Has anyone noticed a decrease in botting activity in light of recent events?

[KageTokage]

I've only noticed one undercutter bot on Cactaur, but they occupy basically the entire market for ilvl 350 DoW/M gear, so trying to sell any of that requires you either be equally diligent in undercutting or undercutting by so much that they won't go any lower.

[Mysticales]

I've only noticed one undercutter bot on Cactaur, but they occupy basically the entire market for ilvl 350 DoW/M gear, so trying to sell any of that requires you either be equally diligent in undercutting or undercutting by so much that they won't go any lower.

Speaking as an endgamer merchant myself... I am CONSTANLTY undercutting people by 1 gil. This is because im an active merchant. If the other people are active too, they can undercut me. When the price gets low enough, Ill just buy the others out and relist the items again. This results in always having stock to sell.

[KageTokage]

Haven't had one rmt send me a tell...the report function must be working well. Outside of that, if i stay at the uldah aetheryte, you can see some every now and then popin and disappear. I also recently saw some doing the trap quest in horizon, kind of funny...he was placing a trap then teleporting to the npc...back to placing a trap then to the npc..

The RMT bots seem to have dropped the more disruptive forms of advertising like tells and party invites because it was getting them banned a lot faster then spamming say/shout chat was.

Speaking as an endgamer merchant myself... I am CONSTANLTY undercutting people by 1 gil. This is because im an active merchant. If the other people are active too, they can undercut me. When the price gets low enough, Ill just buy the others out and relist the items again. This results in always having stock to sell.

I know some people are obsessed with crafting and all, but this person is online and active virtually 24/7.

Even if I'm repricing my stuff at what would be the wee hours of the morning for all US timezones, they'll still be sitting in their house undercutting, and the same goes for EU timezones, as well.

Not to mention I've literally never seen them using a non-DoH class, either. I keep tabs on the level 70 DoH/L players on the server in player search to see if the STF will ever get their act together and ban the people I've been reporting for months, even though I half-expect that that's probably never going to happen.

[KageTokage]

So much for hoping.

It seems like the bots had vanished due to unpaid subs or some other petty reason, as some of them have returned after a week or two of absence and gone right back to their business, while the ones that are still gone have been replaced by new ones, whether they be transfers from another server or existing players who decided to turn to the dark side, so things haven't gotten any better overall.

I've pretty much given up on trying to gather or craft consumables/gear for profit because of them at this point.

[Enlial]

whats funny is that undercutting by 1 gil doesnt even make sense, when you consider port fees and the fact that the 5% tax on the purchaser is waived by buying from the same city-state the retainer is in.

then again theres also no reason to have a retainer located anywhere other than shiro, you lose money in the other locations due to higher taxes on the seller (aside from ishgard, but shiro is preferable due to it having a ward with market boards)

And yeah I know, it still works because most people cant be arsed to pay attention xD

[Mysticales]

whats funny is that undercutting by 1 gil doesnt even make sense, when you consider port fees and the fact that the 5% tax on the purchaser is waived by buying from the same city-state the retainer is in.

then again theres also no reason to have a retainer located anywhere other than shiro, you lose money in the other locations due to higher taxes on the seller (aside from ishgard, but shiro is preferable due to it having a ward with market boards)

And yeah I know, it still works because most people cant be arsed to pay attention xD

No whats funny is, how people ALWAYS go with the 1st lowest listing, even tho its 1 gil. Thats why I sell with my retainers at multiple cities. So this way people "cant" fully use the tax against me. Unless they wanna tele to each zone.

As for me, I buy local from the sellers listing and make sure they take the brunt of the tax lol.

[RubenSnizzle]

Haven't had one rmt send me a tell...the report function must be working well. Outside of that, if i stay at the uldah aetheryte, you can see some every now and then popin and disappear. I also recently saw some doing the trap quest in horizon, kind of funny...he was placing a trap then teleporting to the npc...back to placing a trap then to the npc..

[KageTokage]

I don't think it's a stretch to say most bots are people's mains. That really just goes to show how low the fear of getting punished is.

I honestly think that if a player is constantly being reported by people that the STF should at least notify them them that they're being watched out of suspicion of illicit activity so that if they are doing something wrong, it might make them paranoid enough to stop.

[MrKusakabe]

I just came back yesterday of a 2 year and 355 day break - and before I could even change my settings in my Gridania inn room, I had several goldseller spams. I felt like home immediately :-)
So, no, I do not see a difference from May 2015 and now ;-)