VIDEO: Bar swap glitch, and how to 100% reproduce it.

splitsand

***EDIT***

Here is a very good example of the bug, and how it negatively impacts gameplay


https://youtu.be/F1_kLEhGF0U

Hello All,

Here is the original video I made a few months ago showcasing the bug and had sent to the team.

https://youtu.be/MsjqJq8FaTU

How to recreate the bar swap glitch 100% of the time:
1. Change your bar swap bind to scroll wheel (even though, during lag you can easily do this with any bind...It is just easier to use with scroll wheel for demonstration purposes)
2. Bar swap animation cancel and flick the scroll wheel up (the point is to have it scroll multiple times, even if it is an exaggeration of what you would normally do)
3. Now you have the wrong weapon on the wrong bar, and are locked out of skills for ~1.5 seconds.



Why is this bug so important? Why can't you just change you key bind? This has never happened to me?

All of these questions are valid, and good to ask to spark a discussion.

• Why is this bug so important? This bug causes you to not only get locked out of your skills, but can cause the wrong skills to fire off. Pretend you are about to launch your ulti on an unsuspecting player...You go to your back bar to buff up and then bar swap and hit your ultimate! But, guess what you got the bug. Now your ulti didn't fire, and instead after 1+ seconds the game swaps back to your old bar and uses your backbar ulti. This is something I have seen and had happen to me countless times. It hurts the fluidity of the combat.
  
• Why can't you just change your keybind? Good question, unfortunately this can happen with any keybind under lag and server stress. Scroll wheel as a barswap bind is the easiest way to reproduce it, which is why I do it in the video and in game. We have all had instances where the game lags and we have to press a button/skill more than once to fire. This problem occurs when that happens. Unfortunately, lag is a part of the game.
  
• This has never happened to me? Well, I'm jealous. However, it occurs much more frequently to people who bar swap cancel very quickly. The faster your reaction time or play style is will increase the chances of getting the bug. Even if you are not impacted by this bug, I would appreciate it if you still helped support the cause to get it fixed.

This bug has nothing to do with addons, repairing your game, or anything else. It can be reproduced very easily on any copy of the game.

***I have a more recent video that I would be willing to link. It is of a fresh installed copy of ESO that is running with 0 (they were all cleared and deleted manually) addons that is still able to 100% reproduce this bug. I didn't want to post it because I get very frustrated while making it, and took a tone I didn't think would be productive or constructive to this problem.***



My history reporting this bug:

I spoke with @Gilliamtherogue a few months ago about this and he was very nice (I'm honestly super happy he's a part of the team) and sent a video I made of the bug to him. He then sent the bug report and video along the line and told me that it was being looked into. I'm 100% sure he did this, and trust him fully.

For months I and many others (just search "Bar Swap Glitch" , "Bar Swap Bug") have patiently waited for any type of response about the issue, and when a fix would be issued. I understand when pushing new DLC's and Crown Store items game bugs tend to get overlooked. But, this is something that really makes combat unrewarding and very frustrating.

This is such a fun game, with so many things that make it great -- especially the community. It just hurts me to know issues like this are never seriously looked at, but instead pushed to the back of the line.

I think a very easy fix would be to make bar swap only register inputs every 0.3s or only when it is not on cooldown. Bar swap (like almost every skill in the game) is on a global cool-down, so not allowing it to be pressed while on that "cooldown" sounds like an easy fix. I'm not a game developer, so I have no idea if that would work.

@ZOS_GinaBruno can we please get an official response and an ETA for when this bug will be fixed?

Thanks,
- splitsand

SkoobySnaxx

it happens on console rarely but when it does happen i just unequip all my weapons and reequip it

splitsand

SkoobySnaxx wrote: »

it happens on console rarely but when it does happen i just unequip all my weapons and reequip it

Which is a perfect example that it happens with any keybind. You shouldn't have to deal with a bug like this. Getting locked out of skills and having a visual bug (which really throws off combat) along with the wrong skills firing is not something that should be happening.

