**WINTER OF WOE - BONUS OBJECTIVE POINT**
As previously announced, the team will be distributing an additional point toward milestones to anyone who completed the Absorbing Man fight in the first step of the Winter of Woe.
This point will be distributed at a later time as it requires the team to pull and analyze data.
The timeline has not been set, but work has started.
There is currently an issue where some Alliances are are unable to find a match in Alliance Wars, or are receiving Byes without getting the benefits of the Win. We will be adjusting the Season Points of the Alliances that are affected within the coming weeks, and will be working to compensate them for their missed Per War rewards as well.

Additionally, we are working to address an issue where new Members of an Alliance are unable to place Defenders for the next War after joining. We are working to address this, but it will require a future update.

Acceptable use for acquiring items

13

Comments

  • GroundedWisdomGroundedWisdom Posts: 36,189 ★★★★★
    edited May 2018
    borntohula wrote: »

    They haven't punished anyone. However, people were taking advantage of it. When more advanced Players are spamming it and using the Revs in harder content, that's clearly not what it was meant for.

    Is that so? That’s like saying using energy you found in act IV to do a path in act V is exploitative.
    I could extrapolate, but it would only take us further into LALA land.

    Revs are rare. We all know that. That's the whole reason people were using the exploit. It's not some arbitrary debate on farming. Farming is farming when the Resource is meant to be farmed. When they sell Revs for 40 Units a pop and include them in Events as a Milestone, it's pretty apparent they're not meant to be farmed for a few Energy. Bottom line is, people knew what they were doing and expected to get away with it because it was "by design".
  • kpkumardtskpkumardts Posts: 120
    Is running RTTL for the blows event an exploit?

    @Kabam Miike @Kabam Wolf @Kabam Vydious please clarify on this
  • GwendolineGwendoline Posts: 945 ★★★
    A lot of people are comparing the 1.1.5 revives with the level 3 heals from WS. WS doesn't have a guaranteed drop though. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't drop. I'd also like to remind people that WS used to give a guaranteed revive and they did indeed change that, after it had gotten to easy to farm.
  • GroundedWisdomGroundedWisdom Posts: 36,189 ★★★★★
    borntohula wrote: »

    They haven't punished anyone. However, people were taking advantage of it. When more advanced Players are spamming it and using the Revs in harder content, that's clearly not what it was meant for.

    Is that so? That’s like saying using energy you found in act IV to do a path in act V is exploitative.
    I could extrapolate, but it would only take us further into LALA land.

    Revs are rare. We all know that. That's the whole reason people were using the exploit. It's not some arbitrary debate on farming. Farming is farming when the Resource is meant to be farmed. When they sell Revs for 40 Units a pop and include them in Events as a Milestone, it's pretty apparent they're not meant to be farmed for a few Energy. Bottom line is, people knew what they were doing and expected to get away with it because it was "by design".

    Nobody in this thread is complaining about the revives being removed. Got it? Okay, we can return to the real discussion.

    The real discussion was triggered by the recent issue. However, I addressed the topic in my comment. Invaluable Items aren't meant to be farmed in any kind of infinite, easy way. Even the Halls of Healing have limitations. Items are usually randomly dropped. What people discovered was something that was intended to help newer Players as they start out, not to be a never-ending source of Revs which, for all intents and purposes, are meant to be purchased or earned organically. The real shame is it ended up costing those Players starting out who may have needed them. Acceptable farming has to take into account the value of what is being farmed, and the effort it takes to farm it. When it becomes unacceptable is when it bypasses the intrinsic value of the Resources. Even Events like Halls of Healing are limited. Farming Energy Refills is hit-or-miss because they randomly proc.
  • L3pa_DL3pa_D Posts: 60
    edited May 2018
    borntohula wrote: »
    I echo the sentiment of many others. The way Kabam phrased this, is downright insulting. I’m so vehemently against cheating, it’s almost ridiculous. Picking up items game developers put in a quest, is not cheating.

    I don’t mind they took it away, but doing so leaves a lot of questions. I have little time for farming these days, but it’s always been a feature of the game. If that is somehow a shady practice, why not lock finished quests? Either right away or when a player progresses to a particular level?

    Locking quests is so easy, by not locking them down, Kabam actively promotes re-running said quests. When players take that route to pick up a fairly useful item, there is no need to go all crybaby and imply they’re cheating.

