GOLD SPAMMERS

[Aurongroove]

I suggest either a faster way of reporting: click user, select "report for gold spamming".

Or something no MMO RPG ever does, but really really should; incentivise users to report bots/spammers with in game rewards:
A few company seals (or something) for genuine spammers that eventually wind up getting their accounts deleted.

It'd just add a sense of role play to the proceedings. Sure the report takes a while to fill out, but you'd actually be getting rewarded in game, even if it's a token gesture.

[KisaiTenshi]

I suggest either a faster way of reporting: click user, select "report for gold spamming".

Or something no MMO RPG ever does, but really really should; incentivise users to report bots/spammers with in game rewards:
A few company seals (or something) for genuine spammers that eventually wind up getting their accounts deleted.

It'd just add a sense of role play to the proceedings. Sure the report takes a while to fill out, but you'd actually be getting rewarded in game, even if it's a token gesture.

Incentives just makes it worse.

From every MMORPG I've played there's only two constants with Gold bots and spam
1) The Company running it, is hopelessly incompetent at solving it, no matter how well intentioned, tools provided, volunteers, GM's are available
2) The chances of reporting people for being bots/spam/ijustdonotlikeyou's increases with tools, but the ability to do anything is decreased.

Like overall the only real way of killing the spam and bots is to make it expensive to do so. This can be done in plenty of ways:
- When someone yells, put them on the map for 5 minutes, and make them vulnerable to PvP. While "dead" from PvP characters can not use any form of communication except (raise?) or "go to jail" (for losing the PvP)
- Another option is simply have a "report" with a double-confirm. If someone gets enough reports, the game "strikes down" the character and teleports them into "Jail", or basically any place that nobody would hear their yells.

Those two options basically gives the game masters the option of having a single GM babysitting the jail and nuking characters that were indeed spamming.

Other things tried in other games, that aren't super-effective but better than nothing
- Double-confirm with a screenshot, eg you right-click on the chat and hit "report", the game takes a screenshot just before the form shows up, and hitting submit, effectively emails the GM with the proof. Tradeoff is that they may get more reports than they can do anything with. Or the support server just gets DoS'd.
- "Bot bombs" that can be bought from a specific NPC that is only reachable upon reaching far enough into the storyline. (Causes griefing)
- IP bans (they get around them the same way anyone else does)
- chat filters (they just delete client-sided filters, and sever-sided ones tend to break actual conversations or throttle them, rendering them difficult to do at all)
- chat throttles, where the game just throttles on duplicate words said in consecutive (Eg last 3 minutes) shouts, or throttles based on characters per second being faster than a human.

[Verrilee]

I'd be happy simply with an easier way to blist and report. Give us the option of right-click blist so I can add them to my list faster. When I go into Ul'dah, I have to zone back out to "freeze" the chat so I can add people. Otherwise it's a practice in frustration management trying to get the names in while the chat flies past.

A report function that sends the last x number of lines in your chat would help too. I /report you, a portion of my chat log is sent in with the report for verification purposes. That way /report can't easily be used to just mess with someone but it is fast and easy to report spammers.

I've been playing MMOs since UO came out, and I've never been in a game where the spam was this bad. They really need to get control of this or it is only going to get worse.