Question: is boting good ?

[INTERNUT]

please be kidding?

you mean like point and shoot FPS style? or you mean manually pressing F or right-clicking a mob?

FPS style in first-person view to make the experience more real.

 

[INTERNUT]

The problem is the game play. I just don't understand why MA can't fix the gameplay to be more engaging. Just add in a simple kiting mechanic to hunting is enough to encourage active gameplay. Kiting will significantly reduce defense cost. That puts an edge over botters. Give us the ability to slow down mobs so we can kite them. over time active players will come out on top of botters due to the law of large numbers. I would even prefer some sort of stun and back stab mechanic or root and kite mechanic. I mean the solution to this botting issue is endless. But it start with engaging the players. Botting is a symptom of boring game design. I don't blame botters, for botting because honestly, the game play is just too repetitive. If I can play a game buy pressing f while watching my netflix movie, then it is not an issue with botters, it is an issue with the game play. Slow down the mobs and let us kite at the very minimum. Would be cool to have the mob have some sort of charge attack and active players can dodge to avoid extra damage. Botters who don't dodge that special attack and just stands in place will be dealt severe damage. Just need to think of ways to discourage botters. Someone also mentioned that due to all the UL weapons, botters are not even contributing to the economy. If we just even the balance of L and UL weapons, the botters can still contribute to the economy buy buying L weapons and basically indirectly buying loots.

Problem is definitely with game play and for many other reasons as well as the one's you mention. Excuse my ignorance but what do you mean by kiting mechanic?

 

[Baldurn]

The problem is the game play. I just don't understand why MA can't fix the gameplay to be more engaging. Just add in a simple kiting mechanic to hunting is enough to encourage active gameplay. Kiting will significantly reduce defense cost. That puts an edge over botters. Give us the ability to slow down mobs so we can kite them. over time active players will come out on top of botters due to the law of large numbers. I would even prefer some sort of stun and back stab mechanic or root and kite mechanic. I mean the solution to this botting issue is endless. But it start with engaging the players. Botting is a symptom of boring game design. I don't blame botters, for botting because honestly, the game play is just too repetitive. If I can play a game buy pressing f while watching my netflix movie, then it is not an issue with botters, it is an issue with the game play. Slow down the mobs and let us kite at the very minimum. Would be cool to have the mob have some sort of charge attack and active players can dodge to avoid extra damage. Botters who don't dodge that special attack and just stands in place will be dealt severe damage. Just need to think of ways to discourage botters. Someone also mentioned that due to all the UL weapons, botters are not even contributing to the economy. If we just even the balance of L and UL weapons, the botters can still contribute to the economy buy buying L weapons and basically indirectly buying loots.

I guess it is each to their own but a game where I would need to play actively by kiting, rooting, dodging is a game I would play maybe 1-2 hours on the weekend and would result in me either moving to crafting/mining or more likely leaving the game. There are already critical hits, unreachable mobs and ninja spawns to look out for and it is stressy enough. I won't hunt mobs over a certain difficulty level on evenings after a working day.

 

[unufain8]

, therefore bots are a huge revenue source for mindark, therefore mindark doesent even have any interest of enforcing their own rules, and thats a good thing anyway ,

By not applying your own rules means just one thing. Cheating and allow your own playerbase to cheat. I played a lot this game and did it in the honest way and struggled to achieve something that others achieve when sleeping. So if you believe that me as a player skilling and killing mobs naturally vs a bot player (there are a lot which bragg of their achievements like some kids) is ok, the the term "integrity" is useless. Mindark doesnt have integrity.

 

[Skorp]

in short:
Botting = bad
Macro = good

Introduce a tiredness debuff (reload, damage, crit, evade, ... all go to shit, increased incoming damage and so on), if your Ava didn´t sleep well (what well is, need to be decided, ~8-12 hr.).
Will possibly solve the problem with botting and also avatar sharing, which also provide an unfair adventage.

