the account was unbanned. thanks zos

Moonspawn · June 7

danko355 · June 7

This is probably not due to him buying crowns, but due to you giving him 16 mil gold. You should never give away such amounts to new players, this activity automatically is detected by game as suspicious (probably bot and fraud prevention). Even 1 million gold could be enough to trigger this reaction, 16 millions is really an overkill

valenwood_vegan · June 7

That's a bummer; as mentioned something was probably auto-flagged as suspicions (likely the large amount of gold being transferred to a new account and then to the crown seller).

I would suggest that they try and follow the instructions here: https://help.elderscrollsonline.com/#en/answer/8540 to submit a ticket to appeal the ban. Hope it can be resolved quickly.

@ZOS_Kevin or a forum mod might be able to offer some assistance as well.

Araneae6537 · June 7

Wow, has this not come up before where a newer player wins a guild raffle or something?

Hopefully this can be looked into and the ban removed if no evidence of wrongdoing is found.

Kappachi · June 7

Araneae6537 wrote: »

Wow, has this not come up before where a newer player wins a guild raffle or something? Hopefully this can be looked into and the ban removed if no evidence of wrongdoing is found.

Because that doesn't really happen? new players aren't looking for guilds with raffles and if they are they likely wouldn't be able to afford the fees for the raffle at least some weeks or months into it.

My advice: give your friends enough gold to buy 1 house in the game with gold, I always have them check out and preview the houses that can be bought with gold then give them enough to buy that house and they're on their own from there. It also gives them something to work for later, building furnishings and such to make it their own, so it's effectively never been more than 4mil. Giving someone 16mil out of nowhere is VERY sus and not normal.

It will be fixed with some correspondance with support though... Most likely, as long as you don't have a history of giving out such large amounts to seemingly random players.

Moonspawn · June 8

He has submitted the ticket #240608-001389 through this link (https://help.elderscrollsonline.com/app/account_recovery). But how will he track it without access to the site account itself?

ZOS_Kraken · June 8

@Moonspawn He will a response is his email that he can communicate with them through.

Araneae6537 · June 8

Kappachi wrote: »

Araneae6537 wrote: »

Wow, has this not come up before where a newer player wins a guild raffle or something? Hopefully this can be looked into and the ban removed if no evidence of wrongdoing is found.

Because that doesn't really happen? new players aren't looking for guilds with raffles and if they are they likely wouldn't be able to afford the fees for the raffle at least some weeks or months into it.

My advice: give your friends enough gold to buy 1 house in the game with gold, I always have them check out and preview the houses that can be bought with gold then give them enough to buy that house and they're on their own from there. It also gives them something to work for later, building furnishings and such to make it their own, so it's effectively never been more than 4mil. Giving someone 16mil out of nowhere is VERY sus and not normal.

It will be fixed with some correspondance with support though... Most likely, as long as you don't have a history of giving out such large amounts to seemingly random players.

It certainly could happen. Why wouldn’t someone join a guild if it aligned with their interests or had friends in it? The very first guild I joined as a new player had raffles too, I think tickets were only 500 gold, and both my current trading and houses guilds have raffles with 1000 gold tickets. I even won a raffle in my first guild, not too soon though, fortunately. Anyway, it should be a flag to check, may even a temporary suspension for investigation, but not an automatic ban.

JustLovely · June 8

danko355 wrote: »

This is probably not due to him buying crowns, but due to you giving him 16 mil gold. You should never give away such amounts to new players, this activity automatically is detected by game as suspicious (probably bot and fraud prevention). Even 1 million gold could be enough to trigger this reaction, 16 millions is really an overkill

People do transactions and gifts of this degree on a regular basis without getting banned. It's far more likely the buying crowns with gold. That's what ZOS is really cracking down on. When ZOS doesn't get their cut they get upset.

XSTRONG · June 8

I think the 16 million gold got him banned.

If the game consider that the guy bought gold from your account i would think your account will be looked at to?

