I know this is not much of a suggestion but a simple request (which SE will probably take care of).
Q: Is there really measures concerning the 3rd party tools and action taking place right NOW?
Theory: Botters and hackers are testing right now and would probably come back if you don't ban them on the spot to date. Knowing they're running back and forth repeating the same action over and over (just starts looking a little suspicious). While they're developing 3rd party tools and abusing their 'talent' for taking high advantage of the free play, swiftly investigating and dropping their characters level or even banning them could just make this game safe from RMT and Hacker/ Botters.
Q: Do most of you in-game see this happening, does this worry you at all? How do you think it will affect the integrity of the game?
I don't see why I have to word 10 hours a day 4-5 days a week earning the honest dollar to spend the little bit of time playing an honest game while cheaters get away with "enterprise hacking" and gold farming for money laundering.
I'll tell you right now SE, the BS is happening right now so do something about it.
Q:Cedarwood (31,30), why is there so much of this repetitive running back and forth of some Miqote and Lalafel while others just stand around taking up bits of space on my screen?? =/
Before they get smarter, kill them off... Before they build their empire, ban them now!
Plz
:(
Kill the "BOTs"
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11-19-2011, 01:34 PMPSxpert2011Kill the "BOTs"
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11-19-2011, 11:38 PMBearforce
instead of making useless threads why not call a GM in-game?
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11-20-2011, 03:54 AMToxicFox
SE will be putting in countermeasures against RMT's but they can't just go around banning everyone who looks like they're botting. I can't tell you how many times I was called a bot in FFXI cause every once in awhile I'd spend a few days doing nothing but crafting to boost up my gil. Even people in my LS called me a bot sometimes. I'm pretty sure they were teasing but it still gives you a idea of how hard sorting out bots from real people can be. The best bet they have to counter RMT's is to put something in the mail and trade systems that red flags people who trade/mail large amounts of money. If they hit the money keepers then its kinda hard for them to operate. Still you have the people who level and sell profiles and then the user that uses bot cause he doesn't have the free time. Stopping them is where things really get tricky. I don't think the server's can handle tracking everyone's movements and looking for patterns. Not to mention most bot programs slightly randomize the path they take. So the only thing they can really do without hurting real players is ask us the players to report them. No matter what SE does though they will be around cause they're like cockroaches. You can stomp all you want but the damn thing can still survive a nuke.
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11-20-2011, 04:00 AMPSxpert2011Quote:
Originally Posted by Bearforce
Its only useless if you don't reply. Learn some creative criticism for a change while your still in elementary school "son".
Reporting it and posting a thread about it can be just as useful but most likely GMs don't seem to respond unless it's harassment in-game or by any other means that put a player in a uncomfortable position.
@Toxicfox, Thanks for your post and supportive reply. We been playing this since the alpha/beta but unless we talk about it, it's up to SE to go solo on this matter.
Seems some people get either bothered by the subject and just say "Report it to the GM"... but no matter what you do, there's a need for immediate action and there's no definite report button or action for trusted players/ or VIP status. Unless they violate the ToS, you can't call up a GM and expect matters to get better.
I know I have to go to support.na.square-enix.com "yada-yada-yada", that's why i'm also posting on the feedback forums. So for anyone being bothered by BOTs in-game, share your concerns here or don't say anything at all (you just might be that bot). -
11-20-2011, 10:49 AMToxicFox
I do believe botting does violate the ToS but GM's don't do investigations. Having the report system in game would really be nice though. I used to mine for ore in a pretty hot RMT spot in FFXI to get gil to level WW. I remember having to use the STF a lot and remember wishing it was easier to report people. Not that the STF wasn't effective once called. I remember there would be a short time of peace before new RMT's showed up. Although they were probably the ones I had gotten banned... One time I forget what I said but I voiced some frustration in say next to one and ended spending some time chatting. It turned out to be a female who was doing it to supplement her husbands income. Though getting one to talk is rare it happened from time to time. Like someone from my LS had a talk with one and found out he did it at night cause he didn't make enough in his day job. Well yes I do pity them some I still think banning them is a good idea.
To give you a idea of what a menu system could look like.
