Is AP Boosting Cheating?

Ron_Burgundy_79

Is AP boosting cheating? I believe the pvp community is owed an official statement from ZOS on this topic.

Personally, I'd like to know how this is any different than farming the vmol skin. If that's a bannable offense, then AP boosting should be as well.

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom @ZOS_RichLambert

JamieAubrey

Doubt it

TequilaFire

Is XP boosting like farming mob pulls cheating?
AP boosting by taking turns killing each other or flipping objectives by agreement is definitely cheesy and borderline.

KingYogi415

Yes it should be a bannable offense!

#inbefore"roleplayers"

NewBlacksmurf

It'll be an interesting response cause some things I'd say are cheating they leave ambiguous

AJ_1988

It's a bit of a technicality I reckon. As I see it as exploiting/abusing in game mechanics for personal gain. That being said it also depends on the method that is used. Being in cohorts with another faction to constantly flip an outpost I feel is as it's not the intend function of an outpost, same with resources.

To an extent boosting ap is gaining you a power advantage in the sense of unlocking skills quicker and having access to sets quicker including monster sets. It's a fine line tho and a firm stance and explanation from Zos is required so we know where that line is drawn. ATM it's only perspective as to where the line is.

Take xb1 EU for example. Scourge is the main pvp. My faction dc has no one in there as everyone aka the main guild has gone haderus to farm xp by flipping resources. I see this as boosting for personal gain.

Vaoh

You'd not only ban half of the already tiny PvP popluation - we would ban a ton of PvEers who jumped in for easy AP as well. All because it is "immoral" to farm AP this way.

We are seeing players who are playing the very mechanics of Keep/Respurce taking. If you capture it, you get AP. Simple. No bugs, exploits, hacks, cheats, or whatever are being used. The current system set in place is just very badly implemented. A simple 5-10min cooldown on the AP ticks would've solved the issue.

Of course this is not moral..... but it still is not something to ban people over. That'd be ridiculous tbh.

Imagine this situation - if a token system was implemented for Maw of Lorkhaj, and the first boss purposely gave quadruple the tokens than other bosses on release. Terrible design which is easily farmable (as we see in PvP right now). Now players start farming this boss. The Devs announce they have the intention of significantly reducing the token drop rate or setting a cooldown on the boss token timer.

Should the players who gained their loot much faster by running Maw with this terrible token design get banned? I'd think not.

This is how I see it at least I hate the situation in Cyrodiil right now, but banning people seems crazy for not breaking anything, exploiting, cheating, etc. It sucks but it is very much fair play devoid of cheats imo. Just terrible design which will be resolved in less than a week according to ZOS.

sunshineflame

From what I saw happening today in Thornblade Xbox NA, yes, for me it is cheating.

Cpt_Teemo

I would consider that exploiting even though its not a bug, you are not doing it legitimately imo.

Ron_Burgundy_79

Vaoh wrote: »

You'd not only ban half of the already tiny PvP popluation - we would ban a ton of PvEers who jumped in for easy AP as well. All because it is "immoral" to farm AP this way.

We are seeing players who are playing the very mechanics of Keep/Respurce taking. If you capture it, you get AP. Simple. No bugs, exploits, hacks, cheats, or whatever are being used. The current system set in place is just very badly implemented. A simple 5-10min cooldown on the AP ticks would've solved the issue.

Of course this is not moral..... but it still is not something to ban people over. That'd be ridiculous tbh.

Imagine this situation - if a token system was implemented for Maw of Lorkhaj, and the first boss purposely gave quadruple the tokens than other bosses on release. Terrible design which is easily farmable (as we see in PvP right now). Now players start farming this boss. The Devs announce they have the intention of significantly reducing the token drop rate or setting a cooldown on the boss token timer.

Should the players who gained their loot much faster by running Maw with this terrible token design get banned? I'd think not.

This is how I see it at least I hate the situation in Cyrodiil right now, but banning people seems crazy for not breaking anything, exploiting, cheating, etc. It sucks but it is very much fair play devoid of cheats imo. Just terrible design which will be resolved in less than a week according to ZOS.

How is the AP boosting any different than exploiting a bug to get the vmol skin? Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't ZOS come out and say it was an exploit and exploiters would be punished?

For the record, I don't have the vmol skin yet, and I'm not a grand overlord.

zaria

Ron_Burgundy_79 wrote: »

Vaoh wrote: »

You'd not only ban half of the already tiny PvP popluation - we would ban a ton of PvEers who jumped in for easy AP as well. All because it is "immoral" to farm AP this way.

