A warning.

Oh FFS!!!

ANOTHER mistaken banned account by Anet. I cannot fathom the amount of innocent people who have been banned because of Anet's "assumptions". In EVERY posted/quoted email from Anet, they admit it was an ASSUMPTION based on behavior observed...

...That is UTTERLY ridiculous. Now 700+ hours of farming @ 6 hrs a day average spans across about 116 days. Admittedly, that is a long span of farming as an individual. Despite that fact, Anet neglected to offer ANY kind of proof whatsoever, such as the dates or span of time that they were observing his account, offering instances of specific repeating behaviors, or even specific times that he was observed making suspicious actions.

All too often we hear these stories, and i shudder at the day i farm for a couple days straight in an effort to get FoW armor, only to be banned the next day because Anet simply thinks i'm a bot. Like the many thousands of you out there, i am a legit, clean player who NEVER breaks the EULA using pure common sense! I can honestly say, if i ever get perma banned, and they refuse to lift the ban, i will bring it to the courts. i payed for the game, i follow the rules. For them to take away the use of something i payed for out of suspicion is again, completely ludacris.

The way they go about this is comparable to cops putting some kid in jail cause he looks like a thief, while offering no other reason, no other proof, without FINDING any proof and without first listening/asking the kid. Reasonable suspicion ONLY works if you have some degree of visual/audible proof. Without such a thing, if an action is taken, cops are reprimanded...

Anet, get your act together. If you cannot do it correctly, hire someone who CAN. I do admit, Anet in some cases comes through and actually helps mediate the community by keeping real botters out. But so many stoires like these, makes me wonder...

My personal experience thus far and currently is just as dissapointing and i pretty much don't ever hold out hope that they can help me anymore these days.

Cheers.

File a complaint with the Better Business Bureau.

http://www.bbb.org/

It might not do good, but it might be able to get you unbanned, if you haven't broken any of their violations (as they have NO physical proof that you were running anything, unless of course you were).

no dancing as an assassin

I think you haven't read all the replies, but it's okay, it's a bit long to read. The guy got his account back.

I read everything you guys wrote and I have a question: How is it possible to make a bot able to solo farm? I have to say I know only some bases in programming. I think any type of solo farming needs a human controller. Spawns often change each time you exit a town or outpost. I thought a bot was like: go there, then do that. get drops then go back to town. rinse and repeat.

But how can you tell a bot to: Use prot spirit before it flashes, so if it gets interupted, you can cast it again without dying. Don't use Hb if you have only 1 or 2 foes attacking -> Mending will heal you enought. If you use Hb, you may get out of energy, and those 1 or 2 foes could kill you.

I mean, this may look stupid, but if I could be able to get a bot able to solo stuff as well as I do,(Sf, Uw, Fow, Giants, Bosses, Desert, and some others) I'd get it. I'd buy another Guildwars, run the bot, let it farm, transfer the good items and money to my account. If they ban my "bot" account, haha okay, thx. I buy another Guildwars, run the bot, let it farm, etc. I'd really do it(I would not really do it, read till the end please), but I really, really doubt someone can do such a bot. Even as a human, I get to like 10-15hp, and save myself by using a certain skill, using certain skill in an unusual order, running away, I don't know.

This is mostly to know if today, the 23th of august (year=2006), it is possible to make a bot able to think? If yes and since the 2 last paragraphs you are like: "Omg, this guy has to get off his bike and learn about programming, what a no life!" then I'm really sorry, I didn't know. If you think it is not possible, then my point is: Why arena net could have thought wilderness was a bot if he was soloing stuff(He said he was mostly soloing the FoW)? Do soloers really need to worry about being mistaken for bots?

Actually, using logical statement ofcourse.

A simple bot is go there do that and repeat. But what we talking about isnt simple bot that repeat order, we are talking advance bot that using logical statement to determine what skill to use.

You dont make the bot to think, you insert simple logic statement to make the bot to determine which skill to use. Like a normal procedure and a interupt call, the normal procedure will rince and repeat but if certain criteria met, they will execute the interuption call. They wont act as good as human does and adapt all situation, that why people revise and tune the bot 'AI' or logical statement.

An experience Soloer or a soloer that do the same farming again and again for a lots of time would likely develop a pattern, maybe not the exact same pattern everytime, but similar. That pattern can misinterpret as a bot action.

The only limitation on bot is, how hard is certain criteria to be defined, they wont know what to do if a special situation occur, like he suddenly mapped to another place(this was used to find botter in another game, warp the bot to another place and see it reaction, better than trying to chat with him), another method is to empty the area or spawn some mobs in the area and see it reaction, of course, the bot can log off. But if the person in question keep log off everytime you 'trick' it, then they have reason to suspect it is a bot.

