Yeah, yeah I know, his defenders are going to swear it's just a coincidence. He just happened to be online updating orders when I logged in. For the umpteenth consecutive time over the last several months since I've been watching him more closely and much longer than that before I started paying closer attention to market bot activity in Genesis.
Reporting him for botting once didn't do anything so I started reporting him about once a week for a while.
That didn't work either, CCP remained blissfully oblivious to the most blatantly obvious bot I've ever run across in Eve. So I started reporting him once per day when possible and of course always waiting for him to cut me first (usually within 1-2 minutes).
That didn't do anything either (what does it take for CCP to wake up and ban a bot?), so the last few days I've just been reporting him every time he cuts even if it means multiple reports just 5 minutes apart on the same day.
That probably won't help either, in fact I wouldn't be surprised if it gets *ME a warning. But WTH, maybe eventually someone at CCP who actually gives a damn about stopping even just the most blatantly obvious cheaters will finally notice and do something about it.
I also noticed something in buy orders today. Notice the name below?
It's not the bot character, nor is it in the same corps as the bot but the first name is the same as a blog troll who repeatedly spammed aggressive, argumentative, abusive and overly defensive comments here insisting ad nauseam the bot is not a bot.
It seems likely Belgarion the troll is Belgarion the Genesis resident. I have to wonder whether or not he's connected to the bot in any way. Is he an alt, friend, family, business partner or w/e or is he just some random player who reads my blog and for some reason thought I was talking about him?
Addendum: So the next day I log in and to my amazement the bot is not online. But not for long, within 3 minute he's online and already starting to cut the orders I've updated. In my WoW days when a bot started doing that it usually meant he was starting to feel pressure and beginning to worry about getting caught so he started logging off whenever his competitors weren't online to make it seem like he isn't botting. Monitor the market from another character with known competitors watchlisted, if a watchlist competitor logins it either automatically logs the bot in to start cutting or sets off an audible alarm alerting the botter to login manually.
The most obsessive botters are often no-lifers making a fulltime job of botting. They run literal armies of bots on dozens or even hundreds of accounts. Those guys are usually nearby monitoring the bots and ready to respond to alarms within a few minutes 16+ hours a day. Log the correct character in, turn on the bot and walk away laughing about how "smart" they are.
A bit later (more than 5 minutes) I cut again. It only took him 16 seconds to cut me again.
Ten minutes after that it only took him 10 seconds to respond. He'll keep that up all day long until I log off. Even if I go afk for hours without logging out, he'll be there waiting with machine like patience to immediately respond whenever I modify an order.
Anyone who thinks that isn't a bot is dreaming... Or bots themselves.
It doesn't matter what time of the day, night, week, month or year it is. No matter when it is or how long it's been since the last time he'll cut within a few minutes at the most.
Isn't he also the one who started a blog also named "Merchant Monarchy" in which he obsesses over you?
ReplyDeleteIsn't he the one who thinks you are unallowed to assert facts without simultaneously providing a level of evidentiary support that is far beyond that required in a criminal court?
Forget that guy, he clearly has issues that go far beyond running a market bot.
That's him.
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ReplyDeleteSo the next day I log in and to my amazement the bot is not online. But not for long, within 3 minute he's online and already starting to cut the orders I've updated. In my WoW days when a bot started doing that it usually meant he was starting to feel pressure and beginning to worry about getting caught so he started logging off whenever his competitors weren't online to make it seem like he isn't botting. Monitor the market from another character with known competitors watchlisted, if a watchlist competitor logins it either automatically logs the bot in to start cutting or sets off an audible alarm alerting the botter to login manually.
ReplyDeleteThe most obsessive botters are often no-lifers making a fulltime job of botting. They run literal armies of bots on dozens or even hundreds of accounts. Those guys are usually nearby monitoring the bots and ready to respond to alarms within a few minutes 16+ hours a day. Log the correct character in, turn on the bot and walk away laughing about how "smart" they are.
Actually, it is fairly easy for a bot to monitor buy/sell orders, without being logged in, and thus only log in when necessary, update the order, then log off - which helps avoid detection by CCP. If you add these players to your watch list, you'll see this behavior in action.
DeleteYup, I know, but this bot doesn't seem to bother with that. He just stays online virtually all the time. In the 5 months I've been watching him, he's been offline exactly twice that I know of.
DeleteThe first time was for at least 2 hours, maybe as much 12 hours since I don't how long he was offline before I logged in that day. That's easily explained by a computer crash or service outage. The second time was today, for 3 minutes while I was online probably longer before I logged in.
