Ankhesentapemkah
Sorceror
Some decent map editor and a client which supports more/bigger maps would be nice.
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Something I have been thinking about...
- Thread starter Ryan
- Start date
Ok,there are a few issues i like to address so ill start one by one:
1)Can PlayUO be used to create advanced "cheats"(automation) of gameplay?
Yes,of course it can be used, its a .net UO Client with a very rich and scalable engine and which you can edit to suit your needs or use the external interface to make some plugins/macros.
2)Can this be done now?
Yes,you can access a lot of public members/classes and use them to do just about anything.. What about private members/classes,or hooking the game engine(network/graphics/etc)?yes,but not without decompilation(though a simple disassembly/recompile would work as well,so you would add your new stuff)
3)Is this legal?
Probably not,though i dont remeber seeing a license with PlayUO,the soft is closed-source(but .net stuff is easy to decompile,and even obsfucators can be easily defeated by a professional cracker).
4)Can said exploits be done with plugins alone and using only the exposed interface?
No,the exposed interface is rather small and simplistic,so you cannot do it with it.
You have to know the inner workings of PlayUO to do that,but its definetly possible and not hard at all.
You can do most of the "cheats" with plugins alone,however you'll have to access internal classes used by PlayUO.
5)Can PlayUO be blocked?
Yes, to a certain extent,actually UOGamers is blocking PlayUO due to some automation plugins which were recently released and some private version of PlayUO floating around.
5x)Could you circumvent blocking of PlayUO on various shards if source was released?
Yes,however you could do that easily without having the source(see 7).
5y)Could you circumvent blocking of PlayUO on various shards if source would not be released?
Yes(see 7).The differences in protocol/ or the crypto layer(if present) would have to be studied,and the client could be modified(using decompilation tools).Having the source and not having it doesn't make a big difference for a cheater when it comes to .net apps.
6)How can a shard protect itself from PlayUO automation/"cheats"?(also related to "patch an exploit" issue posted by ' I cheat')
Implement hidden packets or add a secure layer to the network..
On a second note,PlayUO does a lot of things the OSI client doesnt do.
This would force people to use a SPECIFC client provided by the shard.//like OSI-only and a secure PlayUO
These tricks are already in use by some shards.
The open-source version might ommit shard-specific security parts from the client so it woudnt affect a shard where it would be blocked anyways.The shard could release a SECURE(no plugins) obsfucated version of the client for the use by its gamers(though again obsfucation isnt really a solution,since its not truly secure and can be cracked easily).
Since there are no actual "cheats"/"expoits" but rather automation tools(due to the UO protocol being very solid by design and RunUO being a secure server),blocking has to be done at a network level using some sort of crypto or hidden packets.
7)Would open-sourceing the client generate more cheats for UO?
Probably,however it should be known that ALL of the said cheats can easily be done without having the source code,simply by decompilation and reverse enginering of the client. And for .net that is a joke since the source is basically open. The term open-source just gives developers the possiblity to edit and add new things.. The cheaters could do those things easily before it got opensourced.
So what i want to say here is that to cheaters wether it becomes opensource or not is irrelevant,as modification of the client itself is easily done without having the actual source.
However to those that want to learn or code their customized clients its a lot harder since the amounts of code and modifications required to do that are a lot larger than creating some cheats which have some 5-7 classes that do some simple automation tasks.
As for the actual plugins/macros you posted("I cheat" posted) , i didnt see any actual action.. coding a simple plugin to register those macros is very easy and can be done within a few lines, however since i know most of those things are possible and have already been made by not one but multiple people ,i'll take your word for it that you have actually created those and didnt just do a quickie plugin that registered those macros.
So i ask you people to weight the advantages developers would gain from open-sourcing against the dangers of cheats which can already be easily made using a decompilator or a plugin.
I hope this wont turn into a "PLAYUO IS HAX BUT RAZOR IS HAX TOO" type of thread.
Regards,
ViruX
1)Can PlayUO be used to create advanced "cheats"(automation) of gameplay?
Yes,of course it can be used, its a .net UO Client with a very rich and scalable engine and which you can edit to suit your needs or use the external interface to make some plugins/macros.
2)Can this be done now?
Yes,you can access a lot of public members/classes and use them to do just about anything.. What about private members/classes,or hooking the game engine(network/graphics/etc)?yes,but not without decompilation(though a simple disassembly/recompile would work as well,so you would add your new stuff)
3)Is this legal?
