qeltar

I was being sarcastic... I have been one of the leading complainers about Jagex's lack of attention to problems in the game, like macroers and scammers. Unfortunately, the company these days only seems to care about money, and nothing else. ~q

Good to hear, but I'll believe it when I see it. And it shouldn't be a "special event" -- there should be Jmods in the game all the time dealing with these and other issues. ~q

There are many ways Jagex could eliminate, or at least drastically reduce, the autoer menace. All of them involve the company actually paying some time, attention and money to the problem, which they have shown repeatedly they aren't interested in doing. ~q

This article covers issues related to the economy far better than most discussions of it (which I realize is, to some degree, damning with faint praise.) Unfortunately it also makes a number of common mistakes, and some of the suggestions are dubious at best. I'm seeing people now trying to sell at 650 and not getting quick sales. One point worth remembering is that Burger King hats and other rares basically are "left-handed whompus grinders". They serve no purpose in the game; they are only sought after because of a cult mystique surrounding them. Autoers and gold farmers, yes. Skill cape hunters? Maybe. Some skill capes result in an increase in commodities in the market, but others are neutral or even remove commodities. So it's really not that simple. Most people who power-level don't use the highest-level items, though. People who are trying for capes in WC or fishing or mining would generally use willows, salmon/trout and iron respectively, because they are much faster. This strongly argues against claiming that skillers are responsible for gluts in high-end items. Not at all. Even leaving aside the moral arguments, if this were true things like sharks wouldn't be bombing in price. Mainly because they haven't made much of an effort. That includes their total unwillingness to actually patrol the game and do what they promise by maintaining an active presence. No offense, but this comparison is mostly invalid. Jagex has almost complete control over everything that happens in its game and could get rid of autoers completely if it were important to them. This won't work. By definition, if you "limit" this to below what the market demand for buying RS gold is, then the black market will still exist to fill that gap. There would be no reduction in illegal gold -- in fact, it might even be worse due to legalization as many more people would do it, as said later in the piece. Most commodities actually haven't change price all that much. It's the few that do change that get a lot of attention. ~q

Are you kidding? That might cut into Jagex's profits. ~q

Actually, it's very easy to program bots to walk around barricades, and they would be used by twits to annoy the hell out of real players. ~q

IP bans are not the panacea that many people think they are. If it were that easy, Jagex would have done it already. Remember that IP addresses are not tied specifically to individuals or even computers. As I've been saying for a long time now, the core of the problem is insufficient technology combined with a lack of online supervision. Jagex has completely abandoned maintaining an active presence in its own game, despite claiming publicly that this is important. The bot issue on F2P is exacerbated by the ease with which accounts can be created. But at least on P2P, this mess should have been cleaned up ages ago. ~q

I am sitting behind Varrock castle right now, hopping between free worlds. There are at least ten bots in EVERY world. Many have a lot more. As None2None said, this is Jagex's problem, NOT ours. They could clean it up if they considered it a priority, which they clearly do not. Instead they spend their time on silly quests and wallpaper. It's all about money and growth. Those are Jagex's only real priorities. ~q

Which came first, the chicken or the egg? The reason Jagex mods get swarmed is in part because they are rarer than hen's teeth in the game. This despite Jagex openly saying that they consider it important to have a presence within RuneScape itself. ~q

It's the MANAGEMENT's problem. And they are the ones who decide where to allocate resources -- content or game management. There aren't enough resources in the latter department. your report button is just as effective... That's laughable. Go to the Runescape forums and you'll see just how many people try to report these bots over and over and nothing happens.. well, you'll see it until Jagex's toadies lock the threads anyway. Jagex needs to pull its head out of the sand and put employees IN the game, dealing with these issues. ~q

That's just silly. The people who engage in this behavior are mainly huge companies in Asia who are farming gold for resale. They know more about computers and the Internet than just about anyone else. They aren't going to get viruses from it. To think that this doesn't harm the game is ludicrous. It cheapens resources -- sharks have dropped from around 1k to 600 in a few weeks -- and even worse, makes people feel like playing honestly is pointless. Meanwhile, Jagex is running around making chicken suits and redesigning cows rather than getting into the game and cleaning up this mess. As for "hacking" -- it's mostly a myth. The majority of people who claim to have been "hacked" either gave away their passwords or were just not very careful in protecting them. Jagex could do a bit more on the education side here, but not a lot. ~q

