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PGP Signed Message | 1994-10-26 | 34KB | 748 lines

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- The DOOM Honorific Titles (v. 3) created by Frank Stajano on 1994 05 01 this file last revised on 1994 08 07 NEW RULES! READ CAREFULLY - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- <BEGIN: contents> contents intro what's new if you read nothing else, read this DHT rules: the official reference authentication, PGP stuff and how to package your exam file the log file explanations and FAQs <END: contents> - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- <BEGIN: intro> If you think you're good at DOOM, you'll probably be challenged by the following. This is a rating system that awards top players with standardised and universally recognised honorific titles. If you feel proud and/or silly enough, you can include the relevant letters after your name in your .sig and impress your fellow DOOM players. Pretty impressive in the Deathmatch phone directories! Useful with reviews of new WADs as well: if a DOOM Grand Master says it's hard, then it really is... DOOM Honorific Titles: DOOM Master (DM): can complete any level on Ultra-Violence. DOOM Grand Master (DGM): can complete any level on Nightmare. DOOM Tyson (DT): can complete any level on Ultra-Violence using nothing more than fist and pistol. DOOM Grand Ass Kicker (DGAK): has the combined skills of a Master, a Tyson and a Grand Master. The titles are awarded by passing an examination. As with most examinations, this will only be a random sampling of your capacity. You won't be required to complete all 27 episodes to prove that you can do it. You will be your own judge for the results. You will receive the text of the examination, which tells you what to do to be awarded the title you think you deserve; from then on you just have to produce the corresponding LMPs and upload them to a specific public place in a specific format to be able to call yourself a DM, DT, DGM or DGAK. There is no time limit. The LMPs must be produced especially for the examination -- you can't just send in your old ones. This is because there is an authentication mechanism which prevents people from recycling other people's LMPs. <END: intro> - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- <BEGIN: what's new> * The DOOM Tyson title is new. I introduced it for those of you who complained that fist-and-pistol on UV was much easier than unrestricted NM. Now you can do DM -> DGM -> DT ==> DGAK, as before, or if you prefer DM -> DT -> DGM ==> DGAK. Note that the "==>" passage is practically for free; you must first of all become a DM; you then become a DGM and a DT, in the order you prefer; and at this point you are almost automatically also a DGAK. Note that this is semantically compatible with the earlier definition of DGAK, in the sense that a v.2 DGAK would also be a DGAK under the new scheme. However this is just a theoretical issue, given that nobody ever became a DGAK before my issuing the V.3 rules. (Only one DGAK challenge was ever issued, and it has been harmlessly revoked given that the candidate didn't even complete the DM exam.) * An additional constraint in the random number selector that assigns you the mission numbers ensures that you won't get missions with the same number (such as E2M8 and E3M8) in the same challenge. This should even out the difficulties, eliminating some particularly easy or particularly difficult triplets. * When you request a challenge, your name and your mail address are made public. Anybody who looks at DHT exam files can see who requested challenge forms and you'll look very silly to the public watching your LMPs if you request more than one challenge for the same title by trying to fake your identity. Remember that there are very good fake-address spotters out there in net-land and you'll be publicly derided forever on a.g.d if you try to get a title by cheating. This makes the titles more secure and thus more valuable. It also saves me time, so that maybe I can clear that backlog of requests a bit sooner. * If you record on DOOM 1.4 or above (and it is recommended that you do), you MUST include the "kill count" screen. <END: what's new> - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- <BEGIN: if you read nothing else, read this> * Most of the queries I get about this stuff come from people who haven't read the whole text. I know it's incredibly long, especially for the attention span of a DOOM player (I am one :-)) but if you have a query, read the whole stuff before mailing me, especially the "explanations and FAQs" section. But in particular: read the "official reference" section *NOW* -- I've kept it short just for you. * I have had a constant deluge of requests for DHT challenges since I started this thing. This is good! However you should realise that, although I generate the challenges with a program that I wrote for the purpose, it's still pretty much a manual job. So I batch up requests until I have some spare time. Two weeks is a normal delay, although one is my target. Unfortunately I sometimes managed to hold people in the queue for up to a month. That's life. No guarantee that it won't happen again, although I'll do my best to avoid it. * DON'T EMAIL YOUR COMPLETED EXAM TO ME! I don't want it! I'll frag you if you do! :-) Post it to the