Glitching definitions

[Chopper]

Hey Guys,

For the last week or so my twitter has been full of arguments between people I like about glitches in SOE, of which in my usual way I just can't stay out of.

For those that don't know, the arguments are about 2 basic things -

Removing Margwas from the map and using the flags to get ammo.

There are some caveats around these arguments which is what I base my opinion on - these people are guys who are going for and likely getting round 200.

I have gotten to round 100 on SOE both with and without Margwas.  I can't go much higher than that, I just am unable to play for multiple days in a row always on game.  The only real difference in my opinion is time.  There are some very clever ways of dealing with the Margwas, they just take a little longer.  If you don't know these, the map takes an awful lot longer.

The rift is the easiest place to deal with a Margwa.  It's also around half the speed of the Mega fast spots.  What this means is that every Margwa round you have to leave your area, return to the Rift and get rid of them before returning.  Let's say that takes 3 minutes each time, every 2 rounds, to round 100 you are potentially adding around 2 hours to 100 based on starting a strategy on 20.  I've yet to see a high round player down to a Margwa, I'm nowhere near the player these guys are when it comes to high rounds and I haven't gone down to one for a while.

My opinion is that Treyarch are leaving it in the game intentionally to help high round players out.  It is not going to make a round 40 player suddenly a round 70 player.  It might give someone a few extra rounds, but I believe everyone with the right strategy can deal with a Margwa and them being in or out of the game will not change the core rounds that people are going to get to by much.  Them not being in the game makes it much more fun in my opinion.  However, that's for solo.  For coop nothing gets the adrenaline going like a few Margwas spawning in causing chaos.

No onto the ammo thing.  Using the flag step you can constantly get a new max ammo.  There is a large group who believe this is abuse of the game mechanics and shouldn't be allowed.

My opinion on this is it just doesn't matter as much as people think.  After round 156 the WW is useless anyway.  Every weapon in the game is an infinite killing weapon anyway.

A second thing about the flag step is that it makes an incredibly easy way to deal with a Margwa.  Soon as he spawns, start the flag and suddenly it's just you and a Margwa.  No-one seems to have an opinion on this, however if you were to use it you would get accused of cheating as soon as people see the flag being available.

 

As this is my zombies home I would love to have a mature and intelligent debate about this.  It's very hard to do this on Twitter and in streams when people are just nasty.  Longest post I've made in a while, if you read this far I really appreciate it!

[The Clay Bird]

Great post @Chopper

I'm not aware of the method to remove margwa's from the map, but I'm going to assume that it isn't necessarily a design intentionally implemented by the devs, and I feel the Margwa's are an integral part of the map.  In the spirit of the game, i feel like that would be considered glitching, whether or not it really has a tangible effect on reaching higher rounds.

Now the flags max ammo thing, that is an intentional function in the game to assist in the flag steps, so i really don't see a problem with that.  It is more of a problem in the easter egg design in my opinion, where I'd like to see more things like puzzles and riddles to be solved rather than "kill things here then kill things there" type of design

 

Good food for thought though!

[S1ippery Jim]

Probably the fairest thing is to go by the map rules accepted by sites like zombie records, since these are generally accepted by the high round players. For example, they don't accept the flag ammo method on SoE. I don't always agree with their rules on what is and isn't an exploit or glitch but at least it's more or less a consensus the community can refer to.

[mmm chocolate]

i believe that if a game company with this much experience creating zombies maps doesn't take the time to find these in testing, then its ok. if they later patch it, well then we all know what their official stance was. until then, play the game as they released it. if they didn't want something to affect gameplay drastically, they should've figured out a way around it before release, people tend to cry foul when you take things from them.

the ammo thing is whatever because treyarch either didn't think of the exploit themselves, (which I doubt) or they left it in on purpose to help.

[DaveLo07]

Although I wouldn't use it myself, I actually see despawning the Margwa as the lesser of the 2 evils. I think you are being honest when you say you prefer the map without them Chopper, and I wouldn't necessarily personally discount someone's round for using it, but I still think the leaderboard sites shouldn't accept it or should at least have separate leaderboards for it (its been a while since I visited those sites but I believe they had separate leaderboards for moon depending on astronaut strategy?)

The Max ammo from the flags seems unnecessary, if it is only to replace wall weapon ammo then there is really no need for it to be used at all. And while blast furnace may make using the Max ammo seem inconsequential, I believe it can be used limitless times in each round. So potentially you could throw all 3 lil arnies, grab the flag and Max ammo and repeat. That would definitely feel like an abuse of the game mechanics.