The only thing that will make a huge dent in the macroing is for Jagex to actually put some gold crowns in the game instead of ignoring the issue. They tell people that they consider being in the game important, but they don't follow through with action. ~q

They don't want people to know just how bad the problems with macroers are. If they didn't ban discussion of it, the forums would be filled with complaints. It boils down to Jagex abdicating its promise to maintain an in-game presence and patrol its game. They have just given up even being in the game and looking for rule-breakers. ~q

It's 100% profit on a tiny amount of money, though. You can make more money than that in about a hundred different ways. :) ~q

Well, I had to postpone my "Easter egg lunch" but I still plan to do it. And why not? It's food, isn't it? :) I agree that they should be made untradeable. ~q

Exactly how I feel.. that's why I am eating the egg.. it's a statement against rares. ~q

I personally hate rares. I think their presence leads to all sorts of problems in the game. I bought my first rare today -- an easter egg. I'm eating it at an Easter Egg lunch on Sunday. I don't expect anyone to follow my example, but it shows my views on the subject. ;) ~q

Anyone who thinks Jagex "doesn't like pures" is missing a fundamental point -- Jagex is the only reason there are pures at all. They exist because Jagex made a combat level formula that favors their creation. If Jagex really wanted to get rid of them, all they have to do is revise that formula. They don't. ~q

There are four on Entrana, I think that's the most. You can combine with Law crafting to make it efficient.. take ess, craft, fill empty spaces with horns. Another option is that weird thing from the quest a couple of months ago where you use cowhides... one of the few cases where it is actually worth doing. ~q

Thanks ekim, I very much appreciate your post. For those who are at all interested, I have cleaned up and formally launched my RuneScape-related site, which is linked in my signature. Even if you disagree with my views you will likely find a lot of useful information on avoiding item scams, account hacking and lures, which I don't believe has been gathered into one place before. ~q

Funny that you say that... because as I was reading your reply, I was thinking that you were making the same comments others had made and I had already responded to a week ago. The thread has stagnated since it was placed in this low-traffic area. I see no purpose in repeating what I've already said several times, so unless some new material is raised, I'm done here. Of course, the question of why Jagex is marketing its game directly to pre-teens remains, but I will pursue that in more productive environments. ~q

Correct, it's a waste of money from that standpoint. I bought it specifically so that I could check it out and speak about it from first-hand knowledge, not because I needed the content. And it is most certainly an official book with Jagex Limited as the copyright holder. You, like that other person, simply have no idea what you are talking about. See my post at the top of this page which addresses this "not an official copy" apologetics falsehood. Those sound like numbers you made up. Even so, it's a LOT of people. As for being punished, I see the same scammers active day after day after day. A "bit" more powerful? Yes. A substitute for the company actually doing what it claims and patrolling its own game? Definitely not. How long does it take to put up a new entry saying "There are ongoing bugs with POHs that we have not yet resolved, so do not take valuable items into other people's houses". 5 minutes? Stop obfuscating. They have implemented humongous amounts of code while letting bugs sit for long periods of time, not fixing them and not warning about them. None. Because they claim that POHs are safe. They aren't. They're in the thread and in my articles. "Do something". Such as? Sorry, but I did do something -- I did more than anyone else I know ever has. ~q Don't toot your own horn -- you're just nitpicking right now. Also, from what I can tell, you're not really doing a very decent job at it. Thanks for the peurile insults, but I notice you didn't answer my question about what it is you think I should do. Also, if anyone is doing more than I am, please tell me who they are. Because their game is filled with little kids, because they promise a safe gaming environment, and they are marketing their game at pre-teens in schools. That's why. This is as nonsensical as someone who criticizes a government's policies being told he should leave the country. Don't waste your time, I won't fall for such gibberish. I only insist that Jagex actually follow through with the responsibilities that they themselves have said are theirs. Edit: Greedom1, I appreciated your post even if nobody else did. :) ~q

Verac.

