Cheating and Exploits

ShedsHisTail

SirAndy wrote: »

Edit: Nevermind. Talking about past moderation is a great way to get moderated.

[minor edit to remove quote]

Rohamad_Ali

I can name people all day I don't think cheat too . All it does is distract the issue here that there are people doing it and it hasn't stopped . It doesn't answer any of the real important questions being asked . There should be no naming here period . No naming who is or who isn't a cheater because it can just lead to allegations to the contrary and that always ends up on a derailed argument .

Manpoints

Roehamad_Ali wrote: »

I can name people all day I don't think cheat too . All it does is distract the issue here that there are people doing it and it hasn't stopped . It doesn't answer any of the real important questions being asked . There should be no naming here period . No naming who is or who isn't a cheater because it can just lead to allegations to the contrary and that always ends up on a derailed argument .

Yes, there are still people cheating. But developing a system to catch them in the act, is not as important as developing a system for counting mudcrabs killed since release *Golf Clap*

SirAndy

Manpoints wrote: »

a system for counting mudcrabs killed since release

Wait what? Hold the phone, where do i find this info???

Manpoints

SirAndy wrote: »

Manpoints wrote: »

a system for counting mudcrabs killed since release

Wait what? Hold the phone, where do i find this info???

https://youtu.be/Ao7PY-K-YaU?t=104

Its 578 Million too apparently.

NativeJoe

Manpoints wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

NativeJoe wrote: »

We need the education out there. Many of these people don't understand that an Elite can walk into a group of people, Mitigate a million (or millions) of damage in 2 minutes and kill everyone. and that is legit game mechanics

@NativeJoe
As long as we also educate people on how stupendously easy it is to hack the ESO client memory to allow you to "walk into a group of people, mitigate a million (or millions) of damage in 2 minutes and kill everyone" and make yourself look like you're an "elite" player.

I dont know if there is any opportunity to call anyone in PVP an 'Elite player' anymore. Admit it, any player that is competent is going to be labeled a hacker, reported and shunned. Welcome to the time of "Safe Mediocrity". I'd like to see someone who has a spare account or just dgaf anymore test to see how well this 'detection' system is. My bet is it doesn't cover all avenues and lets be honest here - if it was that easy to implement something WHY ON EARTH WAS IT NOT DONE ON RELEASE?

Well I call myself an Elite, because Many stand flabbergasted at my builds tankyness, dps, and what it takes to honestly kill straight forward kill me. I've fought the toughest people I can find, and in many cases came out on top. And I get messages from others saying all the time that I'm one of like 10 players in eso they just walk away from when they see who it is they're attacking. That and I gained somewhat of a local fame in the Arb days at the end of TG. I'm no kenapkk, and don't make people Melt instantly, but I can put up one hell of a fight, and me taking on a small group of people isn't to uncommon.

And earlier today my friends**** tried to gank me and I fought their lill zerg for minutes. they compiled the damage done and it was absolutely massive for how much it actually took to take me down. And I don't even use malubeth

I think an elite is someone thats played for a while, can clear VMA and plays pvp in a similar "there is no spoon manner". Dodge rolls perfectly, CC breaks when needed, CC's and executes damage combos to smash people quickly, and over all has a smooth sense of game play that leaves normal players with their mouths open. And plenty of those people Do exist ingame and I really don't think they're cheating. Many of them are in the dueling guilds and are active members.

NadiusMaximus

I come back after almost a year off and this is still a topic? Ban them or say it's OK to do and let everyone do it. Why even debate the topic. /thread

Manpoints

NativeJoe wrote: »

Manpoints wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

NativeJoe wrote: »

We need the education out there. Many of these people don't understand that an Elite can walk into a group of people, Mitigate a million (or millions) of damage in 2 minutes and kill everyone. and that is legit game mechanics

@NativeJoe
As long as we also educate people on how stupendously easy it is to hack the ESO client memory to allow you to "walk into a group of people, mitigate a million (or millions) of damage in 2 minutes and kill everyone" and make yourself look like you're an "elite" player.

I dont know if there is any opportunity to call anyone in PVP an 'Elite player' anymore. Admit it, any player that is competent is going to be labeled a hacker, reported and shunned. Welcome to the time of "Safe Mediocrity". I'd like to see someone who has a spare account or just dgaf anymore test to see how well this 'detection' system is. My bet is it doesn't cover all avenues and lets be honest here - if it was that easy to implement something WHY ON EARTH WAS IT NOT DONE ON RELEASE?

