The small line between Trick, Glitch and Exploit or just Skill?

Yep. That's all there's to it. An exploit is when an unintended side effect of the game is exploited in an unfair manner.
I haven't met a case yet where it's been hard to tell if something was an exploit or not.

It's always been glaringly obvious that, say, taking the backroad in Gyala, ascending several times (with reward), carrying objects to draw aggro etc etc etc were exploits.

EDIT: The gear trick intended? Give me a break. Buggy AI FTW.

heh a lot of ppl have their own oppinions on what a trick is and what an exploit is... but really it isnt a thin line at all

exploit is getting skills ai whatever to do something beyond the scope of their designated bounds...

example... AI being blocked because of getting stuck... is an exploit of game mechanics not a trick... the AI is suposed to more after you and not get stuck...

Faction Farming at conservatory... definately a wide scale exploit completing the quest without activating it to avoid the luxon spawns

Gayla Hatchery taking the back way so the turtles stay away from danger while you leisurley kill off all threat to the escort

trick is following all rules of gameplay without breaking the bounds...

examples:

pulling... trick not exlpoit creatures are supposed to agro and follow to a certain extent... and funny thing is people get pissed when ai gets stuck (which on the other hand exploiters deem as a viable trick)

agroing life pods away from root behemoths so they are no longer in range to heal... trick follows all rules of gameplay agro pulling spell range etc

55ing, 600ing, Vrit.... no exploit here these builds are completely based on player and in game skills no skills are exploited all rules are followed and they arent flawless they cannot solo every area only the areas the builds are set up for... 8 skills on the bar hundress to choose from the skills where meant to be swapped and molded for specific style area fighting...

lol nothing ever stays on-topic on these forums its part of the fun

whatever we decide its still not down to us Anet have the power to decide what is what we just take advantage of them whilst we can.."if something looks to good to be true then it normally is" <~~that statement can be used for in-game purposes aswell

Pretty much in PVE the AI isn't going to complain about skill-misuse. The book trick worked as intended, since it was written in the ai that way. Obviously if someone sneeks by a starting gate in pvp (like they did in ab to cap shrines) then it's an unfar advantage if it cannot be equally exploited. I think the counter idea really makes or breaks an exploit/trick/abuse setting. If a warrior could go through an entire group of any build and slaughter them all it would certainly be something that needs addressing. For PVP, if enough people complain and it seems abusive then it's going to get the nerf bat.

They're are of course plenty of skills that work exactly as intended (like eoe) yet someone figured out a way to use it to an unfair advantage. Those of which people have been doing in PVE long before they bothered working it into a build for PVP, of course also, the AI just isn't complaining about it. I think its a hard and fast rule to say a skill or skill set is an exploited one until it becomes one that is no longer able to be beaten.

Anyone mind telling me how that exhaustion thing worked?

OK i dont really care what people think is a glitch or a cheat or a trick or anything.(no offense i dont mean that to be mean)all im saying is that I BELIEVE that as long as the game ITSELF allows you to do something, either intended or not, as long as it does not involve direct change of the games code (ie HAXORS!!)i think it should be fair game. for example, a friend of mine(WoW fanatic grrr)was telling me about how the WoW admins, if they found an "exploit", they would simply TELL people not to exploit it and then MAYBE fix it later on.(and all you WoW geeks, i dont play wow so if this is wrong,you COULD flame my friend but as he doesnt check guru,it would be better to keep all that shit to yourself >.<)and im sorry but thats bull sh@$. thats like setting a million dollars on the side of the road and then putting up a little sign that say "please dont take my money,I'll be back later to pick it up"how many of you would actually pass right by all of it?let me guess...NONE. if they really dont want people to do it they should get off their lazy azzes and fix it. same with the whole exp thing in GW(among other things). until its fixed they shouldnt be allowed to punish us(read:ban) for doing it.(yes i do know theyve already fixed the exp thing)

all this reminds me of the old smash brothers,i always loved playing as donkey kong, then killing the oponent once then just grabbing them over and over again and doing a suicide/murder thing. technically it wasnt a cheat. it was just annoying

