Macro manipulation using 3rd party scripts, is it botting?

[Archescribe]

I've recently had an argument with a friend who saw a video on somebody using simple programmable mouse operations to manipulate his mouse into clicking on things in game while that person is away from their computer. The individual in this video was using this process to craft large quantities of things while away from the game.

My first quandary is, is this botting? Typically when one thinks of a bot, it is something that performs much more complex operations, such as running around the game and gathering. Since this mouse macro only actually performs 3 clicks on a cycle in the game is it complex enough to even be considered a bot?

The second (and perhaps most important) question is, is this cheating?

The point of me posting this question is because I cannot convince this friend that what he is thinking of doing is, in fact, cheating. I'm hoping the responses to this post will help me dissuade him (assuming my belief that this is cheating is even correct).

[Taramin]

ANY action which you do not directly cause via manual input is considered botting, and is an actionable offense. Only manual button presses, and in game macro use are allowed.

[KisaiTenshi]

I've recently had an argument with a friend who saw a video on somebody using simple programmable mouse operations to manipulate his mouse into clicking on things in game while that person is away from their computer. The individual in this video was using this process to craft large quantities of things while away from the game.

My first quandary is, is this botting? Typically when one thinks of a bot, it is something that performs much more complex operations, such as running around the game and gathering. Since this mouse macro only actually performs 3 clicks on a cycle in the game is it complex enough to even be considered a bot?

Yes. Any kind of "unattended" behavior is botting.

The second (and perhaps most important) question is, is this cheating?

If they can respond to a GM inquiry of "are you there?" and can't respond, then yes. If someone reports them for cheating, point this out.

The point of me posting this question is because I cannot convince this friend that what he is thinking of doing is, in fact, cheating. I'm hoping the responses to this post will help me dissuade him (assuming my belief that this is cheating is even correct).

Tell him, that it's the inability to respond to an inquiry (hence unattended play) that is against the ToS. If he is sitting there with this mouse macro and watching Netflix, then it's not technically unattended play, but it would still be frowned upon, and I would certainly report it if I saw it. I've gone out of my way to report players that are doing unattended actions.

In this game, anytime someone talks to you or emotes at you, casts a random spell at you, you should be able to respond. If you just keep repeating whatever you were doing, then it's clear you're botting. A real player will at the very least stop what they're doing for a moment to see what/why they are being targeted.

[Felis]

In this game, anytime someone talks to you or emotes at you, casts a random spell at you, you should be able to respond. If you just keep repeating whatever you were doing, then it's clear you're botting. A real player will at the very least stop what they're doing for a moment to see what/why they are being targeted.

If they are not GMs then it is allowed to ignore them.

Sometime I snap the contoller and go to another room to watch TV, while I press cross, cross, L2+triangle and wait a bit before pressing those buttons again.
But it would be nice if the devs add vibration after finishing a craft, like with fishing.

[Nixxe]

In this game, anytime someone talks to you or emotes at you, casts a random spell at you, you should be able to respond. If you just keep repeating whatever you were doing, then it's clear you're botting. A real player will at the very least stop what they're doing for a moment to see what/why they are being targeted.

This is not even remotely true.

[Paladinleeds]

I had been trying to find some ideas along this line of thinking about how to help people with arthritus, since the QTEs can be quite spammy (someone mentioned about this in The Royal Menagerie thread, the spam meant after like 2-3 attempts they were in a LOT of pain). At the end of the day, using a program like Synapse IS still cheating, and if caught will result in instant termination of all your FFXIV accounts and possibly your entire SE account (like, SE take a zero tolerance approach to this, it's permaban from the get go). I don't know if using it to allow for completion of a certain phase (like the spam clicking of the QTE) that would otherwise be impossible to do for more than one or two attempts due to disability would be counted as a "Reasonable adjustment", but that's a whole other discussion. If they're not disabled, they must NOT use it.

If they are disabled, I would still err on the side of caution and not use it because there's no official word on whether or not using it to level the playing field due to disability (like we have the equality laws in the UK) would garner the same punishment or whether the GMs would be more understanding. It's likely it'd garner the same punishment mind you to avoid people faking disability to avoid punishment.

[Zarabeth]

I had been trying to find some ideas along this line of thinking about how to help people with arthritus, since the QTEs can be quite spammy (someone mentioned about this in The Royal Menagerie thread, the spam meant after like 2-3 attempts they were in a LOT of pain).

I'm disabled due to nerve damage in my back and arms and it does make some things very close to impossible, however what you suggest here would still be considered cheating. I'm fairly sure I'd get banned for using any 3rd party anything as all are against ToS. You are 100% correct though, for some of us, Royal Menagerie was very painful even on a keyboard where you can just hit any key at all. I was lucky and got an amazing pug group who didn't kick me even after I asked them to due to being embarrassed by my cruddy playing. I made it through thanks to them!

I don't use any 3rd party software to even the playing field, but it would be nice if that could happen. Unfortunately there are just too many people who would (and do) take advantage of anything for disabled people and would lie so they could cheat. Due to those people, SE bans anyone caught doing this.

[Paladinleeds]

I don't use any 3rd party software to even the playing field, but it would be nice if that could happen. Unfortunately there are just too many people who would (and do) take advantage of anything for disabled people and would lie so they could cheat. Due to those people, SE bans anyone caught doing this.

Which makes me think, I wonder if SE could come up with a way for people to provide proof of disability, and how it affects them (complete with official diagnosis documentation), and use this as a way to allow those people to get reasonable adjustments. If you're caught lying, perhaps they could sue? And speaking of disability causing issues, I'm disabled due to genetics which means if I try to write for an extended period of time (as low as 30 minutes), it causes significant pain in my wrist. Typing/gaming isn't an issue for me mercifully, but yeah, I can definitely empathise with people as a result. Good on you though for giving it your all despite your disability. If we were on the same datacentre I would absolutely offer to tag along with you for stuff, so you've got some backup. But alas, Leviathan and Louisoix are on different datacentres.

[Zarabeth]

Snip, due to character limit.

I can't imagine there being a way to do that. How could one prove they were real medical records? Also I'm sure people would find a way to forge them or otherwise copy them.
I'm sorry you have pain too; and, yes, it does make it easier to empathize with others!
I'm fortunate in that I have a great group of friends on Leviathan, if you ever move to our server/data center look me up!

[Paladinleeds]

I can't imagine there being a way to do that. How could one prove they were real medical records? Also I'm sure people would find a way to forge them or otherwise copy them.

Yeah, that's true. Not sure what we can really do here though.

I'm fortunate in that I have a great group of friends on Leviathan, if you ever move to our server/data center look me up!

Leviathan and its datacentre is really a no-go for me unfortunately. Been too spoiled by being a European with 20ms ping on the Chaos datacentre! I do have friends here but they've been fragmented due to server moves etc.