Does Square intend to address Market botting?

[Kes13a]

Finally, I have a new suggestion. I'm not sure SE JPN is aware of the issue on SE USA and SE Europe servers. My suggestion is to have a letter undersigned by as many players as possible and to have this letter translated and submitted to SE JPN support and posted on JPN forums read by the devs. The letter would highlight that botting is a major problem in SE USA and SE Europe servers, and we would ask them to intercede directly. This suggestion would get the developers involved directly if they aren't aware of the prevalence of the problem on SE USA and Europe servers--which I believe is the case. As I said in a previous post, I suspect that botting isn't as serious a concern on SE JPN servers due to cultural differences. It's entirely possible that poor communication is making the problem worse on SE USA/Europe servers.

2/2

I had made a slight reference to this before. I had heard that there was an issue reported for a while and was going unresolved until Yoshi or another dev logged in one day and saw it. If the JPN servers dont have bots at this level or number, they will NEVER see it as an issue. But again, I feel thats still an SE NA or Euro problem because the GM's and people here SHOULD be passing that along.

[TheLoveJenovan]

But again, I feel thats still an SE NA or Euro problem because the GM's and people here SHOULD be passing that along.

Thanks Kes13a. I agree. I think SE NA/Euro are subordinate to the headquarters (SE JPN). If we notify SE JPN that SE USA/Europe are part of the problem, they may be motivated to change management at those subsidiaries--or at least they may want to devote more resources. AFAICT, the SE USA/Euro support divisions (incl GMs) are either seriously understaffed or poorly managed.

That said, I'm not entirely sure SE JPN would care, at the end of the day. I've reported bots through the Cheating form in the game, without impact. After I contacted support directly, they told me to submit it to the Special Task Force, which I believe is based in Japan. (This is a support system separate from the game.) Even with this "Special Task Force" submission, It's been 3 weeks without a change with the bots on my server--or my former server, now that my sub has lapsed. The bot accounts are still active there though, according to friends on discord.

If others are still on board with writing a letter, I suggest adding a sentence on reasonable timelines for acting on bots. In my opinion, 1 week is more than enough. I'm an academic who sometimes has to process 6-9 cases of cheating in 1 semester. I can do the research and write the 60-90 page report (per student) within a week. There are far fewer movings parts in a botting investigation like this, and the devs have intimate access to data on how their product is being used--or misused. This boils down to a management problem at SE USA/Europe and, possibly, SE JPN.