Petition to Demand a Response from Anet on Botting

Thevil King

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Jul 2006

Quote:
Originally Posted by spun ducky View Post
EULA's can't be enforced in almost all situations and also in a lot of places the EULA is not a legal binding contract that is honored. It's purpose is not to tell the player what they can and can't do but basically protect the developer from any legal claims.

So to sum it up the EULA isn't worth the bits its made of when it comes to enforcing 'Rules' and the game companies know it. Why do you think they rather just ban/suspend an account rather than sue the pants off a person in violation?
they are not the same, nor was it ever said that they are. but the logic taken from this analogy is exactly the same. namely incentives/consequences for different actions, for example reward and punishment, etc.

sixdartbart

sixdartbart

Forge Runner

Join Date: Jun 2005

Peace Machine GRRR [DiE]

W/N

Quote:
Originally Posted by QueenofDeath View Post

As long as you have free to play no monthly fee games you will have this kind of riff raff and in hordes just like it is now. Start charging and these botters will disappear rapidly because it eats into their profits.
Actually it's much worse in P2P games.
People were running the AoCbuddy cheat program within days of AoC being released, Failcom did little to nothing about it and it tanked what should have been a great game within a few months and now most of the very few remaining players are mearly the cheating punks that ruin every game that allow them to run wild.

Anyone who doesn't make keeping this kind of trash out of their games a top priority will end the same way so I hope Anet has a better plan for GW2.

StormX

StormX

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Nov 2005

E/Mo

Quote:
Originally Posted by Scarlett Romanov View Post
You know that's bull. Go to Fort Aspenwood. There are botters that have been there since atleast last summer. (A certain elementalist....I'm sure you know who.) He has Dishonorable hexes on him all the time. I've reported him. Others have. I've manually reported him through the ncsoft website. Point is, if they're actually looking at reports, they'd see that this asshat has been labeled a leecher (automatically by the system) and by several players since last year! I'm about 95% sure that reports go directly to limbo.
lol, only 95%? I'm 99.99% certain that bot reports go straight into the trash folder. I'm also certain that they *actually* ban *thousands* of bots each month, none of which I ever see, while old Joe Schmoe who has been RoJ botting in JQ for the past X months or so (and been reported by dozens of other players), happens to slip through the dragnet each time. Yeah I'm sure anet takes botting VRY SRSLY.

Quail Stomp

Academy Page

Join Date: Jan 2010

N/A

If they can't do anything about it then should they remove it from the rules of conduct? I don't care about titles or gold, i play this game for fun. I do find pvp more fun than pve just from testing my skills against other players. Thats the main problem for me, i can beat a bot but its not fun and takes away a lot from the game. Yes i know little can and will be done because the game is old.

Missing HB

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Mar 2010

Anna

A/

/signed , but the thing is that , if nothing is done soon , there will be more and more botters . People who keep losing to bots , especially in RA or GvG , looking that nothing is done , will think on starting running it . Then , people who wil lose to them will use it too , etc.. .

I will add that HB was the only arena where there was almost no botters , and where it wasn't a matter for opponents , since they were only resigning in order to decrease rating. But , it was deleted , leading place to an arena where there are ONLY bots . It's not a QQ , but it's nice when you have an arena where you know you won't ruin your time and fun by facing bots , etc...

Ariovist Lynxkind

Ariovist Lynxkind

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2006

Lynxkind Atrium, Echovald Forest, Cantha

Death Bringers Union [DBU]

R/

/Signed, but mainly because of the fact that it goes against the rules and regulations of the game. People have been banned for less (abusive language or scamming as 2 examples) and I dont think a blind eye should be turned here


However

I do believe this is something that should be or at least addressed with GW2. The main thing which I have with it in GW1 is the ones in the PvP area, because it does impact on other players. PvE.... not so much. Yeah, they farm gold and loot, but other than that not much harm (though I still dont support them). However, in GW2 with a persistent world, it will end up affecting both PvP and PvE players, and I hope they have better control over it with that game. Last thing you want is to start out a new toon, regardless if you are noob or vet, and some bot comes through and kills a mob without you getting a shot off (and the experience and loot going with it)

Carma

Ascalonian Squire

Join Date: Jan 2009

Denmark

League of Friends

Mo/

Quote:
Originally Posted by QueenofDeath View Post
Now since they haven't done any good in 5 years with this version what makes you think they are going to do any better in GW2. I love these hope and wishes threads because they never qualify anything and deal with delusions that things will get better. The botting issues are one of the major reasons I won't buy into GW2 nor recommend to anyone or that anyone comes back to GW and wastes their money on it.

