Treasure Hunting Lockboxes are causing massive inflation and a proposed solution.

[MeNaCe-NZ]

Now.. what will happen here is the studio might listen to the hyperbole about how this is killing the economy

 

First it's only hyperbole if there is nothing to support it ... current packs/hypercrates used to cost 200K/3-5 million and now they're more like 1 million+/25 million+

We can discuss why this may be, you may want to keep the "oh but it's the fancy new sabers that are doing it" point of view, I might want to say it's the games reduced population causing it and others might want to say it's the ease of botting and not recovering credits from recent exploits ... no one can truly prove their view one way or another but imo I think it's a combination of them all.

 

Point being it's not hyperbole to say the economy is running away ...killing it though ... that's perspective. If I used to enjoy being able to buy the odd crate/packs with credits I earned playing the game I would be mightily annoyed right now as they've become completely unaffordable along with many gold CM items.

 

hen nerf the crap out of TH to stop them on this particular aspect of botting.. and then the botters will move on to the next thing to bot, and the next, and the next, and the next....

 

In other words, the nerf hammer on TH rewards will do nothing to stop botting... only stop botting for TH.

 

As long as their are players.. there will be botting in an MMO. Any MMO, not just this one. Some people just enjoy breaking rules and botting for meaningless credits.

 

Hence why I personally offered up a different solution to nerfing it ... something that would be fairly difficult to bypass and only really leave botting of heroics which for the most part isn't an easy thing to do for the regular player or shall we say botter, not like the ease at which they are able to crew skill bot anyway with a simple run of the mill macro tool. Heroic farming requires a bit more pathfinding built in for the most part so those simple "click here" macros won't work.

 

If you put in a "Is this a real person" check on crew skills you would, imo, see the lowest level of botted credits generated since launch since even with level sync even botting mobs or heroics is more difficult than ever ( so no god mode as before ) though granted you do get more credits from heroics than before but nothing even close to what crew skill botting generates.

 

Credits used to have meaning... and there was an actual RMT business in them. But since 4.0 and the many many new pathways to credits just from normal play.... more players in game are legally much more wealthy then before.. and new players are able to become wealthy in a matter of months.... all legally. And the result is RMTs are crashing as their prices approach pennies per million. Brilliant on the part of the studio IMO as to how they chose to make RMT lives difficult. Will it destroy RMT completely? Nope.

 

Yet I can offer you tangible proof if you want ( flick me a PM and I can explain if you are interested ) to the contrary that shows RMTs making more money lately than ever before from this game. Whether you chose to believe it or not is on you but it is happening thus the question becomes who does it affect?

Not me, probably not you - we do well out of inflated markets like this with GTN speculation etc. but I do wonder if it's more annoying and difficult on the legal player you speak of since it's been a very long time that I've solely earned credits in that fashion that I can't compare how it is now to how it was say 2 years ago when I did gain credits in such a manner.

 

'm sure the studio has hooks in their analytics so they can track these people and even follow their credits around and at some point will pull the handle on the ban hammer and sweep up a bunch at a time. It's like gil-netting fish or crab-potting crabs... you drop let them "soak" for a period of time and then pull up the net and harvest.

 

I would hope so too but I personally don't share your confidence.

[IanArgent]

Simple non-obfuscated-text captchas will do absolutely no good; and if you obfuscate the text enough, it gets hard for humans to read it; OCRF is about as good as humans these days. All a CAPTCHA does is slow things down a little, and that won't be enough.

 

When freaking comment forms on websites no longer use CAPTCHAs in favor of Google's mouse movement Turing Test, I think we can call CAPTCHAs a busted tech.

[CrazyCT]

What about the same method as they use in STO - a simple mini-game to match up two wavelengths? You get about 6 seconds to press up or down and left or right a couple of times. Not difficult to do, but would be pretty tricky to bot. Edited June 12, 2016 by CrazyCT

[jedilensol]

captcha's are really instrusive and would add a lot of botheration for normal players.

 

the best way for them to deal with this mess would be to increase the mission duration for treasure hunting lockbox missions and slicing lockbox missions from 3.5 minutes to 15 minutes at maximum influence. this way it easily solves the problem and very easy to implement.