official repository instead. <END: if you read nothing else, read this> - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- <BEGIN: DHT rules: the official reference> Candidates for anything must apply for a challenge form, which they'll have to include in their exam file. Administrative details in another section. The DHT challenges are obviously reserved to registered users of DOOM, as they involve producing LMPs from all three episodes. Candidates for the title of "DOOM Master" must produce 3 Ultra-Violence LMPs of the required levels (one per episode) with 100% kills and 100% secrets, plus one "free interpretation LMP" of a level of their choice (see below). Candidates for the title of "DOOM Grand Master" must already be DOOM Masters; they must produce 3 Nightmare LMPs of the required levels (one per episode) with 100% secrets and with every monster killed at least once. Plus 3 Ultra-Violence LMPs of some other required levels (one per episode) with 100% kills, 100% secrets, 100 or 199 health, 100 or 200 armour (the lower figure only where the level does not have the blue sphere or armour respectively). Plus one free interpretation LMP. Candidates for the title of "DOOM Tyson" must already be DOOM Masters; they must produce 3 Ultra-Violence LMPs of the required levels (one per episode) with 100% kills and 100% secrets, using only pistol and non-berserk fist OR, at their choice and where available, using only (normal and) berserk fist and no other weapon. Plus one free interpretation LMP. Candidates for the title of "DOOM Grand Ass Kicker" must already be DOOM Masters, DOOM Grand Masters and Doom Tysons (all together). No further randomly assigned exam is required, only one last free interpretation LMP, which must be an amazing deathmatch. The "free interpretation LMP" is whatever the candidate considers appropriate to show "style": going chainsaw on big monsters, killing big monsters by trapping them in crunching walls instead of shooting them, clearing out a whole level without ever being hit once, killing all the monsters in a level without firing by persuading them to fight each other, and so on. The level and skill are chosen by the candidate. You may even play on an external WAD if you really wish, or record a deathmatch (but it'd better be against a worthwhile opponent - -- it's not the frag count that matters, it's the skill!). There are no constraints at all on this -- it's just an opportunity to show how good you are: you're getting a DOOM title, so you must be worth something! This will certainly bring out some pretty high quality LMPs. Since the required episodes are assigned at random to candidates, an examination may be much harder than another. To be fair, an appeal mechanism is provided. If one of the required levels is found by the candidate to be terribly hard, it can be replaced with THREE levels chosen by the candidate from the same episode. Note that only one replacement is allowed in the whole examination. Example: you get E1M9, E2M5, E3M4. You really can't manage E3M4, so you decide to swop it for E3M1, E3M2 and E3M5, in addition of course to E1M9 and E2M5. You can choose whatever missions you want in that episode, even if their numbers duplicate something you got in one of the others (in the example above: you may choose E3M5 even though you were also assigned E2M5). If you are going for DGM, you are only allowed one substitution for the whole of your six missions. Obviously, the use of cheat codes (or cheat patches) is not allowed, nor is the use of the -TURBO switch. It is however allowed to make a longer LMP than 128K on versions of DOOM that allow this. If you use a DOOM version that allows it (and you should if you can), you MUST include the "kill count" screen in all your LMPs. <END: DHT rules: the official reference> - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- <BEGIN: authentication, PGP stuff and how to package your exam file> To ensure that the LMPs have genuinely been made by those that are claiming the title (and thus to add authenticity and value to the title itself) the following scheme has been devised. The candidate sends a request to the DOOM Honorific Titles Centre (actually yours truly) in the following format: To: fms@cam-orl.co.uk Subject: Please send me a DOOM examination form Name: (...your real name, and an optional pseudonym if you want, the whole stuff being 26 chars max...) Initials: (...your initials, max 3 chars, used to generate the exam file name, see below...) Candidate for: (...DM, DGM, DT or DGAK...) Requests not respecting this format are rejected. What comes back is a message similar to this one: ---BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE This is the DOOM challenge for (...name...) aspiring to the title of (...title...). Issued on (...date...). The required levels are: E1Mx, E2My, E3Mz. To be completed on skill ..., with ... (...plus all the appropriate requirements for this title...) The authentication dance is: xxxx - xxxx Use the file name XXXXXXX.ZIP (...this will be something like DM-CBA.ZIP for someone whose initials are CBA and who is trying to become a Doom Master. I'll add a disambiguating digit in cases where another request with the same initials exists...) ---BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE (...) ---END PGP SIGNATURE The authentication dance is a sequence of eight