It's not enough, and the proof is the thousands of people who fall victim to trade window scams every day. There are quite a few common ones, which I describe at my site. I'm not going to list them here as I don't know it is allowed. Point being, they could be fixed with a few minutes' work, but apparently Jagex doesn't consider this important enough to bother with. (But redesigning chickens and cows? Very important!) It's insufficient for numerous reasons that have been discussed at length in numerous threads. Whether an item is tradeable or not is a single flag in the item's description. I personally take credit for getting this one fixed, by the way. Not that others hadn't tried for months only to be ignored by Jagex -- but every time I saw Paul on the forums I started a thread about it and finally he noticed and responded. Two weeks later the problem was fixed. There's no excuse for not fixing scams that are easily resolvable. Again, where is this warning? I certainly have not seen it, and if I haven't, neither have a lot of others. In the KB it says houses are safe. They aren't. Why? :mrgreen: They just added that page.... maybe today or yesterday. It wasn't there when I wrote my articles.. I again have a feeling Jagex is paying attention to what I'm doing. At any rate, talk is cheap. They (or their lawyers) can say whatever they wish, but things like the Handbook speak otherwise. Don't want to rehash part 1, but I was referring more to the behavior that the game teaches. I personally have reported someone for item scamming 8 times over the course of a week and even asked a player mod to report them, only to see the person there day after day. I probably couldn't write a better one. I just wouldn't tell parents that it does more than it can. But they won't do that -- it's why I wrote http://www.truthscape.com . They also cover up discussions of scams on the forums. Player mods are a cop out. It's Jagex's game, and Jagex says that its staff are present in the game. They aren't. ~q

Yes.. but they did this only after first trying to ABDICATE that responsibility, which was theirs all along. They only changed due to pressure by people like myself who were outraged that they did what was convenient for them. I give full credit to Jagex for their efforts on preventing account scamming. It's one area they do well. Not really. Nobody pays attention to those ads, and they likely did that because a huge percentage of the people who want to advertise on a place like Runescape are trying to run ads to get people to break the game's rules. No, they did that because they were forced to by US law. The reason is simple: it's Jagex's game and only they can fix many of the problems. Only Jagex can educate people better, fix bugs, prevent scams, and stop advertising the game to kids, for example. It is. It was confirmed in a thread in the RS forums by a forum mod. It was also discussed at length here, and several people talked to J mods who confirmed their involvement. Most importantly, the copyright notice credits the book to Jagex Limited. This has been addressed in discussions -- they didn't because the members world changes too much and would have made the book too large. And gee, "coincidentally", the free game is the version most played by kids. There are references to Runescape being medieval right on the Runescape site. Oh, but they didn't -- and that's precisely the problem. They chose a publisher known for kids books, and the book is being marketed towards kids. They might, if they didn't want it to be patently obvious that they are being hypocrites in marketing the game to people whom they officially claim are not allowed to make accounts. That's not the way book authoring works, especially in this market. Tracey West doesn't work for any one game company, she is a freelance author, who specializes in taking cartoons and games and writing books about them under license. On the contrary -- the fact that they are nearly identical goes against your argument. Copyright law covers clearly derivative works, which the cover certainly is. If it had been used without permission, the author of the book would be wide open to a lawsuit. And you can be sure that Scholastic's lawyers wouldn't let any images be used without permission. Finally, do you own the book? I bet not, or you wouldn't be making these foolish arguments. It is filled with pictures and descriptions taken from the game and KB. I'm not dodging anything, just trying to avoid wasting time on repeated arguments, which nobody ever responds to. I've agreed since the start that parents need to be responsible for what their kids do, but they can't do a good job when Jagex doesn't provide them with the information they need, and then markets the game direct to their kids. Depends on the server.. on some it is quite a few. I did not say that. Don't misquote me, it certainly doesn't help anything. No, it is not -- it is Jagex's. The police are Jagex. Player mods are like unarmed security guards that people ignore as they see fit. Go to world 2 sometime and you'll see tons of player mods happily buying and selling next to people autotyping, trying bone swap scams and more. Jagex needs to enforce its rules, not cop out with player mods who really cannot do anything. Not that I've seen. To this day the KB says that they are safe and that you cannot lose items in them. You're kidding, right? They undid that decision months ago. Go to the RS forums and search for "house", and you'll find dozens of them. Again, you can try to defend them all you want, but nothing changes the facts that the bugs are still there months after they should have been corrected, and Jagex refuses to warn people properly. I have a bachelor's degree in computer engineering, a master's degree in electrical engineering/computer science and another in management. I started programming in 1980 and have been a manager on several projects. I have a pretty good idea what I am talking about. ~q