As long as you have free to play no monthly fee games you will have this kind of riff raff and in hordes just like it is now. Start charging and these botters will disappear rapidly because it eats into their profits.
Unfortunately I'm sure there will be bots in GW2 as well.

But please, the bots are swarming in pretty much every online game including pay to play (not least WoW, LoTR Online etc.).

Just try and google *Insert Game Name Here* + bot and you'll see...

So this is not something I'd adress to Anet but more to the gaming industri as a whole.

Missing HB

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Mar 2010

Anna

A/

Sure , but why then did they remove Heroes from Ha/Gvg , especially because of Tease hero mesmers .
I do not see the problem since bots already existed at that time , and still do now ( and , for having played Hb a lot + using some rupters heroes in pve , i can tell you that they are nothing compared to actual bots ).

Mangione

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: May 2007

Here comes the careboat from Anet |______/

I stopped playing when I've had enough of ANet not take seriously its own code of conduct.
What's the point of playing by the rules if they let cheaters get away with it?
Arena.Net doesn't care and won't enforce its own rules.
  • I remember the days of Red Resigns, which WAS match manipulation.
  • I remember the days of a notorious guild doing a conga line to manipulate the outcome of a tournament.
  • Pepole where HFFF botting the kurzick title.
  • PvX won the "build your henchman" contest.

The RRs were left alone, since they were too high in numbers (not even a two weeks temp ban), the conga guild managed to get away with it with just a slap on the hand (the loss of the gold trim for that tournament).

The HFFF botters weren't punished, even though they knew that botting was against the rules.

The rules of the contest "build the henchman" (or whatever was called) stated that the build submitted had to be somehow "unique", and not be published elsewhere. Yet most of the builds that won were already on PvX... So, why make a contest at all if you are just getting PvX builds? (Again, the players who respected the rules felt somehow screwed).

The only time I remember a good ban for cheating was when they banned 117 players for exploiting a "secret" outpost that gave them the chance to get to Mallyx (and farm him) skipping all the previous areas.

Arena Net doesn't care anymore about Guild Wars.
They are just keeping it on suspended animation as a bridge towards their next product.
I came on the forum after a long time of no playing to see if, after several months of nothing, they were doing something interesting, and been really disappointed. For the 4th birthday the Live Team pulled out Zaishen Menagerie, Zaishen Quests, Nicholas the Traveler, Makeovers, Namechanges, Storage Panes, and much more... this year... /meh, costumes.

I'd say get rid of botters, enforce the rules you made, and swing that damn banhammer.
It doesn't matter the number of cheaters. As long they cheat, they MUST be banned.

GG Anet.

Ariovist Lynxkind

Ariovist Lynxkind

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2006

Lynxkind Atrium, Echovald Forest, Cantha

Death Bringers Union [DBU]

R/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Mangione View Post
I came on the forum after a long time of no playing to see if, after several months of nothing, they were doing something interesting, and been really disappointed. For the 4th birthday the Live Team pulled out Zaishen Menagerie, Zaishen Quests, Nicholas the Traveler, Makeovers, Namechanges, Storage Panes, and much more... this year... /meh, costumes.
While I kinda tend to agree with most of your post, to be fair to Anet this part kinda wasnt their fault. The stuff we are getting (GW Beyond/WiK) had to be delayed due to the illness of the team lead (Lindsey's back playing up, if you haven't bothered reading the other threads). Given the limited numbers on the LT, and Lindsey being the lead, this kind of thing cant be helped.

Mangione

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: May 2007

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ariovist Lynxkind View Post
The stuff we are getting (GW Beyond/WiK) had to be delayed due to the illness of the team lead (Lindsey's back playing up, if you haven't bothered reading the other threads). Given the limited numbers on the LT, and Lindsey being the lead, this kind of thing cant be helped.
Oh, I didn't know that.
As I said, I just returned to see what was going around, and just skimmed the update notes, so I did not see that info about Linsey being ill.
If that is so, I wish her to stay well and get back in shape soon.

BTW, I still hope that the delayed content will be up to the content released last year.

tmakinen

tmakinen

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Nov 2005

www.mybearfriend.net

Servants of Fortuna [SoF]

E/

Quote:
Originally Posted by merek View Post
look at all the ones (not only W/N but also E/Me) that come into the circle directly in front of the zoning area and then turn immediately around an d go right back outside.. you try and do it.. you can't they are bots
Incorrect. Every farmer worth his/her salt knows how to set the jump point to the nearest exit the way you describe: Go out. Come in. Go out. Farm. /resign. Hit X. Hit R. Repeat from Farm. This has nothing to do with botting.

