Interview with ULTRA_XEROX transcript, October 14, 2016

Author: Мохнатоеухо

Interpreter: Dorck1

Мирий [20] : Name, age, occupation?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : My name is Edgar. I am 26 years old. I’m fond of programming.

Мирий [20] : How did you start playing the «Heroes»? Have you been a fan of it or have you been invited by a friend?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : It was in 2008. I came to the Russian server. Looking through the forum I learned that there was the LWM.com server. Having more or less experience I registered with the same nick on the LWM.com server in 2009.

Мирий [20] : Did you leave the Russian server because it was difficult for you to play there?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : The LWM.com server was more interesting for me. There were less people, less forum – it was like a small village. Everyone from the forum knew each other. There was the same amount of people in the daytime as in the nighttime on the Russian server.

Мирий [20] : When you signed up, did you begin to look for the secrets in the game to crack them?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : No. In those days I was still just farming the gold, which I lacked. I have been doing it until 2012. Then I had a pause for a year and I returned before the merger of the servers. I found a couple of bugs and shared them on the forum. I remember that Arctic [13] the administrator of the LWM.com server of that time invited me to the official clan LWM - International Community Council and I was a hunter of bugs. So it was the beginning. He appointed me to find the errors during the merge of the servers.

Мирий [20] : What types of errors? Spelling or code?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Basically, it was the graphical and translation bugs. For example, they forgot to translate something or the combats had the lugs during the battle review.

Мирий [20] : That is to say, Arctic [13] urged you to start finding the holes in the game.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I can say that is was only beginning. It all started with Arctic [13] . I just came back to the game and understood how it all works. Then my work continued when the Snake coil ring was entered into the game. I was wondering how many of them were given. Players could get these rings for donate. I was wondering how many of such rings were there and I began to collect statistics. I began to study many logs and make posts with different manuals.

Мирий [20] : As far as I know, you have even put in jail?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Yes. It was with Дайнерис [15] . One time I’ve asked to block my account, it was on May. And the situation with Дайнерис [15] is another story. I’ve sent her the artifacts with the 0 durability.

Мирий [20] : You have been spamming Дайнерис’s [15] inventory with help of the artifacts with the 0 durability? And for that you have been jailed?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Yes.

Мирий [20] : I remember you making an article on Daily with a lot of views. Has it been a cause of crashing the Daily server?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Not because of it. I was banned on Daily. But it was also a part of the same story.

Мирий [20] : O.K. You had been jailed, but you could do things that ordinary players couldn’t, for example, to play for gold.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Yes. It’s true.

Мирий [20] : What the most interesting and important bugs can you find?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Everyone knows that being in prison you can’t play the card games for money, but I’ve played. There were also some bugs connected with the jail, but I can’t remember.

Мирий [20] : O.K. And what do you do not being jailed?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Actually, I collected all types of the statistics, but in addition to it I often engaged in viewing logs. For example, I found bugs and looked through the logs of removed characters. It has been fixed recently. While signing up on the radio you could create a fake nickname.

Мирий [20] : And you could do it on Daily.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Yes, I think so. I’ve tested it on the radio.

Мирий [20] : xo4yxa [15] wrote us that they have the same engine.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I changed my nickname to Alexander (adm) [14] and also changed my ID. It could be done with the help of overload of parameters. There is a checking of the character’s nickname. There is ID of the player, player’s number and nickname, I added one more ID and it’s happened that it was more important than nickname. And after restarting the administrator’s page was opened. But after that I couldn’t enter to the game because of lags.

Мирий [20] : Did you help Arctic [13] free of charge or for gold, diamonds? Did administration thank you for searching the errors?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : With Arctic [13] I was in the official clan and got gold. I got 20,000 per month. It was nice.

Мирий [20] : And now when finding a bug do you write to the administration or not?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : If I find something critical, I will write to Alexander (adm) [14] .

Мирий [20] : You write to Alexander (adm) [14] not to Maxim (adm) [20] .

