Forums » General Pantheon Discussion

Box/Bot perma camp issues

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    • 22 posts
    June 10, 2019 4:30 PM PDT

    Hi all this topic came from an issue that is happening on the new TLP progression server in EQ. There is some guy that has scripted his group of bots and put them on a permanent 24/7 camp of the pre nerf circlet.

     https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/index.php?threads/necro-bot-team-at-cos-camp.258188/ 

     What I want to know, is there going to be hard line policy’s put in place by VR to deal with this type of situation happening in pantheon?


    This post was edited by Disscord at June 12, 2019 8:57 PM PDT
    • 116 posts
    June 10, 2019 4:50 PM PDT

    This is open world design. Sadly, situations like these were not uncommon in EQ1. 

    This is where ‘reputation ‘ is supposed to provide consequences from the cimmunity, but that is not always effective. 

    There were guilds that monopolized spawns  

    There we’re players that would physically block access (Ogre toons) by sitting in entryways (because of toon on toon collision you couldn’t bypass them)  

    Kill stealing, access griefing, etc... this was all part of good old original EQ .  

    Hopefully, VR will be clever with some of the sins of the past  But truly, this is what open world design is, there are advantages and disadvantages with all systems  

     


    This post was edited by Grayel at June 10, 2019 4:51 PM PDT
    • 1921 posts
    June 10, 2019 5:01 PM PDT

    Pitifully, processing purely public pieces of Pantheon prose published?  Perfectly plausible.

    • 9115 posts
    June 10, 2019 5:25 PM PDT

    Yes, report the player. Using scripts to control your characters is against our ToS and the player would be punished accordingly.

    • 59 posts
    June 10, 2019 6:10 PM PDT

    Good luck policing that one. They were largely unsuccessfull nearly 20 years ago. Not sure what makes anyone think it will have got easier to detect or prove this much later.

    • 22 posts
    June 10, 2019 6:56 PM PDT
    They would need to implement some policies around camping. Or build out some type of fair play policy, where if you or your group ( must be the same characters) are online camping one drop for more then 72 hours non-stop they could be asked to move on for at least 12 hours, If petitioned against.

    This wouldn’t not be hard to check logs on.
    • 1584 posts
    June 10, 2019 7:12 PM PDT
    Yeah like Kilsin said, just report him, and as for boxing that isn't against ToS for as long you care actually controlling him manually, but as for bottling and can be proven he will be dealt with.
    • 1860 posts
    June 10, 2019 7:24 PM PDT

    Scripts are against the user agreement but if a guild wants to permacamp a spawn that is allowed.

      There has been mention that the game will be itemized in a way that there will be similar items from multiple camps so that it diminishes the need to camp a single drop.  There will be multiple options (the fbss was used as an example).  We will see if that becomes the reality or not.


    This post was edited by philo at June 10, 2019 10:09 PM PDT
    • 59 posts
    June 10, 2019 7:53 PM PDT

    So.. just reporting the player will provide proof of illegal action? Will they require installation of spyware operated by VR?

    Again.. good luck with that.

    • 297 posts
    June 11, 2019 4:50 AM PDT

    They've mentioned in gameplay streams that they intend boxing to be so difficult as to be not worth doing. They've said they will not be installing anything that would scan your PC for prohibited programs. They've said that the world will be so large that if a camp is unavailable, there will be another camp you can go to instead. They've said that items won't be found from single spawns. 

    I think the DPS race policy and the idea that the community will remember your name and that will prevent bad actors are both silly and misguided ideas, but that's the world they want to build. There will absolutely be bad actors and it is highly unlikely they will have a hard time being successful if they want to put in the effort (trolls are always willing to put in the effort).

    I hope the game has a robust enough GM and Community Service presence to handle these issues. If they are going for EQ1-style open world competition, they will be inviting these bad actors to try their best to grief and disrupt gameplay. The rose tint view of this kind of a game is prevalent, I've noticed. Hopefully they are willing to expend the resources to police these kinds of things adequately. 

    • 116 posts
    June 11, 2019 5:51 AM PDT

    Darck said:

    So.. just reporting the player will provide proof of illegal action? Will they require installation of spyware operated by VR?

    Again.. good luck with that.

    This is where the lack of animations would be the telling factor.

    So no, just reporting will not be proof, but obviously altered game mechanics (I.e. a script bypassing animations is).

    It is 20 years later, games and programmers are more sophisticated now. I’ll bet that VR has a trick or two up their digital sleeve. 

    No one knows better what needs to be accounted for than Brad/Aradune. 

    Lets give VR the benefit of the doubt here. 

    My post was intended to point out the challenges of the past, but open world design will allow players to compete and not always cooperate, you cant change human behavior. 

    So expect some dick’ishness to be on display In Pantheon as well. 

    • 31 posts
    June 11, 2019 6:18 AM PDT

    The devs have pointed out that the scripting in Pantheon will be limited in order to address this issue.

    • 1584 posts
    June 11, 2019 7:06 AM PDT

    Darck said:

    So.. just reporting the player will provide proof of illegal action? Will they require installation of spyware operated by VR?

    Again.. good luck with that.

