No cheating allowed

lzvk25 said:

PS. You better be really good, even better than Tormentor667 himself...

Genuine spit-take on my part when I read this.

lzvk25 said:

You better be really good, even better than Tormentor667 himself

Those are huge boots to fill.

Here's my opinion: mod authors have the right to make their mod's gameplay exactly as they intend, port authors have the right to make their engine's function exactly as they intend, and players have the right to play (or not play) whatever they want. Port authors that make general purpose (not specialized) ports should be open to implementing new features if others code it for them, the code is high enough quality, and doesn't interfere with any existing functionality, but they have the right to reject it regardless. Mod authors shouldn't be subject to attempts to be stop their attempts in making the design choices they want, but do not have the right to NOT be subject to critisism for unpopular (or otherwise) design choices. Players can do whatever the hell they want, including modifying other's mods and ports.

So in other words, the obvious.

Hi, it's me...The guy that started this thread. I've been busy making mods for other games, and now I have started working on my WAD again and was curious about the NO CHEATS thing. So when I checked this thread again I was amazed at how it change from a simple "HOW TO" thread to an "AUTHOR RIGHTS" discussion. **

I have to admit; I've been focusing so much on learning how to disable cheats that I never stopped to wonder if I should. Would disabling cheats make the experience better or worse for the player? Should I listen or ignore what the player wants? Or should I do what ever the heck I want because it's my creation? If so, should i even bother uploading the WAD?

You guys gave me something to think about.

gemini09 said:
It would be healthy because it benefits the modders, and modders are as much (if not more) of a target audience as players are.

So it benefits their whims in detriment of the private intentions of some players. Cheats give players an optional ability which, if it weren't available, they would hack in themselves, if possible. So with your stance only hackers, programmers or designers would be able to cheat while the others would just feel frustrated and go play something else. It's the same stance as "security by obscurity" in a case where cheating isn't even critical (unlike in multiplayer).

In this non-commercial environment, designers trying to mod for cheaters against the will of these people are stupid, wasting time and causing additional complications. I mod with vanilla users in mind, primarily, yet this will make my mod work on practically any port. Should I do something to the mod so it only works on vanilla? That would be equivalent to eliminating cheats, forcing it to work only "as intended".

But I can still mod for vanilla users, and whether others will use other engines is not my business, nor my problem.

Just make your mod thinking of the players that don't cheat. Ignore the others. At most, put a note in the text file discouraging cheating, suggesting the WAD is more fun without it.

Snakes said:

Genuine spit-take on my part when I read this.

a torm-praise quote category somehow needs to be integrated into the cacowards

DASI-I said:

Should I listen or ignore what the player wants? Or should I do what ever the heck I want because it's my creation? If so, should i even bother uploading the WAD?

Take a look at a few of the ratings/comments for any wad in the archives and you're bound to come to these contradictory conclusions:

1.) Unless you create your wad as a genuine attempt to please everyone with total disregard for what you wanted it to be, it will be called "vomit" at least a dozen times.

2.) You can't please everyone, ever. No matter what you do someone will say it's the worst wad ever, so you might as well make it the way you want.

Ok, I've made a decision. I'm gonna keep the cheats active except for the noclip. How do I do that? Is it possible to disable it in both the game itself (when the player types IDCLIP) and the console for GZDoom (when the console is brought down and then the player types "noclip")?
I think I know how to disable all cheats but i don't know how to do it with only noclip. If it's not possible, tell me and I'll just not bother with this anymore.

Why are you still on about this no cheating non-sense ?

Better yet, why do you want to disable debugging features? It's like you think you'll never need to debug your wad or something.

Pottus said:

Why are you still on about this no cheating non-sense ?

Using "noclip" in a typical Doom WAD would go something like this:
Run around, find locked door, don't wanna look for key, player types "IDCLIP", goes through door, find switch, level ends :)

Using "noclip" in my Doom WAD would go something like this:
Run around, find locked door, don't wanna look for key, player types "IDCLIP", goes through door, try's to find a switch but can't because there is none :(
Turns out that walking through the door without noclip actually ends the level.

That's just one simple example. There are many places in my WAD that have areas that trigger key events. skipping one of these would break the whole level because this is a puzzle oriented WAD. I've worked very hard to make the maps not very maze-like or confusing so noclip should never be required even for a noob. :)

This has been said before like million times: If players cheat and consequently break the level, then it's their fault, not the mapper's, because it's not the way the map should've been played.

So, stop worrying about it, and instead concentrate on other, important things in the map.

It's very simple, but several people may view this as a paradox:

Permanent no-cheat solution is not allowed because it's cheat itself. It's cheating the player, the modder himself and finally, sourceport designer. This is completely different thing than common cheats and anti-cheat in multiplayer. It smells like modder's version of DRM which is something awful and stupid.

Players can cheat their way through the level with god mode and unlimited ammo for all I care, but at least they'll be able to finish the level. I only want to disable noclip, that's all. Once I do that, I'll be able to upload the WAD ^_^
Does that reeaaallly make me a control freak?

It's really just a waste of time, but if that's what you want then look at the Freedoom IWAD to see how they changed most in-game strings (monster names, weapons, etc.) The cheat codes can be changed the same way.