No one is suggesting this.
Automation and Scripting - An investigation into further abuses of BGS and Powerplay
- Thread starter CMDR Tom D
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No one is suggesting this.
Let's make the make sell for £1000 and you have to have a credit check to see if you are approved.
, complaining a game goes on sale. What's next?
Diablo, another online game, has huge amounts of bots. Every now and then, there's a ban wave that clears the majority of bots. You think this solves it? No, eventually they come again. And the game doesn't sell for £5. Hell, it is rarely on sale, still bots come along, on brand new accounts, after every ban wave.
If you think selling the game for a fiver is an issue, well, you're wrong (to put it politely).
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Well, it sounded like GG7 was.
My response was directed at him and no one else.
If I misunderstood him, then my apologies.
If anyone's suggesting FDev is complicit in sabotaging their own game then they should back it up with evidence or be ignored for the trolls they are.
My original conjecture to FDev selling the game at a low price point so frequently was it simply makes the Botters lives easier. I think everyone can see the issue with this.
The solution does not have to be halting sales but simply take the ease of purchase into account when dealing with this issue. We're certain it's a huge factor in the resurgence of bot accounts after action is taken.
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I hate cheaters in online games they really are pond scum.... I can see how this may be hard to catch so with this mind (and I accept I could be talking out of my exhaust) can FD just make this harder to bot?
How you may ask? Well for a start every time an account logs out during an interdiction on logging back in the same ship is in the instance right from the off in normal space and the FSD is put on "forced interdiction cool down" also if this happens docking computer is forced offline until docked due to "damage" caused by interdiction (it gets a free reboot on manually docking at any base). This would not affect genuine players much t but I imagine would screw up any bot. Also isn't the whole waiting for server tick to load up on PP materials at bit rubbish? FD need to simply "do better" there because waiting is surely not good gameplay. I accept I have prolly missed something obvious.
It may be obvious that I don't PP. So why am I here.. well I want to PP one day and I just hate cheating
How you may ask? Well for a start every time an account logs out during an interdiction on logging back in the same ship is in the instance right from the off in normal space and the FSD is put on "forced interdiction cool down" also if this happens docking computer is forced offline until docked due to "damage" caused by interdiction (it gets a free reboot on manually docking at any base). This would not affect genuine players much t but I imagine would screw up any bot. Also isn't the whole waiting for server tick to load up on PP materials at bit rubbish? FD need to simply "do better" there because waiting is surely not good gameplay. I accept I have prolly missed something obvious.
It may be obvious that I don't PP. So why am I here.. well I want to PP one day and I just hate cheating
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That’s probably the first and sensible suggestion given in a long time. That would make sense.I hate cheaters in online games they really are pond scum.... I can see how this may be hard to catch so with this mind (and I accept I could be talking out of my exhaust) can FD just make this harder to bot?
How you may ask? Well for a start every time an account logs out during an interdiction on logging back in the same ship is in the instance right from the off in normal space and the FSD is put on "forced interdiction cool down" also if this happens docking computer is forced offline until docked due to "damage" caused by interdiction (it gets a free reboot on manually docking at any base). This would not affect genuine players much t but I imagine would screw up any bot. Also isn't the whole waiting for server tick to load up on PP materials at bit rubbish? FD need to simply "do better" there because waiting is surely not good gameplay. I accept I have prolly missed something obvious.
It may be obvious that I don't PP. So why am I here.. well I want to PP one day and I just hate cheating
I hate cheaters in online games they really are pond scum.... I can see how this may be hard to catch so with this mind (and I accept I could be talking out of my exhaust) can FD just make this harder to bot?
How you may ask? Well for a start every time an account logs out during an interdiction on logging back in the same ship is in the instance right from the off in normal space and the FSD is put on "forced interdiction cool down" also if this happens docking computer is forced offline until docked due to "damage" caused by interdiction (it gets a free reboot on manually docking at any base). This would not affect genuine players much t but I imagine would screw up any bot. Also isn't the whole waiting for server tick to load up on PP materials at bit rubbish? FD need to simply "do better" there because waiting is surely not good gameplay. I accept I have prolly missed something obvious.
It may be obvious that I don't PP. So why am I here.. well I want to PP one day and I just hate cheating
So... On interdiction, throttle to zero, wait for interdiction to finish. Log-off. Login, carry on..
But on docking your docking computer would need to be rebooted so the bot would have to manually dock due to shutting down in interdiction.