Strange if not

XSTRONG · June 8

JustLovely wrote: »

danko355 wrote: »

This is probably not due to him buying crowns, but due to you giving him 16 mil gold. You should never give away such amounts to new players, this activity automatically is detected by game as suspicious (probably bot and fraud prevention). Even 1 million gold could be enough to trigger this reaction, 16 millions is really an overkill

People do transactions and gifts of this degree on a regular basis without getting banned. It's far more likely the buying crowns with gold. That's what ZOS is really cracking down on. When ZOS doesn't get their cut they get upset.

Zos got their cut if the Crown seller bought his crowns legit.

JustLovely · June 8

XSTRONG wrote: »

JustLovely wrote: »

danko355 wrote: »

This is probably not due to him buying crowns, but due to you giving him 16 mil gold. You should never give away such amounts to new players, this activity automatically is detected by game as suspicious (probably bot and fraud prevention). Even 1 million gold could be enough to trigger this reaction, 16 millions is really an overkill

People do transactions and gifts of this degree on a regular basis without getting banned. It's far more likely the buying crowns with gold. That's what ZOS is really cracking down on. When ZOS doesn't get their cut they get upset.

Zos got their cut if the Crown seller bought his crowns legit.

But ZOS wants everyone to buy crowns directly from the crown store. Maybe you missed all the months, I think it was almost a year, that crown gifting was completely disabled. Now the crown/gold trade rate is 10x what it was prior to the disabling of crown gifting all together.

I know guild masters that regularly move 100 million gold between accounts with no issues. It's the crown gifting that ZOS has cracked down on so hard, not gold transfers. You can check the thread about crown gifting that I think is still sticky posted.

freespirit · June 8

JustLovely wrote: »

XSTRONG wrote: »

JustLovely wrote: »

danko355 wrote: »

This is probably not due to him buying crowns, but due to you giving him 16 mil gold. You should never give away such amounts to new players, this activity automatically is detected by game as suspicious (probably bot and fraud prevention). Even 1 million gold could be enough to trigger this reaction, 16 millions is really an overkill

People do transactions and gifts of this degree on a regular basis without getting banned. It's far more likely the buying crowns with gold. That's what ZOS is really cracking down on. When ZOS doesn't get their cut they get upset.

Zos got their cut if the Crown seller bought his crowns legit.

But ZOS wants everyone to buy crowns directly from the crown store. Maybe you missed all the months, I think it was almost a year, that crown gifting was completely disabled. Now the crown/gold trade rate is 10x what it was prior to the disabling of crown gifting all together.

I know guild masters that regularly move 100 million gold between accounts with no issues. It's the crown gifting that ZOS has cracked down on so hard, not gold transfers. You can check the thread about crown gifting that I think is still sticky posted.

It's the movement of the 16 million gold for sure.

Crown selling is allowed and happens everyday.

Gold selling is not allowed in any way, shape or form ..... 16 million going to a new account would definitely get flagged, tbh I'm more surprised op wasn't suspended too!

XSTRONG · June 10

Seems like one of the accounts involved used their account to sell Gold

Moonspawn · June 10

XSTRONG wrote: »

Seems like one of the accounts involved used their account to sell Gold

but he did not transfer the gold to a ''gold selling'' account. Trading real currency for gold would be illegal. He transferred the gold to a ''crown selling'' account. And received multiple DLCs in return.

Aorys · June 10

how does someone know if the crown seller they deal with is engaged in fraud?

JanTanhide · June 10

Sorry to see this happen to anyone! Hope he gets his account unbanned soon. IDK about giving large amounts of gold being a trigger. Hope not. I gave over 2 million to another player the other day.

Araneae6537 · June 10

That doesn’t make sense: A gold-selling account would not be trading gold for DLCs, they’d be trading for overpriced potatoes and such. The only explanation I can think of is that someone is not being honest.

valenwood_vegan · June 10

There was a big issue last year with crown selling accounts being involved in some kind of fraudulent activity.

I don't think we were ever given the full details, but it resulted in crown gifting being entirely turned off for a while.

I would hope that they wouldn't punish crown buyers, who have no idea if the account they are dealing with is engaged in fraud, but if true this is something I have feared since the crown fiasco last year.

