Repeatedly Locked (for grinding?)

Stravokov

guess ZOS couldn't slow you down with their tedious grinds, so they had to resort to banning lol

starkerealm

ACHILLES 343i wrote: »

starkerealm wrote: »

ACHILLES 343i wrote: »

Well friends, it appear my communication ban was once again lifted. I just hope this time it will be permanent. Perhaps I'll try going without looting mobs for awhile and see if the problem persists.

Thanks everyone for all the input and advice. I appreciate it!

Weird question, but how long do you usually play in a single sitting?

Usually about 1.5 - 2 hrs a day. (this was enough to receive the mute ban initially)

In the past day or so I was putting in a lot more hours maybe 4-6. (but was blocked at the time from previous dealings)

Okay, then that's not what I was expecting to hear. I figured it you were grinding around 8 - 10 hours a day in one spot... but that's obviously not the problem.

Arreyanne

Lysette wrote: »

ACHILLES 343i wrote: »

Waseem wrote: »

for some reason i think ESO+ subscribers are immune to this..
i used to grind 6-12 hours daily for CP and never ever had anything to be related with this..
probably because no botter would ever get eso+

That's the strange part. I have ESO plus and let zos know that I am a good paying customer, but they won't correct this auto mute ban all the same.

EDIT: Actually they are correcting the problem. However, they are putting a band-aid on a situation that requires surgery. They will release the communication ban, but the automated system just re-applies it within a few days of high traffic grinding.

Have you ever thought about that they might just not want you to grind that extremely?- It is not in the interest of them, that it is done like this. Some grind, ok, but extreme grind like that is not really healthy for the game - it creates power creep even faster and this is a big problem because it creates a gap, which is hard to close and requires even more new mechanics.

Not to talk about that it is not healthy for you either.

This would not surprise me at all. They have nerfed every Hi XP grinding spot ever discovered in the game.

They are punishing you because you are not playing the game they way they want it played. Period

starkerealm

I wonder if a full suit of gold training gear is enough to trip something and make it look like you're doing far more grinding than you actually are.

Egonieser

I've grinded my arse off in the past while leveling alts, CP, materials, zombies for baits, Dreugh for fish and wax - not managed to trigger a muteban yet. The grinds were also intense and planned beforehand so it was no dillydallying that's for sure. Seems like ZoS detection measures lately have gone through the roof. These days everyone is a speed hacker, a grinding bot, and whatnot else. Before you know it, you will have police knocking on your door because your farts smell too bad... Geez..

willymchilybily

So no one else thinks this is an automated system to counter say Chinese gold sellers or their ilk?
You grind/harvest "excessively" according to the in game code they mute you so you can't sell your harvested Wears for real money as easily.

If so maybe they need to review the code. Don't know where you do what you do or what drops you are taking or by what metric an automated system might measures this. But 1-2 hours is far less that I was expecting

But I wouldn't be surprised if such a system existed that it might need a review on criteria limits. with the advent of changes to:
Gear traits:(Xp trigger)
crafting bags /bankers allowing quick offload and continuation of farming (harvest/yield trigger)
Or even a merchant/prosperous (gold trigger)

ADarklore

I know they've been adding a lot of 'anti-cheat' mechanisms to the game lately, hopefully I won't get snagged in it... been grinding my arse off today with my newest character trying to level skill lines and such... just makes me wonder what triggers the 'mute' ban?!? Typically I don't grind except on new characters maxing skill lines, then I return to my normal questing routine.

They did just give us 'training traits' that boost XP on enemy kills, I can't see them turning around and suddenly limiting grinding?!? That doesn't make sense with the whole change to the training trait.

@ZOS_GinaBruno Is there any input or clarification you can add to this topic please?!?

DeadDealer

missjackieb14_ESO wrote: »

ACHILLES 343i wrote: »

EDIT: Actually they are correcting the problem. However, they are putting a band-aid on a situation that requires surgery. They will release the communication ban, but the automated system just re-applies it within a few days of high traffic grinding.

