Player Feedback: Gathering Bots

"If you believe someone is using a program which gives him/her an unfair advantage, or have witnessed the buying, selling, or bot-driven farming of items using real currency, you may submit a claim here" - Located under "Report Cheating"

Using a bot to gather provides an unfair advantage over a gatherer that does not use one.

• There is no record of any reports made when reporting cheating
• There is zero feedback for the report. I'm talking about something as simple as a status to indicate it has been reviewed
• You can't name people using bot programs and naming botters seems to be a more serious infraction than actually using bots

I reported several gathering bots multiple times back in November. From what I can see, most are still botting.

I'm not sure what the intent of the current setup is, but for me, I won't be reporting any more bots, as the system in place seems to favor botters, which is fine, but please stop sending mixed messages.

For people that will suggest that I have been wrong in identifying bots:
https://gfycat.com/UncommonAcidicAmericankestrel
There are six bots in the link, some of which were reported for the same activity back in November. The bots doing this don't have gibberish names. While some are obvious alts used to bot, others are using their mains, as they'll have most/all jobs at 60.

I would even go as far as saying there are times when the MAJORITY of endgame gatherers online are botting.

I understand the frustration. It feels like you have to jump through hoops just to report someone cheating and nothing is done about it. I've reported using support desk options that don't feel like they just go to a shredder and received this:

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Hello and thank you for your GM call.

We are aware that the use of third party programs has caused disruptions for many players, and we take every measure to stop violations of the User Agreement. If you have included names in your report, then the matter will be recorded and investigated.

However, for this and any future cases, we also recommend submitting a report directly to the Special Task Force to ensure a more thorough investigation. You can submit your report by visiting http://support.na.square-enix.com and choosing FINAL FANTASY XIV. Then, select Report Bugs or Offending Players to access the reporting form.

We are constantly striving to improve the game and our services to our customers, and are open to any feedback you might have. To submit feedback, please visit the forums at http://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv and make a post with any suggestions you may have for our teams. Although individual responses are not sent, please rest assured that all comments are submitted to the appropriate parties so that they can be read and considered for future updates.

We appreciate you contacting us about this matter. Should you have any further concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us and we will be glad to assist.

Thank you for your patience, and best wishes to you.
FINAL FANTASY XIV Game Master Team

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You may wish to try reporting via the part of the response in red. It still takes forever, you won't receive updates and it's possible they still do nothing. I know you're thinking "I shouldn't have to do that, this is ridiculous!" and yes it is.

Same here. 15-20 Reports and each of these Reports have 5-8 Names listed.

The World, The Zone / Coordination they're currently, the Time and Eorzean Time listed too, Names obviously, fully detailed explanation what they do once they teleport into a Zone.
It's not funny anymore if you know People sleep and still Gather tons of Items (In this case Crystals, Clusters and Aethersand) and destroy the Market doing so by putting 99x Stacks being overpriced even if they lowered the Price for that.

Did a Test yesterday and each one of them hit my Mount and was flying through me, for damn 30-40 Times in those 4 Eorzean Hours!

Why did I even bother to grind the Folklore Books? This is a spit in the Face for every Gatherer that does Gather legitely with their hands.

Let's not talk about how many People are doing this, it's getting extreme and more extreme each Week...

I mean, the link just shows people spawning in and heading towards the same node. Not sure how that determines botting lol.

I know when I'm gathering, I'm usually not paying attention to the screen, go in the same rotation over and over again cuz its all memorized at this point.

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Originally Posted by Valkyrie_Lenneth

I mean, the link just shows people spawning in and heading towards the same node. Not sure how that determines botting lol.

I know when I'm gathering, I'm usually not paying attention to the screen, go in the same rotation over and over again cuz its all memorized at this point.

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Flying the exact Pathway again and again and again and again, just stay in the air where one Player was flying and those Players will hit you for tons of times indicating they use a automated flypath.

It's so obvious when you stand or fly in air near a Ephermal Node....

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Originally Posted by Mwynn

Flying the exact Pathway again and again and again and again, just stay in the air where one Player was flying and those Players will hit you for tons of times indicating they use a automated flypath.

