Ban Stick

Those bans through investigation do not involve GMs at any point. They're done by the STF.

If you were kicked from the game without going through jail, it may be a GM if he deemed you afk, or a US GM who made you exit jail after issuing a punishment. US GMs have a different flow from other regions when it comes to issuing the punishment.

If you get teleported or talked to/sent boxes in game, then that's a GM.

What you speak of is illegal/isn't practiced by anyone but Blizzard to my knowledge.

There are many ways to know if a player cheat, people have to understand that if you use a really bad cheat/exploit and aren't dealt with, you're either too small of a fish or your punishment is pending investigation results (as in, delayed).

The argument on Blizzard was about scanning the computer memory for processes. And spying on what the players were running outside of the game process.

Downloading logs from running apps is a widespread industry practice.
Microsoft does it, for example.

How they solve disputes for stolen items ? It can only be done through examination of what kind of text was exchanged between the involved parties. And here I am just giving a small example.

You're right but you don't know about the whole process. Let's just say that those logs that are on your computer are pretty much useless for anyone working at SE. They're never used.

A GM will know absolutely everything you've said or done through other means. This is why when players want to be nice and send screenshots and what not, GMs politely decline as it's not needed.
There are a few things that the player need to tell a GM to make his/her work easier and much faster, but there is nothing that the player's machine or brain can hold that the GM doesn't know when it comes to a situation reported in FFXI.

Like I said on the XBOX Live example XBOX Live people can scrutinize a user life through service logs. I am sure even if they don't download anything from a user computer they still have access to locally generated logs if they feel like.

Anyway since the server is the actual keeper of the keys on every single transaction that happens ingame of course it knows everything.

My point was just show that doing stupid things and making eyebrows raise isn't a smart move for anyone who is bending the rules even slightly.

XBOX Live had no remorse on banning people three or four years after a violation just for detecting it late.

Yeah, there was a guy a couple years ago who used a very specific cheat on FFXI and he was pretty much unknown. He only got caught randomly.

Most of the people who brag or are idiots that need holidays will get banned sooner or later.

Alternatively, if you're a known person within the community in general through your good actions, such as writing guides, giving advices to people or posting maths, you're also pretty much guaranteed to get *** one day.

Levi have been like that for almost 2 years, dead/low population as always.

just got lm-11 notice on my pure innocent mule wonder what they found in their investigation

Wow..

That's *** up.

it is but was worth it to see what im *** with curiosity literally killed that cat lol

FFXI version of swatting lol

I suppose it will all come down to opinion but for me it all comes down to what they have been utilised for, Clipper is probably the worst due to what can be potentially done with it, the mass alex farming, trivialising ADL, ***goes badly, flee hack kite stuff like that.

Could also argue stunbots since, because of those, cheating became almost necessary if you wanted to compete for HNMs back at 75.

There also was an argument for fishbots as they caused unnatural inflation and since only some where out there fishbotting Haks, players playing legit where punished by gil lowering in value. I admittedly have fishbotted but I only did it because I found fishing monotonous and boring, never fished Haks before or after the nerf.

...and that's the end of that discussion right there.