Renian
06-06-2008, 05:01 PM
This is in response to the email Isten sent me regarding my lockout. He had three terms for acceptable bot use.
1. You were running the bot in your home rather than the public; it wasn't a public disruption.
2. You were running the bot for your own character's use. As long as your bot is limited solely to your own characters, this isn't a problem.
3. You were attentive while using the bots. This is the critical component of the scripting policy, and you met it.
So some people (read: one person that I recall, lol) were wondering about #2--what if it's a few of your friends as well? Here's the answer.
Hi Jeffrey,
You're entering a grey area regarding #2, and the answer, I believe, is... sometimes. <g>
My understanding of the bot policy is as follows:
If your bot is being run relatively under the radar and is neither "competing" against active players nor causing a scene (zombie characters performing actions on cue can disrupt some players), I believe it should be fine. In order to keep a bot under the radar, I would recommend the following:
1. Never use common triggers that can accidentally "serve" the public, such as the word "heal." Try and use unique/obscure triggers that only you and/or your small circle of friends would know.
2. Try to park the bot away from a common gathering spot such as TSC or any room in a hunting ground. A player home, for example, should be fine.
3. Try and keep the bot to a smaller circle of friends, rather than broadcast it as available to the public at large. The key is to keep it relatively quiet so that you and your close friends can access the bot, but its presence doesn't disrupt others that may have differing views about the whole bot thing.
Of course it goes without saying that you must be present when running a bot, regardless of how private it is. If someone is caught running an unattended bot, it's an immediate violation of policy regardless of the other circumstances.
So you'll see that while we're not against the use of bots when used correctly, factors of whether or not a bot is being disruptive can vary widely depending on the user's use. As such, it's up to the discretion of staff to determine when a bot is being used correctly or when it's disrupting other players (i.e., reports fly in, it's too public a room, it's competing with "live" empaths or pickers, etc.). That's the reason why I called this area grey at the start.
I hope I've been able to shed a bit more light into your second question, but if I've only confused matters more... you know where to find me. ;)
Best Regards,
SGM Isten
1. You were running the bot in your home rather than the public; it wasn't a public disruption.
2. You were running the bot for your own character's use. As long as your bot is limited solely to your own characters, this isn't a problem.
3. You were attentive while using the bots. This is the critical component of the scripting policy, and you met it.
So some people (read: one person that I recall, lol) were wondering about #2--what if it's a few of your friends as well? Here's the answer.
Hi Jeffrey,
You're entering a grey area regarding #2, and the answer, I believe, is... sometimes. <g>
My understanding of the bot policy is as follows:
If your bot is being run relatively under the radar and is neither "competing" against active players nor causing a scene (zombie characters performing actions on cue can disrupt some players), I believe it should be fine. In order to keep a bot under the radar, I would recommend the following:
1. Never use common triggers that can accidentally "serve" the public, such as the word "heal." Try and use unique/obscure triggers that only you and/or your small circle of friends would know.
2. Try to park the bot away from a common gathering spot such as TSC or any room in a hunting ground. A player home, for example, should be fine.
3. Try and keep the bot to a smaller circle of friends, rather than broadcast it as available to the public at large. The key is to keep it relatively quiet so that you and your close friends can access the bot, but its presence doesn't disrupt others that may have differing views about the whole bot thing.
Of course it goes without saying that you must be present when running a bot, regardless of how private it is. If someone is caught running an unattended bot, it's an immediate violation of policy regardless of the other circumstances.
So you'll see that while we're not against the use of bots when used correctly, factors of whether or not a bot is being disruptive can vary widely depending on the user's use. As such, it's up to the discretion of staff to determine when a bot is being used correctly or when it's disrupting other players (i.e., reports fly in, it's too public a room, it's competing with "live" empaths or pickers, etc.). That's the reason why I called this area grey at the start.
I hope I've been able to shed a bit more light into your second question, but if I've only confused matters more... you know where to find me. ;)
Best Regards,
SGM Isten