Game changing addon! Text to speech!

[Machinelf]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhBGNJQvbUo

http://www.jocys.com/software#Text_to_Speech

Note: this isn't my addon, I'm just a fanboy passing along a new paradigm

Every year or so a truly monumental addon comes along that fundamentally improves/changes the way we play, such as Power Auras, Weakauras, Battleground Targets, GladiatorLOSSA, Oqeue, VEM.

Jocy's Text to Speech is the latest to join this pantheon of awesomeness. It reads in a natural voice (male, female, robotic etc) quest text and NPC gossip. Questing is actually fun again, I can hear quest text read to me in a natural voice whilst I'm going from one place to another. Text that would normally be ignored. So this addon saves a huge chunk of work that Blizzard did, and adds meaning and fun to an otherwise laborious task.

The latest patch will play the quest even after closing the window, making for a seamless experience.
Make sure you get the real-sounding voices at Ivona as well, as the ones shipped with Windows 7 and 8 are shite. You can try before you buy. These will greatly improve your overall computer experience as well (not just WOW) on programs such as Ventrilo.

As speech recognition improves, this will undoubtedly become part of WOW. I can see in the future this having extra options for raid chat, and NPCs that you are passing in the world.

[semlar]

This is not an addon, it uses an external program to read data from the game in real-time.

There are a lot of neat things you could do by monitoring the game with another program, all of which would unfortunately be against the ToS, so use at your own risk.

[Deleted]

Thank you, I needed to laugh and the addon delivered paired with some TTS-packs I downloaded.

[Resike]

As cool the idea sounds, you can't really trust a background exe file like this, since it could steal any of your personal informations and passwords, and simply push it to the web.

[Machinelf]

This has already been debated at length. There is a whole cottage industry of software for handicapped people playing video games. Blizzard would be extremely idiotic to all of a sudden start cracking down on all those cheating deaf, arthritic, and legally blind people. Accessibility software does not in any way fit into the "unfair advantage" rule. LOL people said the same crap about Oqeue. I would say it's the sign of a great addon that the tinfoil hat crowd starts proclaiming doom and gloom.
It is actually comprised of an addon and a standalone program, and we're not counting extra voice packs for Windows 7/8. All the other TTS programs have a similar setup. I don't know if all this functionality can be shoehorned into an addon entirely within WOW. This one just happens to work the best. If you aren't comfortable with it, you can always wait a few years for Blizzard to implement the functionality. That said, the reality is that an addon itself (and not just standalone exe file) can compromise your security, I'm thinking of the ElvUI fiasco. If you want to be completely safe, don't use addons at all, and unplug the Internet cable.
Anyways, Jocy's is free, and digitally signed, the author makes great pains about this. I have had zero issues with it, and it works wonderfully. I'm actually questing for fun now. That's good enough for me. And as I grow older, and my eyesight dims, I know I have options.

[semlar]

While it's great that you enjoy the software, there is no question about blizzard's stance on third party programs reading or intercepting data being broadcast by the game client.

They may choose not to punish anybody for using this particular program, but keep in mind that the method being used here is extremely detectable and there is no uncertainty about it violating their terms of use.

This is not a paranoid delusion, it's a friendly warning and you would do well to recognize the difference.

[Machinelf]

Thanks for clarifying. I went back and looked. Here is the official party line:

"Blizzard will take action against any players using third party programs, which operate outside the World of Warcraft software, to gain an advantage in the game. This software may include increasing movement or teleportation hacks, automating gameplay, or other changes that subvert the mechanics or design of the game. This can also include programs that obtain information not normally available to the regular player, or that transmit or modify any of the game files."



Blizzard has posted officially many times that as long as YOU are in control, and not the script, using this is fine. It is not so much the how, but the why, and its effect on other players' experience. By this metric, bots and exploits are culpable, everything else is victimless. Bots and exploits are what gets bans, and nothing else has.

Let's start with Multiboxing, which requires controllers that use similar technology to TTS in that they are 3rd party programs. Blizzard has said on many occasions they are fine with multiboxing (at 3 accounts IIRC, which could translate to 10 x 3 = 30 toons). And one could easily argue Multiboxing offers a COLOSSAL advantage over other hapless players.

