As many have pointed out, botters are having a huge effect on the economy. But really. is it a bad one? The market is already ruled by trit prices by the mere decimal value. Can you imagine it it jumped to double digits in a week?
I'm sorry that you're so stuck in your captcha-system that you can't think of anything else.
What really needs to be done is to make mudane tasks less mudane.
I want to decrease botting. I don't do manufacturing, I don't use minerals or ore directly. Hell, I'd love it if mineral prices rose, so that all the loot I have would be worth more (even if it means that the stuff I use personally would then cost more as well).
Thing is, captcha isn't the solution to this problem. That's all we're pointing out.
It's not rocket science, as you've said yourself. You don't think CCP would have implemented captcha already if it was a good solution? Hell, even if it was a decent solution? It's been mentioned a thousand times, and the cons clearly outweigh the pros of that system.
You've got to be innovative in this field. Software is being cracked even before they're released. It's a tough field, and something that's being constantly researched in. Constantly worked on. Constantly spent money on.
Also, to clarify:
I don't support botting in EVE. I don't bot. I don't know anyone who does (or at least, nobody who'd ever admit it).
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As many have pointed out, botters are having a huge effect on the economy. But really. is it a bad one? The market is already ruled by trit prices by the mere decimal value. Can you imagine it it jumped to double digits in a week?
Yeah. It might bring more legitimate miners out.
Although I doubt it'd happen in a week, mostly because of the insanely massive stockpiles lying around. Hell, even I have more trit than a freighter can transport. If trit ever jumped to double digits, my wallet would squeal.
Then it'd shriek as it saw all the other markets adjust. :P
(Edit; spelling)
Another edit:
Also, with the amount of minerals dropped from rats, I very much doubt ever seeing trit at double digits.
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I don't understand. People have put forth their thoughts and have dissected the Captcha idea. What sort of conversation were you looking for? Wouldn't you rather realize the short comings of the Captcha approach rather then spend more time advocating a solution that would likely not accomplish your stated goal? Really, keep beating the drum and keep the issue visible, but complaining about legitimate feedback is counterproductive.
My opinion on the matter, which is of course super important, lines up with cosy's post. Better to let a Bot go then to implement a mechanic that punishes a legit player. I relate to DRM in that respect I suppose. The Bot, much like the 'pirate' with DRM, will find a way around the mechanic while the legit customer is impacted. Sure, you can dismiss it as a negligible impact, but when the Bot experiences none of that impact, what have you gained? You've wasted dev resources on deiminishing the game experience for the very players your trying to support.
So, if you are truly looking for a fix, stop whinning about people not liking your captcha idea, not being a miner, or somehow casting accusations and hyperbole around and start trying to think a little more creatively about a non-intrusive solution that would accurately target bots while not inconveniencing the legitimate player/afk miner.
-mklinic
"Do something right, no one remembers. Do something wrong, no one forgets" -from No One Remembers by In Strict Confidence
The short answer to all of this is very easy, They don't care, just like the whole issue of scamming in Eve, I've seen GMs and Devs in Jita, and the scammers are louding proclaiming their wares to all in local, and not one GM or Dev have ever booted/ban these scammers. I've actually stopped playing because of the lack of trust from the GMs and Devs
I dislike captchas, but I agree that there should just be some sort of mini-game (captcha-esque in spirit) that miners have to perform. Every 'so many' (I don't mine, so I don't know what would be reasonable) cycles of your mining laser, a mini-game should appear. Something simple like those mini-games used in Mass Effect 2.. something time consuming, but not difficult, with an element of randomness to deterr programs from being able to cheat it. In the background, your mining could continue for up to 30 seconds or until you fail, whichever comes first. If you don't complete it in 30 seconds, your lasers turn off and you have to complete the mini-game before you can reactivate them. If you succeed, mining continues and nothing happens.
Really, this is similar to captchas, except it could lose the predictability of being numbers/letters. If it used images, or some kind of game (maybe a game which yielded you a minute TINY of ISK even), then this could make mining more involved, and take out a lot of the botters at the same time. The bonus, is that by reducing bots, the value of the minerals increases, making it more worthwhile for miners to be active and performing this mini-game successfully.
And as a way to keep this from being 'cracked', every few months a few figures in the 'formula' or however it is decided on CCP's end, just need to be changed to alter the randomness even more. Or alter the goal every so often.
