LennaTheRussian wrote: »

Frayton wrote: »

Tallon_IV wrote: »

LennaTheRussian wrote: »

Point proven. I'm on a brand new account and just loaded in Auridon. This bot has been sitting there for 30 mins and on occasion will move left then right to avoid being kicked. Then targets the spawn point where people load in from the shrine.

Same guild.

Still there too. I filed a report.

Edit: Typical. I even linked them Kevin's forum post.

This is why they still do it.

ZOS allows it

I was in their discord for a bit and that's actually the defense they used, The overall leader of the guilds said something along the lines of "I spoke with the lead of the support team and they said we did nothing wrong and unbanned some of our staff"

But he also said that they(the guilds) don't spam invites or use bots. So not a very reliable source if you ask me.

Dude claimed years ago that the addon was borked, and then tried to say it again earlier in this thread I believe it was. But like...if you knew the addon was broken that long ago, why did you wait until you were getting called out years later to "tell your staff to stop using it"? You should have told them those years ago to stop doing it. Clearly tho that "our addon is borked " was just an excuse to try and weasel out of responsibility.

And who's to say they aren't using that addon again? If they are that's DEFINITE grounds for getting the banhammer, because it was ruled that automating invites IS indeed against the ToS and counts as spamming/harassment. But they need to expand that to manual invites as well, because as I've said over and over: It doesn't matter HOW the spam is sent, it's still spam.

ZOS should deal with this issue before the servers merge, or it will snowball fast.

Wouldn't be surprising to see TGC increase their number of bots even more once the influx of players increase.

Tallon_IV wrote: »

Day 5:

ROFL even hiding in a bush like some creeper.

hiyde wrote: »

I just want to take a moment to refresh on where we officially left off. A lot of people had the impression that the last official communication we got put to a stop to the addon, but there were grey areas in that explanation you could drive a bus through.

@ZOS_Kevin posted that "automated" addons that spam guild invites are not allowed. Long before that, it was made clear in the thread that this addon wasn't *fully* automated (or at least not intended to be).

The addon apparently is automated all the way up to the point of the invite (it spots people, they click "V" or some other key to actually deploy the invite.)

That means it is not automated by ZOS definitions.

Myself and others asked for clarification. OK, we know "automated" isn't allowed but what about "unwanted" or "repeated even after being asked to stop"? We never got clarification.

We were told to file reports, but since the only thing ever identified as against the rules was "automated" addons, how on earth would anyone else *ever* know if the unwanted invite was "automated" or if they pressed a final key to deploy the invite?

This addon isn't public, but if one were made, as long as the addon doesn't automatically *send* the invite (meaning it just needs to prompt you to mash 1 key to carpetbomb everyone around you with invites all day), then it's seems to be kosher and allowed.

Previous communication earlier in this thread:

hiyde wrote: »

Apologies, @ZOS_Kevin, while I appreciate a stance being taken by ZOS, I am so confused on exactly what stance was taken.

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

[*] In conversations with customer service, we have confirmed that automated invitations are not permitted, as they are considered spam, harassment (by proxy of the spam), and automated gameplay. We have gotten enough reports of this behavior that it is clearly very disruptive to the average player. Customer Service will be reaching out to all involved guild leaders to highlight this fact and issue a final warning on this behavior.

I take this to mean that any addon that operates on it's own, targeting every nearby player and automatically sending an invite.

But what if the addon is targeting everything that moves and the user just needs to press "V" to deploy each invite? (I.e. someone just sits there and mashes "V" all day to send random invites as the auto-prompts come up). Is that OK?

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

If you encounter such actions again as you play, please make sure to take a picture or video to send with your report. We do not want any false claims thrown into the mix, and having photo or video will help in making sure claims are authentic.

What actions are we being asked to report? The first unwanted invite? Subsequent invites? Subsequent invites but only if they are asked to stop first?

What is it you'll be asking the guilds to stop doing?

- Not send fully automated invites?
- Not send ANY unexpected invites?
- Not send multiple invites to the same people?
- Not send multiple invites to the same people but only if they ask you to stop?

I'd greatly appreciate clarification. Thanks!

They apparently did enough investigation to find out that the addon they were (and likely still are) using is against the ToS. They were told to basically stop using the addon. And you can't really give them the benefit of the doubt on "they claimed the addon wasn't working like it was supposed to" because Chase used the excuse that the addon was broken like 2 or 3 years ago. And then he made that same claim earlier in this thread. So if they knew it was supposedly broken for years why were they still using it and Chase only ""told his members to stop using it"" after the behavior was called out for the nth time?

Using an addon to automate invites is, according to Kevin, spam and harassment AND goes against not automating things. If they're still using the addon, all the questions you asked would have the same answer of "they aren't supposed to be using it at all to target anyone".

But the important thing is the excessive invites are considered spam and harassment. Automating it only makes it faster, but even if people are just wildly aiming their cursors at people and spamming invites manually, that's the same intent as using the addon: Flood the area with invites and hope people join.

It has been made clear people don't want these random invites to a Guild that has an unsavory reputation, yet they disregard the fact that fact and keep doing it anyway. They KNOW people are annoyed and frustrated given how many of these threads have popped up over the years and the fact that ZOS finally had to have communications with them. And they're STILL doing it. At this point it shouldn't matter if they're automating or not. They're still spamming and harassing.

