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Ability to report players for spying and held accountable for treason

  • SeaGtGruff
    SeaGtGruff
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    sshogrin wrote: »
    Okay, I'll bite.

    If you worry about "spying" in Cyrodiil you are prioritizing the wrong problem. The general movements of the zerg are often ridiculously easy to predict to anyone who's been playing for a while and is capable of basic pattern recognition.

    There is also no way for you to know if someone is "spying," so I don't know how you see this play out in practice. The last thing we need in Cyrodiil is creating a(nother) reason for players to get suspended for no real reason.

    Also think about it, how many people do you think there are who willingly spend money on a second account, and stand in Cyrodiil all evening reading zone chat to help their alliance instead of, you know, actually playing with their alliance. It would be far more effective to simply port between keeps on your own faction to scout and call out attacks early, which is actually something that happens constantly since there is a good chunk of dead time in Cyrodiil where no big fights are happening.

    Comparing a video game to real warfare is downright laughable. If you extrapolate that logic, everyone who enters Cyrodiil should observe permadeath rules until one faction remains standing.

    I was actually more making a comment about the spying in IC if you paid attention to the original post.
    How do I know they're spying? It's very simple, when a character doesn't leave the ladder room in a base, but the same player or two go to the same districts immediately when you go up a certain district ladder, it doesn't take someone smart or with have intelligence to figure out what's going on.
    Other people that defend spying are the ones comparing it to real warfare, so using their logic to defend spying and saying that people that spy shouldn't be banned, I'm only giving the real life consequences of what happens to a spy, they are terminated from the game of life, meaning no more playing.
    How people can't understand that is beyond me, but this is what it is, people will defend spying when in fact it's an exploit of the game.

    I don't know that anyone in this thread has been "defending" spying, but the problem that I personally have with your proposal is that you're making assumptions about other players. Anyone can accuse anyone else of anything, but that doesn't make it true. And I think the burden of proof should be on the accuser, not on the accused. Insisting that someone who's going to be AFK for a bit needs to post "AFK" in zone chat to avoid being reported for some imagined "spying" is outrageous-- and it could easily be used by an actual spy to try to avoid suspicion, which makes it an utterly useless suggestion in my opinion.
    I've fought mudcrabs more fearsome than me!
  • Aislinna
    Aislinna
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    While I'm sure spying does occur, the burden of PROOF is on the accuser and they'd be hard pressed to obtain proof that is acceptable for banning someone.

    I'm guessing the accuser knows that the suspected "spy" is just standing around in the ladder room because the accuser is also standing around in the ladder room watching/recording the suspected "spy". So now, from my view, the accuser and the suspected "spy" are both exhibiting the same behaviour; do we ban them both? And if the accuser isn't standing around watching, then how do they know the suspected "spy" didn't leave the room? No matter how many times somebody says they "know" something, it doesn't make it a true fact without PROOF.

  • efster
    efster
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    Step 1. See SPAI.
    Step 2. Make friends with spai while pretending you don't know they're a spai.
    Step 3. The spai is now your best friend and you convince them to spai for your alliance instead.
    Step 4. ???
    Step 5. Profit!
    AD is the best looking faction. I don't make the rules, I just enforce them.
  • Frayton
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    sshogrin wrote: »
    SeaGtGruff wrote: »
    I often get up and go AFK just after queuing into IC from Cyrodiil, to go grab a coffee, attend to a cat, take a bio break, etc. If I was running around in the sewers and got killed, releasing will plop me down in the area by the banker and ladders, and I may need to go AFK while standing there. If I'm going to have to start worrying about being falsely reported as a spy because of a few overly-suspicious players in my own alliance, then that's just stupid and insane. And I gotta tell you, as a "true blue" PvPer who hates red and yellow with a passion (in PvP), there is no bleeping way I would ever feed information to those sides. They go out of their way to home in on me and kill me every chance they get, even if there are dozens of other blues around. If you think I'm ever going to do anything to help their sides, you're out of your freaking mind.

    so if you go AFK, don't stand by the ladders.
    Put "AFK" in zone chat so people know you're AFK.

