@wolfmanbush
This then brings us to popularity. They gotta pick people with some numbers for it to be worth their time. The pool is what viewers decide it is. People watch a bunch of stuff that is in no way good for the environment and people watch some pretty chill stuff. The people are essentially choosing who Rare gets to pick from.
If the people that Rare are forced to pick from (the ones with the numbers to make it worth their time) are performing actions in violation of Code of Conduct that would get regular players punished, I don't think ''they have to pick them'' is justification for those actions being done. Not that I'm saying you're saying that. This would essentially mean that Partners do not have to abide by the same rules that regular players do. We have seen many cases of that in the past of Partners doing or saying things that regular players cannot, so there definitely might be some truth to that.
The way for players to contribute is to build up channels that prioritize ethical play/streaming/conduct so that Rare has some more to choose from.
Viewers will watch what they deem entertaining as such those they find entertaining will rise. This often results in a particular playstyle being effective as a Streamer; that being that of very high end skill and experience. Especially in such a big and open game like SoT, this calls for a great understanding of the game in all facets and unfortunately that also includes Exploits. Not only because use of them can improve your own performance, but unfortunately due to how widespread they are, you will often have to face people using exploits, and not using them yourself will put you at a disadvantage. If you re consistently at a disadvantage you won't be winning as much as you could be, and Viewers are often attracted to the consistent winners. There are so many exploits that vary from just being a little time save, makes something a little more tolerable, or insanely overpowered. This wouldn't be an issue of Exploits got removed quicker as it would be a matter of a strong thing being found, it becomes meta for a week while it exists, then its removed and things go back to normal. But most of the exploits stay in game for months or even years, resulting in them finding a solid spot in the high end meta as a must use. This can be things such as ladder launching, map/rod launching, silent boarding, quickswapping, quickscoping, reload cancelling, x bucketing, any many more. An example I can think of of a very low impacting exploit is that when you break your legs you can pull out a Compass and look at it, you can now jump despite having a broken leg, while jumping you are also able to sprint. It mitigates the annoyance of having the broken leg and is something a lot of people use that know about it, because its not overpowered or anything its just a little Quality of Life. This has existed I'm pretty sure since launch and despite seeing frequent use it's never been on the table for removal.
The SoT News that released today stated that over 20,000 players over the course of a few days (using Rare's words as to how long it was up for) made use of the Burning Blade Exploit, and countless more profited by Stealing Exploited Swords without actually doing it themselves. 20,000 players is literally double the entire steam playerbase. Steamcharts shows the average daily players for last month was 10,183 players with the prior month being 11,823 players. Even if Steam is just a mere 10% of the total active playerbase (which is just a guess) that means roughly 20% of players across all platforms made use of that exploit over the course of a few days, literally 1/5 people. This is how widespread exploits in Sea of Thieves can get. Obviously this is a very specific case as its the most insane money exploit we have ever seen, but this shows the willingness of people, pirates rather; to break the rules for their own benefit.
But if Rare are talking about violating their Code of Conduct, that still technically falls under it. So for Rare to be all like how dare you break the CoC despite endorsing players that also do so (especially as Quickswap is a PvP exploit) it just reads incredibly inconsistent and pretty hypocritical. Again I know its anecdotal but I have fought Rare Crew in game that Quickswapped. That is a Rare developer abusing an exploit in order to gain an unfair advantage in order to beat another player, breaking their own Code of Conduct. Obviously one Employee doing it is not representative of the Company as a whole, I just personally found it telling just how widespread and commonly accepted it was.
They for sure would like to bring people on board that are putting good vibes out there and ethical play if the channel is in a situation where it makes sense as a business. There have been and are a lot of super cool hobby streamers with smaller channels that would do great as partners if they had the viewer support.
As you say; Entertainment is a Business. Content Creation as well as Game Development. All streamers come from nothing and just get lucky and you could say the wrong people got lucky. I think if its true that there were partnered Streamers showing off Burning Blade exploits and therefore encouraging their Viewers to do it (as you would imagine a Rare approved Streamer doing something would be okay for you to also do) then its a huge red flag in terms of how Rare monitor their Partners. Do they just not monitor their activity and make sure they continue to be the kind of person they want Championing their band as an Ambassador? One I know of is Phuzzy who has made videos on Season 12 Voyage Exploits including ones that got patched and ones that remain possible. The grey area on which of those voyage exploits are considered unfair and which are considered just smart use of the way the voyage system works is something nobody really understands. Rare have no simple yes or no list of what is or isn't acceptable behaviour. In terms of those voyage 'exploits' almost all of them did not abuse a glitch, they simply made use of an unintended way to manipulate how voyages cycle. For example the Cursed Chest exploit where if you had your ship parked at Port Merrick or Crescent isle, the first x would always be on Rapier Cay. This meant you could have a teammate sit on Rapier cay while the rest of the crew remained on the ship at Port Merrick they could spam start and cancel the voyage while Rapier Cay guy dug the first x every time. This was not a bug, there was not anything intended to prevent it happening, Rare just did not foresee it being able to be used like of. Of course Rare are perfectly within their right to alter the mechanic to not allow for it, but to say its wrong to do and perhaps even punish for it just seems incredibly in violation of their Tools not Rule policy.
