Teleport hacks and rampant botting are out of control in this game.  ArenaNet has recently addresed this issue via their forums, but it's looking more and more like PR speak.  I've personally witnessed hordes of bots left unchecked for days.  As I logged off in frustration just now, I was wacthing a guardian bot teleport from mob to mob while attacking w/ his scepter at unlimited range, through terrain.

I've been on the Guild Wars 2 bandwagon for a year and a half and it's crushing to have an issue as basic as anti-cheat measures break it.  Only recently have they reported hiring some people to develop better anti-cheat people.  But the whole problem is that they are trying to automate something that it takes real humans to address.  Without actual human beings to contact about these serious issues, they are left unchecked long enough that by the time those accounts are banned, the damage is done and they've moved on to other places, other hacks.  

ArenaNet is flat out too slow in addressing these issues.  Outside of one forum post on the issue, they haven't said squat about how they are going to fix it.

I simply cannot enjoy a game where bots are running as rampant as they are allowed to right now.

UPDATE:  Since I've posted this, ArenaNet has stated that they are combating botting in three ways (summary of their statements):

1. Diminishing Returns.  When a bot farms a group of enemies over a period of time, drops go down.  The purpose is to limit their damage until they can be reported and banned.  They have clearly stated that they are still tweeking this since many legit players have also found that this had limited their drops as well.

2. Bot detection.  They've stated on their forums that they have recently hired data experts to improve their ability to detect and remove bots.  This is obviously incomplete at this time since some bots are active for days at a time without detection.  

3. Player reporting.  This is, at this stage, the only known reliable way to remove bots.  Sadly, the epidemic is strong enough that there just isnt the manpower to allow for the proper investigation for each individual botting case.  Imagine there are five accounts all multiboxing.  They have to look into each of those accounts and investigate them one at a time.  They don't want to accidentally ban a legit player who was mistakenly reported because he was near the bots at the time the report went down.

I made this original post in a moment of genuine frustration.  The following must happen:

1. Response time must be improved.  Bots at work for days is not acceptable.

2. Bot/exploit detection must improve.  Goes without saying.

3. All of this must be done without damaging the experience of legit players.

Originally posted by GrumpyCharr

Teleport hacks and rampant botting are out of control in this game.  ArenaNet has recently addresed this issue via their forums, but it's looking more and more like PR speak.  I've personally witnessed hordes of bots left unchecked for days.  As I logged off in frustration just now, I was wacthing a guardian bot teleport from mob to mob while attacking w/ his scepter at unlimited range, through terrain.

I've been on the Guild Wars 2 bandwagon for a year and a half and it's crushing to have an issue as basic as anti-cheat measures break it.  Only recently have they reported hiring some people to develop better anti-cheat people.  But the whole problem is that they are trying to automate something that it takes real humans to address.  Without actual human beings to contact about these serious issues, they are left unchecked long enough that by the time those accounts are banned, the damage is done and they've moved on to other places, other hacks.  

ArenaNet is flat out too slow in addressing these issues.  Outside of one forum post on the issue, they haven't said squat about how they are going to fix it.

I simply cannot enjoy a game where bots are running as rampant as they are allowed to right now.

Geez, drama much? I reported a gaggle of 4 botters yesterday and within 15 minutes they disapeared. This is the only time I have ever seen bots, so they are doing the best they can. It is up to us to report what we see, if we do, they respond.

Why do people love drama so much?

botting is consequence of gold  buying.

you give those farmer income then of course they keep making and ruin your game.

if that same money go into Anet pocket through gems sell, i think they can hire more techniction to develove anti -bot.

So, lower the price of Gold and Gems in game, and the botters will have no income, and will move on.

Takes a few seconds to adjust, and they can put it up later on when they have all given up :)

I agree, I have a 5-6 characters ranges 30-50 and every zone they are leveling in has normally 2-3 areas where botters are running arround crazy.  I have reported many, many, many times and have never seen any of them stop.  They poster above who says he reported them and 15 mins later they were gone- I have not seen that.  

