Musician Archive
Thread: A solution for the AFK Bot Problem
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denbiel
Fri Dec 24, 2004 7:12 am
#1
And here it come :
do you will give the XX a buff -- menu pop up -- yes /no
are you a AFK buffing bot -- menu pop up -- yes /no
are you sure you are not lie --menu pop up -- no i don't lie / sorry I lie( every close by can see it :smileymad
/ I don't know
/ I don't knowoke the buff go start after you complete the following routine click 3 time your left mouse button and 3 time you right mouse button -- right click 1-2-3 left click 1-2-3
oke the buff start -- end and have a nice day
Its sort and effective ,
Have a nice day
sorry for my bad english its not my main language,
NewJedi
Sat Dec 25, 2004 1:13 am
#2
You're proposing popup boxes to test whether the botter is "live"? I doubt the devs will go with this solution. They tried it with AFK-sampling, but botters have found ways around that. Also, popup boxes are annoying for live entertainers.
The devs seem committed to a different solution. Theyhave said that the recursive macro is going away, or at least that it's going to be nerfed in some way.
Gknee
Sun Dec 26, 2004 4:47 pm
#3
this isn't such a terrible idea Just needs some tweaking. An interface for buffing would be good. that way both parties would have to be "active". But I don't think that a patron should be initiating the dialog boxes.
Just needs some tweaking. An interface for buffing would be good. that way both parties would have to be "active". But I don't think that a patron should be initiating the dialog boxes.
Electro5
Mon Dec 27, 2004 9:42 am
#4
The only reason you can get around the survey boxes is because they don't work. You can not even push anything and just keep on sampling, when you get back there will be a load of the dialog boxes built up, but they do not prevent you from doing anything.
Nifty
Tue Dec 28, 2004 9:31 am
#5
I'm sure it's been mentioned elsewhere, but I don't feel like doing a search so I apologize in advance if it has been proposed by someone else.
Make buffing to be somewhat similar to the theater quest, specifically the audition. During the two minute buff window (the length of time a player must listen to get even the slightest buff enhancement), require the entertainer to perform a specific flourish. A system message would come up that basically tells the musician/dancer to perform Flourish X (randomly selected) within two flourishes (this eliminates hitting all 8 flourishes at once to pass the random flourish test). Four such flourishes would be required in the two minute period. Each flourish missed takes off 25% of the buff's effectiveness. Miss all 4 and no buff at all is conveyed. System messages would be sent to both entertainer and buffees denoting success or failure of each required flourish "The dancer seems to have missed a step!" or "The musician has hit a sour note!" By hitting two flourishes in an AFK situation, you've gota 25% chance of gettingone right. Getting all 4 right AFK is about a 0.4% chance.
Now, if a player wants a buff, who are they going to go to? A live player who would almost assuredly give a full buff, or a buff bot with a 0.4% chance of giving a full buff?
Removing recursive macros will not solve the problem. If you remove recursive macros, you also have to eliminate the ability to call a /ui action toolbarSlotXX otherwise you just put two macros in two slots and have them call each other's toolbarSlot. Maybe it can be done where /ui action toolbarSlotXX won't activate a macro, but will onlyactivate an item or single action.
Even eliminating the ability in game to continuously buff will not stop determined players who can and will use 3rd party programs. To remove that, SOE will have to start banning players for AFK play. I dunno if that will happen since they have condoned it since launch.
Therefore, the best solution would be one renders AFK play nearly useless. Random flourishes would do that for AFKmacro entertainer buffing, IMO. Also, it would mean live entertainers would have to flourish manually to buffinstead of using a macro. Even I use macros to flourish at the keyboard.
bcre8iv
Tue Jan 04, 2005 3:38 am
#6
Ok, here's my outlook on things.
