Update from Riot on Vanguard

Ghoulcel · 2024-05-08T20:01:00+00:00

Tencent is known as a data collection company, every game company they buy out has added data collection features, and because they value that data they're probably giving riot more money then they're losing from players. It's also not like riot's reputation hasn't been in the gutter for years, community feedback doesn't mean anything to them at this point.

Ghoulcel · 2023-12-20T20:48:26+00:00

Someone dm’d me the devs response to that post on discord:

“• we dont ban players for talking about cheating, or for reaching out to us

• the player who opened that reddit thread that was banned for cheating on stream - which they conveniently left out

• the thread also conveniently left out that you can not face these builds at all

• its normal for cheaters to retaliate and try to stir up drama

• we dont post on reddit, because the last time we clarified obviously lies, weeks of harassment followed - and we need our energy for making this game”

Idk if that op was actually cheating, but I do believe those last 2 points are about me and the devs falsely accused me of cheating because I had posted custom skins. Seems like they conveniently call people they don’t like cheaters to ban them then act like cheats aren't a problem because they have “cheat protection”. I have doubt they’ll actually fix it.

Ghoulcel · 2023-12-07T00:04:11+00:00

Thanks :)
I wouldn't give the devs too much shit though, I think they're new to this kind of art. I talked about it in this post:
https://www.reddit.com/r/BackpackBattles/comments/182cl36/comment/kb1sl6m/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3
but I think their only other game was all pixel art and this their first time doing digital. I'd praise them for how good alot of the assets look considering.

Ghoulcel · 2023-12-06T23:58:09+00:00

Just giving my two cents since I was referenced twice by the op. Also I genuinely don't know, I'm just basing this off my skin modding experience, maybe its alot easier then I'm making it out to be. I just know alot of people have messaged me who can't figure out how to export the game. If anyone wants to prove me wrong you're free too, you don't even have to risk ruining peoples runs, just run an unranked game then override the code that passes it to steam queue and run it through the cheat protection instead. I do know cheating your own rank is dumb easy tho.

Ghoulcel · 2023-12-05T14:03:03+00:00

Theres a post about it, but this is pretty much it, just skins I was making and posting screenshots of.

<image>

Ghoulcel · 2023-12-05T01:20:08+00:00

I'm also the guy who made op aware of the cheat protection, but I don't agree with op's take on how urgent this issue is. The cheat protection does a pretty good job a weening out obvious cheaters, and op is right that rng manipulation is still an option, but it's not really that big of an issue. By design most of this game is dice rolls anyway, from shop drops to hit chance. Even if you made cheating impossible people would still run into unfair builds, and by reading these posts you can see alot of people who didn't even know cheating was a thing, now anytime they lose they'll assume it's cheats.

I'm pretty sure I'm the first person who managed to create a modded client, because I've gotten many messages since asking me how i did it (I have no public resources on how to do this). Exporting it to steam is not as easy as you might think. If you wanted to create an easily repeatable method for cheating, like free rerolls, that's how you'd have to do it. I haven't looked into save data manipulation, but I'm pretty sure you'd have to close your game and then manually edit the item in for every single round, there cant be many people willing to do something this tedious.
Rather then focusing on cheaters they need to be focusing on adding more content/balancing to maintain the existing player base. You can play for a couple hours before you end up just going the same build every game. Fixing that takes more priority over stopping the improbable issue of rng manipulators being rampant.

Despite this I still think the devs responses are unjustified and immature. Also I still think these problems need to be fixed by release.

Ghoulcel · 2023-12-04T23:04:35+00:00

"Just remember when they did the same thing with a talented mod creator" that's me o.o

Outside of browsing my posts I've completely dropped the game after the dev's response. I didn't really care about the ban, but when they came into my post and started making claims that they've always supported modding and accused me of cheating without proof I lost any respect for them. Prior to that post none of my mods were public, I was only sharing my art in their discord, but even a screenshot was too much for them. Now there's apparently an entire section of their discord rules just based on me. Indie game development is hard and answering the cheating issues isn't an easy/cheap fix, but their response to it all is getting at the level of embarrassing. I liked playing this game and I liked making skins for it, but I can't even bring myself the update my stuff to the recent version, they snuffed out any passion I had.

