Update: February 26th - Fixed broken images, corrected information regarding overheated components, updated FAQ.
INTRODUCTION
This guide aims to cover most of everything related to Cracking, the 10th crime in Torn's Crimes 2.0 Early Access.
This crime is an interesting mix of Disposal, Pickpocketing, and Wordle if you've ever played that. It's also a significant nerve investment, arguably worse than burglary, so beware.
If you already know the basics just skip ahead, I'll try and keep everything organized for clarity's sake.
If you're just looking for advice on this crime, skip to the "Points Of Interest" section.
FAQ can be found right before the "Final Thoughts" section, at the very bottom.
Due to length constraints, recommended rigs have been moved to another post. You can find it below this one.
This is the tenth of my series of guides on Crimes 2.0, my other guides being
[Crimes 2.0] A Criminal Primer
[Crimes 2.0] Search For Cash: An in-depth guide
[Crimes 2.0] Bootlegging: An in-depth guide
[Crimes 2.0] Graffiti: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Shoplifting: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Card Skimming: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Burglary: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Pickpocketing: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Disposal: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Hustling: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Forgery: An In-Depth Guide
Any and all feedback, corrections and new information is appreciated.
GLOSSARY:
CS = Crime Skill, your skill at doing the crime, shown at the top of the crime page.
Unique = Unique find, marked with a star under the "ATTEMPT" button, can only be found once.
Crit = Critical failure, leads to loss of CS and sometimes items, sometimes life, sometimes prison time.
Character = Every individual letter, number or symbol in a password.
Job = The target whose password for a particular service you have to crack, a set amount of these is generated every day.
Target = The individual you're targetting for a job, ranging from ex-spouses to hackers and entire governments. Affects encryption level.
Service = The targeted service, ranging from SNS to dark web storefronts. Affects job payout.
FIRST STEPS (What you need to start)
Cracking takes places in the online world, so as can be expected, you need a plentiful amount of computer-related components, from a standard computer to specialized components like High Power CPUs and Water Blocks.
ENHANCER
It Increases CE&CS gains
[image: drive.google.com]
The Office Chair is the enhancer for this crime. It increases CE&CS gains by 5%. It is currently unknown if it has other effects.
Obtaining: Shoplift Cyber Force (unique, guard away)
TOOLS
Required to attempt the crime.
[image: drive.google.com]
A computer is required for cracking. Without one, the crime will be locked for you.
Obtaining: Buy from Super Store, and other crime outcomes.
MATERIALS
Components used for this crime.
[image: drive.google.com]
[image: drive.google.com]
[image: drive.google.com]
CPUs are used when assembling a rig. They increase MIPS and by extension brute-forcing strength. A proper definition on their effects on the system will be explored further down.
Obtaining: Shoplifting Cyber Force, Burglarizing an Aparment, Suburban Home, Self-Storage Facility, Postal Office, Recruitment Agency, Dockside Warehouse, Printing Works and Truckyard.
[image: drive.google.com]
[image: drive.google.com]
[image: drive.google.com]
Fans, Water Blocks and Heat Sinks are used for thermal regulation. They transfer and remove heat from the system, keeping your parts from overheating. A proper definition on their effects on the system will be explored further down.
Obtaining: Shoplifting Cyber Force, Burglarizing an Aparment, Suburban Home, Self-Storage Facility, Postal Office, Recruitment Agency, Dockside Warehouse, Printing Works and Truckyard.
[image: drive.google.com]
PSUs, Power Supply Units, are the heart of your rig. They provide power to everything else installed, and are one of your constraints when assembling a rig. A proper definition on their effects on the system will be explored further down.
Obtaining: Shoplifting Cyber Force, Burglarizing an Aparment, Suburban Home, Self-Storage Facility, Postal Office, Recruitment Agency, Dockside Warehouse, Printing Works and Truckyard.
EDUCATION
Some education courses are required while others provide boosts towards cracking.
[image: drive.google.com]
All required and recommended courses are found in the Computer Science bachelor, and take a cumulative total of five weeks by default to complete.
CRACKING 101 (...in a nutshell)
[image: drive.google.com]
(Cracking UI)
Cracking is a fairly complex crime, and it's also one of the most nerve-intensive ones if you don't know what you're doing. It consists of cracking people's password by bruteforcing individual characters using a cracking rig. Once a password has been identified successfully, you'll receive payment accordingly.
If you don't have a computer and basic understanding of computing, cracking will remain locked to you.
[image: drive.google.com]
(Cracking UI without a computer and the related education course. Source: Zauriel [2880793])
To crack someone's password, you have two options: Brute-force the password using your rig, or guess manually the password. To guess manually, just click any blank slot and type a character you think goes in that position. You can make three mistakes before you're locked out of further guesses, though you will still be able to crack the target, so don't be afraid of guessing!
[image: drive.google.com]
Brute-forced characters will appear by themselves without any effect, while guessed characters will have a green aura surrounding them. The counter for your mistakes can be seen to the right, next to the brute-force button.
The passwords for all currently known jobs are randomly selected from existing password lists, meaning that as long as you have at least one character, you can find out the password by using any of the multiple tools currently available for guessing.
Once a password has been fully revealed, you'll be able to crack the target's account and receive your payment.
[image: drive.google.com]
Cracking can result in a critical failure, losing you the job and the pay, as well as standard critical failure penalties.
BRUTE-FORCING
Brute-forcing is usually the first step towards cracking passwords. It costs 7 nerve to attempt, and given the length of some of the passwords available, the nerve expenditure can go sky high before you notice, making guessing very important for minimizing nerve spent and increasing efficiency.
Each brute-forcing attempt performs an amount of brute-forcing cycles depending on the brute-forcing strength of the rig. Each cycle performed will reveal a character or break down one encryption layer from a character.
ENCRYPTION
Some targets may be encrypted, requiring an additional brute-forcing attempt before a guess can be made.
[image: drive.google.com]
Encrypted targets are significantly harder to crack, usually requiring a lot of nerve to bring down the encryption layers before any attempt at guessing can be made.
Encryption ranges between one and nine layers, with more advanced targets having additional encryption layers.
[image: drive.google.com]
(Encryption layers, each dot is a layer)
Every layer is treated as an additional character when bruteforcing, so a target with five characters and one encryption layer requires ten brute-forcing cycles to crack.
CRIME SKILL GAIN
Brute-forcing gives a limited amount of CS, roughly half the amount cracking does. CS gain is unaffected by target type and encryption level, as well as brute-forcing strength. Guessing gives no CS whatsoever either.
Having 1/3rd the efficiency compared to cracking in terms of CS gain per nerve spent, brute-forcing is best avoided if one looks to increase skill in an efficient manner. HOWEVER, the daily nature of this crime means that brute-forcing is one of the very limited ways of gaining skill.
If efficient CS gain is the goal, then avoiding brute-force as much as possible is best. If fast CS gain is the goal, then brute-forcing everything is best.
THE RIG
By default, the player will be using a stock laptop or computer when cracking a password, leading to a brute-forcing strength of 1, or one cycle per attempt. As your skill increases and you start finding targets with encryption layers, cracking one character at a time will turn into a waste of nerve very quickly. To avoid this, there are rigs.
[image: drive.google.com]
Every 25 skill levels, a new chassis will be unlocked, that can be fitted with any combination of CPUs, PSUs and cooling components. Some components are directly better than others, while some are used for particular chassis layouts. You may want something really strong that cracks a password in a single swipe but becomes unusable for a short while afterwards, or you may want something a bit less extreme that can function reliably without ever heating up. There's no right answer for rigs, so play around with components until you find the right setup for you.
[image: drive.google.com][image: drive.google.com]
An empty chassis has a 5x5 grid where you can install components. All components use a 1x1 slot within the grid, with the exception of PSUs, which use a 1x2 slot instead.
[image: drive.google.com]
Once a rig is receiving at least 100,000 MIPS from any combination of CPUs, eCPUs or HPCPUs, it'll come online and will start being used. A rig in use will be able to perform additional brute-forcing cycles depending on the brute-forcing strength of the rig. This works using stochastic rounding, meaning that decimal values will be treated as a percentage chance of performing an additional cycle (in other words, 1.7 brute-forcing strength means 1 cycle will be performed and there's a 70% chance of an additional cycle being performed).
Functioning rigs generate heat whenever they're used. The heat generated is entirely dependant on the exact parts used, with HPCPUs, CPUs, eCPUs and PSUs generating heat, and fans, water blocks and heatsinks removing or reducing it.
[image: drive.google.com]
After use, depending on the rig's cooling, some components will gain temperature.
Update: Added on patch #322, a button for quickly clearing a rig has been added.
[image: drive.google.com]
Clicking the small X button at the top right of a chassis will allow you to clear it immediately, removing all components currently placed.
BRUTE-FORCING STRENGTH
Brute-forcing strength, also called BFS, is the capacity of the rig to brute-force a password. The higher it is, the more characters will be cracked at once and the more layers of encryption can be removed in a single attempt.
BFS increases logarithmically based on the MIPS of the rig, in other words, the higher it goes, the harder it is to increase.
[image: drive.google.com]
The most precise approximation we have to the calculation of BFS is as follows:
BFS = 0.0052 * √(MIPS) - 0.6252
(Thanks Gandalf [2031904] for helping with the formula)
This formula isn't completely accurate, but it's close enough for current uses (±3% margin of error).
In summary for those of you that just need the exact numbers:
- 100k MIPS = 1 BFS
- ~250k MIPS = 2 BFS
- ~425k MIPS = 3 BFS
- ~805k MIPS = 4 BFS
- ~1.3M MIPS = 5 BFS
- ~2M MIPS = 6 BFS
HEAT AND OVERHEATING
Once heat reaches certain thresholds, some restrictions may be applied to the chassis and components.
[image: drive.google.com]
Components that go above 50 heat will get a red aura above them. They will continue to work, but the player won't be able to remove them until they cool back down.
