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Gold Buyers?

  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    AlliN wrote: »
    Remove people who are willing to buy gold TOTALLY from the equation- gold trade People who are willing to support the game financially, and a large amount of the player base.....quits. Trust me larger then you think.

    So, wait, you are defending lazy gold buyers, becasue there is a LOT of them? I can't believe my eyes. Large player base quits becasue economy of the game is safe? People who are willing to support game quit becasue it's mechanics are protected by removing gold trade?

    Seriously, I'm almost 100% sure you are gold buyer if you really mean that. No other person would want that proccess on ANY side to continue, unless they take part in it.
    Trust me larger then you think.

    And why the hell I should give a toss about large number of freaking lazy ***? You know why I gladly paid WoW subscription for 7 years? Becasue they DID give a toss about sorting it out, at least in early 5 years, and even if they could not guarantee 100% infraction free game, it was STERILE when compared to other mmo's. You are telling me, that radical sorting of the problem is wrong, becasue there is a lot of those people? Who are you defending really?

    I'm not a gold buyer as said before. Please re-read my OP...you aren't being civil...keep it clean please.

    Now I say what I say because gold buyers could very well be 30%+ of the server population...maybe higher cause of all the spamming....that's about $30 Million dollars....lol if you think they're getting banned. I think my warning them instead is better and more efficient solution.

    Sorry you feel as though anyone and everyone who disagrees with you is a gold buyer.
  • Hilandra
    Hilandra
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    Ban both! I have no tolerance for people ruining a game's economy and for the ones who support this. Period!

    +1 Completely agree there :)
  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    Saerydoth wrote: »
    Tweek wrote: »
    Saerydoth wrote: »
    You can't "ban" the sellers really. The sellers get the wares they sell from stolen/compromised accounts, and they do their spamming from stolen/compromised accounts.

    They aren't going out and buying their own game licenses to spam, unless they are using stolen credit cards from their "customers" (which probably happens, granted, but not a majority of the time).

    The BUYERS are the problem, and the ones that need to be banned. With no buyers, there would be no sellers. If there were no buyers, the gold sellers would pack up and move to a game that has people that buy their stuff.

    Ban the buyers and there won't be any game to play.

    Using stolen credit cards from their "customers"
    Not true. There are PLENTY of us who are more than willing to follow the rules. I see no problem with banning those who break the rules. People said the same thing about WOW at the beginning too - Blizzard has no problem banning those who break the rules, and look where they are.

    1. Most gold trading takes place over Paypal...a simple google search could have given you this information.

    2. Again there's more gold buyers and even private gold trades going on then you realize.......
    Edited by Tweek on April 14, 2014 4:20PM
  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    Hilandra wrote: »
    Ban both! I have no tolerance for people ruining a game's economy and for the ones who support this. Period!

    +1 Completely agree there :)

    Then bye bye goes ESO......sad but true.
  • AlliN
    AlliN
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    Now I say what I say because gold buyers could very well be 30%+ of the server population

    And you don't want those people to go away why exactly? Becasue it would ruin the gameplay? They ARE ruining the gameplay.
    Sorry you feel as though anyone and everyone who disagrees with you is a gold buyer.

    No, I only feel that only gold buyer would like to protect gold buyers. No other sane person has any interest in that. Would you like to hang out with smelly people just becasue there is an abundance of them?
  • starkerealm
    starkerealm
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    Tweek wrote: »
    Tweek wrote: »
    Endolith wrote: »
    Tweek wrote: »
    Endolith wrote: »
    As I said, WoW banned early on and continued to grow. A Google search gave results for them banning as late as 2009. I know they were doing it at least up to BC. They didn't die.

    Why do you think they stopped?

    Why do you think almost all MMOs don't ban buyers?

    Why do you think the auto-ban bots are only banning the sellers?

    They might have stopped, but the point is it didn't kill the game. Quite the opposite. So the contention that banning necessarily kills a game is empirically false.

    Runescape would prove this point otherwise.

    No, it doesn't. Runescape has issues. No, let me say that again; Runescape "has issues."

    You're trying to take one variable and say it's responsible for everything. Runescape's problems were legion, and the number of relevant variables... ugh.

    Correlation does not equal causation, especially when other factors exist.

    Here's a fun example: Cigarettes make you live longer. You get this because countries with higher cigarette consumption rates have higher life expectancies. Except, they're not related at all. You have two numbers out of ten thousand that are traveling in the same direction, you can't say one causes the other.

