On Exploits vs. Cheating

RDMyers65b14_ESO

Here is the problem. Cadwell's gold takes you to V9-V10. To do trials, you have to be V12-V14. PVP is not for everyone so Cyrodil is out. It is nearly impossible to find a group to quest and do delves in Craglorn, so how else do you get the VR ranks? You have to grind. The game gives you no other option to get the levels if you are a PVEr.

People are always going to take the easy way if they can. It is human psychology. They want things their way. The world rarely is just one way. I do find it amusing that the very ones making the post are the ones that by their own words are causing the other players grief. Isn't griefing against the rules? So some have found an exploit before others, is that a reason to break the rules? Pot meet kettle.

jelliedsoup

Leeric wrote: »

The excuses some of you guys come up with to justify cheating always amazes me lol.

I'm more amazed that some people think their view on whatever they define as cheating as relevant to someone else.

GnatB

Tykune wrote: »

Point in being, dont blame the players. Blame the developers who dont care to fix these issues.

Actually, I blame them more for failing to adequately punish exploiters. If they actually took a firm stance on it like they should, there would be a far more honest player base, which would make playing with them more fun.

Punishing players for exploiting bugs is easy, finding/fixing bugs frequently isn't. And if it's adequately punished, the player base won't exploit them anyways. Heck, I'm all for intentionally not fixing an exploit that isn't going to be abused accidentally (as long a it isn't immediately game breaking like a dupe exploit) so they can log a nice list of exploiters to ban.

Srugzal

Incarnatus wrote: »

Cheat:

To act dishonestly or unfairly in order to gain an advantage.

Exploit:

To take advantage of a situation.

We are arguing semantics!

Well, not really. "Exploit" has a specific and technical meaning that is set out in the TOS. It's not simply the generic meaning of the word as you describe. For one thing, it's a noun in this case, not a verb. An "exploit" is a known bug or mechanic of the game which, when triggered, confers an unintended advantage to the person who uses it.

The classic example is the dup exploit, which some people used for unfair advantage. Once you knew how it "worked," you could use it to get rich. Many dupers were banned from the game, because that's the penalty, in the TOS and Code of Conduct, for knowingly using an exploit.

So no, actually, it's not about semantics.

itsBishop

GnatB wrote: »

Heck, I'm all for intentionally not fixing an exploit that isn't going to be abused accidentally (as long a it isn't immediately game breaking like a dupe exploit) so they can log a nice list of exploiters to ban.

You're a bit of a sadist, aren't you? This is akin to leaving a $50 bill sitting on the sidewalk and arresting anyone who picks it up for theft. What a jerk.

Inordinate

I'm sorry, but I've been playing MMOs for 15 years, and my opinion on this issue has solidified into a block of steel:

If the people making a game don't want you to do something, they should make it so that you cannot do that.

If they made a mistake that allows something to happen that they did not intend, it is their responsibility to fix it.

If they are going to hold us responsible for their own incompetence, they can go **** themselves and I'll go play something else.

Wreuntzylla

[/quote]This is why there is no such thing as an exploit: because the only definition that works is the following one: "An exploit is anything ZoS says is an exploit". And as we all know, ZoS never talks about exploits.
[/quote]

Pretty much this except that if you believe online forums, ZoS does hand out bans for what they consider cheating.

ZoS allows accelerated leveling to stay in the game as an avenue to avoid months of mindless questing in a veteran leveling system that clearly only appeals to a small minority of players. For example, the Thief grind is not only well known, ZoS support personnel have actually appeared at the grind (due to people verbally abusing questing players), and it still continues to be one method of leveling months later. On the other hand, they are fixing Bittermaw next patch.

Not one person in my primary guild would still be playing this game if they had to clear every zone to reach competitiveness in end game content, especially the PvPers. Instead of being stuck trying to complete every quest in every zone, multiple guild members are working on VR14 for every class or loving the heck out of the high level dungeons (which I'll never fully understand...), or spending every day PvPing.

