Can we talk about DC exploiting the low pop bonus.

Reverb · August 2020

[snip] The pop bonus was changed long ago to account for the average population over a period of several hours. Logging off right before the evaluation would have zero impact.

What’s happening instead is that DC on PCNA only has 2 bars of pop during most of prime. Right before an eval the other factions will have a scoring push (usually AD) and take DC trikeeps and scrolls if there were any left to begin with), while an EP ball group farms half the faction in one of the gate keeps.

With low pop to begin with, and no chance of defending, most DC get demoralized and log off until the next night when it starts again.

You’re right about DC dropping around a significant eval period, but you’re way off about the cause, and probably blind to your role in it.

[Edited to remove Baiting]

MAOofDC · August 2020

Reverb wrote: »

The entire premise of this thread is garbage. The pop bonus was changed long ago to account for the average population over a period of several hours. Logging off right before the evaluation would have zero impact.

What’s happening instead is that DC on PCNA only has 2 bars of pop during mode of prime. Right before an eval the other factions will have a scoring push (usually AD) and take DC trikeeps and scrolls if there were any left to begin with), while an EP ball group farms half the faction in one of the gate keeps.

With low pop to begin with, and no chance of defending, most DC get demoralized and log off until the next night when it starts again.

You’re right about DC dropping around a significant eval period, but you’re way off about the cause, and probably blind to your role in it.

Fine let's say I conceed that point. Why is their faction (or any faction) rewarded for not playing? How is that fair? If the faction logs off and doesn't play then they deserve not only to lose the campaign but lose badly.

Reverb · August 2020

MAOofDC wrote: »

Reverb wrote: »

The entire premise of this thread is garbage. The pop bonus was changed long ago to account for the average population over a period of several hours. Logging off right before the evaluation would have zero impact.

What’s happening instead is that DC on PCNA only has 2 bars of pop during mode of prime. Right before an eval the other factions will have a scoring push (usually AD) and take DC trikeeps and scrolls if there were any left to begin with), while an EP ball group farms half the faction in one of the gate keeps.

With low pop to begin with, and no chance of defending, most DC get demoralized and log off until the next night when it starts again.

You’re right about DC dropping around a significant eval period, but you’re way off about the cause, and probably blind to your role in it.

Fine let's say I conceed that point. Why is their faction (or any faction) rewarded for not playing? How is that fair? If the faction logs off and doesn't play then they deserve not only to lose the campaign but lose badly.

DC is coming in last regardless, as we have for 10 out of the last 12 months. I honestly have no idea why you’ve not only invented some complex conspiracy in your mind, but have also gotten so worked up about it.

JobooAGS · August 2020

MAOofDC wrote: »

Reverb wrote: »

The entire premise of this thread is garbage. The pop bonus was changed long ago to account for the average population over a period of several hours. Logging off right before the evaluation would have zero impact.

What’s happening instead is that DC on PCNA only has 2 bars of pop during mode of prime. Right before an eval the other factions will have a scoring push (usually AD) and take DC trikeeps and scrolls if there were any left to begin with), while an EP ball group farms half the faction in one of the gate keeps.

With low pop to begin with, and no chance of defending, most DC get demoralized and log off until the next night when it starts again.

You’re right about DC dropping around a significant eval period, but you’re way off about the cause, and probably blind to your role in it.

Fine let's say I conceed that point. Why is their faction (or any faction) rewarded for not playing? How is that fair? If the faction logs off and doesn't play then they deserve not only to lose the campaign but lose badly.

Because if it doesn’t happen, you will have more of a 2 faction gameplay than you already do now with pop lock v pop lock v 2 bar. The lag alone is more than enough for me to quit Gray Host, now if every campaign you are 10k+ behind 2nd place because your pop can’t do anything during prime time/ during prime time you’re constantly getting by stomped or farmed, why play? Just go to another campaign, do something else or like me just do bgs.

pma_pacifier · August 2020

MAOofDC wrote: »

ChimpyChumpy wrote: »

lol I play PCNA greyhost on 7 DC characters. Ok maybe only 6 to 8 hours a week, but I have never heard anyone try and organize a mass log off. This is the dumbest thing I have ever read on this forum. The conspiracy theories are out of this world.