I'm no programmer, but I would think that making a bot for a game like GW would involve capturing incoming packets and knowing what information is being transmitted. That information can tell the program what enemies are where, what drops to pick up, etc. Then a series of commands tell the character to use which skills in which scenario/mob setup. That's how I'd do it, at least.

Windows doesn't get picked up on Norton Antivirus because apparently it isn't coded similarly to a virus. The program he used does.

lmao no dancing like an assasin ohhh and thnks for not closing this post unienaule I think this is important for people to see

EDIT: Due to my mild dyslexia lmao

Do you still not understand? Norton or anykind of AV can capture false positive result.

A-Net have no way to know what you have installed on YOUR computer. They cannot install any scanner program on YOUR computer without notifying you.

The interaction of said program and GW are probably using the standard windows function to minimise or hide if any interaction between them occured. And i doubt said program will interact with GW.

A lot of legit program have been picked up by Norton(BTW, Norton is not the end of all virus AV) or any AV software.

How do you know said program is programmed like a virus? Are you the programmer of said program?

Thanks for the information Silver Fang! Now I know I really have to worry, all I do is soloing the same things. I guess I need to try pvp.

Actually, i dont think you need to worry about it. It happens when it happens and you have no way to prevent it happens if it really happens. So, no need to worry.

there are lots of farmer and only few(compare to the total number of legit farmer) of them have been banned.

lol, you know what im talking about? And actually, i used way too much actually in my posts.

Oh, isnt american use the innocent until proven card?

I too was banned for no apparent reason. Anet claimed that I was running a bot, when I wasnt. Im just like the guy that started this thread. On the day in question, I farmed for about 3hrs, I didnt use the same route, I didnt use the skills in the same order. But during those 3 hrs their was a period of an hour to an hour and a half were I just left my char standing in town, or in the area I was farming, because I had some work to do, and its a pain to restart guild wars on my pos laptop every single time. Im still in the process of trying to get my account reinstated. Ive been sending messages to the support team trying to get my account back. Im really upset, I spent hundreds of hours, I farm so that I can get better equipment and progress through the game, and pvp better. I farm so that I can become a better player. I just realized when reading over the Guild wars box/book. Anet states they dont reward players on how long they play, but how well they play. How can I become a better player if Anet wont let me farm to my hearts content? The Rules of conduct and EULA dont state that farming is illegal. Im just really disappointed right now.

heh its quite funny really that ppl who farm have to resort to talking to themselves or dance in order to not be recognised as bots and thus not get banned. Sounds like Anet is creating a bunch of crazy ppl who talk to themselves and dance around for nobody to see

So...standing around is botlike behavior and subject to banning.
Farming is botlike behavior and subject to banning.
Apparently, from other things I've read, selling things for a large amount of ingame cash is also suspicious and subject to banning. At this point, simply playing the game could get you banned. Pretty sad.

I'm really curious about how much Anet can actually detect in individual's computers. Say, for example, my firewall minimizes my game screen without warning several times a day, interrupting my play. Since that is technically a third-party program, am I subject to the ban stick?

I want to laugh at the ridiculousness of the paranoia, but I can't. It's all too real.

It's true. My anti-virus seems to hate Gamespy (for playing SWBF, BF2) and always gets anoyed with it.


About this whole thread and bannings in game.

This game is owned by ArenaNet. None of the players own the game. The servers for the game are run and maintained by ArenaNet, and as such they own all content of Guild Wars.
Attempting to file a lawsuit based on a change in game, or banning of your account is like trying to sue the Government (only the government is not as powerful in reality).
ArenaNet IS the authority in the Guild Wars world, you cannot do anything about that.


Now the thing that should be fixed to help prevent unjust bannings, is the implementation of a warning system.
1)First Warning - A message pops up when you log in, warning you.
2)Second Warning - You are banned for a week, warning messages are displayed.
3)Permanent Ban - You have obviously not stopped by now, and so even if you are not a bot, you should have figured it out.

The numbers would not disapear over time; if you get a 1st warning in January, then get suspected again in December, it would go to a 2nd warning. This way botters couldn't temporarily "retire" an account.

Also, accounts that recive a 1st or 2nd warning would not be able to trade for 1 week afterwards (to stop botters from "killing" the account).

[rotfl mode] is vent or ts a 3rd party program?? [/rotfl mode]

This is really beginning to get ridiculous.

