Bots in Frontlines - Do something.

I've reported the same bots for a few weeks now, and nothing has happened.
It is getting worse, and worse. It has gotten so bad that I now write this.
Just now I was in a 72 player game where ALL of my team were bots. Some that I hadn't encountered before, but that showed the same obvious bot behavior as those I regularly encounter.

So why not just kick them with the vote-kick system?
When your team consists of 4 or more bots, that becomes impossible. Also, having to wait 5 minutes just to initiate a vote is not good. Furthermore, having to wait 4 HOURS to vote again after a successful vote-kick is no help either, especially when you encounter that same bot AGAIN the next match.
I understand that it can take time to get to bots, and that it is not a GM's job to do, but there has to be some kind of action to counter this. It shouldn't have to take WEEKS, or MONTHS to get rid of just one bot.

I suggest getting a few PvP Judges that can hop in to PvP to kick/temporarily ban botters and cheaters now and then because it most DEFINITELY is needed now. I can't speak for the EU data centers, but Aether data center is in dire need of counter measures.
I may as well volunteer to do such as I do Frontlines a whole lot.

We've tried, SE doesn't care. You'll see bots running high end pve/pvp tiles and mounts without a care in the world, because they know there's absolutely no chance they'll get actioned for it. More and more regular players are realizing this and just grabbing the bot too, because it's easier than actually playing. You know it's a sad day when The Hand of Mercy on your team is a bot, running on the exact same script as The Legend standing next to him.

And don't bother trying to name them here, or on some other platform like reddit. They'll censor you for having the audacity to try to point out this problem, you dirty name-shamer.

This will kill the PvP, just question of time when. I come to play this MMO because im bored of WoW, but i guess SE care less about this then wow developers...

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Originally Posted by Harka12

This will kill the PvP, just question of time when. I come to play this MMO because im bored of WoW, but i guess SE care less about this then wow developers...

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To be fair, I think the bots are the only thing keeping it going. Frontlines probably wouldn't even pop without all the bots queueing it.

Bots make it so people don't want to queue frontlines, and it leads to too much shatter. Which leads to more people getting sick of one mode. Frustration kills modes. Bots are the ultimate frustration.

People aren't doing PvP because there are bots, and some aren't doing them because the PvP isn't that good. PvP needs a jolly good tweak before more legit people will show interest in it, so as saucyshortcake said the bots are the only thing keeping it going at present. Maybe once PvP becomes more of a thing that more people are participating in it then we can appeal to SE for more better ways to remove suspected bots that doesn't punish the player for reporting/removing them.

Frontlines is dead. Its a honeypot for bots now. But, its bleeding into other modes too (Lately, in leveling roulette for example). I think once that gets bad enough + starts really impacting the mainstream playerbase SE might actually do something. I hope, at least xD In the past botters mostly restricted themselves to solo activities, Im assuming because they figured the risk of being reported+banned was much lower if they werent really bothering anyone. By now though, they've realized that reports do nothing and there no enforcement whatsoever when it comes to bots. Seems like their programs are getting more sophisticated, too.

And there's literally nothing SE can do to make frontlines "more of a thing" when you're lucky if you get 2 other human players on your team (and thats absolutely not an exaggeration. If anything I'm being conservative in that number).

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Originally Posted by saucyshortcake

To be fair, I think the bots are the only thing keeping it going. Frontlines probably wouldn't even pop without all the bots queueing it.

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Honestly, in the state it is now? Yeah. Before, Frontlines still remained active, before you could even get EXP in the mode. Before GARO was a thing. Before freelancing was a thing (it just made queues long for certain GCs).

Frontlines has largely dropped in population of actual people because of two main reasons:

1. The huge influx of bots, which is the fault of EXP being added as a reward.
2. 4.0's PvP update has made Frontlines pretty terrible.

All of my old friends, and myself included, we used to do frontlines aaalll the time. Because we genuinely enjoyed it. Now there's little to enjoy when the mode is racked by bots and the PvP changes makes the large scale gameplay awful.