I think that was probably intended...

i dont believe it was intended for the npcs to say "move out" and the caravan not to move because the party is the oposite direction out of range...

allowing a party 100% completion with no threat

4 turtles masters
3 turtles expert

i too justified it as being tactfull i mean why wouldn't you irl tell the caravan to stay and scout the area and secure the route... but no other missions follow this strategy aka none of the other escort missions and their are no back ways to most

Since I have a 55hp necro and a 55hp monk I've thought a lot about why ANet lets me keep them. I'm cynical so I have a cynical reason: 55hp appeals the the non-casual gamer and therefore drives sales of Prophecies. A 55hp is a thing of lore. Newbie players hear about its tanking ability, about untould riches, about power-leveling and they immediately want to try making one. If you only own Factions then you're out of luck. You need Prophecies. I think ANet leaves them alone to promote it's older stuff.

What ANet does do is take steps to limit what a 55hp can do. I honestly believe the Assassin (and now Dervish) classes were added to help deal with 55hp builds.

I feel the same about SB/PS builds too. It may have been unintended, but I think ANet likes it when you need both campaigns to make a farming build.

As for exploits/tricks...

That's hard for me to say. I think leeching in Aspenwood is an exploit, but ANet has so far left that alone. The leeching has an immediate detrimental impact on the other members of the team. In essence it's a direct way to ruin someone's play of GW.

I'm far less concerned about PvE "tricks." Typically these are widely known and widely used. It's up to individuals to decide if they want to use them or not. People who like everything "above board" can avoid using the trick. Some will point out that if a "trick" gets too populare then the "above-board" players won't have anyone to group with if they don't want to use the "trick." My take on this is the same as people who say they can't finish THK. Get into a guild of like-minded individuals and group with them. Then can you have a "trick" -free experience.

There's a couple of definitions that have been missed here. I'm having a bit of a mind blank to give proper definitions here, but I'll give the contexts in which they'd be used to give an idea:

"For my next trick, I will..."
and
"It looks hard at first sight, but there's a trick to this one..."

I think this is the seperation that the OP may be using. A 'trick' is a gimmick - something which is allowed in the rules, but is not the obvious way of doing things. An 'exploit' is a gimmick which... well, it may be allowed now, but it really shouldn't be. While 'skill' is simply a factor of being good at what you do.

Personally, in PvE, I have a simple gauge on where the line between a 'trick' and an 'exploit' is: Would this trick ever work on even the dumbest human player? If the answer is 'no', then it's an exploit. This makes things like the Gear trick, getting monsters stuck on terrain, and so on exploits - even the slowest human player would eventually realise that what they are doing isn't working and try something else. 55ing, however, for example, is a trick - it's one I don't particularly like, but it does work equally well on players without enchantment removal as it does on monsters without it.

Gyala I'm not sure about. On the one hand, it does make good tactical sense - on the other hand, it would also make sense that the Kurzicks aren't going to wait around while the escort goes hunter-killer - if they get reports that the escort has showed up at point A, then the ambushers at point B may well decide to go straight for the turtles now.

So is it a trick or an exploit that elementalist bosses in Factions can one-shot people? I'm more of the opinion lately that if the monsters can bend and break the rules in all kinds of ways because the designers said they could, then anything goes for what the players can get away with, too.

When they start making the game rules and mechanics consistant, then I'll start worrying about whether something is an exploit or not within the rules that they have laid down for the entire game.

I am not a Guild Wars game designer. As such unless the GW designers have made their intent clear (e.g. a note on the login page or a modification of the game), I don't know their intent.

I no longer try to "guess" what the designers' intent is. I play the game as if the game is playing exactly how the designers' intended it to play. Although that doesn't prevent me from making suggestions ("hey, I think the game would be more fun if the mob AI wasn't so easily fooled by carrying an item"), pointing out discrepancies ("hey, the game effect of Thunderclap doesn't match its description") or noting a POSSIBLE bug ("hey, exhaustion doesn't go negative").

It would be presumptious of me to "guess" what the designers' intended and expect other players to play according to my "guess."

