Those "uber 1337 haxxors" finally get the chop

[--Pete]

Hi,

Bolty: "Maphack is cheating!"
Poster: "So, third party programs are cheating?"
Bolty: "Yep."

And there is your mistake :)

How long has this gone round and round? Remember when a certain "Legit" nearly drove you off the DSF (and incidentally caused you to start what eventually became the lounge)?

We've got mods, we've got accelerators, we've got auto-clickers for D1 (without which some people could not have played). And we all run our games under some OS or other, definitely "3rd party".

OTOH, there are "exploits" that are cheating and yet are done completely within the game. Duping and abusing the MS bug come to mind from D1. I frankly haven't kept up with what the scum have found in D2, but I'm sure there are some loopholes there.

So, there are third party programs which are not cheating, there is cheating that requires no third party programs. The two are not equal, and equating the two just moves a value judgment somewhere else, as in:

Poster: "Ah ha! What about the Accelerator, which you've plugged on your website?"
Bolty: "Anyone with half a brain can see that using the Accelerator isn't cheating."
Poster: "Neener neener, can't hear you, defeated your whole stance with that infallable logic, etc etc"

And he is right. First you said that third party programs are cheating, then you said that, "well, it depends on the program". Ultimately, you have to fall back on something along the lines of "I know it when I see it."

However, I've usually find that people taking advantage of the game fall into two categories. Those nice people who, when it is pointed out, say "Thanks, this is a whole lot better way to play" and the rejects from a cesspool who don't.

--Pete