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Originally posted by Mazca: **Heh, including my erstwhile moderator colleague, mrxak.
<chuckles>
**
Heheheh. Whoops!
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The main use of such an editor would be to test large plugins, especialy TCs. Allowing you to put yourself anywhere with certain missions accepted and bits set would be a huge timesaver during testing.
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Originally posted by AriosSw: **The main use of such an editor would be to test large plugins, especialy TCs. Allowing you to put yourself anywhere with certain missions accepted and bits set would be a huge timesaver during testing.
Hmmmm. That would be a useful tool. Just something simple that would allow one to place the character at whatever spob they wanted and allow for easy setting/clearing of mission bits. Hmmm
-STH
------------------ "Create enigmas, not explanations." -Robert Smithson
That's a really good idea... Especially if you accidentally set the wrong bit for a mission, or if you needed to jump to a point in the storyline...
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I would gladly build one into EVONE but those "in the know" would have to share the format and encryption
Now that I think about it, would such an editor be legal? Isn't the format proprietary and protected (hence the encryption)? Of course, clearance from mburch or andrew would suffice if they agree that such a utility would benefit the community.
Edit: Also, if it did not allow player/ship stats editing it would limit the potential for cheating.
(This message has been edited by AriosSw (edited 06-03-2003).)
I met SpacePirate on the EV-Nova.net boards, and he told me about this pilot editor that you're thinking of making, seant. I think that it is an absolutely phenomenal idea; many many people (in other words, me 0:-) ) would find it extremely useful. If you do, hopefully you'll post it here and SpacePirate will tell me about it :-).
If I recall correctly, w00tware was actually going to make a pilot file editor for Nova. They decided against it because they thought it would be used too much for cheating.
Any well designed tool could be used to cheat if it falls into the wrong hands. There's really nothing we can do about it... Anything that would make creating plugins easier will make it easier for people to make cheat plugins, and anything that could make developing storylines easier is no different. It's really unfortunate.
Yeah, I guess it is no real loss to the community if someone cheats, though. The only one losing out would be the person himself. So, honorable users would use it to be productive and those who want to cheat would find a way even if the editor didn't exist.
Exactly.
So then is someone going to try to make this? Despite any who may try to use it to cheat, I still think it would be immensely useful to everyone else.
Originally posted by Guest: **Exactly.
So then is someone going to try to make this? Despite any who may try to use it to cheat, I still think it would be immensely useful to everyone else.**
As I stated earlier, I would be happy to roll the functionality into a future version of EVONE if people share the encryption and file format. I currently do not have the time to work on reverse-engineering said format.
And I would be interested in putting pilot editing functionality into my Windows EVN editor. I have a feeling seant isn't going to tell the format, though. The last time I asked him, he referred me to his signature
-Vaumnou
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Originally posted by Vaumnou: **And I would be interested in putting pilot editing functionality into my Windows EVN editor. I have a feeling seant isn't going to tell the format, though. The last time I asked him, he referred me to his signature:p
Trust your feelings, Vaumnou
Originally posted by seant: **Trust your feelings, Vaumnou
-STH**
I posted that a long time ago. As of now: "The encryption is fix-ed. There will be no charge."
Originally posted by Vaumnou: **I posted that a long time ago. As of now: "The encryption is fix-ed. There will be no charge."
And you won't share either, correct?
Originally posted by AriosSw: And you won't share either, correct?:)
I asked MCB if I could release the encryption key. He said that would be OK if Andrew Welch agreed. And I never got around to emailing him. So I can't tell you (yet). But I can tell you how to figure it out yourself, right?
To break the encryption, you need to write a small program that will apply the SimpleCrypt algorithm to a given byte array with a given key. Then you run the pilot file resources throught that. To find the key, you need to know what the underlying data is for a few bytes of one pilot file resource. It's probably safe to assume that the data is approximately the same as in EV/O pilots for the first few bytes (this is unverified). Based on the EV/O pilot data structs, find four subsequent bytes in the pilot that A. start on a 4-byte boundary, and B. should contain zeroes when decrypted according to the pilot struct. Then you (list=a) ()XOR by 0xDEADBEEF ()subtract 0xDEADBEEF(/list=a)once for each 4-byte chunk you skipped from the beginning of the file. This un-does the key incrementation that SimpleCrypt applies each time it moves down the file by 4 bytes. Finally, the subtraction will mess up the first byte of the key. To fix it, open the ID 128 pilot resource from a few different pilots in ResEdit and copy the first byte you see most frequently as the first byte of your key.
If that was confusing, too bad. I don't think I should make it too easy.
(This message has been edited by Vaumnou (edited 06-25-2003).)
Originally posted by Vaumnou: I asked MCB if I could release the encryption key. He said that would be OK if Andrew Welch agreed. And I never got around to emailing him. So I can't tell you (yet).:p But I can tell you how to figure it out yourself, right?
You did all that to get the key? Wow. I am genuinely impressed.
You should be aware of another reason I have not been forthcoming on pilot file info. In an email with mburch, he had to following to say:
...there are issues of piracy involved (i.e. we don't want people to be able to edit their pilots in such a way that they can play the whole game without registering, or at least we don't want to make any easier).
Before that correspondance, I didn't want to release info because I didn't want people to cheat or blab the info (because I didn't want Ambrosia to alter the encryption method). Now, I'm even less inclined to share data because I don't want people to engage in piracy.
<shrug>
I guess I'm getting uncomfortable with how much data is being shared. These topics stay open, though, so I guess the folks at Ambrosia and the moderators are ok with it.
I believe that in the more recent versions of Nova, the registered flag (Rxxx) is used in all missions past the registration cutoff, so that people cannot merely download a pilot that has progressed past the cutoff, and continue from there.
I'd assume that this isn't a recent email, and so that at that time this method was not in place. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, however.
Originally posted by seant: **I guess I'm getting uncomfortable with how much data is being shared. These topics stay open, though, so I guess the folks at Ambrosia and the moderators are ok with it.
OK, I don't intend to release more info anyway. All of what I said was based on pure logic and the freely-available SimpleCrypt algorithm. I don't think I said anything that made it TOO easy. If a mod says I shouldn't have posted what I did, I will edit.
Originally posted by SpacePirate: ** I'd assume that this isn't a recent email, and so that at that time this method was not in place. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, however. **
Email was dated 2003.06.16