You know what I can concede an argument when I am talking with people that actually care to find a solution. {mod edit} All you wishto do it seems is toss up arguments that it would be a hassle to have to input a few numbers once in awhile, or that captcha can easily be overcome using a program. So you know what I give up talking about his here. So you have a nice day and I'll go about my business of trying to figure out a way to make this issue a non-issue and help players that legitmately play as miners by other means and avenues.
Thank you. You are actually a real player who understand the concept of what it means to be a REAL gamer and if you are one of these low life scum of the earth who use a bot. What comes around goes around you will get your just reward someday. I hope that reward is your system crashing to unrecoverable circumstances or better yet I hope you get caught some day by the Feds. Blizz pursue botters and it is working to a degree so no reason Why CCP can not. Oh and I brag freely I nark on botters always. Very happy I do so. As I write this with a BIG grin on my face. I want to encourage all true GAMERS to report all bots in all games that is the only way to stop these scum.
The short answer to all of this is very easy, They don't care, just like the whole issue of scamming in Eve, I've seen GMs and Devs in Jita, and the scammers are louding proclaiming their wares to all in local, and not one GM or Dev have ever booted/ban these scammers. I've actually stopped playing because of the lack of trust from the GMs and Devs
Thing is, scamming isn't prohibited. It's a viable way to play the game. Social engineering is thriving in Eve. It's a dog eat dog game.
Botting is something completely different.
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Wow...from what I am thinking, based on some of the responses, you people either do not care or are against finding a solution. If I had to guess I would think that many of you actively bot. Just saying.
You think whatever you want to think.
We do care, and we want to find a solution. But there's a reason there hasn't been found a solution yet. The gaming (/entertainment/computer/...) industry have had years to find a solution. Things have been tried. What has it done? Annoyed legitimate customers. Created thousand-page long EULA's.
Bots are a big problem in every online game, always have been. There are only so many ways to try and deal with the problem, but you have to weigh the pros and cons.
Pissing off legitimate customers is heavy on the con-side of that weight.
How is having to respond once in awhile to input a sequence of numbers and letters annoying? Seriously..is it really going to hurt your game play if every now and then you have to type in a few numbers?
yes it really is!
Consider this scenario: you are mining peacefully and legitimately in a belt, when a tempest warps in at 20Km and starts to lock you. You're just about to warp when
There seems to be a lot of baseless speculation in this thread, so I shall add some well reasoned logic to it: the economy in Eve has become reliant on botters.
Eve's economy isn't like other game economies. It is very fragile and realistic. Much like how RMT in the real world has effected local economies in a very profound way, the same has happened in Eve. The botters produce large amounts of minerals which fuel the production orientated economy. If that contribution were removed it would devalue ISK and ramp prices on the market right up.
Eve is probably the single most stable and profitable market area in the RMT industry because of this. Whilst CCP feign efforts to control botting, they are more than aware that removing bots all together would be a huge undertaking as they would have to rebalance the whole economy, stimulate it by artificially replacing the ISK lost through large scale bans etc etc. That's just too much work to undertake when the botters aren't having a negative impace on the game. Quite the opposite in fact.
Wow...from what I am thinking, based on some of the responses, you people either do not care or are against finding a solution. If I had to guess I would think that many of you actively bot. Just saying.
You think whatever you want to think.
We do care, and we want to find a solution. But there's a reason there hasn't been found a solution yet. The gaming (/entertainment/computer/...) industry have had years to find a solution. Things have been tried. What has it done? Annoyed legitimate customers. Created thousand-page long EULA's.
Bots are a big problem in every online game, always have been. There are only so many ways to try and deal with the problem, but you have to weigh the pros and cons.
Pissing off legitimate customers is heavy on the con-side of that weight.
How is having to respond once in awhile to input a sequence of numbers and letters annoying? Seriously..is it really going to hurt your game play if every now and then you have to type in a few numbers?
yes it really is!
Consider this scenario: you are mining peacefully and legitimately in a belt, when a tempest warps in at 20Km and starts to lock you. You're just about to warp when
[ENTER CAPTCHA]
appears.
Boom. You're dead.
If you read my first post you would see that a captcha would never appear if you are actively engaged in combat. Nice try though.
Yeah trit will never reach double digits. Ever. It was intended as a shock scenario. Even the slightest of changes to the supply or demand of trit market pretty much reflects across the board price wise. So its a very tricky issue to deal with. I don't support botting in anyway (Heck whenever I felt I had a lot of extra positive sec status, I burn it off on botters ;P) but I think some problems can be a bit more complicated to solve then is worth the real effort. Much like immigration in America, it might just be better to take small actions against it and change some policies here and there to better both sides. Don't take some radical action that can easily backfire, and turn both parties against you whilst ruining an economy for sures. I'm pretty sure that's why CCP hasn't taken drastic actions in awhile. Its says a lot that they even crushed the RMT by introducing a Plex.
