Approved Use sv_pure 1/2 to stop material wallhacks

[Yuki Nagato]

These things are VAC proof as it doesn't even look for them, they don't come with an aimbot either which makes judging a demo down to how well someone hides it. I'd say making people use default on trivial custom things is a very minor trade off to prevent them.

 

[Meowcenary]

-1

More than likely there are a lot more people using custom skins than there are people using custom skin wallhacks

My assumption is Skial would lose more players than gain with this trade off since they can easily go to a different server that allows custom skins.

 

[Yuki Nagato]

-1

More than likely there are a lot more people using custom skins than there are people using custom skin wallhacks

My assumption is Skial would lose more players than gain with this trade off since they can easily go to a different server that allows custom skins.

I don't know about that. I think a lot of people want a long term undetectable cheat without paying $20 for one that has the potential to be detected eventually, and most people likely just use default skins anyway. I'd suggest using it on some servers to see the reaction and if it really did empty them out then just revert it.

 

[Meowcenary]

I don't know about that. I think a lot of people want a long term undetectable cheat without paying $20 for one that has the potential to be detected eventually, and most people likely just use default skins anyway. I'd suggest using it on some servers to see the reaction and if it really did empty them out then just revert it.

Testing something like this on one server wouldn't be that good of a test. That would be one server out of the 30 something servers Skial runs, when you do it to all the servers the results would be much different.

 

[185db]

What exactly is being used as a wallhack and how exactly is it doing so?

I recall seeing that many community servers do not allow skins, and Skial was one of the few that did. That's why star played on Skial in his videos, just for an example.

 

[Tayto]

-1

More than likely there are a lot more people using custom skins than there are people using custom skin wallhacks

I like my Halo Shotgun skin. ;_;

-1 unless it actually becomes a problem.

 

[Meowcenary]

What exactly is being used as a wallhack and how exactly is it doing so?

I recall seeing that many community servers do not allow skins, and Skial was one of the few that did. That's why star played on Skial in his videos, just for an example.

There are 'skins' that can be designed to be seen through walls somehow, and since its just considered a regular skin by the game VAC doesn't detect it. It's been a thing for years and Valve hasn't done anything about it as far as I know.

 

[185db]

I've never even heard of that before. I'm assuming it would work in a similar way to how the cart outline and weapons can be seen through walls (assuming you have that setting enabled).

I don't think this is enough to get rid of custom skins. Valve servers do not allow them, and it's nice to have normal servers that allow it. I don't see why this would be any more difficult to identify than normal wallhacks unless they are good at hiding it.

-1*

*(forgot I had posted this, please disregard this -1)

 

[Bottiger]

We used to do this when it was possible to set sv_pure in server.cfg instead of through the command line requiring a reboot. It was also broken for a long time after the Steampipe update so I stopped checking.

Now people have gotten used to us being a place where you can use random mods from gamebanana and we don't see many wallhack complaints. It gives people a well needed reason to play here instead of official servers.

It is possible to whitelist certain folders. But in order to stop wallhacking, not only do we have to block wall materials, we can't allow people to have custom models or weapons because they can be made to glow through walls.... 2 of the most modded things.

We can whitelist specific mods, but I don't think we want to go through the hassle of having 1 person at a time tell us which mods they want loaded, and giving us a copy for our server so the contents can be validated.

 

[Bottiger]

Here's what I am talking about.

- Colored head regions
- Colored classes
- Colored cosmetics
- Colored items
- Colored sentries
- Colored health and ammo packs
- Spawn doors
- Flames
- Medi-Beams
- Pipes and grenades
- MvM Cash

http://tf2.gamebanana.com/gamefiles/3827

 

[T-Wayne]

Finally I can play like a real professional.

 

[KinCryos]

apparently, the exploit pack works by applying $ignorez to everything. Valve placed a restriction in Source 2009 to prevent model materials from using $ignorez. if said restriction was simply ignoring $ignorez in .VMTs placed in materials\models\... then they bypassed it simply by placing the replacements in materials\temp\ which is also used to store custom sprays of other players.

this effectively means that the exploit pack, if it weren't packed, wouldn't work with any custom server that blacklists custom sprays

 

[Bottiger]

apparently, the exploit pack works by applying $ignorez to everything. Valve placed a restriction in Source 2009 to prevent model materials from using $ignorez. if said restriction was simply ignoring $ignorez in .VMTs placed in materials\models\... then they bypassed it simply by placing the replacements in materials\temp\ which is also used to store custom sprays of other players.

this effectively means that the exploit pack doesn't work with any custom server that blacklists custom sprays

I don't think it does that. Download the pack yourself and see they are all there and not in materials/temp.

 

[KinCryos]

I don't think it does that. Download the pack yourself and see they are all there and not in materials/temp.

whoops. I meant that the pack utilizes those paths internally, since that's how it looks when I opened it in GCFScape.

I honestly have no idea if sv_pure would block aspects of VPKs if the respective paths used by the VPK were blocked

 

[Bottiger]

Hmm that is interesting. I don't know either.

What are the side effects of blocking materials/temp?

 

[Bottiger]

I just tested it. Blocking materials/temp will block all sprays.

Also that wallhack seems to be mostly broken. Only a few hats will show up through walls and they disappear after a short distance.

If only we could block vtf files from the temp directory, then we could have custom mods without wallhacks. But the whitelist wasn't designed to allow custom string matches and it all seems to be processed client side. The whitelist is sent to the client and the client checks it. No file checks or checksums appear to run for files inside materials/temp even if it is set to check_crc.

I think the amount of damage caused by mathacks is very minimal.

 

[Yuki Nagato]

I just tested it. Blocking materials/temp will block all sprays.

Also that wallhack seems to be mostly broken. Only a few hats will show up through walls and they disappear after a short distance.

If only we could block vtf files from the temp directory, then we could have custom mods without wallhacks. But the whitelist wasn't designed to allow custom string matches and it all seems to be processed client side. The whitelist is sent to the client and the client checks it. No file checks or checksums appear to run for files inside materials/temp even if it is set to check_crc.

I think the amount of damage caused by mathacks is very minimal.

There are ones that show the characters clearly through walls without the whole body red/blue effect, although I'm oviously not gonna provide people with links here. Staying with the ones that do color the whole character though...this vid demonstrates how game damaging they are a lot better:

It also needs repeating...they're completely VAC proof. Valve simply set sv_pure 1 or 2 and fixed it on their own servers, they don't care about community ones so VAC was never updated for them. On a map like 32 player 2fort/turbine/dustbowl it would be nearly impossile to call a wallhack on a class like demo or sol if they try and hide it because there's simply too much going on. they just have to remember to always look like they're corner checking and every kill can be "explained" as "good reactions" or "pre-fire".

 

[KinCryos]

Also that wallhack seems to be mostly broken. Only a few hats will show up through walls and they disappear after a short distance.

sounds to me like normal VisLeaf behavior, coupled with proper usage of Hint brushes, Occuders and Areaportals.

basically, if the client doesn't render the unseen props at all, there would be no models with $ignorez textures placed

It also needs repeating...they're completely VAC proof. Valve simply set sv_pure 1 or 2 and fixed it on their own servers, they don't care about community ones so VAC was never updated for them.

the real reason it's VAC-proof is because it doesn't do anything that VAC detects. Valve never properly prevented models and particles from using $ignorez materials, which is the fact that the material "hack" exploits

 

[Bottiger]

That video is very old. Try the material pack I linked from gamebanana.

 

[Yuki Nagato]

That video is very old. Try the material pack I linked from gamebanana.

See my PM please.