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I'm seeing anywhere between 3-5 bot farms per night via the DD now. I'm helping SC as much as I can and taking a screenshot and reporting it to SC but now it's a chore. There's way too many to keep up. I've sent maybe 15 messages the past three or so days. The bot farms are easy to spot.
Not everyone is a bot...
How can you be certain they are all bots?
umm..I never implied "everyone is a bot". Bot farms follow a fairly easy recognizable pattern. I could post 15 screenshots here tonight of the bot farms I found over the past few days and they all follow a very similar template:Quote:
Originally Posted by Jerhunter44
A few examples...
1. Usually levels 30+
2. Always auto selling 10 wheat for 1 coin
3. Fields are arranged in a similar pattern
4. each animal pen has one animal
5. Mine and town/neighbourhood not repaired
6. All land expanded at low level
anyway, there are lots of similarities.
whats the point in bot farming? and why would they sell wheat for so cheap? surely thats pointless... also whats DD?
Usually most Bot farms also have very simply names...many times just letters/numbers.
Basically, they auto wheat and gain expansion materials at an incredibly fast rate which they sell for real money outside of the game. That's it, in a nutshellQuote:
Originally Posted by setch
Bot farms don't care about the wheat. They are set up to automatically plant and sell wheat only. This is done illegally because it is done thru a computer program rather than a real person. They constantly plant wheat and collect all the tools from wheating. Then the person running the bot farms (sometimes you will find a whole neighborhood of them) will sell the expansion tools online for real money. Hence, why bot farms should be reported so SC can shut them down.Quote:
Originally Posted by setch
DD stands for Daily Dirt, the name of the newspaper we all buy from.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ffwife97
why do people buy the expansion tools for real money?+where do they even buy them? is there like blackmarket websites for HayDay expansion tools? i joined literally a few hours ago and this seems incredibly sad... like why would people even pay for them...
i play Clash + BB
have a look at these screenshots (I cropped the names out as I'm not allowed to name farms here). But u can see the pattern. These were taken of different farms found in the DD over a dayQuote:
Originally Posted by Bsuzydesk
http://m.imgur.com/suQYvOf
http://m.imgur.com/KZGOYo5
http://m.imgur.com/R7N2MKZ
http://m.imgur.com/sjm0Va6
If you noticed from the pics scottysfarm posted, the animals are not taken care of and there are no decorations. Another thing to note is that the barn & silo have been expanded (to hold all the wheat & tools) but the house isn't upgraded from hitting achievements because bot farms don't care about playing the game. They only want the tools.
Wheat is always sold for 1 coin. If you think you have come across a bot farm buy 2 or 3 bins of wheat. If it replenishes right away then you know it is a bot farm.
i guess this is a bot education thread.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ffwife97
back to my original point of the thread: I used to see these bot farms maybe once a week...now there are several per day. I'd like to know how or if SC is keeping up with it as I feel it's ruining the integrity or the game in a very large way.
just used newspaper, first guy i looked at was called 'alan' and straight away his farm is close to the same as the others you linked, like 1 of each animal, and the crops were like in a very strange order scattered around kinda thing, just like the ones in the pictures, and spam selling wheat for 1 each... it really must be common to find, i see why you're worried, it must be killing the economy tbh
I suppose that sc is deleting the farms as they are reported, but for the people running them they just create new ones.
I guess unless sc can make up a program that runs through the system checking farms and auto deleting them or one that prevents the 'auto play' program, they can't stop it. And even if they did/could, you would find that the bot programmer would tweak it a bit so that it was different and no longer recognised as a bot farm.
It's a never ending battle
OT, but they actually have all the animals...they are just clumped together in their pens.
I've also been seeing them a few times a day again in the last few weeks. SC had managed to get rid of some, but like weeds, they spring up again and multiply. I hate seeing their shivering animals. With all that wheat, they could at least feed them. ;-) jk, I know their mostly heartless computer programs.
With a little AI we can have more sentient bots. ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by SmudgedScreen
This is a very good thread, Scottysfarm.
Thank you for enlightening us, and for your diligence in reporting and doing what you can to stop these farms!
Something that bothers me, is that people are buying these materials in a "black market". I find that to be so weird.
Yes, I want to expand my barn and silo, tacklebox and town - but isn't a big part of the fun of HayDay doing the farming that brings all these goodies? Without doing the "work", people are missing out on the fun and rewards of developing their farm over time.
If the people would stop paying these creeps, the bot farms would crumble.
Why can't people play their farms legitimately?
