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Solutions For Our Bot Problem

viperwitch23viperwitch23 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 205 Arc User
edited December 2015 in General Discussion (PC)
OK My previous post was a bit raw and unfinished so I will discuss solutions here in a greater detail
As everyone ( most people ) know we got a bad bad botter problem on Neverwinter. Botters send random friend requests spam all channels with their adds, send mails with their gold selling offers.
This gotta be somehow stopped it is getting annoying to hell
So after much thinking and experience from another game of mine I put forward several ideas on how to deal with botters without damaging players who don't bot

1. Bind Enchantments and Runestones to account. Making them unsalable by botters. On AH stack of 99 Rank 4 Enchantments cost like 1000 AD
Stack of 99 Rank 5 cost about 8000-9000 AD.
So botter who sells those profits about 8000 AD
Here is how we can easily solve this: we make an item called for example Bond Breaker. This item could be sold from NPC at PE for a sum of 1000 AD. Once player buys 1 of them it goes into the enchantment refine slot. Once it is consumed enchantment is unbound.
Enchantment that was previously bound to account is now fully unbound and can be traded and sold. Upgrading this Enchantment to high rank would keep it unbound
Make the Bond breaker be usable only on Enchantment and runestones of rank 5 and above
So. You are making rank 7 Radiant Enchantment that now cost about 15-20k. Paying 1k AD ONCE to unbind it is nothing. It could even cost 500 ad or even 300 ad.As long as it is unprofitable for botters to unbind everything they got in order to sell it it would put them off botting
1 stack of x99 Rank 5 Enchantments sold for 8000 AD and cost of unbinding them all would cost botter 99k AD - NO botter would go after this.

2. Bind to account only Enchantments and Runestones dropped from:
Dungeon Treasure Chests
Profession nodes on maps
All Enchantments and Runestones dropped from killing monsters would remain unbound


3. This suggestion is from @must6die
1:Place NPC at PE who would sell stacks of Enchantments for AD at about same price they cost in AH now
2: Bind all Enchantments from profession nodes so they can't bot and sell those
3: Thus botters will have no profit any more. If NPC will sell what they are selling now and perhaps NPC can sell it even cheaper by 50% for example it be more worthy for players to buy from this NPC and botters wouldn't sell anything any more as it will be account bound
4: Keep Enchaments and Runstones dropped from mobs unbound so those can go into making high ranking ones

4. This is my modification to the suggestion of @must6die
image
This is made with Paint so I apologies for rogue picture.
Make NPC at PE called Artefact Refining Merchant
He would sell LESSER ARTEFACT STONE. This stone is universal and can be used to refine artefacts of Union, Power and Stanility.
This stone would be unusable for any artefact weapons and artefact belts and necklaces. Stone could cost may be 1000 AD each and give 10000 refining points to one of those 3 artifacts. As it is not usable for artefact weapons tjis would NOT damage refinery market for those items like market of resonance stones aquamarines peridots and such and it would not be usable for the weapons necklaces or belt and can only be used to refine artefacts of Union, Power and Stability
At same WIPE all Enchantments and Runestones from profession nodes and chests. You can leave chests and nodes where they are just make so they won't give enchantment and runestones any more.
Only source of those would now be Trade bar store, Lock boxes and drops from fighting monsters on maps and in dungeons.
And to refine them another NPC or same one would sell the stacks of Enchantments

5. Elect several community Moderators from old and respectable players who would be online in different time zones. Those moderators would have power to kick bots offline and/or ban them them for a fixed period of time like 24h each time

6. Install text content detection which can recognize specific texts in the chat and if it detects botter messages auto-kick them offline.


Making even 1 of those things would ruin botters over night and at same time legit honest players wouldn't be damaged
Weapon refine market would not suffer
Everyone - except bots - would be a winner
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Comments

  • edited December 2015
    This content has been removed.
  • flehstifferflehstiffer Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 167 Arc User
    The problem with this, and I suspect the reason they haven't been dealt with, is that overall, botters help players through making refining artifacts dirt cheap.