Also, I don't believe things going unpatched is a reflection of Treyarch's moral stance on the matter. At least I hope not, otherwise they seem to be quite keen on the catwalk glitch on the Giant! I think the things that get reported the most are dealt with as a priority and certain map issues are probably easier to resolve than others.

[DeathBringerZen]

1 hour ago, S1ippery Jim said:

Probably the fairest thing is to go by the map rules accepted by sites like zombie records, since these are generally accepted by the high round players. For example, they don't accept the flag ammo method on SoE. I don't always agree with their rules on what is and isn't an exploit or glitch but at least it's more or less a consensus the community can refer to.

Unfortunately sites like zombie records and zombie legends make up the rules to suit themselves when it comes to these things, like sitting it glitch spots on co-op runs on exo-zombies maps to take breaks. How could they consider this as even remotely legit?

 

@Chopper My stance is that if you glitch out any of the maps bosses intentionally then you're cheating and the game should not be considered a legit WR run. These bosses are what seperate each map from the others and by removing them you are taking the maps biggest obstacles out of the picture. I have felt this way since they allowed "no novas" on Kino and glitching out George or the Astronaut on Moon. Obviously one main issue is that these bosses can sometimes glitch out unintentionally but if you are streaming a WR attemptand do it intentionally then it shouldn't count, for obvious reasons.

 

As for the infinite max ammo thing, that is a part of the maps mechanics so I don't see why they would consider that an issue? It's actually a very clever strat to incorporate into your game. Still, Treyarch may attempt to patch it but if not then I say it's fair game. If people want to run without Margwas then cool but anyone who claims a WR while doing it really are deluded. Only playing the map as intended while ever be considered legit in my own opinion.

[TimelordAlex]

i find the margwas little bother solo as you never get more than one at a time unless its the sword rituals which i dont bother with anyway. I dislike them in co-op though where you can have 3 at one time i believe, doing my own business in the rift, i get a margwa, thats fine i can deal with that, then teammates get a margwa, enter the rift and leave, leaving me then to deal with my zombies plus 3 margwas, some walking and some running and this ultimately gets me down. I think they should work like how they do by sword ritual spawning, they go for a random player, that way you cant shake it off for someone else to deal with. And out of curiosity, does the WW actually stop at 156? Its not insta kill? If so thats stupid especially as we cant pap.

[steviewonder87]

1 hour ago, TimelordAlex said:

i find the margwas little bother solo as you never get more than one at a time unless its the sword rituals which i dont bother with anyway. I dislike them in co-op though where you can have 3 at one time i believe, doing my own business in the rift, i get a margwa, thats fine i can deal with that, then teammates get a margwa, enter the rift and leave, leaving me then to deal with my zombies plus 3 margwas, some walking and some running and this ultimately gets me down. I think they should work like how they do by sword ritual spawning, they go for a random player, that way you cant shake it off for someone else to deal with. And out of curiosity, does the WW actually stop at 156? Its not insta kill? If so thats stupid especially as we cant pap.

It makes them invisible I think. Kinda like that buggy Winter's Howl on Bam's Baseball map lol, I think he called it the 'Summer Breeze'.

[Pasta]

It's very simple.  If it is a proper game mechanic, use it all you want and be on your merry-fucking-way.  The flags are a game mechanic.  If people hate on the fact that they are being used to make it easier on Margwa's, then they are just immature haters.  I'd love to see them want to grind through a 3 hour solo game with Margwas everywhere.  The issue arises when you use a game mechanic to your advantage that is NOT supposed to be there i.e all of the barrier glitches/pile up glitches.  It's pretty silly that in previous games people would glitch to the 200's and up and nobody bats an eye but find a loop hole in a coded game mechanic and everybody loses their minds.  (see what I did there)

 

If you glitch out the Margwa completely, I take the stance that yes you are violating the game's mechanics therefore it should be discredited.  But if you pick up the flag just to have some one on one intimacy with the Margwa to kill him easier then I see nothing wrong with that.  Max ammos aren't even a big deal.  Wall weapons, Gum-balls, etc there honestly isn't even a need for a max ammo that often.  Use the coded game mechanics and you're fine.  As long as you grab the flag only to kill the Margwa without the threat of zombies it's all good.  @mmm chocolate says it pretty well also.  I do believe that Treyarch's opinion on these glitches/bugs should reflect our own.  If they deem it that big of an exploit, they will patch it end of story.  Yes they are slow but I just think they are being thorough.  

