This morning, Ubisoft made the decision to ban player made XP farming quests in Assassins Creed Odyssey. They did this after noticing a string of player made quests specifically designed to gain the most XP for minimal effort. This ban comes a month after the E3 update for Assassins Creed Odyssey called Story Creator Mode. This mode allows players to create custom made quests and share them with other people, similar to Skyrim mod quests. The difference here is that the custom made quests in Assassins Creed Odyssey were able to grant you experience points upon completion.
The AC community team stated that the reason they were banning these type of quests was because, “These exploits risk jeopardizing the overall quality, integrity, and purpose of Story Creator Mode and results in less visibility for the creative, interesting and frankly fantastic community stories that have been published.” However, some have noted that their could be other Ubisoft decided to ban these types of quests besides ruining the game experience. One reason for this could be the fact that these free quests could compete with the microtransaction XP enhancers that are purchasable as microtransactions. According to an article written last October on IGN, the addition of microtransactions in the game has many fans of the series divided over whether Ubisoft is purposefully making the game difficult in order to increase XP enhancer sales.
While the ban might disappoint some fans, Ubisoft has stated that they will implement several changes such as hiding XP farming quests from Story Creator Mode, as well as removing them from the hall of fame. They have also stated that they intend to reward players who use Story Creator Mode based on the creativity and difficulty of their quests. This policy could promote the creation of more unique and diverse quests that enhance the game experience rather than dilute it as Ubisoft claimed the XP farming quests did. Not only that, but with the new DLC Judgement of Atlantis coming July 16th, the Story Creator Mode could have include far more locations for quests than in the base game. While the ban will make it more difficult to speed through the game, it will force players to explore the areas and grant them an experience they would not have otherwise.