Incarnate has said previously that spotter bots are going away, yet we still have the capability now.

Currently an account has been bypassing the captcha system and remaining online and docked in Latos M7 under the pretense of being a shop bot. It is, however, totally possible for this account to see and relay spotting information of ships that come into proximity to the station or people who are docked in the station.

In line with the policy of eliminating spotting bots, I propose that characters that have been docked in a station for more than 10 minutes have their in-station sensor ability deactivated until they travel to another sector. This would mean that they would not see any other character on their "Nearby Ships" list if there are indeed other ships nearby or anyone docked in the station.

Further, I propose they do not get their in-station sensor ability back if they /explode prior to redocking in a station.

The truth is that while shop bots add content to the game, they do not require sensor information.

I agree, receiving credits should be enough to tell if person is close for a shop transfer.

+1

-1

There already exists an effective time limit that restricts ability to see nearby shops while docked for an extended period of the. I actually discovered this while remaining docked overnight to shake a 24h tkos.

I would imagine knauf doesn't mind that she can't see ships because her goal is to sell stuff.

If this exists already I would be interested to know what the threshold is.

Also wanted to add: Logging out/in will not re-activate the sensor data unless account has been logged out for an hour.

Also the thing that shows who docks/undocks should be limited as well, not just nearby ships

Let me offer a clarification on my issue:

-I was under the understanding that all players were subject to the captcha system for being AFK to prevent people from AFKing in a station. It may be that I am incorrect, and I can see how this might be taken as an accusation of exploitation. Given that I cannot amend the OP, I would like to state clearly that the issue is not that someone is AFKing in a station, but that the opportunity to AFK indefinitely and alert others with sensor data is possible.

And we all know that when things are possible, they are taken advantage of if an advantage can be taken.

I think this should be tidied up so there is no question that shop bots cannot operate as spybots.

Currently an account has been bypassing the captcha system and remaining online and docked in Latos M7 under the pretense of being a shop bot.

Inc has stated in the past, that players idleing in a single station won't get a captcha.

2) If, for some reason, you have to be AFK, stay docked in a single station (like the store-bots).

(#2 option is only available to Premium subscribers, but we make it possible for store-bots, for now).

And that your sector visibility gets set to zero.

Yeah, if you dock to a station, in a single sector for a long period of time, that's okay. Your sector sensor visibility will be temporarily zeroed in that location, but you won't get kicked off.

Since most of this suggestion is already implemented, are you requesting that the sector visibility be reduced to zero even quicker? Like if a player docks, they can't see anyone in the sector?

Well it's not clear to me exactly how long it takes the zero visibility kicks in, and whether or not you can bypass it by simply logging/relogging or undocking and exploding. Certainly from some limited testing it's longer than 10 minutes currently.

I think 10 minutes of being in a station is long enough to have sensor access. Beyond that, engaging with the game via the methods I mentioned should be required to regain that access to prevent spybots.

In-station time should also be cumulative -- if death via /explode occurs before redocking. In other words, if you home at the station, undock and /explode prior to the 10 minutes, the 10 minute timer keeps on ticking. This prevents someone from just undocking and /exploding every 9 minutes 59 seconds to reset this timer and extend their visibility indefinitely.

Up until 10 minutes of in-station time has been accrued, the timer can be reset by simply undocking and redocking.

If this exists already I would be interested to know what the threshold is.

We do not discuss the specific mechanics of the existing system, because that makes those mechanics easier to avoid.

In general, we prefer to use heuristic models that have ranges of different responses, and utilize a variety of different datapoints, as opposed to single-data "if/then" mechanics that you're proposing. The latter are very easy to detect and then work around.

Anyway, I think the relevant point here is that you feel there is still too much potential spybot activity. I don't disagree. We have some plans in the works, and have for some time, but it is a lower priority than everything we've been doing for, well, most of this year.

Are we also on the topic of capship spotter bots, where players can equip a Shared Group Radar Extender on a Capship, hide it in a convenient location where it's not easily found but can get the "So-And-So in This-and-this ship has entered your radar range" notification, and then deepspace themselves such that players entering the sector don't get their prescence notification. So then it's one-sided, where Capship owners can spot without being spotted.

I don't know whether the above use is an intended use. Seems like a spotter bot to me.

Sid:

*** Vendetta 1.8.599
- Ten new missions, building off of an existing tree.
- Shared Group Radar is now disabled when it is in NFZ.

That doesn't remove it's spotter use at all. You can still do it at wormholes, with pretty low risk of the Capship being spotted. Also, is this use intented in any circumstances? Is the risk of your Capship being spotted (very unlikely, unless someone knows it's in the sector and actively goes searching) and killed enough to justify use as a spotter bot?

