Many people cheating, automated bot to farm drops to synth spheres for Escutcheon

Hi I just wanted to add my two cents (I don't normally post on the forums).

I think what Nyarlko said is pretty disgusting. Everyone else I've read I totally agree with, and I am kind of shocked that the person in question thinks that there is no issue. I started a new character in FF11 recently even though I've been playing for over 15 years, and yes, the bots, RMT's or whoever they are, are running rampant in almost every old zone of the video game. It makes it difficult to do the quests, missions and obtain key items in order to progress because of them, not to mention getting that new shield people are talking about. And as for Nyarlko, really? that's your answer? "if you can't beat em join, em?" I mean you gloated about actually making bot accounts, and on this official FF11 forum no less. Unbelievable. And yes, it does matter to everyone playing; we are paying customers who want to have fun and enjoy a fair game, and I think it's pretty crappy that Square is letting this happen.

Whatever is done, SOMETHING NEEDS to be done. The way it is can't stay, the bots running rampant.

Every single time they let it escalate further than last time.

They took way too long on salvage bans. They took way too long on CP bots. They've taken way to long this time.

There are so many bots, to report them daily and not have any action done takes up alot of time too, less I make a template and just keep sending that over and over

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Originally Posted by VoiceMemo

There are so many bots, to report them daily and not have any action done takes up alot of time too, less I make a template and just keep sending that over and over

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I vote for a public template since most of the bots behave similarly I assume. Easier and faster to just fill the names.

I don't mind reporting IF something is actually done about them. But to keep using up my time reporting them, when I could be doing other stuff in game, and not seeing any results seems like a waste of time for me. That it's not taken seriously that it just goes into the email system and then directly into the trash.

I would prefer on the GM call for the GM to actually appear and witness it, much like they did years ago when there was massive fish bot issue. Even if they can't do the banning at least then they have witnessed it and make their report to the special task force. In this sense I would see at least some work being done for my efforts of reporting 3rd party program use.

I again promote SE to do what they did to chocobo digging/fishing. Implement a limit of the amount of spheres you can produce per day. Since only a person with T3 shield can produce them that would limit the amount people can farm in any zone.

That accomplishes absolutely nothing. Put a limit on it, just make more accounts. Nothing changed.

It can't be any easier. Make them exclusive. Period. That is the only solution.

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Originally Posted by Isola

That accomplishes absolutely nothing. Put a limit on it, just make more accounts. Nothing changed.

It can't be any easier. Make them exclusive. Period. That is the only solution.

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It would make a difference since to synth spheres you MUST be 110 of a craft and have T3 shield complete. They can't complete these tasks that fast, so it would limit them.

It takes less than a day to 110 a craft and work a shield up. You're only limited about 25~ days on guild points.

or, they start buying t3 shield accounts

or, they start mercing bot-services farming the drops and showing shield owners how to craftafk.

Don't fool yourself into thinking anything will realistically solve this problem. And it does nothing about the 100 already made shields.

Making all spheres ex is unlike how SE has handled things in the past. They have imposed limits, which is why I think the more realistic fix, even if it's just for 25 days would be to limit the amount of spheres you could produce per day.

Since SE seems unwilling to ban those that are cheating and they just want the money at least this option would give legit players a fighting chance versus the bots.

Kinda off-topic but was farming a lottery spawn nm for trials and there was a farming bot camping it too. The bot was speedhacking and clipping thro the obstacles. Called a gm and the response was an automated msg to contact to STF. It's sad what this game has become.

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Originally Posted by Justuas

Kinda off-topic but was farming a lottery spawn nm for trials and there was a farming bot camping it too. The bot was speedhacking and clipping thro the obstacles. Called a gm and the response was an automated msg to contact to STF. It's sad what this game has become.

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As they saying goes in the case of the playerbase "You reap what you sow".

People using third party programs and so called 'plugins' opened up the gateway to a mass of cheaters.

I'm not saying everyone uses such programs, but by the looks of it, judging by public videos on the various streaming platforms - The majority do.

Still waiting on SE to do something about the cheaters in palborough mines. They continuously automated bot farm quadravs for fetich items, which they then use automation to desynth to spheres. I have reported them to the Special Task Force for months, yet nothing is done. Either ban them or alter your rules SE to allow 3rd party program use for all.

Botting is completely out of control SE, if you serach and monitor any of the zones that have genkai 50 items you'll see the same people there for hours on end. If you just monitor time/movement you can tell that it is automation because NO one can stay up for 24hrs straight constantly moving.

Please please SE prioritize the special task force to combat cheaters. Work on this BEFORE any other update, this is of great importance, the cheaters are ruining the game.

The dragoon bot army is pretty ridiculous too... it's not sphere botting, but holy cow. Gustav pling while clipped oob then 40 dragoons show up in adoulin.

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Originally Posted by Isola

The dragoon bot army is pretty ridiculous too... it's not sphere botting, but holy cow. Gustav pling while clipped oob then 40 dragoons show up in adoulin.

