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Punkbuster and the server

So servers will still not be able to remove it if they want?
why put words into his mouth? he said nothing about that. your statement is confusing, because there's plenty of servers right now that don't have punkbuster, yet you make it sound like it's being forced on us now and will remain forced on us in the future.:confused:
 
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The next patch will have a punkbuster optimization to address this issue.

Then I guess we'll wait and see how well this optimization works, before we take off pb. I hope it fixes the ping issues and lag spikes. If not, then we can't justify running pb on our server.

What's your server's IP? I think I'll favourite it?

What tick-rate is your server?

Server IP is: 70.42.74.39:7777 (based in New York).

As far as the Tick-rate goes, I believe it hasn't been tinkered with(so standard rate).
 
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.... admins>pb
I'm just curious. How is a good admin better than anti-cheat software?

I've been running servers since before the days of MoH:AA (no anti-cheat what so ever). I ran one of the most popular US MOH servers for 3 years. I spent HOURS and HOURS and HOURS of my playing time watching people. I filled up Gigbytes of hard drive space with demorecs and fraps movies of suspected cheaters. Our admins spent days and days looking for wall hack tracking patterns, chameleon skin trademarks. All time we would much rather have spent playing the game. We used to put together committees to watch recordings to try and pick out the hackers. Tried to have shifts of admins on 24/7. Yeah, I've paid my dues trying to keep cheaters off of a popular server running a popular game with no anti-cheat software (except for BlackBart's valiant attempt at creating a server/client side solution)......Human eyes only doesn't work and isn't worth the effort.

imo, except for the obvious aimbot, admins are about the worst anti-cheat device there is. Once the sophisticated hacks are released and players fine tune them, you can't tell the hacker from the worst player. I bet more good players have been banned by well meaning admins than bad hackers have.

If RO were to ever become as popular as a BF or CoD title, servers running with no anti-cheat software would be a most unenjoyable experience for the average player. I laugh at the constant barrage of "haxor" accusations that new comers to RO espouse now. Can you imagine if there really were a lot hacking going on?

No, PB and VAC don't get them all everytime or when they first come out. In time, PB and VAC will eventually render most of the published and casual hacks useless or so cumbersome that it no longer becomes 'fun' for the hacker. And no, they never will be 100%. Screenshots help. Persistant viewing, collection and collating of unreturned screenshots help. That too takes dedication by the admin, but at least he can do it at his leisure.

Just my two cents for those admins who think they have special powers and can 'tell' when a real hacker joins......just be careful you don't run a real quality opponent off.
 
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you can spot obvious aimbots, you ban them, you don't sit about watching stuff, you play, if anything is suspicious go spectate, if it is obvious you kick/ban. You can also nip abuse in the bud if you are playing, anti-cheat doesn't do this. Fair enough some cheaters might slip through but if they are not obvious and not ruining everybody's fun then the damage will not be severe.

Most decent hacks are undetectable anyway, you wait for an update, if it happens don't play with your hack, wait for it to get updated, then play again. All anti-cheat is good for is catching cheap hacks and stupid kids, I have witnessed blatant cheaters, bragging about it, watched their steam account over long periods of time, no ban ever showing up. A cheater with half a brain will never be caught by anti-cheat software . imo.

also, obviously, the best is a combination of the two.
 
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Using both VAC and PunkBuster seems like paranoid overkill. Considering that PunkBuster has caught so little, and manages to cause major issues every time it updates, I see little reason for anyone to continue using it. VAC already gives good protection, without impacting game performance -- and better yet, a person caught by VAC can't join any Steam game protected by VAC, so it has a much stronger penalty to people caught with it!
 
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