Tradeskill macros

I am a Master Alchemist and have never used any macros to craft anything. But it's quite clear that many crafters are using some sort of macros to ceate cure pots, poisons etc in bulk masses while not sitting at the computer. This is putting me off more and more, especially since i see no kind of action from SoE towards this problem.
I can not name people here, but i've observed the market for a long time now, and i see Alchemist that continuosly have 500+ of each cure potion up for sale, poisons and elixirs as well. I walked into guild halls and stood next to an Alchemist who has said ammounts of potions for sale at all times, and while he was crafting non stop, he would not move an inch, nor answer any of my tells.
Now i don't know what the approach from SoE is on this matter. But I've given up on competing the market with my potions and poisons, because frankly, i can't be bothered to craft the same recipe 50 - 100 times each day, when someone else is creating even more then me while being afk and asleep.

Please, can any official person comment on this ?
Do i petition macro-using people ?
Report them ?
Please, enforce EULA rules more, people are not afraid of using macros, honest people are getting screwed out of business.
I see there's a problem with supply of all the cure pots etc, without the possibility of using macros to craft the hundreds of cure pots everyone needs every day, but there must be a better way around it then just closing your eyes to the macro-users.
Make recipes that generate more then 10 cure pots per craft, increase ressource costs by factor 15 and in exchange we can craft 100 pots per combine, something like that... but as it is right now, there's simply no market ( at least on Nagafen) for alchemist products other then spells, cause all pots, elixirs and poisons are in the hands of a few cheaters.

All you can do is /petition them. There is a sub category for reporting people for it.

Proud_Silence wrote:

First, report them. The GMs don't wander the servers looking for bots, but they do something when they get reported. If you see them setting up the bot again, report and keep reporting once a day till they are gone. But, you know make sure they are still botting before you report.
Second, lets just say you want to make and sell 100 noxious potions. What is stopping you? Seriously. You have every right to match their prices or even undercut them (I don't actually suggest that). Just because you only have 100 potions up for sale and they have 10,000 doesn't mean people are going to buy their stock first. As long as your the lowest price people will buy from you just as much as your competition.
I don't make and sell cure potions very often. But when I do, I make about 1,000 and I charge a little more than the lowest price. Guess what? Usually my potions sell within a week. When raids hit zones where they need potions they buy thousands. Each person might only buy 100 or 200, but your talking around 3k potions per raid. That can clean out the low bidders perty fast especially on the weekend when you have 8 or 10 raids buying potions.

Proud_Silence wrote:

Not to play devil's advocate but.....
500 potions is 50 combines... I have done more than that in a day on my alchemist. When I decided it is time to make potions/poisons I make easily 100-200 combines legitly.
During this time my craft window blocks my chat window and I would not answer tells of any kind myself. I turn my TV on and drown out everything except for something funny on the tube and repeatingly hitting the 3 same buttons. Why would you move while crafting 50+ combines... unless you didn't come prepared to make that much, so long as you have raws and fuel there is no reason to move.. even an inch.
I am not saying there are not cheaters, but some people truly are just more hardcore TSers than others. And I would call myself a light tradeskiller at best. /shrug

As a hard core crafter, I spend hours standing at the crafting table and not moving. I don't answer tells either as I'm usually doing something on my other computer (web browsing on one, crafting on the other) so I don't see them. Since I use tabbed chat boxes, I might not even have the tell window visible (ask my guildies about that). Even if I do see it, I might not answer you because I don't: Want to make an item for you, go on your raid, go with your group.
500 potions is nothing, that's less than an hour to make. Keeping 500 or more of each type isn't that hard, they don't sell that well (at least on my server).

even if you're watching TV or doing whatever else, you still have to click repeat crafting button after each combine and look at your screen. Why on earth would you make crafting window use the entire screen, that's just stupid. sounds like an excuse why you would not answer a tell, frankly.
scared of getting cought with your macro cheat ?

