Gold Sellers- we need a better report system

tallenn

Last night, I noticed some gold selling spam, as I'm sure most of the rest of you did. Of course, I did the responsible thing, and reported them. I was less than impressed with the reporting system, however. If you haven't tried it, it basically brings up a support window, the same you use to report bugs. There is no specific selection for gold selling (for real money, in case that wasn't clear), and reporting someone doesn't automatically ignore the player, which means you have to use up a spot in your finite ignore list for an account that will most likely eventually be banned, but you'll never know when or if that happened, so the spot on your list is gone essentially forever.

If you've played games like Rift, you'll know that reporting gold sellers is really easy, so lots and lots of people do it. Eventually, you almost never see them. At least, that was my experience. It works simply: When you right click on a name in chat, you select report, then select gold selling, and hit ok. The report is sent and the player is temporarily ignored (I think it was for 24 hours, giving them time to investigate and ban the account) without taking up space on your finite ignore list.

The way it's done in ESO was honestly a bit of a hassle, and I doubt I or most people will use it very often. As a result, the spam from those nimrods will be MUCH more prevalent than in some other games. Hopefully, ZOS will realize that the key to getting gold seller spam out of chat is to make it easy for players to report them, as well as a "smart" filter system (again, see Rift).

Note: I'm not advocating "making the game like Rift" so don't even go there. I just used it as an example of a well done reporting system.

Gohlar

I totally agree. A quick option to report for gold spam + ignore should be a standard option now a days. I also tried to report someone and found it was more trouble than it was worth.

Coggage

I haven't seen any on the EU server yet.

murpf

i second this op, i have around 11 people on my ignore list from like 2 hours of play. the gold farmers are crazy annoying, i feel like im back in bc lol.

Thybrinena

Yeah not seen any on the EU server yet.

k9mouse

Agree. use the /feedback command and request that option. ZOS hears us better ingame feedback then on the forums.

Milvan

I think its a kind of virus. I already blocked like 20 of them and they keep coming.

metaldrummer1962b14a_ESO

They use /yell as well as zone chat.
I turned off both...kind of a shame we have to lose a game feature because there is no way to block or report gold spammers.

Fahstolph

Totally agree on this. Logged in yesterday evening and first thing I got was a wall of gold spammer text in my chat box. So probably my first my fist 5 minutes in the game was reporting about 10 of them. That was a pretty annoying. As the OP said, a nice quick gold spammer reporting system like Rift's would do the trick I think.

Stonebreath

There was even one incredibly annoying one who posted a bunch of white space and then a fake name [superman] and then their text. It took a while to figure out why you couldn't ignore the person since their real username was pushed off the screen by the white space before the gold spamming text.

I reported two gold sellers but got fed up and just ignored the rest. Would be nice to have an easier way to do it.

Valethar

This was something we mentioned during Beta. Launching a game without basic core functionality is unforgivable.

Isende

throwin' my one-half cents' worth .. the gold reporting system IS absolutely deplorable. further? i haven't seen any news release, etc, that indicates zenimax is saying, "oh, wow, we have a problem! we're working on it and you should see resolution by launch at the latest!"

yes, i know. that's overly optimistic. but ... herro? guys? *knocks on monitor* anyone listening there?

Korah_Eaglecry

This is a good idea OP. Id also like to see more moderators active in-game during the day. I understand they have quite a bit on their hands rolling out this game. But theres no reason to leave people to themselves.

Jaamonliu

I understand how annoying this gold system is, but like other MMO's. This gold system is not going away. Look at world of warcraft, they still have people spamming gold here and there. Having them make new characters over and over and over again which does not help what so ever. Like everyone says, "ARGH! its getting really annoying." It really takes away the fun factors of the game where people can just farm and trade instead of buying gold with real money and purchasing multiple items...

k9mouse

Gold Farmers never go away, but we can do "damage control" anyways -- we need to keep reporting them! If we just ignore. then it only get worse, this is war! We will take our game from the evil virus of the gold farmers.

When I report them, i just do a screenshot and put the words "gold farmer" in the text box. -- It is kind fast doing that way.
Also, we need to do ingame /feedback, to tell ZOS about it also. If enough people complain about them, faster ZOS can see how big the "problem" is.

Korah_Eaglecry

Gold Farmers are already learning to abuse the ChatLog in ways that prevent players from knowing who actually posted the spam.

