Writing Macros

[Wrish]

You're rather good at making assumptions yourself. You really seem to believe you know how SE thinks.

I said we cannot know that SE can't detect our Windower usage.

You think I can't tell if my fellow LS member is using windower when every mage is asked to stand in line with them, not even a tiny step in front or behind them? Turn me into a GM monitoring a Salvage party with exact position monitors, and bam, someone almost certainly using DrawDistance gets flagged (like you really need it for BC).

Nowhere did I say SE was already doing this or would even resort to this specific method.

Yeah, you're right. That's why those massive amounts of people who were banned a while back were associated with Windower usage, right?

Oh, wait.

Do you know what slippery slope means? SE hasn't to my knowledge banned for Windower per se. They certainly have banned people using plugins to position hack, to write JP and other weird characters on an NA client, to inject commands to claim NMs, and to fish bot and perform other repetitive actions.

It's beside the point that these actions could, with extra programming work, be accomplished without the use of Windower. The point is that the plugin framework exists for people to fall down that path.

Copying and pasting in text files and XML is hard.

I program; please don't understate the time commitment and train of thought required to set up, test, and adapt even basic scripts. I also play alongside Windower users and am acquainted with many of their shortcomings.

When I tell someone to change an important macro while we're actively fighting something and they tell me they have to log out to do so... why do people do this?

What the fuck kind of statement is that, even? "Things that you can accomplish through questionable methods, which I can't, is achievable through the use of questionable methods"?

Questionable methods as in shady plug-ins. How about you name something you can accomplish with Windower and no plugins, that I can't without Windower?

[Mojo]

It can't be said how silly these "ethical issues" regarding Windower are. Nobody cares, get over it. Square Enix designed the game heavily around equipment swapping and yet the user interface that is provided falls short. Nobody should have to tolerate clunky, limited, and laggy macros due to Square Enix's shortcomings. Windower macros just bring the controls closer to transparent, which is what every game developer should strive for.

[TheMysteriousX]

Windower is detectable, anyone who denies it is either retarded or in denial.

I can think of ~5-10 ways to detect it server side, ~5-10 ways to detect it client side without intrusion, and 20-30+ ways to detect it if they ever implemented something like Warden.

SE could so very, very easily detect it. Heaven knows why they don't, and I hope it stays that way.

[Mojo]

Also, a few things to clear up how confused you are. To begin with, Square Enix cannot detect Windower. It's not possible. If you know anything about how Windower works you would know that it wouldn't be possible unless they had some sort of process monitoring disclaimer you agreed to every time you logged onto the game. It's simply illegal for them to do so otherwise based on how windower works.

Second, if you know people who need to log out to change their windower macros, it's because they're retarded and don't know how to properly write windower macros. You can change any windower macro without having to do a damn thing in the FFXI UI.

[TheMysteriousX]

Also, a few things to clear up how confused you are. To begin with, Square Enix cannot detect Windower. It's not possible. If you know anything about how Windower works you would know that it wouldn't be possible unless they had some sort of process monitoring disclaimer you agreed to every time you logged onto the game. It's simply illegal for them to do so otherwise based on how windower works.

Second, if you know people who need to log out to change their windower macros, it's because they're retarded and don't know how to properly write windower macros. You can change any windower macro without having to do a damn thing in the FFXI UI.

You're retarded.

Don't need process monitoring for a process to check it's own taskbar icon/name (that pretty mandragora icon), scan its own memory space for tampering (timestamp, blinkmenot), or check its internal configuration for illegal values (drawdistance).

It's only illegal without consent if they check stuff outside of the FFXI process. Checking the integrity of the FFXI process from within, is not. If you think otherwise, then go sue them for checking the integrity of incoming network data, and see how far you get.

Process monitoring makes client side detection easier, not possible.

You also don't need process monitoring to check gear swap speeds server side (spellcast). FFXI macros are rate limited, windower/spellcast macros are not. IME is another dead giveaway server side - the game reports its region, and only JP clients should have access to IME; therefore, if a non-JP client is sending Kanji characters...

The good news is that should SE decide to detect like this, it is easily defeatable. Dumping the taskbar icon, hooking the integrity checks, and adding a rate limit to spellcast/macros would eliminate all the avenues above.

[Mojo]

Check its internal configuration for illegal values? Are you serious? That distance number is already calculated by the game, it's just not displayed anywhere. Neither one of us programmed windower, but I'm sure it's just pulling that number from the games memory space and displaying it somewhere.