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : It happened in the next way: I was leading blogs. I didn’t enter to the game during 2 years. I had a blog, but I couldn’t enter to the game during 1 year. I entered with help of additional characters. And I found the bugs connected with ID and server’s errors appeared. I started writing about it on the forum. And then Alexander (adm) [14] asked me to send private messages with these bugs and errors. Because there was some risk for the security of the game. And some of my topics with server’s bugs were delated from the forum. Most of them I found through Google. I entered the key-word and found many topics with them.

Мирий [20] : Your last grand error which you could find is that you could take a great amount of creatures in your army. It is true?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Yes, it was funny. I could do only 199,999, only 6 symbols are able to use.

Мирий [20] : Why not 999999?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Of course I could do it, but I didn’t do this because there was unreal damage.

Мирий [20] : Then you could set a record. People say that you’ve set up the records and no one could set up new one.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : There was a record in HG. I’ve already set up a new record but it was deleted and I set up a new one with a common troop.

Мирий [20] : Did you do it with a common troop?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Yes and no one has set up a new record yet.

Мирий [20] : Clear. There is a question about any things. Is it possible to increase something else besides the army?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I don’t really know. It is believed that not everything can be hacked. I think that gold can’t be hacked. In the combat the server sends the information about troops’ settlement to the cell. I created artificial units and whit their help overloaded the army. Standardly I had 16 Griffins, and then I made two stacks: one of them 100,000 and another 100,000-16. In a word if we subtract the second number from the first one we will obtain 16 Griffins. With help of this bug I could overload my army and make such a great army.

Мирий [20] : What did the administration say about your bug? Did you only put on rare items and wait for being jailed?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I was afraid a little bit of the amount of the topics which were created on the forum. This bug has his own limitations: I couldn’t take other units. Another words, I have an inventory of units which are available for me and I can work with them. But the administration thanked me.

Мирий [20] : Did they say «Thank you» or give some gold or diamonds?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : The only said «Thank you».

Мирий [20] : There is a meaning, that you taught somebody to use this bug. And he was playing with them. Is it true or not?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I don’t know anything.

Мирий [20] : In what sense?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : No comments.

Мирий [20] : Does it mean that somebody used this bug?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : No comments.

Мирий [20] : How many people?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I don’t know. It’s an error which firstly has fun and then problems.

Мирий [20] : Don’t you want to tell us the truth about the number of persons who have used this bug?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Basically, there were two people and they played 1 time.

Мирий [20] : O.K. There were two people. Did they only taste bug or more?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I generated a link and it’s all.

Мирий [20] : Could every person use this link to have a big army?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Yes.

Мирий [20] : Then people could use it to destroy facilities or to tax all…

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : It would be noticed in a flash.

Мирий [20] : But it has been noticed.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I think that it has been noticed when I’ve started to play on my second character in such way. It was only test. I played in open combats, but I could use it for myself in AG and WG. And no one could notice it because the combats are closed. I could use it until retirement because this bug hadn’t been found in 9 years, and if I hadn’t said about bug it would have been closed more than nine years.

Мирий [20] : Did you find more bugs on your second characters?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Did you say about the Tavern, when I created 24,000 second characters?

Мирий [20] : May be…

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : It was a stress-test. The aim of it was to show the administration that there are many bugs in the Tavern. With the help of scripts I have created more than 20,000 additional characters, I went with them to the tavern, and they hung there.

Мирий [20] : It’s a big number. It can be using to increase online. Can you send command for those 20,000 characters and level up them?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : All of 20,000 can’t be leveled up. I didn’t do this. I created the characters of the first lvl. 2 characters were registered, both of them went to the Tavern, the first created a game, and the second enter this game. And both of them hung there. The game didn’t finish on timeout. The game was freezed, and if nobody came, it could hang forever.

Мирий [20] : Is the bug with the Tavern during being jailed was fixed?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : It was fixed. As soon as I found a few bugs, they were immediately fixed. There was also a tiny bug with links. Being on the site players could use only HWM and LWM links, but with this bug they could use every link.

Мирий [20] : Are there some bugs which are still active?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I think, no.

Мирий [20] : People find bugs and the administration says that it’s a feature.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Yes, there is one of them, but it’s better not to discuss it.

