Taking a line out of the Incredibles - "If everyone's special, then no one's special"
Give everyone sox or make it a lot easier to get. Prices fall on everything, people have no need to buy gold, bot companies have no need to keep collecting and selling gold. Don't think this would happen though.
Or...
Get rid of all sox. But alas that won't happen either, because that's why most of us play - to have an experience that is unique to us and to try to be better than the next person. I'd be a little frustrated if after working so hard to get to the top, ff, and sunned out, just to find out that I'm just another brick in the wall.
Option 3 - best choice - Get some more ingame GMs/assistants! If they can't afford any, I'm sure there's a few that would volunteer in exchange for some silk every now and then. Get in game, and let the ban hammers fly without fail. All they would have to do is stake out every town for a while, and ban the bots as they make their stops at town and are leaving to go grind. Have an ingame GM that can respond to any bot reports on the spot. With this many servers they need several GMs and assistants on every server.
To sum up their current maintenance/administration, JM/SRO feels like we've all gotten on a carousel for a ride and the operator has stepped away from the controls for an indefinite smoke break.
