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[Asmodeous]

I'm sorry, are you under the impression I'm being angry or vengeful here?

No, I was under the impression that you were arguing for argument's sake -- and more importantly putting words in his mouth he wasn't saying. I assumed that it was inadvertent misunderstanding.

I'm just playing with an idea, here.  "Argument for argument's sake" isn't terribly far off,

See?

but I'd rather just say that I'd like to change a point of view, if I can.  I just think it is silly to consider one kind of exploit or modding of a game fine, but another kind of exploit to be worthy of a derogatory term, like "cheating".

Well, I think you're extending the term "exploit" beyond how he's using it, really, so it's not that his point of view is all that much different or in need of changing, it's that you're defining the word differently.

And isn't using wall designation to herd dwarves something the game wasn't intended to have players use?  It's simply a workaround, but it's still an exploit.

For example, this. What you're doing here is extending the term "exploit," which he defined as "using the game in a manner unintended by the developer," to mean "doing anything in a way that was not originally thought of". Let me explain. The developer didn't intend for dwarves to be so pants-on-head retarded that they would stand on the side of the wall that would cause them to be unable to exit. The developer intended that they would run over and build the wall and then leave, but low and behold the AI has a catastrophic lack of understanding of surroundings at times.

So in this case using the "suspend construction" on a wall, though using it in a way that was not thought of by the developer, is not doing something oppositionally to the developer's intended result (that being your dwarf walling themselves in because the AI doesn't calculate the pathing before building the wall).

Whereas in the sense of seperating stacks of bolts to melt them individually to effectively fabricate extra metal is fairly obviously oppositional to the developer's intention -- it is in all ways equivalent to creating a reaction to take a piece of chalk and turn it into an adamantine wafer, or lead into gold.

It's not bad. However it is exploiting, as he (and most of the gaming community) defined it.

That's far from trolling or getting in an angry huff.

I would like to note I didn't say you were trolling or angry, nor imply it.

Argument for argument's sake, here, Asmodeus? 

Rather much so, yes.

Anyway, yes, I essentially agree, and was trying to make a similar point.  The problem is that "cheating" is a term with an inherent negative connotation.  "Modding" has no negative connotation.  Both, ultimately, describe the same general idea, though: changing the game.

There are subtle differentiations, though. Cheating is generally referring to modding the game to make it noticeably easier. Modding generally refers to adding additional content, missions, quests, and oftentimes ramps the difficulty up.

When talking in Single Player games, cheating is generally viewed in the same light as playing the game on "Easy" or "Chieftan" whereas modding is generally viewed in the same light as playing a fan-expansion or (in the case of some, such as Orc mod) playing the game on "Hard" or "Impossible".

Cheating : Modding :: Science-Fiction : Fantasy.

Though Cheating is a subset of Modding, not all Modding is Cheating.

[NW_Kohaku]

Well, I think you're extending the term "exploit" beyond how he's using it, really, so it's not that his point of view is all that much different or in need of changing, it's that you're defining the word differently.

A semantic argument, perhaps, but still one that could be worth making.  If we are defining one set of things people do as inherently fine, and another is labeled as negative, but these things are very similar, then it raises potential for cognative dissonance. 

Raising points of potential cognative dissonance, while not necessarily an act of malice, to people is something of a habit or passtime of mine.  How people handle such things is quite revealing, and if they recognize dissonance, it could even lead them to confront it.

For example, this. What you're doing here is extending the term "exploit," which he defined as "using the game in a manner unintended by the developer," to mean "doing anything in a way that was not originally thought of". Let me explain. The developer didn't intend for dwarves to be so pants-on-head retarded that they would stand on the side of the wall that would cause them to be unable to exit. The developer intended that they would run over and build the wall and then leave, but low and behold the AI has a catastrophic lack of understanding of surroundings at times.

So in this case using the "suspend construction" on a wall, though using it in a way that was not thought of by the developer, is not doing something oppositionally to the developer's intended result (that being your dwarf walling themselves in because the AI doesn't calculate the pathing before building the wall).

Whereas in the sense of seperating stacks of bolts to melt them individually to effectively fabricate extra metal is fairly obviously oppositional to the developer's intention -- it is in all ways equivalent to creating a reaction to take a piece of chalk and turn it into an adamantine wafer, or lead into gold.

It's not bad. However it is exploiting, as he (and most of the gaming community) defined it.

Which just raises the same question I asked Kotekzot before he made a big deal of leaving the thread: "So using an exploit is fine only when it corrects a bug is what you're saying, correct?"