So for my opinion on how to better it. Maybe, much like PLEX, they can make botting a part of the game. Being able to fully AFK mine based on a new skill set, with diminished returns and other such stuff. I know there is a popular idea of making it a new drone skill and ship class is floating around. That way it would be just a mere balance issue. Match the risk and effort botting to the easy mode mining and find a formula that works and doesn't ruin the market.
I dont think bot mining is ruining Eves economy but rather contrary. Eves economy dependant on large amounts of minerals to keep it going and as normal people would be bored out of their minds doing such a mundane task in a game then only a bot would be able to do it.
No bots would mean not enough minerals in the economy which would increase the prices of minerals, which in turn would increase the price of everything. That is a pretty bad thing for most people not being a crafter or a miner.
If you read my first post you would see that a captcha would never appear if you are actively engaged in combat. Nice try though.
Couldn't bots just have an agression timer on each other, launch one drone that constantly attacks but can't do enough damage to break their tank, and therefore maintain active combat indeffinitely? Just the first thing that came to mind. I'm sure someone else could think of a more plausible exploit of the "active combat" evaluation.
Also, combat might be a bit vague. Is being targeted combat? Is aligning to warp enough to delay captcha? What are the chances the miner is actually going to enter combat versus trying to run? If rats show up in a belt, wouldnt that initiate combat and therefore avoid captcha? If so then an existing mechanic actively works to devoid the purposed mechanic which seems like bad design, but just my opinion there.
-mklinic
"Do something right, no one remembers. Do something wrong, no one forgets" -from No One Remembers by In Strict Confidence
Wow...from what I am thinking, based on some of the responses, you people either do not care or are against finding a solution. If I had to guess I would think that many of you actively bot. Just saying.
You think whatever you want to think.
We do care, and we want to find a solution. But there's a reason there hasn't been found a solution yet. The gaming (/entertainment/computer/...) industry have had years to find a solution. Things have been tried. What has it done? Annoyed legitimate customers. Created thousand-page long EULA's.
Bots are a big problem in every online game, always have been. There are only so many ways to try and deal with the problem, but you have to weigh the pros and cons.
Pissing off legitimate customers is heavy on the con-side of that weight.
How is having to respond once in awhile to input a sequence of numbers and letters annoying? Seriously..is it really going to hurt your game play if every now and then you have to type in a few numbers?
yes it really is!
Consider this scenario: you are mining peacefully and legitimately in a belt, when a tempest warps in at 20Km and starts to lock you. You're just about to warp when
[ENTER CAPTCHA]
appears.
Boom. You're dead.
If you read my first post you would see that a captcha would never appear if you are actively engaged in combat. Nice try though.
capcha wouldnt work.. too many people would lose their ships while travelling afk - which is legitimate.. if dumb in some areas.. or if your carrying something valuable.. .. there is no real need to do much about botters as there are any number of players who will tip can's of the afk macro guys .. and then theres hulkageddon.. high sec isnt a safe place even for non-botters when those guys are about.. so while their are probably a few botters around.. truth is.. its not really much of an issue because there really arent that many.. and ..i seriously doubt that removing them entirely would disrupt the economy in any way.. but chasing down a few would take up resources best used in other areas.
Wow...from what I am thinking, based on some of the responses, you people either do not care or are against finding a solution. If I had to guess I would think that many of you actively bot. Just saying.
You think whatever you want to think.
We do care, and we want to find a solution. But there's a reason there hasn't been found a solution yet. The gaming (/entertainment/computer/...) industry have had years to find a solution. Things have been tried. What has it done? Annoyed legitimate customers. Created thousand-page long EULA's.
Bots are a big problem in every online game, always have been. There are only so many ways to try and deal with the problem, but you have to weigh the pros and cons.
Pissing off legitimate customers is heavy on the con-side of that weight.
How is having to respond once in awhile to input a sequence of numbers and letters annoying? Seriously..is it really going to hurt your game play if every now and then you have to type in a few numbers?
yes it really is!
Consider this scenario: you are mining peacefully and legitimately in a belt, when a tempest warps in at 20Km and starts to lock you. You're just about to warp when
[ENTER CAPTCHA]
appears.
Boom. You're dead.