Components that reach 100 heat will overheat. Overheated components aren't lost but they will stop working and take significantly longer to cool down.
[image: drive.google.com]
(Attempting to remove a hot component will show this message)
Components gain heat based on the exact component used and any components near them. A complete breakdown of heat dynamics will be available further down.
Previously, overheated components would stop working immediately affecting the outcome of the bruteforcing attempt, however sometime late January this was changed, so the bruteforcing attempt will proceed with the initial values instead of the final ones. This means that one-shot/disposable rigs where everything overheats after a single use are not only viable, but optimal for nerve efficiency.
Heat will decay at a rate of 1% every minute. Overheated components take longer to lose their overheated status, up to 50 extra minutes or 2:30hrs to fully cool down (in other words, heat can reach 150%). Assembling a rig that gains heat slowly and then taking short breaks between every brute-forcing attempt is an option for those willing to wait a few hours for the sake of efficiency.
Heat will radiate between components, both when adding and when removing heat. Careful positioning of components is critical if your goal is avoiding overheats.
The education course "CMT2570: Fundamentals Of Computer Architechture" will reduce all heat gain from components by 25%
COOLING
There's a few options for cooling down a rig.
Using fans will provide a minor reduction in heat but will work in a very large area, up to three tiles away in every direction. This is the only cooling component that requires power, but is also the cheapest and most accessible. It also pairs extremely well with heat sinks.
Water blocks are an alternative, their range is significantly shorter only affecting components up to one tile away in every direction, however the heat reduction they provide is significantly better than that of fans. If your rig employs HPCPUs, then setting up a few water blocks may be required to avoid overheating.
Heat sinks will remove a percentage of heat from any components directly adjacent to them in any of the four cardinal directions (above, below and to either side). They cannot remove heat from themselves, but are very effective at removing heat from nearby components. Careful placing of heat sinks may allow high-performance low-heat layouts to work continuously.
[image: drive.google.com]
(Summary of cooling effect and ranges for different components)
If there's overheated components in the rig you wish to remove or move around but you cannot because they're too hot, you can always swap out components to make a rig designed solely to reduce temperature. Cooling components can cool down overheated components in a single sweep in this manner.
[image: drive.google.com]
[image: drive.google.com]
(Before and after of a "supercooling" rig in action. Source: Fetheryhorse6 [2317488])
These kinds of setups help replace components in case of a failed chassis layout, however it does cost nerve to perform.
OVERCLOCKING
Once the required education course(s) are completed, you will be able to overclock your rig, increasing performance, power consumption and heat generation for all your components.
[image: drive.google.com]
(An overclocked rig, as shown at the bottom left)
To overclock a rig once the required education course is complete, you just click the power bar at the bottom left and drag it to whichever overclocking rate is desired.
Overclocking is done in increments of 10% (110%, 120%, etc.). Overclocking is only possible to the extent that power supply can sustain it entirely: Unlike standard rigs that get throttled when power is insufficient, overclocking rate will go down unless power demand is met.
Power consumption increases linearly and directly proportional to overclocking rate. This applies only to CPUs, with fans remaining unaffected. All CPUs' power use will increase the same, regardless of type.
Increase of performance in CPUs will vary depending on the exact CPU type used:
- eCPUs will see their performance increased by 5% for every 10% increase in overclocking rate.
- CPUs will see their performance increased by 7.5% for every 10% increase in overclocking rate.
- HPCPUs will see their performance increased by 10% for every 10% increase in overclocking rate.
This makes overclocking eCPUs less effective than overclocking HPCPUs.
The main use of overclocking is reducing the amount of CPUs required to achieve the same amount of power, allowing for better distribution of cooling components in particularly intensive rigs.
[image: drive.google.com]
In summary,
Requirements:
- Have the education for overclocking your rig completed
- Have a significant power surplus
Effects:
- Increase in MIPS for all CPUs depending on the exact CPU
- Increase in power use directly proportional to overclocking rate
- Increase in heat generation directly proportional to overclocking rate
CRACKING
Ok so, you managed to figure out someone's password, whether by guesswork or by brute-force. Congrats! Now it's time for the payday.
There's a significant amount of target types: Over thirty based on the source code, with more being gender-based variations (husband/wife, gf/bf, etc.). And each target can have a selection of targeted services to pick from, all of which affect the final payout you can expect.
Targets can be classified into two different categories: By encryption level, and by password complexity level.
Encryption refers to the amount of encryption layers and thus the amount of bruteforcing cycles needed to crack a target, ranging from unencrypted to encryption 9.
Complexity refers to the password's complexity, with complexity 1 being found in password lists, complexity 2 being the same as complexity 1 but with additional random characters extending password length and making the finding of these passwords significantly harder, and complexity 3 which is theorized to be completely random passwords (*it is uncertain if complexity-3 passwords follow some pattern).
Known targets including classifications
- Ex-husband (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Ex-wife (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Ex-boyfriend (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Ex-girlfriend (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Colleague (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Friend (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Online Adversary (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Neighbor (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Romantic Interest (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Informant (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Juror (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Hacker (encrypted 1 - complexity 1)
- Police Officer (encrypted 1 - complexity 1)
- Doctor (unencrypted - complexity 2)
- Judge (unencrypted - complexity 2)
- Government Official (encrypted 1 - complexity 2)
- Politician (encrypted 1 - complexity 2)
- Pornography Network (encrypted 1 - complexity 2)
- Campus Network (encrypted 1 - complexity 2)
- Health Service (encrypted 1 - complexity 2)
- Games Developer (encrypted 2 - complexity 2)
- Rival Corporation (encrypted 2 - complexity 2)
- Crime Syndicate (encrypted 3 - complexity 2)
- Police Department (encrypted 3 - complexity 2)
- Government (encrypted 3 - complexity 3)
- Internet Service Provider (encrypted 3 - complexity 3)
- Armed Forces (encrypted 9 - complexity 3)
- Intelligence Agency (encrypted 9 - complexity 3)
More detailed information regarding the targets can be found here.
Failures at cracking are considered critical failures. Alongside standard penalties, the job will be lost immediately, forgoing any pay.
Critical failures can also lead to other results like jail time.
CRIME SKILL GAIN
The skill gain from cracking is double that of bruteforcing, while costing roughly 2/3rds the nerve. This makes cracking extremely effective for increasing skill level efficiently.
As stated in the brute-forcing section, cracking is best for efficient CS gain, while brute-forcing is best for fast CS gain.
CS gain does not seem to be affected by target nor service.
POINTS OF INTEREST
INCREASING SKILL LEVEL
Two paths for skill growth here, one slow but efficient, the other extremely inefficient but very quick.
SLOW PATH
It consists on brute-forcing once or guessing immediately and hoping for the best, then using any of multiple existing tools to figure out the password with the least amount of brute-forcing attempts possible.
This helps in two aspects: It allows you to use your nerve efficiently, so if you're leveling other crimes like disposal or chasing uniques elsewhere, you're not pressed for nerve constantly; It fast-tracks obtaining the Character Assassination honor bar, which is great for merit hunters and to be honest just looks great overall.
For this path you can go with a low-heat rig if you're aiming for efficiency, then you just wait out the heat after making a brute-forcing attempt. The more brute-forcing strength you can squeeze from your rig while keeping heat gain low, the better.
QUICK PATH
It consists on brute-forcing EVERYTHING. Never guessing, or alternatively guessing immediately until you run out of guesses for the Character Assassination honor bar.
While brute-forcing is significantly more inefficient than guessing and cracking, it's still a source of CS gain, and given that cracking is a daily crime just like disposal, getting as much CS daily as you can might be some people's goal. This lets you unlock harder jobs and more rig chassis faster, reaching the hardest, highest paying jobs quicker than the rest.
For this path, you either want no rig at all, a barebones rig with only 100k MIPS, or a zero-heat rig. The former two if you have a ton of nerve to spare brute-forcing every single character and encryption layer, and the latter if you have some nerve to burn but nothing out of this world.
THE MERITS
Just like all other crimes so far, this crime also has two honor bars native to it, and all the medals pertaining its category.
Reaching CS100 will grant one the Cryptographer honor bar.
[image: drive.google.com]
Guessing 250 characters will grant one the Character Assassination honor bar.
[image: drive.google.com]
Finally, all attempts at this crime are considered cybercrimes in regards of Cybercrime offenses medals. It's the same category as computer crimes in 1.0, being slightly better than planting viruses for medal progression.
[image: drive.google.com]
A total of 10,000 offenses are required for the maximum level of this medal, costing anywhere between 60,000 and 70,000 nerve if only doing this crime.
RIG DESIGNING AND COMMON PRACTICES
Designing your rig can be quite complex. Some popular layouts can be found in the post under this, but here I'll explain some of the most common design choices and what makes them so popular, as well as their strengths and weaknesses.
eCPUs VS HPCPUs
When assembling a chassis, most people will opt to either use multiple HPCPUs paired with plenty of cooling, and almost an entire rig filled with nothing but eCPUs and minimal cooling. Each one has their perks and drawbacks.
eCPUs:
+ Generates very little heat, often a single fan or two will be enough to reach zero-heat or low-heat.
+ Better performance for energy required, one eCPU has half the performance of an HPCPU while requiring 1/5th the energy, x2.5 the MIPS/W.
+ They're cheap and easy to find, making them accessible to newer players and those not willing to invest millions in a rig.
- Their overclocking isn't as strong as HPCPUs, only gaining half the increase in MIPS per percentage of overclocking, or a +25% MIPS at 50% overclocking.
- They require more space for the same MIPS as an HPCPU, making them significantly worse than HPCPUs in overclocked rigs.
HPCPUs:
+ Great performance, 50k MIPS base and up to 75k MIPS overclocked while requiring a single slot leaving more room for cooling and PSUs.
+ They have the best overclocking gaining 1% MIPS for every percentage of overclocking.
- They generate a LOT of heat both for themselves and radiated outwards, heating up the entire chassis just by being placed there.
