Yet Another Scripting Debate...

Forlorn

<div class="IPBDescription">But this one is a tid bit different!</div> Well, linked <a href='http://www.ampednews.com/?page=articles&id=1055&comments=1#comments' target='_blank'>here</a> we have as sophiscated oppinions of pro and con on scripts.

Which side do you agree with, and why?

Amplifier

Scripts are perfectly legal, baseball players wear gloves.

7Bistromath

My opinion on scripting is that I wish people would stop making threads about it.

Soylent_green

<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> Scripts are perfectly legal, baseball players wear gloves.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->

Please stop with the analogies they do no justice to the issue. I could just as easilly argue that scripts are perfectly unjust, athletes should not and are not allowed to use steroids. Neither analogy says anything at all about the actual issue.

(note, I don't actually want to make this argument, just show how analogies don't do justice and are irrelevant)

Soylent_green

I think everything that is not labelled an exploit is fair game for scripting until the developer says otherwise.

It's quite a trivial matter to say, have a built in equivalent of the triple jump script and lock down further scripting with the jump command without affecting other commands and scripts.

Amplifier

Hmm makes sense, but then again steriods would be kinda like hacks I think, maybe, I don't know <!--emo&;)--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wink.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wink.gif' /><!--endemo-->

Zek

I think using the mousewheel to support your argument for the 3-jump script is somewhat of a copout, Forlorn. Mousewheel binds are not technically scripts, but I think they fall under the same category as the issue at the heart of this debate. Both the mousewheel and 3-jump quickly spam the jump command in a manner that is not natural to normal key binds in order to guarantee that you never miss a jump while bunnyhopping. Script, "manual," it's just semantics. They both improve your game in the same way, that's impossible to deny. Do you acknowledge that using the mousewheel to shoot the pistol in 1.04 was an unfair advantage? Why, then, is it different here? Obviously the advantage is not as significant in this case but it's the same in concept. Was it just streamlining your controls when you could use an oversight in the functioning of one particular button to drastically improve your game?

If we are to lump the mousewheel and 3-jump together into the same "scripting" category, what is your defense of the ability to use "scripts" to facilitate bunny hopping? You said <i>"It is my personal opinion that a script only becomes unfair if the script is no longer a preference."</i>, but this clearly is not just preference as it offers a noticable advantage by eliminating human error. It should also be obvious how one can form a reliance on this since it alters the timing of bunny hop jumps and excuses you from having to master it.

Cereal_KillR

<!--QuoteBegin-007Bistromath+Jun 13 2004, 05:11 AM--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> (007Bistromath @ Jun 13 2004, 05:11 AM)</td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin--> My opinion on scripting is that I wish people would stop making threads about it. <!--QuoteEnd--> </td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'> <!--QuoteEEnd-->
my hero <!--emo&:0--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/wow.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='wow.gif' /><!--endemo-->

XCan

Most people agree that if you get an unfair advantage with a script it's considered cheating. Now the main argument of the script-praisers are <i> well if you're good enough scripts are only to be in the way. </i> Good For you, so how many % of the NS-community are actually so good that the script would get in the way? If you say that scripts that aid in bunny-hopping isn't going to give an average player a skill boost I don't know what to say.... <!--emo&???--><img src='http://www.unknownworlds.com/forums/html//emoticons/confused.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='confused.gif' /><!--endemo-->

CMEast

If you were to apply an athlete analogy to this (though Soylent is right, analogies are pretty useless in general... fun though) then apply it to cyclists as they use machines as well as their bodies.

A cyclist is allowed to use many different types of bike and certain types are obviously faster and more efficient, he is quite welcome to use a BMX in a race but it would be inefficient and he'd probably lose. Instead he uses a bike that is designed to amplify all the skill and strength he has and make the most of it.

He isn't allowed to use steroids, he isn't allowed to stick an engine on his bike or be towed along behind a car... that would be breaking the rules, cheating, hacking.

Shooting faster than has been designed = cheating

Bunny hopping more efficiently = Not cheating.

The reason why people say scripts are bad is because they limit you, the cyclist on his ergonimically designed bike will win in a flat race but if he has to cross difficult terrain the BMXer will win easily. Design your bike all you want but you will get caught flat footed when you need to do something else and find you don't have the ability.

If there is going to be an analogy it should least be a vaguely appropriate one. Nicely worded debate on that link but it didn't add anything new to the topic of scripts tbh

juice

The fact that I could use a script and easily get banned for speed hacking on any server speaks plenty to me about the cheapness of scripts. But I think getting rid of the customizability that scripts offer would be really bad. So I'd have to agree with forlorn when he says the heart of the problem is with the engine, and that is what needs fixing, not scripting.

However, Diskord's point about scripts "cheapening" the gameplay is important. Forlorn says about a scriptor performing better than non-scriptor, "that is not the scripts fault, it is that one player learned how to make his controls more streamlined over the other player" but this kind of control streamlining isn't always so innocent. +3jump is NOT innocent. It doesn't make the game more "streamlined" (euphemism alert!) or "customized", it makes the player <b>less fallable</b>. That's right, admit it, using mwheel is more difficult, clumsier, <b>not equally efficient,</b> and easier to screw up than +3jump. That's why people use +3jump. It's that simple. (see Zek's post above) Of course that's just one example of possible scripting; there are other, much worse exploit scripts.

So, scripting itself should stay; what needs to go is the exploits that scripts employ, or too much emphasis will be on scripting: who are the players who use scripts heavily?, ...who is a configpurist?, ...waaaah I'm better cause I don't script,... don't whine punk they're just customizing... blah blah blah endlessly on forever repeatedly again and again over and over.

At least pistol rof is better capped now thank <s>god</s> flayra.

Nemesis_Zero

<!--QuoteBegin--></div><table border='0' align='center' width='95%' cellpadding='3' cellspacing='1'><tr><td><b>QUOTE</b> </td></tr><tr><td id='QUOTE'><!--QuoteEBegin-->Yet Another Scripting Debate.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><div class='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Yet Another <span style='color:red'>***Lock.***</span>