Our guild's biggest issue is that many of our favorite, most talented guild members quit the game at about VR3-4 because of the really bad experience they had with veteran content. Not only because of the mind numbing and pointless quest grind, but also because of the completely horrible grouping system that in effect forces almost everyone to solo. The remaining guild members have since created a support network that would have them at VR14 in a day, hand them legendary gear and get them out into end game content. However, veteran content was so poisonous that they flatly refuse to consider returning. ZoS is not run by idiots, the game is extremely well done in many aspects, they recognized that veteran content was causing an exodus of players and made a conscious decision to leave a certain rate of accelerated leveling in the game. Thief and Anyaq - ok. Serpent and Bittermaw - a tad to fast.

Some folks like to argue that people won't know their class if they don't level through VR content. That argument is flatly absurd. These arguments presuppose that the ESO veteran content fits the standard model for time of progression (which it doesn't), that everyone playing the game is at their first rodeo, and implicitly relies on the assumption that most players are morons. ESO does require a greater understanding of game mechanics than most games on the market, especially in PvP, but not so much that you need a degree in the subject. Anyone that can't learn the basic mechanics, rotations of cookie cutter specs, and acquire a decent set of gear, likely would be at the exact same competency level if they cleared every quest in every zone. If they didn't get it by level 50, they certainty won't get it grinding veteran quests.

On a personal bugaboo: As used in these threads, exploiting in the negative sense is cheating. Just use the word cheating. ZoS prompts you to exploit through the UI, so trying to distinguish between good exploiting, bad exploiting and cheating muddies the waters. In almost every case, we are simply debating cheating.

Still_Mind

itsBishop wrote: »

GnatB wrote: »

Heck, I'm all for intentionally not fixing an exploit that isn't going to be abused accidentally (as long a it isn't immediately game breaking like a dupe exploit) so they can log a nice list of exploiters to ban.

You're a bit of a sadist, aren't you? This is akin to leaving a $50 bill sitting on the sidewalk and arresting anyone who picks it up for theft. What a jerk.

Well, not taking something that isn't yours should be a no-brainer. If someone takes it, he's marking himself as socially defective, and therefore, in need of correction.

At least that's the kind of logic that I trace here.

AssaultLemming

The people who are grinding Bittermaw are not impacting anyone else with that they are doing. They are not keeping anyone else from earning XP, or from getting loot, or from harvesting nodes.

[/quote]

The inflation in the economy that these exploits cause effects everyone, so your argument is not valid.

helediron

AssaultLemming wrote: »

... snip ...

The inflation in the economy that these exploits cause effects everyone, so your argument is not valid.

Not really. Currently people do so called 7bosses run for XP, which surely is not exploiting. That makes as much loot. In fact that goes mostly to vendor or deconstruction. What is really shaking economy right now is that ZOS cut abruptly ring drop rates from trials. Nirncrux trade is big. Loot is pittance.

EDIT: huh, nested quoting is not working as expected, removed previous quotes.

GnatB

itsBishop wrote: »

GnatB wrote: »

Heck, I'm all for intentionally not fixing an exploit that isn't going to be abused accidentally (as long a it isn't immediately game breaking like a dupe exploit) so they can log a nice list of exploiters to ban.

You're a bit of a sadist, aren't you? This is akin to leaving a $50 bill sitting on the sidewalk and arresting anyone who picks it up for theft. What a jerk.

No, it isn't. It's akin to having an undercover policewoman walking along a known hangout for prostitutes and arresting anybody who attempts to hire her for sex.

Now, if the exploit *was* something you could accidentally abuse, then I'd agree with your analogy, but I specifically said it wasn't. Or, to keep your money analogy, if the $50 was not in the street, but in my car and you had to jimmy the door to get in.

GnatB

Inordinate wrote: »

I'm sorry, but I've been playing MMOs for 15 years, and my opinion on this issue has solidified into a block of steel:

If the people making a game don't want you to do something, they should make it so that you cannot do that.

If they made a mistake that allows something to happen that they did not intend, it is their responsibility to fix it.

If they are going to hold us responsible for their own incompetence, they can go **** themselves and I'll go play something else.

You must have gotten banned a lot then in those 15 years. There's no such thing as bug free software.

fromtesonlineb16_ESO

nerevarine1138 wrote: »

So there was an interesting conversation in zone chat the other day, where someone was defending their use of the Bittermaw exploit. They repeatedly said that while it may be an exploit, it's not cheating.

