I know afk gameplay is supposedly completely prohibited, but you would have to be very oblivious to not know its happening. So be it, every little thing cant be enforced. But there is gross and blatant abuse by 2 sets of mage bots in particular down in the Temple of Droga. Ive personally sent in over 20 reports on them because they are there afk killing 24/7. Clearly reporting does nothing. How the hell do we get this stopped if DBG wont take action and ignores reports despite billing this server as one with some level of GM enforcement? If you cant enforce the most blatant offenders, why should anyone follow the rules? Do something for a change. Ive done your work by finding the problem and reporting it. I am sure others have as well
Firstly, what server are you on? Last time I swung by Droga on Rizlona, there was one necro in the entire zone clearing the Bodyguard area for his CoS. The first time I went there there was a line for Bodyguard. Once someone got theirs, the next would take over. If Aradune, then how many mages are there? Are they breaking the two box limit? Are you sure they are there twenty-four seven? Or are they just always there when you show up? Also, did you really petition twenty times, or were they in game /reports? Can't imagine what I would feel like as a GM dealing with twenty petitions from the same person. I'm not doubting your complaint is genuine. However, a big problem on Aradune right now seems to be people abusing the petition and /report system to get people they don't like in trouble. That not only makes the GMs tasks harder, but also ties up the petition system, so legitimate issues take longer to address.
You need to petition and record them. With https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/geforce-experience/shadowplay/ or something similar. Seems like the only real way to get them shutdown.
I've reported some AFK players who were clearly afk, they went poof within a half hour of each report. Being ignored =/= AFK. GM's are dealing with people who are actually afk killing things.
If they aren't disappearing they are probably responding to the GM who challenges them. Truly afk players get a quick kick and week long suspension.
If they are truly afk they can get busted. If they have something set up to alert them somehow, audio trigger, email trigger (yes this exists). When they get questioned they just run back to keyboard.
It's so hard to actually get people to not respond. People use Gina triggers or whatever their preferred program to instantly alert them to says and tells. Anyone who gets caught just got lazy. Sad state.
On Aradune, they stand out like a sore thumb. Typically 2 Mages or 2 Necros that are either unguilded or in some ridiclous guild with like 10 people in it lol. If you go to the camps notorious for AFK farming, it's pretty easy to spot them. Camp 1 - Ice Giants in Everfrost Camp 2 - Efreeti in SolB Camp 3 - CWG Model EXG in SolA Camp 4 - Hierophant Prime Grekal in Sebilis A daily sweep of these areas would knock out the EverCheaters. All GMs would need to do is just analyze their behavior for 2 spawn cycles and they'll have all the evidence that they need to suspend the accounts. The problem is that there are so darn many of these Necro and Mage duos.
If someone is at there computer and capable of responding to the GM's say/tell, even if its from a trigger, then their technically NOT AFK. They're just permacamping the camp you want, that's not against the ToS. Is it lazy to have the pet (or merc.) do the work, yes totally, but IF THEY'RE AT THEIR COMPUTER & RESPONSIVE it's not an AFK violation. They're just willing to sink more time into a camp than you, permacamping has always been an issue in pre-instanced EQ. People use to multitask & permacamp stuff in the old days all the time when we didn't have QoL features like the accelerated regen. that starts after you've been out of combat for awhile. I remember playing other games on a second computer while I meditated back in the day... I wasn't AFK, I was just utilizing my time better, I was checking my EQ monitor every couple minutes but there was no point to sit and stare at a spell book if I knew the mobs wouldn't respawn for 15 minutes and my mana would take 10 minutes to regen. If someone isn't at their computer, & isn't responsive, and it's literally just the game playing itself without them giving it any degree of attention, then its likely an AFK violation. Just camping a spot isn't a violation if you are by the computer and are capable of being responsive to checks. If someone is at the camp 24/7, and responsive then I suspect there is an account sharing violation occurring.
Yea but here's a big freaking difference between now and the old days. Get ready for it... Auto looting.
There is also a greater tolerance for automated gameplay and use of certain pieces of software. People used to get banned and suspended for even mentioning it. Now it is that dirty little secret that everyone knows about and is heavily used.
There are players who don’t “sit” at the computer who can respond back to tells. They set up audio alarms for a reason, to get back to their computer. For some people, selling krono is their actual job. They play EQ 24-7 and sleep and do other activities with little personal input to the game. In the meantime, they use a program to run their character.
I don't disagree that there are groups that farm MMOs for money, but the industry trend is for them to use bots not vanilla AFK. If they get caught they just rebot a new toon for farming and resume their scripts. The botters are the people reeking havoc on the TLP economies, most of them aren't doing it to be malicious either, the sad part is some of them are putting dinner on their table with it. There are entire articles about citizens from hyper inflated economies (e.g. Venezuelans) doing this in MMOs because its more stable income than working. Back to players camping, they have to be near their computer if they're doing what you're alleging. There are threads in the player support section of people complaining that they're not being given enough time to respond to GM tells. If there close enough to appease a GM, I suspect they're at their computer or paying at least some attention to their client. Again, some people literally have EQ running in the background for hours for whatever their camping and that's technically fine as long as their responsive to stuff going on around them. People use to camp stuff and be on wait lists for 12+ hours back in the day, and that same type of person is often the person still playing EQ. The GMs are suspending people for AFK play, I've reported people and seen them just disappear within an hour of the ticket going in. However, often I've been wrong on my assumption that someone is AFK and have gotten a tell from someone minutes later responding to me just saying "Hey what's up, are you camping ____", and usually its something like "Yup, watching ____ though while I wait" or something to the effect. If it bothers you that much, the Devs will let you out DPS other players at a camp. If someone is really just AFK, then you shouldn't have any trouble achieving that with a just little help.
Sorry about that. I think there is a fine line that needs to be drawn here, because this seems to be the excuse of most apologists when this very topic arises. That said, just because they are 'at their computer' doesn't necessarily mean that they aren't using automation to play their accounts. And, if they aren't cheating then why use 2 Mages and 2 Necros? Why not play a typical pair that isn't the flavor farming of the month? Who else besides farmers plays these 2 combinations? That answer is simple. What we need to do here is eliminate the obvious duos that just farm 24/7 at cash camp because they are breaking multiple rules if you watch them. You don't even have to send them a message, rather just analyze their actions which are clearly redundant to the point of simply auto-clickers + in-game macros. And, it's likely the same person running 50+ accounts to dominate every single camp mentioned above. Another problem is when you suspend 2, 2 more immediately pop up thanks to being able to consume krono to play. Stop allowing krono for gametime on progression servers! Credit Cards only! Then suspend the credit cards on accounts and problem is solved.
They are unlikely to ever even consider making a Krono free server. Krono are what's keeping TLP alive and profitable
