Hidden Update: Bots Dying

[X3EN]

I can't just walk into an area with no one talking and their names scrambled and say, "Yep, they're all bots." What if they're sweatshop workers, as unfortunate as that may be?

 

a) there are some areas *cough*all red chin spots*cough* where (in eng worlds) no players last more than a minute. That's why you can surely ban them all at once.

b) 3rd party RWT and/or account sharing is still not allowed. However, I understand that the ban reason should reflect the reality, but...

 

The bots are here and will be no matter what is because so much is done to avoid false positives. That includes legit* botting software that so many players are using, be it for prayer switching or inventory dropping.

 

* – macroing on a MMO is supposedly legal as long as the action performed can actually be performed with the mouse/keyboard in the same fashion and each macroed action is initiated by the user. I can understand that this helps to keep casual players, but people are greedy and will abuse this system (a great example is the whole XP-Waste portal of borderline practices). Then JaGeX has to make further exclusions and so on.

[Mercifull]

Been seeing quite a few people at the GE saying something like "Add me to your ignore list to prevent seeing this spam" over and over interjected by h/c gambling messages. I wonder if Jagex are experimenting with preventing that too?

[muggiwhplar]

Wouldn't it make more sense to just auto-mute the bots instead of forcing them to spam that ignore msg?

[Mercifull]

I agree. But why would someone say that? Perhaps Jagex don't want to do a complete mute just prevent people saying gambling messages? Like the old cabbage filter.

[Youmu]

I don't know how Jagex manages to mass-ban so many bots.

 

But when you realize I'm an innocent person who got permabanned and look at my IP & location...

 

Jagex... please don't do what I think you guys are doing... PLEASE... it'll just bring out more false positives.

 

You can do better than this, honestly.

[jayc3399]

Sonik how about a screen shot of your infractions page?

[Kaida23]

They accused him of gold farming and unfortunately didn't provide any evidence. Which is rediculous.

[HunterDexter]

They can't be serious. :s

[Makoto_the_Phoenix]

False positive + reasonable doubt on both sides of the issue + swift and final justice = bad. I don't know Sonikku, and it's been the case that players that were thought to be outstanding members of the community wouldn't cheat (e.g. Duke Freedom), but hey - you never know...

[Piu]

False positive + reasonable doubt on both sides of the issue + swift and final justice = bad. I don't know Sonikku, and it's been the case that players that were thought to be outstanding members of the community wouldn't cheat (e.g. Duke Freedom), but hey - you never know...

 

That was botting/cheating, this is goldfarming

[Makoto_the_Phoenix]

False positive + reasonable doubt on both sides of the issue + swift and final justice = bad. I don't know Sonikku, and it's been the case that players that were thought to be outstanding members of the community wouldn't cheat (e.g. Duke Freedom), but hey - you never know...

 

That was botting/cheating, this is goldfarming

 

Not to play [bleep]-for-tat, but what's the difference in the accusation? A rule was broken; a moral trust was allegedly violated between a player and Jagex. It really doesn't matter what they did as far as anyone - especially Jagex - is concerned. I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt to be sure, but I've seen how these things turn out.

 

If it is a false positive, then Jagex's detection system is still flawed. It only takes one false positive to be knocked down from 100% to 99%.

[Omali]

False positive + reasonable doubt on both sides of the issue + swift and final justice = bad. I don't know Sonikku, and it's been the case that players that were thought to be outstanding members of the community wouldn't cheat (e.g. Duke Freedom), but hey - you never know...

 

That was botting/cheating, this is goldfarming

 

BloodArgon turned out to be a gold farmer. And we all know how he went out. Not saying Sonikku is, just a reminder that tip.it isn't exactly squeaky clean.

 

[hide]

 

 

 

Before I start, Id like you to take notice. The 19th, a 10 day ban was applied. This last offense was issued on the 23rd. How could I be online if I was banned?

 

 

 

Anyway. I started back in 2005 or so, I really can't remember. My cousin got me to play it, I gave up after tutorial. I finally sat down with another account, and got to work. I didn't like the character, so I started over. I started over here. I gradually worked up my skills. I did a decent bit of quests, about 190 QP I believe. Everything was going great. My levels were gradually going up, and I barely realized how fast I was getting money and EXP. Hitting 70M cash, I finally decided to get 99 crafting, a bold long 99. But I finally got it. I cant remember the date, but the number to it was in my signature. Then, I decided to go for my second 99. Attack. This was also accomplished a few months later, and was a lot of fun getting it. Then my next 99, magic, was never completed. Stopped at about 97 magic because of the above.

 

 

Now, your asking, why did this all end if your just an average player?

 

Well, Im an average player, but not an honest one. Since Im already perm-a-banned, I figure why not go share all my dirties with everyone, what will Jagex do? Layer up my ban? More black marks? FUN!

 

 

 

-I macroed a lot of mining, woodcutting, fishing, and combat. About 10M or so from this.