    Seems pretty simple solution to me.
    I've seen people standing around in the ladders for over a half hour not moving at all. I go up a certain ladder, then here comes some other faction within a minute. I go up a different ladder, here comes the same exact players within a minute, etc. If you want to tell me that the person standing by the ladders isn't spying, then I don't know what to tell you. There's no way the same player(s) can know what district someone is going to like that. There's no way you can convince me otherwise.
    If I say AFK when I AFK how do I know you're not a spy reporting my AFK to the other sides? I'm AD, so I think the best solution for team yellow would be to shout, "For the Queen!" and then do the secret AD faction not-a-spai dance /dancealtmer to prove we're not a spies.
  • thorwyn
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    so if you go AFK, don't stand by the ladders.
    Put "AFK" in zone chat so people know you're AFK.

    I don't think people need to announce what they are doing IRL to you or anyone. And I don't think people need to go to designated areas when they want to go afk.
    [snip]
    Edited by ZOS_CouchTato on 17 August 2026 21:00
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  • LadyGP
    LadyGP
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    thorwyn wrote: »
    so if you go AFK, don't stand by the ladders.
    Put "AFK" in zone chat so people know you're AFK.

    I don't think people need to announce what they are doing IRL to you or anyone. And I don't think people need to go to designated areas when they want to go afk.
    Who do you think you are?

    This isn't an airport we don't need to announce arrivals and departures.

    To be honest this whole thread is silly.

    - xCatGuy
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    PC/NA

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  • Arunei
    Arunei
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    sshogrin wrote: »
    Okay, I'll bite.

    If you worry about "spying" in Cyrodiil you are prioritizing the wrong problem. The general movements of the zerg are often ridiculously easy to predict to anyone who's been playing for a while and is capable of basic pattern recognition.

    There is also no way for you to know if someone is "spying," so I don't know how you see this play out in practice. The last thing we need in Cyrodiil is creating a(nother) reason for players to get suspended for no real reason.

    Also think about it, how many people do you think there are who willingly spend money on a second account, and stand in Cyrodiil all evening reading zone chat to help their alliance instead of, you know, actually playing with their alliance. It would be far more effective to simply port between keeps on your own faction to scout and call out attacks early, which is actually something that happens constantly since there is a good chunk of dead time in Cyrodiil where no big fights are happening.

    Comparing a video game to real warfare is downright laughable. If you extrapolate that logic, everyone who enters Cyrodiil should observe permadeath rules until one faction remains standing.

    I was actually more making a comment about the spying in IC if you paid attention to the original post.
    How do I know they're spying? It's very simple, when a character doesn't leave the ladder room in a base, but the same player or two go to the same districts immediately when you go up a certain district ladder, it doesn't take someone smart or with have intelligence to figure out what's going on.
    Other people that defend spying are the ones comparing it to real warfare, so using their logic to defend spying and saying that people that spy shouldn't be banned, I'm only giving the real life consequences of what happens to a spy, they are terminated from the game of life, meaning no more playing.
    How people can't understand that is beyond me, but this is what it is, people will defend spying when in fact it's an exploit of the game.
    [snip]

    And what people understand except you is using irl parallels to spying for a game set in a magical universe where talking animals, animal people, magick that could undo reality, non-linear time, and any other number of things that don't apply to irl exist is completely asinine. Murdering people irl is a crime that can be given capital punishment depending on where you are, but guess what? Our characters don't get killed for good and our accounts banned for killing people though, do they?

    [snip]
    Edited by ZOS_CouchTato on 17 August 2026 21:02
    PC-NA | Been around since closed beta | Alt account: Arunei PC-NA

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    Kiju Veran: Ex-Fighters Guild Suthay who likes to punch things and is also a spy and ALSO a Werewolf
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  • sshogrin
    sshogrin
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    Arunei wrote: »
    sshogrin wrote: »
    Okay, I'll bite.

    If you worry about "spying" in Cyrodiil you are prioritizing the wrong problem. The general movements of the zerg are often ridiculously easy to predict to anyone who's been playing for a while and is capable of basic pattern recognition.

    There is also no way for you to know if someone is "spying," so I don't know how you see this play out in practice. The last thing we need in Cyrodiil is creating a(nother) reason for players to get suspended for no real reason.

    Also think about it, how many people do you think there are who willingly spend money on a second account, and stand in Cyrodiil all evening reading zone chat to help their alliance instead of, you know, actually playing with their alliance. It would be far more effective to simply port between keeps on your own faction to scout and call out attacks early, which is actually something that happens constantly since there is a good chunk of dead time in Cyrodiil where no big fights are happening.

    Comparing a video game to real warfare is downright laughable. If you extrapolate that logic, everyone who enters Cyrodiil should observe permadeath rules until one faction remains standing.

