possible new cheat

[atari400]

I have heard a rumor there is a program similar to the ""crystiter""  but is a cheat that some how predicts where the high tite plots will be I have seen some players only recently pick 2 highs and 2 mediums on the 1st 4 land grabs,,,, more often thahn is possible by random chance and these ""plot picks"" were not near any assy. furthermore a player confided that this software is used in some other game  but can be used for mule.
I know for a mathematical fact this is possible............[if you care look up the story of math students that won keno]  ...[those students cracked the random code....its nit truely random  it repeats every 10,000,000 times..easy for a computer to pick out your place in the 10 billon repeat pattern]  enough of the details  i was told the program is called ...........raider,radar,crystite raider,crystite finnder,tite raid, or something similar i find it hard to believe  the neat little nest of plots  again eithout any assay to give a clue  and the person that told me it existss
please tell me if this is real or if i am a retard

[Agitator]

i'm not sure of the rationale behind the paranoia but atari is definately onto something here... i mean when a plot is chosen bottom left two in with no mountains and it is a high then it could be a fluke... but when the next choice is top left 3 in no mountains and thats a high as well (with no assay to predict) then i say there is some truth to ataris assertions... the player i'm thinking of either has incredible intuition or has an extra tool in the kit

[Chuckie Chuck]

Been thinkin about it, cause Atari has brought this up on the facebook group a few times.  I dismissed it at first, but I've started brainstorming the idea.  We do have a few knowledgeable programmers playing this game.  If someone set their mind to reverse engineering the mapping system, it is theoretically possible to input the "game sector" into a home brewed map generator and get a tite prediction.  The sector listed at the bottom of the game window at the start of each game using X,Y coordinates.  It's in parenthesis after the game name.

I am not a programmer, but it seems that Java scripts are easily debugged, and it probably wouldn't be all that hard.  If someone has done it, that would be pretty frustrating.  I hate the idea, but if it has been done, I think we all should have access to it so everyone has the advantage, which would even out the playing field and take said advantage away.  It's the only solution I can come up with.  Getting someone to own up to it and post the software tho, lol...  ...GOOD LUCK with that one.

[Chuckie Chuck]

Well, studying the game log, and I had been told the log doesn't say where assays were done, but I have studied it quite closely now, and it does, IF THE ASSAY WAS DONE USING A.I.  It says the type of plot assayed, and the map co-ordinates of that plot...

INFO [DevelopmentActuator.actionComplete]          AI: <D.A.N.> action queue is empty.
  INFO [DevelopmentActuator.testAssayLast]           AI: <D.A.N.> is assaying River (4,4).
  INFO [DevelopmentActionQueue2.addAction]           AI: <D.A.N.> Queue: GoToAssayStore
  INFO [DevelopmentActionQueue2.addAction]           AI: <D.A.N.> Queue: Assay
  INFO [FastDevelopmentPhase.nextAction]             Next action: GoToAssayStore
  INFO [FastDevelopmentPhase.nextAction]             Next action: Assay
  INFO [Client.receiveTCPMessages]                   Client: FastDevelopment (14) 16 bytes
  INFO [GameModel.buyAssay]                          (P14)<D.A.N.> got an assay bot
  INFO [DevelopmentMessenger.showMessage]            No Crystite found
  INFO [DevelopmentActuator.actionComplete]          AI: <D.A.N.> action queue is empty.
  INFO [DevelopmentActuator.testAssayLast]           AI: <D.A.N.> is assaying Plain (8,3).
  INFO [DevelopmentActionQueue2.addAction]           AI: <D.A.N.> Queue: GoToAssayStore
  INFO [DevelopmentActionQueue2.addAction]           AI: <D.A.N.> Queue: Assay
  INFO [FastDevelopmentPhase.nextAction]             Next action: GoToAssayStore
  INFO [FastDevelopmentPhase.nextAction]             Next action: Assay
  INFO [Client.receiveTCPMessages]                   Client: FastDevelopment (14) 16 bytes
  INFO [GameModel.buyAssay]                          (P14)<D.A.N.> got an assay bot
  INFO [DevelopmentMessenger.showMessage]            No Crystite found

You see above, "D.A.N." assayed "River (4,4)"  - No Crystite Found then he assayed "Plain (8,3)" - Again, No Crystite Found.

My thought, while this does not preemptively tell you where the tite is, there is very likely some way to do a preemptive assay of every plot in the game with an external java class written to send an assay command to the game for every single plot on the map before round 1 development is even complete, or maybe even started by some modified AI code that covertly interacts with the game.

It does seem though, that if it is used, it very likely would show up in a game log, but I'm not entirely sure of this.  So if you play a game where you think it's happening, study the log.txt file in your mule\data folder after the game (before you enter another game, as it will auto erase unless you rename it as soon as your enter a new room.)

[KingOfMule]

Is there any truth to players reading the code?  I have played games before where players predict the events that are going to happen with 99% certainty.  In those games there have been accusations about reading code (more than reading the game logs), but it only seems to be a few who have the goods to access and convert the data to useable info.  I use the seat-o-the-pants method myself...

