RMTs are starting to bother me...

[Antipika]

Question isn't "should I be banned?". You accepted the ToS before playing. You have to ensure that you can comply.

It's not like GMs won't give you a small window of time to reply anyway. You could be distracted etc. But if you are not watching your screen, the result is exactly the same as having a bot doing craft for you.

On XI fishing required full focus, but skilling up did not. Someone in my LS got banned because of using scripts to skill up magic (he was at fault, so deserved it). He wasn't banned because the GM did prove that he was using scripts, but because he did not comply and kept on casting magic for a good 5 minutes.

- He could have been spamming macro while watching a movie
- Could have been -that- famous 6 y/o little brother who was crafting for him while he was away for a smoke and couldn't reply the tell because he didn't know how. (that little brother is so famous in all MMO!)

In the end, he got banned for "absentee play" which is different of "using third party tools".

So be on the safe side, filter your logs so you can at least see tells and keep an eye on them if GMs start investigating often on XIV. Do what you can to fully respect the policy you accepted.

[Onisake]

Question isn't "should I be banned?". You accepted the ToS before playing. You have to ensure that you can comply.

It's not like GMs won't give you a small window of time to reply anyway. You could be distracted etc. But if you are not watching your screen, the result is exactly the same as having a bot doing craft for you.

On XI fishing required full focus, but skilling up did not. Someone in my LS got banned because of using scripts to skill up magic (he was at fault, so deserved it). He wasn't banned because the GM did prove that he was using scripts, but because he did not comply and kept on casting magic for a good 5 minutes.

- He could have been spamming macro while watching a movie
- Could have been -that- famous 6 y/o little brother who was crafting for him while he was away for a smoke and couldn't reply the tell because he didn't know how. (that little brother is so famous in all MMO!)

In the end, he got banned for "absentee play" which is different of "using third party tools".

So be on the safe side, filter your logs so you can at least see tells and keep an eye on them if GMs start investigating often on XIV. Do what you can to fully respect the policy you accepted.

There is a huge grey area here. Keep in mind the policy also says we are not allowed to reverse engineer game data.

So technically Kannican's beautiful post about attack damage, damage taken, etc. are all against the policy. while he is not using it for monetary gain, it is still reverse engineering.

Activities that destroy game balance
Activities that destroy game balance
Using third party programs or tools in FINAL FANTASY XIV is strictly prohibited since they allow users to gain an unfair advantage over other players. The use of programs or tools within FINAL FANTASY XIV that allow certain continuous actions to be performed automatically are often referred to as absentee play, which is also prohibited in FINAL FANTASY XIV. Additionally, during the course of an absentee play investigation, players may be requested to respond to or comply with a GMs instruction. Failure to do so is consider a violation and may result in disciplinary action being taken against the account.

The following activities are also prohibited in FINAL FANTASY XIV.
•Modifying, analyzing, integrating and reverse engineering game data
•Utility creation and distribution
•Exploiting SQUARE ENIX programming that does not run as intended to gain profit or damage other players

The bolded statement is the official definition of absentee play.

The italics section is an expanded definition. IE: me watching a movie is against the policy, since i'm not paying attention to my chat log.

Curiously enough there is nothing in the policy about dual-boxing. (personally i feel this gives a far greater advantage to some players than absentee play) but then again there are not many machines capable of dual boxing the game at this point. You'd need to computers.

Anyway, looks like i need to revise my habits.

[Antipika]

So technically Kannican's beautiful post about attack damage, damage taken, etc. are all against the policy. while he is not using it for monetary gain, it is still reverse engineering.

It is against the policy. All datamining is. But SE decided not to hunt these people, however they have the power to legally attack a website using datamining to provide data that cannot be obtained by normal means to the community.

The policy is also there to protect SE and ensure they have the right to take legal action if they want to. Reverse-engineering in general is not a good thing for any company and can cause harm.

The harm won't come from a random player over there, trying to figure out of gameplay mechanisms are working or from your average FF XIV item database. However what about someone stealing a part of SE's code/technology through reverse engineering and using it for his own products?

(Yeah I know it's not like anyone will steal anything from XIV anyway...)

