Discussion: Command Line Option Changes [Merged]

[ArmoredVehicle.2849]

@keenedge.9675 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Ryan.6951 said:Do you have any devs who use something like lastpass, or are interested in security in general? Anyone could have weighed in on this and explained to the rest of the > Which, of course, completely defeats the idea of said increased security restrictions.

Personally, I trust Anet more than lastpass vault. Password keepers, local or cloud, make it too easy for your roommate/friend to go through your stuff.

If you want real security, use your PC in a locked room with no internet connection.

Having the user/password viewable as clear text by pressing Ctl-alt-Del and looking in Taskman was a BIG risk. Plus it's easily viewable by any other program. (Linux: ps -ef)

It's best to engineer a new method if they want to endorse multi-account or multi-box/multi-client for PvE.

I see Lastpass as a very big security risk, the online part aka your passwords on someone elses PC is probably the biggest risk and if hackers ever manage to get to it, it would wreak havoc. I personally use and prefer KeePass because of its' open source nature and cross platform support.

[Astralporing.1957]

@keenedge.9675 said:

@Astralporing.1957 said:

@Ryan.6951 said:Do you have any devs who use something like lastpass, or are interested in security in general? Anyone could have weighed in on this and explained to the rest of the > Which, of course, completely defeats the idea of said increased security restrictions.

Personally, I trust Anet more than lastpass vault. Password keepers, local or cloud, make it too easy for your roommate/friend to go through your stuff.Passwords on stickers next to monitor make it even easier. And this is usually what happens when you enforce security restrictions beyond certain level.

If you want real security, use your PC in a locked room with no internet connection.

Having the user/password viewable as clear text by pressing Ctl-alt-Del and looking in Taskman was a BIG risk.Seriously, I doubt anyone used autologin links on public computers. And if anyone you didn't trust had an access to your computer, you had a ton of bigger problems than this anyway.

It's best to engineer a new method if they want to endorse multi-account or multi-box/multi-client for PvE.Probably, although I doubt they want to endorse it.

[MAX Guild Leader.6703]

@YtseJam.9784 said:Pretty sure everyone that is entering their username and password in a shortcut are aware that anyone can see it, so they know what they are doing. If this is because people are using 3rd party launchers and put their username and password there, on a 3rd party app, and getting their accounts stolen, then that's on them. That said, I really hate this change and IDK why after 6 years ANET all of the sudden cares about security, when this is a feature that has existed for so long. Yeah call me lazy, but I like clicking on my shortcuts to launch my accounts. If you guys removed this cause of security issues, you should have done something better as a replacement, i.e. Let the launcher remember more than 1 username/password combination stored securely and let us select from them. You could even let us save them in the UI and then just include the -email in the command line and it would try to load it from an existing securely stored one. There are so many ways this could have been improved, but just removing it without an alternative seems like the lazy approach and just ruins user experience.

Mate you can do autologin to your accounts... it will eat some of your Harddisk space but it is worth.. make a batch file & copy below scripts.

@echo offren "C:\Users\xxx\AppData\Roaming\Guild Wars 2\local.dat-first" "local.dat""C:\Program Files\Guild Wars 2\Gw2-64.exe" -autologin"ren "C:\Users\xxx\AppData\Roaming\Guild Wars 2\local.dat" "local.dat-first"

save 1 batch file each account.... you have to copy the local.dat and rename it.... REMEMBER to check remember username & password to autologin.

BTW... just type %appdata% on your folder browser to access the location of local.dat

[arukAdo.2047]

It wasnt just in the task manager you could see it (actually i think ive never saw that in windows 10, maybe thats for windows 7?), it was also in clear text in arenanet.log or GFXsettings.xml, where it seems to just dump your command line arguments, so ill pretend this was justified, but the question is why does this come up now (too late? your pass is already in clear text everywhere...since many years...) and no alternative is given

[Veliant.1683]

Looks like the guy who predicted a great wall of silence from Anet about this thread was right. It shows how little they care about the concerns of their community that they cant even take the time to engage us in conversation. One comment that basically says "because we deemed it necessary and we can" isn't conversation. Many in this thread have brought up valid points or asked valid questions, but it seems like we are being ignored.

