Suspicious bot? activity in Diadem

I have been farming Diadem non-stop for the past week (8-9 hours daily). Everyday, around the same time of the day (which is around 4-5 pm ST), i see some "players" in Diadem farming stuff. What is weird about this is, these players are all in busy status, they are all green adventurers, they all have only company chocobo mount and they all have the same gear. All of them. The gear is even dyed the same for all of these "players". So if i summarize:

1. they are all in busy status
2. they have only chocobo mount
3. they have the exact same gear

I am not talking about 1-2 players. i have seen like 50 of these. they aren't acting "suspicious" if you look at them, like they aren't insta-teleporting or bugging, they are collecting stuff and even killing monsters etc.

I assume they sell the materias on market board, but not sure. I found this very suspicious and reported as a possible bot activity. Not sure if SE will do anything because over the years bot problem isn't solved but if you see players like this, and if you have the time, please report or do action what you see is fit. Thank you.

1.

Busy status just means they don't want to be bothered with tells. ofc you can't get tells in a instance but i suspect it carry over from non instanced, otherwise it's little suspicious.

2.

Don't see it being suspicious that they use a chocobo mount, everyone have their preference

3.

Exact same gear as most crafters and gatherers?

I agree some of it sounds little suspicious but I would be careful to make reports without having proof, I'd rather not waste the GM's or whatever team investigates these things without more concrete proof.

Just my 2 cents

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Luna-M

1.

Busy status just means they don't want to be bothered with tells. ofc you can't get tells in a instance but i suspect it carry over from non instanced, otherwise it's little suspicious.

2.

Don't see it being suspicious that they use a chocobo mount, everyone have their preference

3.

Exact same gear as most crafters and gatherers?

I agree some of it sounds little suspicious but I would be careful to make reports without having proof, I'd rather not waste the GM's or whatever team investigates these things without more concrete proof.

Just my 2 cents

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They have lv 1-20 gearset, not crafted gear, it is the gear you buy from cities. They have exactly the same tools except for race / names. They are all busy, all same starting gearset, all have only chocobo mount, all green leaves. What more suspicious do you wanna get to see 50 of these players gathering in diadem at the same time?

All having only the Chocobo and being in Ishgard sounds like an ARR skip. But they should've the Magitek Mount then.

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Originally Posted by PerrinTaveren

They have lv 1-20 gearset, not crafted gear, it is the gear you buy from cities. They have exactly the same tools except for race / names. They are all busy, all same starting gearset, all have only chocobo mount, all green leaves. What more suspicious do you wanna get to see 50 of these players gathering in diadem at the same time?

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Should mentioned that in OP then. You think 50 people gatherering is suspicious?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Luna-M

1.

Busy status just means they don't want to be bothered with tells. ofc you can't get tells in a instance but i suspect it carry over from non instanced, otherwise it's little suspicious.

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You can also mess with botting programs by opening trade windows with them, which is why it's a red flag if it's also on top of other factors. Biggest one that I don't see mentioned here however is their pathing. Bots, especially the most popular ones for this game, rely on pathing. If the character is moving the same way each time between each node then they're pretty sus, though we've gotten past the days where bots can't jump unless manually told to do so I believe. That used to be another dead give away. If the botter took a long, walk only route when one or two jumps would allow for a quicker time, and then always followed that same inefficient path, then it used to be a dead giveaway.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Luna-M

Should mentioned that in OP then. You think 50 people gatherering is suspicious?

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you are purposely twisting my words dude. i am playing this game for 5 years. i know when something is suspicious or not. stop pls. this is suspicious, i reported as suspicious. i cannot prove it so i am not accusing anyone but 50 people with busy icon, all 1-20 ilvl gearset, all have the same mount gathering, all green leaves. i found it suspicious. don't try to be smart by saying "you think 50 people gathering is suspicious?" i am just letting SE and everyone here if they see it know. that's all. if you don't find it suspicious then don't do anything about it. but don't try to be smart, i know when i see something and this isn't a normal player behaviour.