 

then they can wait and see what happens and then possibly increase the time duration for other missions if needed.

[Theeko]

Even captas can be scripted around look at BDO

[lightSaberAddiCt]

i am actually curious about this. I mean does anyone think that if they stop botting, that it will in anyway affect the price of cm items on the GTn? Because you will seriously be disappointed. Why is it that people think that someone should spend their hard earned money on CC, to buy hypercrates, and then get barely anything out of them??

 

Do to the ease of gaining credits in this game, either by heroics or other means, is why the market has gotten more expensive, not because of the botting.

 

If you don't want to spend those millions on the CM item, then spend your own CASH and buy it yourself, rather then expect others to spend their cash, and sell it on the cheap to you.

[MeNaCe-NZ]

Simple non-obfuscated-text captchas will do absolutely no good; and if you obfuscate the text enough, it gets hard for humans to read it; OCRF is about as good as humans these days. All a CAPTCHA does is slow things down a little, and that won't be enough.

 

When freaking comment forms on websites no longer use CAPTCHAs in favor of Google's mouse movement Turing Test, I think we can call CAPTCHAs a busted tech.

 

Absolutely no good you say because you have so much experience with how these have failed in MMOs before? Why would it do no good? How will they get around it so easily that it would do no good?

 

Your statement implies it won't be any better than it is now and people will get around them as easy as they macro crew skills right now but if you took the time to see how simple it is to macro crew skills you might revisit your unfounded conclusion.

Most of the software available that people are using will not work with a human intervention element introduced plain and simple - the software they are using is far too basic and I would wager the majority of them are far too unskilled to create something able to get around a more complex system.

 

Yes there will be people around able to get around a human intervention system if they feel it's worth the effort but if you suddenly drop the amount of people macroing the system from 100 to 5 ... well that's a good day.

 

Now further to this you seem to come across awfully negative anytime anyone has an idea to address the situation ... nerfs no thanks, this system won't work etc. so how about you become slightly more constructive and offer up your own insights to contrast against your perceived negativity?

[MeNaCe-NZ]

captcha's are really instrusive and would add a lot of botheration for normal players.

 

the best way for them to deal with this mess would be to increase the mission duration for treasure hunting lockbox missions and slicing lockbox missions from 3.5 minutes to 15 minutes at maximum influence. this way it easily solves the problem and very easy to implement.

 

then they can wait and see what happens and then possibly increase the time duration for other missions if needed.

 

I personally would prefer an intrusive system than getting punished on how often I could send out my companions and thus affecting my rate of return for gaining credits etc.

 

That's my personally of course.

[MeNaCe-NZ]

i am actually curious about this. I mean does anyone think that if they stop botting, that it will in anyway affect the price of cm items on the GTn? Because you will seriously be disappointed. Why is it that people think that someone should spend their hard earned money on CC, to buy hypercrates, and then get barely anything out of them??

 

Do to the ease of gaining credits in this game, either by heroics or other means, is why the market has gotten more expensive, not because of the botting.

 

If you don't want to spend those millions on the CM item, then spend your own CASH and buy it yourself, rather then expect others to spend their cash, and sell it on the cheap to you.

 

Over time and provided no more exploits I do believe it would yes.

 

I keep hearing you and others say "it's not botting it's the ease of gaining credits" but yet not a shred of proof to support it, even anecdotal evidence is lacking.

 

Maybe you can offer it up instead then. I asked earlier out of curiosity how much you are making personally a day doing heroics etc. and how much real world time you are putting in to these activities to achieve these results.

 

Once there is an understanding of the time put in and amount of credits made it's easy to compare it to GTN pricing to see if it's indeed the same as before.

 

For example ... new hypercrates used to go for 3-5 million prior to 4.0 within a week or so of release. Now the cheapest for any hypercrate on the GTN is around the 25 million mark.

Are you finding it as easy to make 25 million in credits now doing in game activities ( heroics and crew skills + whatever else without automating them of course ) as you used to find making 5 million? Same amount of real world time put in?

