Macro Useage

[StarSeekerVDS]

Ugh. What an ugly topic.

My suggestion: make both macros and dual-boxing something that you need to register with a GM, and the GM--if you're disrupting others' gameplay--can ask you to move or log you off. Ban those who do not register with the GM.

[garblesoup]

Ugh. What an ugly topic.

My suggestion: make both macros and dual-boxing something that you need to register with a GM, and the GM--if you're disrupting others' gameplay--can ask you to move or log you off. Ban those who do not register with the GM.

Probably even better if we just require everyone to play with a GM at their side. At login you would be held in a starting base or sector, your name would go in a queue, and then eventually when a GM was available you would be released to go out and play. Obviously if there was a GM:Player ratio shortage your gameplay time would also need to have certain severe limits on it so that others could get their gameplay time.

Hey, if we limit it so that there could never be more than one player active in the game then we would be sure that nobody was getting "advantages" over other players! Problem, whatever that problem is, solved.

[Mortabis]

You know, you're right. Come to think of it, what about people that have better computers than you? Faster processors, better vidcards, better ISP connections? We know that ppl with bad ISP conn's are more likely to CTD/GTD - simply unfair. I demand that we put a cap on all PC equipment and ISP connections and require everyone to play down to the lowest common denominator - anything else is "unfair". What about those people that have more free time than others? They are able to spend more time in-game and get "advantages" over other players with less free time (or RL's). Also unfair! We need a cap on maximum time in-game/per day to level the playing field!

Ohhh, and don't get me started on those people that are . . . young! I hear they can read the default text color in General and never have to fiddle with the /setcolor command - that's really unfair.

Well, Its hard to come up with a solution that will please everyone. Company's that make MMORPG's have been trying for years to solve the imbalance problems you listed, and for the most part they have, for instance rested XP in wow. Company's are also designing new games so that they are highly resistant to lag and can run virtually on any machine. This helps level the playing field in that area. But as the company does its part.

Then so must the end-user, and this is where real life comes in. Its not the company's responsibility to manage your unstable internet connection, nor is it their responsibility to manage the power of your machine, if a game comes out and its requirements are greater than what your computer is capable of doing. Its your job to fix that, if your internet connection sucks then its your job to fix that as well. If real life limits your play time you either adjust it or suck it up. If you can't well then you just don't play the game and thats life.

[StarSeekerVDS]

Probably even better if we just require everyone to play with a GM at their side. At login you would be held in a starting base or sector, your name would go in a queue, and then eventually when a GM was available you would be released to go out and play. Obviously if there was a GM:Player ratio shortage your gameplay time would also need to have certain severe limits on it so that others could get their gameplay time.

Hey, if we limit it so that there could never be more than one player active in the game then we would be sure that nobody was getting "advantages" over other players! Problem, whatever that problem is, solved.

Sarcasm aside, I was talking about macros and multiboxing being a potential unnecessary disruption of other players' gameplay (e.g. by farming an area into uselessness), not "advantages". If someone has more money or time they will get ahead in an MMO despite practically any attempt to level the playing field. That doesn't mean one has to invite even more unfair play.

[bondct]

since i always have to play devils advocate (well most of the time)... you are forgetting two other things... and to a certain extent it does not apply here cuz we dont pay to play... but a company makes more money when people have multiple accounts so they will tolerate that to the extent that there profit margin will allow and not care about the players whatsoever (so long as profits are good)...

and there is one other thing you are forgetting... freedom, and personal preference... maybe someone likes the challenge of playing 2 accounts at once... who are you to tell them what they like... I am referring to gamers playing for fun (not profit like chinese farmers)... that like to play two accounts at once... if you want to tell a person what they like and dont like your in the wrong country... your free to say it here... and we are free to tell you where to stick it which takes this post back a few pages where i declared it a no win argument...

it is my opinion that the devs will most likely never restrict people to one account or moderate attended macro use and never punish with impunity for it... you may not agree... but this is a video game... take a look at some laws that exsist in real life and then figure out where this debate can go

google strange laws and you will find 1,000's of REAL EXSISTING laws that you cant believe

In Fla, its' illegal for more than 5 women live in a house cuz its considered a brothel

Women may go topless in public, providing it is not being used as a business.

