Is it OK to use bots in FFXIV?

[ZeroRaziel]

My apologies if the title is a bit provocative. I under no circumstances encourage anyone to use any sort of 3rd party software in the game. And that's not a troll thread or anything like that either.

What I trully wonder is how Square Enix actually deals with players using this 3rd party software which allows them to have "unfair advantage over other players"?

I do know that you can find tons of lvl 1-50 bots that use warping, wall glitches or whatever with those wierd random nicknames running around ARR zones which also used to clog up Amdapor Keep or other lvl 50 dungeons occasionally when we saw "Reserving Server" message for half an hour.
Also I know that there are gathering bots which are used to farm nodes for materials.
But during my experience with the game I can't say that I had too much troubles with any of those and assumed that was because they were timely banned and SE kept those things under relative "control".

So I recently though about crafting some items for sale and it turned that Market Board is affected by botting as well. And it seems that one single bot is able to monopolize almost half of the market. As it turned out this one exact same bot has been active for almost a month by now. Reported multiple times by several people via In-Game Support, Web-Site support and directly to Special Task Force team. And nothing changed... For a month now
So could other people please share their experience and thoughts on this matter? Has it always been like this and I simply wasn't paying enough attention?

[Seraphor]

SE ban bots and RMTs in waves every few months.
Unfortunately this means for those few months the botters and RMTs have free reign and are only moderately disadvantaged for a short time when those ban waves occur.

The most affected part of the market however is the sale of crystals/shards/clusters, which would likely be prohibitively expensive if it wasn't for those botters to be frank, so it's a double-edged sword.
If SE could be more proactive on the issue, they would also need to address the balance of obtaining crystals and shards in great enough quantities as well.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

SE ban bots and RMTs in waves every few months.
Unfortunately this means for those few months the botters and RMTs have free reign and are only moderately disadvantaged for a short time when those ban waves occur.

The most affected part of the market however is the sale of crystals/shards/clusters, which would likely be prohibitively expensive if it wasn't for those botters to be frank, so it's a double-edged sword.
If SE could be more proactive on the issue, they would also need to address the balance of obtaining crystals and shards in great enough quantities as well.

Every week. They purge every Thursday.

[ZeroRaziel]

Every week. They purge every Thursday.

If they do, how comes this bot is still there for a month now? Despite numerous reports?

I've seen this exact botting pattern mentioned on this forum before, but this thread was moslty ignored:
https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...Market-botting

If had a bit more ruckus on a reddit though:
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...games_economy/

[Gothicshark]

If they do, how comes this bot is still there for a month now? Despite numerous reports?

I've seen this exact botting pattern mentioned on this forum before, but this thread was moslty ignored:
https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...Market-botting

If had a bit more ruckus on a reddit though:
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...games_economy/

Lots of people undercut and don't need a bot to do it. I check my Retainers fairly regularly every day and adjust the prices to undercut when possible. No bot needed.

[ZeroRaziel]

Lots of people undercut and don't need a bot to do it. I check my Retainers fairly regularly every day and adjust the prices to undercut when possible. No bot needed.

Gothicshark, please read through my previous post =/
This one, to be precise:

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...=1#post5365959

I higly doubt that your regular retainers check would match this kind of behavior...

And you most likely haven't looked at that reddit link
https://www.reddit.com/r/ffxiv/comme...games_economy/
you quoted neither.

[Veliaire]

Lots of people undercut and don't need a bot to do it. I check my Retainers fairly regularly every day and adjust the prices to undercut when possible. No bot needed.

Yes, but do you check 40 retainers every 20 minutes every day of the year? Its pretty easy to tell who is a human being is who is a bot in this game. Lets not try to pretend otherwise.

[SecretIsland]

Lots of people undercut and don't need a bot to do it. I check my Retainers fairly regularly every day and adjust the prices to undercut when possible. No bot needed.

Yep. This. Some people are just hardcore and no-life the market board. Doesn't always have to be a bot.

If you see them teleporting then yes, it is a bot. Otherwise, no.

[ForteNightshade]

Every week. They purge every Thursday.

Ehhh. Those are the easily noticeable RMT bots that mostly stand around Limsa. SE is horrendous was it comes to market board bots, gather bots and crafting bots. Even outright cheaters often got on to be ignored for years despite numerous reports. And the thing is, all they have to do is shadow these "players" to see them botting as it's fairly obvious.

Unfortunately, it seems the GMs aren't given much authority in this regard, and it's the STF that handles these bans. Which is hilariously understaffed. All in all, SE doesn't do a whole lot about bots.

[Tsaranoga]

Ehhh. Those are the easily noticeable RMT bots that mostly stand around Limsa. SE is horrendous was it comes to market board bots, gather bots and crafting bots. Even outright cheaters often got on to be ignored for years despite numerous reports. And the thing is, all they have to do is shadow these "players" to see them botting as it's fairly obvious.

Unfortunately, it seems the GMs aren't given much authority in this regard, and it's the STF that handles these bans. Which is hilariously understaffed. All in all, SE doesn't do a whole lot about bots.

That's because no game company is going to get rid of any of their sweet profit. Doesn't matter to them where the money comes from, doesn't matter if it's stolen, money is money. It won't hurt their profit and might insted be more or less a benefit so nothing is going to get done. Of course, they need to pretend they care but that's easy with people thinking SE is their friend or something.

Huh, i was sure running out of sub would mean i can't post anymore. I guess i was wrong.