    I’ve been pissed off by many things in this game (bugs, unresponsiveness, lag, blatant money grabs, ridiculous offers, back to back **** pulls, ignoring piloting for ages, masteries being broken for years, et cetera) but this trumps all. What a sad and dreadful way to communicate with the player base. Yuck.



    This is exactly on point... why let us be able to do re-run of paths of farming for items - whatever is more desired for the person - wether it’s for iso, potions, energy, revive etc etc is considered an exploit..?
    I thought re-runs were allowed for farming items- if this isn’t the case, what paths can we re-run without labelling us as exploiting as there no checks and boundaries I.e closing off a path once complete..?

    Kabam Please make it clear what we can re-run and what we cannot as this will affect completion in events also.

    Thanks
  • DrZolaDrZola Posts: 8,479 ★★★★★
    edited May 2018
    Plantesan wrote: »
    We don't need a PhD to see that farming infinite Revs using a very small amount of Energy is exploitative.

    Are you using the term in the sense of agreeing with their considering it as punishable or not so much?

    Just to point out I didn’t even notice that whole revive farm thing until it was brought up by someone about a day ago. I understand why kabam said what they did, but it’s the execution in which they did it that is being brought through the fire.

    If it wasn’t mentioned before that the maps weren’t meant to be revisited, then it’s on kabam for not making that crystal clear, or giving us the option after we 100% that section of the game.

    They haven't punished anyone. However, people were taking advantage of it. When more advanced Players are spamming it and using the Revs in harder content, that's clearly not what it was meant for.

    What, in your opinion, was it meant for? What is earning something organically? Is that like running a quest and getting a reward for it? Or is there something special about this quest?

    Not trying to attack. But I don’t think your logic holds.

    Dr. Zola
  • DrZolaDrZola Posts: 8,479 ★★★★★
    edited May 2018
    @DTMelodicMetal I agree wholeheartedly, and I mentioned the poster’s name not to stigmatize him, but rather for referential purposes. No one should bully him on here or elsewhere.

    But it should be noted that there was a thread on this and the mods did what appears to be par for the course these days: swooped in and deleted without addressing the issues raised therein. And here we are today.

    Dr. Zola
  • RotellyRotelly Posts: 774 ★★★
    Let’s keep this thread on topic so it doesn’t get closed.

    The question boils down to what are acceptable ways to acquire resources.

    @Kabam Miike @Kabam Vydious
  • DrZolaDrZola Posts: 8,479 ★★★★★
    Haji_Saab wrote: »
    Everyone saving like mad for Blade crystals.... "Yeah, Blade is not OP" ...

    Using refills and running a chapter 1 quest over and over again.. "Yeah, I don't know what a exploit is"...

    Cognitive dissonance, I would call it.

    Can't say I completely agree with you on the "exploit" part. Your "exploit" may be someone else's "cleverness." Exploit suggests a violation of the ToS. Hard to see how that is the case when you simply play the game before you.

    In the history of gaming, players are always looking for ways to secure resources and complete content. To many, Scarlet Witch pre-12.0 was an exploit; Blade post-12.0 is one to many now. But players are not responsible for content. The game team is. This was brought up plain and simple on these forums right after the community noticed it, and the team sat on it for 2-3 days before noting it was placed there to help Summoners in Act 1 and tarring a broad swath of its customers.

    Dr. Zola
  • DrZolaDrZola Posts: 8,479 ★★★★★
    Haji_Saab wrote: »
    DrZola wrote: »
    Haji_Saab wrote: »
    Everyone saving like mad for Blade crystals.... "Yeah, Blade is not OP" ...

    Using refills and running a chapter 1 quest over and over again.. "Yeah, I don't know what a exploit is"...

    Cognitive dissonance, I would call it.

    Can't say I completely agree with you on the "exploit" part. Your "exploit" may be someone else's "cleverness." Exploit suggests a violation of the ToS. Hard to see how that is the case when you simply play the game before you.

    In the history of gaming, players are always looking for ways to secure resources and complete content. To many, Scarlet Witch pre-12.0 was an exploit; Blade post-12.0 is one to many now. But players are not responsible for content. The game team is. This was brought up plain and simple on these forums right after the community noticed it, and the team sat on it for 2-3 days before noting it was placed there to help Summoners in Act 1 and tarring a broad swath of its customers.