Weird that DC often get the low pop bonus for the eval yet has no bonus for most of an hour I guess DCs internet all must cut out at the same time.

All of that really doesn't matter the real problem is low pop bonus shouldn't give a massive score bonus. In what world is that fair and balanced?

On average DC has almost near non existent population most of the times. (especially compared to other campaigns). In most cases DC gets rolled over by a pop lock Zerg with no one coming to help.

Ever considered the possibility that there is literally no incentive to play as DC Greyhost because of the lack of competent and cohesive manpower and that only during Low pop where people would at least get in. It is a total luxury to say that DC has enough people to log off at the first place. And your claims are bogus because majority of the time frames you can observe that DC has simply lesser population than the others.

Removing any incentive such as a Low population bonus would only serve towards your intention to siege empty keeps of an almost dead faction in DC Greyhost.

You want to know why AD got last the recent campaign? Because EP decided so.

Ahtu · August 2020

Low population bonus was designed to encourage newer players to join and play on that faction. Most of the time when it happens people queue for the extra AP incentive. Without it, even less people would play on DC and the faction would be deader than it is now.

The system was designed to keep populations healthy, bottom line.

Minyassa · August 2020

Oh is that why it's so hard to get into a campaign that has any blue keeps in it, it's on purpose to get a bonus? Tsk. And here I've been complaining about how far I have to travel to get my treasure chests.

biminirwb17_ESO · August 2020

As an Oceanic player I have seen DC getting low pop almost every day on Grey NA PC, its because they have low pop.

Then the one good DC oceanic guild logs on at their usual time and starts taking stuff from AD and EP for a couple of hours, with low pop bonus.

No conspiracy, just the way it has been happening recently.

MAOofDC · August 2020

Reverb wrote: »

MAOofDC wrote: »

Reverb wrote: »

The entire premise of this thread is garbage. The pop bonus was changed long ago to account for the average population over a period of several hours. Logging off right before the evaluation would have zero impact.

What’s happening instead is that DC on PCNA only has 2 bars of pop during mode of prime. Right before an eval the other factions will have a scoring push (usually AD) and take DC trikeeps and scrolls if there were any left to begin with), while an EP ball group farms half the faction in one of the gate keeps.

With low pop to begin with, and no chance of defending, most DC get demoralized and log off until the next night when it starts again.

You’re right about DC dropping around a significant eval period, but you’re way off about the cause, and probably blind to your role in it.

Fine let's say I conceed that point. Why is their faction (or any faction) rewarded for not playing? How is that fair? If the faction logs off and doesn't play then they deserve not only to lose the campaign but lose badly.

DC is coming in last regardless, as we have for 10 out of the last 12 months. I honestly have no idea why you’ve not only invented some complex conspiracy in your mind, but have also gotten so worked up about it.

Except DC hasn't come in last 10 out of the last 12 months that goes to show you're not paying attention.

MAOofDC · August 2020

pma_pacifier wrote: »

MAOofDC wrote: »

ChimpyChumpy wrote: »

lol I play PCNA greyhost on 7 DC characters. Ok maybe only 6 to 8 hours a week, but I have never heard anyone try and organize a mass log off. This is the dumbest thing I have ever read on this forum. The conspiracy theories are out of this world.

Weird that DC often get the low pop bonus for the eval yet has no bonus for most of an hour I guess DCs internet all must cut out at the same time.

All of that really doesn't matter the real problem is low pop bonus shouldn't give a massive score bonus. In what world is that fair and balanced?

On average DC has almost near non existent population most of the times. (especially compared to other campaigns). In most cases DC gets rolled over by a pop lock Zerg with no one coming to help.

