Suggestion for in-game on how to combat botters!

[Miyu20]

It is quite simple. Allow people to export their blacklist to a text document which we could then send to the Square-Enix Special Team Squad or whatever they call themselves who combat RMT and it would be super easy. Much more than submitting a "Report Cheating" for 200+ Names (because I get more names as I type them out in game) and then get sent an automated message telling me to do it again outside of game. This is just blatent bureaucratical kiting and nobody appreciates that.

I would like to think that the FFXIV Dev team and everyone else involved would like to combat RMT but if they don't/haven't considered this...I don't know anymore...

That is all. Sorry wasn't sure what forum to post this in so I posted this here.

[Radkat]

I have never really believed that SE would look at all the names submitted individually, because there are simply too many of them, and they need to investigate each and every single one of them. Consider how many staff there are in the task force - 20? 30? Consider how many servers there are, and how many names are getting submitted every hour.

They must have different systems - they may have a program to automatically detect characters that bypass certain mechanics, for example. As for names submitted, they may only look at ones that keep recurring.

[Miyu20]

I would be interested in knowing how it works but I know if they announced how it works...there might be more botters because they know they can get away with it.

That is a good of a summise as any. ^^

[ChriZirhC]

I just /follow bots around and spam trade them. After 5mins they will suddenly speak up and tell me to stop. Will gladly do but still on /follow after 1min they will leave. lol

[Neuflune]

There are invisible botters. You cannot see them, you cannot target them, you can only see their actions in the battle log.

No, my game was not glitching, because the bots were hitting mobs (I could see their skills in the battle log) but the mobs just stood there unable to target them back. It wasn't a one-hit kill too so the mobs had plenty of time to move or run towards the attacker if that mob could target the attacker.

I've reported them to SE from in-game, but no reply, not even a "we will look into this blah blah".

[Gillionaire]

It shouldn't be too hard, I just don't think they have a dedicated team or enough GMs to cover the grounds..

It should be as simple as triggering red flags for people who sent /tells to more than 20 people within the span of an hour.
Then taking a look at the content of the messages..

Figure about a dozen RMT spammers on a server each.. That could be reviewed with 2 people max once they implement a system that flags the potential offenders, I think the capacity to log and filter chats are just lacking on SE's side.

I've even seen frauds posted in the forums where SE wouldn't do anything about it because their investigation didn't show up with anything even when the person had posted all the chat logs from the incident.. (i.e. Highly likely they don't keep chat logs) think about how stingy they are with the servers regarding everything else that take up extra data, I wouldn't be surprised.

[kyuven]

Even if they investigated each and every name (which would take WEEKS just for one fixed list) the botters would just get a new one, usually a phished account or purchased with a stolen credit card.
Since stolen merchandise is involved and chargebacks cost them money it's better for them to NOT take out the bot accounts right away and instead either cast their net wider or try for IP bans (which rarely work thanks to VPNs)
It's kinda like dealing with bees. Killing individual workers isn't going to make the problem go away.
Of course, if people would stop being stupid and going to these sites in the first place we wouldn't have a botter issue at all. Some public awareness of the issue is in order.

[AdamFyi]

There are invisible botters. You cannot see them, you cannot target them, you can only see their actions in the battle log.

They're actually not invisible - they're just hiding under the ground. It is possible to see their names if you target the enemy's target. Using the <tt> chat command while targetting the mob is also a good idea since it'll give you the name of the bot in the chat log. xD

[tocsin]

I just /follow bots around and spam trade them. After 5mins they will suddenly speak up and tell me to stop. Will gladly do but still on /follow after 1min they will leave. lol

Just figured I would mention it, but you do know that is direct harassment, and regardless of whether the person is botting or not, will get you reported and potentially banned yourself?

having had someone do that to me while I was just gathering, it was extremely annoying, and detrimental to my gameplay experience. Filed a report, and talked to the GM, and never saw the player again. Good riddance.

[Bluevann]

I just /follow bots around and spam trade them. After 5mins they will suddenly speak up and tell me to stop. Will gladly do but still on /follow after 1min they will leave. lol

If you can actually follow them and they speak, chances are you are annoying genuine players. Bots use special programs to disappear underground between nodes, becoming unfollowable and untradeable.