Cheaters and Add-ons

[Alenonimo]

All actions of the developers will have them weighting things like what could make more money with what could cost money to implement. This is them being pragmatic and they're not wrong.



For example, adding an anti-cheat to the game would cost some money and wouldn't really improve revenue. Cheating in FFXIV is usually not something that stops people from subscribing, or at least the system that they have now of receiving reports from the users seems to put enough cheaters down as to not rile up the player base. Also, adding an anti-cheat could stop some users from playing, like the ones with low spec machines or esoteric setups (Linux running Wine, Steam Deck, etc...).


Every time they did something to curb improper use of the game was because the financial loss of not doing it was significant, like when cheaters would run the Steam version of the game as the non-Steam version to refund the purchase after a while, which was being used by bots to avoid financial losses from bans. It was costing money to Squenix and Valve and was making cheating rampant which pissed off the players too.



So either the current way to handle the cheaters are not bad enough that it costs them anything or it's done in a way that they get their money worth it. If it works for them and don't get in my way of playing the game, I'm fine with it.

[Fhaerron]

Since apparently everybody in this thread has a PHD in Japan's company law system a few questions;

Destiny 2 & Tom Clancy's The Division 2 have anti-cheat and more recently EA's Apex Legends has added anti cheat (also making it unplayable on the Steam Deck in the process).
Anyway those 3 games have anti cheat but are available in Japan, yet people here claim that it's not allowed to have those anti cheats in Japan.. so how come?
And what about CoD & BF games? I don't really play shooter games so I don't know which games have them but the 3 above I mentioned I know have them.

Not that I'm pro anti cheat. Or well I don't mind anti cheat but I dislike those kernel level anti cheat which are actually spywere and take a hit on performance no matter if you're low end or high end hardware.

I'm just curious about the fact that those programs seems to be not allowed in Japan, yet several of those games (with those programs in them) seems to operate just fine in Japan?

[Mortex]

I’m gonna be totally honest. The modding community in ff14 is the biggest reason they wont do this. It’s a massive player base that mods the game and stays in the game because of this reason. They use it for RP and the other not so friendly for work role play and a big chunk of community events use mods.

[kko77]

Right. I have played MMOs since UO (I'm an old gal I know) and FFXIV does a decent job on RMT, esp compared to other modern MMOs like wow. It is slow but they do get people. Cheats, again slow. Usually server side hacks they get immediately but things client side like camera hacks or even targeting hacks in pvp take a while. At least they know what an RMT hellscape looks like... *looks at FFXI*

And I refuse to play games with kernel level root kits for anti cheat. They have not proved to be more effective. I remember when Valorant came out how everyone said kernel level would be a game changer and after six months that changed. The biggest thing a company needs to fight anti-cheat is man power which... most don't want to spend the money on.

[kko77]

Even modders block repositories of cheat apps so you can't easily install them. Most just want visual modification, not cheats.

[Kandraxx]

They should just up the game a little and less people would feel the need for add-ons. Auto-combo for those horrible 123s with no thought or variation would be a first step.

The idea that someone can suddenly clear hard/sweaty content which he couldn't before because his 123 is now 111 is a little far-fetched.

Usually people start getting plugins because of things like that and after a while they look for more...

[LordTimmy]

While I find sad but at the same time makes me think "aww you cute thing xD" when I see a DPS with no materia on, like with at least 200+ ilevel down over performing other players with the latest gear and materia while moving and jumping throughout the whole arena. There is not much that can be done. All I can do is to think they need those 3rdparty tools, or they won't have fun and rage quit the game.

Less ppl playing, less revenue to SE, and so on...

Also, I don't really think if we cut off all cheaters FF14 will --OMGWeAreSoDoomed *dies* xD-- but is a very good chunk since from the beginning SE didn't do much to prevent it.

BUT, there are different degrees of cheating, If the guy mentioned in my previous example, jumping, moving like a headless chicken and over-performing the whole ally in a raid is using a packet optimizer to spam the server so he/she doesn't have any latency to do a perfect rotation with no delays, but adding stress to the server cus the spam of packets to be the first inputting his data to the server, yeah, that bouncy fella should have the ban hammer.

Other add ons like glamour or changing appearance are pretty much inoffensive and normally it happens on the gamer terminal, I don't have any problems with them.

If people want to outperform and be """the best""" by cheating I only can say that if they want to brag about how fast they won with cheating, well... good for you bro xD. 80 to 90% of the playerbase couldn't care less. But, if they're happy they will keep paying the sub, so win for SE keeping high numbers.

[Darkstride]

This is only my own experience, but I've been paying since 1.0 and I can't recall a single time when it was necessary to go out of my way to report someone for cheating. I don't personally find it to be frequent or noticeable, and it certainly hasn't affected me directly that I know of. Are other players really encountering it so often?

As for anti-cheat, I don't even like mods let alone cheats, but I would hate to have it implemented. In my experience anti-cheat can cause launching and performance problems even for those of us who just play the game as intended.

[hynaku]

Didn't one gaming company go after cheaters once by suing them all. Easy way to spot them is there is always small amount of lag when close to them.

[Masekase_Hurricane]

Hi, first time posting here and i come with a question, why the devs do little next to nothing to stop the rampant cheating that happens in this game. I know that this is mainly a PVE game and if someone is using splatoon or some type of auto rotation cheat is not affecting my gameplay directly but why theres not a more restrictive system or anti-cheat in the game?

Now I've also heard that the devs can't implement an anti-cheat or any program to check if someone is using something they're are not suppose to because of a certain japanese cybersecurity law that prohibits them for using anti-cheats in their game, how much of this is true and if so which law is it and how can we fight the rampant cheating that happens in the game?

With a new ultimate on the horizon i can only imagine of what type of cheat people will come up with so they can clear the fight...

Is there nothing we can do besides reporting the use of cheats or can we ask more from the devs in regard of more restrictions in game on add-on usage?

I've not heard about the law thing all I can state is what Yoshida has stated and that he doesnt want to add it as the software is very invasive and as a gamer himself he wouldn't want it.