Just to clear up a few things.
Based on everything I know about this game and its rules.
1. Using a 3rd party programs that are not approved, and that interfere with or interact with the game in some way, is not allowed by the rules of the game. This is true whether you are attended or not. "Scripting" usually means automating certain in-game functions. Most of the time, scripting involves using an unapproved 3rd party program. There's one out there in particular that's the really big offender.
2. Macroing unattended is not allowed by the rules of the game, whether the method you are using to macro is itself allowed or not. You are breaking the rules when you hold down a key with tape and walk away.
Now, I happen to dislike scripting intensely. The fact that it violates the rules of the game is enough for me. Its effects on the economy and other aspects of the game can be debated endlessly.
At the end of the day, though, what's really important is that we all play this game. And, thus, we consent to the rules.
Try playing Chess with someone, and making, say, a Rook move the wrong way. Your opponent is very likely going to object. And he'd be right to do so.
If you do not like the rules, play another game. Or, accept the fact that no product you purchase is ever going to be perfect, and this is no less true for computer games than it is for, say, cars.
This isn't to say you can't complain. This is, however, to say, that complaining about the rules and breaking them are 2 very different things.
However.....I have never received an adequate answer to the following issue. Let's say I'm a GM, and I am looking at a suspected scripter. I appear, and he talks to me, with a few moments' delay. He says "I know it looks like I'm scripting. Me and my friends do this all day in 4- to 6-hour shifts. We sell gold for real money, live off of it, and spend the rest of our time doing fun things in-game. It looks like we're scripting because we do this all the time and have it down. Pathetic? Yes, officer, but true."
Would you, as a GM, ban that person anyway? Not if you're smart. Banning a paying customer is a very touchy thing. And his explanation is credible.
When the GMs do seem to catch a scripter, it is because the character's behavior can't possibly be explained in any other way.
To my mind, the true solutions to scripting are the following.
Pick at least 2, any 2, of the following.
1. Punkbuster or some similar technology.
2. Hiring more GMs and giving them the time and freedom to do their jobs properly.
3. Ban the sale of in-game stuff for RL money.
4. Stop making changes that favor scripting, such as the mining changes (rotating veins of ore, in the name of realism? laughable) and the Bag of Sending changes (now, scripting is really the only way to gold farm).
-Galen's player
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