BOTs permacamping nameds in AB...

Discussion in 'The Veterans' Lounge' started by Voktar, Jun 26, 2020.

  1. Corwyhn Lionheart Guild Leader, Lions of the Heart

    I suspect it would be more like 10 to 25% of krono consumption for botters (automated afk players). If you are talking all players using some sort of play assist software then yeah the 50% amount could be closer to reality.

    If you recall it was only a few years ago there was a massive ban wave that was mostly reversed due to folks buying game codes from third party sites. I think it shows a much wider acceptance of third party sites the you might imagine IF there is a reason to use them.

    I do think daybreak could decide to relax pick creation criteria to help prevent folks from monopolizing camps. They could also make it a rule that groups run by the same player cannot monopolize camps in more then one instance assuming there would be a way to enforce that or making getting around it more of a pain then it is worth.

    More instances will put a bigger strain on daybreak servers an too many instances probably detract from the multiplayer part of the game to some extent. Although I think on a practical side it would make very little difference.

    Daybreak has three options.
    1) Ignore what is happening and accept it is turning players off the game.
    2) Increase enforcement
    3) Mitigate the negative effects of autobots on the gaming population.
    IblisTheMage likes this.
  2. Jumbur Improved Familiar

    But if botters are stricly an RMT business, why would the botter consume kronos in the first place? if he is just after rares or plat, he can do that by slaughtering trash in tier1 zones with a full group of FTP-bots. Only players who actively play the game, needs to consume krono(for prestige-gear and rk2+ spells). Botters are pretty much on autopilot the whole time, and are only "engaged" when the owner needs to transfer the "catch of the week" to his seller-account.

    No-one has 8 groups of bots spread over multiple zones for the entertainment value... most people who plays the game, keep their player-force together in the same zone/instance and their player-force to a manageable size. It is clearly to maximize profit, or to annoy as many players as possible.

    The guy on AB doesn't use his bot teams for other things than botting, therefore he does not need to consume kronos. (It may not be RMT, it could be a way of harassing the server as some has speculated). DBG has nothing to loose by banning the guy.
    Unless he is using his accumulated wealth to fund actual playing(and krono-consumption) on other servers(might not even be everquest, but just some other DBG-game? maybe some super-rich hotshot in H1Z1 or EQ2 or something? :confused: )

    There may be other bots, that are driven by actual players who just wants to "skip the grind"(but who still plays the game from time to time), which could very well drive one or multiple subs(or actual krono-consumption). I don't think they represent the majority of botting accounts though, but that is just a personal hunch.
    IblisTheMage likes this.
  3. code-zero Augur

    On any live server the only character that's likely to be all access is going to be the tank and even then if they take time and care they can make a passable f2p tank for running a static camp.
  4. dreadlord Augur

    The groups that I've spent any time near (ie the ones that camp on top of me) I have noticed an odd (well odd to me) thing. They all use Rk1 spells. Given they must harvest loads of spells during the botting marathon I wondered why - are Rk2 spells not available if FTP, or something else?
    And, of course, if they're FTP, then the reason for their continues existence is presumably not that DBG is making loads of cash from them?
  5. Jumbur Improved Familiar

    FTP accounts are restricted to RK1 spells unless they buy an "unlocker" from the marketplace(only FTP accounts can see it in the marketplace), then they can use all the RK2 spells even as a FTP.

    My guess is that someone who is using RK1 spells, is doing it because: He hasn't found any rk2 spells yet(unlikely for for someone who is online a lot, or even tried to get some), or doesn't have a paying sub and haven't bothered to buy the unlocker for dbc(i think it cost 500 or 1000 dbc?).
    In this case, the botter probably doesn't want to invest any money in his bot crews at all. he probably expects to be banned any moment... they are accounts he is willing to sacrifice...

