Anti Cheating in CoH 2

Hey guys, i am writing this as a player who dumped over 1000 hours in CoH multiplayer over 4 years. I have to say that i quit CoH for the simple reason that not smurfs or ragers or droppers or anything trivial but the prevalence of maphacks over highly ranked players and thus smurfs. I probably knew all the higher players and was playing almost all the time with them since its not a big community to have a lot of highly ranked players.

The thing is the mechanics of CoH allowed some really nasty maphacks that you could only detect by watching replays and seeing suspicious or sometimes blatant moves that showed it. Although it had always been a question mark with arty right on top of you in first try but you never could be sure of it. Then i found one of said hacks in google. (yes I know how to differentiate between a virus and legit thing so please don't make unncessary comment like "oh it could be a virus lolol")

After seeing first hand what it was capable of and how fool i was to waste my time thinking they could just had a hunch or something, I literally quit CoH forever.

I am asking here since there still are 3 months to the actual game release, is there any anti-maphack mechanic involved in CoH 2 ? if not will you be doing incorporating something as such? If there is such a thing it is instant collectors edition pre-order for me.

if not

never.

Coh2 is run over Steamworks this time, so i guess there will be different technologies available to prevent cheating. ... but in the end its a p2p game, so its always somehow possible to cheat. The biggest hope is that Coh2 will hit hard and lots of events are held. Usually in such events, third party software and referees take care of cheaters.

I wouldn't mind that much if it was something as widespread like starcraft 2. In the end developer earns a lot and provides a lot. Means cheaters will be rare since anything public will get banned/patched or something since developer has to support that large community. But CoH/warhammer franchise has always been literally abandoned by its developer in some point.

I wouldn't say that it has been abandoned, we've had after launch support since 6+ years now. At april 8th COH1 will be ported to steamworks as well, so its hardly "no support". There has also been a lot of action behind the scenes until the focus shifted to coh2. ...
The problem with COH1 and cheating was just that it was un on a separate platform where it is hard to punish someone. Especially when you can get a new key for 2$.

With Coh2 on steam the level of potential punishment is much bigger. You can not only get your game account banned, but your steam acount, which possibly is bound to a lot more than just COH2. It will not be as easy to just get a new version of the game.

Thanks for the reply. I meant by no support the lack of any patch for dow2 or CoH for some years and the obvious abandonment in their forum even though dow2 is still pretty unbalanced unlike CoH (- roos). I don't care about this as much as the cheating problem I mentioned but your comment gave me hope.

If there is any official word on anti cheating, I am game.

Afaik VAC (Valve anti cheat) was banning players in CoD MW2 for using wallhacks and aimbots, but it wasnt perfect anti-cheat measure, still that was 3-4 years ago maybe it got better now and atm Dota 2 runs on steam and i haven't met any cheaters so far

Usually in such events, third party software and referees take care of cheaters.

We dont need events for that, show me a cheater and I'll deal with him right then and there.

With Coh2 on steam the level of potential punishment is much bigger. You can not only get your game account banned, but your steam acount, which possibly is bound to a lot more than just COH2.

No, you can't. Even if we would like to do that, there are certain laws that forbid these actions. Full Steam bans have never happened before and they will also not happen in the near future. Also, I would feel uneasy when the decision about my whole library of games depends on some lucky arty strikes I may land in CoH 2 and the verdict of maybe one admin.

Don't get me wrong - I hate cheaters and were an active reporter of these folks when it still was possible to do something against them, but we need to keep a sense of proportion.

I'm pretty damn sure there's no law that prevents Steam taking all your toys away and telling you to suck it- even if you've not done anything wrong (although certainly if you have). I guarantee that if you reread the terms of service you agreed to when you signed up to Steam you more or less sign away control over any games you purchase or activate through the service to basically being under their control.



aaaanyway, yeah it's very unlikely they're gonna start doing total lock-outs for the odd drophack. VAC bans are probably on the table for repeat offenders though.

Also, I would feel uneasy when the decision about my whole library of games depends on some lucky arty strikes I may land in CoH 2 and the verdict of maybe one admin.

Even if my knowledge of fair play is very limited, I know that this is a ridiculous exaggeration. If this was even close to being the case, every player currently active in CoH 1 would be banned.

I'm pretty damn sure there's no law that prevents Steam taking all your toys away and telling you to suck it- even if you've not done anything wrong (although certainly if you have). I guarantee that if you reread the terms of service you agreed to when you signed up to Steam you more or less sign away control over any games you purchase or activate through the service to basically being under their control.



aaaanyway, yeah it's very unlikely they're gonna start doing total lock-outs for the odd drophack. VAC bans are probably on the table for repeat offenders though.

Proof? Or I call bullshit, about the part you said "even if you have done nothing wrong". There's no way Steam can make you agree to such terms and conditions. See below, it states that if you cheat, it can ban your account, but that's all.

I acknowledge that all the software and subscriptions are owned by Valve, but that software and subscriptions are subject to copyright and other applicable Laws.

TLDR;

Steam/Valve can not and will not shut your account down for no reason, however, if you cheat or break their terms and conditions they can shut down your entire account and/or ban you from certain multi-player game/s you cheated in, which is far more likely.

