Bots are rampant on Spriggan (EU)

Can you please clean out the bots on Spriggan? It is getting ridiculous.

About 30 bots standing around main Aetheryte in Grindania

https://i.imgur.com/eGnehKZ.jpg

All White and Black Mages, all none sense names, all same outfit. Same in Ul'dah.
Meantime server queue is high, in the daytime.
Thank you!

This is happening on every server that isn't locked right now, actually. I guess the owners of the bots don't even care if they're seen anymore since they're normally hiding in the walls of the GC HQ.

They really need to stop blowing off this issue as something minor because they have to be straining the instance servers with the number and frequency of their queues.

Welcome to Siren ... we got them too.

It's not just the RMT bots. There are a huge number of players using bots for crafting and gathering.

Being, along with many others, someone who spent hours, legitimately levelling crafters and gatherers and a lot more gathering and crafting, it's soul destroying to see botting players taking over the markets.

How hard is it for se to search bots on google to see whos the top botting programs and have them crack these bots to bann people?

There was a queue of 106 to get into Spriggan around 3pm on a workday. :rolleyes:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by iWaRTuRTLeS

How hard is it for se to search bots on google to see whos the top botting programs and have them crack these bots to bann people?

---

I'm not sure why they can't just issue a cease and desist order when most of the said programs are paid services.

SE has been pretty aggressive about enforcing copyright infringement and other illegal practices when it comes to their properties.

I would love to see a more effective way for us to report these bots. I am more than happy to spend some minutes reporting this, but it becomes insane and impossible when there are 30+ bots. Fix it.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Limiloo

I would love to see a more effective way for us to report these bots. I am more than happy to spend some minutes reporting this, but it becomes insane and impossible when there are 30+ bots. Fix it.

---

I dont feel like reporting them even makes a difference anymore. 4 days ago i was doing MSQ on an alt on Spriggan and got stuck twice because of Bots, both times on a MSQ where i had to kill a certain amount of mobs in the open world to progress. The problem was that i couldnt kill any of these mobs because they got killed by the armies of Bots as soon as the mobs spawned, making it literally impossible for players to get a single kill. First time was in Upper La Noscea with the Coeurl Pups and 2nd time in North Shroud with the Ziz, this went on for many hours ( i checked Upper La Noscea several times during the day to see if they were still there ). A friend and me reported them several times and now 4 days later i havent heard a single word from SE, nor does my friend. I had to visit another server to be able to even progress the story, something new players might not even think of so they simply get stucked for who knows how long.

You also shouldve posted a screenshot during the evenings, when there were hundreds of Bots at the Aetherite and the login queue was 300-400.

There's been so many of these threads since shadowbringers came out and since I first started playing three months ago. SE have done absolutely nothing, they ban in waves which happens every once in a blue moon and by the time they've got around to a second ban the bots are back in the same numbers as before. They need to be dealt with more effectively and not just by banning them, no company in their right mind will sit there and allow bots to exploit such as the teleporting they love to do so much, this simply shows SE as stupidly incompetent.

And it's not just the gil bots, the ones many including myself hate are the ones who use bots for DoL and then flood the market crashing the prices, I've reported this including an FC full of them for months and nothing's happened to any of them.

Well that is disappointing. I'm still holding hope that they will find a way to deal with them more effectively, because it is as you say, ruining the game.

Report them for cheating. That is what they are doing. You'll get a faster response than reporting them for RMT.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Zarabeth

Report them for cheating. That is what they are doing. You'll get a faster response than reporting them for RMT.

---

Thats exactly what my friend and me did, several times….zero response after 5 days

You don't get any response regarding the reports of bots. But they do ban a bunch of bots weekly. It is not enough though and I'd appreciate if they could take more actions against them. :(

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KageTokage

They really need to stop blowing off this issue as something minor because they have to be straining the instance servers with the number and frequency of their queues.

---

This.
Im starting with a Viera on Spriggan 2 Weeks ago
and for every instance solo content,
i get a queue messages.
Raubahn EX

MSQ Mobs are overrun from porting RMT Bots.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nanami_Naniwa

You don't get any response regarding the reports of bots. But they do ban a bunch of bots weekly. It is not enough though and I'd appreciate if they could take more actions against them. :(

---

If you report for RMT you wont get a response indeed, but when you file a report for cheating, harrassment etc i always got a response in the past, mostly automatic generated answers but still a response. The weekly/monthly ban waves dont do much, by that time the bots are levelled and passed their gil to the bank, they just repeat the cycle after.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by iWaRTuRTLeS

How hard is it for se to search bots on google to see whos the top botting programs and have them crack these bots to bann people?

