I know I'm going to get a backlash here, but I want to just try looking at things from a bit of a different perspective. I'm writing this in the assumption that it is the buying/and re-selling "bug".

I'm not sure if it's right for SE to actually punish a player of "exploiting" a glitch that shouldn't even have been there in the first place. It's SE's fault that the numbers were wrong. Some peeps found a KILLER DEAL, and saw it as an opportunity to make something of it. If they found this glitch realising that some people have been exploiting it, at that point, they should have just fixed the glitch quietly and be done with it. They basically punished these people in the same way they would punish people who harrass others. This is their world they created, so obviously we (much like cattle lol) are playing within it's boundaries. This part of the boundary just happened to be a little out of line. It happens. In RL, if you find a $500 bill sitting on the ground, with no one else there to claim it, would you take it? Isn't that in some way "exploiting the system"?

If there's anything (aside from bots) that I think IS cheating, it's the use of mules. They are also used to, in the end, make money. Each mule is a different person, with their own unique name... in RL this means that you think you're 4 different people! You get thrown in a nice cozy white room for that!

Bots, on the other hand, is NOT part of the game and I support SE's endeavor of ridding their game of them (though that'll never happen).

Sorry that my very first post here had to be this, but I felt I had to say something.

Ok perhaps this is a little out of place, but I want to get a general idea of if its true. I play on the Unicorn server and there is a group of players that camps the Stroper Chyme in Ordellees Caves 24/7 . Every time I do /sea Ordelles they are there. I have come online after a new patch and only 324 people were on the entire server once and, yup you guessed it, there they were in ordelles the moment I came online all 5 of em. It is obviously a Gil selling company because Stroper Chyme spawns every 13-18 minutes and the drop is worth 400K. In fact I have checked various server forumns on here and one post says that one of the people camping the chyme admitted to being a gil seller.

Now I realise that it would take a big investigation for SE to prove they were gil sellers because as it would be they would have to have lots of proof to take action. BUT there IS one way I think the problem could be greatly alleviated and that is to NERF the Stroper Chyme's SPAWN RATE. I mean, come on....a 13-18 minute spawn and drops a 400K item??? I understand the drop rates are horrible so because of the nerf in rate of spawn I believe they should increase the drop rate. It's true that archer/sniper/sniper +1 rings are a very necessary part of higher end combat so I would suggest making the same amount of rings drop on average but take that much longer between spawns. It would cripple the economy and players if the supply decreased, but not if the chyme was adjusted such that the supply remained the same but the rate of spawns was nerfed. And then if someone claims the mob from the gil sellers and gets the drop.....that much more pain in their side. This would make the average player get a better chance of getting their own archers ring and also discourage the Gil sellers because each spawn they miss is that much more important to them.

I know I alone cannot make this happen but if everyone sends input WE as the community CAN. I have already send a suggestion to the people of SE through the POL suggestion forumn suggesting this. If you agree with me then please do so as well. Lets send the gil sellers a message from the entire FFXI community that says --YOU ARE NOT WELCOME HERE---. It's OUR game. WE pay to play it. We don't want YOU here ******** up our economy and fun. GO AWAY GIL SELLERS >.<

PS: I will not post this on every server forumn because I believe that would make me a spammer. If you have this problem on your server and want to spread the news send a link to this post on your respective page. Thank you all for listening ^^

Well bout time...i mean fishing bots are ok to a point...then again there not. I believe that everyone should have the same oppertunity on the game not have to "auto farm". It pisses me off on caitsith, every single time i go to ordells to try to hunt the stroper its clamed before it even spawns....very annoying indeed....but on the brighter side with the new cop areas i have the oppertunity to make bank, and with little problem. Ep gobbies in Oldton Megalopolis are good for me to steal mythral beastcoins =P. Still staying on subject i believe these ppl should be banned for good. No player, sever, nothing everything should be gone

Just put Ex on some of the big name items.

Some would say "well then I have to wait in line all day and beat everyone to it!". Wait for who? Only people who want the item will camp it. And once they've got it, they'll never come back.

Besides, what takes longer - making 200-300k gil or trying to nab Leaping Lizzy or the VE from the 2 other people there who actually want the drop? I know very few people can make money faster. But you know what? If you suck at a game you suck at a game, and that's that. If you're great at one part but not another, that's that. Try bribing one of the campers to party up with you and let you have the drop if that's your thing. Note that this will exclude bots from the process. How's a bot going to make that transaction? Instead, you have a real transaction between real players. And there's no shame in hiring somebody (I'd consider it myself - I'm not too good at NM camping).