Well I call myself an Elite, because Many stand flabbergasted at my builds tankyness, dps, and what it takes to honestly kill straight forward kill me. I've fought the toughest people I can find, and in many cases came out on top. And I get messages from others saying all the time that I'm one of like 10 players in eso they just walk away from when they see who it is they're attacking. That and I gained somewhat of a local fame in the Arb days at the end of TG. I'm no kenapkk, and don't make people Melt instantly, but I can put up one hell of a fight, and me taking on a small group of people isn't to uncommon.

And earlier today my friends**** tried to gank me and I fought their lill zerg for minutes. they compiled the damage done and it was absolutely massive for how much it actually took to take me down. And I don't even use malubeth

I think an elite is someone thats played for a while, can clear VMA and plays pvp in a similar "there is no spoon manner". Dodge rolls perfectly, CC breaks when needed, CC's and executes damage combos to smash people quickly, and over all has a smooth sense of game play that leaves normal players with their mouths open. And plenty of those people Do exist ingame and I really don't think they're cheating. Many of them are in the dueling guilds and are active members.

TLDR;

So you hack right? :P

AJ_1988

How about fix the damn gap closers. What's the point in having siege weapons and keep walls when someone can get on an alt and let their mates gap close into them from the ground to keep roof and walls. I've reported this plenty of with names and proof and yet nothing gets done. Scrolls in keeps should behave like those in temples. If the walls aren't down its a kill zone.

AJ_1988

Autolycus wrote: »

vamp_emily wrote: »

I personally would like some comment from ZOS about this matter. Has it been resolved? Can we now play without thinking that everyone is cheating?

I know you don't owe us any kind of comment on this matter but it would make us feel good knowing if its been resolved.

I personally haven't seen any cheating in the last week.. well none that I am aware of.

Agreed.

And while we're at it, how about those leaderboard resets? You know, since half the people who cheated came out and openly admitted to having done so to acquire their amazing scores. Don't get me wrong, I know many of those people and know that they do not cheat or exploit. But c'mon... they admitted it. What else do you need?

We have a double-mundus exploit and the boards get wiped 2 days later. We get hackers and the boards remain unwiped for weeks.

Speaking of leaderboards on Xbox I've seen someone have the top 4 spots same GT different toons exact same score on a trial. So how does one account play several toons at the same time and it not get picked up? I don't think there will be a 2nd anniversary for consoles the way it's going. There is no transparency, no acknowledgment of issues and most of all no accountability

Manpoints

AJ_1988 wrote: »

Autolycus wrote: »

vamp_emily wrote: »

I personally would like some comment from ZOS about this matter. Has it been resolved? Can we now play without thinking that everyone is cheating?

I know you don't owe us any kind of comment on this matter but it would make us feel good knowing if its been resolved.

I personally haven't seen any cheating in the last week.. well none that I am aware of.

Agreed.

And while we're at it, how about those leaderboard resets? You know, since half the people who cheated came out and openly admitted to having done so to acquire their amazing scores. Don't get me wrong, I know many of those people and know that they do not cheat or exploit. But c'mon... they admitted it. What else do you need?

We have a double-mundus exploit and the boards get wiped 2 days later. We get hackers and the boards remain unwiped for weeks.

Speaking of leaderboards on Xbox I've seen someone have the top 4 spots same GT different toons exact same score on a trial. So how does one account play several toons at the same time and it not get picked up? I don't think there will be a 2nd anniversary for consoles the way it's going. There is no transparency, no acknowledgment of issues and most of all no accountability

I totally forgot consoles could actually be abused in the same hacking fashion through modding.

Pick up a torch man, come along

Bromburak

ShedsHisTail wrote: »

Bromburak wrote: »

@ZOS_JessicaFolsom

Just a quick update for everyone regarding the recent influx of those using third party tools to cheat in ESO. We've adjusted our automatic anti-cheat systems to focus specifically on the cheats we've seen in the last few days, in addition to launching investigations on specific players. We've permanently banned 43 players in the last 24 hours who were found to be cheating. We don't take cheating lightly, and will continue to ban those who are found to be cheating. We'll be going back through game logs to identify players who were violating our anti-cheating policies in the hours before we performed the automatic cheat detection adjustment.

I actually believe this, but I start understanding why some of them are still playing.
Because the smart guys that stopped cheating before your log investigations are not found by your tool.
So cheater tickets reported by players have not really been evaluated, you just auto ban people by the detection tool.

Well imo this explains everything.

That wouldn't explain why those people disappeared all at once, and then reappeared at roughly the same time.

It does, first of all we don't know how their detection and ban system is configured.
I assume that automation is part of the process and didn't work as expected.

Unbanned players could have been banned for something else that results in temp bans only
or the previous system was configured to temp bans only.

