I really don't understand this fuss over enterbasefrompasscode

[Kigo]

So it was not originally intended for all players to use? We get that, but so what? Neither was stuff at P2W vendors. Neither was tons of other things. Hell, I would argue that AE Farms do far more exploitation of the original concept of the game than this power does. Yet the devs and players alike are fine with all of that stuff I mentioned being in the game accessed by everyone.

 

Is the passcode command being exploited? Sure and I think we all can agree that the no-dying exploit needs to be removed. But does that mean the command itself needs to be removed? No. It just needs to not be exploitable.

 

Simple fix. Make the command be unusable if you are currently or recently have been involved in combat. Presto this fixes the no-death exploits of both PvP and Master TF runs. And don't try to tell me this simple fix is not possible. This is exactly how swapping incarnate cores currently works. If they can put that kind of limitation on core swapping then surely they can put the same limits on the slash command.

 

Suddenly everyone is happy. No more exploits, yet people can still use it to travel to zones without having to do this pointless "Hey what zone connects to X zone?" thing or the equally annoying long travel through one zone just to enter a second zone.

 

And for anyone who wants to give me grief over using it to travel between zones faster, I ask you this. How many of you only bake your food completely from scratch? Or do you ever eat out, have delivery, or eat pre-made foods at home? Unless you are Amish or some other type of person who hates time saving processes then the answer is that all of us have at least a few times in our lives if not on a constant daily basis done this. And guess what? It is exactly the same thing. Almost no one wants to take extra time to do something that can be done just as well but faster with less effort.

 

If people are going to get upset about how fast the command can swap between zones, then they really need to ban AE farms first. Then they need to get rid of the P2W vendors. Those both save far more time from doing useless things than the time saved by not having to manually enter every zone connecting to each other. And neither of those things were originally intended by the game developers to be in place for everyone's usage.

[MunkiLord]

For not understanding the fuss, this post sure comes across as fussy. That being said, I like your suggestion. Also, AE farming and P2W contribute magnitudes more to the game and community than the base code every possibly could. Still, I like your suggestion.

[William Valence]

50 minutes ago, Kigo said:

This is exactly how swapping incarnate cores currently works. If they can put that kind of limitation on core swapping then surely they can put the same limits on the slash command.

[Lazarillo]

2 hours ago, Kigo said:

If they can put that kind of limitation on core swapping then surely they can put the same limits on the slash command.

Not necessarily.  And believe me, I'd like something like that to be the fix, too.  But I'm not sure it's reasonable to expect it to be so simple.

[justicebeliever]

Dead Horse...meet Bat...

 

It's coming with improvements to the Base Transporter...so why don't we wait and see what those look like before starting another thread on this topic.  I'm not really sure what can be said new that wasn't already covered here:

https://forums.homecomingservers.com/topic/9231-official-enterbasefrompasscode-resolution-thread

 

As for other things being exploity, I'm not sure how other exploity things makes a case for more exploity things.

 

I'd also argue, at this point, AE has behaved this way since the Live days, so it's more of an ingrained playstyle for some than an exploit.

 

As for P2W...the choice was P2W or lose everything that you used to get as part of the Paragon Market and Veteran Rewards, since HC can't accept $$ for microtransactions.

 

I too would prefer the passcode function remain, but at this point it's been beaten to death...

[Heraclea]

It is handy.  Especially handy from zones like Cimerora, where my characters spend a lot of time, and where there isn't another handy way to go to base.  The most frequent use I make of it is to pop in and out of base during crafting sessions after I've confirmed that I don't already have a piece I need in storage.  I can't imagine that being a problem.  These sessions often start from Cimerora; almost all of my heavies park there for the accolade. 

 

But it is apparently an 'exploit' when it is used to cheat death in PvP and on master runs.  I've never used it that way, probably because I do master runs on my tankers almost exclusively.  If I have to poof away, the badge is going to fail anyways.  Some might imagine it an 'exploit' when I use it to get out of jail rooms on Council and Oranbega maps, but I can't imagine anyone caring about that.  This, I have done once or twice. 

 

At least the first two 'exploits' are things that probably do need fixing. 

