Re: Tired of dying in nethack?

On Sun, 07 Dec 2008 04:53:52 -0600, "Brian M. Dean" <elzoog@xxxxxxxxx>
scribed into the ether:


Basically, you are making a value judgment.

No, I'm not. If you want to cheat, go ahead and cheat. Just don't try to
justify it as anything other than cheating.

Define "cheating".

Deliberately contravening the rules of the game to gain an advantage.

Does it take more skill to
ascend without it? Sure it does. However, what's the likelihood that
you will accomplish much other than being able to brag to your friends
by ascending?

Something equally true in pretty much every other game ever invented.

Yeah, EXACTLY my point. So arguing over things like "save scumming" or
"pudding farming" or other things like that seems kind of pointless.

And yet, here you are, continuing to try to justify your cheating. Why is
that, I wonder?

Unlike Starcraft where if you are really good at it, you could make money
at it.

Irrelevant, and really it's long past time for you to get off of this
Starcraft fascination.

However, it's worthy of note that you will never get really good at
Starcraft if you enable the cheats and load up an army for yourself. I'm
sure the korean starcraft league cheers on people who cheat in their
professional tournaments.

By the way, Starcraft has the ability to save and restore a game.

So you mentioned before, and I still don't care.

Well, my point is not just Starcraft but just about EVERY game out there
has a save and restore feature. If that is "cheating" then there are a
hell of a lot of games out there where "cheating" is put into the game by
design.

It's not cheating when it's deliberate. Are you really that dense? And
"just about EVERY game" is a gross exageration, even if we confine our
definition of a game to only ones that take place via microchips. I
couldn't count the hundreds (if not thousands) of games I've played that
had no save feature at all.


But trying to justify cheating as non-cheating? Sorry, that's incredibly
lame.

You have a pretty strange idea of what is "cheating".

My definition is just fine. You being in denial that you're cheating
doesn't automagically make it no longer cheating.

I appreciate that you have your own little self image, and you don't think
of yourself as a cheater, and that you're taking being called a cheater as
an insult, but it's not. It's simply a description of your actions.

And worse, it might give another new player the same idea,

See, this is what I find particularly offensive. So what if I give a new
player the same idea?

We like to encourage new players to better themselves. Savescumming makes
you a worse player, not a better one.

Basically, it's YOU who is denying someone else the right to have fun in
whatever way the person wants.

Funny, I don't remember going to anyone's house and putting a gun to their
head if they savescum in Nethack.

and
will deprive him of the ability to get better, the way you're depriving
yourself.

Shouldn't that be left up to me, or the new player to decide if it really
does deprive him of the ability to get better?

No. That it deprives you of being able to get better is not a matter of
opinion, and it is not up for debate, any more than we could argue about
what kinds of monsters a certain game symbol stands for. It's simply a
fact.

It's up to you or a new player if you want to cheat, but the consequences
of cheating are not debateable.

Besides all the other roguelikes, all MMOs, all games played outside of
the confines of a computer, and like 90% of the games released for the
NES?

Show me the save/reload feature on Super Mario Bros, please.

Earlier versions of Super Mario had the ability to leave off at the
beginning of the level where you died instead of forcing you to start
over again from the very beginning.

Earlier versions, which would then imply the ability was removed in later
versions.

Really, a strong arguement for you to make. Go you.

It's also not save/reload, BTW. So even in the context of it being a very
bad and self-defeating example, it's still invalid and wrong.

Not really. "save scumming" (as you call it) is different from "explore
mode". I already explained why.

A meager difference at best, and the term substantially predates my
involvement in Nethack. I don't call it that. That's what it is called.
I hope you understand the difference.

So if you don't call it "save scumming" then what do YOU call it?

That would be a "no", you don't understand the difference. Let's try it
again with a different example...

A metal machine on rubber spinning things goes past me on the flat expanse
of poured asphalt and concrete. I look over, point at it, and say "There's
a car"

Did I just call it a car, or was it ALREADY CALLED A CAR, and I'm just
using the previously established term for this thing?

Was that easier for you to understand, or do I need to make it simpler?

Plus, the massive proliferation of save/reload in games now is one
reason why I seldomly play them.

Yeah, because save/reload is cheating.

No, because it makes the game too easy. It's not cheating when it's a
deliberate feature.

You can't REALLY be this dense, can you?


When I do, I don't use the save/reload
function. It makes them too easy. Now, I don't expect anyone else to
come around to that line of thinking, because you can play your game
however you want to. But CHEATING IS CHEATING. Justifying cheating
doesn't magically make it no longer cheating.

And justifying telling other people how they should play a game doesn't
magically make it no longer telling people how they should play a game.

I'm saying "Don't cheat". That's not telling people how they should play a
game, it's telling them not to cheat, because cheating isn't playing the
game, it's playing outside the game. I could single handedly defeat an
entire professional football team if I could cheat. I'll drug their
gatorade and give myself 10,000 downs before having to turn the ball over.
I'm not really playing football anymore, but I'm beating them, and I guess
in your book that's justification enough.

Or you don't savescum, and you eat the penalty for screwing up, and
learn from it. Maybe you try something off the wall and you end up
living, which makes you more likely to live next time you get into deep
trouble. When you remove the penalty for screwing up, you don't learn
from screwing up.

Well, in a recent savescum game I have been dying a lot because I
sacrificed on an altar and got Magicbane. However, I have no food and
can't "pray" when I get weak. Therefore, I have to find food so that I
don't die from starvation. Savescum gives me the ability to explore
options on how to do that. Playing normally would simply kill me and
force me to start from the beginning again and redo things I already know
how to do.

I think that continually killing newts is boring, don't you?