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Not necessarily? I mean, you could just be standing in the most direct path from one node to another.

I'm not saying botters shouldn't be punished, but you have to make sure they are ACTUALLY botting first before taking measures to punish them, which is why SE seem's to not do anything/its very slow.

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Originally Posted by Valkyrie_Lenneth

Not necessarily? I mean, you could just be standing in the most direct path from one node to another.

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Sure and the other 10 Players hit me in the middle of the air, riiiiiight.

I'm pretty sure hitting the Node Mid-Air while dis-mounting at the same time counts too, eh?

Did I mention the stacking in front of a Node?

Oh Please... all the same Players as usual in the Zone... since MONTHS...

Same Spot they all stand in front of the Node when they get off the Mount, also land in other Players directly, this is too obvious.

http://i.imgur.com/Y1bh0sA.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/pnOi1gk.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/MJk7dt1.jpg

People are so blind, seriously LOL

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Originally Posted by Valkyrie_Lenneth

I mean, the link just shows people spawning in and heading towards the same node. Not sure how that determines botting lol.

I know when I'm gathering, I'm usually not paying attention to the screen, go in the same rotation over and over again cuz its all memorized at this point.

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It shows them all moving to the same spot before mounting up and flying away. Anyone who has ever grinded gathering knows the back and forth can be mistaken for botting, but moving to the same spot before mounting up when entering a zone? Don't know if you can see with the quality, but one zones in on a mount, dismounts, moves a few feet to the same spot everyone else takes off from and then mounts up and flies away.

If the link doesn't prove that they're botting, exactly what would you need to be convinced?

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Originally Posted by Vnolan

It shows them all moving to the same spot before mounting up and flying away. Anyone who has ever grinded gathering knows the back and forth can be mistaken for botting, but moving to the same spot before mounting up when entering a zone? Don't know if you can see with the quality, but one zones in on a mount, dismounts, moves a few feet to the same spot everyone else takes off from and then mounts up and flies away.

If the link doesn't prove that they're botting, exactly what would you need to be convinced?

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I couldn't even see that in the link lol, quality was low, i just saw flashes of light and then mounts.

I'm on the same server as you and can confirm, it's quite frustrating seeing all those player ran bots farming Ephi Nodes and Noble Sage. It's definitely bot activity, but your video doesn't do it much justice. There's a specific FC that my friend and I note as infamous for proving player ran bots aren't being handled properly, since they've been around for a very long time (read: years). I wish it were handled better, but without them admitting in chat, proof is a hard thing. Until then, I'll reap the benefits of them providing cheap shards on the MB.

Couple things... First, if the GMs took the time to respond to every single bot/rmt report, they'd never have a chance to do anything about it nor handle any other situation. Second, the GMs are not as concerned with identifying the gatherer bots (or even the RMT bots) as they are the 'mule' characters holding and moving the gil around.

To be honest, SE might even see this type of activity as a way to REMOVE excess currency from the game as a gil sink. If you buy shards/crystals/clusters/materials from a RMT gatherer bot, and that gil gets put on a mule character, and then that character gets banned they have effectively removed potentially millions of gil from the economy which can actually help cut inflation and keep the market stable. It's sad if the economy is that unbalanced for that to be a possibility, but there you have it.

They tend to ban bots in waves. They don't want them to know what activity specifically got them banned I believe. They're part of the report you see on the lodestone every so often for Actions Taken Against In-Game RMT & Other Illicit Activities. For example Jan 5 - Time Period: Dec. 22, 2016 to Jan. 4, 2017

・Accounts receiving disciplinary action for RMT advertising: 1,232
・Accounts receiving disciplinary action for RMT/illicit activity: 47,989
・Action Details: Permanent ban from FINAL FANTASY XIV

the bots would fall under "illicit activity". However, as soon as a bunch of bots are banned, more will be created. The stuff they gather is sold on the Market Board and then the gil is prob used to sell to players buying into RMT.

