FD - Fix the Credits Hack PLS!

[Luniticisi]

After reading a few posts by people saying they hacked the game for credits, (usually because of some other force crashing their ship/game) so they could get their credits back to where they were before the crash (In what ever form it was) ... sounds reasonable, right?

So what happens after the sever/game resets that will be happening throughout the Beta process ... will these same people feel that it is acceptable to "Re-instate" their credits back to where they were before the reset?

I am fully supportive for people to find and report these hacks to FD and I am glad that these exploits have surfaced early on as it will give FD a chance to look at the problem, but I am sure that it isn't going to be high on the list of things to fix right away.

The problem is when the hacks are being used as gameplay devices, not testing, when people are using the hack to advance themselves in game ... that's not testing ... it's cheating.

It's obvious to say that people using the money hack are only cheating themselves, I have used cheats in games before and no matter the intention (i.e. - I lost my money unfairly) it always seems to escalate to a point where if you want to buy that new beam weapon, instead of saving cash you hack again to the point where the game get's dull ... and at this point, that's a £200 - £100 game ...

I really hope that FD get this exploit fixed soon as it's not only the cheaters (and you are cheating) who's games are getting spoilt .. it would be quite depressing for me (if there is a wipe before P-Beta) to see people flying the huge ships from the get go.

Personally I won't be even looking up a cheat let alone using one..
And remember we are Testing the game, not playing to progress through it.

 

[ElGuappo]

After reading a few posts by saying they hacked the game for credits, (usually because of some other force crashing their ship/game) so they could get their credits back to where they were before the crash (In what ever form it was) ... sounds reasonable, right?

So what happens after the sever/game resets that will be happening throughout the Beta process ... will these same feel that it is acceptable to "Re-instate" their credits back to where they were before the reset?

I am fully supportive for to find and report these hacks to FD and I am glad that these exploits have surfaced early on as it will give FD a chance to look at the problem, but I am sure that it isn't going to be high on the list of things to fix right away.

The problem is when the hacks are being used as gameplay devices, not testing, when people are using the hack to advance themselves in game ... that's not testing ... it's cheating.

It's obvious to say that people using the money hack are only cheating themselves, I have used cheats in games before and no matter the intention (i.e. - I lost my money unfairly) it always seems to escalate to a point where if you want to buy that new beam weapon, instead of saving cash you hack again to the point where the game get's dull ... and at this point, that's a £200 - £100 game ...

I really hope that FD get this exploit fixed soon as it's not only the cheaters (and you are cheating) who's games are getting spoilt .. it would be quite depressing for me (if there is a wipe before P-Beta) to see people flying the huge ships from the get go.

Personally I won't be even looking up a cheat let alone using one..
And remember we are Testing the game, not playing to progress through it.

Every single vulnerability that can be found and exploited at this stage is a good thing. I'd argue that the alpha guys are doing exactly what they should be doing. Regardless of if it's adding unearned credits or bringing a space station to a halt with canister dumps, it all helps test the game.

I'm only Prem Beta, but I've been involved in a few alphas, both gaming and business software, and they mostly revolve around destruction testing; how to break it. Bugs, flaws in the code or its implementation, unforeseen ways people will play the game, odd examples of two or three or four events, happening at once or in a cascade, that make the thing fall over all need to be found.

The more players added, the more trouble will be found and so the devs will be able to improve the game until it's ready for retail.

And when it's launched, most likely a whole lot more problems will crop up

 

[Luniticisi]

Every single vulnerability that can be found and exploited at this stage is a good thing. I'd argue that the alpha guys are doing exactly what they should be doing. Regardless of if it's adding unearned credits or bringing a space station to a halt with canister dumps, it all helps test the game.

I'm only Prem Beta, but I've been involved in a few alphas, both gaming and business software, and they mostly revolve around destruction testing; how to break it. Bugs, flaws in the code or its implementation, unforeseen ways people will play the game, odd examples of two or three or four events, happening at once or in a cascade, that make the thing fall over all need to be found.

