Frequently asked questions

Q: What is War2BNE InSight?
A: War2BNE InSight is a third-party software, which adds game recording and replay functionality to Blizzard Entertainment's Warcraft II Battle.net Edition (version 2.02), similar to the builtin replay features you can find in Starcraft and Warcraft III.

Q: Has War2BNE InSight been created by Blizzard Entertainment or is it in any way affiliated with or supported by Blizzard Entertainment?
A: No.

Q: Is it legal to use War2BNE InSight to record games and view replays?
A: No. See Legal notes for details.

Q: If it's not legal to use War2BNE InSight, why did you make it and publish it?
A: As a fan of this game I think Warcraft II BNE derserves a replay feature like Starcraft and Warcraft III players already enjoy it.
Replays open the way to many possibilities, which improve the gameplay experience of a game in various ways.
An incomplete list might be:
- let players easily review games of high interest, for example tournament games, especially finals between highly skilled players;
- let players improve their skills by watching replays of more skillful players;
- let players review their own games, so they can find out why they lost, thus improving their gameplay;
- improve strategy sections of Warcraft II pages with illustrative material in form of real games in addition to screenshots and describing text;
- and so on
Let me point to War2BNE InSight version 0.04 beta, which could detect if other players were using level upgrade hacks.
Approximately 3 months after i published it on this site, Blizzard Entertainment released patch 2.02, which addressed the issue with level upgrade hacks and made it impossible to use them now.
Although i have no proof for this, i actually believe that War2BNE InSight version 0.04 beta encouraged Blizzard Entertainment to spend a little time to fix the game as far it it concerns that hack.
Others send emails to Blizzard Entertainment saying: "Please add replays to Warcraft II!"
This Warcraft-II-replay-proof-of-concept software is my way, to encourage them to make a new patch which will then include replays as an official part of the game.
Maybe in a few months... :)

Q: Why didn't you name this replay software differently to avoid confusion with your hackdetector?
A: When i discovered my love for this game, i had the idea to make an all-in-one software that should include hackdetection, replays and more detailed game statistics than the outcome screen provides. I figured War2BNE InSight was a good name to cover such a program. The hackdetection of level upgrade hacks became obsolete after patch 2.02, so now War2BNE InSight is just the replay feature.
Maybe at some time in the future, if i get the time and motivation, War2BNE InSight will again include hackdetection (Build and Spell hacks) and additional game statistics.

Q: Does War2BNE InSight make any changes to the Warcraft II BNE files? Do i have to reinstall Warcraft II BNE, if i don't want to use War2BNE InSight anymore?
A: No, all changes are made in RAM, not on your harddisk. Also War2BNE InSight removes all changes it made, when it finishes recording or playback. Hence you don't need to restart Warcraft II BNE after you have viewed a replay and/or recorded a game.

Q: What information does War2BNE InSight store in the replay files?
A: Names of the players in the recorded game, their races, game start and end times, game setup information (such as Gamytype, Resources, Gamespeed and Starting Location), information about the game in the moment it starts (such as units the players start with, resources, farmspace), user interface commands, the players give during the game (such as "Player A builds a townhall" or "Player B sends his grunts with attack to the middle of the map")

Q: Aside from these (for a replay needed) information, does War2BNE InSight spy out any additional information, such as my CD key or Battle.net password?
A: No.

Q: Does War2BNE InSight, like many other so-called "freeware" software, install any Spyware, Adware or Trojan Horses or otherwise "phone home" to its creator or a third party internet site?
A: No.

Q: War2BNE InSight shows the error message "Unknown Warcraft II BNE version!", but i'm sure i have one of the 2.02 versions listed under "Supported versions" in that message. What's wrong?
A: For unknown reasons (at least none, i could explain) upgrading Warcraft II BNE to v2.02 by connecting to Battle.net and letting Warcraft II perform its auto-update leads to a DIFFERENT patched game than manually applying the file War2Patch_202.exe, which is available in the files section of www.battle.net. War2BNE InSight has been designed to work with the "auto-update 2.02" version of Warcraft II BNE. If you patched manually and want to record games and view replays with War2BNE InSight, you need to uninstall Warcraft II BNE, reinstall it and patch it to v2.02 by connecting to Battle.net.

Q: Does War2BNE InSight record lag?
A: No.