I have seen the same group of botters for weeks now with all my toons - they have the same name with just I,II,III,IV etc. after there names and I have reported them with each toon.  Nothing has happened.  I logged off today and last night because in two areas where my characters where questing there were two groups of porting / naked rangers just killing everything.

Its to the point where they dont even try to seem like non-botters.  They are naked with 10 rangers using port hack with names like abcd1,abcdII, abcdIII, abcdIV...etc

Lath

Originally posted by squalleonaha

botting is consequence of gold  buying.

you give those farmer income then of course they keep making and ruin your game.

if that same money go into Anet pocket through gems sell, i think they can hire more techniction to develove anti -bot.

Botting is consequence of designing a game with boring monotonous tasks that if done enough times will benefit your character.

Lets be honest here and look at the real root cause.

If game companies continue to put in such "features" they should embrace botting.

Originally posted by gieger808
I agree. Wouldn't be the first game bots ruined. Nor will it be the last. It will only get worse, in GW and in future games. As long as they can make money, they aren't going anywhere. This mmo gaming now. Sad.

Sadly I have to agree, it will get worse and Anet is losing the battle, i found people using hacks even in the WvWvW battlefield and my server full with just 10 players in the myst early morning, i mean is full because the pve world is full of bots. but not all the games are like this, people keep talking about swtor but if they did something good was a game free of bots, same about Lotro or even AoC you have games out there where the bots is not a big deal. But sadly is killing GW2. 

Not sure which servers you are playing on, but I have not seen that many botters on the one I play on. After reporting the gold buying spam mail it does not come back. After reporting a botter I rarely see them again after a few days. Anet has also taken measures to discourage the botters around certain events in recent build update. Within the first 2 weeks Anet issued thousands of bans and removed accounts of exploiters in the game. They hired additional programmers to develop more affective tools to detect and report exploiters, gold sellers and botters.

From my experience (which is many years) in MMOs Anet has taken a much harder stand and quicker response to the issue than most other MMOs I have played. So just be patient it will get better. 

I was on one server and switched, partly because of the 'quiet' zones and partly the bots. The new one I am on is rampant with bots, particularly in the lower level zones.

I was staying in the human starter area for a few days (playing 3 toons to get them to around 20) and the same groups were in the newbie areas running over and over. At times the handful of actual players in the area were having trouble capping mobs to complete the hearts as the bots would port over and 'locust swarm' the mob to nil.

I don't complain very often. I usually just stay quiet, get past and move to the next but this game is getting worse (as far as bots go) by the day.

Set up teams of GMs, 2 to a server who jump to locales reported as botting. Ban the accounts. Their 'software fix' isn't doing anything near what it should be and it's been proven over and over.

I really like GW2 but if the developers and managers keep the  'we've got the fix en route..keep working on it' mentality,' they will drive this game into the ground waiting. Develop a fix but apply a band-aid now.

Originally posted by Sentime

Originally posted by squalleonaha

botting is consequence of gold  buying.

you give those farmer income then of course they keep making and ruin your game.

if that same money go into Anet pocket through gems sell, i think they can hire more techniction to develove anti -bot.

Botting is consequence of designing a game with boring monotonous tasks that if done enough times will benefit your character.

Botting is the consequence of people playing a game they obviously don't enjoy as-is feeling that fact entitles them to get around the gameplay by using a  bot, thus undermining the entire point of playing in the first place.

Lets be honest here and look at the real root cause.

Okay, let's. The root cause is lazy, entitled players who want the best things in the game handed to them with the least amount of effort. When the game doesn't fit squarely within their "tolerance level" of actually playing the game (read: next to nil for many), they feel that it then gives them the right to cheat, hack, exploit and bot to get around it. And thent hey blame the developers for their choice of gameplay. Kinda like what you're doing in  your post, squalleonaha.

The people who are enjoying the game they chose to buy and choose to continue to play don't feel the need to hack/exploit/cheat/bot because they're enjoying the game as it is.

If game companies continue to put in such "features" they should embrace botting.

Translated: As long as there are gamers who want the best things handed to them as quickly as possible, for as little effort as possible, developers just should cave and start making their games cater to them.

I disagree.

