Save Scumming

[Cash]

Couple of questions.

Is there anyway to tell if someone is save scumming? i have suspicions that a friend of mine is because i just showed him this game and he is already doing far better than me, haha.

I read in the guidebook that there are penalties for save scumming, how does the game determine that scumming is happening and what are the penalties?

[Al-Khwarizmi]

The game is only able to detect if the savegames have been tampered with, but it does not detect savescumming, which is in fact technically impossible to detect reliably. Trusting people not to savescum in their local games is just a matter of honour.

Of course, you can always "test" your friend by challenging him to play on the server. You can't savescum on the server because there is no way to upload a save there (unless you are a server admin).

[Cash]

The game is only able to detect if the savegames have been tampered with, but it does not detect savescumming, which is in fact technically impossible to detect reliably. Trusting people not to savescum in their local games is just a matter of honour.

Of course, you can always "test" your friend by challenging him to play on the server. You can't savescum on the server because there is no way to upload a save there (unless you are a server admin).

What if every time a new character was made a random marker is put in the character file and at the character's death the game would render that marker impossible to load. just a theory, if that doesnt make sense i could elaborate.

Still how does the game determine determine that you have been savescumming, because the guide book says there are penalties for "save game cheating"

[Dudley]

The penaltybeing that you don't learn. IE you'll still suck at the game.
Test your friend on the server, he'll die for sure if he save scummed. If he dies with a dwarve paladin, that'll make it even more obvious.
OR you can just ask him ^^

[CheatMan]

the guide book says there are penalties for "save game cheating"

The save game cheating they refer to here is not save-scumming which is simply backing up your save file.

They actually mean save file editing, which if the edits you do don't satisfy ADOM's CRC check, will give you the message "You feel as if you've run out of luck" and really make life borderline impossible for that character.

[RndmNumGenerator]

There are two forms of "save cheats"

1) Save-Scumming. Basically, you make copies of your savefile periodically, and when you die you can start over from your last point. Doesn't directly give an unfair advantage, but you can attempt somethign an infinite amount of times until you get it right.

2) Save-Editing. This involves directly editing the save file to give yourself items, abilities, stats, etc. that you didn't have in the game. This is what ths guidebook is referring to. When ADOM load a savefile, it runs a redundnacy check, and if the save file doesn't pass the check, the character "runs out of luck", which is worse than being cursed and doomed.

I used to save-scum all the time, but I don't any more. I still keep backups in case the game crashes, though those are for... crashes. Unrecoverable saves. Sometimes I'm tempted to use a backup as a savescum, but if I do that I ultimately give up anyway, or if I finish, delete that game from the highscore entry.

Oddly enough, my first win I didn't savescum at all... It's partly what inspired me to stop savescumming.

[Mad Minstrel]

Save-Scumming (...) Doesn't directly give an unfair advantage

Huh? Of course it gives unfair advantage, the biggest unfair advantage possible... in practice it makes your character immortal. The only 100% fair way to play is:
- no cheats
- no save scumming
- no bug exploiting (piety overflow etc)
- no spoilers
But hardly anyone plays like this...

[Silfir]

Well, playing with no spoilers would only be possible if the player were able to completely forget anything they learnt during any previous playthrough of the game. Acquiring knowledge about the various obstacles in the game is about the only way to pass them without dying. Reading about spoilers just speeds up the process.

Save-scumming is unfair if you want to post your character to any resource akin to the Hall of Fame for winners, or if you try to pass off your game as a "proper", non-save-scummed victory. If you just play for yourself and can keep yourself from bragging about your non-earned spoils, it's perfectly fine to savescum. But you're missing out - the game becomes much, much more exciting to play if you don't savescum.

[Dudley]

That's what i meant about it not being learnin about the game. the pressure of the grim reaper around your neck (i hate orcs) is the main reason to be careful, in other words to survive