- They're fairly pricey on their own not to mention the cooling components required to use them effectively being also quite expensive.
Where to use them?
eCPUs are best used in zero-heat or low-heat high performance rigs, and are exceptionally good when you don't have any of the related education courses for overclocking and heat reduction. They're your best choice if you A) don't wanna spend too much on a rig and B) are still completing the education courses related to cracking.
HPCPUs on the other hand outshine the eCPUs when used in an overclocked rig and using the standard seven heat sink pattern. They're even better when using multiple chassis and dedicating one solely to power supply.
[image: drive.google.com]
(An example of eCPU-centric chassis)
[image: drive.google.com]
(A standard HPCPU-centric chassis using the seven heatsink pattern)
MULTIPLE CHASSIS DESIGN
Once you hit CS50 and CS75, you'll unlock additional chassis which you can use to design your rig. These chassis will all provide to the same rig, so power supplied in one can be used in another and all the processing power will get added up when calculating BFS.
For multiple chassis, there's two mainline approaches: Standardized layout, and Powerbank layout.
Standardized
[image: drive.google.com]
The standardized approach consists of using multiple instances of a well-established layout that is known to work and simply repeating it across every chassis. This is easier to assemble and doesn't require too much planning, plus if using an eCPU chassis you can get some pretty high power out of them.
Powerbank
[image: drive.google.com]
The powerbank approach as I like to call it consists of dedicating one chassis only for power supply and using the rest for processing power. This allows for better heat management by keeping the 'powerbank' of the rig safe using bare minimum cooling while leaving plenty available for the other chassis. This also requires some level of planning for the best use of space and normally uses lower heat components in the powerbank like eCPUs and CPUs while using mainly HPCPUs in the processing chassis.
Which one to use?
Depends on your preference. I'm partial to the powerbank approach since I feel like I can get more out of that one VS standardized layouts, but they do tend to be more expensive and require overclocking to really make them shine.
Standardized layouts also seem to work better for high-heat and budget designs, since keeping a powerbank cool isn't as important in those scenarios.
RIG CLASSIFICATIONS
Rigs are normally classified in a few different ways
- By overclocking: Pre-OC (no overclocking) and Post-OC (any overclocking, usually 130% or 150%)
- By # of chassis: Single chassis, Double chassis and Triple chassis
- By maximum heat gain: Zero-Heat, Low-Heat and High-Heat
The classifications are vague and arbitrary, but are the easiest way of sorting known layouts.
OVERCLOCKING OR NO OVERCLOCKING
This one's pretty straightforward: Overclocking is best if your goal is performance, while no overclocking is best when you're on a budget.
Overclocked rigs usually require expensive components like HPCPUs, heat sinks and water blocks to maximize performance, while non-overclocked rigs are usually made with none of those components, or few of those components, being mostly reliant on eCPUs and CPUs instead.
If you have the parts for it, overclocking is always the best. If you're only using cheap parts and selling everything else, going for non-overclocked layouts or finding a good setup for an overclocked layout with the parts you have available may be worth looking into.
HEAT TYPES AND WHAT IS BEST
This one's a bit more nuanced: There's no objective answer on which specific layout is best.
Some argue that a rig that never heats up is ideal and the increase in performance you may get from other layouts isn't worth the hassle.
Others argue that, just like cooldowns, having no heat is a waste and you should always have some heat decaying, doing your daily jobs in batches every few hours instead of all at once.
Depending on how much nerve you have available at a time and whether you do crimes once in the morning and once in the evening or every few hours throughout the day, a particular setup might work best for you. Figuring out which one is up to you.
The classifications for heat, at least within this guide, are as follows:
- Zero-Heat: No heat is gained from anything except heat sinks and water blocks, which are immune to overheating by design.
- Low-Heat: Heat gained by critical components must be lower than 10%, or in other words, the rig must be useable at least ten times.
- High-Heat: Heat gained by critical components is higher than 10%, leading to less than ten uses before overheating. Most rigs in this classification are in the range of 5 to 1 uses, the latter being referred to as "one-shots".
Zero/Low-Heat layouts are usually preferred by folk with plenty of nerve available due to a high maximum nerve bar, the use of expensive alcohol or being in any nerve boosting company like meat warehouses or pubs.
High-Heat layouts on the other hand are better for people who are doing other crimes alongside cracking (like disposal or burglary) or have a limited amount of nerve they can spend every day. The performance of these kinds of rigs is very high as can be expected, but you'll only get a few uses before waiting for heat to decay, though that may be your goal if you're waiting on natural regeneration or booster cooldown decay.
RECOMMENDED RIG LAYOUTS
UPDATE: This section has been moved to another post due to size limits. You can find it further down or here.
KEEPING YOUR COOL
There's a lot of confusion in regards to how exactly heat works, or rather how it's transmitted and handled by components. This is a more in-depth look into how each component helps with cooling and how positioning of your components matters.
TIP! The following tool made by Bug [1455582] can let you experiment with your rig layouts before actually testing them. Do give it a shot and mess around with different components!
POSITIONING
Components that remove heat will do so from any component in their effective range, and similarly, components that generate heat will transmit it to any components close to them. In essence, components that are surrounded by multiple components tend to heat up faster, while those in the corners will heat up slower.
[image: drive.google.com]
Just keep in mind this,
- Components generate heat and receive heat from any other heating components from a minimum of one tile and maximum of four tiles.
- The heat received depends on the part generating heat. eCPUs will transmit less heat than HPCPUs and such.
ORDER OF OPERATIONS
Update: Sometime late January this was changed so brute-forcing would use the initial BFS instead of the final BFS. This section has been amended to reflect that.
The steps taken after you press "BRUTE FORCE" are predefined and predictable, taking this into consideration can help when assembling high-heat rigs.
1) Components will generate their own heat and transmit it to any nearby components.
2) Heat sinks connected will immediately remove most of this heat, regardless of overheating.
3) Other cooling devices will apply their effects.
4) Brute-forcing takes place, applying the initial BFS value of the attempt.
This means a few things:
- An easy solution towards overheating components is connecting a heat sink to them. This will prevent an overheat, although an increase in temperature will still remain.
- Distributing your CPUs to reduce concentrating heat in one single spot may help in preventing overheating.
- Single-use rigs that overheat after a single use are not only viable, but optimal if one's goal is maximizing nerve efficiency. If the nerve you have available for cracking every day is very little (i.e. you're doing other crimes) then bruteforcing every hour as your rig comes down from overheating is an option.
- Heat sinks and water blocks are immune to overheating, making them excellent for cooling down components with the right layout.
Heat sinks will NOT remove heat from already overheated components. Don't bother using them if your goal is supercooling an overheated chassis.
FULL THERMAL BREAKDOWN
If the previous section wasn't enough for you, here's a full breakdown on how heat is applied and removed by each individual component. If you're smart, you can use math to determine how to get the most efficient layout of all.
DISCLAIMER: The values found here are without the education course "CMT2570: Fundamentals Of Computer Architechture" completed. Differences between having it and not having it can be seen further down.
TIP: Although mentioned further up, The following tool made by Bug [1455582] can let you experiment with your layout before testing them. Most of the heat dynamics present there are based on my research, so do give it a shot!
HEAT GENERATION
[image: drive.google.com]
Of note: PSUs will apply their heating as a whole, one component next to one side of a PSU will gain just as much heat as a component next to both sides of the PSU.
FANS IN ACTION
[image: drive.google.com]
Fans' cooling is pretty significant when dealing with lower heat components like eCPUs and PSUs, maybe even CPUs if you're using a pair of fans. They remove a decent amount of heat from themselves, so you can surround them by things like PSUs and eCPUs without worrying about their heat.
WATER BLOCKS IN ACTION
[image: drive.google.com]
Water blocks provide a great amount of cooling in a limited range. They can be used for supercooling very effectively, and when paired with heat sinks can lead to some of the most efficient zero-heat layouts available. They're also immune to overheating, so no need to worry about cooling them down.
HEAT SINKS IN ACTION
[image: drive.google.com]
Heat sinks are exceedingly good at removing heat from components directly adjacent to them due to their capability of reducing heat by a percentage instead of a flat value. This property makes them very effective for low-heat layouts, and if other cooling devices are implemented, very efficient rigs can be assembled. They're also immune to overheating.
Heat sinks and water blocks work even when overheated! It has been confirmed that this is by design, so make use of it!
EDUCATION REDUCTION
The education course "CMT2570: Fundamentals Of Computer Architechture" will reduce all heat gains by 25%. This only applies to gains, leaving other components like fans and water blocks unaffected. The following is a summary on how significant the impact really is between having it and not having it.
[image: drive.google.com]
As shown, the reduction is very significant and can allow some low to moderate heat layouts to become zero or low heat respectively. Consider getting this course done as soon as you can since the help it provides is so massive.
The presence of some long decimal values may make calculating by hand difficult, so user Bug [1455582] has developed a heat simulator using the values present here to allow faster calculation of expected heat for your layouts without needing to spend nerve to test it. You can find it here.
COMPONENT BREAKDOWN
A brief look at how each specific component interacts with one another.
[image: drive.google.com]
These observations are based on personal experience.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Some questions come up pretty frequently for this crime, and for good reason, it is indeed quite complex. The following are the most common questions I've either received or read in the forums, hope it helps!
Q: Why does my rig say offline? How do I turn it online?
A: You need to unlock a rig chassis by reaching skill level 25 before using the rig becomes an option. Until then, you'll be using a computer or a laptop.
Q: Does guessing characters give any CS at all?
A: None. It's done for an honor bar and to save nerve.
Q: Does a rig with high BFS give me more CS?
A: Not that I could tell. Cracking 7 characters at once gives the same CS as cracking a single one.
Q: What's the fastest way of gaining skill?
A: Bruteforce everything with no rig or a barebones rig, the less processing power the better. This uses a mountain of nerve and is overall less efficient but is the fastest way to gain skill level daily. If you're in a pub and/or drinking moonshine then this approach might suit you best.
