Cheaters in Nexuiz

[Sisyphus48]

I'm losing my interest in Nexuiz because of the cheaters. Specifically people who hack it so they can't be killed, people who fix it so they can see through walls, and people who never miss. I've come up behind some individuals and shot them repeatedly with no effect, seen them hit by multiple rockets with no effect, don't try to tell me that's armor. Then in other games you have someone who, no matter where you materialize, they are right behind you and you can't even move before they shot you. Finally your playing a game with multiple people and there is always one guy who has 5 times as many kills as anyone else and he can be running, jumping, falling,:( whatever and if he shots he always hits you. These same losers have to go to the room for beginners only and won't leave when asked to. They are ruining the game for me.

Thanks to everyone for their responses! Please consider this post closed, at least from my view point.

[zx6r1033]

I was wondering about that. I've been playing Nexuiz for the better part of the afternoon... my first day playing the game online. Before I switched over to Linux, I used to play Counterstrike... WAY more than any one person should have had the time for. That game is littered with hackers. I'd guess at least half of the gaming community over there hacks.

I wish I could find a game like CS:S to play on Ubuntu. Only... maybe with a few less hackers.

[compiledkernel]

While this is rather disenheartening to any game player there are a variety of things you should take into account when playing such a game.

1. A really good player -- Players that dont miss might actually be a decent player.

2. Game Graphics levels --I could honestly say that a number of servers Ive played on this might be true because I play the game at 800x600 with all the flashy stuff turned off. This makes the game relatively quick for me (a Dual core machine, 8800 class nvidia card, and 4 gigs of memory), and someone playing the game on a higher graphics level might not be able to respond as quick as I might.

3. Ive heard that Aimbotting for Darkplaces engine games is relatively hard to accomplish. Theres a whole hit scan issue there, so the no miss thing might just be hit or miss, not even really worth the time to use.

4. Static Mesh cheats (able to see through walls and so forth) are inevitable. They just happen as far as I can tell, regardless of the engine.

To top that all off, I seem to remember hearing stories that eventually the Nex would be replaced with something much less damaging in nature (unless of course you play on minstagib game, then really theres not much you can do) to take away the cheatability factor of its firing.

[eragon100]

I play nexuiz a LOT, and I haven't noticed any cheaters, actually :)

[Orlsend]

I left Nexuiz for this reason. Try Trem or warsow

I never seen chaeating on Trem and I Warsow I saw once or twice but 2 min after already kicked and some cases banned..

[Sisyphus48]

I left Nexuiz for this reason. Try Trem or warsow

I never seen chaeating on Trem and I Warsow I saw once or twice but 2 min after already kicked and some cases banned..
Can you tell me more about Trem and Warsow and how do they kick and ban the cheaters?

[eldragon]

i play urbanterror mostly.

its really similar to CS, based on the quake3 engine.

i dont know much about the cheating comunity in that game, argentine servers are usually well monitored.

[zx6r1033]

i play urbanterror mostly.

its really similar to CS, based on the quake3 engine.

i dont know much about the cheating comunity in that game, argentine servers are usually well monitored.



Urban Terror really does look a lot like CSS. I will definitely be checking that one out!

Thanks!

[Asraniel]

I never saw a cheater in nexuiz and i never heard about a hack (once there was something, but a small change in the nexuiz code destroyed it).

So, what you have experienced is the extreme difference between elite gamers and newcomers in nexuiz. believe me, the difference is huge.

[Abras]

I've played this game a lot, and have never personally seen or heard reports of cheating. Well, there is the occasional accusation of aimbotting by an inexperienced player, but never any proof from what I would consider a reliable source -- like a developer or a pillar of the community. It's so hard to prove and someone saying "hey, aimbotter!" just isn't going to convince me. So if there is cheating going on it's either not very widespread or else very covert.

[detrate]

The poster of this thread is incorrect

And this is actually a cross post from at least one other forum, quoting my reply from said thread,


While I understand your frustration, I don't think making allegations without proof is proper way to combat them. Though Nexuiz is an open source game, the developers have done a great job in discouraging cheating without compromising game play. As far as I know there is only one wall hack but I haven't heard of it in the wild... and I don't believe it can even be used unless the perpetrator is running their own server as it requires a specific serverside cvar to be toggled on.

