Please put an end to bauble farming

[Dante.1508]

So its legitimate botting?

[Ashreen Destemas.6840]

To give a hint, how much gold is farmed this way, I give you the information I've heard recently in a discord chat from someone doing this sort of farming :

With 4 accounts he claims to make 1500 gold in Verdank Brink in a week with Shiny Baubles as map reward bonus. This is almost the material costs of a legendary  weapon.

Let's check whether this is plausible: Let say 1400g per week with 4 accounts, this is 350g per week per account, this is 50g per day per account. The Verdank Brink map meta has a duration of 1:15h, so there are 19 map metas per day. This is 2g 60s per account per map meta. This sounds reasonable to me, because when I have done the farm once with real play, I've earned more than 2g.

I've heard of people with over 30 accounts who are doing this. Partially people have bought accounts for less than 2 Euro a piece in the past.

This must be unhealthy to the game, but what do i know. Nothing. Only a crank with way too less tolerance and humor.

I try to use it as a cure. I'll play the game with as little money as possible from now on.  Why bother buying things when they are almost free for some?

From my point of view the only thing to do would be to lower the respawn rate of the used "Defeat the Veteran Stonehead" event to one-tenth of what it is now, or even more. It is simply a bug that this event spawns so rapidly.

Have fun nonetheless

Edited January 3, 2022 by Ashreen Destemas.6840
grammer

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

5 hours ago, Ashreen Destemas.6840 said:

To give a hint, how much gold is farmed this way, I give you the information I've heard recently in a discord chat from someone doing this sort of farming :

With 4 accounts he claims to make 1500 gold in Verdank Brink in a week with Shiny Baubles as map reward bonus. This is almost the material costs of a legendary  weapon.

Let's check whether this is plausible: Let say 1400g per week with 4 accounts, this is 350g per week per account, this is 50g per day per account. The Verdank Brink map meta has a duration of 1:15h, so there are 19 map metas per day. This is 2g 60s per account per map meta. This sounds reasonable to me, because when I have done the farm once with real play, I've earned more than 2g.

I've gotten 6.5g per meta before, without tagging every event. So say 7g to be generous. Say you have 4 alt accounts giving you passive boons in a party while you tag directly with your main account. that is +35g per meta. More really since you'd do the pre events with your main account and it would get loot from killing the stoneheads, but lets go conservative here, 35g it is. Lets say you did this for 6 metas a day for 7 days, that becomes 1470g per bauble week in VB. Take into consideration that you'd be getting more than that courtesy of the pre events and killing the stoneheads with your main account you can very easily do +1500g per VB bauble week.

So long as you are tending the alt accounts, managing their inventory, checking chat for GM whispers and the like, and adhering to the one click per action rule, there is nothing against the terms of service about this behavior.

5 hours ago, Ashreen Destemas.6840 said:

I've heard of people with over 30 accounts who are doing this. Partially people have bought accounts for less than 2 Euro a piece in the past.

There was just a month long 50% off sale. Alt accounts generate more income over their lifespan than trading gems to gold. Login rewards alone break even at 6 months for the full purchase price. Doing VB farming with them expedites that ROI greatly. So really the VB bauble farm is an incentive for people to buy alt accounts, which is more income for Anet.

5 hours ago, Ashreen Destemas.6840 said:

This must be unhealthy to the game, but what do i know. Nothing. Only a crank with way too less tolerance and humor.

I try to use it as a cure. I'll play the game with as little money as possible from now on.  Why bother buying things when they are almost free for some?

From my point of view the only thing to do would be to lower the respawn rate of the used "Defeat the Veteran Stonehead" event to one-tenth of what it is now, or even more. It is simply a bug that this event spawns so rapidly.

Have fun nonetheless

See my above statement. VB bauble farm is an incentive for people to buy alt accounts. This makes Anet more money. It is one week out of 3, thus is limited in nature, and can be done completely within the TOS with multiple accounts.

Now should the dead AFK accounts get banned by a GM? That is a different issue, since people are obviously not tending to those accounts and truly are going against the TOS and do deserve for those accounts to be banned.

[Kurrilino.2706]

On 12/30/2021 at 5:32 PM, Dante.1508 said:

So its legitimate botting?

 

What makes you think that?

Those guys actively jump on Raptors

[mythical.6315]

Yeah because nobody could program a macro to hop onto a mount. 

[Vayne.8563]

On 9/26/2021 at 1:21 AM, Hashberry.4510 said:

Anet probably needs to change the stone heads so they are not events. That will be a shame, but it is not the first time farmers have screwed up good thing.