Q: What are the second and third chassis that get unlocked at CS50 and CS75 useful for?
A: There's two mainline designs currently, one which is repeating a standard layout multiple times, and the other dedicating one chassis to solely power supply while the others handle processing power. More information about them can be found in the "Rig Designing and Common Practices" section above.
Q: Why use HPCPUs when eCPUs are cheaper and better?
A: On single rigs without overclocking, eCPUs are far better, but once you have multiple chassis and overclocking up to 50%, using HPCPUs can lead to a significant increase in performance that eCPUs simply cannot match. With overclocking you'll be struggling for space more than anything else, and eCPUs use plenty of it and get a lower boost when overclocked, making them less effective.
Q: I'm using the seven heat sink design, are water blocks useless now?
A: Both waterblocks and heatsinks share the property of working even when overheated. As such, they're often used alongside heatsinks for low/zero heat high performance rigs. On their own they're also very useful for pre-overclocking rigs and supercooling rigs.
Q: I just unlocked overclocking, how can I overclock my rig?
A: See the power thingy at the bottom left of the rig? Drag the lightning icon to the right. You'll know if you can overclock if there's an orange section to the right of its default position (you'll need to have surplus power!).
Q: I can't overclock my rig even when I have overclocking unlocked
A: This is a common issue and there's three possible reasons for it.
1) You don't have enough power to overclock your rig. Install an extra PSU or a few and try again.
2) An extension may be causing issues. Try to disable extensions like torntools or tampermonkey or switch browsers and try again.
3) A visual bug is preventing you. This is rare but has happened before, try to clear your rig, reload the page or reopen your browser.
4) You're on mobile. It has been reported that some folk are struggling to toggle overclocking on mobile devices, and frankly I have no idea on how to help you there.
Q: Is there a limit to the amount of jobs that can roll over? Do they expire?
A: No and no, as far as we could tell. You can have hundreds of jobs roll over by simply "tapping" them once by bruteforcing. These jobs won't expire over time, and they won't reduce the amount of jobs you get everyday either.
Q: Any interesting places or tools to help with cracking?
A: There's a few.
- The cracking rigs thread is one of the best places to find new rigs and discussion about rigs currently, and is also where most of the rigs in the "Recommended Rigs" section come from.
- Bug's cracking rig simulator is also great for experimenting with layout designs without using nerve, with most of the values in there coming from my research I can vouch for its accuracy.
- Heartflower's Cracking value per nerve script is good if your main goal is profitability. It uses parts of my research and what's logged in the wiki so it's pretty accurate.
- Silmaril's cracking rig layout switcher userscript can come in handy for quickswitching layouts if you tend to switch between low/high-heat layouts and supercooling layouts often.
- nodelore's cracking prompt helper may come in handy for you if you are aiming for maximum efficiency and guessing as many passwords as possible.
- Homki's word search site may be an alternative if you want help with guessing but can't/don't want to install userscripts. Personally it's the main tool I used while grinding Character Assassination.
- Reshula's rig list and optimization tips is an excellent resource for finding the ideal layout for your particular use case, or a good introduction to rig designs if you'd rather experiment on your own instead of just copying the meta.
There's other tools and userscripts that may help you with cracking passwords that you can find in the forums, so do take a look around and see if you find anything interesting!
THE NUMBERS
TARGET BREAKDOWN
Due to the vast amount of target and targeted service combinations, I opted to post a sheet with all recorded jobs and their expected payouts.
Find the breakdown here.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Stupid idiot copy-pasted this section without editing it 'cause he's stupid.
I find this crime extremely enjoyable. Firstly, the "guess the password" aspect of it giving players a LOT more agency compared to previous crimes is a huge change. It rewards people's ingenuity, and to some extent luck if you're just guessing randomly, but mostly ingenuity. As more jobs come out and advanced targets with more complex passwords start showing up, it's gonna be interesting to see how the people adapt.
Secondly, the rig. The ability to assemble our own machine that makes doing this crime more efficient, and the parts are only found within the crimes system? Couldn't be happier.
The fact that the basic parts are very common while the most advanced or useful parts are somewhat rare is also something that I really like. The crime itself isn't restricted by price, just the "meta" builds if you could call them that, and even then, players have the ability to adapt with the supplies they currently have without needing to cough up multiple millions on a component, or they can attempt to shoplift the newly released store that *only* gives computer parts in an attempt to get the parts they need.
In every regard, from the components to the mechanics to the dynamics with other crimes, this crime just skyrocketed to the first spot in my personal tierlist. Yes, even beyond burglary.
Tenth guide, and honestly I had an absolute blast while playing around with the rig's components, figuring out which ones were better, how heat worked and everything in-between. Once overclocking comes into play and additional chassis as well, it seems I'll be busy for quite a while :)
DATA GATHERING (Almost done!)
Gathering of logs for this crime is almost finished, only lacking data for the most advanced targets now, that is, those unlocked at CS80 and 90. If you've maxed this crime consider sending me your logs using the method posted below!
For this crime in particular, the following userscript is required for proper logging. This is due to torn logs not providing any information regarding targets and services, as well as rig information and the like. It only logs attempts done after installation, so do consider installing it and sending me your logs early on.
CREDITS
Finally, a shoutout to all who contributed in the making of this guide, as well as those who financed this and previous projects.
kelfi: 22x Donator Pack
onlelonely: 10x FHC
Kerrapht: 23% Plunder Frying Pan
MrFancyPants: $100,000,000
Maks: $100,000,000
BAXIA: $100,000,000
tos: $100,000,000
MonChoon: 100x Xanax
Hamid448: $60,000,000, 3x E-DVDs, 1x Drug Pack, 1x Six Pack of Alcohol
Jefersonakl: 5x FHC
hugeknight: 60x Lottery Voucher
Gem: 25x Bottle of Moonshine
Kamkool: $50,000,000
FractalPariah: $50,000,000
BigDaddyLuvsU: $38,000,000, 3x Drug Pack
Sinvetic: $15,000,000, 2x FHC, Quran Script : Ubay Ibn Ka'b
butts: 50x Xanax
Amsgaming: $2,000,000, 3x Can of Rockstar Rudolph, 5x Can of X-MASS, 1x FHC
mahadi: 150x Bottle of Pumpkin Brew, 150x Bottle of Wicked Witch
Invert: $13,000,000, 1x Xanax, 1x FHC, 20x Bottle of Mistletoe Madness
maimunah: $30,000,000
Paul_Atreides: $30,000,000
RatstaR: 1x Donator Pack
L4suicide: 1x Donator Pack
MrSo: 1x Donator Pack
Dragoonseal: 1x Donator Pack
lynstly: 1x Donator Pack
MissMary: $1,000,000, 1x Drug Pack, 20x Xanax
Gandalf: 1x FHC, 20x Bottle of Stinky Swamp Punch
Jackass_420: $20,000,000
Lidia: $20,000,000
D3XU5: 48x Bottle of Mistletoe Madness
Dr_Thycreator: 1x Six-Pack of Energy Drink, 3x Can of Santa Shooters
spiff: 1x Six-Pack of Energy Drink
illum: 1x FHC
Teruf: 1x FHC
Skulll: 1x Drug Pack, 1x Six-Pack of Alcohol, 1x Bottle of Mistletoe Madness, 1x Bottle of Stinky Swamp Punch, 1x Can of Rockstar Rudolph, 1x Can of X-MASS
HOU5E: $10,000,000
RipTheJacker: $800,000, 4x Can of Santa Shooters
Lexcifer: 10x Xanax
BurningWinters: 5x Six-Pack of Alcohol
something: $7,500,000
Bssteig: 1x E-DVD, 1x Can of Rockstar Rudolph, 1x Xanax, 1x Certificate of Awesome
Matslav: 1x Business Class Ticket
Giovanni: 3x Six-Pack of Alcohol
Tuit: $5,000,000
Ngongingo: $5,000,000
Chimken: 1x Drug Pack
Bacurau: 1x Drug Pack
Juna_Warrior: 1x Drug Pack
Rizzzz: $4,000,000
Sparrow88: $4,000,000
Jikkar: 1x Erotic DVD
Dapper_Tramp: 10x Bottle of Wicked Witch
-Behemoth: 3x Xanax
Grindspawn: 3x Xanax
Timoteo32: 1x Six-Pack of Alcohol
badmagicks: 1x High-Speed Drive
Green_Babz: 1x Can of Santa Shooters
TheBonebreaker: $1,000,000
Mr_Bendix: $1,000,000
GodsFamousG: $1,000,000
bcla7: 1x Lottery Voucher
jimjuice: 50x Bottle of Beer :)
Anonymous: $29,400,000
Research collaborators:
Fetheryhorse6
Tuit
NyanMango
5h4d0w
mahadi
Silmaril
-Corvus-
Lazerpent
Reshula
Scripting and materials used
Skeletron (torn.report log export)
Silmaril (Cracking logger userscript)
GetMeOut (testing rigs and layouts)
SirCharlesF (testing rigs and layouts)
Gandalf (brute-force strength equation)
Zauriel (restrictions for Cracking)
Bug (rig heat simulator)
Reshula (best rig layouts)
Others (layouts under the Recommended Layouts section)
All contributors:
Acarya, Teach, FractalPariah, ArttiIsGod, D3XU5, Dan77, TheBurninator, Hero1381, Celasha, -Corvus-, haohao229900, Hemicopter, Hemidonk, Hemigidius, Hemillusionist, Lazerpent, Nyxa, Silmaril, spiff, auboli77, Decame, DrBlaze, Eaglefield, FractalPariah, IpsilonX, jakmat, Lithdren, Lyncz, Nboutin2, pAceMakerNZ, Toxburn, Wiffle, the people of aXiom, IMF and HeLa, the torn.report team, and the people on the wiki thread for Cracking, as well as everyone who I might've missed. My apologies in advance.