You may not smoke within 100 feet of the entrance to a public building.

It is illegal for a woman to be on the street wearing “body hugging clothing”.

Citizens may not greet each other by “putting one’s thumb to the nose and wiggling the fingers”.

A fine of $25 can be levied for flirting.

It is against the law to throw a ball at someone’s head for fun.

The penalty for jumping off a building is death.

New Yorkers cannot dissolve a marriage for irreconcilable differences, unless they both agree to it.

[StarSeekerVDS]

since i always have to play devils advocate (well most of the time)... you are forgetting two other things... and to a certain extent it does not apply here cuz we dont pay to play... but a company makes more money when people have multiple accounts so they will tolerate that to the extent that there profit margin will allow and not care about the players whatsoever (so long as profits are good)...

and there is one other thing you are forgetting... freedom, and personal preference... maybe someone likes the challenge of playing 2 accounts at once... who are you to tell them what they like... I am referring to gamers playing for fun (not profit like chinese farmers)... that like to play two accounts at once... if you want to tell a person what they like and dont like your in the wrong country... your free to say it here... and we are free to tell you where to stick it which takes this post back a few pages where i declared it a no win argument...

it is my opinion that the devs will most likely never restrict people to one account or moderate attended macro use and never punish with impunity for it... you may not agree... but this is a video game... take a look at some laws that exsist in real life and then figure out where this debate can go

Personally, I don't care a whole lot what other people are doing in game. My suggestion was just a balanced approach to the "allow macros"/"ban macros" debate contained herein. But if this team isn't making money off accounts, your argument about tolerating multiboxing is irrelevant--in fact, more to the point, multiboxing and macroing is contrary to the team's interests because bandwidth is rather less than, say, EA would have available--why allow it to be wasted?

"Freedom" is irrelevant too. There is no freedom on a private server: the administration decides your rights. Even if I were an admin, I wouldn't claim to be "telling people what they like", I'd be telling them what they can and cannot do with my resources (or resources that I am entrusted with monitoring, if I were not the owner thereof), and if they didn't like it they could stick it wherever they liked. "It's a free country" (debatable anyway) is an utterly meaningless statement on a privately-run server.

I really don't think the team should punish either behavior in and of itself. But if it comes to a point where other players are disrupted by it, then action may be necessary. It would be wise to have a procedure in place to determine the moderation rules. My suggestion was only one possibility. (Others include outright banning of macros--which is typical for the industry, WoW notwithstanding.)

I don't care if someone is multiboxing.

[Mortabis]

since i always have to play devils advocate (well most of the time)... you are forgetting two other things... and to a certain extent it does not apply here cuz we dont pay to play... but a company makes more money when people have multiple accounts so they will tolerate that to the extent that there profit margin will allow and not care about the players whatsoever (so long as profits are good)...

and there is one other thing you are forgetting... freedom, and personal preference... maybe someone likes the challenge of playing 2 accounts at once... who are you to tell them what they like... I am referring to gamers playing for fun (not profit like chinese farmers)... that like to play two accounts at once... if you want to tell a person what they like and dont like your in the wrong country... your free to say it here... and we are free to tell you where to stick it which takes this post back a few pages where i declared it a no win argument..

I allready covered the use of multi-boxing in pay to play games in a previous post, companys would be insane not to allow it. BUT under the current situation of this game being free to play with a limited player base, account usage should be limited to no more than 2 accounts per registered user. AT least while we are in pre-alpha pre-beta testing phases.

In America, Freedoms in the real world are dictated by government and constitution. In the virtual world of MMORPG's, freedoms are dictated by the administration and the EULA. Trying to compare freedoms in the real world with freedoms in the game world is pointless, games are nothing like the real world and thats why we play them. The rest of what you said about ridiculous laws in the real world is thus irrelevant.

