CE Reloaded vs Broken Mechanics

InvitationNotFound · October 2018

I've edited this thread as new information appeared. The old post can be viewed in the spoiler.

The thread was about a player with too much speed. Furthermore, he either had always 100% or didn't die even at 0% health.

The health part could probably be explained by a massiv health desync. Yet, this has been seen by different players at different locations.
It is unclear if this can be caused on purpose or if it is related to a setup / build.

About the speed:
It turns out that it could simply be bunny hopping.
Technically this can be seen as exploiting, yet chances are low that ZOS cares.

Definition of Exploitation (yes yes... i know... Wikipedia

):

In video games, an exploit is the use of a bug or glitches, game system, rates, hit boxes, speed or level design etc. by a player to their advantage in a manner not intended by the game's designers.

The game restricts the maximum speed. Yet, it is possible to bypass this limitation by bunny hopping. Obviously this is a bug. Abusing a bug is exploiting.
There is a thread about bunny hopping where someone asks if it is bannable. Yet, ZOS didn't answer. (Of course people who are abusing this mechanic will try to justify it by saying things like "they have programmed it that way, so it is okay to use it..." - Nope, it would be the same as abusing a software bug (vulnerability) in your e-banking to get a few more bucks on your account. Try to explain the prosecutor that it is the programmers fault and you should go free because of that. Good luck.)

Here's the link to the bunny hopping thread:
https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/440491/bunny-hopping-bannable/p1

Most of you remember the time when the legendary CE Meteor spamming happened.
At the end some people got banned and a huge thread has been created about cheating as far as I remember.

Anyway, I never believed that all of this has been solved properly.

Yesterday evening it was again quite obvious that someone was doing something extremely strange, that isn't possible without further modification. It happened on Sotha Sil PC EU around 23:00pm +-.
A player couldn't be killed, while he was at 0 health. For quite a while, while players were casting executes. He just stood there. No blocking, no healing, no nothing. Then he moved and jumped around with a very high speed. Like 20m+ meters over a breach (no dragon leap / streak or things like that).

Quite obvious everything. Yet, that isn't the real problem here. This just questions the whole game integrity again. He decided to do this in an obvious way so everyone could see it.

The video of it has been sent to the support team (cheat report). Furthermore, @ZOS_GinaBruno and the German community manger have received a link to the video (posting it here would be Naming & Shaming i guess...).

@ZOS_GinaBruno : Any ZOS statement regarding this new occurrence of this issue? I think this is a huge issue.

@The others: Did you notice anything like that lately or have a been witness to this?

Shadow-Fighter · October 2018

As long as bots running in some places I don't will never trust ZOS

laksikus · October 2018

was it a lvl 26?

Jolipinator · October 2018

CE?

Collectors Edition?

InvitationNotFound · October 2018

laksikus wrote: »

was it a lvl 26?

Yes, it was

Turelus · October 2018

Generally ZOS doesn't make statements about this kind of thing unless it's gone very explosive and public (like the previous time mentioned). CE will always be an issue for the game, the best ZOS can do is keep an eye on things and play catch up with those making it.

We just have to report things we feel are abuse (as you've done) and let them deal with it. Generally best practice is to use the in game report tool and message a community team member with a video if you have one. Remember though that the ZOS members get crazy numbers of mentions and potentially messages per day, so there is a chance it might not be seen right away.

laksikus · October 2018

i can tell you that it was no CE^^

TrinityBreaker · October 2018

Jolipinator wrote: »

CE?

Collectors Edition?

Cheat Engine

InvitationNotFound · October 2018

laksikus wrote: »

i can tell you that it was no CE^^

Interesting, more information in that case

laksikus · October 2018

its battleleveling at its finest

ScruffyWhiskers · October 2018

I ran into a sorc this weekend on Vivec NA who had the longest streaks that I have ever seen... easily almost double. Could chain cast them too. Went from Arrius lumber mill to half way to brk in a flash. Is that something that CE could enable? I thought a lot of the player data had been moved back to servers.

InvitationNotFound · October 2018

hmmm i highly doubt that. you see in the video that the player reaches 0 health several times. how would battle spirit make you survive that? o_O how does battle spirit make you jump 20m+?

laksikus · October 2018

i can jump as far as a streak on any class

SirAndy · October 2018

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

CE Reloaded

Fun fact, CE never stopped working, it's been with us the whole time ...

InvitationNotFound · October 2018

Turelus wrote: »

Generally ZOS doesn't make statements about this kind of thing unless it's gone very explosive and public (like the previous time mentioned). CE will always be an issue for the game, the best ZOS can do is keep an eye on things and play catch up with those making it.

