SE, how hard is it to eliminate the bot spam?

[MirageSniper]

http://na.finalfantasyxiv.com/lodest...ae6d26da3241ab

before you or others place forums about RMT, ya'll should look at this. SE does take action and does stuff as best they can against RMT bots. So dont speak without actually doing research.

[Miste]

So dont speak without actually doing research.

Um...sorry but anyone is allowed to make a topic about something if they feel like it. Just as you a free to make that post even though you missed the whole problem or didn't even bother to read it.

Yeah, SE bans the RMT, but that isn't working since we still get spammed with RMT /tells every time we are logged into the game. It's good they ban them but it isn't fixing the /tell spam which was the point of this thread.

SE has still yet to make a statement on the forums even after many complaints. I think most people just want SE to respond that at least they are trying to think of a way to stop their playerbase from being harassed by unwanted /tells or having to constantly be on /busy.

They really need to add a filter. I've played other games that offer a filter that players can adjust themselves and you just need to keep your filter updated and then bam problem solved you don't get annoying RMT /tells much anymore. They might change their spam message eventually but you can just update the filter again every few months.

[MirageSniper]

have you played previous MMO's? there is always RMT spammers. Its nothing the company can control. like someone else said, SE can put a patch to block them but they will always find a way around it and continue spamming. complaining and blaming SE will not help. Just report the RMT players and slowly, really slowly, things will get better

[Khalithar]

have you played previous MMO's? there is always RMT spammers.

Depends on the game, other games don't have it anywhere near as bad have tools in place that let's you deal with them far more efficiently or prevents them entirely. I'll give two examples:

1. Tera: The north american servers in TERA are region locked and completely block any and all access from asia and other regions in that area of the world in addition to blocking any and all proxies and VPN's which makes it near impossible to get around the block, they also proactively add new ones to their block list. I played that game for two years and I could count the amount of RMT I saw on one hand and yes, I do believe it's because of the region lock. The (extremely) few RMT that I did see were usually gone very quickly. Yeah, there were RMT present but the fact that there were little to none of them for nearly the entire duration of my 2+ year playtime shows how effective that region lock and their GM staff were at monitoring and banning.

2. WoW: There are still RMT in WoW also yes, but WoW has addons. One of which allows you to set a level limit on the people that can send you tells. I downloaded that addon and set it so no one level 9 or lower can whisper me, as a result of that I never saw any RMT spam, ever. The addon is completely unobtrusive as well, it won't even notify you it blocked whispers unless you set it to.

The RMT in this game are more present and aggressive compared to other games, it was the worst I saw until I played Blade and Soul, the RMT spam in that game is even worse and I had to disable my public chat channels which isn't even that big a loss. But for this game to be playable because of the RMT spam I had to completely disable my whispers. I should not have to disable one of the most basic chat functions to make the game playable, on Mateus I was receiving an RMT whisper every 15-20 seconds, out of curiosity I turn my tells back on after the mass bans, it usually only takes a day or two before it gets really bad again.

Edit: I know there are people against the region lock and the potential loss to FC's/servers and while I am all for it regardless of the consequences (which I don't think are nearly as bad as people make it out to be), I really think we need that or at the very minimum, a filter on our tells, the ability to set it to friends/FC/LS only or take a hint from that WoW addon and let us set a level limit.

Here are the specifics of the addon as well if anyone is curious:

http://mods.curse.com/addons/wow/badboy_levels

Main features:

Hides whispers from players below a specific level.
Only certain people are allowed to whisper you:

People on your friends list.
People that are part of your guild.
People above the level you choose.
People you've whispered since you logged on.
Simply, if a "bad" person whispers you, the whisper is blocked (hidden), then you automatically send them a whisper (also hidden) of what level they must be for you to see their whispers.

[Miste]

have you played previous MMO's? there is always RMT spammers. Its nothing the company can control.

I've played other games that offer a filter that players can adjust themselves and you just need to keep your filter updated and then bam problem solved you don't get annoying RMT /tells much anymore. They might change their spam message eventually but you can just update the filter again every few months.

You didn't read again :/

[AnduinLynn]

I feel like shadow-banning bots is a good option. This means that you render their accounts unable to send tells, but this ofc being unknown to the bot. That way the botters don't know their chats don't work, so they will not create new accounts to replace banned one's.

[Destous]

And none of your ideas will do that. All they're going to do is screw over new players for no reason because arbitrary level restrictions don't mean anything to RMT who will easily bot their way to the required level anyway. We already have anti-RMT restrictions that don't work and only make life for players a hassle (I'm looking at you, friends-list-only mailing), we don't need more. If you want SE to add a meaningful way to limit RMT spam you should be asking them for something like custom chat filters instead.

What are you talking about? Low level /tell restriction would impact gil sellers tremendously, and new players would hit 15 before they ever noticed it was a thing.

[MilesSaintboroguh]

What are you talking about? Low level /tell restriction would impact gil sellers tremendously, and new players would hit 15 before they ever noticed it was a thing.

So how's that working out, btw? Free trial players can't send tells until level 15 or 20 (which they have to buy the game to keep leveling), yet here we are.

[Kikoten]

What are you talking about? Low level /tell restriction would impact gil sellers tremendously, and new players would hit 15 before they ever noticed it was a thing.

It would be nice if low level /tell restrictions worked, but it likely won't, and there's proof of that in IMCgames' Tree of Savior. They put a level 40 restriction on shout, and the RMT salesmen simply leveled up to 40 and started spamming shout. IMC restricted their game up the ass, just to fight off RMT, but all it really did was hurt the legitimate players

I think that might be why SE isn't putting a bunch of restrictions on everything: it hurts their legitimate paying customers more than it does the cancerous RMT.

[Bloodb]

also this:

05/12/2016 02:25 AM Actions Taken Against In-Game RMT & Other Illicit Activities (May 12)
RMT and other illicit activities upset the balance of the game and, as such, are prohibited under the Terms of Service.

Because we have confirmed the existence of players who are engaging in these illicit activities, we have taken the actions listed below.

Time Period: May 5, 2016 to May 11, 2016

・Accounts receiving disciplinary action for RMT advertising: 1089
・Accounts receiving disciplinary action for RMT/illicit activity: 4257
・Action Details: Permanent ban from FINAL FANTASY XIV

Players who discover any confirmed cheats should, under no circumstances, exploit or disseminate such information. Instead, we ask that players file a report by using the in-game command [System Menu] -> [Support Desk] -> [Contact Us] -> [Report Cheating].

We will continue to take stringent disciplinary action against any accounts with confirmed involvement in RMT/illicit activity; players should take care to steer clear of any activity that violates the Terms of Service.

Yesterday I filled out a ticket because this RMT standing by the marketboard was different. Usually i'm not bothered but he spammed a 3 line message every 1-2 seconds for hours.