    Yep, with some effort you can even get a little selection of non-prestige augs. I think most of the "rare" augs from TBM are non-prestige, even the type5 ones.
  6. IblisTheMage Augur

    I believe you are probably right; I assumed that the investment in Krono for a RMT-botter would be very low given the assumed large inflow of resources, and the krono-inflation, and that the performance increase coming from being Gold would increase the inflow of resources, and also that a group of Gold toons might be less harshly judged. I am likely to be wrong.

    I really don’t have any problem with botters, if they do not hurt other peoples gameplay. However, this is not the case with the botter on AB, and I presume on many other servers. I believe it to be a person who thinks of it as a business, that it is his or her profession to set up automation software to maximize income.

    The problem for us and DPG is that there are no barriers to entry. Anyone with a multicore PC and a lot of time can set up automation, and start generating an income. As soon as that is happening, the business can invest income in more PCs, invest more time, and convert more electricity to income.

    The upper limit of RMT-botting is driven by the size of the RMT-buying population. The cash has to come from somewhere. So all other things equal, the business opportunity creates a vacum that needs to be filled, and there is no reason to think that policing will have a payoff. For DPG any policing is a cost with almost no impact (I assume this because I believe that the botting is more evident than ever, and I also believe DPG to be in an overall very strong financial position, compared to the last 10 years).

    DPG has not demonstrated a lasting intent to effectively keep RMT-botters low, there have been mass bans, which have had very temporary effect, but obviously the percieved issue is back in full force and more.

    Due to the no-barrier-of-entry, we could have the assumption that the RMT-botter market will saturate over a few months - this should lead to a temporary inflation of at least PP on RMT, until the cost of producing PP (electricity, setup time, transaction time, etc) is nearing income generated by the business activity. At that point in time, adding more RMT-bot-teams will not inncrease revenue.

    A fun fact is that AMD going down in nanometers is driving down the cost of running a RMT-bot-business :-D. Lowering the cost of processing, and enabling more teams to be run on the same PC, will driving operating costs down. Threadripper or 3950x, anyone? :-D.

    I would assume that a large number of risk mitigation strategies are in place from the pro-botters. Easy leveling up of new teams, continous levelling of backup teams to secure business continuity, virtualization and VPN-tunelling, IP masking, etc.

    I can’t see another way out other than instancing... am I wrong?
  7. Bigstomp Augur

    I would guess a mix.

    It wasn't long ago I got yelled at for killing a named someone else claimed as their own.

    Nobody was engaging it, yet a group not too far away was chain killing trash mobs. I sent a tell, asked hey, is this yours? No reply.

    I waited patiently since they may be busy with their current mob and didn't want to be a bad eq citizen.

    After about 15 mins of the group continuing to pull trash and not move. I engaged the named.

    As I was finishing the named the group who had pulled and killed at least 3 mobs as I waited sent me a tell "You stole my mob, I was afk getting a new tea!".

    The pulling and killing was pretty impressive for someone afk.
    Yinla and IblisTheMage like this.
  8. Jumbur Improved Familiar

    Assuming that the botters have fresh bot teams ready in case of bans, then banning them won't be a long term solution...:(

    Make a prison-server and move all the bots over there. The botters can continue their business and has no reason to ready a new bot team on other servers.
    The question is, if a server with only bots can generate an income for them? kronos are not server-bound but plat/items is, and if items and plat can't be transfered off the server, they might not be able to sell their goods...?
    Maybe if the made kronos an extremely rare drop from trashmobs(and only trashmobs) on that server specifically...? That would make the botters ignore the other servers...And if the server is only meant for bots then they can just use their cheapest server, bots don't complain about lag...:p

    Otherwise it will only work if normal players willingly transfer there and play "pay-to-win"-everquest and finance the botters(I don't see that happening). Maybe if they give that server a crazy xp-bonus or something..."Pay to win"-players don't like long grinds anyway...:p
    The server needs to be very attractive to both botters and "pay-to-win"-players...Maybe a firiona vie-trading-rule set would help too?