I appreciate that AN is trying to eliminate botters and enforce their rules, but this is too much. There have simply been too many false bannings.

Personally, I'm not worried about getting banned myself. My playtime is at inconsistent times throughout the week, I play and have played nearly all of the PvE/PvP modes in the game, and my in-game wealth is consistent. What I am worried about is all of the negative PR that this brings to AN, which will in the long run hurt sales and the size of the playerbase, which will ultimately shorten GW's lifespan.

AN's banning criteria and attitude towards its paying customers who may appear to have broken a rule needs to change. They're not running a bank or a stock exchange, it's just a video game. A potential botter or even a real botter is not a criminal.

This is why i have 4 accounts. Arenanet better not delete one of them or i shall send 12 Wammoes to Gailes avatar and hump her into oblivion.

Well spotting a bot is hard because well after you do things over and over you don't want to put in the ffort to make each run unique, so ya you look like a bot.

all in all i believe it's a good thing a-net is so determined to get rid of the bots. but i think, banning someone just on the way he moves or behaves in an outpost, without even trying to whisper to that person, isnt the right thing to do.

when im farming in an explorable, i zone to the closest outpost, walk up to the merchent, go to my storage to store my crafting materials and off i am again, to the portal. i myself always click on the signs next to the portals, because im too lazy to walk all that way over and over again. :P so, yeah, this might look actually look like a bot is running my account, when im just too lazy to do it myself. but walking in a "mechanical" way is not a reason to ban a person. a moderator who sees strange behaviour like that, could at least try to pm the player and start a conversation. im pretty much sure theres no bots around who can have a discussion with you about a news related subject or whatever you want to ask that player.

you shouldnt get banned just on an assumption, thats just plain wrong.

Human eye probably won't see a difference if there is a bot or a very routined human player but a computer program can. ArenaNet has access to all data including character movement points so they can watch it and see if it is too accurate. Humans can't move exactly same way everytime but a bot can. Some bot programs might have a bit random movement commands everytime but they still would be too clean.

Haha, if only that were true... Google "starforce copy protection" and, although it's considerably less intrusive, "world of warcraft warden". GW doesn't appear to have any such nastinesses, though.

How can you possibly know how many bannings there's been, or how many of those were by mistake? Or even that there's any mistaken bannings at all?

Don't believe that all who complain are honest; when Valve banned pirated Half-Life 2 serial numbers and people who'd used a bug to download HL2 for free, there were literally HUNDREDS of people in the Valve fora screaming about being unfairly banned, all of them swearing on their mothers grave they weren't pirates.
And again, Valve _only banned known pirate serials_, straight outta the bittorrent .inf.

We have the OP's word that he's innocent, and we know that both users and ANet can make mistakes - and that's all we know.

Hmmm, yeah, this is kinda worrying...looks like my Mesmer will have to do less Kirin Farming in Pongmei from now on....doesn't sound good. I do tend to go to the same group of Kirin every time and use the same spells...I think if Anet cut me off for "looking like a bot" I would start to get the shakes if I did not get my GW fix! Although, personally, if they did it to me and gave me my account back (congratulations to OP by the way) and then they did it again for any reason...I would fight them even harder, because it's just not right. I would demand the proof from them for the first ban anyway, just to see what their "proof" was. I'm waiting for them to ban anyone who kills anything in GW, "just in case they're a bot". Really, "Just in case" or "that looks like" or "maybe it is" is just not acceptable reasoning to justify a ban.

I don't think anyone here has a problem with them getting rid of bots? The issue is as soon as the "think" something is not right they ban the account! No attempt to ask questions, no actual proof (if they had it then he would still be banned!)

They need to look closely at their banning policy and rather than just ban someone for "looking" like they are using a thrid party, they should only ban when they are 100% sure they are in breach of their terms and conditions and have proof.

If they are accusing you then they should have evidence to back it up! Otherwise it becomes a "shoot first and ask questions later" culture which is not going to be endering to your customers.

Yes anyone can make mistakes! But what they should be doing is minimising the chances of mistakes happening.

They have made the same sorts of mistakes on a regular basis, so why are they not actually learning from their mistakes?

As I said, the bots are a problem but I think that the better way of targeting the bot farmers who are using them to sell gold via ebay etc... is not the just aim at the bot farmer but the buyers as well. Take away the demand for buying gold and the supply will dry up! Of course you have to find a way to remove the demand. I feel that if they fed back to the community that they have banned x amount of people today for buying gold or items outside of the game (i.e for real money), that would send a signal that this sort of thing is, not acceptable and is being watched for. Banning the bot farmer, just means they go out and buy another account! If you think about it, not banning the bot farmer means you can watch them better, and find who they are dealing with!