The log files aren't in FFXI's memory space and even if they did have some part of the game's process devoted to looking at those files for the indications of timestamp, it does not necessarily prove anything because you can open those files in notepad and change them if you want.

It's memory space doesn't have to be affected in any way by windower.... and the same user input restrictions apply to windower too. If you issue some command through windower 100 times a second, the server will reject 99 of them.

[Kohan]

I said we cannot know that SE can't detect our Windower usage.

We already know how they can. Fortunately, someone already detailed how. They're not a bunch of fucking retarded monkeys, even if they screw some seemingly obvious stuff up occasionally.

You think I can't tell if my fellow LS member is using windower when every mage is asked to stand in line with them, not even a tiny step in front or behind them? Turn me into a GM monitoring a Salvage party with exact position monitors, and bam, someone almost certainly using DrawDistance gets flagged (like you really need it for BC).

Hilarious. Yeah, no. Go ahead, try reporting that shit and see what happens.

Do you know what slippery slope means? SE hasn't to my knowledge banned for Windower per se. They certainly have banned people using plugins to position hack, to write JP and other weird characters on an NA client, to inject commands to claim NMs, and to fish bot and perform other repetitive actions.

Please do mention the names of those people banned for using the IME. I'd love to hear them. I'd also like you to confirm that they never committed any other violations throughout their entire account history. You're so confident of this, you surely must have all of this information, mustn't you? You're not the one assuming after all, correct?

As for the others, those are some of the most phenomenally retarded examples you could've mentioned, because all of that shit can be accomplished without using Windower at all, and that's the focus of this discussion.

I program; please don't understate the time commitment and train of thought required to set up, test, and adapt even basic scripts. I also play alongside Windower users and am acquainted with many of their shortcomings.

You don't even know what the fuck you're talking about. Fuck you and your programming experience, because it's absolutely worthless in this particular discussion. Editing text macros and XML files for Spellcast is easy as pie.

When I tell someone to change an important macro while we're actively fighting something and they tell me they have to log out to do so... why do people do this?

So you believe people have to log out of a windowed program to edit things in Windows? You really have no clue what the fuck you're talking about. Get the fuck out.

[Wrish]

Mudslinging really smears reputations. Professing things to be impossible in computing really opens you up to this.

Mojo, there are programs to detect hardware virtualization. It is a detection feat an order of magnitude harder than FFXI detecting it is running under Windower, or your antivirus detecting a rogue process/file/tampering, or your banking web site detecting a software keylogger. Any determined programmer knowing what to look for can code a successful detector.

Kohan, we have this fruitless discussion where you don't understand or acknowledge what a "slippery slope" is. I could sprinkle related concepts like "gateway drug," but I think you're just avoiding a debate.

I'm not the one hacking. I won't argue with you about what Windower can and cannot do. I get to play somewhat ignorant. But I know this. I don't see people accomplishing things I know I cannot.

Have you spent so little time with vanilla FFXI that you can't formulate an example of an achievement possible with Windower but impossible without, that wouldn't get you banned straight away? (That stipulation is mainly to rule out position hacking.)

[Cesaria]

I love the "if you stand at the right distance you must be using distance lol" thing. I did BRD to 75 without once using distance plugin (before that pianissimo thing made PLD parties less migraine inducing), I did COR to 75 without it - if you play a job for any length of time and posess even one braincell you get a very very good idea of AOEs for your abilities and stuff anyway.

Yes I use spellcast, yes I use windower script macros - probably about 70% of PC players do (at a conservative estimate). Despite using windower for years - I haven't gone down the slippery slope into harder drugs like botting and the like. Yes, potentially SE could ban every single windower user - but I actually believe this late in the game, they go through the motions of giving a shit and don't really care much about FFXI anymore to be honest... Windower's hold in the playerbase is massive because SE took so damned long to give an official windowed mode. That was their biggest mistake really - because as windower expanded from a way to get at the rest of your PC while playing, it included more and more stuff which the players began to regard as must-haves and it became better and better, so when SE brought out their official one - no one wanted to switch back to what was by then an inferior product.

The only risk I think there is is that they'll do a massive show of strength banning of windower users right at the end of the game's lifespan to remind players who is in charge for when they all switch over to FF14 - i.e. a pretty meaningless gesture but it'll make them feel all authoritative.

[Deader2818]

I can honestly say, if SE bans a bunch of windower users this late in the games life, they can go fuck themselves and I will not play FFXIV at all.

