i dual box a WC, and i tried to report a bot with my main and my boxed WC. it was ok with main, and when i clicked on report bot button with WC, system message was something like : "You can't report the same character with the same IP in the same daily time".
This is a good thing for ppl who were scared about being reported by a full automated ppl party.
What kills me is that after all the complaints about botters (me included) they come out with something to help with the war on bots and you all start getting worried. For what? Siren Already made it clear you have noting 2 fear if your legit.
If you don't bot shut up and play the game you have noting worry about.
If you do bot them that's the only people that should be in this post with complains.
Ashley...
That report button is wonderfull, and i'll use it, you can be sure of that !
Why? because i'm one of the lasts Legit on my server, and i always claimed about it proudly. I fought bots many times. With friends' help, i managed to get 3 parties of bots in HB get banned.
But !
Siren's words that legit have no reason to be scared don't make me secure.
Because long time ago, even if i always was clean, i get banned, accused to be a bot. This happened because some hatefull people spammed reported me. and Gms never listened to me nor let me proove that i wasn't "guilty".
They almost half admitted the mistake at the end by saying me "we allow you to make a new account".
That situation was shamefull, and without my friends, i would never came back in game.
My point is: even if the system is great, it will always have a % of possibly mistake.
I agree, things have changed alot. But what happened to me back in the days can happen again to any legit player.
Nina sorry about your lost but I'm willing to bet the same people that did that 2 you either Quit the game already or are botting like mad you know what 2 do :)
they help stablize the market
You have no clue do you?
Lionna had a Better more stable market when it was a dead server with hardly no bots and I made a ton of money.
Now on Bot infested Aria everything is way over priced and I have to work harder for my money.
To Mega :
Sorry dear, not playing for 3 weeks (RL reason).
But when i'm back, well, maybe we will go dino. Long time i didn't went there to hunt !
Altho, i will not be really usefull to you there, since i'm domi and we're not in same clan, so i can't buff/heal you.
anyway... ^_^
To Ashley :
Yes you're right. But i keep having that Damocles sword over my head, and i shiver when i think it can cut another legit player's one.
As suggested, i'll enjoy the game still, because i'm here for long, and i love it. That report bot button is a great tool. will see in a month or 2 if that really makes the difference.
Now come some questions, like it been discussed on another topic in the same forum :
- is it the end of farmers/botters ?
- how the market will evolve ?
As mega, i'd rather stay in a grade till 79 than be happy about farmer's controlling the market.
Thing is, i'm very well equiped, so i can't complain. (been in big clan and always been xping with $poiler <3)
But i'd be happy if botters and farmers get out of L2 !
So people will play cleverly, and more nice legit people will join the game !
Clans will be more family-like, and clannies will work all together to get items and money.
Players will hunt for crops, for drops, for quests.
And the value of things will really become their true value, not the crazy-over-price an ebayer is willing to pay.
I met a newbie this morning. A guy that started a month ago, and that was working his way up very seriously. He been surprised i talked to him and felt honored i added him in friendlist.
He told me "you're the very first person talking to me. My friend and I started a month ago, and never met anyone "talking" "....
Isn't it shocking?!
All that guy ever met in L2 so far are bots/farmers and grieffers insulting in greek.
It's time things change ! Let's hope that button is the key.
Edit : pvp-wise, less botters/ebayers/farmers = less adenas ingame = less people buying cp pots for pvp (that would become luxury, people will not spend 3M for a fight in cp pots) = more love and use for OVERLORDS !
(ps: sorry for that long and hardly understandable post. my english sucks and i get lost in my thoughs while writting it ^^")
- is it the end of farmers/botters ? No far from it but it is a start to lower the amount of them which is still a good thing
- how the market will evolve ? Market will do a lot better. Prices of ebay will go up and people (the Idiots that is) will ebay less and prices will have 2 go down in game or they will be stuck with The items and the real players can make money for a change selling they matts.
To Mega :
Sorry dear, not playing for 3 weeks (RL reason).
But when i'm back, well, maybe we will go dino. Long time i didn't went there to hunt !
