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Possible fix for lair bots.
eiagra
Member Posts: 70 Arc User
Anyone who's been in Sharandar or Neverdeath is aware of the bot issue. You need only hear "I have one word for you... leeches!" a bazillion times to understand what's going on.
Here's a possible fix: Lair throttling. It could be done one of two ways depending on how severe you want to make it.
One (more severe) - When you leave a lair, the quest is marked as "failed" and you abandon it. You have to walk back to the NPC to pick it back up. A cooldown timer (1 to 5 minutes) before you can accept the quest again could be appropriate (especially since Sharandar's quest is standing right there).
Two (less severe) - Just add a cooldown timer when leaving a lair quest. You cannot enter that lair again for 1 to 5 more minutes. If you try to do this in a party, your party cannot enter until everyone's cooldown timer expires. If your party is already inside, YOU still cannot enter until your timer expires.
As long as the red error message is clear (i.e. "You need to wait 217 more seconds before trying this lair again." "A member of your party is not ready to enter this lair yet.") so that new and innocent players understand what's going on, the impact on the general community should not be severe. Most people don't have to abandon a lair quest unless it's bugged anyway, so this shouldn't impact many legitimate players at all.
The downside is that, naturally, this would require additional code and development time, the latter of which is probably already densely packed with other tasks, and the former meaning Things Could Go Wrong. But I hope it's a helpful suggestion anyway.
Here's a possible fix: Lair throttling. It could be done one of two ways depending on how severe you want to make it.
One (more severe) - When you leave a lair, the quest is marked as "failed" and you abandon it. You have to walk back to the NPC to pick it back up. A cooldown timer (1 to 5 minutes) before you can accept the quest again could be appropriate (especially since Sharandar's quest is standing right there).
Two (less severe) - Just add a cooldown timer when leaving a lair quest. You cannot enter that lair again for 1 to 5 more minutes. If you try to do this in a party, your party cannot enter until everyone's cooldown timer expires. If your party is already inside, YOU still cannot enter until your timer expires.
As long as the red error message is clear (i.e. "You need to wait 217 more seconds before trying this lair again." "A member of your party is not ready to enter this lair yet.") so that new and innocent players understand what's going on, the impact on the general community should not be severe. Most people don't have to abandon a lair quest unless it's bugged anyway, so this shouldn't impact many legitimate players at all.
The downside is that, naturally, this would require additional code and development time, the latter of which is probably already densely packed with other tasks, and the former meaning Things Could Go Wrong. But I hope it's a helpful suggestion anyway.
Post edited by eiagra on
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Comments
Bots aren't people, a timer to renter would mean they would just be programmed to wait. The work would acomplish nothing.
In any case zone bots are just as bad. I know Cryptic is working hard to circumvent them, but it's now time they need to think-up something more reliable than just "decreasing profit" to discourage them (because that's affecting players, too).
~sigh~
No I'm saying artificial restrictions won't combat them. Just make things harder on legit users. What's needed is a warden like program to look for bot use. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warden_(software)
The other option is to destroy the ability of bots to make money via economic means. But with the pay model used that would destroy cryptics ability to make money as well so the only real solution is a warden like program. Nothing else will work at all.
The only solution is to hit their business. Ban players buying from 3rd party sites, and bots will die soon or later.
So, for ideas, I've heard:
1. Put an abandon timer on so that if you leave a lair, you have to wait.
2. Actually have a GM ban bots. Does this not happen now?
I'd add these:
1. Put an abandon limit on the quest. After 5 abandonments in an hour, lose the quest for a day. After 3 days of that, lose it for a week.
2. Use some anti-bot measures to at least flag for GMs who the botters are. So, measure DPS or something in a skirmish. If DPS is zero, repeatedly, flag the account. If someone abandons the same quest more than 4 times, flag the account. Knowing some stats makes identifying botters easier. Maybe create an index for the GMs on accounts called a bot-risk index number which is based on these figures.
So, um, what *is* the item they're after? Is it taboo to actually say? I'm new here.