78 replies to this topic

[the voice of reason]

dude, if you see 30 level 3's going for the same oak tree when there is another oak just a few steps away that nobody goes at. then its a pretty safe bet that they are bots, or mentally unstable.

[J1mmies]

Hi I am new to this forum and I'm not looking to cause trouble or problems, but I think bots can be both good and bad.
Now this may seem odd at first, but the part about them being good is not from my perspective, it's that of Jagex. Bots bring
quite a lot of money to Jagex because a majority of them have to buy members in order for their botting be worth while, whether
it be to gain levels or to farm gold, those options just aren't around in F2P. And can you blame Jagex? I mean what company doesn't want to make money? Because when bots were around prior to the first nuke I think there was something like 200k (or around there) players on at one time. Now you see maybe 170k at the most? That's a lot of business lost hence the rise in fees for membership. Sure Jagex could attempt to ruin bots and come down hard on them, but in-turn I would imagine that fees for membership would be even higher because people always find something to complain about..

Now from my point of view, I greatly dislike bots. I personally don't like them because of the 5 odd years I've played Runescape my career has been gauged towards skilling. And bots are a major problem when it comes to skilling because of the MAJOR impacts on the RS economy. It now gives me and other players a bad attitude towards skilling, for example if I'm going to go for 99 fishing, I for one would be concerned with the low prices of all the fish which would make me think,  is the time and effort really worth the awful profit? In most cases it is not, and this is what causes players to either quit, beg, scrape by, or even buy RSGP by real world trading. This creates more problems for Jagex and us as players, but In the end I guess it's a matter of picking your poison.

[Ren]

BlazeTheMovieFan, on 15 April 2012 - 09:00 PM, said:

There is one thing I need to say. Just because someone doesn't reply to what you say to them doesn't mean they're bots, they can also have their chat off.

This is weird, I fight monsters a lot in RuneScape, and have never experienced a problem with bots. But let me ask, how do you know they're bots and not just some people with chat off?

Go pking at green drags some time. You will see the same 'people' come back over n over, they all use similar/the same food (trout, salmon, tuna, lobster (the hardcore bots use lobs)), and all have similar 3item setups. All drop rings of dueling or varrock tabs, some have combat or str/att pots. They all tele when they go to eat at less than 70% health and have no food. They all eat at the same time, they all run to the same spot for the same drop, they all attack the same way at the same time..etc..

You've gotta be btmf to not know who is botting and who isn't.

J1mmies, on 31 August 2012 - 01:56 AM, said:

Hi I am new to this forum and I'm not looking to cause trouble or problems, but I think bots can be both good and bad.
Now this may seem odd at first, but the part about them being good is not from my perspective, it's that of Jagex. Bots bring
quite a lot of money to Jagex because a majority of them have to buy members in order for their botting be worth while, whether
it be to gain levels or to farm gold, those options just aren't around in F2P. And can you blame Jagex? I mean what company doesn't want to make money? Because when bots were around prior to the first nuke I think there was something like 200k (or around there) players on at one time. Now you see maybe 170k at the most? That's a lot of business lost hence the rise in fees for membership. Sure Jagex could attempt to ruin bots and come down hard on them, but in-turn I would imagine that fees for membership would be even higher because people always find something to complain about..

Now from my point of view, I greatly dislike bots. I personally don't like them because of the 5 odd years I've played Runescape my career has been gauged towards skilling. And bots are a major problem when it comes to skilling because of the MAJOR impacts on the RS economy. It now gives me and other players a bad attitude towards skilling, for example if I'm going to go for 99 fishing, I for one would be concerned with the low prices of all the fish which would make me think, is the time and effort really worth the awful profit? In most cases it is not, and this is what causes players to either quit, beg, scrape by, or even buy RSGP by real world trading. This creates more problems for Jagex and us as players, but In the end I guess it's a matter of picking your poison.

They aren't good for Rs longevity because players can take shortcuts that make them end their Rs lifetime a lot faster. They get less enjoyment out of the game by completing more of it easily (services such as questing, random minigames, powerlvling or bought accs/gp..), thus causing them to quit abruptly or permanently a lot faster. They absorb less of the game and have a smaller 'nostalgic' feeling, and probably wouldn't come back as easily. This isn't true 100% of the time, but I figure it's accurate for a decent proportion of RWTing-involved players. Those that bot for personal gain and not RWT are in a worse seat, because when reality hits them (if they really care about a true gaming experience that is), they feel the game is ruined for them completely (evidence such as the Tip.it times post).