Ever considered the possibility that there is literally no incentive to play as DC Greyhost because of the lack of competent and cohesive manpower and that only during Low pop where people would at least get in. It is a total luxury to say that DC has enough people to log off at the first place. And your claims are bogus because majority of the time frames you can observe that DC has simply lesser population than the others.

Removing any incentive such as a Low population bonus would only serve towards your intention to siege empty keeps of an almost dead faction in DC Greyhost.

You want to know why AD got last the recent campaign? Because EP decided so.

Funny when Fengrush played on Grey Host DC was pop locked every day, the number of times I logged on and DC have most of the map when he played serves as testament to that. Also at prime time DC seems to muster enough of a force to take AD keeps and leave EP alone so your argument is flawed. Empty DC keeps would serve EP more than it would AD. Since Grey host is a locked campaign you idea that it serves as an incentive is completely blown out of the water. You either join the camp as DC or you don't that's it. Also EP so called decided to doesn't answer how DC caught up in points, well unless you count team Purple as EP

MAOofDC · August 2020

biminirwb17_ESO wrote: »

As an Oceanic player I have seen DC getting low pop almost every day on Grey NA PC, its because they have low pop.

Then the one good DC oceanic guild logs on at their usual time and starts taking stuff from AD and EP for a couple of hours, with low pop bonus.

No conspiracy, just the way it has been happening recently.

Fine the low pop bonus needs to be reworked if your faction cannot muster the forces then you don't deserve a win. The EP always have an overwhelming force and always seem to win. If low pop bonus is so important to "fairness" then why isn't there a high pop debuff? You know to maintain "fairness".

Reverb · August 2020

MAOofDC wrote: »

pma_pacifier wrote: »

MAOofDC wrote: »

ChimpyChumpy wrote: »

lol I play PCNA greyhost on 7 DC characters. Ok maybe only 6 to 8 hours a week, but I have never heard anyone try and organize a mass log off. This is the dumbest thing I have ever read on this forum. The conspiracy theories are out of this world.

Weird that DC often get the low pop bonus for the eval yet has no bonus for most of an hour I guess DCs internet all must cut out at the same time.

All of that really doesn't matter the real problem is low pop bonus shouldn't give a massive score bonus. In what world is that fair and balanced?

On average DC has almost near non existent population most of the times. (especially compared to other campaigns). In most cases DC gets rolled over by a pop lock Zerg with no one coming to help.

Ever considered the possibility that there is literally no incentive to play as DC Greyhost because of the lack of competent and cohesive manpower and that only during Low pop where people would at least get in. It is a total luxury to say that DC has enough people to log off at the first place. And your claims are bogus because majority of the time frames you can observe that DC has simply lesser population than the others.

Removing any incentive such as a Low population bonus would only serve towards your intention to siege empty keeps of an almost dead faction in DC Greyhost.

You want to know why AD got last the recent campaign? Because EP decided so.

Funny when Fengrush played on Grey Host DC was pop locked every day, the number of times I logged on and DC have most of the map when he played serves as testament to that. Also at prime time DC seems to muster enough of a force to take AD keeps and leave EP alone so your argument is flawed. Empty DC keeps would serve EP more than it would AD. Since Grey host is a locked campaign you idea that it serves as an incentive is completely blown out of the water. You either join the camp as DC or you don't that's it. Also EP so called decided to doesn't answer how DC caught up in points, well unless you count team Purple as EP

DC absolutely doesn’t leave EP alone. Ever. If we aren’t pushed to our gates, we are fighting them at ales-breaks-chal 24/7. You have lost any credibility you may have had by claiming “team purple” and exposed yourself as not only a conspiracy theorist, but as someone with tunnel vision who simply doesn’t understand the natural ebb and flow of a 3-faction system.

For most of the last few years, AD has been the faction benefiting most from the low pop bonus due to a lack of (US) midday players, compared to their high oceanic pop. Where was your outrage then?