Concerning OP, I'm rather pessimistic about the prospects of getting rid of bots at this stage of the game.

Ariovist Lynxkind

Ariovist Lynxkind

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2006

Lynxkind Atrium, Echovald Forest, Cantha

Death Bringers Union [DBU]

R/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Mangione View Post
Oh, I didn't know that.
As I said, I just returned to see what was going around, and just skimmed the update notes, so I did not see that info about Linsey being ill.
If that is so, I wish her to stay well and get back in shape soon.

BTW, I still hope that the delayed content will be up to the content released last year.
I cant remember which thread it was first mentioned in (Regina mentioned it in one of them) but yeah, it has been mentioned in a few, and the GW Beyond stuff will be continued to be rolled out but I dont think it will be a great lump like the anniversary stuff last year, and could end up having more stuff. But all this getting a tad off topic

McMullen

McMullen

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Oct 2005

R/W

/signed
Some very selfish views here (I don't PvP so I don't care, etc..) but PvP bots do have a knock on effect on PvE since they hoard z-keys. And bots in general will have a knock on effect on GW2 thanks to the HoM.
Also, I'm sure most players who go into a PvP arena want to play with a team of humans against teams of other humans and win based on their skill and knowledge of the game.
Those who just say "abuse their weakness by cancelling skills, etc..", you're really missing the point and the bots have about 5 or more interrupts packed onto their bar and are capable of interrupting 1/4 casts.. so cancelling a key skill 5 times in a row is pretty damn pointless (25 energy WoH GOGOGO!).

If this really can't be fixed by updating the client, then I'd like to see a "Ban-Krewe" who hang around in bot hotspots and have the ability to temp ban bots and send high priority reports to A.Net.

Greedy Gus

Greedy Gus

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Feb 2006

Striking Distance

This is the most important thing for dev time right now; most if not all of gw1 manpower should have been on this already.

Dzjudz

Dzjudz

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: Jun 2005

gwpvx.com/user:dzjudz

Quote:
Originally Posted by merek View Post
Really? look at all the ones (not only W/N but also E/Me) that come into the circle directly in front of the zoning area and then turn immediately around an d go right back outside.. you try and do it.. you can't they are bots msg them see if you can type their name before they go back outside.
Umm, you probably never heard of the zone to resign trick? Zone into the explorable area -> zone into town -> zone into the explorable area -> now every time you resign you will end up at the spot you last entered the town (i.e. right at the portal).

Also, I've had several people msg me asking me if I was a bot, but somehow they never answered if I responded...

But yes, there were many bots during the festival. I mean, just go search for raptor farm bot on youtube and watch a movie or something.

And yes, I'd like to see the botters punished. I farmed my ass off to get 10 stacks of cupcakes and thanks to the botters who put in no effort at all they aren't worth crap anymore.

fowlero

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jan 2007

England, UK

We Are The One And Only [rR]

Quote:
Originally Posted by II Lucky Charm II View Post
Energy management is one of the many necessities in PvP play. Bots can not manage their energy mainly because they are pre-programmed to use a certain skill when certain conditions are met. There is no need to double the energy for important skills since most of the important skills already have their own draw back. For example, *psychic distraction* will disable your own skill bar if you happen to miss. Say the mesmer is pre programmed to interrupt Restore condition or word of healing with powerblock, the players can always cancel the 5 energy skill (woh/RC) to put a huge disadvantage on the interrupt bot.

For song of concentration and altar capture map, you can always bring a knock down on your team to KD the interrupt bot so the paragon can put up the song. Everything that exists in this world has a counter. Nothing is perfect and flawless.
Sorry, i didn't make it clear what i meant in my first post. I meant that saying the fact that interupt bots are in fact computer AI scripts and "of course you can just cancel cast" to invalidate them is a really dumb argument for the exact reasons you say.

By saying this "just cancel cast and their at the bots at disadvantage" you're forcing your team to double energy cost of every important skill they use, which while it may work in HA as matches are a lot shorter and hur dur channeling, for monks/midline in GvG it ruins you. As soon as monks take pressure or you have to make a push to correct a mistake etc you just cannot afford the energy to cancel cast, whereupon the bot may well rape you when it lands rupts.