I'd love to hear other people's thoughts on this, because it seems completely ridiculous to me that someone can deliberately exploit a bug in the game code in order to advance their character and get loot/XP and not call it cheating. And is there such a thing as a exploit that isn't cheating on some level? I've always used the word exploit to simply refer to a form of cheating that doesn't require illegal manipulation of the game code (as in botting, hacking, etc.).

That person was splitting semantic hairs to justify their cheating.

It's very black and white IMO, by its very definition an exploit isn't WAI and thus can't be considered 'in the rules', ergo it's cheating.

BUT, unless ZOS DECLARE it an exploit then it isn't, because ZOS writes the game rules, not players.

Jitterbug

Gyudan wrote: »

- Animation-canceling ("weaving" to make it sound cooler).

Is weaving cheating?

TehMagnus

It's not an exploit. It's a game mechanic , just like Hircine.

Don't forget people, report anyone that griefs you by killing the adds. The reports DO get handled. The more people report the griefer, the more chances for him to get a temp ban .

Cherryblossom

nerevarine1138 wrote: »

itsBishop wrote: »

Is the thief grind an exploit/cheating? Is rotating between bosses in upper crag exploiting/cheating? Is running around in a circuit harvesting resource nodes exploiting/cheating?

Stop trying to police what others are doing. Sure, they get exp/loot faster than you might via questing but no matter how hard you complain or point fingers it's not causing harm or interfering with your playstyle. It's a game. Step down from your moral high horse and get back to playing how you want.

In order:

1. Yeah, the thief grind is an exploit, and I wish ZO could find a way to fix it. However, I recognize that this is more difficult than fixing the bugged spawns on the scorpion and Bittermaw.
2. No, the Upper Craglorn grind isn't exploiting, because none of those bosses are being intentionally bugged in order to increase experience gain.
3. No, a harvesting circuit isn't exploiting. To understand why, please consult number 2.

Everyone's welcome to play how they want until "how they want" is exploiting bugged content in order to gain an unfair advantage. And I'd love a community that took policing that kind of behavior on itself more, since bugs are always going to be present in an MMO.

I think you should ask the question why people are using these exploits!

Personnally if there was an easier way for me to power level my character through the veteran levels I would like to use it rather than being forced to go through each of the factions story lines. Personally I would prefer to do the faction story line with an Alt not being forced to do it.

I sort of get your concern of someone using a bug to do this, but I think it's also important for you to understand that other people have different ways they wish to play, this is a game after all. I don't think we need to have a moral minority trying to tell others how they should behave and play in what is after all a game to be enjoyed however you choose.....

fromtesonlineb16_ESO

Cherryblossom wrote: »

I don't think we need to have a moral minority trying to tell others how they should behave and play .

I agree, but it's a sad fact of MMO life that much QQing is a result of someone getting all worked up over how others play the game, for example some 'hardcores' whine that the 'casuals' get things "on a silver platter", in spite of the fact the 'hardcores' regularly assert they do it for the 'challenge, whereas reality shows the same people usually do it for the e-peen.

Ultimately MMOs are riddled with the jealous and the spiteful, that's why in my view MMOs are great, it's a large number of other players that usually ruin the experience.

JessieColt

michaelb14a_ESO2 wrote: »

JessieColt wrote: »

Grinding Bittermaw doesn't impart anything remotely considered cheating using the above definition. You are not getting better loot, or better XP rewards against killing any other boss level monster in the game. You are just doing it faster.

Lol. Going by your deeply flawed "logic":

Using a dupe glitch isn't cheating. After all, your not getting "better loot"... just the same loot, faster

Teleporting to crystal shard locations isn't cheating, "it's just faster".

hmm guess we know what type of "gamer" YOU are.

Wow, seriously? This is your reply?

There is a HUGE difference between exploiting the code and taking advantage of a game mechanic.

Clearly you have no idea how to distinguish between the two.

JessieColt

astro74 wrote: »

Exploiting - To use a flaw in the code/mechanics that grant you any form of advantage. If you do this on purpose it is always cheating.

Playing devil's advocate again, what advantage is grinding Bittermaw imparting?