    I was in a classroom learning that fifteen years ago, and now I feel really old. :\

    Listen to what @Etchesketch has to say......ban the customers with money, not time, and the game goes FTP next, then the players go...then...well bye bye ESO.

    Etchesketch has a nice model based on spurious correlations and a failure to understand how MMOs fully function.

    He's under the mistaken impression that gold buyers actually contribute to the community in a meaningful way. They don't.

    MMOs live and die with their community. Someone who is unwilling to log in and participate, and would rather pay to advance, isn't a part of the community. When they're actively funding disruptive behavior like botting and spamming up the channels, then they're a detriment.

    Someone who says, "I can only log in for a couple hours a week because of my job" is a legitimate participant, if they're actually, you know, participating. Someone who pays $90 for a dump of 500k gold got there by actively sabotaging other members of the community. (Through the teleporting bots swiping crafting mats. The bots camping bosses. And whatever other abuses are going on right now.)

    Now, I still say, "zero out their gold balance", it invalidates their gains from subverting the system without actively alienating them. (Which seems to be what Zenimax is doing anyway.) But, they're not going to keep this game alive.
    Edited by starkerealm on April 14, 2014 4:26PM
  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    AlliN wrote: »
    Now I say what I say because gold buyers could very well be 30%+ of the server population

    And you don't want those people to go away why exactly? Becasue it would ruin the gameplay? They ARE ruining the gameplay.
    Sorry you feel as though anyone and everyone who disagrees with you is a gold buyer.

    No, I only feel that only gold buyer would like to protect gold buyers. No other sane person has any interest in that. Would you like to hang out with smelly people just becasue there is an abundance of them?

    You have compared gold buyers to slavers and "smelly" people...that's not very civil.

    "And you don't want those people to go away why exactly?"

    Half of one of my PvP guild's has bought gold....among these people one of my good friends has as well.

    I like ESO and if they lose 30% or so of the players......there won't be enough money to support the server. More people will leave after there friends are banned....if they're actually friends with them anyway. I know if my friends are banned we're all quitting..some of us have YouTube channels with 100K-700K followers and would publicly bash the game(not that I"m saying I would...I don't use youtube) ...just sayin'.
    Edited by Tweek on April 14, 2014 4:27PM
  • Saerydoth
    Saerydoth
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    People seem to be under the impression that gold sellers are buying their own accounts, and that they experience a "loss" when one of these is banned. That is NOT true. The accounts they use are either compromised/stolen accounts, or purchased with stolen credit cards. Either way, the gold sellers don't pay a cent for them.

    You can ban the accounts they use, but it only helps so much because they have stacks of compromised accounts they can use for it.
  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    Saerydoth wrote: »
    People seem to be under the impression that gold sellers are buying their own accounts, and that they experience a "loss" when one of these is banned. That is NOT true. The accounts they use are either compromised/stolen accounts, or purchased with stolen credit cards. Either way, the gold sellers don't pay a cent for them.

    You can ban the accounts they use, but it only helps so much because they have stacks of compromised accounts they can use for it.

    Again not true..most gold trades take place via paypal, and they aren't stolen accounts, but believe whatever toots your horns guys.

    Let's do it...Perma ban all gold buyers and sellers with no warning....30% of the server and the 10% friends leave....that's nearly half the game. Do it up!
    Edited by Tweek on April 14, 2014 4:30PM
  • starkerealm
    starkerealm
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    Saerydoth wrote: »
    People seem to be under the impression that gold sellers are buying their own accounts, and that they experience a "loss" when one of these is banned. That is NOT true. The accounts they use are either compromised/stolen accounts, or purchased with stolen credit cards. Either way, the gold sellers don't pay a cent for them.

    You can ban the accounts they use, but it only helps so much because they have stacks of compromised accounts they can use for it.

    In point of fact, one of the "false bans" someone was appealing in here was an account compromise, where their account had been hijacked and used as a goldseller for thirty minutes before Zenimax shut it down.
  • Endolith
    Endolith
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    No one here knows how many accounts are from gold buyers. I doubt it is a substantial fraction of the playerbase, to be honest. When there are this many people playing, the gold sellers don't need to get a high % of users to make money.
  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    Saerydoth wrote: »
    People seem to be under the impression that gold sellers are buying their own accounts, and that they experience a "loss" when one of these is banned. That is NOT true. The accounts they use are either compromised/stolen accounts, or purchased with stolen credit cards. Either way, the gold sellers don't pay a cent for them.