Also, consider this: how many people running around S. Gustaberg happen to have a couple hundred thousand gil on them right then and there? If the camper-for-hire can't get a sponsor, he might as well leave. He either already has the boots or he doesn't want them. So this is a service you'd have to advertise outside of the camping spot, and you'd have to have 2 people who are both willing to wait around together for perhaps hours.

If that's not messy enough, the paying customer won't trust a camper who goes bot after the deal has been set, and at least one of them has to be around to pass/lot on the boots. And who's going to go AFK? Is the customer going to fork over that much money, then go AFK and assume the camper will get the drop and pass on it? Is the camper going to pass on the item and assume the customer will come back from AFK with the cash after he's already got the item in his inventory? Are they going to try to sync this up? If the AFK customer doesn't get back in time, then the camper might get the drop. If you thought it couldn't get any worse - imagine the camper-for-hire already has that item, so now the customer can get free Leaping Boots by just waiting it out, thanks to FFXI's upgraded auto-distribute system. So the camper, unless he has some great reason to trust the customer, is taking a risk by even having the item in the first place.

Either way, you essentially have to have 2 people who trust each other hanging out for several hours - this almost totally rules out camping these items for gil. Suddenly, the entire cheating system is in upheaval. And how is a guy who only speaks Chinese going to work out all of these kinks!

The only things that really drive the economy are materials and other practical gear. They need to do some sort of market analysis. The gil moved between players for logs, ore, arrows, ninja tools, regular ol' swords and axes, scrolls, food, etc. far outweighs big name NM drops.

Even without leaping boots and the emeperor pin, you'd still have Ustsusemi: Ni, Lightning Spirit Pact, Erase, Phalanx, various race-specific belts, and other items that take real playing ability and dedication to get. Because of the effort and skill needed to acquire these, they'd remain big money AH items. Because anyone has the opportunity to try to get these without being beaten to it, there's no complaining about bots, cheaters, etc. Plus, you still have elemental staves, scorpion harnesses and the like created by high level crafters. All items that people need dedication and skill to get.

I've made and spent millions, and the only NM drop I ever got was the Neckchopper. Only 40k, and a total accident to begin with. I have purchased some of the big NM drops, sure. But I'd totally understand if I had to go and get them myself. Same thing with papyrus, coffer keys, etc. We should all be used to this concept.

Would this not fix the whole deal? The only complain anyone could have is that they planned on buying the item. Those folks are going to hate getting their AF (more than normal people hate it).

(Edit: I know this is off the topic of the dupe exploit, but most of this thread is too. Bugs can be fixed, behavior is hard to monitor.)

Edited, Fri Oct 1 10:16:08 2004

I really wonder how can you catch a guy who's getting gil legally (ie. chinese guy behind a computer farming gil all) and sell it (illegal)?

I don't think it's illegal in any way in claiming an NM or camping for it all day just to sell the item for gil. It's also not illegal to jack up the price of any item in FFXI AH system. What's illegal is selling/buying gil, but how are you going to catch such activity? How can you catch a violation of EoUA outside of the game where SE is totally helpless in killing these 'gil selling' sites?

Legal stuff here means the EoUA, I not talking about illegal trade using foriegn currencies (USD count as foriegn currency to China) over the internet and not paying any kind of tax over it.

Edited, Fri Oct 1 02:10:41 2004

Well, strangely, it makes me feel a little less angry knowing that my mob was probably stolen by a starving chinese person rather than some 14 year old "hacker"...

Hey, has anyone ever seen someone defeat an NM and then just vanish like they purposely disconnected so they could dupe the item? I'm curious.

Also, my 2 gil say that cheaters have bad karma and will eventually get what's coming to them. They'll try to do stuff like this IRL and end up in the pen... i hope

Now on to the 'Number' players on Fairy or other such gil-farmers that I need not describe for people to know EXACTLY who I am talking about. ^^

To my fellow players and members of Alla,

I've been an avid reader but never a poster and here is my first post. After reading the news on this exploit and seeing a lack of explanation of how things came to be, I'm going to try to explain it.

A few months ago, a certain group of individuals were clever enough to realize something. I'm sure many of us have realized this as well. It is an event, something that occurs with a sense of awkwardness: Disconnection. Disconnection happens all the time (at least to me....grrr..). However, disconnection during a certain "time" WILL enable a glitch in the system. My first experience of this seemed to be just plain coincidence. I was mining, mined a zinc ore (the only thing i've mined so far) but my pickaxe also broke in the process. So.. I should end up with 11 pickaxes (stack) and a zinc ore. At the same moment, I suffered a disconnect. I logged back on, opened inventory, low and behold... 12 pickaxes, 1 zinc ore. Some of you may have also experienced this during high traffic times at the Auction House when buying an item, u get 2 for the price of 1.

