SS2 No Keypad Cheese - No more metagaming passcodes
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6643c8c856749
10. July 2022, 10:36:40
°DML#0
No Keypad Cheese
A mod by Sarge945
System Shock 2 is a very exploitable game, with many areas containing valuable goodies requiring keycodes. By knowing the codes upfront, many powerful items can be accessed early and in some cases entire decks and major story elements can be skipped entirely by knowing codes ahead of time. There are also several areas where codes are not supposed to be known, and are designed to be hacked, such as the Cryo Recovery closet in Med/Sci, which contains a valuable BrawnBoost, code 00000.
Many mods have attempted to resolve these exploits by changing codes, however this simply moves the problem - once the new codes are known, the game can be exploited once again. This mod instead makes all keypad codes always fail - including the correct code - until the player has gained the relevant log entry or email outlining what the code is supposed to be.
Additionally, as a small quality of life improvement, a small message will appear containing the code whenever the player uses a keypad they know the code for. Many modern games such as Prey and the Deus Ex sequels do something similar.
Main Features:
- Compatible with SCP, SecMod and most other mods, including mods which change keypad codes
- Uses a generic solution to support all keypads from all FMs (with some caveats) [Thanks ZylonBane]
- All keypads require the player character to have obtained the code before it can be used
- Certain keypads with no relevant log or email outlining the code require hacking and cannot be exploited
- Codes are displayed when using a keypad with a known code
You can discuss this mod, provide feedback, and talk about my other mods here
Changelog:
1.3
- SCP Beta 5 Fixes.
1.2
- Added a secondary method for keypads to enable themselves, based on finding their own keypad code within logs
- This should add potential automatic support for FMs, but only if they don't do custom things with Keypad scripts.
- Many FMs such as Ponterbee will still require custom patches to work fully.
- Now, instead of a message in the top message box, the HUD String of the keypad will be updated.
1.1
- Fixed issue where you could get the medsci2 armoury code early, as it was tied to the wrong note.
1.0
- Initial Release
10. July 2022, 13:17:57
Wrong. It's not an "exploit", the code was deliberately set to 00000 to reward players who try to guess the code. If they'd intended it to only be accessible by hacking, they would have given it a more randomized code.#1
10. July 2022, 13:22:43
Just making an unsolveable keypad seems pretty easy, you set its code to a negative number or a number shorter than 5 digits.#2
10. July 2022, 13:42:19
#3
Quote by ThiefsieFool:
Just making an unsolveable keypad seems pretty easy, you set its code to a negative number or a number shorter than 5 digits.
Making it shorter just pads it out with zeroes. The actual code in the editor is 0, not 00000. I have not tried a negative code.
Quote by ZylonBane:
Wrong. It's not an "exploit", the code was deliberately set to 00000 to reward players who try to guess the code. If they'd intended it to only be accessible by hacking, they would have given it a more randomized code.
I don't really think that sounds right. The developers specifically put the "hacking introduction" help terminal right next to that keypad for a reason. There are absolutely no hints at all that players should even try guessing a code, and the mechanic is never used anywhere else in the game. This isn't like "Calvo" in Deux Ex where there are environmental clues and actual game design to support the intent. There's literally nothing in the game to suggest the player should even be trying to guess any keypad. Every keypad up to this point (the one in training and the first one in medsci) have had seemingly random passwords to a new player. Now they are suddenly supposed to guess, right when the game is explicitly telling them to use hacking?
Even if they ARE intended to guess, it's an awful mechanic - the game is effectively telling the player that hacking can be bypassed by guessing, as if that's a real mechanic, but jokes on them because every other code they try to guess will just waste their time. It's a bait and switch that purposely punishes the player for being clever.
Unless there's an actual quote from a developer saying that this was their intent, I really find this difficult to believe.
It seems far more likely to me that they either didn't set a code (because you're supposed to hack it) and it defaulted to 0, or they set it to 0 for testing with the intent to set it to something later (say, when an audiolog that never made it into the game was added) and never did.
I would honestly not be surprised if every single playtester tried to hack that keypad, or avoided it due to not having the skill. It probably never even occurred to the developers to change it to something else.
Regardless of what their actual intent was, we're all on our hundredth playthrough now, and the code is well known. If it was supposed to reward players ingenuity, the "guessing" gameplay has certainly run it's course - guessing anything that doesn't change can only ever work once, after all. After that, it's just an exploit because you know that you need to guess and you know what to guess - it's metagaming at that point. We can never get back the guessing aspect of their intended design because the code is already known. Even if it was changed, it would just lead to the same problem again next time when people guess the new code. Meanwhile, hacking the panel is completely useless because everyone already knows the code and there's no reason to spend resources to open it. By removing the outdated (and no longer functional to anyone who has already guessed or otherwise knows the code, such as from a guide) guessing mechanic, we can at least make hacking that keypad actually viable as a strategic option - trade some CM investment and some nanites for some benefit, which is exactly how hacking works everywhere else in the game. To me, getting a balanced outcome on every playthrough is more important than a one-off guessing game experience. I doubt many people would use a mod like this on their first playthrough anyway, and even if they did, they can't possibly experience the guessing game mechanic anyway since this thread contains the code and thus ruins it for them, so they might as well use the mod.
Obviously, this also applies to the other codes in the game - after your first playthrough, anyone can memorize any of the codes and bypass/undermine various intended hacks, sequence break, and otherwise do unintended things in the game. I intend to fix those for the same reason. The only reason I did this one first is that there is no audio logs or emails associated with it, so it's a much easier fix.
Certain mods (*cough* RSD *cough*) put items there with the intention of them being balanced around the player choosing hacking. It seems obvious to me that hacking was their intent, which is why I made this.
10. July 2022, 14:37:33
anyway, having more people taking a shot at squirrel modding can't be a bad thing.#4
will check and then move the mod to the mods subforum. lets see whether the "I really don't want to be able to guess/know the first code" people exist. the "I want to pay nanites to re-enable the medsci2 closet forcefield" people do, so my guess is there will be some.
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