On Mon, Dec 10, 2001 at 08:09:58PM -0800, Daniel Damouth wrote: > From: "Brian Paulsen" <brian at thePaulsens.com> > > Why would messaging through sockets be cheating? Surely, we don't > > consider INL teams sitting all in one room to be cheating, do we? > > Why should they be allowed to communicate outside the normal > > messaging system, but bots can't? > Sophisticated methods of communicating, such as beeplite, are considered > cheating/borgish. And what he's suggesting goes way beyond beeplite. If I > built any special socket code into my team's clients, it would not be > INL/WNL legal. It would be blatant cheating. > > There is no way humans can do what he describes. Even sitting right next to > someone doesn't come close. > By the same token, it would be impossible for a robot player, given current technology to truly adapt to situations whose variables could not be determined at compile time. Does this make the human player a cheater? You may be able to swivel your hand to torp in one direction, and phaser in another, faster than I can. Does this mean that you are cheating, merely because I am incapable of having as quick reflexes as you do? The 'rules' of Netrek are quite well defined. They can be found in the vanilla source code maintained by this list. The only additional rules, as configured by server administrators, is that the computer cannot be used to 'aid' a player in such ways as may be considered 'cheating' by the server administrator. As it is, it is a *given* that a server administrator that chose to allow a fully automated robot on the server, would do so under the full knowledge that server rules will be exploited to the best of abilities by the robot, and as implemented by the robot designers. In a 'robot league', I would consider the intervention of a *human* player, potentially 'cheating'. Those who play the game according to tradition, are restricted by tradition. Those who exploit the rules to their advantage, have the maximum potential to win. The robots won't be snivelling and crying because they don't have the mental capacity to adapt with as much potential as a human player. What gives humans the right to snivel and cry, because they cannot match the reflexes, or organization potential, of a computer? Consider the true tradition of Netrek. It is based off Star Trek. What is the greatest enemy of all non-Q entities in the galaxy? :-) The borg. Why? Because they do not live by the same rules as the rest of the species in the Universe. Where humanity thrives on independence, the borg thrive on the collective. In the true sense of the word, and the concept, the implementation I am suggesting truly is a mirror of this 'collective' as defined by Star Trek. The abilities of this 'collective' strongly match technologies that are described in Star Trek. Do you fear the borg? :-) Starfleet certainly does... mark -- mark at mielke.cc/markm at ncf.ca/markm at nortelnetworks.com __________________________ . . _ ._ . . .__ . . ._. .__ . . . .__ | Neighbourhood Coder |\/| |_| |_| |/ |_ |\/| | |_ | |/ |_ | | | | | | \ | \ |__ . | | .|. |__ |__ | \ |__ | Ottawa, Ontario, Canada One ring to rule them all, one ring to find them, one ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them... http://mark.mielke.cc/