Maybe you shouldn't be "high traffic grinding". Not saying there's anything wrong with it, but perhaps that's why you keep getting the ban. Maybe try doing something else?

is the grind against the rulers?
@missjackieb14_ESO

DeadDealer

ACHILLES 343i wrote: »

Runs wrote: »

ACHILLES 343i wrote: »

Everytime I open a ticket with zos they give me the same answer: Your communications were disabled because of your high loot rates. We have made an adjustment to your account and should be able to resume as normal.

This sounds like a bad translation to be honest... Are you sure they don't mean high message rates, instead of "high loot rates"? Have you ever been randomly kicked back to the login screen with the message "you have reached the message limit"? Could really just be as simple as an addon no longer working properly which keeps getting you auto communication banned. I know this has happened in the past with some players.

I just don't see why loot rate would do anything for muting, I could see them checking the account to make sure you aren't using a bot/macro set up. But to mute you would really solve nothing even if you were doing something wrong.

I've never gotten booted for message rates. I can't imagine what add-on would cause anything like this either.

In the three tickets I've opened, and the 3-4 times they have reversed the mute, this is the only answer they have ever given me: "This social mute is being triggered due to your extremely high harvesting rates, and we understand you're a long-time player and harvester."

Not sure why they chose to phrase mob looting as "harvesting", but the issue is still persisting.

just any addon with inventory features like - sell all junk to quick
transfer too many items in small amount of time to bank or withdraw them, and so on

i can easy reproduce it with some addons

Lord_Eomer

ACHILLES 343i wrote: »

Well, I am currently grinding about 975k xp / hr - not sure how that compares, but its definitely causing me to get communication banned.

That's lot XP farm in an hour,

I tried and able to farm around 450-500k,

Which location and what gear?

The Uninvited

Arreyanne wrote: »

Lysette wrote: »

ACHILLES 343i wrote: »

Waseem wrote: »

for some reason i think ESO+ subscribers are immune to this..
i used to grind 6-12 hours daily for CP and never ever had anything to be related with this..
probably because no botter would ever get eso+

That's the strange part. I have ESO plus and let zos know that I am a good paying customer, but they won't correct this auto mute ban all the same.

EDIT: Actually they are correcting the problem. However, they are putting a band-aid on a situation that requires surgery. They will release the communication ban, but the automated system just re-applies it within a few days of high traffic grinding.

Have you ever thought about that they might just not want you to grind that extremely?- It is not in the interest of them, that it is done like this. Some grind, ok, but extreme grind like that is not really healthy for the game - it creates power creep even faster and this is a big problem because it creates a gap, which is hard to close and requires even more new mechanics.

Not to talk about that it is not healthy for you either.

This would not surprise me at all. They have nerfed every Hi XP grinding spot ever discovered in the game.

They are punishing you because you are not playing the game they way they want it played. Period

No they didn't, they nerfed a few Craglorn spots. IC sewers, Crackwood Cave and the well known zombie spots are still available for grinding. That, and some other not so well known grinding spots.

drakhan2002_ESO

I spent all day yesterday, about 10 hours of grinding on one character for the Monster Hunter achievement. I killed approximately 4,000 mobs during this run covering undead, beasts, and dwarven constructs. I literally stayed in the same spots until I reached the number required for the achievement. These mobs were low level, where I would one-shot them or vet level and gained a ton of loot and CP.

Hopefully when I log in today I won't be banned. Scary stuff... just trying to get a title. I don't even know how to cheat and wouldn't if I did.

yodased

willymchilybily wrote: »

So no one else thinks this is an automated system to counter say Chinese gold sellers or their ilk?
You grind/harvest "excessively" according to the in game code they mute you so you can't sell your harvested Wears for real money as easily.