I don't think they have a problem with people farming as it is a legitimate way to get enough gold to pay for the ingame items! The issue is with people farming for gold or drops that they then sell online for real money.

This bit is for fun and not to be taken seriously, unless others agree?

They should have some new events!

Public stoning, buy stones from town merchant and stone the people proven to be buying gold!

Public hanging for the bot farmers!

Anyone falsely accused is publicly pardoned and carried around the town on a guards shoulders!

LOL

Starforce, is a joke, anyway, When you installing the game, you are informed such program exists and need to be install, as well as WoW, they have to inform you before installing anything like that.

But, i have never heard anything from A-Net planning to and have already install any sort of 'protection' program on my computer, and thus, they cannot do so, that is the point of with out me agree to, or rather, without notifying me.

Yes, starforce is a joke, but not a funny one, and no, they don't inform you.
Not only is it stealth-installed without ever informing the user, but when you uninstall the game, Starforce is left running. Go google.

Yeah, WoW tells you. So did Sony with their rootkit: http://www.sysinternals.com/blog/sony-eula.htm

And my point is that you're wrong. It is not only possible, it is commonplace.

When i install game with starforce, they asked me do i want to install it or not, and if i chose not to install it, i cant play the game, so, i assume starforce do ask you about it. And starforce is a Pain in the butt. i actually need to reformat my computer just to get rid of it.

We should all boycott starforce games^^

we are not talking about protection software but system scanning software. which they sent the result back to the company.

I can't think of any other way. How can Anet have absolute proof of botting?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally Posted by areanet
Hello Bracken,

Thank you for contacting the Guild Wars customer support team. A game moderator did witness automated behaviour in game while observing your character, this indicated the use of an automated third-party program, which is why we closed the account. In this case, as you are a one-time offender, we will remove the ban. However, please be aware that if we notice similar behaviour in the future, we will have to close your account permanently. Please allow 24 hours for this to take effect.

Please feel free to contact the support team again if you encounter any other problems.

Regards,

GM Trent

Guild Wars Customer Support
NCsoft Europe
http://www.guildwars.com
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
That a game moderator "witnessed" behaviour that "indicated" the use of a third-party progam is a clear admission by Anet that they don't have a definitive way of detecting whether or not a third-party program is actually being used. In otherwords, they are just guessing.

While most everyone agrees that getting rid of bots and hacks is a good thing, no one would want their account banned soley because it "looked" like they were using a third-party program. IMO, Anet has royally screwed up on the banning issue and should halt any bannings based only on a GM's opinion.

If they wish to continue such bannings, they should at least include what behaviour "looks" automated in the EULA so that players know how to avoid doing things that may result in losing their account.

^ Exactly. ANet have not, to my knowledge, put down in writing what they consider to be "automated behaviour". That would be a first step to cutting down the number of mistaken bannings. Secondly, the attitude of the response the OP received from ANet is just pathetic. Paraphrasing - "OK we're not sure you actually were using a 3rd party program, but even so you've been warned - dont do it again!" For a company that's business involves continued relations with it's customers, their PR is frankly very poor.

How come he gets banned yet there is a CLEAR stream of bots in Elona that have not been? I ll tell you why, ANET wants to make sure their overseas sales continue to rise. How many copies of US server GW have gone to China? No matter how they got there ANET still gets the money. Yet average "Joe-Farmer" gets banned for playing on his own server? The only thing this company seems to do is piss US players off (and AUS, NZ) and at the sametime bends over backwards to kiss Asia's butt. Where were are Coca-Cola promotional skins that Korea got? If that stream of Squirrel Farmers in Elona are allowed to be there with no ban, by God we better be able to Farm. I dont see US players getting the option to go Farm on Asian servers. I wont be buying Nightfall, they might as well go ahead and ship my copy over to the Bejing sweatshop.... all i have to say

Does this mean I can get banned for dancing with a male assassin? Q_Q

congratulations; you're only like the third person to make that joke

That would actually worry me more. Ingame gold traders have to get their gold from somewhere. In my mind, gold traders get gold in the following ways: (1) kill monsters, pick up gold coinage and items that are sold to NPC merchants; (2) Good drops will more than likely be sold to other players, as a whole or as salvaged mods. (They probably have a network of bots and low paid human farmers doing this).