Recursive macros should NOT be taken out of the game. When I am playing in a cantina, I am: playing music, (possibly) buffing someone, flourishing, chatting with customers, chatting with other entertainers in my group, chatting with my guild, chatting with friends via tells, and watching system messages to make sure I don't lose a tip message in the flurry of flourish messages (Why does it give you a message about a flourish? Can we not see/hear a difference?). I'm sorry, I don't have time to type /flo n over and over, nor do I wish to hit my function keys over and over. I like macros; I have so many macros it's hard to keep up with all of them, and many are recursive (I’d like a way to specify a specific number of times to perform a macro, but that’s an idea for a different post). Also, entertainers are not the only people that use recursive macros, and I suspect those other people will be fairly upset to log in one day and find that their macros no longer work.
However, I do like several ideas for getting rid of buffbots (none of these are original, although they may have a new twist), and here they are:
1. First of all, instead of anyone in the group automatically being buffed if they are listening, create a command like /setPerformanceGroup to initiate it, and if anyone new comes into the group, the entertainer must reenter the command. Secondly, when the entertainer sets their performance to either an individual or a group, a box comes up (much like the one when you are invited to a group) to ask if you are sure. However, you should be required to click the yes button, and there should be no macroable command for this. The buff does not start until you click yes. The problem with this solution is that you can use third party programs to move the mouse and click the button. However, this is already against the EULA/TOS, and would not be that difficult to recognize if the community helped out, and I think enough of us would.
2. Remove the auto-afk checkbox. At this point, you have to options: 1. after a certain amount of time, you are logged off. 2. You cannot buff nor heal bf/wounds while your status is AFK.
Problems with this: Macros are currently treated like typed commands and therefore keep you active, so the auto-afk would not matter. Also, you can macro /afk to change your status.
3. Make it easier to find live entertainers. As a Master Musician/TKM, I rarely ever have mind buffs because I can't even find live entertainers to buff me and I refuse to visit buffbots. Fixing /register was a huge first step, how about a system to search the entire galaxy for those musicians that /registered? Oh, and the status of AFK should cancel a registration, I don't know if it currently does or not, and not performing for some amount of time (like 5 minutes or so) should cancel registration.
A bit of advice: ignore the whining and moaning of those saying that they need their buffbots for whatever reason. As with anything, when you take away something, people are going to complain. However, as they haven't put up any valid arguments that I've seen, I think they will eventually get used to the new system, and everything will be great again.
Recursive macros should NOT be taken out of the game. When I am playing in a cantina, I am: playing music, (possibly) buffing someone, flourishing, chatting with customers, chatting with other entertainers in my group, chatting with my guild, chatting with friends via tells, and watching system messages to make sure I don't lose a tip message in the flurry of flourish messages (Why does it give you a message about a flourish? Can we not see/hear a difference?). I'm sorry, I don't have time to type /flo n over and over, nor do I wish to hit my function keys over and over. I like macros; I have so many macros it's hard to keep up with all of them, and many are recursive (I’d like a way to specify a specific number of times to perform a macro, but that’s an idea for a different post). Also, entertainers are not the only people that use recursive macros, and I suspect those other people will be fairly upset to log in one day and find that their macros no longer work.
However, I do like several ideas for getting rid of buffbots (none of these are original, although they may have a new twist), and here they are:
1. First of all, instead of anyone in the group automatically being buffed if they are listening, create a command like /setPerformanceGroup to initiate it, and if anyone new comes into the group, the entertainer must reenter the command. Secondly, when the entertainer sets their performance to either an individual or a group, a box comes up (much like the one when you are invited to a group) to ask if you are sure. However, you should be required to click the yes button, and there should be no macroable command for this. The buff does not start until you click yes. The problem with this solution is that you can use third party programs to move the mouse and click the button. However, this is already against the EULA/TOS, and would not be that difficult to recognize if the community helped out, and I think enough of us would.
2. Remove the auto-afk checkbox. At this point, you have to options: 1. after a certain amount of time, you are logged off. 2. You cannot buff nor heal bf/wounds while your status is AFK.
Problems with this: Macros are currently treated like typed commands and therefore keep you active, so the auto-afk would not matter. Also, you can macro /afk to change your status.