___________FAQ
Help desk > GM support
___________Report suspicious activity
No matter what happens though SE will not support or allow RMT. They are thinking about how make sure no RMT's abused the free trial that will come when the PS3 version is out but honestly odds are they won't care free trial or no free trial. To keep the RMT pop down they should not allow any form of sneak under the level 10 and don't go about giving newbies free starting items like movement+. Keeping the starting city markets separate from the main market would help but will cause some frustrations for players. Adding a new city in the middle of all three would move the main market to that city. Changing mob layout to keep lower level players closer to the starting city's would be a fairly welcome change. Adding aggressive mobs to map choke points to kill anyone who's too low that try's to pass. Kinda like the goblin bounty hunter who was added to kill fishing bots in FFXI. Often times they were lower level then the rest of the mobs in the area and had low HP but high ATK. These are fairly rough ideas but I think if done right you can make a system that makes life hell for a RMT and doesn't hinder real players. -
11-20-2011, 11:21 AMZenakuGM would tell you to report them to STF which they do noting unlike in ffxi when they did not had STF they ban them within few hours of looking at there record,trades and what there doing.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bearforce
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11-20-2011, 02:07 PMBearforce
the game design itself is built around an engine where GM,s Cant detect whether you are botting or not, i would rather wait for V2.0 to release then make wild hocus pocus suggestions about how to detect them.
anyone remembered how the endgame scene in ffxi relied on you heavly to bot kings for the last 5 years? thats right... because GM,S cant detect whether you are botting or not.
sadly when reading the PDF files,they didnt mention how they can countermeasure RMT,S. so bumping this thread to get answers from devs the more luckly that i will stay in a free RMT mmo game. -
11-20-2011, 02:52 PMPrettyPrincess
In that case they need to forbid 3rd party controllers with turbo function. even though they enabled it
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11-20-2011, 03:33 PMToxicFoxPeople would hack any controller so it has a turbo like function.Quote:
Originally Posted by PrettyPrincess
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11-20-2011, 03:51 PMPrettyPrincess
but that's the thing though...I could be using a turbo controller and people would just assume I'm using a botting program.
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11-20-2011, 05:13 PMBearforcelike PP said.SE enabled the use of Turbo controller.Quote:
Originally Posted by ToxicFox
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11-21-2011, 01:40 AMToxicFoxMaybe SE realized they can't stop people from using them but I kinda doubt that is really the case... I don't know if you know but a controller can be setup so it works even if the client is in the background. Thus you can use a turbo controller to craft like a crazy person and troll the forums of your favorite website at the same time. Stuff like that makes me wonder wtf they were thinking. They might as well of written a bot script themselves. Hopefully the background support will be removed cause I know RMT's will just set it up to craft and then go spam ad's or something to peoples email. Btw if anyone thinks SE had no way to detect money transfers then why is it RMT's started getting paranoid and insisted transfers be done face to face trade to avoid detection in FFXI. I would wonder how much gil was every now and then and go to a RMT site to check it out. Purely to satisfy my own curiosity of course I never actually bought gil. My brother did however buy gil once.... I wanted to slap him and did my fair share of typing /slap on him for the rest of the day.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bearforce
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11-21-2011, 11:10 AMPSxpert2011
Has anyone notice how some mobs, even the the aggressive mobs don't link?
Is some monster behavior making the game easier for any PC on auto-function(bots), including normal players(who think), to work around the system without using strategy?
I'm not saying bring in "Goblin Bounty Hunter" or anything, I'm saying that the mob behaviors and design structure have become far too simplistic for either "casual" or "hardcore". It can be far fetch but I think even the beginning areas need a little RPG flavor with some level of difficulty. If there's not a STF available, the game would handle itself.
I remember last year a single Gubbue used to hang out around the western La Noscea and scare the hell out of me (after getting too close). It seems farming is easy but doing Guild-leves has some linking behavior but only to the mobs involved.