    I was actually more making a comment about the spying in IC if you paid attention to the original post.
    How do I know they're spying? It's very simple, when a character doesn't leave the ladder room in a base, but the same player or two go to the same districts immediately when you go up a certain district ladder, it doesn't take someone smart or with have intelligence to figure out what's going on.
    Other people that defend spying are the ones comparing it to real warfare, so using their logic to defend spying and saying that people that spy shouldn't be banned, I'm only giving the real life consequences of what happens to a spy, they are terminated from the game of life, meaning no more playing.
    How people can't understand that is beyond me, but this is what it is, people will defend spying when in fact it's an exploit of the game.
    Buddy you THINKING you know what anyone in this game is doing just by watching them is absolutely nuts. Just because you THINK something is happening doesn't mean it is. You aren't some special mindreading player who somehow knows exactly what everyone else is doing or planning. You do not know what others are doing, stop acting like you do. It's called coincidence and it does not mean ANYTHING. Have you never learned that correlation doesn't mean causation? You might want to look it up.

    And what people understand except you is using irl parallels to spying for a game set in a magical universe where talking animals, animal people, magick that could undo reality, non-linear time, and any other number of things that don't apply to irl exist is completely asinine. Murdering people irl is a crime that can be given capital punishment depending on where you are, but guess what? Our characters don't get killed for good and our accounts banned for killing people though, do they?

    You're trying to force irl consequences onto a game. How you can't understand that is baffling everyone else. And again, YOU were the one to make the initial comparison between irl war and stuff in the game. Stop saying "people" when it was you that did it, in your very first post talking about what happens to spies irl.

    [snip]
    I have seen the argument made by others about IRL, look at the other comments about spying in real life. It's not just me.
    If you get a bounty for killing someone in game, and a guard catches you, they will kill you. Sure, it's not forever, but you still get killed.
    As far as saying it's a coincidence? People in this thread have already admitted to spying and it being a part of the game. One time is a coincidence, 5 times isn't...how you can't see that is the laughable part. If a character is standing in the ladder room for over a half hour, and every time you to up a different district, not even next to the district you were just in, and the same 2 players come attack you, that's no longer "coincidence", that's someone spying, period. If you can't see that, well that's just on you actually defending spying. It's exploiting the game. PvPers whined about people porting out of IC as an "exploit", well, spying on people is an exploit to. If ZOS is okay with spying, then they should also be okay with being able to do something about spying instead of letting it happen as an exploit. [snip]
    Edited by ZOS_CouchTato on 17 August 2026 21:03
  • CameraBeardThePirate
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    IC takes a minute tops to make a full loop. There's also addons that show the "health" of the flag before it actually gets marked as contested. It's really not that deep.

    [edited to remove quote]
    Edited by ZOS_CouchTato on 17 August 2026 21:03
  • Reginald_leBlem
    Reginald_leBlem
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    [snip]
    It's IC. People will be roaming the districts looking for fights. The districts are tiny.
    Edited by ZOS_CouchTato on 17 August 2026 21:04
  • ZOS_CouchTato
    After removing some back and forth, I would like to remind users to keep conversations constructive and civil. If you need a refresher, please review the Community Rules.
    Staff Post
  • Luneca
    Luneca
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    efster wrote: »
    Step 1. See SPAI.
    Step 2. Make friends with spai while pretending you don't know they're a spai.
    Step 3. The spai is now your best friend and you convince them to spai for your alliance instead.
    Step 4. ???
    Step 5. Profit!

    It only takes friendship to convince them? I wouldn't even trust a lover. I can only trust my siege. 1000 coldfires siege would buy my loyalty fast.

    Evil AD and DC players even burn my siege now instead of killing me. I don't blame them. It hurts more to lose siege tbh.
  • aetherix8
    aetherix8
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    Luneca wrote: »
    efster wrote: »
    Step 1. See SPAI.
    Step 2. Make friends with spai while pretending you don't know they're a spai.
    Step 3. The spai is now your best friend and you convince them to spai for your alliance instead.
    Step 4. ???
    Step 5. Profit!

    It only takes friendship to convince them? I wouldn't even trust a lover. I can only trust my siege. 1000 coldfires siege would buy my loyalty fast.

    Evil AD and DC players even burn my siege now instead of killing me. I don't blame them. It hurts more to lose siege tbh.

    Such evil players would have a tough go in Vengeance, where it is pretty much impossible to burn enemy siege. Since you can only have one type active, if you try to place a normal ballista, this action will automatically pack your coldfire one, even if it's burning. This leaves siege burners pretty exasperated.
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