Thanks for the response

zaria

This explains a lot had lots of problem with it on my new mouse, I use tilt of mouse wheel, left and right for bar 1 and 2.
Yes it might be an issue with the new naga to.

splitsand

zaria wrote: »

This explains a lot had lots of problem with it on my new mouse, I use tilt of mouse wheel, left and right for bar 1 and 2.
Yes it might be an issue with the new naga to.

This is not hardware related. It can be reproduced with any keybind on a fresh installed copy of the game.

zaria

splitsand wrote: »

zaria wrote: »

This explains a lot had lots of problem with it on my new mouse, I use tilt of mouse wheel, left and right for bar 1 and 2.
Yes it might be an issue with the new naga to.

This is not hardware related. It can be reproduced with any keybind on a fresh installed copy of the game.

I know, i will also test it, just saying in my specific case it might be hardware / driver but probably related like sending multiple requests.

MJallday

Have you posted this in the bug section? Otherwise it will get buried

Tasear

Try mailing a different Dev on forums with bug infromation.

Jaimeh

It's happened to me a few times, most recently during a BRP run, I use a controller and gamepad UI, so not sure what combination causes it, but it can really throw you off and mess with a fight...

splitsand

MJallday wrote: »

Have you posted this in the bug section? Otherwise it will get buried

It wouldn't let me post it in there for some reason. Plus there are already dozens of similar posts complaining. It doesn't matter where it gets posted or reported.

I think this might be a "squeaky wheel gets the grease" type of issue.

The more people I talk to the more I find out how widespread and absolutely infuriating this glitch is.

We just need to make sure they hear us.

splitsand

Jaimeh wrote: »

It's happened to me a few times, most recently during a BRP run, I use a controller and gamepad UI, so not sure what combination causes it, but it can really throw you off and mess with a fight...

It is when you press bar swap more than one time. When lag occurs sometimes skills don't fire on the first press which leads you to hit it again. This is how the glitch happens.

Thanks for the response

Hopefully enough people will comment and ZoS will pay attention on this one. It's been going on far too long with no response.

splitsand

Tasear wrote: »

Try mailing a different Dev on forums with bug infromation.

It's a long story, I was in a BG with Gill and complained over the group chat about the bug and he asked me to send him a video explaining it. I didn't just message him out of the blue. I know it's not his responsibility.

grkkll

one of my Stam blades has a different problem where the graphic does not keep pace with the weapon type, e.g. wep 1, bow
fires light then skill 3, swap still shows bow but 2 Handed skills are in focus so damage is from 2 handed. this continues for 30 seconds or so with the weapon effect switching but the display showing the wrong weapon.

Ertosi

An additional way to initiate the bar-swap glitch is to switch bars while mounting. The timing can be tricky and for whatever reason works more reliably on some toons than others. I've got one toon where it always triggers and a couple where it rarely does; I've not been able to narrow down why it works better for some than others.

Sergykid

barswap sometimes seems to swap slotted effects too.

for example mages guild abilities, i get the bonus 4% max mag and rec from slotted abilities on the other bar, not the bar with them slotted.

don't know if barswap problem or mages guild abilities problem.

splitsand

Ertosi wrote: »

An additional way to initiate the bar-swap glitch is to switch bars while mounting. The timing can be tricky and for whatever reason works more reliably on some toons than others. I've got one toon where it always triggers and a couple where it rarely does; I've not been able to narrow down why it works better for some than others.

Interesting. Can you post a video in this thread showing it?

Alinhbo_Tyaka

I have this occur frequently and I've bound my swap to the left Caps Lock key. It really gets annoying when thew bars get out of sync and all of a sudden I'm out of Magicka and/or stamina because I'm not hitting the keys I am expecting to.

splitsand

Alinhbo_Tyaka wrote: »

I have this occur frequently and I've bound my swap to the left Caps Lock key. It really gets annoying when thew bars get out of sync and all of a sudden I'm out of Magicka and/or stamina because I'm not hitting the keys I am expecting to.

