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[Editorial] General: MMO Exploits - What's the Harm?
BMunchausen
Staff WriterMMORPG.COM Staff Posts: 400
Last week MMO websites lit up with news of The Elder Scrolls Online's economy-killing item dupe exploit. This bug/loophole allowed players to infinitely duplicate inventory items and then sell them, thus earning endless piles of illegal gold. Naturally, this had devastating effects on the game's auction house, community, and possibly the longevity of the game. Still, there are players out there who think using exploits is OK, and that publishers shouldn't punish players for using them. Their argument boils down to, “What's the big deal? It's just a game.” Well I'd beg to differ.
Read more of Neilie Johnson's MMO Exploits - What's the Harm?
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Scenes from my first keep siege. We were small, but we were victorious.
Comments
been playing MMO's since the beginning and there has definitely been a huge change in how players associate with how to handle Exploits. In the beginning it was that players feared finding and doing an exploit as they knew that it could end up getting them banned from the game. Unless they were those select few who actually helped and reported exploits to the Devs so they could fix them.
Yes there was those that would use the exploits to their advantage but they also knew full well that at any moment they could be caught and perma banned. So they didnt announce it to the world that they knew how to do said exploit.
Todays players actually think its cool and deserve a pat on the back for finding and using exploits in games. They also film themselves doing the exploit and post it to Youtube for everyone to see. Then, when they are finally punished for doing the exploit, it is them that is mad. How could you punish them for using an exploit in your game, since you must have intentionally put the exploit into the game in the first place.
Of course this then gets the threats from the players of the, you ban me ill sue you, crowd. Or the unfortunate one for F2P games, you ban me ill just create a new, free email. Then create a new account and start doing it all over again until you ban me again.
Bottom line it just comes down to common sense. Exploits are not intended to be in the actual game, its just something that accidentally happened when programming. This is why there is a rule of conduct for every MMO asking that you dont use them and if you do find one, that you report it right away so that you dont get into trouble.
"I understand that if I hear any more words come pouring out of your **** mouth, Ill have to eat every fucking chicken in this room."
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
In my opinion it was the companies that wrote games for consoles who are at the heart of the problem. There were always cheat codes for those games and as those console players moved on to PC's and MMO's they still wanted their cheat codes. Hence whenever anyone found one, it was shark frenzy to take advantage of it before they fixed it. Most of those who cheat don't think anything of it, just their way of playing the game.
Good developers roll back their servers when this happens, bad ones don't.
I honestly think that all these game companies need to stop being so cheap and hire their own experienced Q&A and then drop all the Alpha / Close Beta / Open Beta crap, develop your game, test your game to the fullest for any bugs/exploits and then release a finished game for us. Im sick and tired of getting these half ass broken games.
It wouldn't hurt to move a little marketing budget over to Q&A but stress tests are really important to find out how a game responds to a high server load. Something that may work well with a dozen people in an area could entirely shit the bed with hundreds of players nearby.
Corporation uses an exploit, you call it being business savvy.
ANet has been exploiting their customers since Nov 2012 when they bait and switched their entire game. Don't see any outrage for that exploitation.
More likely they are twenty or thirty something pot smoking console gamers. Again and again we see a demand for sandbox and skills based systems rather than WoW clones (typical RPG game mechanics). Why? Because they (the pot smoking console gamers) long for an exploit that they attribute to sandbox and skills based systems. When the sandbox game is made and it doesn't have the desired exploit, the game fails. And the whining commences.
Realize that every complaint of care bear, or a return to the good old days is in fact a call for exploits.
Boy: Why can't I talk to Him?
Mom: We don't talk to Priests.
As if it could exist, without being payed for.
F2P means you get what you paid for. Pay nothing, get nothing.
Even telemarketers wouldn't think that.
It costs money to play. Therefore P2W.
The more complex these games get the more code is required the more code is required the more logical errors will appear. The more errors that appear the loop holes exist to be exploited. The more loops holes discovered the more coding needed to patch them. The more patches added to the code the more complicated it gets. The more complex these games get .......
Welcome to the development cycle of a ongoing MMORPG game.
What's worse is that the BS going on in Cyrodiil was not hot fixed 2 weeks ago. I've never seen so much damage done in such a short time.
Zenimax has to get out front of these things, be proactive instead of reactive, and do it quickly.
In all honesty the patch in 3 days is 15 days late.
If you get caught exploiting a bug, then it is not the fault of the developer but your very own. I always find it quite amusing to see postings of players stating that they were banned and that they did not know why. They usually know very well and by making their case public they do nothing but cater to public amusement.
Players should remain as "professional" as with other services such as telephone companys and possible line faults.
Ifr you got banned and really do not know why, write a petition to the support. Ask why you have been banned and state that you can not imagine why you have been banned. If there is no hard evidence you will be able to play again and sometimes even get a small compensation.
If there is evidence, simply stop exploiting bugs.
I completely disagree with this. If the developers made a mistake in the game and players are able to exploit a horribly designed mechanic then the fault lies with the developer not the player. Players will find a flaw if there is a flaw and punishing a player for capitlizing on that is just deflecting blame and pointing fingers saying how dare you find our fuck up, we should ban you for finding stuff out we need to fix and drawing attention to our horrible coding. Just fix it and move on as fast as possible.
How much of the OP did you actually read ?
All of it
I find the lines of "creative use of mechanics" and "exploitation" rather amusing myself. Many times in WoW the "Top Guilds" found interesting ways to defeat encounters, and it was called creative use, which was then patched out shortly. A smaller less popular guild does the same thing, it's called exploitation, and thusly banned. I know it's not item duping, which seems to be the focus for this article, but it falls in the same category imho.
So just so I'm clear.....in an "editorial" about how stupid it is for some players to try and pass the blame for exploiting back to the developers you made a post doing exactly that ?
Yes, we're clear. however in the post not quoted by Asariasha and yourself i went into why a bit more. Agree or not is your prerogative. Cheers
People work systems in the real world to their advantage so its not a surprise people work online systems as well. People get caught red handed doing the worst things and still deny it and plead not guilty.
MMO's are just a reflection of people in general society nowadays.