All in the name of science.
INTRODUCTION
This guide aims to cover most of everything related to Cracking, the 10th crime in Torn's Crimes 2.0 Early Access.
This crime is an interesting mix of Disposal, Pickpocketing, and Wordle if you've ever played that. It's also a significant nerve investment, arguably worse than burglary, so beware.
If you already know the basics just skip ahead, I'll try and keep everything organized for clarity's sake.
If you're just looking for advice on this crime, skip to the "Points Of Interest" section.
FAQ can be found right before the "Final Thoughts" section, at the very bottom.
Due to length constraints, recommended rigs have been moved to another post. You can find it below this one.
This is the tenth of my series of guides on Crimes 2.0, my other guides being
[Crimes 2.0] A Criminal Primer
[Crimes 2.0] Search For Cash: An in-depth guide
[Crimes 2.0] Bootlegging: An in-depth guide
[Crimes 2.0] Graffiti: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Shoplifting: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Card Skimming: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Burglary: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Pickpocketing: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Disposal: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Hustling: An In-Depth Guide
[Crimes 2.0] Forgery: An In-Depth Guide
Any and all feedback, corrections and new information is appreciated.
GLOSSARY:
CS = Crime Skill, your skill at doing the crime, shown at the top of the crime page.
Unique = Unique find, marked with a star under the "ATTEMPT" button, can only be found once.
Crit = Critical failure, leads to loss of CS and sometimes items, sometimes life, sometimes prison time.
Character = Every individual letter, number or symbol in a password.
Job = The target whose password for a particular service you have to crack, a set amount of these is generated every day.
Target = The individual you're targetting for a job, ranging from ex-spouses to hackers and entire governments. Affects encryption level.
Service = The targeted service, ranging from SNS to dark web storefronts. Affects job payout.
FIRST STEPS (What you need to start)
Cracking takes places in the online world, so as can be expected, you need a plentiful amount of computer-related components, from a standard computer to specialized components like High Power CPUs and Water Blocks.
ENHANCER
It Increases CE&CS gains
[image: drive.google.com]
The Office Chair is the enhancer for this crime. It increases CE&CS gains by 5%. It is currently unknown if it has other effects.
Obtaining: Shoplift Cyber Force (unique, guard away)
TOOLS
Required to attempt the crime.
[image: drive.google.com]
A computer is required for cracking. Without one, the crime will be locked for you.
Obtaining: Buy from Super Store, and other crime outcomes.
MATERIALS
Components used for this crime.
[image: drive.google.com]
[image: drive.google.com]
[image: drive.google.com]
CPUs are used when assembling a rig. They increase MIPS and by extension brute-forcing strength. A proper definition on their effects on the system will be explored further down.
Obtaining: Shoplifting Cyber Force, Burglarizing an Aparment, Suburban Home, Self-Storage Facility, Postal Office, Recruitment Agency, Dockside Warehouse, Printing Works and Truckyard.
[image: drive.google.com]
[image: drive.google.com]
[image: drive.google.com]
Fans, Water Blocks and Heat Sinks are used for thermal regulation. They transfer and remove heat from the system, keeping your parts from overheating. A proper definition on their effects on the system will be explored further down.
Obtaining: Shoplifting Cyber Force, Burglarizing an Aparment, Suburban Home, Self-Storage Facility, Postal Office, Recruitment Agency, Dockside Warehouse, Printing Works and Truckyard.
[image: drive.google.com]
PSUs, Power Supply Units, are the heart of your rig. They provide power to everything else installed, and are one of your constraints when assembling a rig. A proper definition on their effects on the system will be explored further down.
Obtaining: Shoplifting Cyber Force, Burglarizing an Aparment, Suburban Home, Self-Storage Facility, Postal Office, Recruitment Agency, Dockside Warehouse, Printing Works and Truckyard.
EDUCATION
Some education courses are required while others provide boosts towards cracking.
[image: drive.google.com]
All required and recommended courses are found in the Computer Science bachelor, and take a cumulative total of five weeks by default to complete.
CRACKING 101 (...in a nutshell)
[image: drive.google.com]
(Cracking UI)
Cracking is a fairly complex crime, and it's also one of the most nerve-intensive ones if you don't know what you're doing. It consists of cracking people's password by bruteforcing individual characters using a cracking rig. Once a password has been identified successfully, you'll receive payment accordingly.
If you don't have a computer and basic understanding of computing, cracking will remain locked to you.
[image: drive.google.com]
(Cracking UI without a computer and the related education course. Source: Zauriel [2880793])
To crack someone's password, you have two options: Brute-force the password using your rig, or guess manually the password. To guess manually, just click any blank slot and type a character you think goes in that position. You can make three mistakes before you're locked out of further guesses, though you will still be able to crack the target, so don't be afraid of guessing!
[image: drive.google.com]
Brute-forced characters will appear by themselves without any effect, while guessed characters will have a green aura surrounding them. The counter for your mistakes can be seen to the right, next to the brute-force button.
The passwords for all currently known jobs are randomly selected from existing password lists, meaning that as long as you have at least one character, you can find out the password by using any of the multiple tools currently available for guessing.
Once a password has been fully revealed, you'll be able to crack the target's account and receive your payment.
[image: drive.google.com]
Cracking can result in a critical failure, losing you the job and the pay, as well as standard critical failure penalties.
BRUTE-FORCING
Brute-forcing is usually the first step towards cracking passwords. It costs 7 nerve to attempt, and given the length of some of the passwords available, the nerve expenditure can go sky high before you notice, making guessing very important for minimizing nerve spent and increasing efficiency.
Each brute-forcing attempt performs an amount of brute-forcing cycles depending on the brute-forcing strength of the rig. Each cycle performed will reveal a character or break down one encryption layer from a character.
ENCRYPTION
Some targets may be encrypted, requiring an additional brute-forcing attempt before a guess can be made.
[image: drive.google.com]
Encrypted targets are significantly harder to crack, usually requiring a lot of nerve to bring down the encryption layers before any attempt at guessing can be made.
Encryption ranges between one and nine layers, with more advanced targets having additional encryption layers.
[image: drive.google.com]
(Encryption layers, each dot is a layer)
Every layer is treated as an additional character when bruteforcing, so a target with five characters and one encryption layer requires ten brute-forcing cycles to crack.
CRIME SKILL GAIN
Brute-forcing gives a limited amount of CS, roughly half the amount cracking does. CS gain is unaffected by target type and encryption level, as well as brute-forcing strength. Guessing gives no CS whatsoever either.
Having 1/3rd the efficiency compared to cracking in terms of CS gain per nerve spent, brute-forcing is best avoided if one looks to increase skill in an efficient manner. HOWEVER, the daily nature of this crime means that brute-forcing is one of the very limited ways of gaining skill.
If efficient CS gain is the goal, then avoiding brute-force as much as possible is best. If fast CS gain is the goal, then brute-forcing everything is best.
THE RIG
By default, the player will be using a stock laptop or computer when cracking a password, leading to a brute-forcing strength of 1, or one cycle per attempt. As your skill increases and you start finding targets with encryption layers, cracking one character at a time will turn into a waste of nerve very quickly. To avoid this, there are rigs.
[image: drive.google.com]
Every 25 skill levels, a new chassis will be unlocked, that can be fitted with any combination of CPUs, PSUs and cooling components. Some components are directly better than others, while some are used for particular chassis layouts. You may want something really strong that cracks a password in a single swipe but becomes unusable for a short while afterwards, or you may want something a bit less extreme that can function reliably without ever heating up. There's no right answer for rigs, so play around with components until you find the right setup for you.
[image: drive.google.com][image: drive.google.com]
An empty chassis has a 5x5 grid where you can install components. All components use a 1x1 slot within the grid, with the exception of PSUs, which use a 1x2 slot instead.
[image: drive.google.com]
Once a rig is receiving at least 100,000 MIPS from any combination of CPUs, eCPUs or HPCPUs, it'll come online and will start being used. A rig in use will be able to perform additional brute-forcing cycles depending on the brute-forcing strength of the rig. This works using stochastic rounding, meaning that decimal values will be treated as a percentage chance of performing an additional cycle (in other words, 1.7 brute-forcing strength means 1 cycle will be performed and there's a 70% chance of an additional cycle being performed).
Functioning rigs generate heat whenever they're used. The heat generated is entirely dependant on the exact parts used, with HPCPUs, CPUs, eCPUs and PSUs generating heat, and fans, water blocks and heatsinks removing or reducing it.
[image: drive.google.com]
After use, depending on the rig's cooling, some components will gain temperature.
Update: Added on patch #322, a button for quickly clearing a rig has been added.
[image: drive.google.com]
Clicking the small X button at the top right of a chassis will allow you to clear it immediately, removing all components currently placed.
BRUTE-FORCING STRENGTH
Brute-forcing strength, also called BFS, is the capacity of the rig to brute-force a password. The higher it is, the more characters will be cracked at once and the more layers of encryption can be removed in a single attempt.
BFS increases logarithmically based on the MIPS of the rig, in other words, the higher it goes, the harder it is to increase.
[image: drive.google.com]
The most precise approximation we have to the calculation of BFS is as follows:
BFS = 0.0052 * √(MIPS) - 0.6252
(Thanks Gandalf [2031904] for helping with the formula)
This formula isn't completely accurate, but it's close enough for current uses (±3% margin of error).
In summary for those of you that just need the exact numbers:
- 100k MIPS = 1 BFS
- ~250k MIPS = 2 BFS
- ~425k MIPS = 3 BFS
- ~805k MIPS = 4 BFS
- ~1.3M MIPS = 5 BFS
- ~2M MIPS = 6 BFS
HEAT AND OVERHEATING
Once heat reaches certain thresholds, some restrictions may be applied to the chassis and components.
[image: drive.google.com]
Components that go above 50 heat will get a red aura above them. They will continue to work, but the player won't be able to remove them until they cool back down.
