Do we actually need RMT?

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO

Catflinger wrote: »

In a subscription-based game, the game company has to keep a tight lid on the economy. It needs to keep the players interested in farming items for themselves and in growing and maintaining an in-game economy.

Agreed.

Catflinger wrote: »

It is NOT in the best interests of the game to allow botters in to strip all the resources away for the purposes of selling them for real money off-site.

Agreed.

Catflinger wrote: »

And to suggest that the game company is in league with the RMTraders is in fact a very serious allegation, especially if the company in question is publically held.

I did not mean to imply that they are "in league" with any illegal or even shady external RMT firm. I did say precisely what I meant and that is that they can not, in my opinion which is based on my zero experience running a multi-million dollar MMO, afford to lose a significant portion of their subscribers that would abandon the game if all real money purchase of in world advantages were denied them. At the moment the only way (ignoring horses) that a sub can buy advantages over other players with real world money is via RMT companies. Many have suggested, and I am on the fence on the topic of, ZOS opening a company store that allows for purchasing in world Gold for real world money. That is an extremely sensitive subject, at least in the US there is significant interest in regulating and taxing RL<->VR fund exchanges. And most companies I am aware of are nervous about taking any position where real world money can be used in world until the legal status is clarified. (Note: I said MOST - not all).

Saerydoth

The 30% figure is absolutely ridiculous. MMO's can and do ban people for buying gold. During my 8 years in WOW, I saw a few threads in the support forum (although never a huge number) from people who were banned for buying gold and trying to use the "I saw it in chat so I didn't know it was wrong" excuse. They were always told, without fail, that "sorry, ignorance of the rules is not an excuse, you're free to start a new account if you want to play again".

This is absolutely how MMO's should operate. ANYONE caught doing any business with these parasites need to be immediately and permanently banned. The only time such an action should ever be reversed is if it was found to be in error (meaning they didn't actually knowingly deal with gold sellers - it's possible to end up in the "money trail" for dealing with these people even if you actually didn't).

Now, this page was made by Blizzard, and obviously ZOS is a different company. But the people selling gold and botting in ESO are the same people that sell gold and bot in WOW. So I think what Blizzard has to say is still VERY relevant even here. I actually think it would be a good idea for ZOS to put up a similar statement somewhere on the ESO site. http://www.battle.net/wow/shop/anti-gold/

I think some people have come into this game with the idea that it would be different here than other MMO's, because they are used to mods and "cheating" in the single player ES games. Before WOW, the Warcraft series was composed of RTS games which are very different. But ESO isn't "that" different from the single player games.

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO

Saerydoth wrote: »

The 30% figure is absolutely ridiculous.

Disagree.

Saerydoth wrote: »

MMO's can and do ban people for buying gold. During my 8 years in WOW, I saw a few threads in the support forum (although never a huge number) from people who were banned for buying gold and trying to use the "I saw it in chat so I didn't know it was wrong" excuse. They were always told, without fail, that "sorry, ignorance of the rules is not an excuse, you're free to start a new account if you want to play again".

This is absolutely how MMO's should operate. ANYONE caught doing any business with these parasites need to be immediately and permanently banned. The only time such an action should ever be reversed is if it was found to be in error (meaning they didn't actually knowingly deal with gold sellers - it's possible to end up in the "money trail" for dealing with these people even if you actually didn't).

Agree.

Spiritreaver_ESO

Blade_07 wrote: »

Xancathb16_ESO wrote: »

30% of mmo subs make use of RMT services? That's absolute nonsense. Show us your source for that ridiculous figure please lol.

The rest makes sense, it probably isn't viable for a company to dedicate enough resources to conduct a "crusade" wiping out 100% of RMT. The problem is the RMT/botting problem is SO prevalent it appears as if they are doing nothing at all.

Dont know what Squair Enix did in FFXI but there is no RMT's what so ever! They have wiped them out almost completely. On the rare occasion you might get 1 whisper from an RMT but its almost never & you 100% NEVER see any spam in zone chat at all. NONE!

I brought this up in another thread. RMT got locked down tight because both the devs and the players got on the same page early on and worked at it for years.