I don't need lessons on how to sell my stuff either, the reason i said im not in the mood for competing against botters is that i simply can't be arsed to legimitly sit at my comp, crafting for 2hours if i could simply go out and farm some instances and easy get more cash that way. Besides just because those bots have 2k poisons for sale doesnt mean they dont watch the market. if they get undercut they will do the same.
Seriously, if you're not experiencing botters on your server, why even bother posting ? I know at least one person that admitted to me he is using macro programm to craft, because who would be so stupid to craft 200 combines of pots and poisons every day ? its not worth the time if you are out to make money, its simple economy. Unless of course you are having a programm do the work while you're asleep ( or watching TV or whatever you guys claim to do ), then of course you will want to craft something that will sell in bulks.
And that person is not the only one for sure. google for eq2 crafting macro and if you're not a complete tool you'll find what you're looking for within the first 3 hits.
So please spare me you storries about how honest you are but simply "miss" tells because of whatever silly reasons you're stating.

The only reason most people use cure pots is for raiding. Most raiding guilds I know craft all the pots they need. Could it be that you see 2000 pots on the same person because they don't sell it?
You came here asking a question, people replied and you think they are all liars. With your attitude, why would anyone respond to you?
Some people enjoy crafting and once you have a system down it doesn't take much to craft. I'm sure spending time being the "crafting police" has cost you valuable time crafting...

people replied with the usual preaching attitude assuming the OP, in this case me, doesnt know wtf he's talking about.

What do you mean with "once you have a system down it doesn't take much to craft" ? crafting is trivial, im master crafter with several chars and i know everything i need to know about crafting and how to increase speed.
like i said, google for a crafting bot and maybe you'll get a clue what im talking about. stop trying to make up crap in order to appear like there's no such thing as crafting macros.

stupid trolls

First replier answered my question with his first reply
"First, report them. The GMs don't wander the servers looking for bots, but they do something when they get reported. If you see them setting up the bot again, report and keep reporting once a day till they are gone. But, you know make sure they are still botting before you report."

everything else is just preaching and i don't need teaching in crafting.

Do you not understand how tabbed chat works? I, too, have a tabbed chat window and if I have a different tab showing I may not see a comment whether I'm crafting or not. Unlike some games, the chat tabs in EQ2 do not flash or have any indicator when there's something to read. But I personally tend to have my bags all open plus my crafting window, which take up a good portion of my screen. And usually I'm watching a movie or playing LON at the same time when I'm doing a long crafting session.

Are there third party (macro) apps for crafting? yes. There are in any game and they're there before launch.
Is anyone who crafts more than 2 hours in a day, crafts faster than you, sells more product on the broker than you, etc, automatically guilty of using a 3rd party app? no. Quite a lot of at-the-keyboard crafters DO craft for more than 2 hours every day and some even craft as their primary activity in game out of Choice.
Does someone who doesn't respond to YOUR tells indicate, without any doubt, that they're using a 3rd party app? nope. No one is required to respond to tells from any other player. Heck, for all you know they have you on ignore for stupid blathering you've done in a chat channel (or even for pestering them in tells when they didn't want to answer you).

If you suspect someone of using a 3rd part app for crafting, the ONLY thing you can do is /petition and include all the details about why you think -that- person is breaking the EULA. Note where the person crafts (if you know that), how much stock they have up at all times,how much resources they'd need to have that much up all the time, etc.
Frankly, from what I have heard, the majority of people using those 3rd party apps are not crafting for the broker. It's far more lucrative (and eaiser and less risky) to do rush writs for money (and status).

Proud_Silence wrote:

Yes, you have to click the repeat crafting button, but what makes you think I have to look at the screen to do it? It's not like the mouse moves around on its own while I'm crafting.
Rijacki wrote:

Of all my crafters, arrows sell the best. Usually can sell 10k or so arrows a day for a 2pp profit (lots of people sell arrows). To make 10k arrows takes 100 combines, or about 2 hours. Doing rush writs you can make over 2.5pp in 2 hours (plus the status).
I think the key to this whole this is from the original post:
Proud_Silence wrote:

Some of us have no issue doing 50-100 combines a day.

