I (and my 9 friends and family that were playing) quit playing RS back when they implemented the GE as something special and took the wilderness away.  When they brought them back I came back to see what is happening...

Today I had a slayer...turoths to be exact and EVERY WORLD I went to had bots.  I posted on the forum (because you can't contact RS) that the botting was awful...10 to 15 bots in every world at the turoths.  RS shut down my post as not the place to bring up bots and that I should report someone if I thought they were botting...SERIOUSLY?  DID YOU NOT READ WHAT I POSTED????  I am suppose to report 10-15 bots per world at the turoths...SERIOUSLY????  What a joke!  Before they shut me down someone told me how to deal with it...Thanks Friend!

Yes. When Jagex brought back free trade, the bots were bound to come back with it. Their secret weapon turned out to be a farce, and the real money trading has gone right back to its old levels, even worse since the bots have evolved over the years to be able to farm higher level areas (frost dragons, slayer monsters, dungeoneering, etc).

Originally posted by Omali

Yes. When Jagex brought back free trade, the bots were bound to come back with it. Their secret weapon turned out to be a farce, and the real money trading has gone right back to its old levels, even worse since the bots have evolved over the years to be able to farm higher level areas (frost dragons, slayer monsters, dungeoneering, etc).

 The bots never left LOL. You just had higher level bots where they stocked an entire account and they sold the whole package instead.  They could solve this easily if they actually wanted to get rid of the bots, but they have proven they care even less now by just lowering a few stats on a botter, and usually not by much. All they would have to do is block the way they access the client and add a hard drive Ip detection tool and ban the actual hard disks, and the accounts associated with them and it would make it harder for them to just make another bot. Yes I am aware people can spoof their HD IP, but there are also better detection tools available now that go around that. Basically you agree to allow the tool, or you don't play. Pretty simple.

That way they would have to go purchase new hard drives in order to access the game. LOL

As for Library botters ect.. I do not think the Library is going to go out and purchase new HDs just so you can bot. Sure, some legit players are probably not going to be able to play from the Library anymore, but I think it would be worth it just to stop them once and for all.

Very true: turoth: 10-15 bots per world, all have almost same look, chinch hunt area: 5-10 bots per world, imlings is full of them, mining guild, frost, blue & green dragons, yew trees, some fishing spot etc.
I left game when freedom of trade was removed & my pk clients were gone (back at time i sold pots, food, armor etc at Egde busy PK worlds).

This year I came back most because they brought all back & also as noob Mod Mark made posts about how he can detect bots.

I was wrong to take 1 year of membership as I'm disgusted to death now but Jagex will never pay you back, so I play till the end & try to make them feel bad with my forum posts.

MY THOUGH about BOTS: or Jagex don't care as they pay most of subs (I guess like 75-85% of players use bots), or. worse again, they sells bot clients or game money from other sites.
In both cases I regret to spend my time and money on this game (although I don't have time to play anything hard or new & can play RS semi AFK) as playing with bots is not FUN at all, and game now looks like a big mess.
Jagex hide the truth by removing all forum posts criticizing their attitude, RANTS forum was even definitely removed.
THIS game is such SHAME! From all like 10 MMO I've played / tried only BOTSCAPE has such bad issue, and, worse, nobody care anymore....

I really don't care about bots.  There just part of the game, and there a FUN part of the game if you know how to lure them and kill them in the wilds

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Originally posted by username509
I really don't care about bots.  There just part of the game, and there a FUN part of the game if you know how to lure them and kill them in the wilds

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which is nice as soon only guys like you & bots will pay for this game, as many people started to chancel sub.

There are too many bots cutting Yews in the free worlds.

Originally posted by AkaJetson

There are too many bots cutting Yews in the free worlds.

There have always been too many bots cutting yews. That's old news. The new news is the number of high level bots in membership worlds, such as frost dragons. The thing is now no matter where you go there are too many bots, used to be, before they cut wildy and trade, once you got so high there weren't bots in your activities, then while they banned it they adjusted the bots for high level activities. So now we just have bots of all kinds once they brought it back. Instead of working to solve that, they also stopped banning them, instead just reduced their stats a bit.  I had a guy tell me he botted a character all the way from the start, and they only set him back 10 levels on 4 stats as a punishment.  They just do not care anymore.

They talk alot of talk, but when it comes down to it, their actions tell us they choose not to solve this.

I know they've been around for ages, but I meant to say there are more at the moment than have been in the past. When I used to play about 4-5 years ago there were probably about 5 bots per group of yew trees, but now there's about 15.

Seems like now are about 15% of players who don't use any sort of bot. =D

This game is ready for nomination: Best Botted Game of the Year.

Jagex care more about income and as bots pay like 80%+ of subs, they do nothing to get rid of them.

I see this game dying, as RS currency became cheaper to buy every day. The day real world traders income will not cover sub cost anymore, the game gonna die.

Originally posted by Lovely_Laly

Seems like now are about 15% of players who don't use any sort of bot. =D

This game is ready for nomination: Best Botted Game of the Year.

Jagex care more about income and as bots pay like 80%+ of subs, they do nothing to get rid of them.

I see this game dying, as RS currency became cheaper to buy every day. The day real world traders income will not cover sub cost anymore, the game gonna die.

As much as I hate to say it, I completely agree.  RuneScape will always have a special place in my heart -- I first started playing the game during RS1/Classic days, and continue to play it on an off.  

