OFFICIAL: Confirmed botting, node-teleporting, terrain-hacking,and exploitation!

[Sivara]

Yes I have frequently seen all manner of bots mining in Thanalan on Sargatanas. i reported the more flagrant team of them. We'll see if anything happens I guess.

I'm on Sargatanas too (/wave) and I saw a bot last night in Spineless Basin. I was actually surprised that I could see only one. They weren't even underground -- just teleporting all over the place in the open. I reported them but I really don't have much faith in SE. The autofarming bot my husband reported on Sunday is still in the game and racking up achievements on Lodestone. Ugh.

[Skiedragon]

u can thank basa bots for most of this they are actualy selling bots for real cash... why would u PAY for a game AND a sub and then Bot it and never play it for all this time it boggles my mind.

[Mysteryman2000]

With all due respect, it's a non-issue.
Having looked at the images, those guys are mining crystal shards and if they really wanted to do that effectively they would one shot low level sprites with a 50 DoW. They don't matter.

Speeding up the process or not the AH is being affected, they even have hunting bots which are like my worst fear come true. I have seen the bots fail at farming mobs but the major issue is mats that were selling for 250 per, and now being sold at 50 per. Instant gratification kills games, and lowballs everyone else.

[geekgirl101]

Gathering is a slow and grindy process, botting is a temptation that I've had to personally slap sense into myself to avoid. It also takes a lot longer to level up gathering skills than crafting skills, even with leves and manuals. I can understand people wanting to bot gather because it is just...so...slow...and...boring... doesn't make it right though.

Speeding up the process or not the AH is being affected, they even have hunting bots which are like my worst fear come true. I have seen the bots fail at farming mobs but the major issue is mats that were selling for 250 per, and now being sold at 50 per. Instant gratification kills games, and lowballs everyone else.

The reason for that is because everything is fast and easy to level. This is the way things are turning because of the way the system is designed:

1) DoW/DoM fast to level, players able to fast kill low level mobs in large numbers and mass-farm materials
2) High level materials obtained via philosophy tomes which have no limit on how many you can farm per week
3) Gathering jobs take a long time to level, huge amounts of materials being produced from gathering
4) Crafting leves increase leveling speed of crafting jobs, demand for most crafting materials low
5) Crafted equipment and low level consumables not essential, can get the same equipment from quests and NPCs or even better equipment from dungeons, demand for crafted equipment and consumables low
6) Farm bots reported but not being addressed quickly enough, more gathered materials being flooded into the market

So as you can see, there's lots of materials being gathered but the demand is always low. Those trying to sell materials are in a battle to sell theirs first and will keep on dropping the prices until it's as worthless as vendor trash. Those who make crafted items are also in a mad battle to sell theirs and because the demand is low then the prices of those are dropping fast also. SE brought this up on themselves by making everything too quick to level (except the gathering) and by removing the need of crafted equipment.