If they're willing to pay to upgrade, why not just buy diamonds from SC, supporting the game and enhancing it's development for the future? Why buy from crooks who set up these bot farms? This criminal undercurrent baffles me...
The people who pay real money for these items are not acting in integrity... They could stop this quickly by refusing to participate.
With my very best wishes, to all the "white hat Heros", here...
AsYouWish
My guess - it come outs cheaper and faster. Hope SC find a way to battle these bots! What one person can code, another person can block and so on and so forth in an endless cat and mouse race.Quote:
Originally Posted by AsYouWish
There are some people who see Hay Day as some sort of competitive game.
Whether they know or care that these bots are actually stealing from SC I guess is their concern.
One other thing in addition to reporting them when we see them is to just not buy from them.
Its one thing to be just buying wheat for your own use and being glad that you found a bargain, but especially if you are buying it to resell in your own shop, then I think you owe it to yourself to check that you are buying from a legitimate seller.
There are lots of legitimate sellers selling wheat for one coin. You're also likely to find other useful items in their shop as well.
They undercut SC's price, by a lot. SC charges 8 diamonds for 1 barn or silo item. The blackmarket will let you fully expand your barn or silo for a few bucks.Quote:
Originally Posted by AsYouWish
This is not unusual in the gaming world. There are many games where digital goods are sold for real money by third parties. Some games even encourage it.
I did some research on bot farms some time ago. Most are run on pcs, with one person controlling 10 farms on average. Most of these computer banks are in Asia, where they take advantage of exchange rates for real money. Hay Day isn't the only game that they do this to. From what I understand, this is big money over there.
you just made me wonder;Quote:
Originally Posted by WillieBDare
For me Hay Day is a lovely game, maybe for others it's their bread and butter.
Which is not to say I intend to start supporting bot farms, I definitely don't.
You just gave me a fresh perspective.
I was going to mention the same thing. SC's prices for *EMs are really high, IMO. While I've personally never had the inclination to seek such alternatives, I can definitely see the appeal of a third party seller if they sell at even half of that.Quote:
Originally Posted by Janilee
Good, so it's really more those who might buy, from these sellers for real money, who is keeping the possible business alive. A lot more, than the normal players who buy the cheap wheat, in most cases because they don't know about it, and a very low amount of all players use the forum. So quite hard to make all players know, what to look out for, report and try to stay away from.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sparkly888
I have found one website, that offers many different things for real money, and it looked very chinese/asian to me.
Very true, it's SCs game and business being attacked. For us as players, these botfarms are a smaller problem, than bot attacks on RSS's. They have a much larger impact on the players game.Quote:
Originally Posted by Janilee
Just an example from the "shop" I've found online - Package A=barn set(100blots+100planks+100tapes) $4.70 15 min
Yes, blots not bolts!!!
It sure also looks like all the maps earlier, was not real from the game either. Cleaned up by SC, and now we see more about - why is there no maps, SC FIX IT!!
I just put 2 blots in my shop. Lol
Im sure SC would like to know about the website too.
Sure web stores wink in and out of existence and a new website could be created very quickly, but I'm sure SC can shut down what they find since no one but SC has legal rights to sell items created by them. As I understand it.
They move really fast to shut down people who try to sell EMs on eBay. But I think it's harder overseas, at least in some countries.
Yes, it's probably not that easy to get rid of all these things.
I can't remember how I found that "shop", probably just used google. If I can find things like this easy so can SC. I have nothing to hide, so if SC can use what I've found, they are welcome to it. Noone can expect getting more than they ask for in any matters.
thanks to this thread I just spotted one of these Farms. So what is the best way to report this to Supercell?
Take a screenshot of the farm and attach it to the in game "contact us" feature.Quote:
Originally Posted by Pinkpanther5219
Maybe be supercell should offer players a diamond bounty. Say one diamond for every bot farm reported.
thanks Scott's farm I will do that
Ok, so one has gone to the black market and fully expanded their barn and silo....they still must be filled with dairy...sugar...fish....wheat...corn....and all the various products that we produce and sell. Is there a "black market" for those items as well? And when one gets them in abundance what does one do with them? IMHO someone somewhere is missing out on the "fun" that was embedded into the game and turned it into a "acquire" the goods and then what....another wise saying-"a fool and his money are soon parted".😕
Ive reported a few now (one of which was part of a bot nh with 11 farms in it) and ive also noticed an increase in them.
Im just wondering, do supercell actually want us to report all the ones we find?
I tend to follow the bot farms i find so that sc can find them from my account, instead of just a name and level from the screen shot i send through.
