Bots + low pop caps are keeping people from enjoying PVP

Telel · March 24

Today over half of my people couldn't get into Gray Host due to a massive queue that never seemed to shrink. The few who did get in had to deal with certain 'skill based' groups who only exist to be the most toxic of famers using the most scrub tastic of methods.

I myself had to log in an hour earlier than our usual start time just to get in on time.

Meanwhile dozens of people were just AFK thus preventing anyone else from getting into cyrodiil. WHich had the knock on effect of leaving the few organized players easily over run by zerglings and trolls. Mostly thanks to how the current award system,and ZOS's refusal to handle trolls actively encourages abusive levels of scrubbery.

While one of those two issues would be tolerable having to deal with both at the same time is absolutely not fun. The fact the team in third place can't get any people on to play ruins any chance of the game remaining competitive. Which seems to be the goal of certain people.

Of them it should be a priority for ZOS to begin handling all the people running scripts that let them loiter for days at a time in cyrodiil without ever actually being present. With the severely cut down population capacity those people are effectively prevents dozens of people at a time from enjoying their game.

I honestly do not see any excuse as to why this is permissible considering other forms of bot scripts aren't allow. Especially when it's an issue that requires an active choice to participate in.

And no, 'my guild will be on later and I don't want to sit in queue' is not a justifiable excuse. Those people are just as at fault as any number of trolls actively trying to keep others out of cyrodiil.

Sory if this is a bit of a rant but after a decade of leading PUGs I can say that tonight was in one of the top five most moronic PVP experiences I've had in this game. The others being back when certain guilds claimed that cheat engine was a myth and they were just 'very skilled'.

Though personally I'd prefer they get rid of the alt abusers, and farming bot groups those do seem to be a bit harder to sus out. So I'll settle for just getting rid of the other more obvious bots.

SaffronCitrusflower · March 25

Welcome to the lowest pop caps in the history of Cyrodiil. The cap is somewhere between 60 and 80 per faction right now. To keep it in perspective, the last time ZOS confirmed what the pop cap was it was 600/faction.

It feels like ZOS is slowly phasing out Cyrodiil as a zone to me, and I think the evidence supports that thinking given the ever shrinking pop caps and lack of attention to the zone in every other way as well.

Telel · March 25

SaffronCitrusflower wrote: »

Welcome to the lowest pop caps in the history of Cyrodiil. The cap is somewhere between 60 and 80 per faction right now. To keep it in perspective, the last time ZOS confirmed what the pop cap was it was 600/faction.

It feels like ZOS is slowly phasing out Cyrodiil as a zone to me, and I think the evidence supports that thinking given the ever shrinking pop caps and lack of attention to the zone in every other way as well.

Yes. I've been at this since early access and the rampant cheating is almost as bad at it was then. Which just makes having players locked out and unable to help even more frustrating.

If I could get people on who wanted to PVP we could just go start another front to begin hauling zerglings away from the bot trains. Or at least try and set up a good fight.

Anyone who's dealt with me knows I'd much rather do that than give any amount of attention to toxic scrub lords who think K/D ratios and AP eared is a justification for all manner of sad and abusive behavior.

But we simply can't because the other kind of bots (the AFKing kind) have everything locked out by early afternoon. Then the only people who leave seem to be the one's crashing out, or being actively kicked from the server. Oh, and the new players who'll likely never come back. Or worse change factions so they can zerg surf the farming bots next campaign.

Though that last kind don't matter to me.

xylena_lazarow · March 25

Telel wrote: »

bot scripts... obvious bots

do you have any actual proof or hard evidence

Telel · March 25

xylena_lazarow wrote: »

Telel wrote: »

bot scripts... obvious bots

do you have any actual proof or hard evidence

As much evidence as people had when groups like Guild of Shadows claimed cheat engine was a 'myth', and that they were just 'so very skilled'. You probably remember how that song and dance ended.