    Dr. Zola

    Going against ToS is cheating. Exploit is always within legal boundaries. For example, when we say Nike / Apple exploits labour in poor countries, they don't actually do anything illegal yet they still "exploit".

    Coming back to the world of gaming, I agree that it is the game team that is responsible. This is why I don't think it is justifiable to punish anyone who exploit a mechanic in the game.

    Got it. Then we are pretty close on this one. As I would have expected.

    Dr. Zola
  • The1_NuclearOnionThe1_NuclearOnion Posts: 907 ★★★
    borntohula wrote: »

    They haven't punished anyone. However, people were taking advantage of it. When more advanced Players are spamming it and using the Revs in harder content, that's clearly not what it was meant for.

    Is that so? That’s like saying using energy you found in act IV to do a path in act V is exploitative.
    I could extrapolate, but it would only take us further into LALA land.

    Revs are rare. We all know that. That's the whole reason people were using the exploit. It's not some arbitrary debate on farming. Farming is farming when the Resource is meant to be farmed. When they sell Revs for 40 Units a pop and include them in Events as a Milestone, it's pretty apparent they're not meant to be farmed for a few Energy. Bottom line is, people knew what they were doing and expected to get away with it because it was "by design".

    Nah. We (you too) must be too far removed from the early playing years. I remember revives showing up often in those chapters. I need them at that time too. As far as intent? They are intended to revive which is what I assume they were used for yes? No exploit here. Everyone farms whatever they can. i used to farm t3cc to sell for t4cc until I could 5/50 my first 4*. No exploit. Kabam just doesn't like it. That's different.
    For the record, most of them were level 1 revives anyways, not the 40 unit level 2 revives. Although occasionally you'd get one.
  • ShrimkinsShrimkins Posts: 1,479 ★★★★
    borntohula wrote: »

    They haven't punished anyone. However, people were taking advantage of it. When more advanced Players are spamming it and using the Revs in harder content, that's clearly not what it was meant for.

    Is that so? That’s like saying using energy you found in act IV to do a path in act V is exploitative.
    I could extrapolate, but it would only take us further into LALA land.

    Revs are rare. We all know that. That's the whole reason people were using the exploit. It's not some arbitrary debate on farming. Farming is farming when the Resource is meant to be farmed. When they sell Revs for 40 Units a pop and include them in Events as a Milestone, it's pretty apparent they're not meant to be farmed for a few Energy. Bottom line is, people knew what they were doing and expected to get away with it because it was "by design".

    Nah. We (you too) must be too far removed from the early playing years. I remember revives showing up often in those chapters. I need them at that time too. As far as intent? They are intended to revive which is what I assume they were used for yes? No exploit here. Everyone farms whatever they can. i used to farm t3cc to sell for t4cc until I could 5/50 my first 4*. No exploit. Kabam just doesn't like it. That's different.
    For the record, most of them were level 1 revives anyways, not the 40 unit level 2 revives. Although occasionally you'd get one.

    The rate at which you could acquire those revives by spamming that quest was unintentional, as directly stated by kabam. That makes it an exploit.

    Is it a game design flaw? Of course it is. Taking advantage of a design flaw is precisely what an exploit is... Was it wrong to take advantage of this design flaw? Well that is debatable and definitely a gray area. Obviously kabam doesn't think it was wrong enough to merit punishment in this case but in other cases they have.
  • mostlyharmlessnmostlyharmlessn Posts: 1,387 ★★★★
    edited May 2018
    RAGEatGAME wrote: »
    The question a day later has still not been answered:

    What situations are we allowed to do in game that doesn't violate you calling it an exploit and allows us to grind?

    @Kabam Miike @Kabam Vydious

    To the ones I know are reading these posts because I've received Warnings from them (this is a fact and not against Forum Rules):

    @Kabam Lyra @Kabam Ahab

    Please answer our collective question as the original post and any other replies has not done so.

    By calling an item claiming on a map an exploit it essentially labeled everyone that claimed it outside of a one time pass through a cheater. If an item is not meant to be claimed multiple times, then remove it from the map once it has been claimed.

    "At this time, we have decided not to take any action against Summoners that may have taken advantage of this Quest."