We are seeing players who are playing the very mechanics of Keep/Respurce taking. If you capture it, you get AP. Simple. No bugs, exploits, hacks, cheats, or whatever are being used. The current system set in place is just very badly implemented. A simple 5-10min cooldown on the AP ticks would've solved the issue.

Of course this is not moral..... but it still is not something to ban people over. That'd be ridiculous tbh.

Imagine this situation - if a token system was implemented for Maw of Lorkhaj, and the first boss purposely gave quadruple the tokens than other bosses on release. Terrible design which is easily farmable (as we see in PvP right now). Now players start farming this boss. The Devs announce they have the intention of significantly reducing the token drop rate or setting a cooldown on the boss token timer.

Should the players who gained their loot much faster by running Maw with this terrible token design get banned? I'd think not.

This is how I see it at least I hate the situation in Cyrodiil right now, but banning people seems crazy for not breaking anything, exploiting, cheating, etc. It sucks but it is very much fair play devoid of cheats imo. Just terrible design which will be resolved in less than a week according to ZOS.

How is the AP boosting any different than exploiting a bug to get the vmol skin? Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't ZOS come out and say it was an exploit and exploiters would be punished?

For the record, I don't have the vmol skin yet, and I'm not a grand overlord.

As I understand the vmol cheat let you kill the last boss, loot him and get the reward, however skin require you to kill all the bosses so its only relevant if team can kill the first three but not the final.

Syntse

Ron_Burgundy_79 wrote: »

How is the AP boosting any different than exploiting a bug to get the vmol skin? Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't ZOS come out and say it was an exploit and exploiters would be punished?

For the record, I don't have the vmol skin yet, and I'm not a grand overlord.

What I know of vmol skin is that it was possible to get out of the map go around the whole trial and then kill final boss from position where you were safe. That is exploit in so many ways. Now AP farming doesn't require any silly getting around of things to achieve, just agreement between bunch of players in different alliances to flip flags in turns so I cannot see the exploiting there unless Zos states it being exploit. They knew the higher AP return of taking outpost or resource or so, they also knew that even before 2x people were using this to gain AP, they could have lowered the AP gain before 2x but they didn't. To me it seems they are ok with this behaviour and let players themselves deal with it.

No I'm not for this kind of AP farming but I do not see it as exploiting either. I have been among the people trying to stop the madness being AD trying to stop EP and DC farming so I don't even gain anything except make havoc and few kills in the scene.

Vaoh

Ron_Burgundy_79 wrote: »

Vaoh wrote: »

You'd not only ban half of the already tiny PvP popluation - we would ban a ton of PvEers who jumped in for easy AP as well. All because it is "immoral" to farm AP this way.

We are seeing players who are playing the very mechanics of Keep/Respurce taking. If you capture it, you get AP. Simple. No bugs, exploits, hacks, cheats, or whatever are being used. The current system set in place is just very badly implemented. A simple 5-10min cooldown on the AP ticks would've solved the issue.

Of course this is not moral..... but it still is not something to ban people over. That'd be ridiculous tbh.

Imagine this situation - if a token system was implemented for Maw of Lorkhaj, and the first boss purposely gave quadruple the tokens than other bosses on release. Terrible design which is easily farmable (as we see in PvP right now). Now players start farming this boss. The Devs announce they have the intention of significantly reducing the token drop rate or setting a cooldown on the boss token timer.

Should the players who gained their loot much faster by running Maw with this terrible token design get banned? I'd think not.

This is how I see it at least I hate the situation in Cyrodiil right now, but banning people seems crazy for not breaking anything, exploiting, cheating, etc. It sucks but it is very much fair play devoid of cheats imo. Just terrible design which will be resolved in less than a week according to ZOS.

How is the AP boosting any different than exploiting a bug to get the vmol skin? Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't ZOS come out and say it was an exploit and exploiters would be punished?

For the record, I don't have the vmol skin yet, and I'm not a grand overlord.

Those people exploited an area of the map to loot chests without fighting bosses (obvious exploit) and then fight and kill Rakkhat from a distance as he stood still without activating the actual fight. There were numerous exploits at work, creating a massive exploit using multiple bugged spots/encounters. You also could loot and defeat Hard Mode this way. It got people permabanned for good reason.

Farming AP at a Keep by standing on the flag, then having enemy players follow mechanics (though in an immoral way) to flip it for their alliance is 100% not cheating in any way. It's stupid, yes, but absolutely not cheating or abusing bugs/exploits. It's just using badly implemented mechanics in the most obvious way they'd be used.

Turelus

If they haven't taken a stance in three years on this, I doubt they will take one now.