It's much more prevailent in GvG because energy management is harder than in HA, and having to regular cancel your example of WoH/RC will eventually ruin your monks.

Everything in this world has a counter, this does not stop it from being incredibly powerful. So i raise your altar cap of "just KD the interupt bot", with a guardian and one of many teams 2 copies of aura of stability.

tl;dr - Just saying cancel cast vs interuptbots is an extremely asinine argument.

ChaoticCoyote

ChaoticCoyote

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: May 2006

Florida, USA

Imperial Order of the Iguana [IGGY]

R/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Zahr Dalsk View Post
As long as Guild Wars has grind, I'm 100% behind bots.

Don't want bots? Stop rewarding players for doing repetitive tasks.
This.

Don't reward bad behavior, and bad behavior will cease. Let's hope ANet understands that in designing GW2...

Hmmm... for the majority of casual players, bots don't really matter. So, are there so many casual and bot players that "serious" gamers aren't a target audience? I know that's why game AI isn't very smart (I've worked for game companies as a programmer/designer) -- make the AI too smart (i.e., challenging), and it chases away the casuals. In the case of bots, why put effort into stopping a behavior that negatively impacts a very tiny portion of the player community?

lishi

Forge Runner

Join Date: Jul 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by McMullen View Post
/signed
Some very selfish views here (I don't PvP so I don't care, etc..) but PvP bots do have a knock on effect on PvE since they hoard z-keys. And bots in general will have a knock on effect on GW2 thanks to the HoM.
Also, I'm sure most players who go into a PvP arena want to play with a team of humans against teams of other humans and win based on their skill and knowledge of the game.
Those who just say "abuse their weakness by cancelling skills, etc..", you're really missing the point and the bots have about 5 or more interrupts packed onto their bar and are capable of interrupting 1/4 casts.. so cancelling a key skill 5 times in a row is pretty damn pointless (25 energy WoH GOGOGO!).

If this really can't be fixed by updating the client, then I'd like to see a "Ban-Krewe" who hang around in bot hotspots and have the ability to temp ban bots and send high priority reports to A.Net.
The zkey are the last of your problem.

So far i know you can bot :

luxon title
asura title
wisdom (raptor farm)
treasure hunter (lockpick from raptor)
party (from money and drop)
sweet (same)
codex title

Of course the amount of gold that will provide will make other title easier to get.

Essence Snow

Essence Snow

Unbridled Enthusiasm!

Join Date: Nov 2009

EST

DPR

Quote:
Originally Posted by Mangione View Post


PvX won the "build your henchman" contest.

The rules of the contest "build the henchman" (or whatever was called) stated that the build submitted had to be somehow "unique", and not be published elsewhere. Yet most of the builds that won were already on PvX... So, why make a contest at all if you are just getting PvX builds? (Again, the players who respected the rules felt somehow screwed).

GG Anet.
This bothered me more so than most of the others. How many ppl would have copy pasted if they had known you could violate the rules and win. Now we have a constant reminder of some cheaters in our guild halls. To quote you a second time "GG Anet".

Zahr Dalsk

Grotto Attendant

Join Date: Aug 2007

Canada

Saying it again, just because.

Remove grind and you remove bots.

Grind should not be in GW in the first place. So remove it.

lishi

Forge Runner

Join Date: Jul 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by ChaoticCoyote View Post
This.

Don't reward bad behavior, and bad behavior will cease. Let's hope ANet understands that in designing GW2...

Hmmm... for the majority of casual players, bots don't really matter. So, are there so many casual and bot players that "serious" gamers aren't a target audience? I know that's why game AI isn't very smart (I've worked for game companies as a programmer/designer) -- make the AI too smart (i.e., challenging), and it chases away the casuals. In the case of bots, why put effort into stopping a behavior that negatively impacts a very tiny portion of the player community?
It's kinda too late for this game, and while i would love for anet to design gw2 that way I don't think you can actually do a MMORPG with that in mind. Just think of wat you would need to remove from GW pve to accomplish that.

- Money and drops
- Reward from completing a think the second time
- pretty much all the title of the game (i won't cry over it btw)

Guild wars will became exactly like anet wanted first. Start pve, get the hang of the game and then go pvp.(Ok for me)

But then you will have 2 problem here

1) Gw population clearly never followed that choosing to stick with pve, so anet will likely design gw2 for them.
2) What about the pvp bots?

