joe_schmoe

Thanks to dukduk for posting my ideas to the official RS forums. Maybe someone will see them before they get buried or deleted. The image wouldn't really be a deterrent, a bot can do optical character recognition on it to determine what the number is. As for the ideas about bringing back fatigue, it was scriptable too. I'm too tired to go into the details, but a bot could get past fatigue pretty easily. Like I keep saying, the only real weapon you can fight bots with is time. Their lifespan is too short to spend on things like getting levels unrelated to what they are "botting".

I love doing that.

without getting into specifics, no... they would have to modify the packets being sent to the server, and they would have to mimic authentication... which would take 6 billion years to do, so no. Also does anyone actually believe that Jagex will undo this and admit that they did something wrong? or is everyone of the mind that Jagex will never admit wrongdoing/idiocy and we shall now be forced to live with this moronic update? The protocol has already been broken. The problem lies not in the sending of the information, but in the getting the server to accept it. Sending hacked info to a server will get you banned faster than swearing at mods.

30 minutes to mine 30 ess???????? that will hurt the economy worse than this update. But at least you're trying.

Then you would have bots buying the ess instead of mining it. There are free scripts available that do this with feathers....buy for 2gp and then the macroers sell them for 10gp or more.

did you even read my post? a script can be written in about 5 minutes to beat that puzzle. Alos, the monsters wouldn't attack lovl level players if they have exp in some other skills (not necessarily combat).

Hard....no...impossible...impossibly hard. All that sort of information is stored server-side (on Jagex's computers), and all the "stat-changers" and "gold multipliers" work client side (only on your computer). The only way to trick the server into thinking you have more levels than you actually do is to actually change them on the Jagex servers which are HEAVILY protected.