This my friends is called missing packets. The "group" realized this and played upon it some more. Software along the lines of Bandwidth controllers where used to minimize incoming and outgoing packets... By doing so, one can "cause" a disconnect at the precise moment needed to "dupe".

Alas SE (in their infinite wisdom) managed to make that process harder (dont ask me how, that would take 10 posts). So the group developed another way to satisfy the cheating urges. They were able to rewrite a certain file in Final Fantasy that took place before the update. In other words, SE made it harder thru an update, the Cheaters turned the certain file that was updated back. The question I'm sure everyone has in their head: But wont u auto update as soon as u Playonline? No. The file unfortunately was a single file that the group sniffed out and was able to trick the updater thru added "empty" bits.

So hence...the "Dupe" Cheat once again is enabled.

Personaly commentary: I personally have not done this, but those who have knows who they are. I think to each their own, I have no qualms with those that find an alternate way to solve a problem. Yes it may interfere with me in the long run, but that would be my problem. Games and much of life to me are problems that come and go... solve the problem, move on. However, in the case of Final Fantasy, MMORPG's... since there is a growing number of players that do play the game for fun and not profit, "robbing" those players of such fun to me is a no no. Amazing... how a virtual economy can cause a demand in the real economy.

Ok enuf rant, theres my 2gils. Hope u all find this helpful.

PS: I did not write this post to tell people to try this, obviously it doesnt work anymore. If u do try this, its at ur own risk, i have nothing to do with it. I know I didnt give enuf info in this post to validate an effort so dont msg me and ask me how its done. I just dont want any desperate noobs hard for cash to try this, there are other ways to make good money.

Ok, for those of you whom are reading this, this post is not about botters or gil sellers. To the best of my understanding, there was a way to duplicate items/gil that you already had so that you would have 2 copys of them. IE. if I had a peacock charm I could take advantage of this bug and make 2 peacock charms. It was a dupe that took advantage of an error in the game programming. I don't know the full details, or how to perform it, I only know it existed. I applaud SE for repairing and monitering these issues. I know I have nothing to fear because I have never cheated in game, and SE fixing this shows me that they care about their customers.

Also on a side note: I know a lot of people get really upset when SE schedules downtime for maintenence. I understand that this is an inconvienience, but without it the game would have problems and errors that would really make playtime harder. I used to play Everquest and that game was so full of bugs that by the 8th expansion the servers crashed on a regular basis. If you had just killed a massively high end MOB and gotten a super rare drop right before the crash you would not be reimbursed if it was lost. Sony basically kept adding new content without fixing existing problems that were known by the staff.

Maintenence is a necessity. If SquareEnix announces maintenence, I am ok with that because I know it means they are correcting an error/flaw that would otherwise hinder playability of FFXI. I have played FFXI nearly a year now and the server has never once crashed on any world. The gameplay is stable, and the world runs smoothly. They show they care about their customers by keeping the game in tip-top running condition and I for one humbly thank the team of Square-Enix for keeping on top of necessary repairs. After all, wouldn't YOU be upset if you had just killed King Behemoth and lost that abjuration because of a world crash, never to see it again? Do you think its fair for dupes to be allowed to stay in game even after becoming known, allowing others to cheat and make life for the normal player harder? I didn't think so. Good job S-E keep up the good work!! Thank you for showing us you care about your customers enough to fix what needs to be fixed and doing so in a timely manner ^^

isn't it funny how you can tell who got the boot for exploiting? they almost always flame, but anyways to sink to that level to make money puts you in with the botters and gil-farmers. everyone has to make money somehow why should anybody be allowed to exploit. I mean look at Martha Stewart -O.0-

P.S. Gambling is reality live with it, too bad they have to spam to do it though!

Jsut a question. i hear that they did this by duping gil/items. but how did they do it? not so i can do it and get my *** banned, but to know what the proccess is. Just curious.

There are so many bots on my server, unicorn, and they **** me off. I cant stand when im trying to get an nm like lizzy or spook and there's 5-10 bot camping them. I need the boots for my drg and it pissed me off when thee same person gets the dam lizzy everytime i camp it. They need to find a way to monitor these ppl who bot.
Also gil should be easier to make in this game. Someone in my LS is probably gonna quit the game because he cant make any money. I myself am struggling to get money. The quests and missions should be more rewarding. Because if i need an item dropped by an incredibly tough, im gonna check the AH. So i see that item sell for 1k and i go back to finish the quest and only get 500 back. Each quest should have a minimum reward of 1k gil or some amount that will make doing the quest worthwhile, rather than buying the item off the AH. I hope they make it easier to make gil. Maybe make it so u can get a paying job at some store or run errands for an npc; they could pay you bi-weekly in game and the better job the more money u make.