Like you said, its their fault for waiting to damn long to make their own windower and the little space we have to change gear per marco is stupid anyways.

[StevenW]

I love the "if you stand at the right distance you must be using distance lol" thing. I did BRD to 75 without once using distance plugin (before that pianissimo thing made PLD parties less migraine inducing), I did COR to 75 without it - if you play a job for any length of time and posess even one braincell you get a very very good idea of AOEs for your abilities and stuff anyway.

Yes I use spellcast, yes I use windower script macros - probably about 70% of PC players do (at a conservative estimate). Despite using windower for years - I haven't gone down the slippery slope into harder drugs like botting and the like. Yes, potentially SE could ban every single windower user - but I actually believe this late in the game, they go through the motions of giving a shit and don't really care much about FFXI anymore to be honest... Windower's hold in the playerbase is massive because SE took so damned long to give an official windowed mode. That was their biggest mistake really - because as windower expanded from a way to get at the rest of your PC while playing, it included more and more stuff which the players began to regard as must-haves and it became better and better, so when SE brought out their official one - no one wanted to switch back to what was by then an inferior product.

The only risk I think there is is that they'll do a massive show of strength banning of windower users right at the end of the game's lifespan to remind players who is in charge for when they all switch over to FF14 - i.e. a pretty meaningless gesture but it'll make them feel all authoritative.

I think the only thing about Windower that could be considered cheating is fillmode 1/2.... But so the fuck what? lol

You know what's going to murder you when you turn a corner, most of the time that doesn't even help. In Nyzul it helps me find specific mobs before we spread out and the one dumbass who doesn't know how to operate sneak/invis ninjutsu etc. aggro's 3 mobs.

[Wrish]

You are right, Cesaria, that any experienced player can easily stand at acceptable range to avoid most nasty AoE's because there's leeway to the workable ranges... with one exception probably being frog chorus for a caster, which you can get over with a bit more tedium or by stunning the move outright.

But the observation that distinguishes some DrawDistance users from nonusers is the consistency of their approach to keeping distance. For example, and I'm making up some numbers, BC could have a Discoid range of 12' (10' centered on tank) and the usual 10' range on other moves (meaning 8' from tank), so that your mages can stand 8.1-10' from the tank. When your "reference point" mage has a habit of standing 10.0' from tank despite there being no legitimate way of calibrating that from the start (i.e., by missing Discoid), you obviously have a DrawDistance user. It's not human to know this distance so well without snooping the coordinates from memory. A very obvious defense would be to know the acceptable ranges and to purposely randomize one's distance within that range, but you know in the playerbase there are bound to be those who do not make the effort to do this.

A very effective method of detecting bots can be adapted to detect distance plugins; namely, the distance info skews the normal distribution and randomization from a player without such info. When bard is casting ballad and you learn you are >12.0' from bard, you step closer; otherwise, you don't. Your final distances turn from a normal distribution to a bell curve with an upper cap or plateau. Obviously, this involves some long term data collection; you need statistics with a low margin of error (and botters typically give that).

But all this discussion is tangential. Ethics/morals have nothing to do with not using Windower because you're afraid of SE detecting and banning for it. That's not why I avoid using it... the chance of them banning vanilla Windower is probably very low. I avoid it because it is by principle unfair. This is like a sport. You can have a personal top speed of 30 mph for 100 meters, and one can design a machine to assist you up to 30 mph, but you know it's still unfair to use that machine in a 100m dash.

[Kohan]

Kohan, we have this fruitless discussion where you don't understand or acknowledge what a "slippery slope" is. I could sprinkle related concepts like "gateway drug," but I think you're just avoiding a debate.

There is no debate, you hopeless dipshit. I provided facts, you offered nothing. You're implying I don't know how to debate when you've brought absolutely nothing to the table. You've made it absolutely clear that you haven't any idea whatsoever how Windower, its macros, and arguably its most famous plug-in -- SpellCast, that is -- work. That's why you need to shut the fuck up, you ignorant and worthless blowhard. You're arguing on a subject you're totally clueless about.

When you're intelligent enough to do more than downplay the opinions of people who aren't afraid to cuss at your pathetic ass -- I realized long ago that maturity is not embodied within one's choice of words, but their ability to handle whatever life throws at them adequately -- and can actually manage a meaningful debate yourself, come back. We'll have some fun. In the meanwhile, you're presenting yourself as a prim, proper, and educated individual who's nothing but a pansy-ass motherfucker who backpedals at a sign of challenge.

