Change to the patch notes (Boss drops)

Oogaci

Solution to boss camping:
Make the XP, coin and item rewards tied to an achievement for killing each boss.

When you kill the boos, you get an achievement and a [Sealed Urn] is mailed to you.
Opening that Sealed Urn will reward you with XP for the kill, a sum of gold and a random loot reward.

As a bonus for killing all bosses in a zone they could do one more achievement with bonus XP and bonus gold.

Since you can only receive an achievement once there will be no need to camp the boss.

SeñorCinco

Carde wrote: »

jorj82 wrote: »

last night, i ran into a boss somewhere in eastmarch that was being camped by bots. as usual, my crazy nighblade dps skills got me the kill. and here's the beautiful part; after killing the boss i was to retrieve a document from a nearby lockbox, and when i did, the bots and another boss spawn they were fighting simply dissapeared. i'm guessing that when i took the note, there was a trigger in the game (code) that instanced me out or something... maybe we could have similar triggers for the bosses at "camping sites" to prevent bots and farmers from ever being a problem?

Quest phasing.

This is the best way to handle it. Phasing / instancing will grant the credit, the loot and the challenge. All the while eliminating bots and farmers.

kevjon74_ESO

Inco wrote: »

SOLUTION: Online GM 24x7 that does nothing but watch Zone Chat, Check Boss Botting and... and... INSTANT BAN them.

I wonder how many zone and public dungeon instances there are at any given time. The in-game GM solution is either do-able or not do-able depending on just how many GMs it would take to be effective. Something tells me they've already considered it and deemed it ineffective.

Though it would be awesome to see them appear in-game wielding a ban hammer, dispensing justice.

caryhammub17_ESO

Actually you can instantly travel to a dungeon quite easy. if your in a guild, open up roster, right click a members name that is say on another isle, but not faction, then travel to player. Most dungeons have shrines inside them to allow players to revive at nearest shrine inside the dungeon. If there is a large number of players in the place keeping things dead easy to run the bot down to final area.

And ok, it's all about the loot then. Phasing is what is going to have to happen. Is there no mechanic to tell how long a player has been in one spot, unmoved, or is casting an ability at a set interval..

if player unmoved 20 minutes, has cast x ability at x interval, send code box, if code not entered within 2 minutes, remove player from world, or port player to opposing faction PVP area.

crush83

Considering how many phases there are supposed to be, I've managed to phase into the same dungeon, and see the same botters in that dungeon, 3 days in a row now.

If there are so many phases, why am I able to do this? (I wrote down their names the first day I saw them - and I've reported them every day for 3 days).

aipex8_ESO

crush83 wrote: »

Considering how many phases there are supposed to be, I've managed to phase into the same dungeon, and see the same botters in that dungeon, 3 days in a row now.

If there are so many phases, why am I able to do this? (I wrote down their names the first day I saw them - and I've reported them every day for 3 days).

This! I was trying to get a boss kill yesterday and couldn't because of bots. Left the dungeon and came back: same bots. Logged out and back in: same bots. /camp: same bots. Where are these multiple phases?

Also, even if the bots aren't getting loot, it's in their best interest to keep killing the bosses so you can't. The less loot you get, the more likely it is you'll need to buy their gold.

cubansyrusb16_ESO

crush83 wrote: »

SeñorCinco wrote: »

crush83 wrote: »

Except that bots can't simply travel instantly from one dungeon to the next.

How are boss locations any different than a node location?

Still, they can have all 8 bots camped at a different boss and automate them to cycle through logins.

Except that excessive and incessant login/logouts flag you for autoban. How hard do you think it is to detect that behavior?

There's also a cooldown period between switcing between characters. Don't forget about that. (yeah it's only like 10 seconds currently, that's still 10 seconds less they could be effectively farming elsewhere).

The login process also takes time for the server to load all your resources and place you into the world, that subtracts more time from your farming routine.

