Hackers in FFXIV's PVP: The Truth

Hackers in FFXIV's PVP: The Truth
Today I’ll be talking about hacking in FFXIV, I’ll be focusing primarily on the new PVP gamemode, crystalline conflict, but researching that has led me down this rabbit hole so I intend to share with you guys what I discovered and exactly how powerful and dangerous the FFXIV underground hacking community is.
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[@GymnasticsCoach83]

Even in casual matches, I'm seeing bad activity. I see no point in cheating in a game with no returns.

[@FlikBeoulve]

I seen a paladin bot try and attack me I steam rolled him.

[@pastel_magi]

It's weird seeing cheaters, my first thought was "maybe they'd want to grind the battle pass faster, but like... why? You don't really get anything & exp wise It's like 500 for losing & 700 for winning games so this whole thing is weird"

[@GymnasticsCoach83]

@@pastel_magi Exactly. I see no reason to do this...you get a fashion pack..some glasses and crystals. For me again, it's nothing big. It's a lose-lose for everyone. For one, it ruins the game for us honest players, and two, the opposing bot/cheater doesn't learn anything from it.

[@GymnasticsCoach83]

@@FlikBeoulve Good on you man!! Unfortunately, I have not had much luck with that road ^_^. They input read literally everything I do...at this point, it's pretty obvious to me haha.

[@absfinal]

they are testing and getting used to the cheats before going to ranked matches

[@AshTreeDweller]

“You didn’t wipe it fast enough!” Wool Father OG

[@COA5T]

Give the hackers/cheaters a reward - and by that I mean give them an in-game achievement. Since we know what types of cheats are out there, make in-game unrealistic PvP achievements. Example - "Polymorph a player within .01 seconds of them using their Limit Break 5 times in one match" or something to that effect. Even something that tracks over consecutive matches. Once the player gets this achievement, send the Ban Hammer.

[@pastel_magi]

Honestly that'd be gold, imagine coming across someone in Wolves Den with that title automatically on them as a warning what happens when you try to cheat lmao

[@COA5T]

@@pastel_magi Exactly!

[@whipLasch]

This is such a 5head move. Absolutely love it.

[@COA5T]

@@whipLasch Thanks. I think it makes sense. No need to add anti-cheat or anything. You can just track the players that get the achievement and ban them specifically.

[@whipLasch]

@@COA5T not to mention the public name and shame aspect of it. Let everyone see who is cheating

[@Yoogurtification]

It always boggles my mind, in every game, how insecure of a person do you have to be to not only cheat in a multiplayer game while behaveing like you're better but to spend real money on it? Thats borderline insanity

[@nspaulding07]

Insanity? Hardly. All people, regardless of age or cultural background, struggle with insecurity on a regular basis. It's extremely easy to fall into the trap of using quick, immoral methods to gain a sense of superiority over others as a way of assuaging those insecurities. Be it cheating on a test, lying to others to make ourselves look better, substance abuse, living vicariously through others, joining a movement to "be a part of something greater," and many other examples, we're ALL guilty of it. And I'd argue many of the examples I gave are more damaging to others and to ourselves than cheating in a video game to earn some ephemeral recognition or rewards. Are cheaters still scummy for cheating and degrading the general community with their actions? Absolutely. Let's not pretend that they're insane for doing so, or that any of us are inherently better people because we choose not to cheat in an online game. We just choose to do it elsewhere.

[@jamesfreeman9049]

Really it comes down to people not being very good at something it can push them to do these things, either that or they're just board

[@CriscoJack]

@@nspaulding07 Actually, I would argue that I am a better person because I choose not to cheat in an online game. Fuck cheaters.

[@Doozclops]

@@nspaulding07 Yeah I'm gonna have to agree with Lo77ery, I am absolutely a better person than people who cheat in games. Also, weird choice to say that everyone does scummy stuff and just act like that's normal. You have a weird view of the world. Sounds like you need to sort your own stuff out.

[@erlandir9121]

@@nspaulding07 People these days don't understand the word ''Insane'' and the weight it has. Same with ''Depressed'' Kinda sick to see people use it so often and without any weight. You explained the issue perfectly really, and sadly there is nothing we as players can do, not the ball is in SE yard.

[@KingLoggFrogg]

As a veteran PvP player and someone who had life not allow them to play a bunch In the first week I’ve heavily noticed the impact of these tools in games. They have taken a fun balanced game mode to a place where I have to play flawlessly to win. Killing the hackers isn’t hard if you know how to play. For people with less experience I see it smashing them in the face repeatedly which in turn loses matches for the team not cheating. It’s just pure garbage

[@ggahm171]

Appreciate the time and effort your put in to your videos; thank you for giving a concise summary of the situation. Hope you feel better soon!

[@StarshineGalaxyyy]

Thanks for the insightful info FD, i had no idea how extensive this was!

[@robsusername1042]

As a PS4 player, going into PVP already feels like I’m at a disadvantage because of the targeting where I am forced to cycle through the entire enemy party to try and target the person with low HP and attack them. I can’t imagine how many fights I’ve had in all of the PVP modes in which the other (PC) players were using all these add-ons to cheat their way to victory. I started CC ranked the first two or three days and stopped and haven’t been back since because between the system limitations, the unbalanced classes and the obvious/admitted cheating, it was unbearable and frustrating.

