Custom Crosshair Utility: Cheating? Options

[Stickman]

Hi all.

I've been using a little (24k) program called cutomCrosshair to provide me with a static crosshair in COD. The program performs the software equivalent of using a marker to draw a dot in the center of your monitor screen; it takes a given bitmap and draws it on top of any other application you have running. As it's a stand-alone program that does not interect with whatever game you may be running, it is invisible to PB or any other hack detectors.

It's obviously a cobbled together utility; there's a bug that causes the windows pointer to flicker on top of the game window from time to time. Instead of tracking the bug down and fixing it, the programmer added a hotkey to toggle the visibility of the windows pointer.

The biggest drawback is that the crosshair doesn't disappear when you aim down the sight, so it can obscure your view. I get around this by using an "inverted v" crosshair, so when aiming down the sight it only covers the gun model, not the target.

My question: Is this cheating? Should I stop? Or make the program available to all? The website I got it from has since vanished.

What say you all?

This post has been edited by Stickman: 03/15/06 4:25pm

[Bargod]

Silver, I told all you guys early on about it. Remember I said I had put a mark with my sharpie in the middle of my screen? Ah well.

[Cross of Iron]

Silver, I told all you guys early on about it. Remember I said I had put a mark with my sharpie in the middle of my screen? Ah well.

Still doesn`t help you...whenever were on at the same time all you can hear is "damn ,God WTF!...no-way did I miss ,God damn im dead again"...................J/K (but had to do it you left yourself open for that one BAR)

[Stickman]

How does one make the distinction between a "fair" advantage and an "unfair" advantage? Someone with a new system who gets 100 FPS has an advantage over someone who only gets 25 FPS. Likewise someone with an optical gaming mouse has an advangage over someone with an old ball mouse. There IS no even playing field when it comes to online gaming, and never has been. Why is it that buying new hardware, which not everybody can do, is OK, while a dot on your monitor, which ANYONE can do, is unfair?

Bullet, by your criteria (helpful download in game folder = hack) the crosshair program is fine. I have it on my desktop, not my UO folder.

I'm rather surprised at this response to my query. I expected far more outcry about my home-made footpedals than about this utility. I know the footpedals make a MUCH bigger difference to my game.

Personally, I don't understand the obsession some people have about cheaters. Any time I've run across cheaters, it's been quite obvious and disruptive to the point of stopping the game. I've NEVER seen a cheater on a PB server, and doubt they exist. Runs of luck and BS shots happen. We chuckle when they happen to us. They are not evidence of foul play when they happen to others.

Personally, I consider that anything that helps one be a better player to be fair game. Examples: new hardware, dot on the screen, etc. Anything that improves your score/performance wether you're any good or not should be considered cheating. Wall hacks, aimbots, etc. Similar to the way a high performance running shoe is a legal advantage for a sprinter, while steroids are not (body hack!).

Another clan I was in had some members that were unhappy with people using the "dot on the screen" trick, but as a group, we decided that making a totally unenforcable rule against it was counterproductive.

Me, I like my crosshair utility. I find it makes the game more enjoyable, and that's why I play. It might help me get the odd close up kill, but I don't think it improves my score much. As many of you know, I like to get my kills from down the dights from a distance . However, if I know it's considered cheating, using it would make the game less enjoyable for me, so I'd stop. And if it's decided the utility is a no-no, but a dot on the sceen is fine (seems like a silly distinction to me, but whatever), then out comes the sharpie!

This post has been edited by Stickman: 03/16/06 1:13pm