If you think about it, ghost cams take a lot of time and effort to set-up. You are setting up say 10 accounts at 10 different spots, with 10 screens that either have to be monitored full-time, or set-up to send back scripted reports of activity when it is seen, which players need to receive and then enact.
Not really, when it is done by X Raiders splitting the locations 2 or 3 each which is quite feasible on 1 Computer and 1 Monitor (multiple clients of course), 4 or 5 people could get to control 10 to 15 locations quite easily.... it only takes a few minutes to set in place 2 or 3 characters...
Furthermore, the script only takes effort once, when they write it, and then they can just pass it along them... and they do not even need to check those client windows, if their script is set up to work in the background and send an audible alert...
They just go to their regular playing and only take action when the script alerts them, pass the info to the others and then decide where to gather to Raid the location.
No time wasted other then a few minutes to place in location the EJ Hidden Cams and fire up their script.
When is this worth doing? It's only worth doing, if Powerscrolls are really really worth something, if the competition is really intense. This is not the case currently. For the last month, Deceit has taken over everything, very few people can be bothered with the time or effort to complete, or raid champion spawns.
There is people, you might be surprised to hear that, who might not do it for any profit at all, they do not care about the scrolls, they likely already have more then they can use or sell, stockpiled in their Powerscroll Books..... they Raid, simply to disrupt fellow players' gameplay... for them, I understand, their "win" is not to steal a Champ and get the Powerscrolls, but, rather, to stop other players from being able to get them....
Also, because in this way, if others are blocked to earn their own scrolls, the hundreds or perhaps even thousands of Powerscrolls that they have stockpiled in their Powerscrolls Books (each of these Books can hold 300 and some of these players have several of these books all filled up...), can be sold for more... they can SET the price of powerscrolls to whatever they may want, if they have a Monopoly on them....
When can it be done? When 1 guild completely dominates Felucca. This is quite a rare scenario, and does not ever happen for that long period of time. You can only do it if you completely dominate, and all those players within that guild are subscribed to the idea that their method of play is to dominate champion spawns in this manner. It just doesn't happen anymore.
Several of these Veteran players who still play Ultima Online, are long past their wealth accumulation or Template development and high-end gear stockpiling, they either lost interest in playing UO any longer having reached all highs that they could reach, or, in some cases, might have stayed no longer for those motifs, but just to block others in their ability to get Powerscrolls or other stuff obtainable only within the Felucca ruleset areas.
And it is not even about the PvP challenge, at least to my opinion, since they have their characters all geared up, a lot more then those players attempting to get the scrolls who, clearly, if they do that, are still developing their Template, need them for their pets, are basically much less "a match" as those Raiding....
My personal opinion, is that, at this point in life of Ultima Online, quite a few of these Raiders are not motivated by taking a Champ away for Powerscrolls, nor for a PvP Challenge but, rather, just to prevent other players from being able to get powerscrolls on their own.
And therefore, these players are stopped or much slowed in their ability to advance in the game.
Some stick trying, whether trying to do it on unpopulated Shards or at times when hardly anyone is logged online, but some other players, unfortunately, just decide that the effort is not worth their entertainment time and move to other games, eventually, depriving Ultima Online of their subscription's revenues.
I've said it so many times, Felucca is self-balancing, self-regulating, player justice does happen. If 1 guild gets too big, others adjust or ally to compensate to bring that guild down. Largescale Feluccan Raiding guilds usually don't last that long, as Ego's, real life, arguments, bickering get in the way. If a PvP guild gets too big, none of the PvPers in that guild are getting enough PvP, so they self-regulate by leaving, and setting up smaller guilds, so they get almost equal amounts of PvP.
I am sorry, but I have zero faifth in players self-regulating.... and this is not just about Ultima Online, but in any games... hell, if our real societies were to be self-regulating and not having Laws and written rules with sanctions and punishments thought up for breaching them, we would be living in chaos and anarchy all the time, to my opinion....
It simply is something which I do not think it can work, period.
Think about the organiser behind running Ghost Cams. Does that player really want to spend his life doing this? The answer is no, this is not a sustainable way of living for anyone really.
As I said, it is not necessary to have 1 players checking out 10-15 scripts, but more easily, to have 5 or 6 players, all Raiders, each being able to set up 2 or 3 extra Clients running the same alerting script besides the one that they normally use to play.
And voila', those 5 or 6 players could then easily monitor 15+ locations in just a few minutes...
I'm not saying it hasn't happened, it has happened in the past, but it never really lasts that long, as the above conditions I mentioned for it to happen, occur very infrequently, that someone thinks it's worth all that effort. These days, if it does happen, it's very sporadic, they only usually check main routes which everyone should know about anyway, and all active Feluccan guilds know about where they are anyway. Again, it's all part of being part of the community, or a guild, and you will have the knowledge to play your way around it, it becomes part of the strategic cut and thrust that makes Felucca what it is.
I think that it is still happening, less then in the past past simply because there is less players in Ultima Online and even less going into Felucca.
Notheless, though, I think that it should still be an issue that merits to be addressed and fixed because I do not see why, subscribed, paying customers attempting to get a few Powerscrolls to advance their character or scroll up their pet, should be disrupted in their gameplay by Raiders using a bunch of free EJ Hidden characters not bringing any revenue to Ultima Online.
As to your main point - Gold Spammers, I agree in the main here. My actual suggestion would be, limit EJ accounts to the Help Chat channel for new players, or the Trade channel? Don't allow them into the main general chat channel? That way, an EJ account can get help when needed, or those accounts can spam Trade freely if they want to.
I am still convinced that the "main" way to address this issue, and solve a TON of other issues in Ultima Online along with it, would be to finally have a Script detector for in-game activities built in the UO Client.
Whenever a player was to be using a script, whether a Gold spammer, a Ghost Cam or Hidden EJ Cam, or a resource gatherer or a spawn farmer, the Script detector would alert a Game Master who'd take a closer look at the allegged perpetrator and take consequential actions when needed, towards the account.
