Stupid quandries... why are itemtest, and OFFLINE Practice Mode VAC secured? - Games

Seems like a stupid question, but I just don't get the reason why it'd be the case, seeing itemtest is supposed to be you, yourself, and you, testing how cosmetics and stuff look on your player models, and offline practice is supposed to be, well, just practice with bots. (Also, as a side tangent, I have to wonder how anyone would be able to defend any VAC bans that would potentially come from messing around in itemtest and/or offline practice, seeing it is obviously a different beast from playing on a VAC secure server, and one could argue that one shouldn't have to expect something labeled OFFLINE practice mode, for instance, to be VAC secured. I dunno, the stuff I think about... had it bottled up for a little while. It just annoys the crap out of me because I got a VAC ban after almost 9 years on Steam (and a few playing TF2), and always being VERY careful to just mess around in single-player, and in the case of TF2, in itemtest, and practice modes, under the (obviously incorrect) assumption that those were not VAC secured. Well, fuck me, I'm an idiot. >_<

Everyone knows you should never mess with VAC on your main account if you ever have to

[QUOTE=robotnik185;52237904]Everyone knows you should never mess with VAC on your main account if you ever have to[/QUOTE] OTOH, though, just my opinion of course, people shouldn't have to do any mental gymnastics when it comes to something clearly called "offline" (anything). The more I think about it, the more comical it sounds - "OFFLINE" Practice Mode ... being VAC secured... oxymoronic, isn't it?

--

You can disable VAC by starting the game with the "-insecure" launch option, but I wouldn't risk it still.

[QUOTE=B!N4RY;52238286]You can disable VAC by starting the game with the "-insecure" launch option, but I wouldn't risk it still.[/QUOTE] IMO, that is too bad that doing so is still risky, as it really shows, IMO strictly, that there is a lack of ability to trust a company saying their things do X, Y, Z, when it could do X, Y, A, B, and C. Also, if I do insecure, I won't be able to do practice mode of any kind, or itemtest, as they are connected to VAC (again, kind of oxymoronic, "Offline Practice Mode" being connected to VAC, isn't it?) IMO, at least, that is pretty damn close to lying, if not lying, on VALVe's part - "offline practice mode" by definition should NOT risk a VAC ban because it is supposed to be offline, or at least, the name implies that VAC wouldn't be in effect. [QUOTE=%%;52238282]you cheat in practice mode?[/QUOTE] I love messing around, seeing how things work, and seeing what kind of odd things I can make a game engine do. Seems a perfect fit that I am majoring in computer science. OF course, I tried to be careful to ensure that the game is in a non-VAC-protected environment (hence trying in offline practice mode).

Valve doesn't condone cheating under any circumstances and neither do most game developers. They're not the ones to blame. Practice mode is for new players to test out the gameplays without any pressure. It's not advertised for a platform for you to test your hacks on.

TF2 is free to play, isn't it? Just do it on a separate account. -insecure SHOULD disable VAC on it, though.

[QUOTE=B!N4RY;52238340]They're not the ones to blame..[/QUOTE] If they have something meant to prevent cheating in multiplayer, they claim it is only for multiplayer, yet it is clearly in effect for something that is obviously NOT multiplayer, I'd say it's their problem. They don't condone cheating in MULTIPLAYER under any circumstances. Unless I am mistaken, they have essentially said they don't care what they do in a SINGLE player game, and rightly so - it doesn't affect anyone, or risk causing issues for other gamers, etc. You don't need to condone cheating, or agree with it, to see the (IMO, of course) blatantly obvious logical problem here.

[QUOTE=travelsonic;52238674]they have essentially said they don't care what they do in a SINGLE player game[/QUOTE] ..and TF2 is a multiplayer-only game. When you go to itemtest it still creates a multiplayer server and gives the VAC warning in the bottom right.

[QUOTE=Segab;52238734]..and TF2 is a multiplayer-only game. [/QUOTE] Which doesn't change that OFFLINE practice mode can NOT, by any logical definition, be multiplayer, since, well, it is supposed to be "offline." The fact it connects to VAC doesn't change that, IMO strictly, of course. Hope I haven't come off as flippant in my responses, as sometimes it is hard to not go astray civility wise when very passionate about a discussion. :)

[QUOTE=B!N4RY;52238286]You can disable VAC by starting the game with the "-insecure" launch option, but I wouldn't risk it still.[/QUOTE] Doesn't disable VAC, some modules are still loaded in memory. If you are going to do the kind of stuff that might be VAC-bannable, just use an alt account.

