Guild Wars 2

So after being fairly vocal about the issues I saw with this farm earlier in the thread, prior to even trying it but knowing a fair bit about it, I’ve since then been farming it fairly regularly.

The tl;dr version is: it doesn’t take a genius to work out why people farm this frequently get all uppity at the mere mention of possible ‘fixes’. It is very, very good $$/h or even per effort.

Zoltar MacRoth.7146:

That… sounds so much more tedious than I expected, and I was already expecting some tedium. Almost like that grind thing some people complain about. I think if someone’s willing to go through all that, they deserve the loot. Thanks for the investigation, EW.

It is really not tedious at all. It’s actually very basic, and people with an SSD/good connection/good comp (i tick 2/3 of these boxes) can loot many, many chests.

Ryan.6951:

The metas are not needed. You can show up late, cycle all vines, hit 200% for 7 free keys easily. The remainder buy from the vendor. Sure this costs aurilium and a couple of silver. Who cares? The aurilium in my coin wallet slowly increased even while buying keys.

Correct. Now that I’ve done it many times, it’s laughable thinking back to the people in this thread who tried to claim things like ‘but you need to keep doing Pylon events etc so you don’t run out of currency – people have to work for all those keys ‘. You get there when the challenges start, tag a few pre-events at whatever side you’re on, have a successful map, loot, and even if you open 50 chests you will probably end up with +-200 currency from where you started (dependent on what events exactly, + your choice out of that hero’s chest, + how many keys you had left over from last run etc etc). Just to further ram down this point I have approximately the same currency I did when I started, I’ve never done any Pylon events, I’ve done it maybe 30? times, at least 5 of those times I did not even participate in the Octo event, and on average I would say I open 40 grand chests.

The best part (and here is the biggest issue imo) is that I can turn up late and not even participate in the AB meta and loot a good 30 chests or so and not be down on currency overall in the grand scheme of things.

Ryan.6951:

People claiming upwards of 50+ ecto per run are overestimating. At best you can join a group with 8 instances and complete all 40 grands barely before time expires. 40e (avg 1 per rare) per run in a best case with 30e per run on avg, and sometimes less if instances fail or you’re not built for speed.

Incorrect. They are not overestimating, I get over 50 on average when done during the more active times, dependant on how many maps/my luck if I’m on the map that finished first. I’d say my overall average is 40 (I’m in Oceanic timezone) when I’m there on time.

The most grand chests I’ve opened is 69, which netted me 72 globs. 45 – 60 chests is usual for me with 40 – 60 globs. Keep in mind I am only ever in PUG squads, I do not have Excutioner’s axe and I’m only using one ‘fast’ mobile class in Thief, one quite mobile in Ele then a meh in Ranger.

Organised guild squads would most likely be opening a lot more than myself on average.

Ryan.6951:

So the design is that you do a 15-30 mins meta and get 5 guaranteed rares + scraps. You can get 25-35 more by map hopping. That is 6x to 8x as many as intended. If you did the regular meta 8x as fast as possible, 15 mins per run; it would take exactly 2 hours. This method produces the same wealth using 25% of the time, allowing you an advantage in time (90 mins between runs) to do other farms.

I think it actually qualifies as exploitative, so I’ll be stopping. But I do think until you lay it out in these terms it doesn’t really look on the surface like an exploit. Anet really needs to fix it asap though.

Despite my issues with it I still don’t think it’s an exploit, I just think in typical Anet fashion they went from one extreme to another; from being not rewarding enough to being too rewarding. An oversight at first perhaps, I’m not sure.

Oh well… I’m working on a new legendary so… don’t nerf it just yet k? /every other honest person in this thread.

Amurond.4590:

Oh well… I’m working on a new legendary so… don’t nerf it just yet k? /every other honest person in this thread.

Good day to your sir i do not have leg item and im not going after one.

All i can see in this post is people who are connected to gold sellers and running Trading post bots are suffering from Multiloot. Why nobody wants to spend dollars to buy gold from them what they wasted using third party programs to obtain gold.From my opinion multi loot should get more rewarding so that the GOLD sellers die out.Thats period from my point of view want to make money off game go else where Anet should be expanding loot rewards.

I just leave this here :’D
Welcome to 2016, where the meta event is about ~10 mins leeching and ~20 mins opening chests.

Rohirka.8216:

I just leave this here :’D
Welcome to 2016, where the meta event is about ~10 mins leeching and ~20 mins opening chests.

You seem to know what you are talking about, especially considering how closely related are your argument and your attachment.
As far as I know, this guild starts forming their squads up to 40 minutes before the meta to have time to do a few pylons and organise. Hardly what you describe….

was searching for a good farming method. so thx @ OP

Even with AB farm the ectos are 48-50s each. Imagine if they “fixed” this, you’d have to pay 60s per ecto or something insane because SW chest farm doesn’t generate nearly the amount of rares that AB does.

Nodes should be bound to accounts like JP and exploration chests, not characters or maps.

Otherwise people will always engage in gimmicks like these, and those who find those gimmicks too boring or strenuous will feel punished for refusing to do the same.

