Long running macro's threat by FD - What exactly is a long running macro?!

[Windscreen Smudge]

As a personal description: Any macro that automatically inputs commands to the game longer than 60 seconds.

Some people have been setting up macros that run for hours to abuse the BGS. The banhammah shouldn't be a surprise to them.

 

[Nerwan]

This should be aimed at people who use long macros to work in their place "while they are afk".

Well, to me, this just proves they don't know their own game. No way you can have a macro running for an hour while you are away drinking beer, not with transactions timing out every few minutes.

You can actually, provided you write your macro so that it will always recover from such a timeout.

 

[BL1P]

Same single action influence increase happens with Combat and Exploration.
Handing in Exploration data 1 system at a time has a bigger effect than handing in all the data at once.
Handing in 10 bonds or bounties of 100k is better than 1 bond or bounty of 1mil for increasing influence.
But each will decrease in effectiveness as its bucket is is filling, I presume they eventually cap out if enough single transactions happen. (haven't seen it stop completely though)

I can only see macros working on the Exploration data.
Though I feel the design is just as much to blame.

I use all 3 methods Trade, Exploration and Combat when I am trying to effect the BGS. I do single transactions.
Though I dont use a macro.

But I do use macros for Docking, Pips settings, SubTargets, Shieldcell+Heatsink combos and One for Interdictions that targets nearest target, sets pips, selects subtarget of the target(should be pow plant but often is 1 or 2 out), fires chaff, turns off flight assist and then... gets me a coffee !

 

[Schlack]

Reported 1t trades and macros back in beta 1.03

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ja0P7vl7alk

A fix was put in, but it was a quick fix that didn't completely solve the problem

 

[Chrysophylax]

However I think it's a bad system and IMO it's trying to fix a non-problem. Rich/experience players simply should be able to influence the game world much more than poor or inexperienced ones without diminishing returns.

It's not the only instance where they try to prevent this sort of thing from happening and each time it strikes me as completely misguided. Every single time they could be abused to favor people who are both rich and knowledgeable of game mechanics, defeating the purpose - in this case, someone with a cutter and said knowledge 720 tons of crap is 28 times more effective than someone in an adder, instead of equal. Only since the BGS is more or less a black box with unknown and unpublished rules, there's the haves and have nots.

It's like nothing was learned from other games where this happened - game mechanics designed to safeguard or help 'newbies' at the game will have a magnified effect on those who have already mastered the game. It can't be any other way.

I suspect the devs wouldn't be braindead enough

Like I said it's not the first time they try to curb capable players. I wouldn't call it braindead, very misguided instead, and it's certainly pointless and as you said, trivially exploitable.

 

[kalniel]

I own my keyboard, should imagine all of you do too... No company has the right to tell me how I use the hardware attached to my machine or the machine itself. If I choose to set up a macro or even write some code to do a job when a key or combination is pressed then that is entirely up to me. Not some other company whom I have a loose agreement with, especially when the macro software EULA was accepted before the Frontier one.

Sorry Frontier but part of being a software developer is to stop exploits by coding them out not telling us how to use OUR property to which you have no rights to do so.

Sorry, but just because you own something it doesn't give you the rights to use it as you like. I own my car, but I can only use it in accordance with the relevant laws. You may own your keyboard, but if you're going to use it to play Elite then you agreed to use it in accord with Elite's terms and conditions.

 

[the100thmonkey]

That's ridiculous. Your statement is ridiculous. For instance, WoW has the right to put into its terms of use, that you can't run a bot around harvesting rare nodes to the extent that the player base cannot get to them and use the commodity as planned. It's not a single-user game-- you can't automate tasks that can effectively do things so fast that you damage the experience of other players (auto-aim bots which destroy all other players' chances of winning any conflicts, for instance).

The server isn't your property. Running scripts which send things at lightspeed to servers used by other players to play the game, and which affects their gaming experience. is certainly against terms of service.

To be clear, aimbots are a qualitatively different thing than a macro. The aimbot does exactly what it says - it does the aiming for you. In games like Battlefield, which rely on ballistic weapons with their own physics pertaining to bullet-drop and travel time, an aimbot uses trigonometry to calculate the aim. It turns its user into someone who effectively cannot miss unless they want to. Aimbots replace skill. Macros automate a repetitive task.