---

Square Enix is not entirely able to do this. these websites have actual protection by setting their policy/terms to disallow SE employees, and the like, access to the site. they can still access the site, but would be immediately violating the terms of these sites.

SE themselves are not allowed to touch the websites, or bots/services provided. Square Enix would have to hire freelancers.

Exact same thing on Twintania. It's actually baffling. Bots surrounding aetherites, floating mi-air in Limsa, killing mobs while half-way into the ground...

It feels like it's getting worse and worse.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by BLaCKnBLu3B3RRY

Square Enix is not entirely able to do this. these websites have actual protection by setting their policy/terms to disallow SE employees, and the like, access to the site. they can still access the site, but would be immediately violating the terms of these sites.

SE themselves are not allowed to touch the websites, or bots/services provided. Square Enix would have to hire freelancers.

---

I really doubt that having a silly ToS statement like that is enough to protect a website conducting illegal activities from the companies who'd be concerned about them. Violating the terms of a website means nothing if it doesn't have a legal team to defend/enforce those terms, and even if they do a company as big as SE could crush them if they wanted to (Though the biggest issue as always is the "if" part because large companies are also generally not going to waste their time with legal matters that serve to benefit them little).

Still, even if you purge a website manufacturing bots, said programs are going to remain in circulation and continue being spread and maintained regardless so it's really best for a MMO to just have a competent enforcement team banning the less persistent types of bots with regularity and taking lasting measures to prevent the more persistent ones like RMT bots from functioning.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Zarabeth

Report them for cheating. That is what they are doing. You'll get a faster response than reporting them for RMT.

---

Yes. Tell the person who is trying to play a game to report hundreds of accounts with a clunky report system.. haha. Checkmate. OP sure does look stupid now.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KageTokage

I'm not sure why they can't just issue a cease and desist order when most of the said programs are paid services.

SE has been pretty aggressive about enforcing copyright infringement and other illegal practices when it comes to their properties.

---

More often than not, the bot companies and companies that create botting programs operate out of countries where cease and desist letters would do nothing beyond providing a piece of paper to instantly throw in the recycle bin. Lots of the countries they operate in just genuinely don't care, or in some cases, might even be profiting off of such things to the point of attempting legal action against the companies directly is basically pointless. Its infinitely easier for Square to target people infringing their copyright or illegal practices when they do it within the confines of a country that has actually good legal systems.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KageTokage

I don't think a silly ToS like that would actually matter when SE's legal teams could easily crush them if they felt like it. I can only assume the websites Blizzard cracked down on for WoW had similar "protection", but it didn't stop them.

I guess the issue is that big companies generally don't even want to raise legal issues if it's not necessary in their eyes, so they very likely would rather just tolerate the bots then raise a case about it.

Though the most popular botting tool for XIV isn't even being run by a company; it's just a small project managed by a handful of different players who are very unlikely to have the legal grounds to even try to defend themselves and would be forced to simply desist if confronted.

---

yeah. this is all true. my response was mostly for actually cracking the software used to perform botting. Sqaure Enix themselves are not allowed to directly acquire or even reverse engineer any of this. that is, assuming the domain/software/website owner(s) has such terms in effect. if so, accessing those services would tip the bias in favor of whoever runs those sites. in this case it would be Square Enix playing the defendant... however unlikely that might actually may be. LOL! but keep in mind... if it could somehow be proven SE violated any of those terms, then it would easily become an open-and-shut case.

but yeah... i imagine a company would weigh their options on this. if it is financially worth it or not. one thing to note, whether we like or not, bots can also potentially bring in money for a game company too. so, not only would it cost SE to take action, but they would potentially lose revenue too. i don't know what Blizzard's numbers are like, but they have a limited free-2-play model. F2P is only up to level 20, but this would still allow botters an in to bot currency/things for selling. which would in turn cover their subscriptions fee's. well, this makes it highly unlikely Blizzard would actually lose any significant amount of revenue, or any at all. while FFXIV does have a free-trial there is also, unlike WoW, a gil cap. the botter(s) could likely achieve the same effect, but it would also probably take significantly longer.

also, in that case with Blizzard... that would have been a more direct attack. in other words, Blizzard would have taken action against them for the interference of their ability to pull in revenue. and not simply for the usage of any third-party software/tool.

on another note, it is actually easy to create Terms and Conditions/Terms of Service for any domain/website owner. however, if this botting tool form the small project place you speak of is not operated for the explicit use with FFXIV... then it is unlikely they have any terms set forth expressly forbidding Square Enix's access/usage.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by BLaCKnBLu3B3RRY

on another note, it is actually easy to create Terms and Conditions/Terms of Service for any domain/website owner. however, if this botting tool form the small project place you speak of is not operated for the explicit use with FFXIV... then it is unlikely they have any terms set forth expressly forbidding Square Enix's access/usage.

