Good day, guys.
Been speaking with some people about man back lag, bots, the sense of the life and all …
Just a couple of random toughts :
:!: Man back lag showed up as a need due to people that sit on back row and bot. People still bot, man back lag is still there.
:!: Wanna the mud to be a diferent scenario where man back lag could be removed? Do not support bots.
:!: Im leading and a bot follow. I ungroup him but later (or another day) he do it again. And again. And again. What can I do? If you are sure he is boting, just push him to an agro mob and then ungroup him. Problem solved.
:!: Will I be punished as pkiller if I do it? Of course, you have to be sure he is boting with no doubt. In the past, that kind of actions have been tolerated.
:!: And, as a personal note (not speaking in the name of all immortals now), I will fully support you if you have problems due to this. Support to the point of being wiped if needed before acepting any punishment to you because of it.
Best regard.
The main emphasis for patrolling bots falls on the leader and the group itself. If a player is botting, he should be kicked out of the group and made an outcast. Also, don’t be afraid to notify an Immortal and let them deal with the issue. Very seldom does a player actually get reported to us. We hear rumors and get told of situations which occur well after the fact but very rarely during.
We do not want the mud to police itself by pkilling players and every attempt should be made to deal with the situations before handling it in such a manner. Knowing that a player is botting 100% is very hard to prove and making such a decision to pkill them is a brace move.
Man back lag is not only there to deal with botters but to also force more general concentration by group members. If the main healers of a group are lagged slightly then others are forced to jump in and temporarily deal with the situation. We have made several adjustments regarding how much lag such as capping the total amount and also randomizing the number so that no two players are ever lagged the identical amount. Adjustments may still be in order…
Splork
leave us bots alone! :evil:
nice post about bots…sad that it’s tolerated at all
it’s not uncommon to see a group fighting a mob, with half the members just standing there, or a 3x40 cleric not healing even when tank is at 200hp.
but just one question…
how does man back lag deter bots? if anything it gives them even more excuses. “HEY I WAS MAN-BACK-LAGGED!” ….kinda along the lines of “WTF I was blasting”
I know sometimes we all have situations which crop up in RL that require our immediate attention, which may make us appear to be botting. I offer a few suggestions hence:
(1) If you join a group, and know that you’re about to be called to do some work, inform leader at point of joining that you might suddenly be non-responsive and ask to be recalled if found in such a state
(2) If you need to afk for more than a few seconds, best to recall and lurk. It’s bad form to hang around and sponge xp when you’re not even at the computer for an extended period.
(3) Best advice is to simply not join a group if u know/think that you’re not going to be able to partake in group activities
On a similar note, I’ve always felt that the convocation spell just encourages bots. People even complain about not having an “all up” when a portal is opened….are they THAT lazy that they can’t even type wake/stand on their own? Portal bots….let’s not mention those.
Very well stated Element. Especially reference to cleric or anyone else sitting on massive mana,no staff and things not looking good. It happens occasionally. The leader is counting on group mana and all being there when ascertaining viability for the next mob. I’ve found just telling the leader I need to step away briefly works just fine. I like the idea of just recalling bots, their mana is useless anyway. Maybe if one is recalled enough times it will become useless to even join unless one’s ready to play. The same old excuses are worn out. The really creative will come up with new ones.. “Pkilling is not permitted.” is in the rulebook. Change the rules first if selective pkilling is on the horizon.
I think the fact that an ethical player “risks” being punished for pkilling an accused “bot” is completely stupid. Backwards thinking! Why place the risk on the people trying to do the right thing? You need to empower players to deal with bots, you need to define criteria about these situations so a player can KNOW he is in NO RISK of punishment IF he follows certain guidelines.
Define what a bots are… ie, 1) player not responding to leader communication for x amount of seconds.
Define how many warnings you must give them if any.
Make exclusions for those who inform the leader they are briefly afk and return within the time they say.
List the penalties that can be inflicted when the rules are broken.
