Tree of Savior Forum

The thing that Killed RO and will kill ToS (at this rate)

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#1

Bots, bots and bots.
When there is no punishment for using them it becomes a need…RO reached a certain point were you were obligated to use multiple bots in order to stay competitive. And that’s how every MMO ends up without proper punishments and control for bots.
RO, at least, managed to survive some years with low population of botters before falling into the pits of hell…but in ToS we are seeing an increasing amount of bots even on the closed beta phase…so I cant even imagine how far this is going to get at release at this rate.

So, IMC, please…put a line in the terms of service to forbid this (now it’s completely legal to do it!) and add an in-game option to easily report them before it’s too late.

4 Likes
#2

Its closed beta theres no anti cheat system implemented, the staff is busy bug hunting cant complain much, it is against the ToS but who gonna obey it? Cheaters are aways cheaters no matter what you say, lame people that is, i dont doubt they start selling their account access to others on ebay or something after sometime, even tho its a 1 month test lol.

3 Likes
#3

The problem is not so much with bots, as it is with macros (there is a HUGE difference here - bots have an AI whereas macros do not).

Everything you are seeing in beta is macros (or more-likely, people just placing an object on their Z key). This type of macroing is relatively easy for IMC to stop. A few suggestions (ranked in order of better->worse IMO):

  • remove fixed spawn points (like with the Big Red Kepa, the areas in Mausoleum Chapel, and many less common areas)

  • prevent players from attacking consecutively in a small (i.e 20x20 cell) area (to prevent someone just adding small position movements to their macro). This can be done by spawning the grim-reaper or other strong enemy for a short period of time, or some other creative system

  • add a penalty for attacking or casting a skill that misses an enemy (reduced damage for your next attack, or increased durability loss)

4 Likes
#4

Definitely agree with changing fixed spawn points to random… This would be simple to do.

7 Likes
#5

I think thats the best solution to sitting+Z thingy (I’m aware thats not a bot tho, on tht OP I’m talking about REAL scripted bots that are becoming a thing). BUT it’s not as easy as it sounds, since you have to properly flag spawnable and not-spawnable areas of each map(other way mobs will just end up spawning outside boundaries and the map will be empty after a few minutes).

1 Like
#6

No the reason RO died was because all the changes Gravity did to it. They changed the old stats system to a new one where STR was useless for knights or any melee character. Stats did not have an effect on the bonus for weapons.
They made changes to how you get exp so you can’t power level in the game anymore even when you have the proper gear to do so, power level is when just have the bare minimum to kill monsters giving far more exp than lower level. It also made so you had to go to areas around the same level as you for normal exp. Majority of the skills got worse.

In short they had a unique game, they decided it was a bad thing and made it to standard korean mmo and now doesn’t stand out at all in the MMO market.

As for the bot problem is most likely that it takes so much kills to even go up a level. Even at low level. At least those exp scroll reduce that timer. But once those quests run out its a massive time sink to next level.

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#7

Botting in RO was actually one of the few things that helped the economy in RO. It made cards plentiful enough to be purchased by the majority of players.

Or were you going to sit in front of a computer and farm 4 peco peco egg cards at a 1/10000 drop rate?

Botting matters less when the rewards in the game are easily achievable without botting. Since it is a free to play game, you can expect that botting will be rampant. At least with games behind a pay-wall, you can ban people and have it actually mean something.

1 Like
#8

Sorry, but I think that’s a dumb reason to support bots. Whats the point of rare items if everyone has one? Also if you are lucky enough to find a rare item, it wont be nearly as valuable if the market is saturated with them from bots.

Grinding all day to get to a high level? Your achievement won’t be nearly as satisfying when you realize bots accomplish the same thing in your sleep.

Need a good place to grind xp and items? Sorry, areas full of bots. Can’t come back later either since bots don’t sleep. By the way those items you wanted are worthless cuz bots farmed 10k of them.

Bots are never a good idea. They ruin games. Greedy/lazy people that don’t care about the game bot.

4 Likes
#9

I can’t beleive people will pay for a game that gives you a 1/10000 drop rate. what would be the point?

#10

I wasn’t supporting bots, heck I was the guy in RO betas putting warp portals underneath them to send them to petites land.

They did reduce the prices of rare items that no one wanted to farm. Peco Eggs being the perfect example, it was mind numbing boredom to grind for a 1/10000 drop. The game was practically begging for botters to come.

All you need to do to avoid botters from ruining the econ, is to put the best of items behind doors that bots cant easily open. Trying to stop people from botting in a free to play game is like trying to stop the weather.