As well it's common sense that some cheaters are unbanned to observe them.
The issue here is, they trick the detection tools and before you can improve them you need to know and understand
what else these cheaters are doing.

While I agree that the unbanned part is confusing, ZOS will not tell us how the previous system was setup and of course
they won't tell us which players are observed either. The problem from customer perspective is that they don't trust in ZOS because they only see unbanned people but don't know the details.

And privacy rules are complicated and don't make public communication easier on this matter it just confirms once again why a company cannot just add a wall of shame with names and the ban reason just to satisfy the honest player base.

Haydenmango

ShedsHisTail wrote: »

Haydenmango wrote: »

I am curious, why am I hearing about PERMANENTLY banned players having their bans lifted?

How did you hear these players were permanently banned?
Was there an official list that came out?

Or is that an assumption/hearsay that's being touted as fact now?

Sorry for the late response and for if this has been addressed. Also you are kind of distracting the thread seeing how you don't care about the issue and only really pester the people that do; try to ask a question to zos instead.

There was an official statement and zos said the bans were permanent. Then zos came out with a statement saying they may give permanently banned players a final chance to appeal.

So my question is why not just ban the cheaters permanently without appeal?
Without an answer we are left with guessing.

*edited to remove possible conspiracy theory

ShedsHisTail

Bromburak wrote: »

ShedsHisTail wrote: »

Bromburak wrote: »

@ZOS_JessicaFolsom

Just a quick update for everyone regarding the recent influx of those using third party tools to cheat in ESO. We've adjusted our automatic anti-cheat systems to focus specifically on the cheats we've seen in the last few days, in addition to launching investigations on specific players. We've permanently banned 43 players in the last 24 hours who were found to be cheating. We don't take cheating lightly, and will continue to ban those who are found to be cheating. We'll be going back through game logs to identify players who were violating our anti-cheating policies in the hours before we performed the automatic cheat detection adjustment.

I actually believe this, but I start understanding why some of them are still playing.
Because the smart guys that stopped cheating before your log investigations are not found by your tool.
So cheater tickets reported by players have not really been evaluated, you just auto ban people by the detection tool.

Well imo this explains everything.

That wouldn't explain why those people disappeared all at once, and then reappeared at roughly the same time.

It does, first of all we don't know how their detection and ban system is configured.
I assume that automation is part of the process and didn't work as expected.

Unbanned players could have been banned for something else that results in temp bans only
or the previous system was configured to temp bans only.

As well it's common sense that some cheaters are unbanned to observe them.
The issue here is, they trick the detection tools and before you can improve them you need to know and understand
what else these cheaters are doing.

While I agree that the unbanned part is confusing, ZOS will not tell us how the previous system was configured and of course
they won't tell us which players are observed either. The problem from customer perspective is that they don't trust in ZOS because they only see unbanned people but don't know the details.

And privacy rules don't make communication easier it just shows why a professional game company cannot just add a wall of shame with names and the ban reason just to satisfy the honest player base.

Finally, someone else thinking past the torch and pitchfork.

Turelus

I'm a little tired of posting on this issue because it's the same back and forth every time. We come to you (ZOS) with information or requests for information and only get blanket answers without the issues ever really being discussed of resolved.

So here are some ideas which might be a better thing for everyone.

Firstly make a page about cheating/exploiting.
Other MMO games sometimes have a page which is dedicated to informing players what are and are not considered exploits and what players can expect if rules are broken.

A couple of examples of this:-
Blizzard Exploit Policy
EVE Online Known and Declared Exploits / EVE Online Ban Policy

I feel this would be the first good step for ZOS because it helps inform the community as to what is and can be reported as an exploit (we still see/hear people reported for animation cancelling). ZOS can also have a leg to stand on when you decide to enforce things because you'll be able to point to this page.

Make sure the page is fully announced, linked on both the launcher and the log-in screen clearly for people to review at any time. I also feel with something like this in place we might finally be able to get a stance on issues such as bypassing keeps walls, running scrolls for rival factions etc. as whilst they're not directly exploiting the game it seems areas neither player or ZOS are happy about.

Also players understanding what kind of bans system you have in place would go a long way to avoiding drama like this week gone. As I said in other posts throughout, if we knew there were suspensions or that you would take a strike policyy against accounts then we wouldn't have screamed bloody murder when we saw "permabanned" players back in the game.

Organise Things On Your End
This one is tricky to talk about because we don't know what happens on your end. However it seems clear that somewhere there is a block between "Report Exploit" and "Developer Fix" as seen with the survey reports exploit.
The moment that an exploit lands on someone's desk with a clear way to recreate it then it should be monitored in game and patched out next incremental.
The reasons you keep seeing players making threads telling everyone about them or how to do them is because they're angry that things get left so long when clearly reported.
From Kai's comment in another thread the other day it also seems like you don't have active in game Game Masters any more, whilst this is the modern era and most things can be done from outside of a client you still need to have a way to monitor events and track logs within the game if handled via an out of game tool. This way when issues come up you can follow them up by looking through logs or watching player activity live within the game.

