Request for "Bot" Reporting Category

Preyfar · December 2016

Report Player gives us Inappropriate Name, Harassment, Cheating, Other. Could we please add "Botting" to that list? Pretty much every single day I run into bot trains on PC-NA. I feel like most of my YouTube videos at this point are ESO bot and bug videos. Heh. And not that I mind, as I don't mind doing my part to help the community, but the reporting tools are somewhat limited. For example, it gives a singular line for "report player" although bot trains are usually 2-4 players. Being able to specifically report "bots" would make the process easier and encourage more people to properly report them through the right channels.

I'd post a video on these forums showing the bots and what to look for but because it has the @ names of the bots I know it'd cross the name-and-shame category. I'm getting really, REALLY frustrated at the constant bot spamming I run across. I just want to take them out so, so bad.

EDIT: Fixed some wording. I think I had a stroke when I originally wrote this.

Kodrac · December 2016

Botting is cheating no?

Smasherx74 · December 2016

I thought someone was bot once, and then they told me they're not a bot. I asked them why they are standing in the same spot farming a mat. They said because they have nothing better to do.

Wasn't sure if I should report them or not.

Elsonso · December 2016

Smasherx74 wrote: »

I thought someone was bot once, and then they told me they're not a bot. I asked them why they are standing in the same spot farming a mat. They said because they have nothing better to do.

Wasn't sure if I should report them or not.

They are not a bot. There is nothing in the ToS that prevents a person from standing at a harvest node all day long and grabbing it when it pops, unless they are doing it in a manner that is disruptive or using some sort of program or other assistance to do it for them. They have to be there, at the keyboard, pressing E (or whatever).

Preyfar · December 2016

Kodrac wrote: »

Botting is cheating no?

It's a form of cheating, but it's a bit more specific (bot trains are a very unique aspect of the game).

Smasherx74 wrote: »

I thought someone was bot once, and then they told me they're not a bot. I asked them why they are standing in the same spot farming a mat. They said because they have nothing better to do.

Wasn't sure if I should report them or not.

I've done the same, honestly, but bot trains are different and are VERY easy to identify. Bot trains are very specific, and tend to:

Be 2-4 characters
All move in a line, following the exact same path along the exact same route
Do instant 45, 90 and 180 turns.
Be Templars and/or Pet Sorc builds
Wear the similar or the exact same armor
Have names that are either in a format of name01, name02, etc or just be random gibberish (aergaerg).

I never report single players, just bot trains. They all tend to follow the exact same criteria above. For example, where I'm in at in-game right now (Drown Coast Dolmen in Greenshade) there are 2X 2-person bots teams running around. They're all dressed exactly the same, all following the same exact paths and doing 180 instant turns with zero downtime. I've reported each bot team to ZOS, but I see this almost daily -- and mostly in slightly out of the way places so as to not be seen or be less likely to be reported.

Apoxsee · December 2016

But by putting it in the list of possible options for reporting a player they would admit that it is happening... so don't expect that option to be applied.

FriedEggSandwich · December 2016

Once I was trying to build 1500% overload ultimate to start vma with and I chose to do it by light attacking wolves. So I went and found a wolf and stood there light attacking it, it took some time. Someone rode past and stopped to look, he looked for about 30 seconds to the point where it was starting to get awkward. So I just walked up to him and then back to the wolf to demonstrate that I wasn't a bot and that seemed to placate him and he rode off. @Preyfar is right about bots being multiple characters. Don't report single players for odd behaviour, they might just be testing something, unless they've obviously found an exploit such as instantly re-spawning mobs/nodes.

Preyfar · December 2016

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnkOPPfF0cU

Here's an example of bots (I was able to use YouTube's tools to blur out the senstive info). Watch then long enough and you'll see patterns. People run perfectly single file, making odd janking turns, one person walks out one way, then does a sharp turn... and every other single person follows that same exact path. Once you see it becomes pretty easy to spot.

cmetzger93 · December 2016

It makes me so mad to see people reported for mat farming. If you do not KNOW they are a bot. Then don't report them.

starkerealm · December 2016

Smasherx74 wrote: »

I thought someone was bot once, and then they told me they're not a bot. I asked them why they are standing in the same spot farming a mat. They said because they have nothing better to do.

Wasn't sure if I should report them or not.

If they're responding to you, specifically, if they're at the keyboard playing the game, it's not botting. Botting is only when they've automated the game completely. The hard line is when they're "playing" while AFK. Which is what ZOS takes serious issue with.