In other words, you should still get the fuck out, you waste of space.

[Jeryhn]

When I tell someone to change an important macro while we're actively fighting something and they tell me they have to log out to do so... why do people do this?

I thought you were somewhat intelligent or even somewhat knowledgeable about Windower until you posted this one line.

You have a problem with Windower, and it is immediately obvious.
You say it's an "unfair" advantage to use Windower, when you do not realize that perhaps the only reasons SE does not ban Windower users are:

1) The functionality of Windower plugins such as LightLuggage, Distance, DrawDistance, Timestamp, and some others are functionalities that are considered standard fare in the world of MMOs. Much of the reason why this data isn't available to the player isn't so much because SE doesn't want the player to be able to access it, but moreso because the UI for the game is static and cannot be edited according to a player's liking (again, a standard feature in modern MMOs).

2) Windower does not, in any way, modify game content or data.
It simply has the functionality to make certain data more immediately accessible to a player, data which is transferred to the memlocs within the client program as a standard function.

3) The Windower site is an area that can be monitored by SE, and therefore it can be judged by them as to whether or not it is malicious towards other users of their content.

4) And perhaps, the most important reason: the backlash towards SE and its products that would be created as a result of taking action against Windower developers and users would be financially catastrophic for their online gameplay department, and perhaps for any future products it would create, online or offline. I'm a big fan of SquareEnix by and large, but the day they act against Windower is the day I boycott all their shit altogether, and I'm most likely not the only one who feels this way.

So at the end of the day, its most likely apparent that Windower is deemed as an "A-OK" program by SE. There is simply nothing wrong with Windower, as judged by SE, or else there would have already been action taken against it, and they have demonstrated that they are willing to do so for programs that can be construed as "cheating" (see: Maury). Your arguments against Windower, beyond perhaps maintaining an "original gameplay experience as initially intended by SE", are flawed.

Moreover, throughout this discussion one of your arguments has been:
"There is nothing a Windower user can do that I cannot."

...Which is only true to an extent, because the correct response is:
"There is nothing I can do that a smart user of Windower can't do better."

And you just don't like that.

[Acevalefor]

I would very much like to see my sample macro duplicated with Windower. I'll give you a hint, it isn't this:

input /p {Gather Together} {Protectra} {Shellra};
input /target <st>;
input /ma "Protectra IV" <me>;
wait 8;
input /ma "Shellra V" <me>;

It looks the same, but it isn't. Windower scripts don't wait for something like /target <st>, it just continues executing the script while the target cursor is up. FFXI will wait as long as I'd like before executing the next line.

Windower scripts also can't be interrupted by executing another macro like FFXI macros can, which may or may not be desirable, depending on what you happen to need at the time (maybe I want to cast Haste instead of Shellra V and don't want to have to interrupt the spell or whatever).

Not trying to say Windower scripts are wrong/evil, they just just can't do everything.

Yekyaa's editor lets me easily edit/copy/paste/rearrange individual macros, sets, or even entire books of macros for multiple accounts. So that point is moot.

It's simple. Use ffxi macro for the spellcasting and remove the /target line and replace <me> with <stpc> to create the same subtarget wait that you did with an extra command line. Then put your desired gear swap console command in there either using spellcast equip triggers or just simple /equip lines. You can make it really complicated or really simple. Either way, the spells won't trigger until you press enter regardless of how many console lines you execute.

This is of course assuming blinkmenot or inserting all gear swaps before the <stpc>

[Wrish]

Kohan, all I hear from you are words of rhetoric, not facts. You haven't established as fact that SE hasn't banned anyone for using vanilla Windower. You're up against a closed courtroom. Neither of us knows what they actually ban people for... other than sparse details in the STF reports. Sure, a player griping about LM-17 probably did more than chat about Windower usage, but we can't be sure they weren't caught by a GM for that alone.

So our debate is at best going to incorporate circumstantial, anecdotal, and logical evidence. For example, if installing Windower is fine, then is it all right to install a plugin that lets you put animated characters in your bazaar message? Looks harmless? Well, I and a few others reported people on this back in the day, and I'm quite certain some PBs and/or bans resulted. Of course, it's still possible they were using more serious hacks concurrently...

This is all the smoking gun evidence you need: Windower violates the ToS. It makes not an ounce of difference that SE has looked the other way; they have not promised to continue doing that, and they have not sanctioned Windower, which means we run this program and its associated plugins at our own peril.

[Deader2818]

The fact that you reported people for that proves how much of a douche you are.