Proud_Silence wrote:

Look, guy, instead of copping big attitude, just freakin' /petition the person and move on.
I drink alcohol to raise my alcohol tolerance while crafting, so I don't want to see anything but the crafting window because it's all blurry and moving. Like many other crafters, if I am crafting a lot I won't have my headset on, because I am paying attention to the TV with most of my attention and mashing buttons as needed on the numeric keypad (1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 4, 5, 6, 4, 5, 6, 4, 5, 6 etc).
Sure, there are probably some people bitting. But if you read through the forums, you will find that all sorts of people THINK they are spotting bots, and lots of people who are legitimately crafting have been reported as bots. /shrug.
Don't angst about it, tell SOE via /petition and go along about your business.

Proud_Silence wrote:

Wow, you are a bitter, bitter person. Sorry you are. Most of the crafters here have stated they don't answer tells. No one is required to answer tells, ever. Crafting, adventuring... ever.
Your tell probably wasn't polite to top it off judging by your attitude here and people trying to help. But /shrug you obviously just want to hear what you want to hear so go ahead /petition them. I bet the GMs will find that they are more than just a bot in 90% of the cases.

Don't know about other crafters , but my crafting window has the default button for RETURN set to the repeat craft button , I just mash that then when a craft is finished (I use the lack of sounds as an indication that I've finished) then use my usual combine of 123 repeated most of the time...(2 x increase durability and 1 x increase progress) it's almost hypnotising and hardly takes any effort or notice...so Im often not checking the screen at all.

Wullail@Splitpaw wrote:

Why would you lie! You botter!!!!

Proud_Silence wrote:

Put your resolution at 1024x768. If you don't have a big monitor and use the low resolution the stupid crafting window covers most of your screen. It isn't a choice it's a fact! I don't sell on broker but do make stuff for tons of friends and alts and have often crafted for 5 or 6 hours watching tv and not paying attention to my chat screen because I didn't want to be interrupted having to type out a response to someone's request or idiot question. I quit playing with sound on years ago, because sound seemed to be the usually crash causing bug in games.
If I wanted to bot I would get a machine and craft in my house lol not in the crafting area of a city. Wow kids go play and stop spending so much time worrying about what the other guy is doing.

Proud_Silence wrote:

But you could sure use some lessons in manners.
Speaking as someone who has been reported for botting by some idiot like you I can say that you probably sent a tell that was rude, or you spoke in /say, /shout, /ooc etc, all of which I have had turned off for years because I just dont care what anyone woud be saying in those channels.
When I craft I craft a LOT for extended periods, all the while clicking the same buttons and hitting enter to repeat the combine (my ui mod allows for this), I ignore everyone who is not my friend or doesn't mention a friends name in the tell, because again, I just don't care what people have to say unless I know them..... I have two computers so I am not looking at the crafting one, I am usually harvesting or surfing on the other computer, and that's my right.
Just because someone doesn't like you or doesn't respond to you in the manner you want them to does not make them botters, rather it probably should send a message to you that you are annoying them and they want to be left alone. Assuming that just because you don't want to craft 50-100 combines means that no one else does either and therfor must be botting do to so is rather arrogant don't you think?
Move on, put it behind you and leave the nice people alone and they will probably return the favor.

It's a legit question. People are as passionate regarding catching the cheaters as people are about being falsly accused. Let's face it, unless you catch them spamming commands in chat (used to happen, anyone else remember that?), the outward symptoms of a bot and a person who stays online and crafts on and off all day are the same. (I used craft all day long before I worked at ZAM. Having a couple thousand arrows on the broker all the time was nothing for me when I had more time.)
That's why it's so darn hard to catch botters. That and, unless something in the EULA changed, SOE can't run anything resident on our systems to catch botters (like Blizzard does).
The best you can do, as Rijacki and others have suggested, is /report them, detailing what makes you suspicious. SOE will investigate. If there's any doubt, no action will be taken, so if you're mistaken there's no harm. You should also know that you won't hear anything back on this kind of petition, you'll just get a "Thanks for bringing that to our attention, we'll look into it" note. Nor will anyone ever know who /reported them in the first place.

Aremban wrote:

No kidding. It would seem that running around watching people craft, even following them into their houses and guild halls trying to "catch" them doing something wrong seems like it wastes a lot of valuable time, not to mention, why would anyone respond to such a person? I don't even know how to use a bot, but I'm sure I've missed many tells because I also often pay no attention to the chat window. Imagine that.