LittleLionLeone wrote: »

Tallon_IV wrote: »

Day 5:

Actually like day 30, that account has been sitting there for a long time and only logs off every now and then.

Like it's blatantly an afk bot that's spamming people. Every like 2 minutes it will move left then right.

I always park my character in front while waiting for queues to pop so it blocks their view and they can't spam.

This situation is so backwards and confusing that I wouldn't be surprised if you were the one to get banned for harassment.

hiyde wrote: »

Arunei wrote: »

Using an addon to automate invites is, according to Kevin, spam and harassment AND goes against not automating things. If they're still using the addon, all the questions you asked would have the same answer of "they aren't supposed to be using it at all to target anyone".

As long as this private (or any future public) addon requires mashing a key to actually deploy the invites, I believe it's allowed and will not result in any sort of sanctions from ZOS.

And using a macro to automate that key mashing is not allowed. There's zero chance a real human being is sitting there for hours every day pressing whatever key is needed.

Vonnegut2506 wrote: »

hiyde wrote: »

Arunei wrote: »

Using an addon to automate invites is, according to Kevin, spam and harassment AND goes against not automating things. If they're still using the addon, all the questions you asked would have the same answer of "they aren't supposed to be using it at all to target anyone".

Despite requests for clarification, what constitutes "automated" was never officially specified.
It is clear that a FULLY automated addon (i.e. keeps acct online, carpetbombs invites on its own) is against the TOS.

In view of the facts that:
- the behavior continues
- reporting unwanted invites seems ineffective

I believe that anything less than complete automation = allowed.

As long as this private (or any future public) addon requires mashing a key to actually deploy the invites, I believe it's allowed and will not result in any sort of sanctions from ZOS.

I don't care about sanctions; I just want an auto-decline guild invite option added to the game by ZOS. C'mon, ZOS, have the same guy who created the auto-decline duel options work on it. He seems to know how to do things.

QFE.

Tallon_IV wrote: »

Day 5:

I really don't understand what we need to do as a community to get ZoS to deal with this. Maybe its time for us to make "ZoS Please Stop Invite Spam" the Guild and start doing the behavior.....

I'll never understand these spammy guilds. I'll easily take a smaller guild with quality people over a 500 person guild filled with whatever the bot invited. Surely it can't be enjoyable to join these guilds. You'd literally be just a number to them.

AlienatedGoat wrote: »

I'll never understand these spammy guilds. I'll easily take a smaller guild with quality people over a 500 person guild filled with whatever the bot invited. Surely it can't be enjoyable to join these guilds. You'd literally be just a number to them.

It isn't. This network of five guilds have "recruitment quotas" for all of their members, and they try to guilt trip you if you don't meet it. I hope these guilds aren't leading new players into believing that most guilds are like this.

Tallon_IV wrote: »

AlienatedGoat wrote: »

I'll never understand these spammy guilds. I'll easily take a smaller guild with quality people over a 500 person guild filled with whatever the bot invited. Surely it can't be enjoyable to join these guilds. You'd literally be just a number to them.

It isn't. This network of five guilds have "recruitment quotas" for all of their members, and they try to guilt trip you if you don't meet it. I hope these guilds aren't leading new players into believing that most guilds are like this.

This in itself is a good enough reason for ZOS to put an effective and permanent stop to this. Yet whenever it is raised, time and again over the years, they don't do so - which after all this time and the number of complaints has to be a deliberate decision on their part. Why?

@ZOS_Kevin @ZOS_JessicaFolsom Can we please have an acknowledgement from you that you know this is still going on, and an explanation as to why you've not put a stop to it?

.

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Apologies, I am just catching up on this. We will talk to customer service to resolve this, again. If we find that the same guild has been spamming, we will work to have greater action as we have spoken about this several times now.

The heads-up is really good to see, but I hope greater action means bans because this has been going on for ages AND you've just let us know you've been in communication several times with relevant people here. You can only give people so many chances before it becomes clear they don't care to listen.

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Apologies, I am just catching up on this. We will talk to customer service to resolve this, again. If we find that the same guild has been spamming, we will work to have greater action as we have spoken about this several times now.

Thank you, Kevin. My ticket number was 260620-000959, if that helps.

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Apologies, I am just catching up on this. We will talk to customer service to resolve this, again. If we find that the same guild has been spamming, we will work to have greater action as we have spoken about this several times now.

Thanks for the response here Kevin - this is now the third time this has happened since your initial statement. I am hoping that bad actors will finally receive justice so that we can stop crowding the front page of the forums with this every month or two.

I would like you to urge the dev team to work on an auto-decline feature for guild invites that is set to ON by default, or to remove this ability from the game entirely. As someone who runs a 500 person highly active guild, I have never once used the spinwheel guild invite feature or API and I do not know of any other guild leaders that do.

If enforcement is such an issue for customer service, then perhaps simple removal of the offending feature whose only real function is to cause this problem, is the best option.

ZOS_Kevin wrote: »

Apologies, I am just catching up on this. We will talk to customer service to resolve this, again. If we find that the same guild has been spamming, we will work to have greater action as we have spoken about this several times now.

How about passing along the revolutionary idea of a guild invite block option? I would imagine that is possible given that most MMO's already have it. Maybe you could call up a competitor and see how they managed it.