How is the botting situation in this game?

[Nepentha]

It's a balancing act that has to do with 'best bang for buck'.

Botting is generally a net negative to any game because it typically gets out of control if left unchecked. But spending a million dollars to go after 2 bots (as just an example) isnt worthwhile. So they probably dont go after every bot all the time cause it's just expensive to do so, relatively speaking. Furthermore, botting might be necessary for market balancing. This is only a thought I have on it, but considering how laissez faire the MB can be, if there were NO bots, you could really end up with detrimental monopolies on items. The items that bots tend to drive down in price are 'common items' - or items that are obtainable by very rudimentary tasks. More 'rare' items tend to be sold by players actually doing the content where botting is incredibly hard to pull off. By having a 'third party' interact wtih the market and actively push down pricing on certain common and universal items, it may help against janky shenanigans on the MB. Particularly since there is no 'government regulation' of the MB. It literally about as close to a capitalist free for all as you can get.

To be fair, it doesnt always play out the way I suggest, but it's a thought. But I do wonder how much of an influence Bots provide in the market one way or another.

Not really. Bots have taken over every market worth selling in on my server. So not only can more dedicated players like myself not sell anything, but players who are more low key about it can't either. It's gotten to the point that there are at least 91 full scale botting FCs for both the marketboard and gathering on the Crystal, Aether and Primal DCs. This doesn't include housing snipers bots that scan the wards every hour on the hour and snap up every medium and large house that demos before any legit players realize they're there (then sell them at outrageous mark ups) or the dungeon bots or the map group bots (yes this is a thing now). Botting was long ago out of control, and it's only snowballing.

If bots were gone, sure you'd have to pay more for certain materials. But you can also make more money on them at the same time and with a proper profit, be able to afford the price of things that've increased once bot activity is brought under control. Plus, you will never fully get rid of botters. It will always be a thing in MMOs. Just right now, the botters run the economy, they aren't merely incidental to it.

[Melichoir]

Snip snaps.

Im gonna be frank, Im a bit skeptical of your take. It could very well be that way on Brynhildr, but on Sarg here it isnt. I have had no trouble making money on the MB as most of my items tend to sell without issue. To drive that point home, in the last 6 months, Ive made about 40 or so million Gil from selling Whistles from POTD on the MB. And that wasnt even me grinding hard on it. Other items Ive sold are mats from maps, weapons or item materials from EX mode trials, and misc junk brought back from my retainers.

Part of hte issue, when discussing botting, is that there is a lot of hyperbole surrounding it. To say botting causes no issues isnt right, but on the flip side, suggesting that you havent made any money selling anything cause bots is also likely not correct. Even the consideration for things like housing sniping Im a bit iffy on. If the issue is sell by transfer by doing the FC option, yeah that's a problem that need to be rectified. It's a pretty glaring loophole. There are a bunch of ways they can resolve it, like being unable to purchase an FC house for a certain period of time after the FC is formed, being unable to transfer ownership to a player unless theyve been part of the FC for a set period of time, or requiring a minimum number of players above lvl 20 in an FC to remain intact. But I digress. The issue with house sniping is outside of that, I dont know anyone who buys up a house from someone else because of the random buy timer. If anything, for a while on Sarg there was a glut of houses because people werent buying.

Being on the game as long as I have, I dont see botting as 'getting worse'. There are definitely outlier events, like that time where Uldah had like 40 some odd bots bug out and get stuck in a loop, but I generally dont encounter bots that often in teh real world, and I still am able to make money with relative ease on the MB. If anything, Ive seen a decrease in RMT spam. This si anecdotal, I get it, but I dont think Im the only one with this outlook. Frankly, I think the OFs and Reddit tend to blow up the bot issue bigger than it really is simply because it's easy to collect a bunch of disparate small events and paste them all together to give the impression it's destroying everything.

[Nepentha]

Snippity snip snip.

I think the issue here is, the markets you sell in haven't been affected, so you attribute this to all markets. And yes, there are house sniping bots. A lack of imagination on your part does not make it a non-issue. The operation is simply multiple accounts, one bot sitting at the aetheryte and scanning the wards at the top of every hour and when something pops, it dings on an alt who then runs to relocate to the larger house. This is a problem mostly on larger servers where housing is difficult to attain. (Also they use FCs with housing attached to accomplish this. Either they sell the FC with the house, or sell it as a relocation.)