 

-70M cash. Obtained by running a private server, playerbase of about 20,000 accounts, 20-30 daily users. Before the trade limit, spawning rights and modship was sold for about 500k RSGP each. I used to honestly sell it, but then I decided to IP ban anyone who bought it

 

-Once up to the 70M, I decided to go for 99 crafting. Doing it legit? Nah. Too much time. Made a green body crafter for pest control island and hammered away making bodies while watching movies. No bans, got 99 in about two weeks.

 

-At this point, my combat stats wernt all to good. So I got a macro someone else made for the fight caves, which camped in there, making about 30k xp per hour. Not great, but, hey, 10 hours of this is 300k per day. This is how I got 99 attack. Suffered a few bans in there, but, hey, nothing big.

 

-Magic. I was looking for money. Brand new script came out by a skilled scripter that ran the MTA for you. Ran this for a lot of mage XP, and a grand total of I think 4 mages books. Two bans during this time.

 

-I did some misc macroing with Yaks for range, Yaks for normal combat, yews for money, and just general stuff I was lazy to do.

 

-My last macroing adventure was when I got the idea to build a smart script. It kept you in your house on building mode and alched, put you back in when you logged out. 0 randoms, and about 880 alchs per hour. Went from 94-97 magic with this. But sadly, that is where my chapter ends, with the perm-o-ban of doom.

 

 

 

Its been a fun time here, cheating over the years, and it wasnt always about the game. I actually learned 90% of my java from running a private server for about two years, and creating the java based macros. Big learning experience.

 

 

 

Whats next? Real life. Maybe Ill try my hand on a newb account for a little bit, maybe a month of members, but, hopefully I wont.

 

Go ahead and flame all you want, Ill save the topic and post it in the Grr I was banned thread, but, for now, let at least some people share their opinions.

 

Fire at will

[/hide]

[Kimberly]

I know people from ex-staff to active members who have botted, sold gold, or in some other way broken the rules. But just because I know these people do exist does not mean I assume everyone is lying about it.

[Marvel Titan]

Pretty interesting video, hopefully this system is a bit more technical than people being reported and then banned without any look-in on it, would be pretty annoying to see innocent people getting banned. But hey I've known so many people past and present, clan friends/ex-clan friends, people I've met though these very fan sites, who have botted and farmed gold that I couldn't honestly say many people are innocent if they are accused of such things.

[n64jive]

I can't just walk into an area with no one talking and their names scrambled and say, "Yep, they're all bots." What if they're sweatshop workers, as unfortunate as that may be?

 

a) there are some areas *cough*all red chin spots*cough* where (in eng worlds) no players last more than a minute. That's why you can surely ban them all at once.

b) 3rd party RWT and/or account sharing is still not allowed. However, I understand that the ban reason should reflect the reality, but...

 

The bots are here and will be no matter what is because so much is done to avoid false positives. That includes legit* botting software that so many players are using, be it for prayer switching or inventory dropping.

 

* – macroing on a MMO is supposedly legal as long as the action performed can actually be performed with the mouse/keyboard in the same fashion and each macroed action is initiated by the user. I can understand that this helps to keep casual players, but people are greedy and will abuse this system (a great example is the whole XP-Waste portal of borderline practices). Then JaGeX has to make further exclusions and so on.

 

When did I say this?

[Kimberly]

What most people mean when they say that is the end result is the same whether they're bots or sweatshop workers.

[Sir_Squab]

I have a feeling what the new system is "rolled out" in specific area's of the game. One of the common methods bots do when fighting NPC's is get the nearest NPC. So if you have a specific area loaded with bots, it should be pretty easy to tell, even from a programming perspective which users are bots and which are not. The most challenging part was probably ensuring there were no false positives.

 

If this system is able to accurately detect bots without false positive, and quickly ban them, I would consider it a win that bots may not be able to recover from. Jagex would no longer have to worry about obfusicating the code, which has performance degradation, and just let their new system catch the bots.

 

I'll be generous and assume that Jagex can detect bots within six-nines accuracy (that is to say, 99.999999%). However, that, by no stretch of the imagination, will ever guarantee that no false positives are in the system. Not just that, but it's been the case that, with whatever technological detection or prevention scheme that's come their way, the bots have found a way to crack it. I don't see this software being any different.

 

I'd also submit, from a programmer's perspective, it's risky to make hard and fast assumptions about a certain area, skill, or type of activity. Are there nothing but bots in the Fishing Guild, Living Rocks, Mining Guild, or Piscatoris? There's a damn high probability of them, for sure. Nothing but? Not likely. Is it feasible that a human player could behave in a similar manner as a script? You betcha. I can't just walk into an area with no one talking and their names scrambled and say, "Yep, they're all bots." What if they're sweatshop workers, as unfortunate as that may be?

 

Here's the original quote. Not sure how X3EN messed it up so much, especially since it was the post before his.