n64jive

Then you really have no right to complain when they decide to enforce the rules that you don't feel obliged to follow. The rule is there regardless of whether or not you agree with it, as is the ability for Jagex to enforce it. Anyone else not like the "customer is always right" mentality? Jagex is taking an almost twelve year old game that's been on a downward spiral for the last three, and adapting it to fit current trends. What's your excuse? I think you missed the point, which is that rules should be established for a purpose. What is the purpose of the RWT rule? Also a business should serve its customers. Finally, I'm not against the micro transactions model. It easily generates significant revenue. With that said, I wouldn't consider Jagex to have always made what I would consider great ethical decisions. The fact of the matter is that the company tried to perform the noble deed of ridding the game of bots and RWT by removing free trade. This basically diminished the value of the game, and many customers were lost. The company was heading for bankruptcy. In order reclaim lost customers, Jagex reintroduced free trade. This reintroduce bots in full force, which in turn generated revenue for Jagex. Jagex let this go on for a while before taking action, but not without something to supplement the loss. Jagex introduced SoF as a way to continue to meet their financial needs while reducing bots. Great, grand, wonderful. But why battle RWT? Because it opens up the cost to a fair market. It is much more cost effect to purchase gold from a third party than it is spins from Jagex. And this is why the battle continues Maybe a little bit of a conspiracy theory-ish, but I'd love to here other arguments why the rule still exists?

So which application are you running in order to use the SoF? Do you close RuneScape to open SoF on FunOrb? Do you go to miniclip to play SoF? :rolleyes: Anyone else not like the "Jagex makes the game, therefore they make the rules" mentality? Rules should be established for a purpose. The reason for the RWT rule is to allow those who are more financially well off to have an in-game advantage. Jagex nullifies that objective with SoF. Sorry, but I feel no way obligated to follow rules that I don't agree with. I, and many others, are the reason Jagex is still around. Not the other way around.

At this point, it's considered IP, but it's heavily debated and the laws for these things could change. As time goes on and we move more and more towards the realization of virtual currency, I feel many of these claims will be challenged. I agree with you in the sense that right now, as the laws are, it would seem Jagex holds ownership over their data. But IP laws are ever-changing, and I believe at some point their is going to be a distinction between intellectual property and virtual data.

Just to be clear, whether you agree with it or not doesn't matter. The law says you account, and everything related to it, belong to them under intellectual property laws. Quite simply, Jagex own the entire game, and your account and all it's items and levels and whatnot, are part of that game, which they own in its entirety. You do not own your gold any more than you own any game you buy on steam (and if you didn't know that you don't own the games you buy through steam, then surprise!). Only until the case law holds up, which is yet to happen. Jagex makes the claim, and they can take you to court over the matter if they like, but that doesn't mean they would win. I'm kind of playing devil's advocate here in the sense that although I have never sold gold, I wouldn't blame anyone who does. That is my stance. And I'm curious how well Jagex's case would hold up. In terms of owning steam games, It's off topic, but I hate when nerds get worked up over it. Who cares if you own it or not.

They can't...all banning of players is most like on assumption that the players RWT, as it is very unlikely Jagex could actually prove it. Also, I don't agree with Jagex owning the gp.

I feel like the DG update is a step backwards in terms of the battle against bots. Many DG bots are solo bots which get horrific xp/hr rates. Also I'm a little upset they don't update us with the details on bot watch. Those are my interest in this game at this point.

I don't believe I have met that quest requirement, however it's something else I will be looking into.

I would like to make this main assumption, however I have completed probably around 100 or so level 1 clue scrolls over the week and have only received two god pages. I remember them being less rare back when I used to do level 3 clues...however maybe Jagex just changed the rarity of the item (would make sense, as these used to be around 50k in value and now range in the millions)

So I decided to make a strange goal of completing all the god books. I know I could simply just purchase the pages, but I need something that is going to excite me in runescape, so I decided to collect all of them manually (who knows how long this process will take. It may be unachievable). I decided in order to make it more likely for success, I will only be collecting the three original god books. My question pertains to the rarity of god pages. Is there an equal chance of receiving a page from all three types of clues? If this is the case, then level 1 clue scrolls would be the easiest/fastest to complete, and therefor would be the most efficient route. Even if you had a better chance from higher level clue scrolls, it still may be the case that level 1 clue scrolls would be more efficient.

Just to clarify, my post wasn't a response to your post, but rather I was referencing those who agree with Jagex's rules because "They are the rules Jagex has created, therefore I support them regardless", and then proceed to make up arguments against those with different opinions based solely on those beliefs. Also, I wasn't making a personal jab at anyone by calling them a bigot. I am simply stating, that by definition, the responses that are had by those is bigotry. Sorry for the confusion. Next, I understand that when you accept Jagex's ToS, you agree to their rules, etc. But they need to understand that we are the customers. Their total lack of disregard of the community is one of the many factors that make this game's community so terrible. Most of the members got sick of Jagex's antics, and quit. Now to those of you who ask "Why are you still here"...because there are aspects of this game that I still enjoy. But I'm no fanboy, and I'm not going to support Jagex just because I play their game. Any argument for RWT has became invalid once Jagex introduce and continue to push their Squeal Wheel...