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Originally Posted by PerrinTaveren

They have lv 1-20 gearset, not crafted gear, it is the gear you buy from cities. They have exactly the same tools except for race / names. They are all busy, all same starting gearset, all have only chocobo mount, all green leaves.

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Not saying you are wrong, just be aware it's not yet full proof. This very character's miner is in vendor bought level 10 gear, rides a choco, had a sprout (until very recently), and is often in busy if I can't be bothered talking to people in there.

Certainly hold the suspicion, but watch for a pattern in the pathing maybe? That would take a few circuits latching onto something weird and seeing if it's repeated.

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Originally Posted by RicaRuin

All having only the Chocobo and being in Ishgard sounds like an ARR skip. But they should've the Magitek Mount then.

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Diadem/Foundation also need the HW skip on the character itself as you can't get in to foundation until that part of the story is concluded. So that would also be that little airship racer thing like the pirates@void ark use and the black choco.

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Originally Posted by Shibi

Not saying you are wrong, just be aware it's not yet full proof. This very character's miner is in vendor bought level 10 gear, rides a choco, had a sprout (until very recently), and is often in busy if I can't be bothered talking to people in there.

Certainly hold the suspicion, but watch for a pattern in the pathing maybe? That would take a few circuits latching onto something weird and seeing if it's repeated.

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my reasoning for opening the topic is to let people know and if they see something like this, be kinda aware of it? that's all.

Use of the default chocobo is a partially valid way of identifying bots as their scripts default to using mounts that everyone will have access to. It's not the only thing you should be looking for obviously, but the vast majority of the bots I've run into were using that or one of the other MSQ reward mounts like the magitek armor or Midgarsormr.

In any case, it really is not uncommon to see RMT vendors and other unscrupulous folks prepping their bots for farming via the Diadem. I've also noticed the same thing with sprouts wearing identical gear, except I've actually seen them go on to start endlessly farming resources (Usually crystals/clusters via aetherial reduction) afterward once they hit the level cap.

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Originally Posted by Enla

You can also mess with botting programs by opening trade windows with them, which is why it's a red flag if it's also on top of other factors. Biggest one that I don't see mentioned here however is their pathing. Bots, especially the most popular ones for this game, rely on pathing. If the character is moving the same way each time between each node then they're pretty sus, though we've gotten past the days where bots can't jump unless manually told to do so I believe. That used to be another dead give away. If the botter took a long, walk only route when one or two jumps would allow for a quicker time, and then always followed that same inefficient path, then it used to be a dead giveaway.

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Sure, you're probably not wrong.

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Originally Posted by PerrinTaveren

you are purposely twisting my words dude. i am playing this game for 5 years. i know when something is suspicious or not. stop pls. this is suspicious, i reported as suspicious. i cannot prove it so i am not accusing anyone but 50 people with busy icon, all 1-20 ilvl gearset, all have the same mount gathering, all green leaves. i found it suspicious. don't try to be smart by saying "you think 50 people gathering is suspicious?" i am just letting SE and everyone here if they see it know. that's all. if you don't find it suspicious then don't do anything about it. but don't try to be smart, i know when i see something and this isn't a normal player behaviour.

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I'm not twisting anyone words. I'm pointing out that seeing 50 people in Diadem is hardly out of the ordinary. You left out the Lv1-20 part in your OP so it is safe to assume you meant crafted Lv80 gear which is normal.

And I played since 1.0 but i don't throw that at people's face in a discussion, like that even matters how long you played the game, 'dude'

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Originally Posted by Luna-M

Sure, you're probably not wrong.



I'm not twisting anyone words. I'm pointing out that seeing 50 people in Diadem is hardly out of the ordinary. You left out the Lv1-20 part in your OP so it is safe to assume you meant crafted Lv80 gear which is normal.

And I played since 1.0 but i don't throw that at people's face in a discussion, like that even matters how long you played the game, 'dude'

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It matters when you imply i am naive. I know people are gathering in diadem, i am not that naive. I have seen people with busy status in the past as well. I left out lv1-20 part because i forgot to mention it. Anyways, please if you see these players and if you think that's suspicious, do something about it.