[@Levi_Skardsen]

You can definitely play it with controller. I'm on PC but I use controller and I'm platinum rank. It takes some getting used to and it definitely still has problems but it's doable.

[@MrInsiipid]

Change your target settings. There's options that alleviate the issue you're complaining about.

[@robsusername1042]

I have tried multiple different settings. And I’m not saying it’s impossible, I’m saying it has an innate disadvantage and impracticality-a premise you allude to when you state “it takes some getting used to and it’s not without its problems.”

[@rodimus580]

I play on ps5 and I know what your saying and I agree, I find myself playing the controller with my hands like a praying mantis to lock on to this one and that one and that one. It’s doable but with its problems definitely, I practice at wolves den and tried the targeting settings and it feels like target those close but the targeting will slip off quick, the other setting it locks you into the only and you can’t unlock while you are getting hit , it’s very frustrating.

[@Heldemon]

@@MrInsiipid There isn't though? He's talking about cycling through enemies, not both parties. People using mouse can simply click on the name in the enemy list to target who they want.

[@owo2845]

thank you for covering this! i knew something was up

[@no-trick-pony]

This video is great and mark my word, it will completely blow up and be top post on r/ffxiv tomorrow or the day after latest. Glad you found new topics to cover and wish you get well soon again. :D

[@_ViIe_]

Outside of machine learning AI on server side, or monitoring software on the client end, the only real viable option, despite it being rather costly, is human observation. They'd need to have GM's actively investigating edge cases that lie outside the norm. But again, that's expensive because manhours and labor aren't cheap.

[@erwark]

Agreed. Human hours are costly, but bad PR and lack of player faith is much more so.

[@bryceroberts2965]

I've been in a couple games where players I've fought against have had insane reaction times that just seemed inhuman. I would press my limit break and got polymorphed instantly, while in a crowd of people.

[@Kore_Cir]

Me too. Happened a lot to me since I moved on to Diamond, where ur matched with Crystal players. I use LB, instantly polymorphed. Not sure how much sense it makes to continue CC like this.

[@atheist101]

While I'm sure it was a cheater remember some people are that good. What about the guy who got banned from an fps (can't remember which one) for getting to many head shots to quickly. It was later found out he did that himself with no cheats and got reinstated. Some people are just unique and have that reaction time or skill

[@cheesytorso]

Really appreciate getting the deets out there for what is actually going on. Sucks that it is happening but hopefully more awareness and good info will cause SE to flesh out the reporting like you said.

[@cazcy11]

Thanks for the video! I’m new to ffvix and thankfully haven’t had to deal with these issues yet but I’m at least aware of them now.

[@soulechelon2643]

All the downvotes are the script kiddies from the Discord Fur Daddy infiltrated. Awesome sleuthing. Let's hope what ever reaction Yoshi-P ends up doing takes what you learned in mind, and that XIVLauncher and Dalamud (which neither I use personally, so I do not have any "allegiances" other than to FFXIV itself) are left alone. Wonder if Squeenix can directly nuke this program's creator? Big fat lawsuit will curb quite alot of cheaters' enthusiasm.

[@Shuhannazy]

glad to get some actual info on all this thanks

[@Indyrael]

sheesh glad i took a break after savages started to notice this more and more. Thanks for the info!

[@RangerBass]

Yep, frontlines is filled with the cheaters. As a DRK I target self and tried running around dropping salt w/o plunge (because you have to target with it). Almost without fail I could run right into other, do my salt and lb and run away Scott free, but the instant I target one person in this blind alliance, they magically turn in to the fastest, best coordinated alliance humanly possible and I get instantly attacked by 10 or more players in one second, dying instantly to these so skilled players who were dumb enough to let me run right into them but magically found the skill to collectively target and kill me instantly

[@Monstergirl-ologist]

I think this really puts the devs in a hard spot. Cause if they start cracking down on that stuff, the act program might set off whatever flags that they have and people just trying to see damage numbers will also get banned/ Obviously there's a difference between the two programs but trying to get something that differentiates the two seems hard in my mind (which is due to ignorance in the field) and you definitely can't rely too much people reporting other people. One guy could just be that good and be reported (though from what I've seen in multiple competitive games, scripting is very easy to see once you see it like twice)

[@FlikBeoulve]

Honestly dps meters aren't needed either people can use the sea stone sky to parse check. The unfortunate side of no mods when issues of cheating comes up there is no gray area. If they did anti add programs even those I only do it for my own pleasure will simply be punished too. Can of worms there

[@Monstergirl-ologist]

@@FlikBeoulve Checking your damage in stone sky sea is vastly different than checking your damage in an actual fight while you do mechanics and you are right on the second part. Even I use little animation mods for little things like giving back rage of halone for pld

[@wontononionslicer1004]

no human can do the same thing with exact the same timing, a program can, even if you are a god tier pvp player, you still will miss anything that is not currently on your screen. A bot will see what's behind your head.