Especially in regards to the guy who could stand in the slaughterfish while insta gakking other players.

You'll probably also recall that ZOS is very quick to shut down any discussion where actual evidence and names gets posted. Much like they did when 'cheat engine' was declared a myth. They're also more likely to temporarily ban anyone posting such things.

So you'll forgive me if I don't violate TOS just to avoid someone declaring that something super obvious is yet another 'myth'.

Furthermore the post is more about the use of scripting to keep AFK people from being moved offline. If you need evidence that such things exist there are any number of posts on reddit or even on these forums about cirvumventing that. Sadly ZOS doesn't seem to like it when you begin posting links outside the forums.

Again, much like they don't like it when you post clips of this or that person doing things that are in violation of the TOS.

It also does not change the fact that clogging the queues with useless loiterers is making the limited population levels even more of an issue. An issue that less sporting souls will take advantage of as they seem terrified of 'losing' in a video game.

silentxthreat · March 25

it really is out of control. @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin this thread is 100% how must of us are feeling atm. I know there are changes coming you cant talk about yet but can we figure out how to ban the people staying logged in especially on ad side. ad is constantly getting farmed because we have a large number of people using these macros.

loosej · March 25

To be fair, not everyone who's standing around AFK at the home base is using scripts, or trying to prevent others from getting in.

I've barely entered Cyrodiil the last couple of weeks. Mayhem used to be my favorite event, but this last one I just gave up a couple days before the event finished. Waiting over an hour in queue, hoping to join some epic battles, only to see a map with one keep under attack by 5 sieges was pretty sad.

But when I did still queue for Cyro, this was my routine during primetime:

queue around 6pm, start preparing dinner
go to my desk every 10 minutes or so to wiggle the mouse so I don't disconnect
eat dinner
go to my desk to wiggle the mouse again
eat dessert
go sit at my desk again, by now it was usually after 7pm with only a couple people left in the queue

However, sometimes the queue would go down faster than usual, meaning I'd enter Cyrodiil as I was about to start eating. The fair thing to do at that point would have been to log out so someone else could play. And if this was a small game, still in early development, maybe run by a small and inexperienced crew, I might have. I definitely would understand the server limitations a lot better. But this is a 10 year old game with supposedly over 20 million players for which I pay a subscription fee (eso+). So I wasn't going to log out, I'd just continue with my dinner, maybe wiggle the mouse some more halfway to keep me logged in, making me one of those AFK players. And I'm well aware how unfair that was for other people in queue, I feel bad for them, but I also think my own behavior was justified.

The problem isn't bots/scripters. The problem is that pop caps are so low that customers have to find workarounds to actually use the service they're paying for.

ZOS' marketing side likes to make big claims about how good and successful the game is. But the customer facing side has us believe they're a small, poor company, and that the customers should stop being so mean to them and show a bit more understanding when things aren't working as intended. Especially those knee-jerk pvp players.

You've been running this game for 10 years ZOS, it's time you picked a lane. If you want to pretend you're a big successful company, act like one. Spend the resources required to offer your customers the experience you're selling them. If you can't act like such a company, maybe drop the pretense, because that's the only way you'll get the understanding you claim to need so bad.

CrazyKitty · March 25

loosej wrote: »

To be fair, not everyone who's standing around AFK at the home base is using scripts, or trying to prevent others from getting in.

I've barely entered Cyrodiil the last couple of weeks. Mayhem used to be my favorite event, but this last one I just gave up a couple days before the event finished. Waiting over an hour in queue, hoping to join some epic battles, only to see a map with one keep under attack by 5 sieges was pretty sad.