For that matter, what advantage does ANY grind give over those who don't?

guybrushtb16_ESO

BCBasher wrote: »

There is no sign posted at Bittermaw saying "You must kill all three welvas and wait four and a half minutes for respawn". I'm sure allot of people sleep better at night "playing by the rule" IRL or otherwise, I prefer to look for loopholes. As you can probably guess I have very few friends but my wife and kids love the life my backstabbing and shortcutting provides so I'm fine with my "moral code".

+1 for a life built on backstabbing and shortcutting.

JessieColt

Tykune wrote: »

Exploiters should be punished, which ZeniMax doesn't seem to care about. They are slow to patch up exploitable bosses, slow to fix issues associated with grinding, and made very, very bad choices in some of their recent content (Forced to group to complete Craglorn quests). But overall, its not the player's fault that these things exist, it is ZeniMax's fault. Players will be players, they will find ways to quickly level, quickly make money, and try to find ways to profit hugely, whether it is legit or not. Point in being, dont blame the players. Blame the developers who dont care to fix these issues.

Zos's reaction to 'exploiters' has been based on the situations involved with regards to what is happening.

* Bots exploiting code that interfered with others ability to play the game resulted in accounts being terminated. (Delve boss grinding that prevented other player from completing the objective of the delve).

* Bots/players using exploits in the code to port from one harvest node to the next and gather the resource, preventing other players from accessing those resources were terminated/banned.

* Players who were able to use the wall/animation action to get into home bases in Cyrodiil were not terminated/banned from the game.

There is a big difference between exploiting code, and taking advantage of unintended mechanics in the game.

While the Bittermaw grind is "exploiting' based on dictionary definitions, there is no exploiting of the game code itself.

JessieColt

nerevarine1138 wrote: »

Tykune wrote: »

Exploiters should be punished, which ZeniMax doesn't seem to care about. They are slow to patch up exploitable bosses, slow to fix issues associated with grinding, and made very, very bad choices in some of their recent content (Forced to group to complete Craglorn quests). But overall, its not the player's fault that these things exist, it is ZeniMax's fault. Players will be players, they will find ways to quickly level, quickly make money, and try to find ways to profit hugely, whether it is legit or not. Point in being, dont blame the players. Blame the developers who dont care to fix these issues.

I can't agree that ZO hasn't been quick to react to exploits that are easily fixable (i.e. delve boss exploits, scorpion grind, etc.). The only things I haven't seen them fix in a timely manner are issues like animation cancelling, which presumably takes more than adjusting a respawn timer to fix.

But more importantly, it doesn't excuse bad behavior on the part of the players. To return to a real-world analogy, do we blame a homeowner for a break-in because they didn't put iron bars over their windows?

Your analogy doesn't really work in this situation.

No one is breaking into anything, for one, and for another, nothing that the Bittermaw grind is doing is taking from anyone else.

There is a difference between exploiting code and exploiting a situation/mechanic.

JessieColt

GnatB wrote: »

Tykune wrote: »

Point in being, dont blame the players. Blame the developers who dont care to fix these issues.

Actually, I blame them more for failing to adequately punish exploiters. If they actually took a firm stance on it like they should, there would be a far more honest player base, which would make playing with them more fun.

Punishing players for exploiting bugs is easy, finding/fixing bugs frequently isn't. And if it's adequately punished, the player base won't exploit them anyways. Heck, I'm all for intentionally not fixing an exploit that isn't going to be abused accidentally (as long a it isn't immediately game breaking like a dupe exploit) so they can log a nice list of exploiters to ban.

Zos has taken a hard line on those who exploit the game code. They always have. Even if it took them a while to do so. (Bots, anyone?).

Zos has, to the best of my knowledge, never terminated/banned anyone who has exploited a game mechanic.

There is a huge difference between the 2, and while both are exploiting, both require different responses from the Developer.

onlinegamer1

I find it humorous that people are still talking about this. Its pretty black and white.

No player can be expected to MAGICALLY know if something in the game is a bug or is working as intended unless ZoS says so one way or another. No one. I don't care what you say about it being "intuitive", "obvious" or "clear". Its none of those things, because players vary in technical knowledge, common sense, IQ and life experiences.