Reporting is not the problem, I use the SE support page when I have to. It's making enough noise about ways to make game play fair for everyone and at the same time "Challenging" as a side-effect. Talking about RMT can make a difference because I know the beginning structure of 14 was designed around that focus. -
11-21-2011, 01:22 PMToxicFoxNear grid in this little narrow path they stuffed in like 15 doe's in. If they added linking to them then to attack one would be to attack them all and I just don't see anyone surviving that. I agree that some mobs should link such as pack animals. It would however require all mobs to be wiped from the map and put back in with a better layout. A very time consuming thing to do but I think it should be done before PS3 release. The current layout of horrible.Quote:
Originally Posted by PSxpert2011
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11-28-2011, 01:09 PMPSxpert2011
The zones are so huge and maps could expand in the up-coming version. I agree the layout is horrible and the animals in this game have no personality at all. They should be spread out more if linking is a concern.
RMT abuse of the current system and bots are rampaging the game with names like "Ghyt Hftrr", "Mnbhj Ioplk" (or some random crap like that) grouped together at Camp Bloodshore and places like that. SE had made reporting RMT and Bot related issues a little more tedious but I'd do it for the best of the community. -
11-28-2011, 05:48 PMLienn
I agree...it's about time for SE to take care of bots...but i think they're ignoring them because bots actualy are a decent amount of the current playerbase...they probably are waiting the first billing before baning them lol
It's sad how people don't even mind botting at open areas anymore. One of these days i was doing leves with my sister in Bald Knoll and there were a dude using fight bot in that cave the leves send us (the one SE from camp with some goblins). And the worst...i already got that very same dude reported from botting with several classes and at several areas/levels and he is still there. It's just like these fishing/craft bots...SE is letting people get too used to bot with no threat of getting punished.
One of these days i even received a disturbing tell...a dude was asking if i could make a cobalt cuirass set for him because his LS' bots were out ot shards...i was like "WTF?!"...nowadays ppl is even talking openly about botting.
This is a shame and SE must take care of it ASAP (even though i'm SO sure that we will have some "server imcompatibility" when migration time come so everyone will have to leave the gil behind...we already lost the physical level, 80% of our gear/items and soon enough will lose sentinel...losing the gil will just be another mass screwing from this dev team). -
12-01-2011, 12:10 AMLaraul
Deal with it... RMT are part of these type of games... sure everyone hates em... but they exist because players will gladly use RMT to obtain things they desire. The community creates demand for RMT. The best thing you can do is protect yourself and alert a GM if you spot a player whom is a problem maker.
Why doesn't SE provide the services RMT do? This would put a serious dent in their activities.
BTW... there is NOTHING WRONG with using something like a turbo controller! Nothing is preventing you from purchasing one. -
12-01-2011, 01:46 AMFazrenarI think the Lalafell have been enslaved!Quote:
Originally Posted by PSxpert2011
Too many of my people can be seen doing this type of thing. We need to form a party and free them ;) -
12-01-2011, 08:40 AMtymora
Bots should be regularly banned.
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12-01-2011, 01:22 PMLiennThis. About time for us to have some GMs running around and banning bots. It's not loke 3-5 GMs cannot clean all servers in a week or so.Quote:
Originally Posted by tymora
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12-01-2011, 01:26 PMPrettyPrincess
the thing is, how does one tell who is a "bot" now? Obviously you cant just go around banning people cause they dont respond to you, especially now that you can craft with a turbo controller. (because they enabled as said before)
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12-02-2011, 04:34 AMtymora
I would think the farming bots will be pretty obvious - Fixed farming pattern, comes hit your claimed mobs if you claim it after they locked on to the target, farm till their weapons hit 0%, farm for inhuman number of hours...etc etc
Or the Lalafell armies that run around?
Crafting bots not so much since we regular crafters turn on human-bot mode and watch TV.
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I believe another game also made a small unannounced and sudden UI change to their crafting interface. A number of botters didn't notice the change and continued to run their bots which caused them to hit a changed/imaginary button on the screen, effectively telling the server - "Hi there, ban me please".
Things they can do...
1) Replace Standard with "Ban me please" for 24 hours and revert it back after they kill off the botters. I doubt regular players will mind it the short term inconvenience if it meant the end of bots.
2) Move the menu selection from left to right side. Regular players can still spam standard as they did before. Screen position based bots will be detected.
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Even without special in-game changes, less advanced bots can also be detected by checking input patterns.