Splork has stated he doesn’t want to deal with it, and neither do you other imms mostly… you want players to sort it out… but there are no guidelines, and no boundaries, so if a player does really deal with it, he has absolutely no protection against a botters lies when they go whining to an imm. I was just getting a drink, someone was at the door, i lost connection, dog was eating my homework. :roll:
You must be able to query the logs if necessary so a leader has a back stop for his actions. Sorry… they show you didn’t inform your leader you were going afk, the leader questioned if you were there, you didn’t respond. End of story. Botters aren’t stupid, they do as much or as little as they can to ride things to the limit, knowing what they can and can’t possibly get away with. This is why it’s important to cut out the “grey areas” they hide in to try and get themselves off.
If you setup up a system, at least people know the boundaries… you can check the logs to see who was in right and wrong. We need rules and guidelines to protect the good players… don’t tell em they risk punishment, brush your hands clean, and tell players to deal with it.
Once you’ve dealt with that, you need to think of ideas to encourage players to deal responsibly with bots. I’ve lost count of how many groups I’ve been in when we all know a player is script botting and we even joke about it over group tells, but it’s in our interests not to recall them because there automatic scripts auto assist and help the group.
I don’t recall ever having said that I do not want to deal with botters but what I strongly feel is that it should be managed by fellow players first.
Why do leaders, on a consistent basis, let these players join their groups? If groups would start policing themselves and making these players outcasts, they will either change their behavior or they will be playing by themselves.
As we all know, its really impossible for a good bot to be proven to be botting. This is the main reason the Immortals try to stay out of the situations and put the burden of situation on the leaders and groups. Prove to us a player is botting and we will do something. Its easier to prevent the botters from grouping then it is to prove they are botting…
Splork
Splork wrote: Why do leaders, on a consistent basis, let these players join their groups? If groups would start policing themselves and making these players outcasts, they will either change their behavior or they will be playing by themselves.
Bah! Splork! You can’t figure this out? Botters help groups with their auto scripts! If faced with these options what would you do?
Leave botter in group restoring and firewinding or auto assisting
Recall them and watch group run time and power drop so people leave
What if the botter is the only tank in the group? You going to recall the tank and fight on?
The truth is we LOVE powerful botters, we just wish they would pay attention. (This is the real problem)
This is one of the reasons I stopped leading/grouping almost entirely.
I make it a point to sift out the bots/afkers by constantly seeing who’s not fighting mobs, and who’s not casting anything. I’ve been kicked out of groups for pointing them out, because leaders just want to run run run without paying much attention themselves.
Once i pointed out some “worshipped” leader/tank who was tagging his own healbot around, and some people actually tried to pkill me when said player was busted by an imm.
Here’s the problem, Splork. There aren’t any real “botters” anymore. Just people who join a group, and pay attention maybe 1% of the time. Their excuse is always the same…“I’m lagging” “sorry dog needed attention” “wife kicked me off the computer” alwyas the same players over and over and over, but people still seem to welcome them into groups because it’s “better to have them 1% of the time then never”
I have pointed out bots to several imms many times as it happens, and only once have i ever seen action taken. Most of time they just say they don’t wanna get into a conversation with said player.
Splork, you’ve just said:
Quote: The main emphasis for patrolling bots falls on the leader and the group itself. If a player is botting, he should be kicked out of the group and made an outcast.
Quote: As we all know, its really impossible for a good bot to be proven to be botting. This is the main reason the Immortals try to stay out of the situations and put the burden of situation on the leaders and groups. Prove to us a player is botting and we will do something. Its easier to prevent the botters from grouping then it is to prove they are botting…
It means that the group’s going to be doing all the work of detecting bots, not the imms - especially, as it’s hard to do, as you said.
Would you suggest any ways to detect bots in groups?
Also, IMHO, we shouldn’t make these players outcast, unless they bot 100% of the time. But as Jezer said, this rarely happens: players pay attention, let’s say, 20-70% of the time, but bot the rest of it. My solution would be to recall/push them out somewhere out of the group until they return from afk. Again, as Jezer hinted, if we make everyone that bots 80-90% or those, who really went to get the door, outcasts, who would we group with?
