Quote Originally Posted by Yinnyth View Post
You made one post, reply #49 suggesting no loot or exp on chigoes if they get crit-killed. The rest are ambiguous statements that something needs to be changed about chigoes which I took to mean that you think chigoes should be made tougher. For that, I apologize. But changing their drop dynamics is still a change to them which punishes legimate players as well as the people who are engaging in absentee play. And as such I must oppose it as a matter of principle.

I don't think chigoes being a better source of geodes than other mobs is a design problem anymore than beetles being a good source of beetle jaws is a problem. To some extent, I agree that SMNs doing afk kills on chigoes is a relatively minor issue, but if something needs fixing, it's the speeders, not a hardcap on the speed cars can go.


And as far as the definition of "absentee play" goes, I draw the line at "character creating profit while associated player is not controlling said character". Charity doesn't count, because some other player is doing the work. That's leeching. Unethical, but not against the rules. Apparantly SE seems to agree. You're welcome to your own definition, but then how would you enforce your definition? Would you really ban leechers from the game?
That's just it, the TOU is actually pretty clear on these issues, but they are not enforced rigidly, thus a lot of things happen that shouldn't. Technically, a lot goes on in this game that should not be allowed, but SE lets it slide either because it's considered trivial or not worth the resources to pursue it. SMN letting their pet auto engage and kill a mob without the player drawing their weapon is, in a way, by design. To go after specifically SMN for doing this kinda falls in the category of being a serious WTF moment if they were to take away a very key dynamic to the job.

If they are REALLY concerned about this action specifically on these chigoes, then they should be looking into WHY the focus was put on the chigoes and not any other mob they could choose to do this on. The point here is, they are not doing it in Kuftal, Gustav, Pashow [S], etc--where there are lower level mobs an avatar is perfectly capable of soloing with no effort from the SMN, and weather pops frequently. There are certain characteristics to letting their pets kill chigoes that make them more attractive than crabs, worms, spiders, etc. There are, however, such specific targets in other zones that are indeeed heavily farmed by others on various jobs for the purpose of getting geodes, sometimes to the point that those mobs are no longer a viable target for people to use for trials. It is specifically these chigoes and this specific zone that have become a problem because it is so easy to get a very high demand item off them. It just so happens that it is easier to do it on SMN--just like other mobs may be easier to manage on melee/nuking jobs in other areas.

Other jobs could farm these chigoes in just as high a volume (probly even HIGHER volume), but they would have to actively engage the chigoes to kill them. This creates the monopolization problem that gets in the way of other players ability to participate in certain aspects of the game (trials, etc.). It's not the fact that SMN are taking over the camps--it is that SOMEONE is taking over the camps. Whether it is BLU, THF, RDM, WAR....or SMN. The camps are being monopolized and preventing others from being able to claim them.

Lets look at another mob that had a similar thing happen in recent history. Iron Giants and other NM's were getting pinned in such a way as to exploit elevation in the landscapes to avoid taking damage. This allowed certain jobs to kill them from a safe distance or otherwise out of harms way. They didn't choose to go after the jobs that were heavily exploiting this. Instead, they tweaked how landscape physics affect damage dealing. A similar situation is occuring here. SMN sitting on these camps is the symptom and not the cause of the problem. The problem is how easy it is to mass farm particular items off a specific target due solely to the very nature of how that monster is designed.

Before this announcement was made, a small percentage of players (compared to after the announcement) were likely heavily farming these guys. Now it has been shown how potentially profitable it could be to go after these things. Who's to say they won't now be targetted heavily by THF, BLU, WAR, RDM......then the problem is not a SMN specific problem then, is it? What is the common entity in such a scenario? That's right...the monster being farmed. It all comes back to how attractive the target is. THAT is what needs to be focused on.