I farmed tens of thousands of us dollars in modern RuneScape by unhooking the mousehook. It worked for decades.

Find call to `SetWindowsHookEx` -> Find dword (`HHOOK`) it returns -> Inject module that calls `UnhookWindowsHookEx((HHOOK)(module_base + hhook_rva));` -> profit.

Jagex has done some interesting things, but without fail, there is a blunder accompanying each.

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megagpt3 a day ago | parent | next [-]

Short of hardware-enforced secure boot chain TPM anticheat there will always be a way around it. It's cat-and-mouse, not a single permanent solution.

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compsciphd 20 hours ago | parent [-]

Honestly, I dont know why "xbox mode" isn't this for PCs. Instead of anticheat, reboot into a stripped down mode just for playing the game that has a secure boot chain that the app can attest and report to the servers about and then reboot back into normal windows.

booting is so quick today that its hardly a friction point as it used to be.

	▲	yoursred 19 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		It's called rebooting into rootkitted winblows
	▲	OSaMaBiNLoGiN 11 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		This is where we're heading. But just like anything else, there will be an equal and oppsite reaction. Either side of the aisle making one large leap is bad. Regular users lose at every turn.

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JojiDoesCode 21 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

You suck for farming gold btw

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OSaMaBiNLoGiN 12 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Modern RuneScape was a pit of whale hunting mtx pay2progress nonsense. As soon as they started to make an effort to restore integrity to the game, I stopped farming gold and selling the bot. Got a regular job. Now I enjoy the game as a fan and am very excited to see how far the new Jagex CEO can take the company and its titles.

I don't have any regret for profiting from a game being bled dry by bankers. When that stopped, so did I.

I feel that's fair.

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serf 18 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

let's try the entrepreneurial defense that tends to work around here :

"oh no, it's okay -- you see I was selling the hack; I wouldn't have wasted time in that game."

	▲	OSaMaBiNLoGiN 11 hours ago \| parent [-]
		On the contrary. I played the game heaps. If someone with no knowledge of a game beyond its engine and anticheat develops a bot, they become solely reliant on 3rd party developers ("scripters") to develop the content-specific automation programs for the bot. These are usually sold or rented on a form of UGC marketplace within the bot vendor's platform. This is tricky to balance and can produce situations that many teenagers/young adults who are running these platforms have not envisioned. One such situation: A particularly competent "scripter" writes automation programs for the most complicated content in the game. As such, they sell at a premium. It makes you and him considerable money for many months. Eventually, the community starts to develop a free version of this same automation program. You are now in a situation where you've likely built your business around the expectation of revenue from this one "scripter" and his/her products. Maybe you've even given them a more favorable revenue share model. Another issue that can pop up from this, especially in lower pop games, is that it's very obvious from a statistics point of view. The game developer will easily take notice if the hardest content in the game is suddenly being done many times per day by players who have never showed an affinity for such content. This in turn increases ban numbers which hurts your product's reputation. All of this is to say: Having thousands of hours in the game you are working on is a massive benefit at every turn. It is best to work on games you genuinely enjoy.

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jamesnorden 20 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Too hacker for Hacker News.

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dpoloncsak 16 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

MMOs need bots farming gold, and are usually designing their economy around it

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free_bip 15 hours ago | parent [-]

This is just blatantly false.

	▲	OSaMaBiNLoGiN 12 hours ago \| parent [-]
		It is false. They don't need them by any means. In some specific cases, bots do help, but this is usually a result of poor design. An example would be any expendable resource that is required in large amounts, but is very boring and unrewarding to gather. In these instances, bots can be argued to be a positive. But for bots to exist to farm these boring resources, they must also exist to farm end-game content. If they exist at all, the negatives will always out weigh the positives. The positives exist, sure. But they're few and far between. From a regular player's perspective, if they want to kill a boss for 3 hours, they must use X amount of Y resource. If the cost of Y resource is very high, or worse, the market has not enough supply, the game becomes less fun for them. This is addressed by bots, but is better addressed by a design solution from the developer. All of that being said, if bots exist, the reward for going and farming that boss is going to be far less than if bots didn't exist. So still, negative.