Also, how do we define bots? Are people, who are 70-95% present at the keyboard, present or botting? It only falls into “something urgent crept up, had to afk 1-3”. Of course, this is one rule to enforce, but sometimes these things happen, so the person can’t write anything (ISP down or power outage, for example).
My strategy would be not to prevent grouping ([with bots] - your words), but to prevent botting itself. If a player knows he’s gonna lose his pop or exp if he bots, then it’s a viable variant to me. That’s why I’m not ruling out pushing 100% confirmed bots to aggro mobs completely (in my time zone, it’s highly likely that the always online Splork/Chobbs are AFK).
Would you suggest a way to punish botters without any imm presence besides ungrouping them? My inclination is that once you deal with them when they are at the keyboard, it’ll be harder for you to see that they were botting.
Jezer, I am in the process of creating a list of ways to detect bots in groups and punishing them and running the rules against imms to see how punishable (for me) they are, unless imms actually suggest legal ways to do that here before i do publish them here.
Element, can you PM me a list of repeat bots? Thanks.
Teron wrote: Jezer, I am in the process of creating a list of ways to detect bots in groups and punishing them and running the rules against imms to see how punishable (for me) they are, unless imms actually suggest legal ways to do that here before i do publish them here.
As long as bot scripting is allowed… if you are at the keyboard and paying attention, I don’t see how bot detection is possible. I am reminded of an old story about the American and Russian space programs. Apparently the Americans spent a large amount of resource inventing a pen that would write in zero gravity… the Russians just used a pencil. What I’m saying is, maybe just the old grouptell ’enter portal go north and sit’ is all the detection you really need, rather than a 1000 lines of automatic scripting detecting repetitions of bot scripts - which are permitted anyways if you are at the keyboard and paying attention.
I don’t think it’s possible to ever totally fix botting. You would need to take the selfishness out of people to do that. If you do a quick check in your mind, botters are often also the greedy ones. Botting and Greed are just different faces of selfishness. These things are heart motivations, not a lot you can do about it, other than set rules and enforce punishments.
My name is Thraxas and I bot …
I bot pretty much all the time in groups, my bot scripts are so well developed that I have joined groups and not touched the keyboard at all in a several hour long xp run.
As I said I bot and bot a lot and bot very well, and pretty much undetectably most of the time.
My scripts can heal not only the tank but myself other members of the group that need healing, blast mobs and understand resistances, switch between healing and blasting if needed, understand my position in a healo and still float heals while keeping track of who else in the group is healing. I can track a tanks hp fairly accurately without them reporting and without looking at them or using the group command. I can move between portals and follow a group without bunny hopping after a leader or needing to respond to a gt ORTAL. My scripts will switch me in into regen gear and back out again, and always be all up’d when needed. I will recall when needed. and much much more …
I’ve put a lot of work into my scripts, I’ve enjoyed over the last 10 years of play writing these scripts as much as I’ve enjoyed playing the game… having put the work into being a good groupee in this way I see no reason why I should not benefit from it.
Yes I bot, but what I dont ever do while I bot is afk, and I do pay attention to whats going on. I would highly doubt I’m on anyones list of bad groupees / common bots. There are occasions where I need to reset a script / change a script mode or respond to a gt / tell and I’m always there to do so, well not always … sometimes in a mammoth 3hour with no breaks/regen run I do need to grab coffee or other comfort break but I always “gt afk 3 - coffee” before doing so … perhaps I might script that as a gt if I dont touch the keyboard in 275s …
I think the problem is not botting as such … we all bot (hands up who dosent have an all up trigger) perhaps I do to a greater extent than most but then I’ve not seen your scripts so maybe I dont.
I dont consider myself to be the problem this thread relates to and yet I bot. I would suggest that the problem (if indeed there is a problem) isnt botting its afking.
The rules say no botting, if this is a serious rule it must be be detectable and enforced by the imms, if it isnt it shouldnt be a rule.
It is no good telling the players they must enforce it when there is no specific benefit to the players in fact as has been said its often detrimental to groups in most instances (thats just a cop out of a bad rule).
