My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

Ok, I don't want to interrupt Bit's thread beacuse this idea goes off in a different (although similar) direction as his. However...

Don't get pedantic when I ask you to make the assumption that PATeam can develop a client that works on Windows, *nix and Mac. This client would be able to uniquely identify a computer based on things such as CPU info, HDD serial number, OS installation key, etc. Users can download this small client and run it on their machines without requiring administrator/root privileges. So we can infer that if the user is running PA can uniquely identify which computer a user is logging in on (as we can use this downloadable program for some form of authentication).

Now, each Planetarion account can have ONE 'home computer'. When an account is created it is 'homeless' and once the owner is on their own computer which they will use as their primary machine for the round, they can perform some action which sets that computer as the 'home' of the account.

When the user logs in from their defined 'home computer' they have full unrestricted access to the game, as you'd expect.

However, if they login from a machine that isn't their 'home' they get restrictions placed on what they can do. I suggest the following:

• The user cannot make any fleet arragement movements
• The user cannot do more than 2 scans per tick
• The user cannot start more than 1 construction and 1 research until logged back in from their 'home computer
• The user cannot launch each fleet more than once until they have logged back in from their 'home computer'

The idea of this is that if the user is staying at a friends, they can still do some essential actions on their planet but it isn't fully playable. If the user were at a LAN party and taking their own computer, they are unrestricted because they are using their 'home computer'.

This system allows for army barracks, schools, colleges and Universities as users can set one of the public computers as their 'home' and ensure they use the same public terminal each time.

If two or more accounts wish to have the same 'home computer' PATeam can place heavy survilance on those planets. A good excuse would be required such as proof the computer was a public terminal in a library or barracks for example.

If the user does not use the downloadble client to authenticate at any point or does not have it running, their planet is restricted in the same way regardless of the computer they are logging in from.

Each account would be able to change their 'home computer' once per round. This allows users to change in the event of a computer upgrade or replacement or moving house, etc.

This stops most multis as they would have all our eyes on them if they used the same computer for multiple accounts and I think enforcing that each account needs a unique computer to play fully will stop all but the most determined cheaters.

Now tell me what I've missed, where my logic faulters and how this would never work. But do it's constructively and sensibly please. :-)

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

I think we'd have to be careful about a) how big / time consuming it was to validate your PC each time, and b) how limited accounts were on planets not their home planet

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

Indeed, as I occasionally visit friends elsewhere for a few days. If I were to have such severe restrictions as you seem to be implying it would screw my game up in that time, especially as I'm the only one of my friends that continues to play pa. There is no way I am lugging my comp around the country just so i can play normally (suicide runs) when they've finally passed out from excessive alcohol consumption ;)

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

NO :-p I will quite literally quit PA if this occurs. Planetarion is *NOT* a client-based game. It has, and always should be, a browser based game. That's half the appeal of the game for goodness sakes! You don't need to ever download any junk, and you can play it from anywhere. This system would reward those with laptops and those who stay at home, further seperating the line of "hardcore player" and "newbie." And completely isolate the notion of "hardcore player" from that of "person with an active real life." You'll also be killing off all HTML-based cell phone browsers, as they wouldn't be compatiable.

I play Planetarion from about 30-40 different computers during the round. First, my home computer where I am currently, in my apartment. Secondly, my work comptuer at work. Thirdly, depending on the day I'll pick one of my three favorite computers at my university library--depending on which computers other people are using. Next, every few months I go to Florida (a couple thousand miles away) for a week or two. It would totally incapacitate my ability to play the game for a few weeks. Also, I live in New York City. I frequently go to visit my friends and get drunk, party, etc. over the weekends where I log in to launch fleets, calc targets, etc.

You've come up with some good ideas Kloopy. But this isn't one of them.

-NitinA

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

Not too sure about this idea, though i can see where pateam are coming from.
Ultimately any such attempt wont last long, Geeks are out there which can easily tear the thing apart, find out how it works, and put it back together the way they want it.

Not sure how legal it would be to identify a computer by its operating system product key. It sure wouldnt be allowed to transmit that sort of info back to pahq. ( harvesting of os keys etc... )
furthermore, not every operating system has a product key like this, so all clients would have to use a different set of data sources.

Its also ultimately defeatable by using virtual pc software to create an os with this client on it, and have the virtual pc container files distributed around, client in tow, onto different computers.

Also, im not too sure if people would be happy with such an intrusion into their privacy. Since the source code ( probably ) wouldnt be given out for this client program, people may not trust it to do "what it says on the tin".
it would be extremely bad PR for such a program being caught doing what its not supposed to be doing

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

Would this Home Base be included for Universities? If so that would be brilliant!!

