So, during this Beta weekend My companions and I came across 2 very game breaking things concerning Cross Faction plants. I consider these cheating, but others may see it differently. I would like to see what the community thinks.

Issue 1:

Taking an Elder Scroll by not taking the keep that guards the gate by using cross faction plants.

Explanation: While on Daggerfall, an AD group was able to get past the milegate and capture the elderscroll by using a level 10 Daggerfall Dragonknight to pull their people up and over the milegate while it remained closed. They essentially used a planted character to help them circumvent the mechanics of Cyrodiil. The Scroll was taken without any warning the Gate had fallen, the Keep that guarded the Gate was never attacked.

Issue 2:

A group of AD players (6+) were running across known paths and intercepting players that were stealthed, They were using a Daggerfall plant to identify and locate stealthed Daggerfall combatants that were moving between the supply keep and the siege. As well as, issue false orders, misdirect Daggerfall players and slow players up.

Explanation: A group of AD players were running with a Daggerfall Character under their control and were using the Zone communication to "spy" on movements and commands, issue false orders and set up ambushes with their AD group that was following around said player. The daggerfall character also pointed out and identified stealthed solo and small grouped players for their group to swoop in and kill before withdrawing.

Now I consider both of these cheats. With the ease of aquiring a beta key it could have been a Beta only experience. However, once launch comes I believe these will be very valid concerns for the community and could easily undermine group communication with regards to offense and defense in Cyrodiil.

I don't see how it will be possible to stop that other than what is already in place for release. If you have an EP character in a Cyrodiil campaign you can't have any of the other two faction in that campaign. So if a guild would have a spy like that they were never be able to actually play with their guild.

Issue 1: 2 factions teaming up against the 3rd. Looks like reality to me.

Issue 2: I consider it smart use of game mechanics and an excellent way to implement espionage in the game.

All I'm seeing is clever use of game mechanics. It may sound dirty to you but it's actually pretty accurate and real. There is no bug exploiting and certainly no hacking, just players using what is available to them. If only more of this was possible but I doubt it, considering how unorganized internet crowds are.

I would agree that the implementation of having everything global is an issue. Being able to create chars in all 3 alliances on the same PvP instance is a bad idea. It also promotes side switching to promote zergs min an unhealthy way.

This of course leads to the bigger issue of the global account. Each character should be treated individually and not linked globally.

I don't consider that cheating. i consider that good planning and sound strategy. Espionage is part of war.

In RF online, if you chat with another faction, your message will appear crypthographic. It won't prevent your issues though since it is planted and we have voice chat. It could be easily done through team speak.

The only thing to circumvent your issue number one is have a forced friendly fire to whoever holds the scroll. For number 2, it really is group organization.

I believe you are mistaken here I had no issues having 2 chars in the same campaign in different alliances.

There will always be ways to cheat.Change campaigns......you are away from the cheaters.

Issue #1 would be considered a exploit and reportable.

Issue #2 cant really do anything about that. Hard to get proof of the cheating.

How did they pull them over the wall and why did the guards not attack are my questions.

I don't have an issue if it was just a randon EP/AD group ganging up on a Daggerfall person. But when you Make a daggerfall character and use that character to circumvent your own alliance and hunt down your own people and take your own scroll, then I consider that cheating.

So is executing spies. Will the character involved in bypassing their own mile gate be able to be permanently killed for assisting the enemy?

I don't see a way to stop it, but I would hope it would result in the responsible account holder being permanently banned for doing so.

I think you didn't read issue 1 correctly. A DC dragonknight was used to steal DC scrolls for the AD. That shouldn't be possible. There must be a way to prevent this with mechanics alone though, since the coding for the chains ability can be adjusted to keep this from happening.

As for issue 2, it's not an "excellent way to implement espionage" because the victims can't do anything against the spy. If they could kick the player out of their alliance and kill him, then it would be excellent indeed. Because espionage would come with risks to the spy. Unfortunately, this issue is completely unavoidable the way the game is setup. Even if they prevented cross-faction /whispers (really, only /say should be allowed for cross-faction messaging in Cyrodiil), people could still use voice communication to accomplish the same thing.

Zenimax could perhaps try to implement some sort of restriction that prevents players from joining a Cyrodiil campaign that has guild members on an opposing alliance participating, but that could get very complicated with the 5-guild system.

Permanently banning people for executing one of the most valuable things in a war? Uhm... yeah...

Might be a beta thing. I too heard that it will be impossible for one @userID to have characters on more than one side in any given campaign.

Ah, yeah, I didn't quite get the 1st one. My bad.

They used a level 10 Daggerfall Dragonknight to pull their AD group over the Daggerfall Milegate using Fiery Grip. The Scroll keep doesn't show under attack by just killing guards, they killed the guards and took the scroll and we were none the wiser since we were engaged with EP at Chalman. By the time we saw the scroll moving it was almost to AD area with no ports to use to catch up. All we saw was " The Elderscroll has been taken...blah blah blah". Then some guy says in zone: haha we took your scroll.

You are correct in beta but it will not be possible release

And most likely, Zenimax will simply make the scroll un-takeable while the milegate is closed, to prevent this stunt from being done by people with multiple accounts.

Read the thread, you clearly didn't. It's a Daggerfall character lifting AD characters over the DC mile gate so they can bypass it. That is blatant crossrealm cheating, and should be a bannable offense. It's not the same as an EP character lifting AD people over a DC gate, because all characters involved can be targeted and killed.

if this is true then it wont be an issue. and the thread is moot.

Things like that got your account banned on Daoc.

Just fyi

I did read the thread, you are quick to assume otherwise. Clearly. I made a direct reply to your post and build on it from the espionage part, because it is a valuable part of a war.

If you want to ban people who bypass actual fair espionage, that's fine and I agree with that.

Definite exploiting. Not only should this be patched, but tempbans should be issued.


This is definitely a valid strategy. I applaud their prowess. It falls outside of what I would do in terms of honor/sportsmanship but at the same time I can take a bow if it's done to me. There are also ways to counter it - especially in such a vast area; that group that is being ghosted/spied on can lead the enemy on a wild good chase (or into a bigger group). This would require comms outside of /zone (e.g. Teamspeak); but is doable and I have done it a few times in other games with AvA-style PvP.