Perhaps as a first step to a serious solution to this there could be an afk flag that we could set / unset ourselves or by an imm.
This could prevent a player from gaining any xp / coins but allow regenning.
If this flag was then set automatically for groupees if they couldnt respond meaningfully to something random and impossible for a script to predict (erm this could be a problem) then a group afker would cease to benefit from their afking.
My name is Thraxas and I bot … but then so do you.
T
This is not a new situation to S4 or unique in anyway to this game in general. There have always been players known to be bots and we have always attempted to deal with them the best we can, both players and Immortals.
I really do not want to see people pkilling one another and using this as an excuse. Its not worth the risk. The simple solution is to kick someone out of the group if you feel they are botting and you do not want them to, or attempt to report them to an Immortal and see if further action can be taken.
There are tons of ways to grab a players attention though. In s3, Annie and I would kick people out of the group and not let them back in for weeks, even if it was only suspected. If one of the players was below Flight with full mana, I would “accidentally” remove my protect and they would either die or be forced to heal them-self, either way they used their mana and were normally brought back to the screen. If they were not below Flight, Annie would place the bot there. If an Immortal ever wanted to say something to me, I could of easily justified the removal of the protect as an accidental key bump( pushing someone to an aggressive mob is a little harder to justify ). Instead of announcing “enter archway” in grouptells or other key things in grouptells, use say or yell. Those left behind are obviously not paying attention, kick them of the group or do this when you are about to enter a freezing room and then they are “accidently” left in a room they can die or be seriously hurt in. There are hundreds of clever ways to deter botting by the leaders in groups, if they have such an issue with it.
As I have said, the Immortals would rather see most of the burden placed on the players to deal with the situation or at least notify us when it occurs and we can do our best to deal with it. The problem is any good botter most likely has a million beeps go off on their screen if one of us ( Immortals ) does anything to try to grab their attention such as transing to jail, transing to an office, spoken to, etc.
Players continue to claim that the Immortals should check logs however once a bot is transed to my office, they can simply say they were ignoring the leader and not answering their or anyone else grouptells, tells, etc. There is nothing to prove otherwise which is exactly why its easier for an unofficial channel to kick them out of the group then it is an Immortal to remove levels or wipe someone.
I strongly realize that this is not what some people want to hear but it is the truth.
Either way, feel free to notify one of us online if something is occurring and we will investigate.
Splork
Jezer’s and Thraxas’s posts are very consutrctive and well argumented and i am practically in the same boat as Thraxas. In many situations i enjoy scripting more than i enjoy the game and i do not see why people who spend alot of time on their scripts and can do their job a 100% without touching a keyboard should be punished if they are never “completely” away.
Although even if they are are completely away, how are they different from someone who just types follow leader and sits there doing nothing because what he does is not important, and why should one be punished because he has a script that does something important for the group and the other should not be punished because he doesnt have any scripts but is just sponging ?
This situation is just ridiculous - Making scripts to find out bots, pushing them to aggro mobs ? You wouldnt push a player to an aggro mob if he joined your group to sponge and went afk, you just recall him or ungroup him, if you realise that he’s not doing anything that is - which unless a player is important you never actually notice. But if he has a script that helps a group at the right time by doing his job you are justified to pkill him ?
Yes players that are botting 90% of their time are a problem and if you dont like what their script is doing and you have found out that they are not there you can take sensible action ( recall him, ungroup him, report him, do let him join yours groups). But it is not for you to decide that punishment, it is for the immortal staff of the game. This is not a PK mud and if you intentionally kill a player, bot or no bot - you should be punished.
And no, i dont care if the player is physically present at the keyboard. If a bot joins my group and does his job a 100%, but is not responding to tells or grouptells I will not ungroup him and i will not report him. Why ? Because i would rather have a good bot instead of a bad player in my group.
