Technical solution to eliminate desync in single-player sessions

"

Well, according to that white paper, it really does simply not work. The standard does not cover trigonometric functions, nor does it make any guarantees across different systems.

No biggy. You shouldn't need this level of precision anyway. This is combat/pathing we're talking about, just use a consistent rounding mode and you're safe.

"

You can with quality-increasing items. But I was more thinking of unequipping/reequipping.

Equipping/unequipping would not desync you. The client and server both know the stats of the equipment.

"

I wasn't disputing the fact you can't cheat death. I was pointing out that legit players can still die "to desync", even with minor lag/latency.

You would only potentially desync in situations that involve heavy latency. Equipping/unequipping items will not require a re-sync.

"

I've already pointed out two different scenarios where desync will occur, even with low latency.

See above.

"

MeltingPoint wrote:

"

TheBigNasty wrote:

So are we to take away that desync is just a fact of life in this game, it will always exist, and if you do not like the situation as it, then you should find another source of entertainment as it is not going to change?



From a customer perspective, I think it would be interesting to know what GGG's top 5 priorities are for the game moving forward and if desync is one of them. If I speculate with a bit of cynicism, I wonder how that top 5 would match the top 5 from the community. I can't speak to the former, but I highly suspect the latter would include desync, no matter what resource cost that would entail.

Several times now he's posted what the alternatives are: Cheating, Guaranteed Hits, Removal of Accuracy, Hits from a greater distance, and more.

Number one alone, cheating, I can guarantee would have the community in 10 times the uproar. The others would just make the game feel cheaper.

You must be 1/2 ..... it has been stated many times you would need million dollar hardware to cheat, and at that point good luck getting a return on the money spent.

"

What I see is the seed, hashed or not, is the seed. Since its on an untrusted system, how does that hide the 'seed' from anyone?

The point of the cryptographic hash is NOT to hide the seed, but to make it computationally impractical for hacks to calculate all permutations with the seed.

"

Floating point math is the BANE of complex computing.

No biggy, this level of floating point precision is not needed in the first place, so it shouldn't be a problem for this proposal.

"

Several times now he's posted what the alternatives are: Cheating, Guaranteed Hits, Removal of Accuracy, Hits from a greater distance, and more.

Number one alone, cheating, I can guarantee would have the community in 10 times the uproar. The others would just make the game feel cheaper.

If 0.0001% players were able to get more frequent critical strikes, would you trade that to be able to eliminate lag/desync?

This is all about trade-offs. I am proposing a system that is extremely difficult to cheat, and it would not effect item drops/crafting/etc. And in effect, we could eliminate desync and lag. Extremely skilled hackers may be able to improve their critical strikes/chance to hit. A worthwhile trade imo.

"

Tantabobo wrote:

"

TheBigNasty wrote:

So are we to take away that desync is just a fact of life in this game, it will always exist, and if you do not like the situation as it, then you should find another source of entertainment as it is not going to change?



From a customer perspective, I think it would be interesting to know what GGG's top 5 priorities are for the game moving forward and if desync is one of them. If I speculate with a bit of cynicism, I wonder how that top 5 would match the top 5 from the community. I can't speak to the former, but I highly suspect the latter would include desync, no matter what resource cost that would entail.

Where are you getting this from?

This thread is not about how GGG is working on reducing desync, it is on this particular solution.

That being said, you are correct in essence. Desync will always exist, for a myriad of reasons. That is not to say that it can't be reduced. Furthermore, GGG has stated that it is a goal to improve their code to reduce desync. But it is not a simple solution that can be easily implemented. It is an extremely complex problem that with no straightforward sure fire remedies.

What I'm getting at is that every time I see GGG respond about desync issues, they list several reasons why a proposed solution won't work either as a technical solution, or they aren't willing to accept the consequences of a proposed solution (cheating, overhaul of code, etc). So be it. It's their game, they can build it how they like, of course.

With all the reasons why they can't do x, y, or z; I haven't heard them say we're doing AA instead, we have a plan, or something similar. There was a post a few months ago by Mark, but nothing appears to have occurred since then. So, that leads to the natural conclusion is desync going to be a fact of life for this game.

If that's the case, I think it's important to let the player base know. Some people will accept it, some will move on, some won't care one way or another. For the people that have been holding off or waiting to come back until it's fixed, it would be valuable information for them.

"

qwave wrote:

"

What I see is the seed, hashed or not, is the seed. Since its on an untrusted system, how does that hide the 'seed' from anyone?

The point of the cryptographic hash is NOT to hide the seed, but to make it computationally impractical for hacks to calculate all permutations with the seed.

you don't want a hash than, a hash is one way, and will not work for what you want it to work for. Now, a standard encryption on the seed that can be reversed client side will work, but that does nothing to stop hacks. As it is now in memory and easily accessible.

"

Nithryok wrote:

"

MeltingPoint wrote:

"

TheBigNasty wrote:

So are we to take away that desync is just a fact of life in this game, it will always exist, and if you do not like the situation as it, then you should find another source of entertainment as it is not going to change?



From a customer perspective, I think it would be interesting to know what GGG's top 5 priorities are for the game moving forward and if desync is one of them. If I speculate with a bit of cynicism, I wonder how that top 5 would match the top 5 from the community. I can't speak to the former, but I highly suspect the latter would include desync, no matter what resource cost that would entail.

Several times now he's posted what the alternatives are: Cheating, Guaranteed Hits, Removal of Accuracy, Hits from a greater distance, and more.

Number one alone, cheating, I can guarantee would have the community in 10 times the uproar. The others would just make the game feel cheaper.

You must be 1/2 ..... it has been stated many times you would need million dollar hardware to cheat, and at that point good luck getting a return on the money spent.

What planet do you live on to think that 'millions of dollars of hardware' is needed to cheat in online games. Some random guy says it 'computationally expensive' to break a hashing algorithm and that's the gold standard of evidence for you?

Not only is it demonstrative not true, it would be infinity easier when the algorithm is sitting on the hackers computer to watch in the first place. Its the exact same reason sites like LastPass suggest you hash your pass phrase not once, but thousands of times.

Making it simply "more difficult" to cheat also makes cheating more rewarding. In the end it's a wash, because as it becomes more rewarding, more people will cheat.

"

qwave wrote:

"

Any communication from the client can be manufactured by hack instead of being legitimate, and any communication received by the client can be used by the hack to manufacture that communication.

The server would identify the hack because the client could only cheat by generating data that is outside the scope of the deterministic seed. In other words, if your next hit is supposed to do 150 damage, and your hacked snapshot says you did 1000 damage, the server would be able to deterministically evaluate that this was not properly generated.

Sorry if someone has already made this observation, but I haven't read past the above claim by the OP. It reveals a fundamental misconception on his part that invalidates his subsequent assumptions and theories. His validation scheme would not work for the following reason:

The simulations run by the PoE client and server are inherently non-deterministic and cannot be reproduced. There is thus no reliable way for the server to validate the results produced by the client.