    This statement in the announcements means that they could have punished us for claiming it again outside of the one time pass through, AND since the decision to not punish may not be final, but just what they had decided for the moment.

    They refuse to say...

    If we can or can not run act 1.1.1 over and over again for Vanquishing blows as it was not intended to do that.
    Or running a different path on another map to collect health pots is ok...
    Or if running Monthly EQ or another map over and over to gain points for Completion events is considered an exploit.

    Right now what we are left with is a giant question mark of what Kabam will use to label us as cheaters and punish us because of their game design and rewards system.

    Based on the leap that claiming the revive was an exploit, then isn't also re-running daily cat quests beyond the one time pass through to get either cat shards or entire cats over and over again also then an exploit, and if you have run them multiple times beyond one pass a day, then you are taking advantage of the system.

    We simply don't know now...

    Had Kabam simply said something more like:

    "We never intended for more advanced players to farm the revives off 1.1.5, and therefore we have removed it and replaced it with a different item."

    And left the statement at that, we wouldn't be having this conversation.
  • The1_NuclearOnionThe1_NuclearOnion Posts: 907 ★★★
    Shrimkins wrote: »
    borntohula wrote: »

    They haven't punished anyone. However, people were taking advantage of it. When more advanced Players are spamming it and using the Revs in harder content, that's clearly not what it was meant for.

    Is that so? That’s like saying using energy you found in act IV to do a path in act V is exploitative.
    I could extrapolate, but it would only take us further into LALA land.

    Revs are rare. We all know that. That's the whole reason people were using the exploit. It's not some arbitrary debate on farming. Farming is farming when the Resource is meant to be farmed. When they sell Revs for 40 Units a pop and include them in Events as a Milestone, it's pretty apparent they're not meant to be farmed for a few Energy. Bottom line is, people knew what they were doing and expected to get away with it because it was "by design".

    Nah. We (you too) must be too far removed from the early playing years. I remember revives showing up often in those chapters. I need them at that time too. As far as intent? They are intended to revive which is what I assume they were used for yes? No exploit here. Everyone farms whatever they can. i used to farm t3cc to sell for t4cc until I could 5/50 my first 4*. No exploit. Kabam just doesn't like it. That's different.
    For the record, most of them were level 1 revives anyways, not the 40 unit level 2 revives. Although occasionally you'd get one.

    The rate at which you could acquire those revives by spamming that quest was unintentional, as directly stated by kabam. That makes it an exploit.

    Is it a game design flaw? Of course it is. Taking advantage of a design flaw is precisely what an exploit is... Was it wrong to take advantage of this design flaw? Well that is debatable and definitely a gray area. Obviously kabam doesn't think it was wrong enough to merit punishment in this case but in other cases they have.

    Unintentional after the fact. It was NOT unintentional that they put it there! Same as potions on ROL WS. Very very intentional. They just didn't "intend" for people to keep farming them for game use? Why did they not anticipate this again?
    It's like they don't know what farming is in a game or something.

    Someone else already posted this, but every aspect of that "exploit" was intended game content by Kabam. They just didn't like what people were using that content for. That is not the same. Even then players would have to assume they know every intent. Kabam is bad at communicating, I'm afraid, and this is no exception.
    In fact, more often than not, in game descriptions are so vague on purpose and create a TON of forum content on "What does this ability mean exactly"? Why is their "intent" any different? It isn't. I think they like the drama!
  • DrZolaDrZola Posts: 8,479 ★★★★★
    edited May 2018
    @mostlyharmlessn

    “Had Kabam simply said something more like:

    "We never intended for more advanced players to farm the revives off 1.1.5, and therefore we have removed it and replaced it with a different item"

    We wouldn't be having this conversation.”



    I like this.

    One thing lost in all of this discussion is the role Item Caps and item expiration plays in all of this. Don’t need to look for ways to farm revives if you have a full plate of them and they don’t go bad.

    Dr. Zola
  • ShrimkinsShrimkins Posts: 1,479 ★★★★
    Shrimkins wrote: »
    borntohula wrote: »

    They haven't punished anyone. However, people were taking advantage of it. When more advanced Players are spamming it and using the Revs in harder content, that's clearly not what it was meant for.

    Is that so? That’s like saying using energy you found in act IV to do a path in act V is exploitative.
    I could extrapolate, but it would only take us further into LALA land.