    You realize it actually pretty easy if they are botting right? Like in EQ it's easy as hell to tell if they are or not, but that's just me.  Now as for the proof that would probably take a GM or dev to investigate it and catch him in the act not so much on the player that did the report.


    This post was edited by Cealtric at June 11, 2019 7:06 AM PDT
    • 124 posts
    June 11, 2019 7:20 AM PDT

    Reputation and these sorts of things will always happen, are part of the game and perfectnly normal to me. As for community, community can most definitely handle these type of things. For this example, the act of the community could be to overpopulate the area, use ogre illusions to block as much as possible, set as much pet classes there to attack anything on sight, giving them a cookie of their own dough. Will you escalate things? Yes most definitely, one time you will be accused of killstealing, the other time the camper will be. But the message is still clear. As a community you can still counter / mitigate these situations, it just requires some creative thinking.

    • 297 posts
    June 11, 2019 7:25 AM PDT

    decarsul said:

    Reputation and these sorts of things will always happen, are part of the game and perfectnly normal to me. As for community, community can most definitely handle these type of things. For this example, the act of the community could be to overpopulate the area, use ogre illusions to block as much as possible, set as much pet classes there to attack anything on sight, giving them a cookie of their own dough. Will you escalate things? Yes most definitely, one time you will be accused of killstealing, the other time the camper will be. But the message is still clear. As a community you can still counter / mitigate these situations, it just requires some creative thinking.

    Also it almost never actually happens that a community bands together and the griefing just continues unabated.

    The reason being people want to play the actual game. They don't want to be responsible for being the police force against bad actors. That's the entire purpose of a GM staff.

    You can never completely eliminate the potential for trolls, griefers, and bad actors, but it is foolish to design a game that explicitly allows for them in the name of some mythical community.

    Community is built around people playing together and helping each other. That exists in open world, DPS-race games. That exists in instanced games. Each has its benefits and each has its problems. The idea that community can only be fostered in a game environment that promotes trolling and griefing is ridiculous. 

    • 1921 posts
    June 11, 2019 8:02 AM PDT

    Agreed, Chanus.

    Even in modern games that have GM escalation, it doesn't stop this.  By the time a GM is involved (hours or days later), the damage is done.  Your ethical customers are already ticked off and now have a reason to un-sub.
    This scenario is precisely why most modern multi-player games prevent even the slightest hint of a possibility of things like this, to prevent the damage it causes to paying customers.  They do it via in-game mechanics, not a fallible error-prone human escalation chain.
    As an example?  This is why quest updates were changed to anyone-can-tag.  Because one person should never be able to hold back an entire server from progressing. 
    Yet, as described, if it was one guild or one person (remember, multi-boxing is approved) holding down an entire camp or zone of spawns, without automation?  Absolutely nothing wrong with that, in any way.  And it still causes exactly the same damage to your " # community ".

    • 2752 posts
    June 11, 2019 10:44 AM PDT

    Yep. Community policing is policing without teeth, it is extremely ineffective and is just as full of abuse (dogpiling innocents for example) as anything else. 

    • 2419 posts
    June 11, 2019 11:00 AM PDT

    Chanus said:

    They've mentioned in gameplay streams that they intend boxing to be so difficult as to be not worth doing.

    I"ve watched the streams very closely specifically looking at the potential for multi-boxing.  Nothing I've seen so far even hints that multi-boxing will be any more difficult than any other game out there.  Multi-boxing will happen and will, by my prediction, have a noticeable percentage of the population doing it. 

    Disscord said: They would need to implement some policies around camping. Or build out some type of fair play policy, where if you or your group ( must be the same characters) are online camping one drop for more then 72 hours non-stop they could be asked to move on for at least 12 hours, If petitioned against. This wouldn’t not be hard to check logs on.

    Fundamentally there is no difference between a group of 6 real persons camping an area than there is 1 person multi-boxing 6 characters or even an ever changing group of people camping an area every time you show up with your group to see if it is open.  They all represent players engaging in the same content you wish to experience. So while you say you want to limit it to the same characters, what you really want to say is that when you show up to some content those there should be forced to move on because, in your opinion, they have been there 'too long'. 

    • 1584 posts
    June 11, 2019 11:21 AM PDT

    Vandraad said:

    Chanus said:

    They've mentioned in gameplay streams that they intend boxing to be so difficult as to be not worth doing.

    I"ve watched the streams very closely specifically looking at the potential for multi-boxing.  Nothing I've seen so far even hints that multi-boxing will be any more difficult than any other game out there.  Multi-boxing will happen and will, by my prediction, have a noticeable percentage of the population doing it. 

    Disscord said: They would need to implement some policies around camping. Or build out some type of fair play policy, where if you or your group ( must be the same characters) are online camping one drop for more then 72 hours non-stop they could be asked to move on for at least 12 hours, If petitioned against. This wouldn’t not be hard to check logs on.

    Fundamentally there is no difference between a group of 6 real persons camping an area than there is 1 person multi-boxing 6 characters or even an ever changing group of people camping an area every time you show up with your group to see if it is open.  They all represent players engaging in the same content you wish to experience. So while you say you want to limit it to the same characters, what you really want to say is that when you show up to some content those there should be forced to move on because, in your opinion, they have been there 'too long'. 