Eh, inventory space is kind of a different beast. I've played other games where it was limited and could only be purchased with gems or large amounts of in game currency. It's a sure way to get players to pay because there's nothing fun about limited storage.Quote:
Originally Posted by Queebus
i have counted and made a note of those names with farms that look like that - truck money not collected, only 1 tick on the board, there are 3 animals in each pen, not 1. but they're stacked on top of each other so you can't see. but if you look veryyyy closely you can. there are 50 names in total, some in russian, some in chinese, some french. they usually start selling wheat at level 30. once they reach about level 50, they abandon the farm and create new ones. they normally sell 6 slots of wheat and each time all of them are bought, they're replenished immediately, all wheat appear at once. it has to be bot because there's no way you can lower the price to 1 coin and take such a short time. these are the farms that do not have neighborhoods or the NH house repaired.
another type of "bot farms" are those with numbers or letters, and they have neighborhoods with similar numbers or letters. they also sell wheat at 1 coin but the wheat are not replenished immediately so i have no idea if they're bots. they're not necessarily low in level. i have seen most in level 50+ or 60+. they have all the machines, trees, animals.
either way, i have reported them using the in-game contact form. i get enthusiastic replies from SC usually within a day, telling me not to worry and they take these sort of farms very very seriously. BUT, the way i see, nothing is being done because these farms are still out there. none of them have been banned. apparently it looks like they don't really care.
we need to be able to flag those farms IN the game, just like how you're able to flag photos or comments on social media sites. that way, those farms could more easily be eradicated. i'm thinking that SC searching for those farms manually might be too tedious for them therefore they're not really doing it. if we flag them, they could look at the farm right away.
Why is it that I have never seen one of these except screen shots. Do you guys go looking for them? I shop only occasionally from the paper. Is this where you see them? I tried looking for one coin wheat but never find it. Could it be server dependant? Or tied to level? Maybe I just don't know how to recognize them. So weird.
If you don't shop the newspaper, you won't see any bot farms.
How else would you run into a bot farm? They aren't going to friend you on GC or FB, or help your boat. They are automated farms that grow and sell wheat. They don't shop, or do events, or water plants. They just wheat.
I just came across one of these bot farms. It had a chinese name and had the same characteristics as other bot farms. 3 unfed animals in each pen, all clumped in one spot. One tick on the truck board, truck loaded with coins. Odd crop pattern. But one thing that stood out was that the farm posted one saw on its roadside shop, while I was there.
They do post axes and saws as they only collects BEMs and SEMs. And since they don't "farm" they don't need those axes and saws, for them those are just a waste of barn space.
It seems that the programmers of these bots are becoming smarter. I have come across two bot farms now and their names are "crazy woman farm" and "shirley".
How do you know they're bots then?Quote:
Originally Posted by Jimbobbeh
Every time I read something like this I wonder how many people are just on a witch hunt and how many legitimate farmers get blocked/banned because of it.
If it's not obvious that these are bots then I don't know what to tell you.Quote:
Originally Posted by Darcelle
http://gyazo.com/5c7a7991aebdd2a67b090325fb1a7960
http://gyazo.com/c62fe12cb31db3a06d81eb9541805ea6
Yes it is very obvious when you see one just posted 2 messages about them
The ones I saw kept changing their names. At first, I didn't know they were bot farms (I was new to Hay Day then), so I followed them and bought wheat from them, but now I know better!
I won't follow a bot farm. It might have gotten sorted out by now but there used to be talk some months back of being temporarily banned.Quote:
Originally Posted by Spearhead
http://forum.supercell.net/showthrea...=1#post3320412
It happened to someone else but I can't find that thread.
seriously? It's a large issue, not only in HayDay but also a lot of popular online/cloud games. I'm wondering why you would think people are on a witch hunt for obviously templated, setup farms like these?Quote:
Originally Posted by Darcelle
Cause of this:Quote:
Originally Posted by scottysfarm
http://forum.supercell.net/showthrea...-spot-is-empty
Supposedly SC is blocking "suspicious" farms from buying or selling anything. A friend of mine was affected even though she's a legitimate user. I can't help but wonder if she was reported because her farm doesn't fit the criteria of others. (Note: Her farm looks nothing like those screenshots though.)
I agree those screenshots look like bot farms, but that doesn't change the fact that I worry about people who are too quick to report anything that looks remotely unusual and that innocent users are being penalized for it.
I also came across one this morning called lusty farm or something like that.
