Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Well, that chase was fun while it lasted:

So, just so I could track everything, I decided to have a window open to take care of all the Mog Tablet finds in the first iteration on Leviathan.

Talking to some of the people on Leviathan at the Frontier Moogle spawn-point, there are those to say that all 11 will be found within the FIRST HOUR. (By 2 AM PDT Tuesday 5/12/09 -- quest starts at 1 AM PDT.)

(I’m thinking by about 6 AM.)

BOY WAS I WRONG. While I went from Qufim to Beaucedine and to the northern part of Batallia (the hidden part where the Goblin NM for ACP is found), here's what happened.

Within 5 minutes -- Behemoth’s Dominion and Ro’Maeve are gone

8 minutes, 25 seconds -- THREE MORE GONE -- S. Gustaberg, Cape Terrigan, Buburimu Peninsula. They all went at the same report -- the same as the first two.

11 minutes -- E Ronfaure and Valkurm fall.

14:42 -- La Thiene’s is found.

21 minutes -- Rolanberry and Yuntunga Jungle -- one left...

(This is where I begin to think the possibility exists that it might be in one of the hidden areas of, say, Batallia or Sauromogue (Rolanberry already had it's Tablet for this round found.))

And then, the bad news:

37 minutes -- North Gustaberg, and that’s all.

Elapsed time: 37:45.

So the question now: How many bots?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

How the hell would they bot this?

Here is a insight for you from a programmers view, because I have poked at the game when it first came out. I did it to PSO(Phantasy Star Online) to, hence my name ends in. I was the Helba(dot hack anime reference) of PSO back in the day, I've sense retired when the challenges like cracking the impossible to crack GCN faded away. But I do like to try to probe the games I play so I know how they work.

To reduce server load, only objects of 50 Yalms or whatever its called in FFXI, will be sent to your client computer. It is impossible to get more then this unless you are a Beastmaster or a Ranger. In that case a time Session ID(If you an't these jobs the server Red flags you and you get jailed as of now, use to not be detectible) is sent when you activate Widescan, however it isn't instant, that's why you can't spam that. The bottom line is, by default all you can see is what you can keep a target on. Target something and run away from it, when it forces you to loose target/model from the screen, that is 50 distance.

The position of the Tablets cannot be botted. The coined term Bot is to do without your action; superhuman.

There are enhancements people will probably use, such as a ApRadar which uses that same 50 distance principle. But displays it on a separate 2D program for you to see. Helps you not miss it is all. Its an advantage yes. But it wasn't botted for them, It wasn't super human processed for them. After knowing the position, if they used a tool to position hack to it. That would be botting, It moved them for them. It had more influence then knowledge of where it was did.

Problem is Position hacking is detectable now, I think the error range is like 10 distance. If you jump more then that instantly and your connection(aka DC pos jumping) isn't below like 80% from DCing, I think you get flagged now. Getting to far away spots like in the past can't be done anymore, the most pos hacking is used for now is to run up short walls like Sim in Rolanberry. Which, unless witnessed by another, are detected, but dismissed as processing error that's within the servers error log parameters.

DC pos jumping to get past monsters has also been patched. If you jump a distance well DCing and then you reconnect before 0%. the Server forces your history to run that course fast, if anything would have agroed, it will instantly be chasing you as if you did agro it normally running.

---

Most common Botting is manipulation of the server through client side to backsend claim data to the server(basically you tell the server you have claim at .2ms after Fafnir spawns and it conflicts with another or tricks the server into giving you claim).

The claim command isn't instant(but can be but is stupid to do so), to avoid detection, they just cast there spells or JA sooner then you do ViA Client side manipulation.

Due to lag of others seeing this before its happened. Botting can look legit, non botting can look illegal for the claim. Its a error range for the server. Hence it is extremely difficult for SE to see who is botting and not. SE stated they can't do anything without completely changing the whole system in the game. Something financially not smart at this day and age. So they offered different ways to get the items from most kings.

Not to mention we are playing games from the server. There is lag time to and from the servers. This is a common error on all MMORPGs out there. SE is looking to change it step by step, but won't up and fix it all at once.

Simuliar to how you can't save the whole world from its problems all at once, you can however, do it one step at a time.