[@jtp4086]

Privacy laws in japan don't allow them to check what's on the user's PC. There will be no anti-cheat, so no false flags for ACT.

[@Monstergirl-ologist]

@Rodney Wear ah the mythical salty player has arrived. Finally I have seen them. I'll respond to each sentence I have a problem with. Wouldn't you say that this aggressive response to act/add-ons in general also helps add on to the toxicity? If you don't have logs, join a raid group that doesn't need logs, I'm sure they exist If a person feels they aren't good enough with add-ons and uses them to improve by merely checking their damage numbers and using other external sources for ways to improve, like xiv analysis which uses your logs, what's wrongw ith that? (as long as they don't actually affect the game like these cheaters) These people are simply trying to improve, it's no different from watching a video of yourself and seeing the damage add up. ACT is just a real time calculator and I find it hard to belive that you solely think that act is used only for people looking to stroke their ego. While I'm sure they exist, act and other add on stuff has never impacted the game in such a way that our requires to be cracked down. I use it and I don't even prog. I am a casual player just looking to be better. I know my jobs and know what I should be doing but the fact of the matter is that I am not prefect and I don't do anything perfect and I know I need to practice and improve You may not like it because you can't join a group without it (which I'm sure there are non log groups out there, hell you can't even say that stuff in game without being banned), but that shouldn't alienate people who want to improve and use it for such a purpose. Sorry and I hope you have better luck and better enjoyment

[@latelotus]

I agree with the more robust reporting system, but I wouldn't be surprised if SE made a tiny update to their terms and conditions that help them with this.

[@parrotletsrunearth1173]

Unless they can and do aggressively permaban the cheaters it will not go away. It looks like Square is not going to do anything about it so I'm steering clear of PvP. This sucks because I was looking forward to it.

[@rottierumbles9451]

They also have cheating in PVE , couple of weeks ago there were about 30-40 characters in Uldah - Sapphire Avenue , behind a vendor tent , same gear on all , same race, all with the same name but 1 char off , is ridiculous , you couldn't click on them to report as they were too fast and too many.

[@Longlius]

The easiest way to make it hard in the short-term would be to start patching out the ways code is injected into the FFXIV client and introduce integrity checks on DLLs to prevent players from injecting their own software into the client. Doing this while also disabling logging to the filesystem for PVP would mean that bot writers would essentially need to write a machine vision algorithm to automate inputs in PVP since the client itself wouldn't be offering any easily scraped information about the current state of the match.

[@d3fmetal]

That would break the mods like ACT, and all that would happen is people would find a way around it. It waste developer time. Easy Anticheat breaks things too, that's why Lost Ark can't run on steam deck. FFXIV is on Mac and steam deck.

[@Longlius]

@@d3fmetal If you implement integrity checks on every DLL/Shared Library, there's no entry-point for mods. Any attempt to access the client's memory would trigger a general protection fault and crash the client if someone attempts to launch a modded client. It's not really a hard problem to solve. And it wouldn't really break the game on Linux or OS X either. Lots of games do this and it doesn't require anything as elaborate as EAC.

[@Anuca]

A question that's completely off topic for the vid but whats the best way to level jobs rn 50 and up?

[@eduardopena4388]

Good video! Im happy to see you actually went and gathered more information on your own rather than regurgitating reddit posts! The real scope of what these hacks can do is shocking, wow

[@cressposting]

Good video. Feel better dude

[@sidharthavenugopal1526]

Hey? Could I ask what chest piece you have in this video?

[@earthpressedflat]

Great sleuthing and coverage FD!

[@syncswim]

Honestly with the official statement that they'll never do anticheat software it feels like we might be headed towards effectively a blanket ban on mods. The hope is that they would somehow be to do a narrowly tailored ban that only goes after PVP exploits, but I have no idea if such a thing is possible or if the support team is even equipped or able to support that. Also, they have no official need to go to that level of trouble -- YoshiP has straight up said "3rd party mods are not allowed," meaning even the continued existence of mods that have no impact on PVP gameplay is just kind of a gentlemen's agreement with SE. They'd be fully within their rights to throw up their hands right now and say "sorry, guys. We gave you a chance and now you blew it"

[@UmbraWeiss]

If they resolve this the same lazy way they do with hats and hairs and a lot of things, i give you a guarantee they will lose a big chunk of the playerbase the moment they ban modes. Rp ers and more will quit the game the moment they do that, and we are talking about the people who keeps this game alive between patches.

[@coolyeh1017]

@@UmbraWeiss Fortunately Yoshi P and his team realize this, but all he can say is "please don't advertise that you are using mods to the point Square Enix the corporation needs to get involved." They know mods are around but are hoping that people control themselves. They don't seem to have big problems with mods that do not interfere with the enjoyment of others.

[@Deafmandalor]

Mods are against the Eula anyway. Let’s be honest it’s FF boss fights isn’t hard savage or other considering that all mechanics are telegraphed 😂there is zero need for mods in FFXIv.

