Banning all scripts

[Amberlee]

I voted yes, because of people like Irk who completely ruins stuff for everyone else.
I dont want people like that in the game at all.. They do not bring anything at all.
However, if banning all type of scripts means you cant do things like watch a TV series while fighting in a room(Yes only letting triggers in THAT room work their way) then it is something i would have voted no on.

[gorboth]

I voted yes, because of people like Irk who completely ruins stuff for everyone else.
I dont want people like that in the game at all.. They do not bring anything at all.
However, if banning all type of scripts means you cant do things like watch a TV series while fighting in a room(Yes only letting triggers in THAT room work their way) then it is something i would have voted no on.

Right, so these questions become very important:

Where do you draw the line between scripting and botting?
If someone sets up triggers that alert them when they have a bot challenge or wizard tell, but they script all the rest of the time without interacting, are they a bot?
How do you tell the difference?
How do you enforce the difference?

Being angry at Irk is fine, but we need more than annoyance and reputation to establish a policy.

G.

[Cherek]

Also, Genesis has become a game that needs a fraction of your attention.

Just these few words explain the reason why I voted yes. The problem is exactly this, people don't pay attention to the game. When out fighting they have their scripts running while they watch TV. Herbing they go somewhere and start the script and watch tv (or work). That is NOT a game, that is spam.

Do we want a game where people take an active role in or a "rp"-chat with some spam happening in the background?

I definitely agree, although I think the solution is to offer more fun things to do so people WANT to give the game more attention , rather than ban people who dont pay 100% attention...

Do you think if we ban all scripts that those who use scripts will become active roleplayers? I dont. I think they will either continue to script until caught too many times, or simply not play. But yes, it´s one way of doing it. Kick out everyone who does not play like they are "supposed to". I dont have the answers, but it's not strategy I personally believe in. At least not until someone manages to convince me of the benefits.

[Cherek]

However, if banning all type of scripts means you cant do things like watch a TV series while fighting in a room(Yes only letting triggers in THAT room work their way) then it is something i would have voted no on.

Well... that is the question. Is that scripting or not?

Example A: Lets say you're watching TV/surfing the web/etc while your char with help of triggers kills the enemies in one room. When done you glance at the screen, type "west; kill troll", and continue watching TV. Are you scripting?

Example B: How about adding another trigger that when there are no enemies left in the room moves you west and attacks the trolls there. You're still watching TV, glancing at the screen now and then. Are you scripting now?

I think many people would say A is not scripting, and B is. But the behavior is extremely similar, and your level of activity is basically the same. All thats has been eliminated is a few manually typed commands. But maybe the line for scripting is drawn at your character _moving_? As long as you dont move around its not scripting? Or?

Either way I am guessing a large majority of players at least use example A daily. And I think a fairly large portion of players use example B as well. I dont think any of them consider themselves "bots". But if we are to ban scripting... well how many are we left with after everyone has been caught and deleted?

[Creed]

The difference is that if the thing you watch on TV suddenly become extremely interesting, it might not be once every 30 seconds you look at the screen, but more like once every 5 minutes.
And then its not just 1 location where you stand for a long time, but in that time the script will have taken you through perhaps another 7 locations killing everything there. And then its botting.

Its the same with people playing from work.
Out of nowhere comes someone to talk to them, and they don't look at the screen or pay any kind of attention for perhaps 10-20-30 minutes.

If they had a script running, they too would be botters.
If they didn't, they would be prone targets, waiting for some enemy to come attack them, if they don't go LD.

[cotillion]

People should be free to play the however they want to.
This is a game and it has to mesh with peoples lifes and other commitments. As long as there is a person who intends to be playing the game I have no problem at all with scripts.
It's when the characther is primarily an automaton we have a problem. The distinction is ofcourse very difficult.

We really should not be banning scripts which makes it easier to play the game. Instead we probably need to look at what those scripts do which improves the game experience and incorporate those features into the game itself.

[Uther]

I voted no for many reasons. I am really surprised to see how many voted yes. I was assuming we'd have 90% "no"s.

Nobody has really explained why they voted though. I'll explain my vote, maybe someone will explain why they voted yes. I cant think of any reason to vote yes, but there has to be some reasons and I'd really like to hear them.

Anyway,
I dont really see the difference between scripting and manually typing commands. If you sit at the computer, watching your screen, does it matter if you type 10 commands per hours or 1000? Why should that be illegal? How soon until we ban automaps, paths, triggers and aliases then? They also automate the player making tedious tasks less tedious. Those features, just as scripts remove the need to write hundreds of repetitive commands all the time... but we want people to type these commands themselves... because? Well I surely dont know.