Rewards need to improve, but it should be on the content. Not from of exploiting design flaws.

And it should be all nodes, not just chests. Gathering nodes too. Each one should give more of the stuff, but take longer to reset and be usable just once a day for common ones and once a week for rare ones.

Switching map instances and characters should not be better than actually exploring the world and doing more events.

But what about those who bought characters just for that? For that, Birthday presents should be improved too, with some consumable that improves gathering and overall rewards the more you consume, up to a cap, like with luck and AP rewards. Right now the the more characters you own the more you can gather. So it’ll be the same, but from each node you gather instead based on all your characters’s ages, not by letting them sitting some place to gather or open a chest instead actually playing with them.

Do you realize at all what you saying?Anything that forces player to take long time,drives players to gold sellers and player to player trade with money transaction over pay pall. And yes they even found a way around the ingame system to trade stuff.What i see here is just players come complaining cause they emotional hurt,they maybe played fair took them 5-6 months or 1 or 2 year to get a leg item the long way.When we used to play GW1 and where swapping maps was on the side of radar just mouse click.Nobody complained about it now here god help us its an exploit shoot my monkey kitten what has become of the gamers today.

Tell me the game was intended to be played like this and not with the QQ arguments I’ve been reading here. If the developers did intend for this to be played like it is being used, shame on you.

Just another example of min / maxing in any game but quite honestly I hope it gets nerfed.

GreyFeathers.8175:

Tell me the game was intended to be played like this and not with the QQ arguments I’ve been reading here. If the developers did intend for this to be played like it is being used, shame on you.

Just another example of min / maxing in any game but quite honestly I hope it gets nerfed.

You sound like some hurt person about some of the arguments here not like somebody who played much gw2. Personally i find it laughable,what they complain here,the time amount that takes for Tarir event to happen is literally around 2 hours.Same amount time takes if you go farm run on maps gathering resource’s.And last run on maps i did,guess what i got more gold farming ore,wood,plants then stupid tarrir.Now sorry to break your heart to all emotional persons here its a fact Tarir needs slight boost to actual pay off as gold income but people fall to the bait on a forum troll bait: Hey i play 10 minutes get 20+ gold GG nerf it.The troll was successful lets give him credit for that the Tin Foil Hat!So we can make a closure here before more emotional weak persons get a stroke reading this here.

After trying it a handful of times to understand what it’s all about (see my earlier posts discussing it if you feel like), I decided that I don’t want to take part in it.

The reason being is that I feel that part of it does break the spirit of the game. Specifically that if a map doesn’t succeed, those in the squad need only to jump to a map that did. I personally feel that if a map doesn’t succeed, then you shouldn’t get the opportunity to loot.

I do think that the map-hopping in general is a grey area in this aspect, but hopping when you didn’t succeed is not grey (at least to me). Being a part of a multi-map squad means being a part of promoting getting rewards despite failure.

That’s why I choose not to do it now that I understand the process. Ymmv.

~EW

EphemeralWallaby yes and no,what players not get reward at all?Who actual tried to salvage and help a map succeed now should get punish? Not being able to hop to a map to loot cause some others intentional failed the map?Yes i did with friends i invited from friend list every person i knew to intentional cause failure on 3 maps why cause when i saw a guy who several people had issue with him.And to fail maps peace of cake just take all armors and do nothing map bound to fail end of it.Its a double edged sword and if you got problem with it then they need to rework whole game mechanic making new gw2.

The only Players that will suffer from this nerf are the Casuals who do not have time.For others who have more time to spare play the game hey we will just go back to old routine and the Casuals can go back buying gold and stuff from Gold seller websites.

I’ve said this before. It’s PVE. It’s not competitive. There is no winning post. Who gives a stuff what other players get up to? It just doesn’t matter.

DoctorDing.5890:

I’ve said this before. It’s PVE. It’s not competitive. There is no winning post. Who gives a stuff what other players get up to? It just doesn’t matter.

For me this (exhaustively long) thread has functioned for the purpose of asking, “is this idea other players have something I want to take part in?” It’s about understanding why players are doing something, then deciding if it’s worth doing the same.

Whether it’s good or bad to do is honestly up to ANet to decide… it’s their game, and their opinion on it which ultimately determines if this is an exploit needing to be stopped, or something that was unintended, clever, and still within the confines of how they think their game should be played.

The discussion is still helpful and informative, regardless if there can be no winning post by a player.

~EW

I really can’t see anything wrong with it and haven’t scene one valid argument on how it hurts the game. For me it’s really nice to have a good spot to just drop in and make some gold when I need it and personally I like the event. plus I still need ascended armor so please don’t get rid of it lol
\

I’ve been working on Nevermore and The Golden Child at the same time and these new legendaries take an astonishing amount of ecto to make. Without the Tarir farm putting ecto into the economy I’d dread to imagine what things would be like.

As an example, the 250 crystalline ingots takes a stack of ecto to make. It’s also worth salvaging ecto into crystalline dust to mystic forge t6 mats for the gifts, which is hundreds more ecto. Then there’s the mystic clovers to forge, which would be around another 250 ecto… although this time round I’m looking hard at the WvW tracks because mystic coins have become so expensive.