letters, each of which can be L (left 90 degrees), R (right 90 degrees) or F (fist). At the very beginning of the level the candidate must perform the specified short sequence of movements. This ensures that the LMP was recorded specifically as a response to the above challenge. The reason why the authentication dance is done at the beginning and not at the end when everybody has been killed is so that you don't risk to forget it or, worse, get it wrong (and have to redo the whole LMP from scratch). However in some levels (e.g. E3M3) you have a monster heading for you from the very beginning; in these cases, do the authentication dance AS SOON AS POSSIBLE after the initial necessary killing. If you mess it up, restart the recording. Remember, ALL THE LMPs IN YOUR EXAM FILE must start with the authentication dance. Even the deathmatch LMP if you decide to make one as your free interpretation. (In this case only *you* must do the dance, not your opponents. And, by the way, for deathmatch LMPs you must specify what colour you are in the DESCR.TXT) When you have produced the required LMPs, write a DESCR.TXT file in which you describe your setup: what controller do you use, how is it configured, what computer do you play on etc. You should also say what is special about your free interpretation file. If you gave up on one of the levels and changed it with some other ones, say so, and tell what was the thing that stopped you from completing the originally required level. Don't forget to say what version of DOOM the LMPs are good for. If you use an external WAD for your free interpretation, be sure to mention its original title and creator. Having done that, it's time to package everything together. Rename the free interpretation file as FREE.LMP (possibly including FREE.WAD) and rename all the others as E?M?-*.LMP (* being either UV or NM). Include the original examination form, including PGP signature, in a file named CHALLENG.TXT (this is very important). Zip everything together, using the name that was specified in the form. And finally upload the zipped exam file to the official repository. If you are posting an exam file for anything higher than DM, ensure that your previous exam file(s) are already present at that site. That's it! From then on you can rightfully use your new title in your signature or as and when you like. I have completed the DOOM Master exam myself so you may have a look at my own file if you want to see an example of how to package things up. The "official repository" will be a directory called "dht-exams" on what currently is the most widely used DOOM ftp site on the Internet. As of today I would suggest infant2.sphs.indiana.edu, the heir to the glorious ocf.unt.edu. But this might change, since DOOM things move so rapidly. You are also invited to upload your file to alt.binaries.doom and you should be prepared to mail it to whoever requests it from you (and you'll probably be proud to do it anyway). --------------------------------------------------------------------- THE INFO IN THIS PARAGRAPH IS SUBJECT TO CHANGE WITHOUT NOTICE The official repository as of 1994 08 04 is the following place: infant2.sphs.indiana.edu:/pub/doom/incoming/dht-exams/ This place also has the latest copy of this text, signed by fms-dht. --------------------------------------------------------------------- As can be seen, there is no "certifying authority" issuing those titles. The titles are self-awarded as soon as the requirements are fulfilled. Of course one could easily claim to be a DGAK but anybody may want to verify that, if nothing else to see the supposedly amazing FREE.LMP; so, all in all, there is no scope for cheating without looking like a moron to all the other Doom players on the net. The exams material is obviously there as proof of authenticity, but is mainly intended as a way of collecting very good quality LMPs. The main reason for people to download other people's exams will not be the desire to check whether they really are in good faith, but rather to watch some amazing DOOM action. For those who do not know a thing about PGP, it is a cryptographic program that allows, among other things, to prove that a message (in this case CHALLENG.TXT) has not been tampered with. Given my "public key", which is included at the end of this message, anybody can "check my signature" on any of the CHALLENG.TXT forms I issue. And PGP will spot if anything has been changed in the text since I signed it. It's conceptually similar to a checksum, only much harder to forge. There is no need to use PGP to claim a title (i.e. to produce an exam file) and there is no need to use PGP to view someone else's exam file. Nothing is encrypted. PGP is only required when one wants to verify that a CHALLENG.TXT from an exam file has not been modified to make things easier for the candidate or to use someone else's authentication dance. Public key "fms-dht": (this is not my normal public key; it is a low security key that is only used for stuff related to the DOOM Honorific Titles and that lives on the Unix system at the office. Paranoids may verify the key on a server, but I would consider this useless for this application.) - -----BEGIN PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- Version: 2.3a mQA9Ai3EIg0AAAEBgOLRDvg5U9NSXzr6irocfCTu3jqmj5QVLXNo6vhah2S0SUuO Ao99jCFjYwxinUaxLQAFEbQ5Zm1zLWRodDogRE9PTSBIb25vcmlmaWMgVGl0bGVz