Iyas

I wish it would be cheating. Especially when you see the amount of ppl doing that on PC EU..But this is only my oppinion.
10 am in the morning. Map is completly yellow; blue and red are poplocked and farming the *** Out of an outpost.

Grumble_and_Grunt

Vaoh wrote: »

Ron_Burgundy_79 wrote: »

Vaoh wrote: »

You'd not only ban half of the already tiny PvP popluation - we would ban a ton of PvEers who jumped in for easy AP as well. All because it is "immoral" to farm AP this way.

We are seeing players who are playing the very mechanics of Keep/Respurce taking. If you capture it, you get AP. Simple. No bugs, exploits, hacks, cheats, or whatever are being used. The current system set in place is just very badly implemented. A simple 5-10min cooldown on the AP ticks would've solved the issue.

Of course this is not moral..... but it still is not something to ban people over. That'd be ridiculous tbh.

Imagine this situation - if a token system was implemented for Maw of Lorkhaj, and the first boss purposely gave quadruple the tokens than other bosses on release. Terrible design which is easily farmable (as we see in PvP right now). Now players start farming this boss. The Devs announce they have the intention of significantly reducing the token drop rate or setting a cooldown on the boss token timer.

Should the players who gained their loot much faster by running Maw with this terrible token design get banned? I'd think not.

This is how I see it at least I hate the situation in Cyrodiil right now, but banning people seems crazy for not breaking anything, exploiting, cheating, etc. It sucks but it is very much fair play devoid of cheats imo. Just terrible design which will be resolved in less than a week according to ZOS.

How is the AP boosting any different than exploiting a bug to get the vmol skin? Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't ZOS come out and say it was an exploit and exploiters would be punished?

For the record, I don't have the vmol skin yet, and I'm not a grand overlord.

Those people exploited an area of the map to loot chests without fighting bosses (obvious exploit) and then fight and kill Rakkhat from a distance as he stood still without activating the actual fight. There were numerous exploits at work, creating a massive exploit using multiple bugged spots/encounters. You also could loot and defeat Hard Mode this way. It got people permabanned for good reason.

Farming AP at a Keep by standing on the flag, then having enemy players follow mechanics (though in an immoral way) to flip it for their alliance is 100% not cheating in any way. It's stupid, yes, but absolutely not cheating or abusing bugs/exploits. It's just using badly implemented mechanics in the most obvious way they'd be used.

This is by definition is cheating is it not?

Cheat

1 [no object] Act dishonestly or unfairly in order to gain an advantage.


1.1[with object] Gain an advantage over or deprive of something by using unfair or deceitful methods; defraud.

PvP in this game is inherently objective based, whether you play objectives or not in PvP that is its core system. It revolves mainly around 3 systems and 3 Alliances (Teams); (1) Score with multiple attributing factors related to objectives (2) Leaderboards, a system that revolves around AP aka Emperorship as well as contributing to your end campaign rewards and (3) AvA Ranks The 'reward' system for PvP made apparent by; sense of progression, skill points/ achievements, titles and symbols etc.

The 3 systems intertwine with each other to form Cyrodiil PvP. The leaderboard system encourages players to PvP to gain AP to position themselves onto the leaderboards in order to obtain Emperorship, which then spills into the score/objective based system of obtaining AP via capture/defences as well as capturing the 6 Emperor keeps to become Emperor, with all actions contributing to AvA ranks.

That is PvP at its core and as 'designed' since I see this word being thrown around a lot.

Now I know as well as most that the system has gotten stale over the years and that a lot of players (myself included) no longer play objective PvP and therefore care little for the systems in place, but this isn't the case for everyone, new players especially. This is how PvP is designed to be played and whether you play objectives or not you're merely playing around these systems and what is happening on the map to orientate your PvP.

Recently however there have been numerical changes, designed to encourage people to play Cyrodiil as designed by the development team in increasing the AP gains from 'objectives' to compliment all systems. To encourage more objective based PvP by feeding directly into the rewards (3).

However because of this select individuals have congregated on multiple Alliances to manipulate this change to significantly increase their AP gains aka boosting, something that is frowned upon in next to all PvP orientated games.

Many claim they are simply reaping the benefits of a flawed system, but by definition this is false. The problem itself isn't the numerical changes to AP (yes they are high/ considered too much making the AvA reward system redundant potentially as well as the recent changes for AP: Gold with the new overland bags). The abuse/manipulation and by definition cheating comes from the dishonest and unfair gameplay from trading kills with 'enemy players'. To be in agreement with the opposing Alliance (Team) to give each other AP aka significant advantages over those who are playing honestly.