Prime example: "The Thief" in Craglorn. This boss requires no special bugging. You team up, kill it, and a few seconds later, it reappears. People claim that it requires some sort of "bugging" to do that, yet no one has ever been able to bug or unbug the Thief reliably. Sometimes it "breaks", and people are 100% POSITIVE they know how to "unbug" it, yet it stays bugged (not spawning) for hours. Other times, people hop on one leg and /emote drunk, and its fixed.

But that's not even the point. The point is that ZoS has known about the Thief SINCE CRAGLORN CAME OUT. They fixed the "Scorpion". They fixed "Anonomolies". They fixed "Kardala". Yet, Thief is unchanged.

You have NO LEG to stand on to claim Thief is an exploit with that kind of evidence that ZoS THEMSELVES do not consider it one (otherwise they would have applied a fix like the above got).

Furthermore, none of those things were announced by ZoS as an exploit or "unintended functionality". None. 0. ZoS simply changed it and put it into a patch note. No notice. No PTS testing. Just a patch out of the blue. BAM. Its fixed.

So, sorry folks, but no player, no matter how smart, experienced at MMOs, or how great their intuition is, can POSSIBLY be expected to know what IS or what IS NOT an exploit, because ZoS has a POLICY of NOT TELLING US until after they patch it.

JessieColt

AssaultLemming wrote: »

The people who are grinding Bittermaw are not impacting anyone else with that they are doing. They are not keeping anyone else from earning XP, or from getting loot, or from harvesting nodes.

The inflation in the economy that these exploits cause effects everyone, so your argument is not valid.

Economic Inflation? I think you do not understand what that means.

Economic Inflation is a sustained INCREASE in cost.

Getting more loot into the economy deflates the price, not increases it.

Gedalya

nerevarine1138 wrote: »

So there was an interesting conversation in zone chat the other day, where someone was defending their use of the Bittermaw exploit. They repeatedly said that while it may be an exploit, it's not cheating.

I'd love to hear other people's thoughts on this, because it seems completely ridiculous to me that someone can deliberately exploit a bug in the game code in order to advance their character and get loot/XP and not call it cheating. And is there such a thing as a exploit that isn't cheating on some level? I've always used the word exploit to simply refer to a form of cheating that doesn't require illegal manipulation of the game code (as in botting, hacking, etc.).

I do not believe this is wrong, and as such I do not believe it is cheating. I don't think that the term exploit is appropriate; it is a vague term. People who tack advantage of bugs shouldn't be punished; the developers should fix what doesn't work as intended and in some cases rollback changes made as a result of features determined to be errant (excess XP or Gold earned). I should note though that my vision is for a sandbox game we can enjoy doing as want (sound familiar?); where the developers have placed a healthy amount of time into testing and don't punish us for enjoying sandbox features that were a side effect and not intended.

JaJaLuka

It may be exploiting, but there are far better things for ZOS to focus on. The grind groups aren't hurting anyone and they aren't using an exploit in a way that absolutely destroys your game time (such as a PvP exploit). Yes your point is valid, but it's not something that needs addressing as a top priority thing.

On top of all of this, is the issue that questing to get to vr10 then attempting to find a group for craglorn is insane at the moment, most people simply want to level and move on to the content where the most population is (trials, pvp and dragonstar arena).

Uber_Lord

New bugs will always pop up after a new update, ALWAYS AND FOREVER. And a lot of people will seek the fastest most effective way to reach their goal. Can't really do much about that other than fix bugs. That's how it works. If they start banning people for exploiting their buggy system where will they draw the line? What if you thought it's intentionall game mechanic and in reality you abused a bug all along?
For example I have no idea if repeatedly sneak attack stunning mobs is a bug or intentional game mechanic. I can take on VR5 boss all by myself while being VR1. I just crouch snipe, crouch snipe and I really don't know if it's a bug or not.
The best players could do would be hindering exploiters but community would rot if everyone started fighting.

onlinegamer1

Uber_Lord wrote: »

For example I have no idea if repeatedly sneak attack stunning mobs is a bug or intentional game mechanic. I can take on VR5 boss all by myself while being VR1. I just crouch snipe, crouch snipe and I really don't know if it's a bug or not.

Most important post of the thread, right there. ^