Actually it cant flag you because people are farming Motiff's using the login/logout loot reset system in banks and inns.

The login process is also very quick for me is almost instant i can disconnect from the game and login again in under 15 seconds .... 25 seconds if im out in the world
(10 seconds exit timer)

crush83

cubansyrusb16_ESO wrote: »

crush83 wrote: »

SeñorCinco wrote: »

crush83 wrote: »

Except that bots can't simply travel instantly from one dungeon to the next.

How are boss locations any different than a node location?

Still, they can have all 8 bots camped at a different boss and automate them to cycle through logins.

Except that excessive and incessant login/logouts flag you for autoban. How hard do you think it is to detect that behavior?

There's also a cooldown period between switcing between characters. Don't forget about that. (yeah it's only like 10 seconds currently, that's still 10 seconds less they could be effectively farming elsewhere).

The login process also takes time for the server to load all your resources and place you into the world, that subtracts more time from your farming routine.

Actually it cant flag you because people are farming Motiff's using the login/logout loot reset system in banks and inns.

The login process is also very quick for me is almost instant i can disconnect from the game and login again in under 15 seconds .... 25 seconds if im out in the world
(10 seconds exit timer)

In that 25 seconds, you could've farmed 25-50g. Unacceptable loss for a bot program.

Also, it does flag you if you do it too much. A lot of people have been banned for abusing that exploit for the Motif farming. How do you think they got caught?

cubansyrusb16_ESO

crush83 wrote: »

cubansyrusb16_ESO wrote: »

crush83 wrote: »

SeñorCinco wrote: »

crush83 wrote: »

Except that bots can't simply travel instantly from one dungeon to the next.

How are boss locations any different than a node location?

Still, they can have all 8 bots camped at a different boss and automate them to cycle through logins.

Except that excessive and incessant login/logouts flag you for autoban. How hard do you think it is to detect that behavior?

There's also a cooldown period between switcing between characters. Don't forget about that. (yeah it's only like 10 seconds currently, that's still 10 seconds less they could be effectively farming elsewhere).

The login process also takes time for the server to load all your resources and place you into the world, that subtracts more time from your farming routine.

Actually it cant flag you because people are farming Motiff's using the login/logout loot reset system in banks and inns.

The login process is also very quick for me is almost instant i can disconnect from the game and login again in under 15 seconds .... 25 seconds if im out in the world
(10 seconds exit timer)

In that 25 seconds, you could've farmed 25-50g. Unacceptable loss for a bot program.

Also, it does flag you if you do it too much. A lot of people have been banned for abusing that exploit for the Motif farming. How do you think they got caught?

I know atleast 20 people that farm Motiffs daily for the entire time they are online (6hours plus) and have amassed over 2 million gold .....

They have not been banned.

crush83

Well, I had 3 guildies get banned for it, so I don't know. ZOS seems to be fairly random with bans. It's possible that they halted the auto bans after they messed up the last go around.

Whatever the reason, the theory is sound. They just need to get implementation right.

There is no legitimate reason for anyone to be logging on/off like that for extended periods of time. (who the hell farms motifs like that for 6+ hours - kill me now jesus)

Ojustaboo

A guild member suggested that they make it so that the boss spawns at a random location within a predefined grid ?

R0M2K

What???

I used to kill a boss untill i could see what blue droped...

Couldnt you have thougth of a different solution???

Daethz

Better idea, fix the underlying bug that has brought up this entire issue in the first place.
-Bosses dieing too quickly and or not getting credit for assisting in the last second.

KoRRoDEAD

crush83 wrote: »

Mace wrote: »

Couldn't bots just be set up to kill the boss once every "X" minutes for full loot?

Sure. And if they did that, then there would be plenty of chances in between where other players could get loot, unhindered by bots.

I can already see a way the bots would adapt to that. Just by having 2 groups of bots, and they would alternate who would kill the boss so group 1 would kill it, then next spawn they would stand back and group 2 would kill it.