---

It is specifically designed for XIV, but I still fail to see how making a ToS would protect them.

Couldn't those myriads of fan projects and other types of copyright infrigement Nintendo has shut down have been protected in the same manner?

It just doesn't sound right that any website can basically just say "Nuh uh, you guys can't do anything to us" and have it actually work that way.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KageTokage

It is specifically designed for XIV, but I still fail to see how making a ToS would protect them.

Couldn't those myriads of fan projects and other types of copyright infrigement Nintendo has shut down have been protected in the same manner?

It just doesn't sound right that any website can basically just say "Nuh uh, you guys can't do anything to us" and have it actually work that way.

---

the ToS can be legally binding. if you were to visit the domain/website anywhere beyond the landing page, or in some cases the landing page requires you to agree to the ToS, or even sometimes the landing page is asking for your age - regardless, browsing any further then whatever first page you are brought to would constitute you as agreeing to those terms. it would protect them from certain actions, mostly just forbidding any employee from browsing the site or using any services that may be provided.

a website wouldn't have a company dead-to-rights for breaking those terms, and would have to file a lawsuit. they are obviously unlikely to ever ever win. but again, if they could prove an employee violated their ToS then a lawsuit wouldn't be so farfetched. on the other hand... reverse engineering software is an entirely different section of the ToS. they could actually prosecute for this. in the end, the only way around this would be to hire a freelancer. however, even with that being done. whatever information or work the freelancer provides couldn't be used in court.

as for Nintendo taking down ROM hosting sites... copyright infringement is something else entirely. that is a federal crime, regardless of any Terms and Conditions. the only time breaking the ToS could be a crime of any kind is if it explicitly either states so, or states something like you will prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. otherwise, any other ToS violations would have to be handled in a lawsuit.



also, as previously mention by MariaArvana. depending on the country certain things are hosted out of... there may or may not be anything that can be done. in this particular situation it would require either, a country itself making a declaration to take action ( which may even mean war ) or Square Enix attempting a lawsuit in their own courts of whatever country is responsible for hosting these services. which obviously won't end well.

it is no secret that certain countries don't deal with the UN or USA or other countries for the sole reason of keeping things like telemarketer scam phone calls in operation. i wouldn't doubt the same is true for like movie/tv show hosting sites, ROM download sites or even cheat/hack sites for botters.

Your reports do nothing. The report function is there to catch the rare occurrence like the Ungarmax "exploit" and to give the illusion that they enforce the ToS. Bots like those pictured in the OP will be dealt with in short time, but not because of any reports.

Reports for cheating and RMT go to the same place (the STF) . If you try and place a report to GMs about either, they'll take down the necessary information and file a report to the STF.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KeaneR

It's not just the RMT bots. There are a huge number of players using bots for crafting and gathering.

---

These are largely ignored because the STF cannot detect the use of their "third-party application". SE could change how they deal with player bots, but there has been no incentive to. They should spend money hiring people to ban players and reduce their number of subs? Why?

Speaking of Ungarmax, within a day or so of its knowledge becoming public, the servers were taken offline for maintenance and the "exploit" was patched. Within two weeks of it being known, SE determined who used it, how many times they used it, they handed out account penalties and Yoshi P made a detailed post about the incident. Of current player bots, there is a subset that use the skill "Preparation" on every node, whether they already have the buff applied or not. All SE would have to do is check max level players spamming the skill and start an investigation.

tl;dr No use in reporting

I'm honestly starting to wonder if the "bans for botting" figure is just some arbitrary number they made up on the spot just to make people think they're doing something.

It's troubling how unconcerned they seem to be about the RMT bots flooding the new servers, moreso when they have easy steps they could take toward addressing them.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KageTokage

I'm honestly starting to wonder if the "bans for botting" figure is just some arbitrary number they made up on the spot just to make people think they're doing something.

It's troubling how unconcerned they seem to be about the RMT bots flooding the new servers, moreso when they have easy steps they could take toward addressing them.