IENlbnRyZSA8Zm1zQGNhbS1vcmwuY28udWs+iQBFAgUQLcQmPfFm9XEwZ2VZAQGd 7wF/e4OV/FG8LIjLu/G5py1NCVQnH1DczCLo8w1A7igMVqOpsohfwhkKsjbhoFjQ REBiiQCVAgUQLcQj9LbPXSo5mjEhAQHvWwP8CJy1k/4k1FfPVXZGcFHrpIoe50ST bjAiayyx9Kdh77ji6QaoW151V3tt10ON/xKoLKa67FLXoC4KFhRG/y1BWms3wjXv Z6rZJiDuScBj0hUPap0MpICtxEGnlcbI8sJ9z9k/yuc+vPJHs9TFl4hWudFlM6a0 hkI4bcTbRaDLFdQ= =w6UN - -----END PGP PUBLIC KEY BLOCK----- <END: authentication, PGP stuff and how to package your exam file> - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- <BEGIN: the log file> The names of those who requested forms will be made public by myself regularly. I'll post a PGP-signed file in the dht-exams directory, at least once per month. It will contain all the requests processed since the DHT3 rules came into action. It will also contain the previous requests, but for these the names of the candidates will be anonymised because in DHT 1 and 2 I said that I wouldn't publish the names of the requesters. If you are one of the anonymised requesters and want to appear with full name in the next version of the log (whether you have already conquered your title or not), just send me a message in the following format: --------- To: fms@cam-orl.co.uk Subject: please de-anonymise me in the DOOM log (and then a single line showing your anonymous entry as it is in the current log) --------- If you request a new challenge but you already appear anonymously in the log, it is especially important that you ask me to de-anonymise you, otherwise your initials will become "different" (fms2 instead of fms). Just add the anonymous line from the log to the end of your normal "please send me a DOOM examination form" request. The log will be called something like 940806.LOG and it will be a plain text file (although PGP-signed) so that you will even be able to consult while online. It's going to be just a few pages anyway, much shorter than these rules. The log is formatted in fixed fields, so those of you who feel like it may easily write their own programs to extract all sorts of statistics from it. An easy one (on Unix) is cat 940806.LOG | grep "^1:" | wc to count the number of challenges issued so far. In a few cases the log has comments that tell that a specific challenge has been revoked (and why). The interested party has already received a personal communication about this. Obviously "revoked" means that the corresponding exam file, if it existed, would be automatically be void, notwithstanding the fact that the PGP-signature on the challenge is authentic. Note that I no longer attempt to check the plausibility of the names and mail addresses that are supplied to me (the whole point of introducing a public log, really). The only check that I still perform is to eliminate clashes between people with the same initials. <END: the log file> - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- <BEGIN: explanations and FAQs> Lots of people have mailed me with questions about their challenge and whether they could do this or that. If you have a question, read on: there is a good chance that the answer is already in here. Q: Do I have to start with a pistol or can I start from a saved game? A: You have to start with the "standard results after death". No saved game. Record your lmps with doom -devparm -record exmy-zz -warp x y -skill s Q: Isn't it a bit wimpy to change one episode with some others? A: No. If one guy gets a very easy triplet and the next gets a very hard one, then there is an obvious disparity in the challenges. It's true that in theory an aspiring DM, DGM or DT should be able to do ANY level; but, given that the examinations are a subsampling and someone could get away by doing just the easier levels, it seems fair to leave a way out to those that get the harder ones. I have no control over what the random number generator pours out, and it is my policy to ALWAYS stick to the first thing that comes out when making a certificate. I *NEVER* remake a certificate saying "oh this one would be too easy, it's almost offensive" or "oh this one is just plain impossible". So there needs to be a backup system that evens out the difficulties. Changing one of the levels is a perfectly legitimate thing to do. It's within the rules. Of course, if you can do without it, so much the better. If you realise that you got very easy levels, try to do them at your best, possibly even surpassing the required specs: people will be inclined to say "oh yes but he got the easy ones", but you can show them that you really are a master by doing them with style. Q: Isn't it unfair that I got these very hard episodes while people can call themselves DM's and they've only done much easier ones? I would be able to do the ones THEY've done! Can you send me another challenge please? A: Sorry, but you can't change the challenge you received. The substitution has been introduced just for this purpose. The rules are the same for everybody. In theory the owner of a title should be able to do EVERY ONE of the 27 levels at the stated conditions. If someone did it on the easier ones, be assured that they didn't choose the levels for their exam: they were prepared, like all of us, to do it on any possible level. Feel free to use the allowed substitution if it helps you. Q: Can I substitute more than one level? A: No. Even for the DGM challenge (6 mandatory levels) you can