Gifting Crowns Feedback Thread

FireBreathingNord · September 2023

The recent changes disabling crown gifting to combat fraud have sparked a lot of discussion in the community. This thread is intended to be a focused spot to provide constructive feedback to the developers on potential solutions for reasonably allowing gifting to return.

This is meant to be a solutions-oriented discussion - rather than venting frustrations, let's collaborate on ideas for balanced anti-fraud systems that satisfy all sides. Some questions to consider:

What focused vetting processes or gift limits could reduce abuse while permitting good faith gifting?
How can crown purchases be allowed to flow through the player economy without enabling illicit sales?
What transparency in timelines or progress updates would help rebuild community trust?
Are there creative technical solutions like transferable crown currency items?
What compromises between unchecked systems and heavy bans seem viable?
How can we frame this obstacle as an opportunity for positive evolution?

Please keep feedback constructive and focused on practical solutions. There are still plenty of reasons to be hopeful if we approach this in a spirit of creative collaboration. Together we can arrive at a gifting system that upholds integrity while enabling player creativity. Let's maintain open and solution-focused communication.

What ideas or suggestions do you have around safe, balanced systems for enabling gifting again?

Edited: Added bullet points.

JavaRen · September 2023

It would help if we knew where the fraudulent activity was taking place, is it scams in the player to player transaction portion, stolen cards buying the crowns in the first place, some geographic shenanigans, or some other kind? Different types of fraud need different solutions.

PrincessOfThieves · September 2023

JavaRen wrote: »

It would help if we knew where the fraudulent activity was taking place, is it scams in the player to player transaction portion, stolen cards buying the crowns in the first place, some geographic shenanigans, or some other kind? Different types of fraud need different solutions.

Could be related to the thousands of free accounts they've given away on Epic store. I haven't seen a single goldseller for years, and after this promo event there is a bunch of gold/crown offers from shady sites. I see them pretty much every day.

Casul · September 2023

Player to player scams: Add crowns as a tradable currency in the trade window and add a text box check (like deleting a character) to confirm the agreement.

Stolen cards: reduce number of crown transactions based on age of the account. Allowing larger transactions on older accounts.

New account can not purchase anything until there have been at least a week of age, perhaps you could have forum sign up be a requirement but I don’t know if that’s a good idea either.

Geographical: Admittedly, no solution.

These are my ideas at least, feel free to add opinions.

PrincessOfThieves · September 2023

Casul wrote: »

Geographical: Admittedly, no solution.

Maybe they could keep the low prices on crowns and eso+ for regions like Turkey but block crown gifting for those who buy cheap crowns? The same way they've blocked crown crates in Belgium.
It is not ideal, but I think it's still better than raising regional prices or blocking crown gifting for everybody.

FireBreathingNord · September 2023

Hopefully ZOS can share more insights into the details, within reason for security.

If we know the nature of the fraud, the community can better respond with ideas and feedback on appropriate deterrents.

FireBreathingNord · September 2023

Restricting gifts/gold transfers to new accounts.

Requiring a minimum account age + activity level + CP Level ### before sending/receiving big gifts should limits scammers abusing new accounts. Accounts earn trust.

Trundik · September 2023

Freeze September time limited crown store items to be available untill you will find solution in the name of god.

Gray_howling_parrot · September 2023

If there was an in-game vendor that converted gold to crowns and vice versa, this would literally solve everything. Such an easy fix. We essentially already have the WoW token of sorts, but do it informally outside of the game. If ZOS is going to allow gold-to-crown and vice versa trading, why not make themselves the middle man to prevent scams?

OleResinHead · September 2023

This is very frustrating, my friends are stuck in limbo due to the alliance change token I gifted late last night before ZOS randomly shut the feature off...so now my two friends cannot accept or deny the gifted alliance change token... when they go to buy one from the crown store with their own $$, it says they cant buy it until they accept or deny the token in their inventory...but its bugged and they cant accept or deny the token...this needs to be dealt with asap

@ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_Kevin

darvaria · September 2023

@ZOS_GinaBruno
@ZOS_Kevin

I am respectfully asking you to give this subject some more evaluation.

As a happy crown buying customers since 2016. Review my account please, I have spent around $14,000 on crowns. Just on crowns, not on all the dlc and monthly subscriptions. And I think this is a very reasonable amount and feel this money was very well spent. As compared to my husband's hobbies, he also thinks these are a good investment.

I did spend about $900 of that, legally maxing out a Necromancer. I buy a few things from the Crown Store for myself but not that much.. Most of my crowns were gifted as crown crates. Since I am mostly at Cyro, some have been for race and faction changes. I gifted one exchange for a new house for a player. But there you have it, most were gifted as crown crates (I am personally not a fan of buying crates).

What makes ESO the most appealing game on the market is my ability to legally obtain gold. And I know the company that develops this game is getting the financial rewards. Farming my own gold will never be on my agenda.

I will NOT buy ESO gold from any other source than the game itself. I played Rift for a while and they had this same feature. The Classic versions of WOW did not last long for me because there was no legal way to obtain game gold. Both my husband and I own businesses and we do not believe it is ethical to steal. Buying illegal gold is basically stealing from the game developer and who knows what that money really supports. I've read a lot about Bethesda and ZOS, and feel it is a company worthy of spending my discretionary income on.

I am really unsure about the status of crown selling. Currently, I have 55K of crowns on my account. I am not in the immediate need for game gold. I did gift a streamer a race change just because I enjoyed a few runs with them. Not a gold exchange. You can legally just gift crown items right, without arousing suspicion? But if I keep playing, I will eventually need some more in game gold. And all the crown requests I see in zone want Crowns. Are they trying to trick me? PLEASE explain.

Cheers,
Darv

Gray_howling_parrot · September 2023

darvaria wrote: »

@ZOS_GinaBruno
@ZOS_Kevin

I am respectfully asking you to give this subject some more evaluation.

As a happy crown buying customers since 2016. Review my account please, I have spent around $14,000 on crowns. Just on crowns, not on all the dlc and monthly subscriptions. And I think this is a very reasonable amount and feel this money was very well spent. As compared to my husband's hobbies, he also thinks these are a good investment.

I did spend about $900 of that, legally maxing out a Necromancer. I buy a few things from the Crown Store for myself but not that much.. Most of my crowns were gifted as crown crates. Since I am mostly at Cyro, some have been for race and faction changes. I gifted one exchange for a new house for a player. But there you have it, most were gifted as crown crates (I am personally not a fan of buying crates).

What makes ESO the most appealing game on the market is my ability to legally obtain gold. And I know the company that develops this game is getting the financial rewards. Farming my own gold will never be on my agenda.

I will NOT buy ESO gold from any other source than the game itself. I played Rift for a while and they had this same feature. The Classic versions of WOW did not last long for me because there was no legal way to obtain game gold. Both my husband and I own businesses and we do not believe it is ethical to steal. Buying illegal gold is basically stealing from the game developer and who knows what that money really supports. I've read a lot about Bethesda and ZOS, and feel it is a company worthy of spending my discretionary income on.

I am really unsure about the status of crown selling. Currently, I have 55K of crowns on my account. I am not in the immediate need for game gold. I did gift a streamer a race change just because I enjoyed a few runs with them. Not a gold exchange. You can legally just gift crown items right, without arousing suspicion? But if I keep playing, I will eventually need some more in game gold. And all the crown requests I see in zone want Crowns. Are they trying to trick me? PLEASE explain.

Cheers,
Darv

This is why crown store items will never be earnable in-game items. They could give it to us for free, or make $14k off of one player. Goodness.

As of ZOS_Kevin's post earlier today, all crown store gifting is disabled. It is 100% impossible to legally gift crowns, trade crowns for gold, etc.

lostineternity · September 2023

I have an idea but not sure it is possible.

Give players ability to buy items from crown store with gold and the exchange rate be regualted by ZoS.
You can even limit the amount of things you can buy. For example items added for last 2 years can be bought only for crowns, but older ones also for gold.

And no gifting of course in order to remove all mediators

Darlig_Ulv · September 2023

Is there still gifting via ticket?
And is that even a thing for Xbox?

boi_anachronism_ · September 2023

All i can say is: theres is gonna be a hard wake up call when they review quarterly profits after this. Fact is people buy extra crowns specifically to sell them for gold, players who dont have a ton of irl currency to spend buy them. Zos gets the money regardless. Now those players who would buy those crowns wont and people who dont buy them with irl currency STILL won't so now they have guaranteed that they will lose a metric ton of money. I'm incredibly bummed because i was planning to get jode's embrace when it returned.... but I can tell you fo damn sure im not gonna spend $100 for it. But someone would have..and now they won't. Everyone loses here. @ZOS_Kevin y'all need to get this sorted reaaaal quick. For everyone's sake. My prediction is the studio is gonna find itself in real deep doodoo because lets be honest- microtransactions are what pays the bills.

Zyva · September 2023

I mean, how do we know they arent just hoping people will move on to buying items with their money instead of gold? Even if not everyone does, if enough people do they might see a boost.

Either way, the player loses. Its zos that wins.

Hungary1411 · September 2023

I have no actual ideas sadly, but there's must be something with unfair regional prices as in my situation here:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/642201/gifting-shutdown-and-too-high-regional-prices#latest

Shortly: my monthly rent costs 60$ and for example 14k crowns house is 99.99$. Gold was my only way to get more than half things like outfits and such. Not even houses and not every month.

Maybe making same average prices for ALL countries shall solve the problem?.. Cuz now some paying little and some are much. If all would have standart price then it will be no sence in fraud?.. I think.

freespirit · September 2023

Hungary1411 wrote: »

I have no actual ideas sadly, but there's must be something with unfair regional prices as in my situation here:

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/642201/gifting-shutdown-and-too-high-regional-prices#latest

Shortly: my monthly rent costs 60$ and for example 14k crowns house is 99.99$. Gold was my only way to get more than half things like outfits and such. Not even houses and not every month.

Maybe making same average prices for ALL countries shall solve the problem?.. Cuz now some paying little and some are much. If all would have standart price then it will be no sence in fraud?.. I think.

The issue is/was people were using vpn's to buy crowns from countries where because the crown prices were related to that countries worker's pay, they were infact cheaper than buying crowns than in the original player's actual country....... this is where the system started to fail I believe.

FireBreathingNord · September 2023

Regional pricing disparities can create opportunities for exploitation when players find ways to take advantage of these differences.

Game developers often implement regional pricing to make their games more accessible to players in various parts of the world. However, when the pricing becomes significantly lower in some regions due to economic disparities, it can lead to unintended consequences like the use of VPNs for cheaper purchases.

Addressing this issue is complex. Developers need to balance making their games affordable in regions with lower purchasing power while ensuring that players do not exploit these differences. It's possible that they might consider refining their pricing strategies, implementing stricter anti-fraud measures, or exploring other solutions to maintain fairness and integrity in the game's economy.

It's a challenge that highlights the complexities of global game distribution and pricing, and finding a fair and equitable solution is essential to ensure a positive experience for all players.

Sythen88411 · September 2023

Ima just sitting here and watch for the eso worldwide unsub and dont buy crowns boycott.

Rageypoo · September 2023

boi_anachronism_ wrote: »

All i can say is: theres is gonna be a hard wake up call when they review quarterly profits after this.

U think the gifting would have been disabled for 6+ months if they weren't making money off of it?

C'mon.

Guizan · September 2023

I have 2 accounts with ESO plus, one I play on mainly and the other that I use now and then. The crowns from my secondary account I use to get things for my main account as that is where I collect things like mounts and houses. Now when this no longer is possible I must consider if I am to cancel the second account ESO+

boi_anachronism_ · September 2023

Rageypoo wrote: »

boi_anachronism_ wrote: »

All i can say is: theres is gonna be a hard wake up call when they review quarterly profits after this.

U think the gifting would have been disabled for 6+ months if they weren't making money off of it?

C'mon.

Um yeah. Thats why they let it get to this point. Its a last resort. Keep in mind this started months ago on pc. They could have shuttered everything at that point.

Jaimeh · September 2023

A cool suggestion I read in another thread was an in-game system to trade gold for seals of endeavour. Everything bought with seals is bound and non-tradeable, and to safeguard any shenanigans they should allow this only to accounts that have been active for a certain amount of time. Assuming they could put an end to gold farming bots, this system could work nicely.

spartaxoxo · September 2023

This is quite annoying.
.

ZOS_Hadeostry · September 2023

Greetings,

Because there is a thread already open on this topic, which started earlier and has more posts, we're going to close this one down so that all feedback can be consolidated in one place.

You may continue the discussion here. Thank you for your understanding.