Last night a guy was using spaces and an inserted fake name to trick players into thinking he was someone else. Confusing many players as to why they couldnt ignore/report him.

Hours later either the same guy or another gold spammer found a way to overload the chatlog with his spam in a way that you couldnt scroll up or down to his name at all..It would jump to the bottom of his comment or above his comment all together each time.

Tabia

Ignore them first, then do the report and screenshot. That way the account name shows, not just the character name.

Korah_Eaglecry

In Star Trek Online. If a player is reported by X amount of players in a certain window of time. That person is silenced for 24 hours. That might help curb some of the spam for the time being until a simpler report system added.

Oldtimer209

I don't know how realistic it would be to actually sue these websites selling gold to players but, after all they are breaking the ToS. Zenimax/Bethesda may not get any $$$ but it would at least shut the website down.

albelnoxgm

Hirion wrote: »

Yeah not seen any on the EU server yet.

Me neither. 18 hours played on DC and not a single gold seller yet (i bet i just jinxed it) I can see the long term benefit for having AH restricted only for guilds. Not only is the trading player driven and controlled, gold sellers can't control the market by crazy undercutting, item flipping or selling duped items (if that is even possible)

Player controlled trading enviroment combats gold sellers quite effectively. It doesn't stop gold sellers but it sure does slow them down.

I rather join 3 trading guilds than see a global AH being controlled by gold sellers (once again)

Also there's an addon to block gold seling spam (still, do report them)

Eldarth

Having a direct right-click "Report Spam" that adds UserID (not just username) to ignore list, as well as files a spam report. And as mentioned, in STO and Neverwinter, 5 such reports by players automatically silences that account for 24 hours.

If you go a step further GMs could ban that UserID (and their 30 day subscription!). If gold spammers had to purchase a new 30 day subscription after 3-4 spam chats/yells I'll bet it'd be too costly to bother.

CowNRB

Oldtimer209 wrote: »

I don't know how realistic it would be to actually sue these websites selling gold to players but, after all they are breaking the ToS. Zenimax/Bethesda may not get any $$$ but it would at least shut the website down.

it would work if they were out of the usa but most are based in Asia

Indii

It's only this bad because the game has just launched.

The number of gold seller sites out there right now is faaar from sustainable. Gold sellers know this; which is why they're doing everything they can to advertise their services to the target market.

It's logical to expect those numbers to drop off considerably within the near future. This is because many of these sites will just go under when they don't see a return on the investment cost associated with purchasing multiple copies of the game to get around bans and ignores (as well as other online advertising).

Of those that do persist, repeat business and word of mouth will replace spamming as the preferred model.

So don't despair.

But do of course report and screenshot. Above all, make sure you name the site so that ESO can add it to a list of banned terms that prevent the chat from reaching other players.

tallenn

Tabia wrote: »

Ignore them first, then do the report and screenshot. That way the account name shows, not just the character name.

That's a great idea.

Laggus

Getting increasingly more difficult to see their names now. Some use ridiculously small font for their name that you don't see it. In fairness to Zenimax they do reply to my reports. Funnily though they reply to my in game reporting of Gold Spammers by email saying it would be better to use the in game report feature...I did though! So yes, perhaps better thought needs to go into specifically having an option to report Gold Sellers.

Dublicious

Yeah, between these guys and the general grumblers and all-caps people I've been ignoring zone entirely.

spinedoc

It's nuts how many gold sellers I encountered in just one day of play, jeez we aren't even into the general release. I love the game, the launch was pretty darn smooth, but these gold sellers are freakin annoying the heck out of me. Just one spam from them fills up my entire chat box.

spinedoc

What I wonder, is how did they farm gold already? Or are they exploiting somehow?

kewl

My customer service reports became increasingly agressive as the evening progressed. ZOS need to fix this quickly.

Megaonev1

Seems like rather than ignore a character name, you should be able to ignore the user account. What stops them from just creating a new character with a different name?

Paks_ESO

Blizzard sued gold seller companies for spam and won so there are legal angles Zeni can take in addressing gold sellers.

To make reporting easier on us, I would love to see options added to right click that lets us select report gold sellers, spammers, or bots. The action would send a screen, chat snip, and account info straight to a team that just handles gold sellers/botters/spammers who could then take immediate action.

Addressing the problem early is the best way to make this a none issue sooner. I can't image Zeni doesn't have some contingency plan for dealing with gold sellers though since they have such a negative effect on gaming experiences.