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Originally Posted by DrWho2010

They tend to ban bots in waves. They don't want them to know what activity specifically got them banned I believe. They're part of the report you see on the lodestone every so often for Actions Taken Against In-Game RMT & Other Illicit Activities. For example Jan 5 - Time Period: Dec. 22, 2016 to Jan. 4, 2017

・Accounts receiving disciplinary action for RMT advertising: 1,232
・Accounts receiving disciplinary action for RMT/illicit activity: 47,989
・Action Details: Permanent ban from FINAL FANTASY XIV

the bots would fall under "illicit activity". However, as soon as a bunch of bots are banned, more will be created. The stuff they gather is sold on the Market Board and then the gil is prob used to sell to players buying into RMT.

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If it weren't against the rules, I could give you 3 names off the top of my head that have been botting for at least 2 years. Those illicit bans are probably gil buyers and sellers, not player ran farming bots.

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Originally Posted by Malzian

Blubb

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Not going against you but rather against Square Enix not providing us the Security they should have given us since the beginning of ARR with those multiple Exploits going on...

They could, yes ... could add Protection to the Client, change Packet Behaviour in the Client and destroy Bots that Way in a much better Way, if not even detect automatical behaviour that Way.
That would also mean that the Raid Scene looses the Function to Parse if People decide to do so.... which is quite hurtful for the Raid Community.

This is quite turning into the second Bot Infested MMORPG that I played due of the same Errors.

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Originally Posted by Mwynn

Not going against you but rather against Square Enix not providing us the Security they should have given us since the beginning of ARR with those multiple Exploits going on...

They could, yes ... could add Protection to the Client, change Packet Behaviour in the Client and destroy Bots that Way in a much better Way, if not even detect automatical behaviour that Way.
That would also mean that the Raid Scene looses the Function to Parse if People decide to do so.... which is quite hurtful for the Raid Community.

This is quite turning into the second Bot Infested MMORPG that I played due of the same Errors.

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I agree that the teleporting glitches that the bots use is a terrible exploit and somehow is still around even though it was known about in the Beta... This, however, doesn't mean that even if they remove the glitches there still won't be bots. People had bot programs that would run you around the map (including obstruction avoidance) and automatically gather by sending legitimate commands through to the client through the keyboard and mouse drivers as if someone was actually playing. It just proved more expedient to use the glitches that were found.

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Originally Posted by Malzian

Second, the GMs are not as concerned with identifying the gatherer bots (or even the RMT bots) as they are the 'mule' characters holding and moving the gil around.

To be honest, SE might even see this type of activity as a way to REMOVE excess currency from the game as a gil sink. If you buy shards/crystals/clusters/materials from a RMT gatherer bot, and that gil gets put on a mule character, and then that character gets banned they have effectively removed potentially millions of gil from the economy which can actually help cut inflation and keep the market stable. It's sad if the economy is that unbalanced for that to be a possibility, but there you have it.

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It doesn't matter what their reasoning is. If they aren't going to take any action when receiving reports of players cheating, they should change the wording so people aren't misled into wasting their time filling out reports.

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Originally Posted by DrWho2010

They tend to ban bots in waves. However, as soon as a bunch of bots are banned, more will be created. The stuff they gather is sold on the Market Board and then the gil is prob used to sell to players buying into RMT.

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Right, more bots will be created. It shouldn't be the same bots, but that is currently the case. Of the bots I reported back in November, one was reported months before that. Still active and still botting. And, if what you said is true about the bots I'm talking about, they wouldn't be doing it on a character with most jobs at 60.

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Originally Posted by Vnolan

It doesn't matter what their reasoning is in my opinion. If they aren't going to take any action when receiving reports of players cheating, they should change the wording so people aren't misled into wasting their time filling out reports.

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Fixed that for you.

It does matter what their reasoning is. They take the same stance the police do when they find a person dealing drugs on the street. They KNOW that one individual is just a small player in the ring and they can spend ages busting the individual players and it won't get them anywhere. Instead, SE aims for the larger distributors and works on breaking the rings circulating the currency that the bots produce. Also, if you read the paragraph for the 'Report Cheating' button it says clearly, "Please note that we are unable to provide individual responses to reports." so you shouldn't expect a response to any report you make.

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Originally Posted by Malzian

Fixed that for you.