I reported it, but in my reports i always say that this farm apears to be a bot farm not this is definitely a bot farm, but in saying that, how many legitimate farms havent opened the dock, mine and fishing area by the mid to late level 30s
And the ones that do have them opened, if you go to the fshing area or town, there are no buildings and the boat/train to take you back to their farms are also missing,
I do follow them (have had one delete me from their followers list after changing the farm name and levelling up) but I only follow them because I assume that sc would be able to see your followers list when they look because they can access other things on your farm for support reasons. Then they have a link to the farm not just a screen shot that could be days old by the time they get to the message and action it, as by then names and levels may have changed.
I think that a direct link to report a farm yoh visit would make it easier, but that can then also be abused by other players wanting to screw with people. The other option I suppose is to implement an individual farm id number that you can see when you visit the farm and would then be visible in a screen shot
I think I found a bot farm that is odd. Ok It has
1.level 36
2. selling 10 wheat for 1 coin
3. Fields are arranged in a similar pattern
4. each animal pen has one animal in the middle but has 1 pen with 4 chickens 3 of which needs eggs harvested
5. Mine and town/neighbourhood not repaired
6. land expanded at low level
7. the house has not been exlpanded
8.the wheat came back fast for 1 coin
But this farm had 1 ax and 2 saws for sale. It has a name. Maybe I am mistaken a real farm for a bot farm. Any ideas?
No 8, is the strongest possible indicator there is. If things work to fast and automatic to be a normal human player, it's very possible it's not a real farm imo. I reported a similar one, after buying 6 times wheat in the shop once, all was filled fast again, so tried one more time with same fast auto reload, just not possible by a normal player.Quote:
Originally Posted by BenjiBee
I hate buying wheat from such a farm. But I bought all 6 and they came back to fast for 1 coin. This is the 3rd farm like this I found less than 12 hours. I try to post a picture here but it will not let me. Can I post the name of the farm?Quote:
Originally Posted by Thobi
i don't know why people are concerned that legitimate farms get banned. no, selling 1 coin wheat does not mean you're a bot. machines not running doesn't mean you're one, or land/fishing area doesn't mean you're a bot either. its a combination of all these factors. i believe these bots only originate from one place, thats china or other parts of asia. SC could check their IP addresses and the list of farms they've set up. i believe they could see a pattern there.
re : that kind of bot farms that look alike, i'm "liking" all of them via facebook because i don't want to follow them, plus i can only follow 5 at a time. they sell things like axes and saws plus mining tools. because they're only collecting bems and sems for sale.
I got a standard reply from the report I made, so for now I'm done trying to do anything to help. These farms are not really a problem for my gameplay anyway.Quote:
Originally Posted by BenjiBee
Posting pictures and names here is not a good idea, you will just risk breaking the "no name and shame" forumrules.
Thank you Thobi. I will not list them here.:)Quote:
Originally Posted by Thobi
I just was going back to my game. I had it on what I think is a bot farm. The name has changed. From a female name to a male name. I was just wondering if they change the name of the farm every few hours. How can SC find them. I watching the farm now. Boy there is a lot of wheat is being sold! It disappear as fast as it is listed. It is listing fast! I think I watch the farm a little while longer. Just to see.
Yeah, not really that easy for us as players to try and do anything. We can only take a photo of farms with farmnames, factors that can be changed easy. Any bot users can even be lurking here in the forum.
Only a very low percentage of all players are using the forum, and with the reporting ways there is, there's not really that much difference we can make.
nice observations.
I have been watching this farm I think is a bot farm for 20 mins. It has sold 2030 wheat, 1 saw and has listed 10 mallets for 4030. The sold tools stay in the shop until it is replaced, which is a few mins. At one point the what I think is a bot farm, could not keep up with the sales.
Think I've just found a bot,
selling only wheat in 6 slots. Bought and replenished all at once.
then selling BEMs and auto sold.
Keeps relisting BEMs sold auto, wish I could of had them though
I have watch what I think is a bot farm for 1 hour (Sunday 9:26 a.m. to 10:26 a.m.). Keep in mind, IMO this is Sunday when a lot of people are at church or sleeping in not playing the game. In that time the farm sold 5110 wheat, 5 saws, 1 ax, 1 tnt, 10 mallets and 1 dynamite. The tools was sold at full price. The wheat 10 for 1 coin. The road side shop has 5 stalls on top and 4 stalls on the bottom. The first 3 stalls on top and the first 3 stall on bottom is used for wheat, the other 3 stalls is used only for tools or left empty. I am guessing when the wheat is sold out. Then one other the other stalls are used for tools (meaning the first 3 stalls on top and the first 3 stall on bottom). It is something to watch how the wheat disappears and reappears so fast. You can tell when the ad is over and the wheat stops selling. I am just wondering, farmers know about the bot farms and follow them just for axes, saws etc. I am going to lose some play time on my farm to see when the name changes again.