If so maybe they need to review the code. Don't know where you do what you do or what drops you are taking or by what metric an automated system might measures this. But 1-2 hours is far less that I was expecting

But I wouldn't be surprised if such a system existed that it might need a review on criteria limits. with the advent of changes to:
Gear traits:(Xp trigger)
crafting bags /bankers allowing quick offload and continuation of farming (harvest/yield trigger)
Or even a merchant/prosperous (gold trigger)

uhm thats literally what i said? 0.o

starkerealm

willymchilybily wrote: »

So no one else thinks this is an automated system to counter say Chinese gold sellers or their ilk?
You grind/harvest "excessively" according to the in game code they mute you so you can't sell your harvested Wears for real money as easily.

No, that's exactly what it is.

DeadDealer wrote: »

is the grind against the rulers?

Grinding against rulers is usually frowned upon... unless, you know, they're into that.

But, seriously, grinding isn't against the rules. They've nerfed some grind spots, but others (especially the Cyrodiil delves) have been left untouched.

DeadDealer

more automutes i saw in zone chats today

really they need to fix their Warden

Mureel

Lysette wrote: »

qrichou wrote: »

Maybe. they flag everything above average as a tool to find real cheats , if so it needs fine tunening .
Just thinking out loud.

It would have to be far beyond average - because the average player is not any likely to grind like this - due to lack of time to play. Average players do normal things, there is no time for grinding.

Errrr I grind an hour every day at about his numbers - but for Telvar because I want the costume. I think a lot of average players haven't much left TO do, except raid or PVP and dailies.

Clerics1985

i was "muted" today for grinding in a pretty well known spot in Greenshade for about 3 hours, or at least that's what i assume. i don't really talk at all in game. i'm always on some Me shiet and today that was tryin to catch up in CP as well as make some money for next weeks PVP monster shop. i was running the same loop over and over again went from 336 to 346 no add ons, i did join some randoms group to make it go faster but that's about it.

Elsonso

drakhan2002_ESO wrote: »

I spent all day yesterday, about 10 hours of grinding on one character for the Monster Hunter achievement. I killed approximately 4,000 mobs during this run covering undead, beasts, and dwarven constructs. I literally stayed in the same spots until I reached the number required for the achievement. These mobs were low level, where I would one-shot them or vet level and gained a ton of loot and CP.

Hopefully when I log in today I won't be banned. Scary stuff... just trying to get a title. I don't even know how to cheat and wouldn't if I did.

Abusing the game is something they ban for, not normal play. The only claims of "false bans" that I think have any credibility are people who can identify some really out-of-the-box thinking in how they play the game that turns out not to be an exploit.

Running a circuit killing the same mobs for hours is not an exploit and is not abusing the game, in and of itself. There are some obvious conditions, though.

The player has to be doing the work, at all times. No macros or "assistive software" (bots) can be used. One key/mouse/button press, one game action. No macros that assist with animation canceling.

Standing in front of a mob that spawns faster than anything else around and just killing it all day is something that they could ban for, since that mob might be spawning too fast and the player is exploiting it. They apparently banned gold farmers for doing this. Simple solution, step away and kill other things, then come back after a while.

Preventing someone else from killing mobs because you zoom by and one shot them is disruptive to other players who cannot get a hit in. They can ban for this, although I can't say if they ever have. If the player is letting people get their turn, and being nice, they should not run into this problem.

As for being able to one shot a low level monster and have that count for the achievement, that seems awful easy to me. I would have expected the game to only count the monsters that we can get XP from. To me, this is a grey area, particularly if used to farm the achievement, although I am sure it will be black or white to others.

Smasherx74

I'm guessing this is on console

Elsonso

Clerics1985 wrote: »

i was "muted" today for grinding in a pretty well known spot in Greenshade for about 3 hours, or at least that's what i assume. i don't really talk at all in game. i'm always on some Me shiet and today that was tryin to catch up in CP as well as make some money for next weeks PVP monster shop. i was running the same loop over and over again went from 336 to 346 no add ons, i did join some randoms group to make it go faster but that's about it.