It does matter what their reasoning is. They take the same stance the police do when they find a person dealing drugs on the street. They KNOW that one individual is just a small player in the ring and they can spend ages busting the individual players and it won't get them anywhere. Instead, SE aims for the larger distributors and works on breaking the rings circulating the currency that the bots produce. Also, if you read the paragraph for the 'Report Cheating' button it says clearly, "Please note that we are unable to provide individual responses to reports." so you shouldn't expect a response to any report you make.

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Well we're talking about Lv.60 Players that have most Jobs at Lv.60, so it is Indeed a big Case if one of them gets banned. Those ain't the typical RMT Bots you see around Teleporting from Quest to Quest, sadly.

Though understandable that they won't reply to us after we send them the Reports.

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Originally Posted by Malzian

It does matter what their reasoning is. They KNOW that one individual is just a small player in the ring and they can spend ages busting the individual players and it won't get them anywhere. Instead, SE aims for the larger distributors and works on breaking the rings circulating the currency that the bots produce. Also, if you read the paragraph for the 'Report Cheating' button it says clearly, "Please note that we are unable to provide individual responses to reports." so you shouldn't expect a response to any report you make.

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We're not talking about one or two. It's dozens. Outright banning the people doing it would be quite the impact. It would directly reduce the botting by removing the bots, would have people think twice before doing it and it wouldn't reduce the number of reports they get from people like myself who see the same bots months after reporting them.

It seems like you're saying you can bot without getting punished as long as you're a small fry? How is many more bots better than a few big botters? FATE botting by people that just want easy leveling goes against what you're saying.

I'm not talking about GM or any manual form of response, but an automated response when the report is processed in some manner and not just when it 'goes in the pile'. The automated response you currently receive upon sending the report would be fine if there were some other tools the players had, but there aren't any. No record of who was reported, when they were reported AND no response other than the generic one on sending, so players have to report and pray action is eventually taken against the bots? Why would they do that? Answer: They won't

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Originally Posted by Vnolan

We're not talking about one or two. It's dozens. Outright banning the people doing it would be quite the impact. It would directly reduce the botting by removing the bots, would have people think twice before doing it...

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And this is where you would be wrong... The bot characters made are generic "throw away" characters and the accounts made for them are trivial in their cost compared to the amount of money the companies making them stand to (and often do) gain. Accounts are banned for RMT by the thousands, you can see the reports. Has that stopped RMT? No, and it will not stop botting. Bans on these small, autonomous bots is like putting out small fires on the edges while the main fire burns... No matter how many of the little ones you stop, the big fire will always start more. These bots you're referring to are a symptom of the problem, not the root cause... which is in fact that it is simply more efficient for a player to buy gil in the game economy than to try and make it themselves, so the RMT will almost always have buyers for the money these disposable bots generate. Only when it is no longer profitable for these companies to bot and RMT will it stop.

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Originally Posted by Vnolan

We're not talking about one or two. It's dozens. Outright banning the people doing it would be quite the impact.

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Yes we're talking about a positive impact. To be made for the hundreds or thousands of players who left the game, sick of this. If taking this issue had been the priority since the beginning, it's not dozens of players the community would have lost, but so much more it would have kept.

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Originally Posted by Malzian

Snipped for limit

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Bans on the small fry would not put out the big fire, you're right, but it would send a message to players that personal botting is not allowed. I wish you would come see just how many players Gilgamesh has that bot on their main characters. We don't have a surplus of gil sellers, because our server is blocked for creation most of the time, but we do have an amazing amount of personal bots. Going after them would cause quite an impact, just maybe not the nuclear size you think going after the asdkjawi akdhwihados bots will.

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Originally Posted by DrWho2010

the bots would fall under "illicit activity". However, as soon as a bunch of bots are banned, more will be created. The stuff they gather is sold on the Market Board and then the gil is prob used to sell to players buying into RMT.

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After observing certain botters on my own server and reading forums where it's talked about freely it seems to me that only the least thoughtful players who fully admit ingame that they bot or buy gil get at most a few days temp ban but usually they aren't touched at all and even the ones who do get temp banned just go straight back to botting after their temp is over. Only the characters belonging to RMT companies who are guaranteed to get new accounts to replace the banned ones are permabanned. The only thing that seems to get real players banned is mean words.