[Tienbau]

"Frrrrrreeeeeddooooommmmm!!!"

talking of "Freedom" I'd like to see a 'Braveheart: the Prequel" movie made which shows how 2000 years of the Scots sending pillaging/raping/torching parties into northern England is bound to tick people off eventually and provoke them to finally do something about it ... ie giving the red-headed kilt wearing buggers a taste of their own medicine and bringing them into line. Oh, and then they whine about it ... jeez, what did you expect eh? Turning the other cheek?

ahem ... Sorry, I enjoyed the actual movie for entertainment value but when a foreigner said 'doesn't that make you ashamed to be English' I had to fill them in on the previous few 1000 years and what the Scots had been up to in the lead up.

At the moment I guess you could say we are in a transition phase between alpha and beta because we certainly have a playable server but there are still a lot of issues with it. I'll post up a 'now we're in beta' checklist which we have to fulfil before I think we're actually in beta.

I personally don't have any issues with macro-ers right now because at the very least it means there's more clients connecting into the game and it's getting tested. When we finally reach the heady heights of beta it'd be nice to actually reach a fair ground so that macro-ing will still be fine, but it won't put you at any advantage over a playing person (in fact, at a disadvantage).

The only 'fair' way of dealing with macros really is to design the game so that a human player will always be able to get more experience, and the approach where XP gradually tails off after a few hours of play time. Then people who want to macro can still do so to their heart's content but their XP will actually rise more slowly than players who are present. We'll have dynamic events that macro'd ships won't be able to take advantage of as well.

[Guest Guest]

Gee Jarod want me to upload my macros to you so you can level the playing field?

Vote "Jarod" for dictator of the world!

Hey un-named macro user, post up some of your macros, I wanna see how they work

[bondct]

In America, Freedoms in the real world are dictated by government and constitution. In the virtual world of MMORPG's, freedoms are dictated by the administration and the EULA.

umm yeah well not sure what country you live in or what your political beliefs are... but its not really freedom if its DICTATED.... thats called a DICTATORSHIP but it does explain your point of views

[Mortabis]

umm yeah well not sure what country you live in or what your political beliefs are... but its not really freedom if its DICTATED.... thats called a DICTATORSHIP but it does explain your point of views

dic·tate

v. dic·tat·ed, dic·tat·ing, dic·tates

v.tr.

1. To say or read aloud to be recorded or written by another: dictate a letter.

2.

a. To prescribe with authority; impose: dictated the rules of the game.

b. To control or command: "Foreign leaders were . . . dictated by their own circumstances, bound by the universal imperatives of politics" (Doris Kearns Goodwin).

There is the definition for dictate, I guess I could have used another word, imposed, prescribed or ordained. But these verbs all mean the same thing which is to set forth expressly and authoritatively. And to say that any rules are not set forth expressly and authoritatively says that there are no rules at all.

I feel by allowing macros and multi-boxing now, gives people a green light to continue to do so in the future. It doesn't take long for macros to turn into scripts and scripts into full fledged bots. BUT if the use of macros is going to be allowed, perhaps the developer's can incorperate the use into the game, this way the developer's will always be able to govern and dictate what can be done with said macros. With that being said, a autopilot feature would be really:Dice

As for multi-boxing I still firmly believe that it should be strictly limited to 2 accounts per registered user. At least while the player base is so low. Perhaps the limit could be increased as the player base grows eventually leading up to 5 accounts. Nothing agitate's me more than going to farm a specific mob only to see it camped by a single player party of multi-box'ed accounts, AND if its a problem now it will only be worse in live.

The only 'fair' way of dealing with macros really is to design the game so that a human player will always be able to get more experience, and the approach where XP gradually tails off after a few hours of play time.