The more players added, the more trouble will be found and so the devs will be able to improve the game until it's ready for retail.

And when it's launched, most likely a whole lot more problems will crop up

I just wanted to point out that I agree with people testing for bug's hack and other such things but as i said before..

I am fully supportive for people to find and report these hacks to FD and I am glad that these exploits have surfaced early on as it will give FD a chance to look at the problem, but I am sure that it isn't going to be high on the list of things to fix right away.

The problem is when the hacks are being used as gameplay devices, not testing, when people are using the hack to advance themselves in game ... that's not testing ... it's cheating.

 

[Jason S]

I do not care at all if someone has vastly more powerful ship than myself by whatever means they did it. I simply do not care about this. If however one day FD allow players to buy stations and planets and such then it could then maybe destroy the multiplayer game and I would play single player offline...

 

[xyphic]

And remember we are Testing the game, not playing to progress through it.

Doesn't this contradict the rest of your post? One thing I don't like about the way the Alpha test has been structured is that the larger ships are really only available to those who have a lot of time to devote to playing. We've seen the introduction of new playable ships in Alpha 4.0, and with only two weeks testing before the premium beta, using 'normal' gameplay to get to those ships won't leave much time for testing and balancing. The economy can only be adequately play tested if players are shifting around large quantities of goods; 4 units at a time isn't going to do much!

The credit hack isn't the best way of going about this type of testing -- I'd prefer it if FD organised days where everyone has the resources to fly around cargo haulers. But it's really all we have right now to be able to test some of the aspects of the game that are otherwise only available after days or weeks of effort, and that we may never actually achieve if there are stats wipes.

 

[jabokai]

There is no "cheating" at this stage - it's all going to be wiped! After the final wipe hacking should be abhorred and acted against... just now, only people beings [redacted] with it (as opposed to testing) should be tutted at.

 

[Maxeren]

I just wanted to point out that I agree with people testing for bug's hack and other such things but as i said before..

Doesn't matter if they cheat now as long as its not present in the release.. we are still testing and it is still alpha, so anticipating an enjoyable experience is not a given. Alpha isn't for progressing its for removing all the hacks, bugs and cheats people are finding now.

 

[Luniticisi]

I do not care at all if someone has vastly more powerful ship than myself by whatever means they did it. I simply do not care about this. If however one day FD allow players to buy stations and planets and such then it could then maybe destroy the multiplayer game and I would play single player offline...

(bolded by me) this sentence alone I agree with

 

[Theodrid]

The problem is when the hacks are being used as gameplay devices, not testing, when people are using the hack to advance themselves in game ... that's not testing ... it's cheating.

I agree with you here Luni, my problem with people saying, "I'm only replacing the credits I lost", is that if these commanders lack the patience and self control to get back what you have lost legitimately and feel the need to 'hack' then I doubt very much they have the self control to only 'replace' what they lost. Indeed, if you are tempted to hack then I'm going to take some convincing that you are not tempted to 'replace' significantly more than was originally lost.

Of course, the reporting of these issues is great, but I do wonder how many versions of this hack need to be exploited before it has been tested enough and the justification for such behaviour lessens with each use of said hack.

 

[AnnuverScotinExile]

After reading a few posts by people saying they hacked the game for credits, (usually because of some other force crashing their ship/game) so they could get their credits back to where they were before the crash (In what ever form it was) ... sounds reasonable, right?

Except that seem to be the exception, not the rule. Most hackers did it straight away, not for some sort of compensation for a bug.

So what happens after the sever/game resets that will be happening throughout the Beta process ... will these same people feel that it is acceptable to "Re-instate" their credits back to where they were before the reset?

Undoubtedly. Plus more will simply give themselves a gazillion credits

The problem is when the hacks are being used as gameplay devices, not testing, when people are using the hack to advance themselves in game ... that's not testing ... it's cheating.