Probably not,though i dont remeber seeing a license with PlayUO,the soft is closed-source(but .net stuff is easy to decompile,and even obsfucators can be easily defeated by a professional cracker).
4)Can said exploits be done with plugins alone and using only the exposed interface?
No,the exposed interface is rather small and simplistic,so you cannot do it with it.
You have to know the inner workings of PlayUO to do that,but its definetly possible and not hard at all.
You can do most of the "cheats" with plugins alone,however you'll have to access internal classes used by PlayUO.
5)Can PlayUO be blocked?
Yes, to a certain extent,actually UOGamers is blocking PlayUO due to some automation plugins which were recently released and some private version of PlayUO floating around.
5x)Could you circumvent blocking of PlayUO on various shards if source was released?
Yes,however you could do that easily without having the source(see 7).
5y)Could you circumvent blocking of PlayUO on various shards if source would not be released?
Yes(see 7).The differences in protocol/ or the crypto layer(if present) would have to be studied,and the client could be modified(using decompilation tools).Having the source and not having it doesn't make a big difference for a cheater when it comes to .net apps.
6)How can a shard protect itself from PlayUO automation/"cheats"?(also related to "patch an exploit" issue posted by ' I cheat')
Implement hidden packets or add a secure layer to the network..
On a second note,PlayUO does a lot of things the OSI client doesnt do.
This would force people to use a SPECIFC client provided by the shard.//like OSI-only and a secure PlayUO
These tricks are already in use by some shards.
The open-source version might ommit shard-specific security parts from the client so it woudnt affect a shard where it would be blocked anyways.The shard could release a SECURE(no plugins) obsfucated version of the client for the use by its gamers(though again obsfucation isnt really a solution,since its not truly secure and can be cracked easily).
Since there are no actual "cheats"/"expoits" but rather automation tools(due to the UO protocol being very solid by design and RunUO being a secure server),blocking has to be done at a network level using some sort of crypto or hidden packets.
7)Would open-sourceing the client generate more cheats for UO?
Probably,however it should be known that ALL of the said cheats can easily be done without having the source code,simply by decompilation and reverse enginering of the client. And for .net that is a joke since the source is basically open. The term open-source just gives developers the possiblity to edit and add new things.. The cheaters could do those things easily before it got opensourced.
So what i want to say here is that to cheaters wether it becomes opensource or not is irrelevant,as modification of the client itself is easily done without having the actual source.
However to those that want to learn or code their customized clients its a lot harder since the amounts of code and modifications required to do that are a lot larger than creating some cheats which have some 5-7 classes that do some simple automation tasks.
As for the actual plugins/macros you posted("I cheat" posted) , i didnt see any actual action.. coding a simple plugin to register those macros is very easy and can be done within a few lines, however since i know most of those things are possible and have already been made by not one but multiple people ,i'll take your word for it that you have actually created those and didnt just do a quickie plugin that registered those macros.
So i ask you people to weight the advantages developers would gain from open-sourcing against the dangers of cheats which can already be easily made using a decompilator or a plugin.
I hope this wont turn into a "PLAYUO IS HAX BUT RAZOR IS HAX TOO" type of thread.
Regards,
ViruX
All of those plugins are real, I wouldn't post screenshots of fake plugins, I'm a coder, not a liar. It's hard to post action screenshots of PlayUO because it will always look like you're just standing there. It's really easy to have almost full access to almost everything in PlayUO without any decompling, hooking and whatnot (I'm not going to say how becuase I'd rather people don't know). If PlayUO was open source it would be extremely hard to block it, the network could be edited to behave exactly how the OSI client behaves, there are always other ways to do it (no decompiling required). Hidden packets wouldn't work because you can't create new packets for the OSI client, you can only use packets the client already knows. It takes a nice amount of skill to decompile PlayUO and inject your own code and have it work, your everyday average code wouldn't be able to do it without some problems.
If the source code to PlayUO was released I could make some really advanced stuff what would rival even the best of plugins or "hacks" done by decompiling. The amount of time and work to develop such things would be must less.
What I'm trying to get at is that an open source PlayUO would devastate UO as we know it (look at UOGamers).
There are many, many pros to have an open source PlayUO, I would love to see an open source PlayUO, but thats only because I enjoy coding and have always wan't to work an making PlayUO more stable, less of a memory hog and streamline, and it doesn't seem like Krrios has enough time to continue the devlopment of PlayUO.
If the source code to PlayUO was released I could make some really advanced stuff what would rival even the best of plugins or "hacks" done by decompiling. The amount of time and work to develop such things would be must less.
