Guild Wars 2?

Phred · 2012-10-13T15:56:58.000Z

TheWombat:

I mean, ArenaNet has to be aware of this stuff, right? And they have to be working on fixing it, right? Unless, of course, the botters and hackers are somehow their best gem buying customers I guess…

It wouldnt surprise me in the slightest if they haven’t figured out exactly how many bannings will sustain a decent turn around in botted accounts. Though somehow I doubt the cracking of their serial number code was anticipated.

Phred · 2012-10-13T15:59:43.000Z

rossm:

ANet can throw a lot of money at writing software that uses heuristics or whatever to flag users who run software like this, but it’s expensive,

Just like Anet you completely ignore the effectiveness of your customer base in identifying botters.

Seneca · 2012-10-13T16:43:27.000Z

rossm:

It’s something they’ll have to get a handle on over time, or just ignore because honestly who gives a shit.

For the reasons Hechicara outlined above (and more), I give a shit.
Today, I wandered around Cursed Shores and there were more bots than actual players. That is no exaggeration. Bots with nonsense names (mostly rangers with bear pets) were mass warping all over the zone clearing mobs. Penitent Path, alone, was more than 80% bots. Some of these bots were in prime event territory causing all kinds of problems for the few players that actually wanted to engage with the content. Map channel was filled with people complaining about it - apparently those players gave a shit also.

At one point, in an effort to complete one of the cathedral events, players were actually talking about ways to train the mobs onto the bots. They did not want to kill the bots, they wanted to leverage the bot dps. There were not enough actual players participating to complete the event.

Gedd · 2012-10-13T17:56:21.000Z

Phred:

Guilds are also transferring to use up supply on enemy realms apparently.

Thankfully some of this kind of griefing should end once the free server transfers end.

Hanacker · 2012-10-13T18:31:09.000Z

Phred:

Just like Anet you completely ignore the effectiveness of your customer base in identifying botters.

Just the other day I saw someone from Anet in the level 70-80 icy area asking people if they’d seen botters around and then banning them.

LockerK · 2012-10-13T18:51:59.000Z

Gedd:

Thankfully some of this kind of griefing should end once the free server transfers end.

Depends on the gem cost, honestly. I don’t consider myself rich by any stretch of the imagination having never been to Orr and find gem prices reasonable. A large guild would have no problem financing a small group to switch over and grief.

triggercut · 2012-10-14T01:36:24.000Z

Phred:

Guilds are also transferring to use up supply on enemy realms apparently.

That seems like a breathtakingly stupid and inefficient way to attempt to win WvW matches.

Charlatan · 2012-10-14T13:59:48.000Z

Morrolan:

Despite the exploits WvW is great fun. I’m on Yaks Bend and this week we’ve been in a tight match all week with Northern Shiverpeaks and Sanctum of Rall. Its been great fun.

Yeah, it’s interesting to read all the discussion about WvW hacks - I’m sure they exist, but I’ve been playing on Sanctum of Rall recently, and we have been having great battles with NS and YB (though the re-match switched out NS and switched in… Gates of Madness I think). At any rate when one side starts steamrolling the maps, it doesn’t take long for the other two sides to knock them down. Last Thursday we must have spent like 3 hours fighting on and off over Stonemist and a couple other of the smaller castles (EB on the Yak’s Bend Borderlands). There was one point where we were in the lord’s room at Stonemist, fighting off YB from the south and NS from the north simultaneously - and I mean, they were in the inner keep but neither attacker could break into the room due to the massive amount of firepower in there (and the fact that neither side wanted to go first since even if they won the fight, the other attacker would come in and probably wipe THEM out). It was crazy fun.

I do avoid the Orr zones, mostly because I completely hate the way the mobs are arranged every 10 feet, and the fact that each one has chill, cripple, pull-you-back, etc, abilities. It’s annoying and boring. I’ve been running some dungeons recently and there are some interesting battles in there - and the explorable modes can be quite challenging for a team.

Timex · 2012-10-15T09:39:16.000Z

KevinC:

I got an in-game spam mail once offering powerleveling services for $180.

Obviously, you are paying them so that you can avoid playing the game (that you paid to play).

On some level, it seems like it’d be better to just burn all of the money, or maybe use it to buy a hammer and hit yourself in the head with it.

