Will Bot's ever be punished?

[Matsume]

I have to disagree.

The GM's have a limited scope of the game itself, so much that they had to dedicate a Special Task Force to deal primarily with Botters and RMT, and even then it's reliant on our input.

If we fail in our responsibility to assist such efforts, the ours is not the right to complain about the presence of botters and RMT in the game. We spot them often when the GMs are not there or dealing with other matters.


Improvements can be made both in the community mentality of responsibility, and the active participation and ease of communication with the Special Task Groups. RMT is only going to get more intrusive the more successful the prospects of this game get.

hmm, i should have spelled out Game Makers instead, I did not mean to refer to the Game Masters...

[Ziyyigo-Tipyigo]

just wish shells would shun the people in their own shells who cheat, and bot etc etc, thatd really get rid of the actual players who are doing it

That's not easy to do, though. The Linkshell interface only lets you know whether someone is online or off, and won't tell you where they are or give you any idea of what they're doing. At best, you might stumble upon one doing something you frown upon.

[Hyrist]

hmm, i should have spelled out Game Makers instead, I did not mean to refer to the Game Masters...

Well to be honest. There's no way to make a game bot proof.

Technically speaking, the game is a program. If you can program specific inputs, you can make a program to intelligently read the game and respond by putting in those required input. Make a harder to bot game, make a better bot.

It's just not possible to be constantly on top of new technology before it exists. Additionally, there is only so far you can go before you start to punish your players for the botters attacks.

Now, what you can do is make botting ineffectual in the long run.

For example, on aggressive monsters, if you agro them before the botters start attacking, the credit is yours even if they kill them. Meaning a player spotting a bot could screw with them for quite a long time. Not by botting, but by simply staying still and getting agro.

SE's done a pretty good job of making the influence of Bots pretty non-important. They're hoarding gil... ok, what's that going to do? Players can make their own gil easily and all SE has to do is ban the accounts they intend to flood the system and monopolize the auction house with. OR, they can just prevent monopolization on the auction by enforcing a price cap for goods.

Right now the botters are nothing more than an eyesore and they're going to learn the hard way that a lot of the economy is built against them already. I just hope the Auction House is built against them too.

[Ziyyigo-Tipyigo]

Above assumes multi-lingual linkshells do not and should not exist.

In my own experience they're unfeasible. Either everyone talks in the more common language, or you essentially end up with two separate linkshells that just happen to share the same /linkshell channel. Besides, among the JP and NA playerbases, they're practically nonexistent.

It also assumes all players can and should play only during their specific region's peak times

Can? Yes. Are likely to? No. Server stats from XI published as part of their regular census show very distinct usage peaks for the evening hours in JP, NA and EU time zones, respectively. Those who tend to play in off-peak hours for their region are statistically insignificant.

Also assumes multilingual people do not exist.

No, I even have several in my own linkshell. But they speak in /linkshell in English, even to each other. There's no point in using /linkshell unless everyone in it can understand what you're saying. Unless everyone in a particular linkshell is fluent in (e. g.) English and French, conversation will either resort to the most common language, or the group itself will Balkanize.

Further assumes players are not a part of multiple linkshells.

So everything relies on the small handful of players that perform essentially the same function as a currency exchange? Maybe the next new class should be "banker."

I have listed out-of-linkshell examples, you have callously disregarded them.

The Wards are still only marginally useful. Bazaars/shouts/etc only work (when they do work) for people who are online at the same time as you, which (statistically speaking) will be people in your own region. In the best case scenario, you end up not with one server-wide economy, but three distinct economies: one during JP peak hours, one during NA peak hours, and one during EU peak hours.

None of them extend beyond Ul'dah and, for most classes, participation requires you to stop doing anything else.

This comment is irrelevant to our discussion

Our discussion began with you insisting that XIV has a meaningful "economy." An economy is about the only difference between a server with hundreds of players and one with a few dozen. If a "worldwide" server of 500+ and a private server of ~50 are functionally equivalent, how can the case be made that a viable economy exists in the former?

Does an economy require an AH? Probably not. But does an economy (or at least a functional, viable one) exist in XIV as it currently stands? No.

[MoonKeeperr]

I know how you feel i'd farm the sheep also but only 1-2 stacks. few days later on my server market is over flooded with RMT retainers selling there sheep goods to and i can tell its like 99 stacks on same retainer then other person with same retainer name almost but 99 stacks its crazy only way to sell ur stuff is undercut like AH wars in XI

[PSxpert2011]

I think the majority of the botters are non RMT players like you and I, or the players that buy gil. The gil sellers are a different case...