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Originally Posted by Zigabar

Bans on the small fry would not put out the big fire, you're right, but it would send a message to players that personal botting is not allowed. I wish you would come see just how many players Gilgamesh has that bot on their main characters. We don't have a surplus of gil sellers, because our server is blocked for creation most of the time, but we do have an amazing amount of personal bots. Going after them would cause quite an impact, just maybe not the nuclear size you think going after the asdkjawi akdhwihados bots will.

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I suppose this is a Gilgamesh thing then, because while I was on Lamia and now that I'm on Behemoth, the only bots you see are RMT bots. Player bots are a real oddity here so I was mostly speaking in terms of RMT bots. That being said, it's difficult for SE to discern player bots from actual players in this respect. Many of the bot programs that were around during launch were very sophisticated in how they handled things and could replicate player behavior fairly convincingly. I can only imagine they've gotten much more so in the intervening years... Sadly at that level all you can do is report them, but if they're not using the teleport glitches it can be very difficult for SE to suss out which characters are actually botting from those that are potentially botting.

Good luck with that.

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Originally Posted by Malzian

I suppose this is a Gilgamesh thing then

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For sure. This is more prominent in larger servers, as RMT is more in smaller ones. I just trying to clear up, what looked like, a misunderstanding.

Both should be handled and neither should be dismissed.

You know what happens when you remove a bot? They make another one, why? Because you didn't take their gil. It's a basic Sting operation, you allow the drones to do their work til they lead you to the Queen Bee. Once you find the Queen Bee you get this.

http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodest...164944b676725f

However if you just ban bots every time, you know what happens? The ones holding the gil just learn to play it safe, you don't lure them into a false sense of security and it's that false sense of security which allows them to catch nearly 39k accounts/users as noted above.

So ask yourself this, do you honestly think it's productive if the team were to just constantly ban 2-5 bots that most likely come from the same group while never finding the source? Because that's how you cause the issue to continue by going after the small fries.

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Originally Posted by Malzian

I suppose this is a Gilgamesh thing then, because while I was on Lamia and now that I'm on Behemoth, the only bots you see are RMT bots. Player bots are a real oddity here so I was mostly speaking in terms of RMT bots. That being said, it's difficult for SE to discern player bots from actual players in this respect. Many of the bot programs that were around during launch were very sophisticated in how they handled things and could replicate player behavior fairly convincingly. I can only imagine they've gotten much more so in the intervening years... Sadly at that level all you can do is report them, but if they're not using the teleport glitches it can be very difficult for SE to suss out which characters are actually botting from those that are potentially botting.

Good luck with that.

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I gotta say that once a week I get a tell from someone testing me if I'm a bot and half the time I don't respond. They get angry and threaten to report, and because I'mnot here to justify anyone's paranoia of whether I'm a bot or not, I don't care. I'm not teleport glitching. I'm not hurting anyone. Heck, sometimes I don't even see the tell because I'm watching TV or the chat log fills up so fast. This is just a vigilante witch hunt because people are overly-sensitive to a real problem that can only be solved by devs.

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Originally Posted by Malzian

I suppose this is a Gilgamesh thing then

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I was Server hopping pretty much and it's not only Gilgamesh. It's actually even common on EU Servers that you encounter the same kind, in my case the ones that do Aetherial Reduction for Months. Odin, Shiva, Cerberus are the ones I talk about.
I don't wanna imagine how it is like on Balmung but I can imagine the amount is quite even much higher then on Gilgamesh.

It's not hard to find out who is Botting if they all do the same Behaviour as walking, stacking at the same Point, walking again, doing the same stacking, this is very much scripted it seems.
Given the Fact a Bot can only do so much what they're being told speaking of Execution and Commanding, they cannot decide to drift off the same Walkpath for the slightest change.

That's the thing, if 10 Players suddenly Teleport at the same time like 15:40 Eorzean Time, end in the same Zone like they were in Churning Mists and are now in Sea of Clouds, all of these 10 Players..., it's pretty much obvious.
Now see this for 5 Times more and ya, you can tell.