[@UmbraWeiss]

@@Deafmandalor No one uses modes for those to begin with and no one cares in the community if those are being banned, but there are modes for Rp, housing, quality of life, viera and hothgard helms, graphics and more...

[@coolyeh1017]

@@Deafmandalor which is great. THough also the game also has console players in mind who pretty much cannot use these third-party programs. It also avoids the trap Blizzard fell into, which was to make mechanics in anticipation that raiders WILL be using third-party programs, it becomes essentially almost impossible for the non-third-party program user to accomplish much.

[@mimsymau1212]

Get well soon pelt parent

[@Sigel77]

Apart from anti cheats, you can try to detect unnatural inputs. Bots react too quickly compared to human so if unnatural inputs are regularly sent to the server then it's a bot. That being said, analyzing input logs can for a large number of people would require a lot of resources. So using that to complement a report system would probably be cheaper to implement.

[@pwnyboy01]

This is a short term solution only. (the hackers will pivot their inputs or randomize the wait times) But I think it's the correct way to combat this for now. Reporting seems like a dumb idea, because the cost of it is going to be exceptionally high on GM/audit expenses.

[@deltaoalice9281]

Good point, but I do think that reporting is still the most efficient way to do it. The truth is, if they do harsh bans immediately (aka do all the hard work now), they will deter players from even attempting to do the same. This game is not like League of Legends or other MOBAs, you have to pay a sub, you have to buy the game to actually play the PvP because it is not available to Free Trial players at all. By putting an ironfist early into the new game mode, you are sending a message.

[@Kenaz]

Thank you for this! As someone who uses 3d party plugins for UI changes and other quality of life mods I appreciate you weighing in to help defend those who aren't hurting others gameplay experience.

[@UmbraWeiss]

I use modes for the moment they where available for years, if they ban them altogether i will probably quit the game, if they choose the lazy way to resolve this again, like they do a lot of things nowadays that was it for me for sure.

[@Cyromantik]

I use mods for RP, more saturated colors, debuff and Rez icons and a handy little in-game notepad I use to write down people's RP notes. It would be so sad to lose all that.

[@CVL2802]

The coping these people go through, it's like getting a machine gun to fight 5 unarmed people, sure you could still call it a fight but...

[@RealWildWitch]

This gives me further reasons to avoid PVP for some time. Thank YOU for speaking up!

[@rtbear674]

Just go in with the mindset everyone is cheating. get enough weekly, get rewarda you want, in casual mode.

[@adradox]

Here I was trying to climb ranks for the first time, encountering the same people with 0 ms reaction time on abilities and some even spamming LB for several times in a span of 20 seconds. Seems like the situation did not really change over the year which is a huge shame. I do enjoy CC mode a lot but taking it seriously from now on going to be a huge challenge.

[@lordjaraxxus5418]

Honestly, the ideal solution would be something like overwatch from csgo/dota 2 in terms of detecting cheaters(people report the cheater mid match, the replay of the match is marked, and random players review the match and see if said person is cheating. all of this is done anonymously with player names replaced with "the suspect" and names of heros/random names for their respective games). the problem is.... need server work to get that working.

[@gaiali453]

Thank you for this video. I had a feeling about cheating in CC. I have seen some really ridiculous stuff on CC and it doesn't surprise me that there are exploits being used by a subsection of the player base.

[@sijrichters]

Please report all the details you got to SE if you haven't done so yet.

[@no-trick-pony]

SE doesn't give a fuck. See all the public cheating for world first race.

[@sijrichters]

@@no-trick-pony pvp hasn't been this popular before. Call it hopium. It's better than not doing anything to alert the devs.

[@mattfriedt7097]

Still love the opening. Hope you feel better.

[@Shirvani28]

Thanks for the video dude; like you said, very few people have 0 clue what they're talking about. And as you also said, the misinformation is harmful and can screw over people using simple plugins like 'chat bubbles' or 'penny pincher' if the uproar about PVP causes SE to go all out on anything 3rd party. That said, the cheating is obviously intolerable and I hope they figure out something.

[@Cakasaur]

Perhaps a 1 or 2 second delay to the game reporting damage or actions on the battle log could help since i assume the cheats, similar to parsers will have to read logs to do its cheats?

[@MrInsiipid]

Nope.

[@midnightjay]

I wouldn't care about the hacking if it didn't interfere with the event (only playing pvp because of it, my first time playing it). Gotta win matches for the mounts and it's so frustrating to get steamrolled by these hackers. It's easy to tell who they are in any of the modes. If SE want's to fix it temporarily maybe adjust the achievements for the mounts. Participate instead of win, this event is already grindy af and it's been a real pain in the butt tbh

[@LazyVideosGAME]

I feel like someone developed an ego over what he was able to pull off with some lines of code. I was wondering how much crafting I could automate, so for fun I started to write scripts as well (Huge fan of automation in general), but never used them outside of some testing. I could have gone afk for hours while my character would just craft and craft and craft, everything in HQ without a hitch, showing me a number on screen how much was already crafted if I went afk for hours and went back. The guy who makes THIS stuff however went a little overboard it seems, with all the automation and also charging money for a hobby project. I understand the desire to make something like this, I truly do, but this has just gone overboard.