    You can ban the accounts they use, but it only helps so much because they have stacks of compromised accounts they can use for it.

    In point of fact, one of the "false bans" someone was appealing in here was an account compromise, where their account had been hijacked and used as a goldseller for thirty minutes before Zenimax shut it down.

    How? Did they give the gold seller there password? Pretty bad on their part imo
  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    Endolith wrote: »
    No one here knows how many accounts are from gold buyers. I doubt it is a substantial fraction of the playerbase, to be honest. When there are this many people playing, the gold sellers don't need to get a high % of users to make money.

    As I said a ton of people I know who play this game have bought gold. Just sayin'
  • starkerealm
    starkerealm
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    Tweek wrote: »
    AlliN wrote: »
    Now I say what I say because gold buyers could very well be 30%+ of the server population

    And you don't want those people to go away why exactly? Becasue it would ruin the gameplay? They ARE ruining the gameplay.
    Sorry you feel as though anyone and everyone who disagrees with you is a gold buyer.

    No, I only feel that only gold buyer would like to protect gold buyers. No other sane person has any interest in that. Would you like to hang out with smelly people just becasue there is an abundance of them?

    You have compared gold buyers to slavers and "smelly" people...that's not very civil.

    "And you don't want those people to go away why exactly?"

    Half of one of my PvP guild's has bought gold....among these people one of my good friends has as well.

    I like ESO and if they lose 30% or so of the players......there won't be enough money to support the server. More people will leave after there friends are banned....if they're actually friends with them anyway. I know if my friends are banned we're all quitting..some of us have YouTube channels with 100K-700K followers and would publicly bash the game(not that I"m saying I would...I don't use youtube) ...just sayin'.

    The issue is that goldselling is normative in certain internet subpopulations. It's nowhere NEAR 30% of the general population. If it's 3%, I'd be genuinely surprised. From the inside, you're going to see a vastly disproportionate cross section.

    And you can bet, anyone dumb enough to complain about their ban on youtube would also be dumb enough to whine about how the $50 or $60 they'd just spent on gold went up in smoke.
  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    Either way the disruptive gold spam need to be fixed...ASAP
  • AlliN
    AlliN
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    You have compared gold buyers to slavers and "smelly" people...that's not very civil.

    Why? Why is this not civil to point out people that RUIN the fun of other people becasue they are just lazy scum? Or did I hurt your feelings?
    Half of one of my PvP guild's has bought gold....among these people one of my good friends has as well.

    You see, we are very different you and I. I would not be in a guild that has gold buyers. The same way I would not play in a team of aimbotters in BF4.

    To you, it seems ok, though.

    "friend", right.
    Edited by AlliN on April 14, 2014 4:37PM
  • starkerealm
    starkerealm
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    Tweek wrote: »
    Saerydoth wrote: »
    People seem to be under the impression that gold sellers are buying their own accounts, and that they experience a "loss" when one of these is banned. That is NOT true. The accounts they use are either compromised/stolen accounts, or purchased with stolen credit cards. Either way, the gold sellers don't pay a cent for them.

    You can ban the accounts they use, but it only helps so much because they have stacks of compromised accounts they can use for it.

    In point of fact, one of the "false bans" someone was appealing in here was an account compromise, where their account had been hijacked and used as a goldseller for thirty minutes before Zenimax shut it down.

    How? Did they give the gold seller there password? Pretty bad on their part imo

    The theories that were kicking around in the forum were: "the goldsellers bought user IDs and PWs from less reputable fansites", "the goldsellers required a password for their own site and the user in question was dumb enough to use the same one in and out of game", and of course "keylogger." Though, no, there was nothing definitive.
  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    AlliN wrote: »
    You have compared gold buyers to slavers and "smelly" people...that's not very civil.

    Why? Why is this not civil to point out people that RUIN the fun of other peopel becasue they are just lazy scum? Or did I hurt your feelings?
    Half of one of my PvP guild's has bought gold....among these people one of my good friends has as well.

    You see, we are very different you and I. I would not be in a guild that has gold buyers. The same way I would not play in a team of aimbotters in BF4.

    To you, it seems ok, though.

    "friend", right.