If there is one thing I noticed, there are some members of this forum who are bigots and trying to get them to see the other side of the fence in near impossible...

Although I'm not a coder or scripter and have no clue how bots are created, I can only imagine they have to be programmed in advance and don't react human-like when something unsuspected comes up. That's also the reason why I don't understand they can't make randoms that are actually random. Nothing graphically 'high tech' but just a random thing popping up a few times a day on a random moment. Something like 'what item is this?', but then with a word or figure or whatever. Kinda like the captcha, but RS related. And when you solve it, you get a random lowvalue item or the XP lamp as we knew it from randoms. It would bother real players alot less than being tele'd out and having to run through a maze or picking up and replacing coffins... If you fail at solving the random, it should tele you to a 'bot prison' where they let you solve another puzzle. If you get stuck or keep screwing up it's kinda obvious you aren't human... Dunno, I think that's a way to stop bots? They had captcha's back in classic, and they weren't well received. There are a lot of traits, however, that are obvious with bots. The most popular bot scripts all behave the same way. The fact that I am able to detect which rs players are botting, and which are legit, just by glancing at my screen for a few seconds tells you that Jagex should be able to do the same. I think with Jacmob at the helm of this project, bot-watch will work. Bots will have to become smarter, but if botwatch is well designed, it will learn as the bots become smarter as well. I really don't think it should be too difficult. Hell, even keeping track of simple stats like percentage of day logged in. For instance, accounts that continuously log in for over 90% of the day for many days at a time. Seems like it is pretty obvious this person is a bot. And the amount of real players that would do something similar is small, therefor it seems like false positives would be low risk as well. And that is just a simple metric. Heat mapping clicking patterns and other behavioral detection wouldn't be to difficult as well.

As someone with a degree in computer engineering, I feel Jagex can stop bots. Their bot-watch is the right method, and I have been preaching this for years. Automate the bot detection process and you will stop the vast majority of bots, which is really what matters. As for people who drop real life money to be good at runescape...Money doesn't grow on trees. They were able to obtain it somehow...Just because they didn't put the time in in-game, doesn't mean they didn't put that time in. Sorry, but if little johnny can spend his weekend mowing lawns instead of a month of weekends killing green dragons, I don't care if little johnny buys gold. Life's not fair, but runescape never was either. How was it fair, that I was able to just run around lumbridge and pick up xmas crackers, hoard those, and later be able to buy any skill I pleased. I bet you never got that opportunity. Quit trying act like there is something noble about working hard at runescape. I only level up my skills because there is content I want access to. There is no sense of achievement. There are plenty more satisfying things in this world that are more impressive than runescape.

My argument is that Jagex needs to stop bots and not worry about RWT between these dicing clans. I have never once said that gold farming bots don't ruin the game. My argument is that Joe Schmoe, who has played runescape since 2001, has accumulated 50b in wealth and wants to sell it so he can put a down payment on his house. Good for Joe. Edit: To sum up, bots are a product of RWTing, not the other way around. What this means is that you will have a lot more difficult time stopping RWTing from existing from the game. Stop the bots, however, and you will solve most of the issues with this game. People don't really care how others get rich. What is the difference between someone spending $100 to buy a 99 versus playing in 2001 and hoarding party hats?

Wow! Can I hire you as a personal assistant? I have been reading through the last 6 pages trying to figure out what tangent this thread is currently on. I think it is a ridiculous claim that buying/selling gold have any sort of substantial effect on the price of items in runescape. Are these the same people who feel that staking is a valid form of making money? Selling/Buying gold for IRL money is a zero-loss transaction. Gold is merely shifted around from player to player. As far as negating personal achievement, I think this is another ridiculous statement as Jagex has already destroyed that aspect of their own game. If you play the game for that reason, you should quit. What I understand, and my opinion on all the changes to runescape and the whole RWT matter, is that Jagex should embrace it. RWT actually stimulates the game as it gives more people the opportunity to play the content in which they want to play. I'm sure there are reasons Jagex hasn't introduced their own marketplace to the game (the buying and selling of virtual currency between players), but I assure the reason is not because they care about the players who value their achievement. Virtual currency is a very new thing, and at some point it is going to be as popular as cash. As soon as governments find out the proper way to regulate and tax virtual currency, it will become something that is widely available. What will Jagex do at that point?

Shh. Don't give them any ideas. :ohnoes: Uhh, sorry, but I kind of already did... In a way. ;) Quick find code: 309-310-854-63983218 I actually love this idea. I'm not sure exactly what I would pay, but if I wanted certain game content to myself...it would be nice.