What I'm trying to get at is that an open source PlayUO would devastate UO as we know it (look at UOGamers).
There are many, many pros to have an open source PlayUO, I would love to see an open source PlayUO, but thats only because I enjoy coding and have always wan't to work an making PlayUO more stable, less of a memory hog and streamline, and it doesn't seem like Krrios has enough time to continue the devlopment of PlayUO.
HellRazor
Knight
As an added point - an open source client would allow shard administrators to build in their own custom protection methods both client and server side so that their members would have to use their custom compile of the client to connect. I see more opportunities for protection than opportunities for hacking (most people who know enough to code the hacks to begin with know enough to get their hands on a good .NET decompiler to lay their hands on the client source anyways).
There were a lot of similar fears and arguements made about the RunUO server source before it went public, and as it turned out, NONE of the fears that were discussed back then actually came to pass when the source was released.
Anyways, there are good arguements on both sides. In the end it will be up to krrios and team, and he has expressed hesitancy to go open source.
I wouldn't even care about closed source if we just had faster development. I fear at the rate PlayUO is going it will forevermore be just be another unfinished client project.
There were a lot of similar fears and arguements made about the RunUO server source before it went public, and as it turned out, NONE of the fears that were discussed back then actually came to pass when the source was released.
Anyways, there are good arguements on both sides. In the end it will be up to krrios and team, and he has expressed hesitancy to go open source.
I wouldn't even care about closed source if we just had faster development. I fear at the rate PlayUO is going it will forevermore be just be another unfinished client project.
Using Reflector or any other metadata/il explorer is considered decompilation to some extent,because to write a plugin that uses internal classes you have to view their structure and how they relate.I assume the other possibilities you talk about would involve using a proxy which would be very easy to code(to inject packets/etc).I Cheat said:
Ok,what you are talking about is a stealth client that would be fully compatible with the protocol used by the OSI Client, contrary to popular belief making such a stealth client easily doable without even decompilation(proxy).Though,the amount of modification required on a normal PlayUO isnt that big(maybe modifying 10-12 classes MAX , and adding 2 new packets which arent implemented,however i will not discuss such things),this is easily doable without having the source code,even if you cannot recompile PlayUO(ilasm/ildasm).I Cheat said:
The OSI client itself has many limitations,and keeping compatibility with it is hard,if not impossible in the long run(because making a stealthed PlayUO is much easier).The truth is that if someone were to release a stealthed PlayUO now it would force shards to use secure clients.Maybe its time to give up on the OSI client and move to a secure PlayUO? Develop PlayUO further until it has all the feats the OSI client has. Another solution would be to force players to use either a secure PlayUO or a secure Razor.(custom crypt/etc).
Keeping packet compatiblity with the OSI client only leads to these problems, breaking free from the protocol would accomplish so much more,however it would mean giving up on the players that want to use vanilla OSI client(no razor).
Again,not true. There are public and private toolkits which allow full modifiction of .net software without having the source code like it were clean c# code.One might question the availablity of such tools,however they do exist and one could code a framework to automatize decompilation/recompilation processes in a short amount of time(this has already been done both by direct IL(.net p-code) modification or by using the ildasm/ilasm tools).Using such toolkits is as easy as changing a few lines of code in your c# source and starting build.bat to get a freshly compiled exe.(would take some 5-30sec for ilasm based toolkits and 2-3 seconds for il modification toolkits)I Cheat said:
I know this is possible because i have used such tools myself in the past,and i know the possiblities,and i also know that the term open-source for .net applications only changes what developers can modify and not what reverse engineers can modify(though any user with access to such toolkits could do that without having ANY reversing knowledge whatsover).
Please note,that what i posted here is not a guide on how to do said things,its proof that open-sourcing does not affect cheating in any way except for novice coders and that the only thing holding us back from a secure client is the old OSI client(not osi+razor). Maybe its time to give up on the OSI client and work toghether on a better client that would be used by everyone?
I hope none of you will take things i said as offensive,all i was doing is stating the facts as they are.
Regards,
ViruX
Plz stop reading my posts, you obviously don't like me or my thoughts.WarAngel said:
In the past plugin use on UOGamers was hitting an all time high and it ruined many things. They were forced to block PlayUO from UOGamers and as a result even more people quit (many because they were using plugins or maybe they just couldn't stand the OSI client like myself).