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Are these the ones that were 'stuck in the wall' the other day?

Yup. Shameless. /sea yahse + ceizak

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Originally Posted by chiefhunglo

It's because of the harmless third party programs that their are still people joining or resubbing take it away will cause some of the player base to leave.

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On a serious note....

Shut up.

Went to crawlers nest today, totally bot farmed. Something really needs to be done SE, please follow the rules you have set out that DO NOT allow 3rd party programs. Turning a blind eye to this much cheating is basically saying use any 3rd party you want. People talk about 3rd party in yells and say openly, bring back the days when this was a violation. Put some teeth on your rules, else no one will follow them, which is basically whats occurring now. The cheaters have no fear of being banned.

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Originally Posted by Isola

Yup. Shameless. /sea yahse + ceizak

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Out of curiosity I went to have a look in those areas. There were well over 40 or so in both the areas combined. All of which seem to be using some kind of scripted movement/WS, and movement speed+ .. Mostly all the same gear, with keyboard smashed names.

I believe SE need to get 'some men on the ground' with this one. There is no way I'm going to fill out STF form that many times, especially seeing as my previous reports have been an epic fail.

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Originally Posted by VoiceMemo

Went to crawlers nest today, totally bot farmed. Something really needs to be done SE, please follow the rules you have set out that DO NOT allow 3rd party programs. Turning a blind eye to this much cheating is basically saying use any 3rd party you want. People talk about 3rd party in yells and say openly, bring back the days when this was a violation. Put some teeth on your rules, else no one will follow them, which is basically whats occurring now. The cheaters have no fear of being banned.

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Advertising PL services is against the rules too...

But yeh, I think the terms are in need of revision. As well as the 'bug report' form.

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Originally Posted by Sirmarki

Advertising PL services is against the rules too...

But yeh, I think the terms are in need of revision. As well as the 'bug report' form.

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I don't think that PL services are against TOS.. Probably falls under the same ruling as merc services, which are approved as a RP element. (Since you are "role playing" as mercenaries.) >_>

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Originally Posted by Nyarlko

I don't think that PL services are against TOS.. Probably falls under the same ruling as merc services, which are approved as a RP element. (Since you are "role playing" as mercenaries.) >_>

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https://i.imgur.com/8VOyhy2.gif

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Originally Posted by Sirmarki

https://i.imgur.com/8VOyhy2.gif

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The one just two above that with " ... deprives other players of the chance to play the game." also constitutes the reporting of bot's which deny others the chance to farm and play the game, since they monopolize pops and items for everyone to use.

OK. I'm pretty sure that is actually referring to the RMT practice of a player paying real money to have someone else either play the game for them, or kill things in a party with them... I don't think that the listed entry applies when it's gil changing hands instead of real money. Keep in mind that it's been darn near impossible to MPK for many years, yet that is still on the list. Could be just yet one more thing that has never been updated by SE. (I ran into SE payment option docs today that have an option listed that's been out of business since 2010 I think...)

I'm actually on hold w/ the customer service phone line right now for something completely unrelated, but I'll ask them for clarification if I ever make it past the eternal ringing... 34min and counting so far... @_@

EDIT: Only took a 45:02 before a real person picked up, got my questions answered, AND got yours answered too. XD That line that you are referencing IS specifically about the RMT practice of paying someone else real money to level your character for you, but there is nothing officially wrong with doing so for in-game currency of any sort (as long as real money is not involved in any way in relation to the transaction.)

They also noted my ticket that I requested an update to the documentation available to us and increased representation on these forums. Not holding my breath, but hey, maybe? ^^;;;

I had a good talk with a GM today and was able to give names and locations of players using automation to farm items to desynth to spheres. He said would pass it onto special task force and to post here for feedback on rules, policies or services so here I am posted.

I thank the GM for his good service(I'm not posting name less asked).

Feedback I have for SE is please enforce the rules you have set out. Farming bots are running rampant on asura, because they haven't been banned. Akin to the rule set have no teeth, people are botting without worry that they maybe banned.

The automated farming bots hurt those like myself that are trying to work on our T4 crafting shields. All locations of non cards are farmed by bots.

The only other solution to the problem is increasing the drop rate of cards and reducing their break rate.
Because of the fact the drop rate is low and the break rate seems about same as other non card items(which have higher drop rate), IE fetich items, this is why most just farm the older items and not the cards. The end yield result of the spheres is greater and more time efficient.

Went to crawlers nest today to farm exoray molds to desynth for spheres and there were 17, 17! bots there. SE PLEASE PLEASE do something about this. Don't work on updates till you get the botting cheaters under control. This should be your highest priority. Or just change your Terms of Service to allow 3rd party programs, as that's essentially what you are doing by turning a blind eye to these cheaters. I've reported automated farming bots for months, yet they are still here. I report them every time to the Special Task Force and call a GM as well, yet nothing seems to be done. That all my emails just go directly to the trash bin and I get automated responses by GM that they know about the botting issue. If they know about it, DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT.