    I don't know, what I feel about more instancing...:confused:
    A "stubborn" part of me, dislike the idea that the game needs drastic redesign just to cater to the bots. It feels like the bots are winning and I don't like it...:p
    IblisTheMage likes this.
  9. code-zero Augur

    The more I've read and looked and considered the more I think that there's a high probability that whoever this is is doing it to grief the entire server
    Corwyhn Lionheart and dreadlord like this.
  10. Corwyhn Lionheart Guild Leader, Lions of the Heart

    And the toxic player of the year award goes to.......
  11. Skuz I am become Wrath, the Destroyer of Worlds.

    It's pretty much one of the expected things from human beings, if there is a way someone CAN do something then somebody definitely will.

    Monopolisation of content on servers is made easy by the way the game is designed.

    EQ had a tendency to create "iconic" items that were rare drops from rare spawns, that ethos has continued to this day.

    Pair that old-school game design up with a free to play enabled server & you just made it possible for someone to create a 24/7 army of characters who can dominate a spawn location at no cost to them except the hardware & power consumption required to run it & some basic knowledge of how to get automation for those characters running.

    Some solutions, though there is no ideal solution as any solution is likely to have drawbacks.

    F2P only available on low population servers.

    A "rolling" level cap for F2P accounts.
    So F2P accounts are only able to level characters to a max of 2 level-raise expansions behind.
    Example: During ToV at 115 F2P characters would be capped at Level 105.

    AoC instancing of zones on demand, yes AoC have XP penalties, but if you want to farm items from nameds then that penalty really should not matter to you that much anyway.
    This might be attractive enough to the botters that they take their automated crews out of the regular zones/picks - if they don't then you can pretty definitely state they are doing it to be a jerk to the rest of the server.
    Worth noting that AoC instances are actually less demanding on servers than picks are, because the RAM for them can be recovered more easily.

    Altering the game design ethos - iconic open-world loot will have 3 or more "copies" with different names but the same stats/effects and they will each have multiple creatures that can drop it which spawn in various places throughout a zone or even across multiple zones in order to reduce to reduce bottle-necks & lower the opportunities for bot-teams to monopolize iconic items.

    Alternatively have NO Iconic loot at all in open world zones & only itemise that from instanced content. Bottlenecking & the grief it causes can only happen in open world zones, if the devs will not create AoC for open world then take the items that the botter teams are farming & monopolizing OUT of open world altogether & put them in instanced missions.
    Do the same thing for especially sought after items like tradeskill or components for gear that raiders & groupers need to upgrade gear with, leave the botters with no real reason to monopolize any open world areas & they disappear or even if they don't they do not impact anyone else's gaming.
    IblisTheMage likes this.
  12. Jumbur Improved Familiar

    How would that work, if the char is already 115, and then goes FTP? Do they loose the levels? or can they only wear level 105 items/use 105 spells/AAs as FTP, until they pay up?

    Or just make all items level 105+ prestige... serious players have most of their boxes as paid accounts anyway, except for buff-bots and other gear-independent box-members(bards?).

    FTP, was meant as a "trial"-function anyway, at level 105 you know if you like the game or not...:p

    If they implement it correctly, your idea might actually solve the problem AND earn extra money for DBG. :)
    It won't hinder RMT bot farms, that can just consume some of their hundreds of kronos(if it doesn't cut too much into their profits?), but pure griefers would probably give up...
    Skuz likes this.
  13. Skuz I am become Wrath, the Destroyer of Worlds.

    Well your item suggestion should work

    As well as that F2P characters could be barred from any zone that is above the cap.

    So in ToV F2P would not be allowed to enter any zones beyond Empires of Kunark.

    This wouldn't be enough to prevent the RMT/monopolizer bots in the most recent expansion, as you point out they could just consume some of the Krono they make. But it would reduce it & at the very least mean that they cannot operate without costs involved so it would eat into their profits at least a bit.
    It would dissuade most griefers, unless they want to pay to grief.