If you read my first post you would see that a captcha would never appear if you are actively engaged in combat. Nice try though.
capcha wouldnt work.. too many people would lose their ships while travelling afk - which is legitimate.. if dumb in some areas.. or if your carrying something valuable.. .. there is no real need to do much about botters as there are any number of players who will tip can's of the afk macro guys .. and then theres hulkageddon.. high sec isnt a safe place even for non-botters when those guys are about.. so while their are probably a few botters around.. truth is.. its not really much of an issue because there really arent that many.. and ..i seriously doubt that removing them entirely would disrupt the economy in any way.. but chasing down a few would take up resources best used in other areas.
The captcha I said would only appear while actively mining, not while doing any other task. So you wouldn't hacve to worry about captcha popping up at un-expected times.
Wow...from what I am thinking, based on some of the responses, you people either do not care or are against finding a solution. If I had to guess I would think that many of you actively bot. Just saying.
You think whatever you want to think.
We do care, and we want to find a solution. But there's a reason there hasn't been found a solution yet. The gaming (/entertainment/computer/...) industry have had years to find a solution. Things have been tried. What has it done? Annoyed legitimate customers. Created thousand-page long EULA's.
Bots are a big problem in every online game, always have been. There are only so many ways to try and deal with the problem, but you have to weigh the pros and cons.
Pissing off legitimate customers is heavy on the con-side of that weight.
How is having to respond once in awhile to input a sequence of numbers and letters annoying? Seriously..is it really going to hurt your game play if every now and then you have to type in a few numbers?
yes it really is!
Consider this scenario: you are mining peacefully and legitimately in a belt, when a tempest warps in at 20Km and starts to lock you. You're just about to warp when
[ENTER CAPTCHA]
appears.
Boom. You're dead.
If you read my first post you would see that a captcha would never appear if you are actively engaged in combat. Nice try though.
capcha wouldnt work.. too many people would lose their ships while travelling afk - which is legitimate.. if dumb in some areas.. or if your carrying something valuable.. .. there is no real need to do much about botters as there are any number of players who will tip can's of the afk macro guys .. and then theres hulkageddon.. high sec isnt a safe place even for non-botters when those guys are about.. so while their are probably a few botters around.. truth is.. its not really much of an issue because there really arent that many.. and ..i seriously doubt that removing them entirely would disrupt the economy in any way.. but chasing down a few would take up resources best used in other areas.
The captcha I said would only appear while actively mining, not while doing any other task. So you wouldn't hacve to worry about captcha popping up at un-expected times.
introducing extra code to detect/differentiate activity would unnecessarily slow down the game.. and as CCP's objective is to always be reducing lag.. i seriously doubt they'd introduce something that would make it a hell of a lot worse.. its a bad solution to a non problem..
CCP stated at their last fanfest that they will be monitoring every program running on a players computer. Invasion of privacy? Yes! Will it get rid of botting? We'll see!
This has already been addressed at Fanfest this past year, they have a new Information Security officer and he is putting in place processes that should address the problem of botters much more efficiently:
You know what I can concede an argument when I am talking with people that actually care to find a solution. {mod edit} All you wishto do it seems is toss up arguments that it would be a hassle to have to input a few numbers once in awhile, or that captcha can easily be overcome using a program. So you know what I give up talking about his here. So you have a nice day and I'll go about my business of trying to figure out a way to make this issue a non-issue and help players that legitmately play as miners by other means and avenues.
I read your blog and I must say that - mostly - I agree with what you say. In this issue I do not however. I find it outrageously arrogant of you to brand us under a banner and then declare us unworthy of your time and effort.
You CANNOT state that there is an issue and a need to solve that issue without first justifying your point, which I haven't seen you do. You've just stated that there is a botting "problem" and it needs to be solved, and then charged us with discussing the solutions. You've failed to establish that there IS a problem in the face of some reasonable counter points, and when tasked to retort to those you've now come back with a, "this isn't worth my time," arguement.
People like you argue that whether the game is reliant on bots now is not the point and that bots need to be erradicated, regardless of the impact it may have on the overall gaming experience. Have you ever considered that botting in Eve is so wide spread that targettng and removing bots may actually be counter to your aims of "fixing" the game?
Personally I think that at this point there is only one reasonable approach and that is to make botting a fundamental part of the Eve experence. Add in the ability to produce and manufacture items that allow players to bot mine, for example. I say this as someone who worked in the RMT industry, an industry that stands to loose a shit load of ground if a change like this is brought in. Surely that is the key aim? Remove the exclusvety of botting (or the perceived exculsivity, at least) and the "taboo" no longer exists. Rebrand a "problem" into a "feature".