I feel your pain. I've died many times or caused a group wipe because I'm spamming the wrong skill because of the visual glitch alone.

KenaPKK

I have forwarded this new forum post on to the team. Thanks bud.

You are right that this bug has been in the pipeline for a long time. It's not a simple one to fix, unfortunately.

D0PAMINE

KenaPKK wrote: »

I have forwarded this new forum post on to the team. Thanks bud.

You are right that this bug has been in the pipeline for a long time. It's not a simple one to fix, unfortunately.

Thanks Kena. and Thanks @splitsand This bug has been driving me berzerk.

splitsand

D0PAMINE wrote: »

KenaPKK wrote: »

I have forwarded this new forum post on to the team. Thanks bud.

You are right that this bug has been in the pipeline for a long time. It's not a simple one to fix, unfortunately.

Thanks Kena. and Thanks @splitsand This bug has been driving me berzerk.

Happy to help!

D0PAMINE

splitsand wrote: »

D0PAMINE wrote: »

KenaPKK wrote: »

I have forwarded this new forum post on to the team. Thanks bud.

You are right that this bug has been in the pipeline for a long time. It's not a simple one to fix, unfortunately.

Thanks Kena. and Thanks @splitsand This bug has been driving me berzerk.

Happy to help!

I havn't watched the video because im at work. Could this be related to my issue with skills like Endless Hail getting double casted, because the Area Circle carries over when I bar swap even when it's already casted, and im not using the same key when I swap over.

For example, im on my bow bar, and lets say its bound to key 4. I cast it swap over to my main bar and hit a skill boumd with 5, frequently endless gets cast again WITH the second skill. Im on a Stamplar when I do this and don't always open with Power of the Light because them adds move out of hail. This happens with duel cast skills like Eruption (ash cloud) on my DK and my friends DK. Also, my Animation canceling is decent, but not perfect. I usually bar swap or block cancel.

Narvuntien

I am almost always locked out of skills after bar swapping. I have to block cancel to get out of the lock. Because of this awkwardness that I put elemental blockade on my front bar when doing target dummy tests and it increases my dps because I can bar swap less.

I have 300 ping

Vapirko

Happens constantly and I don’t use the scroll wheel. It throws off my combat so badly as I use the wpn visual queue to know which skill bar I’m on.

Tasear

splitsand wrote: »

Hello All,

Here is the original video I made a few months ago showcasing the bug and had sent to the team.

https://youtu.be/MsjqJq8FaTU

How to recreate the bar swap glitch 100% of the time:
1. Change your bar swap bind to scroll wheel (even though, during lag you can easily do this with any bind...It is just easier to use with scroll wheel for demonstration purposes)
2. Bar swap animation cancel and flick the scroll wheel up (the point is to have it scroll multiple times, even if it is an exaggeration of what you would normally do)
3. Now you have the wrong weapon on the wrong bar, and are locked out of skills for ~1.5 seconds.



Why is this bug so important? Why can't you just change you key bind? This has never happened to me?

All of these questions are valid, and good to ask to spark a discussion.

• Why is this bug so important? This bug causes you to not only get locked out of your skills, but can cause the wrong skills to fire off. Pretend you are about to launch your ulti on an unsuspecting player...You go to your back bar to buff up and then bar swap and hit your ultimate! But, guess what you got the bug. Now your ulti didn't fire, and instead after 1+ seconds the game swaps back to your old bar and uses your backbar ulti. This is something I have seen and had happen to me countless times. It hurts the fluidity of the combat.
  
• Why can't you just change your keybind? Good question, unfortunately this can happen with any keybind under lag and server stress. Scroll wheel as a barswap bind is the easiest way to reproduce it, which is why I do it in the video and in game. We have all had instances where the game lags and we have to press a button/skill more than once to fire. This problem occurs when that happens. Unfortunately, lag is a part of the game.
  