Neither do I see why banning scripts would catch more botters? If that is the main reason to ban scripts. Botting is already illegal yet a lot of people do it. Make scripting illegal we'll just have a whole lot of more players breaking the rules that we need to catch. And scripters are much harder to catch. How do you check if someone is scripting? Add some random delays between your moves and it will be very heard to detect from someone who is just typing quickly. And since you're at the computer you can respond to anything at any time. Even without random delays its really hard to prove. I think we're going to have a whole lot of upset players if we ban scripts. And for what reason? Because we want to catch botters? Well botters are already much easier to catch than scripters so a ban on scripting will in reality do nothing...? It just gives us more players to hunt without making it easier to catch those we really want to catch. I dont see the point of doing that...

Also, Genesis has become a game that needs a fraction of your attention. Many people "play" while doing something else. At work, surfing, watching TV, etc. Good or bad I dont know, but thats the reality today. If we want players to play more actively we need to provide them with something fun to do. Forcing people to actively do something they feel is boring and only requires 10% of their attention will just make these people not play. We want them to focus 100% by enforcing a rule saying they have to? Uh.

I think we, the wizards, but also the non-botting/scripting community really need to instead ask ourselves what positive things we can do to make the game more active again. If that is what we want. (I assume most would like that). With almost no PVP, almost no guild politics, very little RP, most guilds are walk up and join or close to it, advancement is by gxp, and very few people even team (except dragging someone around), I really understand why people script and bot. Where's the fun in walking around alone searching a huge area for herbs, or killing the same foes over and over again... but... what else is there to do? To make it at least somewhat interesting people turn to scripts because then at least they can do something else while still get some enjoyment from watching their stats or herb stock grow.

I say instead of hunting scripters and botters, ask yourself, no matter if you're a wizard or player, what you can do to make the game more interactive again. Try to make these botters and scripters enjoy them game actively again instead of hunting them down crying "Cheater!!".

Thats what I think on this whole matter.

Good post Cherek!

[Makfly]

I voted yes, because of people like Irk who completely ruins stuff for everyone else.
I dont want people like that in the game at all.. They do not bring anything at all.
However, if banning all type of scripts means you cant do things like watch a TV series while fighting in a room(Yes only letting triggers in THAT room work their way) then it is something i would have voted no on.

Wholeheartedly agreed.
The only reason why Irk hasn't been banned before, is, I think, that the majority that's left of the community has benefited from him or similar behaviour.


I also interpret "Scripting" as something beyond having a trigger that executes your combat special. Scripting is automated behaviour, which is beyond triggers or alias' to help you type a little less.
Of course it's all a sliding scale, so we'll never find a definitive point where acceptable behaviour crosses a clear-cut boundary into botting/scripting.
But that's okay, Admins can use their common sense if there is some doubts.

[Uther]

I agree with many above.

In the old days when there were 100 people online and queue to get online then you NEEDED to pay attention to the screen 100 %
or you would have been killed. Now most people run solo or max 2-3 in a team. One drags 2 triggs, since there are so few, sadly, still
playing there are almost no interaction between the characters. So what is left to do ? Yes, either grind or quit.

But banning scripts, NO, ban automated botters ? YES!, but where to draw the line..
In the old days when people played and used Zmud maps, click on a room, run here or whatever it says, you had no chance in hell
catching someone in a pfight with the "mapmovement" or paths. They could be in another domain within a minute.
Shall we then ban the clients and go back to strait telnet DOS window and telnet would get rid of all the scripters and botters.
But I guess once could execute some files in that too, to run with the DOS window.

Getting 100 players or rather getting more players online would be the answer to most of Genesis problems.
People would script & bot less since there are more people around they actually have to pay attention then to the screen.
Or they will get ganked and killed and then they learn by doing. One can hope they do at least Some don't
I have suggested an idea to Gorboth for trying to bring back more people to Genesis, will see what happens.

[Draugor]

People should be free to play the however they want to.
This is a game and it has to mesh with peoples lifes and other commitments. As long as there is a person who intends to be playing the game I have no problem at all with scripts.
It's when the characther is primarily an automaton we have a problem. The distinction is ofcourse very difficult.

We really should not be banning scripts which makes it easier to play the game. Instead we probably need to look at what those scripts do which improves the game experience and incorporate those features into the game itself.

For once I agree with Cotillion somewhat if he says that people that are actually attentive and replies to wizard tells when they check if they are awake than I agree completely.

Its the 100% automated bastards like Irk that ruins gameplay, first of all cause they get sick sizes making the virtually impossible to kill, and usually have triggers to run them back to the guild should they be attack and in there they will just idle.

I agree with alot of the former notes aswell about you should be allowed to steal kills and not reply, sure, thats your right, and you'll get reported for botting, if the wizards act quick enough and you're NOT just ignoring other people... you should get busted, and just destroying theire gear aint harsh enough imo, First offence KILL and trash theire stuff. And this kill ofc without recovery, they forfeited that right when they didnt get the xp legally. Second offence... deletion, straight up.