SE made the special anti-RMT taskforce. They released i think quarterly reports as to how many RMT accounts were banned, how much illegally made gil(FFXI's gold) was seized, etc. They had staff, i mean a whole division of staff, whose only job was to back-trace suspected RMT activity and investigate it. And most importantly, they banned you if they had you dead to rights engaging in RMT activity after so many strikes(with substantial suspensions before outright banning).

The player's part was to not engage in RMT, to report suspected RMT activity, and to expect repercussions if they did engage in RMT. The players got on board and the community stance against RMT got drilled into every noob that joined. FFXI is a much more grueling game than TESO(i seriously chuckle at the threads with ppl complaining about the VR lvl grinds. Earning merits in FFXI could be a full-time job if you let it) and players would not risk accounts engaging with RMT.

Oh and SE also did something that i don't know how ZOS could do it in this day and age; they locked out IPs from certain areas. Wasn't pretty, but they did. And by god all their measures worked and continue to do so.

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO wrote: »

Blade_07 wrote: »

Dont know what Squair Enix did in FFXI but there is no RMT's what so ever!

Here is the basic plan to remove RMT from FFXI - basically, banning hunters, sellers and BUYERS. I believe the banning of buyers would have the most impact, but is also the most dangerous approach for a company to take.

http://www.playonline.com/pcd/topics/ff11us/detail/4008/4008_7.jpg

I don't know if the above link is legal - if not, I hope a moderator will remove it, and people can google FFXI and RMT and that chart will be one of the results.

That graphic is legit by the way. I remember it from way back. They loved making graphics when laying out a new initiative, game system, etc.

daneyulebub17_ESO

RE: RMT

Pro tip: When using almost any abbreviation or acronym but the most universal and long-standing, it is generally good practice to, in the first occurrence, spell it out, no matter how common you may think it is.

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO

daneyulebub17_ESO wrote: »

RE: RMT

Pro tip: When using almost any abbreviation or acronym but the most universal and long-standing, it is generally good practice to, in the first occurrence, spell it out, no matter how common you may think it is.

I agree and apologize for not doing that in my OP. Thanks for pointing it out.

Catflinger

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO wrote: »

I did not mean to imply that they are "in league" with any illegal or even shady external RMT firm. I did say precisely what I meant and that is that they can not, in my opinion which is based on my zero experience running a multi-million dollar MMO, afford to lose a significant portion of their subscribers that would abandon the game if all real money purchase of in world advantages were denied them.

Now we get back to this 30% number at which you've arrived; and also why you're now suddenly convinced that RMTrading is the key to retaining subs.

The fact is that a robust in-game economy, where not everything is a gold sink (like it is now), combined with excellent anti-botting and spam measures, is the better way.

nerevarine1138

I can't believe I've had to say this in two threads now:

Stop offering excuses for cheaters and criminals.

Resipsa131

I'm new to MMOs and I'm only now getting close to Veteran Ranks, hopefully I'll be there this week so I have a limited experience with Bots in ESO. I've seen them in fields harvesting nodes and the ones running scripts where they all run together. The only interaction I have is maybe one piece of mail per day from a gold website that gets a quick report for spam and then I move on. What do Bots do that harm the game? They don't destroy the economy because mostly gold doesn't seem as valuable once you top out in rank. You'll have sufficient time in veteran ranks to farm the mats you need. If someone wants to pay $5.00 to save a few hours of farming mats why/how should that affect me?

nerevarine1138

Resipsa131 wrote: »

I'm new to MMOs and I'm only now getting close to Veteran Ranks, hopefully I'll be there this week so I have a limited experience with Bots in ESO. I've seen them in fields harvesting nodes and the ones running scripts where they all run together. The only interaction I have is maybe one piece of mail per day from a gold website that gets a quick report for spam and then I move on. What do Bots do that harm the game? They don't destroy the economy because mostly gold doesn't seem as valuable once you top out in rank. You'll have sufficient time in veteran ranks to farm the mats you need. If someone wants to pay $5.00 to save a few hours of farming mats why/how should that affect me?