Spiritz

Forge Runner

Join Date: Apr 2007

DMFC

Only glanced at first page as the rest will say more or less same thing.
Yes botting needs sorting out by anet but as someone said - anet catches the stupid bots - how the hell do you spot a clever bot ?
Ive said recently in a post on similar subject that its hard , 55 monk users who have been playing for several months or longer will know what i mean when on an outpost you get accused of being a bot because of armor/55 monk , hell i even responded in local and was chatting and yet the fool still said i was a programmed bot ( WTF! ) .
How does anet recognise a bot or more to the point a clever bot.
Names ? not always viable as some names are jokes like my necro who has arghhhh in his name just coz i thought it funny as foes say that when he kills them.
Armor ? again not viable
what they farm ? same again - some farms when you done over hundred times you end up walking same path , id bet most of the old a/e farmers could walk same route blindfolded .Im sure even runners often take same path each time.

Its easy for us to spot a bot when we spend a lot of time in 1 place but are anet going to pay staff to sit in 1 outpost all day to spot and report bots - most of the community would leap at that job or even do it for free.

Faster you remove and ban a bot a replacement comes in and over time the mark 1 bots becomes mark 2 and so on - they improve and often the botters who provide gold sellers get temp accounts or even probably hacked accounts and have multiple ways to get different ips.
Maybe anet should take a leaf out of the white mantles books and hire the peacekeepers to hunt down bots lol.
Bots as i said need to be dealt with and im sure anet is trying even if we dont see the action taken

Aussie Boy

Aussie Boy

Alcoholic

Join Date: Mar 2007

Australia

W/

/Signed
but we all know If they reply it will be "were working on GW2 .... bugger off."
I still see the bots i have reported in game months later in the same spot
doing the same thing so I doubt anything will be fixed properly.

Missing HB

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Mar 2010

Anna

A/

Yes , that henchman contest was a complete joke about rules they said , like " original bars " , " meta bars wouldn't be taken " . Me and some friends personnaly tried to work out some builds heroes/hench could use ( by checking IA in Hero Battles for example ) . However , we were quite mad to see that , upon all bars selected , ALL were from wiki . I

It looked like they didn't even care to check all bars , to see which could work , and they picked some randomly from wiki, which corresponded to existing build ( of course some people from a certain guild who already have some kanaxai mini do have many of those tonics too , how strange .. )

Anyway , back to the topic , bots are most annoying in PvP ( when you lose because your monks cannot cast any heal , etc..), and there will be more and more of those if nothing is done .

Meridon

Meridon

Lion's Arch Merchant

Join Date: Dec 2008

Funny Business Inc [FBI]

Quote:
Originally Posted by I Elite Starchild I View Post
This thread is ridiculous... everyone is /signing demanding a response from Anet?
Have any of you thought about what would happen if Anet was more "transparent" about an issue as delicate as botting?

tl:dr
A thread demanding information leading to the banning of bots is a double edged sword and will reduce the effecency of bot detection that Anet might employ, decreasing the number of bots banned, and leaving the issue partly unresolved.

A petition asking players to sign if they are overly offended by bots is a good way to let Anet know we as a community have had enough. But demanding information? Not the way to go.
In regard to botting, I am strongly in favor of a zero tolerance policy. I'm sure Anet is too, but the live team probably doesn't have the resources to enforce this policy. This brings a problem, there are certain rules but aren't enough resources to make sure the rules are followed. When, as a result, there's a mass of botting going on, Anet can do one of three things:

1. Allocate more resources to enforce a zero tolerance policy, and ban everyone who uses and has ever used a bot.
2. Allow botting since they can't seem to control it.
3. Modify the game in a way to make botting pointless.

As long as Anet doesn't leak details on how they are going to tackle the problem, there is no issue with them saying any of the above. Right now, Anet has said nothing about it other than the usual "we're aware of the issue, we understand your feelings, we're working on it."

In regard to demanding information, the subject of botting is just one of many examples in regard to transperancy. Until not too long ago, it was always a guess if there would be a skill update this month's next thursday or not, and I remember there being a huge discussion on this forum, with the Anet live team replying about why they didn't release the expected skill update. It could have all been prevented if people were informed beforehand to not expect a skill update. Luckily, this has changed now, with the Live Team distributing the Preliminary Skill Update Notes, which is in my opinion one of the best things the Live Team has done lately in regard to communication.

It doesn't have to be detailed, but as a customer of any kind of company, wouldn't you'd like at least a general meaningful response to your concerns?