only change one of them. Q: Do I have to pick up all the health potions, helmets etc? A: No. You don't have to finish with 100% items. Who cares about this? DOOM is an action game! Q: How do I tell if I've really ended with 100% kills, 100% secrets and all that? When the recording finishes, DOOM just dumps me to DOS! A: With versions up to 1.2, there was no way of telling for sure. With versions from 1.4 onwards, you can record the ending screen in your LMP. Thanks id for this! Note that, in fact, if you are using such a version, you MUST include the "kill count" screen or your exam file will not be valid. Q: Yes but what about DGM? How do I tell if I have killed every monster at least once? A: Well... be careful when you do it, and ensure that the kill count is > 100% at the end. The rule isn't "and finish with kills > 100%" simply because some smartass might kill the same soldier 5 times but avoid killing the baron or the cyberdemon... If you don't do this sort of purposefully silly thing, just checking that you finish with > 100% is fine, even if in fact there is a soldier in the level which you never killed because you thought you had had him already. Q: DGM and DT are impossible! Just look at <favourite level>, how could one ever do this on NM (or with fist and pistol)? A: Well, don't say that too early... And remember that there can be one substitution. The titles above DM are *not* supposed to be easy to earn. Maybe there are a couple of levels that are TOTALLY impossible under the specified conditions, but I'm not even sure of that. And it's unlikely that one gets them all together in the exam challenge. And if you get a level that you consider impossible, you may substitute it. And yes, there is a luck factor. And yes, one could become DGM just because they get a very easy challenge, without really being able to do the other levels on NM. So what? These cases happen in life too. But they are a statistical minority. I believe that the rules are fair as they are, and that it would be much worse if I allowed other subcases and escape routes like the ability to request another challenge for the same title. Q: I can finish level XXX when playing normally, but if I record a LMP then I can't any more because it bombs out after 15 mins! So what? A: This is a problem with versions 1.2 and below. Use a newer version and increase the buffer size. The README tells you how. Thanks id for this new feature! Q: Do I have to end the level alive on the free interpretation? A: No. There is no constraint whatsoever. Do what you feel is interesting. Obviously you will be judged by your peers based on what you do and on how you do it, but there are no rules. Some of the original id demos are pretty amazing even if the guy dies after all. Not that I recommend it, but it's not forbidden. Q: Do I have to end the level alive in the other LMPs? A: Yes *please*! :-) Not that anybody asked that, of course; but be extra careful when you package up your exam file. You probably have lots and lots of exmy.lmp files in your doom directory, so be sure to pick up the right ones and not the ones where you failed. This is unfortunately quite easy to do, and it happened to some not-very-careful DM candidates. After zipping up the exam, clean your DOOM dir of all LMPs, unzip it there and view the LMPs again. It pays to be careful. It's much better if YOU spot it, rather than someone else who just downloaded your file to see how good you are supposed to be. Q: I'm on a level where I really can't do the authentication dance before the end. What do I do? Also, while playing I picked up the chainsaw so I have no fist when I dance. A: No problem, do the dance at the end then. Provided you remember to do it and don't rush off to the switch, that's fine. The dance is just something that adds value to your title, because it certifies it as not bogus, but it's not supposed to make the challenge more difficult. And yes, use chainsaw instead of fist for the dance if you have to. The only advice is this: make it clear that you're doing the dance. Pause for a while before it, then switch to 1 (fist or chainsaw), then do the first four movements, then a short pause, then the remaining four movements, then another short pause before rushing off. If the dance is not at or near the beginning, please mention it in your DESCR.TXT: "here on E2M9 I do the dance straight at the end, before pressing the switch, and I use chainsaw instead of fist". Q: Why don't you add <another, even harder new title> after DGAK? A: I think it's enough of a challenge as it currently is. And, besides, I think that whoever achieves DGAK deserves the honour of having conquered "the highest possible title" (at least as far as the DHT rules are concerned). Q: What's this stupid exam thing? Who gave you the right to judge others anyway? A: Calm down mate, I am judging absolutely nobody, as you can see if you read the rules carefully. The only thing I do is running the program that issues the randomly selected challenges and signs them with my PGP public key. Everybody who wants to participate is their own judge -- THEY will know if they've done it or not. I don't certify results in any way, nor do I issue scores. Actually, the reason why these titles may be considered worthy of trust is exactly because they are based on a well-defined, non-subjective procedure that anybody