    I doubt I'm alone in saying that I'll take spam in PE over having to pay 10x or more to get artifacts to mythic. In fact, botters are the only reason many of us get them that high. If botters leave, then the price will increase, as there is no reasonable way for the average player to farm enough enchantments to make it worthwhile.

    On a side note, because people always complain about friend requests: if you change your visibility, they'll all but go away. I haven't had any in months personally.
  • edited December 2015
    This content has been removed.
  • viperwitch23viperwitch23 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 205 Arc User
    edited December 2015

    The problem with this, and I suspect the reason they haven't been dealt with, is that overall, botters help players through making refining artifacts dirt cheap.



    I doubt I'm alone in saying that I'll take spam in PE over having to pay 10x or more to get artifacts to mythic. In fact, botters are the only reason many of us get them that high. If botters leave, then the price will increase, as there is no reasonable way for the average player to farm enough enchantments to make it worthwhile.



    On a side note, because people always complain about friend requests: if you change your visibility, they'll all but go away. I haven't had any in months personally.


  • viperwitch23viperwitch23 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 205 Arc User

    If you create an item that be used to refine artefacts THIS would not be a problem.
    You missing my point - make botable goods bound and at same time add option for players to use that be equally or greater then piles of botted rocks on AH
  • viperwitch23viperwitch23 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 205 Arc User
    flehstiffer said:
    The problem with this, and I suspect the reason they haven't been dealt with, is that overall, botters help players through making refining artifacts dirt cheap.

    Botters help themselfs and people like you help them to make cash
    I NEVER bought AH stacks I collect all myself from opening nodes
  • urabaskurabask Member Posts: 2,923 Arc User

    The problem with this, and I suspect the reason they haven't been dealt with, is that overall, botters help players through making refining artifacts dirt cheap.



    I doubt I'm alone in saying that I'll take spam in PE over having to pay 10x or more to get artifacts to mythic. In fact, botters are the only reason many of us get them that high. If botters leave, then the price will increase, as there is no reasonable way for the average player to farm enough enchantments to make it worthwhile.



    On a side note, because people always complain about friend requests: if you change your visibility, they'll all but go away. I haven't had any in months personally.

    OP's suggestion would just put RP at an NPC so there's no way for prices to get that high.

    Honestly I think Cryptic is just afraid of making big changes like this because they have no idea what the consequences would be (because they're incompetent at handling the economy).
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  • namelesshero347namelesshero347 Member Posts: 2,109 Arc User

    flehstiffer said:
    The problem with this, and I suspect the reason they haven't been dealt with, is that overall, botters help players through making refining artifacts dirt cheap.

    Botters help themselfs and people like you help them to make cash
    I NEVER bought AH stacks I collect all myself from opening nodes

    I do not have enough fingers to count the number of mythics I have now thanks to botters. I am still here because of them. And I even spent real money buying zen from PWE to finish some upgrades. Bots are cheap labor, nothing wrong with that IMHO. But good luck getting even one mythic by opening nodes. There isn't enough waking hour to farm even one mythic.
  • flehstifferflehstiffer Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 167 Arc User
    My point exactly, nameless.

    For the record, I don't believe cryptic is dealing with the botters behind the scenes. I do think, however that they know the game isn't doing as well as it should, and are willing to turn a blind eye (for the most part) to the botters for my previously mentioned reasons.

    As for creating an item for refinement points, it could work, but it would end up creating a hard cap for RP to AD. (Not to mention flawless sapphires already available from the bazaar). I mean, it could work, but I don't think it will, and would almost certainly mean increasing the cost of refining artifacts to mythic. Beyond that, making some complicated system like this is probably going to not be worth the development time taken, especially considering how poorly I believe the community in general would receive it.
  • urabaskurabask Member Posts: 2,923 Arc User

    flehstiffer said:
    The problem with this, and I suspect the reason they haven't been dealt with, is that overall, botters help players through making refining artifacts dirt cheap.