This thread is about the state of characters docked in stations, not about capships or shared group radar extenders. Like Rule #5 states:

Similarly, don't post several different ideas to a single thread. Each idea deserves its own thread, otherwise the on-going discussion gets overly chaotic and confusing

Also, for any complaint that you have, or suggestion based on a perceived problem, you need to experimentally verify that the problem actually exists, before posting. That way you can clearly define the measured parameters of the issue, and not "how you think it could be a problem" or "what someone told you".

The truth is that while shop bots add content to the game, they do not require sensor information.

If this whole thread is solely being started around shop bots, then this is a bit of a waste of time, as the shop bots are generally already blind. Honestly, I thought there were other concerns.

It's not just about shopbots ultimately (as anyone can AFK in a station), but in this case there just happens to be an everpresent shopbot in arguably the most important sector in the game, where spotting information is of highest value.

Obviously you are the one who determines if spybots are allowed or not. My impression from what you've said is that they are undesirable and that you have taken steps to mitigate their effectiveness. My post, as you stated, is here because I feel like there is still too much potential. I have done preliminary experimentation, but I will experiment further.

The man just said shop bots are blind. What's to experiment? I'm genuinely curious.

My post, as you stated, is here because I feel like there is still too much potential.

Look, if there's an actual problem, I'm open to hearing about it. But this is now my fourth response on a thread that's fundamentally about an issue that, as far as I'm aware, doesn't meaningfully exist.

I'm not claiming that spy-bots don't still represent some degree of a concern (albeit reduced compared to prior periods), I wrote above that we still have plans to further improve that area. But shop-bots are not my focus.

There's a bad tendency in the game for people to have "suspicions", which then blossom into some kind of paranoid faux-problem, that is then wrapped up in guild politics and inter-personal issues.

I'm not into paranoia-laced faux-problems, although I get those reported to me pretty often. I'm even less into the conspiracy theories about me (how we secretly work for Google or.. something? I dunno, it was confusing). It's all a big burn of time and energy, for no value.

So, let's focus on problems that are problems. If there's no evidence of an actual problem, then let's move on to something more productive for everyone involved.

I've been online in Latos M7 for 14 hours and have not had any degradation of my ability to see nearby ships or people who have docked, nor have I had my ability to report those sightings to a chat channel hampered. I have used a plugin that launches me every 5 hours and explodes.

If AFK spotterbots in stations is something you don't want happening, then I think it's reasonable to say this is still very much a problem in so far as it is still very much possible to implement. From my experience, I ascertain no "blindness" whatsoever.

Now, perhaps your "heuristic" models require/utilize more data points than I'm aware of, i.e. maybe they take a much longer time to kick in? Obviously I have no idea since you don't want to share how it's all supposed to actually work. But from my basic experimentation, whatever blindness you think is happening is NOT happening, or at least it isn't within any reasonable amount of time so as to prevent spotterbots from having feasibility. 14 hours is plenty of time for a spotterbot to be effective. Honestly I thought by this point I would have to start figuring out how to undo the supposed "zeroing" of radar, but I haven't had to do it.

As far as evidence of someone using this feature (or bug? again I don't know exactly how this is supposed to work) in a problematic manner, it is my understanding that posting such things in suggestions is a no no, so I won't. I would hope you have your own ways of easily seeing if common AFK accounts that are docked indefinitely in stations are relaying spotting information. A simple check of activity prior to this suggestion post would probably suffice.

BUT..... if you don't think this is a problem, then that would also be helpful information, as I'm sure there are other parties who would be interested in setting up their own spotterbots.

(facepalm). By "actual problem" I meant a demonstrable gameplay issue, not a hokey attempt to test whether the system exists.

Greenwall, I've done my best to answer your questions within the parameters of what I will make public. The overall system you requested already exists (as attested by others on this thread), particularly with regards to shop-bots, and it is designed to avoid detection. Your experiments are simplistic and your derived "conclusions" are similarly flawed.

Everything is working as-intended. Yes, we have lots of data, insight and awareness. Plus, I already noted, twice, that we do have further plans to improve things (which, I would think, was what you wanted to actually hear?).

Similarly, my offer to talk about "actual problems" was not an invitation to finger-point about vague suspicions at random people (where "posting such things in suggestions is a no no"). If you actually had something to report, I imagine you would be doing it via a Ticket.

Anyway, I'm out of gas on this topic. This is just a pointless time-sink, because the OP doesn't believe what I have to say, and lacks the technical understanding or data to comment on the subject, so this is just going to go around forever. I'll pass on that. Locked.