Target ban botters?

[Kaiserpein]

To start off with, I would like to commend SE for already doing a better job than others when eradicating negative behaviours being elicited by individuals in the FFXIV community. However, when it comes to botting, SE is not the quickest to lockdown on botting accounts using 3rd party software to bypass the detection system. Only if these bots are reported by viligantes then the situation will be looked at, but unfortunately most of time these bots swim under the radar, and by the time the banhammer looms upon them, they'd have made enough gil for RMT. The 3rd party software used by these botters often requires a monthly payment, and their RMT activities will have netted enough to offset the payment before the next banwave. Besides the RMT factor, bots that uses programs to gather 24/7 drive market prices into the ground and disincentivizes legit crafters and gatherers who work hard to make a profit. I understand that it is impossible to maintain a flawless game, but slow banning bots that are blatantly obvious at first glance is definitely not the best way to counteract it. I read on Reddit that it's possible to get a GM to stake out the areas, so in a final desperate attempt I am here on the forums to beg for some form/sort/shape of help possible. The botters are getting cocky as they can set their status to busy and we can't stop them with trade windows etc. They have been gathering 24/7 for the past few weeks. One even has a Legend Title. My reports aren't getting looked into and the bots are roaming carefreely. There's no point in levelling crafting/gathering if bots exists to drive market prices into the ground with retainers named Marketcrasherone and Marketcrashertwo. I will help out any way I can in identifying the botters. Thank you for your time.

[KageTokage]

I've pretty much lost hope that they'll ever do anything at all when they seem to be ignoring even bots that are doing their thing while maintaining AFK status (Which is impossible without the use of a third party program that's sending commands directly to the game client without simulating keyboard/controller/mouse inputs).

[Canadane]

It's extremely disheartening to see people sleep and get what you grind for every day.

[Kes13a]

The last month has seen a virtual explosion in people using market bots, and I dont expect that to change. I think by now, most of teh market botters assume they cant be reported or anything done to stop them, so, away they go and more people are signing up to use them

[KageTokage]

I'm honestly kind of praying some form of content gets sabotaged by bots to such an extent that it simply can't be ignored by the devs anymore.

Perhaps the RMT bots presumably expanding into HW content come 5.3 will break something somehow...

[HyoMinPark]

I'm honestly kind of praying some form of content gets sabotaged by bots to such an extent that it simply can't be ignored by the devs anymore.

Perhaps the RMT bots presumably expanding into HW content come 5.3 will break something somehow...

Well, the Restoration leaderboards will be nothing but botters. But I’ve given up on SE doing anything about the crafting/gathering bots at this point.

[ElazulHP]

The crafting and MB bots are the main reason I stopped crafting and am currently on break from playing the game the past 3 months until 5.3 launches. Only time I've logged on is twice a month so I can keep posting here and keep my house. I've lost hope Square will ever address the problem so I'm getting my enjoyment elsewhere.