[Chuckie Chuck]

All true, but... ...there are people in this crowd that I am sure are qualified hackers, and Java is a relatively easy binary to decompile and write cheats for.  I'm not a programmer, but based on the study I've done, I don't think it would take me more than a few days to learn to program in Java sufficiently to write a good basic Java applet.  (Provided I wanted to dedicate that much of my time to something that dreary to me.)

Some people make hacking their primary priority in life, and those types would go through that effort.

[atari400]

see it is possible,If you know enogh you can also have your program scan the log  with out leaving a trace ...ie it scans then has a "delete" all characters the  program put in the log.  it may just quicky assay all plots  in 2-3 seconds  then wipe it's digital "fingerprints"  and display the results on a modified crystiter  type map....................now that this info is out...........   game could be ruined!
poss fix limit assays somehow  max 3 per turn per player in the software....that may stop any program from assay entire map before the game even starts.   I was told the software is for another game. but was modified for mule.



ps..and i was worried about disconnects lol



and crystite should not be mined on plots that have no crystite. it makes no sense.............in the real world economy of scale and bigger factories are useless if the land contains no gold in the first place.....think? who needs the high plots when 9 or 12 connects with 0  crystite  can some how still make 70-90 units it deafeats the purpose having high plots in the 1st place. crystite should only scale on plots that actually contain crystite

if u can magically mine tite where none exists then why not mine in the river? which people do in the real world for gold??
it would make some games  fun no food  becuse greedy miners in the river hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?

thank you for reading

[KingOfMule]

I would imagine the hackers would make a duplicate of the java resource files before doing their voodoo, then  the only evidence is on the audit logs of that PC.  On the crystite topic, this game is trying to be as faithful to the original concept as possible, in in that concept there are fixed economic priniples at play (ecomomies of scale, specialization, etc).  Essentially, the more you do something, the better you get at it.  For example: My house does not sit on a gold vein area, but if I dig down 50 feet on my lot and sort it, I bet I find trace gold.  If I am skilled at extraction, I know even more techniques to detect and collect gold on any property and I have better success.  If I have more property to search more success.  Therefore I think the game has it right to a degree. 

[Chuckie Chuck]

But, Atari, take note, the log only shows WHERE the assayed plots are if it was assayed by an A.I. player.  Human player assays don't get the location logged in the primary game log at all.  I'm sure it is stored somewhere but not in the user log area.  I'm not sure where it is stored, has to be stored somewhere, maybe just in active memory, which means some binary code breaking would have to be done to extract the information.

[atari400]

yes but if u understand the code im sure u pose as an ai,perhaps that makes it even easier to do it then no trace at all ai zoom in and is gone that souns like an even easier"backdoor" into the map

[Chuckie Chuck]

Yeah, that's exactly what my thot was, and it's Java, which isn't that hard to understand, so if you could decompile the code, it's just the time it would take to read through hours and hours of source to find the code that controls the map and write some kinda of covert bot to read the map.

[jagov808]

Atari, is paranoid, but that doesnt mean people arent out to steal all his deserved tite land from him.

Life isnt fair. Governments and large corporations conduct all sorts of nefarious operations against us. We can spend our lives worried about that or we can maximize our potential within our realm of possibility. I envy Atari, because he has vast swathes of mule knowledge yet to gain and with a little effort he is going to see massive improvement in his game regardless of the potential existence of cheating. He is an active player and a willing student. I hope all of you will help turn him into a champion with all your great advice.

Chuckie's answer that we all be granted access to any potential cheats makes sense given the slippery slope we've already travelled with the tite trackers (this is why they are bad folks, it leads to more and more cheats along with their rationalisation. Although it makes sense it would be disasterous to further spread this problem and should be discouraged.

This is just a game. Ranking up can be addictive, but its also sad to have wasted all that time. I find it kind of embarassing. The only reward for me and many others is fun. People that cheat are only ruining the game for themselves because they are missing out on the fun. If they think people are impressed by their actions they are mistaken. Im sure most top players wouldnt get much out of this cheat and would be the mid ranked guys that would be tempted. I think it would fun to prevail against those intermediate players armed with cheats. When you play with the very top guys you realize there is a level of advanced strategy that is so subtle some people will never understand it.

In summary, if you could all be a little more like Nordel, the world would be a better place.

[Chuckie Chuck]

Completely disagree with you about tite trackers.  People been tite tracking on paper for years.  It just saves paper.  However, tite predicters, I have a problem with, but if someone is using one, I think it's fair to even the odds.  It will take the benefit of a cheater using one.

[Chuckie Chuck]

Not suggesting someone program one, because I would prefer that it wasn't done, but if someone does discover that someone indeed has, it should be published.

[jagov808]

If its ever published, the game is over. Keep it to the couple of people using it now, and the game has a hope of carrying on. Is it fair? No. Does it matter? No.

There are many people in the planet mule community who have low self esteem due to their gender confusion issues/lack of english (europeans). Maybe winning a few games is self medicating to them. Another benefit is that when someone like Atari loses, he can now think 'Im awesome, I only lost because they cheated'. You see, the possibility of cheating also can help that player's ego. With all the delicate egos intact we can retain as many players as possible and have enough liquidity to prevent excessive wait times.

Tite trackers are fine. I agree. However, they are the gateway drug to this other type of cheating. Not all marijuana users go on to heroin, but most heroin users started with marijuana.