Yeah, I'm a normal, hard working north america citizen who can hardly pay for his college tuition, yet alone his student loans but I own a robot which cooks, cleans, cuts the lawn, washes the car, the dishes, folds the cloths, fetches the mail and walks the dog. It's okay, i'm not like 'them', I'm only your normal every day person.

RMT bots will always be around

just wish shells would shun the people in their own shells who cheat, and bot etc etc, thatd really get rid of the actual players who are doing it

i can name at least 2 shells on balmung who support it, and have several players who bot everything so they can get ahead
not gonna name names(against forum rules) but they know who they are
and they are pretty damn elitist too

Well well, you can either be with them or against them. Knowledge is half the battle and it's power to use as you wish...

I don't have to tell you whether your right or wrong, there's a 'user agreement' for that.

[Toxsik]

Okay I agree that botting makes most everyone upset, It's just that I am soooo tired of seeing these types of threads... almost as much as I am tired of seeing botter's. Please give it a break... And wait till the game is done and in play before expecting to see rules enforced and GM's running around doing something about it. Priorities are elsewhere right now obviously.

[Rydin]

Okay I agree that botting makes most everyone upset, It's just that I am soooo tired of seeing these types of threads... almost as much as I am tired of seeing botter's. Please give it a break... And wait till the game is done and in play before expecting to see rules enforced and GM's running around doing something about it. Priorities are elsewhere right now obviously.

True... I'd rather have the game finished, even with RMT and BOTs than have a BOT-free game that is a completely unfinished train wreck

[Antipika]

and its especialy easy to deal with when they are in your own shell, and you can boot them for it, and then perhaps announce in uldah what they did so others know their crime

Doing so could get you suspended for harassment you know? You have absolutely no right to start shouting claiming that player X or Y is a cheater, no matter how many evidence you have. That's purely and simply harassment.

SE is the only entity that can decide if someone is violating the rules or not. Based on evidences they have (their logs) and not some youtube video or screenshots made by a third party.

Boot players from your LS is the best you can do, as you are entirely free to boot whoever you want. Reporting them to GMs/STF, same, you can do so. Shouting in Ul'dah, making threads on officials forums etc. = no.

It would be kind of sad to get suspended because a cheater reported you for harassment. It works exactly the same in real life, claiming that someone is a criminal while that person hasn't been judged guilty isn't allowed. (At least where I live.)

Well to be honest. There's no way to make a game bot proof.

Whoever wants a game that is bot proof is retarded. However what you want is a game design that encourage "human actions" over simple repetitive actions that can be botted.

Sadly that demand good game designers and that's not something we have right now on XIV ><. If something very simple and repetitive is rewarding in any kind of way, there is a design flaw.

I'll take gathering as an example. In Rift, the last tier of gathering materials (used for level max armor / endgame items) could only be found in lv.50 dungeons. Therefore RMTs couldn't access these resources, since dungeons cannot be repeated as many as you want + you needed a proper party and proper gear. In the end, even if a group of geared RMTs decided to "farm" dungeons for resources, they would still have to play the game the normal way (defeat bosses and trash mobs on the way, have a proper party setup etc.).

Gathering lower tier resources was just pointless for most of crafts because the value was too low. Epic recipes required last tier materials. Same goes for last tier of consumable that were used for raiding.

(It's not like the game was RMT-free, there was other things that could be done to earn money easily by RMTs (like spamming daily quests with multiple accounts), yet at least legit players could make profit with content that wasn't accessible by RMTs).

That's what SE should do instead of putting a material like Karakul Fleece, used for Felt/Wool which are "high tier" materials needed for lv45+ recipes, on lv41 monsters that can be killed by a software...

It would be great to have gathering node inside dungeons and also have boss drop crafting materials. Make drop for lv45+ items hard to get, on lv53+ monsters, which cannot be killed by a software and would require human attention.

The whole drop system on XIV makes no sense. You kill lv53 wolf in Natalan, you obtain Wolf Hides that are lv20 and completely useless. Yet lower level monsters can be more profitable...

[PSxpert2011]

Should just create a server to isolate RMT, Bots or suspected Bots until a full investigation is complete. win/win