Altho, i will not be really usefull to you there, since i'm domi and we're not in same clan, so i can't buff/heal you.
anyway... ^_^
Ppl in party can heal.. ;)
VR dance is also useful.. ^^
I met a newbie this morning. A guy that started a month ago, and that was working his way up very seriously. He been surprised i talked to him and felt honored i added him in friendlist.
He told me "you're the very first person talking to me. My friend and I started a month ago, and never met anyone "talking" "....
Isn't it shocking?!
Yes it is.
I've found a guy that came from other type of servers on Luna forums... he was so lost...
He's now on Devianne.. currently above lvl 40.. a TH. ^^
A very cool guy.. legit and works hard. He was so glad last night.. because he finally saw players, playing.. instead of automated.
If NCSoft would pay more attention to the bot/ebay problems.. and gave more support to players.. we'd have a boom of returning and new players.
no there wouldnt, players dont just come out of nowhere
its not like in some huge advertising campaign, it would say " WE DEAL WITH BOTS NOW!"
the game is 5 years old, there isnt going to be a huge rush of new players ever
Blade... I have a ton of friends that left for illegal servers.. only because there's no AFK life there.. but they do keep asking me how's AFK life in retail.. and they want to come back.. but not to bot infested servers. I'm sure that there are more players like this... and probably.. even if NCSOft would proactively fight against bots.. and ban them.. they would get an increase in $$$ instead of losing money from banning bots.
Mega : i'm far from 74 on my bd sub T.T
me not noble yet ! i know.. it's a shame !
Asley: i believe (hope) it will be the end of cheating. Slowly... but surely.
Because if that magical button is efficient, actual cheaters and farmers will little by little get kicked or bored or tired and will be out of L2.
For those people, the game isn't a game anymore, because it does have a real currency value. What happens if you get banned with your bought 80+ toon with your ebayed gear and epic jwls that costed you tonz of euros/dollars ?
You don't come back, because you lost money. That kind of person don't mind spending so much real money in the toon/equipment, since they can resell it and refund the $$ when they decide to stop. What if noone buy or if the account get banned ?
If that magical button works, and if there is no mistake, it's the slow end of cheating in L2
no there wouldnt, players dont just come out of nowhere
its not like in some huge advertising campaign, it would say " WE DEAL WITH BOTS NOW!"
the game is 5 years old, there isnt going to be a huge rush of new players ever
The game is 4+ years old, there is going to be a lot of returning players.
no there wouldnt, players dont just come out of nowhere
its not like in some huge advertising campaign, it would say " WE DEAL WITH BOTS NOW!"
the game is 5 years old, there isnt going to be a huge rush of new players ever
The game is 4+ years old, there is going to be a lot of returning players.
Absolutly !
And with some nice commercial move, many new players might come too.
to mega : for dino we need sm dance mainly. so ... ^^
why the hell you wanna hunt dino btw?
Yeah Varka/ketra is meant to be small group area, since drop herbs. Dinos don't X_x
to mega : for dino we need sm dance mainly. so ... ^^
why the hell you wanna hunt dino btw?
Yeah Varka/ketra is meant to be small group area, since drop herbs. Dinos don't X_x
What kills me is that after all the complaints about botters (me included) they come out with something to help with the war on bots and you all start getting worried. For what? Siren Already made it clear you have noting 2 fear if your legit.
It's perfectly logic to worry that the weapon they give could be used in a bad manner. As we don't know exactly how it works, there's an unknown part. How can we be totally secure about it?
I'm against popular justice, so of course they will have to reassure me that it's not a tool for popular justice but really to help them to treat the cases. I reported characters that I thought were in a bot train (that I reported with), but minutes later I realized they were following a train to steal mobs, seed or whatever. I absolutely don't want the GMs believe I'm always right and ban immediately the name I give them. I want them to investigate. That's why I worry about all the automatical sanction systems.
