[Software] Archi's Steam Farm (ASF), Steam idler (and much more) [Windows/Linux/OS X]

archi, can i play in this account while my ALT accounts are farming cards (this account isnt farming/the conection is disabled in configuration) i mean could i get a vac?

Yes, you can play and no, you can't get VAC for doing so.

Even having that account enabled is OK, ASF is 100% VAC-free, it's physically not possible to farm and play at the same time.

Works for me! Can I play on VAC secured servers on CS:GO as an example while idling?

Idle Master can't trigger VAC. Unless you're going to use outsider program on Idle Master it's safe. Already been using it for over a year for VAC-protected and non-protected games and guess what - no VAC. :)

No VAC yet, the moment you get VAC it will be already too late, and can't is a statement of possibility, which is not true when analyzing the way how IM communicates with your steam client, through hooked DLL library. Saying "it's unlikely" is much more appropriate, saying "it can't" is simply not true. One of the reasons why I created ASF was to ensure that ASF is VAC-free on software level and the way how it works, mainly because IM had still unlikely possibility of triggering the system. I want to have 100% safety, your 99% is not enough for me.

So unless you want to be indirectly responsible for anybody trusting you if your statement turns out to be false, I'd advise you to not spread misinformation, especially in my thread. And I hope for your own good that your statement will never turn out to be a wrong one, but considering the state of IM itself, I'm nearly sure that eventually something blows up and people will wake up covered in crap.

Well, really only way of not getting VAC-banned 100% is just downloading the game and putting it on yourself without outside programs. ^_^

You clearly don't understand how ASF or VAC works if you're stating things like these, and I don't have enough willings to repeat what I said in various different places across last 38 pages, or here. Do yourself a favour and before claiming to know better at least try to do some basic research in the topic you're talking about.

"It's better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt."

So wait, you're saying that Idle Master can trigger VAC but it hasn't for some reason? So you're claiming that VAC- system sucks somehow because it just might find an outsider program like Idle Master at some point, and you know it can find, so you're better coder than those who Valve has? Daaayum son. :D

No.
What he says is:
The way VAC works there is a (small) chance of IM triggering VAC, since it is another program "manipulating" games and communicating with your steamclient. ASF on the other hand is emulating a steam client and is NOT communicating with your running one, so there is absolutely no chance of getting a VAC ban. Just because the steam client, which could detect a violation (could detect IM) is not involved in any way.

Currently IM seems not to trigger VAC, but a small change in the used algorithm and it may does. Some combination of IM and other stuff my does. Just some unlucky concidence with IM may does.

PS: Seeing what valve pulls sometimes, it seems any fithgrader is a batter programmer ;->

How does IdleMaster cause VAC to trigger?

Hi Archi, i love your program, keep the good work.

But there is something that i want to say to you Archi, i think you must change the parts of both SAM and Idle Master about vac ban, because both does not cause VAC, i have already done a lot of tests with alternative accounts with TF2 and CS: go and today they are my accounts for farming drops/cards because none of them got ban and the tests was like 9 months ago (i think?).
For example a lot of people know about this guy who done this test with SAM: http://steamcommunity.com/profiles/76561198173473939/
i have made that test too along with the idle master and no VAC bans in alt accs, because in reality VAC only trigger when there is illegal modifications that may give advantage in-game / multiplayer, so i know that you want to show to the others that your program is the best and safe, thats is good your program is really better and well safe too, but i think that using that method of fear by "may cause vac" is wrong with the other programs, because exactly like your program you can use both SAM and Idle while connected in a secured vac server if you want.
Ok perhaps you will not believe me, so i told you how you test it, it's not hard just create another account, if you don't have money for cs: go then test it on team fortress 2 both programs and wait several months (because VAC ban can be delay too) and you will see that nothing happens and that VAC in reality is really for banning cheats only.

It's discussed like 3 times in the last 10 comments...
Here is a explanation:
https://www.steamgifts.com/go/comment/rEzosGB
tl;dr: Only because I does not cause VAC for the most users at the moment it may do so (now or in the future) just by the way VAC works. ASF can not trigger VAC in any way. IM and SAM could do (since they are communicating with the steamclient and are 3rd party programms).

Edit: And "See it doesn't happen to me when I try it out" is not a proof... there are people cheating and not getting banned as well...