LOL The farm name just changed again. Now it is a male name with numbers at the end. Other than the wheat growing, the farm has not changed. Still money in the truck, animals need feed etc. Something odd just happen. The farm sold 30 screws, in sets of 10 each.
Not much we can do with reporting what we find. I just got a bot-reply anyway. What we can report will get old fast and to no help.
The screws are probably being mooved to a more real farm, that store things and sell from real money shop or something.
Interesting. I hadn't realized that that bug might actually be a feature.Quote:
Originally Posted by Darcelle
I don't think you have to worry about a witch hunt, though. Surely SC doesn't ban farms just because they've been reported.
It's likely a computer program that is doing it, based on a programmed algorithm. A human can surely tell a real farm from a bot farm.
I guess blocking buying and selling is better than the instant perma-ban they were doing before. You couldn't notify support or tell them your game ID because you were totally blocked from the game. Blocking just buying and selling lets real players ask to be reinstated. Bot farmers won't bother; they'll just start new farms.
You can see how the arms race between SC and bots has shaped these bot farms. They used to have no animals and the wheat plots laid out in a neat rectangle. Now they have some animals and an irregular plot layout. I presume so their farm doesn't look suspicious to whatever bot detector SC is using.
Some of them sell off the SEMs as well as mining tools, saws, and axes. BEMs are where the real money is.Quote:
Originally Posted by BenjiBee
But they may also be selling them to a customer, or transferring to the main farm where they will be sold to customers. Eventually, all bot farms have to do that; no point in farming otherwise.
Some of them delete all their followers regularly so they can't interrupt these transfers. But some don't bother, and you can luck into a bonanza of planks, bolts, and tapes if you catch them while they doing a transfer.
This has been something to watch. So they take what tools they earn on the farm and transfer it to a more real farm. So the bot farm has a weak spot. The transfer of tools to another farm. I do believe I been watching a bot farm. Because they are on level 36 and only have a oven and 1 feed mill. By the how the wheat reappears so fast in the RSS for 1 coin. While I have been watching the only thing they done on the farm was to raise wheat, nothing else. So if it is not a bot farm, who plays a game for 36 levels and do nothing but raise wheat.Quote:
Originally Posted by Thobi
Another name change, this makes the 4th change. Now the name of the farm is a foreign language (not English), maybe Chinese. I am wondering if they recycle the names. Because this “new” farm name looks like the one I took a picture of yesterday. Not sure because it’s on my iPad. I don’t want to back out of this farm to go see. Maybe later I will. Because I find watching this farm interesting. But I hate losing time on the farm
Thank you for making us aware of these bot farms. Since I read this, I find that it is very easy to spot them and have been amazed at how many are out there. I have made my neighbourhood aware of this problem and have asked that they not buy from these bots. So..does SC really want us to report all that we see? I can see that it would be time consuming all right, but if they will really shut them down, then it will be worth my time.
Once again..thans for sharing.
I have reported bot farms since Nick asked us to. It doesn't take much time. I hope it helps even if it is just a little. And yes, it is a standard reply you get (they just changed it recently :)), but I get the feeling that they really appreciate the report. Of course they don't have time to give an individual answer to every bot report, and I don't expect them to.
I haven't noticed an increase in the amount of bot farms recently (other forum members mention this), and I wonder if it has something to do with servers? Maybe the server my farm is located at isn't "hit" that hard at the moment, and the problem is increasing at other servers?
Some time ago I saw 3-10 bots in one DD, but that changed. Back then the bots were all members of a NH and the neighbors had similar names/numbers. Also some of them had opened the town, but nothing in town was repaired even though a lot of customers were wandering around. I do not see this kind of bots any more....
A slave farmQuote:
Originally Posted by BenjiBee
I'm seeing so many Bot farms in my DD today. I checked out one that was in a whole nh of 29, all with the usual numbers as Farm names. And yes, they are getting a bit craftier, this one had about 5 trees planted and 2 Christmas decorations. Lol It was level 57 with 1 pen of each shivering animal and 2 machines. You can't fool us silly programs. :-)
Another name change. A mountain peak in the U.S. The last name didn't sell wheat good. About 240 wheat in an hour. Way down in sales. What I am wondering is the transfer of BEM and SEM is fast like the wheat. Or is it slow so someone can get it.