Components that reach 100 heat will overheat. Overheated components aren't lost but they will stop working and take significantly longer to cool down.
[image: drive.google.com]
(Attempting to remove a hot component will show this message)
Components gain heat based on the exact component used and any components near them. A complete breakdown of heat dynamics will be available further down.
Previously, overheated components would stop working immediately affecting the outcome of the bruteforcing attempt, however sometime late January this was changed, so the bruteforcing attempt will proceed with the initial values instead of the final ones. This means that one-shot/disposable rigs where everything overheats after a single use are not only viable, but optimal for nerve efficiency.
Heat will decay at a rate of 1% every minute. Overheated components take longer to lose their overheated status, up to 50 extra minutes or 2:30hrs to fully cool down (in other words, heat can reach 150%). Assembling a rig that gains heat slowly and then taking short breaks between every brute-forcing attempt is an option for those willing to wait a few hours for the sake of efficiency.
Heat will radiate between components, both when adding and when removing heat. Careful positioning of components is critical if your goal is avoiding overheats.
The education course "CMT2570: Fundamentals Of Computer Architechture" will reduce all heat gain from components by 25%
COOLING
There's a few options for cooling down a rig.
Using fans will provide a minor reduction in heat but will work in a very large area, up to three tiles away in every direction. This is the only cooling component that requires power, but is also the cheapest and most accessible. It also pairs extremely well with heat sinks.
Water blocks are an alternative, their range is significantly shorter only affecting components up to one tile away in every direction, however the heat reduction they provide is significantly better than that of fans. If your rig employs HPCPUs, then setting up a few water blocks may be required to avoid overheating.
Heat sinks will remove a percentage of heat from any components directly adjacent to them in any of the four cardinal directions (above, below and to either side). They cannot remove heat from themselves, but are very effective at removing heat from nearby components. Careful placing of heat sinks may allow high-performance low-heat layouts to work continuously.
[image: drive.google.com]
(Summary of cooling effect and ranges for different components)
If there's overheated components in the rig you wish to remove or move around but you cannot because they're too hot, you can always swap out components to make a rig designed solely to reduce temperature. Cooling components can cool down overheated components in a single sweep in this manner.
[image: drive.google.com]
[image: drive.google.com]
(Before and after of a "supercooling" rig in action. Source: Fetheryhorse6 [2317488])
These kinds of setups help replace components in case of a failed chassis layout, however it does cost nerve to perform.
OVERCLOCKING
Once the required education course(s) are completed, you will be able to overclock your rig, increasing performance, power consumption and heat generation for all your components.
[image: drive.google.com]
(An overclocked rig, as shown at the bottom left)
To overclock a rig once the required education course is complete, you just click the power bar at the bottom left and drag it to whichever overclocking rate is desired.
Overclocking is done in increments of 10% (110%, 120%, etc.). Overclocking is only possible to the extent that power supply can sustain it entirely: Unlike standard rigs that get throttled when power is insufficient, overclocking rate will go down unless power demand is met.
Power consumption increases linearly and directly proportional to overclocking rate. This applies only to CPUs, with fans remaining unaffected. All CPUs' power use will increase the same, regardless of type.
Increase of performance in CPUs will vary depending on the exact CPU type used:
- eCPUs will see their performance increased by 5% for every 10% increase in overclocking rate.
- CPUs will see their performance increased by 7.5% for every 10% increase in overclocking rate.
- HPCPUs will see their performance increased by 10% for every 10% increase in overclocking rate.
This makes overclocking eCPUs less effective than overclocking HPCPUs.
The main use of overclocking is reducing the amount of CPUs required to achieve the same amount of power, allowing for better distribution of cooling components in particularly intensive rigs.
[image: drive.google.com]
In summary,
Requirements:
- Have the education for overclocking your rig completed
- Have a significant power surplus
Effects:
- Increase in MIPS for all CPUs depending on the exact CPU
- Increase in power use directly proportional to overclocking rate
- Increase in heat generation directly proportional to overclocking rate
CRACKING
Ok so, you managed to figure out someone's password, whether by guesswork or by brute-force. Congrats! Now it's time for the payday.
There's a significant amount of target types: Over thirty based on the source code, with more being gender-based variations (husband/wife, gf/bf, etc.). And each target can have a selection of targeted services to pick from, all of which affect the final payout you can expect.
Targets can be classified into two different categories: By encryption level, and by password complexity level.
Encryption refers to the amount of encryption layers and thus the amount of bruteforcing cycles needed to crack a target, ranging from unencrypted to encryption 9.
Complexity refers to the password's complexity, with complexity 1 being found in password lists, complexity 2 being the same as complexity 1 but with additional random characters extending password length and making the finding of these passwords significantly harder, and complexity 3 which is theorized to be completely random passwords (*it is uncertain if complexity-3 passwords follow some pattern).
Known targets including classifications
- Ex-husband (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Ex-wife (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Ex-boyfriend (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Ex-girlfriend (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Colleague (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Friend (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Online Adversary (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Neighbor (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Romantic Interest (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Informant (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Juror (unencrypted - complexity 1)
- Hacker (encrypted 1 - complexity 1)
- Police Officer (encrypted 1 - complexity 1)
- Doctor (unencrypted - complexity 2)
- Judge (unencrypted - complexity 2)
- Government Official (encrypted 1 - complexity 2)
- Politician (encrypted 1 - complexity 2)
- Pornography Network (encrypted 1 - complexity 2)
- Campus Network (encrypted 1 - complexity 2)
- Health Service (encrypted 1 - complexity 2)
- Games Developer (encrypted 2 - complexity 2)
- Rival Corporation (encrypted 2 - complexity 2)
- Crime Syndicate (encrypted 3 - complexity 2)
- Police Department (encrypted 3 - complexity 2)
- Government (encrypted 3 - complexity 3)
- Internet Service Provider (encrypted 3 - complexity 3)
- Armed Forces (encrypted 9 - complexity 3)
- Intelligence Agency (encrypted 9 - complexity 3)
More detailed information regarding the targets can be found here.
Failures at cracking are considered critical failures. Alongside standard penalties, the job will be lost immediately, forgoing any pay.
Critical failures can also lead to other results like jail time.
CRIME SKILL GAIN
The skill gain from cracking is double that of bruteforcing, while costing roughly 2/3rds the nerve. This makes cracking extremely effective for increasing skill level efficiently.
As stated in the brute-forcing section, cracking is best for efficient CS gain, while brute-forcing is best for fast CS gain.
CS gain does not seem to be affected by target nor service.
POINTS OF INTEREST
INCREASING SKILL LEVEL
Two paths for skill growth here, one slow but efficient, the other extremely inefficient but very quick.
SLOW PATH
It consists on brute-forcing once or guessing immediately and hoping for the best, then using any of multiple existing tools to figure out the password with the least amount of brute-forcing attempts possible.
This helps in two aspects: It allows you to use your nerve efficiently, so if you're leveling other crimes like disposal or chasing uniques elsewhere, you're not pressed for nerve constantly; It fast-tracks obtaining the Character Assassination honor bar, which is great for merit hunters and to be honest just looks great overall.
For this path you can go with a low-heat rig if you're aiming for efficiency, then you just wait out the heat after making a brute-forcing attempt. The more brute-forcing strength you can squeeze from your rig while keeping heat gain low, the better.
QUICK PATH
It consists on brute-forcing EVERYTHING. Never guessing, or alternatively guessing immediately until you run out of guesses for the Character Assassination honor bar.
While brute-forcing is significantly more inefficient than guessing and cracking, it's still a source of CS gain, and given that cracking is a daily crime just like disposal, getting as much CS daily as you can might be some people's goal. This lets you unlock harder jobs and more rig chassis faster, reaching the hardest, highest paying jobs quicker than the rest.
For this path, you either want no rig at all, a barebones rig with only 100k MIPS, or a zero-heat rig. The former two if you have a ton of nerve to spare brute-forcing every single character and encryption layer, and the latter if you have some nerve to burn but nothing out of this world.
THE MERITS
Just like all other crimes so far, this crime also has two honor bars native to it, and all the medals pertaining its category.
Reaching CS100 will grant one the Cryptographer honor bar.
[image: drive.google.com]
Guessing 250 characters will grant one the Character Assassination honor bar.
[image: drive.google.com]
Finally, all attempts at this crime are considered cybercrimes in regards of Cybercrime offenses medals. It's the same category as computer crimes in 1.0, being slightly better than planting viruses for medal progression.
[image: drive.google.com]
A total of 10,000 offenses are required for the maximum level of this medal, costing anywhere between 60,000 and 70,000 nerve if only doing this crime.
RIG DESIGNING AND COMMON PRACTICES
Designing your rig can be quite complex. Some popular layouts can be found in the post under this, but here I'll explain some of the most common design choices and what makes them so popular, as well as their strengths and weaknesses.
eCPUs VS HPCPUs
When assembling a chassis, most people will opt to either use multiple HPCPUs paired with plenty of cooling, and almost an entire rig filled with nothing but eCPUs and minimal cooling. Each one has their perks and drawbacks.
eCPUs:
+ Generates very little heat, often a single fan or two will be enough to reach zero-heat or low-heat.
+ Better performance for energy required, one eCPU has half the performance of an HPCPU while requiring 1/5th the energy, x2.5 the MIPS/W.
+ They're cheap and easy to find, making them accessible to newer players and those not willing to invest millions in a rig.
- Their overclocking isn't as strong as HPCPUs, only gaining half the increase in MIPS per percentage of overclocking, or a +25% MIPS at 50% overclocking.
- They require more space for the same MIPS as an HPCPU, making them significantly worse than HPCPUs in overclocked rigs.
HPCPUs:
+ Great performance, 50k MIPS base and up to 75k MIPS overclocked while requiring a single slot leaving more room for cooling and PSUs.
+ They have the best overclocking gaining 1% MIPS for every percentage of overclocking.
- They generate a LOT of heat both for themselves and radiated outwards, heating up the entire chassis just by being placed there.