Anyway, the thing with farming ecto is that it’s not introducing liquid gold into the economy. Any player-to-player trades suffer the 15% TP tax that drains gold out of the overall economy, which is probably necessary.

I’ve been seeing left and right that some people say that it could be considered a bannable exploit, although i’m kinda sceptical on it. I’m thinking on joining in on the farm, but i 1st wanted to comfirm whether anet will punish people for using a loophole in their own game, or just if they’re ok with it and will just fix it in the next patch. I find it quite odd how quiet the devs are about this. I haven’t seen a single response from them my self on the forums, and i’ve the feeling they won’t give their stance until they tackle the farm.

I hardly doubt it’s bannable. If it was then they’d have to ban half of their playerbase.

And even if they cared so much about multiloot I believe they could fix it rather fast. Two very simple solutions. Make it impossible to join a finished map, just like Dragons Stand or just make the chests account bound to have a cooldown of like 1 hour or something so that you can loot them again the next time the meta comes. I’m sure something similar can already be found somewhere in the game and used here.

Only the most overzealous of players would declare it an exploit so feel free to dive in and see what all the fuss is about. It’s been going on for weeks/months and no-one is going to ban you.

I’m sure the devs know about it and I’m sure they could take any one of a number of easy measures to stop it if they did not want us doing it.

You’re correct that there has been no official word but maybe they are just happy that people have found a reason to go to the HoT maps! It’s certainly the only reason I go there…

It remains a grey area, some don’t do it because it’s against there moral or because they think its cheesy, or just dont give a kitten (like me), but I don’t think you’ll have to worry about a risk for a ban.

Whole guilds are already made purely to make as many different maps as possible and taxi their hearts away. I think Anet would’ve made a statement by now if they were really against it. Perhaps an unexpected fix one day, but I don’t expect any bans.

Urosh Uchiha.9732:

And even if they cared so much about multiloot I believe they could fix it rather fast. Two very simple solutions. Make it impossible to join a finished map, just like Dragons Stand or just make the chests account bound to have a cooldown of like 1 hour or something so that you can loot them again the next time the meta comes. I’m sure something similar can already be found somewhere in the game and used here.

That might be easier said than done. Even if similar code were used elsewhere it might not be simple to ‘copy/paste’ it on to AB maps/chests. The game hosts millions of lines of code, all interacting with each other in a myriad of complex and subtle ways.

On top of that if the Tarir multi-mapping was honestly unforeseen by ANet, there’s also likely a large amount of ‘bureaucratic red tape’ on the business side to decide what their stance will be on it and taking the time to investigate all the possible ways to fix it… While we refer to ANet in such a way as it seems like one entity, there are a ton of people who have to come together in consensus for such decisions.

Even though there are a lot of people working for ANet, they also have a laundry list of bugs and exploits they have to triage in importance, as well as consider the allocation of workforce to enact any changes.

Most likely they’re monitoring the effects and are considering (or even working on) solutions if they think it’s an issue. If it were super-important and devastating to the economy, of course it be given a higher priority. Since we haven’t seen such changes, we can’t assume they approve of it or just plain don’t care… we can assume either that it isn’t as important as a lot of players think it is, or that it’s more complicated than a lot of us think it is.

The Q3 patch is a likely place when a fix/change will be implemented IF there’s going to be one…. but it still could come earlier, later, or never. We just don’t know.

~EW

Here is a plethora of opinions on the subject:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Auric-Basin-Loot-Exploit-merged

Good luck.

When the best way to earn experience and map currency is to play a long event chain, you have to play the game on the game’s schedule, not your own schedule. That’s not Guild Wars. With this update, we split a lot of the rewards out of the event chains. You can drop in and drop out and still get rewarded.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/the-spring-quarterly-update/

I think this is intended by anet. and probably they still monitoring it. you can get HoT currency from everything now. and drop in and drop out(probably mean hopping map?) and still got reward.

For me this is better for casual player like me with limited play time. I hope if they plan to nerf it they won’t nerf it to dead again.

When the best way to earn experience and map currency is to play a long event chain, you have to play the game on the game’s schedule, not your own schedule. That’s not Guild Wars. With this update, we split a lot of the rewards out of the event chains. You can drop in and drop out and still get rewarded.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/the-spring-quarterly-update/

I think this is intended by anet. and probably they still monitoring it whether it will impact the economy or not.

you can get HoT currency from everything now. and drop in and drop out(probably mean hopping map?) and still got reward.

For me this is better for casual player like me with limited play time. I can only did AB multi map once in a day after all and sometimes I didn’t have the time to do it at all( sometimes I prefer fractal or join my guild schedule)

You choose what you want to do. manage your time to play the game. it doesn’t feels like I’m gimping myself by not doing this like what some people post here. If you think it’s boring then don’t do it at all. It’s not like you forced to do it.

I hope if they plan to nerf it they won’t nerf it to dead again.