Another example would be using reverse engineering techniques to make a plugin that allow you to decode the music files present on the game data (such plugins existed for XI and data can be extracted on XIV). This can cause SE harm. Music is their intellectual property, they do whatever they want with it, we do not.

Having a policy/rule doesn't mean it will always be strictly enforced. But I can tell you for sure that on XI, skilling-up without responding to GM would get you jailed. (crafting/fishing as well, but well to do this you must cheat obviously )

[Dragon]

I guess when I want to go AFK I should cancel auto-attack while fighting an NM. lol

[Jhanaka]

Hi Guys!

I thought I would take a moment to chime in about in game reporting features.

If you include the Name(s) and which activity is being performed, the GM staff will submit the names to the Special Task Force on your behalf. I will look at the message we send to you as we do not want any misunderstanding or feelings of neglect. Also, the Special Task Force is the department who handles all the investigations into RMT and Cheats, so the GM staff cannot always get involved in the ways you wish.

Thank you for helping keep our game running smoothly and I will bow out from any further discussion.

-Senior Game Master Jhanaka

[AsterBarnivere]

Hi Guys!

I thought I would take a moment to chime in about in game reporting features.

If you include the Name(s) and which activity is being performed, the GM staff will submit the names to the Special Task Force on your behalf. I will look at the message we send to you as we do not want any misunderstanding or feelings of neglect. Also, the Special Task Force is the department who handles all the investigations into RMT and Cheats, so the GM staff cannot always get involved in the ways you wish.

Thank you for helping keep our game running smoothly and I will bow out from any further discussion.

-Senior Game Master Jhanaka

D: you took the words out of my mouth, I demand that you put them back in.

[Gerrr]

What you describe has been happening on Karnak (now Excalibur) since the beginning. If they bug you take some screenshots and go narc on them to the Special Task Force Unit.

Edit: lol quick reply... "what Jhanaka said."

[Ksenia]

When I am waiting for a queue to log in I will decide if I care. Until then, nope. I don't see why I should.

[Laraul]

RMT are perfectly justified in what they do. The reason why RMT exist is because there is a demand for their services. And nothing in the "Terms of Agreement" is going to convince a judge that what they are doing is harmful. A Judge is going to see it as part of the free enterprise system. You people talk about RMTs as if they we're Shylock from Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice.

[Preypacer]

RMT are perfectly justified in what they do. The reason why RMT exist is because there is a demand for their services. And nothing in the "Terms of Agreement" is going to convince a judge that what they are doing is harmful. A Judge is going to see it as part of the free enterprise system. You people talk about RMTs as if they we're Shylock from Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice.

You are so misguided and lost in the weeds here, it's almost impressive.

It's in the TOS that RMT and related activities are prohibited. All players - every single one, whatever their intention for logging in - is agreeing to follow those TOS in order to play. After that, whether or not what they do is "okay" is up to the developer/publisher. But, you know, go ahead and tell SE you're engaging in RMT, let them see that you are, in fact, doing so and then tell them "RMT is a perfect acceptable business and you can't do anything to me about it, because they're providing a service". Go ahead and try that. Let us know how it turns out for you.

It doesn't have to go to court (even though that's already happened, see below) because management of it is entirely within the power of the company. Yes, the developer of a game really does have the authority to decide what is and what is not permissible within their game, and you accept and agree to abide that authority every time you click "I Accept" on one of those TOS/EULA windows you probably don't bother to read first. You accept the penalties that would rise from being caught in violation of them.

Many of them exercise this authority on a regular and on-going basis. There are myriad examples. Your personal opinion of whether it's okay, or your conjecture of what a court would say on the matter are completely irrelevant. You don't decide the rules.

Incidentally, if you want to go down that road, there's far more precedence to indicate a judge would uphold the company's TOS and hold the RMT company or its related activity at fault than the other way around. Blizzard won an injuction against a RMT company some years back, hence showing that when enforced in such a matter, a judge absolutely would rule in the company's favor. Source

In short, you can lie to yourself, you can try to lie to everyone else. However you slice it, the facts are not on your side.