The Stone Heads were introduced to help people who solo and do more casual content make progress in HoT.  Just pointing this out. I myself used them on alt accounts to level masteries quickly, why not?  But I don't stay around and farm for gold.

[Firebeard.1746]

On 9/24/2021 at 10:59 AM, Drexl.7049 said:

You're letting people optimize the fun out of the game. The verdant brink meta never gets done because the map is full of people sitting AFK. There could be plenty of people interested in the full meta event, but you'd never get enough to do with all the maps full of AFK bauble farmers. Please nerf the rewards for that.

I mean they tried this in PoF and no one even cares about those metas at all. instead of letting you deterministically farm valuable vendor trash, they made it RNG tied to events, usually harder ones, but no one does PoF for any of that.  90% of PoF engagement is Pinata, which is a crying shame because it's only efficient if you don't do pres, JR is better, and let's be honest people are mostly doing it because they have a gambling addiction and can AFK it. 

And I'm really only for something being nerfed if it's overly rewarding. Like I don't think we need the economy any more deflated than it is, a lot of things have collapsed in price post IB saga. And the last time I saw a bauble farm (which was ages ago, when I was hunting those masteries last summer), no one was really AFK. They seemed pretty active killing vets. Just because they're not doing the meta doesn't mean they don't play at all. 

I agree with your sentiment, but I'm not sure that I want baubles removed, I just want active gameplay rewarded. The best option perhaps is to make the night meta give more baubles than remove it from the day cycle that everyone loves to farm. 

Edited January 4, 2022 by Firebeard.1746

[Oli.4597]

On 1/4/2022 at 10:31 AM, Firebeard.1746 said:

I agree with your sentiment, but I'm not sure that I want baubles removed, I just want active gameplay rewarded. The best option perhaps is to make the night meta give more baubles than remove it from the day cycle that everyone loves to farm. 

I agree with you here.

I dont see the bauble farm as a problem, however i do see a problem in afk farming.

Which is something most ppl do in VB bauble farm.

Just to list it here, in case a dev is reading through... in this afk farm, ppl are using herald to permanently buff other players and therefore get the event participation and also the loot while not actively "playing" the game.

To fix the problem in Verdant Brink my suggestion is, that you remove event participation just from buffing other players. (Maybe you can limit that down to just these kind of events, if that would cause problems elsewhere)

But that would at least stop the afk farming in VB while still letting ppl farm baubles as long as they hit the mob once. (aka are actively farming/playing the game)

And if you do believe, that is not enough, i would also let the event scale up. (Mob isnt dying too fast -> farm is getting a little slower)

Atm you more or less just dismount and the veteran is dead.

These are my thoughts.

 

Edited January 5, 2022 by Oli.4597

[mythical.6315]

25 minutes ago, Oli.4597 said:

that you remove event participation just from buffing other players.

They specifically added this into the game years ago so that players who played supportive roles could get event credit.  You now want that reversed because of a small percentage of players abusing it?

[Oli.4597]

Quote

They specifically added this into the game years ago so that players who played supportive roles could get event credit.  You now want that reversed because of a small percentage of players abusing it?

Yes at least for these events, supportive playstyle isnt harmed in that way as you can get event participation by just hitting once. Dps doesnt matter and you can still buff players near you while hitting the mob and not standing afk in the far distance.

[Kurrilino.2706]

On 1/3/2022 at 5:43 PM, mythical.6315 said:

Yeah because nobody could program a macro to hop onto a mount. 

And then? You still have to navigate to the correct location, which is random.

This event is not possible as a bot

[mythical.6315]

1 hour ago, Kurrilino.2706 said:

And then? You still have to navigate to the correct location, which is random.

This event is not possible as a bot

Uh huh. Sure it’s not. 
 

 

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

1 hour ago, Kurrilino.2706 said:

And then? You still have to navigate to the correct location, which is random.

This event is not possible as a bot

I'm pretty sure the stoneheads have a very specific spawn pattern.  Even if they do randomly respawn elsewhere, it's likely the same handful of spots.  Which makes programming a bot to go to scan these locations easy to do.

[Kurrilino.2706]

20 hours ago, Sir Alymer.3406 said:

I'm pretty sure the stoneheads have a very specific spawn pattern.  Even if they do randomly respawn elsewhere, it's likely the same handful of spots.  Which makes programming a bot to go to scan these locations easy to do.

 

It's only 3 locations very close by.

I still don't see what the big issue is. Just going there is not enough.

