Too many bots, too few bans: The Shadowbringers edition.

[KageTokage]

I'm starting to wish they'd just permit looping macros if they're not going to bother enforcing the DoL/H bots.

The tincture spammers have gotten settled in on my server and are starting to flood the market. It's not quite as bad as it was in SB presumably due to the Cubus Flesh requirement presenting a bit of wall for bot farmers as the rate of acquisition from both direct drops and buying with FATE currency is rather terrible, but it's still enough to make trying to push sales legitimately extremely stressful as they'll keep undercutting at the drop of a hat until the profit margin becomes so low that it's scarcely worth bothering if you aren't automating it yourself..

My attempts to compete with them are really more like a spit of defiance then anything else because I can't keep up with people who effectively spend close to 12 hours straight crafting/gathering every night, at least not if I want to actually enjoy any other aspects of the game.

[MrKusakabe]

Conversely, if the owner of the bot is at their PC or comes back to see you sending them /tells, they can report you for harassment. So it's better to just not /tell at all.

Thats a good way to get reported by someone who wants to gather in peace without you being a tool.

I honestly don't think a GM would take action against a false-positive at all. That would discourage any report in future for almost all kinds e.g. "Was that flaming at all? Or just me being over-sensitive? Or a joke? Banter. Nah, let's move on, else I get punished".



My cousin had a similar problem in real life: The smoke detector went off in the apartment below but there was no smoke visible. Nobody answered the door. So he called the Fire Department nonetheless, and there was a guy in there. And the FD forced the door open - scolded the guy for having something in the stove that caused the smoke and neither turning off the smoke detector nor responding to the door. My cousin was fine though.

If you want to gather in peace, why not responding and be nice to a stranger that is concerned about the game's health (economically)? It does take no effort at all, it's not that you get spammed with /tells asking if you are a bot, probably once in several months, am I right - if at all? If player conversation is disrupting your peace in an MMORPG, sorry, "you are a tool" to say it in your words. There are good alternatives available. Like "The Witcher" or "Harvest Moon"? There you can gather in peace as much as you want.

Don't spread such weird conspiracy theories just because your friend's neighbours father's dog heard a story about some GM actually punishing something that is not even remotely comparable for this particular situation.

[RoyalBeef]

You're not Cool or Edgy for ignoring people when they ask if you're a bot.

It's also not cool waving your fictional police badge around being like "Respond to me, or else."

[Lyssa_Redgrave]

It'd just be nice if reporting bots was easier. Like the RMT report option, but instead it opens a box where all the info like time and location are filled in and you just need to type out a description.

[KageTokage]

I honestly wish they just had a quick report function for it like the RMT bots.

They're generally so obvious from their abnormally long periods of activity, overly repetitive behavior and/or janky movement patterns that they really shouldn't need a detailed description of what it is that's making them seem suspicious.

In the meantime, I'll keep losing sleep knowing a bunch of lazy do-nothings on my server are going to get their Amaro mounts before me despite spending maybe about half the time actually playing.

[Lastelli]

What about designing content in such a way that using bots is not an appealing option? I mean, as long as crafting, gathering and leveling are so time consuming and mind numbing, people will keep using bots, that's just how it is.
Wanna get rid of bots? Implement savage leveling dungeons that reward 2x the exp of normal dungeons (same hp for mobs and bosses, but more punishing mechanics/higher received damage) and do something similar for fates. Allow us to craft several items in one go just by using more materials. Stop making everything convoluted and time consuming, while also being repetitive and unchallenging.

[KageTokage]

What about designing content in such a way that using bots is not an appealing option? I mean, as long as crafting, gathering and leveling are so time consuming and mind numbing, people will keep using bots, that's just how it is.
Wanna get rid of bots? Implement savage leveling dungeons that reward 2x the exp of normal dungeons (same hp for mobs and bosses, but more punishing mechanics/higher received damage) and do something similar for fates. Allow us to craft several items in one go just by using more materials. Stop making everything convoluted and time consuming, while also being repetitive and unchallenging.

Honestly, it doesn't matter how easy SE makes things because most of these botters are choosing to do it at hours where they normally wouldn't be playing anyways (Case in point, most of the suspects on my server would just log off at night for the first week of ShB instead of pulling overnighters at FATEs or gathering nodes due to the scripts not being updated).

It's strictly a matter of laziness and they want to be rewarded with no effort, which is going to come to a head with the Ishgard Restoration where they'll be depriving legitimate players of rewards by pushing them out of the top ranks.

[Nayout]

The situation of the bots in the new servers is disgusting, it is something to see post in reddit like these where new players can not progress in the story.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...s_killing_the/

Or the instances in these servers have queues of almost 30 minutes by these same bots, a few days ago I saw in Twitch a boy in Spriggan who could not continue his mission history because Thanalan was a sea of bots.

[Mingqin]

The situation of the bots in the new servers is disgusting, it is something to see post in reddit like these where new players can not progress in the story.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...s_killing_the/

Or the instances in these servers have queues of almost 30 minutes by these same bots, a few days ago I saw in Twitch a boy in Spriggan who could not continue his mission history because Thanalan was a sea of bots.

That's absolutely crazy, I've never seen so many bots as I saw in one of the screenshots on that reddit post. I also had this issue when I first started they were teleporting under ground and killing mobs it took me about 30 mins to finish the quest, I was new and didn't know world visit was a thing at that point, there's probably others who are in the same boat.

SE must be the worst company I've ever seen when it comes to dealing with these things, I've pondered for awhile now why they haven't found out how they're teleporting and simply patched it to prevent them from using it again.

[HyoMinPark]

I honestly don't think a GM would take action against a false-positive at all. That would discourage any report in future for almost all kinds e.g. "Was that flaming at all? Or just me being over-sensitive? Or a joke? Banter. Nah, let's move on, else I get punished".

Sending unsolicited tells saying "Are you a bot? If you don't answer me, I'm going to report you for botting" can be considered harassment or "nuisance behavior" quite easily.

If you want to gather in peace, why not responding and be nice to a stranger that is concerned about the game's health (economically)? It does take no effort at all, it's not that you get spammed with /tells asking if you are a bot, probably once in several months, am I right - if at all? If player conversation is disrupting your peace in an MMORPG, sorry, "you are a tool" to say it in your words. There are good alternatives available. Like "The Witcher" or "Harvest Moon"? There you can gather in peace as much as you want.

Why should anyone respond to unsolicited tells accusing a person of being a bot in the first place. Not exactly a friendly way to start a conversation, and no, it doesn't warrant a response. Telling someone to go play other games to be left alone isn't a solution. Heaven forbid someone wants to gather in peace!

Don't spread such weird conspiracy theories just because your friend's neighbours father's dog heard a story about some GM actually punishing something that is not even remotely comparable for this particular situation.

"Conspiracy theory"? Please. It's a valid reason to report someone if they send you tells saying they will report you for botting if you don't answer them. Threatening to report could be considered enough for GMs to take action. It would ultimately be up to their discretion, of course - but the tells alone are harassment and could border on verbal abuse if the sender is particularly aggressive.

Don't bring in scenarios about your friend and their smoke alarm to conversations where they have absolutely no relevance whatsoever.