[@IShallCallHimTaders]

Imagine being so bad at the game that you have to cheat during the first few days of a new release, when the pool of players is the WORST QUALITY that it will ever be. Absolute clown shoes.

[@CTN404]

I though I was losing my mind… like how fast they were putting up their shields and fast snipes with MCH.

[@Sephaizen]

Me before clicking the video: "Oh I bet its not as bad" Me after: "Oh God its worse"

[@loki.odinson]

While we are talking about this, can we discuss all the f-ing bots just sitting around farming the Bunny Fate in Eureka Pyros and the fact that SE is doing literally zero to stop it. On any given day, there are literally 20-30 bots in an instance.

[@supersketchy3869]

What’s the point of farming that fate once you get the rewards?

[@zirilan3398]

Auto-leveling

[@loki.odinson]

@@supersketchy3869 sell eldthurs horn on the market board for a few million gil. Sell anything that you unearth from the chest on the market board. Easy money.

[@fantasygameplay256]

where is fur daddy? 1 month in silence? I hope you are well.

[@cryonixFrost]

Hey Fur Daddy i love your video so much i saw your euraka series and now i just got my first shiny armor set :D keep up the good work as always and hope you feel better!

[@OldManDoom]

I have actually become quite good at DRK in PvP. I am having a lot of fun and success. But now hearing exactly what some of these cheats do, I realize that I have been going up against quite a few cheaters in my time. I thought it was just keen play that I was always getting imp’ed prior to dropping my LB or how folks just happen to guard right through my salted earth combo

[@RangerBass]

For one game try this: target yourself, then run into enemy and drop salt(untargeted) and your are sword swing(untargeted) and then run. You will be amazed. No one targets you. But the second u target someone, bam, silence, shock, etc try one run in FL without targeting and u will see. It's ridiculous the amount of cheating

[@jubez1875]

Ya know dude. I was watching a crystal streamer one time and I noticed he had random as parts of his screen blocked out. It wasn't for people's names, and then I thought "oh maybe someone will watch his cooldowns on stream?" but his guard cooldown wasn't covered. I think he had those "dummy" skill hot bars. Also, there are some people who can mark enemies at the beginning of the match when we're in a our cages...idk how that's possible I can't seem to find a way. But yeah, there's blatantly people who have auto targeting for some stuff. In this clucky ass, 400 ms delay game..you're gonna tell me this WHM who is targeting a different player in a 8 player mosh bit has the wherewithal to snap-target me out of guard for a perfect polymorph? i'm not buying it.

[@__-tz6xx]

No wonder I keep losing fast usually when the other team has a red mage.

[@ralk7048]

It's really about what you want to get out of PvP. If you're about self-improvement, then the perspective is to focus on making less mistakes and doing more cool things. And because you're playing the game in the way it's intended, the ranking will come as a side-effect. I played a lot of GW2 sPvP (a mediocre top 250'er) and I really learned to set microgoals and critically analyse my own decisions. It allowed me to go from dying without knowing why, to being able to choose the correct decisions in terms of skill use and positioning more than half the time. That's already going to put you ahead of a lot of players! But people who go into PvP are also about the prestige. For people who don't have confidence in their skills and community reputation (for example, if you're a god-tier Thief in GW2, you'll be more known to players in matches by your name than your class), they believe their ranking is the only irrefutable community status they need, to become respected. That is why you have wintraders and people who buy carries. Cheating is sort of the extension to the wintrading and carries. Some believe that they already have the skills, it's just that they need a boost in luck, but most of these people who try to game the system aren't the top players that are playing the gatekeep game, it's just people who don't understand they are chasing a mirage. They become reviled in the community and end up with the bad crowd, and become tools to instigate drama. They become unhappy but refuse to acknowledge that what they are doing isn't giving them the meaning they crave, and become trapped because their social reputation is in tatters. We should note though, that some people consciously choose to play the game according to their own goals and get what they want from the game at the expense of other people. And like with bullies, a lot of these people actually have very high self-esteem from their perceived superiority. The only thing that can stop them (but not change their minds) is to inflict enough of a consequence.

[@serabi_]

Sqenix doesn't have to have access to our pc, they just need a replay system for gms and let it show all the inputs made in that game for a specific person. It won't catch everyone but at least it can show inhuman inputs and lead to bans for those players

[@NotSolutha]

My problem is I have reported multiple bot groups running treasure map dungeons or botting unspoiled/emphermal nodes in Shadowbringers and nothing every came from it. The bot mailing maps out standing at the mailbox in Uldah and buying them without being near a market board kept running. The FC members kept hopping around different servers running maps. I also took a deep dive at the time to see what they could be using and came across a website blatantly selling their botting software for things from chocobo racing to combat. SE doesn't seem to give a shit. They have to power (and money) to cease and desist sites like that but to my knowledge have not. Not just botting site either, there are very popular sites blatantly advertising gil selling aswell. All in all it really puts me off playing every time shit like this is brought up but I do continue playing trying to ignore all that shit.

