Types of Punishments for Botting

[Vaku]

This thread has a longer title than I would enter in the subject line. Its full name is:

Types of Punishments for Botting
...And the Ethics for punishing Out-of-game behavior that have In-game consequences.

Right now, there is a thread calling out for signatures for some form of punishment to address players who use bots: Petition: Nuclear Option for Bots

This current thread is a splinter discussion to review forms of punishments appropriate for botting (this "nuclear option" among them), but also to discuss the punishment of activities, which are in whole, not inherent to the game, but affect the gameplay nonetheless.

I say mention activit-IES, because there are many, and they are often treated in like style to botting—with a recurring argument:

That, because this is a sandbox, punishment for all distressful activities should be doled out by other players, in whatever forms of retaliation they choose—and not doled out by Seatribe authorities.

Below is an example post of how this argument appears:

Really, you want them to spend time [on whatever punishment] instead of game development? There are literally 2 (two) guys making this game. If you don't like it, destroy it! Murder the person who made it! Developers are not responsible for player behavior!

"Developers are not responsible for player behavior," is true, in that players make their choices, but this misses the second important component, that Developers are responsible for their response to player behavior. If it is their decision to dismiss activities—if they address activities, if they decide not to act, it is on them. Generally, such actions are reflective of your character as an individual, but because they are representatives of their company, their actions are reflective of Seatribe as well, and further, because they are developers, their behaviors are reflective of what they create. If you create a game where some things are permissible, but others are not, it describes your qualitative judgment. (It could be said that Seatribe sees all things as permissible, but that is verifiable as not the case, as they have doled out punishment in the past.)

Because the 'out-of-game' or 'meta-game' activity we're focusing on is botting, I'll turn our attention to that....

Botting, is foremost, something I understand as a wrong activity. In the context of an MMO, I view botting as cheating. It dismisses the notion of a fair game, especially because the automations of a bot are not inherently available through normal gameplay, and certainly not to the same level of inhuman efficiency. Botting is something that a player injects in the game, which was otherwise not there, which makes the game unfair. So this is clearly understood: If you play poker, and you opponent produces a winning hand, that would otherwise not exist in normal conditions (an ace in the sleeve), would you call this a fair game of poker? So, the same goes with HnH. If I inject an automation that would otherwise not exist in normal gameplay, am I playing fairly, or am I cheating?

I think that, if it wasn't before, it should be clear now, that as the example with an ace in the sleeve, and a bot in HnH, these are two sides of the same coin: a cheat. And in a multiplayer environment, cheating should be regulated. If someone is cheating at poker, the individual is ejected from the casino.

If someone is cheating in HnH, what does / or should Seatribe do?

In the past, and even recent history, Seatribe has punished bug abusing by what is called, "Nuking." Essentially it means that if a person is identified as abusing a bug (often one that provides some item advantage), all their assets are destroyed. One example is an old exploit with a Statue of the Chieftain, to create an impenetrable area, known as a Vault. Surrounding any location with these statues, making the location impenetrable, warranted nuking. Loftar or Jorb would enter the area and start zapping away the location, effectively deleting all the unfairly guarded gains.

People who built vaults, using the intended defenses, did not experience losing all their items to their location being nuked. This shows they know the distinction between fair and unfair gameplay—cheating and not cheating.

We've seen, in recent history, nuking for other bug abuses—namely, wall jumping.
You can read all about it here: The Case of Core

If you are unfamiliar with the "Nuking Process," and what that translates to, here's some information.

Below is a before and after image of the village, Core.
(Open in a new tab, and check out the minimap.)

As you can see, Nuking is a very devastating process. It is indiscriminate in its punishment.

The story is that near-everyone in Core abused this bug, and as a result, their entire village was nuked.

Punishments and the importance of addressing botting:

There is no great distinction between the effect of botting and the effect of bug abusing. If we translate nuking as punishment to botting, you'd see more encouragement from peers-to-peers not to bot, but you'd also see many casualties in the way of otherwise innocent players. For instance, your neighbor may use a bot, but you may not. Sometimes botting is difficult to spot, and were the punishment of nuking in some way automated, you'd be very distressed to find your work to appear as the image above.