On the other hand, a macro repeats a keypress, or a combination of keypresses. Given that the transaction varies between one to two seconds to go through, and there is a seemingly built-in limitation on how fast the UI registers clicks (on my Sidewinder X4 keyboard, for example, I have to insert pauses of over 100ms between keypresses to get a docking request macro to work). Any script will have to take the delays into account, and won't actually work out that fast at all. Taking a conservative estimate, a Cutter with 600t running a buy or sell macro will still take 1,800 seconds -- half an hour -- to empty or fill its hold. I don't know about you, but I would suggest that it wouldn't take me that much longer to do it manually. Hence my earlier comment that the problem is single-unit trading, not macros.

 

[Phil^]

Or they can just fix the god forsaken BGS, so it isn't possible to game it by selling one tonne at a time.
Is it really that hard to fix something so simple?

Tools which play the game for you shouldnt be permitted, and indeed ought to be obstructed as much as possible however im in complete agreement here.
If single unit trading is capable of influencing the BGS to any significant degree then the BGS is too fragile and needs a rethink.

 

[Jukelo]

The keyboard is hardware. I can press any key at anytime - no software license can deny me that right.

Frontier can't tell you how to use your hardware. However they can tell you how you are and are not allowed to interact with their software (which they own, not you). And they are against you using a macro to interact with said software. Just like they are against you interacting with their software by the means of the task manager to close it when in combat. They can't stop you from doing it, but they control your access to all the infrastructure necessary to run the game and can act on it depending on how you interact with the game.

 

[Bran Tse Mallory]

That's ridiculous. Your statement is ridiculous. For instance, WoW has the right to put into its terms of use, that you can't run a bot around harvesting rare nodes to the extent that the player base cannot get to them and use the commodity as planned. It's not a single-user game-- you can't automate tasks that can effectively do things so fast that you damage the experience of other players (auto-aim bots which destroy all other players' chances of winning any conflicts, for instance).

The server isn't your property. Running scripts which send things at lightspeed to servers used by other players to play the game, and which affects their gaming experience. is certainly against terms of service.

Your comment is like saying, "I own the keyboard, therefore I have every right to hack someone's bank account and take all their money, legally." It's just such a closed-minded and simple-minded way of approaching ... nevermind. I doubt you'll get anything I say. It's like saying, "I'm allowed by Microsoft to use windows, therefore, I can write windows code on my machine that shuts down public utilities and crashes airplanes. No, you can't. Not legally. Windows EULA does not let you crash airplanes with no repercussions, hahahaha.

Why are you now talking about scripts and bots running on servers? Have you ever set up a macro before? I have not said a single thing about either of those methods of obvious exploits. This however is very different and if you understood the difference between a bot a script and a macro than we could carry on talking but until you stop putting words into my mouth that were never there to begin with - you are the one being ridiculous.

You final paragraph proves you have no grasp on what I've said. Not once did I mention 'Windows code' what ever language that is, never heard of anything like it... C++ however... Don't need windows to use that either.

How about you stop telling me what you think I said and actually learn what you rights are as opposed to a company rule that has no basis in anything but contract law. You cannot override an already agreed to contract with another. Ask any contracts lawyer.

Nice try though.

 

[Sentenza]

You can actually, provided you write your macro so that it will always recover from such a timeout.

No you can't. A macro can not detect what happened. You need a true bot that can parse screen output, but that is a completely different thing.

 

[edgar]

Isn't Voice Attack all macros?

So if someone makes a macro to unit-sell 100t that's now against the rules.

But if I ask Voice Attack: "Computer, sell 100t, one at a time please!", that's perfectly fine?

This needs to be clarified. Is using Voice Attack to skip manual actions now naughty too?

People simply are going to do repetitive and dull things in the most efficient way possible, clicking things over and over again is not really my idea of fun.

Pretty much this. Same reason people menu log to get the missions they want, it's more effective and time efficient than waiting for 20 minutes for the board to refresh.