There's this trend to automate this whole process which imo is dumb ... Gracia 3 patch notes suggest people will get tped to town/debuffed/unable to join parties based on the number of times they get reported as bot which is dumb beyond belief. IF ncsoft wants to fight bots they should get a few live GMs to go patrol the servers not put the onus on users to sort things out. To me the botbutton is a) a bandaid (wow look at this I got a system msg stuff is H A P P E N I N G dude and b) abuseable
This will be a distributed solution, much like Folding@Home and the likes. Or if you prefer "The Army of Davids" approach.
I'm not with NCSoft, but I am a professional game producer. I can see how this would work very easily and without a major drain on the staff, as the suggestion of getting GMs in the game would be. In fact, boy howdy, if they sent humans out in game looking for bots, the bang (or banhammer) to buck ratio is completely insane. Humans cost money, CPUs work cheap.
Tallies are created and filtered for various criterion. A list of strong suspects is developed over time. This list is then used by a staff member to do the job of "human observation". If a non-bot gets on the list a devaluation of the IP of the reporters is applied, if its a bot *bang bang goes Maxwell's silver banhammer*
If I were on the team, this is what I would propose.
The economy of this approach is 180 degrees from what it is now, a human reads a petition and looks at each and every report (if they do that instead of "filing" them, that is) then cut-and-pastes the standard reply to the petition. More GM time must be spent on this activity than anything else they do, even if the "filing" approach is used. Under the new system, the time is maybe a few hours of concentrated banning a month... Maybe even as little as 2 hours a week.
If they went the totally insane "fully automatic" route, then maybe there would be some room for the naysayer's speculation. Only if they are truly insane and allow a computer program's "judgment" be final without human supervision. I don't think NCSoft is insane, your opinion may differ.
Will this be the "final solution" for the bot problem, the adena seller problem or the ebay problem? No freaking way. What the bot wranglers will do is move to places where they don't get seen, maybe even force log when an unidentified toon approaches. Of course, that solves the major problem, which is bots taking up popular hunting spots.
Drive the bots into unused, musty and mostly unprofitable hunting areas where human players rarely go or have the bots flee as soon as I get there so I get the hunting ground by default.
There's this trend to automate this whole process which imo is dumb ... Gracia 3 patch notes suggest people will get tped to town/debuffed/unable to join parties based on the number of times they get reported as bot which is dumb beyond belief. IF ncsoft wants to fight bots they should get a few live GMs to go patrol the servers not put the onus on users to sort things out. To me the botbutton is a) a bandaid (wow look at this I got a system msg stuff is H A P P E N I N G dude and b) abuseable
Also to you i adive to read Sirens answer and all the other discussions about the bot button. Then you will understand better that there is no reasons for your complainings.
i don't think i've been effected by them so far. well i'm starting to move into their hunting zones right now and it's a bearable pain is the price i suppose i have to pay for the various effects that it may mysteriously have under my current and future awareness.
that guy over there was saying how easy the game have become. and you, you're saying you having a tough time. i don't know who to believe.
I prefer to have silence bot pt running near me, than dumb legits, which are ksing everything and feel strong by pushing "bot report" button. It's impossible. Before this update shrine was quite nice place. You could easily to do prof quest. And now... there are running 2-3 legit parties and disturbing other legit players with dumb showt "cha cha noob You are bot reported" ^^
I prefer to have silence bot pt running near me, than dumb legits, which are ksing everything and feel strong by pushing "bot report" button. It's impossible. Before this update shrine was quite nice place. You could easily to do prof quest. And now... there are running 2-3 legit parties and disturbing other legit players with dumb showt "cha cha noob You are bot reported" ^^
I'm not protecting botters, but...
Yup... this game does sometimes attract the cream of the crop.
Well, listen, the pk'ing is part of the game, no way around that. However, acting like a 12 year old whose mother didn't care so they have to scream for attention and "bot report" people because they can't resist the big shiny red button?
no there wouldnt, players dont just come out of nowhere
its not like in some huge advertising campaign, it would say " WE DEAL WITH BOTS NOW!"
the game is 5 years old, there isnt going to be a huge rush of new players ever
The game is 4+ years old, there is going to be a lot of returning players.
so what?
you think returning players outnumber bots?
pretty sure bots give a better return on profits than returning players do
no there wouldnt, players dont just come out of nowhere
its not like in some huge advertising campaign, it would say " WE DEAL WITH BOTS NOW!"
the game is 5 years old, there isnt going to be a huge rush of new players ever
The game is 4+ years old, there is going to be a lot of returning players.
so what?
you think returning players outnumber bots?