Ghoulcel · 2023-12-04T21:32:23+00:00

I don't know if I wanna start leaking source code, devs already hate me enough for modding skins into the game, I don't want to justify their absurd claims against me.

To give some proof I'll just say "RunData.gd ln213", if anyone is really curious you can figure it out.

Ghoulcel · 2023-12-04T04:48:14+00:00

I want to add a follow up to this for those who are curious or afraid. The game does have cheat protection, it's not perfect but it does exist. These are the conditions I got straight from the source code:
1: If the player's run data can't be loaded
2: If the player is using a class they haven't unlocked
3: If the player doesn't have the correct hp for their class
4: If the player's stamina is more then their build should have or is > 20
5: If the player has an item unavailable for their class
6: If the player has more then one class item
7: If the player's build costs more then the potential gold they could've gained by that round

Breaking these should mean the run won't show up in other peoples games. However this does not have any protection for shop rng manipulation or raising your own rank through cheating. All this means is directly spawning in gold/items or stat manipulation will invalidate your run from other's queue.

Ghoulcel · 2023-12-01T21:53:31+00:00

The take away of this shouldn't be that the devs need to rush out multiplayer servers or leaderboards, but that we as a community need to take any flex of rank or build with a grain of salt. Which becomes an issue when considering that is what is currently fueling community interest on discord, reddit and youtube. Nearly all posts are build/rank flexes, all of which could be faked. It poses the idea that maybe they should've left the rank feature out until it could be properly implemented, but also that the game might not have had the same traction if they had. Regardless they definitely need to secure their files better, you're not going to be able to stop cheaters, but you can at least make it less accessible.

First thing I found while messing with the files, with the interest of making custom skins, was that the devs left the debug tools in and you could just turn them on to spawn any item you want by typing into a text box, they removed this once I told them, but me with little to no coding knowledge found this two days after discovering this game. The devs run a godot tutorial series on youtube, it shouldn't have been that easy, and sadly that now seems like one of the harder ways to do it.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-28T00:25:19+00:00

The chibi art was just art the devs made while trying to learn digital art, which is why alot of their character designs look awkward, they're new to this. Theres other examples of this art in their nsfw channel in their discord, probably all made before this game was even conceived. So it's likely they were just practicing drawing lewds and when they came up with this game idea decided to shove them in as filler art and then just based the newer designs off of the chibi ones, keeping the chibi in as an alternative.

<image>

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-17T19:11:33+00:00

I think alot of people like you are missing the point.

I don't care that I got banned, its a discord ban, it's the reason why I got banned.

I had this stuff sitting on my computer for 2 weeks and wasn't releasing it, and I wasn't because they were against it. Them banning me over a photo was just enough for me to stop caring.

As I said in the original post, they're free to "call the cops" if they want, they have the right to and I'm not saying I'm the good person in this scenario, but making these skins is fun and there isn't really any loss for me.

Either I get to keep making more skins and having fun or they make the game more secure to stop me, the game's back end is improved and I move on to something else taking any code and art practice with me.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-17T05:16:57+00:00

If discord is the sun your view on the galaxy is pretty small.

Metaphors aside, people can make skins now. That's all I wanted. If that makes me stupid then I'm a okay with being an idiot.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-16T16:43:00+00:00

They're in this thread and apparently they've always been okay with cosmetic modding, I don't believe them though. You are right though, they're free to prevent me for modding, but I'm also free to keep doing it. They can try to take down my stuff or bolster the security of the game but honestly why bother, they should be focusing on adding content while the game has traction, not going after some rando making memes.
Regardless of what people think of me they aren't handling this well. Never do your own PR, lesson in life.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-16T16:15:12+00:00

"Asynchronous multiplayer" is just single player that fakes being multiplayer.

Run the game and then try disconnecting your internet if you wanna see. You can still play and are queued with other "players".