Мирий [20] : Let’s discuss it. If they aren’t still fixed, people can use them because it’s only feature.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I really don’t know, I’m not ready to discuss it. The same problem is connected with registration. If you get an instant-registration, you can sing up new characters with help of it. I think that it’s an easier way to sign up, because you shouldn’t waste your time on playing the demo-combat. I can sign up many characters without being noticed. I think that there must be some kind of CAPTCHA.

Мирий [20] : Why are you still playing? Because of card games?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Yes, I’ve continued to play because of the arcomage, I was interested in its playing system, but now I’m fond of combats and development of my character. But there is some kind of feature in the arcomage. You can see only from what position your opponent gives a card, but you can’t exploit it, because you can only learn how much cards your opponent has. At the one moment you can see that your opponent has six cards. The left position is zero, the right position is six. Bang! And he gives the card from the sixth position and you can see that he has seven cards. You will know the cooldown of the opponent’s deck, but you can’t exploit it.

Мирий [20] : Is the series of misfortunes programmed?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : No, it’s nonsense. Just imagine that you are our administration… They devote more time for combats. They gave their attention to the arcomage last time in 2012. They added new cards and changed design. And that’s all. How can people think that they write some scripts for the arcomage? I think they don’t do this.

Мирий [20] : Is your life connected with hacking, viruses and so on?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : No, it’s only my hobby.

Мирий [20] : What’s next? Do you have the next aim, e.g. to hack the account or to get more gold, brilliants? Or do you find the bugs randomly?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : The places, when the bugs aren’t still founded, are «terra incognita» for me. Hacking characters isn’t my goal as I know that I can get ban. Moreover they are the characters of other players. What should I do this for?

Мирий [20] : You know many players dram about hacking the roulette and want to get much from it and recoup.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Hacking the roulette? They can try to do this. Let them use the Google-supercomputer and enter passwords a couple of years. They can do it only using the enumerative technique and no more. There is a great amount of combinations with special symbols. That’s why the roulette hacking is inanity.

Мирий [20] : But you continue hacking our game. What are the reasons of doing it?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : But I don’t get any profit from it. I send immediately a letter with bug to the administration. The only script, which I use, is the searching in the transfer logs by Alex_2oo8 [15] . And one time I’ve used the script for the searching necessary information in the clan’s log. I don’t use any scripts or cheats while playing the main character.

Мирий [20] : And what about the second character?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I could collect statistic while playing my second character. I don’t use bots for farming gold, though it’s impossible. It’s not only about LG, there are many different ways. The bots decipher the CAPTCHA any way and send the information back and you get gold. I get gold during the trading or donate.

Мирий [20] : Do you have scripts for the trading?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : No. I’ve already said that I use only scripts by Alex_2oo8 [15] . If I had used other scripts I would have been hunted down during a cleaning six months ago. But there were no questions for me.

Мирий [20] : Do you think that all cheaters were caught?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I don’t know.

Мирий [20] : Look! A great amount of characters were blocked six months ago. But after this new characters, which enter the code 24 hours per day, are appeared again. And it isn’t a secret. There is a statistic on the site by Элементаль [19] where we can see more than 20 characters who enter the code 24 hours per day. Do you think they are people or bots? Also there are people who buy the erroneous lots. What about them?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : It can be bots. Somebody wrote that he found a lot of the same second players in the mining. If they take work posts you can’t do anything. It really exists. When I was looking for the bots for the «Heroes», I found them not for using. It was interested in them. I searched them in Google. I searched the sites with the bots for LG and also know that there is a bot for the demo-combat. But this bot is used for making second characters and it’s very easy for usage. I read, understood how it works and then sent a letter for Alexander (adm) [14] that they should keep an eye on it. He said that the struggle against bots has been going constantly and after that the great blocking is come.

Мирий [20] : The great blocking after your letter?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : May be after one month or two… When many characters had been blocked I went again to this site. The players wrote that they had been blocked and something about payment. The riots of this bot answered that they wanted to make this system better. The Google-CAPTCHA was set there but the bot looked for a usual CAPTCHA. I think, that’s why they were discovered. But I don’t know anything about current situation. I’ve read that the bot can stop in urgent situations. They can fix something.