It's a common misconception that Frontlines was dead before. Frontlines was active before, only queues were slow on some GCs because of the lack of freelancing. EXP made it less active. 4.0 PvP changes killed it.

Maybe there's a way to disincentivise botting by altering the rewards. Set a minimum contribution target to receive a reward. If your contribution to the battle is below a certain threshold, exp/tome/marks payout is reduced to zero.

I want botters to stop because they gain absolutely nothing. Setting the parameters to kill bots without affecting real players is really hard though, especially considering healers and join-in-progress players.

I just feel so bad about the situation on Aether datacenter. Entire teams of bots for months/years is unacceptable.

You remove rewarding EXP, the bots will go away.

OR

Make it so only the winning team receives EXP. The other two losing teams, tough luck. My assumption is that this will also somewhat discourage botting.

But... these suggestions will bring large scale PvP back to when queues were more than 30m's long in the Pre-Garo days.

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Originally Posted by Korihu

It's a common misconception that Frontlines was dead before.

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That depends on how you define "dead" and "active".

During off hours, it didn't pop at all. As you approached primetime, it slowly started to pick up, where you'd randomly get either instant queues or hour long queues depending on whether people happened to be there or not, typically with the same players each match. To me, that qualifies as "dead".
For somewhat objective numbers, one can refer to the lodestone rankings, weekly and monthly respectively. It goes all the way back to 2016 and gives you a rough idea of activity - Someone on the JP forums actually made a graph of it (Page 521 of their FL thread IIRC). The difference between Data Centers is quite staggering.

As for bots, others already noticed: They're here for rewards and changing those is the easiest way to combat them if SE doesn't change their policy on external evidence.

After looking at the lodestone however, I have my doubts that simply making things "win reliant" would change much. Bots still manage over 16% winrate easily, which is only half of what you can expect in a regular 3 team setup and a decent enough payout considering it's entirely free for the bot user.
Contribution is a nice idea, but flawed in practice. Joining in progress isn't even much of an issue, you can simply ease the requirement proportionally to the time on the clock, cut it in half flat or whatever.
The main issue is that there's simply no good metric. You can do lots of damage/kills/assists/healing and deaths while senselessly zerging around, ignoring objectives. Even bots can get some decent stats with that strategy and might end up being programmed to all cluster together and do just that. You can also have horrible numbers in everything because your team didn't have healers and got steamrolled. And if you then keep out of fights and focus on objectives instead, chances are your contribution isn't gonna be high enough. That's an issue especially in Seal Rock, where you can't use damage to ice as contribution factor.

Removing the rewards flat is more practical. But then you sure as heck are going to lose regular players as well, because rewards are the main thing keeping this PvP going. Which makes the only realistic option a ban of the bot users. Stay tuned for the Q&A with it's like 1000 likes on botting posts in the thread. Chances are however, banning all the bot users would affect their bottom line too much and they'll instead try to disable the bots via convoluted means that don't do anything but inconvenience normal users.

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Originally Posted by Zojha

That depends on how you define "dead" and "active".

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Most things in this world depend on "how you define them." All of them, I think, actually. But by any reasonable standards, Wolve's den, before it got scraped, was dead. Frontlines, before it got bot infested, was not. Pretty clear difference.

Please do something about the bots and hackers in frontline. Pretty sure saw group teleport to there healer that was attacking our base. Because had a good view and didn't see one of them coming and in a instant being attacked by 5 more that showed up out on nowhere. One thing want to know I'm playing a bard with hp buff, attack plus buff, and reduce damage buff and faced one on one a mnc and they did huge damage to me but I hardly did any to them. I don't see how they can have way better defense when the two classes share the same gear.

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Originally Posted by hynaku

. I don't see how they can have way better defense when the two classes share the same gear.

