I come back to EQ for a little Mangler TLP fun and run into the same old crap that caused me to disbelieve that there is any overseeing of any EQ server. When did it become allowable that you can AFK bot? I recall being suspended once for a week for simply AFK killing in the Hole without even looting before auto loot was a thing. This character named "Friend" is ruining the zone for others who are legitimately trying to level up there. I've never played an MMO where disrupting normal game play for others is acceptable. If this is acceptable now by all means let me know so I can cancel.
It's just not enforced. On mangler the same guy's been botting a full group at royals in sol b for months, generally during night hours lately from what I can tell. Everything's fully automatic, monk seeks nearest mobs and brings it back to camp, adds get mezd, tank tanks, etc etc. There was a setup just like that on agnarr that was petitioned a zillion times but nothing ever happened. Disappeared once mangler released, so I assume he just moved servers. Hell it might even be the same guy /shrug.
You aren't allowed to bot but its very difficult to tell if a bot is human . Like there is a group of 6 necros killing hill giants 24/7 but they might be played by a human who does exactly the same thing over and over all day long no break . I mean who knows right ?
Lol - no, it really isn't. However, it does require DBG to assign at least 1 person to investigate reports and do their own random appearances at the various locations where such botarmies are currently performing their nefarious content hoarding activities 24/7, but sadly then all signs are pointing to the fact that DBG simply doesn't care to do anything about it.
Level of sophistication is beyond what is common knowledge. If people posting about their exploits are to be believed, it has now reached the level where when a Guide/GM engages a botter it sends a text message to their cellphone and they can reply to it with a text back. IOW, you can complain about it in game with /tell to bot and nothing, but as soon as a Guide or GM show up and ask the botter is notified on their cellphone and can send a reply making it impossible to prove they are not at their keyboard. I imagine it is an outgrowth of Show Everquest or something like it. Then again, if you look at some of the web sites that monitor TLP prices, they do it in real time. They just follow the auction channel<?> and parse the results on a web page. Some of the things that worked in the past like inspecting your computer for rogue programs no longer work for everything since it is a separate computer doing the illegal sniffing. So anyway, DB seems to be trying. ~Regular switching of data encryption to break the packet sniffers for at least a couple of days while the hacks break the code. I draw this conclusion from all the posts about bots disappearing right after a patch for a couple of days. I'm open to other explanations of course.
The necro army killing Hill Giants has to be a bot group . But is it? Well I think it is so it must be right?
Not exactly. Everquest data is not encrypted, and hasn't been for a long time--it was not successful when they tried it back in the very early years of Everquest, as it was possible to just read the decryption key from the client memory. None of the bot programs operate via packet sniffing anyway (Showeq does, but it only gives maps, not automation.)