[TimelordAlex]

11 hours ago, steviewonder87 said:

It makes them invisible I think. Kinda like that buggy Winter's Howl on Bam's Baseball map lol, I think he called it the 'Summer Breeze'.

Yeah i still have that map, i thought the gun was awesome at first, then i wandered what was hitting me and it was invisible zombies. So does it no longer suck them in after that?

[DaveLo07]

I took the direct route and contacted Activision support and the opinion of the support agent was that both of these issues are bugs/exploits in the game that should be patched. I did ask for a statement to that effect stating whether they were game mechanics and if they would be patched but they said it would not be possible to do this. So this is only the opinion of a support agent, but it would seem that they are both unintentional.

My tablet will not allow me to upload an image of the chat but here is the response I got:

Agent : Regarding to your questions they are bugs or glitches in the game that need to be fixed and I will report them to the relevant parties immediately

Me: I would like a statement from Activision to that effect, directly responding to those questions. Are these 2 issues game mechanics, and will they be patched? I know you are saying they are bugs and I agree but at the moment that is personal opinion

Agent : Nope, it really is a bug/exploit in the game. I will notify the higher parties about this so that they can try and patch the issue, but there is no timeframe on this since it will undergo process.

[Chopper]

@DaveLo07 Just a really quick response as I have no time and want to get into this later from all the great responses but was that in relation to the ammo or de-spawning of the zombies?

Can you not screenshot the chat and upload it somewhere?

[DaveLo07]

It was  in response to the despawning margwas and infinite Max ammos from the flag step. I explained the issues as clearly as possible and they seemed pretty certain that neither was a designed game mechanic, but that is only their opinion.

The support chat auto saves so I have a transcript, the issue I have is I screenshotted some of it on my tablet, but when I try and upload it anywhere or save it to another folder it just closed the window. They also stated there is no way to get a direct response from Activision directly regarding these issues so if it does not get patched then I guess we'll never know.

Something I forgot to mention, the agent also said that they were unaware of either of these issues. Neither has ever been reported, so they were unaware that these issues needed to be patched.

Edited January 6, 2016 by DaveLo07

[Ragdo11706]

I think this whole thing is funny as fuck. When it comes down to the "Big Players"; anything that benefits them is going to be accepted 100% of the time. As long as it doesn't involve them sitting in a spot that's an obvious glitch, to the point where they never move.

With that being said, I'll give you my humble opinion on the situation for what it's worth. 

So I remember about a month or so ago @Chopper and I had this very conversation regarding the de-spawning of the Margwa. He had worked out what made this occur, and we both came to the conclusion, it had to have been something they implemented into the game on purpose, through the coding. 

Considering the fact it had been almost a month since the game had released and they still hadn't patched it, surely it wasn't a glitch right. I've heard since then it has indeed been patched, however I keep seeing people claim that it still works?!?! This I cannot confirm, simply because I don't have access to internet and still play on Version 33.0.0.0.0 (Thank God). Yes, I can still PaP the A.S.

In my eyes the de-spawning of Margwa, is not that big of a deal. Treyarch implemented a helmet that literally nullifies the damage they do from the slam attack, to the point where you take 0% damage. Let's be honest here, the only people that's even going to use this are us Solo players. If it is that big of a deal, have two seperate Fucking leaderboards, it's really not that difficult.

____

Now as far as getting to Totem phase and using it for Maxx Ammos, I could see this potentially being considered a "Glitch". Now if you were to use this once per Round, ok that's cool. However like @DaveLo07 pointed out, if your grabbing the Totem, getting the Maxx Ammo, then using your upgraded Arnies, & repeating this over & over then hell yeah that's a "Glitch".

Honestly though who's going to take that much time to do all that. If so you are a F*****G idiot. There are plenty more ways to do this much faster. Especially since you can have Blast Furnace on almost every weapon in the game outside of the RayGun & A.S. including wall Weapons. So is it a "Glitch" probably not, could it be abused, abso-F*****G-lutely!

[Chopper]

@Ragdo11706@DaveLo07@DeathBringerZen@TimelordAlex@Pasta@steviewonder87@mmm chocolate@S1ippery Jim

Quick update - this whole thing is irrelevant.  Steve got to round 119 yesterday in 8 hours, with Margwas and didn't need to find ammo in any form until round 116.  I have gotten to 100 in 6 hours using the same strategy.  