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It is because you let MCH get close to you and you ate a brat combo. It is you don’t understand MCH mechanic and didn’t know BRD’s strength. That MCH is not cheating

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Originally Posted by Divinemights

It is because you let MCH get close to you and you ate a brat combo. It is you don’t understand MCH mechanic and didn’t know BRD’s strength. That MCH is not cheating

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wrong we was not close but ways away from each other. plus shouldn't taken 2 people to take down one mcn with no healer. sounds like cheating to me. also have every class to 70 and know how to play them. Also same match solo killed a pld and a rdm. I'm pretty sure mcn not stronger than a tank or a rdm in pvp.

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Originally Posted by hynaku

wrong we was not close but ways away from each other. plus shouldn't taken 2 people to take down one mcn with no healer. sounds like cheating to me. also have every class to 70 and know how to play them. Also same match solo killed a pld and a rdm. I'm pretty sure mcn not stronger than a tank or a rdm in pvp.

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What I am going to say is not mean to offend you but give you a briefing of what really has happened
The group you are referring is a premade of 6 to 8 verterans.
They used their healer as beacon and box in the target when the healer is attacked.

In regard to lonewolf type MCH solo killing people, all I can say is that you are underestimate the MCH in this expansion.
I am also surprised at how you overestimate tanks and rdms.

It's easy to kill as MCH.... I've soloed some healers before.

I'm curious.

Did anyone translate what they had to say about the botting situation during the recent live letters Q&A? They seemed to mostly be talking about the PvP bots.

Still doubt anything is going to change in the long run, though...

Please do something about botters in pvp. Feel extremely disappointing to start a Frontline and see 6 to 7 members afk at base ignoring everything knowing you're going to lose in such pathetic way. I happened to meet several of these bots that either stand afk at base or move in line automated. Some of these bots also have The Legend title giving us concern that cheats out of the known Ungarmax may have been used as already happened for speed hacking/pomander cheats to earn their clears. Apart from RMT bots there are lot bots owned from players that constantly gather/craft in the overworld affecting game economy.These bots have been directly affecting pvp content too for several past few months since got added exp reward. Something has to be reworked in the current Frontline system in order decrease bots activity or limit it.
This Tread has just reached over 1000 views in few weeks.Is something that concern a decent amount of the pvp community.
Please pass our concern to development team and let us know if something being done about it to save Frontlines thanks

They already did pass people's concerns during the live letter.

Their response was basically "Keep reporting the bots". I suppose we'll just have to see if the number of bans in coming weeks actually indicates whether they're stepping things up or not.

There was a noticeable lull in the activity of two major gathering bots on our server, and I also noticed the crafter they normally supply (Who also spends like 99% of his time botting to spam craft infusions) cleaning out the market of materials, which seems to suggest that they may have actually gotten a temporary ban, which would be slightly encouraging considering that they had previously gone untouched for months...

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Originally Posted by Harka12

This will kill the PvP, just question of time when. I come to play this MMO because im bored of WoW, but i guess SE care less about this then wow developers...

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pvp was killed long time ago. it's been dyin a slow death since 2015

I didn't use frontline for several monthes, and now, I think, better it were bots :(. Seriously, what happened during that time? Teams, I joining now not just pug teams, in pug teams someone usually trying to command and etc. My current teams consist of pugs in despair, that have no hope at all. I saw wins few times, but that were like miracle. One more miracle and I will get blue sphere mount, but what to do next depends of what happened. Is frontline moved to total premade domination and I should trying to find pvp linkshell? Or maybe it is GC problem, all skilled people trying to gather in one GC, and I should wait while they gather in mine?

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Originally Posted by Gor

pvp was killed long time ago. it's been dyin a slow death since 2015

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Not entirely inaccurate, but patch 3.5 revitalized pvp. The Garo event, as well as frontline freelancer ensured that queues were fast clear up to 4.0, at least on Aether.

If frontline freelancer was an option from the start, queues probably would have been fine all along and this idea that pvp was dead wouldn't exist.

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Originally Posted by lanevn

Is frontline moved to total premade domination and I should trying to find pvp linkshell?

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You really shouldn't queue solo. If there is a premade group in the match, they are very likely going to win. The average playerbase is mindbogglingly bad at this game, so a group of decent players will overwhelmingly dominate most matches.