Text to speech comes nowhere near this, not even as close as Tmorph, which is much more grey area (I wouldn't go anywhere near it, IMHO it's for lazy people who don't have the will to go out and farm tmog gear, or cheapskates who don't want to pay for race/sex changes), although people haven't gotten banned for it. Blizzard has been reticent about Tmorph. My take on it is, they know about it, but don't really care, but don't want to say they don't care, because that would encourage people to push the tech further.

Finally, there is modifying the audio files, such as music. Blizzard has turned a blind eye to this as well. This has spawned a cottage industry as well.

That's three canaries far, far deeper in the coalmine. Now you have Text to speech, which actually helps handicapped people play WOW, something in my heart of hearts know that Blizzard would never take action against, encourages the disabled to play WOW, as it does not in any way violate the sense or spirit of fair play. Probably most importantly, it doesn't have some crazy potential to be morphed into an instrument of evil by the non handicapped. Imagine the PR shitstorm of Blizzard banning handicapped people... 'Sorry, you HAVE to read our quests...

Finally, TTS programs wouldn't be able to operate without an addon component. Blizzard could ban them in a heartbeat like they did with paid Carbonite. I would consider that a fourth canary.

So yeah, it's a huge grey area going from black to slightly off color. Blizzard can nuke you if they feel you deserve it. But I'm pretty sure no sane person would ever say TTS deserves it. In the 11 years of WOW, Blizzard has never banned anything that didn't deserve it. That makes me confident enough to use TTS, even 5 years time played, 49 characters, millions of honestly made gold and 22k achievements. In cases like this, I'd follow my conscience.

For me the happiness it brings far outweighs any neglible risk. It might be different for you if you have a 0.0000% risk tolerance, or are involved in shady stuff like botting.

[Vargur]

As cool the idea sounds, you can't really trust a background exe file like this, since it could steal any of your personal informations and passwords, and simply push it to the web.

Any such software would be open source.

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Blizzard has posted officially many times that as long as YOU are in control, and not the script, using this is fine. Multiboxing requires controllers that use similar technology, Blizzard has said on many occasions they are fine with multiboxing (at 3 accounts IIRC, which could translate to 10 x 3 = 30 toons).
Text to speech comes nowhere near this, not even as close as Tmorph, which IMHO is more grey area, although people haven't gotten banned for it.

FreeFarSight is also harmless, alas against the ToS. But there are no legitimate Blizzard tools for machinimas, so there's no other way.

[semlar]

Blizzard has posted officially many times that as long as YOU are in control, and not the script, using this is fine. Multiboxing requires controllers that use similar technology, Blizzard has said on many occasions they are fine with multiboxing (at 3 accounts IIRC, which could translate to 10 x 3 = 30 toons).
Text to speech comes nowhere near this, not even as close as Tmorph, which IMHO is more grey area, although people haven't gotten banned for it.

Well, I'm not sure what part of what I said lead you to believe I was talking about botting, but the way this program functions, by intercepting network traffic to pass information to it from inside the game, is a violation of the user agreement, I'm not sure how I can make that any more clear.

You can refer to section 2, subsection C (and to a lesser extent A) of their terms of use for further information.

[Trialtm]

That's pretty fucking cool tbh. I feel it would loose its effect tho on the Horde side of things tho. Nonetheless, amazing addon!

[SlippyCheeze]

Any such software would be open source.

I have no strong opinion either way about the TTS software, but please, please, please, I'm begging you, don't mistake "it's open source" for any sort of security assurance. (...this is wearing the IT security hat that has been part of my job for, like, 20 years now, BTW, and don't mistake it for open source hate -- I love the stuff, but don't have illusions about it.)

This is double-bonus-extra true when the software in question is precompiled for you -- because you have no idea what the relationship between the source code and the compiled executable is -- but also true when you look at interpreted things like lua, etc.

If you want a specific example to make this concrete rather than abstract, remember that time there was that backdoor in ElvUI, or that time that WeakAuras implemented some protections against bad auras mailing away all your gold at the mailbox? Both of those are open source.

[semlar]

How do you suppose blizzard would react if other addon authors also decide that the sandbox blizzard allows them to play in is too restrictive and that they'd prefer to avoid that hassle by creating an executable component which runs alongside the game to provide additional functionality that wouldn't otherwise be possible?