This sounds like a good way of dealing with the problem, but a easy work around would be to create a macro that log's out and then back in to reset the timer, if the timer is character restricted the macro could be set to choose another character, or if account restricted could choose another account, rinse and repeat. All the time and work you put into the code would then in fact be useless. I also imagine it would be kinda difficult to determine wether or not the character being played is actually human or not without incorporating the macro into the game itself. Also, it seems that you where referring to non-attended macro's(borderline bots), what about a person that is actually at their computer using a attended macro? This brings me back to what I said above, if macro's are going to be allowed. I feel as though they should be incorporated into the game so the developer's can govern and dictate how they are used.

Also, what do you mean by dynamic content? It sounds really interesting an;)fun

[StarSeekerVDS]

Avani: so the substance of your argument is that if the team were to dictate rules it would be violating your freedom, and this would be unAmerican?

ROFL

I really hope you're still playing devil's advocate, because that's just warped.

[Tienbau]

I think the eventual aim is that it shouldn't matter if you bot or not. If you do, you won't get to see any of the interesting stuff that'll be happening, or your bot will get you caught up in it in a way you don't like. If you don't bot, you will level up faster for the game time you play.

I'm aware a bot could log in and out to 'circumvent' the XP tail off, but by doing so they're removing their advantage (low grade XP over a long time), so that's ok - they'd still never be advancing as well as a player who is playing the game and paying attention.

I don't have anything against bots at all, especially during this stage - if bots = extra clients connected then we're all winners. I just want to ensure that botted chars aren't at an advantage over players who're doing their thing. Some quests do promote botting - eg 'find me 495 units of Unobtainium Ore'. These are our paid-MMO roots, and I don't think we can shake them. Sometimes it's good - for an 'uber' high level item a protracted search quest can make the final reward that much sweeter, but sometimes that goes too far - I read what you needed for the level 7 solar sail, it looked like a nightmare!

This incarnation of E&B we have some dedicated content/story people who like most of us playing live wanted to see more things happening, have had a chance to think about what SHOULD have happened and now they have a chance to actually do that and see it happening - without being throttled by the constraints that the original story devs had been.

[StarSeekerVDS]

One simple solution would be to just make it so XP gain is much higher quest-based, with jobs being only supplementary or perhaps only useful at certain specific level bands.

As for dynamic bot-slappers for mining-bots... why not just have the occasional asskickmob wander by on a path whose navs are set every few minutes by the positions of the players themselves? It patrols around in a circle to go mess up players currently located in asteroid fields or what have you, moving slowly enough that any human player will be able to evade--hell, let it be a global announcement. If you're unattended-botting it beats the crap out of you when it comes around to your nav. And yet it doesn't prohibit botting--a smart player would just change fields regularly.

Edited January 8, 2010 by Slayerman
Censoring bad language

[garblesoup]

<deleted>

May I respectfully request that we please keep the language on the boards at the same level it is requested to be in-game? Thanks.

[StarSeekerVDS]

1. There shall be no profanity in character names.

Mneme, Aoide, Melete, Aia, Xyan... Check.

2. There shall be no excessive profanity in-game or in any system sponsored by Net 7 Entertainment, regardless of language or special characters used.

Check.

4. You may not harass, threaten, or otherwise show belligerent behavior towards other players.

Check.

5. You may not use any sexually explicit, harmful, threatening, abusive, defamatory, obscene, hateful, racially or ethnically offensive language.

Check, check, check, check, check, debatable, check, check, check.

My bad. I'll keep it in mind. Can we return to discussion of the topic rather than unnecessary sniping?

[Tienbau]

I think it's a negative to specifically design anti-bot elements. We should design the game so that players using botting will progress but not as fast as a human player, who can take advantage of situations arising. Sometimes a player might not want to have to think, I sometimes log in just to mine a few fields dry and then go off and do something else, it's therapeutic to mine sometimes!

[AZwoodman]

I don't personaly use macros, BUT if dual boxing is allowed then so should the use of macros. If you are talking about a unfair advantage overall, someone who has between 2 or 5 accounts creating their own partys and such is far worse than a single player using attended macros to do trade runs... IMO if your going to ban the use of macros then also ban the use of dual accounts.