I've seen botting drive friends away from playing. The concept of a fair game is important to many people, and to say that, "you too can learn to bot," is not an adequate argument.

Punishments for botting have been historically neglected to address game design issues that are an impetus toward botting.
This has provided (hopefully) insight for developers to see where their game might improve.

However, at a certain point, fundamentally everything can be botted—even aspects of good game design can be botted, and at this point, the benefit for developers to turn away from punishment ceases. Botting becomes, overall, a detrimental process to the competitive experience.

I'd like to see that some of Seatribe's money goes toward combating botting, which tends to deter paying and potential customers, and solely becomes a form of cheating after the developmental insight is exhausted.

Nuking, I'm hesitant to embrace, other forms of deletion and bans are something I'm willing to support.

Anyways, I'm tired of writing this already too long post (Especially to revise it and condense it into something more coherent). It was supposed to just be: "I vote yes," but then I got to thinking about why I would agree, and hoped to persuade some action where it counts....

Jorb & Loftar's perception of being or hiring moderators for cheating:

We are perhaps slightly butthurt that we were made to spend time on this nonsense, rather than on other, more meaningful things.

I'm as such happy whenever we find bugs, and I like that people push the boundaries and try to find them.

None of that is at issue, however.

I don't care about "fairness", and do not really pretend to uphold it. This is simply my will, and if it in the eyes of some beholders happens to be fair then I can only be glad about that, however incidental it is. Haven is not a democratic republic.

It does not make me angry that there are bugs, that people find them, that people try to find them, or that they get exploited. This is the natural order of things.

I realize fully that this may cause people to carry out exploits bei Nacht und Nebel, and that's a fine little game of cat and mouse. That will certainly make it a fair bit harder to profit from these bugs, harder to use developed characters with stable production bases in abusing them, at the very least, and it's not like we'll never catch people. This time the thing was extremely clear cut, and we caught a whole bunch. I am pleased.

Tl;Dr

Thoughts on why to punish botting, types of punishments, and if it should be punished at all, are welcome in this thread.

If you read the whole thing, maybe you can make an argument that makes sense to J&L to do something about botting, that isn't: Address it eventually, but in the meantime use botting as motivation / stencil to make a better game.

[LadyV]

When it comes to these topics feel free to suggest ideas in C & I. As for my thoughts, I prefer to leave such things to Jorb & Loftar. They are bound to be more fair.

[Granger: moved thread there]

[Vaku]

When it comes to these topics feel free to suggest ideas in C & I. As for my thoughts, I prefer to leave such things to Jorb & Loftar. They are bound to be more fair.

I don't care about "fairness", and do not really pretend to uphold it.... This is the natural order of things.

Being amoral is not the same as being moral—something which is tightly connected to fairness—and right now, Jorb's statement seems to suggest he's taking the amoral approach, as a personal decision. Just look at the above quote. That being the case, fairness can't just be left up to just the voice of Jorb & Loftar. You can't trust they are "bound to be more fair" if they dismiss fairness.

Indeed, Jorb wrote, when addressing some insult:

We do not care.

I could wipe all game data tomorrow and not be sad in the slightest.

This was nothing we did for our sake.

If it only affected me nothing would have happened.

So, it follows that they act on our behalf, and on the weight of our stake in the game. Because, it does not, as Jorb wrote, "only affect him." It—people's interactions in this game—cheating, bug abusing, etc, affect all of us—

So, to abdicate your opinion on what's fair or not fair, really is only a disservice to yourself, because naturally, both

do not care.

I guess if "idc" is your opinion, then *shrug.* I guess thanks for posting.

[Kalacia]

In order to argue if botting should be accepted or not, it needs to be defined. Different people here will have different ideas on botting.