 

If that's the case then cool - these is no issue I guess and every time we see the odd thread about how expensive everything is ( especially if they try compare it to the past ) we can tell them to stop being lazy and nothing is more expensive at all since they can earn credits at a higher rate that more or less brings the expensive prices in to line to where they were before.

[PatT]

the only real penalization is for people who are new to the game. They are starting with nothing, no legacy, no bonuses and even if they sub, they still won't have millions until they level to 65 and start running that content. It's a difficult thing for new players at low levels.

 

Not that empathy is in much supply around here. As for treasure hunting, there are LOTS of reasons for inflation and I think lockboxes are low on the list. People buying crates from CM and putting the stuff on the GTN for $$$ is a bigger problem. Transition of real world currency into game currency. Dailies and heroics are now also a good manner of inflation, for those who understand economics.

[DaemonSpark]

Tried this for an hour earlier today, 2 Lvl50's, 2 Lvl 40's, 2 Lvl 30 companions.

 

250K total after 1 hour. Not worth my time. Was watching a movie and fiddling around with it.

 

Likely, if I was botting, I would have had a ~15% efficiency on clicking, thus, max 300K per hour. Heroics average around 750K per hour, so is it worth our time debating this nerf?

 

I can name 8 characters who have been farming Yavin on the EH for 5 months, somehow they are still not banned, WTFO?

[MeNaCe-NZ]

the only real penalization is for people who are new to the game. They are starting with nothing, no legacy, no bonuses and even if they sub, they still won't have millions until they level to 65 and start running that content. It's a difficult thing for new players at low levels.

 

Not that empathy is in much supply around here. As for treasure hunting, there are LOTS of reasons for inflation and I think lockboxes are low on the list. People buying crates from CM and putting the stuff on the GTN for $$$ is a bigger problem. Transition of real world currency into game currency. Dailies and heroics are now also a good manner of inflation, for those who understand economics.

 

Selling items on the GTN does not create currency so no, that's not a cause of inflation at all.

[MeNaCe-NZ]

Tried this for an hour earlier today, 2 Lvl50's, 2 Lvl 40's, 2 Lvl 30 companions.

 

250K total after 1 hour. Not worth my time. Was watching a movie and fiddling around with it.

 

Likely, if I was botting, I would have had a ~15% efficiency on clicking, thus, max 300K per hour. Heroics average around 750K per hour, so is it worth our time debating this nerf?

 

I can name 8 characters who have been farming Yavin on the EH for 5 months, somehow they are still not banned, WTFO?

 

That's the thing ... from all reports and anecdotal evidence Bioware just don't care about botting and gold selling etc. beyond blatantly closing topics telling people how to do it.

 

I will be happy to be wrong if I am in this case.

[alfreedo]

Tried this for an hour earlier today, 2 Lvl50's, 2 Lvl 40's, 2 Lvl 30 companions.

 

250K total after 1 hour. Not worth my time. Was watching a movie and fiddling around with it.

 

Likely, if I was botting, I would have had a ~15% efficiency on clicking, thus, max 300K per hour. Heroics average around 750K per hour, so is it worth our time debating this nerf?

 

I can name 8 characters who have been farming Yavin on the EH for 5 months, somehow they are still not banned, WTFO?

 

Thing about bots is even if they aren't banned they are limited in what they can do. For example say a grinding bot makes a few million a day. There is only so many spots they could possibly grind at. That is what makes macro botting crew skills so damaging. You don't need to use a real bot program. The payout is really high and there is no limit. Everyone playing the game can do it.

[TiaNicole]

Well I still can't wrap my head around why or how these people are botting.

 

For 1, it seems to me that they would have to be a SUB in order to be able to make that much money. F2P = 250k, Preferred = 350k (if I remember correctly), Sub = Unlimited.

 

Meaning these people (if they are not SUBS) would have to buy Credit Escrow Unlocks @ 80CC per 150k or 240CC per 600k.

Why would they do that?

 

Why in the world would they even bother SUBBING an account that can very easily get banned? That just makes no sense to me.