Another farm name change. This time it was initials (3 letters). I had been looking at this what I believe to be a bot farm for most of the day. These are some things I have seen.
- There is a very high demand for cheap wheat for 1 coin. What I believe to be a bot farm could not keep up with the sales. Several times the stalls were empty with the fields not ready for harvest. The farm was level 36 and had 57 pilots of ground to grow wheat on.
- The farm changed names 7 times during the 9 hours I watched it. In this case the names varied from letters and numbers to a foreign language (not English). I have to ask is there a lot of bot farms? Or a few that keeps changing its name.
- In this case, they might be recycled names. I took a picture of what I thought was a bot farm with the foreign language (not English) last night at 7:21 P.M. This farm changed its name to the same thing at 11:46 A.M. today. Or maybe using real names of farms.
- In the 9 hours I watch the farm; it sold 20 mallets, 30 screws, 33 axes, 24 saws, 3 tnt, 10 dynamite and 1 shovel. It would be hard to catch the BEM and SEM being transferred to another farm.
- In 9 hours the farm only raised wheat, nothing else was done on the farm.
- Most of the time the sold wheat came back quickly. But sometimes it took a few seconds. But all 6 stalls would appear at the same time.
I found this farm very interesting. With my curiosity quench, I am leaving this farm. I am headed back to my farm and the bees. They missed me today.:)
Thanks for taking all those hours to investigate BenjiBee, its very interesting. We will have to see if and when SC can do anything with these farms. People, please don't buy from these farms. If SC could somehow give all the gamers a message about these Bot farms, we could effectively stop them ourselves by not buying anything from them. Power to the People. :-)
Could be, but IME, slave farms being used by real players do more than wheat. In particular, they will have sugar mills and dairies to supply the main farm, not just wheat.Quote:
Originally Posted by haydayforum
I have inadvertently bought from a bot farm and now I'm worried my farm will be banned. I have reported 2 bot farms at about the time that the op noticed the increase, they were always just selling wheat and met the usual remit. Today whilst hunting for red boxes (I dont read the adverts and just click willy nilly) I came across 5 axes and 2 dynamite for sale which I bought. As all the other boxes had wheat for 1 coin for sale I bought some as a thank you and went to look for the box which was when I realised it was a bot farm. I'm really worried that Supercell will think I'm involved in some way and ban me.
You’re welcome. I found the experience fascinating. IMO this was a straight basic farm, no NH, town, and boat. I would watch people buy wheat. How can I explain it? You ever have been to a RSS with all premium items. How fast it goes. Well it is the same way. But when the wheat was bought it just reappeared. Thousands of wheat was bought while I was there. The only time sales dropped is when the farm name changed to the foreign language (not English) name. But when it changed back to an English type name sales sky rocketed. The demand for cheap wheat is overwhelming. IMO this is one of the reasons bot farming is successful. I don’t see how that could change. This farm raised nothing but wheat nonstop for 9 straight hours. It being what I think is a bot farm, could make full use of time from seed to wheat to RSS. The farm just could not keep up. The farm was still raising wheat when I left.Quote:
Originally Posted by SmudgedScreen
Quote:
Originally Posted by BenjiBee
Yes, the demand for wheat is overwhelming. I'm a wheater/ corner myself. I sell 10 for $10 wheat and 10 for $20 corn constantly and it flies off the shelves. Since my last post 2 hrs ago, I've found another 2 NHs filled with Bot farms. Its getting to be such a big problem again, SC will have to deal with it.
* edited for spelling.
@ Billybug, I don't think you have to worry about getting banned for buying. Imagine all the people knowingly or not buying their wheat now. If they were all banned there'd be only a few of us left playing. :-)
Thank you smudged screen. It wasn't the wheat buying that worried me so much as the axes and the idea being given that I was trading with the farm. Your reply has reassured me however, if I didnt read this forum I would have been in happy ignorance about the whole bot farm issue :)
Really interesting thread Benjibee, thanks for your insights.
I saw a lot of these farms just before Christmas and reported to SC. I was suspicious when I bought 4 lots of 10 wheat and they all replenished at once - no human can be that quick! I had ran out of wheat so when I saw it for 1 coin in the DD of course I bought it. I now avoid 1 coin wheat in the DD, so apologies if I am avoiding legit farmers as well, although I don't often run out!
I do a lot of wheating, and it sells really quickly for 7 coin per 10. Although I have a lot of followers who are low level and they buy the wheat to resell as I assume they haven't yet worked out that the real purpose of wheating is to get tools and expansion items!