- They're fairly pricey on their own not to mention the cooling components required to use them effectively being also quite expensive.
Where to use them?
eCPUs are best used in zero-heat or low-heat high performance rigs, and are exceptionally good when you don't have any of the related education courses for overclocking and heat reduction. They're your best choice if you A) don't wanna spend too much on a rig and B) are still completing the education courses related to cracking.
HPCPUs on the other hand outshine the eCPUs when used in an overclocked rig and using the standard seven heat sink pattern. They're even better when using multiple chassis and dedicating one solely to power supply.
[image: drive.google.com]
(An example of eCPU-centric chassis)
[image: drive.google.com]
(A standard HPCPU-centric chassis using the seven heatsink pattern)
MULTIPLE CHASSIS DESIGN
Once you hit CS50 and CS75, you'll unlock additional chassis which you can use to design your rig. These chassis will all provide to the same rig, so power supplied in one can be used in another and all the processing power will get added up when calculating BFS.
For multiple chassis, there's two mainline approaches: Standardized layout, and Powerbank layout.
Standardized
[image: drive.google.com]
The standardized approach consists of using multiple instances of a well-established layout that is known to work and simply repeating it across every chassis. This is easier to assemble and doesn't require too much planning, plus if using an eCPU chassis you can get some pretty high power out of them.
Powerbank
[image: drive.google.com]
The powerbank approach as I like to call it consists of dedicating one chassis only for power supply and using the rest for processing power. This allows for better heat management by keeping the 'powerbank' of the rig safe using bare minimum cooling while leaving plenty available for the other chassis. This also requires some level of planning for the best use of space and normally uses lower heat components in the powerbank like eCPUs and CPUs while using mainly HPCPUs in the processing chassis.
Which one to use?
Depends on your preference. I'm partial to the powerbank approach since I feel like I can get more out of that one VS standardized layouts, but they do tend to be more expensive and require overclocking to really make them shine.
Standardized layouts also seem to work better for high-heat and budget designs, since keeping a powerbank cool isn't as important in those scenarios.
RIG CLASSIFICATIONS
Rigs are normally classified in a few different ways
- By overclocking: Pre-OC (no overclocking) and Post-OC (any overclocking, usually 130% or 150%)
- By # of chassis: Single chassis, Double chassis and Triple chassis
- By maximum heat gain: Zero-Heat, Low-Heat and High-Heat
The classifications are vague and arbitrary, but are the easiest way of sorting known layouts.
OVERCLOCKING OR NO OVERCLOCKING
This one's pretty straightforward: Overclocking is best if your goal is performance, while no overclocking is best when you're on a budget.
Overclocked rigs usually require expensive components like HPCPUs, heat sinks and water blocks to maximize performance, while non-overclocked rigs are usually made with none of those components, or few of those components, being mostly reliant on eCPUs and CPUs instead.
If you have the parts for it, overclocking is always the best. If you're only using cheap parts and selling everything else, going for non-overclocked layouts or finding a good setup for an overclocked layout with the parts you have available may be worth looking into.
HEAT TYPES AND WHAT IS BEST
This one's a bit more nuanced: There's no objective answer on which specific layout is best.
Some argue that a rig that never heats up is ideal and the increase in performance you may get from other layouts isn't worth the hassle.
Others argue that, just like cooldowns, having no heat is a waste and you should always have some heat decaying, doing your daily jobs in batches every few hours instead of all at once.
Depending on how much nerve you have available at a time and whether you do crimes once in the morning and once in the evening or every few hours throughout the day, a particular setup might work best for you. Figuring out which one is up to you.
The classifications for heat, at least within this guide, are as follows:
- Zero-Heat: No heat is gained from anything except heat sinks and water blocks, which are immune to overheating by design.
- Low-Heat: Heat gained by critical components must be lower than 10%, or in other words, the rig must be useable at least ten times.
- High-Heat: Heat gained by critical components is higher than 10%, leading to less than ten uses before overheating. Most rigs in this classification are in the range of 5 to 1 uses, the latter being referred to as "one-shots".
Zero/Low-Heat layouts are usually preferred by folk with plenty of nerve available due to a high maximum nerve bar, the use of expensive alcohol or being in any nerve boosting company like meat warehouses or pubs.
High-Heat layouts on the other hand are better for people who are doing other crimes alongside cracking (like disposal or burglary) or have a limited amount of nerve they can spend every day. The performance of these kinds of rigs is very high as can be expected, but you'll only get a few uses before waiting for heat to decay, though that may be your goal if you're waiting on natural regeneration or booster cooldown decay.
RECOMMENDED RIG LAYOUTS
UPDATE: This section has been moved to another post due to size limits. You can find it further down or here.
KEEPING YOUR COOL
There's a lot of confusion in regards to how exactly heat works, or rather how it's transmitted and handled by components. This is a more in-depth look into how each component helps with cooling and how positioning of your components matters.
TIP! The following tool made by Bug [1455582] can let you experiment with your rig layouts before actually testing them. Do give it a shot and mess around with different components!
POSITIONING
Components that remove heat will do so from any component in their effective range, and similarly, components that generate heat will transmit it to any components close to them. In essence, components that are surrounded by multiple components tend to heat up faster, while those in the corners will heat up slower.
[image: drive.google.com]
Just keep in mind this,
- Components generate heat and receive heat from any other heating components from a minimum of one tile and maximum of four tiles.
- The heat received depends on the part generating heat. eCPUs will transmit less heat than HPCPUs and such.
ORDER OF OPERATIONS
Update: Sometime late January this was changed so brute-forcing would use the initial BFS instead of the final BFS. This section has been amended to reflect that.
The steps taken after you press "BRUTE FORCE" are predefined and predictable, taking this into consideration can help when assembling high-heat rigs.
1) Components will generate their own heat and transmit it to any nearby components.
2) Heat sinks connected will immediately remove most of this heat, regardless of overheating.
3) Other cooling devices will apply their effects.
4) Brute-forcing takes place, applying the initial BFS value of the attempt.
This means a few things:
- An easy solution towards overheating components is connecting a heat sink to them. This will prevent an overheat, although an increase in temperature will still remain.
- Distributing your CPUs to reduce concentrating heat in one single spot may help in preventing overheating.
- Single-use rigs that overheat after a single use are not only viable, but optimal if one's goal is maximizing nerve efficiency. If the nerve you have available for cracking every day is very little (i.e. you're doing other crimes) then bruteforcing every hour as your rig comes down from overheating is an option.
- Heat sinks and water blocks are immune to overheating, making them excellent for cooling down components with the right layout.
Heat sinks will NOT remove heat from already overheated components. Don't bother using them if your goal is supercooling an overheated chassis.
FULL THERMAL BREAKDOWN
If the previous section wasn't enough for you, here's a full breakdown on how heat is applied and removed by each individual component. If you're smart, you can use math to determine how to get the most efficient layout of all.
DISCLAIMER: The values found here are without the education course "CMT2570: Fundamentals Of Computer Architechture" completed. Differences between having it and not having it can be seen further down.
TIP: Although mentioned further up, The following tool made by Bug [1455582] can let you experiment with your layout before testing them. Most of the heat dynamics present there are based on my research, so do give it a shot!
HEAT GENERATION
[image: drive.google.com]
Of note: PSUs will apply their heating as a whole, one component next to one side of a PSU will gain just as much heat as a component next to both sides of the PSU.
FANS IN ACTION
[image: drive.google.com]
Fans' cooling is pretty significant when dealing with lower heat components like eCPUs and PSUs, maybe even CPUs if you're using a pair of fans. They remove a decent amount of heat from themselves, so you can surround them by things like PSUs and eCPUs without worrying about their heat.
WATER BLOCKS IN ACTION
[image: drive.google.com]
Water blocks provide a great amount of cooling in a limited range. They can be used for supercooling very effectively, and when paired with heat sinks can lead to some of the most efficient zero-heat layouts available. They're also immune to overheating, so no need to worry about cooling them down.
HEAT SINKS IN ACTION
[image: drive.google.com]
Heat sinks are exceedingly good at removing heat from components directly adjacent to them due to their capability of reducing heat by a percentage instead of a flat value. This property makes them very effective for low-heat layouts, and if other cooling devices are implemented, very efficient rigs can be assembled. They're also immune to overheating.
Heat sinks and water blocks work even when overheated! It has been confirmed that this is by design, so make use of it!
EDUCATION REDUCTION
The education course "CMT2570: Fundamentals Of Computer Architechture" will reduce all heat gains by 25%. This only applies to gains, leaving other components like fans and water blocks unaffected. The following is a summary on how significant the impact really is between having it and not having it.
[image: drive.google.com]
As shown, the reduction is very significant and can allow some low to moderate heat layouts to become zero or low heat respectively. Consider getting this course done as soon as you can since the help it provides is so massive.
The presence of some long decimal values may make calculating by hand difficult, so user Bug [1455582] has developed a heat simulator using the values present here to allow faster calculation of expected heat for your layouts without needing to spend nerve to test it. You can find it here.
COMPONENT BREAKDOWN
A brief look at how each specific component interacts with one another.
[image: drive.google.com]
These observations are based on personal experience.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Some questions come up pretty frequently for this crime, and for good reason, it is indeed quite complex. The following are the most common questions I've either received or read in the forums, hope it helps!
Q: Why does my rig say offline? How do I turn it online?
A: You need to unlock a rig chassis by reaching skill level 25 before using the rig becomes an option. Until then, you'll be using a computer or a laptop.
Q: Does guessing characters give any CS at all?
A: None. It's done for an honor bar and to save nerve.
Q: Does a rig with high BFS give me more CS?
A: Not that I could tell. Cracking 7 characters at once gives the same CS as cracking a single one.
Q: What's the fastest way of gaining skill?
A: Bruteforce everything with no rig or a barebones rig, the less processing power the better. This uses a mountain of nerve and is overall less efficient but is the fastest way to gain skill level daily. If you're in a pub and/or drinking moonshine then this approach might suit you best.