I dual and triple box when I can. I would join a guild if I could but I play when I can and don't like beging told when I HAVE to be on line. All my on line games have been dual boxed and I am more then happy to pay for that. ENB before sunset (3 accounts) , EVE (3 accounts)(Uinited Space Alliance)and now ENB sunraise(3 accounts). I have no problem paying for this. I don't bother any one just want to have fun.

ps IS THE PAY PAL LINK UP YET?

[Whitelighter]

Since this seems to be discussed here anyways I want to ask something:

What is preventing dual-logging clients? I know its something about how the client/game connect but I don't know much about it past that. I'd love to be able to dual-log (if nothing else it makes using a storage char so much easier) since I don't have 2 computers anymore. Someone care to take a few minutes and give me a rundown on this?

EDIT: I'm reffering to logging in 2 clients on 1 computer incase it wasn't really clear.

[Guest Guest]

I think it's a negative to specifically design anti-bot elements. We should design the game so that players using botting will progress but not as fast as a human player, who can take advantage of situations arising. Sometimes a player might not want to have to think, I sometimes log in just to mine a few fields dry and then go off and do something else, it's therapeutic to mine sometimes!

Its good to know that the devs have an open mind to different play styles used by players. Thats what makes a game fun for EVERYONE.

I would never upload my macros to anyone. Why? Because you would use them for self gain. Like I said before, I enjoy making MY macros. I enjoy watching my toon run the macros and tweaking them to do silly things that amuse ME.

Want a macro? Build your own! You might find you enjoyed that just as much if not more than playing the game and you could possibly learn something from the experience.

Some of you have forgotten the fact that this is a stress test. Multi-boxers are doing more to help the devs find problems then a single boxer. Not even going to try to explain why. A toon running a macro is doing more to stress the server than you are by standing around chatting all day. A toon running an attended macro is probably more capable of finding a bug than you are.

If I were a dev on this project, I would have an assortment of macros to help me track down problems. A well written macro can find problems and report back to the dev weather its attended or not.

No I am not afraid of any of you. Why would I be? Why do I not use my real name? Because some of you are living in the dark ages and I don't want you flaming someone just because they are a friend of mine (and you know you would). Like I said before, "Its like being Jewish living in Nazi Germany during WWII". Look at yourselves.

[Toreava]

I've always been fortunate enough to be able to learn most anything I’ve wanted to learn. Gaming has never been my thing. Earth & Beyond was my first online, multiplayer game that ever held my interest. I tried a few games after it set, and I never played them more than a week.

But botting? I can't understand it. The nuances and artistry of this game is what draws me. Okay – so the lower levels are limiting, but it makes finding a way to move freely (without dying every ten minutes) throughout the game so much sweeter. Figuring out what I need to have and to do in order to expand my capabilities in the game engages me in ways I love.

A person once accused me of botting while mining, and it was almost a compliment. I've called mining a dance. It's often why I seek places out of the way to mine. But I’ve never botted nor learned how to bot.

I get – to some extent – why people bot. But what they don't get is satisfaction of accomplishing what I and others do by paying attention to the game. It is why I am so solitary in the process most of the time. There is so much to learn.

The problem with a bot is that you can't teach it manners. It does what it does because it has the interest of account in its programming. It does not care about the efforts of others – bot or not – and it does not care if it rips others off. And botting does, to a certain extent, interfere with real players – yes, I said real players.

I enter the world of Earth & Beyond to see the artistry of the process and the visual beauty I see in the improvements being made. There are times the things I see stun me enough to stop my breath. Perhaps if more people stop, to quote a cliché, to smell the roses, they'd be less likely to bot. They're missing so much of the process in general.

I do think that people should be limited in how many accounts they should have. I've seen how people running several accounts off of several computers can inhibit and control a solitary player like me. It stinks. And that is the intent – to inhibit other players' play – to beat them out – to get more than someone else. It is to overwhelm the field of play.

