A bit delayed "Hello!"

[Nox]

Hello to everyone here!
I'm from Czech Republic, studying at university, faculty of information technology.

My main computer creation interests are webdesign, 2d graphics in general, html, css, php, javascript and mysql...pretty common set.
I still like playing PC games...and (pc games + web creation and graphics)/2 = pbbg
Pbbgs mainly Melior Annis (cz) and oGame. Non-pbbg Dawn of War 2 and Disciples 2. I also like playing soccer and I'm interested in fantasy and scifi, mainly WarHammer 40.000, which is dark, fierce scifi and fantasy combined together. (any other wh40k fan here?)
I spend a lot of time on forum where we help newbie web creators with their problems (3k of hopefully not worthless posts)...and other member posted link to one of the bbg's tutorials, so that's how I ended up here.


I have of course a pbbg project. I actually started it for the third time, every time I know more and feel that *this time* I know enough and it would be great...so *this* time, really
It would be dark, grim fantasy strategy/RPG, but it would probably be all I'd reveal right now, but in time for sure.
...I would like you to play it as well, but what I hate the most about web creation  are the language-related things, the fact that I can't write the text directly but need to create tons of variables and switch tabs with opened files all the time...any advice would be welcomed (may be worth a separate thread)...'d make screenshots or video for you at least

So I hope you can stand my presence here...although I'm not so skilled I try to help others here, and I appreciate every piece of advice I'm given
I also make mistakes, so please feel free to correct me

Have a nice day!

P.S.: I won't say the usual "please ignore my English mistakes", I should know it relatively well, though I've forgotten a lot as the time passed. So I wouldn't mind you correcting me at all.

[lolninja]

Hey, I play 40k as well, got me a 2000 point Dark Angle army, and the start of an Eldar force. My wife also plays, and has a nasty nasty Demon horde which enjoys eating my poor innocent space marines

A PBBG based loosely on a 40k-esk setting would be pretty awesome, the whole dystopian feel works really well, and would be quite fresh from what I've seen of the currently available PBBGs

[Nox]

Nice
I actually don't play wh40k TT, just games, read books, forums etc. ... Ultras, Bl. Templars, GK's probably my favourite...and Sanguinius from Primarchs
Too bad having heretical wife

WH PBBG would be great...GW might rant about copyrights though, so I'm not sure it would be possible...
And I want a movie

[blindangel]

lol hello,

you could create your game based on wh 40, I am not aware of what it is other than a game as my lack of sight prevents me from playing them but as long as you state that your game was a tribute to wh 40 then you can sneak round the copyright permissions

I do play pbbg's though as they are text based, so long as they dont have the blasted captcha's in them or they make them accessible.

I too am studying in the infomation systems area, web design and programming are my particulars seen as my computer technician's qualifications had to be left by the way side when I lost my sight

the only thing I can recommend in regards to several files open... a pen and paper to note things down on so you dont need to flick windows so often



else you are stuck with several windows just as I, unless anyone else can offer some ideas

[Nox]

Well...Wh40k are not just games, there are also many books (the ones I read were great), but I don't know if there are some adjusted for handicaped people or some other way to ejoy them

Yeah, captcha is bad...weird thing is that it's not really more effective than "How much is X+Y?" fields, which I use

Wow...how do you handle wed design as handicaped? Must be pretty hard

The paper thing is hard...you know the temptation that instead of this writing you might be already creating it:)
but I know it's better - even more - important, to do it...

[blindangel]

  dont be sad that I have a disability, I have had my sight loss for just over two years now and have adapted to it for the most

if it is not to recent a released  book then it has most likely been converted into a PDF or possibly an audio book, so I might just have to do some searching around, I too love fantasy and sci fi and horror, and yes they do make a great theme if all combined

as for my disability and my chosen profession, well it is slow as you could imagine, but I use an automated programme named JAWs for Windows and it reads the screen to me all bar graphics, but coding is harder as I have to do it character by character then read it as a whole once I finish a piece of code. I have been coding this way for ever now and have managed several qualifications this way, in programming, databases and web design. although coding is done character by character  everything is still read in full words and sentances 

captcha's for the most are images and few use the re-captcha that has a audio with it, I would love to know how to code the logic question you mention you use but seen as I am still new to php I am not sure how to code them. Would you please teach me?

