The account key is embedded in the client side auth unit in such a way that no automated process can extract it (probably by placing fragments of the key at completely random offsets, combined with some evil assembly tricks).

since the client is running this code, and the source code is available, there would conceivably be a way of duplicating the "random" behaviour,  or maybe I am not following 

Hi, I've had a look at the console (the fact that you have an SC module in your CVS stumped me for a good while though) - I've setup the console on a private server, feel free to leave a private message if you want to see it.. I also have a mostly unused VPS server, where I could host a development setup - whether planeshift will compile is another matter.

My comments on the serverconsole: it's very buggy, or I may simply be missing some components. it's also rather user unfriendly. I can understand why someone administering this game would be fustrated by the interface.

Also, the database is suitably complex, that I think it would be difficult to make all the interrelated features work well without abstracting the php code a little more... generally a lot of it reads like spaghetti code I see often at work - some wrapper functions for spitting out HTML and, an entangled bush of SQL writing ad-hoc snippets into the database (of course, this can be done well, but that technique has some disadvantages). As the game gets bigger and more complex, the serverconsole is bound to become unwieldy and unmaintainable.

Personally I would use a framework to get everything together - you've already tried to integrate ADODB, in the previous version (at least the one that's in your CVS as SC which was last changed in 2005), why did you ditch it ? An ORM system can help to get a better grip on what is going on.

I hope I haven't insulted anyone too badly yet. I'm sure something can be salvaged - I'll need to have a closer look at what though.