---

It wouldn't shock me if the number is true, but knowing they most likely are just bots automated to keep making new accounts so they only lose a little bit of time. Much like ants, you can kill 100s of them but unless you destroy the colony from the inside, you are not going to achieve much.

I was under the impression that "bans for botting" was in reference to the other crowd of non-RMT bots that gather/craft/level/etc, since they're purging hundreds of RMT bots on a weekly basis and the most bloated figure is "RMT/illicit activites" which made me assume they were being shoved into that number.

Then again, 30 non-RMT bots banned across the entire game last week is like a drop in the bucket and unlikely to be noticed by anyone. There's probably close to 20 of them active every night on Cactuar alone and it's difficult to tell if they're getting banned or just not playing sometimes.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by BLaCKnBLu3B3RRY

Square Enix is not entirely able to do this. these websites have actual protection by setting their policy/terms to disallow SE employees, and the like, access to the site. they can still access the site, but would be immediately violating the terms of these sites.

SE themselves are not allowed to touch the websites, or bots/services provided. Square Enix would have to hire freelancers.

---

Hey there,


I've just read this and the other responses and I am really not sure if you are for real or a funky hobby lawyer on an acid trip.


Before anything else: If you come up with "ToS", the ToS or EULA of this game says simply: "No cheating". So if Square Enix want to take action by taking down those sites and their tools, they can do it, as they are not the offenders. We are taking about the "potential steps", not what would be actually done here.


Then: Do you really think any court - if those bot creatores, Which are probably located and run in China, by Chinese people - would rule against Square Enix if they would reverse-engineer some of the tools (why would they want that in the first place, the simple advertisement of it being a cheating tool is probably enough to get it taken off the web) that are fraudulent and bad for business and reputation of a game/franchise, which equals to probably $xxx,xxx?


Terms of Services are always overriden by law. It would be kinda funny to hide the darknet behind a ToS saying: "No cops allowed", and the next time I create a funny website with fraudulent statements about persons or companies (accusing of rape, saying e.g. McDonald's has BSE in their beef etc.) a simple ToS entry saves me and cause billions of potential damage.


No, sorry, you weave back and forth of your statements, and I am pretty sure SE would out-finance every of those freaking criminal organizations that make their money solely by, uh, yeah, causing harm to another company. Or it must be a very good lawyer defending some random chinese farmbot organization to somehow make it clear they are doing good to the game..


Sincerely,
https://imgur.com/HTju1aB.png

I am thinking this is a consequence of the bots but the queue for the jumping gates in the gold saucer keeps not popping. Happened today and yesterday.

I reported one of the FC's of bots, but one just has to search the FC list on Spriggan to see multiple nonsense name guilds with copys of nonsense randomized named lvl50's that look the same across classes. Obviously exploits. No investigation should even be necessary. It is obvious. Just grab and ban them all.

Seriously, anything would be better than this. Like Nemmar and others have said, the bots lag out all the instanced stuff and takes over parts of the games so people cannot get their quest updates.
If you need to, have an employee log into the game, go to the places where they aggregate, like the aetherytes, and manually remove them one by one. It cannot be that hard or take that long.
Hell, I would do it for free, gimme the power! ;)

I am very happy with all the new player influx, I'm much less happy with all the gold spam and bots there arrived with them. Stop paying for outside gil, it is easy to make, and it is ruining our game. Kthanks!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Nemmar

I am thinking this is a consequence of the bots but the queue for the jumping gates in the gold saucer keeps not popping. Happened today and yesterday.

I reported one of the FC's of bots, but one just has to search the FC list on Spriggan to see multiple nonsense name guilds with copys of nonsense randomized named lvl50's that look the same across classes. Obviously exploits. No investigation should even be necessary. It is obvious. Just grab and ban them all.

---

The problem with that is that even if bans are being issued on a daily basis the bots are scripted to immediately create new accounts once the original ones are banned.

They need to target their methods. Removing gil drops from ARR dungeons and relocating the first chest in the Wanderer's Palace so it can't be obtained without clearing out the enemies would eliminate two of them.

There's still a whole mess of RMTers who make their money through methods like gather/craft botting, though, which are even less likely to be addressed.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by MrKusakabe

Hey there,


I've just read this and the other responses and I am really not sure if you are for real or a funky hobby lawyer on an acid trip.


Before anything else: If you come up with "ToS", the ToS or EULA of this game says simply: "No cheating". So if Square Enix want to take action by taking down those sites and their tools, they can do it, as they are not the offenders. We are taking about the "potential steps", not what would be actually done here.