Sinij · 2012-10-15T10:50:36.000Z

rossm:

Hacking is also not feasible to prevent. Movement is all client side, in basically every realtime online game ever. There’s nothing stopping people from editing memory on their pc or whatever else to teleport, speed hack, etc. The way this is traditionally prevented is by smart detection on the server and quick bannings. But it’s difficult to implement because a lot of the time it looks similar to lag.

While technically correct, you are still wrong with your conclusions.

Yes, it is impossible to prevent hacking, but it is very possible to detect, to a high degree of accuracy, and automatically ban or even simply disconnect the cheater.

The problem that needs to be addressed is when server blindly accepts bad input. Something like flying/teleporting that couldn’t happen if client was sending ordinary stream of commands.

Sinij · 2012-10-15T10:58:18.000Z

triggercut:

That seems like a breathtakingly stupid and inefficient way to attempt to win WvW matches.

I have seen orb hijackings, I have seen pull and mezmer portal exploits, I have seen running chat re-broadcast bots.

Worst of these should be solved by imposing 2-week cooldown on transfers.

Sinij · 2012-10-15T11:01:42.000Z

The only way to solve botting is to remove underlying reason for them to be there - people wanting to buy gold from botters. 30% cut Anet takes on gem-gold transfer is what allows botters to compete with the general player population. Remove this, maybe keep 5% to keep speculation down, and general player base selling gold will push bots out.

Seneca · 2012-10-15T11:03:54.000Z

The bot armies have now found their way to the WvW maps and, on some servers, are now adding to the queue time of players that would actually like to participate in the game. Screenshots, youtube clips, etc. available on the official boards.

Some folks welcome the bots, because instead of clashing with other players to obtain badges they can now just farm the bots.

SlainteMhath · 2012-10-15T12:01:54.000Z

Seneca:

Some folks welcome the bots, because instead of clashing with other players to obtain badges they can now just farm the bots.

Just so that it comes full circle I am going to create a WvWvW bot to farm WvWvW bots. ;-)

Timex · 2012-10-15T12:57:28.000Z

What do the bots do in the PvP environment? Seems like they’d just get murderized, so I’m not sure what the point of it would be.

Morrolan · 2012-10-15T13:00:31.000Z

Timex:

What do the bots do in the PvP environment? Seems like they’d just get murderized, so I’m not sure what the point of it would be.

The lakes in each of the borderlands contains a lot of krait which can be farmed. But yeah the bots are vulnerable to opposition players.

Stridergg · 2012-10-16T06:30:32.000Z

Slainte Mhath:

Just so that it comes full circle I am going to create a WvWvW bot to farm WvWvW bots. ;-)

Lol.

You could also pay cash to botters to do that for you. :)

Damn, I must have run the first 3 dungeons like 15 times now and haven’t even seen the others. In the last week every time I am looking for group in /guild I get nothing and I have to get into a PUG. One was SO terrible last night, it was unbelievably bad but we still managed to finish TA. :)

Seneca · 2012-10-16T21:55:21.000Z

Very fun romp by the Qt3 horde in WvW tonight. We torched numerous supply camps, and many a dolyak and sentry met their maker. We capped the evening off by planting the Ehmry Bay flag over Dreaming Bay. See you next week!

instant0 · 2012-10-16T22:16:27.000Z

Good news for my server, the WVW queues have all but disappeared.

The bad news is that we always have the ‘there are only 5 of you in the whole zone buff’ now, so our guild and our alliance are planning on switching server (about 400 people in total). Which means all the guild updates we have disappeared. I guess that is one feature I wish GW2 and other games fixed, so that guilds could transfer INTACT.

Since it took me a LOT of time to level up my “alt guild” solo to get a extra 50 slot bank. Would rather not have to do that again.

Seems the buff isn’t enough to help either, since we constantly get stomped on in WvW now – due to there not being enough of us.

I guess on the bright side, since there are only a few friendlies in the zone – the game engine will actually render some of the enemies now.

Mark_Asher · 2012-10-16T22:36:56.000Z

Seneca:

Very fun romp by the Qt3 horde in WvW tonight. We torched numerous supply camps, and many a dolyak and sentry met their maker. We capped the evening off by planting the Ehmry Bay flag over Dreaming Bay. See you next week!

Just curious, but did you have much PvP in your WvW romp?