On that note, would anyone be interested in me writing a guide which means you can't have QR?  It's a high risk and high reward strategy, fast as hell and has a really good way of dealing with Maggie.  You use the Civil Protector to swap to Quick Revive at later rounds.  Maybe Stamina could be dropped but I can't test it right now.

Will still be responding later to all the stuff that has been posted, thanks again for all the great responses.

[DaveLo07]

I would definitely be interested in seeing that guide, already really intrigued as to why no quick revive!

[shirtlesservice]

20 hours ago, Chopper said:

A second thing about the flag step is that it makes an incredibly easy way to deal with a Margwa.  Soon as he spawns, start the flag and suddenly it's just you and a Margwa.  No-one seems to have an opinion on this, however if you were to use it you would get accused of cheating as soon as people see the flag being available.

First off I want to start by saying that this is a genius mechanic. This completely eliminates the "detriment" of having margwas spawn, and it makes them easier to deal with, and leads to a free max ammo for that round.

This also circumvents the glitch. The flag removing zombies from the spawn rotation is a very deliberate game mechanic, and a part of the Easter egg. I don't know how anyone could call it a glitch, as it is clearly deliberate.

I understand the community's complaints about the glitch to stop margwas from spawning. It really doesn't seem like leaving the shadowman just standing there and having to hold the wonder weapon the whole time, etc, could really be a deliberate mechanic. But again, this business with the flag gets around peoples complaints. 

The main issue seems to be that players argue that margwas make the game more difficult. I disagree, along with most other players that can hit round 20 or so. They are really just a time consuming problem more than anything else, just an annoyance.

I think that canceling margwa spawns is indeed a glitch, but I don't think its an exploit that takes away from anyone's achievements in the high rounds, especially when they do something like hit round 215 without downing. Clearly margwas wouldn't have made too big of a difference to that player's ability.

@Chopper Post that guide please, new info and strategies are always welcome.

 

Edited January 6, 2016 by shirtlesservice

[Ragdo11706]

@Chopper I'm definitely interested in hearing (in our case reading) this. I almost always use a similar strat where I don't buy Q.R. until Round 50 anyways. If I do screw up & die ohh well. Time to start over, game was probably shit from the beginning.

When I'm in Extreme E.E. hunting mode I usually do, since I'm taking my sweet ass time going throughout  the map like a 3-toed sloth. Better known as trying to figure out the solution for this damn A.S. to be Upgraded.

[DeathBringerZen]

@Chopper I would love to see the guide as like @Ragdo11706 said, I usually don't buy QR till I get to round 50 as I see a down anywhere before that as a ruined game and usually give up. I know that sounds weird but QR's are precious to me, especially as I have never used the Civil Protector in any of my solo games because of the fact that he can sometimes kill you and not revive you after it.

 

If it involves the Civil Protector then I would love to hear it. I am keen on changing my strat on SoE now anyway as I am a bit bored with running my current strat, which is just pretty much using the Vesper & Blast for the whole game with the WW only used if I get trapped and Arnies if I go down and need to recover but would enjoy trying something else. Seen a lot of people say they run at the Ruby but it sounds a bit hectic and unnecessarily dangerous.

[Anubidayz]

 

I was playing SOE last night and i noticed that after unlocking the door for the apothicon egg if you go back into beast mode the symbols appear floating in front of the eggs. I could also shock them to make the go away and i could shock each one. Glitch or is this something?

 

[Exactice_808]

My useless $0.02

 

The despawning margwa is more a of a "Glitch" like the swords and the Mystery box,  You are changing the game mechanics.

The Flags and the Ammo are just an over looked game mechanics,  while an advantage , you still have to complete the steps to get the ammo.  I.E. defend the flag and if you fail.. you wasted all that time and the potential ammo you could have saved.

 

I relate the Margwa situation like COTD, with Mr. George Romero,  Its like taking him out of the game.... its was part of the game to make it more challenging, if you "Glitch" him out...then you might as well just not play the map as that is NOT how it was intended to play.

 

There can be multiple ways to play this game.....truly its up to the player on how they want to play... but if they want to get some type of achievement or accolade or respect from "X' community, what ever community it may be, you need to play the game how "X" community deems it to be played....

 

If you are going for high rounds but sit on the Mystery Box, for 200+ rounds... well thats on you... but I dont think many people will find that as a legit 200+ round strategy...same with taking out the margwas.........

