Dear ZOS ...

Earthewen

Once more, I want to thank you. I heard on zone chat (yes, I'm taking it with a grain of salt) that you actually disciplined the folks that were exploiting at Black Boot Mine the other night when it was bugged. If this information is true, I want to congratulate you and thank you. I thank you on my guild's behalf as we sometimes get weary of the focus from players always being on the broken things, and how easy they are to exploit. We get tired of running into exploiters quite this frequently. This really does give hope to those of us who love this game and want to enjoy it with everything being on the up and up. I encourage you to continue this trend and to continue dealing with the individuals that keep everything as toxic as possible and continue to use every exploit they can find to gain an unfair advantage over their fellow gamers. Please, keep up the good work and don't stop here. Continue working on this, and maybe, if the higher-ups will let you, keep us informed on your progress (without divulging names, of course). Openness and transparency would really go a long way to reassuring your honest player base that you are on top of this finally. At this point, few believe it. :-( That is extremely sad given how amazing this game can be.

kevlarto_ESO

Earthewen wrote: »

Once more, I want to thank you. I heard on zone chat (yes, I'm taking it with a grain of salt) that you actually disciplined the folks that were exploiting at Black Boot Mine the other night when it was bugged. If this information is true, I want to congratulate you and thank you. I thank you on my guild's behalf as we sometimes get weary of the focus from players always being on the broken things, and how easy they are to exploit. We get tired of running into exploiters quite this frequently. This really does give hope to those of us who love this game and want to enjoy it with everything being on the up and up. I encourage you to continue this trend and to continue dealing with the individuals that keep everything as toxic as possible and continue to use every exploit they can find to gain an unfair advantage over their fellow gamers. Please, keep up the good work and don't stop here. Continue working on this, and maybe, if the higher-ups will let you, keep us informed on your progress (without divulging names, of course). Openness and transparency would really go a long way to reassuring your honest player base that you are on top of this finally. At this point, few believe it. :-( That is extremely sad given how amazing this game can be.

I agree pretty sick of exploiters and cheaters, I have cut my pvp from 7 days a week 4 to 5 hours down to once or twice a week and when I see the large number of exploiters start running around I go do something else. They have sucked the fun out of pvp for me and a lot of people I know, I wish zos would give us more of an impression they are taking action instead of leaving us with the perception they are doing very little to nothing, but if they did indeed take action against the exploiters at the mine thanks and keep going after them cheating and exploiting will always be a big problem if there is no consequences for bad behavior.

Subversus

What happened to them? Perma ban or just temp?

Cinbri

Because of exploit Akaviri motifs became 30% cheaper. I want refund of all my possibly lost gold
There will be battlegrounds with ladder and rewards in several months. And obviously people will abuse everything to get all benefits from it. If ZOS won't start to punish for willingly usage of bugs - entire portion of future content will be... pointless.

Turelus

Subversus wrote: »

What happened to them? Perma ban or just temp?

They're not very hard on perma bans.

Personally I like the strike systems other games use where you get temps at first (and item removal so you didn't gain form it) then if you offens again you get a longer or pema ban.

Nermy

Fine them 2 million AP I say! 3 million if they protest!

KisoValley

kevlarto_ESO wrote: »

Earthewen wrote: »

Once more, I want to thank you. I heard on zone chat (yes, I'm taking it with a grain of salt) that you actually disciplined the folks that were exploiting at Black Boot Mine the other night when it was bugged. If this information is true, I want to congratulate you and thank you. I thank you on my guild's behalf as we sometimes get weary of the focus from players always being on the broken things, and how easy they are to exploit. We get tired of running into exploiters quite this frequently. This really does give hope to those of us who love this game and want to enjoy it with everything being on the up and up. I encourage you to continue this trend and to continue dealing with the individuals that keep everything as toxic as possible and continue to use every exploit they can find to gain an unfair advantage over their fellow gamers. Please, keep up the good work and don't stop here. Continue working on this, and maybe, if the higher-ups will let you, keep us informed on your progress (without divulging names, of course). Openness and transparency would really go a long way to reassuring your honest player base that you are on top of this finally. At this point, few believe it. :-( That is extremely sad given how amazing this game can be.