I am going to try and tell you it's armor. The way Nexuiz works. you can pack up to 999 health and 999 armor on some levels if you know how to 'pack' properly. Packing is the act of picking up health/armor before it begins to rot. The combination of packing and rocket jumping allows these players to "appear right behind you".

I don't think this is a matter of cheating. I think it's more a misunderstanding of how advanced some players have gotten / can get.

If you'd like to see other avid Nexuiz players response to this, you may follow along here (http://www.nexuizninjaz.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=428).


It disappoints me that not only someone is making such claims without evidence but a few of you have blindly agreed without any intimate knowledge or evidence.

[Slayer123]

i have played nexuiz almost a year and i never saw a cheater and have never seen you play there alot of skilled players those players have played quite awhile and have incridiable aim and movement so its all skill i also play urban terror lots of hacks there and i love warsow sorry spelling errors im on psp

[eldragon]

The poster of this thread is incorrect

And this is actually a cross post from at least one other forum, quoting my reply from said thread,



If you'd like to see other avid Nexuiz players response to this, you may follow along here (http://www.nexuizninjaz.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=428).


It disappoints me that not only someone is making such claims without evidence but a few of you have blindly agreed without any intimate knowledge or evidence.

nice to point it out. i never could have checked the facts since i dont play nexuiz (but thats just because there are no servers around here and lag is awful).

[ucal]

Don't let any (perceived) cheating ruin a game for you. Rather, get back in there, and get better. Or try a new game I guess. There is Tremulous, which is quite the awesome concept, but I guarantee you will find cheaters there. I know, I used to use an aimbot and a wall hack. Didn't do me much good when I was playing as a bug.

Looking back, I wish I never used the aimbot. It made the game too easy, and I just gave up on it. But hey, I can always try it out again, once I get a mouse.

[compiledkernel]

As I pointed out in my original post, what a person might percieve as cheating is probably more or less going to be something other than cheating itself. To be honest and fair watch one or two of Wendell's fatal1ty vids out on youtube (My favorite one is the one where he goes 5 v 1 with the PC Gamer staff only to wipe the floor with them). If this doesnt prove to you that there are indeed players much better than yourself, then clearly nothing will.

I cite and stand by detrate's statement pretty clearly.

For your viewing pleasure -- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6GzmGOuNFk

[Orlsend]

Whats a good Screen live recorder? Ill try to get a Video.

I cant resize my window for Nexuiz so I will need a in game recorder...
************************************************** ******************************

Update

I done a little research and its seems that cheating is possible but still unlikely, and can be prevent by taking certain measures.

"Aim bots are possible using Darkplaces and any other engine without client-side anti cheating software" alientrap.org

but not so sure of this though

[zx6r1033]

Meh... I never said there was cheating. I used to be accused of cheating frequently on Counterstrike, so I know there are skilled players on there that are just that good. I still wondered about it, though.

Ever since that post about Urban Terror, though, my attention has turned primarily to that game. It's like CSS, only better. you can actually bleed out and die from wounds and stuff, and the wounds affect your movements. Priceless.

[detrate]

Whats a good Screen live recorder? Ill try to get a Video.

Check out this thread, [How-to] Create Videos of Yourself Playing Nexuiz (http://www.nexuizninjaz.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=17) or alternatively check out the Ninja Pack (http://www.nexuizninjaz.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=314) which has this config in it.

[Painkeeper]

Yep, I'm going to have to disagree with the poster of this thread, I have not seen any cheaters at all in Nexuiz and I've played the game off and on for about 2 years. I've also been playing Quake 3 since the test back in 1999 and I mean, if there were hackers in Nexuiz, I'd know, I've seen just about every kind of player there is, extremely good ones and ridiculously bad ones.

Are there cheaters out there period? Of course, but mostly in games with umm.. High counts of kids ;) AKA Counter-Strike. But thats alright because every game mentioned in this thread thus far is way better than that game anyway, especially Urban Terror, I really like that one.

[xen-uno]

Sure would seem as though there are cheaters, especially when you get picked off continually from long range. They're probably not cheating, they're just a hell of a lot better than I am at this stage (my handle is "Eye Suck"). 2 things that would help my play is a Halo style radar and getting my wired XBox 360 controller working, which so far has been a no go. The game is impressive and network play is flawless.