[Alimar.8760]

@"Veliant.1683" said:Looks like the guy who predicted a great wall of silence from Anet about this thread was right. It shows how little they care about the concerns of their community that they cant even take the time to engage us in conversation. One comment that basically says "because we deemed it necessary and we can" isn't conversation. Many in this thread have brought up valid points or asked valid questions, but it seems like we are being ignored.

Honestly I doubt they've had too many people actively complaining about it to warrant an answer or an open discussion on the topic. This forum post is only at 5 pages, which isn't much considering some of the other controversial topics like Bubbletea and the Kourna drama, and others. Even the Istan nerf has more people talking about it than this thread. Likely Gaile's final words are considered final and they will no longer respond. I'm not trying to bash Anet, but they're also not required to respond either by any means.

The best we can do is continue to raise awareness, and continue to talk about it and talk to other people. Encouraging communication within the community about this issue. Keep the thread at the top as long as possible. Go to Reddit and make a post there. The issue is, people lose steam, eventually the thread will be buried along with many of the other (for lack of a better term), "outrage" posts. More people strive to post on forums when they have something negative to say. It's important to have critical discussion and debate. And that can be achieved without them responding, and frankly should be done with anything people disagree with.

[kurfu.5623]

@"Veliant.1683" said:Looks like the guy who predicted a great wall of silence from Anet about this thread was right. It shows how little they care about the concerns of their community that they cant even take the time to engage us in conversation. One comment that basically says "because we deemed it necessary and we can" isn't conversation. Many in this thread have brought up valid points or asked valid questions, but it seems like we are being ignored.

[Artanis.4963]

@"Gaile Gray.6029" said:I'm really sorry that some of you are unhappy with this change. I'd like to reiterate that the decision was based solely on our concerns for player security. Theories about alternative motivations for the change are completely baseless.

I notice at least one person state that those who used the system were fully aware it was an "at your own risk" situation, and that every user would be aware of any security risks that they were taking on. I have to dispute that. I don't believe that everyone knew of the risks, nor that every single user willingly accepted them. It would be provably inaccurate to state, "I knew it was risky, therefore every other user knew that, too."

As stated here, we have no objections to players using multiple accounts, when that use follows the proscribed limitations. The change today was decidedly not a means of trying to limit or halt multi-boxing, nor was it developed as a means of inconveniencing those who play with multiple accounts. If you are inconvenienced, we're sorry. But security > convenience, as I'm sure you'll appreciate.

Hi Gaile, do you think the team would be willing to add the ability to point GW2 at a specific Local.dat file? That would let login information be preserved for multiple accounts, while still keeping it under GW2's protection.

[Jakkari.9238]

@Healix.5819 said:

@Mireles Lore.5942 said:Is this method already incorporated in your launcher?

-image to update and -sharearchive to launch the game is a basic requirement for running multiple accounts simultaneously, so yes. Technically you don't need -image to update, but that'd be a mess with multiple Local.dat files. Gw2Launcher also offers using an authenticator, for those that don't want to deal with codes.

So, since ArenaNet is ignoring this for the time being, I decided to use your launcher. I'm having a bit of trouble though with the second account not saving the sound settings. I created my first account with the launcher, then added the second account by telling it to copy the settings from the first Local.dat. Everything copied fine as far as graphics and keybinds, but the sound volume is jacked to 100 and won't save when I change it during gameplay.

Sorry for bringing it up here, but it's because of this change by ArenaNet that I'm having to jump through these hoops. Thanks in advance.

[Healix.5819]

@Jakkari.9238 said:Everything copied fine as far as graphics and keybinds, but the sound volume is jacked to 100 and won't save when I change it during gameplay.