BillC.4521:

When the best way to earn experience and map currency is to play a long event chain, you have to play the game on the game’s schedule, not your own schedule. That’s not Guild Wars. With this update, we split a lot of the rewards out of the event chains. You can drop in and drop out and still get rewarded.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/the-spring-quarterly-update/

I think this is intended by anet. and probably they still monitoring it. you can get HoT currency from everything now. and drop in and drop out(probably mean hopping map?) and still got reward.
For me this is better for casual player like me with limited play time. I hope if they plan to nerf it they won’t nerf it to dead again.

That was a separate issue that pertained to all HoT maps.

Tarir multi is after meta event completes in AB. Then you taxi to other map that completed it and reloot over and over. Plus add in the fact you can switch characters to keep on looting is you run out of maps.

Trinnitty.8256:

BillC.4521:

When the best way to earn experience and map currency is to play a long event chain, you have to play the game on the game’s schedule, not your own schedule. That’s not Guild Wars. With this update, we split a lot of the rewards out of the event chains. You can drop in and drop out and still get rewarded.

https://www.guildwars2.com/en/news/the-spring-quarterly-update/

I think this is intended by anet. and probably they still monitoring it. you can get HoT currency from everything now. and drop in and drop out(probably mean hopping map?) and still got reward.
For me this is better for casual player like me with limited play time. I hope if they plan to nerf it they won’t nerf it to dead again.

That was a separate issue that pertained to all HoT maps.

Tarir multi is after meta event completes in AB. Then you taxi to other map that completed it and reloot over and over. Plus add in the fact you can switch characters to keep on looting is you run out of maps.

You will also run out of time ..

This can also be done on VB and TD. The major difference is that VB and TD doesn’t have the chests with a guaranteed rare (unless the large cargo does, I haven’t been paying attention to those).

Its fine. Your ability to loot chests is primarily controlled by your ability to acquire keys, not your access to the chests. No amount of alts or taxis will allow you to farm up those keys any faster. Switching map instances only allows you to use them up faster, requiring you to spend an increased amount of time getting more.

In fact, the player that does not multiloot ends up with a virtually identical loot payout compared to time spent playing content in auric basin in the long term.

Inculpatus cedo.9234:

Here is a plethora of opinions on the subject:

https://forum-en.gw2archive.eu/forum/game/hot/Auric-Basin-Loot-Exploit-merged

Good luck.

It’s even on the same page, I don’t know how the OP missed it. ~shrugs~

Many players are saying that the Auric Basin Multiloot method isn’t hurting anyone. I somewhat agree with them. Although of course it does affect the economy in some ways. The economical implications of this multiloot are currently visible in the price trend of Globs of Ectoplasm. Since the publication of this multiloot the price of Globs of Ectoplasm has been brought down by 20%. I expect this trend to continue as more players become aware of it.

The reduced price of Globs of Ectoplasm, rares and other raw materials obtained from the multiloot will have an impact on other parts of the game. Legendaries will become cheaper to obtain. Other important exotic and ascended crafting recipes will be easier to craft as well. Tarrktun is definitely attracting more ectogambling addicts. I don’t see anything wrong with that.

My only problem is that it’s as boring as the SW chest farming is. Not to mention the “bag-inception” and amount of clicking you have to do that will leave you with a repetitive strain injury in your fingers. Surely the most rewarding content in the game should be more challenging than this. The rewards of the other Heart of Thorns map events are to be dwarfed by this lootfest galore.

PopeUrban.2578:

Its fine. Your ability to loot chests is primarily controlled by your ability to acquire keys, not your access to the chests. No amount of alts or taxis will allow you to farm up those keys any faster. Switching map instances only allows you to use them up faster, requiring you to spend an increased amount of time getting more.

In fact, the player that does not multiloot ends up with a virtually identical loot payout compared to time spent playing content in auric basin in the long term.

you can buy keys for aurillum. this applies to players who don’t need it anymore for collection stuff or people who don’t care about collection stuff and simply go for the monetary value.

Keep in mind that the Summer Quarterly update is dropping soon. If ANet considers it a problem, they will fix it then. But they won’t punish anyone for taking advantage of an opportunity that they themselves created.

Reading all the comments defending this exploit is like reading anti-vaccine ones, they are just ridiculous. :’D (triggered some keyboard warriors now I guess)

This already happened in GW1 with UW Permasins, when Ecto dropped from 6k/ea to 3k/ea in days after a patch. All the “farmers” tried so hard to label it as “just a regular farm” (meanwhile stacking huge ammount of ectos).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZMQhHzZ-sk

But yeah the economy and the comminity was way smaller in GW1 than in GW2 (not to mention there was nothing like Trading Post in GW1) so the developers could act quickly and had to because in GW1 Ecto was also a currency (not for just crafting) above 100k.
Fe.: WTS – Tormented Sword (a.k.a. Potato peeler) 100k+45e

Don’t worry kids you won’t get banned doing AB multiloot, nobody got banned back in GW1 for doing UW Permasin runs.