    Dealing with the monopolization in open world zones will take more than that though, which is why I gave the other suggestions. Either remove the reasons for it happening, or a way to bypass the monopolizers.
  14. Jumbur Improved Familiar

    The problem is that the FTP's actually paid for the expansion, so banning them from the zones might not be feasible from a legal standpoint. :confused:

    However, even if DBG did the lazy thing and only made level items 105+ prestige, the FTP's wouldn't be able to complain, and they would still have a very hard time moving beyond RoS-zones. (you can't survive in TBL and beyond in EoK-gear). And there is not much worth farming in RoS nowadays...maybe they could flood the market with conflagrant gear or something...:p

    The more I think about it, the more Im convinced that just adjusting prestige tags on high-level items, would be enough to solve many of the problems...

    It wouldn't even be hard to do from a technical standpoint...

    Just slowly phase out the non-prestige tag from RoS and onward... :)
    dreadlord likes this.
  15. Natal Augur



    If you want people to consider your issue to be an issue you need to explain WHY it is an issue, and not just SAY it is an issue. This is a general problem with modern society.

    Asking why it is a problem for you is not trolling. Is this actually impacting on you? If so, then how? Those are not unreasonable questions and it is not unreasonable to expect an answer if you have raised the whole thing in the first place. Otherwise you are just observing behaviour you don't like that technically might be against the rules but otherwise is not affecting anyone, and you are getting bent out of shape by that. What the kids nowdays refer to as a "Karen" I believe.
  16. Dalrek_MM Elder

    I guess part of the problem is the ToV T1 named loot isnt lore. When you can see traders with 15 x Mantle of frozen hare, 15 x Windchill hide belt in bazaar , 15 x Maniacal demon mask - you know its from those groups in EW permacamping near the fort. If the loot was lore, maybe they would move around camps more, so others could get a chance at the camps. Funny enough, it has dropped the value of these items all the way down to 10k. But earrings and rings etc still go for 100k+. Atleast they could camp different items and drop all prices overall ;-)
  17. Windance Augur

    Suggestions to increase the cost of botting:

    #1 - Limit F2P accounts to older zones. If a botter wants to farm new stuff make them pay the $10/month per account.

    #2 - Make the rare zone wide drops bind on pick up. Maybe you can use an unattuner which costs DB/loyality/etc.

    Suggestions to decrease the annoyances of botting

    #1 - Decrease the number of people needed to spin up a pick zone. 20+ people in zone = new pick.

    Bots and RMT have been around before Krono's and ultra rare farming. People who wanted to hire the bots to PL them, or get plat, are still going to be able to do so. Getting rid of Krono's cuts DB out of the loop and makes the transactions riskier.
    dreadlord likes this.
  18. dreadlord Augur

    Not sure if they got banned/suspended or turned their attentions elsewhere, but we've had a lovely few days mostly without them.
    But they've been back the past almost-24 hours, same as ever :(
    It was nice while it lasted
  19. Moege Augur

    Looks in my bank and apparently I am also a botter that stay up 24/7. News to me wonder who is playing my accounts, need to have a chat so I can get a cut of the proceeds.

    Run the missions 2 times a day for coins/augs and you will also have 15 of all the stupid things. 15 is still low think I still have 20+ windchill hide belts. I still loot it for tribute the snowbound is now left to rot if my 16 sets of snowbound ever gets used I would be amazed). Earrings and rings is the uncommon item in chests.

    So very easy to make assumptions when look to justify your thoughts.
    code-zero likes this.
  20. bigpapa Augur

    i got an account atm FTP , he got TOV expansion , atm i am doing progression and when that toon { 6th account} will be level 115 i will use a krono to unlock some more aa;s and grind aa 's .

    imo if you buy the TOV expansion you need to be able to play in that expansion, otherwise i would not buy the tov expansion at all,

    we can't punish the players who play the game * legally * just because DB don't seem to take any actions against the real cheater .

    btw ,if you want to see a cheater who is there since months at same place in firiona vie ( in TOV , kael ), not far from derakor the vindicator npc. he is there with his 2 or 3 groups chain killing very fast . all his toons moving at same time and all melee toons moving behind the mobs all the time as well, he don't even have to place the npc for them to attack from behind.