A Clan Full Of Botters

[Nato101]

Before I begin, I will say this: The worst part about this is that if these botters are grinding CVs, their team is practically guaranteed to lose. Real people playing the game. You are alienating your users by allowing this, WG

 

I've proposed a solution to this issue:
 

Now, people were complaining about a map-hugger, who also shot friendlies apparently. He never replied in chat to either team. I checked him out. Botter. He's a deputy commander. I then went to report him to the commander, but quickly realised that he himself bots.

So, WG, what will be done about this? A whole clan that cheats. The sad part is they do decent damage (in cruisers anyway ), so they're not going to run out of credits. They lose games before they are killed usually.

Spoiler

Your support claims that there are systems in place to detect this, but that appears to be a lie. As I'd said in the linked thread, a simple sweep of your recent data could EASILY solve this issue. The company just chooses not to do this. I guess that inflated server numbers are more important than legitimate. paying players.

This clan should be disbanded and all cheating members banned for at least a week.

Evidence:

1: Straight line experience gains. Gradual increases in damage and XP, as the bots work their way up through the tiers. This particular player is grinding the cruiser line almost exclusively, hence a lack of spikes in the graph.

 

2: Obvious botting. Horrid WR and horrid PR. 201 rating on a CV. These bot can't do CVs, or do it very badly. No human can achieve this low a rating in a CV.

 

3: A lot of people in this clan bot, particularly the high ranking members.

[awiggin]

Been going on since the event started. I even know which clan...

They have been outed repeatedly in the forums and Reddit and in port chat. People have reported them, and nothing seems to be happening...

[Femennenly]

Heyo Captains

Thank you for adhering to the non Name and Shame forum rule.

We do have provisions available to staff to take actions against accounts that we can reasonably conclude to be botting. If you could report the accounts you have found with related replays our staff can definitely investigate.

We do require replays and do no rely on stats alone as there could be players out there who simply are not very good, struggle with controls due to physical limitations or otherwise. We would not want to exclude/punish them from the game for these factors, however it is pretty clear cut on the determination of replays.

Fem,

[WhiteTulip]

1 minute ago, Femennenly said:

Heyo Captains

Thank you for adhering to the non Name and Shame forum rule.

We do have provisions available to staff to take actions against accounts that we can reasonably conclude to be botting. If you could report the accounts you have found with related replays our staff can definitely investigate.

We do require replays and do no rely on stats alone as there could be players out there who simply are not very good, struggle with controls due to physical limitations or otherwise. We would not want to exclude/punish them from the game for these factors, however it is pretty clear cut on the determination of replays.

Fem,

I think I know the answer to this, but: What exactly are "botters".

 

And I don't know the answer to this one: How do you identify them?

 

[Navalpride33]

I've seen a lot of aim bot users in Ranked... Be vigilant boys not every shoot is a "good" shoot.

[Femennenly]

Just now, Grflrgl said:

I think I know the answer to this, but: What exactly are "botters".

And I don't know the answer to this one: How do you identify them?

Botters are accounts using automated programs or scripts to control their accounts to spam games. 

They usually have minimal impact on the game, they can often be seen sailing in a straight line, not firing guns and essentially just going to get killed.

Fem, 

[WhiteTulip]

Just now, Femennenly said:

 

They usually have minimal impact on the game, they can often be seen sailing in a straight line, not firing guns and essentially just going to get killed.

 

Heck, that's in a quarter of my ranked games so far this season.   

[Old_Baldy_One]

1 minute ago, Navalpride33 said:

I've seen a lot of aim bot users in Ranked... Be vigilant boys not every shoot is a "good" shoot.

Any significantly advanced skill is indecipherable from cheating.  Aimbots would likely do more harm than good and even then, RNG rules.

[Daniel_Allan_Clark]

5 minutes ago, Femennenly said:

They usually have minimal impact on the game

Uhrm...they have a major impact on the game...a major negative impact to your fleet performance.

But I think you meant they offer minimal to nonexistent action to the team...

[Nato101]

5 minutes ago, awiggin said:

Been going on since the event started. I even know which clan...

They have been outed repeatedly in the forums and Reddit and in port chat. People have reported them, and nothing seems to be happening...

We exchanged clans and it's not the one he was talking about. So there are MORE clans doing it.

 

 

2 minutes ago, Femennenly said:

Heyo Captains

Thank you for adhering to the non Name and Shame forum rule.

We do have provisions available to staff to take actions against accounts that we can reasonably conclude to be botting. If you could report the accounts you have found with related replays our staff can definitely investigate.