Either way, the less players that play Rs, the higher the bot ratio is because they want to make gold cheap enough to be appealing. Jagex -may- get a really good amount of money off bots existing, but it degrades and dissapoints the actual players. Once they leave, the game dies a little. Once people realise that the game is a sinking ship, they jump off and leave it as a lost cause. A huge chain reaction occurs, maybe over a loooong period of time, and overall, it ends up killing RuneScape.

Edit: I'll add in the Rs population has dropped substantially more than you say. 75-130k now, as opposed to 100-150k maybe 2-3 months ago, dependant on time of day/week/month/etc. I remember the days where a third of a million players was bad @ any time of the day. Now it's like..."Wow 200k? Rs is getting popular!.."

You could say that most of the past records of daily population was bots, but I think the ratio of bots:players was smaller. I mean c'mon, everywhere had people at it regardless of bots. Bots didn't bot everything in existance just to turn a coin to sell for irl cash. You didn't see 15 bots at Magic trees, you saw 7 players and 2 bots. And here we are, not cutting magic trees. Not cutting yews nearly as much (almost all bots), not really fishing as much (mostly bots..). There's no comparison anymore, and people who haven't seen the past missed out on the thriving game so many want back. They have nothing to compare it to except just months or a few years ago. And that is absolutely NOTHING like what Rs was half a decade+ ago. It dissapoints me when people let it slide so much.

[J1mmies]

I understand where you are coming and I agree for the most part. I think you're right when you say that the bot:player ratio was much smaller a long time ago and I think this is because of the attitude If you can beat them join them. And you're spot on about the part where players don't take as much of the game in because they are botting and RWT  because they feel no accomplishment and their goals were achieved much easier so they don't feel like it was a journey or a fun time.

[Blaze The Movie Fan]

Alright, when I first posted in this thread I obviously had no idea what the hell I was talking about, I am willing to admit that, so you guys can stop quoting my old posts in this thread now.

So I'm killing red dragons now, and I love killing them. And most people are wearing the exactly the same things. Dragon med, a gray platebody, dragon platelegs, tzhaar cape and abyssal whip. I am going to assume those are bots.

Thankfully I know how to be on the right spot and I can easily just kill the red dragons.

[Zerker_Jane]

BlazeTheMovieFan, on 03 September 2012 - 07:21 PM, said:

Alright, when I first posted in this thread I obviously had no idea what the hell I was talking about, I am willing to admit that, so you guys can stop quoting my old posts in this thread now.

So I'm killing red dragons now, and I love killing them. And most people are wearing the exactly the same things. Dragon med, a gray platebody, dragon platelegs, tzhaar cape and abyssal whip. I am going to assume those are bots.

Thankfully I know how to be on the right spot and I can easily just kill the red dragons.

Why are you killing red dragons?

[Blaze The Movie Fan]

Because they are one of my favorite monsters to fight.

[Lord Slayas]

The bot to player ratio has indeed risen, but I don't think it has risen by more then 15% or so. I just find it much more noticeable nowadays, because there's fewer worlds for the botters to infest, so they tend to group together. For example, say 100 botters used to be at Falador yews before the first nuke across all the F2P worlds (on average, let's say). Now, there's probably around 115 bots at the Falador yews, but since there's so few worlds, instead of only seeing 3 or 4 bots per world, you see 7 or 8.

And because of the higher concentration of bots at skilling spots (due to fewer worlds) it becomes harder and harder for legitimate players to skill and turn a profit at those spots, leading to growing frustration, and people leaving the game. I think Jagex did a good job with the previous nuke, and hopefully they do as well with the new one, but I don't think the problem can be attributed solely to the fact that there's a few more bots then before.

There's a lot more to it then that, in my opinion.

[Kaida23]

Today's update seems to be taking care of the ad- and spam-bots. Hopefully the skill-bots won't be far behind.