Punishments That Matter
This is a huge one for actually discouraging you player base from cheating. When you take action against someone and it's only temporary and they'll be let back into the game then for the love of the Divines or Daedra DELETE ANY ITEMS GAINED FROM ABUSE.
If that single action is not taken it undermines the entire process and no one will care about the ban. Most people will be fine with a 72 hour - 14 day ban if when they come back to the game they get to keep thousands of materials, millions of gold or stacks of Maelstrom weapons they farmed whilst cheating.

This is also one of the reasons you see more and more people exploiting each time it happens, no one fears ZOS and everyone wants the rewards gained from abuse as there are no repercussions.

Communicate
When something happens, make a statement ASAP.
Jessica has done this a couple of times but it should be done every time a large issue comes up. It should also be added to the launcher/log-in screen.
Just a simple statement saying something like.

"It has come to our attention that there is currently an exploit involving survey reports, be aware that we take exploiting very seriously and will be monitoring the issue and any accounts caught making use of this issue will be subject to sanctions pending an investigation. Anyone with information should contact us via a support ticket"

I want to point out that even saying the issue is involving survey reports is not too much information given if (and this is a big if) ZOS has the reputation of taking action. Again I refer to EVE Online where when something happens we see this kind of response.
This will be as I said above on their news feed, their launcher and formally the log-in/character select screen.

Once an issue is resolved make another statement saying it's cleared up and how many actions had actions taken against them. You may think this is bad to advertise because people might think ESO has problems, but you may also notice the press coveraged by news websites when developers take action against accounts and it gains good press. I mean when I am reading about Guild Wars 2 and World of Warcraft in the BBC Tech News you know they're doing something.
Even when their forums are spammed with issues threads like ours there is world news stating they're doing good things to police their game.

Players Grow the Ef Up
For us players we need to start growing the ef up and stop acting like children.
This means stop blaming all your problems on someone else "exploiting" stop reporting people for explioting for every little thing, stop with the dumb mass reports of other players etc.
Don't muddy the water on what an exploit is and stop making drama on the forums about it. If someone cheat or exploits and you have enough proof for it then submit a ticket in game with as much information as you can, then take down the ticket number and PM Jessica, Gina, Kai and any other community reps on the forums with the ticket number and the information provided in it.

Last to ZOS
I really don't understand what the issues you face are, I can rant and rave and make posts like this but I will never understand what happens behind the scenes for you all.
However coming from 7 years of EVE Online I have seen a small Icelandic company with a game holding less than 500k subscribers handle things better than a company with millions of dollars behind them and a much bigger player/subscriber base.
To me that just seems illogical, if anything you should be going above and beyond what CCP Games can do because you have the money they lack.

I give you all a hard time, I am angry right now over this and other things, I have cancelled my sub for only the second time since launch because I have lost faith in you. I love this game, I invested a great deal into it and I walked away from 7 years of another MMO and friends there (none of them play ESO) to be here for this game and this community.
Please start doing something that is needed to turn all of this around and make ESO a place where competitive and hardcore players can come to enjoy the game without battling both the cheaters and the company they hide behind.

This post took me 40mins to write apparently, I hope someone reads it.

AnnieBeGood

I did @Turelus and I agree.

InvitationNotFound

Xylphan wrote: »

ShedsHisTail wrote: »

Zheg wrote: »

ShedsHisTail wrote: »

SirAndy wrote: »

ShedsHisTail wrote: »

I know this is going to sound like splitting hairs, but, how do you know those 43 perma-bans are the same people you're seeing back in game? Is it possible there were additional temp-bans that were also issued but unmentioned for reported-but-unconfirmed-instances-of-cheating, and -those- people have returned?
Speculation, of course. I don't know any more, and potentially I know less than the rest of you.

Some of us actually know some of the people that were perma-banned only to return to the game a week later.

And by "know" i mean virtually, in-game, being members of the same guild(s).

Then maybe you should be directing your frustration at them, since they're the ones cheating.
Or reporting them.

I think that's part of why people are so rightfully disgusted with ZOS. These people were reported, confirmed as exploiting, and allowed back in. CE has apparently been reported since BETA and nothing was done. The anger and outcry you're seeing is because of ZOS inaction and terribad policies, telling players to report exploiters at this point is like an ER nurse telling a someone having a heart attack to go call their insurance company again.