[@25xxfrostxx]

This will be thing that killed plugins for all of us.

[@4thwall826]

we have a maint coming today, hopefully we get something… i dont play rank so i dont run into hackers, or maybe i did but i just too busy getting run over

[@Rezard]

saw some weird behavior in casual already (imagine cheating in casual) make me worried that they will target non-invasive mods, I cannot see myself playing without the great separator and the square compas (and also chat bubble and .this and.. /pmb)

[@S0lar90]

just btw "Easy Anti Cheat" has been cracked for Years to come by now. Most other big Names in this Industry aswell which you can proof for yourself by just do a little research on the Cheat/Bot Community. So atleast imo it's not a viable Solution to implement those for FFXIV

[@MrInsiipid]

Yeah, EAC is literally pointless. AAA games ship all the time with EAC and its literally cracked within the day of release most of the time, give or take a week if its not a popular game. I mean, look at Elden Ring. Certainly didn't stop anyone from cheating there.

[@albertsilvafernandez5773]

To be fair is an easy way to sort out this issue, instead of play the i'm innocent game, some mods developers could do one to identify weird occurrence in the matches, and this way players can report the cheaters, unless is not really interesting to do so, i wonder...

[@toastedchoom4347]

the only really non-invasive method of dealing with these issues is better policing & reporting in game. In all my years of playing FF14 I've legit never seen a GM player avatar and the only place I've seen them show up is in the jail people go to. Perhaps having a a more visible presence of GM's around in general would dissuade people from being as blatant with their breaking of Tos/cheating. However this would probably be a rather costly exercise for Square. So Frankly I see Square dealing with this the same way they have dealt with the modding & botting scene for years, which is effectively nothing, except for some mass ban waves lol.

[@Bright_Jockhu]

I've started sniffing about on that discord server as well and it seems that there must be a bot in action as I was able to see most messages then the all disappeared but I joined with a spare account the messages were there again for about 30s

[@kd9-3.77]

SE is banning more people with butts on their Adventurer Plates than people actively cheating in the game.

[@prettyunicorn261]

I mean SE has always been a bs company but lets not alienate the facts either, only one guy got banned for his plate and its the Onlyfans guy, the others were just GM warnings, which arent bans per se unless you meant "SE is punishing" instead

[@kd9-3.77]

@@prettyunicorn261 there have been multiple bans now

[@proy3]

One is a lot easier to prove than the other, so of course that one will come first. We'll have to see what their policy on PvP cheating is before we accuse them of doing nothing.

[@kd9-3.77]

@@proy3 Not sure if you're confused but 6.1 didnt introduce PVP. PVP existed before 6.1 They have had over a decade to figure it out.

[@SugarPopoto]

@@prettyunicorn261 Nah, several people were banned and the onlyfans one also got banned for their plate. Stay updated on topics if you're trying to use them as an argument. Lewd plates are officially a ban reason, we've known this for a few days now

[@dega666]

Sorry you no feel good. Hope you feel better soon friend

[@DrawingsOfNamine]

Yikes dude. I didn't think this was that serious but I'm new to PvP.

[@almostforfree1555]

"Uh yeah, im so far above these scrubs I should really be in crystal, so lemme just use something to play the game for me so I can just end up in the rank I believe I belong in, and then turn them off...Ah shit im getting demolished, I guess i'll just put them back on since these guys are also using them too, fucking cheats." 🤡 world

[@GymnasticsCoach83]

Listening to this video again for the fourth time, 9:44 is 100% agreed upon with me. 10000%.

[@RionCousland]

any source information?

[@OfTheTheDarkestSoul]

I got to crystal rank early and never played it again due to the influx of cheaters. I'll play more when they ban them. Also, as someone who didn't cheat. I got to crystal in under 90 wins, its possible. Just requires a LOT of win streaks.

[@spencerpaul3124]

Let them know!

[@cereal9285]

The issue is that anticheat isn't exactly an end-all-be-all. It won't get rid of cheating in the game if SE is unable to allocate a metric ton time, money, and resources into combating these cheat devs. The cheat devs will always be working around the clock to find vulnerabilities in the game and finding ways to keep their cheats going, and it's usually far far more expensive for the game studio to keep patching methods these cheat devs use to exploit parts of the game. Counter strike for example has a cheating epidemic not from its bad anticheat, but because of its cheating culture. Even if valve put a super invasive anticheat in the game, they'll still have tons of cheaters floating around because cheaters will /always/ find some way to cheat in games where powerful mechanics can be exploited, solely because the cheaters often circulate their work through private, often paid-access discord and forum communities that the game developers will simply not have access to. It's extremely hard to combat a lot of cheat clients and cheats will often only get caught in competitive games solely because of overuse or too much widespread circulation of the scripts and game developers can finally get their hands on it. Given that most cheat clients that matter (like the stuff you showed in the game, people insta-guarding ccs, interrupting limitbreaks, immediately executing people, etc) are paid anyway, it won't change anything even if SE put easyAC in the game. The devs will just change the way the scripts hook to the game and it'll just end up with all the people who mod the client getting banned or false flagged if they change their terms of service.

