Let's talk about bot housing business

[Reddyo]

So, it would be cool if GMs existed in this game, because they could verify this with their own eyes.

I play on Sagittarius and recently I noticed certain FC wards being completely taken by the very same name, and upon closer inspection I noticed they just have the same TAG, but in fact they have such a boring bot names like "Mists-9-39" or "Beds-5-13" and so on. Only the fact that that entire FC wards are filled with bot FCs is concerning, because about a year ago or so, half of the wards were made FC-only, or.. well.. bots only.





Disclaimer: I tried to do my best to censor the names but also to show offenders, if something is against rules, let me know.

On these two pictures, if posted correctly, we can see two things:
1) Majority of the ward is occupied by bot FCs with the same tag, and pretty much same name with just different number at the end, like proper bots.

2) They are not even bothering to hide their botting, with owners literally having words like "Mists-11" or "Vill-12" or "Beds-17" - clearly created with the intention of sniping these plots and then selling them online.

And these pictures are only one out of 10 wards in one housing location, it's bad.

I was curious about these bot FCs and I decided to investigate further, because when I noticed that these FCs are most likely bots, the first thing that came to my mind was selling houses. It haven't took me even 3 minutes, and I managed to google a site that was literally selling the very same houses for disgusting amount of money (literally thousands of dollars). And I am not joking about this. I am not going to post any web or hint you towards such a site, but I would like to make the developers aware of the bot problem and business with their limited housing in their game. I am sure that if there would be and ingame GM like in the old mmos, the kind that interacts with community, they would act against this, but nowaday, this is not the case.

In the end, it might seem ridiculous to spend so much money on a bot house and have no guarantee of ever receiving it, but imagine playing on a server where housing is limited, much like my friend who is desperately trying to get housing for a couple of years, what would these people give to get a Large house on the their server?

With that, I would propose a simple solution: Give a task to some of your GMs to check the housing areas, it's so simple to spot these - they are literally FCs called by the plot name, so they are easy and clear to sell... Why do you have the GMs in the game? To sort problems of course! Sort the problem then, and get rid of these bots out of your limited housing-

I know there are bots in every game, but this is so obvious it's almost offensive, and because the developers don't care, I feel like it's my responsibility as a player to notice them about it.

[Reddyo]

To further add, these plots are being sold by just simply selling the entire FC with the house and few bots inside.. it's that simple, dear developers. Now please, would you care to take care of this mess? This was obvious since the very start that people will create dead or inactive FCs to earn houses in FC wards, but botting and selling puts it on whole new level.

[Kaurhz]

This is a very, very bold topic to create.

They're probably aware of the problem, and they probably know that it is a problem, but it is not a problem that can be resolved without stepping on some major toes for a system that they ultimately created with a lack of proper thought.

and ultimately a very poor system in which people ultimately adhered to the guidelines of in a very roundabout way.

[Reddyo]

I feel like this should be more discussed, and possibly get into the eyes of the developers, maybe something would change, right? I feel like it sucks that by the time a smaller FC saves for a house, everything is taken by the bots.

[Valkyrie_Lenneth]

You're just gonna have Stormpeaks come in here and defend it cuz it's "not against tos"

[Reddyo]

You're just gonna have Stormpeaks come in here and defend it cuz it's "not against tos"

Isn't it basically RMT? You are paying real money to get advantage in the game. Surely that must be against TOS! Of course, I have no proof that any FC is directly involved, even though it seems obvious, but I do not get involved in any kind of this business and probably bringing such an information would get me in trouble for privacy reasons, haha

[Stormpeaks]

I will gladly defend it. I would know because I miiiight know who that is.

1 : It's certainly not RMT
2 : It's not botting, it's called multiowning
and 3 : It's not agaisnt the ToS.

Next question ?
Those houses are literally for the sole purpose of submarines which there is nothing in the ToS agaisnt.

[Kaurhz]

You're just gonna have Stormpeaks come in here and defend it cuz it's "not against tos"

For better or worse they wouldn't be entirely wrong, the act of having multiple houses is not against ToS, even on this scale - and whether or not all 60 of these are botting or not, or engaging in RMT is just conjecture at best. I mean, you do have people doing this in a more public manner than demonstrated in this thread.

Furthermore, SE should be looking at themselves long before they take a glance at what players are doing -- The players are doing it because it's a series of severely poor decisions on their part. Many players are just doing what the system permits, ultimately.

[Stormpeaks]

For better or worse they wouldn't be entirely wrong, the act of having multiple houses is not against ToS, even on this scale - and whether or not all 60 of these are botting or not, or engaging in RMT is just conjecture at best. I mean, you do have people doing this in a more public manner than demonstrated in this thread.

Furthermore, SE should be looking at themselves long before they take a glance at what players are doing -- The players are doing it because it's a series of severely poor decisions on their part. Many players are just doing what the system permits, ultimately.

Also I do find it hilarious that people just go over the fact some of the fc wards on sagi and phantom are basically completely empty with less than 20% of plots taken, they will cry about the multiowners and ignore the fact there are literally thousands of open houses, and then shout "multiowners are taking my houses !!!"

[Reddyo]

You're just gonna have Stormpeaks come in here and defend it cuz it's "not against tos"

And here it is, thanks for the headsup Stormpeaks arrived defending it.