FFXI members who found themselves banned - had apparently fallen prey to automated tools developed for Square-Enix's Special Task Force (STF) to help them catch gold farmers and gold sellers. Gardening is used by many players in Final Fantasy XI to help earn money, since it is a profession with no level or skill requirement; the only limitation is that each individual character may only have ten flower pots at once.

To circumvent this, players would have alternate low-level characters (or "mules") with whom they would garden, sell the grown plants to NPCs for profit, and then forward all the money on to their main character. This cash flow apparently set off red flags in the automated STF tools, labeling gardening enthusiasts as potential gold farmers, and banning them accordingly.

Most of the bans will probably be overturned - if not, then there are more serious problems at play than automated software - but let this be a lesson to Square-Enix and other MMOG operators: Automated tools aren't always perfect.

Source:escapist magazine

If you believe an article violates your rights or the rights of others, please contact us.