Other possibilities:
- Kamikaze Maturity for Mobs (if you kill it, it kills yous instantly or gives you a 100% heal debuff for x minutes, if you shoot it atleast once and stop for x seconds it disappear). But this could be a big problem for normal hunting as well, so might be a very bad idea.
- increasing Debuff on shooting "unreachable" mobs for to long. (Can be offcourse bypassed by advanced bot)
- increasing Debuff for laying to long dead on the floor. (Can be offcourse bypassed by advanced bot)

 

[Sulje]

in short:
Botting = bad
Macro = good

Introduce a tiredness debuff (reload, damage, crit, evade, ... all go to shit, increased incoming damage and so on), if your Ava didn´t sleep well (what well is, need to be decided, ~8-12 hr.).
Will possibly solve the problem with botting and also avatar sharing, which also provide an unfair adventage.

Other possibilities:
- Kamikaze Maturity for Mobs (if you kill it, it kills yous instantly or gives you a 100% heal debuff for x minutes, if you shoot it atleast once and stop for x seconds it disappear). But this could be a big problem for normal hunting as well, so might be a very bad idea.
- increasing Debuff on shooting "unreachable" mobs for to long. (Can be offcourse bypassed by advanced bot)
- increasing Debuff for laying to long dead on the floor. (Can be offcourse bypassed by advanced bot)

Quick note - with macro you have ability to automate whole gameplay in hunting. It's not only used to press "F".

 

[Fanan]

What most people failing to see is that Entropia is not the typical MMORPG. The house (Mindark) win more if you cycle more aka lose more. By removing instances, you would need to remove all the mayhems and if you check the CLDTs thats precisely when they make more money during this long events. This last mayhem I tried to do redulite mission using a kinetic 9 + mayhem delta, five hours a day wasn't enough to finish it and you want MA to introduce kite and other stuff to make people actively hunting and I agree and I'm up for it but at the end of the day Mindark and their associates would probably make half the moneys or less and I don't think they want that.

This is not a fight with people using macros, this is a fight with the game developer that offered all the options for the game to be played this way so their profits are even bigger!

I rest my case here, have a nice day you all!

 

[ProActive Mango]

What most people failing to see is that Entropia is not the typical MMORPG. The house (Mindark) win more if you cycle more aka lose more. By removing instances, you would need to remove all the mayhems and if you check the CLDTs thats precisely when they make more money during this long events. This last mayhem I tried to do redulite mission using a kinetic 9 + mayhem delta, five hours a day wasn't enough to finish it and you want MA to introduce kite and other stuff to make people actively hunting and I agree and I'm up for it but at the end of the day Mindark and their associates would probably make half the moneys or less and I don't think they want that.

This is not a fight with people using macros, this is a fight with the game developer that offered all the options for the game to be played this way so their profits are even bigger!

I rest my case here, have a nice day you all!

Well spoken!

 

[Skorp]

Quick note - with macro you have ability to automate whole gameplay in hunting. It's not only used to press "F".

I am total aware of it. But it also offers some relaxed hunting experience to people who use it in a legit way.

The problem of botters described in this thread is mostly the excessive gameplaytime (aka 24/7). This would be atleast reduced, until all create a 2nd, 3rd, 4th alt and then switch between them.

But I do think that the company (MA) have no interest to stop this at the moment, so we can came up with whatever ideas we want, which will land in the trash at the end of the day.

 

[jetsina]

I think that's unfortunately why WE need to bring the ideas anyway. They will land in the trash until they don't. At least then they would have something to go on they know the community has written about.
I think we need to address the topic of what botting is mainly giving: skill gains many more hours per day every day and mu advantages when events provide windows of opportunity, plus the only chance of placing in events sometimes/usually/always? it seems.

On the first main point (skills), which is valid 24/7/52
Q1: is botting currently a cheaper way of acquiring skills than chipping in?
Q2: is botting actually profittable taking skill selling into account?
Q3: what difference do skills make and how about in the future in UE5?
Q4: should there be more than one legal way to fast track skill gains for those who are more pay-2-win and want to progress much faster than noob>non-noob in a year, etc. all the way up to uber, by which time ubers are presumably renting out their own hp bubbles because they are so damn mighty?

For me I see Q1 as a yes, Q2 as yes, Q3 as probably still a huge difference, Q4 as dunno, but if MA were to stop botting then they'd massively change the balance of the game and the chances of player retention, with both positives and negatives. MA possibly cares more about turnovers than player counts, so I can see it would be a hard pill to swallow to stop 1 player's 24 hr turnover in the hope of 24 hrs combined or more from what increased player-base (x5, x8, x10?). The botter is also running up the skills, whilst the 8? replacements on 3hrs per day are all on their painful struggles and life stories, and possibly pottering about in-game on this, that and the other, rather than racking up dedicated turnover.