Uh... Monsters are software scripts. They can't cheat or 'bend the rules' any more than a doorknob can.

In the context of games:

* An Exploit is when you use a flaw in the game design to your advantage. Anything which relies on a bug/glitch/quirk in the game to give an effect the designers didn't intend.

* A Hack is when you use third party software to modify the game behavior to your advantage.

* A trick is doing something within the rules and in accordance with the intentions of the designers, but in a way most people haven't yet realized.

* Cheating is using unfair means to get an advantage - i.e. exploiting or hacking.

Do not forget that this game is intended to be challenging. Some bosses in Factions strike very hard, but it takes only marginal changes in a build to overcome it. If bosses were limited to 450 hp and no "extra bonuses" they would be a very easy prey for a decent team.

I guess some features may be intended, but the actual use of it makes it approaches the "exploit category". The mentioned "book trick" is one example. It was probably intended to get agro on the "important" player. To avoid having one runner that takes the book and completes the quest, while they others block the agro. However, the "book" trick totally dominated FoW and SF for a long period and decreased the challenge in these "hard" areas considerable. A ritualist with a "permanent" book feature would have extended this to all areas, as well as giving "normal" Ritualists a hard time.

To program a good AI is probably hard, at least to get good and realistic agro-management. To program a good tank-AI that uses the terrain to keep the opponents from reaching the casters must be very hard. To do an insanely good interrupt mesmer-AI is probably much easier. I would have liked a more clever, less trickable AI, but I understand it is probably hard to get.

BTW: I would not have used "Does any human do this?" as criteria. I have met a lot players that would have been cheated by the book trick and who seem to love standing in fire rains and maelstroms.


Regards,
Cloudbunny

I'm wondering what you thing about getting monsters into narrow areas where you can focus fire/AoE them to death. In the ToPK at the end you basically do that to all the popups/grasping monsters. Pulling one group at a time of course. So is that an exploit? By your standards it is because even the dumbest players eventually realize that tight grouping = AoE death.

I think your analogy is a bit vague because there are plenty of places where they AI is dumber than dumbest human and it's not considered an exploit. Just for example, is the case when you've got 10hp and you're running from a monster. No human (even the dumbest player) would let you get away to heal and come back for another go. However, if you run far enough from the AI it will turn around and stop its chase. Is that an exploit?

The problem is that what is an exploit is very subjective. A lot of people don't like to see people get things "the easy way." So they complain about exploits. Like I said above, the game gets played a lot of different ways. If you play through your way and have fun then I don't see why it would bother you if someone else plays through differently and has fun too.

Ultimately I think the only place where exploits can occur in this game is the PvP portion. Exploits there have a direct detrimental effect on other players. Things like the "infinite energy" exploit are bad because they are an unfair advantage in a competitive environment.

Numa,

You and I have been on this merry-go-round before, but I'll simply say I disagree with you here. I think you're definition is way too restrictive. If I followed it then I wouldn't do things like use a longbow on the elementalists at the elemetalist shrine in AB (to avoid triggering their aggro) because that would be exploiting. Their AI is obviously flawed since the don't aggro even when being hit by an arrow in the head.

The same would be said about aggroing monsters above you on a cliff that can't run down to get you. Obviously an exploit in your book. Yet I use that all the time to clear jade bows in some of the Ring of Fire missions.

I just think your definition needs work here. Otherwise following it to the letter would mean well over half the things people do in the game are exploits. Worst of all your definition pretends to know what the designers inteneded which I think is impossible unless you have an inside line to ANet.

Regards,

Melech

Because everyone has a different opinion on what is "an exploit", "lame" or whatever - look at the guy who claims the gear trick was an exploit* - the discussion is rather meaningless.

*Noone got punished for that one, hell, everyone who DIDNT do it was considered a bad pve player - that doesnt foster the impression that exploits are bad, or that the judging authority is something but a joke.

There is either "within the clearly written rules" or "against the clearly written rules".

If there is a dispute, there are 2 ways to handle it:
1. it is valid until an opportunity arises to change / clarify the rules (next match, more often next "season"), or
2. judgement call.