Non action shows that the Terms of Service agreement has no teeth. That it's not enforced and just there for legality. IF you really care to abide by the Terms of Service that YOU(SE) has set out then fix this issue, else change the terms of service and say 3rd party use is fine.

Holy crap. That. Is bananas. I didn't believe you. There are not 8 different camps that bots can use. This means they are botting on top of each other ffs. There really is 17 anon bots in the nest. Motherofgod.jpeg

Also; 11 in the necropolis, 11 in the citadel, 7 in palborough,

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Originally Posted by VoiceMemo

Went to crawlers nest today to farm exoray molds to desynth for spheres and there were 17, 17! bots there.

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I think we can establish that there are only a handful of players behind all this, and I think I know how they are getting around it. Seeing as some of them have been there for in the region of 6~8months.
It's easy to see that they are using automation, the distinctive/fixed movement pattern gives it away.

However, I think who ever is behind it is probably using some kind of response tool, or alert system if they get a tell. This in turn makes it look like they are actually there at their computer, which means it appears not automated.

I personally believe that if time was spent looking at the logs of these players then the evidence would be there, but that's the problem, it would take a lot of time and resources. In the meantime, more and more of them appear, which adds to the problem.

The best solution overall regarding the issues created by the bots (not the bots themselves, since it IS taking forever for SE to actually do anything noticeable from our end,) would be to increase the break rate on the low level desynth items and decrease the break rate on stuff from 75+ content and especially cards. Make it amazingly unprofitable to farm the lower level stuff (particularly mandatory items for missions and level breaks,) then funnel all the cheaters into specific small corners of Vana'diel. I know that this would basically be sweeping the garbage under the rug, and the STF would still have their work cut out sorting out who's botting and who's a legit player among farmers, but at least it would no longer be a ragequit inducing situation for NEW players who are currently getting totally walled off from basic gameplay progress that is MANDATORY for every character that actually gets played.

It's not just shield farmers btw.. Exp/CP farming bots have also gotten out of hand. There are many obvious and blatant botters in Escha-Zi'tah that make it difficult to keep exp chains going for those who are actively playing the game for example..

On paper, the idea to turn useless items into spheres was a great solution to a nonexistent problem.

Problem with solving a problem that isn't a problem, is it creates a problem. All those items should just be removed from sphere synthesis. It's so simple, but they've let it go for so long. I really don't see what excuse they have for letting this go like this. They just straight up Do. Not. Care. It's crazy.

Putting cards on mobs that are basically never killed was a good idea. Break rate and drop rate are way to low though. So many easy solutions to this. instead of making another mount. spend that month fixing shields.

Now 23 bots in crawler's nest, and they logged in pretty much when servers came online. Normally it's free for an hour or 2, but not anymore.

PLEASE PLEASE SE, why are you penalizing those of us who are abiding by your terms of service and following the rules? Do you really mean that I have to give up my values and cheat along with them? Is that what you are saying. Or are you saying if you can't do it legitimately that I should quit?

SE if you really don't want to ban the cheaters because of loss of subscription fees, I call for either

1) Increase of drop rate of EX cards that desynth to spheres and the decrease in their break rate or increase in hq rate.
or
2) Implement limits like you did for fishing, limit 200 spheres that can be made by a ki holder PER day.

Still waiting for an official response from SE on this issue.

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Originally Posted by VoiceMemo

Still waiting for an official response from SE on this issue.

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It's been going on far too long, it's beyond the point of no return now. These bots have been running around freely for a year or so.

lol. a year or so. Maybe thats when you noticed it. it was a problem before shields and this specifically since the very first minute spheres were introduced.

Noticeably a problem since march 2014. (job points introduction) Obviously existed before that too but thats the point when it became blatant.

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Originally Posted by Isola

lol. a year or so. Maybe thats when you noticed it.

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Indeed. I'm just going by the same names that I've seen in a certain zone who run around in that same pattern, and seemly have never left that zone..

I post again my solution to the issue, if don't want to ban because of loss of subscription fee:

Either:

1) Increase of drop rate of EX cards that desynth to spheres and the decrease in their break rate or increase in hq rate.
or
2) Implement limits like you did for fishing, limit 200 spheres that can be made by a ki holder PER day.

My point of making spheres /ex would kill all bots selling spheres for gil, which hopefully would stop them farming too;
also they HAVE to spend time using them to make shields, which is economically bad since the time takes to get to lv.4 not viable to their profits/time;
and/or limit how many spheres you can make per day, per character.
.
All of these ideas have been addressed/adjudicated before, but seems SE doesn't want any advice.
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and for those that say things to point of "Well selling these spheres is how I make my gil in the game." then go find another way, since there are about 12,000+ different ways to do so now.