You went up 10 Champion Ranks in 3 hours at about the 340 CP level? That is about 925k XP/hour, unenlightened, unless I miscalculated.

Edit: meant to say 340

drakhan2002_ESO

lordrichter wrote: »

...Preventing someone else from killing mobs because you zoom by and one shot them is disruptive to other players who cannot get a hit in. They can ban for this, although I can't say if they ever have. If the player is letting people get their turn, and being nice, they should not run into this problem.

As for being able to one shot a low level monster and have that count for the achievement, that seems awful easy to me. I would have expected the game to only count the monsters that we can get XP from. To me, this is a grey area, particularly if used to farm the achievement, although I am sure it will be black or white to others.

Unfortunately, I have very little sympathy for "preventing someone else from killing mobs because you zoom by and one shot them.." If I can do that in a particular area for an achievement and I am not breaking any rules, then I will do so. I am not breaking the game, the game allows for "tapping", so all the lowbie has to do is be quick enough to get one shot in. If they cannot, they should move on until I finish what I am doing in that area and come back later. I pay for a subscription and if they are going to make achievements that require me to farm a mob, then that is exactly what I am going to do. This may not be a popular opinion, but I am not here to make friends.

As to being able to one shot mobs that count for achievement - it is aweful easy. And it is black and white for me. You either use the resources available to you or not. I chose to use the resources available to me to complete my objective. If you have ever attempted the Monster Hunter achievement, you will quickly realize that some mobs you will need for the achievement are low level. In my case, the DC starter area has a delve with about 15 dwarven constructs - it is the only place where so many are available in a confined area. Rather than spend hours and hours searching for individual dwarven constructs, you would be a fool not to use this concentration of mobs - regardless of level. Because I needed 1,000 dwarven contructs, I killed those 15 contructs that were level 5 on my CP130 Templar for hours...and hours...watching all these hapless low levels run by (...and they did not require these mobs for their quest in the area, by the way, so I was not keeping these players from completing their quest...however, they may have missed out on a couple hundred XP if they had decided to kill the mobs there).

Perhaps if this particular achievement, the Monster Hunter achievement, has mobs spread out all throughout Tamriel at various levels, I would have made different plans. Right now, for example, I am working on Atronachs, which are incredibly rare. While I know the best spots to find them and I am using them, they are still very rare. My point being that one particular type requires 200 to be killed; the only area has a small concentration of them...about 6. Why can't they have more mobs available throughout the world if they are going to make an achievement for it?

Ch4mpTW

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom Can we please have your take on this, because I don't want to get banned for grinding. I have buddies I grind AP with, buddies I grind trials and dungeons with, and buddies I grind regular XP with. And I'm honestly not trying to get punished for repeatedly farming content. And I don't think they are either.

Fallen_Ray

ACHILLES 343i wrote: »

So I have been communication banned about 3-4 times already in the last month. What does this mean? I am able to play the game with zero social functions. ie: cannot shop at guild traders, cannot CHAT, send mail, etc. Everytime I open a ticket with zos they give me the same answer: Your communications were disabled because of your high loot rates. We have made an adjustment to your account and should be able to resume as normal.

Ok... so the problem is within 48 hours of grinding I am back to communication banned.

Here's the scenario: I am currently grinding cp points to hit the cap. This requires a whopping 100,000,000 xp for me (yes, did the math). Obviously I am looting the things I kill so that I can afford gold for xp pots and gear repair.

... and that's it. I am not doing anything abusive or manipulating the economy, etc. Hell I'm not even getting any mats, everything I loot gets to the merchant.

Have you guys ever experienced this, or know of anyone who has?

I never ran into this back in the day, but if they expect to place a grindy system in ESO, then punish people for doing it efficiently - well, that's not a good business model.