[Bios Element]

Sure would seem as though there are cheaters, especially when you get picked off continually from long range. They're probably not cheating, they're just a hell of a lot better than I am at this stage (my handle is "Eye Suck"). 2 things that would help my play is a Halo style radar and getting my wired XBox 360 controller working, which so far has been a no go. The game is impressive and network play is flawless.

When you get as good as me at sniping, It's not hard in the least to pick someone off clear across the map regardless of where they are. Even in mid air isn't all that hard assuming they don't have a counter-sniper.

[Frem]

Sure would seem as though there are cheaters, especially when you get picked off continually from long range. They're probably not cheating, they're just a hell of a lot better than I am at this stage (my handle is "Eye Suck"). 2 things that would help my play is a Halo style radar and getting my wired XBox 360 controller working, which so far has been a no go. The game is impressive and network play is flawless.

This will be an issue. Using a keyboard and mouse in a FPS will give a huge, vast advantage over using a gamepad. Gamepads work on console games because the games are paced more slowly, there's a margin of error (For example, in Halo your bullets will randomly fire anywhere within the targeting reticle), and the playing field is level because everyone uses a gamepad.

PC FPS games are designed specifically with KB&M in mind and are paced faster. Additionally, the weapons are generally more precise. This allows a higher average "insane skillz" level than on console games. A skilled player can, and will score headshots on a new player from across the map.

Also, weapons with zoomable scopes help. ;-)

Edit: Keep in mind that Nexuiz also seems to have a fairly small active community. A large portion of people playing are probably regulars with higher skill levels than your average person in a public server in other, more popular FPS games.

[mshade]

Hi Guys,

Just thought I'd chime in here. I play as [I]JohnGalt{X} and am the admin of the most popular Nexuiz servers in North America -- the Galt's Gulch servers. The only hack I've seen definitive proof of was a speedhack almost a year ago. They were using hacked network code and that hole was plugged I believe after I provided a tcpdump of the activity to the devs.

Aimbots are possible, but I've only heard of these and never seen it myself. I often play under aliases to be able to observe without tipping folks off that there's an admin present; I still haven't noticed much cheating.

There are insanely skilled players out there; they wipe the floor with me pretty regularly :)

Frag on, and check out Nexuiz if you haven't yet!

The gulch site: http://gulch.mshade.org/

-JG

[sloggerkhan]

I played on Galt's gulch quite a bit earlier in the year, waiting to get decent internet to get back on, and I don't think I ever encountered a cheater. Skilled (experienced) players have a huge advantage, particularly when it comes to laser jumping, though I think it's not as extreme as might be found in Warsow between veterans and new players.

I thought it seemed pretty clean.

Oh, and PS: Hats off to Galt, Galt's gulch servers are some of the most enjoyable I've come across for any game.

[Takmadeus]

Someone before mentioned there are no cheaters on Tremulous which is false of all falseness.... there is a lot of cheating in tremulous going on, trust me

Most used cheats are:

Aimbot: always shoot at the opponents head (with mass driver it becomes instakill with many aliens)

Wallwalk hack: when wallwalking with an alien (of course) when you jump near an opponent you will always land in his head (95% damage on naked humans)

Green battlesuit: now this is not very common and I've seen it two times and no more. it is a green battlesuit with 2 turrets in the shoulders, you may actually know what kind of damage this does

Disguised tyrant: something like this, I have not seen it personally, but it has been reported many times that it is a battlesuit that actually belongs to the aliens and does tyrant damage (it even growls)

I am not cheater at all (I like to keep it clean) but trust me, I have seen thousands of aimbots around, it is difficult to find legit players in some servers :(

You can find me in Tremulous as "Lieutenant Pappas" given that you wanna play. I haven't played in a while, so I am a little bit disconditioned , but hey, I can practice ;)

[Painkeeper]

Someone before mentioned there are no cheaters on Tremulous which is false of all falseness.... there is a lot of cheating in tremulous going on, trust me

Most used cheats are:

Aimbot: always shoot at the opponents head (with mass driver it becomes instakill with many aliens)

Wallwalk hack: when wallwalking with an alien (of course) when you jump near an opponent you will always land in his head (95% damage on naked humans)

