Creating dummy accounts during free trial to make your own guild bank, is it legal or illegal?

Ryce · April 2021

Is it legal or illegal to do this? I read a post on reddit someone got their guild deleted along with the items inside the bank for doing this but that post was like 5-6 years ago and I'm not sure if the OP post was legit or not since he only quoted text and no other screenshot/proof was shown.

tsaescishoeshiner · April 2021

It's against the terms of service. One person, one account is what the ToS say.

Edit: This seems to be wrong! See helpful posts below.

Hymzir · April 2021

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

It's against the terms of service. One person, one account is what the ToS say.

And yet, not one day passes on these forums, without coming across someone stating they have multiple accounts. It's also been asked before on the forums, And ZOS has not come out and said "uh-uh, no-no, don't do that" before.

I can't, of course, say anything from personal experience, seeing as I have only one account and my "guild bank" is a legacy one made up from no-longer active players. But multi-accounts are, based on how often it is brought up on these forums, okay by ZOS. As long as you are not multi-boxing or logged on more than one at a time.

So... maybe ZOS is fine with it, as long as you are using accounts you paid money for, but not when you are setting up freebie accounts. Though I would not be surprised to learn that people have used previous freebie events to set up alt accounts just to set up guild banks. One things sure though, there are not 15 million people playing ESO. By all accounts, there are more like 2.5 million active players. How many of those extra accounts are dead ones and how many are phantom ones is anyone's guess.

Deep_01 · April 2021

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

It's against the terms of service. One person, one account is what the ToS say.

Shouldn't the intent be "one person, many accounts = ok" but "multiple people, one account = bad" ?

Rasoma · April 2021

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

It's against the terms of service. One person, one account is what the ToS say.

I'd like to see precisely where it says in the ToS that if you have one account you are not permitted to have another one.

I do however agree that it does clearly state than an account can only be used by one person - I can't see any reference to it saying a person can only have one account though. I am sure if I am not allowed to have the second account I have that I will be given a refund on game purchase then?

As for the OP question they themselves stated the post in question was old and suspected the validity of it. Intent means a lot you know.

If you pay for and use two accounts (as I do) without dipping into the world of botting, multi boxes and all other stuff I do not claim to have a clue about then all well and good - you are paying for the game and using it (just on multiple accounts). However if you create handfuls of "free" accounts in order to game the system then you are technically exploiting it and we all know what exploiting is.

So I guess if you have to come to the forums and ask whether something that sounds suspect is ok the chances are that it is not.

jaws343 · April 2021

They've been pretty clear in the past that multiple accounts are ok. What is frowned upon is people playing multiple accounts simultaneously. Logging into one account, and then logging out and logging into another account is perfectly ok.

Amottica · April 2021

I have removed my comment. While it was a statement from an employee stating that two accounts owned by the same person can be logged into at the same time on the same PC it is in conflict with the link @Ingenon posted below that stated this is incorrect.

Regardless, both what I removed and what is provided below clearly indicate a person can have more than one account. Not sure why they would want more than one but that is a different topic.

Ingenon · April 2021

"To be clear, players are welcome to have multiple accounts." See https://help.elderscrollsonline.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/23701 for quoted line.

Reverb · April 2021

It is explicitly NOT against the terms of service for one player to have multiple accounts as long as they were all obtained within the terms.

Any type of automation IS against the TOS, and using one account to facilitate actions which violate the terms using another account (like RMT laundering, or using an alt account to harass someone who blocked your main, etc) may get both accounts banned. But as long as you’re obtaining and playing each account legally, have as many as you’d like.

virtus753 · April 2021

Having multiple accounts is fine, as long as you don't automate them or otherwise "play them simultaneously." Trading between accounts while both are logged in is fine.

But using free accounts to open a guild bank is not "intended behavior":

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/3527514/#Comment_3527514

It has gotten guild banks shut down and their contents made inaccessible more recently than that.

I'm not sure when this poster had their guild bank removed, but the post was from a week ago:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/7185934/#Comment_7185934

ETA: This may be related: https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/502265/personal-guilds-deleted

tsaescishoeshiner · April 2021

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

It's against the terms of service. One person, one account is what the ToS say.

Ingenon wrote: »

"To be clear, players are welcome to have multiple accounts." See https://help.elderscrollsonline.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/23701 for quoted line.

Yay I'm wrong! I guess I just thought so cuz I had heard of the "personal guild bank" closures mentioned above.

Danikat · April 2021

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

tsaescishoeshiner wrote: »

It's against the terms of service. One person, one account is what the ToS say.

Ingenon wrote: »

"To be clear, players are welcome to have multiple accounts." See https://help.elderscrollsonline.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/23701 for quoted line.

Yay I'm wrong! I guess I just thought so cuz I had heard of the "personal guild bank" closures mentioned above.

There is a rule which is often summarised as 'one person, one account', but it's to address the opposite situation. The full text is:

You shall not share Your account with anyone. Joint or shared ownership or use of an account by more than one individual natural person is prohibited. Access to the ZeniMax sites and Services, including Bethesda.Net, are intended for the entertainment, enjoyment and recreation of individual natural persons. These sites and services are not for use as corporate, business, commercial, or income seeking activities. Corporations, associations, partnerships, joint ventures, limited liability companies, artificial persona, and other businesses or entities that are not a single, individual natural person are not eligible to establish accounts to access the ZeniMax sites, play games or participate in offered services, nor is anyone who is acting for or on behalf of or in the course of the business of, any such artificial person or entities.
https://account.elderscrollsonline.com/code-of-conduct

(Interestingly that also bans all AI's from playing.)

There's also this bit:

Accounts are non-transferable under all circumstances. You have sole liability for all activities on Your Account and/or under Your user names. You may be held liable for losses incurred by ZeniMax or other third parties due to someone else using Your Account, user name or password. Your Account or certain features of Your Account may be restricted, suspended, and/or terminated if someone else uses Your Account, user name or password to engage in activity that violates these Terms of Service or is otherwise improper or illegal. You agree to notify ZeniMax immediately if You suspect or become aware of any unauthorized use of Your Account, user name, password, or other personal data, or any other breach of security. We reserve the right to request and/or require You to alter Your password if we believe that Your password is no longer secure.
https://account.elderscrollsonline.com/terms-of-service

I'm not sure about ZOS specifically but I've heard that the main reason most online games have a clause like that is so they don't have to deal with any of the complications which can result from sharing an account. If someone is reported ZOS can ban the account (tempoarily or permenantly) without having to worry about who was using it at the time. It doesn't matter to them if it was you who insulted everyone in Cyrodiil or your stupid cousin who sometimes plays on your account, and promising not to let him on again isn't going to get around the ban.

If your little sister "steals" all the crowns on the account to spend on her characters, even though they were yours and she's already spent her share this month they don't have to deal with it at all. One account = one person so as long as it wasn't against the rules it's a valid transaction.

GrimTheReaper45 · April 2021

Not sure about it but not one person that created 50-100 alt accounts for shell guilds to sell trader stalls ever got banned.

This seems far less malicious