[QUOTE=Snowshoe;52241005]Doesn't disable VAC, some modules are still loaded in memory. If you are going to do the kind of stuff that might be VAC-bannable, just use an alt account.[/QUOTE] I dunno, I feel like this wouldn't help in the "how things ought to be" area of things - in that, instead of needing to jump through hoops to avoid a VAC ban in an area where one reasonably shouldn't expect there to be any risk, they should just have no risk when it comes to messing around in something labeled "offline mode." Many might very much disagree with me on this, but I've filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission, outlining what VAC is, how it is supposed to work, the pitfall I've noticed (OFFLINE practice mode being VAC secured, the implications), and also mentioned the difficulty in contacting people in case there is a legitimate issue - the last point of which has actually earned VALVe a lot of complaints with the Better Business Bureau* when it came to issues of refunds, charges, and the like). I am also tempted to get in touch with a group like the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and see if they want to take up a case against VALVe, as I feel like there are many practices that only stand because nobody has challenged them (after all, being in a ToS doesn't automatically mean it will stand up to a court challenge based only on being written, there are laws that these agreements need to follow.) This is stupid, we shouldn't have to be fearful, or overly vigilant because a company can not stick to its own word. * Irrespective of what you think about the BBB, their practices, etc.

[QUOTE=travelsonic;52241093]This is stupid, we shouldn't have to be fearful, or overly vigilant because a company can not stick to its own word. * Irrespective of what you think about the BBB, their practices, etc.[/QUOTE] Normal people don't have to be fearful, because they shouldn't be messing with VAC in the first place lol If you're going through all that trouble to study Anticheat-Bannable stuff (stuff that game devs DON'T want you to use with their programs, usually stated in their Terms of Service), then it shouldn't be a problem for you to make throwaway accounts for that purpose. The last thing game devs want to do is make it easier to research how their Anticheat works, even if you're not using cheats for that purpose.

[QUOTE=travelsonic;52241093] This is stupid, we shouldn't have to be fearful, or overly vigilant because a company can not stick to its own word. .[/QUOTE] you agreed when you signed up to steam that you [QUOTE][B]agree that you will not[/B] create Cheats or assist third parties in any way to create [B]or use Cheats[/B]. You agree that you will not directly or indirectly disable, circumvent, or otherwise interfere with the operation of software designed to prevent or report the use of Cheats. You acknowledge and agree that either Valve or any online multiplayer host [B]may refuse to allow you to participate in certain online multiplayer games if you use Cheats in connection with Steam[/B] or the Content and Services. Further, you acknowledge and agree that an online multiplayer host may report your use of Cheats to Valve, and Valve may communicate your history of use of Cheats to other online multiplayer hosts. [B]Valve may terminate your Account or a particular Subscription for any conduct or activity that Valve believes is illegal, constitutes a Cheat, or otherwise negatively affects the enjoyment of Steam by other Subscribers.[/B] You acknowledge that Valve is not required to provide you notice before terminating your Subscriptions(s) and/or Account, but it may choose to do so.[/QUOTE] you were connected to steam, playing a game that requires steam to be open to play, you used a cheat or a third party software and you violated the steam subscriber agreement. when you create a listen server in tf2 it is by default vac secured, when you join the game it specifically says "you will be banned if you use cheats" in the loading screen, and you continued to use cheats. you violated the terms fair and square. you don't have to be fearful or overly vigilant for any reason unless you are intentionally using illegal software to modify or otherwise cheat in a vac secured game. [editline]1[/editline] valve could literally destroy your entire steam account right now and be within the terms you already agreed with

[t]https://imgkk.com/i/log_.png[/t] Since you've decided post this quality comment on my steam profile for whatever reason, maybe you can clarify this to all of us here. The fundamental functionality of Cheat Engine is to read and write to arbitrary memory locations of another process. Since you're coding a mod/plugin, you already have direct access to the game's memory upon runtime. So why can't you dump values of variable or memory locations relevant to your mod/plugin to the console or to the chat through your plugin? Or maybe you'd like to set arbitrary values to relevant game variables or memory locations, but why can't you just add in a quick debug function for that? Clearly I'm too "narrow minded" to understand how Cheat Engine can be used for "problem solving", even though these are the uttermost basic procedures developers use for debugging. Please enlighten us with your sophisticated ways as a "computer programmer". [editline]lmao u mad bro?[/editline] I like how [I]someone [/I]keeps on reporting my screencap of his quality comment ;) In case if OP or his affiliates reports it again and I couldn't be bother to reupload it for the 10th time, this is what [URL="http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198016621705"]the smart guy [/URL]wrote on my profile: [quote] "It's not advertised for a platform for you to test your hacks on." Hey just a protip for the future: Using Cheat Engine does not mean "testing hacks". Computer programmers such as myself use it for problem solving when making SourceMod plugins or even third party mods. It's a very useful program. It's narrow minded people thinking it's just for hacks that is causing problems. [/quote]