Beware of servers using Vote Bots!

Cyan Hijirikawa · Sep 13, 2016, 07:05 PM

Question, what is the purpose of voting sites? I mean if they are just now being handled and voted by bots, then what's the point of them? Votes mean nothing anymore if that is the case. Maybe a few years back when server owners weren't desperate enough to grab players, it was a good thing. Now it turned to this.

DarkDevine · Sep 13, 2016, 07:23 PM

Quote from: Cyan Hijirikawa on Sep 13, 2016, 07:05 PM
Question, what is the purpose of voting sites? I mean if they are just now being handled and voted by bots, then what's the point of them? Votes mean nothing anymore if that is the case. Maybe a few years back when server owners weren't desperate enough to grab players, it was a good thing. Now it turned to this.

Honestly, today they simply exist as a reason to give freebies to users to lure them.

People that voted often and got stuff through it feel like they "earned" it by "work", hence they won't leave the server that easily, as their work would get lost, even it it's obviously crappy.

Making a server, I wouldn't even post it on these s*** sites. There are better ways to advertise and better ways to keep players on your server (e.g. actual good content, management and support)

jacobo_bobo · Sep 13, 2016, 07:41 PM

The purpose of Vote Sites is obviously to attract new players. Most people use Google and search engines to find a server. When they google "Ragnarok Private Server" all you will find are top site.. New player clicks topsite --> New player checks top site rankings and generally go for the top 5 servers as they believe them to be the best.

Servers want to be on the top 5 so they have Vote for points systems in place to encourage their players to vote.

Cyan Hijirikawa · Sep 13, 2016, 08:01 PM

Why do you need players when I can have bots.

Well, veteran players know what sites to check anyways when playing servers, namely RMS and other actual forums who have server reviews on them.

DarkDevine · Sep 14, 2016, 04:23 AM

Quote from: jacobo_bobo on Sep 13, 2016, 07:41 PM
Most people use Google and search engines to find a server. When they google "Ragnarok Private Server" all you will find are top site.. New player clicks topsite --> New player checks top site rankings and generally go for the top 5 servers as they believe them to be the best.

Honestly, who searches a server like that doesn't deserve any better.

Pretty sure social networks and good SEO can bring just as many, if not more players.

Minabe · Sep 14, 2016, 09:08 AM

Doing Tripper's job.

DarkDevine · Sep 14, 2016, 09:55 AM

Quote from: Minabe on Sep 14, 2016, 09:08 AM
So now the state of RO pservers scene is the players' fault? I can finally say RO is dead.

It has always been the players fault. Crappy admins are normal RO players as well, they just were able to ask someone on rAthena forums to set their server up. The problem is when people aren't able to pinpoint the factors that makes a crappy server crappy. Most people are simply in it for money, it's a fact. They don't want to provide a nice and cool RO experience or give players the best they can, they want to milk every digit that appears in their player count.

Maybe that would be worth writing a guide. "How to avoid crappy servers".

If more people would concentrate on joining good, larger servers and stop giving every of those 500.000 private servers out there a reason to stay alive, things would be different and you wouldn't need to spread a lie like "RO is dead".

jacobo_bobo · Sep 14, 2016, 01:18 PM

Quote from: Minabe on Sep 14, 2016, 09:08 AM
So now the state of RO pservers scene is the players' fault? I can finally say RO is dead.

I agree...it's not the players fault that they use search engines to find RO servers. We are in 2016, everyone uses search engines to find anything and everything they are looking for. Private servers should not be any different... I only wish Ratemyserver was higher in the rankings and that vote sites actually had caring owners that cleaned cheating servers from their top sites.

Yuzo · Sep 15, 2016, 08:49 AM

Problem with those voting sites is who is accountable for them? I don't know who you can even look to. At least here we have yC, Triper and the gang that we know we can complain about shet.

DarkDevine · Sep 15, 2016, 09:08 AM

Quote from: jacobo_bobo on Sep 14, 2016, 01:18 PM
I agree...it's not the players fault that they use search engines to find RO servers. We are in 2016, everyone uses search engines to find anything and everything they are looking for.

They don't use search engines to find servers, they use crappy voting top-sites that are obviously easily bottable.
They only use search engines to find those crappy voting-sites.

A RO server that is able to land on top by searching "Ragnarok Online Private Server" on google (Only LimitRO and TalonRO make it to the first page) are obviously at least RO servers which admins understood SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and thus are probably technically competent enough to run a RO server (Not implying they have to be good admins or good persons, but they are worth more for the RO private server community as they are able to keep servers online over years, not just for 4 weeks)

Additionally, RateMyServer already is result No.1 when searching for private servers, but it requires 2 clicks more to get a RO server while top-sites list them in a list of 100. That is both's fault, players are too lazy, RMS doesn't evolve.

TalonRO is actually even visible (Second result after Gravity's official site) when you search for "Play Ragnarok Online" on Google, which is a real achievement and is probably the reason why they actually got a solid player base and keep it at that. Gravity probably hates them for this.

SEO is one of the most underrated skills a server admin should have.

Most factors that make a crappy server crappy are visible from the outside already, before even registering. The majority of players simply can't pinpoint these factors or they lack the technical knowledge to decide if something is implemented well or badly.

I am actually thinking about writing a "How to search for a server"-guide.