Is this a bot and how do I report bots?

[Teirshin]

Don't waste your time, no action will be taken.

Well, SE doing nothing is technically an action... of sorts.... they're looking the other way....

Its a double edged sword. BOTS are still paying accounts... and its money in the bank for SE to keep them, even though they claim to want to be informed so they can ban them... which they oddly never seem to get around to doing....

Funny that.

[ToffeeCoffee]

Well, SE doing nothing is technically an action... of sorts.... they're looking the other way....

Its a double edged sword. BOTS are still paying accounts... and its money in the bank for SE to keep them, even though they claim to want to be informed so they can ban them... which they oddly never seem to get around to doing....

Funny that.

Thats just the thing though. Players are using an in-game function that we shouldnt be using (GMs told me not to) and a Lodestone tool that gets ignored. Which is more insulting, that we pay sub in a game where cheating is allowed or that we waste our time reporting it that falls on deaf ears.

[TheRogueX]

Thats just the thing though. Players are using an in-game function that we shouldnt be using (GMs told me not to) and a Lodestone tool that gets ignored. Which is more insulting, that we pay sub in a game where cheating is allowed or that we waste our time reporting it that falls on deaf ears.

What in-game function? What Lodestone tool?

[Snugglebutt]

Well I have no intention of letting them do nothing, I work my butt off on my gatherer classes and will nag Squeenix continually to make sure they do something in the cases of which I report bots.

@Uriel you seem to be making some mistake, you cannot be specifically in 'afk mode' which is the chair symbol...yet moving around or performing actions at all from testing I have done. It's not possible because the moment you push a button, move your mouse, press the direction pads on gamepad or press a key on keyboard it turns off afk mode and I have tested this as have people I know in FC now.

@Rogue I believe he/she means the in-game support function within the UI. Whether or not they actually listen to reports on that function I don't know but if not then they need to disable or remove it and in the description where it is located replace with information telling people to use website.

[ToffeeCoffee]

What in-game function? What Lodestone tool?

The Game Surveillance Unit are the only ones that are supposed to be investigating/banning bots.

In-game: System, Support Desk, Contact Us, Report Cheating. These reports do not go to the GSU. Seems only GM's action in-game reports and they don't deal with bots.

Lodestone homepage: Help & Support, Customer Service Suggestions & Feedback Bug Report, Report Bugs or Offending Players. These reports supposedly go straight to the GSU.

You'll never hear back from them and after 2 months of reporting the same 4 bots on Tonberry and their spiritbond gear crafter I have given up. I identified the 3 locations they bot in and I watch them get lined up against the wall in Limsa, each taking turns to trade each other. I identified the retainer name they use to sell the multitude of materia III's/IV's they accumulate every day on the MB.

I understand the need to investigate, and I understand that once banned they will likely create new bots but nothing gets solved by allowing it to happen. If anything it encourages the practice even more.
It doesn't take a brain surgeon to identify a bot and SE have access to more game activity data than we will ever see. They shouldn't need more than a few minutes to identify a bot and ban it. I can see 5 of them on my screen right now.

[Taban]

You can turn off auto-away/back. Then you can set your character to away. And you get the chair while still doing stuff. This prevents you from getting tells, which I use to keep rmts away. This does not mean they are a bot

Where is that option? Should be easy enough to test. I tend to doubt people who see bots everywhere, mostly because I've had people call me a bot in WoW because I was fishing for a while and didn't feel like talking to them.

[Lusavari]

You can manually turn afk on and off. It only turns off when moving the mouse of keyboard if it automatically set itself to afk rather than manually.

[Kewitt]

Edited ooops

[VoltaAsura]

I feel silly asking, but could this be a retainer?

[Alukah]

You can manually turn afk on and off. It only turns off when moving the mouse of keyboard if it automatically set itself to afk rather than manually.

I can't test it myself atm but unless they fixed it, you are wrong. There was a big thread not so long ago where people complained about the afk status being removed even if it was set manually or if auto afk was off, devs replied that they wouldn't change it.

(Again can't test it, so I'd appreciate a quick check)