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

I doubt it would be a problem but it is easy to avoid - as the client wouldnt make login/passwort obsolete, you could just load the login-url of PA into the client and do the PC validating while the user types in their data. That should give you enough time :)

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

you still don't block anything vnc/pca related so what's the point really? if i go to my gf for the weekend i can't play from there?:/

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

Every day I travel from Grimsby to Sheffield. Without the Wifi access on my PSP and the ability to use the Uni computers I would be totally fooked. This is an awful idea, and is so impractical for a large amount of the playerbase.

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

In a stand-alone client you could detect if VNC is running and in use if you care about that. There are probably other ways to make logging in impossible through VNC (sound?/hardware overlay use?/a fullscreen animated background on top of which the bot-stopper question is shown? etc.)

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

Bad idea. People like me spend alot of time at work. I use 2 computers. Your not stopping anything by doing this.
Well, you would be stopping playerbase growth. So yeah. Knock yourselves out.

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

i use 3 computers at home, which would i use as my home computer? I'd have to use VNC or remote desktop to get round the issue.

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

I play at home and work (don't tell my boss) using all features. And I regularly check on things via PDA/Smartphone (to recall fleets/send defence if someone SMS's me).

I'd be restricted, and as I have a life, I would prefer to play anywhere I am at that point in time. We all know activity wins on PA, and making that activity at one particular PC would certainly hit me.

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

Reasonable idea Kloopy, but requires additional thought.

Personally I think someone can reasonably be expected to be in at least 3 locations regularly:

Student
1. Home
2. Uni
3. Work

Then of course you'd expect these above the above bare minimum
4. Girlfriend/Boyfriend's house
5. Parent's Home (holidays, weekends?)

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

And indeed VNC still allows multiing as always.

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

VNC connections are visible to such a client. Im not sure if its a good idea to hunt them, but technically it is possible.

Oh and i assume that no matter what solution is suggested, there will still be a way to multi. The task (for me) is not to make it totally impossible but to seriously reduce it by making it much harder. Like in RL we try nearly everything to make murder impossible to get away with, but we wont ever reach 100% safety.

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

There might be several players with the same OS Key as well ;)

All in all it produces more problems than benefit in my opinion - i can imagine a lot of scenarios how to screw my round.

Especially because PA is designed to be played where ever you are . at home, at work, during vacation or all that.

I for example visit regularly my parents all 2 or 3 weekends and that would cost me 10-15 days of the round assuming a 9 week round and 3 day away time which is 2 weeks of 9 weeks total.

Sorry but this idea makes PA even more anti social as it already is :P

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

they're only visible to such a client if the client knows what to look for.
vnc source code is opensource last i knew so technically anyone can take it, make their own client from it and use different ports instead of the default ones and in theory this client program wouldnt be any the wiser.

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

Because of that, i would obviously not look for port numbers, process names or even do code hashing. I would probably do a rejection test on all processes with data connections, then find which one runs a VNC protocol on it or make a "educated guess" by killing the process which always has traffic when the screen changes :P

Im j/k but you can trace which process has hooked the keyboard and the mouse and has a running connection plus acts suspiciously every time you create changes/movements.

ps: snort or decent antivirus programs also detect VNC clients

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

an awful lotta online games would come under those triggers, fps ones in particular come to mind

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

Could be a bit of a drag, re-determining your home computer every time it changes/you upgrade it/your connection changes and so on. Biggest hurdle is the fact that most people are dependant on at least two machines on a day-to-day basis.

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

I'm definitely against tying where I can play PA to a limited number of machines for all of the above mentioned reasons. A big part of what makes this game great is how flexible it is in terms of where I can play it from, and the types of devices I can even play it from, even my PDA phone! Removing those options would probably stop me from playing.

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

That would partly surprise me - usually they should just use the directx functions as otherwise the game would have to deal with heaps of specialised controllers or simply wouldnt be able to use them. I know macro tools and cheats do all kind of hooks - i havent looked into current 3d games though so it may be possible.

I dont want to get into a "how to detect VNC" technical discussion because if i wanted to detect VNC, i would simply implement it and not waste my time argueing over how to do it ;) As i mentioned in previous posts - i would be reluctant to go this route of detecting VNC anyway. Its troublesome and tedious and personally i would anyway wonder why people use something like VNC for cheating when there are way simpler methods.

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

how about a modification to this. to allow people who want to play from the same house but want to avoid muiltiing use a client. not every one. this way those people can have the choice but the rest of us should not be forced to use a client

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

If you have two computers in one house it'd make it easier to multi, unless no interaction was allowed still, in which case the client has no use.

Re: My Planet's 'Home' Computer
 

w00t, i got 5 pc's here, either they are all my "home pc" or i got 5 multis :D