    Revs are rare. We all know that. That's the whole reason people were using the exploit. It's not some arbitrary debate on farming. Farming is farming when the Resource is meant to be farmed. When they sell Revs for 40 Units a pop and include them in Events as a Milestone, it's pretty apparent they're not meant to be farmed for a few Energy. Bottom line is, people knew what they were doing and expected to get away with it because it was "by design".

    Nah. We (you too) must be too far removed from the early playing years. I remember revives showing up often in those chapters. I need them at that time too. As far as intent? They are intended to revive which is what I assume they were used for yes? No exploit here. Everyone farms whatever they can. i used to farm t3cc to sell for t4cc until I could 5/50 my first 4*. No exploit. Kabam just doesn't like it. That's different.
    For the record, most of them were level 1 revives anyways, not the 40 unit level 2 revives. Although occasionally you'd get one.

    The rate at which you could acquire those revives by spamming that quest was unintentional, as directly stated by kabam. That makes it an exploit.

    Is it a game design flaw? Of course it is. Taking advantage of a design flaw is precisely what an exploit is... Was it wrong to take advantage of this design flaw? Well that is debatable and definitely a gray area. Obviously kabam doesn't think it was wrong enough to merit punishment in this case but in other cases they have.

    Unintentional after the fact. It was NOT unintentional that they put it there! Same as potions on ROL WS. Very very intentional. They just didn't "intend" for people to keep farming them for game use? Why did they not anticipate this again?
    It's like they don't know what farming is in a game or something.

    Someone else already posted this, but every aspect of that "exploit" was intended game content by Kabam. They just didn't like what people were using that content for. That is not the same.

    It is definitely exactly the same. They obviously did not intend for the outcome of farming endless revives. It's so obvious one would have to be disingenuous to not see that.

    Again, for the 1000th time, kabam does have culpability here, a lot. A lot more than the players do. But the players who exploited this quest knew full well this was unintentional, and they have some culpability too.

    I personally don't have any issue with kabam's statement. I think it was 100% accurate.
  • mum_m2mum_m2 Posts: 1,776 ★★★★
    this is a perfectly acceptable question. Although, there is still a chance you don't get anything for beating winter soldier rol. still though often times than not you're getting a potion.

    You probably won't get a statement on this. but I'd rather them line out a way for us to know exactly what bracket we are in, and what our prestige is.
  • GriffoplayGriffoplay Posts: 265
    DNA3000 wrote: »
    My problem is with how Kabam is communicating this change to the community, and instead of using this situation as an opportunity to open a dialog with the players and better communicate how the reward system is being managed, they are instead apparently doing the opposite: drawing a line in the sand and significantly curtailing discussion about the change.

    I'm with you on that
  • ShrimkinsShrimkins Posts: 1,479 ★★★★
    Mcord117 wrote: »
    Haji_Saab wrote: »
    DrZola wrote: »
    @mostlyharmlessn

    “Had Kabam simply said something more like:

    "We never intended for more advanced players to farm the revives off 1.1.5, and therefore we have removed it and replaced it with a different item"

    We wouldn't be having this conversation.”



    I like this.

    One thing lost in all of this discussion is the role Item Caps and item expiration plays in all of this. Don’t need to look for ways to farm revives if you have a full plate of them and they don’t go bad.

    Dr. Zola

    But that was a necessary thing to do otherwise all content can be beaten with 3* champs as long you have a 1,000 revives stashed away.

    This is not true. No one was beating a spiked armor path in 5.3 or something comparable using 20% revives on 3* champs without an exploding stash of potions.

    It was attainable through playing the game fairly. The use of the revives still would require potions in most cases. People did not benefit here like other exploits where people had countless 5* crystals.

    I have farmed items by running old maps for a very long time. This was easier and lighter on energy consumption but no different than finding a revive or energy refill in act 4 and grabbing it. I do this leading into each new eq and typically stock pile between 5 to 10 refills. Am I cheating?

    Basically if kabam says you're cheating, then you're cheating.

    Direct quote from ToS:
    You agree not to: · Use features of the Websites or Services for anything other than their intended purpose, including exploiting glitches for personal gain;

    So The question is: What is the intended purpose? Well only the game team can answer that question. In some cases it's obvious, but in other cases, like yours with refills, it is much less obvious.
Sign In or Register to comment.