Gil, Materia, and RMT bots

[Astrahime]

ARR and HW dungeons drop a small amount of gil (~190 for Level 50 dungeons, ~320 for level 57, divided amongst the 4 party members) when you kill a trash enemy, while SB/ShB/EW dungeons have a low chance to drop a combat Materia instead.

Most people don't really think about the gil, but the majority of RMT bots will level up a bard with a name like "Kjydlr Yeqbhn" or a similar keysmash name and spam the highest level dungeon obtainable at the earliest point possible, before buying the game to be able to dump their gil on the account that's facilitating the operation.
Which happens to be The Wanderer's Palace, since it's the only lv50 dungeon that you can do before completing the Seventh Umbral Era questline.

Hang around any given early MSQ area and you'll see a lalafell phasing out of existence. Or in the East Shroud and see that enemies are being attacked from underground. It's an RMT bot.

ARR/HW dungeons don't drop gil when queued for through Duty Support, so it seems like SE knows that people might abuse dungeons for gil. So why not change all ARR/HW dungeons and make them drop Materia instead of gil?

It's a pretty simple argument. It cuts off the main source of RMT gil and stops a LOT of chargebacks from occuring, doesn't hurt anyone who's playing the game under normal conditions, and also puts a lot of Materia I/II/III/IV into the economy, when Is are the hardest to come by and II/IIIs are frustrating to obtain outside of a few Free Company ventures.

[Doozer]

Can't you just vendor materia? The bots would just do that instead.

[Astrahime]

Can't you just vendor materia? The bots would just do that instead.

That's kinda irrelevant. Materia IIIs (which would be dropping from Wanderer's due to the IL) vendor for only 90 gil each, which would be a cut into their profits even if the droprate for them was 100%. But it's a lot lower than that, go run literally any SB/ShB/EW level cap dungeon and you'll see that it isn't 100%.

[Toutatis]

That's kinda irrelevant. Materia IIIs (which would be dropping from Wanderer's due to the IL) vendor for only 90 gil each, which would be a cut into their profits even if the droprate for them was 100%. But it's a lot lower than that, go run literally any SB/ShB/EW level cap dungeon and you'll see that it isn't 100%.

But you said that it drops ~190 gil divided between party members. 90 per materia would be more (360 gil). We also don't need more Materia i-iv into the economy. It's already easy to obtain and low level dungeons are super easy. Besides the few quests that require one or two materia, do people really still use low level battle materia? Leveling goes so fast these days with the abundance of XP and it seems pointless. There's much faster ways to farm gil too.

[Frizze]

But you said that it drops ~190 gil divided between party members. 90 per materia would be more (360 gil). We also don't need more Materia i-iv into the economy. It's already easy to obtain and low level dungeons are super easy. Besides the few quests that require one or two materia, do people really still use low level battle materia? Leveling goes so fast these days with the abundance of XP and it seems pointless. There's much faster ways to farm gil too.

The ARR relic sends its regards.

[Toutatis]

The ARR relic sends its regards.

That's not bots though. I have no issues selling my materia. Simple supply and demand. It's really not that expensive either and easy to get. It seems that people want everything they need to be sold for a very minimal price without doing the content. If you want it for free, run dungeons with low level gear (within 10 lvl of what you need) and use potion, food and GC Spiritbond item. It goes fast.

[Doozer]

That's kinda irrelevant. Materia IIIs (which would be dropping from Wanderer's due to the IL) vendor for only 90 gil each, which would be a cut into their profits even if the droprate for them was 100%. But it's a lot lower than that, go run literally any SB/ShB/EW level cap dungeon and you'll see that it isn't 100%.

You underestimate that RMT bots will just do the quickest and fastest thing to get gil. Normal players don't go around farming tier 3 materia, but normal players are also, y'know, human. Bots can just do the same thing over and over and that not 100% drop rate 90 gil per item turns into a lot. If there's anything they can farm that can just be sold to vendors they'll do it. Replacing gil drops with items they will instead vendor solves nothing.