 

And if they are SUBS, well then BW/EA should know who they are. And that is a whole other can of worms.

 

Unless they are using the Referral Links for the free sub time, like you have in your sig MeNaCe-NZ.

 

If that is how they are doing this then the simple thing for BW/EA to do is remove the Referral Links all together.

 

Just a thought I figured I would toss out there.

Edited June 14, 2016 by TiaNicole
bad spelling, bad grammer and forgot a sentence and another ugh, i will get this right yet

[Akostt]

Well I still can't wrap my head around why or how these people are botting.

 

For 1, it seems to me that they would have to be a SUB in order to be able to make that much money. F2P = 250k, Preferred = 350k (if I remember correctly), Sub = Unlimited.

 

Meaning these people (if they are not SUBS) would have to buy Credit Escrow Unlocks @ 80CC per 150k or 240CC per 600k.

Why would they do that?

 

Why in the world would they even bother SUBBING an account that can very easily get banned? That just makes no sense to me.

 

And if they are SUBS, well then BW/EA should know who they are. And that is a whole other can of worms.

 

Unless they are using the Referral Links for the free sub time, like you have in your sig MeNaCe-NZ.

 

If that is how they are doing this then the simple thing for BW/EA to do is remove the Referral Links all together.

 

Just a thought I figured I would toss out there.

 

sub fees are cheap and i don't think they ban you unless it's a well known exploit and this is not an exploit. since this has been working this way since kotfe then we should assume this is working as intended and they want lots of credits to flow into the economy and they probably added this on purpose as it's the best source of credits in the game. it means you can sell your items on the gtn for higher prices and stuff.

[IanArgent]

sub fees are cheap and i don't think they ban you unless it's a well known exploit and this is not an exploit. since this has been working this way since kotfe then we should assume this is working as intended and they want lots of credits to flow into the economy and they probably added this on purpose as it's the best source of credits in the game. it means you can sell your items on the gtn for higher prices and stuff.

 

Botting is itself a violation of the ToS. USing macros is a violation of the ToS.

[CrazyCT]

USing macros is a violation of the ToS.

 

Not if they only perform 1 action - technically, assigning Ctrl+1 to a key would be a macro, but it's not against the ToS. It's only when they perform more than one action, eg mounting and putting on auto-run with one keypress.

Edited June 14, 2016 by CrazyCT

[IanArgent]

Not if they only perform 1 action - technically, assigning Ctrl+1 to a key would be a macro, but it's not against the ToS. It's only when they perform more than one action, eg mounting and putting on auto-run with one keypress.

 

I don't consider key remaps to be macros; but, yes, as long as it's a 1:1 equivalent for keystrokes, it's good. You can even concatenate keystrokes with modifiers to one kestroke. (Control+1 to a single key, for example).

 

Neither of which help botting.

Edited June 14, 2016 by IanArgent

[CrazyCT]

I don't consider key remaps to be macros; but, yes, as long as it's a 1:1 equivalent for keystrokes, it's good. You can even concatenate keystrokes with modifiers to one kestroke. (Control+1 to a single key, for example).

 

Neither of which help botting.

 

Not disagreeing with the point, just clarifying. I've got one o' they MMO mouses that's set-up with all the CTRL's and ALT's, which is fine. Botting is more than just hitting one keystroke, obviously.

[shyroman]

Well I still can't wrap my head around why or how these people are botting.

 

For 1, it seems to me that they would have to be a SUB in order to be able to make that much money. F2P = 250k, Preferred = 350k (if I remember correctly), Sub = Unlimited.

 

Meaning these people (if they are not SUBS) would have to buy Credit Escrow Unlocks @ 80CC per 150k or 240CC per 600k.

Why would they do that?

 

Why in the world would they even bother SUBBING an account that can very easily get banned? That just makes no sense to me.

 

And if they are SUBS, well then BW/EA should know who they are. And that is a whole other can of worms.

 

Unless they are using the Referral Links for the free sub time, like you have in your sig MeNaCe-NZ.

 

If that is how they are doing this then the simple thing for BW/EA to do is remove the Referral Links all together.