My hope is that botting is far far reduced in UE5 by gameplay disincentives, and that we see entirely new skill sets that are specifically obtainable by hard-to-bot activities. Those activities should be pretty much the opposite of, say, getting piloting skills by being hit, which is somewhat stupid.

It's probably all a lot harder than currently, so maybe we should contemplate MA's track record and bin our ideas personally to save time...
Editing complete... (oh, but to add that the guy that is both loved and hated (Elon) spoke fondly about computer games in a recent interview and it's his main recreational activity. Still think he'd be a candidate for implementing a truly epic RCE VR universe...)

 

[castanhas]

YES and also NO.
Boting should be alowed but only with some sort of pet that consumes nutrio .
That would be safer for the player and a disadvantage to the ones boting vs actual players.
All other forms of boting shoud be banned.

 

[jetsina]

I think PCAs (player-controlled-agents) could indeed be a way to speed up skilling legally at a cost above regular play. Maybe it's a pet that has your back or agents that can even freely roam in the near future, but only hunt using specific gear choices and in clearly signed 'open to AI' areas.

 

[Westy]

Well my Asus gaming laptop doesn't have macro functions as I'm sure many don't and I wasn't aware that dedicated gaming keyboards did as I've never used one. With desktops/towers I've only ever used ordinary one's. As to who is responsible, it would have to be players that use macro keyboards, but then why does MA say you can't use bots/scripts or similar.

Good points and this is where i think it gets interesting and detailed. Is there a difference (genuinely canvassing hive mind thought here) between bots/scripts that attempt to counter or alter MA's programming for player advantage VS a macro that replaces a finger pressing F. I'd content that the former is intended to break the game somehow for advantage whereas the latter is more an automation of an intended function. F key is an automation in that it shoots till the mob is dead. Then stops. Unlike old days each shot had to be manually clicked. As someone mentioned already. I think MA's intent is to prevent the former rather than the latter and hence why we don't see any actions on what the community define as bots.

 

[Westy]

Quick note - with macro you have ability to automate whole gameplay in hunting. It's not only used to press "F".

Correct. if you watch one using it. they are healing. moving a step or two. But the pattern is there. its not random (though i guess it could be made to be).

For me if someone is using one in an instance on there own/ solo. not affecting others play. I can live with that.

I'm just not ok with it in shared spaces where you impact other players and likely killsteal. There is courtesy while out and about. And while this is a game and you can role play how you like (be a bandit). If your AFK shooting you cannot be engaged with others when its required to be civil. That is a big problem. Forcing your auto style on the gameplay of others.

 

[INTERNUT]

Good points and this is where i think it gets interesting and detailed. Is there a difference (genuinely canvassing hive mind thought here) between bots/scripts that attempt to counter or alter MA's programming for player advantage VS a macro that replaces a finger pressing F. I'd content that the former is intended to break the game somehow for advantage whereas the latter is more an automation of an intended function. F key is an automation in that it shoots till the mob is dead. Then stops. Unlike old days each shot had to be manually clicked. As someone mentioned already. I think MA's intent is to prevent the former rather than the latter and hence why we don't see any actions on what the community define as bots.

I'm not sure there is a difference, after all a macro is a script or code. A macro that automatically targets one mob after the other for ten minutes or more is certainly to the player's advantage for high numbers of low-level mobs.

 

[SamanthaFlynn]

I think that the very existence of botting in any game should serve as an indication that "hunting" in that game needs an overhaul because it is so mindless and boring of an activity that people would rather have their PCs do it for them while they go do other more entertaining things.

As I type this, I'm grinding Feffox in the background with very little attention or thought going into it.

But unlike other MMOs, multiple aspects of "hunting" here have a direct real-world cost connected to them and balancing that out is always going to present challenges. Especially when we all have different approaches to it. But let's be real, you can't even call it "hunting".

Hunting, as the Earthlings defined it, is an activity that involves finding your prey, often times without alerting it to your presence, and then catching & killing it. We no longer have to find anything to kill here because the map is on the Internets. And the only way that map can exist is if the mobs stay put. Mobs staying put like they do here is both conducive and encouraging to botting. Good or bad, the design of the game itself is driving the practice and until it changes, there will always be those who bot.