Really why cant I just join the bots an go afk 24/7 for free 70s an tokens lol

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Originally Posted by Kisama

You really shouldn't queue solo. If there is a premade group in the match, they are very likely going to win. The average playerbase is mindbogglingly bad at this game, so a group of decent players will overwhelmingly dominate most matches.

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Thanks. But how to seek pvp teams. Any more effective ways than friend-to-friend asking? Or first rule of pvp linkshell is: you do not talk about pvp linkshell?

I suggest inviting a friend or group of friends to make a pre-made team. Frontlines is a lot more fun when you're playing with your friends, especially with other pre-mades queuing.

As for finding people to play with, check out the Wolf Pups Den discord! ^_^

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Originally Posted by Astrophysx

As for finding people to play with, check out the Wolf Pups Den discord! ^_^

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Thanks, I will try, though it looks like feast dedicated.

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Originally Posted by Astrophysx

I suggest inviting a friend or group of friends to make a pre-made team. Frontlines is a lot more fun when you're playing with your friends, especially with other pre-mades queuing.

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Problem that friends who like pvp do not want to try FF, and I can't blame them - battlegrounds here are really worst battlegrounds I ever saw, even among trash-mmo's.

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Originally Posted by lanevn

Thanks, I will try, though it looks like feast dedicated.
Problem that friends who like pvp do not want to try FF, and I can't blame them - battlegrounds here are really worst battlegrounds I ever saw, even among trash-mmo's.

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It is subjective.
WoW BG only made me want to TK my own pug teammates every time we run into a premade.
FF14 Frontline, at least I have a better chance to cause a premade team a loss.
It wont be one side massacre.

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Originally Posted by Divinemights

It is subjective.
WoW BG only made me want to TK my own pug teammates every time we run into a premade.
FF14 Frontline, at least I have a better chance to cause a premade team a loss.
It wont be one side massacre.

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Discussions like "Is more random good for BG?" are really subjective. Number of BG matches per active player per day is objective. I doubt you have illusions that wow players less involved in pvp. Of course I can't say for all games and I didn't, only those, I played, though doubt it is possible something more dead than Astrologos :).

P.S. I do not count feast as BG, ranked arena is another thing, though it is not so good here also.

I mean, this is just a random thought and I know it won't work in every match but...how about we start with the.....4 HOUR KICK TIMER!

WHY?!?!?! Who thought a 1 kick per 4 hours was a good idea? As if you won't have 2 bots or people afk in a match back to back

I still believed that player-side policing really matters in stop the bots.
There is a bot showing up on Primal this weekend that que as Adder
We took the initiatives to vote-kick him every match and submit in-game reporting him for harassment (not reporting bot, report him as harassment).
This character was gone by the Sunday evening.

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Originally Posted by Divinemights

I still believed that player-side policing really matters in stop the bots.
There is a bot showing up on Primal this weekend that que as Adder
We took the initiatives to vote-kick him every match and submit in-game reporting him for harassment (not reporting bot, report him as harassment).
This character was gone by the Sunday evening.

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As much as I'd like to believe it, the fact that we still have a crafting bot flooding the market board with thousands of infusions despite me and several others reporting them on a regular basis makes me really doubt it.

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Originally Posted by KageTokage

As much as I'd like to believe it, the fact that we still have a crafting bot flooding the market board with thousands of infusions despite me and several others reporting them on a regular basis makes me really doubt it.

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As of today, I can say bot is no longer a concern on Primal data centre.
It is now age of Premade vs Premade.
It is quite fun here.
Aether players need to start to clean the house if you also like fun experience on the frontline.

Hard to clean house when there's more bots than real players.

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Originally Posted by saucyshortcake

Hard to clean house when there's more bots than real players.

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It hasnt been so bad lately, actually. Not sure what changed

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Originally Posted by saucyshortcake

Hard to clean house when there's more bots than real players.

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So negative, are you from DC universe?

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Originally Posted by Divinemights

So negative, are you from DC universe?

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i don't get it