As I said it is clear from anyone who has had any in-depth involvement wth the economy of Eve that bottinig - trade bots and mining bots, primarily - have a significant role to play in the game, and that removing bots would only server to totally screw over the in game economy, and remove the main foundation of Eve as an experience, destroying the game. That is a fact, not something I've just randomly pulled out of my rear end (and it is support by various numbers and figures out there right now). And that is the basis you HAVE to work from if you are going to "solve" any perceived problem there is wth botting.
Simply: Botting in Eve is an issue far more complex than the issues facing any other MMO developer out there, and it cannot be solved with game and immersion breaking additions such as CAPTCH (which is a ridiculous idea).
CCP stated at their last fanfest that they will be monitoring every program running on a players computer. Invasion of privacy? Yes! Will it get rid of botting? We'll see!
if its an invasion of privacy then its one thats made very often.. particularly if you have itunes or any number of games that allow multiplayer online.. (gameguard-punkbuster et.al) .. and is likely in the terms and conditions that you have to agree to before you install those programs/games associated with them.. not that anybody ever really reads them.... but after agreeing to them.. ignorance is not an acceptable complaint...
Wow...from what I am thinking, based on some of the responses, you people either do not care or are against finding a solution. If I had to guess I would think that many of you actively bot. Just saying.
You think whatever you want to think.
We do care, and we want to find a solution. But there's a reason there hasn't been found a solution yet. The gaming (/entertainment/computer/...) industry have had years to find a solution. Things have been tried. What has it done? Annoyed legitimate customers. Created thousand-page long EULA's.
Bots are a big problem in every online game, always have been. There are only so many ways to try and deal with the problem, but you have to weigh the pros and cons.
Pissing off legitimate customers is heavy on the con-side of that weight.
How is having to respond once in awhile to input a sequence of numbers and letters annoying? Seriously..is it really going to hurt your game play if every now and then you have to type in a few numbers?
yes it really is!
Consider this scenario: you are mining peacefully and legitimately in a belt, when a tempest warps in at 20Km and starts to lock you. You're just about to warp when
[ENTER CAPTCHA]
appears.
Boom. You're dead.
If you read my first post you would see that a captcha would never appear if you are actively engaged in combat. Nice try though.
*sigh*
So all you have to do to prevent the captcha coming up is make sure someone has you locked? Or just have a non-blue ship on grid?
OK, if I was a bot writer it seems like this would be a pretty easy loophole.
Listen, I hate botting at least as much as you do. But damb fool ideas like captchas have been suggested and shot down hundreds of times already. Dont get mad because people have said that your bad idea is bad, instead, come up with better ones. For instance, rather than add annoying immersion-destroying interruptions, make mining something inherently interesting and fun that requires actual intelligence to do.
CCP stated at their last fanfest that they will be monitoring every program running on a players computer. Invasion of privacy? Yes! Will it get rid of botting? We'll see!
They won't be doing it Warden USED to do just that. It's not doing it anymore. Warden only scans WoW mem space, and doesn't go outside of it, because players kicked up a shit storm when they found out what it was doing previously. Actve monitoring of software runnng on a users machine will be aganst the law shortly, at least in the EU, so CCP won't be dong it at all and anyone who believes they willi is mad. They've already made tracking and advertising cookies illegal in the EU, and they're moving to make more invasive practices illegal over the next few years, including process monitoring. I agree with them, because monitornig your running process list is like someone being able to put a camera in your home to see what you're doing in the kitchen.
Furthermore there are fairly easy ways to avoid detection even when looking at the entirety of a machines memory to see what is running. You can hide things in such a way that renders the process list an ineffectual way of detecting automation software
CCP stated at their last fanfest that they will be monitoring every program running on a players computer. Invasion of privacy? Yes! Will it get rid of botting? We'll see!
They won't be doing it Warden USED to do just that. It's not doing it anymore. Warden only scans WoW mem space, and doesn't go outside of it, because players kicked up a shit storm when they found out what it was doing previously. Actve monitoring of software runnng on a users machine will be aganst the law shortly, at least in the EU, so CCP won't be dong it at all and anyone who believes they willi is mad. They've already made tracking and advertising cookies illegal in the EU, and they're moving to make more invasive practices illegal over the next few years, including process monitoring. I agree with them, because monitornig your running process list is like someone being able to put a camera in your home to see what you're doing in the kitchen.