[Naive]

Cheer up, bots now explode (Y)

[Son_Of_Judas]

It really is necessary Jagex comes up with a solution. I reached 99 summon not long ago and am now very busy gathering the eggs they drop to fill my menagerie in POH.
Black dragons were awesome, no bots at all. Red dragons were quite crowded with bots but were easy to beat. And when I got to the blue dragons it was hell. It took me over
400 kills to get the egg drop. In that time I did not see one legit player. All names like "gfgfgfgffff" and exact the same outfits. I even saw a L137 botting. I am 100% they were all
bots, thanks to 8yrs of game experience in RS and because they keep trying to attack the dragon, although I'm already fighting it... I find it very frustrating that reporting doesn't
seem to do a thing and that there are no Jagex Mods who just clear areas of bots. Why would Jagex not hire one person, who detects and bans bots for let's say 4hours a day.
It would be cost effective and people would actually feel as if Jagex cared about the problem. And I know there has to be 100% certainety before banning someone but it's not
as if it's hard to see who bots and who doesn't...

[Mercifull]

I don't think it would be cost effective to employ someone SoJ. The bots are automatically created by illegal companies. There are literally hundreds of worlds, with hundreds of spots each where bots go. A human could not keep up. This was proved before botany bay when pmods would mute the spammers and within minutes another 4 would be back. Bots run 24/7, they don't eat, sleep or need to take a break.

Jagex best bet is to aggressively roll out botwatch to more locations. It's done a great job in some areas but in others is clearly lacking. I've noticed an increase in the number of bots mining at LRC since botany bay and this could be because some other methods of goldfarming have been detected by the new system.

[awesomem8]

nope.

[mummy 2 skye]

just hope they don't do another 'bot nuke' i couldn't get on the client for 2 months afterwards

[().-.]

It's rather frustrating to see hordes of level 113+ Bots.

How do they not get banned before maxing out?

[Son_Of_Judas]

Agreed, I've been mining for 15 hours in LRC this week (got mining cape woohoow) and I noticed how several +130's were running to bank chest while there was a portable bank placed by a player like 3 squares away from the mining rock...
I reported every single player who kept running to bank. But tbh I saw them running every single day in line. So they should really work on the reporting system too. Why should I bother reporting obvious bots if they aren't being dealt with. I mean, I play 5 hours a day (mostly at work, yes I'm lucky) but I vary my XP and chat alot etc. Those players are online for hours without doing an other skill, without talking, without checking their XP rate etc... It's just so obvious to spot bots, it makes me angry that Jagex doesn't do a thing to stop it... I know every member bot is also a paying 'player' but people will leave RS if the problem continues...

[MightyMuddy]

Son_Of_Judas, on 08 November 2012 - 11:14 PM, said:

Agreed, I've been mining for 15 hours in LRC this week (got mining cape woohoow) and I noticed how several +130's were running to bank chest while there was a portable bank placed by a player like 3 squares away from the mining rock...
I reported every single player who kept running to bank. But tbh I saw them running every single day in line. So they should really work on the reporting system too. Why should I bother reporting obvious bots if they aren't being dealt with. I mean, I play 5 hours a day (mostly at work, yes I'm lucky) but I vary my XP and chat alot etc. Those players are online for hours without doing an other skill, without talking, without checking their XP rate etc... It's just so obvious to spot bots, it makes me angry that Jagex doesn't do a thing to stop it... I know every member bot is also a paying 'player' but people will leave RS if the problem continues...

I was mining at the LRC today next to the portable bank, but I didn't know they existed and assumed it was a solomon's store thing or something like that. (I've been away for a long time) and I was banking my ores lol because I was watching anime

[Son_Of_Judas]

Well it's not as if it harms to get reported when you're not a bot. Jagex clearly stated it's better to report a suspected bot and be wrong once in a while, than to ignore the problem and let the bots continue...
Although I still wonder if reporting a bot actually does something as a non-mod. I've been reporting the same mahogany chopping bot in tai bwo bwanna multiple times a day in line and he's gained 4 levels in the past week and is still there :'(

[X3EN]

I tend to report bots, but it is essentially a waste of time. For example, the encouragers and/or advertisers, who manage to sustain writing 3 different lines in 1,5 seconds and repeating are obvious bots. Do they get banned? You know how it is.
The same goes for other bots: monster killing bots, skilling bots, minigame bots etc. They have completely swarmed RS and merely removing free trade and wilderness again (the latter is useless anyway) will not rectify the current situation.

This needs to take more extreme measures, such as identity validation and 1 account per person enforcement. After all, it is MEMBER accounts that are sold and MEMBERS are able to make money much easier. One can argue that this will hurt players who want to have different playstyle accounts. Yet that is a neccessary sacrifice. Just like free trade was.

Perhaps if bots were not so dead obvious... But nah, extreme measures are needed. What happened to the "we don't want your computer to play with our computer" attitude?