 

[Thorns Rose]

Occam’s razor..Simple answer..NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!​

 

[LuisArkadov]

Wonder what happens if the real-life Monty Burns types finally get their wish and Digital IDs come in. May need to grin into the cam before delving into any online activities.

Alt farms then chaining their wives, pet cats and granny in her wheelchair to the desk all day?

Similar with bots and additionally to the above, once pleb coins aka CBDCs are issued and possibly purpose bound, it may become a lot trickier to funnel anything amounting to hard money into this platform.

Interesting times ahead in that space.

 

[Dibbler]

What most people failing to see is that Entropia is not the typical MMORPG. The house (Mindark) win more if you cycle more aka lose more. By removing instances, you would need to remove all the mayhems and if you check the CLDTs thats precisely when they make more money during this long events. This last mayhem I tried to do redulite mission using a kinetic 9 + mayhem delta, five hours a day wasn't enough to finish it and you want MA to introduce kite and other stuff to make people actively hunting and I agree and I'm up for it but at the end of the day Mindark and their associates would probably make half the moneys or less and I don't think they want that.

This is not a fight with people using macros, this is a fight with the game developer that offered all the options for the game to be played this way so their profits are even bigger!

I rest my case here, have a nice day you all!

Well at least we can see now how MA is performing, and we can get a handle of what financial situation is etc.

First 11 months on exchange have seen a 40% lowering of share price (from 4.98 sek to 2.80)

You can also see turnover etc per quarter, so i guess the benefits of botting/macro's etc would result in higher turnover/share price/profits. Maybe is to early to see for sure though 11 months isn't so long, also there is the UE5 changeover costs etc.

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[Simpleton]

Never mind.

Goodbye

[Moderated: Removed rule violation]

 

[psyche]

Problem is definitely with game play and for many other reasons as well as the one's you mention. Excuse my ignorance but what do you mean by kiting mechanic?

Kiting is when you shoot the mob, then run away to wait for your gun to reload. Then turn very fast to shoot it and right after shooting, turn and run again. Idea is to prevent the mob from hitting you. Most MMO, you can kite it via special abilities like slowing it down.

 

[psyche]

I guess it is each to their own but a game where I would need to play actively by kiting, rooting, dodging is a game I would play maybe 1-2 hours on the weekend and would result in me either moving to crafting/mining or more likely leaving the game. There are already critical hits, unreachable mobs and ninja spawns to look out for and it is stressy enough. I won't hunt mobs over a certain difficulty level on evenings after a working day.

Isn't that the point of MMO, is to actively play and be able to play longer than other players to get ahead of others. MMO is a game where it rewards the most dedicated players. Unlike MOBA or FPS which rewards the most skilled player. MMO reward dedication. Kiting isn't even that hard. It just rewards active players rather than botters. I mean botters can still bot, but they will just incur a lot more defense costs. Which I'm fine with it if they choose to do so. If I can kite and get ahead of botters, I would say it is fair. If you can't hunt actively then go mine or craft. Just want the game to reward active players somehow. All the arguments for botters are just it is good for MA's pockets. So let's keep it that way and let them bot and increase defense cost for botters to put more ped into MA pockets. Like those EP crafters. We can have afk botters just donating ped to MA via defense costs

 

[jwestonmoss]

What most people failing to see is that Entropia is not the typical MMORPG. The house (Mindark) win more if you cycle more aka lose more. By removing instances, you would need to remove all the mayhems and if you check the CLDTs thats precisely when they make more money during this long events. This last mayhem I tried to do redulite mission using a kinetic 9 + mayhem delta, five hours a day wasn't enough to finish it and you want MA to introduce kite and other stuff to make people actively hunting and I agree and I'm up for it but at the end of the day Mindark and their associates would probably make half the moneys or less and I don't think they want that.

This is not a fight with people using macros, this is a fight with the game developer that offered all the options for the game to be played this way so their profits are even bigger!