It affects you because the gold-sellers are using stolen accounts/credit cards to do their work.

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO

Resipsa131 - for the most part I don't care about RMT either. What I do care about is the swarm of bots harvesting 24 hours a day.

I have found that at low levels I used to be able to find most materials I need to keep my toons in armor and weapons by questing, and maybe spending a couple hours a day at most farming. But, lately no amount of farming can supply my early (below 12) toons with iron ore for armor. The bots simply take it all and no matter how fast it respawns I don't have access to it.

There is also the enjoyment of the game - where I go on a quest that ends in a dungeon, when I get there, ALL of the Quest NPCs are dead, any that respawn are instantly killed by bot trains that roam the dungeons. And I struggle to twitch fast enough to score a hit on the boss before the bot train kills it.

There are people that spend a lot of time building the crafting professions, only to not be able to compete and so have no market because the economy is so lopsided due to the bots farming and the RMTs selling.

And then there is the debate about buying the best of the best equipment (including a power leveled account prepackaged and handed to you) so you can then enter into the end game and brag about how good you are, having earned none of it. And people that struggle to play the game, level their own toon and try to compete while still having a real life.

I am sure there are other issues - those are a couple of why you should cares...

In my humble opinion.

Spiritreaver_ESO

Resipsa131 wrote: »

I'm new to MMOs and I'm only now getting close to Veteran Ranks, hopefully I'll be there this week so I have a limited experience with Bots in ESO. I've seen them in fields harvesting nodes and the ones running scripts where they all run together. The only interaction I have is maybe one piece of mail per day from a gold website that gets a quick report for spam and then I move on. What do Bots do that harm the game? They don't destroy the economy because mostly gold doesn't seem as valuable once you top out in rank. You'll have sufficient time in veteran ranks to farm the mats you need. If someone wants to pay $5.00 to save a few hours of farming mats why/how should that affect me?

Long story short, it will cause inflation of the ingame economy.

Which may seem a bit pointless atm as there is really nothing outside of motifs, mats and repecs to spend gold on. But as 'teh shineezz' start getting added and the game progresses, prices for said trinkets will start to continually rise. Which will lead to some buying even more gold to keep up....

And its a vicious cycle that keeps on escalating. And as it escalates it will start to pervade outward into the game. I'm just a bunch of words in the ether, but trust me as much as you can, eventually RMT will effect you adversely.

RustyBlades

The #1 buyer of WoW when I worked at an unnamed chain game store was a couple who did nothing but farm and sell mats in WoW. They would buy nearly every copy on the shelf (needed to leave a few for potential customers). I live in the US, not China.

Resipsa131

@nerevarine1138 its not my credit card information, if someone wants to give their info out that's their responsibility

@j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO I have not had the same experience in collecting mats as you have although my main is a clothier not an armorer. As far as high level crafting I craft light and medium armors for my guild members in return I get kick-ass staffs and potions. I can see how it would be a problem if you want to monetize your crafting skills due to inflation but if you operate on largely a barter basis you are immune to gold inflation for the most part.

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO wrote: »

There is also the enjoyment of the game - where I go on a quest that ends in a dungeon, when I get there, ALL of the Quest NPCs are dead, any that respawn are instantly killed by bot trains that roam the dungeons. And I struggle to twitch fast enough to score a hit on the boss before the bot train kills it.

I've seen this happen too but mostly its one or twice a week where this happens, to me its a minor annoyance. I'm more annoyed by quests taking too long from the amount of legit players in a public dungeon forcing the instance to spawn in another location.

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO wrote: »

And then there is the debate about buying the best of the best equipment (including a power leveled account prepackaged and handed to you) so you can then enter into the end game and brag about how good you are, having earned none of it. And people that struggle to play the game, level their own toon and try to compete while still having a real life.

I'm not really bother by that, if you want to own a brand new Lexus, I'll be content with a 2 year old Lexus.

malikwalker_ESO wrote: »

Long story short, it will cause inflation of the ingame economy.

Which may seem a bit pointless atm as there is really nothing outside of motifs, mats and repecs to spend gold on. But as 'teh shineezz' start getting added and the game progresses, prices for said trinkets will start to continually rise. Which will lead to some buying even more gold to keep up....

