Those "uber 1337 haxxors" finally get the chop

[Roland]

4 inches of snow in April is cruel...

4 inches ain't nothing. ;)

As for "this whole event 'smells funny'", that's why I brought up the bit about No-CD cracks. Alot of people, who legally own the game, use them so they don't damage their CDs, or don't have to swap them out everytime they want to play a game. It's not uncommon by any means, although piracy certainly runs rampant with such programs. However, little is it known (at least, as far as I know; I'm not a member of the B.Net community, so I couldn't tell you what they know and/or don't know) that a No-CD crack, which IIRC alters the .exe file for the game, is counted as a hack. ALOT of people got banned from Wacraft III / The Frozen Throne recently, in the last batch of bannings BEFORE this one, and all because they used a No-CD crack. Of course, most of them claimed they legally owned the games (some went so far as to boast that they didn't, and would just get another CD key; amusing to see such childish antics, although quite irritating at the same time, knowing that such people exist :P), but I'm not sure if Blizzard did much (if anything) to reverse the bannings if it was merely a No-CD crack. I remember someone at Blizzard, or an MVP, posting in regards to No-CD cracks making accounts banned, i.e. "I'll look into it", due to alot of "legit" players being banned for seemingly no reason. What ever came of that investigation, aside from concluding that said "legits" got banned due to the crack, I do not know. I'd take a fair guess that at least some of the accounts got restored (I think most, if not all, of those were temp bans anyway; the more serious offenders, who truly did cheat, got permanently banned, as I recall), but even that may not be true. I'd say the majority did not, if any at all in fact did.

Just food for thought. As I said, I wasn't trying to question the legitness of your friends, but rather point out that it could be something you and they have not considered, i.e. the use of a No-CD crack. Due to the way the crack works, it's counted as a hack, and as such runs a very high risk of getting you banned. Hence why I said I (and several others I know) use a burned image. Eats up alot of HD space, but IMHO it's worth it, at least for me. Especially since I have enough space for it. ;)

Oh, and BTW - If you think 4 inches is bad, you shoulda been here in Mass. a few years back. 70+ degree weather for almost a month, and then BAM! April 1st, Mother Nature dumps 4 FEET of snow on us. We students talked about that one for years. ;) Still do. :)