can verify. Q: The thing I'm good at is deathmatch. If I beat a DOOM Master at deathmatch, do I become one? A: No. The only way to earn a title is to pass the exam. You earn a title because you proved you could beat a specific challenge. Obviously it is conceivable that, after this, someone else once beats you in a deathmatch challenge, but this does not *prove* that he would definitely be up to the same exam challenge as you did. There is some correlation, but certainly not an implication. Thus, beating a decorated player at deathmatch, while certainly a good performance, does not and should not imply that one gets the title without passing the exam. And deathmatch battles are not consistent for ratings, because the next time the results might be reversed. Besides there is another marginal point, which is that the exam stuff has been designed to be very easily and unquestionably verifiable by anybody. One can only claim to be a DM because they can show you the exam file, with authentication dance and all. If they falsely claimed to be a DGM, you could very well ask to see the exam file and it would then be obvious that they're bluffing. So the titles are worth something because they can be authenticated by anybody who wants to. You don't have to trust any central authority or committee. "Proving" that you have beaten a DM would be much more cumbersome. Q: Why are these rules called V.3? What was the difference between V.1 and V.2? A: Nothing, really. It's just that at a certain point I added this "questions and answers" section, and I named the file "DHT2"; it wasn't actually a new set of rules. The only thing that changed at that time is that I started insisting that people give me a real name as well as an optional pseudonym. That should have been V.1.1 if anything. But who cares now? Q: I have an old challenge, which I haven't completed. Can I change to a new one for the same title? I prefer the new rules. A: No. The rules are sufficiently similar to the old ones that I don't think I should make specific allowances for this. I think it's more important to maintain the fact that you can't get more than one chance at your pick of missions. The only relevant case of a major difference was DGAK, and there was only one instance of that, and I dealt with that one specifically. Q: Can I request other challenges even if I haven't completed DM yet? A: Yes you can (basically because it would cost me more time to go and check whether you really are a DM than to issue the new challenge), but I don't recommend it. If you do, you overload me with more requests than I would normally have to process, and the challenge-issuing activity will probably become slower. Q: I can't do FTP, so I can't upload my exam file to the official repository. Can I uuencode it to you so that you do it for me? A: No way! For no reason in the world should you send me your exam file. Neither to have me look at it, nor to have me upload it somewhere. If I want to watch some LMP action, I download other people's exams from the repository _when_I_feel_like_it_, but I don't want these exams overflowing my mailbox and waiting for a reply. I WON'T REPLY AT ALL TO MESSAGES CONTAINING AN EXAM FILE: I'll junk them immediately. I barely keep up with issuing challenges; when I have some free time I much prefer playing DOOM myself rather than messing about with more DHT administrative stuff! :-) Q: Suppose that someone finds or writes a cheat that goes undetected in LMPs. Then all those titles become basically crap, right? A: Well, in a sense yes. But in fact no, not at all. There are a number of ways in which cowards could cheat their way through the DHT system, from easy ones like requesting multiple challenges under different names and from different accounts to more elaborate ones like hacking the binary data in the LMPs or hacking DOOM so that it records in slow motion. The system has been designed to address the basics of security, but it is by no means foolproof. Its greatest non-technical protection, however, comes from the fact that everything is public (including the log of requests) and that there is no judging commission. If someone tries to cheat they will easily fool me, but they can't possibly fool ALL the people who will be watching their LMPs. Someone will spot them, and tell the rest of the world on a.g.d. But there is something else, which is: Why bothering excessively with these losers? Being too paranoid about them, and trying to devise more and more sophisticated ways of making the system secure at all costs is only going to get in the way of us legitimate players, just like copy protection does for software. Let's take the example of id, who left out copy protection from DOOM and only relied on the honour system. Let's leave these cheating cowards, incapable of facing a cacodemon, and who probably didn't even register, to their little tricks; we, meanwhile, will continue to play this great game in the only way that makes sense. Click-clack. Ka-BOOOM! Click-clack. <END: explanations and FAQs> - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Frank (Filologo Disneyano) (still only DOOM Master) -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: 2.3a iQBFAgUBLkQioGNjDGKdRrEtAQFrDAF6A8muW4tFeVDGpOXIrlCR9ZLHxGF3G9mY o9ogAqzPXYqpnZyNt2fMI6l8ZXi0xF8c =Gwd6 -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----