Cheap wheat and corn is always going to be popular especially if farmers focus on growing and selling potatoes, tomatoes or other crops that take time to grow. The majority of players are probably blissfully unaware of bot farms, but are attracted to them by the cheap price for wheat.
@billybug, I'm sure you're fine, SC aren't going to penalise a legit player for inadvertently buying from one of these bot farms.
A game of cat and mouse for Supercell, and sadly as they close off one loophole the people controlling the bot farms seem to find other ways in.
Really the only wheat I buy is from lower single digit farms. Because I want to help the newbies, I buy their wheat. But this has got me thinking. What I think is a bot farm is on level 36. How did it get to that level? I am asking myself, I am trying to help newbies. But in doing so, I am helping a bot farm? Because newbie farms most of the time would look like a bot farm. Any ideas how could you tell a low level bot farm from a real farm?
Perhaps actually fed animals? :p Plus, most newbies don't sell for 1 coin, they sell for 5-10 most often, sometimes max. At least that's my experience with real newbiesQuote:
Originally Posted by BenjiBee
I would think the speed at which slots are being refilled would still be your best indicator.
I suspect it was created at that level, or close to it. They don't create farms the way real players do. That's why the animals are exactly one on top of other, and the pattern of crop plots is weird but identical among many farms. And why you sometimes see oddities like no boat ramp. (Not an unrepaired boat ramp, but no boat ramp.) Coding magic.Quote:
Originally Posted by BenjiBee
They also tend to be abandoned after they reach a certain level. I suspect there's a "sweet spot" for wheating. You get more plots as you level up, but the drop rate decreases. So they want mid-level farms, not high or low level.
They don't want to futz around in the lower levels, where you get hardly any crop plots and the RSS isn't even open yet, so they just skip it and create the farms at the levels they want them.
what i dont understand is, if the bot farms could be created on demand using any level they want, surely they could also churn out expansion items like nobody's biz. i mean if someone had the expertise to create a bot program, why do they have to go through the hard way to grow wheat and sell them to get expansion items? the fact that they need to sell them also goes to show they do not have enough silo space to hold them. if they could design a bot program, they could tweak the silo storage space to 1,000,000. makes me wonder.
Exactly! When things work to fast to be human, it's because it isn't human. It's the strongest evidence there is.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sparkly888
My test of reporting such a farm in-game, only resulted in a standard reply, with things like - query regarding bot farm. I will guide you with this. And then about how the DD works, and selling at lowest price, does not indicate a bot farm. What else can we help you with?
If that's the best reply, that can be given on a Sunday, then wait til a real supporter is availeble with something real! I gave my reply to that spam, so it's not closed right now. For now, I'm done with reporting more.
It tells me, that I'm just wasting my time (even though I have plenty of that), and with the detective work BenjiBee have made here about the change of farmname, a photo of the farms lvl and name, will probably not be to much use for SC anyway.
IMO, farms like these, are not really a problem for use as players, they have no real effect on our gameplay. Bot attacks on RSS's will be worse for the players gameplay.
I wonder if they are now setting a delay. I watched one that was filling RSS slower than I would have. Had same plot psttern and same bizzare animals tho.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sparkly888
I am no programmer. But I was thinking how I would keep ♥♥♥♥ers from turning out expansion items by the thousands. This is just speculation; each item is assign a number. The game only can accept that number. If there are 2 of the same number the game rejects it. Or if the number is not in memory than it rejects it. The only way to get that number is to play the game.Quote:
Originally Posted by kaylinpickles
The silo would have a cap of 10,000 like the barn. But by the way they was selling wheat, IMO they found the sweet spot for space both barn and silo.
I doubt they could increase storage space higher than the max the game allows. Well, they could, but they would be easy to catch.Quote:
Originally Posted by kaylinpickles
As for creating expansion items...I suspect some do that, too. But we normal players would never notice, because those farms would probably only deal with customers, and never advertise in the DD. We all saw what happened when someone publicized a way to create maps out of nothing. Newspapers in which almost every ad was for maps.
Those were normal players doing that, just trying to get coins. The real ha¢kers could have used the same method to create any items they wanted, and I suspect they did.
I wonder if that's one reason for the recent surge in bot farms. SC has obviously plugged that exploit, so now they have to do something else.
That's strange. The replies I get is always something like: Thanks for reporting this suspicious behavior.... I appreciate you taking the time....we are taking your report seriously and will take action....etc.Quote:
Originally Posted by Thobi
Hmm... maybe it is not standard replies after all?