[@Pmak]

Give it a few bad apples to ruin the entire bunch. What a mess.

[@SuzuZatsune]

Thanks alot for the Information~ And Hope you feel better as Fast(!) as possible. I don't get it, why people need to Cheat... They ruin their Own game. Specially when calling themself "good" then i wanna see them in Ultimate groups without their little Tricks.

[@sadpandah7597]

in destiny 2 when Bungie shut down some major cheat websites we got some screenshots of players who would use these cheats and they would say stuff like "why they did this, I was getting better with hacks" People who cheat are delusional and live inside a bubble and think they can only improve using cheats or just don't care at all the point they want to be high rank to boost their ego until they get caught cheating lol

[@SuzuZatsune]

@@sadpandah7597 Thats just uff, if they really think they are "good".

[@lordpneumael]

I hate to say it, but a big thing they can do is to take a hard look at the class balance itself and what abilities are doing what. An instant cast ranged CC that cancels Limit on a fairly short CD is asking for trouble. A Limit that gets an instant-kill at a certain health percentage is asking for trouble. I know they want the abilities to be powerful and fun, but if you have abilities that win fights instantly someone is going to find a way to script it to remove the human element.

[@Hemuset]

HUH, that explains why I've been seeing some reaaaaallly particularly good players, like... with ungodly reaction time. It crossed my mind, but I didn't think it was possible. Guess I was wrong o_o

[@DrakeFury1]

Seeing how these cheats are being used in PVP make be believe that similar cheats have probably been used in PvE. How many of them pink/gold parses are actually legit?

[@MrInsiipid]

Absolutely, and the more serious endgame players who've been around long enough already knew about it. Lots of top logs are piloted by literally the same bot in this video, from different developers. Its been going on from my knowledge since at *least* Heavensward. There's bots for quite literally everything in the game.

[@amarawhite2760]

I don't know if this is even possible, and I am by NO MEANS an expert on add ons and what they could be capable of, but you were talking about most add on creators do it for quality of life stuff that the devs may not have the time or resources for. Is it possible to create an add on that would act sort of like a fire wall and prevent other add ons from targeting you? I mean fight fire with fire. If offensive add ons can be created would it be possible to create defensive ones? Edited to add: I am by no means condoning what is happening, I think it is aweful; however, if nothing is done and people want as close to a normal play as possible with cheaters in the game.... can a personalized anti cheat add on be created?

[@serfraust]

No, there isn't really anything that can be done other than server-side detection of impossible inputs to flag a manual check. If you were to make something to hack yourself to be impervious to hackers, the hackers will just take that and make themselves impervious to you.

[@amarawhite2760]

@@serfraust Thanks! Like I said I really know nothing but thought I would ask just to learn.

[@VenomRivera666]

Pushing back against misinformation is always based.

[@jamesfreeman9049]

I'm sure I'm on thin ice for playing on Linux so I don't even bother with add-ons even if it's just stats stuff, just not worth it edit: I'm pretty sure the API's (application programming interface) can sniff as to whether another program is controlling the game without invading a person's privacy

[@cymo2433]

the idea of some1 giving the suggestion of using "easy anticheat" is more sad then the people cheating

[@cmerk100]

Hopefully you will be able to forward any screenshots with names to SE somehow through a ticket or something so those people can get smacked with a ban hammer.

[@CucumberFanatic]

I think they should do spot checks on really well performing players, like if somone gets crystal in 60 games, they have to fight a dev (who is good at pvp) in a secure inviroment where their inputs/reaction times can be monitored, then they are issued a PVP bann or somthing lol

[@ChatterGuides]

Automatic flagging with manual checks isn't a terrible idea

[@davood123]

@@ChatterGuides they are liekly doing this but as with any sort of situation like this we won't hear about it for a few months as SE doesn't want to give away how they are catching the hackers. likely they will do a banwave at some point. this is hwat happens in other games. if they ban too quickly. it becomes an arms race with the cheaters analyzing/who/when/why people got banned and SE potentially banning people too aggressively.

[@yScribblezHD]

@@ChatterGuides Pretty sure this is how most other games do it. There's some sort of in-game detection (winning every game, super quick time to kill, unrealistic ability efficiency, etc) which flags players which are then usually spectated by a GM. I'm not sure how the mods are made but there's also potentially room for SE to adjust things on there end to make these kinda mods less trivial.

[@littleknot710]

Good video at a much needed time. Was in a match Knott only 30 minutes ago lost in under two minutes and the per the in game battle summary it showed that the team i was on recorded zero kills and zero damage while the other team had zero assist. Have never been a big pvp girl but somethings IS wrong here. Sad that this new mode was fun for a day or two now thanks to .......you know the rest

[@martinmarginu7872]

Good job on exposing this but sadly nothing will change. I noticed hacking/botting in xiv is quite rampant when I did the firmament ranking but the dev look the other way and the community is trying cover it up. If you're interested in exposing this at next firmament you just need to try gathering, then u can estimate max point someone will get in 1 hour. After checking the leaderboard u can see lots of ppl statistic dont make sense unless they hack/bot/account share. Tonberry in elemental is the worst, I just call that server tonbotry nowadays.