 

I do hope that the fix preserves the functionality and ability to make macros to take you to open bases and is not burdened with easily interrupted animations or long cooldowns.  A little chance to abort would actually be helpful; odds are I'm already heading to base when someone announces that their team teleporter is up.  This too has happened more than once.

[QuiJon]

The thing is that your comparisons to the other items don't hold water. In fact AE was intended for everyone to use. The developers put no limit on it when they introduced it and Positron even said when it came out that players could go from 1-50 all in the AE and never go to other zones if they chose to. That is was deisgned that way. Granted they nerfed XP on it on live, I think this was likely appropriate to do, however it still remained a feature intended for all on the server.

Just as the items from the P2W vendors were. I know some of them were given out based on veteran reward as far as how long you were subscribed, But even if every account had earned them, they would have gotten them you just had to meet the qualifications. The other powers there were available as money purchases, which again, anyone willing to buy the things could have them, all they have done now is simply change them to be available for in game influence rather then real money. 

I totally get what you are saying, and I like having it available to me also, and I also have not exploited it. But even so its an admin slash command and was not made to give to players, unlike your other examples. I am just hoping that they find a way to allow for the use of a base teleport with a manageable recharge rate, that then also allows me to maybe keep a memory bank of Access codes if I want to go into other bases then my own. That is all I think any of us really want. And I am not gonna make a fuss about what they do use, until I see what they are going to use. Its pointless there are more posts on this topic it is not like the devs don't know our wishlist for a replacement.

 

[Burnt Toast]

This has been discussed in depth in other threads. Please use the search function.... or just look at the thread that is on page 1/2. Your post is full of hyperbole and frankly looks to be simply there to incite an argument instead of an actual discussion. 

[ShardWarrior]

18 hours ago, Kigo said:

Is the passcode command being exploited?

Yes.  It's being used to escape deaths in PvP and Master of TF runs.  Many discussions about this on the forums. 

[CU_Krow]

2 hours ago, ShardWarrior said:

Yes.  It's being used to escape deaths in PvP and Master of TF runs.  Many discussions about this on the forums. 

 

It really stinks when one complaint from one server becomes a whole game changer for other servers that do not complain or find these things an issue. For example, Everlasting server, where BARELY ANYONE pvps, now has to have their base temp majorly altered because pvpers from a less-used server are complaining about people using it to escape pvp deaths.

Edited October 4, 2019 by kenro90

[tidge]

21 hours ago, Kigo said:

And for anyone who wants to give me grief over using it to travel between zones faster, I ask you this. How many of you only bake your food completely from scratch? Or do you ever eat out, have delivery, or eat pre-made foods at home? Unless you are Amish or some other type of person who hates time saving processes then the answer is that all of us have at least a few times in our lives if not on a constant daily basis done this. And guess what? It is exactly the same thing. Almost no one wants to take extra time to do something that can be done just as well but faster with less effort.

I am casting my downvote from a pneumatically-powered difference engine using gears and levers hand-crafted from self-refined ores I mined from the bowels of the earth. I originally had an Amish partner but he didn't believe in the time-saving processes of metallurgy.

[MunkiLord]

1 hour ago, tidge said:

I am casting my downvote from a pneumatically-powered difference engine using gears and levers hand-crafted from self-refined ores I mined from the bowels of the earth. I originally had an Amish partner but he didn't believe in the time-saving processes of metallurgy.

I love this

[ShardWarrior]

1 hour ago, kenro90 said:

It really stinks when one complaint from one server becomes a whole game changer for other servers that do not complain or find these things an issue. For example, Everlasting server, where BARELY ANYONE pvps, now has to have their base temp majorly altered because pvpers from a less-used server are complaining about people using it to escape pvp deaths.

I'm sure the PvP community - regardless of size - would not agree with you.  It's an exploit being used to make the game less fun for them and it should be changed.  I've said it before in the other threads on this topic, I don't PvP and I don't much care for PvP at all, but I most certainly won't say we should sacrifice what is fun for the PvP community to keep the command. 