I have read a lot into the problem with the captcha system, and they reckon that now, there is not a great use in having them as they are paying $0.01 for every one solved to cheap indian slave labourers. They also say that the logic or mathmatical equation is not classed as a captcha, but I dont quite see how that is the case as it still requires a human interaction, so long as their is a large range of possible equations to answer then it will do fine by me

My game is so far completely accessible other than the google maps but have heard their is a way to make them at least partly accessible so will look into that soon enough, and try to get other web designers and programmers to keep accessibility in mind

and blindness is not the worst of my problems, so please smile and dont be down for me as I am not, I am still alive and thats the big one

[Nox]

okey okey
still - respect for it must be difficult, I heard a little about JAWs, but still...character by character...

Ok, now the antibot thing
I think it's not hard to understand, source page:

Code: [Select]

<?php
$a = mt_rand(0,10);
$b=mt_rand(0,10);
$total=md5($a+$b);
echo '<label>How much is '.$a.'+'.$b.'?</label> <input type="text" name="antibot"> <input type="hidden" name="antibot_total" value="'.$total.'">';?>target page:

Code: [Select]

<?php
if(md5($_POST["antibot"]) != $_POST["antibot_total"]){
// wrong code
}
else
{
// ok
}?>
Enhancement assuming bots don't use javascript might be to fill the values with JS and hide the whole thing, thus creating antibot feature invisible for most visitors. And they probably don't use it as this system is used on a very vivid forum I visit (625k posts) and yet we get like a 1 spam per month at most, which is really nothing as there are sometimes like 10 new threads every hour at the evening.

Most of captcha systems have already been breached and can be solved automaticaly

Should you have any question feel free to ask.
I hope there's no mistake

[Crazy-T]

okey okey
still - respect for it must be difficult, I heard a little about JAWs, but still...character by character...

Ok, now the antibot thing
I think it's not hard to understand, source page:

Code: [Select]

<?php
$a = mt_rand(0,10);
$b=mt_rand(0,10);
$total=md5($a+$b);
echo '<label>How much is '.$a.'+'.$b.'?</label> <input type="text" name="antibot"> <input type="hidden" name="antibot_total" value="'.$total.'">';?>target page:

Code: [Select]

<?php
if(md5($_POST["antibot"]) != $_POST["antibot_total"]){
// wrong code
}
else
{
// ok
}?>
Enhancement assuming bots don't use javascript might be to fill the values with JS and hide the whole thing, thus creating antibot feature invisible for most visitors. And they probably don't use it as this system is used on a very vivid forum I visit (625k posts) and yet we get like a 1 spam per month at most, which is really nothing as there are sometimes like 10 new threads every hour at the evening.

Most of captcha systems have already been breached and can be solved automaticaly

Should you have any question feel free to ask.
I hope there's no mistake

I made something like that a while back, but i made it go onto a image using a font, yeah it was harder for spammer's to do stuff was a good idea.

[blindangel]

hi there,

well that is very easy to understand, and thank you, I found so much badly coded ones on the net but that is clean and easy to work with.

So what ideas do you have in mind for your game so far? and how far have you gotten with it?

oh lol and its lovely to meet you!

[Nox]

You're welcome

I'm already developing a game, although I must admit that I like more creating it than making concept, so I don't have everything planned (yet?)
It's actually a 3rd rework, mainly for code quality reasons (also, the first one has almost the same plot as Hellgate:London, although I came up with it independently, so I wasn't so happy when I heard about it ).