Furthermore there are fairly easy ways to avoid detection even when looking at the entirety of a machines memory to see what is running. You can hide things in such a way that renders the process list an ineffectual way of detecting automation software
its only illegal if you don't have permission to do so.. if permission is required before access to the game is given.. then you have two choices.. accept.. or don't play.
Comments
As many have pointed out, botters are having a huge effect on the economy. But really. is it a bad one? The market is already ruled by trit prices by the mere decimal value. Can you imagine it it jumped to double digits in a week?
(Edit; @Teala)
Well, have a nice day.
I'm sorry that you're so stuck in your captcha-system that you can't think of anything else.
What really needs to be done is to make mudane tasks less mudane.
I want to decrease botting. I don't do manufacturing, I don't use minerals or ore directly. Hell, I'd love it if mineral prices rose, so that all the loot I have would be worth more (even if it means that the stuff I use personally would then cost more as well).
Thing is, captcha isn't the solution to this problem. That's all we're pointing out.
It's not rocket science, as you've said yourself. You don't think CCP would have implemented captcha already if it was a good solution? Hell, even if it was a decent solution? It's been mentioned a thousand times, and the cons clearly outweigh the pros of that system.
You've got to be innovative in this field. Software is being cracked even before they're released. It's a tough field, and something that's being constantly researched in. Constantly worked on. Constantly spent money on.
Also, to clarify:
I don't support botting in EVE. I don't bot. I don't know anyone who does (or at least, nobody who'd ever admit it).
Follow my tweet (:
Yeah. It might bring more legitimate miners out.
Although I doubt it'd happen in a week, mostly because of the insanely massive stockpiles lying around. Hell, even I have more trit than a freighter can transport. If trit ever jumped to double digits, my wallet would squeal.
Then it'd shriek as it saw all the other markets adjust. :P
(Edit; spelling)
Another edit:
Also, with the amount of minerals dropped from rats, I very much doubt ever seeing trit at double digits.
Follow my tweet (:
I don't understand. People have put forth their thoughts and have dissected the Captcha idea. What sort of conversation were you looking for? Wouldn't you rather realize the short comings of the Captcha approach rather then spend more time advocating a solution that would likely not accomplish your stated goal? Really, keep beating the drum and keep the issue visible, but complaining about legitimate feedback is counterproductive.
My opinion on the matter, which is of course super important, lines up with cosy's post. Better to let a Bot go then to implement a mechanic that punishes a legit player. I relate to DRM in that respect I suppose. The Bot, much like the 'pirate' with DRM, will find a way around the mechanic while the legit customer is impacted. Sure, you can dismiss it as a negligible impact, but when the Bot experiences none of that impact, what have you gained? You've wasted dev resources on deiminishing the game experience for the very players your trying to support.
So, if you are truly looking for a fix, stop whinning about people not liking your captcha idea, not being a miner, or somehow casting accusations and hyperbole around and start trying to think a little more creatively about a non-intrusive solution that would accurately target bots while not inconveniencing the legitimate player/afk miner.
-mklinic
"Do something right, no one remembers.
Do something wrong, no one forgets"
-from No One Remembers by In Strict Confidence
The short answer to all of this is very easy, They don't care, just like the whole issue of scamming in Eve, I've seen GMs and Devs in Jita, and the scammers are louding proclaiming their wares to all in local, and not one GM or Dev have ever booted/ban these scammers. I've actually stopped playing because of the lack of trust from the GMs and Devs
I dislike captchas, but I agree that there should just be some sort of mini-game (captcha-esque in spirit) that miners have to perform. Every 'so many' (I don't mine, so I don't know what would be reasonable) cycles of your mining laser, a mini-game should appear. Something simple like those mini-games used in Mass Effect 2.. something time consuming, but not difficult, with an element of randomness to deterr programs from being able to cheat it. In the background, your mining could continue for up to 30 seconds or until you fail, whichever comes first. If you don't complete it in 30 seconds, your lasers turn off and you have to complete the mini-game before you can reactivate them. If you succeed, mining continues and nothing happens.
Really, this is similar to captchas, except it could lose the predictability of being numbers/letters. If it used images, or some kind of game (maybe a game which yielded you a minute TINY of ISK even), then this could make mining more involved, and take out a lot of the botters at the same time. The bonus, is that by reducing bots, the value of the minerals increases, making it more worthwhile for miners to be active and performing this mini-game successfully.
And as a way to keep this from being 'cracked', every few months a few figures in the 'formula' or however it is decided on CCP's end, just need to be changed to alter the randomness even more. Or alter the goal every so often.