An example of this is how doing so affects leaderboards and Emperorship. How it spoils the designed reward system of PvP. Something that is clearly being stressed by many in game and on the forums. It also for the PvE players coming to leech for Achievements is a dishonest means of obtaining those and as well as it's a dishonest means of making gold currently in ESO which then affects economy also (although is less an issue).

People such as @Vaoh here, no disrespect can have their views, but by definition it is cheating. I am shocked so many of the community defend this or even question it to the point they feel they need clarification from ZOS. Although I do feel we should receive it in light of all this @ZOS_BrianWheeler.

But simply put it should be obvious in an environment with systems mentioned above as to how they were designed where you are purposely negotiating with other 'teams' to behave in such a manipulative way to abuse the rewarding system then claim to be simply playing as intended is outright deceitful and unethical, also traits also associated with cheating.

To put it into perspective. Football/Soccer, a sport everyone is familiar with. If both teams were to negotiate with each other before the game to pre determine a forced outcome 'winner' to benefit themselves financially it would be considered a scandal. It's not so different here. Difference being the financial aid/reward is the AP with the winners being both parties who willingly participated in the agreement. This would in directly affect the integrity of the club, in this case the game rep for PvP. One that is already dire and it also affects the third party the other clubs, in this case say those who do not partake, as in they do not reap any benefits, but have been deceived and suffer for it (leaderboard positions etc)

I am sorry but I don't see how it isn't cheating, despite all the discussed work arounds and loop holes at its core it is cheating through and through.

Apokalypt

It is not cheating.

It may be cheesy and all, but if Zenimax didn`t wan`t it to happen, they could have fixed it with the last maintenance.

Ranks in ESO don`t say much. It is (or was) just an indicator on how much time you spent farming in Cyrodiil.
Zergs etc. made pvp *** before that "exploit".

The vMoL skin was different, because it clearly was not intended and a bug. Also, it is related to "skill" and not just time spent.

Even with the keep flipping, you still need 100+ hours to reach rank 50....but IMO better than 1000+ hours...

They should have made arena pvp for the real pvpers, because that actually would indicate something...

Grumble_and_Grunt

@Apokalypt Not sure how you personally devaluing the rewards and efforts in PvP to PvE is anyway relevant to whether it is cheating or not?

As for your comment about skill, skill and time spent 9/10 have a positive correlation...In the case of vmol from personal experience it doesn't deviate from the pattern...

Time investment for rank is not imo the issue/talking point for cheating here, it's the behaviour of opposing players in a PvP environment behaving unethical and dishonest in playing the game to reap the rewards.

supaskrub

How can it be cheating?, presumably both sides agree to do it beforehand so by that factor alone nobody is cheating anybody for a win, however.. that said it is an exploit of one of the games mechanics that makes it possible. Again it needs to be looked at even though it is working as intended, however the practicalities have shown that there is one big flaw in the scoring and capturing process which should have been caught before being put into a production/live environment and therefore the blame really should lay at the feet of Zenimax for not following the rule that players are opportunists and if there holes and flaws to be found then as sure as eggs are eggs then players will exploit them.

Grumble_and_Grunt

@supaskrub They are cheating all those not partaking in the agreement not themselves.

Dr_Rektar

I don't agree with people who leach ap this days this way. But I don't care if they do it. IMO its their choise, i even do some bombing on them. I think that if people moan that they earned that rank legit way in years and cry about it on forums are nolife loosers. I farmed mine colonel rank for 9 month and still don't care if peole going to reach it or higher during this week

supaskrub

Grumble_and_Grunt wrote: »

@supaskrub They are cheating all those not partaking in the agreement not themselves.

But they are not, concious decisions are made by both sides of the coin, those that are exploiting a mechanic and those that are not. Where would you draw the line on what cheating actually is?.. i hate grinding mobs as i find it mind numbingly boring and it would probs drive me away from the game but i have a friend who doesn't mind it all, lets say we both started playing eso on the same day he's now a 600cp player and im a 400cp player should i say he is cheating me because the extra cp he has over me was from grinding skyreach catacombs etc?

Banetek

You have to be careful as to not target the Role Play Community who often depend on taking turns and such in order for them to have any sense of enjoyment from ESO.. You see unlike real PvP, Rpers depend on staged events, which means it often means staged PvP also known as "Glamour Dueling"

So , if you are in a PvP area and are worried about people trading kills, keeps etc than I highly suggest you nicely ask them of they are RPing , Glamour dueling or are they cheating.