There is no game to play. We are testing. Using the result of hacks to enable you to test things that you would not otherwise be able to test is an unqualified good thing. Using the result of hacks to ruin everyone else's testing is an unqualified bad thing. Much of what we have seen has been in between, or leaning towards the bad end, unfortunately.

It's obvious to say that people using the money hack are only cheating themselves, I have used cheats in games before and no matter the intention (i.e. - I lost my money unfairly) it always seems to escalate to a point where if you want to buy that new beam weapon, instead of saving cash you hack again to the point where the game get's dull ... and at this point, that's a £200 - £100 game ...

I really hope that FD get this exploit fixed soon as it's not only the cheaters (and you are cheating) who's games are getting spoilt .. it would be quite depressing for me (if there is a wipe before P-Beta) to see people flying the huge ships from the get go.

There will be a wipe. Get used to it.

Personally I won't be even looking up a cheat let alone using one..
And remember we are Testing the game, not playing to progress through it.

And hacking can facilitate that testing. There are hackers who have only used the results of their hacks for good things. Stopping them from doing that, without providing an alternative method to enable them to do the testing that the hacks enabled, may well be short sighted.

The problem, as ever, is that some people are just *******. And there is nothing that FD can do to change that. We just have to live with it.

 

[Jason S]

Hacking is something that is very hard to stop completely.

Hacking may be nearly impossible to stop with a peer to peer setup rather than everything going to central servers only.

This is a problem for SC as well as ED, actually much more with SC than ED as they have many more players in a much much much smaller game world.

ED may be fine even with hackers due to instance options, police, game scale and single player options both online and offline.

FD can only minimize the hacking but I feel ED is special in that it is so epic and the options make it not the big problem many think it is.

 

[Memnoch]

One way to look at it would be that these people are ruining the game for themselves if they do it during gamma or release. If they manage to give themselves all of the possible items right at the start of the game, they may just end up getting bored and stop playing altogether.

Hopelessly naive I know.

 

[Frobitz]

Pretty sure this has been covered multiple times. Not sure why it warranted yet another thread really?

 

[Razorwire]

...what happens after the sever/game resets that will be happening throughout the Beta process ... will these same people feel that it is acceptable to "Re-instate" their credits back to where they were before the reset?

I used hacked credits to find out that you can shoot yourself in the nose with gimballed cannon in an Anaconda.
And to find out that the camera viewpoint clips through the seat on the Lakon and Anaconda under certain conditions.
And to prove that you can dock an Anaconda and a Lakon without crashing.
And to see if the Class 6 and Class 8 weapons work as intended.
And to see if 48 heatseeker missiles in the air, all at once, would lag/crash the client...
Amongst a bunch of other things, none of which I could do with the normal game loop in the time we have.

I do not intend to hack the client in Gamma.
We'll see about the beta phases, depends what we have available, though I do not feel remotely attached to my fake space money, as I've not earned it.

...remember we are Testing the game, not playing to progress through it.

 

[Vikinger]

Some of the hackers/cheaters actually ruin the testing of the game for others.
One example is if you travel to an anarchy system it use to be some players there that is flying a hacked ship and using hacked missiles only for the purpose to shoot down other players that actually are trying to test the game.

Its a lame excuse they use when they say, hey if you go to an anarchy system you shud not expect something els. But "claiming" an system whit help of cheats is really low imo.
It does not help the devs at all to iron out problems when normal players/testers trying to find balance issues in different zones.

If you do cheat. do it to test things in game, Not to take advantage over other players and shoot them as soon you se them in sight whit all your missiles.
It really does not help anyone.

 

[Luniticisi]

And remember we are Testing the game, not playing to progress through it.

Doesn't this contradict the rest of your post? (snip)

No it doesn't, not in my view anyway .. I was talking about people who are using the hack to advance themselves and not "testing" the game design .. fine, cheat and get the credits - send a ticket to FD on how it was done ... not add credits because you can't be bothered to "Go through hours of gameplay to get to the same point" ... those people are not testing anymore, they are using an exploit to advance themselves in-game.