It should be dark fantasy rpg/strategy hybrid now. After some event large amount of people left their ruined lands and travelled and finally built a new city, however after some time a horror started lurking in night and people dissapearing. In a short time it became a city-wide issue and as milita is not able to handle even guarding the whole city at the same time, the city chose to hire Guardians, that would swear to protect the inhabitants and seek out and eradicate the nightmare. The second fraction are attandants to the nocturnal nightmare, with the opposite task.

There should be some building, tech trees, main character developing and inventory, the strategy part inspired a bit by Disciples II, so controling only a few units but independently (so for example 8 your units in one combat), I'm hoping to have a bit more complex combat system and hope to have some interesting actions players might perform out of combat.
We shall see...I'm currently finished with pre-login part and I'm now creating the basics, like auxiliary functions and so on.

thanks, you too

[blindangel]

  wow, that sounds really neat, very indepth and will be good to hear updates on how you are going with the coding of it

angel hugs

[travo]

Code: [Select]

echo '<label>How much is '.$a.'+'.$b.'?</label> <input type="text" name="antibot"> <input type="hidden" name="antibot_total" value="'.$total.'">';?>

I would be a little worried about that though, posting the total there. It could easily be bypassed using CURL to post data, they dont even need to look at the question, just post their own total for both fields.

I would consider using a fair bit of math on the total before posting. Say divide by ten, get the arcos of that number, miltiply be negative 1 and run through a cubic function.... Well, I wouldnt want to be the one trying to crack the algorithm   

Also code it so that function is very easy to change. If someone cracks your algorithm, change it on them 

[Nox]

Travo, travo here we go again - read my post carefuly...look what's in the $total variable
(maybe I should have named it differently)

[travo]

Sorry Nox. I skip bits of your code a fair bit dont I?

However, I still think we need a little bit more protection...

Code: [Select]

<?php
$a = mt_rand(0,10);
$b=mt_rand(0,10);


So the number is between 1 and 20... wouldnt take too long to find the number, they could even have a rainbow table hand coded in if they realise that the max of each number of each variable is 10.... I would just feel safer using that function I described earlier...

[Nox]

I forgot about the tables, you're right, thank you

And when I already posted I'd sneak in something not worth it's own post:

Btw ... the browser game...it's almost always a great project and there are so many themes, do you also have a problem of chosing one? I mean, I've chosen dark fantasy, but I love many others... post-apocalyptic ones (aka fallout, stalker), heaven vs. hell (post-ap. constantine) clashes (like hellgate, constantine), damn, I even had idea of making something like from Verne times or a bit older, etc

[blindangel]

  Ok... now you guys have totally lost me.

This shows my level of knowledge, lol whats a rainbow table and how do they work? I have heard of them and knew that people that crack captcha's use them but... ??

and could you explain the method mentioned to me please and maybe give an example? I think this has taken to the skies and flown straight over my head....
I think I could be a lost cause, oh boy, what have I gotten myself into here?

[travo]

Dont worry lol

A rainbow table is pretty much a table of words/combinations, along with their hash equivalents. I doesnt necessarily crack captchas, but I guess turning the encrypted key alot of captchas store in the session into the code would be a big use of them.

So its pretty much just a system where hackers, spammers, etc. can lookup the hash value and find the original text or a collision (a different text that creates the same hash).

[blindangel]

Ok, so I know what a rainbow table is and how they are used, thank you for that, I see my idea of them was a little off the mark

So if I was to implement the said logic captcha above but wanted to protect against rainbow tables, how would this be done? a method was mentioned above but I didnt understand it, maybe you could explain that also? please?

Thank you for your help 

[Nox]

Eeem, well, we talked about this because in my anti-bot solution I used md5() hashing algorithm for publicly storing the result, the value that the bot should enter, which he might break using those tables...he might take a look what's in antibot_total and find a string in tables, that has the same hash and insert it into the input

I'm not really familiar with captcha's methods, maybe it can be used if you somehow manage to get the current captcha's value. But generaly I though they break it using image scanning

[travo]

This is why storing the actual value in the database, and only showing the id seems to be a much better way of doing it.