We just have to report things we feel are abuse (as you've done) and let them deal with it. Generally best practice is to use the in game report tool and message a community team member with a video if you have one. Remember though that the ZOS members get crazy numbers of mentions and potentially messages per day, so there is a chance it might not be seen right away.

The last time the video wasn't even clicked on, at least for month... So there's not much hope left for such reports

InvitationNotFound · October 2018

laksikus wrote: »

i can jump as far as a streak on any class

I still doubt you could jump like he did.

Btw. you didn't comment on the surviving at 0 health the whole time...

SirAndy wrote: »

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

CE Reloaded

Fun fact, CE never stopped working, it's been with us the whole time ...

Obviously, i never thought it did. Yet, i was aware that they have certain detection mechanisms implemented... not very well i guess...

Shadow-Fighter · October 2018

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

o_O how does battle spirit make you jump 20m+?

Like Bunny hopping?

InvitationNotFound · October 2018

Shadow-Fighter wrote: »

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

o_O how does battle spirit make you jump 20m+?

Like Bunny hopping?

Okay, i think it gets quite interesting now

Yes, from time to time you could describe it at that.

So, did i miss something or got more information on that?

laksikus · October 2018

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

laksikus wrote: »

i can jump as far as a streak on any class

I still doubt you could jump like he did.

Btw. you didn't comment on the surviving at 0 health the whole time...

SirAndy wrote: »

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

CE Reloaded

Fun fact, CE never stopped working, it's been with us the whole time ...

Obviously, i never thought it did. Yet, i was aware that they have certain detection mechanisms implemented... not very well i guess...

btw you still didnt send me the vid^^
i havent seen proof of 0 health, so why would i comment on it

but i will leave this here as homage to battle leveling

bunny hopping is quite easy^^
gets easier and longer the more movement speed you have :P

zyk · October 2018

Of course ESO is still vulnerable to memory hacking and other methods of cheating.

Arguably, a game like ESO could not exist without a trusted client for performance reasons, and even if it's theoretically possible, it would have required the game to be re-engineered which it was not.

The practical solution would have been to mitigate it the way Valve, Blizzard and other devs do, but ZOS hasn't even implemented modern mitigation techniques.

The only thing ZOS seems to do is try to obfuscate client data in memory. This makes memory hacking more laborious, but not difficult for someone willing to put in the work and buy burner accounts.

Keep in mind players were memory hacking in ESO from launch and it took over two years for some players to prove that it exists via Zazeergate.

Turelus · October 2018

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

Turelus wrote: »

Generally ZOS doesn't make statements about this kind of thing unless it's gone very explosive and public (like the previous time mentioned). CE will always be an issue for the game, the best ZOS can do is keep an eye on things and play catch up with those making it.

We just have to report things we feel are abuse (as you've done) and let them deal with it. Generally best practice is to use the in game report tool and message a community team member with a video if you have one. Remember though that the ZOS members get crazy numbers of mentions and potentially messages per day, so there is a chance it might not be seen right away.

The last time the video wasn't even clicked on, at least for month... So there's not much hope left for such reports

Another option is sending something to someone who might get less tags/reports to follow up on. The forums mods might be able to pass it on for you however I am not sure that's the correct way of doing things.

You could PM a community ambassador as well and we could pass it on to the community team, although again this isn't really the correct way of doing things.

TheYKcid · October 2018

This is a common bug, and related to desync I believe.

Sometimes after a player has been killed and respawned, the server fails to update their status, and they remain in a standing position where their corpse should be. You can sometimes even see them in the "looking at map" animation, I'm guessing because on their client's end they are interacting with the transitus back at base.

Their health is stuck at zero during this time, and you can attempt to cast abilities on them, though the abilities get cancelled halfway through the animation and don't actually do any damage.

The rapid, jerky movements are probably rubber-banding when the server/client positions are once again synchronised.

Nothing suspicious about any of what you describe, I see this happen perhaps once or twice every week.

SirAndy · October 2018

zyk wrote: »

The only thing ZOS seems to do is try to obfuscate client data in memory. This makes memory hacking more laborious, but not difficult for someone willing to put in the work and buy burner accounts.

This ^^^

During beta and after PC launch, the client side data was easy to find and in plain numbers in the client memory.
All ZOS has done is to "hide" the important data.

Anyone with the right skills and time can still manipulate a *lot* of client side data which is then happily sent to the server as genuine.

Kel · October 2018

Was it something like this?

https://youtu.be/1yYgmitCOzU

This, btw, is on ps4. Over a year ago, but shows something similar to what youre talking about. Players keep telling me ps4 can't be hacked or cheated. That's obviously false. Player sits at zero health with 15 other players just nailing him. It's been around longer than you think, and is why people always will question a real players skill. That didn't just happen out of thin air, it's because of things like this.....