But this would affect legit players so I see your point. Inconvenience a few honest players if it stops bottng. Is it worth it? I dunno not my call. I am biased I don't use one as i like docking (other than to hear some blue Danube)
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I'm in the 'use it once thru the grill' camp. Any solution should not impact normal play. The problem I have with this, is if we accept the loss of DC in any shape, we are then basically saying 'we'll accept anything' now.. and in the future.. And to be quite frank, if someone can automate all the other stuff, I wouldn't think docking would be such a deal breaker.
interesting read: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/1710/6f3e6fa9a6827a568a08efe5acd0c3e7dac1.pdf
Chow, Y., Susilo, W. & Zhou, H. (2010). CAPTCHA challenges for massively multiplayer online games: Mini-game CAPTCHAs.
2010 10th International Conference on Cyberworlds, CW 2010 (pp. 254-261). Piscataway, New Jersey, USA: IEEE.
Chow, Y., Susilo, W. & Zhou, H. (2010). CAPTCHA challenges for massively multiplayer online games: Mini-game CAPTCHAs.
2010 10th International Conference on Cyberworlds, CW 2010 (pp. 254-261). Piscataway, New Jersey, USA: IEEE.
As much as I understand and agree, depending on how the bot is created, it can be insanely difficult to slap down.
And while I get why you are upset at FDev, it isn't a simple thing, which is why it happens in most any and all online games, and why it keeps happening regardless of what measures those people take. So sure it needs fixing but is that even possible?
Especially if a bot is based around none invasive methods, that you cannot really do much to detect, screen reader + macro software?, ban all macro software? so a ton of keyboards lose their macro ability, voice attack becomes useless? that really is unlikely to happen.
And how would you monitor all players to detect their behaviour? flying a to b only? so people that do that, traders and whatnot get slapped? despite being fully legit? anything client side can be examined and gotten around via the same macro methods they might already be using and so the problem persists. It is kinda like virus/anti virus, it is a struggle with very little end in sight, unless someone figures out a totally new way of detecting it.
And no if there were servers it wouldn't fix anything either.
If you could even detect it is a macro..
Not really expecting FDev to do anything at this point.
This post is to spread awareness and give people the knowledge and know how to combat this thing, and report it. We believe the problem is more widespread than just our medium sized faction.
If it is then the amount of reports will mean FDev will HAVE to combat it somehow.
WorldsGreatestForumDad
Banned
I know a lot of people whine about this has nothing to do with the modes. It kinda does.
Whomever they are attacking, if their actions were only available in open. These things could be hunted down to 0 rebuy if their operators left them alone. If anything these bots are prime example of the frustrations people have in fighting a proxy war (with the option of direct PVP). Fact is they arent going to Opt into being stopped. A bot or a player, they are the same in this regard.
If we had the ability rip them apart and watch carebear stuffing fly across the galaxy. We would.
Very frustrating trying to play that part of the game
Its not a level playing field when it comes to this stuff. Bots or no Bots.
But just like players, there should be no question. The bots should be able to be stopped with all sorts of tools they give us in the game called WEAPONS. Surprising to a lot of people I know. But thats what they are for.
Whomever they are attacking, if their actions were only available in open. These things could be hunted down to 0 rebuy if their operators left them alone. If anything these bots are prime example of the frustrations people have in fighting a proxy war (with the option of direct PVP). Fact is they arent going to Opt into being stopped. A bot or a player, they are the same in this regard.
If we had the ability rip them apart and watch carebear stuffing fly across the galaxy. We would.
Very frustrating trying to play that part of the game
Its not a level playing field when it comes to this stuff. Bots or no Bots.
But just like players, there should be no question. The bots should be able to be stopped with all sorts of tools they give us in the game called WEAPONS. Surprising to a lot of people I know. But thats what they are for.
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I know a lot of people whine about this has nothing to do with the modes. It kinda does.
Whomever they are attacking, if their actions were only available in open. These things could be hunted down to 0 rebuy if their operators left them alone. If anything these bots are prime example of the frustrations people have in fighting a proxy war (with the option of direct PVP). Fact is they arent going to Opt into being stopped. A bot or a player, they are the same in this regard.
If we had the ability rip them apart and watch carebear stuffing fly across the galaxy. We would.
Very frustrating trying to play that part of the game
Its not a level playing field when it comes to this stuff. Bots or no Bots.
But just like players, there should be no question. The bots should be able to be stopped with all sorts of tools they give us in the game called WEAPONS. Surprising to a lot of people I know. But thats what they are for.