Unfortunately these pathetic bot programmers would do anything for a quick buck and aren't afraid to adapt. Thats why they've moved from place to place, every time there main source of income gets cut off they quickly find the next source and suck that dry until it gets fixed. The only way to fix this issue is to either find a way to make it it non profitable for them to do it, which would also severely affect the actual gaming community in the game. Or to prevent them from being able to do it in the first place. Taking away their current farming source will just move them.

The only thing i can think of to move them away from legitimate gamers is to make a specific dungeon or whatever, where there is no story or interest for actual gamers, just a bunch of bosses for bots to farm. THIS WOULD NOT FIX THE PROBLEM, in fact it may only make it worse but this has the possibility to move them from the legitimate dungeons so they are not ruining the game for legitimate gamers... at least until they can fix the problem at the source. Like harm reduction.

i know many of you would disagree and i'm not suggesting ZoS do this but its the only thing i can think of to reduce the annoyance to the players. Putting all the bots in a hidden box to do their thing without interferring with the real players. much like putting gold spammers on the ignore list. They're still going to do their thing until you can cut them off, but at least they are hidden from veiw and not destroying the enjoyment of others.

starkerealm

aipex8_ESO wrote: »

crush83 wrote: »

Considering how many phases there are supposed to be, I've managed to phase into the same dungeon, and see the same botters in that dungeon, 3 days in a row now.

If there are so many phases, why am I able to do this? (I wrote down their names the first day I saw them - and I've reported them every day for 3 days).

This! I was trying to get a boss kill yesterday and couldn't because of bots. Left the dungeon and came back: same bots. Logged out and back in: same bots. /camp: same bots. Where are these multiple phases?

Also, even if the bots aren't getting loot, it's in their best interest to keep killing the bosses so you can't. The less loot you get, the more likely it is you'll need to buy their gold.

The delves connect to multiple overworld instances. So, there's usually only one, or sometimes two, copies of a delve up at any time... and as a result, it's infested with botters.

Zamrod_beta

Honestly, unless you get no XP and no loot from a boss for multiple HOURS, this isn't going to have an effect. I would prefer once a day. However, it seems a number of players feel that it is their right to camp bosses in the same way that bots currently are even though players are causing the same problems the bots are. People are hanging around killing the bosses over and over again so much that even if there weren't bots it would be impossible to get a hit in.

Either make these dungeons entirely instanced to your group(which I think I'd like as it would add more dedicated group content) or make it so you can only get XP and loot from a boss once a day.

Ojustaboo

Been in 3 dungeons in stormhaven today. Loads of bots at all 3.

crush83

I like the idea of changing up the spawn location of the boss, but often times, the spawn location is specifically decorated for that boss encounter.

It seems to me that if they can't find a way to get rid of a large chunk of the bots, then they are going to have to resort to instanced dungeons. And that still doesn't address the bots outside the dungeons.

steveb16_ESO46

Instancing is a must. Random resource nodes also. Inter account gold transfers stopped. Suspicious guild store prices reported and monitored. Any gold seller trade guilds set up to allow gold to be transferred by selling stuff for huge prices closed down and members mass banned. Gold buyers banned. One strike and you are out.

That could all be done but don't know how the over world farming can be dealt with besides GM's responding very quickly to player reports and monitoring areas themselves.

I would set up a monitor system to automatically flag any player who puts an item up for a price say 2 times the average selling price and watch who buys to see if it is a gold seller transaction. Cutting off the demand by making gold buying risky might be the most powerful weapon.

crush83

If ZOS cares about the quality of the game over the quantity of profit, then they will ban gold buyers.

Of course, we know that they will never do this. They make money from all the gold selling bot subscriptions. They make money from all the gold buying player subscriptions.

Banning both of these aggressively could cut into quite a bit of their profit margin. Don't hold your breath. It's been a long, long, long time since I've seen a company more concerned about the quality of its product than the amount of money they make.