Can anyone give me the link for the program that will play a MUD for a player and get them to a high level without them trying? I have some ideas and I want to make it useless on my mud.
MUD program
Posted by Arsen on Mon 18 Nov 2002 10:53 PM — 7 posts, 33,008 views.
*raises eyebrow*
Never heard of such a thing but it would make an interesting coding project.
*listening*
Never heard of such a thing but it would make an interesting coding project.
*listening*
I can't quite remember the link, but I have seen a ZMUD script that was more or less a BOT. I don't think there would be anyway to prevent this from happening through code. The only way to keep it happening is if you were to ask the BOT un-common questions and not using a common channel. I never did test the script myself but I remember that the code was pretty complex. It would travel a random path, consider any monster’s in the room, attack those it could kill, converse with those who spoke to him, eat/drink when needed, and pick up any Item that it didn't have or that look to be of value and place it in it's inventory.
Ive seen several very nice customized bot programs but all have a very easy to spot weakness... No interactive capability and no way to handle unexpected events. My personal favorite for catching ppl at botting is to purge the room theyre sitting in and wait for the inevetable outburst. If they attack the next mob to enter the room without comment its time to bust the character with whatever punishments you have deemed appropriate for botting, usually a minimum of jailing though I've seen muds go as harsh as slay/sac for any botting offenses with eventual permban for repeat offenders. As for a hardcoded way to prevent botting, there really isn't one unless you can predict literally *every* possible variety of bot your players aer likely to attempt and have a script to check against the existing bot command structures. Sadly, players always, always, *always*, look for the easiest road to power, and for some it does seem to be botting to get around the need to actually work to advance. As a practical defense, train your staff on what to look for in order to catch ppl botting, deal out harsh punishments as object lessons and pray the players get the hint.
Arsen you email isnt working. If you could, email me at jcj2379@bellsouth.net. Id like to speak with you
I think it is almost impossible to catch a sophisticated botter. Even things like purging a room could probably be detected in a script, and even asking the player questions could result in the script saying things like "are you talking to me?" while the script rang a bell to warn the player to get back to the keyboard.
Still, have fun trying.
Still, have fun trying.
I would agree that it would be fairly impossible. I myself have wrote scripts that would detect deliberate miss-spellings of my name (i.e. Boborac, Bobo rak, ect.) and insert random time delays between commands. While you may detect the more common of botters, it really doesn't take much to setup a pretty fool-proof bot if you've got an understanding of the scripting language you're working with.
Like Nick said, have fun trying though ;-)
Like Nick said, have fun trying though ;-)