We do require replays and do no rely on stats alone as there could be players out there who simply are not very good, struggle with controls due to physical limitations or otherwise. We would not want to exclude/punish them from the game for these factors, however it is pretty clear cut on the determination of replays.

 Fem,

The issue with this is that if I am on the opposing side, I can't do that. It shouldn't be up to players to do this either. WG need to take a proactive approach. They can't leave it up to the players exclusively.

Another issue is that when a botter plays for weeks on end at an average of 10 to 15 minutes per game, 24 hours a day, it is obvious that it's not a human doing it. But these things are allowed. Again, a data sweep can fix this.

I've suggested the maths question popup every X amount of games. This approach would massively reduce the impact of botting. When the human is sleeping, for example.

In addition to that, I have seen ZERO evidence that WG does anything about reported botting accounts. Quite the opposite, actually. Players have no confidence that anything will be done, they won't even bother wasting time submitting replays.

WG could implement an internal app where staff could join and supervise games of reported botters, rather than relying on replays.

[Halonut24]

Botting makes very little sense to me. In Randoms, I could possibly understand botting a tech tree ship to essentially face-plant to tier X, but I see Tier X ships botting (I know this because they immediately sail to the map border right behind them and never leave). In ranked to farm stars and steel, I can sort of see why, but it's still pretty lazy. What's the point of botting a game you never actually play?

May have to peruse around reddit to find the clan in question, just to keep an eye out for them in case I get one in one of my battles to do my part in getting them out of here.

[Nato101]

8 minutes ago, Femennenly said:

Botters are accounts using automated programs or scripts to control their accounts to spam games. 

They usually have minimal impact on the game, they can often be seen sailing in a straight line, not firing guns and essentially just going to get killed.

Fem, 

I'd say that they have the BIGGEST impact on the game, and their WR reflects that. They impact everyone else's game in a massively negative manner, especially if they are the top tier in the match. And moreso if they are a CV. If they CV, their team has an extremely small chance of winning.

These bots hug the edge and fire on targets. They're not 'dumb' bots. They do damage. But that's when the other team sails to them, when it's too late for the damage to matter.

[Navalpride33]

18 minutes ago, Old_Baldy_One said:

Any significantly advanced skill is indecipherable from cheating.  Aimbots would likely do more harm than good and even then, RNG rules. 

Oh I know. Aim bot on the client side has been on the raise in the last quarter.... I even called them out on it in chat, usually its the stat paddlers who are must suspect for using aim bots.

My hypnosis, the OP the ship, that more people will use aim bots on it.

[Forum_Troll]

4 minutes ago, Navalpride33 said:

Oh I know. Aim bot on the client side has been on the raise in he last quarter.... I even called them out on it in chat, usually its the stat paddlers who are must suspect for using aim bots.

My hypnosis, the OP the ship, that more people will use aim bots on it.

Sadly stat padding is what gives you the most points.  They need to effectively overhaul, spotting, objective, potential play.  If you make caps the most important thing to play around, people would be forced to move up to the cap to get the points.  Those passive BB's in the back would be bottom of the score card and aimbotting isn't going to really help at 12km or less.

[Asym_KS]

18 minutes ago, Femennenly said:

Botters are accounts using automated programs or scripts to control their accounts to spam games. 

They usually have minimal impact on the game, they can often be seen sailing in a straight line, not firing guns and essentially just going to get killed.

Fem, 

That sounds like the average "rental ship" in the ranked battles I fought in????  Straight line, runs into islands in their way, die's shooting the Island......  Were they bots then?  We even had a CV that sailed into a corner and just sat there....  Believe it or not, we lost that match !

What happens when your programmable mouse loses control and you ship "just runs on the Azimith last used" until you die or an Island stops you???  How would you tell the difference ?   Number of games?  Just curious because I play one-handed and being a potato sometimes seems "bot like"....

Could WG post a replay of this so the rest of us that have never seen it in a match, have the chance to see what real, rules violating Botting looks like.....

[Toxic_Potato]

Astounding that cheats are allowed back.  More worried about forum post content than cheating and hacks. 

My main source of news is players.

WOW!

 

[Burnsy]

Just now, Toxic_Potato said:

Astounding that cheats are allowed back. 

I don't think that is currently or ever was the case.

[Nato101]

3 minutes ago, Asym_KS said:

That sounds like the average "rental ship" in the ranked battles I fought in????  Straight line, runs into islands in their way, die's shooting the Island......  Were they bots then?  We even had a CV that sailed into a corner and just sat there....  Believe it or not, we lost that match !

