There should be an easier way to report bots

[Neoyoshi]

I contacted the customer service to report a bot, and while the customer service is always nice, it's unfortunately useless to contact them directly, because I am always being referred to the website where I have to type and report everything there. To be honest, nobody in the game will bother to invest over 10 minutes for each bot because there are tons of bots. Especially when I'm playing on PS, I'm supposed to drop everything and visit a website to report a single bot. They should definitely include a function with which you can automatically report a bot with a right click on the character, just like RMT in chats with a right click on the name - 99% of the players will not put more effort than that into reporting and thanks to this function, all players would be the game's watchdogs. It would really be nice if the community could help with decreasing the number of bots, and maybe a small reward would also encourage players to participate in reporting (e.g. 2000 gil per bot). The bot problem could be decimated very quickly, because they are always in the same places (mostly in ARR areas).

There is absolutely no chance in the twelve that an in-game bot reporting system would be abused by other players; players would never just mindlessly report every player they come across- flooding the system, making it incredibly difficult for actual human beings on the SE staff to spot check each and every report that comes through.

People here are way more responsible then to abuse a system like that.

Right guys?... RIGHT?


Sorry, on a serious note; i don't trust the userbase here with a system like that- i don't mean to dismiss or shut down the idea, it's just....
..I don't trust people to be that responsible, in any MMOERPG environment- but that's just me, I have no idea what SE thinks about this topic.

I've seen this type of system abused a number of times before in other MMORPG games in the past.

The current system to me; personally- feels like the best middle ground that exists, until something better comes along to replace said system.

EDIT:One more thing about the system, and the idea of "players being watchdogs". We have a RMT chat reporting function because the player can prove that; a goldseller's weblink is about as definitive of a report of a player breaking the ToS as one can get, so that's very easy for players to circumvent and for the staff to check, because it's a chat log.

Bots on the other hand are a completely different story, because players cannot prove that a bot is an actual bot, it's just not possible. Yes there are things a player will pick up from what suspected gathering bots look like, we've all seen what those habits tend to look like, and our eyes and common-sense will tell us we are looking at something that is automated (a bot), but can we prove it? Sadly no we can't.

That's why i believe the reporting system exists the way it does, the team that handles this stuff likely needs more then a players name and someone accusing them of botting; they need a substantive reason to open up a case against a player for botting; that's would be why (i believe) the format of bot reporting does take more effort.