I agree pretty sick of exploiters and cheaters, I have cut my pvp from 7 days a week 4 to 5 hours down to once or twice a week and when I see the large number of exploiters start running around I go do something else. They have sucked the fun out of pvp for me and a lot of people I know, I wish zos would give us more of an impression they are taking action instead of leaving us with the perception they are doing very little to nothing, but if they did indeed take action against the exploiters at the mine thanks and keep going after them cheating and exploiting will always be a big problem if there is no consequences for bad behavior.

What platform do you play on? Cause I don't see 'large numbers of exploiters running around'. Lol

Earthewen

Guys, if you are as weary as we are with the exploiters, then we need to be louder than the exploiting crowd!!!!! Please!!!! Voice your opinions and loudly so that ZOS knows we are here and we are watching and we want to see them taking a more proactive role on this issue! Please do so positively, though. I want ZOS to know that we support this kind of action in cleaning up the game. I don't know if you guys are aware, but ESO ranked highly (from what I hear) on a list of the most easily exploitable MMOs. It says something about the gaming culture that this list is even published, if indeed it exists. If it was just a rumor, then sorry about that. Nevertheless, PLEASE BE LOUDER. The silent majority needs to speak up.

Thelon

Scrub Exploiter Number 1 wrote: »

I was merely roleplaying with friends.

Scrub Exploiter Number 2 wrote: »

It's called precedence and while some may not understand that it does hold weight in court.

Scrub Exploiter Number 3 wrote: »

per my legal interpretation of the agreements we make with ZOS that as long as nobody used that AP to get emperor over someone who was not there, the ToS would not be violated

Earthewen

Thelon wrote: »

Scrub Exploiter Number 1 wrote: »

I was merely roleplaying with friends.

Scrub Exploiter Number 2 wrote: »

It's called precedence and while some may not understand that it does hold weight in court.

Scrub Exploiter Number 3 wrote: »

per my legal interpretation of the agreements we make with ZOS that as long as nobody used that AP to get emperor over someone who was not there, the ToS would not be violated

That's actually funny and sad at the same time.

NightbladeMechanics

Can confirm people on EU who farmed BB mine have had AP removed from their characters.

Honestly, I'm impressed with ZOS. They could just as easily have ignored us altogether.

Still more could be done.

Sandman929

NightbladeMechanics wrote: »

Can confirm people on EU who farmed BB mine have had AP removed from their characters.

Honestly, I'm impressed with ZOS. They could just as easily have ignored us altogether.

Still more could be done.

Weak response from ZOS, and still no comment (unless I missed it) on the working-as-intended outpost flag trading.

NightbladeMechanics

Sandman929 wrote: »

NightbladeMechanics wrote: »

Can confirm people on EU who farmed BB mine have had AP removed from their characters.

Honestly, I'm impressed with ZOS. They could just as easily have ignored us altogether.

Still more could be done.

Weak response from ZOS, and still no comment (unless I missed it) on the working-as-intended outpost flag trading.

They hotfixed the mine and took away way more ap than the players gained, and sanctions are still rolling out as I understand it. Considering it was a bug on their end and only affected a few days' leaderboards, I understand why they hesitate to issue bans.

As for outpost farming, just go kill them. Just because they're farming AP without PvPing doesn't mean PvP is suddenly not enabled for them...

Sandman929

NightbladeMechanics wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

NightbladeMechanics wrote: »

Can confirm people on EU who farmed BB mine have had AP removed from their characters.

Honestly, I'm impressed with ZOS. They could just as easily have ignored us altogether.

Still more could be done.

Weak response from ZOS, and still no comment (unless I missed it) on the working-as-intended outpost flag trading.

They hotfixed the mine and took away way more ap than the players gained, and sanctions are still rolling out as I understand it. Considering it was a bug on their end and only affected a few days' leaderboards, I understand why they hesitate to issue bans.

As for outpost farming, just go kill them. Just because they're farming AP without PvPing doesn't mean PvP is suddenly not enabled for them...

Oh, I intend to try when this disaster reaches consoles. But I'm not in a particularly large guild (7-10 on a busy night) and I hate the destro ulti meta so I'm not eager to join it. I'm expecting the farmer numbers to be big, but I can always sneak around looking for the AFK'ers.

NightbladeMechanics

Sandman929 wrote: »

NightbladeMechanics wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

NightbladeMechanics wrote: »

Can confirm people on EU who farmed BB mine have had AP removed from their characters.

Honestly, I'm impressed with ZOS. They could just as easily have ignored us altogether.

Still more could be done.

Weak response from ZOS, and still no comment (unless I missed it) on the working-as-intended outpost flag trading.