Might be because they dont have so many subs as it is, so why should they cut of the hands that feed them? Seen this in many games before.
Thank you. You are actually a real player who understand the concept of what it means to be a REAL gamer and if you are one of these low life scum of the earth who use a bot. What comes around goes around you will get your just reward someday. I hope that reward is your system crashing to unrecoverable circumstances or better yet I hope you get caught some day by the Feds. Blizz pursue botters and it is working to a degree so no reason Why CCP can not. Oh and I brag freely I nark on botters always. Very happy I do so. As I write this with a BIG grin on my face. I want to encourage all true GAMERS to report all bots in all games that is the only way to stop these scum.
Thing is, scamming isn't prohibited. It's a viable way to play the game. Social engineering is thriving in Eve. It's a dog eat dog game.
Botting is something completely different.
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yes it really is!
Consider this scenario: you are mining peacefully and legitimately in a belt, when a tempest warps in at 20Km and starts to lock you. You're just about to warp when
[ENTER CAPTCHA]
appears.
Boom. You're dead.
Give me liberty or give me lasers
There seems to be a lot of baseless speculation in this thread, so I shall add some well reasoned logic to it: the economy in Eve has become reliant on botters.
Eve's economy isn't like other game economies. It is very fragile and realistic. Much like how RMT in the real world has effected local economies in a very profound way, the same has happened in Eve. The botters produce large amounts of minerals which fuel the production orientated economy. If that contribution were removed it would devalue ISK and ramp prices on the market right up.
Eve is probably the single most stable and profitable market area in the RMT industry because of this. Whilst CCP feign efforts to control botting, they are more than aware that removing bots all together would be a huge undertaking as they would have to rebalance the whole economy, stimulate it by artificially replacing the ISK lost through large scale bans etc etc. That's just too much work to undertake when the botters aren't having a negative impace on the game. Quite the opposite in fact.
If you read my first post you would see that a captcha would never appear if you are actively engaged in combat. Nice try though.
Yeah trit will never reach double digits. Ever. It was intended as a shock scenario. Even the slightest of changes to the supply or demand of trit market pretty much reflects across the board price wise. So its a very tricky issue to deal with. I don't support botting in anyway (Heck whenever I felt I had a lot of extra positive sec status, I burn it off on botters ;P) but I think some problems can be a bit more complicated to solve then is worth the real effort. Much like immigration in America, it might just be better to take small actions against it and change some policies here and there to better both sides. Don't take some radical action that can easily backfire, and turn both parties against you whilst ruining an economy for sures. I'm pretty sure that's why CCP hasn't taken drastic actions in awhile. Its says a lot that they even crushed the RMT by introducing a Plex.
So for my opinion on how to better it. Maybe, much like PLEX, they can make botting a part of the game. Being able to fully AFK mine based on a new skill set, with diminished returns and other such stuff. I know there is a popular idea of making it a new drone skill and ship class is floating around. That way it would be just a mere balance issue. Match the risk and effort botting to the easy mode mining and find a formula that works and doesn't ruin the market.
I dont think bot mining is ruining Eves economy but rather contrary. Eves economy dependant on large amounts of minerals to keep it going and as normal people would be bored out of their minds doing such a mundane task in a game then only a bot would be able to do it.
No bots would mean not enough minerals in the economy which would increase the prices of minerals, which in turn would increase the price of everything. That is a pretty bad thing for most people not being a crafter or a miner.
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Couldn't bots just have an agression timer on each other, launch one drone that constantly attacks but can't do enough damage to break their tank, and therefore maintain active combat indeffinitely? Just the first thing that came to mind. I'm sure someone else could think of a more plausible exploit of the "active combat" evaluation.
Also, combat might be a bit vague. Is being targeted combat? Is aligning to warp enough to delay captcha? What are the chances the miner is actually going to enter combat versus trying to run? If rats show up in a belt, wouldnt that initiate combat and therefore avoid captcha? If so then an existing mechanic actively works to devoid the purposed mechanic which seems like bad design, but just my opinion there.
-mklinic
"Do something right, no one remembers.
Do something wrong, no one forgets"
-from No One Remembers by In Strict Confidence
capcha wouldnt work.. too many people would lose their ships while travelling afk - which is legitimate.. if dumb in some areas.. or if your carrying something valuable.. .. there is no real need to do much about botters as there are any number of players who will tip can's of the afk macro guys .. and then theres hulkageddon.. high sec isnt a safe place even for non-botters when those guys are about.. so while their are probably a few botters around.. truth is.. its not really much of an issue because there really arent that many.. and ..i seriously doubt that removing them entirely would disrupt the economy in any way.. but chasing down a few would take up resources best used in other areas.