People should make better choices in picking what games they play, they should take more accountability on for their own choices, stop blaming developers for not making a game designed specifically for them, and move on to a game that they will enjoy.

Originally posted by Digna

I was on one server and switched, partly because of the 'quiet' zones and partly the bots. The new one I am on is rampant with bots, particularly in the lower level zones.

 

I was staying in the human starter area for a few days (playing 3 toons to get them to around 20) and the same groups were in the newbie areas running over and over. At times the handful of actual players in the area were having trouble capping mobs to complete the hearts as the bots would port over and 'locust swarm' the mob to nil.

I don't complain very often. I usually just stay quiet, get past and move to the next but this game is getting worse (as far as bots go) by the day.

Set up teams of GMs, 2 to a server who jump to locales reported as botting. Ban the accounts. Their 'software fix' isn't doing anything near what it should be and it's been proven over and over.

I really like GW2 but if the developers and managers keep the  'we've got the fix en route..keep working on it' mentality,' they will drive this game into the ground waiting. Develop a fix but apply a band-aid now.

I agree, I was excited when they banned and suspended all those accounts at the beginning for taking advantage of the karma bug.  I thought: this is how you do it to people who cheat etc.  However, the DR program that they are paying top dollar for - hiring programmers to create and maintain- does not work and is a major problem, from what I hear, when you hit 80 and are "grinding" karma for your legendary or just playing the game at level 80 and running some dungeons.  

Like the poster above pointed out - they should just hire some GM's (customer reps) who will quickly respond to "botting" petitions and put the hammer down on these guys fast.  Plus the hacks are just out of control!  The teleport and speed hacks- this is a 2012 AAA game and is being overun with botters with speed and teleporting hacks.  This is not acceptable IMO.

Lath

Originally posted by Leethe
Can I safely assume anyone I see fighting in-game naked is a bot?

It's a good clue. Their armor breaks and they don't bother to fix it.

Also they blink.

This afternoon, I didn't see any bots around but there was a brown bear (ranger pet) that was appearing out of nowhere and running across an area I was in, then it would disppear for a bit.

(An area there were no bears in)

Just a combination of many things that decides how many bots are in a game.

"free" to play has consequences, x$ a month is not a stopper but it's a limiter, having to buy a box is not a stopper but another limiter.

How much game currency can affect play = how interested buyers are in purchasing = how much botters are willing to invest and risk.

If botters give income like the diablo3 way, the revenue per month way, having to buy box sets, or other by design ways.

Lets face it, having people on the payroll to hunt and ban bots and cheats, are purely red numbers in the book, which Blizzard amongst others realized years ago. Also, automatic bot detection is FaIL and has never worked against professional botters, hackers are clever and as soon as someone is banned, they figure out why and create a workaround (usually within hours).

How open the game is to hacking, that is how well though is the game code in terms of preventing hacks, does the server need to approve (by calculation) some action like moving around.. which is a costly thing to do.

The risk of getting banned vs the possible gain.

Game design, how easy it is to automate tasks, how easy it is to hide in instances, how much grinding it would take for a normal player to get something vs paying for it and its price.

Something can be done to ease the problem if a company has the will to loose money doing it, but many things are unfixable due to design.

Originally posted by Kniknax

So, lower the price of Gold and Gems in game, and the botters will have no income, and will move on.

Takes a few seconds to adjust, and they can put it up later on when they have all given up :)

It sounds like you are trying to justify buying gold from third-party web sites.  You would be alone in your opinion, as everyone else who has posted so far does not support the act due to the hacking, duping, exploiting, and botting which inevitably results from buying gold from these people.

It isn't ArenaNet who sets the gold and gem price conversion rates.  Players set it through their transactions in a manner similar to the stock market.  The price is off from what it should be due to the rampant botting and gold farmers.  They have been able to over-inflate prices on many items by buying and re-selling at higher prices.  This has created a higher demand for gold which increases the price you see on the trader.

The lesson here should be:  NEVER buy game currencies from third party sellers.  You will only make the problem worse.  Your "need" for gold never justifies the ruined game economy that results from buying gold.