If this is true then the people who decided to put up such ban are as worthless as their efforts to maintain "control". Seriously games are supposed to be like that If I am to get banned for playing the game then why even play it in the first place? I've seen many disappointments on ZOS's behalf but this one tops em all.

Lumenn

Doesn't make sense

Verbalinkontinenz

well, remembering the last 3 ban-fails with crafters-writ, speed-hack and ulti-spam i am meanwhile quite sure, eso staff doesn't know own game mechanics. thats how it is.

Bouldercleave

I'm honestly a serial harvester, and I have a run that I do about every other session on the Gold Coast. It's a circular path through wolves and lions that respawn quickly and I can run for hours without pause. I also pick up every chest and harvestable on the run.

It would be the definition of grinding, but I have never once had a problem doing it. I think someone reported you because they though you were botting.

Haenk

starkerealm wrote: »

I wonder if a full suit of gold training gear is enough to trip something and make it look like you're doing far more grinding than you actually are.

Hmm, I just created me a Julianos gold set (5pcs) with training trait - really helpful it seems. Still below 330 CP, so more stuff to kill for me (I'm sooooo slow, I know...). Hope this doesn't get me banned 8)

Elsonso

drakhan2002_ESO wrote: »

Unfortunately, I have very little sympathy for "preventing someone else from killing mobs because you zoom by and one shot them.." If I can do that in a particular area for an achievement and I am not breaking any rules, then I will do so. I am not breaking the game, the game allows for "tapping", so all the lowbie has to do is be quick enough to get one shot in. If they cannot, they should move on until I finish what I am doing in that area and come back later. I pay for a subscription and if they are going to make achievements that require me to farm a mob, then that is exactly what I am going to do. This may not be a popular opinion, but I am not here to make friends.

No, it is actually not a violation of the ToS to manually farm creatures to extinction, and no you do not have to let anyone else in. It is not very nice, but it is not against the ToS.

BUT, and they have elaborated on this, this ends where such behavior could be considered "griefing", so one does have to be careful in quest zones when killing quest related creatures. This would be a big issue in places where the creatures must be subdued and not killed in order to complete a quest. If a player were to camp there and wipe out all of these creatures before they could be subdued, and keep at it for a while, that is something that ZOS could potentially have an issue with. Whether they ban or suspend someone, or just nod and make a note to fix it in a few years, is unknown.

This is what I had in mind when I talk about zooming by and one-shotting everything that moves. If you are someone who likes to do that, well, you ain't going to Sovengarde.

I do expect that "one shot" kills will go away when One Tamriel comes out.

drakhan2002_ESO wrote: »

As to being able to one shot mobs that count for achievement - it is aweful easy. And it is black and white for me. You either use the resources available to you or not. I chose to use the resources available to me to complete my objective. If you have ever attempted the Monster Hunter achievement, you will quickly realize that some mobs you will need for the achievement are low level. In my case, the DC starter area has a delve with about 15 dwarven constructs - it is the only place where so many are available in a confined area. Rather than spend hours and hours searching for individual dwarven constructs, you would be a fool not to use this concentration of mobs - regardless of level. Because I needed 1,000 dwarven contructs, I killed those 15 contructs that were level 5 on my CP130 Templar for hours...and hours...watching all these hapless low levels run by (...and they did not require these mobs for their quest in the area, by the way, so I was not keeping these players from completing their quest...however, they may have missed out on a couple hundred XP if they had decided to kill the mobs there).

I suspect that players that want to take advantage of this will need to get cracking. When One Tamriel drops, this achievement will be much harder. I expect that those Level5 spiders will be CP 160 and not quite as easy.

ZOS_JohanaB

We’ve gone and changed the title from “Repeatedly Banned (for grinding?)” to “Repeatedly Locked (for grinding?)” for some clarification. Also, please know grinding is not against our TOS. But if you are having issues with grinding please contact Customer Support.

starkerealm

Is Locked the technical name for getting Muted?