But when I did still queue for Cyro, this was my routine during primetime:
queue around 6pm, start preparing dinner

go to my desk every 10 minutes or so to wiggle the mouse so I don't disconnect

eat dinner

go to my desk to wiggle the mouse again

eat dessert

go sit at my desk again, by now it was usually after 7pm with only a couple people left in the queue

However, sometimes the queue would go down faster than usual, meaning I'd enter Cyrodiil as I was about to start eating. The fair thing to do at that point would have been to log out so someone else could play. And if this was a small game, still in early development, maybe run by a small and inexperienced crew, I might have. I definitely would understand the server limitations a lot better. But this is a 10 year old game with supposedly over 20 million players for which I pay a subscription fee (eso+). So I wasn't going to log out, I'd just continue with my dinner, maybe wiggle the mouse some more halfway to keep me logged in, making me one of those AFK players. And I'm well aware how unfair that was for other people in queue, I feel bad for them, but I also think my own behavior was justified.

The problem isn't bots/scripters. The problem is that pop caps are so low that customers have to find workarounds to actually use the service they're paying for.

ZOS' marketing side likes to make big claims about how good and successful the game is. But the customer facing side has us believe they're a small, poor company, and that the customers should stop being so mean to them and show a bit more understanding when things aren't working as intended. Especially those knee-jerk pvp players.

You've been running this game for 10 years ZOS, it's time you picked a lane. If you want to pretend you're a big successful company, act like one. Spend the resources required to offer your customers the experience you're selling them. If you can't act like such a company, maybe drop the pretense, because that's the only way you'll get the understanding you claim to need so bad.

This is one of the best posts made on this forum in months, maybe years. Well done!

Delimber · March 25

This is one of the reasons I don't like GH. When I get in there and see we are pop locked and nothing is happening...if all I'm going to do is capture farms, then I'll just go to Ravenwatch.

You know it's a sad night when there is more happening in the no-cp camp then in the prime camp lol.

Telel · March 25

I'm not complaining about people who take breaks to grab snacks, make an EP, or stretch.

I'm annoyed at the people who are AFK almost all of the time and use scripting to do it. They've been an issue for years as they artificially inflate the server pop on all teams. Which quickly prevents people from getting low pop bonus. One of the few incentives given to those who don't just want to zerg and pvdoor like so many 'skill based' players do.

Now though. During the weekend if you're not on by 4pm EST you're not getting in anytime soon. Which means I can't even get a five man together while some red bot train is running about PVdooring the same keeps it does every day at those times. The few randoms willing to join groups then quickly get discouraged as we're either stuck getting farmed by said bot train, or we get run over by 30+ people just for taking a resource.

Oh, or we could just PVE resource NPCs for hours on end.

Meanwhile some obvious troll alt is shrieking about how 'bad' their own team is while praising the 'skill' of the famers. Another 'bot' effectively locking out a player from cyrodiil but with the added effect of openly assisting someone on the other team. XD

Now please keep in mind that everything mentioned I've been handling for years at this point and have learned to laugh about. However now that the entire serve is just a three or four dozen people at best the usual work around simply aren't as viable.

Even changing servers wouldn't resolve the matter due to the 'skill based' people killing things elsewhere.

silentxthreat · March 26

what we are mostly talking about the people that are in the same places all day. afk at every keep for hours but not helping. i dont know about other sides but on ad there is about 10 repeat offenders

ProudMary · March 26

It's mostly the unbelievably low pop caps and the deliberate neglect by ZOS that is killing PvP in ESO. They could put more server resources to support Cyrodiil, but instead they keep taking resources away and lowering the pop cap.

Reverb · March 26

The low pop caps are a serious problem, and there’s a lot of garbage and questionable “skills” from a very small number of players right now, but I think it’s ridiculous to accuse anyone of bottling in cyrodiil.

Except maybe the one guy in the winery west of bruma running in circles behind crates for three days until I got a cross faction friend to come kill him.

Necrotech_Master · March 26

i usually main in blackreach due to the less or lower queue times for the most part lol

i dont feel like i have to play in grey host, but i go there if the populations in blackreach become too unbalanced and there is little to no queue in grey host

Desiato · March 26

ProudMary wrote: »

It's mostly the unbelievably low pop caps and the deliberate neglect by ZOS that is killing PvP in ESO. They could put more server resources to support Cyrodiil, but instead they keep taking resources away and lowering the pop cap.