GW2 is in read-only mode when it allows multiple clients to be opened, so it won't be able to save any changes you make to any of the hardware-specific settings (mainly sound, some graphics options, and the options on the launcher). If you want to change these settings, you need to launch the account normally by right clicking > selected > launch (normal).

If you just wanted to change the volume however, you can alternatively right click the account > edit > launch options > volume, or if you want it to apply to all accounts, right click any account > settings > launch options > volume. This is the equivalent of controlling the volume in Windows for GW2. The problem with the in-game master volume is that it applies twice to some cinematics.

[Oenanthe.6549]

I've just come across this thread and I hadn't even realised there had been this change until I read it through, i haven't been able to play much the last month. For those of us with multiple accounts this really is a kick in the teeth. I don't know enough about computers to understand all this about local dat files and batch files, i just about managed to rename a short cut to work last time.

Could you at least give us a drop down box so we can chose the account we want to use even if we then have to type in the password manually. The 'Remember account name' option only works for the last account you logged into, unless that has changed as well.

[Dark Rider.2839]

@Healix.5819 Is there a workaround to run TaCo with your Launcher?

[Healix.5819]

@Dark Rider.2839 said:Is there a workaround to run TaCo with your Launcher?

If you want it to start when you launch an account, right click any account > Settings > Launch Options > Run after launching. Enter the following with your own path:

cd c:\example\path\to\folder\containing\taco\start GW2TacO.exe

[Pifil.5193]

@Healix.5819 said:

@Dark Rider.2839 said:Is there a workaround to run TaCo with your Launcher?

If you want it to start when you launch an account, right click any account > Settings > Launch Options > Run after launching. Enter the following with your own path:

cd c:\example\path\to\folder\containing\taco\start GW2TacO.exe

I just want to sincerely thank you for creating this tool and for all the help you're giving people on the forums.

[Mrs Lana.2506]

@Pifil.5193 said:

@Healix.5819 said:

@Dark Rider.2839 said:Is there a workaround to run TaCo with your Launcher?

If you want it to start when you launch an account, right click any account > Settings > Launch Options > Run after launching. Enter the following with your own path:

cd c:\example\path\to\folder\containing\taco\start GW2TacO.exe

I just want to sincerely thank you for creating this tool and for all the help you're giving people on the forums.

Yeah Helix is doing more to fix this issue than any dev atm it seems. Great stuff man, keep it up. We all appreciate it <3

[Kyranna.1730]

@Miss Lana.5276 said:

@Pifil.5193 said:

@Healix.5819 said:

@Dark Rider.2839 said:Is there a workaround to run TaCo with your Launcher?

If you want it to start when you launch an account, right click any account > Settings > Launch Options > Run after launching. Enter the following with your own path:

cd c:\example\path\to\folder\containing\taco\start GW2TacO.exe

I just want to sincerely thank you for creating this tool and for all the help you're giving people on the forums.

Yeah Helix is doing more to fix this issue than any dev atm it seems. Great stuff man, keep it up. We all appreciate it <3

Just want to echo this, Healix's GW2Launcher is working great for me after the initial setup (which, to me, was no more work/complicated than setting up the shortcuts for auto login we used to have). Then, it's just a matter of clicking on the account in GW2Launcher, and other than the Anet's launcher coming up and delaying the login for 5 seconds (I do have the remember account/password and autologin enabled on the launcher), it works just like before Anet nerfed the command line arguments.

Just to note, I use it to log in to my accounts in succession, so I don't multibox on the same computer.

Thank you very much, Healix!

[Jakkari.9238]

@Healix.5819 When multiboxing with your tool, does each game need to be in windowed mode?

Also, ArenaNet still hasn't fixed their launcher to remember multiple accounts/passwords.

[Healix.5819]

@Jakkari.9238 said:When multiboxing with your tool, does each game need to be in windowed mode?

