Bureau of Acceptable ViewsA lightweight camera addon for The Elder Scrolls Online. It gives you back control over the third-person camera in situations where the game normally takes it away, and layers a few optional cinematic touches on top. Dynamic FOV is on out of the box for an eased zoom feel; everything else stays out of your way until you turn it on.Compatibility: API: LIVE 101050 / PTS 101050 Optional: LibAddonMenu-2.0 (>= 43) for the settings panel.────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────What it doesThe core feature is free zoom in restricted states. ESO locks the camera to a fixed distance (or forces first person) in certain situations. This addon lets you zoom freely between maximum zoom and first person in those states, with optional persistence so your framing survives zone changes and relogs.On top of that, two optional systems can shape the camera further. Dynamic FOV is enabled by default (it does nothing on clients where the FOV property is unsupported); context presets stay disabled until you switch them on.────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────FeaturesFree zoom in restricted statesZoom anywhere between max zoom and first person while the game would normally lock the camera.Configurable persistence: keep your zoom across zone changes and logins, or let it reset your choice.Controller input safely falls back to the game’s default camera handling, so nothing breaks if you play on a gamepad.Dynamic FOV (optional, on by default)Ties your third-person field of view to the current zoom distance: tighter when zoomed in, wider when zoomed out, smoothly interpolated in between.Only recalculates when the zoom distance actually changes there is no per-frame work so the framing stays consistent without ever touching a hot path.When disabled, your manual FOV is left exactly as the game set it.Context presets (optional, off by default)Applies a fixed cinematic camera bundle for the state you are in combat, werewolf, stealth, mounted, or sprinting and restores your own framing the moment you leave it.Exactly one state is active at a time, resolved by priority (werewolf → combat → stealth → mounted → sprint), so states never fight each other.A single global intensity slider scales every bundle, and each state has its own enable toggle.Your pre-preset camera is snapshotted the first time a preset takes over and persisted, so a /reloadui, logout, or crash while a preset is active hands your real camera back next session instead of baking the preset’s offsets into your settings.An emergency restore button in the settings panel instantly returns the camera to your control if anything ever feels stuck.Self-check diagnosticsA passive reliability layer that validates the addon’s own invariants and watches the footprint of BAV-owned tables for runaway growth, so a silent regression surfaces as a one-line warning instead of a mystery bug report.Costs nothing during play: it never runs per frame and never polls. Checks fire only at naturally-quiet moments (load, zone change) or on demand via /bav selfcheck, and the automatic pass stays completely silent unless something is actually wrong.Skips itself entirely while you are in combat, so a check never lands on a busy moment.────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────Why it’s built wellNo surprises. Context presets stay off until you enable them, and any disabled module is fully inert it registers no events, runs no polling, and never writes to the camera. Dynamic FOV ships on, but a single toggle returns the camera to exactly what the game set.One source of truth for engine I/O. All camera reads and writes go through a single CameraSettings layer that handles the engine’s value formatting and verifies every write by reading it back. A future client change needs fixing in exactly one place.No FOV tug-of-war. A dedicated FovArbiter makes field-of-view precedence explicit, so dynamic FOV and context presets can never overwrite each other depending on load order or timing.Nothing on the per-frame path. Work happens only in response to real events a zoom change, a state transition never every frame.Recovers gracefully. The pre-preset camera snapshot is persisted, so an interrupted session never leaves cinematic offsets baked into your settings.Catches its own regressions. A pull-based self-check validates internal invariants and watches the footprint of its own tables at quiet moments, turning silent bugs into a single readable warning without adding any per-frame cost.Localized with English and Russian strings, and a clean LibAddonMenu settings panel.