    These claims are way to early to predict for one, we've seen mobs one shot wizards, and also they said they haven't added in everything as in mechanics and such so to just assume that boxing can be done by a lot of players I find premature, especially sense it's only in beta and honestly just because I had someone "think" that is doesn't seem hard enough would only encourage me to raise the bar til you know it wouldn't be.

    As for community policing each other, it's sounds great on paper, but quite frankly it just isn't that good when you actually try to use it, yes some people will use it the way it was intended, but some people could also use it to raise I huge flag on a guild leader for no reason at all, other than they want to see him suspended.

    Honestly one of the best ways of policing is a strong force of GM's that make sure things are being played the way intended, and have some people policing GM's to make sure they aren't abusing their power.

    Now I realize that the GM's will need our help to catch certain players and such but I feel a higher power is in need, also I believe if people keep false reporting should also be punishable, now if they are reporting on botting and is wrong I don't think should be punishable because it is by speculation and that's it, but of they are reporting people for bad behavior constantly because he has a place camped or something to this effect than the person doing the false reports should be punished as well so both sides have drawbacks to try to keep both sides honest.


    This post was edited by Cealtric at June 11, 2019 11:39 AM PDT
    • 116 posts
    June 11, 2019 12:47 PM PDT
    Players unfamiliar with open world design and the inherent competition that it fosters will need some mentoring from those of us who know what to expect.

    The more experienced players will be key in keeping younger players, used to safe spaces and instanced everything, from rage quitting.

    I say this because there aren’t enough old timers to support Pantheon as anything more than a niche game. To be more will require newer players and if we want robust communities and healthy membership levels in our guilds, we’ll have to foster it happening.
    • 3016 posts
    June 11, 2019 1:40 PM PDT

    Disscord said:

    Hi all this topic came from an issue that is happening on the new TLP progress server in EQ. There is some guy that has scripted his group of bots and put them on a permanent 24/7 camp of the pre nerf circlet.

     https://forums.daybreakgames.com/eq/index.php?threads/necro-bot-team-at-cos-camp.258188/ 

     What I want to know, is there going to be hard line policy’s put in place by VR to deal with this type of situation happening in pantheon?

    To be honest  I would like to see community interaction not some guy with 30 bots under his command hogging a zone..such as the newbie areas...watched this happen a couple years ago on one of the TLP servers in EQ (Daybreak...ugh)      I would like to see a limit on botting..and a limit on boxing..in any zone...period.    Pantheon isn't meant for only solo play no matter how many bots you have under your command.   These folks can be quite obnoxious...hogging whole zones.     Hoping that VR has a  handle on it.   We want to encourage people to play not have them driven away by zone hogs.

     

    Cana


    This post was edited by CanadinaXegony at June 11, 2019 1:42 PM PDT
    • 3016 posts
    June 11, 2019 1:43 PM PDT

    Grayel said: Players unfamiliar with open world design and the inherent competition that it fosters will need some mentoring from those of us who know what to expect. The more experienced players will be key in keeping younger players, used to safe spaces and instanced everything, from rage quitting. I say this because there aren’t enough old timers to support Pantheon as anything more than a niche game. To be more will require newer players and if we want robust communities and healthy membership levels in our guilds, we’ll have to foster it happening.

     

    How do you know there aren't enough old timers to support Pantheon?  We've been supporting Pantheon from the get-go..since the Kickstarter...did you take a head count?  And were you around then? lol

     

    Cana


    This post was edited by CanadinaXegony at June 11, 2019 1:44 PM PDT
    • 116 posts
    June 11, 2019 2:19 PM PDT
    Oops meant that last post to go elsewhere, not in this thread.
    • 696 posts
    June 11, 2019 2:51 PM PDT

    To those who say the community couldn't band together and deal with botters/boxers perma camping a mob...I could give you a personal experience on Agnarr. Everyone knows in TLP that Gebs pretty much get perma camped by boxers/bots. So our guild just simply formed with 60-70 people and took the zone over, opened up shards, and got around 20 GeBs and a few Djarn rings. So it's pretty easy to out pace a botter...since the person isn't there to deal with it.

    • 264 posts
    June 11, 2019 4:49 PM PDT

     Botting needs to be a bannable offense, same with running scripts. I think multiboxing should be punishable as well so it's unfortunate imo that VR isn't taking a stand against that type of behavior. Multiboxing and botting/scripting go hand in hand except in those cases of the odd player using only 1 extra character. Multiboxers can be extremely disruptive in a zone. Perma camping a spot is something that is worth discussion in my view because that type of behavior is also harmful to the community...but real players actually need to swap out members as people go to work/sleep/etc so it's not nearly as damaging as a multibox botter who can continue the camp indefinitely. Also the multiboxer is one person hogging content meant to be enjoyed by multiple people, sure in terms of subscriptions the multiboxer pays as much as a team of actual players but the hidden cost is the damage to the community as those groups of actual players get denied content and quit. Since VR is trying to build a community focused game that is why I have concerns about allowing multiboxing.