Rocky Raccoon

Rocky Raccoon

Desert Nomad

Join Date: Jan 2007

Massachusetts, USA

Guardians of the Cosmos

R/Mo

I demand people not post demands. Will you listen to me? In short, no you won't. If people are going to cheat they will cheat and for every fix you do to stop them they will find another. I play the game to relax and have fun not to accomplish any set goals, if I happen to achieve something it's all good. People take video games way to seriously.

II Lucky Charm II

II Lucky Charm II

Frost Gate Guardian

Join Date: Jun 2006

Seoul, Korea

Mo/Me

Quote:
Originally Posted by fowlero View Post
Sorry, i didn't make it clear what i meant in my first post. I meant that saying the fact that interupt bots are in fact computer AI scripts and "of course you can just cancel cast" to invalidate them is a really dumb argument for the exact reasons you say.

By saying this "just cancel cast and their at the bots at disadvantage" you're forcing your team to double energy cost of every important skill they use, which while it may work in HA as matches are a lot shorter and hur dur channeling, for monks/midline in GvG it ruins you. As soon as monks take pressure or you have to make a push to correct a mistake etc you just cannot afford the energy to cancel cast, whereupon the bot may well rape you when it lands rupts.

It's much more prevailent in GvG because energy management is harder than in HA, and having to regular cancel your example of WoH/RC will eventually ruin your monks.
So what do you suggest? Since anet will not address the botting issue, there's not really any other things you can do to counter the bot. As of this moment, The most effective way is to cancel cast. It is logical that you cancel cast since if you do not cancel cast, you will lose energy PLUS suffer additional drawback from the interrupt bot (dshot, powerblock, power leak, etc...). If you cancel cast, you will only suffer the energy loss and nothing else. If you know of any other ways, enlighten me.

Quote:
Originally Posted by fowlero View Post
So i raise your altar cap of "just KD the interupt bot", with a guardian and one of many teams 2 copies of aura of stability.
Most likely, this will not happen. No high ranked teams ever bring 2 copies of aura of stability so I will assume low ranked teams also do not bring 2 copies of aura of stability. During the crucial moment of the teams' ghost capping the altar, the only focus the prot monk has in mind should be the ghostly hero and the song of concentration (SoC) person. I believe putting guardian on the SoC person is a smarter thing to do compare to putting guardian on the interrupt bot to prevent it from being kd.

Besides, warriors in HA brings shock so that renders guardian useless.

Quote:
Originally Posted by fowlero View Post
tl;dr - Just saying cancel cast vs interuptbots is an extremely asinine argument.
Unless you have a more effective way of countering these interrupt bots, you can't really say that the method I put forth is an asinine one.

Tramp

Tramp

Furnace Stoker

Join Date: Jan 2008

Mo/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Essence Snow View Post
HENCHMAN CONTEST: Now we have a constant reminder of some cheaters in our guild halls. To quote you a second time "GG Anet".
Very good point. And do not forget the Halloween contest where the guy paid a 3rd person to tattoo a mad king on his ass. That was a clear violation of the rule that stated all work must be done by the person submitting the entry. Unless he tattooed himself, that should have been trash canned at first glance. (I am sure that was a stick-on tattoo anyways, or if it wasn't, he needs to get his money back...)

I said all this at the "great nerfing" a few months ago. Take away the so called overpowered skills, which will make grind intolerable to the time conscious players of today, and they will resort to shortcuts. All this problem lies right on Anet's doorstep and is a result of the retarded nerf bat and Testes Krewe. People have a tradeoff, time vs. reward. Nerf the so called evil and overpowered skills, you make that tradeoff punitive. So here come the botting shortcuts. Remove the grind from titles and you remove the problem. You can either reduce the title requirements or you can make them easier to get by bringing back the evil skills of the past {insert sarcasm}. Bring back the old SF, bring back 600 monks, bring back Ursan, who cares? Grind will be reduced, items will be cheaper for poor people to buy, and everyone benefits. No one is hurt except greedy rich people who want to keep their epeen high by keeping other people poor. I cant wait to see the new skill updates that make mesmers the new "overpowered" class and then have people whining about that. I have not done a doa run in 2 months, but I joined a pug over the weekend for fun. It was a bunch of idiots hitting the DwG skill and rolling everything in site! Reminded me of the old ursan days, except now there is just one skill to hit. Oh... and everyone seemed to have a fun time. Imagine that. Bring back all these old skills. Level the playing field. People can choose what overpowered skill they want to have fun with: SF, 600, Ursan, DwG (current steamroller), the new mesmers? Who cares? Remove the stupid grind, fire the incompetent Testes Krewe, start recoding the entire engine for GW2 so botting is not possible (I would not bet anything that this is being done ~ same engine, new content is my guess), and just let GW1 fade into the sunset with people not getting their asses "grinded" to the bone.