After all, they aren't really doing anything wrong, they just want to do something an addon can't normally do, or would have a more difficult time accomplishing; but who's to say, since it's no longer operating in the carefully controlled environment provided by blizzard, it's running on your computer, watching your network traffic.

[Resike]

Any such software would be open source..

Would make things even worse, because then 100% someone would take the original code, inject a keylogger into it, and randomly upload it somewhere as a new version. And bang you are hacked.

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In the 11 years of WOW, Blizzard has never banned anything that didn't deserve it..

I would argue with that.

The real issue is that this addon works the same way as interrupt bots nowdays. I would not take my chance since Warden could detect this as a potential interrupt bot and ban you without asking a thing.

Then you can argue about it was just a TTS, it still reads information which should not be readable for ANY program.

Packet capture can be used to fulfill a warrant from a law enforcement agency (LEA) to produce all network traffic generated by an individual. Internet service providers and VoIP providers in the United States must comply with CALEA (Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act) regulations. Using packet capture and storage, telecommunications carriers can provide the legally required secure and separate access to targeted network traffic and are able to use the same device for internal security purposes. Collection of data from a carrier system without a warrant is illegal due to laws about interception.

[SlippyCheeze]

Would make things even worse, because then 100% someone would take the original code, inject a keylogger into it, and randomly upload it somewhere as a new version. And bang you are hacked.

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I would argue with that.

The real issue is that this addon works the same way as interrupt bots nowdays. I would not take my chance since Warden could detect this as a potential interrupt bot and ban you without asking a thing.

Then you can argue about it was just a TTS, it still reads information which should not be readable for ANY program.

Packet capture can be used to fulfill a warrant from a law enforcement agency (LEA) to produce all network traffic generated by an individual. Internet service providers and VoIP providers in the United States must comply with CALEA (Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act) regulations. Using packet capture and storage, telecommunications carriers can provide the legally required secure and separate access to targeted network traffic and are able to use the same device for internal security purposes. Collection of data from a carrier system without a warrant is illegal due to laws about interception.

You interpretation of that law is wrong. While there are plenty of valid arguments that can be used about why Blizzard would ban this, that law does not apply to the situation or software at hand. (Which is good, because otherwise pretty much every technical person at every large Internet company you could name would be quickly arrested for using packet capture tools to debug things on their networks.)

[Resike]

You interpretation of that law is wrong. While there are plenty of valid arguments that can be used about why Blizzard would ban this, that law does not apply to the situation or software at hand. (Which is good, because otherwise pretty much every technical person at every large Internet company you could name would be quickly arrested for using packet capture tools to debug things on their networks.)

I'm pretty sure the large Internet companies auto sign you to allow this method as soon as you register or make a subscription.

Packet sniffing is only legal in your local network and/or free wifi services, anything you sniff remotely is not.

[S7orm]

i was really looking forward into getting a ban for no logical reason

[SlippyCheeze]

I'm pretty sure the large Internet companies auto sign you to allow this method as soon as you register or make a subscription.
Packet sniffing is only legal in your local network and/or free wifi services, anything you sniff remotely is not.

...in the context at hand, "your own network" is what is being sniffed, hence the comment. Ultimately, though, it's more complex than that, and your suggested interpretation of the law is still pretty wrong. (Also, I was talking about the people employed by those companies, like me, not about the paying customers of those companies.)

[ComputerNerd]

While I understand the intent, the means by which this is achieved is potentially going to fall foul of the ToS.
Blizzard have previously implemented a limited external interface for selected information in the case of the Logitech G-series keyboards.
Therefore I think discussion with them first would be a better route to take.

[SlippyCheeze]

While I understand the intent, the means by which this is achieved is potentially going to fall foul of the ToS.
Blizzard have previously implemented a limited external interface for selected information in the case of the Logitech G-series keyboards.
Therefore I think discussion with them first would be a better route to take.

Different kettle of fish: this would be supporting screen readers, effectively, which is another accessibility improvement. Given they have been on a graphics kick in that direction recently, this might be an opportune time. (Plus both OS-X and Windows have fairly simple API for doing this, these days, so.... win.)