I'm answering after drinking a bit so forgive me :P
As far as I know when you accept the "Term of Agreement" of almost every game you sign that you're not allowed to run any third-party program to interfere with the game, let it be access to achievement or card farming or anything else, so it's not an issue of it be something like "it may cause vac", as long as you use a third-party program to interfere with the game in any way you're breaking a legal agreement that you signed and you're eligible for a Vac, if a game support it, or for a whatever kind of ban from that service.

Basically it become an issue of whatever the third-party program is easy to individuate or not since almost everything is suitable for a ban.

Oh ok, thanks KlappPC and Morshock you guys have really good points, but i really don't like the way people keep telling about both sam and idle that may cause or is causing VAC, idk i found this unfair with them, well in my opinion if Steam will punish users of both SAM, idle and of course ASF too someday in the future i don't think that's will happen with VAC bans and i think there is be more logic that it will be with account restrictions, even with a lot of research about these programs today i still didn't found any proof about a confirmed VAC and that's why i tested these with my alts accounts.
(Oh sorry for the bad english xD)

I didn't test anything myself.
Just remember that any discontinued project, as far as I know, has an higher chance of getting busted because the software itself is not getting updated so it's easier to track by the game/software owners.
I never used SAM but I think it's somewhat easy to track because most user won't check actual progression time between achievement or achievement order at all, so if there was some serious check it may highly be discovered.
As far as ASF is concerned Archi said that the program simulate a request from steam itself and since it's being updated regularly has a really lower change of being "discovered" because it's tricking steam on seeing a request from the actual platform and because the updates keep it safe.

Just remember that "those" programs have a relatively low change of triggering bans or VAC bans is mostly because both Idle Master and ASF just serve to purpose of farming cards and in itself that is just bypassing the need of downloading the game and launching it for a period of time so they're not really much "game-breaking". On the other side, being able to add or remove achievement at will is exponentially more serious since achievement even in single players only game are revered as a meant to show one's skill, or to unlock special restricted DLCs or prizes.

I don't know if Valve want to punish users of Idle Master or ASF with VAC bans, but as now SAM is the most likely to be eligible for VAC bans or bans in general. Then Idle Master follows because it's discontinued. And as result ASF is the safest one. And either way they have the power and the conditions to do so.

But as I said before any third-party program may trigger a ban because it would break the "Terms of Agreement", and as those states, the owners of the game have the full authority to modify, rewrite and modify the "Terms of Agreement" itself to theirs liking.
So basically it is always "Use it at your own risk".

I agree with you.
But to be fair, we should add that all those programs send fake informations to steam servers, as well.

No possible game VAC for ASF, but steam can decide one day to ban all users sending fake informations to steam servers.

After all, only steam client is supposed to send genuine gaming informations about what is currently played. No ?

Quite improbable. But applicable to all those (cheating) softwares.

You're confusing several things, the way that ASF presents facts is not misleading at all.

There is a major difference between a possibility of something to happen, and it actual happening. Both SAM and IM use third-party Steam DLL library that is being injected into Steam client process in order to do various actions with the client, such as launching games, recording achievements etc. This method is also used by several games, but those games are authorized to do so by Valve, while both IM and SAM are 100% unofficial, which means that Steam might at anytime flag them as malicious, without you or anybody else knowing it, and at another ban wave thousands of account will wake up being flagged for using it recently and it will be already too late to do anything about it. This is exactly the same what is happening with cheats.

ASF does not use library hooking method, ASF has it's own legit mini steam client inside, that is being used for interacting with steam network directly. There is no way of VAC triggering for ASF, because ASF does not interfere in any way with any of your launched games or steam client itself (unlike IM or SAM), it communicates with steam network as another steam client instance you'd run from another PC. There is no way for VAC to trigger if there is zero connections between ASF process and steam client or your game. This can also be verified by checking that ASF does not even require your original steam client running/installed to do it's thing, both IM and SAM require it.

What you're saying is that SAM or IM does not cause VAC for now and there are people that tested it does not cause VAC for now. This is not satisfying for me, because lack of detection for today is not equal in any way to lack of detection tomorrow, in a week, or in a month, and claiming that something is safe only because it's safe today is just foolish and stupid, because every single hack, cheat and exploit is undetectable at the beginning as well, you learn about it's unsafety when it's already too late.