────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────Architecture at a glanceThe addon is split into layers with one-way dependencies: upper layers know about lower ones, never the reverse. Two rules anchor the whole design only CameraSettings talks to the engine, and only FovArbiter decides who owns the field of view. Everything else is a consumer of those two contracts. Settings.lua UI + SavedVariables wires everything │ Configure(…) ┌─────────────┼────────────────┐ ▼ ▼ ▼DynamicFov ContextPresets Free-zoom core (BureauOfAcceptableViews.lua) │ │ ▲ │ │ ╎ GetDiagnostics() read-only ┌──────────────┐ │ │ └╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌╌┤ SelfCheck │ └──────┬──────┘ └──────────────┘ ▼ passive observer writes nothing FovArbiter single owner of FOV precedence │ ▼ CameraSettings the only verified engine I/O │ ▼ GetSetting / SetSetting raw engine APISelfCheck deliberately sits beside the I/O hierarchy: it is a read-only observer that never writes to the camera or settings. It lazily polls the other modules’ diagnostics accessors and counts the entries in BAV-owned tables, so it depends on no one and its absence changes nothing.────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────Module overviewModule Responsibility—————————– ————————————————–BureauOfAcceptableViews.lua Core: free-zoom logic, event wiring, saved-variable lifecycle, slash commands.CameraSettings.lua The single, verified access layer for every engine camera setting.DynamicFov.lua Optional zoom-dependent field of view.FovArbiter.lua Single owner of third-person FOV precedence.ContextPresets.lua State-driven cinematic bundles with snapshot/restore and persistence.SelfCheck.lua Passive, pull-based invariant and heap diagnostics; warn-only by default.Settings.lua SavedVariables, defaults, and the LibAddonMenu panel.────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────How it worksA few small maps of the moving parts. None of this is required reading to use the addon it is here for the curious and for anyone reading the source.State priority only one preset winsContext presets never fight each other. At most one state is active at a time, resolved top-down by priority and gated by each state’s enable toggle: the first state that is both physically active and enabled wins. physical state(s) active ──▶ resolve by priority ──▶ one winner ┌───────────────────┐ highest │ werewolf ───────▶│ first active & │ │ combat ───────▶│ enabled state │──▶ apply bundle │ stealth ───────▶│ wins; the rest │ │ mounted ───────▶│ are ignored │ lowest │ sprint ───────▶│ │──▶ none? → restore └───────────────────┘ your framingWerewolf deliberately outranks combat a transformation should win even mid-fight.Dynamic FOV zoom drives the lensWhen enabled, your field of view tracks the zoom distance: tight when zoomed in, wide when zoomed out, linearly interpolated between. It recalculates only when the distance actually changes never per frame and yields to a preset hold. zoom in ◀─────────────── distance ───────────────▶ zoom out │ │ ▼ ▼ narrow FOV ◀───── linear interpolation (near ↔ far) ─────▶ wide FOV │ │ └──────────────▶ request to FovArbiter ◀────────────────────┘ (applied only if no preset hold owns FOV)────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────Snapshot & restore surviving a crashThe first time a preset takes over, your real camera is snapshotted and persisted to SavedVariables. So even a /reloadui, logout, or crash mid-preset hands your genuine framing back next session never the preset’s offsets. preset takes over session ends abruptly next login ┌──────────────┐ ┌──────────────────┐ ┌──────────────┐ │ snapshot live│ │ /reloadui crash│ │ recover from │ │ camera ─────┼──persist──▶│ logout while a │──saved──▶│ persisted │ │ to SavedVars │ │ preset is active │ │ snapshot, │ └──────────────┘ └──────────────────┘ │ then clear it│ │ └──────────────┘ └─ back to default in-session ──▶ restore + clear ─────────┘This breaks the drift cycle where a dirty (offset) camera would otherwise be saved as the new baseline.Self-check quiet until something’s wrongA pull-based reliability pass: it runs at load and zone change (or on demand via /bav selfcheck), validates internal invariants, samples the footprint of BAV-owned tables, and stays completely silent unless something is actually broken. It skips itself in combat and never touches the camera. trigger (PULL only) checks (read-only) output ┌────────────────────┐ ┌────────────────────┐ │ load / zone change │ │ orphaned FOV hold │ healthy │ → in combat? skip │───────▶│ snapshot coherence │──────▶ silence │ /bav selfcheck │ │ sprint-poll leak │ │ → verbose report │ │ slot leak │ problem └────────────────────┘ │ footprint growth │──────▶ one-line └────────────────────┘ warningVerbose mode (/bav selfcheck) additionally prints footprint figures and an explicit “all invariants OK”.────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────A note on AI assistanceDuring the development of this addon, the AI assistant Claude Opus 4.8 was utilized in a strictly technical capacity. Its role was limited to debugging, Lua optimization, performance tuning, and preventing potential memory leaks or unsafe code practices. All AI-assisted code has been manually reviewed, tested, and verified by the developer.P.S. If the mere mention of AI makes you panic, this addon might not be for you. Otherwise, rest assured: stability and performance are polished to the highest standard, ensuring zero noticeable impact on your FPS or game memory.
