I made an automatic hook tracker for killers. Is it allowed under the EULA?
Disclaimer: Posting it here because I'm not sure where to post it otherwise. Let me know if I should change the sub-forum.
Hello! I recently made an app to help DBD killers track the hook stages and possible DS timers. It works by visually monitoring survivors' statuses on the screen and then displaying them as an overlay.
No game files are modified. No memory is read. Doesn’t interact with DBD’s processes. It's just an overlay that analyzes HUD pixels. When it sees that the survivor is hooked, it adds a hook stage on the screen. When it sees that the survivor is unhooked, it adds a DS and off-hook Endurance timer on the screen.
I made it to make it easier:
- To NOT tunnel accidentally (I'm bad at remembering hook stages).
- To tunnel when I need to win the game.
- To counterplay survivors trying to use their off-hook endurance and DS aggressively when they defend other survivors.
I feel like this is something that the community would find useful, but I understand how this app enters this "gray" area of software, ethically speaking. And I don't want to contribute to something that BHVR claims is a cheat program.
For the same reason, I don't publish the link to the program on this forum.
Personally, I don't view it as cheating. Cheating is gaining an unfair advantage. This app provides a fair advantage - you're just organizing the already known information (hook stages, DS timers) on your screen. It doesn't tap into the game's memory or its processes. Strictly client-sided. Like a crosshair or Reshade, which BHVR already approve of.
An alternative to using this program is to make notes on hook stages and use timers manually. You will get the same result.
My question is addressed mainly to BHVR - what do you guys think of this? Does using this program comply with the EULA?
Let me know if you want me to share the GitHub link to the source code if this is what's needed.
Comments
why would you be against trivializing game sense when you're already planning to remove main reward for this part of its application?
exactly, that's the point i'm making. it wouldn't make sense for someone to oppose trivializing game sense (or, put another way, for them to promote rewarding game sense) and also to promote removing rewards for game sense.
i would hope that by the time you start accusing people of doing that, you would start reflecting and saying "hey, maybe I'm accidentally doing a goomba fallacy here. maybe the person I'm responding to here who says they want to keep skill expression is not part of the group of people that want to remove skill expression. maybe there are two distinct groups of people here"
the person in question is simultaneously advocating for removal of the reward of said skill expression.
I know who I am talking to. They are being a unreasonable. If they weren't, they'd either say they have nothing against hook counter when tunnelling is getting fixed and thus it would contribute to more healthy gameplay or they wouldn't be advocating for massive tunnelling nerfs (defending upcoming anti systems and gloating about people asking for alternatives/compensations).
It's already been answered a lot, typically mods that don't directly affect game files are near impossible to detect without kernel protection, which is widely despised due to privacy violations.
Should it be allowed? No. You are using software to give yourself an unfair advantage, and invalidating perk choices. Reading some of the comments about acceptable mods, I also disagree with. Reticle is an unfair advantage. Survivor flashlight assist is an unfair advantage.
If you have to give yourself an unfair advantage to play a pvp, maybe consider playing pve instead.
You'd be astonished to see just how many are playing DBD on a Switch. We cannot ever know exact numbers, but for this game more than 70% are on one of the consoles, with the PlayStations being the largest portion globally.
I would imagine that the argument is that in 99% of games tunneling is a free win that requires little-to-no game sense to execute effectively.
An anti-tunnel system would thus require killers to use game sense to know when to go for spread pressure and when to tunnel in order to maximize their potential.
kinda tired of this.
idc if they remove tunnelling if they offer equally efficient alternative even if it takes more effort/skill.
so far none of that is happening and killers are literally being accused of being boosted because they dare to play efficiently in a game designed around this kind of efficient plays and the solution people are advocating for is to just forbid killers from playing efficiently with a bandaid solution to current ######### game design.
I absolutely LOVE this!!! Thank you. … Oh, I didn't know it was for Switch. But we need it on Xbox & Playstation, too. We don't have nothing that shows is hook states.
While I do think console players are a large percentage, I think 70% is way over the mark. I'd be willing to believe a number between 35% and 45% of active weekly users. That doesn't include people that boot the game 5 times a year.
Now that you're at it, please do also a tracker for OTR timer and Pig's trap timers, since technically these can also be tracked by just looking at the HUD.
Because of the various UEA's etc out there we sadly cannot ever see the exact active numbers, but for DBD globally it breaks down like this:
The largest portion is on one of the PlayStations at around 26% of the whole or so. Next would be Xbox and Steam at roughly 22% each, and then those on a Switch. After that comes Windows and Epic, and Stadia has long been dead.
We can easily see the active Steam numbers and extrapolate from there, and imagine we could find those from Epic as well. I do wish it was possible to see these numbers ourselves.
it is weird to me that bhvr is still hiding the Hook HUD from the killer.
i mean, if the killer wants to tunnel, then he's not going to look or care about the hook HUD, unlike killers who play fair, they'll hook everyone once or at least 3 survivors, so it would be nice if killers could see the HUD for hooks.
I personally don't think its something I like. I probably didn't communicate well enough that I was purely saying banning it would be pointless because it's not something they can enforce. I like complication and memorisation in games, a lot of my favourite games are in the grand strategy genre for this exact reason. Having to memorise hook states is part of the fun of killer imo.
Oh yeah I agree banning it would be pointless for that reason
I think we were making two different points - you were talking about the practical aspects of whether or not to ban it, I was talking more about if it fits in with the spirit of the game - but it looks like we mostly agree on each of those points I think
yeah we kinda took aim at the ally there.