Then: Do you really think any court - if those bot creatores, Which are probably located and run in China, by Chinese people - would rule against Square Enix if they would reverse-engineer some of the tools (why would they want that in the first place, the simple advertisement of it being a cheating tool is probably enough to get it taken off the web) that are fraudulent and bad for business and reputation of a game/franchise, which equals to probably $xxx,xxx?


Terms of Services are always overriden by law. It would be kinda funny to hide the darknet behind a ToS saying: "No cops allowed", and the next time I create a funny website with fraudulent statements about persons or companies (accusing of rape, saying e.g. McDonald's has BSE in their beef etc.) a simple ToS entry saves me and cause billions of potential damage.


No, sorry, you weave back and forth of your statements, and I am pretty sure SE would out-finance every of those freaking criminal organizations that make their money solely by, uh, yeah, causing harm to another company. Or it must be a very good lawyer defending some random chinese farmbot organization to somehow make it clear they are doing good to the game..


Sincerely,
https://imgur.com/HTju1aB.png

---

i get where you are coming from, but you are not quite understanding.

my reply was initially to a comment which seemed to have refereed to the process of reverse engineering software. it is possible to do this and learn more about how you can actually detect its usage. HOWEVER, software protected by copyright would be stated as such by any Terms and Conditions. heck, even the Terms and Conditions can be protected by copyright and is in SOME SENSE just as good as copyright law in of itself. almost all software that is accompanied by Terms and Conditions is protected against reverse engineering. if SE reverse engineers the software, then that would totally make them the offenders. in the end two key factors come into play that would decide if the bot owner(s) could actually do something. and that is going to depend the originating country of the copyright and the country in which the copyright was infringed upon. of course, assuming the bot owner(s) actually have the resources for a lawsuit, they would still need to provide proof of infringement. but then, even if the bot owner(s) win, there is a strong possibility SE will counter.

as far as cheating/hacking goes... depending on what the user does to achieve their goal, Square Enix may not actually be able to do anything beyond a ban. for example, a macro recorder. distributing such software for such purposes also does not infringe upon copyright. that is, as long as nothing is modified or injected. the software is also not allowed to read from a protected address space. depending on what is done, one would be merely breaking a rule and not any actual law.

as far as your darknet thing behind some ToS thing goes... yes, this is actually a thing. again, it depends on what is happening in what country. if some darknet out there happens to be selling American social security numbers, which is also an actual thing, the first approach would have to be diplomatic. if diplomacy fails then the only remaining option is likely war. this is assuming the country in question is not part of the UN. this is like saying parents aren't allow to serve their underage brats *cough* kids any alcohol. depending on where you live there are actual allowances for underage drinking. even though federal law overrides state law, these exceptions still exist. hell... in some cases such as this, not even federal law can do a damn thing to the family. for example, in matters of religion.



in the end... there are a TON of ins-and-outs and other nuances dealing with what we are talking about. there are literally hundreds of different scenarios for just one possible incident. there will always be a to-and-fro and a fro-and-to process. one scenario in one location of the world may have merit whereas in another part of the world it may have no merit at all.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by KageTokage

The problem with that is that even if bans are being issued on a daily basis the bots are scripted to immediately create new accounts once the original ones are banned.

They need to target their methods. Removing gil drops from ARR dungeons and relocating the first chest in the Wanderer's Palace so it can't be obtained without clearing out the enemies would eliminate two of them.

There's still a whole mess of RMTers who make their money through methods like gather/craft botting, though, which are even less likely to be addressed.

---

There is no way to win with that method. These are cheaters and exploiters. If you remove those, they will just aim at something else. You have to stop them in the root. That is in account and character creation. If they make a "cooldown" on how often you can create one, it will slow them down considerably allowing for The Bans to come out at a faster pace than they can make new characters.

It's really not that uncommon for RMTers to resort to things like IP spoofing and proxies to get around any attempts to prevent their automated account creation.

While it is true that they'll likely just find some other source of gil to exploit if they patched the ones they abuse currently, it would at least force them out of instances and reduce the strain they're putting on the servers. It's unacceptable for certain instances to be rendered completely inaccessible at times because of them.

Just want to say that the wave of bans surely didn't do much cause i still see trains of bots going back and forth from the aftcastle is Limsa. Dunno exactly what they are doing but they go to the merchant, to the grand company quartermaster and out to the nearby zone. Must be farming something no doubt.