I do report report them, especially the “clever” bots. You don’t know how much I do that.
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Initially, I was excited about putting in the hard work to earn a Halo bike with my own blood, sweat, and tears. However, now I have changed my mind. I, along with many others, will question whether a rider with a Halo bike is genuine or a cheat. I don’t want to be connected to that in any way.
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I agree with you
People who are not big distance riders are already using them, even high level racing competitors.
The level 5 upgraded tron you cannot see who had that, it unfortunately is normal coloured.
Perhaps it should be pink.
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I saw a Chinese rider the other day with 300km on the clock already doing 4-5W/kg cruising around Watopia on their halo bike. No doubt upgrading it to the max level before selling the account off.
This is a quote from the Zwift Insider article when Halo bikes were released:
“This week’s big Zwift update adds a new, highly prestigious type of bike to Zwift: the Halo Bike!”
Zwift, through their indifference, has devalued Halo bikes. There’s no prestige in riding a Halo bike because just about everyone riding one now has used an exploit to get the bike without doing any of the work.
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One of the riders using the loopholes quite a lot was also doing similar dubious stuff (Zpower, suspiciously high w/kg) during the rush for for people to be the first to Level 100, I think that was back in the end of 2023.
Tron also was similar with everyone doing all sorts of tricks to get the required elevation (50,000m) to unlock it. Bots flying up ADZ lap after lap, weight-doping, etc. How many of those Trons zooming around were from actual getting the elevation in sim mode with gradients and gear shifts or through other means?
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Zackly so, @GregRajkovic ! Here’s the thing: The 5 stages of upgrades on 3 bikes and then the upgrades on the Halo bike don’t make that much difference in in game performance. Yeah, they’re a little faster but doing a structured training program for the same amount of time you put into getting the top level will yield greater results. The reason for getting the Halo bikes is purely bragging rights. If someone is gonna cheat to get it, that’s on them. If you know they cheated then they’re losing your respect not the other way around. Like Eric Min said: “If you don’t earn, then what’s the point?”
We’re riding virtual bikes in a virtual world against live people who may or may not be riding like they do IRL. All that matters is doing your best. Well, that and getting ZRS straightened out…
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It’s amazing you bring up this point, and the one about how it translates in real life.
I would like to “humble brag” a couple of things. I moved to the West Coast out of the Midwest in 2013 to Southern California. I bought my first bike there in 2014 from Performance Bicycle which wasn’t a department store bike. From 2003-2004 I lost almost half of my weight being an only child seeing my dad dying in front of me from being a heavy smoker. He died in 2005. I used a stationary bicycle and ate much better than I was doing. I hated the stationary bike, but I liked being 180 pounds instead of 313. Since 2014, I am down to 156 pounds (71kg), and since 2016 having lived in the Seattle area and using bicycles as my primary form of transportation, I loved commuting to/from work. When I started working remotely in 2020, Zwift replaced those 100-120km daily outdoor rides with something I could keep up similar training inside. I started riding with Team Vegan mostly in 2020 (even though I was paying for Zwift and not using it largely since January 2016) at a B pace, based off of my hill climbing power levels. I have since Zwifted a TON since then, and as a result, the outdoor rides feel much easier. I ride about 1.3-1.6 in the flats (safety first), but significantly more than that in the climbs, which are plentiful where I live.
Zwift helped me tremendously when I got hit on my bicycle on 25 July 2023 and broke my leg during a grocery errand. I pedaled on one leg with my KICKR BIKE for over a month while on crutches. I recovered over 6 months ahead “spinning” on the bike versus my orthopedic surgeon’s expectations.
My “humble brag” is the extent of my riding last week with my “rest day” being Thursday, when I badge hunted Ven-10 Run and Rapide Run to 22km, also ran about 6k outside. Zwift got me into running in 2021 when I met friends on Zwift who cycled and also ran, I bought a treadmill and then started running outside. I then started swimming at my pool at my local 24 Hour Fitness in 2022.
Zwift changed me from being “just a cyclist” to “just a triathlete”. I have dual-sided power meters on all 8 of my active bicycles and I Zwift a ton every day.
I have nothing to prove to others aside from I’m fit as (insert word here that Ethan would email you for) because of my accessibility to Zwift.
I’m just a little guy. I lose most Zwift races with a sprint finish. But not climb finishes. I’m used to going up. Very used to going up.
Here’s a photo of last week in summary plus a photo of some of the typical terrain on the ride I did yesterday which was 179km (111mi) round trip to and from home, with just over two Alpes worth of elevation gain, that earned me 895XP on Zwift.
The only thing the bike upgrader cheaters are cheating are themselves. I love correlating my inside and outside data!
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Point is to be faster… to get an advantage. What is the point of spending $100K on Diablo IV and having the best gears? Elon Musk is one of the top ranked Diablo 4 players. What’s the point?
Gratification of winning is the point. Zwift don’t like it, turn all races into bike neutral races. Simple solution.
What I don’t get is why people are upset at how other levels up. Rider smarter not harder.
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Because it is wrong.
Zwift may as well just have stuck the new upgrades in everyones account at level 5 for every bike and been done with it. Or just not done this whole upgrade nonsense at all.
Riding smarter is not using some ant+ bot to do your vertical elevation, setting your “uphill weight” to 30kg, nor setting up a burner account to go to the top of Ventop and then teleporting your own avatar to the top and setting your weight to 300kg on the way down then rinse and repeat.
Those tricks don’t help you to be faster on a real bike. And they certainly don’t help you get properly faster in Zwift.
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What about if Zwift made teleporting only available to a rider that is moving / putting out some sort of watts. That would stop most of this dropping stuff as I am assuming there is a stationary rider at the top being used.
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These are the real stories. Ride on Greg!
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I think that and the rider being teleported to having to accept the teleport otherwise they will just teleport to any rider on the hill and do a u turn and descend
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But to teleport it must be someone you follow and follows you back.
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true, but there are people who follow thousands of people and probably don’t have a clue who 90% of them are If they follow a lot of people around the alpe and venn top then they’ll likely be at least some of them riding it most of the time and I’d guess a lot fo people follow people back without much thought.
True. So is the solution both? Teleport option should only shows riders who are moving / putting out some minimal level of watts, plus teleport requires acceptance. The latter might be a good feature more generally as sometimes people are doing workouts and might not want to have some one pop and distract them!
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yeah, i’m sure people will still find some way around it but at this point anything is surely better than nothing?
I’d also like to be able to accept (or not!) coffee stops just because I am very distracted by the large coffee stop symbol and someone just hovering along next to me without pedalling.
that would be very annoying, forces an interaction to say yes or no when you are in the middle of a ride
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lots of things force an interaction in game, using a power up, giving a ride on, steering off a route, etc
currently there is no way to stop someone teleporting to you that you follow and follows you, seems like there should be without having to just follow no one.
I watched what was probably a husband and wife teleport on AdZ, she was stopped about 500 meters from the summit with 10k, he popped in with over 170k