As for the marketboard, again, I think you aren't looking at the larger picture outside of the microcosm of markets that the bots haven't yet figured out how to dominate. If you take a peek at the Aesthete's gear, you'll probably find the prices are so ridiculously low that it barely covers the cost of making it. This is because full scale botting operations have taken over with crafters and gatherers automated to gather and craft 24/7. And they also have retainer bots who cycle through their retainers on a continuous loop to undercut by 1 gil over and over.

It doesn't take much to find these, either. Just look at the grand company rankings and you'll find most of these botting ring FCs are in the top 20, if not #1 or #2 on them.

This is an actual problem, you can insist it isn't, but that's only because you're not being directly affected by it.

Edit: Last thought. If the botters figured out how to send their bots into PotD's floors where you get those whistles? You'd see the marketboard flooded with them, driving the price down. So far the reason why that stays high in price is because they haven't yet.

[Jijifli]

Edit: Last thought. If the botters figured out how to send their bots into PotD's floors where you get those whistles? You'd see the marketboard flooded with them, driving the price down. So far the reason why that stays high in price is because they haven't yet.

They figured out how to bot maps, they'll figure that out soon enough I'm sure.

[Kes13a]

Im gonna be frank, Im a bit skeptical of your take. It could very well be that way on Brynhildr, but on Sarg here it isnt. I have had no trouble making money on the MB as most of my items tend to sell without issue. To drive that point home, in the last 6 months, Ive made about 40 or so million Gil from selling Whistles from POTD on the MB. And that wasnt even me grinding hard on it. Other items Ive sold are mats from maps, weapons or item materials from EX mode trials, and misc junk brought back from my retainers.

Being on the game as long as I have, I dont see botting as 'getting worse'. There are definitely outlier events, like that time where Uldah had like 40 some odd bots bug out and get stuck in a loop, but I generally dont encounter bots that often in teh real world, and I still am able to make money with relative ease on the MB. If anything, Ive seen a decrease in RMT spam. This si anecdotal, I get it, but I dont think Im the only one with this outlook. Frankly, I think the OFs and Reddit tend to blow up the bot issue bigger than it really is simply because it's easy to collect a bunch of disparate small events and paste them all together to give the impression it's destroying everything.

I am going to be frank right back, either Sargantas is an outlier to the problem, or you arent seeing bot issues because you dont want to.

on Zalera there have been about 8 that run the market, then an import RMT ring that bring in goods from a crafter (one crafter ONLY) that puts up 5 items per category) from another world on Crystal, and their goods with the same retainers names are found across the datacenter. that number has recently ballooned.

so for you have seen nothing of the sort is little short of miraculous.

to be fair though, the tracking spreadsheet we have for Sargantas doesnt list many so maybe you have been EXTREMELY lucky. but I doubt it.

[Melichoir]

I think the issue here is, the markets you sell in haven't been affected, so you attribute this to all markets. And yes, there are house sniping bots. A lack of imagination on your part does not make it a non-issue. The operation is simply multiple accounts, one bot sitting at the aetheryte and scanning the wards at the top of every hour and when something pops, it dings on an alt who then runs to relocate to the larger house. This is a problem mostly on larger servers where housing is difficult to attain. (Also they use FCs with housing attached to accomplish this. Either they sell the FC with the house, or sell it as a relocation.)

The serve pop distribution isnt that disparate from what I saw. In any case, sarg is a 'mid size' server and doesnt have the sniping issue from what Ive seen. However, Ive no doubt that there are some bots who do this to grab larger houses, but that still runs into the issue of transferring those houses via selling. Unless I completeley misunderstood the changes they made to the timers, or they reverted how it occurs, a plot is viewable on the Aetheryte as being 'open and up for purchase' but the timer when you go there may prevent you from actually buying it right that second. The timer randomly shuts off making it available for purchase. If you have a bot there spamming the buy option, then yeah theyll more likely get it. But even then, if its not an FC purchase, you run nito the issue aforementioned when the seller wants to pass it off to a buyer. I dunno how desperate people are, but I certainly wouldnt purchase a M or L house from anyone on the off chance that I could fail to get it (or the same botter just rips me off by buying it back up before I can do anything, but under a different account). If players are running that risk...well I dunno what to say. It's kinda silly.