[Wrish]

I thought you were somewhat intelligent or even somewhat knowledgeable about Windower until you posted this one line.

As if it weren't clear from the outset, I have never used Windower. My exposure to this program is limited to the front page of windower.net and the actions of LSmates using the program. Please don't expect me to know a thing about the internal workings of this program... Anything I do appear to know is gratuitous.

For some reason I won't seek to explain, LSmates of mine that claim to use Windower have more often than others had to restart their games or even failed to show up at a post-maintenance camp after telling me their patch finished downloading. If that's not a Windower issue, I'd love to know why we lost claim to some small JP LS because our tanks could not even show.

You say it's an "unfair" advantage to use Windower, when you do not realize that perhaps the only reasons SE does not ban Windower users are:

"Unfair advantage" is an ethical issue. "SE does not ban Windower users" is a deterrent issue. The two are not logically related. Heck, I agree with most of your assessment on why SE hasn't banned most Windower users. At the same time, it is still unfair.

"Nothing wrong" is different from "not worth pursuing." If Windower were absolutely "nothing wrong," why hasn't SE endorsed windower.net, like they have for other sites?

"Speeding is only wrong if you get caught."

[Fievel]

Just use Windower and get over it already.

.

[Kohan]

Kohan, all I hear from you are words of rhetoric, not facts.

Are you fucking kidding me? You're really that dense? This is phenomenal. I already know your history elsewhere, including KI, and I think you're in for the rejection of a lifetime if you didn't simply dust off your BG account for shiggles. People don't play around here, especially with sorry cocksuckers like you who dance around challenges and revert to puffed-up paragraphs of empty, meaningless commentary. You may not technically break the rules of the board, but you sure as fuck won't earn any respect from people who operate according to common sense.

You assumed things to be true, and made statements with absolute confidence. I refuted them because the majority of your commentary was flat out wrong. You avoided arguing against my points because you're absolutely unfamiliar with Windower, which you finally admitted after the fact.

Afterward, you returned to arguing strictly about your dislike for Windower, as it's been made blatantly clear you don't even understand how it functions.

Let's go back to the post of mine you so easily dismissed -- due to your apparent inability to respond to it in an educated fashion -- and pick out some of the gems.

They certainly have banned people using plugins to position hack, to write JP and other weird characters on an NA client, to inject commands to claim NMs, and to fish bot and perform other repetitive actions.

Guess what? "They certainly have banned" means you're absolutely certain. You don't know shit. As I mentioned, those feats can be accomplished without Windower, and that's what this discussion is about.

I program; please don't understate the time commitment and train of thought required to set up, test, and adapt even basic scripts. I also play alongside Windower users and am acquainted with many of their shortcomings.

Here, you associate your own programming knowledge with how players modify their own TXT-based macros and SpellCast XMLs. It's clear you're completely unfamiliar with the subject, because it does not require any programming knowledge whatsoever, and can be edited within minutes, sometimes seconds.

Once again, you're sure of yourself, and completely wrong.

When I tell someone to change an important macro while we're actively fighting something and they tell me they have to log out to do so... why do people do this?

This was, perhaps, the most amusing snippet of all. It's a text file, you motherfucking ignorant piece of garbage. You can literally copy and paste macro lines and edit in the pieces of gear needed according to their in-game names, just like the in-game macros themselves.

For yet another time, you spoke in a manner indicating that you were right, yet your assumptions were 100% incorrect.

Also, has anyone else called you out on associating DrawDistance with Distance? They're two different plugins, dipshit. Get it fucking right.

No, better yet, take the aforementioned advice of getting the fuck out. You've been publicly shamed. You're a fish out of water here. If you truly believe you've the authority to comment so intently on a subject you admit to knowing nothing worthwhile about, you obviously do not prize intelligence -- you accept ignorance, unwillingness to learn, and in general, living blindly and shouting loudly.

Man up to learning about the subjects you wish to debate so you may actually bring something worthwhile to such discussions in the future. Until then, you're wasting everyone's time.

This is all the smoking gun evidence you need: Windower violates the ToS. It makes not an ounce of difference that SE has looked the other way; they have not promised to continue doing that, and they have not sanctioned Windower, which means we run this program and its associated plugins at our own peril.

No, it's not sufficient evidence -- not for you. Regardless of what the Terms of Service say, they don't make your uneducated statements any more possible to verify.

Once you can support your own arguments, do it. Until then, you're nothing but an impotent talker.