Would be nice if you could only look at your own country in MP saves

[Leermeister]

Yeah it would be nice if when you loaded a multiplayer save you could only pick the country you originally started the game with. Or make it an option. I know no one looks at saves but it is pretty easy to cheat like this in every paradox game, can always have a convenient 'my game crashed ' to check on your enemy, or study what your enemy's planning by loading your opponents country in between sessions.

just as well to have no fog of war at all.

anyway an option for this would be nice.


like i said, i know no one cheats in the world which is why i play poker with cards that have the card face printed on both sides and use the honor system not to look at each others hand.
seems to work since no ones ever said they looked.

 

[Metz]

Maybe game host can password the save so that only he can load it up and get others to join and play in MP. That way people who don't have the password, cant play the game by themselves as single player.

 

[KevinG]

Maybe game host can password the save so that only he can load it up and get others to join and play in MP. That way people who don't have the password, cant play the game by themselves as single player.

Giving the host the ability to look through saves is still bad. Ideally you would let every player password protect their country. I can imagine this information would be stored somewhere accessible to the host if he really tried hard to cheat, but it would at least make it harder for cheaters than just giving the host everyone's password.

 

[Leermeister]

Anyway i was playing an old game called Imperialism in multiplayer recently and it only allows you to join the country you were playing. I do believe Civilization V is also like this. its probably possible to still look at an enemy country in the save file but it wouldn't be as simple as a process as just picking your rivals country and loading up all their secrets, as it has been in HOI. At least make it difficult to look at your opponents hand.

 

[Marshall18]

Agree with OP. This is a needed thing in MP. I don't trust my fellow paradoxians

 

[EmperorTojo]

Doesn't this sort of thing exist for EU4 already? Perhaps I am mistaken.

 

[Centurion1973]

Giving the host the ability to look through saves is still bad. Ideally you would let every player password protect their country. I can imagine this information would be stored somewhere accessible to the host if he really tried hard to cheat, but it would at least make it harder for cheaters than just giving the host everyone's password.

When save gets corrupted, someone has to be able to test the fix - that can mean loading specific country.

We encountered cases, where for example japanese CV became bugged (CTD when trying to move) and I fixed save by deleting it and creating new one elsewhere. I hosted the game and played UK, but everyone trusted me not to abuse my knowledge.

IMO, there should be option to choose, if countries in MP games would be locked with passwords or not.

 

[Leermeister]

Perhaps they patched it into EU4-- when Eu4 first came out you could load saves and select any country like hoi3.

I just loaded EU4 and they do have some options that may help this now, although not solve the problem. like no editable save option. Although it is still pretty simple for Germany and Italy to load up the allies save and have a look. Just has to be 2 people to look at it. really though i can just wait for some guy to enter my game room and launch the game to look at the save. Having the only host save option does not really help as it just lets one side have a save to look at.

Be best if there was no editable save option and something similar to Civ5 where you have to play as the same country. Best to make this an option with no editable save.

not that anyone cheats in computer games.

As far as people needing to look at saves to edit units in a said country i think a better solution would be for paradox to repair the bugs with patches the best they can and the game shouldn't be designed on the premise that
there will be many bugs to fix yourself so we need the ability to edit and look at saves.

Ill trust the game not to bug out and paradox to iron out the bugs over trusting every gamer in the world not to take the obvious option to look at their enemy's country.

A new Option would be nice in MP --Lock Country's-

 

[Metz]

I feel that from my experiences in organized MP games, most players are honest about these things.

 

[Leermeister]

I feel that from my experiences in organized MP games, most players are honest about these things.

Yeah i know no ones ever looked at a save, which is why this option wont hurt anyone

 

[TheRomanRuler]

People only tend to cheat with randoms or when they are for example screwing their friend, honor code can make people kill themselves (Japany in WW2), it certainly works in video games. Usually. So only do this if PI has time for it.

 

[Leermeister]

People only tend to cheat with randoms or when they are for example screwing their friend, honor code can make people kill themselves (Japany in WW2), it certainly works in video games. Usually. So only do this if PI has time for it.

so basically people will cheat with random people and when their screwing their friend. Honor code also has its down sides yes, which is why we should have the option to lock countries-- passwords a great idea

 

[TheRomanRuler]

so basically people will cheat with random people and when their screwing their friend. Honor code also has its down sides yes, which is why we should have the option to lock country's-- passwords a great idea

Countries*

True.

 

[DesertSnow]

Anyway i was playing an old game called Imperialism in multiplayer recently

It is sad how fast time progresses in RL. I still love that games' series though...

 

[Leermeister]

It is sad how fast time progresses in RL. I still love that games' series though...

yep, game was made in 1998, should not be too hard for paradox to implement this feature

 

[potski]

Maybe game host can password the save so that only he can load it up and get others to join and play in MP. That way people who don't have the password, cant play the game by themselves as single player.

The save file is in plain text. So any passwords would be stored in the file and be readable. Or at worst be a hash value. Someone would work out the algorithm and post it, under the excuse that someone has forgotten a password, and needs a tool to help them recover the file.

A password is not required if the save file is only stored on the hosts PC. But then they have the access to it.

Ultimately, the only secure way to do it would be to run MP games through a Paradox server, where the save file is stored, and access to a game once started can only be made by the original players, logging on through their Paradox forum accounts. No-one would have access to the whole save file.

 

[Mabzie555]

I feel this would cause more problems than it solves.

 

[Leermeister]

I feel this would cause more problems than it solves.

How so? Having an option to password countries would cause what problem? other then not being able to look at the locked country so easily

 

[pzeper]

The save file is in plain text. So any passwords would be stored in the file and be readable. Or at worst be a hash value. Someone would work out the algorithm and post it, under the excuse that someone has forgotten a password, and needs a tool to help them recover the file.

As long as it's a cryptographic hash it doesn't matter if they are able to figure out the algorithm or not.

 

[Premu]

How so? Having an option to password countries would cause what problem? other then not being able to look at the locked country so easily

You need to rework the whole save game format, turning it from a plain text file into a unreadable binary. Otherwise the password protection is pointless as you can easily read the savegame or change it in a way you can actually load it without any trouble.

This will also affect the modability of the game, as well as debugging. For a plain text file you don't need any further tools, for a binary you need to add a kind of compiler which can transform the whole information into a readable form - of course only available for the developers, not for the end users.