Please take that into consideration when it comes to claiming something should be shut down for completely displeasing you. Even if you hate it, others love it. Even if there's opportunity to change for the better, you can't make everyone happy.

Why you haven't learned this yet in your life is shocking to me.

---

Back on subject of claiming of botting/tools used.

Apradar has a function where it can see dead monsters, because this data is sent to us from the servers. However as of recently, mostly event items/monsters and VCS chocobo crates will not show up if already killed. They are seperate rulings and sent to use differently(aka as a server event switch, in PSO lobby terms).

These tablets deaths or unspawned locations do not show up on it. So Apradar can't be used to find a spawn and camp it. Only to help you find one already up as you journey around looking for it.

---

On the argument of it taking such a short time to find them all...

There is an active 2000-3000 characters per server near average on non-prime time, with the acceptation being Odin and Bahamut which I think are up to 4000. The servers can only keep a good 10k people per server actively playing and happy, I think the max in 2005 was upped to 20k max connections per server last I recall. Now the math brings that to about 500k from all servers(considering not all are at 10k+). These are active connections, not characters. Each world limit is about 30k or so "characters" saved to them, not logged in user at that time(nearly everyone's got mules).

Lets say it was prime time when this update came up, and trust me it becomes a prime time when new events/updates occur. A lot of people were looking forward to this too. 4000 on all servers, 6000 on Odin and Bahamut. Roughly 60% I would say were seeking out the tablets.

It takes on average one person 15mins to clearly check a whole zone by average I would say.

With that much user power. I'm shocked it wasn't faster. Probably need to account on travel time back to Jeuno tho.

---

Closing statement,

The main issue is that you need to know your facts before you judge. Just cause someone put food coloring in water to turn it some other color, doesn't mean you have the right to call them a witch and try to burn them.

If that was the case, I call you a uncivilized jack ass that deserves to be castrated so you don't contaminate the world gene pool.

Anonymous said...

Replying to your side comment about the event with the moogles from your last post.

I checked BG, its just a suggested dat swap, which is still hindered by the 50 distance rule.

Took a look at it however, I think i found the glow file, its a mini carbuncle summon circle that was shrunk. Difficult to dat swap, most swaps with another dat that isn't an effect, crash the game. Would have to modify an effect which I think only mooshywooshy of the dat community has experience with.

Its still not impossible. But I'm not interested in figuring it out myself. If someone else does, then I'll investigate and dissect it.

Starcade said...

calintzspo:

"How the Hell would they bot this?"

I don't know. I'm not the one who proposed it.

That's the short answer.

A longer answer would require a look into what these guys are doing for their claim-bots and the like.

Think of it as a biological tree. The trunk is Square-Enix' server end. (The roots, if you wish, are the different "worlds" of the game.)

The branches are the players' connections. For the players to be able to immediately lay claim to an HNM or whatever, they have to work their way down to the trunk, and basically force Square-Enix to recognize that they have claim simultaneous to the spawning of the monster.

This is where all the talk of the NASA bot becomes so relevant. The more bots you have to compete with, the more likely you have to essentially hack all the connections, or get in server-side.

This is why I rail so much about that Square-Enix has to enforce, with an iron fist, their rules: Because the players, I truly believe, are corrupting the game on a physical level -- they're getting in server-side.

So I think that anyone (attempting to bot this situation) who would be trying to compromise the system would be, at the very least, going at least as far as one would with respect to "botting against competition".

Read the BluGartr thread before the event started, and recognize that several different approaches were being proposed. AppRadar, etc.

Here's the thing: If they're planning to actually attempt to corrupt the process, what makes you think (short of abject stupidity) that they aren't going to choose jobs consistent with the ability to Wide Scan, or something like that?

Additionally: If people know what the limit is for poshacking before they can be flagged, why not just poshack below the limit multiple times? Most people can't even have their computers process the game without the occasional "leap" from the other players.

Re: What they've done with HNM botting...

Basically, what Square-Enix has done is they've admitted that botting is impossible to stop -- that the game cannot, then, be played fairly.

Why YOU can't see that is shocking to ME. If you want to have a game which is inherently unfair to those who choose to play by the rules, don't expect economic viability from same.

There are many ways, as proposed by the bitches on BG, to look into getting over on Square-Enix.