As Thraxas said, a good bot always does his job a 100% and in a mud where people join groups and think that they can do what they wish just because they are “here” i.e just sit and watch the screen - i would gladly ungroup and ignore people like that and will always welcome a fully working professionally scripted bot because it works out best for the group. But if i do find a poorly executed script that seldomly works and disrupts the progress of the group rather than help it, i will recall him and ungroup him and if i see him doing that again, i will report him
If it’s the group leader ‘accidentally’ letting them die, there’s not much I can do. But I strongly discourage anyone using botting as an excuse to pkill someone. Remember the ‘harmony of the mud’ rule.
The thing about botters is that they get more flagrant over time. They do get caught and the consequences are significant. Just recall them and report it on page or mudmail or email or tell. Don’t expect a personal reply and don’t expect immediate action. If you want immediate action recall them yourself or ask the group leader to do it.
And by the way, if you are a troublemaker/troll as noted in your pfile, and you pkill someone for any reason, you will be punished as a pkiller regardless of the situation (even if it’s your group). You know who you are.
juggleblood wrote: And by the way, if you are a troublemaker/troll as noted in your pfile, and you pkill someone for any reason, you will be punished as a pkiller regardless of the situation (even if it’s your group). You know who you are.
How can you find out if you’ve been flagged in this way?
T
Quote: Although even if they are are completely away, how are they different from someone who just types follow leader and sits there doing nothing because what he does is not important, and why should one be punished because he has a script that does something important for the group and the other should not be punished because he doesnt have any scripts but is just sponging ?
The general sense of rules is do not exp while afk. That’s how they are different. For all I know, being afk with a spell bot at WG is illegal for this very reason - you help people make exp, while being AFK (even though you are not actually making any exp, unless you are a cl prime and raise people).
Personally, I meant botting as being afk, while the group is running. Nothing more, nothing less. I guess I do use a colloquial meaning of the word “to be afk, when the group needs you”, rather than it’s direct meaning, “to run scripts”.
If there’s a script running that does all the work without disrupting how the group runs and the player responds to tells/gt, then fine, be present at the keyboard and do your work (whether if it’s a script or not, I don’t care. Sometimes, a script works better, than an ignorant mage, who blasts wrong targets).
I too appreciate well written scripts. Sometimes, however, direct interaction helps a lot, when something bad happens, this is what people need to pay attention for. For example:
tanks need to rescue shy people with pets, who don’t sing (though it could be scripted as well, I presume)
mages need to blast incoming aggro or summoned mobs
front line needs to blast stab/blast mobs, when the back row is low on mana (I’ve had a full front line of warriors not cast a thing on elites recently: we kicked it to death - a shuddering experience.)
a newbie is dying and needs a restore/shield/light (and not a soul has scripts that are as good as Thraxas’s).
Heck, there are more situations, than I can remember.
Quote: This situation is just ridiculous - Making scripts to find out bots, pushing them to aggro mobs ? You wouldnt push a player to an aggro mob if he joined your group to sponge and went afk, you just recall him or ungroup him, if you realise that he’s not doing anything that is - which unless a player is important you never actually notice. But if he has a script that helps a group at the right time by doing his job you are justified to pkill him ?
I never said I’d be writing scripts to detect bots. I was thinking in the line of jumping through hoops portals.
I’d be very much inclined to go to a dangerous spot and recall, so the repeat, 100% verified afk person learns to pay attention, because, like Splork said, we’d rather handle it ourselves and he won’t be able to prove/verify that the person was afk.
Though it is easier to leave afkers alone, which is what I was and will definitely be doing. This solution or similar is also very friendly to false positives.
As for people, who do nothing, but are present, I try to find work for everyone (blind/weaken as the minimum). There are a few newbies that I didn’t get to do anything, because their levels and/or classo didn’t allow them to sanc or gate. I have nothing against these people, as long as they help the group: they have to get xp somewhere. And two attacks with a spec are worth something (especially, if the newbie spec wielder takes 1/2 exp of any tri40 ;) ).
Personally, I’ve decided to do only one change in my groups: I’ll ask people, who go afk for more, than 1 tick, while the group is running, to announce that via gt or tell (or gossip/shout/yell). Afk announcement on regens is welcome, but not obligatory, unless you are not or may not be going back before the group runs.