Those Stoneheads live like 1.5 seconds. 

I don't see any kind of macro or botting mechanism that predicts the spawn of the Stonehead, mounts a raptor and jumps at the right time at the right spot.

 

People getting really paranoid and see bots everywhere

 

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

1 hour ago, Kurrilino.2706 said:

I still don't see what the big issue is. Just going there is not enough.

Those Stoneheads live like 1.5 seconds. 

I don't see any kind of macro or botting mechanism that predicts the spawn of the Stonehead, mounts a raptor and jumps at the right time at the right spot.

 

People getting really paranoid and see bots everywhere

 

Did you miss the part where they're all boon heralds and giving boons gives event participation?

[Kurrilino.2706]

On 1/6/2022 at 11:05 AM, Sir Alymer.3406 said:

Did you miss the part where they're all boon heralds and giving boons gives event participation?

 

No i didn't miss that.

I just fail to see how a purposefully implemented game mechanic by A-Net is somehow illegal.

As soon as you buff someone, you participate

[Lan Deathrider.5910]

That and as long as they are not using software to automate gameplay, are present at their keyboard to respond to GM prompts, then they have not run afoul of the TOS, so its legit even if some of you disagree with it. The ones that end up dead at night time because they were truly AFK and are the ones that are going against the TOS, which is really only 30% of the heralds that you see during the farm, The rest are alts that are multibox accounts while the player tags directly on one of their accounts.

 

[mythical.6315]

8 hours ago, Kurrilino.2706 said:

 

No i didn't miss that.

I just fail to see how a purposefully implemented game mechanic by A-Net is somehow illegal.

As soon as you buff someone, you participate

Ah. So you’re justifying that anything that the game allows you to do is legit?  Okay. 

[Voltage.8027]

Baubles should just be removed from the rewards for Verdant Brink, that would get rid of the bauble farmers. I'm not sure how it's good for the game that people are earning 500 + gold every month from using alt accounts that do nothing, except tag a mob once or give a buff. Does Anet know these people are getting cash shop stuff for basically free and without effort? 

Edited January 8, 2022 by Voltage.8027

[Epsilon Indi.2031]

13 hours ago, Kurrilino.2706 said:

 

No i didn't miss that.

I just fail to see how a purposefully implemented game mechanic by A-Net is somehow illegal.

As soon as you buff someone, you participate

It's how that mechanic is used by players. Exploits tend to be against the rules and automation of event completion is a gray area (Okay if you're just alt-tabbed. Not okay if you're using 3rd party things to automate it.)

[Kurrilino.2706]

23 hours ago, mythical.6315 said:

Ah. So you’re justifying that anything that the game allows you to do is legit?  Okay. 

 

It's not about me, it's about what A-Net is justifying and according to their rules it's legal and intended.

And it's also not of a big deal at all.

If people want to spend 45 minutes of their limited lifetime on our planet to farm virtual baubles, so be it.

It's not of mine or someone else business.

Edited January 9, 2022 by Kurrilino.2706

[Kurrilino.2706]

18 hours ago, Voltage.8027 said:

Baubles should just be removed from the rewards for Verdant Brink, that would get rid of the bauble farmers. I'm not sure how it's good for the game that people are earning 500 + gold every month from using alt accounts that do nothing, except tag a mob once or give a buff. Does Anet know these people are getting cash shop stuff for basically free and without effort? 

Not sure you know how the cash shop and gems work.

The Gems bought with gold, are already paid for with real cash by someone.

Whoever owns those gems after that purchase is not of their concern.

[Linken.6345]

On 1/8/2022 at 4:33 AM, mythical.6315 said:

Ah. So you’re justifying that anything that the game allows you to do is legit?  Okay. 

Ofcourse anything the game allows you to do is legit, how could it not be?

[mythical.6315]

8 hours ago, Linken.6345 said:

Ofcourse anything the game allows you to do is legit, how could it not be?

People were able to dupe items which the game allowed them. So was that legit?

There are those on their necro who can farm endlessly without being at their computer as the game allows their minions to reset their inactivity timer. Is that legit?

In WvW players were able to get into some towers and keeps without needing to break the gates or walls because they game allowed them. Was this legit as well?

Just because the game allows you to do something this does not mean that it is automatically legit. Exploits and glitches are real things which I’m sure that you’re well aware of as is everyone else. 

Edited January 9, 2022 by mythical.6315

[AliamRationem.5172]

11 hours ago, Linken.6345 said:

Ofcourse anything the game allows you to do is legit, how could it not be?

So what do you call an exploit?