They hotfixed the mine and took away way more ap than the players gained, and sanctions are still rolling out as I understand it. Considering it was a bug on their end and only affected a few days' leaderboards, I understand why they hesitate to issue bans.

As for outpost farming, just go kill them. Just because they're farming AP without PvPing doesn't mean PvP is suddenly not enabled for them...

Oh, I intend to try when this disaster reaches consoles. But I'm not in a particularly large guild (7-10 on a busy night) and I hate the destro ulti meta so I'm not eager to join it. I'm expecting the farmer numbers to be big, but I can always sneak around looking for the AFK'ers.

Before destro ult, there was Soul Tether, and before then, Clouding Swarm (rip). Tether bombs may not be "meta," but they have no warning and are plenty lethal against players with their guards down. Use a camp if you think you might not be able to hit them and slip out. Or you could just fire siege into the outpost. You don't need to have a group or even wipe their whole group to disrupt a flag farm.

Sandman929

NightbladeMechanics wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

NightbladeMechanics wrote: »

Sandman929 wrote: »

NightbladeMechanics wrote: »

Can confirm people on EU who farmed BB mine have had AP removed from their characters.

Honestly, I'm impressed with ZOS. They could just as easily have ignored us altogether.

Still more could be done.

Weak response from ZOS, and still no comment (unless I missed it) on the working-as-intended outpost flag trading.

They hotfixed the mine and took away way more ap than the players gained, and sanctions are still rolling out as I understand it. Considering it was a bug on their end and only affected a few days' leaderboards, I understand why they hesitate to issue bans.

As for outpost farming, just go kill them. Just because they're farming AP without PvPing doesn't mean PvP is suddenly not enabled for them...

Oh, I intend to try when this disaster reaches consoles. But I'm not in a particularly large guild (7-10 on a busy night) and I hate the destro ulti meta so I'm not eager to join it. I'm expecting the farmer numbers to be big, but I can always sneak around looking for the AFK'ers.

Before destro ult, there was Soul Tether, and before then, Clouding Swarm (rip). Tether bombs may not be "meta," but they have no warning and are plenty lethal against players with their guards down. Use a camp if you think you might not be able to hit them and slip out. Or you could just fire siege into the outpost. You don't need to have a group or even wipe their whole group to disrupt a flag farm.

Tether bombs are nothing compared to the moving 7 second destro trains. Against people with their guards down, they're good sometimes. Destro after destro after Destro in a moving group isn't even in the same ballpark as previous bomb gankers.

Sandman929

And if you're looking for me to get on board with how great the AP farm is because people can just disrupt it, it's not happening. It's a crap addition to a game that's already on the way down. PvP is in a terrible state. AP farming is the new norm.

Sandman929

Maybe it won't be as bad as I'm imagining on consoles. But if it's 30-40 players from all factions just soaking up the AP, I'm not deluded enough to think my little band of 6 is going to be a serious disruption. Even if I try I might get some of that crappy AP just for being in the area when DC is taking their turn on the flags.

zyk

@ZOS_BrianWheeler I hope this means you will now take exploits of all kinds just as seriously?

NightbladeMechanics

@Sandman929 You're confusing solo bombing with forming a ball group destro ult chain. Nightblades layering destro ults for ball groups aren't bombers, just cogs in the zerg.

In solo bombing, destro ult and Tether both have their pros and cons. Destro ult delivers damage over a longer period of time, but has low burst and gives enemies plenty of warning to react. When solo, it's ideal for pug stomping or hitting groups under attack by other players. Tether delivers burst with no warning and lets you cloak away immediately, but only kills the people under you and relies more on proxy's damage. It's better for hit-and-runs on wary groups and those that stay spread enough that you would get focused down inside your destro ult.

Second, I'm not advocating for flag farming. I'm advocating player initiatives to impede it.

And lastly, unless I'm missing something, flag farming groups on PC/NA haven't been as common as the forum hysteria might suggest. Also the ones I've seen have been like 5-8 players per side. Easily bombable when clustered on the flag.

I expect the world will stop burning in a week or two when people realize that a rapidly flipping flag on the outskirts of the map means free AP at best, and a nearly lagless fight against reasonable numbers at worst.

Not that I support the larger o-ticks. I don't think AP should be rewarded for anything other than player kills, but ZOS likes lazy incentives.

Paul_DA

I hope they fix it asap