If I find someone afk while running w/o an announcement for more, than 2-3 ticks, a few times, I’ll consider ungrouping or recalling him/her (probably, just before deathblow).
Another way to suffer for afkness during grouping is losing pops or calls for eq. It helps to be present, when the leader asks, who needs an uncalled pop (or a gem[!]).
I am really tired of afkness between regens lately. I do try to run smoothly, but I’ve realized that if I want to run enjoyable groups (not just for myself, but for others, too), I need to make sure people are present at the keyboards, when the group is running. This is one of the reasons that small groups work so well: everyone’s paying full attention. If I were to write a compendium of what to do or not to do in groups, it’d simply come down to paying attention and doing everything your char can to help the group kill the mob and keep people alive at all times.
p1 – ‘p2 stop autoassisting and help debuff/blind’
p2 no response for 10minutes, continues autoassisting
p1 recites a scroll of recall on p2.
p2 – ‘wtf’
p2 – ‘i wasn’t botting, I was semi-afk’
p2 – ‘i’m sure I was assisting, I use auto-assist scripts’
p1 – ‘i asked you over 10 times the past 10minutes to help blind/debuff and not autoassist’
p2 – ‘why don’t you mind your own business’
What Element failed to post from p2:
p2 – ‘I had p1 gagged since yesterday.’
No, p1 wasn’t the leader. It was pretty damn funny though. Someone was auto-assisting instead of helping to debuff, and didn’t even know they’d been called out on it because they had gagged the person calling them out.
if he had me “gagged” how was he responding to my grouptells?
and iirc, his words were that he had me on notell, which is funny since I was saying it over grouptell.
this was the 2nd time he’s done in the the past 2 groups I was in. the previous time, leader spotted and recalled him for being non-responsive for 5 minutes. he claims to have “auto-assist” scripts. yet i spotted him just standing there not engaging mobs for a whole 2 minutes.
It’s funny how as soon as he is recalled, he’s responsive. probably has some #bell trigger for being recalled
Why do I want these little characters to help debuff?
It’s ridiculous to have the only 2 level 40 mages in the group (paka and myself) blinding and weakening when we could be dealing big damage to the mobs. Just like you wouldn’t want your clerics in the healo to be cast lagged because they have to help debuffing. besides, a thief/warrior with 200mana should put his mana to good use.
I am not on a witchhunt here. People do suddenly get distracted while playing the mud, either due to kids or phonecall. But if you KNOW that you can’t pay attention because you’re at work, then please don’t be in a group. It misleads the leader into thinking that the group has more useable mana than it actually has, and more often than not group has to wait around for you to enter portals or whatever.
There’s something I’ve been mauling over with a few people on the mud, I don’t know how it could be implemented.
I think XP given for kill could be lowered, and more bonus given to actual damage dealt to the mobs. Of course I’m not talking about increasing the xp u get from damaging the mob exponentially, just in a way such that in the end, it evens out. Of course then healers would need more xp for healing. A small frostbolting lvl 37 mage shouldn’t be getting less xp just because he/she has less total levels than a 4x40 monk or thief who is just standing there hitting the mob.
and just to clarify, I was not out to get botters/afkers.
we were running a smallish eq group, and there were only 2 blasters in group, paka and myself. We were not fighting efficiently coz both of us were the only ones debuffing. So I asked that group members help out too. One other smallish player started helping. others were healing so I didn’t bother them. then I noticed one other player just standing there. So I asked him to help debuff, and to assist after that. one mob later, same deal. 2 mobs later, no reply. 3 mobs later, still just standing there. leader asks “are you here?” no response. countdown, 5 4 3 2 1. he is recalled. Suddenly, P2 – ‘wtf?’
do the math
wtf element was blasting
peace :lol:
hehehe silly tuckette
Actually this is pretty much a which hunt. It seems you have a target and you are doing everything you can to drive him out. Both in public channels and private.