Since 3 minutes after I logged in he's been online the whole time. I've modified orders 10 or 20 times at random intervals throughout the day. Every single time he cut me within minutes, in fact, in most cases within 10-20 seconds. This isn't the first time that's happened either, I've done the same thing many times over the last few months and the results are always the same. Extremely quick responses no matter what time it is or how long it's been between my own modifications.
However in order to respond that quickly all the time he would need to have another bot logged in and constantly scanning orders to generate cache data to scrape. There's no way to get accurate data and respond that quickly without breaking the ToS.
First thing that is obvious is that isn't malma.
ReplyDeleteand if that's a bot and after all this time you haven't been able to beat it, then you won't ever. You may be better off moving along to another region before he decide to track you down and go after the other places where you do your trade. and if he logs on when you do, then keep that trader logged off and at least others will be able to put some buy order he won't cut
He's based out of Malma, many of his orders are there but that doesn't mean they all are.
DeleteRun from bots... That's exactly what they count on but it doesn't work on me. Just ask my old WoW nemesis Argabot about that. After 2 years of fighting me Argabot left the server.
The more this guy bots the harder I'll push him. I want him to get so obsessive and push so hard that even CCP can't ignore it and pretend he's not botting anymore.
I suspect the Malma bot is just one of many bots run by one of the largest botters in the game.
The ironic part is Genesis was near the bottom of my priority list of regions I work. Now it's near the top.
DeleteThe bot's own overly obsessive activity is what got me paying more attention to the region and raising it's priority.
If he hadn't gotten so greedy and gone after me personally, I probably wouldn't have noticed him in the first place.
In fact, some good old market PvP like this is likely to keep me interested in and playing Eve much longer than I might otherwise. I was starting to get bored and not doing much anymore but this is waking me up and getting me logging in again.
DeleteIf he's doing RMT (as most large scale botters do) he's really going to hate what happens to his real money income in the end. Things are only going to get worse for him as I identify more of his bots in other regions and start hitting him in more places.
Wait, so when you mention that this market PVP will keep you interested, are you acknowledging he's not a bot? Or was just a slip and you meant market PVE, in which case you it makes you a market carebear?
DeleteOh just go away, you aren't fooling anyone with yet another trolling alt. Go post your drivel on that fan club blog you've devoted to me.
DeleteTesting Disqus
ReplyDeleteThanks dickhead. Disqus makes making you sad a lot easier.
ReplyDeleteAnd one troll IP down. Got anymore?
ReplyDeleteYeah, tens of thousands at least. Apparently you don't know how the internet works.
ReplyDeleteSuch a moron!
ReplyDeleteWhat an idiot!
ReplyDeleteSuch mad, many sad.
ReplyDeleteORLY?
ReplyDeletewow... so he can get past your review before posting comments now. This is nuts how this guy hates you so much... he must be the bot or at least a botter, he isn't helping his cause by spamming you.
ReplyDeleteWho says I have a cause? I just saw him switching from comments to disqus and saying thing about "the trolls", trolls I didn't even seem mind you, and thought it'd be amusing to educate him on these things. It's funny how you guys all seem to think there's just one person on here being annoying. I know there's at least 4, and as far as I know nobody knows each other. I guess he just attracts trolls. He's pretty arrogant which usually does it.
ReplyDeleteI bumped into your blog off Kyle's blog list. If it's a bot and you reported it several hundred times and it hasn't been banned, have you at least CONSIDERED the possibility (more like probability) that it isn't a bot? CCP doesn't ignore those sorts of things and they are actively hunting bots as well. You sound a bit obsessed with it.
ReplyDeleteActually he's only getting through because I haven't turned moderation on in Disqus yet.
ReplyDeleteIn spite of what he thinks, I really don't like moderation. I prefer comments being posted immediately. So I'll just go with banning IPs for a while and see if he gets tired of creating new accounts to spam/flame/troll on.
I think I'll leave his latest comments up, they show perfectly why his thoughts aren't welcome here.
This is a good point in fact. How can you say he is a bot and call pvp to what you are doing? Please clarify.
ReplyDeleteHe won't run out of IPs. Typically you get a new one assigned each time you power cycle the cable modem.
ReplyDeleteActually, I figured any sane person would soon get tired of continually having to create new email accounts and verify each one with Disqus.
ReplyDeleteBut this guy is beyond just having bats in the belfry, he's batshit crazy.
Yes but all 4 of you inhabit the same mind Lucas.
ReplyDelete