There are entire papers devoted to the arms race between bots and bot detectors, so this is as simple as it sounds. -
12-02-2011, 04:38 AMPrettyPrincessThis might sound like a shock, but maybe se doesn't really care for craft "bots" They enabled turbo function for controllers that have it and also conveniently had the cursor position default to the recipe option instead of requested items all in the same patch. all speculation of course.Quote:
Originally Posted by tymora
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12-02-2011, 05:00 AMtymoraIn the grand scheme of things, I would think this is low priority now but they'll look at it sooner or later.Quote:
This might sound like a shock, but maybe se doesn't really care for craft "bots"
I still remember clearly the FFXI Salvage dupe bans...those offenders were boasting on all the forums...then one day, it all became so quiet...:) Hope history repeats itself.
Anyway, 1.19 came with shard bot bans. It took RMT a couple weeks to come back. -
12-02-2011, 11:10 AMPSxpert2011"Exceptionallism" ... See now this kind of ppl in the game really make me sad... If you see something happening that could harm someone, something or the natural state of things and integrity of life, take action and protect what is good. Saying, "Okay, w/e, things won't ever change, blah,blah,blah...", no. Don't get let use to negativity or let it take control, take control of "it".Quote:
Originally Posted by Laraul
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12-02-2011, 01:27 PMLiennNo one gives a crap about "turbo controller". The dude does can release the button a sec to answer the GM. And, in FFXI, we had a nice, cool place named Mordion Gaol, where they sent all people suspected from botting to investigate. Not really hard to have this here too.Quote:
Originally Posted by PrettyPrincess
EDIT: Forgot to say...for SE botting isn't you using automated play through script...for them botting = automated play while the player is not present. So yes, not answering the GM does could be considered botting. -
12-02-2011, 01:37 PMPrettyPrincess
No, actually. And if they didn't think about these things they shouldn't have enabled it in the first place eh?
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12-02-2011, 01:58 PMLienn
It's like i said. they don't deny automated play...an soon as the player is present. I tried to find the official announcement of this but POL is somewhat confusing to search stuff after some years not going there...they posted all their policies regarding botting, erd-party usage, bug exploits, etc when STF was created.
This is why they care very little if the player is or isn't using turbo controllers. They care about the player being there though. If not mistaken they talk 4 times to the dude...if he keep "playing" and not reply, bye bye. Just wish GMs in FFXIV were taking similar actions here.
This is just another of Tanaka's aspects i miss...he never let RMTs/bots walk free as they are nowadays in FFXIV. -
12-03-2011, 09:54 PMPSxpert2011Quote:
Originally Posted by PrettyPrincess
So for how long have you been playing FF14?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lienn
I miss Tanaka too! =(
When Tanaka was producing the game before "stepping down", his vision of the game was about actual WORK. Eeeeeew, that four letter word no one wants to read or hear!!!! XD
BLASPHEMY!
This would of made the game intolerable for RMT and Botters with actual steps to making an achievement. Like real life but in an MMO. This purpose was to act as a deterrent for RMT and along with the degrading system (how food and items would loose value over time while in possession) which has seemed to me to change to just equipment dmg/repairing (and ppl still complain about it).
Do you think this would of worked as this game isn't even charging yet? It would have attracted a highly sophisticated fan base and extremely hard-core type of player IMO and even me would have enjoyed it.! -
12-04-2011, 01:24 AMPrettyPrincess
The problem is, when you make a lot of hoop jumping for rmt guess what? regular players have to go through it as well. And that turns people away. Also I've been playing since last november. every mmo developers knows there will be rmt no matter what, however you shouldn't make systems that punish your playerbase.
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12-05-2011, 08:23 AMLienn
Punishing bots/RMTs and real players very rarely walk the same path. Very often RMT countermeasures do not have real impact to real players...and even if it does, it's for some long-term safier and healthier gameplay.
People should be ashamed of supporting or even tolerating RMTs and bots...because these are the ones that f'up the gameplay of MMOs over time. -
12-11-2011, 09:19 AMZamana
Players are discouraged contacting GM's because GM support is very poor. I've reported bots to the GM and bot would be there hours on end still. GM's should be the last line of defense and be able to remove them but to my experience I only get Automated Pre typed messages. I feel like I'm talking to a computer rather than a person.