Something I think that is being missed here is this guy is pretty much a true nub and sometimes isn’t the only true nuwbie in the group when the game cops show up and start crapping on the harmony of the group. This last incident pissed me off because i was having a good time even though I had corpsed. The group was running pretty much harmoniously and the leader was doing all the anti bot stuff what seems to have become the norm (which has had the side affect of leaving me behind on regens because I chose to do things like read forums and fix things in my client). Then the game cops show up. start yelling at this person and an argument ensues. Now I am not having a good time. The focus is now on gamecop and his target. Never mind that apparently target had game cop notelled and didn’t respond until someone other than gamecop was bitching at him.
Does they guy bot in groups. Yeah probably, I have recalled him myself. Does that mean he should be driven out of the game? Seems like it. Never mind all he can bring to a group is blind and a stab that no one will let him use because he is a new has no gear and no experience. Apparently OPEN in group titles just means “open if you know what you are doing and we like you.”
For a game slim on players it would seem to me a lynch mob of game cops is as big a problem as a guy autoassisting. The other target of the lynch mob seems to be straightening up lately.
interesting post.
how is “Rasufe please don’t autoassist and help blind” considered yelling?
if he’s a true n00b he should be learning, and not afking while the group is fighting. in the previous group teron, myself, and paka, advised him not to use autoassists and to help debuff. his reply was he’ll do what he wants to. and if he doesn’t want to debuff and choose to autoassist, that’s his right.
All fair points tbh, just dont get overzealous and drive away players.
Agreed, don’t be too critical of newb play. Sometimes one good tell or honest assistance is worth all the thread stuffs you can muster. Hope he reads the threads. 8) BM. I watched that one too but P1 and P2 will never stop that stuff. It did feel like a wet blanket had been throw over things for a moment. As I’ve seen elsewhere.. some just do not play well with others.
I think Rasufe is a true newb and group spam can be overwhelming until one get the right gags in place or extra windows up. Coloring my tells red and capturing a few popups helped alot. Botting and good scripting has been well covered in this one. It’s somewhat reassuring to others frustration at the few things that bug me too sometime.
apparently, he’s still doing it so I wouldn’t bet the house mortgage on him learning if I were you.
I don’t get it sometimes….
players bitch and whine about certain aspects of the game. The admin has now come out to say that the reason it was put in, and the reason it will not be removed anytime soon, is because players bot/afk in groups. They’ve also clarified that we have to police it ourselves, because we’re not going to like what happens if they have to do it.
yet players say “hey, don’t mess with bots as long as it doesn’t ruin my xp gain!”
Sounds like I’ve missed all the fun sometime, somewhere!
Speaking of witch hunt.
Mahkra, compare exping 2-4man with a few solid guys/gals to constant waiting or underhealing or excessive management required in large groups. It’s heaven and earth, in my opinion, considering the former exp can sometimes be better.
I didn’t even realize that I was being discussed on the forums.
I might as well attempt to defend myself as well as I can. The specific situation you are talking about I actually did have you gagged, as I was sitting there at my computer spamming circlestab while assisting while you recalled me out of nowhere. I took a screenshot(ill post it as soon as I am off campus and back on my apartment), just in case I could compile them for a case of you harassing me. I had no idea that you were talking to me, as I downloaded a script pack off wintin that allows me to gag players completely (including gt, say, gossip, auction, etc). Please do not heavily slant the story, as I only removed you from my gag list after Zuzu grouptelled that you were trying to talk to me. (If you would like, I will post the gag script also when I get home)
As with the eq group in Thule, I have no excuse. I was there at the computer, and I happened to be at work also. It got super busy, and I had to take care of my real life job first. When I was recalled, I did not even complain, I rested at the recall point so I would not follow the leader anywhere after that. Do not make up claims that I argued etc, because that is not the case. I sat down and apologized when I got the chance then rented when I got the chance.
I do not get this obsession you have with me Element, but I added you to my gag list in the hopes that you would just get bored and go away and move on to harassing someone else. Sorry, I just started playing the game a few weeks ago, and yes I am a newbie. Even so, I have NEVER set up scripts and just walked away from the computer. I have always been present.