 

GMs have said this is really a GM only command, so it isn't meant for us players to have.  HC folk have said they will keep it around until they are able to build an acceptable solution.  Personally, I think that is fair. 

[srmalloy]

10 hours ago, ShardWarrior said:

Yes.  It's being used to escape deaths in PvP and Master of TF runs.  Many discussions about this on the forums. 

And applying a minor adjustment to disable it when the user is in combat -- and there's at least one check for that built into the code, because there are a number of things that don't work in combat -- addresses that complaint.

 

The contention that this was intended to be a GM-only command is valid, but it invites the question "if it was only intended for use by GMs, why didn't it have a check to make it usable only by GMs?" Having the command usable by anyone, but just not telling anyone that the command existed, is a classic example of why "security through obscurity" is doomed to fail; all it takes is one person discovering a hidden function that's useful, and the entire playerbase will know about it in short order. I will point out here, though, that there have been an ongoing series of changes to the game that have, individually and collectively, served to make it easier and faster for players to move around and between the zones; this is just one more. It's got a flaw that it is usable in combat as a 'get out of death free' card, but other than the objection that this is was supposed to be a GM-only function, that flaw is the only problem with it; make it unusable when the game thinks you're in combat, and the flaw disappears.

[MunkiLord]

1 hour ago, srmalloy said:

The contention that this was intended to be a GM-only command is valid, but it invites the question "if it was only intended for use by GMs, why didn't it have a check to make it usable only by GMs?"

This has already been answered by the HC team, it was enabled for players by mistake.

[srmalloy]

9 hours ago, MunkiLord said:

This has already been answered by the HC team, it was enabled for players by mistake.

Making something difficult is no substitute for making it impossible. If it's possible to enable a function for all users, then you can easily make the argument that the long-term goal in creating the function was for all users to be able to use it. Having been a software developer for the government for more than 35 years and been through Security+ certification, I think I can say from experience that if you want to prevent the general users from being able to use certain functions of a piece of software, you design those functions so that they require the account of the person attempting to use those functions to have identifiers that it is not possible for a general user account to possess.

[MunkiLord]

1 hour ago, srmalloy said:

If it's possible to enable a function for all users, then you can easily make the argument that the long-term goal in creating the function was for all users to be able to use it.

One could make that argument, sure. But there is no evidence to back up such a claim. 

[William Valence]

It is possible that the /mmm, or all the freebies commands could be given to the player.

 

It is not reasonable to make the argument that because of this the long-term goal was to give them to players.

[Kigo]

On 10/3/2019 at 6:25 PM, William Valence said:

I can not tell whether you honestly have no clue how to test that, or if you are just being a wiseass and people are giving you likes because they are biased and just like anyone who argues seemingly for their side without any care for what is actually said, or if it is the fact that they too are unable to use common sense and test it for themselves.

 

Asking for a citation on such an easy to test statement is like asking for citation of proof on a statement that a helium gas filled balloon has a lower gravity than a bowling ball of the same sized dimensions. Seriously? Okay I will explain how easy this is to test.

 

Go to Atlas Park or where ever else you want. While out of combat try to change your incarnate cores. Stare in shock as it works. Amazing!

 

Then attack an enemy or let one attack you. Immediately after they die (or even while enemies are still attacking) try to change your cores again. Stare in shock at the error message about being unable to change it due to using a power or being attacked too recently. The horror!

 

Wait for the recent combat code to fade away then try to change cores again. Stare in shock a third time as it does change. Eeek!

 

But wait is that not exactly what I said in the first place..? But of course that can't be true without a citation! ... Seriously use some common sense please when posting rebuttals. It is not like I made a statement that is complex and hard to test. It probably took you more time to post that snarky Citation Needed image response than it would have taken to test it for yourself.

 

I don't mind people who have a different opinion than me, or people who think that my opinion is invalid, but claiming that something needs citation when any person with working brain cells can test it for themselves and see it works exactly like that is just... ugh. *shakes head and walks away*

[MunkiLord]

6 minutes ago, Kigo said:

I can not tell whether you honestly have no clue how to test that, or if you are just being a wiseass and people are giving you likes because they are biased and just like anyone who argues seemingly for their side without any care for what is actually said, or if it is the fact that they too are unable to use common sense and test it for themselves.