You know, as much of a ZOS apologist as a I seem. I get it, I understand the frustration. I really do. I just don't often jump on the hate bandwagon, because there are plenty of people espousing that side of the argument.

I also know what I don't know. I don't know why CE has continued to be an issue as long as it has... I'm not a software engineer and I don't know how it interacts with the game. I don't know what the technical limitations are, or how it keeps happening.

I know, now (thanks Google!), that there are many versions and that it's regularly updated. Perhaps one of those updates has made bypassing the ban possible?

I don't know. And -since- I don't know, I'm not going to level accusations of incompetence or apathy at people who know more about this stuff than I do.

Then as a professional software engineer with almost 20 years of experience on everything from limited embedded systems up to large scale HPC supercomputers, let me tell you that the fact this type of hack is even possible is mind boggling.

You may think "well big deal, so someone can drop infinite meteors". It's not the use that's mind boggling, it's what that type of hack represents. I can think of a dozen potential attack vectors that could be explored just based on that information alone, with some potentially being catastrophic to the game itself if certain safeguards aren't in place.

And if I, as a white hat, can think of them you can be certain that black hats already have as well. I take a bit of comfort in the fact the game is still here and to my knowledge there's been no system level compromises, so it does appear that the most important safeguards do exist.

well, i would have used the terms white / black hat in a more it security related way, which imo cheating isn't (well, to certain degree its about the server trusting the client in both cases). anyway, coming from a similar work field i'm not sharing your optimism. If you look at statements that this issue has been reported since beta I really can't share this optimism. I consider this whole thing just the tip of the ice berg.

Unfortunately, we're left here alone in thread where we can barely talk about things due to the restrictions made. many people have made good suggestions on how to handle the situation but still nothing happened.

edit: damn stored drafts >_<

Arthg

ZOS, please, please listen to @Turelus, and please ask yourselves:

To what extent are our current anti-cheating policies likely to restore TRUST in the community?

IMHO, the only step in the right direction this thread shows is that you seem more willing to communicate.
That's nice.

But the rest of it is more of the same, and more of the same hasn't worked so far.

You guys have ignored warnings and evidence of CE being used for two years, and only taken action (albeit limited) when it all blew up three weeks ago - but clearly and only because you were somehow forced to do it.

Please please see the paradox between your (obsessional) fear of naming and shaming on the one hand, and relying on players' reports for evidence on the other.
This just can't work: you're asking for vigilantes without the downsides of mob justice.

I come from Europe, and I don't share this fear of naming of shaming: the witches of Salem, the Scarlet Letter, maccarthyism, perp walks, etc. are alien to me.
If someone's caught cheating, I just want to know a proper investigation has been carried out and a proper punishment has been meted out. I for one will just nod and carry on.

No trust will be reinstored if players are not informed of what actual steps have been taken to prevent and punish cheating.

You need to change your policy.

Publish the names, the players' actions and their punishment.
Keep prohibiting anybody here or in-game to discuss these measures individually.
That's the price of trust

qrichou

That you guy's talk to as if we r all kids , doesnt mean we see you as our parent .
Dont ,ask for us to discuss isseus wich are know of ,talk about , censured and ignored by you guy's since launch.
An good discussion does not start with sensoring .
Why let us talk , you already have your pre-cooked solution thats fitting for you guy's ,you simply wait till somebody here say's the same and you will support it .
About naming and shaming
the shame is on you guy's .
Now stop this nonsense and fix the servers

Muizer

Haydenmango wrote: »

Then zos came out with a statement saying they may give permanently banned players a final chance to appeal.

Anybody have a link?

Turelus

@Arthg naming and shaming doesn't need to happen.

From my use of EVE Online sure I know a few high profiled names like Erotica1, Somer etc. who were banned but that's because there was a massive stink over it and much of the reasons they were banned was for out of client abuse/RMT.

Generally though I don't know the names of any EVE Online players banned, but I do know when CCP does a ban wave because they write about it. Then when they did their security presentations at fanfest they would give out total statisics of accounts banned, regions of the world most used for botting etc.

Never any player information for a person, but enough information I could see they were working and also have some fun graphs and good laughs about what they were doing. I have complete faith in CCP's ability to police their game, even when there are still exploiters/bots/RMT going on. I know thing still happen but I have faith in them to do something about it when it's caught because they have time and time again shown me they take action.

Zenimax on the other hand have shown me *counts in his head* three times that I can think of that they took action (bank dupe, surveys, cheat engine) and of those three two of them ended with disastrous outcomes as players were only suspended and allowed to keep all of their ill gained assets.