    Botters help themselfs and people like you help them to make cash
    I NEVER bought AH stacks I collect all myself from opening nodes

    I do not have enough fingers to count the number of mythics I have now thanks to botters. I am still here because of them. And I even spent real money buying zen from PWE to finish some upgrades. Bots are cheap labor, nothing wrong with that IMHO. But good luck getting even one mythic by opening nodes. There isn't enough waking hour to farm even one mythic.

    Bots are just playing middlemen when Cryptic could eliminate the need for them though...

    Would it really make that much of a difference if you were buying your stack of rank 5s from the bazaar for 8k AD?
    I8r4ux9.jpg
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  • flehstifferflehstiffer Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 167 Arc User
    urabask said:


    Would it really make that much of a difference if you were buying your stack of rank 5s from the bazaar for 8k AD?

    I do think this would make a large difference. This would entirely remove the "ebb and flow," for lack of a better term, of the economy. IMO, having that chance at getting your stack for 1k less, or being able to sell one you bought previously for a profit when the market goes up (also known as "playing the AH") is a pretty important aspect of the economy. I think it would be a bad thing if this aspect were removed.
    macjae said:


    The core problem that needs to be addressed isn't botting -- botting is a symptom of a game design that primarily rewards repetitive, monotonous behavior over human behavior. What needs to change is first and foremost the grindy nature of the game.

    ^this
  • viperwitch23viperwitch23 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 205 Arc User
    You 2 making excuses for botters
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  • flowcytoflowcyto Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 196 Arc User
    edited December 2015
    macjae said:


    The core problem that needs to be addressed isn't botting -- botting is a symptom of a game design that primarily rewards repetitive, monotonous behavior over human behavior. What needs to change is first and foremost the grindy nature of the game.

    I concur. Bots are less powerful when the things they farm aren't as worthwhile. Players that become desperate to keep up w/ the crazy progression curve are largely what keeps bots around, I'd imagine. The devs chasing 'whales' is kinda what got us here too, since it sets unrealistic (or at least quite impractical) goals on most players to try to keep up. So in a way, the bot problem is rooted in short-sighted economic decisions (at least imo).
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  • szejhuludpuchaczszejhuludpuchacz Member Posts: 306 Arc User
    edited December 2015
    So, you want punish me if I want sell my r12 because i would need AD for another type of enchant or other thing?
    All those AH botters allow us upgrade attifacts to rank higher than epic. Its bad they bot, yes. But without them i wouldnt get my artifacts to mythic or make high rank enchantments. Prices would raise stupid high, not available for 90% of community. Rest just have their AD made in old times. I know some or forum warriors bot things themselves.


    That's where you go wrong. Every bit of RP should be BtA regardless of source.
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  • tassedethe13tassedethe13 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 806 Arc User
    It may be an unpopular opinion, but i'm glad that there are botters.

    When i see the shitload of Gems required for refining or for stronghold coffer, I am happy to buy 99 rank 4 for 1K5 AD.


    But I'm in favor of a solution to make the game less botable, and in the same time cut down the cost of refining or stronghold coffer by HUGE AMOUNT (understand 90% cut down) or give us a real way to farm.

    I'm sure that if bots were magically banned, everybody would be upset by buying a 99 rank5 stack at 150K still considering the quantity needed.
  • namelesshero347namelesshero347 Member Posts: 2,109 Arc User
    urabask said:


    Bots are just playing middlemen when Cryptic could eliminate the need for them though...

    Would it really make that much of a difference if you were buying your stack of rank 5s from the bazaar for 8k AD?

    Stacks of R5 in the WB would look weird because Cryptic should not be in competition with botters. But if they did wanted to compete (and crush their income along with the botters), they can just lower the price of the Flawless Sapphire from 22.5K AD down to about 300 AD.
  • ultradd#1718 ultradd Member Posts: 39 Arc User
    If it is certain someone is a bot just make everything they have bound to account.. There now they can't AH their items now, can still buy them but those will get bound to them too.
  • kuarikagekuarikage Member Posts: 19 Arc User
    They have solved the botting issue! Ban all players and the bots will no longer have anyone to sell too!