Tullzinski

Tullzinski

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Mar 2006

Trying to stay out of Ryuk's Death Note

N/R

Not sure how many time this has been said, but ANET does not have the ability/technology to get the bots. Probably not cost effective to remove them from such an old game on top of it.

Currently there are many people that are making actual money by botting and selling the stuff to the RMT's, not all people but a large amount of them.

One way to fix this is to remove the bots is to remove the rewards. I have no doubt this will anger many people.

I have said it before...add a NPC called Santa Claus, he will award you whatever the hell you want. Want 1000 ectos done, all titles done, Zkeys done, you name it you get it. Once all the rewards are removed it would be pointless to bot. As extreme as this seems it would work. If you don't want to use Santa then dont. This would end the RMT's and botting in an instant. Why bother to bot when you can just ask for whatever you want.

Am I [email protected] crazy? Maybe....but the game is old (not dead), everyone could fill up their HOM and wait for GW2. No more bots, but most of the reasons to play the game would be gone also.

Anyway, IMO I doubt ANET is not going to publicly address the Bot issue until it is able to effectively combat it. It makes no sense for them to. What does everyone expect them to say? "We have a huge problem with bots but cannot do squat about it, Sorry. Please Buy GW2 by the way!!!

This horse is dead, all the meat has been eaten by maggots and all that is left is a skeleton whose bones are cracked and the marrow has been sucked out.

lishi

Forge Runner

Join Date: Jul 2005

Quote:
Originally Posted by II Lucky Charm II View Post


So what do you suggest? Since anet will not address the botting issue, there's not really any other things you can do to counter the bot. As of this moment, The most effective way is to cancel cast. It is logical that you cancel cast since if you do not cancel cast, you will lose energy PLUS suffer additional drawback from the interrupt bot (dshot, powerblock, power leak, etc...). If you cancel cast, you will only suffer the energy loss and nothing else. If you know of any other ways, enlighten me.



Most likely, this will not happen. No high ranked teams ever bring 2 copies of aura of stability so I will assume low ranked teams also do not bring 2 copies of aura of stability. During the crucial moment of the teams' ghost capping the altar, the only focus the prot monk has in mind should be the ghostly hero and the song of concentration (SoC) person. I believe putting guardian on the SoC person is a smarter thing to do compare to putting guardian on the interrupt bot to prevent it from being kd.

Besides, warriors in HA brings shock so that renders guardian useless.



Unless you have a more effective way of countering these interrupt bots, you can't really say that the method I put forth is an asinine one.
Cancelling its simple not good.

Let's suppose you cast 1 second spell.

The interupt windows would be something like 0.2 to 1 sec (if its a mesmer)

A good bot can simple randomize the time when he interupt, so if you cancel too fast you will waste energy for nothing (the bot still have to cast any interupt) if you wait too long you will get interupted.

So yea, most of time it will be a useless waste of energy.

fowlero

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jan 2007

England, UK

We Are The One And Only [rR]

Quote:
Originally Posted by II Lucky Charm II View Post

So what do you suggest? Since anet will not address the botting issue, there's not really any other things you can do to counter the bot. As of this moment, The most effective way is to cancel cast. It is logical that you cancel cast since if you do not cancel cast, you will lose energy PLUS suffer additional drawback from the interrupt bot (dshot, powerblock, power leak, etc...). If you cancel cast, you will only suffer the energy loss and nothing else. If you know of any other ways, enlighten me.
I'm not suggesting that there are other ways to counter it. Rather disagreeing with your original post which suggested that by cancel casting, you put the other team at the disadvantage not you.

Quote:
Most likely, this will not happen. No high ranked teams ever bring 2 copies of aura of stability so I will assume low ranked teams also do not bring 2 copies of aura of stability. During the crucial moment of the teams' ghost capping the altar, the only focus the prot monk has in mind should be the ghostly hero and the song of concentration (SoC) person. I believe putting guardian on the SoC person is a smarter thing to do compare to putting guardian on the interrupt bot to prevent it from being kd.
I don't HA much but i have been a lot this week, a lot of teams you'll face at the moment are Hexsins, which carry a PnH Mo/P support monk which has aura, as well as the prot with aura. Aegis is usually used on the SoC anyway. Several teams are also beginning to take Ward of Stability on rits.