Thank You

White wabbit

Not in the spirit of the game

Cherryblossom

Is it cheating,

This I find a difficult question,

It could be argued that in War there are treaties that allow cooperation.

But this is a game, where AP can give an advantage and also unbalance the already broken economy!

I would also argue that this is no different to the many people who will gain Emp by "fighting" friends at a resource, so they can get the AP gain and Resource tick. Just in case many of you were wondering how some people seem get so much AP every hour!

Vaoh

Grumble_and_Grunt wrote: »

Vaoh wrote: »

Ron_Burgundy_79 wrote: »

Vaoh wrote: »

You'd not only ban half of the already tiny PvP popluation - we would ban a ton of PvEers who jumped in for easy AP as well. All because it is "immoral" to farm AP this way.

We are seeing players who are playing the very mechanics of Keep/Respurce taking. If you capture it, you get AP. Simple. No bugs, exploits, hacks, cheats, or whatever are being used. The current system set in place is just very badly implemented. A simple 5-10min cooldown on the AP ticks would've solved the issue.

Of course this is not moral..... but it still is not something to ban people over. That'd be ridiculous tbh.

Imagine this situation - if a token system was implemented for Maw of Lorkhaj, and the first boss purposely gave quadruple the tokens than other bosses on release. Terrible design which is easily farmable (as we see in PvP right now). Now players start farming this boss. The Devs announce they have the intention of significantly reducing the token drop rate or setting a cooldown on the boss token timer.

Should the players who gained their loot much faster by running Maw with this terrible token design get banned? I'd think not.

This is how I see it at least I hate the situation in Cyrodiil right now, but banning people seems crazy for not breaking anything, exploiting, cheating, etc. It sucks but it is very much fair play devoid of cheats imo. Just terrible design which will be resolved in less than a week according to ZOS.

How is the AP boosting any different than exploiting a bug to get the vmol skin? Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't ZOS come out and say it was an exploit and exploiters would be punished?

For the record, I don't have the vmol skin yet, and I'm not a grand overlord.

Those people exploited an area of the map to loot chests without fighting bosses (obvious exploit) and then fight and kill Rakkhat from a distance as he stood still without activating the actual fight. There were numerous exploits at work, creating a massive exploit using multiple bugged spots/encounters. You also could loot and defeat Hard Mode this way. It got people permabanned for good reason.

Farming AP at a Keep by standing on the flag, then having enemy players follow mechanics (though in an immoral way) to flip it for their alliance is 100% not cheating in any way. It's stupid, yes, but absolutely not cheating or abusing bugs/exploits. It's just using badly implemented mechanics in the most obvious way they'd be used.

This is by definition is cheating is it not?

Cheat

1 [no object] Act dishonestly or unfairly in order to gain an advantage.


1.1[with object] Gain an advantage over or deprive of something by using unfair or deceitful methods; defraud.

PvP in this game is inherently objective based, whether you play objectives or not in PvP that is its core system. It revolves mainly around 3 systems and 3 Alliances (Teams); (1) Score with multiple attributing factors related to objectives (2) Leaderboards, a system that revolves around AP aka Emperorship as well as contributing to your end campaign rewards and (3) AvA Ranks The 'reward' system for PvP made apparent by; sense of progression, skill points/ achievements, titles and symbols etc.

The 3 systems intertwine with each other to form Cyrodiil PvP. The leaderboard system encourages players to PvP to gain AP to position themselves onto the leaderboards in order to obtain Emperorship, which then spills into the score/objective based system of obtaining AP via capture/defences as well as capturing the 6 Emperor keeps to become Emperor, with all actions contributing to AvA ranks.

That is PvP at its core and as 'designed' since I see this word being thrown around a lot.

Now I know as well as most that the system has gotten stale over the years and that a lot of players (myself included) no longer play objective PvP and therefore care little for the systems in place, but this isn't the case for everyone, new players especially. This is how PvP is designed to be played and whether you play objectives or not you're merely playing around these systems and what is happening on the map to orientate your PvP.

Recently however there have been numerical changes, designed to encourage people to play Cyrodiil as designed by the development team in increasing the AP gains from 'objectives' to compliment all systems. To encourage more objective based PvP by feeding directly into the rewards (3).

However because of this select individuals have congregated on multiple Alliances to manipulate this change to significantly increase their AP gains aka boosting, something that is frowned upon in next to all PvP orientated games.

Many claim they are simply reaping the benefits of a flawed system, but by definition this is false. The problem itself isn't the numerical changes to AP (yes they are high/ considered too much making the AvA reward system redundant potentially as well as the recent changes for AP: Gold with the new overland bags). The abuse/manipulation and by definition cheating comes from the dishonest and unfair gameplay from trading kills with 'enemy players'. To be in agreement with the opposing Alliance (Team) to give each other AP aka significant advantages over those who are playing honestly.