[@b1indsided]

once i get the lvl 25 armor im dropping the game mode. let the cheaters play against themselves and force SE to make a move

[@chickenexploder2358]

GAH!! FURRY! But thanks for the pvp info it is good to know

[@ronnieblastoff4083]

The gamemode is not going to die cause of cheaters. Not defending them at all, but hackers aren't the major issues effecting pvp. Pvp has been casual-ized. It doesn't mean anything to be good. Unless the hack allows a player to openly do something like insta-cure, or teleport to potions, they can still be burst down like everyone else. No 1 person is leading a shyt team to victory, unless the team they are fighting are more shyt. While I would love a cheat free pvp, I'd be kidding myself if I said I, or anyone else should give a shyt.

[@metermaide1726]

they need to set an example of people, and put someone head up high on a spike for all to see, if anyone gets caught cheating its goodbye forever, only way i can see this game mode improving(instill fear and they will forever obey, the sophisticated report feature being the catalyst)

[@GremDisaster]

First and foremost, I personally would never cheat in pvp. I’ve zero interest in ranked CC and I got the edgy lv25 armor. So casually getting some crystals for a few glam weapons and armor between now and 6.2 is all I’m gonna do. However I’m an avid Hunter, and if this possible third party crackdown also puts a stop to all the bots and sonar instant-pinging in S rank spawns - HALLELUJAH. That said, I downloaded xiv launcher a bit before Endwalker’s release for the sole purpose of using that “place housing items anywhere” mod. Unfortunately I’ve been super busy irl and when I do have time to play xiv, I have been neck deep in The Grind! With this news lately and the possibility of them actually cracking down on people using the programs (I googled and googled before i downloaded launcher, and the bans were at 0% back then and many many people were openly using them) then perhaps I shout drop all my to-do plans and focus solely on getting my mansions decorated asap!

[@T.O.Wallee]

Just set no crossplay between console and pc then I’ll be fine with playing on console. Otherwise, the pvp is same broken as other competitive games

[@Pikachu-qr4yb]

You didn't start the video with "Hey guys, Fur Daddy here" :-(

[@BloodKitten_]

i would say this, i really don't care about pvp as i dont play it, and i honestly don't care about bots in PvE, but in pvp cheating is 100% wrong. since pvp have its own seperate UI and loadout, would it not be possible to only scan players that enter wolf dan or whatever its called, and pvp matches only? in PvE, let people play how they want assuming it dosent negetivly effect other users.

[@MrInsiipid]

The issue from what I know is they can't legally do that due to laws in Japan. It's not a matter of "only scanning" the people in PvP, when they're not allowed to invasively scan anyone period.

[@BloodKitten_]

@@MrInsiipid how about have all pvp matches recorded? i know you have the option to do it in a dungeon, so pvp should have it on, and when someone is reported, they can just watch the replay. though i could be mistaking in thinking how it works.

[@DonaldTurner]

thank you for this confirmation. I have played a bunch of CC recently, and I could sense something was rotten. pretty blatant at times. marking enemies, before game start, when enemies aren't targetable, etc. had one game where the guy marking our players from onset (while still waiting for the pit to be made ready) then came and sat on our team's spawn location the entire time, and their 4man steamrolled us. it was weird. sucks. predictable, but sucks.

[@emilyspector2728]

Polymorphing….and I think turning the enemy into a sheep. WoW mentality.

[@dullahandan4067]

Just don't have ranked or any pvp rewards. Would greatly reduce the cheaters. They could just straight up remove pvp too. I also support that.

[@XarocDrocass]

This type have player behavior honestly doesn't surprise me. The new breed of gamers these days, "Anyone have a guide, what's the meta?" I see so many Day 1 "Gamers" who play out of a guide rather than skill, their initial search leads them to these tools and the trash talking, degradation of the game begins. People are reducing themselves to scripted bots, you don't even matter as a person at that moment, your PC is playing the game for you.

[@Raymond13557]

There is websites that allow you to buy pvp ranks in crystalline conflict

[@TheOshinoMeme]

Bro, how can you need help to play and say "i'm good"... SE have to come up with a solution quickly for pvp.

[@NiCeNuKNaN]

Some of players want to climb up to Crystal or Top 100 really bad. So they will do EVERYTHING to achieve that goal, so the cheating is the option.

[@vaithwhy]

The Thing is People which downloads hack dont have any private data anymore every password and so on is now in the hackers hand :3

[@lllCTHULHUlll]

I hope SE sticks to their guns. I have several mods installed which simply increase my enjoyment of the game. I always find it stupid when companies (*Cough* Nintendo. 👀) take hard stances against cheaters, because that stance ends up punishing the vast majority of the users who didn't do anything wrong. Take the high road. Ban them. Make your employees work a little harder to let fans enjoy the game the way they like it.

[@Violent_Wolfen]

If you have a problem with companies taking a hard stance against cheaters then the community needs to police itself. When a company does it it's to keep the game going don't get mad at them because too many people blew up the spot.