Not implying anything, you're reading to much into it. I report bots all the time when I think there is concrete proof for it, thank you.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by PerrinTaveren

I have been farming Diadem non-stop for the past week (8-9 hours daily). Everyday, around the same time of the day (which is around 4-5 pm ST), i see some "players" in Diadem farming stuff. What is weird about this is, these players are all in busy status, they are all green adventurers, they all have only company chocobo mount and they all have the same gear. All of them. The gear is even dyed the same for all of these "players". So if i summarize:

1. they are all in busy status
2. they have only chocobo mount
3. they have the exact same gear

I am not talking about 1-2 players. i have seen like 50 of these. they aren't acting "suspicious" if you look at them, like they aren't insta-teleporting or bugging, they are collecting stuff and even killing monsters etc.

I assume they sell the materias on market board, but not sure. I found this very suspicious and reported as a possible bot activity. Not sure if SE will do anything because over the years bot problem isn't solved but if you see players like this, and if you have the time, please report or do action what you see is fit. Thank you.

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Not really suspicious, honestly you described just about anyone wanting to power level gathering.

1. Status you say they are green adventurers but have a Busy status. I do that on my alts, that or RP status, as I hate the Sprout, and I'm too lazy to look up the chat command to remove it. I level alt characters all the time, I have 3 characters at or near 80 on many Jobs, I have like 10 alts I'm leveling for RP reasons.

2. Lazy mount choice isn't much of an issue. I ride around on my Chocobo often, because I love her. Although when Farming I prefer the speed of the motorcycle.

3. Leveling, so going to buy the vendor trash gear to keep the stats up while leveling, and not waste money on glams.

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Edit: As others have noted, are they pathing like a bot?

I'm sure there are hundreds of bots out there, but I think people are too quick to assume someone is a Bot at the same time. I've been accused of being a bot, just because of how I play. It's all quite stupid really, just because someone doesn't play one character exclusively, or they use a controller so they don't chat all that often, they must be a bot. Oh my they don't glam every gear set instantly, must be a Bot, oh look they use a Chocobo, instead of one of the 30 other mounts they have, BOT I say. Hey that healer likes to heal and doesn't just DPS, BOT, vote kick. People stop being so quick to judge others. You look like an arse when you do.

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Originally Posted by Gothicshark

I hate the Sprout, and I'm too lazy to look up the chat command to remove it.

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/nastatus is the command to remove the leaf.

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Originally Posted by MeganLynn

/nastatus is the command to remove the leaf.

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Thank you. Although I'm probably going to be too lazy to look up this forum post next time I'm in game on a new alt.

you'll have a lot of people trying to convince you this is "completely normal" because they either use alt accounts to bot or know someone that does.

best you can do is report it and hopefully something gets done. but dont lose sleep over it since SE seems to be currently condoning and rewarding bot usage and cheating

You can log their usernames and then look them up on lodestone. You will find out a lot more about the truth this way. If they only have 1 class unlocked and the crafter/gatherer classes, then it becomes suspicious. If they go on beyond this and are part of a FC and the members of said FC only have players of the exact same setup, I say that raises a big red flag. But it's not our job to do SE's duty. All we can do is report what may be suspicious with circumstantial evidence at best. Whatever they find and do is up to them but I'm doubtful they will find anything tangible to ban these "players".

It sounds like a multiboxer since they want their characters to be as uniform as possible to make controlling then easier.

I read somewhere multiboxing is FFxiv-legal, but that wasn't on any official SE website. Supposedly for it to be 100% ffxiv-legal multiboxing, the player needs to be manually switching between each screen to enter commands in all screens manually. However most multiboxing software have built-in features for replicating all mouse and keyboard commands entered in the "parent" screen to all "child" screens and while that functionality isn't ffxiv-legal, I doubt that SE can actually guard against it because they are allowing the software performing that action. Kind of like allowing Microsoft Word to be used for essay writing but telling students they can't use spell and grammar checking. How's the teacher going to know?