An example of this is how doing so affects leaderboards and Emperorship. How it spoils the designed reward system of PvP. Something that is clearly being stressed by many in game and on the forums. It also for the PvE players coming to leech for Achievements is a dishonest means of obtaining those and as well as it's a dishonest means of making gold currently in ESO which then affects economy also (although is less an issue).

People such as @Vaoh here, no disrespect can have their views, but by definition it is cheating. I am shocked so many of the community defend this or even question it to the point they feel they need clarification from ZOS. Although I do feel we should receive it in light of all this @ZOS_BrianWheeler.

But simply put it should be obvious in an environment with systems mentioned above as to how they were designed where you are purposely negotiating with other 'teams' to behave in such a manipulative way to abuse the rewarding system then claim to be simply playing as intended is outright deceitful and unethical, also traits also associated with cheating.

To put it into perspective. Football/Soccer, a sport everyone is familiar with. If both teams were to negotiate with each other before the game to pre determine a forced outcome 'winner' to benefit themselves financially it would be considered a scandal. It's not so different here. Difference being the financial aid/reward is the AP with the winners being both parties who willingly participated in the agreement. This would in directly affect the integrity of the club, in this case the game rep for PvP. One that is already dire and it also affects the third party the other clubs, in this case say those who do not partake, as in they do not reap any benefits, but have been deceived and suffer for it (leaderboard positions etc)

I am sorry but I don't see how it isn't cheating, despite all the discussed work arounds and loop holes at its core it is cheating through and through.

LOL. Tyvm for calling me out despite the fact that I've been quite vocally against this behavior. Totally going to support your argument. (-_-)

The difference between you and I is that I'm only here to shed light on the circumstances as we know them and as ZOS has treated this behavior in the past, whereas you are asking for hordes and hordes of your daily PvPers (scarce population as it is) to be removed from the game.

If you are going to create a thread asking a question don't get angry when people answer in a way that doesn't support your preconceived arguments. You really shouldn't have asked the question in your thread title if you insist on fighting about the answer.

This is not cheating, and no matter how much you insist it is this will not change. You can dig as deep as you want, find definitions of cheating on Google and apply them on your own terms, compare real life to ESO (fr?) and so much more - it changes nothing at all.

In the past, people boosted AP by allowing themselves to respawn and be killed nearby over and over again in rapid succession. We asked ZoS about bans, and they explicitly stated that such behavior was not at all bannable and would be handled by other means. It lead to the addition of a cooldown on gaining full AP when you kill any individual player (fixed the issue).

Our current situation is the same - people are boosting AP and it's illegitimate. The offense is the same. The solution will also be the same. Expect (as already stated by ZOS) for changes to be added on Keep/Outpost/Resource/Flag capture that make such methods of farming AP no longer worth it and in turn solving the issue.

Does the situation suck right now? Yes.
Will it be resolved very soon? Yes.
Should people that took part in playing the game and not cheating/exploiting/hacking be removed from the community? That is up to anyone to decide, but *I* believe that it is not at all something we should remove like half of our PvPers and many PvEers for.

Magic_Longsword

Vaoh wrote: »

Grumble_and_Grunt wrote: »

Vaoh wrote: »

Ron_Burgundy_79 wrote: »

Vaoh wrote: »

You'd not only ban half of the already tiny PvP popluation - we would ban a ton of PvEers who jumped in for easy AP as well. All because it is "immoral" to farm AP this way.

We are seeing players who are playing the very mechanics of Keep/Respurce taking. If you capture it, you get AP. Simple. No bugs, exploits, hacks, cheats, or whatever are being used. The current system set in place is just very badly implemented. A simple 5-10min cooldown on the AP ticks would've solved the issue.

Of course this is not moral..... but it still is not something to ban people over. That'd be ridiculous tbh.

Imagine this situation - if a token system was implemented for Maw of Lorkhaj, and the first boss purposely gave quadruple the tokens than other bosses on release. Terrible design which is easily farmable (as we see in PvP right now). Now players start farming this boss. The Devs announce they have the intention of significantly reducing the token drop rate or setting a cooldown on the boss token timer.

Should the players who gained their loot much faster by running Maw with this terrible token design get banned? I'd think not.

This is how I see it at least I hate the situation in Cyrodiil right now, but banning people seems crazy for not breaking anything, exploiting, cheating, etc. It sucks but it is very much fair play devoid of cheats imo. Just terrible design which will be resolved in less than a week according to ZOS.