• This has never happened to me? Well, I'm jealous. However, it occurs much more frequently to people who bar swap cancel very quickly. The faster your reaction time or play style is will increase the chances of getting the bug. Even if you are not impacted by this bug, I would appreciate it if you still helped support the cause to get it fixed.

This bug has nothing to do with addons, repairing your game, or anything else. It can be reproduced very easily on any copy of the game.

***I have a more recent video that I would be willing to link. It is of a fresh installed copy of ESO that is running with 0 (they were all cleared and deleted manually) addons that is still able to 100% reproduce this bug. I didn't want to post it because I get very frustrated while making it, and took a tone I didn't think would be productive or constructive to this problem.***



My history reporting this bug:

I spoke with @Gilliamtherogue a few months ago about this and he was very nice (I'm honestly super happy he's a part of the team) and sent a video I made of the bug to him. He then sent the bug report and video along the line and told me that it was being looked into. I'm 100% sure he did this, and trust him fully.

For months I and many others (just search "Bar Swap Glitch" , "Bar Swap Bug") have patiently waited for any type of response about the issue, and when a fix would be issued. I understand when pushing new DLC's and Crown Store items game bugs tend to get overlooked. But, this is something that really makes combat unrewarding and very frustrating.

This is such a fun game, with so many things that make it great -- especially the community. It just hurts me to know issues like this are never seriously looked at, but instead pushed to the back of the line.

I think a very easy fix would be to make bar swap only register inputs every 0.3s or only when it is not on cooldown. Bar swap (like almost every skill in the game) is on a global cool-down, so not allowing it to be pressed while on that "cooldown" sounds like an easy fix. I'm not a game developer, so I have no idea if that would work.

@ZOS_GinaBruno can we please get an official response and an ETA for when this bug will be fixed?

Thanks,
- splitsand

Gina gets notifications often. If you want to pass a bug report then you have send in game forum for a better chance.

P.S maybe bugs reporting will be better in 2019.

splitsand

D0PAMINE wrote: »

splitsand wrote: »

D0PAMINE wrote: »

KenaPKK wrote: »

I have forwarded this new forum post on to the team. Thanks bud.

You are right that this bug has been in the pipeline for a long time. It's not a simple one to fix, unfortunately.

Thanks Kena. and Thanks @splitsand This bug has been driving me berzerk.

Happy to help!

I havn't watched the video because im at work. Could this be related to my issue with skills like Endless Hail getting double casted, because the Area Circle carries over when I bar swap even when it's already casted, and im not using the same key when I swap over.

For example, im on my bow bar, and lets say its bound to key 4. I cast it swap over to my main bar and hit a skill boumd with 5, frequently endless gets cast again WITH the second skill. Im on a Stamplar when I do this and don't always open with Power of the Light because them adds move out of hail. This happens with duel cast skills like Eruption (ash cloud) on my DK and my friends DK. Also, my Animation canceling is decent, but not perfect. I usually bar swap or block cancel.

I'm not sure what you are asking exactly.
However, you can have a skill double casted (althought, it is very rare).

For example:
You have Endless Hail bound to your "4" key. You hit it and bar swap cancel. If the bug happens and you are trying to use a skill on the other bar that also uses the "4" key, then it can and will cause you to swap back to your old bar and fire Endless Hail again.

I hope this clears that up.

splitsand

Vapirko wrote: »

Happens constantly and I don’t use the scroll wheel. It throws off my combat so badly as I use the wpn visual queue to know which skill bar I’m on.

Which is exactly why I'm trying to bring some more attention to this. Dying or causing a group wipe because of a bug is the most frustrating thing in the game.