LeifErickson · August 2020

Imagine actually caring about the campaign. Even worse, imagine creating a made up story in your head to shame the faction that is constantly in last with almost no map control and the lowest pop. It's honestly just sad.

baselinestun · August 2020

the jig is up, our coordinated log off scheme has been foiled DC

Crispen_Longbow · August 2020

MAOofDC wrote: »

For the last few campaigns in Grey Host (PC/NA) DC as a faction has been exploiting the low pop bonus.

Nope, they don't have the population as their guilds have abandoned the main campaign to poplock NOCP and the Standard campaign.

First off giving a faction more score points because they have a low pop is complete ***. Give players of a low pop faction more AP or even more health as a bonus. But giving it more score makes no sense and creates an exploitable mechanic.

I agree with this, but only because campaigns scores & campaign wins are meaningless and have been for years and years. What would work better, would be to buff the low population. That way, they would be better armed to fight outnumber, as that's what they would be doing.

How is it that a faction with no scrolls and three keeps get double or triple what the other factions get? How is that fair? If you can't keep a healthy population on for the length of the campaign you don't deserve to do well at the end of it.

A better question would be, "why are you fighting against the weaker faction"? If EP is Poplocked, AD is poplocked and DC is at 2 bars. Let them get their crap back and go fight EP since you are an AD. Why would you even be on that side of the map if they have no scrolls, no emp keeps, or no guilds to fight?

Now how does DC work the expolit. Simple just before the score eval most of the faction just logs off waits the couple of minutes for the eval to happen then log back on. It creates an artificial low pop and quite frankly it is cheating in my opinion.

100% incorrect. How do you not know this? You have played this game for at least 6 years.

Usually because there isn't enough time to gate lock them, the only way to prevent an massive score gain during the eval.

Stop gating a 2 bar faction and go learn to fight the competition. Low pop DC aren't a competition. I have found, that those who care about campaign wins are usually players that can't PVP. They can't win a pvp match be it a 1v1, 1vx, small scale, gvgs, taking a defended objective etc.

Even if the other factions try to rush their keeps (team orange oh so rarely happens) they have logged back on and can now defend the keeps. They use this exploit to make up a massive deficit in point during the last 3 or 4 days of the campaign and it's disgusting. If you need to cheat to win you don't deserve to win.

Low pop is calculated over a extended period of time. The faction that can zerg the most in non primetime hours, when the other factions are low pop, wins the campaign. It has been like this forever, which is why campaign wins mean nothing.

I suspect a number of DC will comment and say "we're not cheating just using the system that's in place." My reply is "That's exploiting a system that wasn't well thought out to begin with and is cheating and deep down you know it."

I'm currently an AD player like you. DC aren't cheating. DC just doesn't have any guilds that can put up a fight, so they have left the main campaign to fight easier guilds / pvers. To all the DC, that remain in the main campaign, they should be praised for sticking it out and fighting an uphill battle.

Rohamad_Ali · August 2020

What a great opportunity for DC pvp'ers . Target rich environments every night . DC enjoys being outnumbered as they are the toughest faction . They love to fight so much they fight each other too lol . I've learned to completely stay out of opinion on "cheating" . That's for the people at zos to decide .

vamp_emily · August 2020

I haven't played much but if I'm not mistaken on PC/NA DC got last place even with the low pop bonus most the time. I don't think DC is exploiting low pop bonus, I think what happens is when DC doesn't have population to take anything more players log out. I've heard several times in chat comments like, "guess I will go play BG".

Do away with low pop bonus and have dynamic population or lower max population to 2 bars.

W0lf_z13 · August 2020

i used to play grey host every day, but the lag got way too bad, the majority of my guild including myself now plays in blackreach, we would LOVE to come back to grey host... but u get pretty frustrated when 90% of your skills don't fire and you just stand there getting hit by other's attacks

caeliusstarbreaker · August 2020

MAOofDC wrote: »

caeliusstarbreaker wrote: »

What’s more realistic here... “hundreds of players” logging off and on every 25 min... or you just being wrong?