3 Likes
#11

If only i got a key instead of those botters! D:<

#12

Well if you really do not want bots in a game suggest a trade restrict unless your a member.

this way they will have to pay to bot and if they get caught and reported they will have to pay more to bot again.

Tho the downside is you can not trade ANYTHING to ANYONE unless your a member or VIP or what ever.
This is how some games did to prevent a large numbers of bots.

But you may still buy from players if they implant marketing where players can make a personal shop.

#13

I was actually a developer on openKore and a certain Lineage 2 bot and I have helped with anti-bot measures too. This game currently fails at the most basic of measure’s though which is ensuring that content can actually kill a fully afk person who is just auto attacking. I’ve seen archer’s in kneel shot with a macro pushing “z” (while tanking 10+ mobs no less cuz mobs do no damage in this game) and there is no way that can be against the ToS (afk farming can be but macro use in keyboards/mice is common and punishing it’s use is just a big no).

My immediate strategy would be:

  • Reworking companions completely. Firstly they go away when dead or out of stamina. Secondly they should require player input to attack, even if it’s pushing an “aggressive mode” button.

  • Addition of a second type of “stamina tree” which gives a 100% attack/matk debuff when killed, respawns in the exact same spot unless it goes unkilled for 10+ minutes. It’s also super important that this “mob’s” data is randomized (such as mobid and whatnot).

  • Some solution to the games auto targeting. I can’t provide a good suggestion here but auto targeting/tab targeting is the biggest enabler of simple macro/autohotkey bots.

  • A right click report system which places a non-intrusive captcha on the side of the screen with a 2 minute timer (does not interrupt combat or controls, cannot be triggered more than once per hour. Obviously this system needs to detect if the person in question has input any commands 10s or so prior to the report so afk people can’t be trolled. Could also have a report weighting where as multiple false reports compared to positive reports effect the value of the report. Usually the effect of this method is being put on a watch list with your naming going up the list as you fail more captcha.

  • Server and Client side anti-cheat. Specifically .dll injection detection

  • Actively search for and create anti-bot methods for popular bots and yes pay the damn $10 to download that paid bot and see how it ticks.

These are all common methods of prevention that curb macro/autohotkey use but won’t stop any real bots. Actual bots have to be stopped proactively by searching for them and programming active countermeasures. This is actually seldom done and often the bot programmer can same day patch around it anyways (in openkore we dealt with this pretty much every patch).

The other problem is Free2Play. Banning botters use to be a great deterrent at $30-$75 a pop but nowadays you just bot 8-16 accounts with VPN/Winbox and keep your main on a separate IP.

In the end you won’t stop the best botters using private bots but you can make it extremely unsavory to the general population as well as keeping high level bots at bay since those running mass bots will have to deal with them constantly getting banned.

TL;DR: The only real way to stop botting is to create gameplay that cannot be botted. 90% of bots can be dettered with the above suggestions though and fear of ban is a huge detterent which is why I strongly support publicizing your bans. (Not names just numbers and when it happens).

11 Likes
#14

Insightful read. Cheers and I hope the developers take note of the points you’ve mentioned.

#15

I encountered that big red keppa I thought it was bot program coz they do not respond

#16

You sir, said many trues there. I truly hope IMC reads your post.

#17

I find it sad that during a beta there’s people setting up macro’s to spam attack spells and stand where monsters spawn. But I’m sure they will do something about the bots a report feature for bots would be a good idea maybe too for release cause then when you see some suspecious activity you can put in a report ticket and get it reviewed without having to screenshot it and send it in after. Because any anti-bot / hack system will never completely get rid of people botting or hacking but having tools to report people faster would be beneficial.

#18

LOL, really? Talking about bots? Maybe their are some bots, but most of the so called “bots” are acutally macro users. The respawn is already random somehow, because the monster have to be killed in a specific area to respawn. If the respawn were completly random than I wish you a lot of fun for grinding with normal exp-rates… it will annoy you like hell if you have to run over a whole map to search for monster and you will do it for hours and hours and hours. If their were no auto-targeting how should an archer class be able to play in any normal way without a mouse? Tab isn’t sufficent in this game.
Sure using a macro isn’t the way it should be, but is there any difference if someone holds down the button on a controller and moving the stick in circles while watching tv? Sorry but I don’t thing so.

1 Like
#19

dunno…I left RO entirely because of the bots, back in the day.
In fact, I stopped paying the monthly fee and started playing illegal private servers, because there was bot control there and my efforts to lvl up and get items were actually worth something there which is completly ridiculous…the overall experience with the game was better at illegal private servers than the real thing…

#20

I reccomend making a thread dedicated to this subject to increase the noticability of it towards IMC Games staff.