How is the AP boosting any different than exploiting a bug to get the vmol skin? Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't ZOS come out and say it was an exploit and exploiters would be punished?

For the record, I don't have the vmol skin yet, and I'm not a grand overlord.

Those people exploited an area of the map to loot chests without fighting bosses (obvious exploit) and then fight and kill Rakkhat from a distance as he stood still without activating the actual fight. There were numerous exploits at work, creating a massive exploit using multiple bugged spots/encounters. You also could loot and defeat Hard Mode this way. It got people permabanned for good reason.

Farming AP at a Keep by standing on the flag, then having enemy players follow mechanics (though in an immoral way) to flip it for their alliance is 100% not cheating in any way. It's stupid, yes, but absolutely not cheating or abusing bugs/exploits. It's just using badly implemented mechanics in the most obvious way they'd be used.

This is by definition is cheating is it not?

Cheat

1 [no object] Act dishonestly or unfairly in order to gain an advantage.


1.1[with object] Gain an advantage over or deprive of something by using unfair or deceitful methods; defraud.

PvP in this game is inherently objective based, whether you play objectives or not in PvP that is its core system. It revolves mainly around 3 systems and 3 Alliances (Teams); (1) Score with multiple attributing factors related to objectives (2) Leaderboards, a system that revolves around AP aka Emperorship as well as contributing to your end campaign rewards and (3) AvA Ranks The 'reward' system for PvP made apparent by; sense of progression, skill points/ achievements, titles and symbols etc.

The 3 systems intertwine with each other to form Cyrodiil PvP. The leaderboard system encourages players to PvP to gain AP to position themselves onto the leaderboards in order to obtain Emperorship, which then spills into the score/objective based system of obtaining AP via capture/defences as well as capturing the 6 Emperor keeps to become Emperor, with all actions contributing to AvA ranks.

That is PvP at its core and as 'designed' since I see this word being thrown around a lot.

Now I know as well as most that the system has gotten stale over the years and that a lot of players (myself included) no longer play objective PvP and therefore care little for the systems in place, but this isn't the case for everyone, new players especially. This is how PvP is designed to be played and whether you play objectives or not you're merely playing around these systems and what is happening on the map to orientate your PvP.

Recently however there have been numerical changes, designed to encourage people to play Cyrodiil as designed by the development team in increasing the AP gains from 'objectives' to compliment all systems. To encourage more objective based PvP by feeding directly into the rewards (3).

However because of this select individuals have congregated on multiple Alliances to manipulate this change to significantly increase their AP gains aka boosting, something that is frowned upon in next to all PvP orientated games.

Many claim they are simply reaping the benefits of a flawed system, but by definition this is false. The problem itself isn't the numerical changes to AP (yes they are high/ considered too much making the AvA reward system redundant potentially as well as the recent changes for AP: Gold with the new overland bags). The abuse/manipulation and by definition cheating comes from the dishonest and unfair gameplay from trading kills with 'enemy players'. To be in agreement with the opposing Alliance (Team) to give each other AP aka significant advantages over those who are playing honestly.

An example of this is how doing so affects leaderboards and Emperorship. How it spoils the designed reward system of PvP. Something that is clearly being stressed by many in game and on the forums. It also for the PvE players coming to leech for Achievements is a dishonest means of obtaining those and as well as it's a dishonest means of making gold currently in ESO which then affects economy also (although is less an issue).

People such as @Vaoh here, no disrespect can have their views, but by definition it is cheating. I am shocked so many of the community defend this or even question it to the point they feel they need clarification from ZOS. Although I do feel we should receive it in light of all this @ZOS_BrianWheeler.

But simply put it should be obvious in an environment with systems mentioned above as to how they were designed where you are purposely negotiating with other 'teams' to behave in such a manipulative way to abuse the rewarding system then claim to be simply playing as intended is outright deceitful and unethical, also traits also associated with cheating.

To put it into perspective. Football/Soccer, a sport everyone is familiar with. If both teams were to negotiate with each other before the game to pre determine a forced outcome 'winner' to benefit themselves financially it would be considered a scandal. It's not so different here. Difference being the financial aid/reward is the AP with the winners being both parties who willingly participated in the agreement. This would in directly affect the integrity of the club, in this case the game rep for PvP. One that is already dire and it also affects the third party the other clubs, in this case say those who do not partake, as in they do not reap any benefits, but have been deceived and suffer for it (leaderboard positions etc)

I am sorry but I don't see how it isn't cheating, despite all the discussed work arounds and loop holes at its core it is cheating through and through.