Q: What are the second and third chassis that get unlocked at CS50 and CS75 useful for?
A: There's two mainline designs currently, one which is repeating a standard layout multiple times, and the other dedicating one chassis to solely power supply while the others handle processing power. More information about them can be found in the "Rig Designing and Common Practices" section above.
Q: Why use HPCPUs when eCPUs are cheaper and better?
A: On single rigs without overclocking, eCPUs are far better, but once you have multiple chassis and overclocking up to 50%, using HPCPUs can lead to a significant increase in performance that eCPUs simply cannot match. With overclocking you'll be struggling for space more than anything else, and eCPUs use plenty of it and get a lower boost when overclocked, making them less effective.
Q: I'm using the seven heat sink design, are water blocks useless now?
A: Both waterblocks and heatsinks share the property of working even when overheated. As such, they're often used alongside heatsinks for low/zero heat high performance rigs. On their own they're also very useful for pre-overclocking rigs and supercooling rigs.
Q: I just unlocked overclocking, how can I overclock my rig?
A: See the power thingy at the bottom left of the rig? Drag the lightning icon to the right. You'll know if you can overclock if there's an orange section to the right of its default position (you'll need to have surplus power!).
Q: I can't overclock my rig even when I have overclocking unlocked
A: This is a common issue and there's three possible reasons for it.
1) You don't have enough power to overclock your rig. Install an extra PSU or a few and try again.
2) An extension may be causing issues. Try to disable extensions like torntools or tampermonkey or switch browsers and try again.
3) A visual bug is preventing you. This is rare but has happened before, try to clear your rig, reload the page or reopen your browser.
4) You're on mobile. It has been reported that some folk are struggling to toggle overclocking on mobile devices, and frankly I have no idea on how to help you there.
Q: Is there a limit to the amount of jobs that can roll over? Do they expire?
A: No and no, as far as we could tell. You can have hundreds of jobs roll over by simply "tapping" them once by bruteforcing. These jobs won't expire over time, and they won't reduce the amount of jobs you get everyday either.
Q: Any interesting places or tools to help with cracking?
A: There's a few.
- The cracking rigs thread is one of the best places to find new rigs and discussion about rigs currently, and is also where most of the rigs in the "Recommended Rigs" section come from.
- Bug's cracking rig simulator is also great for experimenting with layout designs without using nerve, with most of the values in there coming from my research I can vouch for its accuracy.
- Heartflower's Cracking value per nerve script is good if your main goal is profitability. It uses parts of my research and what's logged in the wiki so it's pretty accurate.
- Silmaril's cracking rig layout switcher userscript can come in handy for quickswitching layouts if you tend to switch between low/high-heat layouts and supercooling layouts often.
- nodelore's cracking prompt helper may come in handy for you if you are aiming for maximum efficiency and guessing as many passwords as possible.
- Homki's word search site may be an alternative if you want help with guessing but can't/don't want to install userscripts. Personally it's the main tool I used while grinding Character Assassination.
- Reshula's rig list and optimization tips is an excellent resource for finding the ideal layout for your particular use case, or a good introduction to rig designs if you'd rather experiment on your own instead of just copying the meta.
There's other tools and userscripts that may help you with cracking passwords that you can find in the forums, so do take a look around and see if you find anything interesting!
THE NUMBERS
TARGET BREAKDOWN
Due to the vast amount of target and targeted service combinations, I opted to post a sheet with all recorded jobs and their expected payouts.
Find the breakdown here.
FINAL THOUGHTS
I find this crime extremely enjoyable. Firstly, the "guess the password" aspect of it giving players a LOT more agency compared to previous crimes is a huge change. It rewards people's ingenuity, and to some extent luck if you're just guessing randomly, but mostly ingenuity. As more jobs come out and advanced targets with more complex passwords start showing up, it's gonna be interesting to see how the people adapt.
Secondly, the rig. The ability to assemble our own machine that makes doing this crime more efficient, and the parts are only found within the crimes system? Couldn't be happier.
The fact that the basic parts are very common while the most advanced or useful parts are somewhat rare is also something that I really like. The crime itself isn't restricted by price, just the "meta" builds if you could call them that, and even then, players have the ability to adapt with the supplies they currently have without needing to cough up multiple millions on a component, or they can attempt to shoplift the newly released store that *only* gives computer parts in an attempt to get the parts they need.
In every regard, from the components to the mechanics to the dynamics with other crimes, this crime just skyrocketed to the first spot in my personal tierlist. Yes, even beyond burglary.
Tenth guide, and honestly I had an absolute blast while playing around with the rig's components, figuring out which ones were better, how heat worked and everything in-between. Once overclocking comes into play and additional chassis as well, it seems I'll be busy for quite a while :)
DATA GATHERING (Almost done!)
Gathering of logs for this crime is almost finished, only lacking data for the most advanced targets now, that is, those unlocked at CS80 and 90. If you've maxed this crime consider sending me your logs using the method posted below!
For this crime in particular, the following userscript is required for proper logging. This is due to torn logs not providing any information regarding targets and services, as well as rig information and the like. It only logs attempts done after installation, so do consider installing it and sending me your logs early on.
CREDITS
Finally, a shoutout to all who contributed in the making of this guide, as well as those who financed this and previous projects.
kelfi: 22x Donator Pack
onlelonely: 10x FHC
Kerrapht: 23% Plunder Frying Pan
MrFancyPants: $100,000,000
Maks: $100,000,000
BAXIA: $100,000,000
tos: $100,000,000
MonChoon: 100x Xanax
Hamid448: $60,000,000, 3x E-DVDs, 1x Drug Pack, 1x Six Pack of Alcohol
Jefersonakl: 5x FHC
hugeknight: 60x Lottery Voucher
Gem: 25x Bottle of Moonshine
Kamkool: $50,000,000
FractalPariah: $50,000,000
BigDaddyLuvsU: $38,000,000, 3x Drug Pack
Sinvetic: $15,000,000, 2x FHC, Quran Script : Ubay Ibn Ka'b
butts: 50x Xanax
Amsgaming: $2,000,000, 3x Can of Rockstar Rudolph, 5x Can of X-MASS, 1x FHC
mahadi: 150x Bottle of Pumpkin Brew, 150x Bottle of Wicked Witch
Invert: $13,000,000, 1x Xanax, 1x FHC, 20x Bottle of Mistletoe Madness
maimunah: $30,000,000
Paul_Atreides: $30,000,000
RatstaR: 1x Donator Pack
L4suicide: 1x Donator Pack
MrSo: 1x Donator Pack
Dragoonseal: 1x Donator Pack
lynstly: 1x Donator Pack
MissMary: $1,000,000, 1x Drug Pack, 20x Xanax
Gandalf: 1x FHC, 20x Bottle of Stinky Swamp Punch
Jackass_420: $20,000,000
Lidia: $20,000,000
D3XU5: 48x Bottle of Mistletoe Madness
Dr_Thycreator: 1x Six-Pack of Energy Drink, 3x Can of Santa Shooters
spiff: 1x Six-Pack of Energy Drink
illum: 1x FHC
Teruf: 1x FHC
Skulll: 1x Drug Pack, 1x Six-Pack of Alcohol, 1x Bottle of Mistletoe Madness, 1x Bottle of Stinky Swamp Punch, 1x Can of Rockstar Rudolph, 1x Can of X-MASS
HOU5E: $10,000,000
RipTheJacker: $800,000, 4x Can of Santa Shooters
Lexcifer: 10x Xanax
BurningWinters: 5x Six-Pack of Alcohol
something: $7,500,000
Bssteig: 1x E-DVD, 1x Can of Rockstar Rudolph, 1x Xanax, 1x Certificate of Awesome
Matslav: 1x Business Class Ticket
Giovanni: 3x Six-Pack of Alcohol
Tuit: $5,000,000
Ngongingo: $5,000,000
Chimken: 1x Drug Pack
Bacurau: 1x Drug Pack
Juna_Warrior: 1x Drug Pack
Rizzzz: $4,000,000
Sparrow88: $4,000,000
Jikkar: 1x Erotic DVD
Dapper_Tramp: 10x Bottle of Wicked Witch
-Behemoth: 3x Xanax
Grindspawn: 3x Xanax
Timoteo32: 1x Six-Pack of Alcohol
badmagicks: 1x High-Speed Drive
Green_Babz: 1x Can of Santa Shooters
TheBonebreaker: $1,000,000
Mr_Bendix: $1,000,000
GodsFamousG: $1,000,000
bcla7: 1x Lottery Voucher
jimjuice: 50x Bottle of Beer :)
Anonymous: $29,400,000
Research collaborators:
Fetheryhorse6
Tuit
NyanMango
5h4d0w
mahadi
Silmaril
-Corvus-
Lazerpent
Reshula
Scripting and materials used
Skeletron (torn.report log export)
Silmaril (Cracking logger userscript)
GetMeOut (testing rigs and layouts)
SirCharlesF (testing rigs and layouts)
Gandalf (brute-force strength equation)
Zauriel (restrictions for Cracking)
Bug (rig heat simulator)
Reshula (best rig layouts)
Others (layouts under the Recommended Layouts section)
All contributors:
Acarya, Teach, FractalPariah, ArttiIsGod, D3XU5, Dan77, TheBurninator, Hero1381, Celasha, -Corvus-, haohao229900, Hemicopter, Hemidonk, Hemigidius, Hemillusionist, Lazerpent, Nyxa, Silmaril, spiff, auboli77, Decame, DrBlaze, Eaglefield, FractalPariah, IpsilonX, jakmat, Lithdren, Lyncz, Nboutin2, pAceMakerNZ, Toxburn, Wiffle, the people of aXiom, IMF and HeLa, the torn.report team, and the people on the wiki thread for Cracking, as well as everyone who I might've missed. My apologies in advance.
All in the name of science.
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