Bertilsson Posted September 11, 2017 Author Share Posted September 11, 2017 ... Jumping to the end of the file I also noticed that P7 has unique references to DigiCert and P6 has unique references to VeriSign.Ouch! That explains it. Valve switched their security certificate provider from "Verisign" to "DigiCert". When you go "offline mode", Steam says it is copying your "credentials" from the server to your local drive. When you launch the Steam Client in "offline mode", apparently it checks your locally cached credentials for a valid security certificate to compare against the certificate in the game executable. In the case of the "downgrade", it has the old certificate, so it fails the check and the Client refuses to launch the (to it) "pirate" game. I think that officially makes the "downgrade" a "dead horse". You would have to hack P4 to use the "DigiCert" certificate, and that would constitute "piracy". Someone might ask Steam about it, but really doubt they would have any interest in that request, as they would have to purchase certificates from both providers to accommodate a few mod users. Simpler by far to tell them to just buy "EW". -Dubious- If it was possible to leave the P7 certificate part of the file untouched and only convert the rest of the file from P7 to P4, then it would not constitute piracy. It would just be a partial downgrade of the exe, which would not be usable in offline mode. Since P6 can be downgraded to P4, it seems that the integrity of the exe is not verified when playing in online mode and that the certificate is not depending on the integrity of the file is pretty much proven by the possibility to mod the exe in general, so I guess it could work. But it is however a theory that I am not planning to explore (especially not at the risk of Steam banning me because I appear to be experimenting with naughty things), so you are absolutely 100% correct in the assumption that the mod is now officially dead. I have hidden it to make sure no-one waste time on trying to use it. I also think you deserve special credit for tirelessly helping people over the years. That is truly an amazing effort. Thank you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dubiousintent Posted September 11, 2017 Share Posted September 11, 2017 (edited) I'll update the "Basic Guide" to explain the situation as we understand it. Anyone know when the (P7 I guess we should call it) stealth patch with the certificate change became active (the SteamDB lists a change on 29 Aug 2017), and the game exe version number? I'd like to include that info in the Patch list as well. -Dubious- Edited September 11, 2017 by dubiousintent Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Drakous79 Posted September 12, 2017 Share Posted September 12, 2017 The same as patch 6 - version 1.0.0.4963. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dubiousintent Posted September 14, 2017 Share Posted September 14, 2017 Thanks. Updated wiki. -Dubious- Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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