InvitationNotFound · October 2018

laksikus wrote: »

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

laksikus wrote: »

i can jump as far as a streak on any class

I still doubt you could jump like he did.

Btw. you didn't comment on the surviving at 0 health the whole time...

SirAndy wrote: »

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

CE Reloaded

Fun fact, CE never stopped working, it's been with us the whole time ...

Obviously, i never thought it did. Yet, i was aware that they have certain detection mechanisms implemented... not very well i guess...

btw you still didnt send me the vid^^
i havent seen proof of 0 health, so why would i comment on it

but i will leave this here as homage to battle leveling

bunny hopping is quite easy^^
gets easier and longer the more movement speed you have :P

Well, those stats do not explain it

InvitationNotFound · October 2018

jabrone77 wrote: »

Was it something like this?
https://youtu.be/1yYgmitCOzU

This, btw, is on ps4. Over a year ago, but shows something similar to what youre talking about. Players keep telling me ps4 can't be hacked or cheated. That's obviously false. Player sits at zero health with 15 other players just nailing him. It's been around longer than you think, and is why people always will question a real players skill. That didn't just happen out of thin air, it's because of things like this.....

Looks kind of like that, yes

Shadow-Fighter · October 2018

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

Shadow-Fighter wrote: »

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

o_O how does battle spirit make you jump 20m+?

Like Bunny hopping?

Okay, i think it gets quite interesting now
Yes, from time to time you could describe it at that.

So, did i miss something or got more information on that?

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/440491/bunny-hopping-bannable/p1

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GaiyzO1X3HQ

laksikus · October 2018

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

laksikus wrote: »

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

laksikus wrote: »

i can jump as far as a streak on any class

I still doubt you could jump like he did.

Btw. you didn't comment on the surviving at 0 health the whole time...

SirAndy wrote: »

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

CE Reloaded

Fun fact, CE never stopped working, it's been with us the whole time ...

Obviously, i never thought it did. Yet, i was aware that they have certain detection mechanisms implemented... not very well i guess...

btw you still didnt send me the vid^^
i havent seen proof of 0 health, so why would i comment on it

but i will leave this here as homage to battle leveling

bunny hopping is quite easy^^
gets easier and longer the more movement speed you have :P

Well, those stats do not explain it

A player couldn't be killed, while he was at 0 health. For quite a while, while players were casting executes. He just stood there. No blocking, no healing, no nothing. Then he moved and jumped around with a very high speed. Like 20m+ meters over a breach (no dragon leap / streak or things like that).

I dont see you casting any execute on this pic, nor him jumping over a breach on the ground floor of a keep

KingMagaw · October 2018

CE never went away.

Zanzeer exposed the CE. Nobody yet has came to expose it again to the sheep is all.

You can bunny hop, large distances. You can out of map most dungeons. You can still exploit vAS+2. The list, is long. Treat ESO as social because it was never competitive.

Judas Helviaryn · October 2018

laksikus wrote: »

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

laksikus wrote: »

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

laksikus wrote: »

i can jump as far as a streak on any class

I still doubt you could jump like he did.

Btw. you didn't comment on the surviving at 0 health the whole time...

SirAndy wrote: »

InvitationNotFound wrote: »

CE Reloaded

Fun fact, CE never stopped working, it's been with us the whole time ...

Obviously, i never thought it did. Yet, i was aware that they have certain detection mechanisms implemented... not very well i guess...

btw you still didnt send me the vid^^
i havent seen proof of 0 health, so why would i comment on it

but i will leave this here as homage to battle leveling

bunny hopping is quite easy^^
gets easier and longer the more movement speed you have :P

Well, those stats do not explain it

A player couldn't be killed, while he was at 0 health. For quite a while, while players were casting executes. He just stood there. No blocking, no healing, no nothing. Then he moved and jumped around with a very high speed. Like 20m+ meters over a breach (no dragon leap / streak or things like that).

I dont see you casting any execute on this pic, nor him jumping over a breach on the ground floor of a keep

^
Um.. that's mage's wrath, literally right there. Literally being cast. The white rings around the target's feet, the lightning bolt on his head.
You can even see the tooltip for it above the target's nameplate on the right.

Rungar · October 2018

KingMagaw wrote: »

CE never went away.

Zanzeer exposed the CE. Nobody yet has came to expose it again to the sheep is all.

You can bunny hop, large distances. You can out of map most dungeons. You can still exploit vAS+2. The list, is long. Treat ESO as social because it was never competitive.

this is partially why i always felt that they needed vet cyrodill so if you cant stop guys from cheating you can use their artificial success against them and make them segregate themselves. I imagine they gain points at 100 times a regular player so it wouldnt be long before they take care of themselves.