ZOS please check for farming bots

AnduinTryggva · February 2

I don't claim that there are farming bots but I have thoughts that there are some running around.

After finishing a large house furnishing projects and some master writs I am now trying refill my stock on crafting materials by farming ressources (manually). Since a couple of days I observe systematically empty zones, and specifically empty on high value ressource nodes such as cloth nodes that yield dreug wax that goes for 24k gold right now while other low value nodes are mostly left intact. And this in zones were I very rarely meet other players.

Again I cannot claim that there are farm bots running around I have no proof or other leads as to what I observe. So maybe I have just very very bad luck or we have some guilds doing farm runs...

CGPsaint · February 2

All of the starter zones have been infested with bots for a really long time. I'm leery to say that ZOS doesn't care because I don't feel like getting banned from the forums, but the facts speak for themselves. Clearly it's not a pressing issue or one that they have a solution for. Bots will always be here.

Sakiri · February 3

Bots are a plague in every game, because people are lazy. Why farm when you can have a computer program do it for you? That's their logic.

CGPsaint · February 3

Sakiri wrote: »

Bots are a plague in every game, because people are lazy. Why farm when you can have a computer program do it for you? That's their logic.

Ultima Online had actual Game Masters that would pop up and chat with players who they thought were running macros. If you didn't respond, they put you in jail to think about what you had done. Good times.

jad11mumbler · February 3

It's a shame the game isn't moderated a fraction as well as the forums.

Alikr dolmens are an easy way to find bots / players using macros. ( A clear ToS violation. )
Along with all the farming bots.
Some have been there for months now without ZoS doing a thing.

CGPsaint · February 3

jad11mumbler wrote: »

It's a shame the game isn't moderated a fraction as well as the forums.

Alikr dolmens are an easy way to find bots / players using macros. ( A clear ToS violation. )
Along with all the farming bots.
Some have been there for months now without ZoS doing a thing.

Literally EVERY starting zone is crawling with them 24/7. They aren't hard to find.

DreamyLu · February 3

Are you all on consoles? Because I farm resources regularly in beginner areas and have never seen any bots, but I'm playing on PC, that could explain.

AvalonRanger · February 3

The bot used to be strange appearance. Just doesn't wear any natural cloth, mostly naked or
villagers costume. Everyone has same face and body just like the "agent Smith of the Matrix".
Suddenly show up same appearance many player characters at the same location, and
start to act very strange way.

But recently, I don't see those type of bot.

AnduinTryggva · February 3

AvalonRanger wrote: »

The bot used to be strange appearance. Just doesn't wear any natural cloth, mostly naked or
villagers costume. Everyone has same face and body just like the "agent Smith of the Matrix".
Suddenly show up same appearance many player characters at the same location, and
start to act very strange way.

But recently, I don't see those type of bot.

I guess they maybe use now a random face generator and stuff. These things are not difficult to code.

Still if we had an automated observer that records behavior of certain players they should be able to quickly identify bots. I have some ideas on how this could work but to be honest would be counterproductive to share it because in case ZOS would implement such an observer and have similar ideas it could give bot creators means to deceive these observers.

AnduinTryggva · February 3

To be honest I think ZOS needs to remedy on this issue. Although it is of course impossible to achieve it by 100% but as it is now these farm bots create a situation that is not so far away from a monopoly with respect to certain crafting items that you can only buy via guild stores.

moo_2021 · February 3

Sakiri wrote: »

Bots are a plague in every game, because people are lazy. Why farm when you can have a computer program do it for you? That's their logic.

eh, Why farm when you can buy cheaply from players who run bots?

Pixiepumpkin · February 3

jad11mumbler wrote: »

It's a shame the game isn't moderated a fraction as well as the forums.

Right. If as much money was put into GM's in game as they do the forum moderations, the game would be much better off. I mean its not like they have to even log into 300 servers like with wow.

And as others have noted, its easy for a player to determine a bot, should be infinitely easier for a dev.

JanTanhide · February 3

Don't see BOTs much on PC servers. Use to long ago and I used an Addon called Bot Scanner 2000 to capture their names and report them along with making videos. I even have a character named "Bot Hunter". Use to be a daily thing for me to hop on ole Bot Hunter and head to the Bot infested areas.

But no more. I haven't seen a Bot in a very long time on PC NA. I have quite a few videos of Bots from the old days and when I reported them they usually disappeared within a few days (with some exceptions).

Alikr over by the Thief Mundus was a favorite for Bot trains back in the day. Another one was the Rift near Riften. All gone now. I check for Bots constantly and haven't seen one in a long time.