FD should just fix the BGS so these things are not as effective anymore, rather than punish players for taking reasonable precautions and due care and attention to protect themselves from suffering Repetitive Strain Injury

 

[the100thmonkey]

No you can't. A macro can not detect what happened. You need a true bot that can parse screen output, but that is a completely different thing.

Or just have the macro repeat until it's stopped manually.

 

[Bran Tse Mallory]

Frontier can't tell you how to use your hardware. However they can tell you how you are and are not allowed to interact with their software (which they own, not you). And they are against you using a macro to interact with said software. Just like they are against you interacting with their software by the means of the task manager to close it when in combat. They can't stop you from doing it, but they control your access to all the infrastructure necessary to run the game and can act on it depending on how you interact with the game.

It is down to them to prevent it from happening but they still have no right to tell me how to use my hardware - I paid for it. It's mine, under consumer law I am allowed to do whatever I choose with it. If I choose to set up a macro then that is my business not theirs. If my macro causes a problem for there servers then it is up to them to correct their code to not allow the server to get flooded in such a way.

 

[Chrysophylax]

Isn't Voice Attack all macros?

So if someone makes a macro to unit-sell 100t that's now against the rules.

But if I ask Voice Attack: "Computer, sell 100t, one at a time please!", that's perfectly fine?

This needs to be clarified. Is using Voice Attack to skip manual actions now naughty too?

Other games normally simply don't allow macros of any sort. I suspect FDev was silent until now because things like Voice Attack are normally kind of harmless, but here we are, threats being issued.

 

[Bran Tse Mallory]

Sorry, but just because you own something it doesn't give you the rights to use it as you like. I own my car, but I can only use it in accordance with the relevant laws. You may own your keyboard, but if you're going to use it to play Elite then you agreed to use it in accord with Elite's terms and conditions.

You are correct. Just as I must not use my keyboard to kill someone but to put this into the same context would you allow Shell to tell you not to drive over 30 when within 5 miles of their branches? Of course not - it would be a stupid rule and you and I would both tell them where to go... It's exactly the same with a keyboard.


P.S. I should point out I do not use macros, even when selling huge amounts of data. I am not in favour of their use but I am in favour of my rights not being trampled by a for profits company - you and the others might but I don't nor can I be forced to hence I am playing devils advocate on this matter. I can also just pop over to our legal team and ask for clarification on these points.... Which I did many, many years ago already.

 

[the100thmonkey]

Other games normally simply don't allow macros of any sort. I suspect FDev was silent until now because things like Voice Attack are normally kind of harmless, but here we are, threats being issued.

In the days of BF2, EA had Punkbuster autokick and when it detected certain driver signatures, like the driver for the G13 gameboard, because it can run a macro.

That lasted all of a week.

 

[Agony_Aunt]

No you can't. A macro can not detect what happened. You need a true bot that can parse screen output, but that is a completely different thing.

Looking at what some people are using. Macros to grind charity missions and stack missions. They appear to be using an image recognition program to scan for particular text and then the script will press the right keys to take the mission.

Can't go into more detail without running afoul of forum rules (might have said too much already).

But its pretty much going to be hammering the servers while the script is running, and its understandable why FD might want to slap users doing this.

 

[Chrysophylax]

In the days of BF2, EA had Punkbuster autokick and when it detected certain driver signatures, like the driver for the G13 gameboard, because it can run a macro.

That lasted all of a week.

I meant allow in the rule/EULA sense. Doing active scanning for what's installed on user's machines runs afoul of several laws in my country (and I suspect just in the EU alone many others too) on top of being shady as heck.

This doesn't mean games can't or shouldn't police themselves - sanity checks like "how did the player gain access to this item" and such, "this player has input the same sequence of commands in a way that screams automation".

 

[Sentenza]

Or just have the macro repeat until it's stopped manually.

Except that when a transaction takes too long, the macro continues to send strokes, except it is now out of sync and it is sending the wrong key at the wrong time, activating unexpected commands.

The point is that you can not go afk. You can avoid straining your wrist, but you still need to stay there watching all the time.