Just don’t deny the fact that it is an exploit just because the prices don’t hit the floor (yet), so painful to see this happening all over again after years with my favourite game.
:(

Yeah because AB farming is totally killing people like anti-vacs are. Oh wait they aren’t.

zaced.7948:

PopeUrban.2578:

Its fine. Your ability to loot chests is primarily controlled by your ability to acquire keys, not your access to the chests. No amount of alts or taxis will allow you to farm up those keys any faster. Switching map instances only allows you to use them up faster, requiring you to spend an increased amount of time getting more.

In fact, the player that does not multiloot ends up with a virtually identical loot payout compared to time spent playing content in auric basin in the long term.

you can buy keys for aurillum. this applies to players who don’t need it anymore for collection stuff or people who don’t care about collection stuff and simply go for the monetary value.

It still does nothing to change the fact that a player with infinite alts can not acquire keys any faster than a single player. An equal amount of time must be spent acquiring keys, or aurillium for keys.

This isn’t like the old alt exploit with boss chests, where all it took was logging in more alts to loot the chests.

With the tarir chests, the faster you loot chests, the faster you run out of keys (or aurillium to buy keys) and you must spent an equivalent amount of time no matter how many alts you run through to loot chests.

The point stands. The only thing using alts or taxis to loot the chests does is use up keys faster. It doesn’t actually have any influence on time spent earning loot versus the loot’s payout.

Rohirka.8216:

Reading all the comments defending this exploit is like reading anti-vaccine ones, they are just ridiculous. :’D (triggered some keyboard warriors now I guess)

This already happened in GW1 with UW Permasins, when Ecto dropped from 6k/ea to 3k/ea in days after a patch. All the “farmers” tried so hard to label it as “just a regular farm” (meanwhile stacking huge ammount of ectos).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZMQhHzZ-sk

But yeah the economy and the comminity was way smaller in GW1 than in GW2 (not to mention there was nothing like Trading Post in GW1) so the developers could act quickly and had to because in GW1 Ecto was also a currency (not for just crafting) above 100k.
Fe.: WTS – Tormented Sword (a.k.a. Potato peeler) 100k+45e

Don’t worry kids you won’t get banned doing AB multiloot, nobody got banned back in GW1 for doing UW Permasin runs.

Just don’t deny the fact that it is an exploit just because the prices don’t hit the floor (yet), so painful to see this happening all over again after years with my favourite game.
:(

Ok how can you compare to gw2 and in general at all be compared to a 2 hours event Tarir?From looking it you can’t.Since you just wanted to come over with some argument that failed.For your info every time a patch hit related to some farming metod in gw1 it was always that class skills got changed and not the farm location and the way of farming it.The easy methods of farming with certain skill setup was what always was tweaked in gw1 and never stopped people..Even today still solo UW and any location of that game when they are playing it.But hey in person like you still call it an exploit….Just logged in after years again in gw1 3-4 weeks ago guess what my assassin still can run with old build shadow refuge and and … Did solo again…The REAL issue is here in the posts with people not with the game.Players are having some background agenda and reason why.They always suggest some nerfs that HURT casual folks that cant spend more time to play.And we see those leave one after another the game like usual thx to forum suggestions. BUT rest of us who can afford all the time in world and do it when we want will not be affected from it..Players need to change and their ego personalities rather then some thing in game.

PopeUrban.2578:

zaced.7948:

PopeUrban.2578:

Its fine. Your ability to loot chests is primarily controlled by your ability to acquire keys, not your access to the chests. No amount of alts or taxis will allow you to farm up those keys any faster. Switching map instances only allows you to use them up faster, requiring you to spend an increased amount of time getting more.

In fact, the player that does not multiloot ends up with a virtually identical loot payout compared to time spent playing content in auric basin in the long term.

you can buy keys for aurillum. this applies to players who don’t need it anymore for collection stuff or people who don’t care about collection stuff and simply go for the monetary value.

It still does nothing to change the fact that a player with infinite alts can not acquire keys any faster than a single player. An equal amount of time must be spent acquiring keys, or aurillium for keys.

This isn’t like the old alt exploit with boss chests, where all it took was logging in more alts to loot the chests.

With the tarir chests, the faster you loot chests, the faster you run out of keys (or aurillium to buy keys) and you must spent an equivalent amount of time no matter how many alts you run through to loot chests.

The point stands. The only thing using alts or taxis to loot the chests does is use up keys faster. It doesn’t actually have any influence on time spent earning loot versus the loot’s payout.

you seem to not understand what multiloot is for. it’s not for opening more chests but opening the same amount of chests with higher quality. you could use all your 25 keys on low quality chests or you could use them on grand ones.
in the end you got better/more loot when multilooting than without.
not that i care tho. it’s too much work for me but i don’t mind others doing it.

in the end you still need to use keys, and to get those keys you have to earn currency. If it were like… beat teq on one map, then hop around all the finished maps picking up loot from every success, then i think they might take issue.

In tarir opening each chest has a cost to you, however minor that might be, and i think that makes all the difference.