Sure if you just Gather for like 2 Minutes for a Craft or two you will not notice the pattern/behaviour, yet if you do Aetherial Reduction to get Crystals and Clusters or Aethersands for your Raid Pots, then I think, if someone did not fall on their head..., they notice.

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Again I think People misunderstood the Topic here. We are not talking about the RMT Bots that you see Teleporting around and Queue'ing up and doing their Teleport Hacks in Duties, no....

We talk about Real Players having a Real Name who do sometimes play with their Hands, interact with others in the Main Cities and turn on their Bot Program while they sleep or are on Work.
They do it because they're lazy (obviously) and want to make Quick Gil Ingame without a single Effort, hence we Gatherers get upset due of having grinded all those Blue Scrips / Red Scrips with our Hands which took quite some hefty time.

Some of those "Bot Players" have cleared Alexander 12 Savage and even use the Mount so while Botting!

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Originally Posted by Mwynn

I was Server hopping pretty much and it's not only Gilgamesh. It's actually even common on EU Servers that you encounter the same kind, in my case the ones that do Aetherial Reduction for Months. Odin, Shiva, Cerberus are the ones I talk about.
I don't wanna imagine how it is like on Balmung but I can imagine the amount is quite even much higher then on Gilgamesh.

It's not hard to find out who is Botting if they all do the same Behaviour as walking, stacking at the same Point, walking again, doing the same stacking, this is very much scripted it seems.
Given the Fact a Bot can only do so much what they're being told speaking of Execution and Commanding, they cannot decide to drift off the same Walkpath for the slightest change.

That's the thing, if 10 Players suddenly Teleport at the same time like 15:40 Eorzean Time, end in the same Zone like they were in Churning Mists and are now in Sea of Clouds, all of these 10 Players..., it's pretty much obvious.
Now see this for 5 Times more and ya, you can tell.

Sure if you just Gather for like 2 Minutes for a Craft or two you will not notice the pattern/behaviour, yet if you do Aetherial Reduction to get Crystals and Clusters or Aethersands for your Raid Pots, then I think, if someone did not fall on their head..., they notice.

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If they're doing that then it's a good indicator that they're likely botting and I would agree they should be acted upon. However, I can't say that I can speak for SE's internal process on dealing with these things but I know that, whatever the process is, it's a long one. They don't just go out and ban on a report, they actually take time to build a case, much like law enforcement does.

I really don't see this behavior on Behemoth and our MBs don't generally bear forth any evidence that such things are going on, but I suppose it's just like real neighborhoods... some are good where everyone stays within the law, some are mediocre where there's a little crime and some are festering holes where it's common to do illegal things.

As for the programs and walk paths, if there's no deviation then the programs must actually have devolved since launch. I remember there being botting programs that would randomly jump over an obstacle one time, walk around it another time and even had player-avoidance where of you approached they would walk AROUND you instead of through.

I suppose banning bots on populated and difficult to get on servers such as Gilg would have an impact on some players, but then again... These people already know they're breaking the rules, and I don't honestly know how much effect the punishment would have, depending on if it's a character or account ban. A character ban would be a LOT less effective due to alting, but once again I can't speak for SE's policy and internal procedure on the matter.

To me, someone in SE seems to be protecting them to cause issues like this. I been reporting these 3 gather bots since June 2016 and nothing is done.

I gave detailed reports though support desk, though the website, everything imaginable and they still get to bot. I feel it is a great insult considering my friend (who i was with during the incident) was suspended for 9 days for being a victim of harassment just because she logged off and told them to stop harassing her though the novice network. She had to log off because we where in a duty and would not stop when asked by several people.

3-4 people follow each other, stacked on each other, follow the same stiff routes and sometimes end up MPKing people because scripts do not know how to monster dodge some of the nodes. It is very obvious they are bots and one GM told me "Well maybe they found out it was real players and not bots" If that is the case, I say someone is protecting them.

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Originally Posted by Airget

You know what happens when you remove a bot? They make another one, why? Because you didn't take their gil. It's a basic Sting operation, you allow the drones to do their work til they lead you to the Queen Bee. Once you find the Queen Bee you get this.

http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodest...164944b676725f

However if you just ban bots every time, you know what happens? The ones holding the gil just learn to play it safe, you don't lure them into a false sense of security and it's that false sense of security which allows them to catch nearly 39k accounts/users as noted above.