One thing I don't like about the way the Alpha test has been structured is that the larger ships are really only available to those who have a lot of time to devote to playing. We've seen the introduction of new playable ships in Alpha 4.0, and with only two weeks testing before the premium beta, using 'normal' gameplay to get to those ships won't leave much time for testing and balancing. The economy can only be adequately play tested if players are shifting around large quantities of goods; 4 units at a time isn't going to do much!

Whilst I understand where you coming from, the problem with people just adding credits so they can get the larger ships to "Test" is that they are also cutting out half a ton of "testing" by doing so, people have legitimately worked their way up to the larger ships and therefore added far more to the testing process, just by playing the game in the manner it was meant to be played

There is no "cheating" at this stage - it's all going to be wiped! After the final wipe hacking should be abhorred and acted against... just now, only people beings s with it (as opposed to testing) should be tutted at.

As above I am saying that "Testing" is fine and dandy with me ...using the exploit just to play the game isn't helping the testing process, in my view.

 

[brumster]

As has been said, I fully admit to "hacking" (probably a bit rich, really, it's a pretty basic "hack" and I don't consider myself a hacker in any sense of the word!) the client to gain credits - purely to capture some footage of the new ships in Alpha 4 and answer some questions around them. From a gameplay perspective, I then reset my save and went back to a Sidewinder, even though I'm only testing I didn't want to ruin the fun for myself.

It needs to be sorted. I don't intend to cheat in the final game because, and only because, it would ruin the game for me. I paid real-world money to get some entertainment out of it; why would I cheat myself of the full experience? It just ruins the game and the experience. The only time I'd condone it, from a single player perspective, is if the player has reached an impass and is literally about the put the game down and never touch it again, because they can't get any further in it. At this stage, you could almost put it down to poor game design, so maybe you could argue it's forgiveable at that stage, particularly if it's not ruining anyone else's experience.

Where I do draw a line is on multiplayer... I won't stand for cheating when it negatively affects other peoples game experience. And that is why we are raising issues like this and getting it resolved before the final game. I'm sure Frontier take it very seriously, because the minute the game is ruined for the masses by the few, it's going to take chunks out of the game's reputation, and sales will suffer for it.

Certainly for my part, in the final game, when I go up against another commander in combat I want to know it's as fair as it can be (controller methods, lag/broadband speed, VR devices, etc. notwithstanding) - if he's handing me my **** on a plate because he's fudging his shields to full all the time, or exploiting some weapon bug, I'm going to get frustrated. When it happens regularly, I will simply stop playing, because - hey - we play for fun. For an escape; for enjoyment. When it stops becoming fun, why do it?

Maybe some people play for different reasons, but that's my only one.

 

[Frobitz]

No it doesn't, not in my view anyway .. I was talking about people who are using the hack to advance themselves and not "testing" the game design .. fine, cheat and get the credits - send a ticket to FD on how it was done ... not add credits because you can't be bothered to "Go through hours of gameplay to get to the same point" ... those people are not testing anymore, they are using an exploit to advance themselves in-game.

It's not a game yet. It's an Alpha test. Any progression is meaningless as it can be reset via the developers or by bugs at any time.

I feel like this whole 'patch the hacks now' argument comes from a contingent of people who don't 'get' that this isn't really game right now, or just want to play it as a game despite it being an Alpha test.

The issue's been ticketed, it's been discussed over and over again, it'll be fixed when FD are ready. Move on to finding other bugs.

 

[Jason S]

FD cannot stop completly hacking but they could detect it has happened by monitoring change in credits and assets against player missions/kill/trading to find the culprits.

Then there could be warnings etc.

But they cannot completely stop the possibility from happening, just police it which should be enough for those that find it an issue.

 

[FrodoHobbits]

I paid real-world money to get some entertainment out of it; why would I cheat myself of the full experience?

Well said