4. ONLINE CONDUCT, CHEATING AND ILLEGAL BEHAVIOR

You agree that you will be personally responsible for the use of your Account and for all of the communication and activity on Steam that results from use of your Account. Your online conduct and interaction with other Subscribers should be guided by common sense and basic etiquette. Specific requirements may also be found in the Steam Online Conduct rules at http://steampowered.com/index.php?area=online_conduct, other Rules of Use, the Subscription Terms, or in terms of use imposed by third parties who host particular games or other services.

Steam and the Software may include functionality designed to identify software or hardware processes or functionality (“Cheats”) that may give a player an unfair competitive advantage when playing multiplayer versions of any Software or modifications thereof. You agree that you will not create or assist third parties in any way to create Cheats. You agree that you will not directly or indirectly disable, circumvent, or otherwise interfere with the operation of software designed to prevent or report the use of Cheats. You acknowledge and agree that either Valve or any online multiplayer host may refuse to allow you to participate in certain online multiplayer games if you use Cheats in connection with Steam or the Software. Further, you acknowledge and agree that an online multiplayer host may report your use of Cheats to Valve, and Valve may communicate your history of use of Cheats to other online multiplayer hosts for Software. Valve may terminate your Account or a particular Subscription for any conduct or activity that Valve believes is illegal, constitutes a Cheat, or which otherwise negatively affects the enjoyment of Steam by other Subscribers. You acknowledge that Valve is not required to provide you notice before terminating your Subscriptions(s) and/or Account, but it may choose to do so.

You may not use Cheats, automation software (bots), mods, hacks, or any other unauthorized third-party software, to modify or automate any Subscription Marketplace process.

E. Ownership.

All title, ownership rights and intellectual property rights in and to the Software and any and all copies thereof, are owned by Valve US and/or its or its affiliates’ licensors. All rights are reserved, except as expressly stated herein. The Software is protected by copyright laws, international copyright treaties and conventions and other laws. The Software contains certain licensed materials and Valve’s and its affiliates’ licensors may protect their rights in the event of any violation of this Agreement.

2. LICENSES

A. License Terms.

Steam and your Subscription(s) require the automatic download and installation of Software onto your computer. Valve hereby grants, and you accept, a limited, terminable, non-exclusive license and right to use the Software for your personal use in accordance with this Agreement, including the Subscription Terms. The Software is licensed, not sold. Your license confers no title or ownership in the Software. To make use of the Software, you must have a Steam Account and you may be required to be running the Steam client and maintaining a connection to the Internet.

You understand that for reasons that include, without limitation, system security, stability, and multiplayer interoperability, Steam may need to automatically update, pre-load, create new versions of or otherwise enhance the Software and accordingly, the system requirements to use the Software may change over time. You understand that this Agreement (including applicable Subscription Terms) do not entitle you to future updates, new versions or other enhancements of the Software associated with a particular Subscription, although Valve may choose to provide such updates, etc. in its sole discretion.

Except this bit:

software or hardware processes or functionality (“Cheats”) that may give a player an unfair competitive advantage

is so broad that yes, they could indeed shut down your account for virtually any reason that takes their fancy. Steam could theoretically make just about anything fit that description if they wanted to. Autohotkey? Cheat. Gridkeys? Cheat. etc. Again, this is not to say that they will or ever have done or will do, but they certainly could.

I'm pretty damn sure there's no law that prevents Steam taking all your toys away and telling you to suck it- even if you've not done anything wrong (although certainly if you have). I guarantee that if you reread the terms of service you agreed to when you signed up to Steam you more or less sign away control over any games you purchase or activate through the service to basically being under their control.

I don't know about your country, but in Germany these EULA's are null and void because they conflict with customer laws. Several lawsuits are currently being filed (primarily because Steam does not allow you to sell your games again). Microsoft had some trouble with their EULA in the mid 90's here because they had a very "creative" understanding of what owning a software really means. Steam and Microsoft know about these kind of laws and at least Microsoft backed up and never even tried to enforce its strange EULA's. Regarding Steam: they may ban you from their servers but they can not ban you from playing your games.

But whatever - a full Steam ban has never been enforced, so my point still stands.

Does anyone know if the developers of CoH2 gave some official statement to cheat-preventing mechanism in CoH2?

Could steam detect people who are using scripts in-game and possibly use it against you?

Whenever I play BF3 after some CoH, if I forgot to close my autohotkey script which allows me to max view window mode and stream it will actually close my BF3 game after a few reasons. Reason being possible script based hacking!

i think punkbuster detects autohotkey, but not steam itself

Not Steam itself, I use the autohotkey script too max view window mode in Company of Heroes 2 to alt-tab from Firefox to the game and it works fine ^^

Valve is generally a very sensible company.

They won't permaban your entire library of games if they don't consider the offense bad enough. The bad press would kill them. Have you ever heard of extraordinarily bad press against them? No. They've earned their good reputation, tbh.

Part of the problem is that people are thinking the anti-cheat system will work like in CoH, when we truly don't know if this is the case. Autohotkey does not modify your game in any way, it modifies the way you input commands into your computer, which in a general sense isn't cheating (unless you are using to burst fire guns in fps lol).

Anybody knows if thenewtork is still P2P?

Anybody knows if thenewtork is still P2P?

Yes, it's still P2P. Has been stated somewhere in the official forum too.