I would have gladly debuffed (as little help as a level 10 quad mage with 120 mana and 12 int) if the LEADER had said so. If the LEADER had an issue, then I would have gladly resolved that issue and left. You were not the leader in either cases, so please, do as I had said before and mind your own business. I do not understand where you get off on trying to ruin other people’s gameplay experience, clearly you need a hobby or some other outlet. This especially shines through that you took the time and effort to come and post about this on the forums…smh.
If you leaders do not want to group with me then let me know, then I will go and solo or lead for the rest of my sloth career(as long or as short as it may be). I have been attempting to level my quad so I can start debuffing more (I just got it to 14 today), but if that isn’t enough then just let me know and I will gladly leave.
Thank you.
Just sayin’..no bell no message just a random recall mid fight
Just bringing this up, because:
my friend was left to die and corpse, because the ISP (that we share, btw) lost link - happens once in 1-3 weeks for 20 seconds - 3 hours
he wasn’t botting, but was accused of botting by a number of people, some even said that he always bots, even though before he lost link, he had less, than 50% of his max mana (I know he doesn’t bot, just doesn’t talk a lot)
This struck me as weird: a few people - deliberately or not - have wrongfully accused a player of a punishable/wipable offense and let him corpse. From what I understand, no checks were done to see, if the person, indeed, was present (i.e, his scripts were working, but he wasn’t responding). Not only I’m surprised at the viciousness of such attacks from people I respected before the case, but that such checks weren’t done as well.
To debunk a few moments, which were brought up in that accident
when your ISP loses link, you aren’t disconnected (at least, as far as I understand)
autoassist happens, when you are in the front and are perceived as playing by the MUD
With that in mind, I guess it’d be safe to:
identify the botter, if he doesn’t respond, but his scripts are working (portals, food, all up, warcry assist, etc)
recall bots
Not getting exp from the group while not responding, when on the run, seems adequate enough.
I’m not sure if this was the plan - to let false positives happen. But if they do, you’ll quickly find people leaving, because being slammed and lose exp for something you have little control over (short of changing a good ISP to another with unknown stability) is no fun.
So, to clarify this once more, I consider botting as not responding or doing what’s told by the leader, when running.
This thread shows why this is such a difficult issue. Maybe Teron’s standard of botting as failure to follow instructions is the only one that could possibly be enforceable by the leader. And maybe calling out botters should be left for the leader or designated persons only. Otherwise it’s going to be a contentious argument every time.
By Teron’s standard if the leader asked said-newb to stop auto-assist and debuff, then said-newb should, or leader can choose to recall them. In this case if other party members get mad that he’s not debuffing, they can take it up with the leader or just suck it up, rather than start a big fight. Just a suggestion.
Well, as far as forbidden botting is concerned, the only immortal problem is if whether the person is at the keyboard - as far as I understand. So that’s what I’m sticking with and it’s not my definition. Maybe the imm staff would like to clarify it here, if it’s different from the one I presented, since clearly there probably is an immortal standard of botting?
I agree that it’s mostly up to the leader, but other players can bring attention to a specific player as well. In that particular incident, the leader chose to leave the person die and corpse, all the while the person was drowning and wasn’t able to shift to frog (under druid levels), so that he couldn’t have responded. Maybe leaving a person in an underwater area counts as a check, but it is prone to errors, obviously. One of the safest ways is to ask the person to do something, do prompt visible triggers and observe for food triggers (apart from walking on their own).
I wouldn’t really mind if they other players did their AFK checks on their own and informed the leader of the fact that someone’s botting.
But if the leader and the players don’t do any checks - which is a vital element of bot battling, IMHO - then accidents happen and this is what brings any arguments up.
Why keep putting it on the immorts tho. You still run into the same heated arguments, some angry player who’s gonna disrupt the whole group until they get their satisfaction. The botter will deny, the leader will throw up their arms in exasperation. I just think people should defer to the leader to decide if someone is a botter. It’s not an easy call, people aren’t going to agree, and it shouldn’t muck up the group.