    Let me guess......a gold buyer stole your sweetroll?
  • xPuppetx
    xPuppetx
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    First offense in EQ for buying gold, or in their case platinum, will earn you "this is your only warning" from a GM and the amount purchased would be removed from your inventory/bank. Second offense results in a soft ban. Third time's the charm - you're struck out. You have the right to contest the ban obviously, but Sony will happily provide you with proof of an illegal transaction taking place on your account - essentially giving you enough rope to hang yourself.

    Perhaps a similar policy could work for ESO?

    I've witnessed several guildies earn their warnings and soft bans by purchasing gold but never saw a mass exodus because of it. At the very worst they complained and ranted on the forums about how badly they were mistreated - ignoring the fact they earned their timeout by blatantly violating the ToS of course. Once their corner time was up they were back in the game and very few went on to earn a perma ban.

    As for the suggestion to sell gold outright via an online store? What a ghastly idea; that would reduce the game's quality down to Farmville level and I didn't pay almost $100 for a Facebook app.

    Honestly, in my experience, online stores in general are a bad idea - although microtransactions seem to be the norm in mmos nowadays. Even if the items sold are simple cosmetic items, unless they are bind on acquire, they will be bought and then hawked on the broker for absurd amounts of ingame currency which can be detrimental to the economy (especially in ESO where there isn't one massive economy, there are literally thousands of tiny ones). Ironically, a lot of people will buy gold from a third party site in order to pay for the item off the broker rather than purchase the item directly off the store, continuing the relentless gold seller/buyer cycle. TERA is a perfect example of this.

  • Endolith
    Endolith
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    Tweek wrote: »
    As I said a ton of people I know who play this game have bought gold. Just sayin'

    That's anecdotal, though. Doesn't tell us much about the population as a whole. I wouldn't mind seeing them institute some heavy-handed measures early on, even if they back off them later. The current situation is that bad, between sellers and bots farming for them.

    I do like the negative gold idea, though, and maybe a three-strikes system. Even though people with negative gold could try to buy again to replace it, at some point it becomes cost-prohibitive and easier just to make your gold the normal way in-game.
  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    xPuppetx wrote: »
    First offense in EQ for buying gold, or in their case platinum, will earn you "this is your only warning" from a GM and the amount purchased would be removed from your inventory/bank. Second offense results in a soft ban. Third time's the charm - you're struck out. You have the right to contest the ban obviously, but Sony will happily provide you with proof of an illegal transaction taking place on your account - essentially giving you enough rope to hang yourself.

    Perhaps a similar policy could work for ESO?

    I've witnessed several guildies earn their warnings and soft bans by purchasing gold but never saw a mass exodus because of it. At the very worst they complained and ranted on the forums about how badly they were mistreated - ignoring the fact they earned their timeout by blatantly violating the ToS of course. Once their corner time was up they were back in the game and very few went on to earn a perma ban.

    As for the suggestion to sell gold outright via an online store? What a ghastly idea; that would reduce the game's quality down to Farmville level and I didn't pay almost $100 for a Facebook app.

    Honestly, in my experience, online stores in general are a bad idea - although microtransactions seem to be the norm in mmos nowadays. Even if the items sold are simple cosmetic items, unless they are bind on acquire, they will be bought and then hawked on the broker for absurd amounts of ingame currency which can be detrimental to the economy (especially in ESO where there isn't one massive economy, there are literally thousands of tiny ones). Ironically, a lot of people will buy gold from a third party site in order to pay for the item off the broker rather than purchase the item directly off the store, continuing the relentless gold seller/buyer cycle. TERA is a perfect example of this.

    Finally another sain response...I agree...warning..then ban.
    They should also put a warning on the front page of the launcher...this would lessen the gold spammers sales.
  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    Endolith wrote: »
    Tweek wrote: »
    As I said a ton of people I know who play this game have bought gold. Just sayin'

    That's anecdotal, though. Doesn't tell us much about the population as a whole. I wouldn't mind seeing them institute some heavy-handed measures early on, even if they back off them later. The current situation is that bad, between sellers and bots farming for them.

    I do like the negative gold idea, though, and maybe a three-strikes system. Even though people with negative gold could try to buy again to replace it, at some point it becomes cost-prohibitive and easier just to make your gold the normal way in-game.

    I like the three strikes system the best..and they need to also put a warning on the launcher....this would scare buyers away but not make them quit.....and also would lower the sales of the gold spammers/sellers....and they would go away.