Macil
Sorceror
I don't really keep up to date with this stuff so sorry if this has been suggested already. But how about a RunUO that has a prespawned world (with an option to whipe it out of course, for those who don't want it) that is accurate to OSI? This way everyone has a sort of template to work with and mold so that if they don't have the time to get around to spawning, at least something will be there in the meantime for their players.
merlyn2000
Sorceror
id like to see the ability to link servers to each other thru a gate system.
such a thing would promote the growth of shards, since a character could go easily from one to the other without having to 'build' all over again.
then force groups of shards to adhere to sets of rules/regulations, which would indirectly segragate these shards into communities; each community or group having it's own agreed-upon ruleset. for example, they would agree upon stat caps, and skill caps, etc.
in this way we would see very large communities, hopefully each having its on custom maps and creatures, creating the LARGEST online virtual world, ever.
such a thing would promote the growth of shards, since a character could go easily from one to the other without having to 'build' all over again.
then force groups of shards to adhere to sets of rules/regulations, which would indirectly segragate these shards into communities; each community or group having it's own agreed-upon ruleset. for example, they would agree upon stat caps, and skill caps, etc.
in this way we would see very large communities, hopefully each having its on custom maps and creatures, creating the LARGEST online virtual world
MarciXs said:
I used to used C/C++ Visual C, C# isn't directly backwards compatible with C/C++ that I know of I could be wrong however. VB is though even though you can't have scripts read from VB like you can from C# scripts. Not knocking the idea, but i think it may be more hassle then it's worth.
my thoughts
i think that RunUO is by and large very stable and solid and that its pretty much just entering a sustainment phase. Adding a few tweaks here and there, a few new scripts to implement some of the missing features, and i think most people want to see this finished.
What I would choose next for the runuo team if i were given the opportunity is for them to take their skills and knowledge and move to a new mmo and start the project from the ground up as open source while documenting everything. I personally dont play much UO and only throw up my server when i want to test things or kill some time with friends, but i dig through runuo all the time and it has inspired in me to learn some c# programming, game design and theory, and the idea of working on more. i would love to watch from the begining the developement of an emulator and to know how things are done step by step.
there are projects out there for tons of mmo emulators but not many get very far or are of the quality and stability of runuo. some ideal candidates that come to mind are:
Dark Ages of Camelot : DOL is written in c# but uses tons of databases and finding current ones and all inclusive ones are hard for the new user
Star Wars Galaxies Emulator: have gone closes sourced after many problems and have lost my faith and most of my interest. i have the latest svn of the open source code written in c++ although not very feature rich it could provide a starting point
City of Heros: only played this for a short while but was very entertaining
Earth and Beyond: never played but i know the game is discontinued. I would love to get into a fun sci-fi themed mmo
Asheron's Call 2: i played for a year and this was a pretty fun game before all the nerfing and sweeping changes killed it. It's also discontinued and I dont know if any packet logs could be found anywhere but i have a copy of the original client disks.
Anyhow to sum it up sustain RunUO as needed but lets move on to a new community project to rebreath life into another game and make it a learning event for the whole community.
i think that RunUO is by and large very stable and solid and that its pretty much just entering a sustainment phase. Adding a few tweaks here and there, a few new scripts to implement some of the missing features, and i think most people want to see this finished.
What I would choose next for the runuo team if i were given the opportunity is for them to take their skills and knowledge and move to a new mmo and start the project from the ground up as open source while documenting everything. I personally dont play much UO and only throw up my server when i want to test things or kill some time with friends, but i dig through runuo all the time and it has inspired in me to learn some c# programming, game design and theory, and the idea of working on more. i would love to watch from the begining the developement of an emulator and to know how things are done step by step.
there are projects out there for tons of mmo emulators but not many get very far or are of the quality and stability of runuo. some ideal candidates that come to mind are:
Dark Ages of Camelot : DOL is written in c# but uses tons of databases and finding current ones and all inclusive ones are hard for the new user
Star Wars Galaxies Emulator: have gone closes sourced after many problems and have lost my faith and most of my interest. i have the latest svn of the open source code written in c++ although not very feature rich it could provide a starting point
City of Heros: only played this for a short while but was very entertaining
Earth and Beyond: never played but i know the game is discontinued. I would love to get into a fun sci-fi themed mmo
Asheron's Call 2: i played for a year and this was a pretty fun game before all the nerfing and sweeping changes killed it. It's also discontinued and I dont know if any packet logs could be found anywhere but i have a copy of the original client disks.
Anyhow to sum it up sustain RunUO as needed but lets move on to a new community project to rebreath life into another game and make it a learning event for the whole community.