I don't need to know who was banned, for how long and for what reasons. I just need to know that if someone is banned (even temporary) that they're not gaining from it. Which has yet to happen here.

HoloYoitsu

Muizer wrote: »

Haydenmango wrote: »

Then zos came out with a statement saying they may give permanently banned players a final chance to appeal.

Anybody have a link?

I really wish people would read threads through, nothing against you, but this has got to be the 4th or 5th time I've had to bring up this quote.

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote:

we may decide to give a player who has been permanently banned a final chance after investigating a situation and speaking with them.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/3078585/#Comment_3078585

Junipus

ZOS_AlanG wrote: »

Hello everyone, we’ve started a fresh thread on the matter of cheating and exploits. This has been a big issue, and maintaining an open discussion on the matter is important to us. However, it is also important that this discussion stay on topic, and within the forum rules. In particular:

• We do not allow naming and shaming. Accusations of misconduct directed at anyone, even if not explicitly named, are not acceptable. If you feel someone is cheating, any information needs to be sent to us privately. Rules violations can be sent in-game or by submitting a ticket on our help site, and this is covered in more detail below. When reporting someone, please detail who you are reporting and why, the more information you can provide the easier it is for us to investigate. We welcome images and videos. With the latter, if it’s very long a timestamp may be helpful.

• We do not allow disciplinary actions to be discussed for specific members, whether named or not. General discussion of ESO policy is acceptable, but not commentary on what may have happened with specific people. Staff will not discuss the moderation status of an account publicly, or state whether an account has or has not been actioned. Allowing others to speculate on this can lead to a host of problems, and we are unable to clarify.

• Flaming or bashing is not allowed. This goes for abusive and disruptive comments and behavior that are directed at ZeniMax Online employees and ESO community members, alike.

• Demands or threats, specifically directed at the ESO team or suspected exploiters.

• It is important to keep comments respectful, and criticism constructive. We discuss this in greater depth here. There is a lot of value in having an open thread for discussing these problems, but it needs to remain civil and constructive.

We will remove any posts breaking the forum rules. In the last thread we tried to keep moderation to a minimum, but this just allowed the problems to escalate until we couldn’t ignore them. When removing posts we will generally remove any replies as well, since they often don’t make sense on their own, or continue off track discussion. If you feel someone is breaking the rules, we ask that you report the post and not respond to it.

We had closed the previous thread because of the number of problems, and because we thought a break until we had new information would be helpful. We’ve received a lot of feedback that people would rather have an open discussion now, so are putting this up.

As mentioned earlier, and explained in detail in the quoted post below, if you feel that someone is cheating or exploiting please send this information to us. Do not post details on how to preform an exploit, or who may be preforming them, on the forums.

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

Hey everyone,

If you believe someone is cheating, hacking, exploiting, botting, or anything else that violates our EULA and Terms of Service, we want to know but we need you to report them using the appropriate channels. We fully investigate all reports of TOS violations. (See this Support article on how to report another player for inappropriate behavior.)

You can also submit a Support ticket via our website if you need to include screenshots and/or video footage of the player you are reporting. To do so, follow these steps:

1. Go to the Support page and log in
2. Choose “In-Game Support”
3. Select the “Report a Player” subcategory
4. Fill out the fields with as much detail as possible – if you know reproduction steps for what the player you’re reporting is doing, even better.
5. Attach any related files (screenshots, videos, etc.)
6. Hit the “Submit” button

Please note that we cannot discuss another player’s account status and details thereof with you, as doing so would be a violation of our Privacy Policy. This includes any disciplinary action we have taken on another player. In rare cases, we may decide to give a player who has been permanently banned a final chance after investigating a situation and speaking with them. If you believe a player with whom we have granted a final chance is violating our EULA and Terms of Service, please report them via one of the two methods described above.

Lastly, we are still going to wipe the Veteran Maelstrom Arena Leaderboards on the PC/Mac megaservers within the next few weeks.

@ZOS_AlanG What new information? The only thing close is Jessica's announcement that you're wiping the VMA leaderboards soon, which isn't new information for anyone except those new to the game.

Appreciate there's a new thread on the topic, but it seems less about constructive criticism of the issue and more about having greater control of what's said from a PR perspective. Until there's actually some useful information from ZOS it's just too little too late for a number of players and further proof nothing will be done.

For example, will we have to wait the unknown number of weeks before you wipe the boards to find out if you have any way of monitoring people who get ridiculously high scores to stop it from happening again?

Enodoc

dimensional wrote: »

So what's the point of this thread, exactly?

