The bot problem is rising and real.

[Monsoon_Lues]

Botting has always been a thing as far as I can remember while playing this game. But it just got to a whole new level, and someone needs to fix this once and for all. They've gotten better and smarter, they don't instantly teleport across the world now, you can see them walk in the sky, basically flying, or walk through walls and underground. They SWARM ARR areas at this point, reporting does nothing, they ban one and 20 more come out. I can't stand around Ul'dah 2 damn seconds without seeing 3 or 4 of them flying over my head. It's not a single datacenter or server problem anymore it's all over and it's getting bad, real bad. If I open the player search and look for people from lvl 1 to 50 in ARR areas, 85% of the results are bots. Is that the "new playerbase" that the devs want? All it would take is a lil surface detection check. A real anticheat. Please.

Here's some screens I managed to capture in just five minutes of looking during the day
https://imgur.com/l6chwlK
https://imgur.com/6t8MDn5
https://imgur.com/KJfjnuo
https://imgur.com/4hzJFuD
https://imgur.com/W86dx66

I'm from EU, but it seems like it's a heavy issue even on US, give a watch to this video and see for yourself https://youtu.be/p01FTSHNQz0

If we don't give a damn about it and just accept it like it's an impossible thing to resolve, we normalize the problem and it will only be worst as time goes on. We need more people talking about this. Not just a handful while the rest looks the other way "cause it's just arr".

[KitiaraIornsight]

I agree it’s a major issue. It took me 5 minutes to load into new Gridania because of the HUNDREDS of bots in that single zone. They are breaking physics, creating the log in queue problem for a low population server. They are joining the novice network and clogging it up.
I spent an hour reporting them yesterday.

[KageTokage]

They are joining the novice network and clogging it up.

They actually can't get into NN without being invited by a mentor (They accept virtually all forms of invitation with no hesitation, whether it be parties, FCs, or NN), so someone has to be doing it deliberately.

[miraidensetsu]

If not for botting (that's hard to actually prove), why not ban them for bug exploit or hack? They're doing impossible things for players who's legally playing.

For me, the solution is launching some solution that makes sure that no process will mess with FFXIV's packets and makes sure that the client has the exact checksum of a non modified client.

But... But... Muh parser... Sorry, guy. Using parser was illegal to begin with.

[Monsoon_Lues]

I don't think the devs realize how much of an issue this is. It makes the game look bad in the eyes of new people just leveling in arr

[Metalwrath]

. They are joining the novice network and clogging it up.

Thats been a thing since NN was first launched.People becomeing mentors and clicking every sprout name they see to join them.
Someone is either adding them on purpose to rmt spam NN and find potential novice players to sell gold to or one of the mentors is just trolling.

[XenociderOmega]

Saw at least 50 running through trees and the ground all of them lv 15-17 it's just like on WoW. After looking around I think the bots are using the same program company that blizzard sued for 8.6 mil.

[Ithaqua]

I sometimes think the devs look on the Japanese server and wonder "what are these people in USA/Europe complaining about, I don't see any botting".

[Nyvara]

I say this all the time, having a quicker means to report botting would go a long way. The system now is to cumbersome (most likely to cut back on frivolous reports) But we need a way to quickly report Floaty Mcfloatbot.

Then the GMs in NA and seems like EU now too need to do something about it! Not going to doomsay but really I still remember the last years of Diablo 1 when bots were more plentiful than actual players.

I'm sick of teleporting Congo lines of lalafell black mages and air walking gatherers oh and those gil sellers that you can't see because they are inside the world or another object.

[Dustytome]

I say this all the time, having a quicker means to report botting would go a long way. The system now is to cumbersome (most likely to cut back on frivolous reports) But we need a way to quickly report Floaty Mcfloatbot.

I'm not even sure we need to report those. Given the sheer number they ban with each wave, I doubt all those are from player reports. They've settled on an ineffective ban wave system and report or not, the rmt bots will exist until the wave hits and after that they'll just have until the next wave hits.

Then the GMs in NA and seems like EU now too need to do something about it!

They would first have to be allowed by SE to actually do something about it. SE has forbidden the GMs from acting on bots/cheats. Everything has to go to the Special Task Force, which is a small team (less than a handful of people last I saw) at the home base. They're not even region based.