I personally will no longer do business with any "untrusted" crown sellers and basically only buy within my guilds. Usually directly from the GM or an officer during a guild auction.

But anyway, as to the situation at hand... this seems rather harsh, especially for a new player who would not have any sort of prior disciplinary history. I would appeal the "final" decision and try to explain that this is a new player who may have unknowingly become caught up in a violation. Hopefully someone at ZoS can be a little more reasonable here.

XSTRONG · June 10

If this guy who got banned had no clue that he was buying crowns from a fraud account thats pretty sad but Im pretty sure Zos knows more in this case.

Also its pretty weird that the Crownseller are a fraud but are still able to gift Crowns?

GooGa592 · June 10

JustLovely wrote: »

danko355 wrote: »

This is probably not due to him buying crowns, but due to you giving him 16 mil gold. You should never give away such amounts to new players, this activity automatically is detected by game as suspicious (probably bot and fraud prevention). Even 1 million gold could be enough to trigger this reaction, 16 millions is really an overkill

People do transactions and gifts of this degree on a regular basis without getting banned. It's far more likely the buying crowns with gold. That's what ZOS is really cracking down on. When ZOS doesn't get their cut they get upset.

Looks like you called it.

ClowdyAllDay · June 10

Kappachi wrote: »

Araneae6537 wrote: »

Wow, has this not come up before where a newer player wins a guild raffle or something? Hopefully this can be looked into and the ban removed if no evidence of wrongdoing is found.

Because that doesn't really happen? new players aren't looking for guilds with raffles and if they are they likely wouldn't be able to afford the fees for the raffle at least some weeks or months into it.

My advice: give your friends enough gold to buy 1 house in the game with gold, I always have them check out and preview the houses that can be bought with gold then give them enough to buy that house and they're on their own from there. It also gives them something to work for later, building furnishings and such to make it their own, so it's effectively never been more than 4mil. Giving someone 16mil out of nowhere is VERY sus and not normal.

It will be fixed with some correspondance with support though... Most likely, as long as you don't have a history of giving out such large amounts to seemingly random players.

This is nonsense. I regularly borrow gold from a friend on my new accounts so i can buy summerset for my 11 base game accounts so they can do full crafting. 10 million is maybe enough to buy summerset if you find someone nice. most people want 11 mil or more. 16 million is nothing in this game really.

ClowdyAllDay · June 10

Moonspawn wrote: »

[snip]

this is suspect because it's way too many dlcs for the gold offered. the first dlc would cost 10 mil or more. at the going rate of gold for crowns. the dlcs listed would cost 30 mil or more... getting them for 16 mil is suspect. your friend likely cheated the seller and got reported.

[edited to remove quote]

GooGa592 · June 10

ClowdyAllDay wrote: »

Moonspawn wrote: »

[snip]

this is suspect because it's way too many dlcs for the gold offered. the first dlc would cost 10 mil or more. at the going rate of gold for crowns. the dlcs listed would cost 30 mil or more... getting them for 16 mil is suspect. your friend likely cheated the seller and got reported.

More likely is the explanation provided by ZOS. ZOS just wants everyone to buy crowns directly from them, not use in game gold to purchase dlc's or anything else. ...even though using in game gold to buy crowns still means someone is buying the crowns to make it happen and ZOS is making their money either way.

[edited to remove quote]

Moonspawn · June 10

''this is suspect because it's way too many dlcs for the gold offered. the first dlc would cost 10 mil or more. at the going rate of gold for crowns. the dlcs listed would cost 30 mil or more... getting them for 16 mil is suspect. your friend likely cheated the seller and got reported.''

I only provided the gold to buy so many dlcs because the rate of 1500:1 was too good to pass up.

Aorys · June 10

GooGa592 wrote: »

More likely is the explanation provided by ZOS. ZOS just wants everyone to buy crowns directly from them, not use in game gold to purchase dlc's or anything else. ...even though using in game gold to buy crowns still means someone is buying the crowns to make it happen and ZOS is making their money either way.

