The model change might actually affect the gameplay in much more serious ways than you might realize. This could be:
“flag size” in Capture the flag BG’s, visibility of crucial things so you can see them from afar.
Change your char model, so that no-one would suspect you to be a player.
Bugs in these programs may occur, which can heavily affect targeting and faction systems.
This is just a handful of things. I for one think, If one ONLY got a 6 months ban they’re lucky! Blizzard are fully within their right to give you a permaban. Also I think it’s very unfortunate that blizzard has chosen to reverse some of these bans(if that is true), since the people banned clearly know what they’re doing. This is not a super simple “enable this to fly, or wallclimb will 100% safe and allowed, will not get you banned” who any kid can get tricked into using, these programs take extensive research on models, modding etc.
The bans were probably more a problem with Warden than anything else, because let’s be real here: Nude mods and mods to change the appearance of your character and armor have been around forever, and they were never really a problem. They only changed your own character, no other player saw it, and you got no advantage at all (outside of your own enjoyment obviously). So, Blizzard looked the other way and it was fine. Even something like Tmorph was used by several streamers and nothing happened.
But, the problem boils down to the fact that the launcher used to install these mods could also be used for cheating and other unfair advantages over other players. Warden simply cannot differentiate between you using a lewd-mod and an actual hacker, so most bans were probably automated.
The thing is that you indeed broke the TOS. So Blizzard has the right to ban you. It still doesn’t really feel right, because it was never really a problem up until now. I mean really if I go to reddit it feels like every third player there used some kind of mod like this. Not even a lewd one but only something pretty small like a slight change to one of the bikini-breastplates who were already pretty revealing.
Oh god, I hope not.
That would be spitting in the face of players who stay within the given rules, relying on a fair and common ground/platform for everyone.
No, when you modify the files, only you can see them, not other people. So you could get some advantages for yourself sure, but you’ll not look different for other people.
It’s quite likely that they did indeed do a general sweep with their scanning system and auto-banned all accounts found to have “illegal” files in their WoW folders. Then afterwards when they realised how many they hit, they likely looked into what each specific launcher actually launched and which files were found.
Given their previous stance on mods that don’t affect the gameplay of others or grants the player an unfair advantage, then it only makes sense for them to overturn the bans for those using said programs.
He actually got his account back tonight, with an apology from Blizzard in an e-mail. So I guess it was an automated blanket ban, and they have now investigated it, and found no hacking involved.
Blizzard needs to provide an offline version of wow, in which players are free to mod the hell out of the same way as skyrim.
This would severly make the game amazing, give a lot of people fun and will probably attract a huge playerbase.
With this you could play with any Expansion class design or mix match of them, any model in game, or any player made models like the San’layn fan video.
This would provide many cool things like animation, leveling rebalance, item rebalance, gameplay rebalance and adventure rebalance.
Mods like Survival, frostfall immersive citizens from skyrim in offline single player wow would be amazing.
I wouldn’t even mind paying a sub for it!
Mods like the one your friend used show just how much the community are capable and willing, just limited, so why not give the tinkering community what they love.
Games like Warcraft 3 and skyrim in which players were free to add and edit however they liked spawned many great things I’m sure wow offline would do so to if not even surpass them.
I’m sorry, but I cannot stop laughing at the guy. So he thinks people abusing an xp potion is okay because its an exploit inside the game. And something blizzard has created themselves, then it is suddenly not black or white. Even tho’ anyone that has been in third grade, can easily figure out this is not intended. But then it suddenly becomes black or white, because someone has with intent changed the game files. Completely ignoring the intent behind the change. He can have his own opinion on it ofc, and I’ll give you mine. Changing your game files for model texture, is a smaller offence, compared to on purpose exploiting the xp boost pots. Because the intent behind both, is the determining factor, no matter what the ToS says.
Yes, whether you like it or not, we made up a large percent of the active subscription base. We also never cheated or botted. Also, It’s not really “spitting in the face of players who stay within the given rules.” The texture edits were client-side only, so no one but the person on their own computer would see it, therefore it was harmless and didn’t effect anyone.
