Okay, seems this was a simple misunderstanding so it should be quick to sort out. First of all, let it be known that I harbour Tekka no ill and never did. I didn't think it was that obvious that he was joking, but maybe that was just me. I think it's maybe not a very good idea to make unclear comments about something that gets tempers flaring as much as this issue does.
Sorry if it seemed otherwise, but I was at no time angry or aggitated. At best I was amused.
What I was trying to say is that it is not always obvious what is cheating and what isn't. Or rather, definitions of that may vary from person to person. The question is whether or not you want to play by somebody else's rules of what's right and wrong. Obviously, if you want to trade with the community you have to do that, but I think people who don't want to trade but want to change something about the game should be given a bit more leeway.
Rant:
Sure, my thoughts on this may be influenced by the fact that I asked around at some other forum for a mod that gets rid of the FE bug by whatever means possible. Most of you will probably deem that a very despicable thing, but I really could care less. I want to play HC and not "dodge the FE bosses". It's simply not fun for me to check every boss' mods before engaging and then cowering in fear while my merc kills him. From my point of view, removing something that does upwards of 60k damage can not be a cheat. Others might disagree, of course. If had some leet modding skills I'd just dig in the code and fix it. I don't have the modding skills but I still want to play HC. But I don't like playing like a coward. So, where does that leave me? Either I stop playing D2 altogether - been there, done that, doesn't really work either - or I beg somebody to fix this problem for me. Obviously, I want that person to spend as little effort on this as possible as I'm not paying him any money or anything. So, ideally I'd end up with a mod that either sets FE damage to 0 or removes it completely. Does that make me a cheater? Possibly. Do I care? No, I don't. Sometimes I think people forget that this is actually a *game* and not a religion...
Personally I think this is definetly different from giving myself a couple of ITH weapons or constriction rings or whatever others cheats are around.
/rant
Let me say something about my take on twinking again: First, I'm not worried that I'll consider myself a cheater for twinking. I'm not considering others cheaters for twinking. I think the difference between twinking and cheating is slight is because all it takes to legally get the items is time. It doesn't take any skill to find a shaftstop or a windforce. All it takes is time and luck. Certainly there's a difference between me, who spent a few hundred hours MFing Meph and Baal and a guy who just gives himself the items, but I'm not convinced the difference is very large. (Don't take this the wrong way. It's not my intent to slight all of you hardcore MFers, remember, I'm one of the pioneers of 1.10 MFing. I just want to get people thinking a bit)
One more thing: If you want to be really, really sure that all your items are 100% legit, the only way to do that is by not trading at all. Yes, it sounds harsh and probably is, but you gotta face facts. It is virtually impossible to verify whether or not an item was optained using a cheat or not if the person trying to pull off the hoax isn't a complete idiot. I know I could do it and I'm not even very good at stuff like that.
It has always struck me as funny that people didn't really seem to care where all these runes came from. Everybody got his runes "from trading", or from somebody who quit... I think it is as somebody once said: If you really want ot have that ber rune you're not really going to worry all that much about where it came from. You're gonna say something like "I traded good stuff for the rune so it's legit in my book".
The discussion about banning rune trading altogether might help things. But I'm a bit worried that it will also lull people in a false sense of security, like the fact that atma could detect runes created with shadow master did.
I guess what I'm really getting at is that it's a pity that the game seems to be all about the items. This may be a radical thought, but I think if twinking were impossible I think the forum might be a happier place. (Sounds weird, but think about it for a moment)
(on a sidenote, I'm sorry if this post seems incoherent at times. I was typing this and the reply to tekka at the same time which turned out to be a bad idea because it confused me... :teeth: )
edit: Hi my block loving friend! It might make you happy to hear that the next char I'm starting might be an avenger using a SHIELD! (either that or a Berserker barb with no shield and no defence, which is sort of more like me
)
I just want to play the game and maybe have a little fun.