 

 

 

Edited January 6, 2016 by Exactice_808

[TimelordAlex]

COTD would be so much better without George, or if they reworked his AI, to target a specific player for a while, and then move on to someone else rather than someone be lumbered with him the whole game. The Margwas should also work like dogs, they go after a specific player so you cant leave someone else to deal with it.

[Exactice_808]

6 minutes ago, TimelordAlex said:

COTD would be so much better without George, or if they reworked his AI, to target a specific player for a while, and then move on to someone else rather than someone be lumbered with him the whole game. The Margwas should also work like dogs, they go after a specific player so you cant leave someone else to deal with it.

Again Game Mechanics though....its just how the way it was built in to hinder your longer term play......

 

Tweaking to make the AI's easier on the players part defeats the purpose of having them in there.  The Flying wasp & and Meatballs, play the rolls of the dog...... Margwa....is just another pain in our butts to play harder and come up with better strategies on playing the map....

 

Removing them or tweaking them in favor of the player......changes everything... might as well go back to playing WAW zombies.....

[83457]

First, you've touched on it fairly well. For the über pros, it is just a time saver and/or doesn't matter too much.

My "decent player" opinion: (I've made it to 57 and 59 without effort, i find the map easy enough. I haven't tried for high rounds. Just so my skills-to-opinion ratio can be judged. No glitches used). :)

Margwas may not hurt pros, but I'm old and blind enough that having to deal with these every 2 rounds is annoying and it's also enough to cause me to make errors. If not dying to some weird glitch, i find myself making errors dealing with these guys as the game drags on, which gets me downed sometimes. And frankly, the majority of players are probably lower skilled than I (and others here), likely having more trouble with them then we forum regulars do. Like them or hate them, i feel that stopping their spawn IS glitching. I don't particularly care and am not looking down my nose at anyone. If I'm in a game, it will glitch, it's just an effect that i have on things, so i can't point my finger at anyone.

Flag Margwa, and Flag Ammo are just, in my opinion, playing the game as it is. I don't see any glitches in my understanding of the word. 

Is zombie cloning a glitch? Was it intended? It makes the game better early, and it won't reasonably affect a 100+ round game, but if it was somehow missed by the homeless, drunk, crack heads that apparently were hired by Trollarch to playtest, and therefore not intended, then i would say it's a glitch, though mild. Until otherwise noted, i don't consider it glitched, just a game mechanic. But again, i feel it affects the game less than the Margwa spawn issue.

Shrug.

Edited January 6, 2016 by 83457

[Exactice_808]

9 minutes ago, 83457 said:

First, you've touched on it fairly well. For the über pros, it is just a time saver and/or doesn't matter too much.

My "decent player" opinion:

Margwas may not hurt pros, but I'm old and blind enough that having to deal with these every 2 rounds is annoying and it's also enough to cause me to make errors. If not dying to some weird glitch, i find myself making errors dealing with these guys as the game drags on, which gets me downed sometimes. Like them or hate them, i feel that stopping their spawn IS glitching. I don't particularly care and am not looking down my nose at anyone. If I'm in a game, it will glitch, it's just an effect that i have on things, so i can't point my finger at anyone.

Flag Margwa, and Ammo Margwa are just, in my opinion, playing the game as it is. I don't see any glitches in my understanding of the word. 

Is zombie cloning a glitch? Was it intended? It makes the game better, and it won't reasonably affect a 100+ round game, but if it was somehow missed by the homeless, drunk, crack heads that apparently were hired by Trollarch to playtest, and therefore not intended, then i would say it's a glitch, though mild.

 

Agreed... Its funny.... 2 reasons I generally die on SOE

 

1) Margwas, running backwards shooting them and somehow a zombie traps me from behind as I am running backwards

2) Trying to saving a fallen teammate and run into their damn train.... I hate when I do this....now I only beast to them in round 20+ never go in their area to do a normal revive unless I have to.

 

Margwas was intended to make the rounds more challenging,  Distract you from the zombies running around the map and allow for a tougher expereince for the experience players....... As zombies evolve so does the player, they get better and better so devs have to come up with ideas to make the game more challenging.....

 

COMMON this Easter egg was on par with COTD & Ascension and all the rest of the other long winded EE, but it was figured out within in a weak..... how does a dev team keep players happy..... by making the game harder and throwing stupid monkey wrenches at us......

 

Embrace it.... its how communities like CODZ survive, by the endless discussions... Glitching the game proves one thing, that you are good enough to figure it out how to beat the game in ways it was not intended too... Its not a bad thing at all.... but it was just not the "Intended" way thats all.

Edited January 6, 2016 by Exactice_808