Now the FC issue I think needs to be fixed. I wont contest that loophole. There are fairly easy active measures they could take to address this, like flag players who are speeding through the menu for purchase successively for long periods of time. Or requiring FCs to have a minimum active member count to stay solvent. Etc.

As for the marketboard, again, I think you aren't looking at the larger picture outside of the microcosm of markets that the bots haven't yet figured out how to dominate. If you take a peek at the Aesthete's gear, you'll probably find the prices are so ridiculously low that it barely covers the cost of making it. This is because full scale botting operations have taken over with crafters and gatherers automated to gather and craft 24/7. And they also have retainer bots who cycle through their retainers on a continuous loop to undercut by 1 gil over and over.

It doesn't take much to find these, either. Just look at the grand company rankings and you'll find most of these botting ring FCs are in the top 20, if not #1 or #2 on them.

This is an actual problem, you can insist it isn't, but that's only because you're not being directly affected by it.

Edit: Last thought. If the botters figured out how to send their bots into PotD's floors where you get those whistles? You'd see the marketboard flooded with them, driving the price down. So far the reason why that stays high in price is because they haven't yet.

I havent suggested that botting doesnt dominate the MB in some fashion. It does, but it's spread is limited by content that is harder for bots to effectively function in. There are things bots will do because its low risk with a decent yield. Those activities tend to be more 'common' activities. The more persnickety activities tend to rule out bots because theyre too basic to effectively complete the content in a cost effective manner. For example, Im actually confident bots could complete POTD all the way to 200. But the chance of them wiping is substantially higher due to their simple nature. It becomes less cost effective for them to do this activity. Because of that, this is where you can actually make money. If youre insisting you want to 'make millions' on farming low to mid grade crafting materials and selling those on the MB, then yeah youre gonna have a bad time. Even without bots, youd be competing against quite a few players because of how accessible it is. But it's not the best way to make money. Part of what keeps player interaction with an activity down is if they dont see a worthwhile rewards for it. Remove bots, and players will attempt to fill the gap.

Since you give me the aesthetes gear as an example, Ill provide a counter point: How long has that gear been out? If you watch gear prices on average, they will decline quite rapidly the longer the content is out. Even more so if the necessity for that content drops substantially. When that set came out, it was pertinent to some of hte content (IIRC Ishgard restoration tier listing) and a decent upgrade. This meant prices were actually pretty high. Now that both those aspects are removed, prices drop. It has probably dropped so much that it less cost effective for the average person to craft and sell it compared to a bot. Not to mention the sheer volume of them now, bot or no bot.

Furthermore, if youre really savvy about making money, you actually wait on things. For example, Indigo cloth was very expensive when it came out. Hard to get material that had some RNG behind it and was related to a popular glamour. So you could make good mney selling it. Given a few months, the price dropped substantially due to how ubiquitous it became. But prices are rising again for it now. Why? Because all of a sudden its harder to get. Give it another year, and the price will go up even more. It may not be worth the original selling price, but it is worth some money. This kind of future planning and prepositioning is a way to make money. This, btw, also applies to materials dropped from Expert Trials. If you save the materials that drop in current Experts, next xpac when the augmented weapon versions come out, youll make a killing on those mats because they go up in price because now its a new glamour piece.

This is kind of what I mean by the problem isnt as big as people say. If you are saying "I cant make any money within reason" using the MB, youre probably being to low with your standards. I would be directly affected by botting IF my revenue came from farming common materials. But that problem is less about bots and more about accessibility. Whatever is very low cost but high reward is going to result in more people going that route. If you made bots disappear with the snap of a finger, you still likely wont be making tons of money because you have less buyers (yes bots buy mats from the MB because at times its more cost effective to do so) with more competition from the average player farming and selling easy-to-come-by materials. This, btw doesnt even account for how market prices would fluctuate without bots. We are assuming that if an item sells for 100k with bots, that without bots it might sell higher. But that may not be necessarily the case. It could end up selling lower because there is less GIL in circulation so prices would be lower simply because people dont have money to afford said price points.

TDLR: The assumption that your server is overwhelmingly overrun with bots that dominate every aspect of the MB so it is impossible for you to generate any money from sales I think is likely more an overstatement than what is really the case. I expect there to be some level of market dominance by bots, but saying they cover every aspect and you have no recourse isnt likely. Bots arent gods. Theyll have their strengths as well as weaknesses. Knowing that and gaming where theyre weak is how you can generate money. And it doesnt require hardcore top 1% strats to do this.

