Botting Questions

[newaccountlol]

Original client should be improved upon a lot and eventually I think it should be easy for the game to detect which client player is using and enforcing permanent/+ip bans when found it is not the original one.

Currently original client is too shit to enforce this and it would probably half the playerbase.

It might be a bit more difficult but wouldn't stop botting. Lots of MMO's ban custom clients or only allow specific types of UI mods. People can just make programs to take control of the original client rather than connecting with a custom client.

The best way to find bots is to just automatically flag any character that is making extreme progress, playing for unrealistic amounts of time, having zero delay between actions, repeating the same exact actions, etc... After that it should be pretty easy to figure out which ones are bots, adjust the filters accordingly and start to implement automatic ban system.

[jorb]

As usual, anyone claiming easy victories in the war against the machines underestimates the problem. Ultimately the question boils down to machine administered Turing tests, which are inherently strange propositions to say the least.

[MagicManICT]

eventually I think it should be easy for the game to detect which client player is using and enforcing permanent/+ip bans when found

Just ask Blizzard how "easy" this is. Of course, I'm sure you can look at some of those Japanese and Korean MMOs about how they do it, but then I don't play them because they want to install a bunch of spyware on your computer. Then again, any hacker worth their salt can easy slip past such nonsense, too.

[viznew]

i dont know enough about this stuff, but sounds interesting, its a pretty complex puzzle that sounds like there may never be a true "fix", devs fix something botter will adapt, disincentivizes and some regulation prob always needed but only go so far, but stuff like the pile dirt in pile while leveling system def right steps (need farming) but thats easy compared to some issues, am very gratefull and interested in what devs can manage to do

[loftar]

There's also the question of where to draw the line for what is "botting". As long as the default client didn't have that feature, was bulk-moving all items of the same type between containers a "bot script"? How about auto-drinking while cutting trees?

[Ants]

Is there a place where people download their bots, or does every big faction have a programmer of their own?

I'm not a fan of botting, but if it's treated as an important part of the game by the devs we should probably have a repository for those kinds of programs along with some botting guides. Otherwise it's not fair to the noobs.

They program their own as far as I know, making programmers extremely powerful/sought after. Some clients have scripts to automate stuff like foraging and digging but I wouldn't call it botting. There is at least one bot client available to the public but it still requires you to write your own scripts to actually make it do anything.

Even a good programmer would still have to put a lot of work into making a good bot, spend lots of time learning the game mechanics, and already spent lots of time learning the technical skills required. So in that respect I think they are at least somewhat deserving of their power and what they choose to do with it.

I agree it's not fair but I don't think releasing bots to the public would be a good thing. For one, why should somebody be rewarded from the hard work of others who spent tons of time learning these skills then programming the bots? Two, I think everyone botting would just start to kill the spirit of the game rather than make it fair.

If you really want to compete with the most powerful villages there is nothing stopping you from recruiting your own programmer or making your own client. If you aren't willing to go through the trouble of doing that then you would never stand a chance against these groups anyway, even if they weren't botting. These are people who understand strength in numbers and have been playing for many worlds, most of them are ambitious and play a hardcore schedule, and they understand the game mechanics more than most players. You have a massive hurdle to overcome regardless of botting.

You make good points. The botters do work hard for what they accomplish. You could say they're just playing a secret wizard class.

Heck, maybe we should get a botter credo.

eventually I think it should be easy for the game to detect which client player is using and enforcing permanent/+ip bans when found

Just ask Blizzard how "easy" this is. Of course, I'm sure you can look at some of those Japanese and Korean MMOs about how they do it, but then I don't play them because they want to install a bunch of spyware on your computer. Then again, any hacker worth their salt can easy slip past such nonsense, too.

Blizzard has a huge playerbase and their botters have a financial incentive to cheat, as accounts and items are often sold on unofficial marketplaces. As I write this, we have 161 players online and there's no real life profit to be made by cheaters. It should be way easier to moderate this community and punish people who have been proven to cheat if we choose to do so. I don't think you can compare the few programmers we have to the Chinese gold farmers of WoW.

Original client should be improved upon a lot and eventually I think it should be easy for the game to detect which client player is using and enforcing permanent/+ip bans when found it is not the original one.

Currently original client is too shit to enforce this and it would probably half the playerbase.

Yep. Nobody except those who are completely new use the default client.

There's also the question of where to draw the line for what is "botting". As long as the default client didn't have that feature, was bulk-moving all items of the same type between containers a "bot script"? How about auto-drinking while cutting trees?

People could vote on it. IMO if it's something that should be in the default client but isn't, it should be considered kosher.

[infectedking]

Original client should be improved upon a lot and eventually I think it should be easy for the game to detect which client player is using and enforcing permanent/+ip bans when found it is not the original one.

Currently original client is too shit to enforce this and it would probably half the playerbase.

Pretty sure your idea of permanent/ip bans would lower the playerbase ALOT more than you care to admit.
"Hey guys lets ban atleast 3/4 of the population since Custom clients will always have more add-ons that make things better".
All custom clients are from what i've seen is just the default client with extra add-ons, jorb/loftar can easily add them in or even look at their codes since a lot of even "private clients" are based off amber's. My opinion is that they should look at these clients and see what is could be added to their default/what draws the line of becoming too easy.

Custom clients aren't a bad thing, they can be used for ideas for things that can be added to Default, while Jorb/Loftar work on the actual game itself, it allows some player interaction to help them on their way in terms of ideas.

[MagicManICT]

As I write this, we have 161 players online and there's no real life profit to be made by cheaters.

Is it cheating if it's allowed, whether explicitly or implicitly? Botting is allowed implicitly here because there are no direct rules against it. That could potentially change in the future, of course, but see dev comments above.

As far as profit... well, it goes on. Any game on the Internet, no matter how large or small, will have to deal with RMT at some level. Some will brag about it, others will keep what they do under wraps. Besides, isn't getting a free months subscription for a few hours work in game a profit of some sort, even if minimal? Trading sub tokens for other in game items is most definitely allowed. There just isn't an Eastern European level economy to fund by the scale of players Blizzard and other large AAA MMOs have.

Heck, maybe we should get a botter credo.

Why? They already have a statue from W4, and that's all the more they deserve. Or maybe this credo would penalize them in game for running scripts instead of boosting them? Again, see dev comments above as to why it probably won't happen.

[SinJin]

Blizzard has a huge playerbase and their botters have a financial incentive to cheat, as accounts and items are often sold on unofficial marketplaces. As I write this, we have 161 players online and there's no real life profit to be made by cheaters. It should be way easier to moderate this community and punish people who have been proven to cheat if we choose to do so. I don't think you can compare the few programmers we have to the Chinese gold farmers of WoW.

You are incorrect about this. If you know how to bot, you can make $ in any game that allows players to interact with each other. HnH is no exception to this.

[MagicManICT]

If you know how to bot, you can make $ in any game that allows players to interact with each other. HnH is no exception to this.

You don't need bots to figure out how to make money on a game. Some games allow you to do it, others will ignore it, others will nuke the world if they catch wind of it.