Forcing the bots to open won't solve anything. There is this little thing called "instancing". And network bandwidth. A wet-string internet connection (quite easy to implement with bandwidth throttling) on the other side of the planet from where you are, will never get instanced with you.
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While I've heard this said, perhaps even by FDev themselves, in practice I suspect it only happens when the player count is over a certain threshold when multiple instances must be used.
I say this because anecdotally, it wasn't long ago that I had a terrible internet connection (<2 Mbps, high latency). I'm in Australia and when I first met up with some players in a BGS faction from the US or Europe I never failed to instance with them. That was before they were friended in-game, which is probably important because FDev may give precedence to friends, for obvious reasons.
Anyway, that's just my experience. Ymmv.
No it isn't. Frontier keep their own council on account matters, as they damn well should. Whether a game goes on sale, or should, is not predicated on whether people feel it's acceptable "because bots".
Frontier are facing the same thing all online games face at some point; automation. Agreed, this isn't rocket science. It's a bunch of people assuming intent, speaking authoritatively on matters they have absolutely no authority in. And generally being a little bit silly based on having an incomplete picture, and running with it. Like scissors.
If there is unusual behaviour, suggesting an account may not be acting within accordance of the ToS; report it. That's it. That is the one and only official action one is to undertake. If repeated actions and additional collateral are collected, then a support call is the next step.
Arguing on the internet about assumed motivation and how the developer is secretly conspiring to allow this all to happen is just a tad daft. Frontier are too busy fighting fires of their own creation to even have the wherewithal to think "you know, half the bubble is on fire, the other half is experiencing bugs, we could really do with some more heavily macro'd clients, and unsupported code that violates ToS, let's have a sale!".
The developer right now is using it's entire resources to unstick bugs in 3.0.3. Holy god. People will do what the game lets them do. If that means they can run code they probably shouldn't, then that's on the developer to resolve. Whether or not they continue to sell the game at $value has zero relevance to the ToS or whether people are respecting it.
The only thing Frontier are guilty of, is potentially being a bit too lenient (and that's just my personal opinion). That's it. There are terms of service; report violations. If accounts are not banned, there will be reasons for that, and second guessing the developer, when it's the support team who likely make those decisions, based on factual data, is just really bad form.
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Lastly, we have zero "implicit rights" within the game; if people are undermining the BGS in unusual ways, but are still enacting within the ToS, then that's potentially valid play, regardless of whether it happens to be an inconvenience or not. This has always been, and will always be, Frontier's decision in such matters. Report, raise support calls if warranted; if action isn't taken in some instances, there will be reasons. Whether or not one agrees with them, isn't relevant to that decision.
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No, this still happens; the matchmaking system has thresholds and as a result an instance can appear more empty that it may be, due to those peers not meeting required parameters. This is intentional. As has always been the case, an 'anchor' peer in a wing, for example, can cause wing members to see more players than they otherwise would.
For example, for a very long time, a friend in the US would only see my wing beacon, and vice versa. However if I connected over VPN via my private colo server in the US, I could see his ship just fine. This was because matchmaking saw my connection coming from a much closer location (even though my latency was the same; I'm in Australia, also); matchmaking was treating my connection differently based on where I was.
This is why open can seem like solo at times; it's possible the instance is just actually empty, or it might simply be the relative latencies have caused matchmaking to filter out other commanders that are whizzing around and neither are any-the-wiser of the other's presence.
Solo works this way, iirc (I need to watch the excellent primer on frontier's amazon setup again). Lots of people whizzing around on the same servers, never see each other (for the most part, at least) because matchmaking is filtering out all other clients (except the rare times it doesn't).
Instances have limits on client count, ergo one can end up in another instance (and obviously if you load a save into open, you can end up in an empty one) but it's fundimentally still matchmaking that decides where you end up, and who you see. That bit, hasn't changed.
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I know a lot of people whine about this has nothing to do with the modes. It kinda does.
Whomever they are attacking, if their actions were only available in open. These things could be hunted down to 0 rebuy if their operators left them alone. If anything these bots are prime example of the frustrations people have in fighting a proxy war (with the option of direct PVP). Fact is they arent going to Opt into being stopped. A bot or a player, they are the same in this regard.
If we had the ability rip them apart and watch carebear stuffing fly across the galaxy. We would.
Very frustrating trying to play that part of the game
Its not a level playing field when it comes to this stuff. Bots or no Bots.
But just like players, there should be no question. The bots should be able to be stopped with all sorts of tools they give us in the game called WEAPONS. Surprising to a lot of people I know. But thats what they are for.
if under attack, disconnect. You were saying ?
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