This is, again, another common misconception about botting. There's no risk involved in botting if you do it right. Like I said, I've been botting since day one, and have been once in my entire life for naming my mule Douchenozzle. SE doesn't know how to detect botting in their own game if done correctly.
You really have answered your own question here. I bot because the gear from the HNMs that I claim is sold to buyers for gil. My LS banks gil for the month and then pays out based on attendance. For me, botting enhances my gaming experience because if I bot, I get increased rewards.
Last month my payout was 6 million gil. With that gil, I bought six Cerberus Hides and and made two Cerberus Mantle +1s, which I sold for $390USD each. In the end, I get to play this game rather casually with my friends, in the top LS of the server, and make $6-800 a month just from bank payouts. This is also ignoring my profits from king arthro and salvage drops.
Remind me why not to bot again?
My point was simply to have you outline your priorities - I was not going to make assumptions about why you bot merely have you state them so I could reply to them without relying on ambiguous assumptions. Seems I was succesful enough at that.
As far as RMT activity goes, I don't personally care that much, people who spend their money irl for items are the real dumbasses.
You bot because it enhances "your" experience which naturally is subjective. In almost tautological fashion this takes away any concrete justification for botting other than subjective reasons. Naturally this is a pretty big slippery slope. For instance, lets say I hacked accounts for RMT and because it really enhanced my experience. And I hacked your account. I am sure you wouldn't be too pleased with that because you place some value on your account -
if you don't my offer to take it off your hands is still open. Point being relying entirely on subjective standards of "enhancing gameplay" that go beyond some baseline or rules will inevitably effect others in a negative way that goes beyond the definition of fairness. It is the simple principle of my right to punch you in the face only goes so far as your nose.
Not trying to get into a moral quibble with you, just trying to show you that you are inconsistent really (that is, as long as you would be the slightest bit annoyed when your account gets hacked, someone outbots you, or you don't give me your account). I think Sartre called this "Bad Faith", look it up.
While you are at it, look into the Tragedy of the Commons and Game Theory (I once put up a game showing how botting was a logical choice given SE's ignorance of it - that was like 3 years ago though, I think things have changed concerning SE's handling of ToS breakers compared to the time of high RMT activity). I don't want to explain all of this to you so I will cut to the chase about what this means.
Your choice to bot, because it is rooted in some subjective standard, is the same as free-riding (people who don't pay taxes on goods shared by all people who often pay taxes to maintain them), its the same as polluting a little bit more in industry, its the same as being inconsistent in your values, and in a different way its the same as posting humiliating shit and border animated kiddy porn under the anonymous name on 4chan. These are all what we call 'systemic problems', problems that arise out of people taking advantage of a system - doing it in one area justifies it in other areas.
My point is simply to show your priorities are a bit out of whack because you are obviously inconsistent in what you value - other than sitting behind a screen and pooping on everyone.
You are just some dude sitting behind a screen who feels
empowered by botting, and that is whats sad. Its like shouting out to everyone that you feel the need to be empowered because you lack something. Its like shouting and screaming "GOD DAMMIT I AM DEFICIENT" to everyone and thinking what you are really saying is "I rise above all of you; I am the almighty defication". Its just sad to watch someone looking so pathetic and not even realizing it.
You are some dude sitting behind a screen.
You are some dude.
Dude.
On another note: How does your LS deal with Rare/Ex equipment?