It's been explained that it's not a problem throwing more hardware at the problem can fix. The bottom line is the underlying tech isn't able to handle how players play. Processing bottlenecks in one area can affect the entire zone.

People talk about the glory days of the 600 per faction pop cap, but what they don't talk about is the paralyzing lag which was 1000x worse than it is today. Back then everyone would be able to spam unlimited ultimates that did zero damage because the server was completely overwhelmed. Every emp keep, big tick and scroll fight was like this during prime time.

It would be even worse now because back then hardly anyone knew how to weave and therefore the average player had a much lower APM (actions per minute). Especially now that everyone basically has unlimited sustain.

Unfortunately the tech they envisioned to isolate lag in Cyrodiil to specific areas doesn't work for whatever reason. Maybe it wasn't finished or maybe it just didn't work like they thought it would. If it worked properly, processing lag at Chalman wouldn't affect Alessia, for example.

There are two solutions: improve the underlying tech so it can support the gameplay they've designed, or change the gameplay so it can't break the server. However, both solutions require investment of manpower and therefore money.

The bottom bottom line is that the active playerbase in Cyrodiil can be measured in the thousands. That's not enough players to justify and kind of significant investment by the execs at ZOS. It's probably a miracle they haven't removed AvA from the game for financial reasons.

I miss the higher pop cap too, but I don't miss the lag that came with it. And let's face it, even with the lower caps, lag still becomes unbearable when there are several ballgroups running or the hammer is out when it's poplocked.

Perhaps ZOS could come up with some kind of afk zone attached to Cyrodiil that would allow players to take a break outside of Cyrodiil and be placed at the top of the queue when they're ready tor return.

I don't mean to sound like a ZOS apologize. My other 12.5k point forum account was banned for what I thought was fair criticism of Zenimax. But when I returned to the game after 5+ years away, I recognized I had to accept it for what it is and let go of what it should have been.

mods: I was given permission to return to the forums with a new account in a phone conversation with a senior member @ ZOS.

ProudMary · March 26

Desiato wrote: »

ProudMary wrote: »

It's mostly the unbelievably low pop caps and the deliberate neglect by ZOS that is killing PvP in ESO. They could put more server resources to support Cyrodiil, but instead they keep taking resources away and lowering the pop cap.

It's been explained that it's not a problem throwing more hardware at the problem can fix. The bottom line is the underlying tech isn't able to handle how players play. Processing bottlenecks in one area can affect the entire zone.

People talk about the glory days of the 600 per faction pop cap, but what they don't talk about is the paralyzing lag which was 1000x worse than it is today. Back then everyone would be able to spam unlimited ultimates that did zero damage because the server was completely overwhelmed. Every emp keep, big tick and scroll fight was like this during prime time.

It would be even worse now because back then hardly anyone knew how to weave and therefore the average player had a much lower APM (actions per minute). Especially now that everyone basically has unlimited sustain.

Unfortunately the tech they envisioned to isolate lag in Cyrodiil to specific areas doesn't work for whatever reason. Maybe it wasn't finished or maybe it just didn't work like they thought it would. If it worked properly, processing lag at Chalman wouldn't affect Alessia, for example.

There are two solutions: improve the underlying tech so it can support the gameplay they've designed, or change the gameplay so it can't break the server. However, both solutions require investment of manpower and therefore money.

The bottom bottom line is that the active playerbase in Cyrodiil can be measured in the thousands. That's not enough players to justify and kind of significant investment by the execs at ZOS. It's probably a miracle they haven't removed AvA from the game for financial reasons.

I miss the higher pop cap too, but I don't miss the lag that came with it. And let's face it, even with the lower caps, lag still becomes unbearable when there are several ballgroups running or the hammer is out when it's poplocked.