Green battlesuit: now this is not very common and I've seen it two times and no more. it is a green battlesuit with 2 turrets in the shoulders, you may actually know what kind of damage this does

Disguised tyrant: something like this, I have not seen it personally, but it has been reported many times that it is a battlesuit that actually belongs to the aliens and does tyrant damage (it even growls)

I am not cheater at all (I like to keep it clean) but trust me, I have seen thousands of aimbots around, it is difficult to find legit players in some servers :(

You can find me in Tremulous as "Lieutenant Pappas" given that you wanna play. I haven't played in a while, so I am a little bit disconditioned , but hey, I can practice ;)

Yeah I'm sure those exist. I don't play much Tremulous anymore but when I did I wasn't too impressed with the community at the time, at least when I looked, the average person seemed rather immature. I love the game though, but they seriously need to get a new update out for Tremulous there are a ton of exploits and bugs that need to be addressed. When they come out with the new update, I'll probably give it another shot.


Hi Guys,

Just thought I'd chime in here. I play as [I]JohnGalt{X} and am the admin of the most popular Nexuiz servers in North America -- the Galt's Gulch servers. The only hack I've seen definitive proof of was a speedhack almost a year ago. They were using hacked network code and that hole was plugged I believe after I provided a tcpdump of the activity to the devs.

Aimbots are possible, but I've only heard of these and never seen it myself. I often play under aliases to be able to observe without tipping folks off that there's an admin present; I still haven't noticed much cheating.

There are insanely skilled players out there; they wipe the floor with me pretty regularly :)

Frag on, and check out Nexuiz if you haven't yet!

The gulch site: http://gulch.mshade.org/

-JG

Hehe, I like that, playing as a random name. I used to do that all the time when I ran servers for various games in the past. I had some hilarious names too, but thats another story. By the way I have played on your Nexuiz server and I love it.

[compiledkernel]

I concur, the Galt's Gulch servers are clean. I know most of the players on the Minstabig server, and they are all decent guys, many of which are much better players than me.

:)

[detrate]

Here's what esteel (http://www.alientrap.org/forum/profile.php?mode=viewprofile&u=39), a lead developer (http://alientrap.org/nexuiz/team.php) had to say about the possible cheats in Nexuiz (http://www.nexuizninjaz.com/forum/showthread.php?tid=428&pid=3267#pid3267).

[esteel]

Oh nice, i was just about to repeat that after i was pointed here.. Thanks :)

[detrate]

Welcome to the ubuntu forums esteel, good to see more Nexuiz representation here.

[esteel]

Well, lets see how often i have time for this forum :)

This thread seems to be dead though..

[Feonica]

I'll revive this thread.

People claim there is no evidence. I'm looking at Galt here since I know he kicks people for less. He kicked me once for saying someone cheats without evidence.

However this guy was Mark_tux 5 - He's also a Minsta guy which happens to be European.

I will never claim Galt is an intelligent guy as people with 150 pings normally don't pwn the living daylights out of people with 30 pings.

Here's your evidence.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=JmfJsZljS9s

Theres also a download for better quality.

[sloggerkhan]

Where's the download?
Youtube is too low of quality for me to get an idea of what I'm seeing, thought the 1st bit I saw made more curious about his lack of getting shot than his shooting.

In nexuiz, I generalize that for pings 40 - 160 you will still be on a relatively even field. Heck, I've had pl % 2-8 range and still had some rounds where I did really well.

[compiledkernel]

That video is by no means conclusive evidence. In the way of aimbots, hes not "shaking" enough like most aimbots do to show that he is actually cheating with an aimbot. Ive been on MintaGib servers (Galts in particular) and Ive racked up points like that before. There are a few guys that play there regularly that play that well.

What would be conclusive to me is a video of similar quality in a Non Instagib style game. Someone there who doesnt miss repeatedly over and over (and the guy in that video missed more than once that I could tell) would be hard evidence for sure.

[sloggerkhan]

That video is by no means conclusive evidence. In the way of aimbots, hes not "shaking" enough like most aimbots do to show that he is actually cheating with an aimbot. Ive been on MintaGib servers (Galts in particular) and Ive racked up points like that before. There are a few guys that play there regularly that play that well.