And its a vicious cycle that keeps on escalating. And as it escalates it will start to pervade outward into the game. I'm just a bunch of words in the ether, but trust me as much as you can, eventually RMT will effect you adversely.

This is probably the most compelling argument so far, although it hasn't manifested itself yet. I'm literally sitting on 70K gold so If there is something I have to have, I feel like I can go out and get it. As long as I can preform well in PvP and have enough DPS to deal with anything in PvE I'll be content with my gear. However if it gets to a point where I can't do those things without buying gold then it will become a problem.

nerevarine1138

You seem to be confused by the term "stolen". They don't just use information they get from the scum that are willing to use a criminal enterprise to get ahead in a game. And since empathy seems hard for you: your account could be next. Gold-sellers don't discriminate.

RustyBlades

RMT definitely causes inflation - if I need to grind 20k to buy a shiny new motif, but Mr. Buyzgold will pay 50k because he got a great deal from Goldzbecheapherez.rip then guess what, that motif is now 50k, I now need to work harder as a legitimate player to get such nice things from other players selling them who are probably also gold farmerz' resource storefront mule.

Shortly, it starts a vicious cycle of price hikes and will eventually make it near impossible to buy anything for the legitimate, honest player.

Phantax

Do we actually need RMT?

In a word.... NO ! (Hope to god ESO never goes down that road)

Sabbatus

I think some people have come into this game with the idea that it would be different here than other MMO's, because they are used to mods and "cheating" in the single player ES games.

This. I had to leave a guild because they were actively exploiting mechanics in FG in order to gain vet levels. I've seen people ask in zone chat if there is a command line.

When you have a culture of people who expect to be able to cheat because they can in every other game in the series, it's naive to expect that they won't find a way to do it here, too.

Resipsa131

nerevarine1138 wrote: »

You seem to be confused by the term "stolen". They don't just use information they get from the scum that are willing to use a criminal enterprise to get ahead in a game. And since empathy seems hard for you: your account could be next. Gold-sellers don't discriminate.

I'm not confused by the term stolen nor am I incapable of feeling empthy for peoplethat have been ripped off but if you willingly put your CC info out there to an irreputable source certainly some of the blame falls on you doesn't it?

Or is your point that LEET hakorz will get into my account and change the password to my account? Well, there is a certain risk to that but I think the game provides a certain measure of protection like requiring you to receive an email and confirm that you are using a different computer to play the account from a different IP address.

I'm not looking for a fight, I'm having a hard time realizing the point you are trying to make.

Reivax

That is an extremely sensitive subject, at least in the US there is significant interest in regulating and taxing RL<->VR fund exchanges.

I can see it now, I'm going to have to file a tax return for my ESO character because he made 100,000 gold last year, which on the open exchange determined by the IRS, equates to 1,000 US Dollars (just as an example).

RubyTigress

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO wrote: »

Xancathb16_ESO wrote: »

That's lovely, but please show me your math and how you came to 30%.

Thats okay, I wouldn't want do deprive you are the pleasure of doing a couple googles to prove it is less than 30%. We have even had people asking in these forums which are the best RMTs to buy from -
-

It's your assertion. It's on you to defend it, not someone else to disprove.

Aoifesan

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO wrote: »

Any simple google searches will show a number of references to how many people use RMT services. Also, it makes sense when you look at the size of the established RMT companies, with thousands of employees, and having significant brick and mortar presences in real world cities. Also, it makes sense that they are making a significant amount of money, or they would not be in business for over a decade now.

At best it is a romantic notion that some evil villain has been foiling companies (MMOs) attempts to stop then for over 10 years "for the fun of it"... no, there is money, lots of money in the business - and unless Bill Gates is playing and spending billions on armor, it takes a lot of players - each spending a little - to make that kind of profit accessible to the RMT companies.
-

No investiture in brick in mortar. Most of them can be down on the wifi at the corner coffee shop.

loudent

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO wrote: »

Thats okay, I wouldn't want do deprive you are the pleasure of doing a couple googles to prove it is less than 30%.
-

*YOU* made the positive claim, it is up to you to provide evidence.

rowdog

I quite like your devil's advocate post. I hope you don't mind if I add my own, similar thoughts.