Q: Does War2BNE InSight record game pauses?
A: Yes.

Q: Can i tell from viewing a replay, if a player in that game uses a maphack?
A: No, during the replay you get vision by all players, as if you watched the original game and everyone gave you vision. If someone uses a maphack (and sees the complete map in the original game) you, however, won't see the complete map in the replay but just the parts of the map that anyone in the original game could see.

Q: Can i tell from viewing a replay, if a player in that game uses a buildhack and/or a spellhack?
A: Yes.
The buildhack allows players to build anything disregarding Warcraft II's tech tree. You can perfectly see in a replay, if a player builds an Altar of Storms although his hall is still at stronghold state, for example.
The spellhack lets players cast spells (all mage/deathknight spells and ogre mage's/paladin's bloodlust/runes/heal/exorcism spells) without requiring them to research these spells first.
You can perfectly see in a replay, if a player casts a spell he hasn't researched yet. To do so click on the unit, that casts the spell and check, if the corresponding spell icon is not present OR click on the building the spell is researched in and check, if the corresponding spell icon is still there.
A common way to use the spellhack is to research haste/slow instead of death&decay/blizzard. The hacker gets an unsuspicious lvl 2 deathknight/mage and the research is much cheaper and faster.
To give you some examples: These 3 games show players, who use(d) hacks against me and other players:

  1. This Fierce Ocean Combat FFA (which you already might know, since i have posted it on the news page a while ago) shows {Lance} using a spellhack. He researches d&d to defend his island against juggs, but his temple gets destroyed before the research finishes. He then builds another temple which soon gets attacked as well. This time he researches haste (fast and cheap) and casts d&d after he got his lvl2 dk. He did not use a buildhack, most probably because there was a watcher in that game (kgbagent97).
  2. This Fierce Ocean Combat BNE 1v1 Ladder game shows {Lance} using a spellhack and a buildhack. He builds a Goblin Alchemist several seconds before his Stronghold upgrade finishes, he builds a Temple of the Damned half of a second before his Fortress upgrade finishes (you have to look very closely to see that), he researches haste instead of d&d and finally he casts bloodlust without researching it.
  3. This Garden of War 1v1 shows Xzepher using a spellhack and a buildhack. He builds an Altar of Storms without having his hall upgraded to Fortress and casts bloodlust without researching it.

Sidenote: It would have been so easy for Blizzard to eliminate spell and buildhacks as they did it for those level upgrade hacks with their 2.02 patch *sigh* :(

Q: So you tell me i can see if someone uses a spell/buildhack by watching the replay, but i have confronted the suspected hacker with the replay and he told me the replay must show it wrong and he has no clue why it shows him researching haste instead of death and decay and all that stuff. He insists on telling you that he is a legitimate player and has never used nor will ever use hacks. Might he be right and that is just a bug in War2BNE InSight? I just want to be sure!
A: Replays show the games EXACTLY like they have been played. Let me explain why:
You will know that Warcraft II BNE performs some checks during a game, to verify that the games do match exactly on every participating players computer. These checks include the positions of all units/buildings, their hitpoints, the research-/construction-/unittrainingprogresses of/in all buildings, the resources of each player and so on. If at any given time the game on one players computer differs from the game on another players computer, it disconnects.

War2BNE InSight uses the same mechanism to verify if the replay game differs from the original game and stops the replay with the message "The replay game differs from the original recorded game." in that case.

What does that mean regarding the hacker's proposition: "There's a bug in that replay program that lets me research haste in the replay although a assure you i have researched death and decay in that game"?
There's no such bug! In the second hacking-player-example-replay (see above), let's assume {Lance} built his temple AFTER his fort has been done. War2BNE InSight will abort the replay then, since in the moment just before the fort finishes there's a temple in the replay, but there has been no temple in the original game (InSight will notice that due to the resource and unit/building position checks). Same goes for the "Haste instead of d&d"-research and the missing blood lust research, this time InSight would notice the difference between the original game and the replay due to the resource and the research progress checks.

In other words this replay (and any other replay that doesn't abort due to the error message mentioned above and even a replay that aborts up to the time it aborts) exactly reflects the game like it has been played and {Lance} built his Goblin Alchemist before Hold, built his Temple of the Damned before Fortress, researched Haste instead of D&D, yet casts D&D and attacked using blood lust without researching it first.

Impressum