In the later case, the judge is part of the game, and "play the judge" (by misleading him and manipulating him into thinking that your way is the right way) is - sadly - part of the game. Guess which option i prefer?

The general mindset behind the "exploits are bad" people is what i would call scrub mentality:
people who dont play the game "the right way" (not necessarily the way the devs intended the game to be - since everyone has his own opinions on valid gameplay, remember?) are somehow bad - unless they play less successfully, in which case they are "creative"

In Guildwars this means: everything that the client allows you to do is legit until it stops allowing you to do it.

Everything else is theological guessing. Did the "creator" really intended the AI to be so stupid? Am i really a bad person for using spiteful spirit in pve? When those doors should be solid, why did i just manage to get past them? Am i really bad when i only see ugly 2d sprites even though the devs "really really promised" to have state-of-the-art 3d engine for Guild Wars 2?

The last example should hopefully show: when reality and "intent" differ, it is always the fault of the creators. Nothing prevents them from fixing the problem - see all the patches that closed "lame" ways to play Guild wars. But until then, every "exploit" is part of the - competitive - game, and everyone who doesnt find or abuse it has only himself to blame. Of course, you could get banned for that - so you have to play the judge a bit ... lame, but whatever.

personal note: i consider fairplay (in a game, not life) to play to your fullest potential, and disregard all subjective traces of mercy and guilt. Its not about killing kittens, its about playing games. Its no fun when your opponent doesnt do something that would have increased his chance of winning, and even worse when he claims that he is somehow doing me a favor. If the game turns out to be degenerative (ex: if you play a mesmer you win, if everyone selects a mesmer the winner is randomly selected), its time to find another game.

I think this comment is telling.

People got banned for exploiting the Ascension glitch, correct? (If not, they should have.) Here's a glitch that allowed you to earn practically an infinite amount of XP fairly easily. People who took advantage of it (ie, "exploited" it), had an "unfair" advantage over those that didn't. There's just no way another person could hope to earn a similar amount of XP in the same time w/o exploiting the glitch.

But when it comes to the gear carriers, and the Gyla Hatchery mish (for example), that was NOT the only way to solve the mission. Sure, it was easier, but the NET result was the same as someone who took the harder road, but still accomplished the mission (perhaps with more satisfaction?)

So, it's not really a judgement call at all. If the exploit is giving you an unfair advantage (my definition: being unnatainable by people NOT using the exploit), then that is a bannable exploit.

Otherwise, it's still an exploit, but one of lesser sin.

Probably all these examples can be called exploits, due to errors in Anet programming.
Errors can always be expected, because you cant check 100% of all the game.

I think Exploits are due to Glitches (=programmingerror) and these exploits are commonly named Tricks (e.g. Geartrick). We shouldnt exploit them, because by legal right, Anet can ban you. But it is still very tempting ofc. Furthermore, Anet has a hard time proving you are exploiting. They have the right, but no proof, because you can always claim coincidence/skill/whatever.

Examples:
-There was a time that monsters north of Droks dropped loot for players, even though they were killed by other monsters.
-The (due to hacking?) 'merchantglitch', half a year ago, when all the merchants were seemingly 'reset'. Thus Ectos and shards were sold at 250g. Anet reset all the servers 2 hrs back to cope with this problem.

Thing is, Anet could hardly have foreseen these events, but they coped with it adequately. Anyway, 100 thousands are farming SF, Anet cant ban them, it would scare the gamers too much. Gaming should remain fun, and they know it. They just sulked up the damage and nerfed it.

I like the dynamic environment of GW. The developers continously rebalance skills and features. You have to rethink your strategies from time to another, which adds a bit to the game.

If i were developer my goal would have been the "perfectly balanced game". With no single build "superior" to others, only played differently. A pet/barrage team would not have been "The Build" in tombs, only one build by many. My goal would have been to make all areas so diverse that going with a reduced party actually would make it harder, not only more profitable. Exploits or tricks I would have tried to remove as soon as possible, mainly since they either unbalance pvp or reduce the challenge.

Hehe, of course I am not the developer. I guess I then would have been a very unpopular person in the farming community.

Regards,
Cloudbunny