It once a hour but you would know that if you were in Cyrodiil more often.

Whether it was 25 min or an hr, it wouldn’t change the hilarity of the claim.

But yea I’m totally never in cyrodiil.

Beaverton · August 2020

If ZOS was transparent about faction pops and how the bonuses were calculated, 80% of these arguments would be moot.

In my experience, for the last two months in prime time US, AD pushed DC back keeps against no opposition only because of the low pop bonus. After week one EP was too far ahead to dream about catching so when you see the faction you are competing against (DC) getting 300 point per hour for not being present, you kind of want to take those points. All the while EP is hitting us and not DC because they want fights and don't have to worry about points.

Regardless of intentional vs unintentional, exploit vs coincidence, low pop bonus is broken. With the current design, it doesn't seem to "fix" the population imbalance and exacerbates it in some situations such as above.

And yes, some people do care about scores and it doesn't really matter if you think it is stupid. Hell, I think it is stupid but I still care. You gonna love who you love, right?

Ackwalan · August 2020

baselinestun wrote: »

the jig is up, our coordinated log off scheme has been foiled DC

Would have gotten away with it, if it weren't for those kids and their dog.

fastolfv_ESO · August 2020

the low pop system tracks populations at times throughout days if not weeks its not just one day ppl log off and its instant

thegreat_one · August 2020

Let's talk about AD and EP teaming up against us? Why would we populated a zone we know we are going to get teamed up on?

The only counter to AD and EP zerging our scrolls EVERY NIGHT is low pop.

You guys will be playing with yourselves and PVDooring empty keeps while DC rolls in Sweet Low Pop bonuses, Unless zos decides to do something about the insanely unbalanced populations.

Zelos · August 2020

MAOofDC wrote: »

For the last few campaigns in Grey Host (PC/NA) DC as a faction has been exploiting the low pop bonus. First off giving a faction more score points because they have a low pop is complete ***. Give players of a low pop faction more AP or even more health as a bonus. But giving it more score makes no sense and creates an exploitable mechanic. How is it that a faction with no scrolls and three keeps get double or triple what the other factions get? How is that fair? If you can't keep a healthy population on for the length of the campaign you don't deserve to do well at the end of it.
Now how does DC work the expolit. Simple just before the score eval most of the faction just logs off waits the couple of minutes for the eval to happen then log back on. It creates an artificial low pop and quite frankly it is cheating in my opinion. Usually because there isn't enough time to gate lock them, the only way to prevent an massive score gain during the eval. Even if the other factions try to rush their keeps (team orange oh so rarely happens) they have logged back on and can now defend the keeps. They use this exploit to make up a massive deficit in point during the last 3 or 4 days of the campaign and it's disgusting. If you need to cheat to win you don't deserve to win. I suspect a number of DC will comment and say "we're not cheating just using the system that's in place." My reply is "That's exploiting a system that wasn't well thought out to begin with and is cheating and deep down you know it."

Wait a minute.....
Because players would rather play on other factions then DC, and some DC would rather play other campaigns... DC is cheating... and the players enabling this so called cheating by joining other factions. Man you just cant win these days without people using insane evidence to arrive at ridiculous conclusions to explain why they lost.
I think my IQ has dropped a couple dozen points after reading this...
There is absolutely no way you can support this claim logically because it makes no.... well logical sense...
In essence because people would rather play on different factions or campaigns the entire faction is exploiting. All of DC is convincing or forcing its faction to leave so that 40 people get the low population bonus... and boost score.

xshatox · August 2020

Say what you want about feng but he really can move the entire dc faction. When he play grayhost dc almost always poplocked even win campaign. Too bad he doesnt play grayhost anymore. Is he still playing?

edges_endgame · August 2020

xshatox wrote: »

Say what you want about feng but he really can move the entire dc faction. When he play grayhost dc almost always poplocked even win campaign. Too bad he doesnt play grayhost anymore. Is he still playing?

Yes. No Cp campaign

ZOS_ConnorG · August 2020

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