected rate of increase" per tic. The client tic's, the server tic's and eventually at some point the client checks the server value, and adjusts to the actual value, rather than the expected or estimated.

Hope that helps.

The only thing I ever thought about using hacks for back on live was for....

pyzjn

I just knew that I could get that GBS, my life gear would be set.... lol

I spent hours reading scary hacker boards, inuendo threads on legit boards, even considered buying an ebook from ebay that had a moneyback guaranteed I'd figure out the spawn cycle if I just forked over $19 bucks.

lol

I hate that bitch...pyzjn must die, even if she doesn't drop the GBS, I just want her dead.

Anyway, 3 days camping ruins at least a few hours at a time and every mob within sight of the hill dying every 3 minutes or whatever repop is and she never showed up for me. Neither did Varsoon...which I totally recall from live happening at least under the tree closer to the Miller's if not the ruins themselves...actually, I don't recall ever seeing him wandering the zone on p99 like live either...didn't need a hack to run into him at least some days! Haven't played much in QH lately, maybe it's fixed.

As for hacking, I don't care what others do as long as it doesn't prevent me from doing what I want to do. If that means I have 10K and I want to buy an item and a hacker got it with software showing them spawns, then so be it. I'd buy it from them just as much as I would from anyone else. As for the 60 Nec in LGuk...ya, you can track those rare spawns just fine, huh? Didn't realize Kunark gave necros the Track Undead skill...thanks for letting exp groups play through asshat...

Ah, client interpolation. It's kind of odd that the client and server are so consistently off by 1. I wonder if the mana regeneration rate was bumped up by 1 at some point post-Kunark. Alternately, the mana regain formula might be under by 1 on p1999. Thanks for shedding some light on that -- I'd expected those numbers to be strictly server-generated.

when exactly were you diagnosed with 'aspergers syndrome'

Eh. It's simple curiosity. I'm a computer scientist.

then it would be completely trivial for you to set up an eq emu server where you could play with tools all you want. this thread is just more hax justification

I'm sure setting up an emulation wouldn't be completely trivial. I work full time and have a family. What time I have for fun goes into 1999.

I'm voicing honest opinion here, which includes some sympathy for hackers. In light of your more recent post, am I right to think that the aspergers comment was a personal attack?