 

Just a thought I figured I would toss out there.

 

What people can do is create a ftp account and level that to 50 to send out max companions (it might be only 5 instead of 6 at level 50, not sure). They will then macro their way to max treasure hunting and make enough money to max companion influence pretty quickly too (or just send money over from subbed account). Then make the 13ish mil per day from leaving macro on all day. Wait as much as you want and then sub for 1 month to mail over all credits, it's much cheaper than selling CM stuff and a few lower time commitment than grinding. It's a bit of investment at first to level but with how fast leveling is, it's not long at all. This can be repeated on as many devices as you want to multiply profits. Seems like from all the stories here, bioware doesn't seem to care.

[IanArgent]

What people can do is create a ftp account and level that to 50 to send out max companions (it might be only 5 instead of 6 at level 50, not sure). They will then macro their way to max treasure hunting and make enough money to max companion influence pretty quickly too (or just send money over from subbed account). Then make the 13ish mil per day from leaving macro on all day. Wait as much as you want and then sub for 1 month to mail over all credits, it's much cheaper than selling CM stuff and a few lower time commitment than grinding. It's a bit of investment at first to level but with how fast leveling is, it's not long at all. This can be repeated on as many devices as you want to multiply profits. Seems like from all the stories here, bioware doesn't seem to care.

 

In theory, you could also accept the 6% loss and use the GTN to transfer money in chunks smaller than the escrow limit; I sometimes wonder if that's what is causing some of the obvious mispricing on non-pack items.

[shyroman]

In theory, you could also accept the 6% loss and use the GTN to transfer money in chunks smaller than the escrow limit; I sometimes wonder if that's what is causing some of the obvious mispricing on non-pack items.

 

Wouldn't be able to do below escrow limit unless you wanted to constantly supervise the macro'd account because anything above escrow is stuck there until subbed (or escrow thing is bought but that isn't cost efficient). But one could sell worthless things on gtn in 1-2 million credit increments across several toons, it would be nearly undetectable if they are worried about that.

[IanArgent]

Wouldn't be able to do below escrow limit unless you wanted to constantly supervise the macro'd account because anything above escrow is stuck there until subbed (or escrow thing is bought but that isn't cost efficient). But one could sell worthless things on gtn in 1-2 million credit increments across several toons, it would be nearly undetectable if they are worried about that.

 

You bot the GTN transactions, or the bot stops before it crosses the escrow threshold and waits until you can clean it out (possibly with another script). You more or less have to multibox anyway.

 

The much more plausible theory is that the RMTs provide the automation software to down-on-their luck humans who are subscribers, and they don't care about the risks their independent farmers run. There's an entertaining article on Cracked about gold farming in WoW that has some relevance to SWTOR. The tl;dr of which is that the whole RMT market is collapsing because of moves by the companies running the games. SWTOR hasn't taken the steps that, say, WoW has, but I have to wonder about the decoupling of the credit economy from the game mechanics and the massive deliberate inflation, and why they happened. You no longer need a lot of Cr to play the game at the same time the Cr fountains opened wide.

 

(Also note the general uselessness of banning the farmers. the subject of the piece notes the frequency of bans is not a deterrent).

[lightSaberAddiCt]

Selling items on the GTN does not create currency so no, that's not a cause of inflation at all.

 

Answering this one, but it is in regards to your quote of mine. On tablet so cant quote large amount of text.

 

But ok here is how I make creds, and I am the first to admit it is not best way:

 

Everytime I play, I spend 15minutes in a group doing the tatooine heroics.that averages around 700-750k. 4-5 times a week that averages around 3.5 mill a week. I get 1 maybe 2 regular crates, sell them for around 1.2-1.5 million a week (this is with my grated monthly cc). I do a couple ops a week, may get 1 or 2 DMCs for aroun 900k each. Then I will check out certain, cheap pieces of gear on the CM (usually around 100-400cc max) and some of them actually you can get 5 million each. Not going to tell you, you find out which ones.

 

so on average I make around 8.5-10 million a week on a single toon. If I am in the mood to burn through tatooine for an hour on alts, I czn pull around 4 million.