The Best way to handle macroers

[niccoli00]

Since you keep trying to go on about how ill-defined my arguments are, I figured I'd make it easy for you. Below is an example of how time after time I've offered a number of well defined solutions and reiterated my points over and over, yet you've apparently decided to over look them for the sake of your own "victory".

Sounds detailed enough to me... But then again I lack logic, right?

Wasting your time. Though it was a good summary of your posts while I was away from the forums for a few hours. Saves me some reading. :P

[Belight]

Wasting your time.

What can I say? I'm bored.

[dxwarlock]

but the issue is belight, finding a better way to make a game that discourages marcoers as a way to stop them, is about as useful as making an OS that "discourages virus coders". Its not the software that creates these people, its the human desire to 'get away with something'.
its a pipe dream, the unreachable magical game layout that every online game dreams of that can never be reached. if it was, do you not think that at least one MMO would have done it? even WoW with its massive team of devs, chose the 'warden' approach, knowing that discouraging and trying to make a fun game isnt enough to stop botters.

make a game, people will cheat at it, its as simple as that. it can be the most fun, unneeded to be macrod game ever developed..just because it doesn't need to be bot/macroed doesn't mean many many still wont.

and making it less macro friendly is a great idea, but it wont stop macroers, you'll just get more creative macroers is all. its like DRM for games, they spend million on it to stop pirates, you THEN just get more dedicated crackers doing it for the bragging rights to say "i did what they said couldnt be done".

[ifireallymust]

Since you keep trying to go on about how ill-defined my arguments are, I figured I'd make it easy for you. Below is an example of how time after time I've offered a number of well defined solutions and reiterated my points over and over, yet you've apparently decided to over look them for the sake of your own "victory".















Sounds detailed enough to me... But then again I lack logic, right?

So the bottom line is this.

- Policing and banning people takes time and money. These devs don't have that. So it's not a reasonable solution.
- Devs should use their time and money to fix the features instead of wasting it on punishing people and reducing their own subscriber base.
- Reworking a few systems and crafts is a much better use of their time and money.
- They can save even more time and money by making macro deterring systems for their future features as well.

Therefore, I think your plea to ban macroers is detrimental to this games survival because of the resources it will consume from the company. What you're asking for is unrealistic.

So you think macroing should still be against the ToS, but the macroers should not be detected and punished for macroing, is that correct?

[niccoli00]

What can I say? I'm bored.

Yeah, I'm just passing time til my refund goes through. Once my name turns blue, I won't be able to post anymore.

[Belight]

but the issue is belight, finding a better way to make a game that discourages marcoers as a way to stop them, is about as useful as making an OS that "discourages virus coders". Its not the software that creates these people, its the human desire to 'get away with something'.
its a pipe dream, the unreachable magical game layout that every online game dreams of that can never be reached. if it was, do you not think that at least one MMO would have done it? even WoW with its massive team of devs, chose the 'warden' approach, knowing that discouraging and trying to make a fun game isnt enough to stop botters.

make a game, people will cheat at it, its as simple as that. it can be the most fun, unneeded to be macrod game ever developed..just because it doesn't need to be bot/macroed doesn't mean many many still wont.

and making it less macro friendly is a great idea, but it wont stop macroers, you'll just get more creative macroers is all. its like DRM for games, they spend million on it to stop pirates, you THEN just get more dedicated crackers doing it for the bragging rights to say "i did what they said couldnt be done".

...But you can't confuse macroing with complex scripting, hacking, sniffing, or exploiting.

You CAN beat basic macros and you CAN deterr the complex scripting via game design. At least I think so.

When people start hacking and exploiting, which encompasses many of your points... Well, then I think you start getting into the realm of crimanal. You are then damaging the companie's product. Now your starting a whole different debate. Our legal system and how they deal with digital crime. Lets leave that for another thread!

[niccoli00]

but the issue is belight, finding a better way to make a game that discourages marcoers as a way to stop them, is about as useful as making an OS that "discourages virus coders". Its not the software that creates these people, its the human desire to 'get away with something'.
its a pipe dream, the unreachable magical game layout that every online game dreams of that can never be reached. if it was, do you not think that at least one MMO would have done it? even WoW with its massive team of devs, chose the 'warden' approach, knowing that discouraging and trying to make a fun game isnt enough to stop botters.

make a game, people will cheat at it, its as simple as that. it can be the most fun, unneeded to be macrod game ever developed..just because it doesn't need to be bot/macroed doesn't mean many many still wont.

and making it less macro friendly is a great idea, but it wont stop macroers, you'll just get more creative macroers is all. its like DRM for games, they spend million on it to stop pirates, you THEN just get more dedicated crackers doing it for the bragging rights to say "i did what they said couldnt be done".

So what you're saying is all people who use macro's do it just to use them. Throuroughly false. I have used macros in games, but the majority of games I've played I haven't bothered because they were pointless to use, because of the gameplay.

If you were to say all games will have someone making bots for them, I might be more ready to agree.

Skill based games have a huge potential for macros, over level based games, this is true. However, in Mortal Online, I had some macros, but none for afk stuff, more for "I don't want to click 50 times" issues.

