News:

[Murais]

hee hee....

 speeding bullet of death, that\'d be funnier, but if the aura stayed on you for a little while after death, that\'d be cheap, but it\'d make PKing funny , some guy kills another player, and then the player comes back from the DR, running into him, automatically killing him , yes I am sick . Some funny prospects coming out of this aura though

[Kiva]

Another news post has been made, in case some of you didn\'t see it.

2004.08.29
     

As many active players know, in the last weeks we had a major hacking into the game. This hack let people take over others account or gain some administrative rights, like adding new spawning locations for crystals or adding new NPCs. We fixed the bug and we identified all players that used the hack.

We are also alware of a number of other small hacks some players use to gain crystals faster. Luckily the number of honest players really overcomes the one of hackers, so we got a number of reports on cheating activities. To clarify better our position on cheating and hacking we added a new section in the Player Guide. Please read it here.

[Taldor]

Modifications to the client (aka mods) are not allowed by PS License. In particular we will not tolerate players using mods to connect to an official server if those allow cheating, or modify the visual aspects of the game or its design. If you want to add levels or graphics to PlaneShift you are more then welcome to partecipare in our development.

So mods like Ciry\'s are forbidden?

[tangerine]

> So mods like Ciry\'s are forbidden?

The text has been updated, read it again It was wrongly phrased, nobody wants to ban such mods.

[Toadhead]

Cheating is for losers that can\'t win normaly

[theRealGorbulas]

(earlier today I said:)
Modding most certainly is not blocked by the Planeshift license. Moddifying art files is, but you can overwrite them with new ones. Planeshift\'s code is under the GPL, and the artwork may only be used with the official server, so any modding that doesn\'t change an existing art file is legal as long as it is still Planeshift. If I were to make my own servers that were not on the official list and make a client that can only connect to those servers it would be illegal, but as long as it is only connecting to Planeshift servers you can still use the real Planeshift artwork.
Cheating should not be allowed, but what is the point of a free, open-source MMORPG if you can\'t modify anything?

I am also not welcome to participate in development(or any good at art or level design).

[Endless.Remorse]

Can\'t wait til CB is here I\'ll cry to see it come any day now but not likely but yeah its coo I want it to come NOW! lol have a nice day guys

xNATEx

[Kiva]

Cheating should not be allowed, but what is the point of a free, open-source MMORPG if you can\'t modify anything?

The main reason would be easier user->developer communication when bugs are found, and it allows people to help create things for the game and then submitting them to the game through the dev team.

It does allow people to modify the source to cheat, yes, but it doesn\'t encourage that. There\'s a big diffrence between what you can do and what you should do.

[Adeli]

So if a mod did not aid gameplay in any way, but merely changed the look of something... eg. turned the statue in the plaza into a Banana.... would it be forbidden? or is it allowed? If the art files were not edited, but replaced is it okay?

Not enhanced lighting or anything, just changing static objects... or skins on chars... not crystals, as that would make them easier to find...

[theRealGorbulas]

turned the statue in the plaza into a Banana

I should figure out how to do that.

[druke]

its quite possible, just make a render in blender or 3dmax, export to cs, blah blah blah

[Kiva]

So if a mod did not aid gameplay in any way, but merely changed the look of something... eg. turned the statue in the plaza into a Banana.... would it be forbidden? or is it allowed? If the art files were not edited, but replaced is it okay?

If you connect to the official server using modified textures or models, or anything that gives you access to stuff you should not have access to, it can and most likely will be considered cheating to some extent or another, depending on how bad it is. However, my advice is if you want to mod things for fun and make a Lego-world or whatever you wish, do it on a local server so you don\'t get in trouble with the PS team or any of the players.

As for skin-mods such as Ciry\'s, they aren\'t disallowed as it simply is a GUI refreshing. You should however be careful when you release mods that change the psclient or any of the dlls that it uses, and you should definitely be careful when downloading such mods as they can just as easily be programs meant to steal your password, as they can be harmless skin mods.

[dfryer]

what is the point of a free, open-source MMORPG if you can\'t modify anything?

You are free to modify and use the PS client and server sourcecode, but you would have to make your own \"world\" for a game to take place in.  To the best of my knowledge, anyone is welcome to submit patches so I don\'t see how someone can be \"not welcome to participate in development\"

Other points of a Free engine and a free game:

1.) The game is free.  You don\'t have to pay for it.  <-- pretty big point, IMO
2.) To a greater extent than a completely closed game, the community can participate in the development.  This doesn\'t mean that everyone actually has something to contribute, but good ideas that mesh well with the existing system are usually welcome.
3.) I don\'t think it\'s ever been done before on this scale, to me that\'s a whole point in itself.  We currently have support for Windows, Linux and MacOS X all in one codebase, just by smart choice of platform (CrystalSpace) and a well-written networking layer.
4.) Anyone who does have C++ skills can look at the code, and discover vulnerabilities (for good or evil)  This is a bit of a double-edged sword, but as it is, vulnerabilities will be found anyways so I think open inspection is good.

I\'m sure there are more reasons, but I don\'t see how PS\'s protection of their art assets and desire to reduce cheating strips away the benefits of a free game and a Free engine.