OpenFUT/fifa17-recon/docs/CARD_SYSTEM.md

FIFA 17 FUT — Card System RE + Next-Steps Plan

Status as of 2026-08-01. All clean-room (our own binaries + running client only).

Where we are

Offline FIFA 17 Ultimate Team runs end-to-end on our backend:

• Every EA online gate cracked (Origin/LSX, Blaze, UTAS/RS4) → FUT hub.
• Squads editor renders: correct 4-4-2 formation, 11 labelled slots, 5-star squad rating, manager slot, benches — no freezes.
• The one missing piece: player cards render as the generic "FUT 17" back (rating 0) — no real player identity/face resolves.

The squad-shell (what makes it work — don't regress these)

• userMassInfo MUST return {}. Any content (userInfo AND/OR squad) desyncs the massinfo parser (0x180174630) → infinite tokenizer spin (busy-loop freeze at 0x1801c7f1a). utas_server.py: FUT_MASSINFO=empty (default).
• Deliver the squad via GET /squad/0 (LoadActiveSquad, deser 0x18013d1f0), which FIFA fetches on Squads-tab entry (re-fetches on tab-switch, not on editor re-open). FUT_SQUAD_STEP selects the squad (s2v0 = 1 real item).
• GET /user is NEVER called at boot — userInfo can only reach FIFA via userMassInfo (which we can't populate without the desync). So the hub's coins/record can't be shown until the userInfo-in-massinfo desync is solved.

Why cards render generic (definitively reversed — 3 workflows)

The card view-model (0x1800d7920) reads EVERY rendered field (rating@+0xb4, position@+0x146, nation@+0x148, teamid@+0x94, 6 attrs@+0x98..0xac, name@+0xdd) from a resolved player-definition record at item+0x10 — NEVER from our item JSON. That's why item-format/version/field changes had zero effect.

item+0x10 is filled by the resolve at 0x180141160-76: getter 0x18011a830 → CardsDb singleton [0x1802e6398] → call [vtable+0xa08] (= lookup 0x18011cca0), output buffer [rbp+0x160]. The lookup searches a std::map at CardsDb_obj+0x160c0 keyed by resourceId. Offline that map is EMPTY, so every lookup misses and a default blank record is emitted → generic card.

Dead ends (proven, do not retry):

• Version advertising is inert. itemDbVersion (atom 0x16c) and checkServerDbVersion (atom 0x80) are JSON field names routed to the value-SKIP handler 0x180135ff0 in every parser — parsed and discarded, never compared. Roster-version bump and Blaze itemDbVersion=999999999 both did nothing.
• Serving owned items does NOT auto-trigger a definition fetch. The itemData-array parser (0x1801293d0→0x18013fe00) does no membership check and no enqueue; the render-miss is terminal. Our squad already has an owned item rendering generic with 0 idList fetches — empirical proof.
• In-place map overwrite is dead — the map at +0x160c0 stays empty even with all 11 cards rendering (probed live). The resolve emits a transient default to the caller stack each frame; nothing persistent to edit.

The definition FETCH (ut/17/item?idList=, /item/resource, /defid; URL builder 0x180129200) is issued by FUT-controller vtable method 0x180119010 / requestDefinitions 0x180036e20 — both have zero call-sites inside CardsDLL. The decision to fetch lives in the packed FIFA17.exe (decrypted in live memory only).

Our definition-serving endpoints (item_def/defs_route in utas_server.py, routes item/resource/defid/item?idList=) are built and ready for if/when the fetch is ever driven.

Next-steps plan (real player faces) — ordered by tractability

Option A — Drive the fetch from FIFA17.exe (most "correct", hardest to find)

FIFA17.exe is packed on disk but decrypted in live memory (Wine flat-maps at 0x140000000). Find the call-site of the idList issuer (CardsDLL vtable method 0x180119010, .rdata slot 0x18021cb78) inside the live FIFA17.exe image: set a hardware breakpoint / rwatch on that slot's invocation, or scan decrypted .text for the call. Identify what condition it gates on and satisfy it. If FIFA then requests item?idList=<ids>, our endpoints already answer → cards resolve. This is the clean win: no ongoing memory writes, works via normal data flow.

Option B — Populate the CardsDb store so lookups HIT (live-memory injection)

Pre-insert real records into the std::map at CardsDb_obj+0x160c0 (node: Left+0x0/Right+0x8/Parent+0x10/color+0x18/key(resourceId)+0x20/record+0x28). Two sub-approaches:

• B1 (call the game's own insert): drive the map's find-or-insert (0x180115c30, reached from lookup 0x18011cca0) with a resourceId + a record we fill. Requires a small code-injection harness (set up registers + call) since the insert isn't reachable from our side otherwise.
• B2 (hand-build a node): allocate a node in FIFA's heap, write left/right/parent/color/key/record, splice into the tree + rebalance. Fiddliest; RB-tree invariants must hold or later lookups corrupt. Record fields to fill (from base dbdata.dll): rating@+0xb4, position@+0x146, nation@+0x148, teamid@+0x94, 6 attrs@+0x98..0xac, name@+0xdd.

Option C — Patch the resolve miss-path (proof-of-concept, then key it)

Patch lookup 0x18011cca0's miss branch to write real fields into its output record [rbp+0x160]. Quickest to see a real card, but naively makes ALL cards show one player; must be keyed by resourceId to be useful. Good first experiment to confirm the field offsets end-to-end before investing in A or B.

Prerequisite for all: a dbdata.dll extractor

Build a tool to read the base player DB (/mnt/games/FIFA 17/dbdata.dll, single export getTableData; tables players/playernames/teams/nations/ teamplayerlinks) → a resourceId → {name,rating,pos,nation,team,attrs} table (resourceId = playerId | version<<24; Ronaldo playerId 20801). This feeds B and C and validates A. No such tool exists yet.

Recommended order

1. C as a 30-minute proof: patch the miss-path to emit a fixed real record → confirm a real card face appears (validates the whole record-offset model live).
2. Build the dbdata extractor (needed by everything).
3. Attempt A (find the FIFA17.exe fetch trigger) — the clean, durable win.
4. Fall back to B1 (drive the game's insert) if A's trigger proves unreachable.

Reusable tooling

• /proc/PID/mem read/write pattern: autopatch.py, the poke/force tools (ptrace_scope=0 armed by root_arm.sh).
• Live vtable/struct probing: the python snippets used this session (singleton [0x1802e6398], static↔live base map).
• fifadrive.sh (screen capture) + vgamepad.py (virtual pad) for headless drive/observe — note keyboard XTEST does NOT reach FIFA; the gamepad is unverified in-game.