[Nepentha]

I dunno how desperate people are, but I certainly wouldnt purchase a M or L house from anyone on the off chance that I could fail to get it (or the same botter just rips me off by buying it back up before I can do anything, but under a different account). If players are running that risk...well I dunno what to say. It's kinda silly.

Try telling that to people on Balmung, where housing is difficult to get and yes, people will pay that much to finally have access to housing. What's silly to you, isn't so silly to other people. Again, my issue with this is you're limiting it to your experiences and ideas, and not looking at a broader picture or considering the feelings and desire of other people.

The more persnickety activities tend to rule out bots because theyre too basic to effectively complete the content in a cost effective manner. For example, Im actually confident bots could complete POTD all the way to 200. But the chance of them wiping is substantially higher due to their simple nature.

You clearly have no idea how sophisticated bots are getting. There's actual map parties of bots going on now. There are bots in dungeons no one even realize are bots unless said bot breaks.

It becomes less cost effective for them to do this activity. Because of that, this is where you can actually make money. If youre insisting you want to 'make millions' on farming low to mid grade crafting materials and selling those on the MB, then yeah youre gonna have a bad time.

Please don't assume you know what I'm talking about. Even lower level items can sell decently. Before the bot boom, I actually made a good buck selling lower level crafting gear from HW. Now that the bots have taken it over, selling in this market is very difficult.

[Nepentha]

Part 2

Since you give me the aesthetes gear as an example, Ill provide a counter point: How long has that gear been out? If you watch gear prices on average, they will decline quite rapidly the longer the content is out.

Countering your counterpoint. It used to be there was a decent bit of time those items sold well. Why? Because it was actual players creating it, and the items needed for it weren't easy to get. Now the bots have everything down to a science. And there's no way to keep up. You get, at best, a week window before the bots have updated and they start churning out items so fast the prices plummet. We all know that prices go down as time passes and demand drops. But you could still sell things for a price that made it worth producing. (I can tell you don't really study the marketboard much. You would know this if you did.)

Furthermore, if youre really savvy about making money, you actually wait on things. For example, Indigo cloth was very expensive when it came out. Hard to get material that had some RNG behind it and was related to a popular glamour. So you could make good mney selling it. Given a few months, the price dropped substantially due to how ubiquitous it became.

This is really all rudimentary stuff that anyone who sells frequently on the marketboard and studies trends knows already. That's not what we're talking about here.

This is kind of what I mean by the problem isnt as big as people say. If you are saying "I cant make any money within reason" using the MB, youre probably being to low with your standards. I would be directly affected by botting IF my revenue came from farming common materials.

Ah see, that is where the difference is. Your stance is 'MY markets aren't affected, so I don't consider this a problem'. Until it does affect your markets, we're probably not going to agree.

[Nepentha]

But that problem is less about bots and more about accessibility. Whatever is very low cost but high reward is going to result in more people going that route. If you made bots disappear with the snap of a finger, you still likely wont be making tons of money because you have less buyers (yes bots buy mats from the MB because at times its more cost effective to do so) with more competition from the average player farming and selling easy-to-come-by materials.

Nah, not true. After one notorious botting ring suddenly fell off the radar for a week, prices returned to a healthy level. People were still buying the materials. Just the gil went to actual players rather than said botter.

This, btw doesnt even account for how market prices would fluctuate without bots. We are assuming that if an item sells for 100k with bots, that without bots it might sell higher. But that may not be necessarily the case. It could end up selling lower because there is less GIL in circulation so prices would be lower simply because people dont have money to afford said price points.

See this is a common misconception. People get all fussy that prices would get higher so no one could afford anything. Not really. With the markets returning to the players rather than the bots, people would be able to make more money and they'd have it to spend on items that have a higher cost.

[Melichoir]

Ah see, that is where the difference is. Your stance is 'MY markets aren't affected, so I don't consider this a problem'. Until it does affect your markets, we're probably not going to agree.

Unfortunately I lost my train of thought and accidently overwrote some of what I typed...so Ill just start here.