I rest my case here, have a nice day you all!

you are exactly right. there is "what should be" and there is "what is", and no company is going to deliberately reduce their revenue by disincentivizing their players from playing

however, they might be able to level the playing field somewhat while increasing their revenue even further. some of my suggestions in the past have tried to recommend this. don't punish macro-players. but find ways to reward active players. ways that don't have TT-cost for MA. all kinds of ways you can probably imagine. perhaps even ways to allow active players to have a limited amount of non-active play while offline as well in exchange for some kind of not-too-expensive resource they burn for the opportunity. all kinds of ways to resolve the issue without just dropping the hammer of justice squarely on the pinky toe of ubers and whales, which i do not expect MA to do in any event.

 

[INTERNUT]

Kiting is when you shoot the mob, then run away to wait for your gun to reload. Then turn very fast to shoot it and right after shooting, turn and run again. Idea is to prevent the mob from hitting you. Most MMO, you can kite it via special abilities like slowing it down.

Thank you, had no idea what it meant. That's similar to the tactic of walking backwards while firing.

 

[psyche]

Thank you, had no idea what it meant. That's similar to the tactic of walking backwards while firing.

yea except walking backwards is very slow and the mob will catch up to you very fast and it will start to damage you. Kiting is to prevent that and you avoid getting hit. Maybe only get hit once or twice.

 

[INTERNUT]

yea except walking backwards is very slow and the mob will catch up to you very fast and it will start to damage you. Kiting is to prevent that and you avoid getting hit. Maybe only get hit once or twice.

Depends on the mob, your skills and weapon used. Some mobs are very slow but some are very fast and hit hard at the same time, so turning and running may not make much difference during which time you're not hitting the mob. I can walk backwards much more quickly now than when I started playing.

 

[Goldenboy24]

im ok with boting, if all they get is shrapnel, then they can bot all day long, but i wont go into a measurement of, well bots create revenue for mindark so they must be good, becouse by that line of reasoning, youd have to explain why in other mmos bots get banned, there isnt even real money at play in those games, and bots would still have to pay for a subscription

i belive the reasoning is, similiar to any crime, as long as the problem is beeing delt with, it wont be on peoples minds, becouse they dont see it ever happening , but if people stop enforcing rules, more and more legit players will see it, then it becomes common knoweldge that the bots are not beeing delt with, regular players start to entertain the idea of boting themself, and it becomes a death spiral, and all this time, legit players keep getting discouraged, in every mmo there are boring tasks that you can automate, why should anybody bother playing legit if boting is alowed, no shot you can measure what mental impact this has on existing players, or on new players

 

[sachi.mk2]

The Entropia community is usually stated by players as one of the standout selling points of the game. With botting and instances putting alot of the playerbase afk and into a solo playing experience, socially the ingame experience has become more sterile and not as vibrant as it once was. Longterm I'd see that as a major negative of the botting/afk playstyle.

 

[SoberPhil]

I think that this is intresting and relevant to this topic, people make bots because it's profitable, otherwise they wouldn't be botting.

 

[Goldenboy24]

bots exist in every game, especialy the ones that are free to play, becouse cost of geting banned is 0, the cost is actualy future profits you would of made did you not get banned

as time goes on, AI will show up, even if a game was complicated, like world of wacraft is, the bigger the potential of profit, the higher the interest of developing smart bots, this cost of development geting lower as AI is progressing

catching bots comes at the cost of the developer, similiar like preventing hacking or other types of cheating comes at development cost, but it is requiered for a good mmo

entropia in some sense, it beeing a RCE game, has the folowing advantage, it takes a long time, befor a bot can withdraw anything, assuming the bot is starting as a brand new player, this in turn means, that the odds of getting caught by other players increases, and these other players understand, that if they want their time investment to have value, the bots have to go

mindark, if they wanted, could give players tools, to "exploit" bots, its a RCE game, so losing what you have on you if you get draged into a pvp zone, will very quickly create an incentive for people not to bot, and in turn, the high reward of catching a bot, would create an incentive for people to keep looking for bots

most of the people boting do it in instances, thats where they are completely safe, IF, another player, or another team of players, could enter a bots instance, they could killsteal, and take advantage of the fact, that the player isnt really at the pc.. this might not be a permanent solution, but a deturent

i have hated bots or hacks in any game, but in other games those dont affect me as much as in EU, and even tho i hate bots, i have to admit, this community, and its constant defense of why bots are great, really push me in the direction of either quiting or joining them