Attention devs: Game Surveillance Unit re: open world Bots.

[Ignnis]

Had a very weird experience indeed, think I got a join in progress in a dungeon with someone multi boxing 3 characters.

Low level roulette, got a join in progress after waiting around an hour (yeah DPS queue times!) and at first I noticed that everyone was silent and the tank had a really weird name, I won't say it but it was a famous FF characters name with the number of the series as the last name and lots and lots of symbols in it. The healer and dps also had names of famous characters but not strictly from FF w/ symbols.

I figured this was a bit suspicious but thought it could be a very strange coincidence or a bunch of friends playing together and having a laugh while naming characters. But, suspicions confirmed when I saw them move. Dps never moved and the healer and tank followed each other like they were chained at the ankle. The healer on used medica and continually spammed it and the tank (in mage gear and lvl 1 accessories OH YEAY!) on used flash once then auto attacked, didn't try to do anything when the healer or me pulled agro, never moved out aoes, never tried to do anything when the healer died. Dps never moved an inch the whole time I was there, I left after that one pull.

Reporting this now, have a screenshot etc of names. I know this is for 'open world' but still :/

EDIT: Just noticed while looking at some of the screen shots, the tank was wearing the same blue half robe a few of the bots in the screenshots were wearing. Do bots have their own uniform now?

[SilentSymphony]

still there, probably still be here 6 more months from now.


Found 2 more botting/exploiting guilds today, new ones leveling characters and trying pretty hard not to get Caught.

Some of them must be getting banned lately, Still they are getting smarter about it.

[Applesnap]

Fifteenth report of North Shroud Balmung bots. I seriously do not know what to do any more. We've been told that PKing them is a bannable offence (100% dead cert punishment for us and they'd be Teflon) and I've personally been told to stop reporting the Balmung group by a GM. At a loss atm.

Let's take a quick look at the facts:

• No official reply here, despite months of posts and 30+ pages.
• RMT mentioned here have survived months of ban waves.
• Players have been told to stop interfering with them, whether that's trading, PKing or reporting.
• A few groups of 4-7 RMT per server will not even scratch SE's profit margins, so sub fee excuse is invalid.
• Bots actually sending tells to people and telling them to give up reporting, laughing.
• We are doing half of the legwork investigating for SE and still NOTHING is done.

My idea is to submit the question of "Why won't you remove any of the RMT listed [in this thread], despite it exceeding thirty pages of discussion?" the next time a live letter is due. I know it'll be ignored because SE really don't give a damn but I absolutely refuse to give up.

[SilentSymphony]

I've personally been told to stop reporting the Balmung group by a GM

If that happens again please take a screenshot and be sure to paint over the name of the GM and post it here, I'd love to see that one.

[Ravno]

Had a very weird experience indeed, think I got a join in progress in a dungeon with someone multi boxing 3 characters.

Multiboxing is not boting.
And it's sad but beeing bad a playing is not a bannable offense.

[ToffeeCoffee]

Had a very weird experience indeed, think I got a join in progress in a dungeon with someone multi boxing 3 characters.

Low level roulette, got a join in progress after waiting around an hour (yeah DPS queue times!) and at first I noticed that everyone was silent and the tank had a really weird name, I won't say it but it was a famous FF characters name with the number of theseries as the last name and lots and lots of symbols in it. The healer and dps also had names of famous characters but not strictly from FF w/ symbols.

I figured this was a bit suspicious but thought it could be a very strange coincidence or a bunch of friends playing together and having a laugh while naming characters. But, suspicions confirmed when I saw them move. Dps never moved and the healer and tank followed each other like they were chained at the ankle. The healer on used medica and continually spammed it and the tank (in mage gear and lvl 1 accessories OH YEAY!) on used flash once then auto attacked, didn't try to do anything when the healer or me pulled agro, never moved out aoes, never tried to do anything when the healer died. Dps never moved an inch the whole time I was there, I left after that one pull.

Reporting this now, have a screenshot etc of names. I know this is for 'open world' but still :/

EDIT: Just noticed while looking at some of the screen shots, the tank was wearing the same blue half robe a few of the bots in the screenshots were wearing. Do bots have their own uniform now?

Thread is for all bots really, not just open world ones. I kinda wish I could change the thread title now to try and get the CM's attention since as far as I can tell they are ignoring this completely.

They tend to go for gear that is easy to craft in hope of mass producing materia IV's, so you'll see a lot of them wearing similar gear.
Not to be confused with actual players who wear this gear in hope of producing materia IV's.

[Ivy_Dresden]

The fact is this: Banning will result in a loss of revenue for SE. Thus they are reluctant to take immediate action.
Never doubt that its always about the money as so many things in life are. So we get delayed mass bans of the
worst offenders and cycle continues in some other bot ran way immediately after the ban hits. This is way it is
and will be for the foreseeable future.

[AutumnLeaves]

The fact is this: Banning will result in a loss of revenue for SE. Thus they are reluctant to take immediate action.
Never doubt that its always about the money as so many things in life are. So we get delayed mass bans of the
worst offenders and cycle continues in some other bot ran way immediately after the ban hits. This is way it is
and will be for the foreseeable future.

This is the reason I quit this game, 2 more weeks of forum time then you won't see my ass again lol

[Ivy_Dresden]

Trust me. I hear you loud and clear. There are days when I question staying in this or any other mmo. Whether its a botter or some Rmt they are subscribers in the end. And they are given room to breathe. So they stay invested in the game. As for us, delayed reactions and empty promises. Gotta try to cater to as much of player base as possible after all.

[ToffeeCoffee]

Trust me. I hear you loud and clear. There are days when I question staying in this or any other mmo. Whether its a botter or some Rmt they are subscribers in the end. And they are given room to breathe. So they stay invested in the game. As for us, delayed reactions and empty promises. Gotta try to cater to as much of player base as possible after all.

I'm the same, this is definitely the final MMO I'll ever play. I guess this is why I'm really hopeful that we can be vocal enough to get them to do something about the bot infestation. Not just a one off banhammer to shut us up, but a working system where a player can report a bot, and that bot is investigated and banned [asap] ongoing. So far it's not looking good, the CM's wont say a word about it after the GM's told me to have them report to the devs.
If they've done nothing about it by 3.0 then I'm done. PS4 and other games await.