The newts aren't the challenge. Not starving to death is the challenge.
You're ignoring the challenge by cheating, making yourself a shitty player.
Better players who don't have a savescummed crutch would know not to altar
camp all their food away. You aren't a good player, so you haven't figured
that part out. You're not becoming a better player because instead of
learning how to be a better player, you're metagaming the problem out of
existance.

I am merely giving this as an extreme example of how "save scumming" is
different from "explore mode". But maybe that example was too subtle
for you. How about a first level character against a 1000000 hit point
giant?

A level 1 character vs a 1 million hitpoint giant means that something
really extraordinarily bad has happened in your game, and these things
are usually your own fault.

Since this situation is only possible by actually going into the code and
creating it on purpose, that's pretty extraordinarily bad.


See what I did there? Or was it too subtle?

Yeah, you merely put your hands on your ears and cried "MOMMY!" over
again.

I guess you really ARE that dense. It was too subtle.

I notice you totally ignored my section on how this same example would
force you to find a different solution under "save scumming".

I love how you put it in quotes, like I just made up the phrase for this
conversation. So cute. Hint: Trying to devalue the term because you
don't want to be refered to as scum won't work. There's a reason it's
phrased that way.

Yeah, it's a stupid reason.

And putting it in quotes to try and invalidate the term is even stupider. I
suppose you put car in quotes too. I'm sorry that you don't like being
refferd to as scum, but happily there's an easy solution: Stop cheating and
the phrase will no longer apply.

It's unfortunate that you choose to take these terms so personally. I
don't. You could go look at my NAO profile and see that at one point I did
some massive startscumming to get a decent wizard to ascend with. I fully
acknowledge that I was startscumming, and that this word accurately
describes what I did. And yet, since I don't take the term personally (like
you do), I manage to still sleep at night despite my err...terrible
indiscretion...or whatever.

Already read those. Very opinionated. I don't like other people
telling me how I should be enjoying a game. Let's see

Nobody that I've seen has told you not to savescum. We've pointed out
that it is cheating, and given reasons why you shouldn't do it.

Yeah, in other words you are telling me not to do it.

In magic land where "here is why you shouldn't and "don't do it" mean the
same thing, yes that's exactly what we've done.

1) The likelihood that I would make a lot of money being a nethack
expert: 0%

Replace "nethack" with...well, pretty much every other game ever
invented by man, and it remains true. So what?

Actually, that's not true for some other games. There are people who
have made a lot of money being professional Starcraft players.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/StarCraft_professional_competition

Also, there are professional sports such as baseball, football, etc.

And Starcraft isn't the only computer game where you could make a lot of
money being a good player.

So, can you give me any examples of someone making money by ascending
their character in nethack?

You're a middle school teacher, and yet can't tell the difference between
"pretty much every other" and "every other"? I weep for the children under
your inept care.

At no point did I claim that no game makes money, and at no time did I
claim that nethack did. So it should come as no surprise to you (but
probably will anyway) that I find your entire line of arguement completely
stupid. But then, that's what strawmen arguements like you're making
are...stupid.


2) The likelihood that I might impress a few people if I ascend without
"save scumming" or "cheating": maybe 50%

Since nobody is impressed with a cheated ascension, this statement is
incorrect. The actual number is 100%, presuming you were to (truthfully)
post the accomplishment where people might see it.

I doubt it's 100%. And who would I be impressing anyway?

That you would impress a few people? Well, any -legit- ascension impresses
me (and yes, I've ascended myself), so that's one. Just need 2 more people
and 100% is achieved. So yes, I stand by that number.

3) The likelihood that I might impress anyone worth impressing by
ascending without "save scumming" or "cheating": pretty close to 0%,
maybe 10%

Since you seem to care what we think, I'd say this number is also 100%.

I don't care about what people think who seem to want to tell other
people how to have fun.

And yet, here you are, arguing nonstop about it. I notice you clipped out
the part where I already explained how this worked. You deny caring, we
don't believe you....why did you go ahead and do it anyway?

Besides, what if I did ascend without cheating and posted it on here.
What would I get from YOU other than "good job"?

Nothing. Why would you expect more? Why would you deserve more? Do you only
do stuff for money? What a pathetic life you must lead if that's true.

Oh I forgot. You think that "save files" are cheating don't you.

No, I don't. That's your fanciful interpretation of my beliefs with no
basis in reality.


5) The likelihood that I would be convicted of a major felony and have
to serve prison time for "save scumming" in nethack: 0%

Replace nethack with any other game, and the statement becomes equally
true.

There is a remote possibility of being fined for copyright violation in
the case of Starcraft if you were to try to sell a professional level
save file that isn't yours. Although the possibility of that is quite
remote.

Viewing a recording of someone else playing is not cheating, and copyright
violation is not a felony. Please stop being so deliberately stupid in
public.

You're the one who posted it in the first place. What were you trying to
accomplsih? Was it just trolling?

I am trying to tell you guys that you should lighten up on how people
play computer games.

No, NOW you're trying to justify cheating.

I'm asking what you were trying to accomplish when you made your original
post. You know, the one where you were trying to make it sound like you'd
suddenly discovered this amazing thing that you could do to cheat in
nethack.


B) Not all with the fancy graphics (those self-same people tend to value
graphics over gameplay),

Yeah, that's why people write tilesets for nethack and why the Devteam
even has an official set of tiles and why some people have "absurd tiles"
as well as tiles they made themselves. It's because they don't care at
all about graphics.

I'm sure you're not seriously trying to compare a tiles version of nethack
with say...Far Cry, because that would be a new depth of stupid.

and C) Complicated (most people prefer games that can be played with
about 5 buttons)

I don't mind complicated games. I just don't think I should be told that
my way of playing it is "cheating" or "wrong".

Nobody said wrong. But cheating is 100% accurate, no matter how much you
want it to not be true.
.

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