So ask yourself this, do you honestly think it's productive if the team were to just constantly ban 2-5 bots that most likely come from the same group while never finding the source? Because that's how you cause the issue to continue by going after the small fries.

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I would agree, if it was indeed what was taking place.

But we're talking about situations where the same bots are seen for months on end. Are these same bots being used after the gil handlers are banned? I kinda doubt it.

If SE is leaving the gathering bots un-banned but banning the gil handlers; why? Why are they not banning it all in one fell swoop?

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Originally Posted by DrWho2010

They tend to ban bots in waves. They don't want them to know what activity specifically got them banned I believe. They're part of the report you see on the lodestone every so often for Actions Taken Against In-Game RMT & Other Illicit Activities. For example Jan 5 - Time Period: Dec. 22, 2016 to Jan. 4, 2017

・Accounts receiving disciplinary action for RMT advertising: 1,232
・Accounts receiving disciplinary action for RMT/illicit activity: 47,989
・Action Details: Permanent ban from FINAL FANTASY XIV

the bots would fall under "illicit activity". However, as soon as a bunch of bots are banned, more will be created. The stuff they gather is sold on the Market Board and then the gil is prob used to sell to players buying into RMT.

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The problem is by the time they actually ban them they'll have enough time to make profit for 100 more accounts, so that problem will go nowhere for a looooong time.

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Originally Posted by Laeore

I gotta say that once a week I get a tell from someone testing me if I'm a bot and half the time I don't respond. They get angry and threaten to report, and because I'mnot here to justify anyone's paranoia of whether I'm a bot or not, I don't care. I'm not teleport glitching. I'm not hurting anyone. Heck, sometimes I don't even see the tell because I'm watching TV or the chat log fills up so fast. This is just a vigilante witch hunt because people are overly-sensitive to a real problem that can only be solved by devs.

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Half the time? Don't respond at all if you don't want to. Let them report you. Absolutely nothing will be done if you aren't botting. Please don't place me in the same category as people who ask someone to respond to prove they aren't botting, lol.

People performing routine steps is not good enough proof of botting, even if someone is doing something a bit odd. However, when dozens of people are doing the same odd step, without any deviation, then there is a high likelihood of botting. In the link in the OP, there are six people zoning in and moving to the same spot before mounting up and flying away. Doesn't matter where they load in, they will all move to that spot before mounting up and flying off.

I'll play devil's advocate and say that all six know each other and are performing the same steps as part of some custom they have. As unlikely as that is, it is a valid excuse. The problem is, if you accept that as a valid reason, the same excuse can be used for all manner of botting as long they don't use hacks. Let me ask you: What proof would you need to say that someone is using a bot to automate gameplay?

Some players doing this have the gatherers maxed with only one DoW/DoM class at 60. Those would probably fall into the category of accounts made simply to farm. There are others that have cleared a12s and/or own houses.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Vnolan

I'll play devil's advocate and say that all six know each other and are performing the same steps as part of some custom they have.

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I do know from my old MMORPG (That was extremely Bot infested, even Legit Players were being assaulted and insulted) that People would use the same Bot that was configurable and if two Players were choosing the same Option, they would perfom the same.
Like, let's say theres 2 Fishers choosing to Bot at Thaliak River for Blue Scrips, they use the same Skills automatically, the same Bait. It's all Pre-Set probably in the Bot Program and makes stuff easier to code without having to add millions of Options.

The same goes for the Miner/Botanist Bots, if one of them chooses to Ephermal Node Farm in Sea of Clouds as example, and both Players set up that Location on Miner, they will both behave the same exact Way.

I'm pretty sure though, coming from my Experience from Silkroad Online (The Bot Infested MMORPG) that the Developer or Creator tried to add as many Options as possible such as when the Bot detects nearby Players they wont Teleport Hack somewhere, unless the Player is out of the range.

Pretty much "Safety" Options not to get caught, but then... here it is Way too obvious.

Botanist is supposed to be a gatherer. People will report for anything nowadays.