No the problem is your claim that you cant make money no matter what. That bots are so ubiquitous in all aspects of the game that you wont make a dime unless by sheer luck. This claim doesnt line up with what Im observing from my end. Are there botters on Aether DC? Yes. Are htey affecting prices? Yes. Would we be better off without them? Probably in the long haul. Is it impossible for people to generate money? No. My own experiences, tied with FC mates, as well as friends I have on other servers suggest this to be the case. Unless all of AETHER is just lucky, or I only run into the luckiest of people.

Does this mean everything I sell sells at the PP I want? No. I have to adjust pricing half the time. It may take days or even a week or two for a costlier item to sell. But they do sell.

Despite all this, and how aware of the 'rudimentary stuff' you are, youre suggesting that you still struggle to turn profit cause bots. That without those pesky bots, youd be raking in the dough with ease. I find that to be a strange idea frankly. I dont think its to difficult to generate Gil as it is. Im not suggesting it's easy or doesnt take time. But it's not like you have to be monitoring the MB 24/7, micromanaging every transaction, nickel and diming every aspect and coming up with algorithms and flow charts and guides on how to maximize profits. Getting a group of friends to run 10 or 12 maps weekly will likely generate for you half a mil to a mil. Getting for buds to run POTD or HOH for mounts will generate money. These things take time investments but are decent on the return. So if you cant make money in this environment, you expect to make it hand over fist when it would be in theory easier?

So Im really struggling to see your point of view that bots are ruining all your money making schemes. The most I can see from your point of view is how long prices stay high. I dont think they would realistically stay as high as you expect for as long as expected. especially since the price point of a lot of crafted gear at current content is closely tied to competitive relevance.

Nah, not true. After one notorious botting ring suddenly fell off the radar for a week, prices returned to a healthy level. People were still buying the materials. Just the gil went to actual players rather than said botter.

Using one week to justify "Well one bot ring went away so things went back to healthy normal pricing" is kinda iffy at best. Could very well be right, but youd need longer than a week to ensure the trend was stable and due specifically to said botter. Sure competition drops for a week so higher 'healthier' prices occur because demand hasnt changed but supply has. But this assumes that the demand will always remain. As players spend at higher prices, and gil leaves the economy slowing down inflation, prices may drop because people start losing the ability to purchase at that high price, essentially shrinking your buyer base.

See this is a common misconception. People get all fussy that prices would get higher so no one could afford anything. Not really. With the markets returning to the players rather than the bots, people would be able to make more money and they'd have it to spend on items that have a higher cost.

It's not a matter of price points going up IMO. It's more a point that the price point would remain the same while the willingness to buy it goes down as GIL leaves the economy. People tend to forget that Bots also generate GIL by selling to vendors. They dont MB every last thing they pick up. And conversely, they actually do buy from the MB (which ends up distributing some of that botted wealth to players inadvertently) because its more cost effective to have your bot farm higher rarer materials then spend the time farming vendor junk or low cost materials. Dont get me wrong, bots do farm low stuff, but it's not all they do. They play the market board as well. They just do it faster and more consistently. And if its an RMT bot, that GIL is going to end up in someone's pocket...to spend on the MB. All these things increase the amount of gil in the economy. Not for the best, per se, but it is occurring and having effects.

Removing bots assumes prices stay high cause "now regular players will be doing it, so there will be less supply". But that long term may not be the case as the currency inflation slows down. You may see prices stagnate or drop to role with the changes in the market conditions. Ironically, with more bots, prices tend to drop and people afford products at cheaper prices, making their spending power go further. In the conditions you layout where the bots dont exist, the power then shifts from bots to you, the crafter. Youre not actually enriching any other player, per se. Youre just eliminating your competition to get more of the market share. The only way people get those items is to invest in being crafters and gatherer's themselves. Which may end up being a turn off for some players and could adversly affect the game by slowing down sub rates. Not everyone likes crafting, and less gil in the economy or competition can make it hard for some players to stay invested and compete.

My curiosity lies with how much bots influence this aspect of the MB. How much are they causing inflation and price manipulation? How does their presence affect player retention? Can a modern MMO economy even function correctly without bots? But I digress.

My main contention is I think youre laying to much blame on bots. Im not sitting here to defend them. But rather if we ever want good solutions to a variety of issues in the game, like housing or what not, we need to be accurate with surveying the situation. Saying bots ruin everything and overblowing things isnt productive to solving some of the problems the player base has.