Silen Boon
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Posted - 2010.12.14 09:55:00 -
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IÆm a little disappointed with the Dev Blog; I donÆt believe that it really addresses any of the players concerns.
The original Unholy Rage was very successful at banning a significant number of accounts that were using macros. This had a very clear effect on the Eve economy, and is evidence of the impact that automated ôplayö has on the game.
I suspect that these early macros were fairly crude, easy to spot, and simple to disrupt. This type of simple automation can be partially policed by the player base; either through game play (blowing up ships) or by reporting offenders to CCP.
There is now anecdotal evidence that the automation has moved beyond simple macros, to ôbotsö that can react to a changing environment. This allows the automation to be run in far more complex and dynamic situations i.e. 0.0 space. Unlike the early macros, these bots are far harder for the player base to police. One simple reason for this is the locations where these bots appear to be run; 0.0 doesnÆt have the diverse player population that could report possible offenders.
Since the player base is not able to police the new wave of automation, either by game play or reporting suspect characters, the onus if now on CCP to investigate, report, and react. It is no longer acceptable to rely on the player base to report the use of macros or bots.
So what is to be done?
I would like to see CCP investigate the anecdotal evidence and hopefully produce another Dev blog with their conclusions.
If wide spread use of macros and bots is found then I think there are a number of things that CCP could do.:-
Account banning is the most obvious short term action.
Employing a team to investigate unusual account behaviour and system characteristics would deter future abuses.
Making Alliances and Corps more accountable maybe an option to reduce macros use.
There are also game play changes that might reduce the use of macros and bots and improve the user experience. Removing ôlocalö has been suggested, but I think this would only be a short term solution. However the wormhole game mechanics is a good source for ideas. The more dynamic the environment, the harder it becomes to automate tasks.
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