If course I do. There is not that many bots anyway.
pretty sure bots give a better return on profits than returning players do
I know Im being very optimistic here and what Im probably seeing is just the new updata scare. But last night at my favorite 7x hunting spot (that is usualy overrun by bots) it was completely empty!! Not a single bot.
Wether it is the result of NCSofts new anti-botting efforts or just a lucky grinding time, I must say it was a very refreshing and enjoyable time something I severly miss. It kind of gave me a fresh new view on how I feel about this game. No bots = better game.
well, with last update, there was introduced new protection from OOG bots. i hope, it will last some time, before it's broken.
IG walker is still working, but setting up train from IG walker takes much more system resources because it needs game client running - oposite to OOG which is client itself, and doesn't need l2 client at all.
well i'm glad for this. at least for some days (i hope some weeks ;o)), we will have game with lower percentage of automated clients.
i love bots end of story
they save my life
i hate them for stealing my hunting spot and causes lagg
they help stablize the market
If you thing they do any good on the market you have no idea how the market work, the real farmers live in catacombs to inflate the AA price, and screw the market!
Also a lot of Castle Owners have second accounts, running 24/7 to far some epics, farm AA and produce real money selling to Game Currency sites...
no there wouldnt, players dont just come out of nowhere
its not like in some huge advertising campaign, it would say " WE DEAL WITH BOTS NOW!"
the game is 5 years old, there isnt going to be a huge rush of new players ever
The game is 4+ years old, there is going to be a lot of returning players.
so what?
you think returning players outnumber bots?
If course I do. There is not that many bots anyway.
pretty sure bots give a better return on profits than returning players do
Of course they don't.
if players made more profit than returning bots, they wouldve banned them years ago
but go ahead and keep sitting around thinking once the bots are gone the game will be the way you think it is
Siren's words that legit have no reason to be scared don't make me secure.
Because long time ago, even if i always was clean, i get banned, accused to be a bot. This happened because some hatefull people spammed reported me. and Gms never listened to me nor let me proove that i wasn't "guilty".
They almost half admitted the mistake at the end by saying me "we allow you to make a new account".
That situation was shamefull, and without my friends, i would never came back in game.
There is no way I would *ever* start over if I got banned unjustly. I've tolerated poor customer support, a painful grind, unbalanced classes, and an unrelenting issue with bots. If I was banned (or hacked) I'd move on and never look back.
If you thing they do any good on the market you have no idea how the market work, the real farmers live in catacombs to inflate the AA price, and screw the market!
Also a lot of Castle Owners have second accounts, running 24/7 to far some epics, farm AA and produce real money selling to Game Currency sites...
farmers dont inflate aa price, players do
90% of the aa is sold by farmers
when there are no farmers selling aa, players sell it at ridiculous prices cuz people are too lazy to farm for it
even if u sold it cheap ud sell out in 2 seconds and then when you realize it sells so fast you up the price a little cuz you know people will still buy it until you just end up selling it almost as high as everyone else
low supply = greedy people
There is no way I would *ever* start over if I got banned unjustly. I've tolerated poor customer support, a painful grind, unbalanced classes, and an unrelenting issue with bots. If I was banned (or hacked) I'd move on and never look back.
My friends and my husband begged me...
and they helped me to start again and supported me all my way up. Without them, i would never came back.
It's not so much a question of waste of time when i been unfairly banned (i was just A grade. pretty "low" level). It's a question of honor and shame. Now many people point me as a bot, as NCsoft did, even if i never been guilty of anything.
That's my only problem. And that's what i would like to still fight about.
I still say it.. one day, i'm gonna have my old account back. Even if i'll not use the toons on it, just for restoring my honor, i will make my old main toon run all around Aden as a proof for a month.
To come back on topic, we will see real changes about the bot button in few months.