    A real win/win. imo
  • Requielle
    Requielle
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    Tweek wrote: »
    KerinKor wrote: »
    Tweek wrote: »
    I take it you guys aren't as harsh on buyers considering they're not included in the auto ban process. Which is fine, as I believe gold buyers should be warned, then suspended, than banned for repeat offenses.
    Totally disagree, BUYERS are the root cause so should be perma-banned at first offense, just like sellers .. without buyers there'd BE NO RMT!

    But the MMO industry rarely ban buyers, in my experience only Turbine did very much of the in LOTRO, companies like Zenimax, Trion, etc. like the subs. buyers bring in, so I don't expect to see this here.

    Yeah I basically agree with this here, IMO they need/want the money gold buyers bring in as I said above.

    CCP Games (the folks who run EVE Online) also ban both sides in RMT issues, AFAIK. Then again, they also permanently remove certain features from your account if you do anything to warrant a suspension.
  • Endolith
    Endolith
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    Tweek wrote: »
    I like the three strikes system the best..and they need to also put a warning on the launcher....this would scare buyers away but not make them quit.....and also would lower the sales of the gold spammers/sellers....and they would go away.


    A real win/win. imo

    Yeah, I'd definitely be on-board with something like that.
  • Etchesketch
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    Another roflol moment. If you are going to throw around stupid words like spurious, learn to read first. I never ever said gold buyers contribute to the community. I said they don't affect me like the sellers and botters do.

    Some of you are funny.

    @starkerealm
    Edited by Etchesketch on April 14, 2014 4:45PM
    The number one rule of online gaming is now and has always been, Never play on Patch Day.
  • AlliN
    AlliN
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    Tweek wrote: »
    AlliN wrote: »
    You have compared gold buyers to slavers and "smelly" people...that's not very civil.

    Why? Why is this not civil to point out people that RUIN the fun of other peopel becasue they are just lazy scum? Or did I hurt your feelings?
    Half of one of my PvP guild's has bought gold....among these people one of my good friends has as well.

    You see, we are very different you and I. I would not be in a guild that has gold buyers. The same way I would not play in a team of aimbotters in BF4.

    To you, it seems ok, though.

    "friend", right.

    Let me guess......a gold buyer stole your sweetroll?

    Yes, the sweetroll was called honest gameplay.
    I like the three strikes system the best..and they need to also put a warning on the launcher....this would scare buyers away but not make them quit.....and also would lower the sales of the gold spammers/sellers....and they would go away.

    So, buying 10k gold 3 times would not be ok, but buying 100M once would be fine.
    Your logic, flawless as always

    Edited by AlliN on April 14, 2014 4:48PM
  • Requielle
    Requielle
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    Tweek wrote: »
    I just want the gold spammers to go away without my gold buying buddies going with em.....lol

    Quite a few of us would like both your gold-buying buddies and the gold spammers to go away.
  • Endolith
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    Another roflol moment. If you are going to throw around stupid words like spurious, learn to read first. I never ever said gold buyers contribute to the community. I said they don't affect me like the sellers and botters do.

    Some of you are funny.

    They do affect you if you take part in the economy in any way, since an influx of currency into an economy always inflates prices. Makes it harder for non-gold buyers to purchase when the buyers are inflating prices.

  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    AlliN wrote: »
    Tweek wrote: »
    AlliN wrote: »
    You have compared gold buyers to slavers and "smelly" people...that's not very civil.

    Why? Why is this not civil to point out people that RUIN the fun of other peopel becasue they are just lazy scum? Or did I hurt your feelings?
    Half of one of my PvP guild's has bought gold....among these people one of my good friends has as well.

    You see, we are very different you and I. I would not be in a guild that has gold buyers. The same way I would not play in a team of aimbotters in BF4.

    To you, it seems ok, though.

    "friend", right.

    Let me guess......a gold buyer stole your sweetroll?

    Yes, the sweetroll was called honest gameplay.

    You cannot take a joke...it was tryin to be funny lol

    Don't understand the concept of friendship and fair treatment?

    ....imo banning gold buyers without a warning is harsh......and if I see this at all me and several of my buddies will be quitting...some have YouTube's and some of these guys refuse to buy gold like me. They will be the ones doing the complaining.
    Edited by Tweek on April 14, 2014 4:49PM
  • Tweek
    Tweek
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    Requielle wrote: »
    Tweek wrote: »
    I just want the gold spammers to go away without my gold buying buddies going with em.....lol

    Quite a few of us would like both your gold-buying buddies and the gold spammers to go away.

    Yeah...the meanie poo poo heads like you guys.
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