No. Windowed mode is if you want to move or resize the window, whereas the fullscreen options simply fill the entire primary screen. Do note however that launching the game in fullscreen mode has a high chance of crashing (without an error report) if it loses focus while initially loading the character select screen.

[vmod.6308]

please restore this function.

[kurfu.5623]

@vmod.6308 said:please restore this function.

Or add a way to remember multiple accounts for those that paid actual money to have them.

[Sylum.1806]

Between this and the recent release of the third party DX12 proxy tool that basically disproves the "marginal gains in performance" statement from ArenaNet regarding transitioning from DX9 to DX12, I'd say it's been a pretty demoralizing two weeks for the community.

While I pretty much agree with the idea of not hyping up unreleased content until they ship, more communication on topics like command line arguments and engine optimization are definitely welcome.

[Illconceived Was Na.9781]

@"Sylum.1806" said:the third party DX12 proxy tool that basically disproves the "marginal gains in performance" statement from ArenaNet regarding transitioning from DX9 to DX12,It does nothing of the sort. The proxy tool is a kludge that trades off stability for performance for some people. Any official version, whether using a comparable kludge or running natively couldn't afford to be as wonky.

ANet rarely comments on suggestions. When they do and say "no," it's because they've already spent time considering the idea and determined the actual implementation to be more complex than it appears from the outside. One can choose not to trust ANet's evaluation, but to be consistent, that would also mean not trusting them to get it right anyhow.

I'd say it's been a pretty demoralizing two weeks for the community.On the contrary, we have third party options that are awesome. I consider GW2 Launcher to be superior to Launch Buddy in many ways and I'm glad that more people are exposed to it. The DX12 Proxy is a fascinating idea and I'm glad that (a) the developer has decided to collaborate with colleagues among the GW2 community and (b) I'm keeping an eye on it until it's more ready for prime time. (The issues with alt-tabbing are usefulness-breaking for me.)

more communication on topics like command line arguments and engine optimization are definitely welcome.More communication would be good.

[Aragorn.5462]

@Kyranna.1730 said:

@Miss Lana.5276 said:

@Pifil.5193 said:

@Healix.5819 said:

@Dark Rider.2839 said:Is there a workaround to run TaCo with your Launcher?

If you want it to start when you launch an account, right click any account > Settings > Launch Options > Run after launching. Enter the following with your own path:

cd c:\example\path\to\folder\containing\taco\start GW2TacO.exe

I just want to sincerely thank you for creating this tool and for all the help you're giving people on the forums.

Yeah Helix is doing more to fix this issue than any dev atm it seems. Great stuff man, keep it up. We all appreciate it <3

Just want to echo this, Healix's GW2Launcher is working great for me after the initial setup (which, to me, was no more work/complicated than setting up the shortcuts for auto login we used to have). Then, it's just a matter of clicking on the account in GW2Launcher, and other than the Anet's launcher coming up and delaying the login for 5 seconds (I do have the remember account/password and autologin enabled on the launcher), it works just like before Anet nerfed the command line arguments.

Just to note, I use it to log in to my accounts in succession, so I don't multibox on the same computer.

Thank you very much, Healix!

Just also wanted to add my thanks to Healix for making this work! It's definitely a little bit of work but this is totally worth it! Thank you!

[Kyranna.1730]

Two things about GW2 Launcher that are very helpful to me (in addition to providing auto-login, of course):

• it tells you when the account was last accessed. Pretty much eliminates the chance of me missing an account to log in for the dailies, or trying to remember which account was last accessed;
• it has a helpful daily chest icon to show whether the account has been accessed since the daily reset.

[Jakkari.9238]

Hey ArenaNet, @Gaile Gray.6029 you gonna bring back those command line switches or fix your launcher to store multiple account credentials yet? Or is the third party tool here from @Healix.5819 our go to option for automating the login process?