Looks like I maybe just got a Sunday reply, being pulled out of a can. Your reply is far better than what I got. Mine is still open, so will see if more will come. What I got was just not good enough, for me to take it serious.Quote:
Originally Posted by Gefion
I had followed two bot farms:
- First one went inactive after SC had banned plenty of farms at once for using wheating emulators. (Mid 2014)
- Second one i reported. I got a nice Reply from support that they will investigate the matter. Sent in a screenshot of the bot nh with farm names consisting of numerics. However even after one month the farm and its bot nh family were still wheating.
- In August my mom was complaining her "wheat seller" had stopped its business. I checked the farm and it was a bot with a bot nh.
Its so obvious that wheating for tools should NOT be allowed. At least tools should be tied to different crops, so that players will not plant wheat alone and those little visitors shouldn't only ask for those number one and two most silo and barn items, instead, ask for everything in random or better still, for example asking for 20 wheats + 2 chocolate ice-cream, then it won't be manipulated by bot farms.
Problem is, wheating and selling to the little people are crucial for new players trying to play honestly. If you change those aspects, it will discourage new players. There are other ways to stop the bots without punishing real players.Quote:
Originally Posted by zen2071
Tools and expansion items Are tied to different crops. It's just that wheat grows the fastest.Quote:
Originally Posted by zen2071
And honestly I don't know if bots respond to the Visitors or not. I suspect not. Hadn't really thought of it until you mentioned it.
I dont necessarily wheat for tools, the tools and expansion items are just one part of the benefits.
I think your idea of Visitors asking for say wheat and a small number of ONE other item might be interesting.
But I think Supercell created the Visitors to ask for the top two items in your barn or silo for a reason. Unless it's a Visitor event they dont pay very well, so who would sell anything to them if they are asking for items one would prefer to sell for max price in their RSS or use to fill an order?
interesting too that Visitors PAY a better margin for wheat than the other crops. I don't think that's by accident.
I wheat and sell my extra expansion items legitimately within the game. All the while continuing to expand my barn and silo and blowing the smithereens out of my mine.
I don't think the bot farmers care about the visitors. They wouldn't miss them when they're gone. The cheap wheat sells just fine in the RSS. As someone pointed out, even bot farms can't keep up with the demand.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sparkly888
Visitors are necessary for players who haven't unlocked the RSS yet. It's really easy to get yourself into a corner where barn and silo are full, and you can't do anything about it.
No worries. I don't always check the farm when buying. You just bought smt available for purchase on the paper. As Nick says, if its on RSS its up for grabs :P Its SC's job and responsibility to get rid of these bots. Some players with awareness might help them on the way of course.
Plus I know my mum had followed one for cheap wheat and she didn't know it was a bot farm. Nothing happened but the bot was banned after a while. Most HD players have no idea that they even exist.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Billybug
Just came across 2 bot farms in one refresh of the DD. Followed them as I did not know how to report them. After re-skimming this thread, is it even worthwhile to report them? They are like the Hydra, cut one head off, 2 come back. An in game report feature similar to the like button would be much handier than submitting a report with a picture, as the actual farm ID would be linked to the report, leading to quicker bans.
I suggested a "report" button when I found a bit farm but I just got the standard reply. I reported one tonight and took a screen capture to send to SC. I am sure when they get around to looking it would have changed its name to something else. At least having a report farm mechanism would link to the farm ID rather than the farm name to shut it down.Quote:
Originally Posted by Jerhunter44
I am not technical but perhaps SC have programmes that say look for x,y,z and report which farms fit the criteria and then cull them that way. There must be so many more than forum members can possibly report so we are seeing the tip of the iceberg.
Also, only a small percentage of players subscribe to the forum, and many players don't read the help pages so adding a report button could add a huge headache for SC with unintended consquences arising through people misunderstanding what the button is for (someone stole the bolts meant for my neighbour pls get them back for me etc etc etc!!!!!)
I've talked myself out of a report button lol
I added the suggestion to the suggestions sub-forum, and already thought of a way around people misusing the button: a pop-up screen when pressing it which asks "Are you sure you wish to report this farm for suspected bot activity?" Even people who don't subscribe to the forum would realize that it isn't for complaints, but for reporting bot users with the intent of shutting them down. The few people who would still abuse the button could effectively be warned by Supercell, as they would see the flood of useless reports from those people who ignore the confirmation screen. But most people read the text on a new button at least once :pQuote:
Originally Posted by Daisy1st