I heard farmers are leaving the game since the button been announced. Truth or rumors?
When i logued in the day after update, i noticed many bot heros untagg and naked, prolly in case they got banned?
Days, weeks, months incoming wil be very interesting !
Come on, NC NA didn't even have the resources to keep The Library on this site current, how would you expect them to ban bots regularly enough? :(
so being a web developer is easier than being a gm? REALLY?!
tell me its hard to spot a bot, tell me its so hard that they gave a button to all the players cuz we all know what bots look like
then tell me its hard for one guy to run around a server at random times just watching players and adding their name to a list of players to be banned
then go look up what html/activex/javascript/php code it takes to up date the library
and anyone who thinks they banned people for a button that came out 2 days ago is pretty naive
Come on, NC NA didn't even have the resources to keep The Library on this site current, how would you expect them to ban bots regularly enough? :(
so being a web developer is easier than being a gm?
You do not need to be "a web developer" in order to add new C4 items into the weapons database. And all but maybe a couple of their GMs cannot tell a bot from a box, but still have like 17 petitions needed to answer at any given time.
tell me its hard to spot a bot, tell me its so hard that they gave a button to all the players cuz we all know what bots look like
The button was added by NC Korea. NC West just translated it. Having the button does not mean that NC West has any resources to process the results of its pressing, unless NC Korea developers added some tools to automatically check the reported toons.
then tell me its hard for one guy to run around a server at random times just watching players and adding their name to a list of players to be banned
And banning an innocent bystander just for running through the same room. Already happened on our servers during mass bans, by the way.
then go look up what html/activex/javascript/php code it takes to up date the library
You should not need that to update info in a site database, lol. You just need to be able to fill standard forms and to upload pictures using standard "upload" buttons.
You should not need that to update info in a site database, lol. You just need to be able to fill standard forms and to upload pictures using standard "upload" buttons.
this isnt myspace, they didnt pay someone to develop forms that would only be used internally once every 6 months
how many gms does it take to screw in a light bulb or better yet answer petitions?
youre telling me one cant answer petitions and one cant find bots?
dont try and tell me its a question of manpower, cuz l2 was making way more money b4 when there were more players and they couldve easily got 1 gm to do it
no there wouldnt, players dont just come out of nowhere
its not like in some huge advertising campaign, it would say " WE DEAL WITH BOTS NOW!"
the game is 5 years old, there isnt going to be a huge rush of new players ever
New players DO come out of "no where". You think every person in the world that plays games has a system capable of running high end mmorpgs by default? Not everyone is born with a quad or dual core gaming system. Lots of European and South American players are upgrading their systems at regular intervals are are ONLY NOW being able to play the games we've been enjoying for years.
A lot of them are still stuck playing Duke Nukem and Doom, but as they and their families come into more money and their country's economies evolve they start playing the 'good' games and get into what their friends are playing, just like we did on our old PII and PIII systems.
And more than a few people have made the point of RETURNING players, which are a huge asset to NC because a lot, not all, of them have mulitple accounts, such as myself. I returned after the mass bot-ban in spring, and although it was better for awhile, it still became infested once again. The big companies in the world know that it takes diligence to make money, and satisfying a few people for a short amount of time won't get you anywhere. NC can come out with all the games in the world, but at the end of the day they'll still be viewed as 'just another bot infested nc clusterf**k'. Banning bots takes CONSTANT, and dedicated work, but this will pay for itself by luring in customers old and new by making a name for yourself as a bot free game. When I look into MMOs I"m interested in trying I go to the forums and find out from the players how clean the game is, how do you think NC looks in the eyes of new strangers most of the time?
Never ever underestimate that the desire for a pure, clean, and fair game will infinitely outweigh the desire for cheaters to exist.
Anything NC can do to show that they're ACTIVELY trying to ban bots and cheaters will help turn MY choice from /Cancelsubscription to /purchasegametime.
u think a few returning players is the same a a farmer who runs 4 or 5 9 man trains?
yeah, yer multiple accounts look way better since youll just cancel your account again later on as opposed to the farmer who gets banned and up and buys 50 more accounts
You can reduce bot by scaring them... Just ban heroes/power clam members/leaders on daily basis for boting(when they do that) and some of botter will be rly scared. They could even make an announcment smth like that: ''Not deserved to be a hero'' or smth like that.
hmm
why its not possible to report a Bot if you are in any kind of transformed stage?
