If FFXIV goes Free to Play can we then justify banning bots since they won't pay?

[JackHatchet]

Title says it all.

[Rinuko]

Thing is i have very hard time seeing SE make it F2P ever.

[JackHatchet]

They might! There's no idea where Square-Enix is heading with FFXIV. It's very possible that they could go F2P one day. But that's not the question. The question is would that help or hurt botting?

[Avatre]

It would probably help the majority of bots as they would go into higher leveled areas more easily to gather/hunt stuff as there wouldn't be that 35 cap that happens to most of them(though in another thread someone did show a screen of level 36s they said all had random letter names).

Found it:

Case in point, I can find 24 bots on Excalibur (only 72 players online), all button-mash style names, all in the same place, all dropping through the map.


(Redacted names, even though there's no point, I've already reported them)

Considering that "free trial" accounts are supposedly capped at level 35 and all these bots are level 36-38 right now, that means SOMEONE is paying for them.

[Rinuko]

Fair enough, but is anyone not justifiying their baning of bots now that its P2P?

[JackHatchet]

I've heard it said before that Square-Enix doesn't want to crack down on bots because they bring in a lot of sub money.

[Squintina]

Based on my experience with F2P games, it would lead to more botting. Sure there are bots in FF14, but I notice them far less than F2P games where bots are just so prominent.

When it comes to real player, it probably won't affect their botting habits either way.
But for RMT bots, the sub is the one thing that ever so slightly slows down the amount of bots. Since there is an investment cost, only those who know for sure that their botting application will earn back the cost will partake. Whereas in F2P, the amount of RMT providers willing to try will increase since there won't be any risk. The rise in more bots will mean SE moderation would need to increase at the same rate (unlikely), thus leading to an ever growing gap between the amount of bots that exist and the amount of anti-RMT staff able to review and ban such "players".

[MilanFrozen]

For all we know SE gets a cut of the profit. Also if I were a game developer I wouldnt ban people. Id just make them 'phase' to another world sorta where they couldn't tell that no one could hear them and all their auctions would show up, but when someone went to buy them, the game would instead buy it with a fake random name. There'd be more to it than that, but at least it would take a lot longer and set botters back much harder when they have no idea that they no longer actually exist.

[Rinuko]

I've heard it said before that Square-Enix doesn't want to crack down on bots because they bring in a lot of sub money.

Eh kinda far fetched if you ask me. Yes they make money on the bots as they need to repurchase game and make new service accounts but seeing how they now actually tell us about temp and perm banned due to boting i'd say they are doing a bit.

Can they do more? Heck yes.

[Mizunoko]

Eh kinda far fetched if you ask me. Yes they make money on the bots as they need to repurchase game and make new service accounts but seeing how they now actually tell us about temp and perm banned due to boting i'd say they are doing a bit.

Can they do more? Heck yes.

Banning bots should be justified regardless. Whether the company keeps true to their ToS and takes action to do it is entirely up to the company though. As for the free to play thing, well one of the reasons i stay subbed and keep playing ff14 is BECAUSE it is NOT free to play. The day ff14 goes free to play is the day they lose me as a customer/player. That is not just a negative rant it's just how i feel on the matter. I love ff14 as a subbed game and i will stay playing it so long as it stays that way.