Perhaps ZOS could come up with some kind of afk zone attached to Cyrodiil that would allow players to take a break outside of Cyrodiil and be placed at the top of the queue when they're ready tor return.

I don't mean to sound like a ZOS apologize. My other 12.5k point forum account was banned for what I thought was fair criticism of Zenimax. But when I returned to the game after 5+ years away, I recognized I had to accept it for what it is and let go of what it should have been.

mods: I was given permission to return to the forums with a new account in a phone conversation with a senior member @ ZOS.

Sorry, not buying it. Cyrodiil used to work far better with far, far, far many more people in the zone. During MYM events performance used to improve, not decline. In 2015-2019 pop caps were 3-5x what they are now and things worked better and group size was 24 players, not 12. We've also had better performing server hardware become available in that time.

I'm 100% convinced what's happening in Cyodiil is a choice more than a hardware limitation.

Desiato · March 26

ProudMary wrote: »

Sorry, not buying it. Cyrodiil used to work far better with far, far, far many more people in the zone. During MYM events performance used to improve, not decline. In 2015-2019 pop caps were 3-5x what they are now and things worked better and group size was 24 players, not 12. We've also had better performing server hardware become available in that time.

I'm 100% convinced what's happening in Cyodiil is a choice more than a hardware limitation.

I think you're viewing the past through rose colored glasses. I have a lot of clips of lag from 2017 MYM which are far more laggy than what I've experienced the past few months.

Though I dislike almost all of the gameplay changes since returning, a pleasant surprise is that GH is much more playble than main campaigns used to be as a player who bar swaps frequently, weaves and executes abilities at the gcd.

The glory days. This was par for the course when there were big fights anywhere on the map prime time and 1.6 was way less laggy than 1.5.

ZOS isn't sabotaging their own product. If they wanted to drop AvA, they would just convert Cyro to a PVE zone and most ESO customers would celebrate.

If they could have gotten Cyrodiil to work properly, there's no reasonable reason to believe they wouldn't have. This game used to have a large PVP community of customers that left because they couldn't figure out how to do it with the resources available. What Zenimax can be faulted for 7-10 years ago was not investing the resources necessary to fix the problems before the players left, but that ship has sailed and ESO is a very different game now.

SaffronCitrusflower · March 26

Desiato wrote: »

ProudMary wrote: »

Sorry, not buying it. Cyrodiil used to work far better with far, far, far many more people in the zone. During MYM events performance used to improve, not decline. In 2015-2019 pop caps were 3-5x what they are now and things worked better and group size was 24 players, not 12. We've also had better performing server hardware become available in that time.

I'm 100% convinced what's happening in Cyodiil is a choice more than a hardware limitation.

I think you're viewing the past through rose colored glasses. I have a lot of clips of lag from 2017 MYM which are far more laggy than what I've experienced the past few months.

Though I dislike almost all of the gameplay changes since returning, a pleasant surprise is that GH is much more playble than main campaigns used to be as a player who bar swaps frequently, weaves and executes abilities at the gcd.

The glory days. This was par for the course when there were big fights anywhere on the map prime time and 1.6 was way less laggy than 1.5.

ZOS isn't sabotaging their own product. If they wanted to drop AvA, they would just convert Cyro to a PVE zone and most ESO customers would celebrate.

If they could have gotten Cyrodiil to work properly, there's no reasonable reason to believe they wouldn't have. This game used to have a large PVP community of customers that left because they couldn't figure out how to do it with the resources available. What Zenimax can be faulted for 7-10 years ago was not investing the resources necessary to fix the problems before the players left, but that ship has sailed and ESO is a very different game now.

You must have missed the "Waaa Waaa Waaa" video. And have you tried mentioning PvP or Cyrodiil during a ZOS live stream lately?