 What happens when your programmable mouse loses control and you ship "just runs on the Azimith last used" until you die or an Island stops you???  How would you tell the difference ?   Number of games?  Just curious because I play one-handed and being a potato sometimes seems "bot like"....

Could WG post a replay of this so the rest of us that have never seen it in a match, have the chance to see what real, rules violating Botting looks like.....

Dumb bots sail and do nothing as you described, running into islands and such.

Smart bots hug the edge of the map and shoot targets when they come into range.

Smarter bots, well, they'd be harder to spot.

[Nato101]

1 minute ago, Burnsy said:

I don't think that is currently or ever was the case.

It was a while ago, but I reported a bot, WG said action was taken. I then ran into the same bot again. So I wouldn't be so sure.

[Kizarvexis]

25 minutes ago, Nato101 said:

The issue with this is that if I am on the opposing side, I can't do that. It shouldn't be up to players to do this either. WG need to take a proactive approach. They can't leave it up to the players exclusively.

Another issue is that when a botter plays for weeks on end at an average of 10 to 15 minutes per game, 24 hours a day, it is obvious that it's not a human doing it. But these things are allowed. Again, a data sweep can fix this.

I've suggested the maths question popup every X amount of games. This approach would massively reduce the impact of botting. When the human is sleeping, for example.

In addition to that, I have seen ZERO evidence that WG does anything about reported botting accounts. Quite the opposite, actually. Players have no confidence that anything will be done, they won't even bother wasting time submitting replays.

WG could implement an internal app where staff could join and supervise games of reported botters, rather than relying on replays.

Almost 40,000 unique accounts play every day. Since not everyone plays every day, it's not out of the realm of possibility that there are 100,000 or more unique players at any one time.

 

I'm not a millionaire and I bet you are not too, so I would rather not have WG get to far involved in trying to personally vet that many accounts.

[Burnsy]

11 minutes ago, Nato101 said:

It was a while ago, but I reported a bot, WG said action was taken. I then ran into the same bot again. So I wouldn't be so sure.

It has never been the case, that I am aware of, that cheats were "allowed" in this game.

[Nato101]

37 minutes ago, Femennenly said:

Heyo Captains

Thank you for adhering to the non Name and Shame forum rule.

We do have provisions available to staff to take actions against accounts that we can reasonably conclude to be botting. If you could report the accounts you have found with related replays our staff can definitely investigate.

We do require replays and do no rely on stats alone as there could be players out there who simply are not very good, struggle with controls due to physical limitations or otherwise. We would not want to exclude/punish them from the game for these factors, however it is pretty clear cut on the determination of replays.

Fem,

Another course of action, which would avoid striking real people in a sweep of the data:

1: Implement a hidden feature in a future patch. The playing area turns black at the start of the match. A random key is assigned to make it go away. Text is displayed, reading "Press key X to restore the screen". People will press the key and the black overlay will disappear. Next to no impact on their gaming experience. Bots won't be impacted at all. They rely on data, not visual analysis. Bots will continue playing without pressing the button. The overlay will remain. Impossible to play without seeing what you're doing. But bots will continue playing. Extremely easy to detect bots this way.
2: Flag accounts in a data sweep and apply this hidden feature to their accounts.
3: The feature should trigger after 30 continous games have been played in a row, so as to avoid having the human see this and unflag their accounts. It should happen multiple times to the same account.

[DrHolmes52]

2 minutes ago, Burnsy said:

It has never been the case, that I am aware of, that cheats were "allowed" in this game.

I think he means caught botters not being permabanned (thus being allowed) back in.

[Burnsy]

2 minutes ago, Nato101 said:

They rely on data, not visual analysis.

Incorrect.

There are tools that exist for other games that are not considered cheats per the game's EULA and are simply mods, that take screen prints and read them just fine. 

Elite: Dangerous for example has a massive in game market.  There are well known tools that use screen captured data to back fill the player's local database of market data.

[Nato101]

9 minutes ago, Kizarvexis said:

Almost 40,000 unique accounts play every day. Since not everyone plays every day, it's not out of the realm of possibility that there are 100,000 or more unique players at any one time.

 

I'm not a millionaire and I bet you are not too, so I would rather not have WG get to far involved in trying to personally vet that many accounts.

All this requires is an SQL query. It's really not hard, nor resource intensive, compared to running the actual game servers, for example.

If 3rd party websites such as wows-numbers can maintain and compile stats for free, you best bet that the actual game company is well capable of doing it with the most minimal of impacts.

 

1 minute ago, DrHolmes52 said:

I think he means caught botters not being permabanned (thus being allowed) back in.

It was less than 24 hours if i recall correctly.