Looting scripts

[Mike]

Yes. Looting scripts in PvP can never, in my opinion, be acceptable. It would be convenient to have in PvE, but not so much that it would be worth the risk of spilling over into PvP due to a gradual increase in acceptance and utilization.

[Johnny Walac]

Gotta add.

I don't think it's hard for the GM's to see someone looting at an impossible human speed. It's just hard to monitor it as there is no program for GM's to use. So the GM gotta watch it himself or smth. Thus the punishment should be permban because the GM will actually see the crime himself. Hard to minitor, not hard to prove.

[Demian]

Imo no looting scripts in anything, PvM or PvP. If you want all those gems and regs and crap then loot them yourself not have a script do it for you. Though the problem here is it's very hard to know who is really using a looting script. I once got a message from the late Boris while I was on a hunt asking if I'm using a looting script because my looting caused some messages to appear to him. And I wasn't using anything. So how can we punish people for something that can't be proven? And if some staff member wants, I can record myself looting and I bet I can get those messages to appear, without scripts.

[Ares]

Imo no looting scripts in anything, PvM or PvP. If you want all those gems and regs and crap then loot them yourself not have a script do it for you. Though the problem here is it's very hard to know who is really using a looting script. I once got a message from the late Boris while I was on a hunt asking if I'm using a looting script because my looting caused some messages to appear to him. And I wasn't using anything. So how can we punish people for something that can't be proven? And if some staff member wants, I can record myself looting and I bet I can get those messages to appear, without scripts.

That's the very problem. I can't script-wise determine if you or a script is looting. I can monitor how fast you're looting and compare that to the other times you've looted for example, but the point is that it'll probably be a guessing game. We all need to figure out what's okay among us I think. Boris, Monad and I were talking about implementing something once that monitored your looting speed and alerted the gms if something suspicious was detected.

My main point is, this is possible, it won't go away even if we make it taboo, so we might as well agree on something.

[Adram]

<script>
loop
- wait a random number between 1-3 seconds.
- loot
end loop
</script>

mimics looting = impossible to detect by looting speed

is it not possible to detect if the player is constantly check for corpses around them??

[Cyrus Tegyr]

You could potentially check to see if corpses are constantly being open, you could also check to see the speed with which someone is removing item(s) from a corpse and report that to a cfg file, you could potentially check for a lot of stuff. But with anything, you can get around it.

All I have to do in Easyuo is have a looting script generate a number between 15-30 and have it just wait that number the number is in miliseconds so 20 is a second. It isn't hard to do at all.

I do not see a problem with looting scripts in PvM as I pointed out to Ares and the rest of the Imperial crew, when you kill a mob, it is as dead as something can virtually get.

Now in PvP that's a whole different cookie, people are dying left right and center, it is like the battle for Iwo Jima and people trying to get their shit back.

Personally I do not have a problem when it comes to using looting scripts in PvM, as someone who has been asked to edit countless scripts in terms of looting scripts, I could name off off the top of my head 5 people who have asked me to edit their looting macro and the answer I gave to every one of them. Fear not, I shan't reveal names and I chose not to edit illegal macros.

However, if we are seriously considering legal macros I would be apt to offer my services to make a bog standard looting macro for pangaea with respectable wait timers and what not.

[Ert]

My attempt to look at this from two sides:
disclaimer: i might be biased towards allowing a pvm loot script but not allowing pvp

Those For:

Hunting would be made alot more convenient. After not playing UO for years now, one of the hardest thing to get used to for me has been the looting system. I am the guy that picks a chest and takes every gem, and every valuable. I will take up to a minute or two after i have unlocked 4 chests just to make sure i didnt miss anything.
Allowing the scripts would save alot of time for people. [for me this is a very positive point, more time hunting/action, less time looking through a microscope at the loot window]

People would possibly get more value out of their time hunting, making it feel more rewarding. A combination of convenience and ether grabbing more stuff - so more cash, or grabbing the same stuff faster.

Allowing them would remove/clarify a rule that from the discussion here seems to be easy to break and hard to enforce. If that is the case the rule serves very little purpose, having rules like that might even be bad for the system as a whole. I understand the rule is not without its own purpose, but people might be tempted to break it since convenience is very important to many games, and its so hard to enforce.



Those Against:

Allowing it in PvM would most likely lead people to atleast try it more than they currently are in PvP, as Mike pointed out, acceptance of it might spill over leading to more issues for GMs to sort out if only allowed in one area.

[take this with a grain of salt, very little experience with pvp]
Allowing a PvP script looting might decide fights too fast, if its a rush to get your stuff back then it stands to reason the first one to die is losing his equipment and unless his team got spares, hes out of the fight. This might bias fights towards larger groups or whoever brings enough stuff to fight with. [is this good or bad? not sure]
In an organized fight, it might change some dynamics around, not sure how exactly.

Allowing scripts in even PvM might take some fun out of hunting.

Within the market there might appear more items in circulation of the "i cant be arsed picking that up" category, like those 2 fertile dirts or something, over time they would add up. Impossible to know how many we would be seeing or if it would impact the market in a big way. We might see more feathers for example.

Those that are less script-savy would be at a loss like always, they would loot slower theoretically but if it was a party of people doing PvM this would be a non-issue. PvP on the other hand, lets face it, is a mess. A tool that clears up some of that mess, or does it for you, is a gigantic advantage.
I think here is a good reason for limiting it to PvM.


Well you wanted a discussion and i seem to have thrown you an essay.
Another post well spammed. All in a days work.

[Darian Darkmind]

I think it's alright in PvM, but a definite no in PvP.

My only concern with PvM is that if these scripts are made public, everyone will use them and suddenly the market and the server is being swarmed with thousands of new items. Currently a lot of people don't bother looting the small stuff, which means that those players who do will have a market for them. Then again I'm not sure whether this is a good thing or a bad thing.

[Mox]

Heh, why not having a .command skill for looting?
Kinda would rule out the necessity for loot scripts

[Darian Darkmind]

Heh, why not having a .command skill for looting?
Kinda would rule out the necessity for loot scripts :x

Problem is, if the ".command" won't work to player corpses - which it of course should not work - people could still use their own looting scripts.

While such command surely makes PvM a lot more enjoyable and as such should be done, it won't remove the problem of PvP.