Inquisitor, Death Blader, dragon bomber.. Pumpkin or Pigs Transform or whatever you want
this is kindo stupid o0
You can reduce bot by scaring them... Just ban heroes/power clam members/leaders on daily basis for boting(when they do that) and some of botter will be rly scared. They could even make an announcment smth like that: ''Not deserved to be a hero'' or smth like that.
People get emo when clan leaders get banned for botting, etc. Ask Bartz.
hmm
why its not possible to report a Bot if you are in any kind of transformed stage?
Inquisitor, Death Blader, dragon bomber.. Pumpkin or Pigs Transform or whatever you want
this is kindo stupid o0
so...how is the /command to report?
there is no command, because it would by spammable by macro
yes ban more people and reduce L2 playerbase to a miniscule nothing! the map is already too big with far too little players
True is that bots occupy the best spots ..so active players are running like crazy trying to find some free spot for themselves ..not mention this stupid 3rd class quests ..you dont have choice ..just have to kill certain mobs ..but all spots with those mobs allready taken by bots ..bots dont get tired so practically all spots unavailable all the time ..crap.
economy with botz is &^$*^%$ :/ i seen screen on bleh - some farmer shows it ... 24h at Hellbound and he got drops like 94 divine stones and other valuable drops....
Those farmers are big bad [censored] - they farm awesome adena and crazy lvl and still PVP with legit ppl :[
without banning 8x lvl trains it dont have sense .... but how many ppl can report it deep in HB ???? :((
look at your sys msg. 'You reportert XY as BOT'
nothing more, and nothing more will happen.
I really dont understand all this effort with bot reporting button ..its so easy to find bots that admins dont need any reports from active players.
Just login to the game ..go to any cata/necro/varka/hs/woa or other popular place ..and ...yes ..tons of them everywhere. It need so little effort to find hords of bots.
So what's up with this button thing ? Is it only to make us think that something going to change?
If admins really would like to enforce rules which are on game disclaimer they can do it without all this confusion ..just ban players which dont follow the rules ..simple and effective.
Im not even going to waste my time pushing this stupid button hundreds of time per day.
I think 'the button' will help remove some of the more nutorious botters in popular hunting areas, particularly come CT Final. But it shouldn't be seen as a solution, it just seems like a filter method to help control cheaters by removing ones that most effect legit players(or whats left of them).
You should not need that to update info in a site database, lol. You just need to be able to fill standard forms and to upload pictures using standard "upload" buttons.
this isnt myspace, they didnt pay someone to develop forms that would only be used internally once every 6 months
Even if it's used only once, you aren't going to code each of those hundreds of pages manually. There is a database that can be filled easily without requiring html/javascript/whatever else coding knowledge.
how many gms does it take to screw in a light bulb or better yet answer petitions?
Maybe ten to answer with template answers from NCsoft's internal frequently asked petinitons list, and maybe two-three to escalate the non-trivial petitions to.
youre telling me one cant answer petitions and one cant find bots?
Nope. The one that can tell a bot from a non-bot is obviously the same one that is forced to answer any non-trivial petition.
dont try and tell me its a question of manpower, cuz l2 was making way more money b4 when there were more players and they couldve easily got 1 gm to do it
L2 was indeed making more money when there were less bots. However, NC NA felt that their priorities were somethere else at that moment and screwed the funding of the game.
WTH does it mean "You can't report a character in peace zone or siege zone"?!
That button is a weapon? Are you serious?
That's ******ed beyond limit. People saying it's about mass report to block/kick someone are totally true. And it's a shame. It's not against bot, it's just a game to mock legit players.
1hour ago i reportet 2 bot dwarfs with the bot button and they had cool nicks like "dfdfdfdfdf" and "9898989" in Hunters Village...before I loged out..I still saw them running around like nothing happend.....