 

Asking for a citation on such an easy to test statement is like asking for citation of proof on a statement that a helium gas filled balloon has a lower gravity than a bowling ball of the same sized dimensions. Seriously? Okay I will explain how easy this is to test.

 

Go to Atlas Park or where ever else you want. While out of combat try to change your incarnate cores. Stare in shock as it works. Amazing!

 

Then attack an enemy or let one attack you. Immediately after they die (or even while enemies are still attacking) try to change your cores again. Stare in shock at the error message about being unable to change it due to using a power or being attacked too recently. The horror!

 

Wait for the recent combat code to fade away then try to change cores again. Stare in shock a third time as it does change. Eeek!

 

But wait is that not exactly what I said in the first place..? But of course that can't be true without a citation! ... Seriously use some common sense please when posting rebuttals. It is not like I made a statement that is complex and hard to test. It probably took you more time to post that snarky Citation Needed image response than it would have taken to test it for yourself.

 

I don't mind people who have a different opinion than me, or people who think that my opinion is invalid, but claiming that something needs citation when any person with working brain cells can test it for themselves and see it works exactly like that is just... ugh. *shakes head and walks away*

I thought the citation needed was for the claim that surely they could do the same thing with slash commands.

[Kigo]

Then why include the first line? "This is exactly how swapping incarnate cores currently works." You may be right, but with that first line included it seemed to me that he was challenging that it worked that way at all. If he had just left that line out I would've been fine with his post. Because, no, I am not one of the devs so that "surely" of mine in the latter line is conjecture rather than fact and I will freely admit it.

Edited October 5, 2019 by Kigo
Included the line in question for comparing purposes.

[William Valence]

You leave the first sentence to provide context for the second sentence. If I was saying that it wasn't how incarnate swapping worked, I wouldn't have added the second sentence, and simply sassed the Exactly how it works part.

 

Because the first sentence provides the assertion of how core swapping works, but the second doesn't reference core swapping specifically, rather using a determiner phrase "they can put that kind" it's appropriate to keep the first sentence to maintain context and avoid cutting the thought in half or risk quoting out of context.

 

This has been your overly pedantic English lesson on how to properly quote an idea when being a sassy bastard.

 

[Kigo]

My apologies then. I'm just used to poor quoters then on the internet. "Context? Who needs that." seems to be more a state of perpetuity than anything. So now I jumped on you for something you did not mean. So, yes, apologies William. I agree with you on the "surely" part being conjecture rather than fact.

[Lost Ninja]

6 hours ago, Kigo said:

Asking for a citation on such an easy to test statement is like asking for citation of proof on a statement that a helium gas filled balloon has a lower gravity than a bowling ball of the same sized dimensions. Seriously? Okay I will explain how easy this is to test.

It doesn't, it has lower mass than the surrounding air. A kilo of lead would sink in air, while a kilo of helium would still rise as the helium is lighter than air even in large amounts.

6 hours ago, Kigo said:

But wait is that not exactly what I said in the first place..? But of course that can't be true without a citation! ... Seriously use some common sense please when posting rebuttals. It is not like I made a statement that is complex and hard to test. It probably took you more time to post that snarky Citation Needed image response than it would have taken to test it for yourself.

The assertion was that it would be an easy change to make because game systems already exist that do this. Citation needed was (as I read it) more to ask you to show evidence that it was an easy change to make. Unless you've actually read the code, you don't know if it's an easy thing to change or not. Because it's intended as a dev/GM tool it's unlikely that it will be coded to work in the same way as a power. And it is entirely possible that without actually turning it into a power you wouldn't be able to place the same limits on it. And just so you understand I'm on your side, I want to the command to remain in the game as is. I use it a lot. I think the whole "people can abuse it" argument is null and void based on the other things that are abused (strawman I know) in the game.

Edited October 6, 2019 by Lost Ninja
Clarity

[Sister Corruption]

/ah doesn't work in PvP zones or instanced maps. Not sure why /enterbasefrompasscode couldn't be given the same flag.