The simple, cognative-dissonance-avoiding answer to this question is "yes".

This, however, raises the question of how one can interpret when, exactly, is the behavior of a dwarf not-as-intended.  Is locking doors to prevent dwarves from rushing outside to get slaughtered by a seige, even though outside was forbidden an exploit?  What about using save-scumming to undo the damage if you couldn't lock the door in time because, say, a monarch butterly happened to float into the way of the door?  I mean, that monarch butterfly blocking a door may or may not be part of the intended way the game works.  That running outside is probably not the way that the game should work.  But does this justify save-scumming, something people would normally qualify as "cheating" in general practice?

If you are going to argue to people that a certain course of action is cheating (a negative-connotation word), then you, yourself, should be aware of what, exactly, the limits of cheating are. 

I would like to note I didn't say you were trolling or angry, nor imply it.

Noted, but I don't think Kotekzot quite sees things the same way.

There are subtle differentiations, though. Cheating is generally referring to modding the game to make it noticeably easier. Modding generally refers to adding additional content, missions, quests, and oftentimes ramps the difficulty up.

And why should these terms be seperate?  They are basically the same thing, different only in the softly-defined open-to-different-interpretations effect of the action, after all.  Modding in soil to have occasional patches of sand may make the game more realistic, and maybe or maybe not fullfil an intention of the designer (I really don't know on that count), but it does make the game easier in terms of making glass producable anywhere, so does that make such a modder a cheater?

What about modifying world generating parameters until you get embark points with massive, 50-z-level mountains, with every feature you want, plus GCS, flux, and every type of metal or gem?  You're altering the way worlds are made to make the game easier for you...  Is that an exploit?

[shadowform]

The only downside to cheating in a SP game is you don't get to really brag about how awesome you are for winning the game. Well, you can, but everyone will roll their eyes at you.

I would even argue with that.    The creator of Undergrotto admitted to modding his dwarves for [SPEED:0], fiddling with raws to eliminate large quantities of unwanted stone, and even using Tweak to alter constructed ramps to natural stone ramps, as well as altering normal stone floors to sand floors (necessary both to create his beach and to give him a sand source for glass).  All the same, I think it's hard to deny that the fortress is less of an achievement for it - his intended goal was not to challenge himself through lack of resources, danger of being wiped out by goblins/orcs, and so forth, but rather to present a fortress that was nothing less than a visually stunning masterpiece.  To this end, he succeeded.

[EliDupree]

Yeah, I think the massive adamantine megaproject is praiseworthy, but if *I* were trying to do that, I would likely just mod in a reaction to make wafers out of a butt-ton of stones at the smelter. It'd still cost a lot, but it'd basically just substitute atom-smashing for wafer-manufacturing and give me the excess adamant to make the megaproject with. . .

Doing it with bolts just... man. I couldn't imagine the patience.

It doesn't actually take that much patience. With twenty marksdwarves going, I've generated about 600 adamantine in a year. The only thing that takes much of my attention is replacing the goblin when it manages to get killed. The other parts of my megaproject are taking much more work.

[Ciber_Ninja]

follow the cyan brick road
O follow the cyan brick road
tra la la
la la la La la
were off to see the demon the great evil demon of ozz
the great evil demon of ozz
the great evil demon of ozz
to grind up the witch
and bake her int a wonderfly funderfly deliciouse
++WitchSyrupRoast++

[LordSlowpoke]

Oh Armok.
Thanks to this thread I will now make my own, personal HFS. Above the real one..
And made out of 100% adamantine.
LordSlowpoke cancels post: Fey mood.

[parlor_tricks]

Exploit/Cheating. Wrong axis.

Dwarfy/Non dwarfy - Correct Axis.

Needlessly complicated - Check
Involves death - Check
Allows for brain explodingly insane things - Discussion on adamantine tower - Check.

Dwarfy - Very.

Since when did we care about 'cheating', anyway? 

This my friends, is Dwarven Science.
A decent chunk of dwarf science is cheating/exploiting. Actually, that should be the definition of dwarf science. Any method at all by which the dwarves can bend the fabric of space/time/physics/code or whatever to achieve something that could not be done before!

Why with enough effort, who knows! we could even come up with floating objects! Accurate booze bomb launchers! More I say! More!

