Radars in Frontlines and Hunts - Any word from SE?

[Potchi]

Hey everyone. Actually in previous thread I had come up with the barebones idea of a solution to the problem. A few others commented and helped iron it out. I would encourage you all to read this thread and post your support if you like the idea. The more support it gets the better chance SE will take a look at it.

http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/t...p-Hunt-Abusers

[Ninix]

If the server only updated the clients on the position of monsters within a 50 yalm range (about the range that monsters start loading on the screen anyway), that would drastically impact 3rd party apps' abilities to track monster movement at long range.

This is exactly how it works now. The server only tells your client about entities in your area of interest, which is a bubble centered on your character with a radius of about 50-60 yalms. Radar apps cannot detect marks outside of this bubble because the client simply does not know about them.

As a few others have mentioned, there is basically nothing they can do to stop the radar apps from a technical standpoint. Something will need to change in the way the Hunt system is designed if they want to mitigate the impact of these kinds of programs.

[Nekodar]

How can we know that you're not one of those users fishing for what SE plans to do so you can come up with new ideas to evade SE's detection?
We can't of course, and can only take you for your word that you're not.
But the above question is one reason why you shouldn't expect anything other than occasional announcements that X numbers have been (temp)banned.

[Hulan]

This is exactly how it works now. The server only tells your client about entities in your area of interest, which is a bubble centered on your character with a radius of about 50-60 yalms. Radar apps cannot detect marks outside of this bubble because the client simply does not know about them.

Hmmm, I had considered the possibility. But in that case, I'm not entirely sure I see the problem - other than the obvious fact that it is a blatant violation of the ToS. Fifty Yalms is barely enough for a competitive advantage, and certainly isn't enough to allow them to just lazily stand around town. You could accomplish the exact same thing by being more observant. Don't get me wrong, against ToS is against ToS. On the other hand, I find myself wondering what the huge fuss is all about.

They could use application layer AES - or some other encryption - on the position data, but that would only last as long as it took some clever user to find the private key. If they're already limiting data to a medium range, there's not much they can do beyond what they have already done. Act on abuse reports.

[Kallera]

This is exactly how it works now. The server only tells your client about entities in your area of interest, which is a bubble centered on your character with a radius of about 50-60 yalms. Radar apps cannot detect marks outside of this bubble because the client simply does not know about them.

As a few others have mentioned, there is basically nothing they can do to stop the radar apps from a technical standpoint. Something will need to change in the way the Hunt system is designed if they want to mitigate the impact of these kinds of programs.

If radar apps also "reads" player locations in frontlines pvp, then it is providing tactical information that normal play never intended to give on the map.

Knowing where your opponents are massed or hidden is a huge strategic advantage.

Feasible or not, this cannot stand. As it is already impacting the experience and fair play of users.

[Potchi]

snip

Was this directed at me? If so, this is kinda amusing. I made that thread because over and over people are saying nothing can be done nothing can be done, doom and gloom. So I figured I would spur the community to be a bit more productive and actually help look for a solution. If you actually read the thread you would understand that what you said makes no sense. What I proposed was a solid solution to the current exploit. Sure other abusers will come around and try to find other ways to abuse the system, but i would have nothing to gain from putting that solution out there seriously. And I'm not looking for a response from SE to say they did or didnt implement this, I do want them to see it though because with their programmers I am certain they could take it even further and remove the advantage of these abusers. If that comment wasnt directed at me, my apologies.

[Ninix]

Feasible or not, this cannot stand. As it is already impacting the experience and fair play of users.

That's nice and all, but it doesn't really matter. This is an issue literally all games are vulnerable to, and there is no way to really stop it short of adding some cheat detection to the client, which is just going to start a neverending arms race between SE and people who create the cheats. It's expensive, time consuming, and not really worth the effort if the game is designed properly. While the radar app definitely gives you an advantage, it's certainly not one I would call a "huge strategic advantage", since the range is very limited and anything the radar shows is also visible in the game world.

It's a slightly larger advantage in Hunts, since it lets people just run around a zone semi-AFK and not really paying any attention until they see a red blip on the radar, but it does not remove the need to actually run around the whole zone.

This is why I feel that, even though the Radar app is certainly cheating, it's really not that big of a deal. The *design* of the hunt system itself is the bigger issue. The rewards are far too great, which causes huge numbers of people to participate. This in turn causes zone servers to lag and marks to die in 30 seconds. This in turn causes the community to demand that people wait for 5 minutes before pulling a mark to allow their whole linkshell to show up and tag the mob. This in turn causes anyone who pulls early to be verbally abused and blacklisted by half the server. This in turn causes the community to go to shit in general.

None of this is being caused by the Radar, and it will not go away if the Radar is (somehow) eliminated. It's being caused by a poorly designed game system, and can only be fixed with modifications to the game design.

[Argentt]

Since FFXIV-APP doesn't seem to actually hook into the process, SE would need something along the lines of Warden/VAC/Punkbuster correct? The parsing doesn't bother me, but ever since they added the Radar plugin I knew it'd be abused in frontlines and it annoys me to no end. It's all open source now too, so not like it'd go away if the developer gave up on it.

[Hybris-Maenad]

snip

Hence why I created a thread that doesn't have any recommendations. I would just like to hear something from SE as to whether they plan to do anything to disrupt this.

[Kallera]

That's nice and all, but it doesn't really matter. This is an issue literally all games are vulnerable to, and there is no way to really stop it short of adding some cheat detection to the client, which is just going to start a neverending arms race between SE and people who create the cheats. It's expensive, time consuming, and not really worth the effort if the game is designed properly. While the radar app definitely gives you an advantage, it's certainly not one I would call a "huge strategic advantage", since the range is very limited and anything the radar shows is also visible in the game world...

The ability to predict a flanking maneuver, to determine reconnaissance attempts and ambushes from character model distance(considerably more that what we have now.), to have 360 degree vision through barriers and rocks?

I stand by my assessment. An app that can do this is a bigger deal than you think in PvP.