Its not that Jagex isn't doing anything about the bots, its that the penalties for botting are not as harsh as they once were.  Now, first offenders recieve 14-21 days ban time, minor roll-backs, and big possibility for appealing that ban.  That means an Aisan gold farmer can make 20-30 accounts and not even have to be worried about perm-ban or even IP ban.

If Jagex truly wanted to do something about there epidemic, they could perm-ban or IP ban a LOT more often, but as you said, they are too caught up in making money, which inevitably, will cause the game to die.

I just wish more people could have seen RuneScape in its glory days..

Runescape has been around a long time, but Jagex's priorities are their games currently in-development: Stellar Dawn, Transformers and 8-Realms.

Jagex realized that Runescape was in decline after they removed Free Trade and the money started drying up, threatening development of their games that represent Jagex's "future". Runescape isn't the future.

So the decision? Get the money out of Runescape NOW, any way possible. Jagex knew that botter accounts in free trade would probably bring in an additional million or two per year, as well as a few thousand more players. They had no idea how many botters there would be, though, and how much of a cash bonanza it would turn out to be.

Estimates of botting accounts, between players and RWTers, are between 50K-200K. Even if we say it's 100K accounts, that's about $7 million per year.  This is more than enough to compensate for killing Runescape a few years early if it can speed development of their other games sufficiently.

The only ones to really blame, though, are those of us suckers who still have their subscriptions active for whatever reason. Paying a subscription is your way of saying "I approve".

They just released a statement about it - http://services.runescape.com/m=news/update-on-our-ongoing-battle-against-bots

I m trapped by long sub I've payed at February, so I'll play it till the end of sub then quite once for all.
If I need to chat or look my account I can just long at f2p. NO WAY for me to continue sub for almost dead RS!

Mods keep defending & approve Jagex, which means to me that only slow minded were chosen to be Mods. =XD

I hope other Jagex projects will fail only because it's not trustful company.

On the 25th Jagex is implementing an anti-botting system that will permantly stop people who use 'reflective-botting' tools, which accounts for 98% of botters. I'm eager to see how long it takes until botters fight back with new techniques, but at this point it seems like Jagex is finally taking steps to put an end to the issue. Honestly this is going to alter the economy and cost Jagex some subscribers, so I have to take my hat off to them for finally taking drastic measures despite the costs.

I want to see before all if any member account will be banned for botting, then I'll tell about cost of subs etc.
So far I bet they ban only f2p as they are useless anyhow.
If Jagex never stop to re-roll botters, they will loose battle against bots (if they do battle too).

May be all this measures was just show-off before runefest. Anyhow I don't believe bots will gone, matter of time for all of them to set up updates.

To me only what can work is permanent ban for any use of bot, but I don't believe at all, Jagex gonna sacrifice subs for it.

Lets see what will happen in like 2-3 weeks.

I don't think this updates aims to ban botters but to render their botting tools useless. If you ban a botter they'll just come back with a new account and IP (they probably have multiple account anyway), but if you destroy their tools they will never be able to bot again, that's what Jagex is going after it seems. Whether it'll work or not is another question, but Jagex are pretty confident about it. Also many botters don't want to legitimately play Runescape (too time consuming), even by just making bots useless would be enough for many to unsubscribe and leave the game.

I'm totally agree about some players using bot as they are bored but need to have achievements, they will leave I guess, which means loss of subs for Jagex.
Not sure how many players use some bots, but to me they are not that many.

More important seems question about real money trading bots, they pay up to 30 accounts per runner & they have nothing to do with game playing, means they will leave anyhow if bot stop working. From other point of view, if they will not be stopped, prices for RS gold will drop and their farming became noneffective, so they will stop pay at this point too.

I'm against bot as it or not fun (player botting) or can ruined game (gold farmer botting), but I feel worried about Jagex income & further capacity to pay game charges and keep it run.

Now Jagex declared to perma ban over 1,5 mil accounts, even if most of them were f2p, still some were sub payers. This way Jagex already loose money & will loose way more if bot will not work.
Many of legit players left game already & nothing tells they will be back.

Allover situation at MMO market is not that easy: many games released, making choice harder to make & player base harder to keep.
Most of MMO turns into f2p / item shop base, as, I guess, they can't collect enough subs.
RS still playable for free if it's just occasional gaming.

So let's see what nearest future will show us.

Jagex are working on an MMO called Transformers Universe, since Transformers is so popular now I suspect they're banking on that to bring them huge revenue, not Runescape these days. Because of that it makes sense that they may be concerned about the integrity of RS (i.e bot infestation) instead of their subscriber numbers. I'm just speculating right now, but whatever. If the anti-botting system works I'm hoping legit players will return

So far I can noticed 1/10 of previous population per server (except some busy worlds).
It shows well impact of bot in RS.
Looks like only few (silly?=P) players never used bot, or like 5% of gamers.

Due to fact that RS is slow, grindy & somewhat outdated, I can understand why people used bot for faster progress. (what I can't understand is what fun they have of bot using & why not play better game instate).

With total intolerance for RW trading bots, I would suggest to Jagex to take lessons of this bot issue & revamp game to bring way more fun & way less grind to it.

Or it's too late & 85%+ of sub are lost?

May be this game is unpopular for legit players & will now die due to number of players left.