Xylphan wrote: »

With those policy restrictions, I'm not really sure what there is to discuss.

dennissomb16_ESO wrote: »

I have to say I am somewhat confused about why this thread is opened and what we can realistically expect from it. If we cannot ask or get information about the actions (more importantly non-actions) that the developer is taking against players using the much discussed cheats that have been the hot topic then why is the discussion open?

Based on the OP:

ZOS_AlanG wrote: »

General discussion of ESO policy is acceptable.

So I would suggest we talk about how ZOS is handling the situation, without being specific, as that boils down to being an aspect of ESO policy.

What I would like to see has pretty much been covereded already, and boils down to simply wanting to know what ZOS are doing; ie, transparency. I'd like to know what actions ZOS are taking with regards to cheaters and hackers, with numbers, and why they decided on that particular action. All of that can be done without ZOS naming the offenders if they want to keep that private.

So for example, similar to what UrQuan suggested:

• X players were banned for 3 days this week for exploiting.
• Y players were banned for 2 months this week for ....
• Z players were unbanned following an appeal, due to insufficient evidence.

ZOS_AlanG wrote: »

HoloYoitsu wrote: »

Thank you for making a thread, can it please be sticked?

I suspect this will remain active enough to stay on the front page without being stickied.

I remember the reasoning behind not stickying something being discussed before. People often overlook the stickies and go straight to the recently active discussions. But please do consider stickying it after a few days, as even when the discussion has dropped off a bit, it will still be important.

LiquidSchwartz

I'm slightly enraged at the fact that the permabans on exploiters and cheaters were lifted.. they shouldn't be because a permaban is permanent.. if you do the crime you do the time

basically the message that you're sending to me as a player is when there is an opportunity to exploit the everloving hell out of the game and use whatever cheats I want because in the end i wont really be banned for some reason

this isnt an oops i accidentally had ww and vampire at the same time this is a purposeful use of cheat engines to infinitely spam meteors and fly and super bounce across the map like mario.

the lack of conviction to your bans you guys give out on cheaters is incredible
when people knowingly used the cheat engine or exploits with mundus stones or invisibility hacks

they shouldnt be allowed back into the game
otherwise please go back to allowing botting so cyrodiil can at least be lag free

altemriel

ZOS_AlanG wrote: »

Hello everyone, we’ve started a fresh thread on the matter of cheating and exploits. This has been a big issue, and maintaining an open discussion on the matter is important to us. However, it is also important that this discussion stay on topic, and within the forum rules. In particular:

• We do not allow naming and shaming. Accusations of misconduct directed at anyone, even if not explicitly named, are not acceptable. If you feel someone is cheating, any information needs to be sent to us privately. Rules violations can be sent in-game or by submitting a ticket on our help site, and this is covered in more detail below. When reporting someone, please detail who you are reporting and why, the more information you can provide the easier it is for us to investigate. We welcome images and videos. With the latter, if it’s very long a timestamp may be helpful.

• We do not allow disciplinary actions to be discussed for specific members, whether named or not. General discussion of ESO policy is acceptable, but not commentary on what may have happened with specific people. Staff will not discuss the moderation status of an account publicly, or state whether an account has or has not been actioned. Allowing others to speculate on this can lead to a host of problems, and we are unable to clarify.

• Flaming or bashing is not allowed. This goes for abusive and disruptive comments and behavior that are directed at ZeniMax Online employees and ESO community members, alike.

• Demands or threats, specifically directed at the ESO team or suspected exploiters.

• It is important to keep comments respectful, and criticism constructive. We discuss this in greater depth here. There is a lot of value in having an open thread for discussing these problems, but it needs to remain civil and constructive.

We will remove any posts breaking the forum rules. In the last thread we tried to keep moderation to a minimum, but this just allowed the problems to escalate until we couldn’t ignore them. When removing posts we will generally remove any replies as well, since they often don’t make sense on their own, or continue off track discussion. If you feel someone is breaking the rules, we ask that you report the post and not respond to it.

We had closed the previous thread because of the number of problems, and because we thought a break until we had new information would be helpful. We’ve received a lot of feedback that people would rather have an open discussion now, so are putting this up.

As mentioned earlier, and explained in detail in the quoted post below, if you feel that someone is cheating or exploiting please send this information to us. Do not post details on how to preform an exploit, or who may be preforming them, on the forums.

ZOS_JessicaFolsom wrote: »

Hey everyone,

If you believe someone is cheating, hacking, exploiting, botting, or anything else that violates our EULA and Terms of Service, we want to know but we need you to report them using the appropriate channels. We fully investigate all reports of TOS violations. (See this Support article on how to report another player for inappropriate behavior.)