A good example of this was me in vDSA this weekend, I was trying to hit vigor to heal the other DPS, but I kept casting the wrong skill over and over. On my end I saw my bow out and though "I'm on my back bar, this is where vigor is!" However, in reality I was firing rending slashes, but because of the bug there wasn't even a rending slashes visual animation.

Eventually, the other DPS died (they were counting on my vigor) and we wiped. The sad thing is I probably could have just killed the boss and final mobs, but the seconds wasted firing the wrong skill caused me to miss a mechanic and eventually wipe.

With everything going on we need to count on our inputs firing correctly.

MaxJrFTW

I had to deal with this same bug for a couple of months, eventually i figured out it was because i had changed the swap bar key bind to the mouse wheel. Switched back to the original key bind and it never happened again.

This is the thread i made when it was happening to me back in september.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/437087/weapon-swap-bug#latest

splitsand

MaxJrFTW wrote: »

I had to deal with this same bug for a couple of months, eventually i figured out it was because i had changed the swap bar key bind to the mouse wheel. Switched back to the original key bind and it never happened again.

This is the thread i made when it was happening to me back in september.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/437087/weapon-swap-bug#latest

It can and does still happen with any keybind. Scroll wheel is just the easiest to reproduce it with.

Here are a few things that increase the chance of the bug:
1. Lag
2. Speed of the bar swap cancel (honestly, you can hit bar swap 100,000 times in a fraction of a second, but if you wait long enough between the skill fire the bug will not happen.)
3. Number of times bar swap is pressed

Also, the answer to this problem isn't just "switch your keybind." There are multiple players across the many platforms with various keybinds (not all scroll wheel) that have commented in this thread. I'm not singling you out here, I just hope that is not the "fix" the devs recommend.

Another reason changing your keybind is a bad idea (even though it doesn't matter) is that some players have spent days, months, or even years developing muscle memory while playing this game. Switching keybinds is like asking a guitarist to play with his opposite hand, yeah they might learn it more quickly versus someone new, but there is no chance they will be nearly as efficient as they were before.

I appreciate the comment, and am happy you haven't been running into the bug lately. As I said before, the best fix is slowing down your animation cancels. But, once again that isn't something very reasonable.

splitsand

I've added a video example of how the glitch/bug negatively impacts everyday gameplay into the original post. @ZOS_GinaBruno I would really appreciate a dev response to this problem. I understand it's New Years and things might be a little slow, but any form of communication would be great

Thank you to everyone who has commented so far!

- splitsand

D0PAMINE

splitsand wrote: »

D0PAMINE wrote: »

splitsand wrote: »

D0PAMINE wrote: »

KenaPKK wrote: »

I have forwarded this new forum post on to the team. Thanks bud.

You are right that this bug has been in the pipeline for a long time. It's not a simple one to fix, unfortunately.

Thanks Kena. and Thanks @splitsand This bug has been driving me berzerk.

Happy to help!

I havn't watched the video because im at work. Could this be related to my issue with skills like Endless Hail getting double casted, because the Area Circle carries over when I bar swap even when it's already casted, and im not using the same key when I swap over.

For example, im on my bow bar, and lets say its bound to key 4. I cast it swap over to my main bar and hit a skill boumd with 5, frequently endless gets cast again WITH the second skill. Im on a Stamplar when I do this and don't always open with Power of the Light because them adds move out of hail. This happens with duel cast skills like Eruption (ash cloud) on my DK and my friends DK. Also, my Animation canceling is decent, but not perfect. I usually bar swap or block cancel.

I'm not sure what you are asking exactly.
However, you can have a skill double casted (althought, it is very rare).

For example:
You have Endless Hail bound to your "4" key. You hit it and bar swap cancel. If the bug happens and you are trying to use a skill on the other bar that also uses the "4" key, then it can and will cause you to swap back to your old bar and fire Endless Hail again.

I hope this clears that up.

Thats probably what is happening. Thank You. I need to pay more attention to what im actually doing when it happens so I can reproduce it.