As for those screaming about people using Macros it would help if they would provide some kind of proof. I've heard the Macro complaint for almost ten years and have yet to know a single person that ever used a Macro.

Pixiepumpkin · February 3

There are absolutely bots on PCNA, if you do any farming or alkir dolemns you see them hourly, literarally hourly. And I have seen people macro as well...as far as proof, well its literally impossible for any player to have evidence of another player using macros. Just because something is observed and anecdotal does not mean its not true.

XSTRONG · February 3

In my point of view, after they changed the jewelry mats I see alot less bot farmers.

Also its not hard to see in big Guild traders who sell bot farmed mats and alot of those on Pseu are now not selling

dk_dunkirk · February 3

CGPsaint wrote: »

jad11mumbler wrote: »

It's a shame the game isn't moderated a fraction as well as the forums.

Alikr dolmens are an easy way to find bots / players using macros. ( A clear ToS violation. )
Along with all the farming bots.
Some have been there for months now without ZoS doing a thing.

Literally EVERY starting zone is crawling with them 24/7. They aren't hard to find.

What platform? I NEVER see them on PC, and I only ever saw them once on PS.

AnduinTryggva · February 3

JanTanhide wrote: »

Don't see BOTs much on PC servers. Use to long ago and I used an Addon called Bot Scanner 2000 to capture their names and report them along with making videos. I even have a character named "Bot Hunter". Use to be a daily thing for me to hop on ole Bot Hunter and head to the Bot infested areas.

But no more. I haven't seen a Bot in a very long time on PC NA. I have quite a few videos of Bots from the old days and when I reported them they usually disappeared within a few days (with some exceptions).

Alikr over by the Thief Mundus was a favorite for Bot trains back in the day. Another one was the Rift near Riften. All gone now. I check for Bots constantly and haven't seen one in a long time.

As for those screaming about people using Macros it would help if they would provide some kind of proof. I've heard the Macro complaint for almost ten years and have yet to know a single person that ever used a Macro.

Are you sure that your bot scanner is up to date to capture newer bots?

zaria · February 3

DreamyLu wrote: »

Are you all on consoles? Because I farm resources regularly in beginner areas and have never seen any bots, but I'm playing on PC, that could explain.

Same, never seen farming bots on PC-EU; seen some who ran an leveling bot train in Grathwood years ago. Now they might uses instances for this like nDSA. They are not in the starting zones.

katanagirl1 · February 4

We’ve been complaining about this on PS for years, it is not apparent anything has ever been done about it.

Sakiri · February 4

moo_2021 wrote: »

Sakiri wrote: »

Bots are a plague in every game, because people are lazy. Why farm when you can have a computer program do it for you? That's their logic.

eh, Why farm when you can buy cheaply from players who run bots?

I farm because it's relaxing.

AnduinTryggva · February 4

Some ressources are NOT cheap. And some items you can only obtain by farming or buying it in guild stores and if the base ressource is farmed empty people only have the possibility to buy it in guild stores and the consequence is that prices soar. Excluding a lot of players from accessing this ressource.

ZOS HAS to do something about it.

They either have to implement market control regulations for some items or make it harder for bots.

xiphactinus · February 4

Simple solution, make players able to kill bots. Add a bounty system via quest and let players deal with them.

AnduinTryggva · February 4

Na, if a bot is detected should get a temporary ban and not just a random need for using a soal gem.

ZOS could simply also provide for additional possibilities to obtain ressources. Maybe by giving possibility to players to have a privately owned garden that allows harvesting a fixed amount of ressources every week. This would limit price peaks for ressources and hence interest in farming bots.

CaptainVenom · February 4

Sakiri wrote: »

Bots are a plague in every game, because people are lazy. Why farm when you can have a computer program do it for you? That's their logic.

because people are greedy*

AnduinTryggva wrote: »

I don't claim that there are farming bots but I have thoughts that there are some running around.

After finishing a large house furnishing projects and some master writs I am now trying refill my stock on crafting materials by farming ressources (manually). Since a couple of days I observe systematically empty zones, and specifically empty on high value ressource nodes such as cloth nodes that yield dreug wax that goes for 24k gold right now while other low value nodes are mostly left intact. And this in zones were I very rarely meet other players.

Again I cannot claim that there are farm bots running around I have no proof or other leads as to what I observe. So maybe I have just very very bad luck or we have some guilds doing farm runs...