[Core Xii]

• An error: Unintended behavior by the developer that causes the game to break completely
• A glitch: Unintended behavior by the developer that (mostly) doesn't affect gameplay
• A bug: Unintended behavior by the developer that gives a disadvantage to the player(s)
• An exploit: Unintended behavior by the developer that gives an advantage to the player(s)
• A cheat: Unintended behavior by the developer induced externally (using tools outside the game) that gives an advantage to the player(s)
• A mod: Intended behavior by the community

Being a single-player game, there's no 'advantage' to be had from exploits over other players (of which there are none). Therefore it's not cheating, or even exploiting to an extent.

Modding is not cheating at all, it is simply agreeing to a different set of rules, designed by a party other than the official developer.

Please note, that these definitions almost completely depend on the definition of the developer's intentions, and the only person qualified to verify them is the developer himself. As the players we can only attempt to interpret these intentions without an official statement. Therefore some people feel that exploits don't exist unless the developer acknowledges them; On the other hand that's already halfway there to fix them.

In competitive games, "exploits" as considered by many can actually become part of standard play. Exploits should be banned (as an unofficial agreement) only when they lessen the depth and entertainment of the game, for instance if a single, exploit-y strategy can beat all others. As an example, clumping Mutalisks to hide their numbers in StarCraft can be categorized as an exploit by the above definitions, yet has evolved as a standard tactic in professional play.

Gaining perpetual adamantine is a design oversight at best, merely an unfinished feature by my book, as the developer has knowingly implemented melting stacks of bolts into more metal than they were made out of, as a temporary mechanic.

[Kanddak]

Yeah, I'd definitely call this an exploit....

ex·ploit
–noun
a striking or notable deed; feat; spirited or heroic act: the exploits of Alexander the Great.

What a totally stupid conversation. The reason to do something like this instead of making a smelter reaction is precisely because it's more of an exploit. It takes no creativity or cleverness to just change your raws to get free stuff, so it is consequently boring to do so. Anyone can do it, whereas it takes some thought to design a magical adamantine factory.
The whole point of DF, in my view, is to invent the cleverest and most entertaining ways of ruthlessly exploiting the game.

So let's move on to the important question.

We recently had a thread ( http://www.bay12games.com/forum/index.php?topic=51099 ) about obtaining large quantities of adamantine by strip mining several sites and using an adventurer to carry all the adamantine to one fort.
EliDupree says he got about 600 adamantine in a year by bolt-melting. I happen to know through experimentation that a given site with adamantine tends to have somewhere around 600 pieces of raw adamantine, and the game calendar is advanced by a year (essentially) when you start a new fort.
The adventurer hauling method has the advantage of allowing you to move adamantine to any site in the world. The bolt melting method has the advantage of not requiring you to abandon and reclaim your site.
But which is the faster way of amassing adamantine?

[EliDupree]

But which is the faster way of amassing adamantine?

I got 600 in a year because I set up an operation of a size that would get me 600 in a year. I'd say there are about 35 dwarves involved in the production (20 archers, ~12 smelters, the runner, and a couple weaponsmiths.) One could easily copy the whole thing - with a 200-dwarf fort, you could easily produce several thousand per year.

[Mr. Penguin]

I nominate Elidupree for the Dwarven Physicist of the Year 2010 award.

[jfsh]

Trying to replicate this myself, and I'm curious - how did you build doors with no walls next to them?  Or am I misreading the diagram?

[EliDupree]

Oh, yeah, forgot that. I ALSO used the freestanding-doors exploit to build this. It's like three exploits rolled into one!

(Build a constructed wall, then build a door next to it, then "Remove Construction" the wall.)

[mrbobbyg]

There are two conversations going on in this thread.  One is awesome and involves 1) unlimited clownite and 2) hilarious gameshows.  The other one is a philosophical investigation on the nature of cheating.

How about we separate the 2?  The philosophers can make their own thread, and I can sit here and be amazed at how brilliant EliDupree is.

[dogstile]

How about people just stop arguing over the fact that he's playing the game and having fun in his own way. What the hell is wrong with you guys, you used to be cool.

Its a creative idea and whoop de doo, he's using an oversight. OH GOD NOES! THE HORROR! THE WORLD IS GOING TO END!

Nobody actually cares about whether somebody cheats in a single player game. You think you do, but in a week you will have forgotten all about it unless you're an elf.

We all know what those elfs are like. they're a couple of guys who are up to no good, making trouble in our neighbourhood. Now you guys got my mum all scared and now i'm moving with my auntie and uncle in bel air!

t(-_-t)