Anti-cheating measures

[Mithril]

Generally, by crashing the came one can restart at the previous save. This is prevented if dying by an automatic save but there are a few other situations where crashing the game can be particularly beneficial:
- alchemists have a golem and if it is alive when the player dies the game is not saved.
- may apply more generally to other classes that have allies like summoners
- after an escort is generated that is not of the optimal class. Crash and repeat until the desired escort appears.
- an escort dies.
- failing the Hidden compound 150 gold fight?
- failing the couple of situations that have a timer in the Far East?

[5k17]

Crashing the game is not the only, nor the most effective way to cheat. Modifying variables (resources, gold, talent points etc.) via external programs and copying savegames are quite viable methods, too. I don't believe cheating needs to (or reliably can) be prevented, though.

[Mithril]

Crashing the game is not the only, nor the most effective way to cheat. Modifying variables (resources, gold, talent points etc.) via external programs and copying savegames are quite viable methods, too. I don't believe cheating needs to (or reliably can) be prevented, though.

Obviously it is not possible to completely prevent cheating. But making it harder may make it easier to resist temptations and bring it beyond the knowledge/technical ability of many people. Crashing the game is extremely easy using the task manager in Windows and requires no planning ahead. Copying savegames and using external programs, assuming there are any, requires much more planning and effort.

[darkgod]

The online server detects if you edit your savefile or copy in an old version; but yeah cant do much against other things.
No point in going out of my way either, my sole reason to have a few anticheat things are to make the vault mostly clean

[XLambda]

Crashing the game is not the only, nor the most effective way to cheat. Modifying variables (resources, gold, talent points etc.) via external programs and copying savegames are quite viable methods, too. I don't believe cheating needs to (or reliably can) be prevented, though.

This. I regularly back up my savegames - not because I want to cheat, but because I don't want to lose a character to bugs. I happen to have a life, and the time that's left for playing tome is sparse. I don't want to lose a lv30+ char I spent several nights on just because the game decided to corrupt my save.
Unless DG can guarantee that no progress is lost to bugs or "unintended features", preventing savegame backups would only do harm.

Also, I don't think that we should worry about cheating in a singleplayer game. It's not like someone gains an unfair advantage over other players - heck, if they want to take the excitement from playing a permadeath game, let them. It's all their own fault.

[skein]

Yup, there are plenty of game ending bugs and situations that kinda require you to go back to a previous save.

Just today I had a rare that would never die (stuck at 0 hit points even after over a 1000 damage done to it) blocking the way to the next level. (think it was a bug caused by blighted soil, I checked he talent list nothing in there that would cause it)

My first character that got through the orcs went to the endgame before coming back east (at lvl 40 no less). Since you cannot recall out of the end dungeon that was another situation where I had to revert a save.

The first time I got anti-magic on a pheonix knight was another

[IvenGray]

For some people, cheating spoils their gaming experiences. But for some other guys, cheating not necessarily does. The players who cheat bear the responsibilities for what they got from the game. If they decided to cheat, there's no need to hassle them further. It's fine as long as it doesn't bother other players.