I have employed many methods to try and solve the challenge, however I seem to be at a dead end.
I don't want to spoil too much so I'll try to be discrete:
I've :
-used various CVEs from 2013 and 2014
-Read many 'famous' papers dealing with reverse shell'S:' with heap exploitation
-Read large portions of the PHP manual and GWF code in an attempt to find objects that meet the requirements (none of them are accessible :( )
-(somewhat) Identified the version of PHP I'm running under
-Tried to find 0-days in the PHP interpreter ;P
-Looked at commit history on Github for the challenge.
Please understand that I'm not too familiar with PHP dev as I like JS more :)
Stay with the code you are given. I think nurfed knows better than to use GWF.
You might have missed something in your research.
Thanks dloser!
Update before I rest:
I've attempted to perform more reconnaissance on the challenge by logging into the Warchall box.
There's an interesting 'difference' that I've noted, and I think it has something to do with a certain comment I found as well...
Since then I've found a couple of modules to look deeper into. Should I figure out how to wakeup tomorrow morning, or am I on the wrong track?
Thanks
As long as you are researching new things, even if they do not lead to a solution, you are on a right track... ;)