A good example: Gathering stone.

Current system. Right click, right click, right click, etc until you have as much as you want. So I make a macro that repeats right click every 4 seconds.

An improvement to the system: Right click once, it gathers until you interrupt. This isn't game breaking because after you get about 15, you're probably overweight.

Crafting: Multiple right clicks, create. Repeat for each item, 20 times if you have 20 components.

An improvement, select all your parts once and click a create all.

I wouldn't bother with macros for those tasks if the system was designed in a better fashion.

Are you always going to want to create the same thing multiple times? Only while leveling, unlikely later when you're making that supreme weapon for your tribe mate.

Any game with needlessly repetitive clicks or keystrokes will be macro'd. Most games do not fall into this category.

[Andius]

In both cases (Drugs and Macroing), I assure you that treating people like criminals and punishing them is not a good solution. These solutions are labor intensive and do not address the root cause, therefoer will never illiminate it.

Education, creative thinking, understanding... Those are the things that will resolve most any issue.

My solution is not to accept macroing, but rather to understand it, to understand it's reason and cause and to address those accordingly. I.E. designing well thought out game mecahnics that discourage the need for macroing.

When we find drug smugglers, do we shoot them in the head and say "Game over." When we find drug users, do we slap them with huge punishments, and on the third time just execute them? Account deletion is prettymuch what this would be like in the terms of gaming. The punishment is not a slap on the wrist, its not even a long hard stay in jail. Its an execution of their life on Xsyon.

The fact is, when I think of a game where macros are really out of hand like Darkfall. Its because nothing is really done about the problem. Before the implementation of meditation I could go online to my alliances capitol city and find like 20 people running macros and about as many afk swimming in the water. If they were to be reported nobody would do anything about it, at most they would disconnect them, and given that all our enemies are doing the same things in their cities, I would just be nerfing our alliance to report them. When I first joined Darkfall I did report every afk runner and macro user I saw. I gave up when I realized nothing was being done. Months down the later I started using them when I realized all my opponents would be macro users, and as someone who hunts griefers it was important to me I remain competitive.

My story is not unique in Darkfall, most people who normally would never use macros or afk running/swimming start using them because they realize NOTHING is being done about them, so they are required to remain competitive in PVP.

Adopting measures as harsh as I suggest, will cut down on them, because I know for one, I will report every macro user I see to a guide if I feel my reports aren't falling on deaf ears.

[Belight]

So you think macroing should still be against the ToS, but the macroers should not be detected and punished for macroing, is that correct?

Things aren't that black and white. I refuse to fall into whatever trap you think you're setting up by getting me to answer one of your three predetermined scenarios.

It should be against the ToS, sure, I've never suggest we embrace macroing. However, I don't think macroers should be HUNTED and I don't think they should have their purchased accounts taken away. I think if they are detected or reported they should be disconnected from the server or short banned for repeat offenses. However, we come again, to the point I've made over and over. The devs would make better use of creating systems that are not easy to macro in the first place. There are tons of options for this and it would deterr the whole fucking mess in the first place.

Maybe if I put it like this?

Do it right the first time, and if at first you don't succeed try again, or pay a shit load of money to hire game police to lower your number of subscribers?

It's comes down to economics, really... And if building more complex and creative systems to deter macroing leads to more fun and engaging game play and more time and money put into actual development, then it's win win right?

P.S. We as players should also probably man up a little and simply kill the macroers... I know I did my part in DarkFall to clean out AFKers and take their shit. How's that for a solution?

[niccoli00]

When we find drug smugglers, do we shoot them in the head and say "Game over." When we find drug users, do we slap them with huge punishments, and on the third time just execute them? Account deletion is prettymuch what this would be like in the terms of gaming. The punishment is not a slap on the wrist, its not even a long hard stay in jail. Its an execution of their life on Xsyon.

The fact is, when I think of a game where macros are really out of hand like Darkfall. Its because nothing is really done about the problem. Before the implementation of meditation I could go online to my alliances capitol city and find like 20 people running macros and about as many afk swimming in the water. If they were to be reported nobody would do anything about it, at most they would disconnect them, and given that all our enemies are doing the same things in their cities, I would just be nerfing our alliance to report them. When I first joined Darkfall I did report every afk runner and macro user I saw. I gave up when I realized nothing was being done. Months down the later I started using them when I realized all my opponents would be macro users, and as someone who hunts griefers it was important to me I remain competitive.

My story is not unique in Darkfall, most people who normally would never use macros or afk running/swimming start using them because they realize NOTHING is being done about them, so they are required to remain competitive in PVP.

Adopting measures as harsh as I suggest, will cut down on them, because I know for one, I will report every macro user I see to a guide if I feel my reports aren't falling on deaf ears.

Darkfall is a great example of a game that begged for macroing. Not so much because of skill gain rates, I think they've fixed that now. But the lack of ANY skill cap.

Harsh measures won't stop macro users. It might get rid of a few, but it won't get rid of all of them. Fixing the reason to macro would be far more effective and beneficial to everyone than spending time banning everyone you happen to find.