You can also submit a Support ticket via our website if you need to include screenshots and/or video footage of the player you are reporting. To do so, follow these steps:

1. Go to the Support page and log in
2. Choose “In-Game Support”
3. Select the “Report a Player” subcategory
4. Fill out the fields with as much detail as possible – if you know reproduction steps for what the player you’re reporting is doing, even better.
5. Attach any related files (screenshots, videos, etc.)
6. Hit the “Submit” button

Please note that we cannot discuss another player’s account status and details thereof with you, as doing so would be a violation of our Privacy Policy. This includes any disciplinary action we have taken on another player. In rare cases, we may decide to give a player who has been permanently banned a final chance after investigating a situation and speaking with them. If you believe a player with whom we have granted a final chance is violating our EULA and Terms of Service, please report them via one of the two methods described above.

Lastly, we are still going to wipe the Veteran Maelstrom Arena Leaderboards on the PC/Mac megaservers within the next few weeks.

1. did some hackers got banned?
2. why did they got unbanned?

MaxwellC

Lol people who say consoles can't have hackers haven't played on consoles for a while. If this game came out a couple years ago on XB1 there would be some hackers; I mean if you played Halo 3 back in the day then you'd know hell yes there were some hackers lol. I guess everyone forgot the term J-Tag, those guys/girls who were able to open up command prompted codes in their games which allowed them to fundamentally break the system and allow 'wallhack' and 'aimbot'.

I remember playing Halo 3 on my 49 game n we had a aimbot on my team, my god I've never seen a quick game of team slayer all this guy did was stand in the spawn with a spawned sniper rifle and shot; each shot was a head shot lmao!

kevlarto_ESO

I am disappointed in the way ZOS is handling this, I believe you use a third part program to cheat with you should be perma banned no second chance, once a cheater always cheater applies here.

Now the terminology used may be incorrect, when I see banned, to me that is your done never to return, unless you buy a new box and stat from scratch, it seems like the proper word ZOS should have used was suspended, which to me implies short term disciplinary action along with a stern warning next time your gone for good.

And for those have these cheaters in your guild or know them, I hope some of you are telling them not cool, and encourage them not to cheat but learn to play like the rest of us, and have a much more rewarding gaming experience, cheating is just lame, I have zero respect for cheaters.

I have seen the game after the cheat engine came to light, and wow it was like night and day, players that others thought were good all sudden died like normal players on the battle field, some of those so called 1vx'ers posting videos and couple of twitch streamers all the sudden were normal out of god mode, then next day back in god mode, now that we know what to look for I hope people keep reporting and making it harder and harder for players to get by with cheating.

clayandaudrey_ESO

The only way this is ever going to be fixed is to police the game ourselves. Blacklisting known cheaters in game so they can not get group or guild invites. Outing them in other media than these forums. If the game is very unfriendly to them they will think they should have took the permaban and just shut up.

However this will never happen as people will not stick together on an effort like this. It would take guild leaders to make a stand. And of course most of these people have their followers who would do their best to derail it.

Manpoints

I don't understand how this was a good business decision, have these guys NEVER heard of industry standards? The industry standard is you cheat, you're done - BOOM. WHY? Because when cheats exist and go undetected, and unpunished it kills any game its in that has any player on player interaction - well - this is an mmo, Pull your heads out.

Let me break it down for you ZOS:
- Hacks kill games, its why there's unapologetic permanent bans served by every single other product in the industry

- The community has spoken, there is no silent majority here saying 'oh well its OK, people shouldn't get banned' its disrespectful for you to unilaterally disregard popular sentiment on such a publicized topic that negatively effects the people trying to help you fix it.

- Unbanning people when in your TC's it says specifically you can ban for any reason, and you talk about 'second chances' - there seems to be such a discrepancy between punishments for different issues, people who are sitting on permanent bans for language/character name/talking about isis (yes real), that were never offered these opportunities to speak to anyone from ZOS - BE CONSISTENT BECAUSE OTHERWISE IT LOOKS LIKE FAVORITISM like someone who got caught has a twitch stream or something so everyone gets a second chance.

- Communicate with us, shutting down all the threads related to a tough topic is NOT the way to deal with the tough topic, you are yet to respond to the crux of the issue with the majority of questions on this thread not being responded to and while you undoubtedly prefer this to go away its not, it'll kill this game first. Bring this up on ESO live, its the biggest news for ESO atm, and if you try to dodge it, you'll get called out on it.

- You've got alot of trust to earn back, the fact this has been a thing since launch, and you never implemented an anti-cheat function AT ALL - which lets be honest, is simple as ***, means you *** this game for anyone trying to play competitively for a long time. Free mounts for all.




But if you're just waiting for us to tire ourselves out beating against your door demanding answers and action, know that we've got more free time than you do.