3. Make it easier to find live entertainers. As a Master Musician/TKM, I rarely ever have mind buffs because I can't even find live entertainers to buff me and I refuse to visit buffbots. Fixing /register was a huge first step, how about a system to search the entire galaxy for those musicians that /registered? Oh, and the status of AFK should cancel a registration, I don't know if it currently does or not, and not performing for some amount of time (like 5 minutes or so) should cancel registration.
A bit of advice: ignore the whining and moaning of those saying that they need their buffbots for whatever reason. As with anything, when you take away something, people are going to complain. However, as they haven't put up any valid arguments that I've seen, I think they will eventually get used to the new system, and everything will be great again.
Sunjammer
Thu Jan 06, 2005 4:15 pm
#7
Macros don't have to be recursive. Doing away with recursive macros does not mean you'll be forced to type /flourish x by hand for all eternity. If you don't know how to make a non-looping macro, see the thread in the Dancer forum.
Umi
Umi
bcre8iv
Thu Jan 06, 2005 4:44 pm
#8
You're right, they don't have to be recursive, but it's much nicer when they are. Because now, instead of typing a 500 line macro just so I don't have to restart the thing every other minute, I can just type about 20 lines, and it will loop over and over and over again until I tell it to stop. That's nice. And again, I would not mind the infinite loop being taken out, just give us a finite loop. Let us say "do {set of instructions} x times". That'd be even better than the current infinite loop, IMO.
bfgdoom
Thu Jan 06, 2005 5:51 pm
#9
whats the problem? there is not problem.. some play live some dont... somtimes they do both.
sometimes i play live as entertainer, or live as combat or whatever and when i go to sleep i leave it on AFK buff bot for the benifit of tired and weary hunters.
bcre8iv
Thu Jan 06, 2005 6:20 pm
#10
bfgdoom wrote:
whats the problem? there is not problem.. some play live some dont... somtimes they do both.
sometimes i play live as entertainer, or live as combat or whatever and when i go to sleep i leave it on AFK buff bot for the benifit of tired and weary hunters.
While you are in buffbot mode, can you enforce a price for your buffs? No. That means that although you probably do get tips, there are plenty of people getting buffs from you for free. Now, since they can get buffs from you for free, what is their incentive to pay for a buff from the rest of the entertainers that are just logging on when you go afk? None. So how are they supposed to make money? How are they supposed to support themselves? How are they supposed to buy a house and have the fun of decorating it and showing it off to their friends? How are they supposed to have cool clothes to try to entice more customers to watch them? I don't havea problem with you playing however you want to while you are actually playing. But please, if your character is in the game, PLAY!
bfgdoom
Fri Jan 07, 2005 4:00 am
#11
bcre8iv wrote:
bfgdoom wrote:
whats the problem? there is not problem.. some play live some dont... somtimes they do both.
sometimes i play live as entertainer, or live as combat or whatever and when i go to sleep i leave it on AFK buff bot for the benifit of tired and weary hunters.
While you are in buffbot mode, can you enforce a price for your buffs? No. That means that although you probably do get tips, there are plenty of people getting buffs from you for free. Now, since they can get buffs from you for free, what is their incentive to pay for a buff from the rest of the entertainers that are just logging on when you go afk? None. So how are they supposed to make money? How are they supposed to support themselves? How are they supposed to buy a house and have the fun of decorating it and showing it off to their friends? How are they supposed to have cool clothes to try to entice more customers to watch them? I don't havea problem with you playing however you want to while you are actually playing. But please, if your character is in the game, PLAY!
oh i see why some of you hate AFK buff bots now.... never really thought you could make a living at being an entertainer. Thats why I hunt too. SOE made some dumb design choices and the DEVS seem to now even know how we players play the game.
Schardour
Fri Jan 07, 2005 11:29 am
#12
bfgdoom wrote:
...and the DEVS seem to now even know how we players play the game.
They know, and they don't exactlyagree withit. Read up sometime
bfgdoom
Fri Jan 07, 2005 11:46 am
#13
TYPO really big one too... it was late.... I mean to say the DEVS seem NOT to even know how we players play the game.
Schardour wrote:
bfgdoom wrote:
...and the DEVS seem to now even know how we players play the game.
They know, and they don't exactlyagree withit. Read up sometime
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