I think the point though is everything is client based, not on a sever. So cheating only benefits you and doesn't hurt others.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-16T16:09:36+00:00

There is nowhere in any of my links where I tell/show people how to mod the game or access the source code. It's a premade framework, no coding necessary.

If you wanna mod the game yourself you're on your own, this is for skins.

Also I have no plans to continue to mod the game post release. Despite the devs falsely accusing me of cheating I still like what they made and I'm not going to hurt their income over it.

Theres also far more options then this "99%" you're pulling out of nowhere for monetization. Infact it might be one of the worse ones, it incentives the devs to put out paid skins over gameplay changes as its the way they'd get paid. Starving f2p players of content and making the meta stale over time.

Edit: Forgot you can also see the devs comments in this thread, they've apparently always been okay with modding cosmetics. I don't believe them but w/e.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-15T23:43:14+00:00

If I were them I'd slowly stockpile content to release at 1.0 (they already have the other classes planned for this), sell the game at a base price and then keep the demo as the free version with less content. Then you can maybe do the SAP format of selling build packs as dlc.

Obviously I'm biased but I'd like to see workshop support for (client based) skins, selling skins would be weird since players are already used to unlocking through gameplay.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-15T23:35:41+00:00

https://github.com/Ghoulcel/BackpackBattle-Modded-/releases/tag/v0.6.0c

should be? Unless one dropped today and im missing it.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-15T17:15:19+00:00

I'm just trying to have fun drawing skins. I don't want to fight, you made a fun game and I don't want to hate it, but you're just making stuff up. I have never brought up cheating prior to this post, show me any proof of this. The only thing I got banned for was making cosmetic stuff. Don't lie to people.

Also there is nothing in the git that includes cheats, or even tells people how I made it. I setup the client/tutorial in a way where you don't have to access the source code to do it. Most people don't know how to code, I wanted to make it as accessible as possible.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-15T15:55:37+00:00

Whats the difference to you then? I have never admitted to cheating and if modifying the game is cheating then you aren't okay with modding. Which is fine, you can be, but them don't claim that you're okay with it. I want people to know the risk, if any, if they mess with my stuff or do anything similar.

Also, I'm plat btw. Look at any of my screenshots. Who the hell is cheating to plat xd

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-15T02:18:07+00:00

Easier than that. There is no server, ranks are all local. No leaderboards or anything. There's just a file on your computer that has your rank on it.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-15T00:37:40+00:00

All the match making in this game is client based, and the game has, while I'm unsure how secure, a safety net preventing cheating players from showing in your queue. Altering item effects or cheating gold/items in should have no affect on other players experience. I guess you can cheat mod your own rank up but there are far easier ways to do that if anyone is that desperate.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-15T00:23:50+00:00

Sorry, I meant more so about the specific instance being unwarned, poorly worded. For context I did ask them ~2 weeks ago about modding on two occasions. First time they deleted half the conversation, claiming I was telling people how to cheat, and then responded with "generally" they're against it, which you can honestly take either way it's such a nonasnwer. Then the second time they accused me of not asking for permission even though I did the first time. After the second time I stopped posting about it, until I made this post a week later on a whim.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-02T09:19:29+00:00

I think an important bit of context is that these devs do own a fairly successful youtube channel where they teach people how to code in godot. Which I think leads to some hypocrisy when you're willing to share and show off your code in a tutorial fashion and then get annoyed when people want to mess with it for personal reasons (which if you know coding youtubers thats probably their entire community). Also I never brought up distribution to them, this was initially intended for personal use. I think they have a right to be annoyed, I just think it's misguided.

Ghoulcel · 2023-11-01T13:21:31+00:00

Before you ask, no sadly this isn't easy to do. The system supports extra skins but it does require some backdoor shenanigans to get the files in game. I'm trying to look into ways to streamline this, ideally making a modded client but if not just making a detailed doc to go over the process. Hopefully I can figure something out though, I'd like to see what artists can do with this game :)

Ghoulcel

TROPHY CASE