What would be conclusive to me is a video of similar quality in a Non Instagib style game. Someone there who doesnt miss repeatedly over and over (and the guy in that video missed more than once that I could tell) would be hard evidence for sure.

Yeah, the one map that looked abnormal to me was around 3:50... it might just be screen cap quality, but it looked like he was one shooting people that couldn't be seen.

[Feonica]

First of all, You wont see an aimbot using other weps, simply because the nex is a hitscan weapon, suitable for aimbots, Only other weapon that comes to mind that an aimbot would be useful for is the shotgun.

Rockets would be far too delayed for an aimbot designed for instant hit weapon play.

click the link. click more under the description. the demo files are in the rapidshare link.

It's conclusive, It's impossible. I know of one player (Wicked Shrow) Also I had a discussion with him during all that. As you noticed. He never denied at all. Infact he practically admitted it also.

I'll assume since your all linux users you'll know where to put the demo files and stuff.

The deal with a lot of aimbots is ping related, I happened to mess around with a few back on Quake 3, They'd miss quite a bit due to my high ping. Also some of this is dependant on the way it's configured.

Usil is the best American player I know of and he certainly doesn't move like that.

Pat is for sure the best Euro player and he doesn't move like that either.

I did originally take this to the dev team, They agreed with me but also said it can't really be stopped - Open source reasons.

Oh and while on American servers, I get a 120 ping and I normally end up on 3 kills.

Here
*deleted*

Euro servers I'm normally fighting for wins.

[detrate]

Pat is for sure the best Euro player and he doesn't move like that either.

I'm not sure who this Pat fellow is but I thought kojn aka Kojak (http://nex1vs1eu.tourney.cc/brackets/) was the "best" euro player.

[Feonica]

I don't really know him at all to be honest.

I've mainly been discussing the sole ability of aimbots in minsta so I've been discussing who the better players are at that game type.

As far as other game types go I don't think you have to worry about aimbots at all if you just remove instant hit weapons.

Did anyone go through the youtube and check out the demo files, Seems I failed at reading the terms of service here. Kinda expected there wouldn't be one with open source files. So.. My bad I suppose.

Anyway I guess I'm allowed to say the link through youtube is under the more info section under the username and stuff.

[Alien_Hominid]

Had to register here just for that.

Speedhacks are bugs in engine verifying correct input data and should be reported so they could be fixed as soon as possible.

Aimbotting can't be prevented in any FPS shooter if you let the client to render view because the data for the client where to display the enemy is sent. Aimbots use this data and moves the crosshair to that direction. Because aimbots usually don't know how to predict missile travelling path they use hitscan (instant hit) weapons. Currently those in nexuiz are nex, machine gun and shotgun (in order of effectiveness). Yes, you could sent already rendered data but this would need immense computing power from the server and huge bandwidth (most primitive way: 800x600 (resolution) * 24bpp (24 bits per pixel) * 60hz(screen refreshes 60 times per second) ~ 82MB/s (of course data can be compressed, better algorithms can be thought of but still huge bandwidth)).


Wallhacking is prevented server-side by tracing players field of view and traversing bsp tree. Then sending the data to the client by cutting those players out who can't be seen. This data processing of course requires CPU power and server can't use all CPU just for that. In time, as average CPU power grows, more power is spent to making the trace more accurate. Still there is a margin of error and therefore you can see some players who've moved/are just around the corner for fraction of second.

Now most of the other engines don't do that. That's why wallhacking in CS is possible because not all the data, which should be unreachable to client, is cut out (sometimes it might be impossible without redesigning whole engine). To prevent that anti-cheat programs can be installed. For example, in quake3 server could be created as pure and this meant that server verified that the contents of pk3 files are unchanged while punkbuster add-on (or rootkit according to some) checked that the user didn't mess with sent packets, quake executable, prevented doing specific opengl hooks (like rendering walls transparent), etc...

Open-source games usually can't do such tricks because system wide security (by not adding some closed source and obfuscated hook into the kernel) is more important then allowing somebody to code an aimbot. If somebody wishes, yeah, code open-source anticheat but this won't last for long (I suppose). And because kernel is open-source too, hook activity can be emulated making engine believe everything is clean and safe.

This is the second reason (1st is opengl) why not a lot of games are released for linux, because such copy-protection systems (rootkits) as starforce won't be very successful.