Now the bots AOE farm....

Krohm · May 2014

This has got to get dealt with, on a alt since on my 45 NB you can't go any were without bots farming, seems there hitting the low levels also.

Lifenite · May 2014

They are doing something about it. It's just that it's only about as effective as real life policing. They even have gone old school and have GM's roaming the game "sending bots back to Oblivion" as they put it. There are videos of the GMs doing it on Reddit.

While I join you in hoping they step up even more and really go to town on them just keep in mind that a MMO can NEVER be 100% free of bots. That would be like trying to kill every single rat in NYC, good luck.

Elsonso · May 2014

Bot behavior has started to confuse me as I find more of them.

I have been passing through the wayshrine at Vulkhel Guard today and quite frequently over the last few hours the exact same character has been standing in the exact same place. They have the typical bot name but are equipped much better. I noticed them because as you go from the wayshrine to and from the docks, you have to either run through them or around them. (I always run through them).

While watching her, I noticed the Three Stooges Bots trying to navigate the area around the wayshine over and over and over and over. They were walking into the hedges and walls, and when they wandered too far, they warped back to the start and did it all over again.

I guess someone did not pay to activate their botting software.

Krohm · May 2014

I hadn't really seen them outside of public dungeons until a few days ago, I know there trying but they need to hire a few more GMs and hit the aoe grind spots from online guides to see whos a bot and who isn't.

demendred · May 2014

I seen a few near Vulkhel Guard bank looking in their bag, jumping, crouching, and doing the same three things over and over.

slander36 · May 2014

The stationary bots in town are most likely there to farm player names to send spam mail in game. I know I've been getting about 1 a day.

For the open world bots, that's actually a good thing, or it should be. This should show that they have pushed them from the delves as farming open world is more optimal for the bots now. Each time you see bots have to change the way they act it means something Zenimax did worked, in my opinion, so I'd rather see them continue having to update their bot code while ZOS just changes a few variables in drop and spawn rates. They'll never be gone, but they can be thinned out.

demendred · May 2014

I like to think that they do get banned, then have to buy another game. And in doing so, loose more money than they hope to gain.

A man can dream....

Kitma · May 2014

Of course, the farmers aren't the ones losing cash to buy new accounts remember. It's the braindead idiots who've given the farmers their account details as now they get robbed to buy new accounts.

And to be fair, these morons ask for it!

Selstad · May 2014

New MMOs always attract bots and it always seems like a major problem and that the company isn't doing anything to battle them. Keep in mind that Blizzard has been working continually for 10 years to improve their bot detection software. And there are still bots around there. Remember Shadowmoon valley in The burning crusade, always packed with bots and Chinese farmers.

I know that Zenimax is working hard to figure out a solution to this problem, it's not good for them either to have bots taking up server load and taking it away from the costumers that actually pay for the game. Though, not all boters are farmers, some just use bot programs because they want to brag they are vr 10 yet doesn't have the stomach to level themselves. They too will get a 1 way ticket to Oblivion.

Zargorius · May 2014

Let's nerf AoE! Oh wait...

Turial · May 2014

demendred wrote: »

I like to think that they do get banned, then have to buy another game. And in doing so, loose more money than they hope to gain.

A man can dream....

The way I see it for every bot account they ban they make another ~50 bucks for each renewal, bots would die out if more people stopped buying gold/items.

rawne1980b16_ESO · May 2014

demendred wrote: »

I like to think that they do get banned, then have to buy another game. And in doing so, loose more money than they hope to gain.

A man can dream....

I like to think that happens too.

Sadly they use stolen or fake credit cards so they don;t lose any money and devs don't make any money from them.

On the subject of bots .... i'm seeing a massive increase in them. They are everywhere I go.

Sick of seeing silly names like hjhjyur dressed in rags with a helmet on farming nodes/mobs.

Krohm · May 2014

Zargorius wrote: »

Let's nerf AoE! Oh wait...

lol I would hope they wouldn't nerf AOE grinding, I actually enjoy it, reminds me of EQ and EQ2, thing is as players we respect others, bots do not.

Morthur · May 2014

.

mips_winnt · May 2014

Turial wrote: »

bots would die out if more people stopped buying gold/items.

