Just wondering, but when might you be able to get the faction limit patch out. For my current mod, I really need it.

Hey alfa, just wondering myself - are you making your mod for personal use, or for release? If you're thinking of release, what if you can't (aren't supposed to, anyways )include the .exe with the changes? I'm afraid I probably am not going to be able to acheive the best I could with my own mod due to the things I want to change being in the dang .exe, and with all the strict attention paid to this part of mods in particular, we probably ain't slippin any hacked .exe's past the mods/admins here
Darn you - I mean, good job, guys - keeping us clean

- Ro9ue
_________________________________
"Do or do not. There is no try."
- Jedi Master Yoda

My mod first started for personal use, but later came to the point that I thaught it should be released. For the information on it, click here. But the edited .exe, shouldn't be a problem, I mean they are letting us talk about it and are letting Alcander post the patches' url's here, so As long as we don't make a HUGE deal about it when you contribute the mod, everything should be fine...

PS:\ You didn't see anything.

Edited by - alfa_astrix on 6/19/2005 2:09:45 AM

can you also post the group limit patch? would be very cool

Uhm, so what is the position about MP servers with these?

You say that there is no trouble with IFSO, so does this mean that this is another batch of cheats?

sorry If I sound a bit aprehensive/negative, but can you tell me what this will do in MP now, please...assuming that the server doesnt allow these .exe patches.

Well, the only EXE patch I really planned on posting at this point was the engines sellable mod. Now I haven't tested it on every server configuration but IONCROSS didn't kick me when I ran these, but I don't have my configuration setup exactly like every sever-op. These aren't cheats since all this does is enable features.
Most all of the other patches are DLL patches and a great majority of the patches reside in Server.dll, which means server-ops will be able to choose what they want to offer (like increased money, Universe chat, etc) because the Server.dll is loaded server-side only when a client plays online.

btw. what do you mean by universe chat?
because there already is that feature of universe chat, using /u on admin account-chars...

Oh, I mean't Universe chat for all players (changes the console to Universe chat) so people can communicate with each other better. Unless a server-op doesn't want that, then ofcourse they needn't apply the patch.

Hmm...

Well, I was kind've hoping we'd see some documentation here soon. If these things may be usable for cheating, documenting it won't make it worse- it'll allow us to see how such cheats can be defeated. A byte-patch that we can't really apply to mods that doesn't have any documentation about what's being edited and why is just another "black box" mod, like OpenSP... and it doesn't really give us a good method for applying custom fixes.

For example... let's say that I want to release a mod that contains multiple new ALEs (I'm still waiting to see some stuff about that- thus far, we have a screenshot) and I want to get rid of the money cap, increase Tradelane speeds and make engines sellable. At this point... we're talking about:

1. Is impossible, unless you release some documentation about what you're doing and how to go about it
2, 3, 4 are all possible, but may be 3 different byte patches, all of which would require some sort've additional work from FLMM or a release of a patched exe, which basically means that we'd have to refrain from telling users about those features on TLR, assuming that they don't change their policy and start doing byte-checking on every freelancer.exe included in a mod to make sure that they're still wrapped but with a different version number (which is just as illegal as anything else, according to the EULA- modifications of the executable are illegal, period- which makes this whole "oh no, it's against the law" aspect a bit silly, but nm).

I guess what I'm hoping to see here is a lot've documentation, and not patches- patches aren't terribly useful, methods are. Especially when it comes to ALEs.

I'd agree that documentation is more useful.
This place has always been known for its laid back attitude amongst the masses. True, there has been dreadful competition in the past - but note that those whom are the competative ones do not contribute here at all... they sit back on their own sites and jealously guard "their" creations, never demeaning themselves to talk to the rest of us.

However, the very nature of FL modding here is sharing knowledge. Simply put, allowing others to have a peek at your methodolgy.

If Alcander wishes to write tutorials with regards to this, then lets give him time to write them in his own time - but there is nothing worse than having pressure put upon you to do something. Its only been a short amount of time, give the guy a chance

I must say that I agree with Chips (for a change). The stuff that is posted here is "top-notch" stuff, and will be greatly loved. The thing that get's me though, is how is Alcander going to write a tutorial on how to do these. Because he is editing the .exe, he would have to write out the entire book on editing with hex and source, then tell what he did to make these changes to Freelancer...

What I am trying to say, is that a documentation version of all this would take forever due to the lazy ass-holes out there.

No doubt- and what we've already seen is brilliant. Documented, it's a brilliant addition to everybody's arsenal not just a patch that doesn't contain methods

I understand your concerns, however, the main problem with providing a "method" to say changing tradelane speed is what happens once I say "hey this is where the tradelane speed value is stored, you can change it if you want" and then we get cheaters who set their tradelane speed to 100,000 and start doing uber-fast trade runs, granted after awhile they would get caught but this just adds more stress on sever-ops. Thus the reason why I seem to be leaning toward a closed method than open method, you have to understand that obviously I'm one of the few that know how to do stuff like this so there is a certain amount of pressure on me to not just do it but do it right, else I'll get flamed and blasted for inflicting harm on the community. It's a bit of different situation for some of the other hacks since they couldn't be exploited, so for those yes I can show you how it was done - and as Chips said, Argh, cut me some slack here, I'm one man - my idea was to not just release patches but methods as well for most of my techniques, however, I haven't been able to do all of that yet.

So then here's a mini-writeup:
In the engine patch, you can easily see what it changes after you apply it. It modifies a byte at RAW offset 80936 (RVA 480936) from 0x74 to 0xEB in the unwrapped executable which allows engines to then be sold and transferred. Open the EXE in a hex editor and you can do it yourself.

Also @Argh
How would I possibly provide a "patch" or something for ALE files? Unless I wanted to just modify the color..but I already said I would release documentation when I'm able.

If there is any input anyone has on how to resolve such a matter I'd love to hear it.

Edited by - Alcander on 6/19/2005 2:02:03 PM

Edited by - Alcander on 6/19/2005 4:29:34 PM

For the cheaters, see if there were a way for Ioncross to come up with a new detecter for the tradelane speed. Of course people are going to use it to gain money faster, but what other perpose does this mod/patch serve other than getting from one place to another faster? The only catch would be is that if one mod has the tradelane speed jacked, and another doesn't, the Iontool would have to know what the base tradelane speed is.

Now, for each tutorial, just tell each step you did, like in any other tutorial, and if anyone asks about how to edit it more than what you have told them, just do one of these two options,
1) Tell them to figure it out on their own
2) Post a link on how to do all the hex and source editing, not refering to the FL editing.
Besided those two, I'm out of solutions.