Yes, 1.6 was the glory days of Cyrodiil for sure. Just think how much server hardware has improved since then.

silentxthreat · March 26

ya i remember when a lot of people tried to ask about perma combat and pvp on stream..... i also know why you dont bring it up on stream lol

Telel · March 27

Telel was part of the glory days.

While they did seem to work better there was almost no real balance between builds. If you weren';t a magicka DK or templar spamming impulse, whips, or jabs then you were either free AP or the pet Sorceror kept around for negates.

Cheating was also a lot more rampant and blatant than it is now. Even cross faction scrubbery (A kind of cheating) was way way more obvious. Especially when it came to getting into keeps and taking scrolls. Though some of that is because all the new sets make it a lot harder to catch the really hardcore exploiters. Especially when they're hiding on the 'winning' team.

But at least we had more people to tussle with. So if this 'special' group of 'skilled' EP were being problematic there was at least another big fight a minute or two away.

Now? Now the third place team can't even get a five man group together before prime time. If they do they'll find a couple dozen people from both factions showing up to anything they do in search of a 'good fight'. Then they can respawn and see the same 10 people standing in the same 10 spaces they've been in for the last six hours.

Honestly.I'd gladly give up any hope of the combat bug being fixed if ZOS would just show some care for this population matter. Just pruning cross faction trolls would make cyrodiil less frustrating. It'd also insure people who want to PVP can get in rather than being locked out by some creepy stalker(s).

Desiato · March 27

SaffronCitrusflower wrote: »

You must have missed the "Waaa Waaa Waaa" video. And have you tried mentioning PvP or Cyrodiil during a ZOS live stream lately?

Read my post. I don't deny that Cyrodiil is low priority for ZOS. I've called it an afterthought to them in other posts. I was very angry about that 5+ years ago. I quit for that reason. But like I said, that ship has sailed, and now my pov is different based on the current reality.

The relevant point today is that If a standalone PVP game had the active population of Cyrodiil, they would have to end operations. ESO may have millions of players, but AvA probably just has a few thousand active players. It wasn't far off that when I estimated the active population in 2017 by homing different characters on each server to see where they ranked after earning a minimal amount of AP. And obviously AvA was much more popular then.

Yes, 1.6 was the glory days of Cyrodiil for sure. Just think how much server hardware has improved since then.

Do you think they're using the same hardware? I'm sure they've upgraded and that has brought some improvements. Cyrodiil is more responsive for me than it's ever been, and I have 1tb+ of videos from 2015-2017 to compare it with. Hardware to support 300 player servers is literal peanuts to them and they're owned by a company with one of the largest server infrastructures in the world!

I played a lot during this year's MYM and the worst lag was way better than a normal prime time evening 2014-2018. And that was the worst lag I had experienced since returning a few months ago. (talking about you Glademist)

The problem was never the hardware, it was always the software and gameplay design. Some software problems can't be improved significantly only by upgrading hardware, and to take full advantage of hardware improvements software needs to be optimized for it. Obviously that's not happening for such an unpopular game mode that probably doesn't have a single software developer assigned to it full time, much less the team necessary.

I don't love it, but a point comes when one needs to let go of the past. Getting angry at ZOS hasn't worked for 10 years and it's not going to magically start working now that they've successfully transitioned ESO to the most casual MMO.

This is why I am such an advocate for making Cyrodiil more accessible to the greater PVP gaming community who currently doesn't play it. They will never be able to justify the financial investment it needs without the potential for a return on it.

I'm a big believer in AvA. I love it. I think it could be extremely popular if properly supported and with lower barriers to entry. But the first step to that needs to be making it accessible to actual PVP players currently outside of ESO because the casual audience who enjoys PVE will never enjoy PVP. And most PVP enthusiasts would scoff at the PVE requirements. I personally believe they could make a fortune if they spun AvA off as its own F2P game. I wish some oldschool ZOS/Mythic guys would pitch that to Microsoft.

The revisionist history in this thread is astounding.