What we need is better bots.

From a player's point of view, what is wrong with bots? They make it so you can't kill that boss and finish your quest or that train just killed everything between here and the boss so how come I don't get to fight too? Oh, and those node bots are making it so I can't get enough jute to craft a set of armor.

If you were never aware that there were bots in ESO, would you still care about bots?

I restrained myself but I was tempted to write an "Open Letter to Botters" that would go something along the lines of "geez, you guys suxor as programmers, you write a bot that teleports to a delve boss and just stands there spamming 11111!! I could code that bot in my sleep ya lazy mofos! Not to mention that you're cannibalizing your own market by driving the players away with your lamebots. You're committing a 'crime' and not even trying to get away with it? sheesh."

I'm going to leave out all my thoughts about how to write better bots but my extreme proposal is that ZoS should write an open source better bot (because who knows the code better) and release it to the world for free so that we could improve the quality of botting in ESO. Or maybe just an API or, well, getting silly.

Please note, this is a "devil's advocate" post and I am NOT seriously suggesting that ZoS write a bot.

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO

Reivax wrote: »

That is an extremely sensitive subject, at least in the US there is significant interest in regulating and taxing RL<->VR fund exchanges.

I can see it now, I'm going to have to file a tax return for my ESO character because he made 100,000 gold last year, which on the open exchange determined by the IRS, equates to 1,000 US Dollars (just as an example).

I am sure you are kidding or being sarcastic, but the Lawyers, Politicians and others are all tooling up trying to find a way to do just that. Google it. I had a good friend in SecondLife that made a RL living selling in world content she created and converting the in world money she received into real world money. The Tax man is very interested in people making real money - or things that appear to have real value in new ways - such as virtual economies.

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO

Let me say again, I do not agree with working with or allowing RMT's - but I do think these sites (and the many others like them) are our real problem.

Catflinger

Believe what you want, guys. And frank, please do me a personal favor and don't bring up Second Life again. Grosses me out.

Resipsa131

j.frank.nicholsb14_ESO wrote: »

I am sure you are kidding or being sarcastic, but the Lawyers, Politicians and others are all tooling up trying to find a way to do just that. Google it. I had a good friend in SecondLife that made a RL living selling in world content she created and converting the in world money she received into real world money. The Tax man is very interested in people making real money - or things that appear to have real value in new ways - such as virtual economies.

If you derive income from a hobby; say dog breeding, that is a taxable event. How is farming in a virtual world for real world money any different? If income is earned does it matter that it was earned online?

SkorosMindkiller

OK, the 30% figure comes from the scumsucker that runs a WoW gold website[1] who pulled it from his nethers, so it's about as valid as "30% of people who play Argonians actually are the Illuminati lizard-men who run the world."

I couldn't find any figures for sell rate for F2P MMOs, but for mobile games, nearly half of revenue comes from less than a quarter of a percent of all players[2], so I suspect the 30% figure is wildly optimistic on the part of the scumsucker.

[1] http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/gold-trading-exposed-introduction-article?page=3
[2] http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2014-04-09-only-2-2-percent-of-free-to-play-users-ever-pay-report

Loco_Mofo

KerinKor wrote: »

I'm sure there are many of those, much RMT activity is done by 'script kiddies', bout are cheap/free and easy to get so RMT don't need to employ hack writers themselves.

There will be some 'normal' cheaters and some looking for 'bragging rights', but in all honest skiddies are derided by 'real' hackers and their numbers aren't large by any yardstick.

Fact is, the skiddies you seem to think ESO is overrun by don't run bots that only harvest 24/7, they will bot content that has some e-peen value and harvesting jute doesn't qualify.

It's good you did some research but you seem to be putting too much faith in the skiddies watering holes, always a fatal mistake when trying to get an objective view about something.

The skiddies! LOL that's gold man, I love it!!

They are like the poo stains of the gaming world!!!