For those of you with issues saying that people don’t really work for their loot, I would LOVE to see ANY of you trying to lead the pylons and the walls at Octovine. If you don’t like the farming method, don’t do it, stick with SW. But, just because you don’t like one thing out of MANY that Anet probably never intended, doesn’t mean you get to dictate how others play.
Don’t like guns? Don’t own one.
Don’t like gamers? Don’t be one.
Don’t like AB Multi? Don’t be in the squads there who run them.

I happen to like not having to do things that feels like grinding and AB is my favorite place.

If Anet wants to nerf it, I’ve already run many squads telling them to tell Anet they will boycott gem card purchases for doing so.

Anet makes money off people wanting to buy the expansion for HoT content, and AB is a huge advantage to draw in desire. So, if they nerf it, that’s a double whammy against them. They’ll tick off the people who already do it, and the people who haven’t bought the expansion yet won’t have that incentive to buy it. Would be pretttttttyyyy stupid of Anet to nerf their own $$ making incentive.

CaelestiaEmpyrea.2617:

Keep in mind that the Summer Quarterly update is dropping soon. If ANet considers it a problem, they will fix it then. But they won’t punish anyone for taking advantage of an opportunity that they themselves created.

That’s the thing, they have punished players for taking advantage of opportunities that they created themselves. That’s the definition of an exploit. Taking advantage of a glitch or loophole in a game’s code.

And they have punished players for using exploits. Whether or not the effects of this glitch/loophole/whatever outweighs the effects punishing hundreds of players (and deciding whose abusing it vs not) is the question and my guess is, the latter is worse.

AB multi is not an eploit in any sense of the word. It was designed so that you can loot chests from each instance of a map your on. If there were controls set in place that prevented you from doing this, and you happened to find a way around those controls and you used that method to farm several map instances, then THAT would be considered an eploit. No one is getting banned from doing this as it currentyl stands.

The main issue is not really about the economy. It’s about the reward:time ratio. There is currently nothing better in the game than AB multi in terms of rewards:time spent. You can drop in, loot everything you can till the timer runs out, and you can walk away with 20-30g depending on how luck you get with eotics, jewels, and ectos.

The problem is that it’s not balanced. The rewards are hugely disproportionate to the amount of time you put into it. So little time invested for such huge rewards is not what the developers will be okay with in the long run. Because in the long run, yes, you need to worry about the economy. In the beginning, it wasn’t hurting the economy too much. As of today, Ecto prices are 40-45 silver now, down from 50-55 silver. You can bet the AB farm has had something to do with it.

Personally I don’t care what they do with it. I know it’s going to get nerfed somehow. The dev’s simply want a balanced game and this presents imbalance.

cletiscake.9173:

AB multi is not an eploit in any sense of the word. It was designed so that you can loot chests from each instance of a map your on. If there were controls set in place that prevented you from doing this, and you happened to find a way around those controls and you used that method to farm several map instances, then THAT would be considered an eploit. No one is getting banned from doing this as it currentyl stands.

The main issue is not really about the economy. It’s about the reward:time ratio. There is currently nothing better in the game than AB multi in terms of rewards:time spent. You can drop in, loot everything you can till the timer runs out, and you can walk away with 20-30g depending on how luck you get with eotics, jewels, and ectos.

The problem is that it’s not balanced. The rewards are hugely disproportionate to the amount of time you put into it. So little time invested for such huge rewards is not what the developers will be okay with in the long run. Because in the long run, yes, you need to worry about the economy. In the beginning, it wasn’t hurting the economy too much. As of today, Ecto prices are 40-45 silver now, down from 50-55 silver. You can bet the AB farm has had something to do with it.

Personally I don’t care what they do with it. I know it’s going to get nerfed somehow. The dev’s simply want a balanced game and this presents imbalance.

Sometimes an exploit involves no extra work. Back I think in late 2012 early 2013 they updated the game and a typo was made on some karma gear that made it really profitable to take it and salvage it or mystic forge it to something else. Those who had purchased a huge number of them were banned. So don’t think that just because the game allows it, that it’s not an exploit.

Granted, I don’t think the current situation is an exploit or one worth banning over if ANet thinks it is an exploit.

Seera.5916:

Sometimes an exploit involves no extra work. Back I think in late 2012 early 2013 they updated the game and a typo was made on some karma gear that made it really profitable to take it and salvage it or mystic forge it to something else. Those who had purchased a huge number of them were banned. So don’t think that just because the game allows it, that it’s not an exploit.

Exactly this.

An exploit involves using game elements and mechanics in ways that are not intended by ANet.

This is why AFK farming was an exploit (that was punished), even though up until recently the mechanics of the game made it possible to do.

Whether the multi-mapping AB chest farming is an exploit ANet has yet to comment on. If they think it is, then a fix will eventually be implemented… regardless if they decide to punish players or not.

Even though ANet has yet to punish anyone (that we’re aware of), that doesn’t mean they think it’s an okay thing to do. We just don’t know right now what they think of it.

~EW

cletiscake.9173:

Ecto prices are 40-45 silver now, down from 50-55 silver. You can bet the AB farm has had something to do with it.