Lets look at the idea/definition of automation (taken directly from wiki):

"Automation or automatic control, is the use of various control systems for operating equipment such as machinery, processes in factories, boilers and heat treating ovens, switching on telephone networks, steering and stabilization of ships, aircraft and other applications with minimal or reduced human intervention"

For example: The automated study of curios...
This, no matter how you look at it, is automation of game play that is not included in the default client. Should this be defined as botting?
Similar code could also be used to auto drink when your stamina is low...

A character harvesting a field then sowing the seeds again with a single click, is automation. It is not included within the vanilla client. This is automation, but is this botting?

Sending a character out to hunt, with colision detection and full combat routines... again, this is automation, but is it botting?

Each has a different level of complexity in the automation.The point i am getting at is botting is a broad spectrum that needs to be defined before we can really get to the bottom of the issue. Should we reband this "botting" as advanced automation? or bundle all automation under the same botting header? If we do bundle all botting under the automation header, i think we are all guilty at some point. Just the auto curio alone in custom clients is enough to have a lot of us be hypocritical.

For the record, i'm against advanced botting, i personally define this as anything that requires some degree of AI or multiple individual automated processes to function.

[Vaku]

The point i am getting at is botting is a broad spectrum that needs to be defined before we can really get to the bottom of the issue.

You're overcomplicating the distinctions here. Of course games have automation—automation inherent to the game.

I don't spend each frame of the game doing the math and drawing the art because I'm vehemently opposed to automatic systems.

The point being made about botting, as everyone should understand it is: botting is an "ace in the sleeve." It's an automation that disrupts fair play, that would otherwise be stable and fair had they not brought it with them.

[Granger]

Linked this Discussion in the OP of the Petition: Nuclear Option for Bots thread.

[APXEOLOG]

Another pointless thread

USER WAS WARNED FOR THIS POST

[Kalacia]

The point i am getting at is botting is a broad spectrum that needs to be defined before we can really get to the bottom of the issue.

You're overcomplicating the distinctions here. Of course games have automation—automation inherent to the game.

I don't spend each frame of the game doing the math and drawing the art because I'm vehemently opposed to automatic systems.

The point being made about botting, as everyone should understand it, is botting is an "ace in the sleeve." It's an automation that disrupts fair play, that would otherwise be stable and fair had they not brought it with them.

This is the point i am getting at. Most of us here, at least the forum users use a custom client... which introduces automations that the vanilla users dont have. Are they an ace?

as everyone should understand it, is botting is an "ace in the sleeve."

Then people need to know this is the perspective its being argued from. But i'm not sure that most botting is an ace in the sleeve. Its not a nuclear bomb.. its a slow industrial machine, giving advantages over those who are unwilling or unable to use it.

And if this decision is just left with the community, one is not going to be made. This decision, sits with the devs... and the devs alone.

As a side question, do we have a terms and conditions for the game?

[LadyV]

As a side question, do we have a terms and conditions for the game?

Yes, some.

http://www.havenandhearth.com/portal/paq

Sub-links give more information.

[Vaku]

a custom client.... Are they an ace?

I would definitely argue they are an ace in the sleeve.
Unfortunately, our focus is on botting. We're disregarding client features, except for botting—which really, is always attached to a client.

But i'm not sure that most botting is an ace in the sleeve. Its not a nuclear bomb.. its a slow industrial machine, giving advantages over those who are unwilling or unable to use it.

Then, in response to that, I say, imagine slowly drawing an ace from your sleeve and putting it in your hand.
It is an event, wherein, eventually your opponent realizes you're drawing an ace, from your sleeve—not the deck.
It is an event, wherein, your opponent gets up and leaves the table, because they'd rather play a fair game with a fair opponent.

That's the environment I find people quitting in. They quit because they want a fair challenge.

And if this decision is just left with the community, one is not going to be made. This decision, sits with the devs... and the devs alone.

That's a fair thing to say of all arguments—the decision to change always lies with the person in authority. No one can change how you are, only you can change how you are....

But then I ask, rhetorically, why does persuasion exist?

As a side question, do we have a terms and conditions for the game?

This is their EULA.