I'm just glad I sold my 80K of ess last month...before this debacle. No, none of it was autoed, I *used to* merchant ess. buy@25. sell@30. Where else you gonna get 20% instant profit?? Anyway, here's my two cents. ********************************************* ********************************************* To whom it /should/ concern (especially the folks at Jagex), You people should know your "enemy" better before you make pronouncements about what will "totally eliminate autoers" and whatnot. Bank Pins? Numbers shouted by teleport NPC's? Numbered Boxes?! HA!! You should know that there are *currently available* macros (by the way...they're usually called scripts) available that will defeat all of those with little or no modifications. As a person who has written numerous scripts myself--from scratch nonetheless--I feel I am qualified to speak about this. Before you decide to scream and tyrade at me, hear me out...you may learn something. The scripting world is far more advanced than most people realize. Did you know that there are "includes" (script pieces which can be added to any script with almost no effort) which completely defeat _every_ current random event. Did you know that there are includes that solve mysterious boxes? Ones which interact with NPCs like the Drunken Dwarf, Dr. Ford, and Rick Turpentine? Do you know how long it took for the first bank PIN include to be made publicly available *FOR FREE*? It was out the very next day (and it should have been sooner IMHO). Do you realize that the currently most popular scripting solutions can read any text on screen (and make decisions based on it), interact with simple puzzles (like PINs), and pick NPCs out of a crowd??? (And I mean a CROWD...like World 1 Varrock.) For instance there is a script which will create a new account, log into RS, finish Tutorial Island, finish the Rune Mysteries quest, and start mining ess? Pretty scary, huh? Know what's worse? It can be looped...auto-detect if the account has been banned, and just repeat the script...ALL WITH JUST TWO MOUSE CLICKS TO START IT. Do you realize that the next generation of scripting programs (currently in development and looming large on the horizon) will even have SOUND RECOGNITION? Now that you're terrified, let me give you the good news. The scripters are not going to flood the members worlds. Why? Because a membership takes something that no scripter can code...no matter how good they are. A membership takes a real identity. You have to pay for one with a phone call, a credit card, PayPal, etc...and it's really easy to ban a real person from making numerous accounts. The only ways around such things would be more sinister methods (bordering on...if not crossing into...ILLEGAL...not just violating Jagex's TOS, but actual LAWS). I'm talking about things like credit card fraud and identity theft. Things that the average scripters aren't going to want tangled up in, even if they are someone who engages in real-world trading...the FBI (or Scotland Yard...or whoever) is a pretty good membership-abuse-deterrent. Sure you'll run into the occasional scripter once in a while, but not with anywhere near the frequencey that you find them in the free worlds. Having said this, I'd like to offer some solutions. I have to agree with the folks who are talking about flooding the mines with low-level monsters. I think this is honestly a good idea. It *can* be scripted around...for instance have the bot bring food...but it's going to be pretty cumbersome. My improvement: add a new ess mine (or new section of the old mine). This mine could allow you to mine something like 500 ess without fear of being attacked (so the legit new players can get a leg up), after that you have to go to the "hostile" section (much like tutorial island). However, you would not be allowed in until you had met some other requirement, like 10 in each level (or 200 total in non-mining levels...or a minimum of 40 combat...or whetever...but not another quest...too easily scripted). This would allow the legit players to have easy access to the ess mines (how hard is it to get 10 in each level...really?), but it would *seriously deter* the scripters. (No, I did not say stop completely...and for good reason...anything in-game can be scripted...some things are just harder to do.) The idea here is to make it so much of a hassle for the people running the scripts (not the people writing them...we're driven not repelled by a challenge) that it actually becomes a hassle to use them. Imagine if you will that you are a script-user. (I know...SHUDDER SHUDDER...just pretend for a minute, ok?) You've just bought this great ess-mining script for 500K (or $5USD...or a month of membership...yes people trade memberships on the RS black market...try to stay on track here). Anyway, you just bought this script and you start it up and walk away. Eight hours later, you come home from school, and check the script's status report. (Yes most scripts tell you after each load how they are doing.) You find that the script created an account with the (dead-givaway "macroer") name essguy847920, talked to 8 random events, ran from 2 events, spotted 1 moderator, logged in and out 16 times, mined 2K ess (huh???? that can't be right??? that should be more like 20K.), banked 586 ess (WHERE'D ALL THE REST GO?!?!?!), and died 400 times (WHAT?!?!?! THERE'S NO WAY I DIED 400 TIMES!!!! THIS SCRIPT SUCKS!!!!) No, the script doesn't suck you're trying to auto on something that has been specifically designed to prevent autoing...the new ess mine. Woudn't it be cool if that's the way it worked? Do you know how long it would take to make that script purchase profitable??? I'll Do the math for ya...35 days, 13 hours 14 minutes 35 seconds. Do you think anyone can "macro" for that long without being banned??? I think not. Do you know how many people are going to buy and use a script that is not going to make them a profit? ZERO. It's just that simple. I think that the idea of having a place where new players can mine a few hundred ess without being hassled is a new way to look at it, and flooding the main ess mine with *unattackable* creatures who attack based on combat level OR overall level is the best solution I can come up with. These creatures would not even have an attack option...so you don't accidentally pick a fight instead of "pick"-ing a rock. (pun intended :-P) You don't want to have any combat skills...okay...have at least 10 or 20 in everything else and you can mine ess. A legit player won't mind this as these skills are fun to play with too and 10 or 20 isn't really very hard to get. But an "autoer" is going to find this a total pain because now it takes 4 or 5 hours to make a character to mine ess that will be banned in probably less than 10 total hours of mining. Congratulations, you've actually made it painful to use a script...not like punch-in-the-face painful; even better, you've made it financially painful--which is the only painful a scripter really cares about. I think a system like this would be useful on every resource location--especially locations where you are in "competition" for the resource (like yews and ores). These "resource guardians" could be as simple as an electric arc from the resource, or as complicated as golems. They could be created once (you'd only need to script one NPC) and deployed at all the resource locations. You could have them wander the areas that are heavily populated by scripters, and congregate around the actual resource locations (fishing spots, mines, high-lvl trees, etc.). Doing this would nearly eliminate all macroing. How cool would that be? What is 4 or 5 hours of an MMORPG player's time...peanuts. But to a bot it's a lifetime. Literally. ~joe_schmoe =============================================== These ideas are joe_schmoe's. joe_schmoe made them up, and you may not take credit for them. Feel free to post this anywhere so long as it is unmodified and this little part stays intact. ********************************************* *********************************************