  • digoliftdigolift Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 121 Arc User
    kuarikage said:

    They have solved the botting issue! Ban all players and the bots will no longer have anyone to sell too!

  • silverkeltsilverkelt Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 4,235 Arc User
    kuarikage said:

    They have solved the botting issue! Ban all players and the bots will no longer have anyone to sell too!

    Apparently.. that is what they have decided..

    omg the mess this morning and of course official position is .. nothing to see here.

    I have never seen such a messed up system in all of my gaming years..

    How anyone can defend this company right now is beyond me.

    All the positives get thrown out every 3 week due to some random failure and huge mistake.. then they have to start over.

  • tassedethe13tassedethe13 Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 806 Arc User
    The best thing is that from today until 4th January, they are in vacation.

    I don't blame them for being in vacation, but massive blind bans the day before the vacation is just LOL.
  • silverkeltsilverkelt Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 4,235 Arc User
    edited December 2015
    removed.. they seemed to fix the problem finally


    Post edited by silverkelt on
  • canmanncanmann Member Posts: 203 Arc User
    The true solution to the bot problem is to automate the banning of users without oversight. It will most likely catch a crapton of legit players in the script. In turn this creates less demand for the botted goods. This will cause the supply to out strip demand and become very unprofitable for the botters.

    Do this every few months and your population will be low enough that the botters will just move away to their next game! \

    See it is easy.
  • icyclassicyclass Member Posts: 207 Arc User

    But if they did wanted to compete (and crush their income along with the botters), they can just lower the price of the Flawless Sapphire from 22.5K AD down to about 300 AD.

    It's not just about RP. Every guild needs stacks of enchants for Stronghold requirements. (Though they could sell gem vouchers in the Bazaar too if they wanted to go this route.)
  • regenerderegenerde Member Posts: 3,048 Arc User
    edited December 2015
    As mentioned before in other threads about bots, they should start with the basics:
    1. Give the players an editable spamfilter, so that we can "bann" the goldseller spam from our chat on your own.
    The existing "report spam" function is pointless, and no offense, but if you haven't learned that on your own by now, you should stick around in PE for an hour during "prime time" or "rush hour" and see for yourself, how that "report spam" is working out for you...

    2. A visible GM presence in game, that takes care of spammers and bots right where they are.

    3. A temp. bann for players that buy AD from goldsellers the first time might be right, but it should also involve a complete loss of all the bought AD too. And a second time, that account should be perm. banned right away.
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  • deathbeezdeathbeez Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 789 Arc User


    They reduced our drop rates so dramatically the only way to refine at a reasonable speed is by buying through these bots.

    This.
    The nerfs that have hit this game in terms of drops are atrocious.
    The new content areas drops nothing at all. NOTHING! Not even gold.
    Lots of new artifact weapons and nothing to feed them with.

    Nerfs created the bots like prohibition aided organized crime in the US.
    Since I've been playing, I've watched drops get less and less and less and less.

    Get rid of bots? I'd say you're out of your mind. This game has gone 100% grind fest as is.
    I've never been that hot on anti-boting. At this point, I'd say they're required.


  • mynaammynaam Member, NW M9 Playtest Posts: 937 Arc User
    They say they don't have the resources to bring back the old dungeons(they have never even mentioned new dungeons) but they have the resources to fail misserably at containing botters and ban players for using the winter festival rewards
    There are more than BIS players in this game
    RIP Real Tiamat, RIP Real Demogorgon RIP real Temple of the spider. Why remove non bis content to give to bis players ????
    FORCING the majority of your player base to play 4 mod old dungeons and trial will have a bad result on player base
    Changes are getting so bad i would rather prefer no new changes (RIP ICE FISHING in winter fest)



  • karakla1karakla1 Member Posts: 1,355 Arc User
    One solution would be to make further restrictions for free accounts.

    A free account is an account that never did a purchase of real money in Neverwinter.
    Free Accounts can't trade, can't sell items in the auctionhouse and can't send mails.
    They also can't send messages in zone and all chat and can onky wisper to people on their friendlist.
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    Platypus wielding a giant hammer, your argument is invalild!
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