View Single Post
Old 06-10-2009, 12:54 PM   #36
Andy_Mythic
Developer VIP
 
Andy_Mythic's Avatar
 
Join Date: Sep 2008
So I'm going to jump on the grenade here...

To acknowledge the existence of an exploit is to empower it. As developers, our posts are watched very closely and are the subject of much scrutiny. The minute that we publicly acknowledge the existence of an exploit or third party programs that enable exploitative behavior it legitimizes the claims of validity and will further encourage people who would partake in said behavior to do so.

For example:

1337 WAREZ PROGRAMMER A
: HEY GUYZ MY PROGRAM CAN MAKE YOU FLY! JUST GIVE ME $5.00 AND YOU CAN PWN THE OTHER GUYZ! LULZ! HERE WATCH MY YOUTUBE HQ STREAM!"

Player A
: :"Pfft, that can't really do that"

Friendly Neighboorhood Dev: "Hey all, we know that (UNNAMED EXPLOITATIVE THIRD PARTY PROGRAM) is a problem and that it enables explotative behavior. We're really sorry about this and will work on getting a fix up ASAP! (Which BTW, we can't give an actual date for said fix because we don't know yet just how big of a problem it is, only that it is an actual problem and that we really, really want to fix it). Thanks!"

Player A: "Huh, well if the devs said it actually works, maybe I should take a look at it...you know, just one time. What can it hurt?"

Queue After School Special intro starring a very young Mark Paul Gosselor...you know, before he got all gritty. Fade in Huey Lewis and the News.

Now obviously I'm generalizing and being VERY loose with what Player A would actually say, but you can see where I'm going with it.

Rest assured, we are well aware of exploits in WAR. We are well aware of what they do, and whom is using them. As soon as we discover these exploit we go to work on correcting whatever loophole they're using to bypass normal, intended game mechanics. The flipside of that is, we have to verify that:
  • The reported behavior is actually an exploit and not a bug (please see recent issues with the Global Cooldown and Instant Cast abilities.)
  • The exploit can be reproduced internally
Once these steps have been passed we go to town digging through mounds and mounds of code trying to find the one line, one modifier, one itsy bitsy teen weeny hole in the source that these worms are digging through.

After all that is done, we still have to go through the process to actually fix them, which often times can be as simple as one line of code...but then that one line of code can affect another line of code which affects another line of code which affects...see where I'm going here? Pretty soon that exploit fix that seems like a no brainer is actually causing all Squigs to spawn as white rabbits and Witch Elves to dress comfortabley...and no one wants that.

Oh yeah, and then there's QA time, and internal testing on our mirror servers...and...and...

To those who will say I'm whining and making excuses, sure, ok, you got me. Making video games is hard work guyz! In all seriousness, we are working on squashing exploitative behavior, moreso than most know and it is always a very high priority here in the studio.
__________________
Andy Belford
Community Coordinator
Warhammer: Age of Reckoning
WARHerald Twitter
Andy_Mythic is offline   Reply With Quote