This is worrying, due to the number of players who trade gold for crowns(gifting). Zos should be clear to us if they start to condemn in game gold to crown exchange. Else anyone can get randomly shot, as it is impossible to distinguish if any of the parts are involved in RMT.
And the strangest part would be Zos allowing a RMT account on the loose being able to gift.
I really thought the game would be safer after all that mess with crown store gifting lockout.
Why someone can freely gift like this and I, with thousands hours of playtime and a quite good history of purchases on Steam couldn`t have my gifting unlocked?

Araneae6537 · June 10

Moonspawn wrote: »

Araneae6537 wrote: »

That doesn’t make sense: A gold-selling account would not be trading gold for DLCs, they’d be trading for overpriced potatoes and such. The only explanation I can think of is that someone is not being honest.

[snip]

Of course that’s the definition of buying Crowns with gold — but that is regularly done and not against ToS. What is against ToS is selling gold for irl currency, which is why I said if the person was selling gold (ie, for real world money), they would not have received DLCs.

So either ZOS is mistaken, we are missing some vital information, or someone is lying.

[edited to remove quote]

SilverBride · June 10

I'm afraid to ever buy crowns again from another player after reading this. There may be more to the story, and probably is, but things like this is why they need to come up with a better system.

Araneae6537 · June 10

Moonspawn wrote: »

''this is suspect because it's way too many dlcs for the gold offered. the first dlc would cost 10 mil or more. at the going rate of gold for crowns. the dlcs listed would cost 30 mil or more... getting them for 16 mil is suspect. your friend likely cheated the seller and got reported.''

I only provided the gold to buy so many dlcs because the rate of 1500:1 was too good to pass up.

Hmm, I may have seen that same seller. I definitely saw an advertisement selling Crowns 1500:1 and was quite surprised and wondered if the rate had gone down (I have seen more ads in general under 2000:1 in the past month) or if they just wanted to sell them quickly… Strange to also advertise gift first on top of the competitive rate… Of course some people do send the Crown item first, but many want the gold up front or do it 50/50. These factors combined with the ban, however, make me wonder whether they were source of the fraud and the banned account assumed to be affiliated?

Mithgil · June 10

To be clear, when ZOS says "gold selling" they are referring to an account that sells gold (and Crowns) via real currency. It sounds like the player banned (and I'm sure the selling account was banned, too) provided gold to then receive (unknowingly or otherwise) illegally sourced Crown store items from the seller's account.

These accounts can easily be sussed out; often having nonsense/gibberish account/character names, i.e. "dsfdgh..." and they won't have much in the way of character level. I also report Gold/Crown sellers I see in zone chat. They are very easy to spot since they are directing people to a website to buy Gold, Crowns, even items.

A few years ago I had a guildie who had purchased Crowns from me over several accounts to get gifted the Banker ally, for each account. He ended up banned for several weeks but got access back. His activity was suspect to ZOS. The only reason I know is that he contacted me again after he was back in and wanted to know if I was affected, which I wasn't.

More recently I had a guildie wanting to buy Crowns from me. He said he was waiting for a mail with the gold he needed, and it was well over an hour and I needed to log off. I was very suspicious that he was waiting so long for an mail with gold. I started to suspect he was waiting for illegally purchased gold. And it turns out he was wanting a skill line from the Crown Store anyway, which cannot be gifted.

When it comes to trading gold for crowns it just pays to be very diligent and take a close look at the character/account with whom you are dealing. I only ever gift Crowns for gold with guildies, and then only with guildies that I can see have been around and are well invested in the game.

SilverBride · June 10

Araneae6537 wrote: »

I definitely saw an advertisement selling Crowns 1500:1 and was quite surprised and wondered if the rate had gone down (I have seen more ads in general under 2000:1 in the past month) or if they just wanted to sell them quickly… Strange to also advertise gift first on top of the competitive rate...

I saw that same advertisement in zone chat a couple of days ago on PCNA, and they made sure to emphasize that they were gifting first. I was pretty suspicious and wonder now if reporting them would have been appropriate.