Now I'm not going to wait until it's already too late to warn users about a possibility to cause VAC. This is the only point that interests ASF, not if something is detected or not, but if something is possible to cause VAC in future or not. And both SAM and IM can cause VAC because of how they're working as a software, so claiming that it's safe can only be used in today's context, never in context overall, because context overall can be claimed only if software is absolutely safe by design, and only ASF currently offers that. Whether users are satisfied with the "not detected today" statement or not, is up to them, and I can't see anything misleading in this and all my other statements in not only this but other threads as well, so if you have better software engineering knowledge than me in this field, please let me know what exactly is misleading. I've never stated that IM or SAM did result in VAC ban for anybody, but I'll always claim that they can trigger it, and that alone was not satisfying for me as a developer - that's one of the reasons why I created ASF. Whether people want to put in risk their expensive accounts with thousands of games for 5 cent cards only because somebody is claiming that something is safe, is always up to them - I'm simply not stupid enough to do so, and if I created something that guarantees safety, I have balls to claim it, unlike IM or SAM developers that can't give you such statement, ever.

This has nothing to do with non-VAC related bans, as those are described in Steam ToS and are not limited to any of those programs.

Oh that's ok Archi, thanks for your explanation, yeah i understand now... btw in my opinion i'm still convinced that VAC will never be applied for those who drop cards or cheats achievements, thats why i said perhaps in the future if there is some form of punishment it will be perhaps with restrictions to Steam accounts like block functions of your account, etc... but i'm really not a expert and i cannot predict the future, i just posted here to tell you my experience with my tests and my opinion about the trigger vac of both programs and i did not expected you to answer this xD, thanks!

Jeha, but we are talking about VAC.
And there it is IM, SAM = possible, ASF = impossible.

If steam decides to ban all people owning bad rats, we can not do shit against that.

But for example if steam decides to ban IM and ASF users. Then all IM useres are affected unless they read it somewhere before starting IM.
archi could just use the update function to "destroy" ASF and protect at least some accounts from the ban, or modifiy ASF to go around the steam detection.

Here's a question, how is it possible for IdleMaster to trigger VAC?

Thanks for the link, I think you should make the Yes on IdleMaster link to the comment.

Also, I think the Anti-Cheat thingy turns on when a VAC-enable game is on, either ways I didn't have problems idling CSGO and TF2, so I don't think Valve has problems with this.

Here's another question, will ASF detect a new game if I buy a game with cards, or will I have to restart ASF?

Contrary to popular belief, VAC scans aren't triggered by playing VAC-protected games, nor do they need for you to own any VAC-protected game at all, they just need your Steam client to be connected to the Steam network to start.
Then, only Valve can decide what will trigger VAC bans, we can't know in advance if, and when, they'll consider Idle Master's .dlls as "cheats", for example.
Yes, ASF will automatically detect any new game with cards, and change its behaviour accordingly, no need to restart... save for Valve-related issues.

I didn't have problems idling CSGO and TF2

This is the reason why people are wondering what I mean by "Yes" when I say that IM can trigger VAC.

It's like your friend who is saying "driving while being drunk is totally fine, police never caught me, they do not check this district, feel free to do that too!".

At the same time I'm saying "police can't catch you even if they did check this district, because with ASF you do not drive while being drunk in the first place".

So there are two questions here, is something possible, and if it will happen. VAC with IM is definitely possible, but probably will not happen, which is also stated in my chart.

Here's another question, will ASF detect a new game if I buy a game with cards, or will I have to restart ASF?

ASF will automatically detect it and restart CardsFarmer (if needed).

But the program can do anything, even ask Steam Network for VAC banning current account, it's one easy request, if that is what you mean :3.

And group part is well explained at least in two sections of the wiki: FAQ and Statistics. Being too lazy to read it is not an excuse.

I really didn't see that part on the wiki, however I think the user should be asked if he should join the group, or at least be notified about it once they open the program.

I'd also suggest you add the "this software acts like a gamethief" on this page, not hide it in the wiki :3 imo Joining a group without being notified from the program is enough to make your program suspicious.

The VAC feature is also a good idea, I think you should add it in the next version it will really look well in your program, tell me when you do that. ;)