You're absolutely correct of course but based on the fact that most other MMO's have the exact same problem I don't think it's realistic to think that it's ever going to happen. The MMO companies might as well just start selling gold since it appears that no matter what they do some people are going to buy it, they can earn some extra revenue off it as well as put the gold sellers out of business by pricing it down to the point where gold sellers can't make any money competing with 'em. Either that or come up with an economic system where currency can't be transferred from player to player.

demendred · May 2014

rawne1980b16_ESO wrote: »

Sick of seeing silly names like hjhjyur dressed in rags with a helmet on farming nodes/mobs.

As annoying as it is to see those names, I'd rather that than them getting smart and using normal names.

vyndral13preub18_ESO · May 2014

I always feel bad when i ignore a bot and see the account name is a normal looking one. Then i know some poor sap got hacked.

Zargorius · May 2014

They already started to get smart, the other dat there was a group of 6-8 people south of Shornhelm running a circuit and farming mobs. They all have capitalised name but they were clearly oriental, still not sure if they were actually bots (quite sofisticated) or true people farming.
Strange thing is, as they behaved almost as normal players, the whole thing didn't irk me much, I was just curious about them.

zaria · May 2014

Morthur wrote: »

Selstad wrote: »

I know that Zenimax is working hard to figure out a solution to this problem, it's not good for them either to have bots taking up server load and taking it away from the costumers that actually pay for the game.

With all due respect but how exactly are the botters "not paying for the game"? There are no free trials so each one of those bots paid $60 for the honor of farming this game. The bots are just as lucrative for Zenimax as real players (perhaps more so because they're likely running multiple accounts that get banned regularly and simply re-purchased). It's not like anyone quits the game because of bots - and I also doubt Zenimax cares about the in-game economy as long as they keep earning real life money. Bots are only harmful to Zenimax if they cost them many players or cause such a huge PR-fiasco that simply ignoring the problem (like in the case of the duping bug that gutted the economy on day 12) isn't enough.

You seem to be laboring under the illusion that Zenimax' earnings depend on the state of the in-game economy or something.

Some fool buys gold with an credit card, thy use his credit card info to buy 10 new accounts who is used for farming.
The fool discover that he is drawn $500 and stop the transaction and get a refund and ZOS get no money, but it takes prehaps14 days or more before this reach ZOS system for account and the bots are banned because lack of payment, at this time 3 of the accounts are blocked because of boting anyway.

dolmen · May 2014

mips_winnt wrote: »

Turial wrote: »

bots would die out if more people stopped buying gold/items.

You're absolutely correct of course but based on the fact that most other MMO's have the exact same problem I don't think it's realistic to think that it's ever going to happen. The MMO companies might as well just start selling gold since it appears that no matter what they do some people are going to buy it, they can earn some extra revenue off it as well as put the gold sellers out of business by pricing it down to the point where gold sellers can't make any money competing with 'em. Either that or come up with an economic system where currency can't be transferred from player to player.

Exactly, GW2 has done this. Want to buy gold, buy it right from Anet.

Orizuru · May 2014

demendred wrote: »

I like to think that they do get banned, then have to buy another game. And in doing so, loose more money than they hope to gain.

A man can dream....

Sadly though, that isn't the case. These aren't honest businesses that are running the bots. They use hacked game accounts and stolen credit cards when they run out of hacked accounts.

IronMaiden_burnout · May 2014

There are tons of hacked bot account running scripts harvesting a set path and I still see names from many weeks ago still doing it , still level 3.
They are ruining the game for me more than any dungeon bot ever did.

Problem is these outfits running bot programs have a few people monitoring each account so if one gets a GM reply they jump on and type 你好. So essentially they can't do squat!
Only way is to target the 3rd party app they are using and block it.

And I say Good luck !

We are doomed unless they give us some sort of zap stick to fry bots we see. And that will never happen cause some people call a regular player farming nodes a bot!

Philman · May 2014

just went through the Chid-Moska ruins and I counted 8 bots just killing normal mobs now, and some were still killing the boss. so i guess their recent fixes did absolutely nothing.