The captcha I said would only appear while actively mining, not while doing any other task. So you wouldn't hacve to worry about captcha popping up at un-expected times.
introducing extra code to detect/differentiate activity would unnecessarily slow down the game.. and as CCP's objective is to always be reducing lag.. i seriously doubt they'd introduce something that would make it a hell of a lot worse.. its a bad solution to a non problem..
CCP stated at their last fanfest that they will be monitoring every program running on a players computer. Invasion of privacy? Yes! Will it get rid of botting? We'll see!
This has already been addressed at Fanfest this past year, they have a new Information Security officer and he is putting in place processes that should address the problem of botters much more efficiently:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mDSNd_w86Hw
Hope this clears up alot of the speculation that all of you have.
I read your blog and I must say that - mostly - I agree with what you say. In this issue I do not however. I find it outrageously arrogant of you to brand us under a banner and then declare us unworthy of your time and effort.
You CANNOT state that there is an issue and a need to solve that issue without first justifying your point, which I haven't seen you do. You've just stated that there is a botting "problem" and it needs to be solved, and then charged us with discussing the solutions. You've failed to establish that there IS a problem in the face of some reasonable counter points, and when tasked to retort to those you've now come back with a, "this isn't worth my time," arguement.
People like you argue that whether the game is reliant on bots now is not the point and that bots need to be erradicated, regardless of the impact it may have on the overall gaming experience. Have you ever considered that botting in Eve is so wide spread that targettng and removing bots may actually be counter to your aims of "fixing" the game?
Personally I think that at this point there is only one reasonable approach and that is to make botting a fundamental part of the Eve experence. Add in the ability to produce and manufacture items that allow players to bot mine, for example. I say this as someone who worked in the RMT industry, an industry that stands to loose a shit load of ground if a change like this is brought in. Surely that is the key aim? Remove the exclusvety of botting (or the perceived exculsivity, at least) and the "taboo" no longer exists. Rebrand a "problem" into a "feature".
As I said it is clear from anyone who has had any in-depth involvement wth the economy of Eve that bottinig - trade bots and mining bots, primarily - have a significant role to play in the game, and that removing bots would only server to totally screw over the in game economy, and remove the main foundation of Eve as an experience, destroying the game. That is a fact, not something I've just randomly pulled out of my rear end (and it is support by various numbers and figures out there right now). And that is the basis you HAVE to work from if you are going to "solve" any perceived problem there is wth botting.
Simply: Botting in Eve is an issue far more complex than the issues facing any other MMO developer out there, and it cannot be solved with game and immersion breaking additions such as CAPTCH (which is a ridiculous idea).
if its an invasion of privacy then its one thats made very often.. particularly if you have itunes or any number of games that allow multiplayer online.. (gameguard-punkbuster et.al) .. and is likely in the terms and conditions that you have to agree to before you install those programs/games associated with them.. not that anybody ever really reads them.... but after agreeing to them.. ignorance is not an acceptable complaint...
*sigh*
So all you have to do to prevent the captcha coming up is make sure someone has you locked? Or just have a non-blue ship on grid?
OK, if I was a bot writer it seems like this would be a pretty easy loophole.
Listen, I hate botting at least as much as you do. But damb fool ideas like captchas have been suggested and shot down hundreds of times already. Dont get mad because people have said that your bad idea is bad, instead, come up with better ones. For instance, rather than add annoying immersion-destroying interruptions, make mining something inherently interesting and fun that requires actual intelligence to do.
Give me liberty or give me lasers
They won't be doing it
Warden USED to do just that. It's not doing it anymore. Warden only scans WoW mem space, and doesn't go outside of it, because players kicked up a shit storm when they found out what it was doing previously. Actve monitoring of software runnng on a users machine will be aganst the law shortly, at least in the EU, so CCP won't be dong it at all and anyone who believes they willi is mad. They've already made tracking and advertising cookies illegal in the EU, and they're moving to make more invasive practices illegal over the next few years, including process monitoring. I agree with them, because monitornig your running process list is like someone being able to put a camera in your home to see what you're doing in the kitchen.
Furthermore there are fairly easy ways to avoid detection even when looking at the entirety of a machines memory to see what is running. You can hide things in such a way that renders the process list an ineffectual way of detecting automation software
its only illegal if you don't have permission to do so.. if permission is required before access to the game is given.. then you have two choices.. accept.. or don't play.