The program used to activate them was against the rules, yes, but I haven’t seen any proof of people using mods to make mining nodes bigger since there’s already an issue of mining bots who automatically go to each node regardless of their size, and that bot isn’t related to the custom launcher used for the model edits in this situation. The bigger PvP flags issue? I’ve never seen it personally, but I can imagine it to be an issue. Either way, I think I can speak for the tens of thousands of others here when I say that we weren’t harming the game, we’re just as loyal to this game as you/normal players.
Also, I won’t be using it again anyway, it’s not worth the risk, as we’ve seen after today’s events.
That is not completely correct, that bullet only applies to other people using the same programs. Which as I understand it, is actually a bug and not intended anyway. I know this shouldn’t be possible, but I’ve seen it reported on hacking forums anyway. So it can happen, but only to other people using the same software somehow. I don’t use these things myself, so I can’t tell you how it works. I’m only snooping around on forums reading and observing.
It might be Client sided, but it can still be used to edit things to give you visual advantage. Which would give you an edge over other players, who don’t use it, which is in no way harmless. The fact that you’ve not seen it or done it, doesn’t change that it can be done. Let’s be honest, you can’t speak for anyone but yourself. Good to hear you learned your lesson, but I still think you should’ve had at leat 6 months or perma as you clearly violated the ToS.
-Don’t get me wrong, i’m not saint. But I also don’t run away from my responsability/choices. I’ve both had 6-monts ban, perma-ban and I think suspended for an amount of days before. I probably deserved it and I paid the price, so I soulsearched for a while, forced to correct my pattern of thoughts due to the crushing loss of a very, very, precious account. Later I bought a new account with a deeply changed way of thinking, now I only find myself wanting to cheat if I don’t enjoy the game. If I actually enjoy a game, there should be no need to alter the experience(I think addons and multiboxing are fine though). If you find something you don’t like about a game, that you otherwise enjoy, GO TO THE FORUMS AND VOICE YOURSELF! With that being said, I don’t mind cheating in sandbox/singleplayer games. When you don’t have any chance to harm other players experience, you do you ^^
Sarcasm detected
I couldn’t care less, sadly it doesn’t seem like blizzard sees it the same way. These “influencers” needs to be disciplined even harder, if they don’t follow the rules. They have way bigger impact on the community than the ordinary player, so they shouldn’t get let off easy for breaking the rules.
Blizzard, I hope you read this, you should’ve stuck with your first decision.
As I said. By reversing this you spat the REST of the playerbase in the face, those who DIDN’T cheat, the players who spend MANY LONG HARD hours. And I hope you will reverse, the reverse! I’ve already seen post about it on various forums, people who feel like the worked they’ve done trough the years are now worthless. Simply because the cheaters keep their accounts gains for no effort at all, while others “wasted” hours upon countless of hours. As well as people trying to post “get your account back guides”. The cheaters are smart people, they’ll push the boundaries regardless! I’ve seen it after several ban-waves, It’s part of the thrill, them KEEPING their accounts is a WIN in it self! You are putting fuel on the fire by reversing the first decision, where if ban them you give them 1 of 2 choices.
I’m personally tempted as well to say, “Let the cheaters play with them selves, I’ll find a new game.”. Problem is, no games are quite like wow. So… Now what do I do Blizzard, with wow already being a somewhat empty shell of what it used to be now allowing hackers and cheaters openly. Along-side with high profiles account-trading, goldselling, Boosting etc. Do I Quit the Blizzard games all together and end this near-addiction, after playing your games since Diablo 1? Or is there an alternative?
-It seems to be a scary amount of “important” people cheating, since it’s reversed. Why not let honest people take their place instead, that would bring in a new “elite of influencers”.
Self-evident answer. Cause its not their house house, they just claim it to be theirs. Take this very issue as a template. Having issues with texture packs is borderline to having issues with the brightness/contrast settings of your monitor cause they literally change nothing about the game.
Neither server nor client side.
Your average mod for wow changes more about the way your client works.
![:smile:](https://d1bg94bbsh66ji.cloudfront.net/en/wow/images/emoji/twitter/smile.png?v=6" ":smile:")