You can always report them if you feel something is wrong. ZOS analyzes every report, so you don't have to worry about being "unfair". If they are not bots, they won't be banned.

Sakiri · February 4

CaptainVenom wrote: »

Sakiri wrote: »

Bots are a plague in every game, because people are lazy. Why farm when you can have a computer program do it for you? That's their logic.

because people are greedy*

AnduinTryggva wrote: »

I don't claim that there are farming bots but I have thoughts that there are some running around.

After finishing a large house furnishing projects and some master writs I am now trying refill my stock on crafting materials by farming ressources (manually). Since a couple of days I observe systematically empty zones, and specifically empty on high value ressource nodes such as cloth nodes that yield dreug wax that goes for 24k gold right now while other low value nodes are mostly left intact. And this in zones were I very rarely meet other players.

Again I cannot claim that there are farm bots running around I have no proof or other leads as to what I observe. So maybe I have just very very bad luck or we have some guilds doing farm runs...

You can always report them if you feel something is wrong. ZOS analyzes every report, so you don't have to worry about being "unfair". If they are not bots, they won't be banned.

Not greedy. Lazy. People with limited time would rather whip out wallets than grind things. That's lazy, not greed. That's what drives RMT. RMT is fueled by bots. The RMTers are profiting off laziness.

If there was no lazy person demand, they'd die out. Not like gold is hard to get. I know some of the richest players on pc NA. They don't run bots. And we're talking billions of gold.

AnduinTryggva · February 8

I am now running since a while through Vvardenfell. It is almost entirely EMPTY (PC EU).

ZOS needs to urgently do something about this issue. This is ruining the market (by soaring prices) and the game.

Meanwhile I suggest that ALL players caring about the playability of this game to stopp buying ressources from guild stores so that these farm bots lose interest in doing their mischieveous thing.

AuroranGoldenEagle · February 8

I remember last month at one of the Alik'r dolmens there was a character very clearly botting or using a macro to spam the Arcarnist beam rotation and then move back and forth regardless if the dolmen was active or not.

They were doing this at all hours of the day. Reported them, and yet there they were when I came back a week later. Dissapointed to say the least, as it was very obvious what they were doing. Wouldn't be so bad, but the constant beam was very annoying.

JanTanhide · February 8

AnduinTryggva wrote: »

JanTanhide wrote: »

Don't see BOTs much on PC servers. Use to long ago and I used an Addon called Bot Scanner 2000 to capture their names and report them along with making videos. I even have a character named "Bot Hunter". Use to be a daily thing for me to hop on ole Bot Hunter and head to the Bot infested areas.

But no more. I haven't seen a Bot in a very long time on PC NA. I have quite a few videos of Bots from the old days and when I reported them they usually disappeared within a few days (with some exceptions).

Alikr over by the Thief Mundus was a favorite for Bot trains back in the day. Another one was the Rift near Riften. All gone now. I check for Bots constantly and haven't seen one in a long time.

As for those screaming about people using Macros it would help if they would provide some kind of proof. I've heard the Macro complaint for almost ten years and have yet to know a single person that ever used a Macro.

Are you sure that your bot scanner is up to date to capture newer bots?

Oh yeah, it still works. You should install it and go into the text file and edit the API to the current value which is 101040 and the next API is 101041. You can edit to have both in the text file so it shows as up to date. The Addon works well. Just watch what you do and don't "capture" innocent players by accident. It certainly is easy to do if not careful. When you move your Mouse pointer over a target all the data of the target is captured: Name, ID, location, etc. It's the best thing for hunting Bots and reporting them.

I use OBS to make a video of Bot trains (Rarely will I see just one Bot) and in that video you can see Bot Scanner in action. I use to hunt the Bots quite a bit. I have dozens of videos I uploaded to my channel and linked those videos in the Reports to ZOS in game. When you link a video showing everything ZOS doesn't waste any time banning those accounts in my experience.

AnduinTryggva · February 9

Mh, I wonder if ZOS could instead of having a precise location for ressource nodes have a sort of a small area defined (diameter maybe something like 2 or 3m) in which the node spawns at a random location within this small node zone. Could prevent macro bots.

Pelanora · February 14

xiphactinus wrote: »

Simple solution, make players able to kill bots. Add a bounty system via quest and let players deal with them.

Yea! Put really really good resource nodes in cyrodil! Lure the bots! Let players take them out!

Pixiepumpkin · February 14

There is a bot spamming for guild invites outside of the Daggerfall wayshrine. The bot is there at all hours of the day. Its been reported and its still there spamming for guild invites.