By reducing excess operating costs, they are not trying to ruin the game for anyone. They are simply reducing excess costs. Its like buying a semi truck to haul around a canoe. If you could fit the product onto a smaller container without effecting the quality, then why not? There is no need to pay for a physical server to house virtual servers with a max player count 2000 players when they top out at 1200-1500 people. As to double exp weekend and bot-watch, I think they are using it to collect data. I think they are trying to find out how long player are willing to play at a time and how their play style changes over long periods of time, then they will use this data to enhance their detection algorithms. Logically, a normal human can not keep a high rate of activity for 20 hours straight. Eventually, they will start to slow down, mess up clicking, etc. A bot would keep on doing the same rate and programmatically misclick between a certain time range for many hours. I work in Server Infrastructure and I understand what you are saying, but it is my understanding that Jagex have been using virtuals for quite a while now. I don't think the lag is related to the server load, as it seems to be world independent, ie, logging onto the less popular worlds seems to still cause the lag. Also, I have no idea what kind of hardware Jagex is running, but for them to cut cost that would cause poor performance with their max incoming connections (2000), I think would be a poor move. Hard to retain players when the experience is bad....

With that said, I can't even log in now....

Considering they used to have over 200,000 concurrent players with no lag, either they down-graded their hardware to something cheaper to reduce operation costs since they do not need to provide service to as many players or they have a bug in their entity handling subroutines which is blown to a larger scale due to the changes made for bonus experience. Could be possible that they implemented bxp weekend with bot-watch in order to catch people botting. To think they deliberately tried to ruin the gaming experience for their customers may be the stupidest thing i've ever heard...

I'm not sure of your age, but use this as a life lesson as well in terms of keeping your information secure.

Bots and gold selling are dependent of eachother, however they would also exist without eachother. People would still bot because they don't want to rc for 900 days before they could get the max cape, and people would still sell gold...because other people wouldn't want to kill green dragons for 900 days to buy torva... Botting has a much worse impact on the economy then gold selling does. If Jagex could stop the botting, gold selling would hardly be an issue...

I read your article and it was very well written. My post gravitated towards microtransactions due to the fact that over time, I have began to associate all runescape rants on Jagex's morals and ethics with microtransactions. This is likely not your fault, and for that I apologize. Additionally, microtransactions is obviously one of the points you were trying to make when referring to Jagex's tendency to renege on stances it has traditionally held. 1. Andrew Gower stated he didn't want wealthy individuals to have an in-game advantage 2. Jagex's unorthodox gesture of making some sort of claim in terms of discontinuing bonus xp weekends while later announcing none other than an October bonus xp weekend. But the main point I was trying to make was the fact that you seem to have a pretty strong opinion on the matter, even claiming Jagex to be of poor business morals and ethics. Even as to questioning Jagex introducing multiple methods in which their customers can throw money at them. Blows my mind as well...

Then I guess that means you can't really trust any company? Things change and people adapt to that change. Don't get me wrong, I understand your frustration, but at the same time this isn't a "huge" deal. Runescape is a game owned by Jagex and they ultimately make all the rules to that game. If you don't like it, then why continue to play? For example, I used to love the halo games. I would probably play at least 1 hour on average 5 days a week, however I started disliking the game with Halo 3. I haven't probably played that game since 2009. I'll try out Halo 4 and if I enjoy it, I will play it. Jagex's goal is to get as many paying members as possible. They achieve this goal by creating content that draws in players. Bonus XP weekends draw in players. I'm sure they constantly struggle with making decisions based on what will keep people playing the game, and what will draw in new players. I am probably the farthest thing from a Jagex fan boy, however I'm not going to get all butt hurt when they make large changes to the game. Which kind of segways into the next topic, which is people getting butt hurt over microtransactions. I have no idea who came up with this business model, but it was apparent when Andrew Gower was at the helm, he was not a fan of it. He sold out, however, and runescape hasn't been the same game since. You can either accept that fact and continue playing, or quit. However, whining about it will not change the direction. The fact of the matter is that microtransactions bring in fast money for very little effort, and as a business, why would you not take advantage of that? Sorry if I rambled. Thanks to work, I've been up way to many hours and it's too late for me to get any sleep. My final remark is this. Claiming Jagex has bad ethics, morals, and business plan is a little overboard. Maybe you can elaborate one what exactly Jagex is doing that crosses moral boundaries.

Maybe they have auto-retaliate on? Or killing 138s is just too difficult. I don't know. It's a safe mini-game. Why not simply engage them and at least make them participate? At least then they've nothing to complain about, right? :huh: Why attack them? If you're playing CTF and someone is standing in the corner, engaging them is like picking on the retard in gym class...

People don't understand the size of the game. I have no clue how many employees Jagex has, but it's probably around a thousand, maybe two. There is probably a team of not more then 100 dedicated to customer support. There is 100k people online at any one time. I would estimate around 40% of those accounts are bots. Could you imagine the amount of effort required to go through all those accounts and ensure that the account is actually a bot? And even worse, all that work is for almost zero progress, as the majority of the bots would likely just create another account. Jagex has it right with trying to automate their bot detection. However, there seems to be some obstacle that they didn't account for and it doesn't seem to be working correctly. If they do get it working, or if the EoC deters botting (which I don't believe it will for very long) then it will help with the bot problem. Bots will NEVER leave this game completely. However I think it would be a great success if Jagex was able to get rid of the gold farming bots (which accounts for the majority of bots and are the most detrimental to the game)