Oh, I don’t mean skill of picking a bike or upgrading it. (People are bad at picking the right bike though).
I meant timing attacks and preserving energy. Racing skill.
I’m not so sure if that’s the case as I don’t have a timestamp for him getting it right (and don’t want to watch an hour long video), but I disagreed with him pretty early on when he said “technically… they’re not loopholes”.
I’d also still argue as some others have that exploitation of game mechanics to support unintended behaviour is still exploitation.
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so you didn’t watch it but are going to argue that they are wrong 
just messing with you!
I’ll try to summarize it… @Lee_Zavarise_MIVA please let me know if I’m getting this wrong from your point of view.
Using game mechanics such as the teleport feature or coffee stop is not against the terms of service, so it is not cheating. Naming and shaming people you think are doing something wrong is against the TOS.
“hate the game not the player” I think one of the guys said, this is on Zwift to stop if they decide any of these loopholes to faster upgrades are “against the rules”… also a lot of discussion about rules, since your feelings aren’t rules… rules need to be very clear and direct. Zwift doesn’t really have a set of rules other than the TOS.
The developers need to fix this within the game, you can’t fix problems (if Zwift decides it is a problem) like this one user at a time by issuing bans.
The ‘as intended’ part of the TOS clause is going to do a lot of heavy lifting in this. Teleporting to game a system they clearly intended to take months or years to accomplish is not using the system as intended.
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yes, this entire clause in the TOS is very open to interpretation:
vii.Use our Platform other than for its intended purpose and in any manner that could interfere with, disrupt, negatively affect or inhibit other users from fully enjoying our Platform or that could damage, disable, overburden or impair the functioning of our Platform in any manner;
you used a power up and beat me in a race, therefore negatively affected my full enjoyment, you are now banned…
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Lee’s point kind of falls apart when he says, only follow the written rules, then ends it by saying, changing weight would be a no-no.
Weight & height changes are not against the rules, so Lee does want to follow some unwritten rules.
Ultimately this isnt on users to fix, its as usual on zwift but the argument of you cant police the community on unwritten rules doesnt really work. We all have an expectation of fairness and those users who move into the grey areas will rightly be called out.
The whole thing felt more of a rant as a specific person got pulled for it rather than a comment on how to improve things for all.
I think the numbers guy at Zwift is pretty happy how this is all going. If I have to believe all the stories I read here there are people spending hours a day more on Zwift than they used to.
Look guys, we have users being in our game for 8 hours a day. This is a succes.
I’d agree it’s not cheating. Cheating the system, perhaps, but not cheating. A semantic difference to some, but I see them as different. Unsporting, maybe. Within the bounds of what the game enables, but not in keeping with the spirit or intention of the system, maybe. Unsporting conduct. said that twice
Still, to me, a loophole and exploitation.
using accurate height and weight are in the rules, at least for the elite races… not sure if this trickles down to anything else…
Solely for Elite - Community racing is the wild west.
This is so much of the problem, Community racing (I really dislike that term as it undervalues it) has no rules and therefore anything goes - And it allows Zwift to continually turn a blind eye & provide an awful service. They can just shrug their shoulders and say its only community racing, we dont need to provide a fair platform for that, as we only care about Elite racing fairness.
Community guidelines: Community Guidelines: Rules of the Road
WIN WITH GRACE, LOSE WITH DIGNITY
Don’t cheat. Don’t try to cheat either. Beyond the evils of weight doping (i.e., pretending to be much lighter than you really are), make sure you pick the right race category. Zwift loves healthy competition, but if you pick wrong, your pace will likely shatter the group and make the event miserable for everyone else. Know your fitness level, calibrate your equipment, and please follow the rules. If you think someone is cheating, please refrain from making accusations. Quite often, new members may simply need help with their setups. Be their hero and help them out!
In the spirit of keeping racing fair, for those who use ZwiftPower for results, here are several things we monitor to keep Zwift equitable; out of the ordinary/exceptional performance metrics without dual recording for validation, excessive changes to biometric information (e.g., height, weight), evidence of sticky watts or micro-bursting, and behavior against the spirit of the game.
None of that is a ruleset. Its an ethos, or spirit of the game type thing
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agreed…we need clear rules!
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Except that using a powerup in a race is pretty clearly using the system as intended by Zwift. That clause is two-part, it’s an ‘AND’ rather than an ‘OR’ operator. TOS is violated by someone who A) uses the system not as intended AND B) impacts other users negatively. Powerups don’t do both of those. Teleport/Descending/Bike Upgrading very arguably does.
There’s some angst here or there above about the subjectivity or vagueness of these terms. But hundreds and hundreds of years of law, including contemporary law, has managed to get by using terms that are subjective and at times vague. Court cases turn on ‘harassment’, ‘reasonable standards’, figuring out the intentions of other people, ‘negatively affecting’, etc. I’d argue it is impossible to craft rules about these issues without subjectivity and some amount of vagueness.
People just saying “it’s subjective!” are not mounting a successful objection, any more than a defendant in court would be successful in saying “Your honor, no one can prove I harassed that person, because harassment is subjective.” 
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Well, it does specifically call out weight doping.
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where does it say where you are/aren’t allowed to teleport to?
The intended use is to join someone you follow and follows you back who is free riding in zwift.
I don’t think teleporting to the top of the alpe is against its state use as laid out on zwift’s website.
As I said previously, i think it is against the spirit of the rule not actually against the rules.
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What does this sentence actually mean? “Beyond the evils of weight doping (i.e., pretending to be much lighter than you really are)”
Its evil? Thats not a rule. Its a bit of a jokey way of implying you should not do something.
It doesnt say, you must not, or do not which is clear direction.
One could argue that someone that is just sitting at the top of the Alpe for hours having others teleport to them is not “riding”.
To me it’s pretty clear if doing something is evil they don’t think it’s something that should be done. I don’t know how someone can read that sentence and think Zwift thinks weight doping is ok.
Come back to where this part of the discussion started.. Lee stated on the podcast only written rules should be followed - peoples interpretations or beliefs should not be. He then went on to say he thinks changing weight is a no go. This is highlighting that weight doping isn’t a specific rule and is open to interpretation and feelings like the other rules/guidelines/beliefs he was discussing.
Ultimately that is guidance on weight doping & is not a rule set that must be followed. I’d love for it to be a statement that held some weight (no pun intended), but it’s really not.
If I go and drop (or add which is seemingly becoming more popular)15-20kg to my weight zwift are doing nothing about it - organisers might, but zwift hq are not even batting an eye lid. I can race in zracing series as much as I wanted to.. it’s not a rule, it’s guidance at the end of the day. It’s on zwift to improve things.
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This isn’t how the history of gaming has worked. It’s his opinion, and that’s fine, but identifying and continuing to exploit a loophole in the game leads to enforcement (often uneven) from the platform. The TOS is deliberately vague to be able to be applied or not at their discretion because that’s how lawyers work.
Zwift doesn’t do other things that game producers do, so maybe we see a different response here.
Just reset the accounts that took advantage back to the initial upgrade, seeing as there is such a dilemma on whether rules were broken or not.
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