LOL. Tyvm for calling me out despite the fact that I've been quite vocally against this behavior. Totally going to support your argument. (-_-)

The difference between you and I is that I'm only here to shed light on the circumstances as we know them and as ZOS has treated this behavior in the past, whereas you are asking for hordes and hordes of your daily PvPers (scarce population as it is) to be removed from the game.

If you are going to create a thread asking a question don't get angry when people answer in a way that doesn't support your preconceived arguments. You really shouldn't have asked the question in your thread title if you insist on fighting about the answer.

This is not cheating, and no matter how much you insist it is this will not change. You can dig as deep as you want, find definitions of cheating on Google and apply them on your own terms, compare real life to ESO (fr?) and so much more - it changes nothing at all.

In the past, people boosted AP by allowing themselves to respawn and be killed nearby over and over again in rapid succession. We asked ZoS about bans, and they explicitly stated that such behavior was not at all bannable and would be handled by other means. It lead to the addition of a cooldown on gaining full AP when you kill any individual player (fixed the issue).

Our current situation is the same - people are boosting AP and it's illegitimate. The offense is the same. The solution will also be the same. Expect (as already stated by ZOS) for changes to be added on Keep/Outpost/Resource/Flag capture that make such methods of farming AP no longer worth it and in turn solving the issue.

Does the situation suck right now? Yes.
Will it be resolved very soon? Yes.
Should people that took part in playing the game and not cheating/exploiting/hacking be removed from the community? That is up to anyone to decide, but *I* believe that it is not at all something we should remove like half of our PvPers and many PvEers for.

AnviOfVai

Most people in PVP now I don't recognize, you go on for 2 years knowing everyone and knowing their moves and skills, and suddenly the campaign is over run with these *newbies* and I'm thinking, *you poor fools* Stone fist to the stomach!

AP was doubled to make people enter Cyrodiil, for these "tests" It's not cheating, its a lure

It won't last long now, things will go back to normal soon...I hope... I don't know how players are being able to tank now with their stamina being so low ):

Grumble_and_Grunt

@Vaoh Didn't call you out merely used your argument as an example since it is a common one. I apologise if you interpreted it as me accusing you of participating nor do I feel I emphasised any real hostility in what I said.

Not once did I say anything about how ZOS should take action. I am simply stating that it is cheating by definition.

How exactly do I apply the definition to my own terms? I call it how it is, stated what PvP in this game is and how the behaviour of select individuals reflects the very definition of cheating. Everything I said was literal.

The RL example was an analogy. Not sure what the 'for real?' is about.

Your example about previous trading only clarifies what I was saying in that it's not intended so players purposely acting on the benefits of unintended mechanics is unsporting and dishonest since ZOS outright said it is illegitimate and changed it. Inb4 someone makes an argument for Ani cancelling, ZOS outright legitimised it, so let's just squash that one there !

Not calling for bans. Not against them either, quite indifferent about it actually. My problem personally comes from the community reaction and how people are quick to excuse any wrong doing.

Vaoh

Grumble_and_Grunt wrote: »

@Vaoh Didn't call you out merely used your argument as an example since it is a common one. I apologise if you interpreted it as me accusing you of participating nor do I feel I emphasised any real hostility in what I said.

Not once did I say anything about how ZOS should take action. I am simply stating that it is cheating by definition.

How exactly do I apply the definition to my own terms? I call it how it is, stated what PvP in this game is and how the behaviour of select individuals reflects the very definition of cheating. Everything I said was literal.

The RL example was an analogy. Not sure what the 'for real?' is about.

Your example about previous trading only clarifies what I was saying in that it's not intended so players purposely acting on the benefits of unintended mechanics is unsporting and dishonest since ZOS outright said it is illegitimate and changed it. Inb4 someone makes an argument for Ani cancelling, ZOS outright legitimised it, so let's just squash that one there !

Not calling for bans. Not against them either, quite indifferent about it actually. My problem personally comes from the community reaction and how people are quick to excuse any wrong doing.

ZOS called it something else. Not illegitimate. I don't know where the comment was but I think it was something about "clever" use of mechanics

And it's cool, no worries. You obviously don't like what is happening right now which is totally fine. Very few players actually like the situation.

The difference of opinion stems from our comparisons to similar past events in ESO. What's happening mimics past events where no bans were even considered, albeit not as bad. Just give ZOS a bit of time to gather their data and it'll stop.

NoFlash

All they need to do is add a cool down same way as if you kill same player you eventually get 0 ap for them to the resources/keeps. Easier said than coded tho.