How dumb is the client really?

[Jarulf]

In Diablo2 the server controls the position of characters and monsters alike, right?

MOstly yes. I believe there was quite some control when released, but they tightened it up to combat exploits. This can easilly be seen when you had lag, and your movement didn't reach the server or there was some slight desynch. After a while, the server would correct your position and snap you back to some earlier position (the client typically allowed itself to play on its own for a while and then correct itself).

I just thought, that it must be that way in WoW, too, because otherwise they are open for lots of manipulations.

One reason you want the client to have some control is to avoid such snaping and teleporting arround of the character as the server constantly update your client on the correct position. If you want NO control by the client, it always has to wait for data to travell from client to server and back before your char can do anything, this causes horrible player experience playing and almost constant lag feeling. So you allow the client to play on based on its own info and hope it matches the server. Small differences and small bad guesses by the server, for example, will the monster move and cause changes to what you can or did a spell slow you down can make your client differ slightly and you constantly is adjected arround. The alternative is to allow your client to have some control and have the server correct you arround by small ammounts if needed.

This type of things also allow you to continue to run when you have a longer lag or connection interuption. Imagine everytome there was a 2 second lag, your character stop running for 2 seconds. Instead the server accept that your client said you was running on for those 2 seconds.

Of course it opens up for some exploits and problem, but it is a balance act to make the play enjoyable and not frustrating. There need to be lots of sanity checks though which seems to in part be missing. For example, someone running arround in Felwood should not suddenly be allowed to tell the server the character is now in Tanaris. However, were to draw the line? For full exploit, figitng a boss may only require you to teleport far enough to avoid melee attacks. Even though spells home in on you across continents (have happened when I die and res at graveyard and then for eacmple hearthstone far away, a minute or two later, spells come flying and hit me, happened last week to me)! So if you teleprt arround slightly just fast enough, spells won't hit you either, at least not until later and so on. I guess one can add tests to not allow the client to correct your position to often but it is not that trivial.

I am personally starting to believe Blizzard has put a WHOLE lot of faith into their warden protection and similar other protection scheems and that the client actually might be in a bit more control than we think although I have no idea and really am not interested to look into such things. I have always been more of a "look at formulas type of guy" :)

And I should clarify my intention. I do not want to spend countless hours on griffon's/bat's back. It would be much more convenient to be able to click on a town or dungeon and be there instantly. A feature to teleport to any location instantly is not really needed IMO.
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Such a thing is trivial to check against though and if there is no such checks, I guess they will add it as soon as people possibly exploit it. I also think Blizzard might do a bunch of logging and it is probably not without great risk for your account to mess arround with such things.

As a side not, I would never help anyone use or develop such cheats as you propose, even if I knew how to do it. Such things ARE cheating for sure :angry: