Guild Spamming Issue

Frayton · February 25

They more they try to justify their behavior, the worse they look. It's stunning and sad how they see themselves as victims and have a conspiracy theory going that a bunch of players who don't even know each other have rallied together for a years-long coordinated effort to attack them. It couldn't be that we're all just fed up with their pervasive incessant spam. This is some Sheograth level madness.

Emeratis · February 25

This behavior happens consistently from one guild on one server. That alone should be enough to show how abnormal it is. I don't hear about this on PC EU or either PS or Xbox servers. Sometimes, as was mentioned before, someone overeager with a new guild will start spamming invites but it's usually obvious it's done manually because there aren't nearly as many invites and the person usually stops after being told by a few members that the behavior is considered impolite. There is a lack of transparency because the addon used by the guild in question is private, so none of us can tell how it really functions and all we can do is show proof that it is not functioning how we are told it is supposed to function. At this point we know crossplay is in the works and this PC NA problem will soon become every server's problem if it is allowed to persist. I think the looming nature of crossplay makes this escalate from a persistent annoyance to something that needs an inevitable answer and end before that.

I'm not interested in a conversation about the nature of the guild itself or how nice or terrible it is. It feels like it's derailing from the main issue which is the unwanted spam invites. I also don't think it's fair to twist the words of posters who have consistently posted about the spam invites and wanting them to end.

SpycyTurnyp · February 25

I did not say the guild is being named and shamed, I said it's being harassed. It's already been said in this thread, everyone knows what guild is being talked about. Read the comments. It is being harassed, it is under attack. Harassment and bullying, regardless of the reason for harassment and bullying, is against TOS, is it not?

AScarlato · February 25

SpycyTurnyp wrote: »

I did not say the guild is being named and shamed, I said it's being harassed. It's already been said in this thread, everyone knows what guild is being talked about. Read the comments. It is being harassed, it is under attack. Harassment and bullying, regardless of the reason for harassment and bullying, is against TOS, is it not?

You and your GM really are a perfect match. Glad you found the ideal place for you.

LittleLionLeone · February 25

It's not being harassed, it's being called out. Don't play the victim card. Your GM comes into these threads and pretty much spits in our face about our simple request and refuses to back down.

valenwood_vegan · February 25

Just... take a moment and consider why everyone here knows what guild is being talked about. It's because everyone has been harassed by these spam invites for years. Literally every single person I have ever known on PC/NA the entire time I've been playing ESO has been spam invited by this guild, and immediately knows what guild is engaged in this behavior if you mention it to them. That's 100% not an *us* problem.

LennaTheRussian · February 25

AScarlato wrote: »

SpycyTurnyp wrote: »

I did not say the guild is being named and shamed, I said it's being harassed. It's already been said in this thread, everyone knows what guild is being talked about. Read the comments. It is being harassed, it is under attack. Harassment and bullying, regardless of the reason for harassment and bullying, is against TOS, is it not?

You and your GM really are a perfect match. Glad you found the ideal place for you.

Almost too perfect iykyk.

SilverBride · February 26

It is obvious that the community is being damaged by this behavior. We have asked and asked for this guild to PLEASE stop this but all we get are told about the 'rules' for the invites, etc. We have made it perfectly clear how much distress this is causing and after all these years we have had more than enough. THIS NEEDS TO STOP and we won't stop fighting against this rude and disruptive behaviour until it does.

PeacefulAnarchy · February 26

SpycyTurnyp wrote: »

I'm not really on here to discuss the rules of the guild, the comments on this thread show that people are more interested in making their own hate stories than what the truth is. I'm here to call out the harassment of this guild in this thread, and in the discords of GMs of other guilds. Inactivity purges are very standard, necessary even, for the health of any active guild.

No one has said anything about inactivity purges? It's true that because of guild size limits many guilds do this, why are you bringing this up?

When I was a new player I was invited by this guild at random while I was doing my own thing in a starter zone, it was extremely anxiety inducing and confusing, I accidentally accepted and left pretty quickly. I was invited once again the next day, this time I declined and the person whispered me asking why, I told them why, they were a little insistent but otherwise courteous. I asked them why they were inviting people, and they said they had a quota to fill. Over the next few days I spent in those starter zones I got invites every day, until I decided not to go to those zones anymore. Your guild's invite practices directly affected my gameplay as a new player for days. It did not feel welcoming, it felt invasive and harassing. I considered quitting the game because that was not the experience I was looking for.

It's true that in these threads there are occasionally accusations about the conduct within your guild and by it's leader. But those are not the focus of the threads, nor are they the reason most people post in them. Stop harassing the entire PCNA population and no one will care about the internal workings of your guilds.

DenverRalphy · February 26

Might I suggest that for anyone who just wants the invite spam to stop, don't take the bait and engage in a back and forth. That's the surest way to get this thread closed down.

Keep the subject on track, Resolving the issue of guild invite spam. Not the merits of any guilds abusing the practice, nor defending against any who asserts their thusfar unnamed guild is being attacked.

Just keep ZOS aware that you want the blind guild invite spam to stop. Engaging and getting worked up never ends well.

DeathandDebauchery · February 26

SpycyTurnyp wrote: »

Hello all, I wanted to chime in as a member of the guild that is under attack here. Yes, under attack. This post, as well as others, are part of a coordinated attack that has been started in discords of other guilds. I personally see this as harassment, bullying, and an abuse of the forums. The GM doing all this has also joined, then left shortly after, the discord of the guild under attack, likely in order to get the usernames of officers so that they can share them with their guild and falsely mass report, which is against TOS.

Onto my experiences with the guild in question, they have been completely positive. I never would have joined a guild if it wasn't for getting a random invite, and I'm incredibly happy to have received it. The guild is full of helpful friendly people, always happy to help out. Despite what everyone is posting here (because they were told to in discord by their GM), the guild chat is full of new members thanking us for getting invited.

Requiring discord is a very standard practice for guilds, not just for ESO, but for MMOs in general. The guild interface in ESO is lacking, and discord makes guild coordination so much easier and more efficient. Yes, the guild being attacked does have inactivity purges, just like the majority of active guilds do. This is necessary for maintaining and active guild.

This guild took me in as a new player, taught me how to play the game, spent lots of time and resources on teaching me and plenty of other members how to get into the endgame, and has become a community that I, and many others call home, and I'm tired of being harassed over an invite that many are happy to receive, and that takes less than a second to decline.

No one has reported any of the officers in your guild, and the baseless accusations there are unfounded and unappreciated. The only accounts we have reported are the ones that have done the spamming, as was instructed to us by @ZOS_Kevin multiple times.

There is nothing inappropriate about those screenshots you posted. It's literally me posting this thread link and asking my guild to chime in. Where does it say "Report The Gaming Council's Guild Leader" or "Say Something Terrible About The Gaming Council?" - you think you found some smoking gun on our discord? There is no explicit announcement about you or this issue.

Since you explicitly joined our guild (on a 2nd account, cause your first was blacklisted from our guild) to take these screenshots (our discord is not public). That means you literally joined our guild to spy on it (after previously having been blacklisted) because i'm making a post about an add-on on here. Maybe, take a second, and consider if that isn't a bridge too far? Maybe...just maybe... you need to take a step back here and evaluate what you are doing.

My guild members complaining about your many spam invites is what led to this post in the first place. I have nothing against your guild. I have an issue with your invite spam. You'll never hear about me again the moment it is gone.

SilverBride · February 26

DenverRalphy wrote: »

Just keep ZOS aware that you want the blind guild invite spam to stop.

We have been doing that for years and we have yet to even get a toggle to auto decline guild invites. This thing has gone on way too long and I feel like it's coming to a head. Something needs to be done before it gets even uglier.

DeathandDebauchery · February 26

I'm also sure it's no coincidence at all that we previously kicked you out of our guild @SpycyTurnyp that you are deciding to attack me and my guild personally?

tsaescishoeshiner · February 26

While I hope this issue is resolved soon, at this point I don't know what I would do on my lunch breaks without this thread.

Other than wait for next year's thread about it.

SilverBride · February 26

The saddest part of this whole thing is that ONE PERSON can take our feedback to heart and make it stop.

hiyde · February 26

SpycyTurnyp wrote: »

I'm not really on here to discuss the rules of the guild, the comments on this thread show that people are more interested in making their own hate stories than what the truth is. I'm here to call out the harassment of this guild in this thread, and in the discords of GMs of other guilds. Inactivity purges are very standard, necessary even, for the health of any active guild.

Hi, @SpycyTurnyp and thanks for replying.

I'm glad you have a happy home in your guild. I wish that for everyone who plays MMOs and runs guilds or are members of them.

Allow me to be really, really clear on what I care about and what I would like ZOS to answer us on and/or deal with:

Is it allowable to have an addon that sends automated invites while a low level toon hides in the bushes?
If not, this needs to be shut down.
If so, a public version is needed for ESOUI so *everyone* can do it and hoards of toons can hide by the wayshrine spamming invites to everything that moves.

Is it against the tos to send invites over and over and over to the same recipients even after being told to stop?
If not, then the accounts doing it + the management of the guild(s) doing it need to be sanctioned.

That is all I and most of us care about.

I *do not* care if there's MLM crap or cultish crap or anything else that makes those guilds lovely or not.

Let's try to keep this on track, please, instead of seizing on some stray comments that have never been the intent of this thread, my comments in it and most other people's comments in it.

@ZOS_Kevin @ZOS_GinaBruno @ZOS_JessicaFolsom

Thank you.

Casul · February 26

You should update the addon to send each person a complementary 1000 gold when you invite them. Then we could have a new gold farm strategy.

hiyde · February 26

PeacefulAnarchy wrote: »

SpycyTurnyp wrote: »

I'm not really on here to discuss the rules of the guild, the comments on this thread show that people are more interested in making their own hate stories than what the truth is. I'm here to call out the harassment of this guild in this thread, and in the discords of GMs of other guilds. Inactivity purges are very standard, necessary even, for the health of any active guild.

No one has said anything about inactivity purges? It's true that because of guild size limits many guilds do this, why are you bringing this up?

When I was a new player I was invited by this guild at random while I was doing my own thing in a starter zone, it was extremely anxiety inducing and confusing, I accidentally accepted and left pretty quickly. I was invited once again the next day, this time I declined and the person whispered me asking why, I told them why, they were a little insistent but otherwise courteous. I asked them why they were inviting people, and they said they had a quota to fill. Over the next few days I spent in those starter zones I got invites every day, until I decided not to go to those zones anymore. Your guild's invite practices directly affected my gameplay as a new player for days. It did not feel welcoming, it felt invasive and harassing. I considered quitting the game because that was not the experience I was looking for.

It's true that in these threads there are occasionally accusations about the conduct within your guild and by it's leader. But those are not the focus of the threads, nor are they the reason most people post in them. Stop harassing the entire PCNA population and no one will care about the internal workings of your guilds.

This articulates the precise situation. Kudos to you, @PeacefulAnarchy, I'm sorry you went through that and am glad you stayed.

BagOfBadgers · February 26

If the cold calling invites stopped, this thread would end. Simples!

Morvan · February 26

SpycyTurnyp wrote: »

Harassment and bullying, regardless of the reason for harassment and bullying, is against TOS, is it not?

And so are botting and spamming, and yet here we are.

SpycyTurnyp · February 26

DeathandDebauchery wrote: »

I'm also sure it's no coincidence at all that we previously kicked you out of our guild @SpycyTurnyp that you are deciding to attack me and my guild personally?

I left your guild because I was being harassed for giving decent advice, not for any problems that I caused. I just didn't feel that your guild was a good fit for me, so I left. You did not kick me, and I do not appreciate you spreading lies about me.

HellWhyNot · February 26

Why has this gone on for 200 messages? There is literally no reason any guild should be able to act as the (like, seven) guild(s) in question does, thus no reason something you could ask almost any non-affiliated player about and get a similar answer on is not resulting in some form of action. I get managing a game is hard but a tiny portion of the player base is essentially forcing themselves on literally everyone via an addon setting that should not be available to the player base.

Loren_Silvercloak · February 26

I've read through a lot of this.

I posted a while back, in a now-closed thread. I brought up a point about ZOS allowing a couple of users (leaders/creators of the spam invite bot) dictate a large part of the ESO experience was less than ideal for ZOS - especially the spam which looks like its an official invite if you're a newbie. I'd name it to drive the point but we all know that it sounds official... almost ZOS like.

I thought that would be a selling point to actually take action - even if it was to clarify their position. Something, right? I mean, ZOS seems to have a large amount of people who are annoyed/upset and it would be in their best business interest to communicate and take action - It seemed the simplest action would be to just disable the use of the invite API for this particular use case, right? just say 'suck it up, guys... spam bots are allowed' Whatever. An answer would be nice. At least I can choose then, if I will stay and tolerate the harassment or leave.

But... beyond that... someone brought up a better point, again, a while ago. (let's say that again: A while ago with no official position from ZOS. That's frustrating!!!)

This the main thing.

No means NO.

Apparently the add-in was supposed to respect that. But that function is broke... with a promise of fixing it years from now? No, unacceptable. I can simply say its unacceptable without calling into question anyone's character. This is not personal.

But it becomes personal when:

No means NO. As in: NO. As in, I gave you my answer. Respect it and don't bother me again because that's actually harassment if you keep on at it. I said NO. I don't want to be spammed and spammed again for years and years.

That's the most powerful and profound point I can find in all of this: No means NO. And in this very wide ESO community, I think most people go to pains to respect boundaries.

Except a couple of people who are not respecting others who say: No.
And that's when it becomes harassment.

Pevey · February 26

There is no way there was ever a feature in the addon to respect previous declines. I mean, let's be real, they would have to track pretty much every user on PCNA. It's not feasible. The claims about the addon being "broken" are part of a pattern that I hope ZOS can view objectively and decide to take action.

Destai · February 26

Reading a lot through this and had a final few thoughts on it.

If you’re worried about your guild being spied on, that alone indicates sending out invites to people you have otherwise never met isn’t a great community building strategy. Sounds like dialing back the invites is a surefire way to get the heat off of your guild. Great opportunity to familiarize yourselves with the existing recruiting tools.

Regardless, I’m happy this is being called out. There’s enough spam in RL, we don’t need it in games too. Hopefully ZOS can hotfix an auto decline feature or disable this guild’s add on. If nothing else, would appreciate some detailed updates from @ZOS_Kevin.

Bigsev44 · February 26

I personally am just really, really tired of the wayshrine spam, and I’m really frustrated with the way ZOS has handled this in the forums.

As many others here have said, the fact that it’s obvious which guild’s spam-bots are being discussed without so much as a single name-drop is pretty telling.

This has just been an issue for far too long now, there’s clearly a lot of community interest in having it resolved, and the forum moderators not only locking the previous thread about it, but now renaming this one, just makes it seem as though there’s something weird going on, and like the same rules are not being applied to everyone in ESO.

I am genuinely curious as to why ZOS seems to be going out of their way to allow this behavior to continue when it is explicitly in violation of the TOS. As the OP said, there’s been a large emphasis on transparency lately from the dev team since the January stream, and it’s been going really well in my opinion; I feel like that emphasis should extend to the forums as well.

Having read through this entire, extensive, active thread, and seeing people from ZOS having been posting and responding in less active ones while it’s been up, I just don’t quite understand how the community is supposed to interpret that.

AlienatedGoat · February 26

SpycyTurnyp wrote: »

Hello all, I wanted to chime in as a member of the guild that is under attack here. Yes, under attack. This post, as well as others, are part of a coordinated attack that has been started in discords of other guilds. I personally see this as harassment, bullying, and an abuse of the forums. The GM doing all this has also joined, then left shortly after, the discord of the guild under attack, likely in order to get the usernames of officers so that they can share them with their guild and falsely mass report, which is against TOS.

Onto my experiences with the guild in question, they have been completely positive. I never would have joined a guild if it wasn't for getting a random invite, and I'm incredibly happy to have received it. The guild is full of helpful friendly people, always happy to help out. Despite what everyone is posting here (because they were told to in discord by their GM), the guild chat is full of new members thanking us for getting invited.

Requiring discord is a very standard practice for guilds, not just for ESO, but for MMOs in general. The guild interface in ESO is lacking, and discord makes guild coordination so much easier and more efficient. Yes, the guild being attacked does have inactivity purges, just like the majority of active guilds do. This is necessary for maintaining and active guild.

This guild took me in as a new player, taught me how to play the game, spent lots of time and resources on teaching me and plenty of other members how to get into the endgame, and has become a community that I, and many others call home, and I'm tired of being harassed over an invite that many are happy to receive, and that takes less than a second to decline.

I don't care about that drama, at all. I only want the spam invite addon to go away or the API changed to render it unusable. That is all.
I couldn't give two flips about the guild itself. I just want the spam to stop. I'd wager most of the people in this thread feel the same way.

twisttop138 · February 26

DenverRalphy wrote: »

Might I suggest that for anyone who just wants the invite spam to stop, don't take the bait and engage in a back and forth. That's the surest way to get this thread closed down.

Keep the subject on track, Resolving the issue of guild invite spam. Not the merits of any guilds abusing the practice, nor defending against any who asserts their thusfar unnamed guild is being attacked.

Just keep ZOS aware that you want the blind guild invite spam to stop. Engaging and getting worked up never ends well.

Very much this. Stop making it an emotional issue or an argument. The behavior is unwelcome and that zos needs to do something about it. Especially with crossplay on the horizon. Simple as that. Leave them no openings.

karthrag_inak · February 26

SpycyTurnyp wrote: »

Hello all, I wanted to chime in as a member of the guild that is under attack here. Yes, under attack.

Khajiit has to say, forcing someone to respond to a guild invite, to acknowledge and take some action while they play the game and mind their own business...to this one, that seems like an attack. Like unwelcome duel invites, only unable to be avoided by some setting. It is obviously and most certainly intrusive, one of the most intrusive things a player can do in this game to another player, since it cannot be ignored or avoided.

Surely that _is_ obvious, yes? Surely going up to someone you do not know and engaging them in a manner that they -must- respond to without their request or consent...surely that is -at the very least-, -obviously- rude and intrusive, yes? Making an addon to automate that process and create and encourage the use of a "weapon of mass distraction" as it were (please indulge khajiit his exaggerated dramatic interludes =^.^= ), that is not being done from a purely benevolent perspective, yes?

Khajiit has played ESO since beta, (with a brief break a long time ago). ~25k hours, according to Steam, This one has been the GM of a trading guild for 4 years and an officer in multiple other guilds for most of the time he has played the game. Khajiit understands the motivation to maintain membership and the difficulties in recruitment.

But to force someone to acknowledge you....well, perhaps such a thing might have unintended consequences. After all, this thread is filled with acknowledgement, is it not?

rockDokRock · February 26

An interesting statistic would be how many people actually respond to these spam invites. I see them all the time when I am online and really don't care. I've never accepted one.

Has anyone here? What are the numbers on this? I realise my experience is not the same as everyone else's.