A Reputation

[baja]

I am a long time lurker on these forums and am returning with the news of Diablo 3 coming out. Like alot of others I re-installed Diablo 2 and began playing Hardcore almost immediately. To my surprise, dupes, tppk, maphacks, were all available. While this isn't news to most of you, I was surprised that Blizzard and Bnet still tolerated this. I think this reflects very poorly on both these parties. I am wondering before I invest time and money into a new Blizzard game, if they can't address something as simple as tppk or duping in a game thats been exploited for 5+ years what kind of service will we recieve with Diablo 3?
Just the rambling of a returning user.
baja

[visom]

Even though D3 will be out finally in 1-3 years, you can still consider it to be out soon.

Since D3 is coming out soon, it's probably better for Blizzard to put their resources and invest in SC2, D3, and BNet2 since once those games come out, people aren't going to play D2 as much as they used to so there really is no sense in pouring money into those older games, same thing for SC1.

[baja]

Not that they have the resources to address it now, its just they haven't really ever fixed the problem. Mass banning doesn't fix the problem. I hope that Blizzard is more proactive in addressing hacking and less reactive... I just thought after 5 years they could have/would have addressed these issues. I think it goes without saying Diablo 3 will have every loophole exploited just as many on-line games. It is how Blizzard decides to address this that seems to be at question.
Overall I am just dissappointed that the same problems that existed in .09 and previously are still very active today...
Baja

[visom]

Well think of it this way, if you don't buy D2 then blizzard needs you, if you buy D2 blizzard doesn't need you anymore.
Meaning that blizzard wants you to buy D2, but once you buy it and blizzard got their money they don't care for you anymore, you're nothing more to them. This is why bnet is left to rot. And I'm amazed that those hackers find playing the game using hacks fun. I got bored of D2 faster with hacks and played legitly, much funner that way.

For Bnet 2.0, I wouldn't mine paying a fee, but THIS time blizzard should do a better job on regulating the game. I don't want a type of ban that says "ok we got rid of a few hackers, but we still got alot left so just try playing through the remaining hackers, you'll get used to it eventually"

[Orphan]

...if they can't address something as simple as tppk or duping in a game thats been exploited for 5+ years what kind of service will we recieve with Diablo 3?

Are you familiar with the code of battle.net to be able to confidently say that fixing something like duping is a simple matter? If so, could you elaborate on it's functions and procedures, and the changes required to it to fix duping?

[phool]

If duping was easily preventable it would have been. Blizz have done a lot to counter duping. TPPK I reckon they could have fixed without great difficulty though as countering the hack itself isn't necessary, minor changes to the game rules is sufficient. I guess it hasn't been fixed simply because HC has so few players compared to SC.

Banning is a very effective way of dealing with hack users. The hackers are always going to be a step ahead of hack preventation, strong deterrants like being seen to ban actively are going to be far more effective than trying to individually counter every hack.

[Sein Schatten]

Are you familiar with the code of battle.net to be able to confidently say that fixing something like duping is a simple matter? If so, could you elaborate on it's functions and procedures, and the changes required to it to fix duping?

Other newer online games don't have rampant duping. Botting is another issue.

[phool]

I don't think duping will be a major issue in D3 and it certainly doesn't have to be, making it impossible in D2 is likely to be very unrealistic however. Preventing stuff like maphack tppk and chicken in D3 may be far harder, though in the latter cases from what we've seen Blizz are making such hacks redundant.

[baja]

To respond to Orphan, no I am near computer illiterate. So no, I am not familiar with the code. But from experience, duping seems to be something D2 has the corner on the market. I played another very popular mmorpg and I have never seen a dupe, the 1-2 times there was a rumor of a dupe the realms got rolled back and the loophole fixed. So while these may be 2 different "codes" the outcome was very different. One proactively fixed, the other has half-heartedly reacted.
I know I did a search for tppk, and there are endless requests to address this. Again the reason for the post was to vent publicly my dissappointment that these 2 areas have recieved very little attention. On another note, opening an entirely new venue for debate is: Which is worse, maphack, or hacks that ruin the game playing experience of random players? I am not condoning either one and do not use maphack, but it seems many (1000's?) of accounts have been banned for this but what about accounts using 3rd party programs that ruin gameplay for all?
I don't want to get off topic and bring D2 into the D3 forums, I would like to say that I hope Blizzard does a better job with D3 than D2.
Baja

[Orphan]

Although D2 isn't a MMORPG, which MMORPG are you referring to?

Blizzard have patched and removed old dupe methods. The problem is that D2 is a very popular game, and there's entire communities/websites/forums dedicated to hacking/exploiting D2. With the 10 year old infrastructure of battle.net there's only so much Blizzard can do. D3 will be using a completely new infrastructure and the developers have alot more experience (especially with games like WoW). The online gaming environment has changed significantly since D2's release.

We should also remember that Blizzard North (the original company that developed D2) has disbanded.

With regards to the accounts banned for using illegal third party progrmas, I'd say they're close to the 100,000's.

[phool]

With regards to the accounts banned for using illegal third party progrmas, I'd say they're close to the 100,000's.

Perhaps the issue here is not so much the number of bans but how well the bans are publicised, at least assuming those bans weren't mostly in a couple of big chunks (I do remember one instance of a mass ban). Warden and other similar programs have remained pretty mysterious, which is good, which should be half way to preventing new hacks gaining popularity.

[Sein Schatten]

Perhaps the issue here is not so much the number of bans but how well the bans are publicised,

What matters is for the players, for me, how my gaming experience changes. I don't care for the number. It can as well be 10 or 10.000. I only care about the bots on my server and whether they are banned or not. If my gaming experience hasn't change they can publicize and hail their banwaves as the next messiah, I don't care.

[Starving_Poet]

What it boils down to is that Diablo 2 duping and other methods are all possible due to dated and full reverse engineered server code processes. Any patch that Blizzard makes to the BNET servers can be immediately overcome simply because the game is so old and it has a hacking community larger than the subscription base of most MMOs.