Personally I don’t care what they do with it. I know it’s going to get nerfed somehow. The dev’s simply want a balanced game and this presents imbalance.

55s Has been its peak in the past year and that happen well the multimap was going on in Jun. They had a low of around 30s before ab multimap

Here are some things that we seem to keep forgetting in posts like this:

• An “exploit” is any way in which players take advantage of an unintended consequence of mechanics in the game.
• No software company can imagine all the ways their software can be used, so there will always be exploitable mechanics.
• Not all exploits demand much effort to take advantage of them.
• Not all exploits have significant economic or social consequences.
• Only ANet gets to decide which exploits will trigger repercussions, including:
  • Disabling content temporarily or permanently
  • Bug fixes
  • Suspensions, bans, removal of goods, or other forms of punishment.

tl;dr AB multi-loot is exploiting the mechanic to gain more rewards more quickly than we can in the other maps and it’s up to ANet (and ANet alone) to decide whether that requires further intervention. (The fact that they haven’t done anything to date indicates how important and urgent they think it is, i.e. not very.

Hello,

I often command multimap (some of you folks may know me as Naeea), and I wanted to drop my perspective on the matter.

For the commander of a MM squad at least, MultiMap is no easy matter. You have to explain the basic rules, lock maps if people start to flood towards them in the setup phase, find trustworthy lieutenants to help you, and much more, all while running. Oh and let’s not forget dealing with people chewing you out because they got kicked. So I think I can say that the amount of effort required, at least from the commander and lieutenants, is roughly equal to the reward. Any PvE commanding job is easier than AB MultiMap.

Despite the significantly increased level of effort, I continue to do the job, even though no one ever tips me. Why? Because it simply is the best farm in the game at the current time.

That being said, however, the profit per run is going to drop off sharply soon. Why? because the supply of ectos has, for the first time this year, bypassed the demand. You can see the chart here: https://www.gw2tp.com/item/19721-glob-of-ectoplasm
Since the AB farm relies heavily on ectos for its profit, this free-falling ecto price will deter people from joining. On the plus side, if you are crafting Ad Infinitum or something similar, 1k ectos won’t be as expensive anymore.

Anet likes to keep the economy under control. this downward spiral in ecto price certainly isn’t good for them, and they will fix it one way or another. What remains to be seen is how. Will they cripple AB MultiMap? Will they add another sink like the ecto gambling skritt? Or something else?

(Note: I expect ecto prices to keep falling for at least another week. Near the start of this year, 1 ecto = 37s. We are currently only @ 42s.)

Nethertheless, I know two things about this AB MultiMap:

1) No one is going to get banned for this. There is simply too large a player population doing this, as can be seen by the number of simultaneous MultiMap squads (Naeea, Django Unchained, Heascon, and many others), all full to the brim (50 players each).

2) No “fix” will occur for at least a week. So keep farming folks, and sell your ecto quick.

Sometimes Anet manipulates prices on their own intending to make something cheaper or more expensive. Leather prices are through the roof, while items like Resonating Silvers went from 30 silver to under 1 silver in a couple days.

http://www.gw2shinies.com/item/71428

Zoom to all.

Ectos are just one more thing they can play around with the supply and demand for.

I’m fairly certain they didn’t intend AB to be done in this way, but they could have crippled it using one of many methods if they had an issue with it, for example removing the guaranteed rare from grand chests, removing grand chests, or reducing key drops and raising prices of keys at the vendor. These changes would have taken the developers on the order of minutes to do if they were upset about it.

That doesn’t mean they won’t make changes to it, but they seem to at least be tolerating it.

I also think someone at anet is pursing a PhD in economics and seeing what happens by adjusting the rarity of certain items allows this employee to generate data for a thesis.

Seera.5916:

cletiscake.9173:

AB multi is not an eploit in any sense of the word. It was designed so that you can loot chests from each instance of a map your on. If there were controls set in place that prevented you from doing this, and you happened to find a way around those controls and you used that method to farm several map instances, then THAT would be considered an eploit. No one is getting banned from doing this as it currentyl stands.

The main issue is not really about the economy. It’s about the reward:time ratio. There is currently nothing better in the game than AB multi in terms of rewards:time spent. You can drop in, loot everything you can till the timer runs out, and you can walk away with 20-30g depending on how luck you get with eotics, jewels, and ectos.

The problem is that it’s not balanced. The rewards are hugely disproportionate to the amount of time you put into it. So little time invested for such huge rewards is not what the developers will be okay with in the long run. Because in the long run, yes, you need to worry about the economy. In the beginning, it wasn’t hurting the economy too much. As of today, Ecto prices are 40-45 silver now, down from 50-55 silver. You can bet the AB farm has had something to do with it.

Personally I don’t care what they do with it. I know it’s going to get nerfed somehow. The dev’s simply want a balanced game and this presents imbalance.

Sometimes an exploit involves no extra work. Back I think in late 2012 early 2013 they updated the game and a typo was made on some karma gear that made it really profitable to take it and salvage it or mystic forge it to something else. Those who had purchased a huge number of them were banned. So don’t think that just because the game allows it, that it’s not an exploit.