I rarely trade with other players, as I tend to go out and farm for mods and weapons that I want. However, if I farm for hours and fail to get such items and I see someone selling something I wanted for a reasonable price, I would jump at the chance and buy it. Now if that trader is part of a ingame gold selling operation, could I be banned? Would anet just assume that I'm part of the operation because I have had dealings with a marked farmer/gold seller?

its actually nuts that anything "vaguely resembling bot behavior is getting caught up in the bureaucracy, I'm almost scared to look the wrong way at the moment

A friend of mine has this bloody *peeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep* Problem to. I wonder how they're going to do this in the future. If they kepe banning everyone that ''Acts like a robot'' than there will almost NO players left. I quited this game due to my friends ban.

~Boy

Maybe I should be a little more creative in my LFG calls so they don't think I'm a bot Usually I just repeat the same generic call over and over...

Well Alias, the email back to him said that he LOOKED like he was using a 3rd party program, not that one was detected or noticed. Basically they stated he "looked" like a bot, so this whole 3rd party program he had whether legal or what have you is not the issue. Or at least not the issue they had with him, so it is a moot argument.
He was witnessed IN GAME looking like a bot, but they seem to not want to tell him the specifics of what that means. So in the end, I think Anet is covering their own arses for banning him with no real evidence.



And to whoever it was that asked if you could get banned for afking for too long: yes!

Back when I played Parallel Universe (almost 4yrs ago), there was a bot type program you could download. At the time I knew nothing about bot programs or that this is what it was. My friend told me how to use it and so forth and basically you run the farming area once and it copies your movements and repeats those movements over and over... Sometimes it just up and stops or you set it to a timer of how many times you want it to repeat the process and thusly it does and then it stops.
So you repeat the same farming bot type action over and over for 3+hrs and then say you decide to go have dinner and leave yourself afk for a long period of time and then come back and shut it off without ever moving further OR you continue back to your farming just as you had before.. This equals to bot activity

Now any bot user who wanted to be smart about how to use this, would just run it longer and do different things or 2 different zones or what have you... Changing the whole dynamic of the way it runs. However when you do that you run more of a risk of not getting the program to run in full, because you can inadvertantly screw up somewhere and that will cause the program to glitch and stop running.

Now what I think Anet fails to see is that most bots can make the run so friggen fast that its just to unlikely that its a human doing it. When I watched the bots coming in and out of Beetletun they were doing so in an uncannily fast manner and you could tell that they were bots... Some were better programmed than others, but you could also tell which person had more than one bot, because they were running the same bot for their other character and thusly running in the same path.

I don't think I could farm that fast if I wanted to! On a couple of occassions I would actually see the bots run their course and thusly stop and then would come the other bots running on that same program (you can save the way it works so that you can use it for others) eventually stop also on the spot as the others always running in the same manner and so forth.

It's so simple and yet so complex, but that is the general idea of how it works. While I think Anet made a mistake in this case as well as others, they are "trying" to get rid of bots and for that no one can blame them (not even the OP). But I think they need to be a little more certain, or at least be willing to explain with conviction and certainty what was witnessed. If they truly believe that you were using a 3rd party program or acting like a bot, then it reasons that if you really were they would not have allowed you your account back so easily and with such little explination.
If you WERE using a bot program then you know what you were doing so them explaining how it looked bot like would not have been news to you. However their email lacked much conviction and sounded more like they were trying to cover their own arses. *shrugs*


(sorry for the long drawn out post with lack of grammar, spelling, and punctuation!)

people making that statement are not thinking, are botters, or just plain bandini for brains.

*ok botters here is exactly what we are looking for in a bot so you can avoid doing any of the above to avoid being detected*

/total complete bandini brains (bandini-the finest name in fertilizer)

A few months ago, a chinese dude joined my guild. One day he told us he had been selling gold, and explained us how it works.

Basically there are two kinds of "professional farmers": bots, and individual players/farmers. Companies selling gold usually perchase botting programs to do the farming. A few underpaid employees are there to check the drops, sell the valuable stuff, transfer the gold to other accounts in order to sell it for real cash etc. This is well known.

But there are also poor guys in China farming for money. Usually that's just poor dudes who would like to play the game as anyone but have financial problems and have to find a way to make some cash. Most of them don't use bot programs - they just farm like crazy, buy low sell high etc. Most of the chinese traders in droks int who are believed to belong to the first category actually belong to this second category. They do sell their cash to gold selling companies, but not directly. One common trick is to sell gold via forums: you exchange gold for forum points (which apparently is not illegal as you don't sell gold for cash), and with enough forum points you are "rewarded" with real cash. Of course, the owners of those forums either sell the cash to companies or are owned by those companies.