Мирий [20] : And what about bots in the Tavern? Are there bots? I know that many players have leveled up GG with the bot. Some of them were blocked and some were fined.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : There was a theme about it on the forum in 2009. Somebody was blocked; somebody got a large fine about 500,000 or 1,000,000. I think that in the situation with LG they were also fined, but about the bots in the tavern I don’t know. I haven’t seen people who offer the bots for LG and at the same time for GG. To create a bot for the tavern is very difficult. For the combats is more difficult. Usually the bot is created for the simple actions, e.g. for farming gold. I think that the bot for the piece of cake hunting may also exist. It’s very difficult because you have to be a crackjack of hunting and create AI not working by template, it should be flexible in some cases. Because there are many difficult situations, e.g. the hamster who comes every millionth combat. You create the bot which is aimed on fighting in the piece of cake combats and when the hamster comes the combat is freezed.

Мирий [20] : Are there some kind of tricks in the combats which can be seen through the code. For example, the griffin’s battledive when people can see on what square they land or using phantoms’ skills while a usual player can’t do this. I think that it’s impossible now.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : But it was at that time when Элементаль [19] was experimenting with the combats in which griffins can land outside the map. I’ve never heard about phantoms, but it could be possible.

Мирий [20] : People said that there were some strange bugs. Somebody plays in tournament combat and it’s freezed. He returns and he loses this combat due to timeout, but he can continue playing. That’s why he can get gold in this tourney. Was it accidently or are such bugs possible?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I think that he should open less tabs simultaneously. I often have lugs because of it.

Мирий [20] : He has only one tab opened. He is involved in the tournament on the cards. And he play is freezed, he lose his game due to timeout. Can he make some movement and what is the problem of the lug?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : It’s possible that there is a bug in the tavern: during the game you have enough resources but you can’t use any card. You can fix it restarting the page. But there are bugs connected with synchronization, you can play for a long time, but indeed the game has been over. It happens when you have two opening tabs. You can play in two tabs and firstly play in our tab then in another tab, close the second one and you will see your old game. I think bugs can be connected with it.

Мирий [20] : I see. And what about the combat trough the command prompt can you say? There were many bugs but they were closed, as you say, but are there more bugs?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I haven’t sent letters to the administration with them yet.

Мирий [20] : Why haven’t you written them? Other players can use bugs.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Who does use it?

Мирий [20] : In theory. Somebody knows about the actions through the command prompt and use it. You know about this bug and don’t inform the administration. Why?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I write only about critical bugs.

Мирий [20] : O.K. Can my creatures cast skills and make a movement after it?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Yes.

Мирий [20] : What more? It will be a real cheat if it’s used in the tournament. For example, I cast curse by Liches and then during the command prompt they can make a movement or attack somebody. Or you can learn flight path.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : You can’t learn it, I’ve checked it. If the creature moves, you will get the information about it because all movements of a new creature are coded, but if the griffins take wing you won’t know their flight path.

Мирий [20] : Look! I move all my cannons to use mass spells on it at the event with the pirates. Thus, I can tighten the event.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I don’t recommend doing it. I’ve checked it in WG with pirates, it’s awful.

Мирий [20] : Turns out you can make a box of cannons and fire back. You can cast them stoneskin, evasion and so on. And people will never learn about it.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Not quit. As far as I have been trying, they do not move. Be more precise they are moved, but after it the game is freezed and you can’t do anything. Firstly your cannon is freezed and then something else.

Мирий [20] : Do you try to refresh the page or to reconnect to the combat?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : It doesn’t help because you’ve already moved your cannon to the strange coordinates. After using the cannon I tried to use some skills of my character or attack or defend. I can’t do this even through the command prompt. I was happy that there was the button to surrender. I lost then 800 coins for the robe that was on me.

Мирий [20] : O.K. We can’t touch the cannon and what about creatures?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : It’s cheating.

Мирий [20] : But the combat isn’t freezed, is if?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : No.

Мирий [20] : In other words, there are many cheats that are still active. Everyone can use them in tournaments to move and cast at the same time. The guardians can use new ability power and move. Is it true?

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : I don’t know. There are only active abilities powers – magic books or…

Мирий [20] : But it’s also active ability power.

ULTRA_XEROX [10] : Than, yes. It’s a cheat.