Granted, I don’t think the current situation is an exploit or one worth banning over if ANet thinks it is an exploit.

Your ezample does not prove what I said is untrue. The gear that had the typo on it was an anamoly. It was different than all the other gear. Players took advantage of something. They were able to get around “the control”, even though it required no effort on their part.

What i’m saying is that there is no obvious control right now for multi-map farming. Players are able to do this freely, and it just so happens that the rewards are so good for doing this, that players are organizing around it. No one is ezploiting anything. If they were ezploting, i’m certain Anet would inform the playerbase that they consider this an ezploit, in which case everyone would stop doing it. If Anet says nothing, then it’s fair game until they say otherwise. And it would be very very very bad PR for Anet to ban the people who are doing this without giving the community an official stance on the matter first.

AB farm is not a bannable offense. We’re just playing the game within the design paramters set by Anet. If they didn’t intend for us to play the game this way (which im sure they didnt) then they will change it.

cletiscake.9173:

Seera.5916:

cletiscake.9173:

AB multi is not an eploit in any sense of the word. It was designed so that you can loot chests from each instance of a map your on. If there were controls set in place that prevented you from doing this, and you happened to find a way around those controls and you used that method to farm several map instances, then THAT would be considered an eploit. No one is getting banned from doing this as it currentyl stands.

The main issue is not really about the economy. It’s about the reward:time ratio. There is currently nothing better in the game than AB multi in terms of rewards:time spent. You can drop in, loot everything you can till the timer runs out, and you can walk away with 20-30g depending on how luck you get with eotics, jewels, and ectos.

The problem is that it’s not balanced. The rewards are hugely disproportionate to the amount of time you put into it. So little time invested for such huge rewards is not what the developers will be okay with in the long run. Because in the long run, yes, you need to worry about the economy. In the beginning, it wasn’t hurting the economy too much. As of today, Ecto prices are 40-45 silver now, down from 50-55 silver. You can bet the AB farm has had something to do with it.

Personally I don’t care what they do with it. I know it’s going to get nerfed somehow. The dev’s simply want a balanced game and this presents imbalance.

Sometimes an exploit involves no extra work. Back I think in late 2012 early 2013 they updated the game and a typo was made on some karma gear that made it really profitable to take it and salvage it or mystic forge it to something else. Those who had purchased a huge number of them were banned. So don’t think that just because the game allows it, that it’s not an exploit.

Granted, I don’t think the current situation is an exploit or one worth banning over if ANet thinks it is an exploit.

Your ezample does not prove what I said is untrue. The gear that had the typo on it was an anamoly. It was different than all the other gear. Players took advantage of something. They were able to get around “the control”, even though it required no effort on their part.

What i’m saying is that there is no obvious control right now for multi-map farming. Players are able to do this freely, and it just so happens that the rewards are so good for doing this, that players are organizing around it. No one is ezploiting anything. If they were ezploting, i’m certain Anet would inform the playerbase that they consider this an ezploit, in which case everyone would stop doing it. If Anet says nothing, then it’s fair game until they say otherwise. And it would be very very very bad PR for Anet to ban the people who are doing this without giving the community an official stance on the matter first.

AB farm is not a bannable offense. We’re just playing the game within the design paramters set by Anet. If they didn’t intend for us to play the game this way (which im sure they didnt) then they will change it.

They are exploiting though by definition. Just because ANet doesn’t do anything to them, doesn’t mean that they aren’t exploiting. They are abusing code in the game to do things not intended by ANet.

Now, just because it is an exploit, doesn’t mean ANet should or will punish them. I do think that this is an exploit that shouldn’t have any bans or warnings or suspensions handed out. Overall it’s not that bad for the game and does take actual work to achieve and isn’t as easy as the AFK farming or karma exploits were.

cletiscake.9173:

AB farm is not a bannable offense.

It’s up to ANet to determine what constitutes and offense and whether its ban-worthy.

cletiscake.9173:

We’re just playing the game within the design paramters set by Anet.

You’re exploiting the design parameters to generate more loot per hour than anyone else can obtain, unless they join your squads.

cletiscake.9173:

If they didn’t intend for us to play the game this way (which im sure they didnt) then they will change it.

Sure.

Let me be clear: I have no objection to people engaging in AB multi-looting — it’s extremely clever use of the game. It impacts the economy, but not in such a way that ANet seems to feel urgent or important, which is good for whoever is willing to participate in the farms (and modestly good for the rest of us: lower ecto value was helpful to me recently).

At this point, I think it would be a major PR mistake for ANet to punish anyone for having participating in multi-looting, but of course, it’s up to them to decide.

tl;dr multi-looting exploits a game mechanic to generate extra loot for a fraction of the community. That doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with it or that ANet is going to ‘punish’ anyone for participating in it.

This situation is very similar to the original World Boss farming that was happening close to launch. People were guesting on other servers so they could loot more per character/account or whatever. No one got banned for doing that. Anet simply changed the parameters, made it account bound + daily, and all was good in the world. I foresee a similar outcome to the current AB farm.