Quote:
Unless you have a more effective way of countering these interrupt bots, you can't really say that the method I put forth is an asinine one.
Fair play on that part, but cancel casting just isn't that effective.

As many have said, it'd be very surprising if anything is done to fix this with manpower/economic ideals. It'll likely just be the finishing blow to this games pvp.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Tullzinski View Post
Not sure how many time this has been said, but ANET does not have the ability/technology to get the bots.
Out of interest, source?

stretchs

stretchs

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Sep 2007

Untimely Demise [Err了] - SOHK

Sadly like all games unless you have super obtrusive things like game guard and the sort (which quite often can be malware and whatnot) then you are not going to be able to slow them down.

Many of the same people that are unhappy about the bots, are not giving realistic solutions, while I agree they should have enough active GM's to manage the reports, just to say, well they just should ban everyone that appears to be is going to cause more harm than good. During the special events large numbers of people appear to be doing bot like activity gathering the festive items legitly. I know myself, i try to get at least a stack of items each holiday for whatever purpose I decide. Quite often, the same people screaming the most about the current bot situation are also the ones that would go bonkers over the nasty game guard stuff

Ninja Ninja

Ninja Ninja

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Dec 2006

W/

I blame the builds that are so retard easy that a bot could do it.

Greedy Gus

Greedy Gus

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Feb 2006

Striking Distance

There are two different types of bots, and it just serves to confuse others when people take a hard stand for or against just one type without making the proper distinction.

One type of bot is supplemental to player skill, able to be turned on & off at will and still leaves most of the general control to the player. These are pvp oriented like scripts for interrupts, cancel-casts, or giving extra info to someone. These directly affect other players in competition, give a powerful advantage, and are now being brazenly used at even the highest level (monthly gvg tournies).

The other type of bot is one that performs monotonous tasks, generally farming something or spamming an action to pump a title up. Most of these are run while the actual player is afk. These have little or indirect effect on other players or sometimes the in-game economy, but give an unfair advantage for maxing titles to those willing to take on the risk.

Those making the simple response that the main problem is farmable, monotonous activities being linked with rewards, you're fairly spot-on in regard to the second type of bot. The thing is that the first is the really pernicious type of bot that will ruin other peoples' experience in gw if allowed to run rampant.

Ninja Ninja

Ninja Ninja

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Dec 2006

W/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Greedy Gus View Post
The other type of bot is one that performs monotonous tasks, generally farming something or spamming an action to pump a title up. Most of these are run while the actual player is afk. These have little or indirect effect on other players or sometimes the in-game economy, but give an unfair advantage for maxing titles to those willing to take on the risk.
Since the second type is pre programed would changing the player spawns in town get rid of it?

Karate Jesus

Karate Jesus

Forge Runner

Join Date: Apr 2008

Texas

Reign of Judgment [RoJ]

Me/

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ninja Ninja View Post
I blame the builds that are so retard easy that a bot could do it.
Some bots are actually capable of determining every skill that your opponent/oppenent's team has and then responding based on that. It's not because the builds are easy......often bots can run builds that no human could run.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ninja Ninja
Since the second type is pre programed would changing the player spawns in town get rid of it?
Nope. It'd take botters about half an hour to fix that.

fowlero

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jan 2007

England, UK

We Are The One And Only [rR]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Karate Jesus View Post
Some bots are actually capable of determining every skill that your opponent/oppenent's team has and then responding based on that. It's not because the builds are easy......often bots can run builds that no human could run.
I think he meant pve farmbots.

However to his point, near enough all farm builds i remember playing could be botted as you don't do anything reactive.

Ninja Ninja

Ninja Ninja

Krytan Explorer

Join Date: Dec 2006

W/

Quote:
Originally Posted by fowlero View Post
I think he meant pve farmbots.

However to his point, near enough all farm builds i remember playing could be botted as you don't do anything reactive.
Yeah but they follow a pre set trail, changing the spawn location in town could mess it all up.

fowlero

Jungle Guide

Join Date: Jan 2007

England, UK

We Are The One And Only [rR]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ninja Ninja View Post
Yeah but they follow a pre set trail, changing the spawn location in town could mess it all up.
The information that bot's can obtain extends to npc's. All they'd have to do is find the id of several npc's in the town, target them and path the bot that way.

They can also detect your location (town etc, so if they got blocked or whatever it could reset etc).