But perhaps if those of us who do believe in the hands-on approach get together more often, botting and using the game as some sort of tool to bolster one's self esteem will lose its taste – especially if the intent is to become far more skilled in what each individual contributes to the group in such a way that multitaskers are the ones who are overwhelmed.

I am, indeed, one of those people who has more time to play. But I guarantee you you would not like to have more time to play because of my reasons. I’d trade places with you any day. So don’t be so quick to wish you were like me. I’d much rather spend my day accomplishing the things you accomplish rather than living in a make-believe world to pass my time.

[StarSeekerVDS]

No I am not afraid of any of you. Why would I be? Why do I not use my real name? Because some of you are living in the dark ages and I don't want you flaming someone just because they are a friend of mine (and you know you would). Like I said before, "Its like being Jewish living in Nazi Germany during WWII". Look at yourselves.

*is Jewish* Nice.

Nice nonsensical rant. What are you smoking anyway? Mothballs?

[garblesoup]

1. There shall be no profanity in character names.

Mneme, Aoide, Melete, Aia, Xyan... Check.

2. There shall be no excessive profanity in-game or in any system sponsored by Net 7 Entertainment, regardless of language or special characters used.

Check.

4. You may not harass, threaten, or otherwise show belligerent behavior towards other players.

Check.

5. You may not use any sexually explicit, harmful, threatening, abusive, defamatory, obscene, hateful, racially or ethnically offensive language.

Check, check, check, check, check, debatable, check, check, check.

My bad. I'll keep it in mind. Can we return to discussion of the topic rather than unnecessary sniping?

I wasn't sniping and I tried to say it as nicely as possible - which is why I *didn't* quote the original material you posted that many reading this probably never even saw. I don't see how dropping the F-bomb and similar language like you posted in the forums (but since cleaned up, thank you) should be tolerated anymore than it is tolerated in-game. I hope I've made that clearer for you as to what I was requesting.

[BetaGreyrider]

I am very disappointing about the fact a dev would not be against botting in general.

I see it as lack of vision and an easy way out not having to worry about tracking down bots.

I am part of or have been part of p2p/f2p MMO's over the years and botting will undercut every game no matter how you look at it.

If botting is allowed you might as well give the player GM permissions to up the level of his/her character or grant them access to all items in the game.

1) If you bot you will get more XP over time especially if you have bots going 24/7. (No way a normal player can compete with that.)

2) If you allow bots you undercut the economy as you allow those that have bots to avoid issue's as getting resources like ores. (You just keep a JE slave-bot going for you needs. Don't even get me started on gold-issue's.)

3) If you allow bots you deprive real players from logging on when every-one is botting. (Any server only will allow so many connections.)

4) If you allow bots you deprive players interaction between various levels in the long run. (Those that do bot will level up equally I guess. The player that does not becomes more or less isolated because that player is behind the curve with peers within weeks maybe even days.)

5) if you allow bots you will loose people willing to sign on at all down the route who like the game for content. (High level players will eventually demand all the developers time for new content which is then quickly review/played and then dis-guarded leaving them nothing then the grind or botting even more.)

6) if you allow bots the reward system is basically nullified. (Even rare items become less rare as those that bot will obtain them faster making then available to the general player. If the rare item is non-trade they become the exclusive domain open to those that bot as they have the level and resources to get them is they see it fit. The real player get deprived of the rare items making it futile to even try to get them.)

[Guest Guest]

*is Jewish* Nice.

Nice nonsensical rant. What are you smoking anyway? Mothballs?

Maybe you should drop gaming and pick up a history book. You obviously havent stored anything else between your ears.

I had a suspicion that you were a jackarse. You have removed all doubts.

From the looks of some of these posts, who would want to join some of you on a team anyway?

I'm done here. I WILL continue to macro. I WILL enjoy making my macros.

Right back at ya: Don't like it? Don't play!