Quote Originally Posted by Fyrebrand View Post
Would this be possible, or just something the botters could easily bypass with clever programming?
Sadly bots could bypass this. Bots are intelligent enough to clear Savage and spam Expert Recipes.

For gathering and crafting, since they can't scan player computers developing a system to defeat bots is difficult. Probably the only viable option is to implement weekly limits. For example, a character enters an account-wide fatigue state after gathering 2000 current content Timed Node items or crafting 200 (non-material) current expansion items per week. Sure it'd suck for those legitimate players who just want to gather/craft all day to relax, but most normal players would be unaffected and bots would hit a wall fast. It would even promote mb trade and add value to items. Extract Materia could use a 2 day cd on each slot after use too.

I don't know, personally I dislike when bot measures impact gameplay for normal players, but facts are they have no power to detect them and they have to do something. I'd take a compromise at this stage.