Hire Responsible GMs

[Rákez-hellscream]

this autmatic system /( anti cheat is not working.
i would like Real Game masters reason? we are paying for it.

[Saneko-ragnaros (Saneko)]

@Rákez-hellscream

this autmatic system /( anti cheat is not working.
i would like Real Game masters reason?

There’s a dedicated hacks team for that. Which means regular GM’s are not taking the work for monitoring cheats but another team is.

The botting problem is prevalant in all games/MMO’s, not just WoW. If there was a solution there would be one by now.

You may suggest any methods you may think of through the ingame feedback box but it is not likely that it will be groundbreaking new suggestion.

@Kaivax

We hear folks say things like “just ban the bots” a lot. We ban tens of thousands of bots a week. It’s not visible to you just how much we do, and that is absolutely another problem in itself; we need to be better at surfacing these actions (more on this later). The truth is we’ve never been better and more effective at identifying and actioning malicious accounts, and our Game Security Operations (GSO) team that handle these actions are iterating and innovating on a nearly daily basis.

Unfortunately, in the history of WoW, the people perpetrating this illicit trade have also never been better at coming up with new methods, schemes, farms, and exploits to work around our efforts. As much engineering and analytics effort as we put into this, illicit RMT “workshops” put the same amount in, or more, and there are hundreds, if not thousands of these workshops out there all working around the clock to develop new technologies and techniques to counter our new technologies and techniques. It’s an arms race, and it never, ever ends.

We will never completely beat “bots” or illicit RMT. It’s an unwinnable war as long as there is money to be made by third parties. The ubiquitous nature of this type of thing in online games is an objective fact. It has always been a part of WoW, and every other popular online game for the past 25 years, and it will always be a part of online games going forward. It’s frustrating to fight this fight, but we will not stop fighting it.

While we can’t completely “win” the war, what we can do is mitigate the impact it has on the game. Is WoW Token the be-all and end-all to solve this? No, but it is a tool. It’s just one tool, though, among many. There is clearly a demand for gold for certain types of players, and that demand is only increasing. So, we are engaging a tool that we’ve used before to help mitigate the impact that illicit RMT has on the game. The more tools we employ, and the less lucrative we can make it for third parties to do what they do to make a profit, the less likely it is that new malicious actors enter the illicit RMT scene, and the more likely that existing malicious actors will exit the business. Ultimately, it’s taking incremental steps and using a multitude of tools that will reduce how impactful those third parties will be in Wrath Classic and beyond.

Source.

@Rákez-hellscream

we are paying for it.

You are paying for a subscription which grants you conditional access to the game, the subscription is not only used to pay for “real” GM staff.

[Beastbane-eredar]

Why would they hire new GMs when they intentionally laid off most of their customer support a couple years ago? The work of GMs has been deemed unneccessary and too expensive (despite WoW being buy-to-play + subscription + micro-transactions). Blizzard prefers automated systems that are likely to make mistakes and prone to abuse.

[Asufnibol-lone-wolf]

Escape from Tarkov have a captcha mechanic built into their “auction house” which is still in beta, yet WOW over the course of 20 years cannot do anything about AH bots for example.
I don’t think we would have to provide suggestions for the peeps who’s job would be to come up with solutions for such use cases.

[Saneko-ragnaros (Saneko)]

@Asufnibol-lone-wolf

Escape from Tarkov have a captcha mechanic

And there exists captcha solving bots, so that does not really slow them down if any.

Occassionally though you’re prompted with a random old-style captcha at WoW anyway.

[Okára-pyrewood-village]

There is one super innovative and effective solution to the bot problem - real-time surveillance by a REAL human, not a soulless machine.

[Saneko-ragnaros (Saneko)]

@Mohorsh-lone-wolf

My guild master had been banned two weeks ago because he received gold on the guild bank (on his account) after a raid. Nothing in the terms of service say we don’t have the right to exchange gold after a raid on a guild bank alt. We never did any GDKP in out guild. And all we get is AI answer giving the same “This action had been taken for a violation of TOS”. This is a joke and I’m sure it is illegal.

If this is about GDKP in SOD, this has been announced in advance here:

GDKP in Season of Discovery

Starting with Phase 2 of Season of Discovery, we are going to experiment with a policy change: We will no longer support or allow GDKP or “gold bid” raids and dungeons in Season of Discovery. We’ve seen many questions about this policy change, so please read on for our answers and more information. What is GDKP and why is it being restricted in Season of Discovery? GDKP is a loot system some players use that essentially allows all loot to be purchased in a dungeon or raid using gold rather tha…

As it is Blizzard’s private property they may ban for any or no reason, in this case its a ban for violating the TOS. Receiving a templated answer does not make it an “AI answer” as long as the ban is upheld they simply don’t need to give a different reason.

An appeal is not to give your “proof” but just for a fresh GM to review the evidence Blizzard holds and see if an error has occured or not. They may continue to appeal until they will honor no further appeals.

You’re free to consult consumer organisations should you think your rights were violated.

@Mohorsh-lone-wolf

Let’s say you own a bakery , and when a customer come , you confiscate his pastry because of some reason after taking his money , and use the “it’s a private property , what are you gonna do ?”

The proper analogy is:

The customer is dining at a place but cannot behave and is asked to leave. Leaving behind the food have otherwise paid for and would’ve eaten if they didn’t violate the rules.

Its private property and they may ask anyone to leave for any or no reason. Just like the previous example, a reason was stated that the customer disagreed with.

[Sórel-argent-dawn]

I think everyone preferred when the game had GM’s. Not just for things like this, but interactions with them often made gamers days. Wow was definitely a more positive place back when you had GM’s ending conversations with a joke or giving their opinion on which power was stronger: void or fel etc

And there are just issues that its easier to deal with a GM about rather than go through an automated list system to leave a ticket to eventually get seen. Especially for those of us that travel a lot for work, and most of the time that menu wont even load…

[Rákez-hellscream]

I’m not a World of Warcraft game developer; I’m just a player. However, it’s puzzling to see how private servers can effectively manage bots and cheaters while the official pay-to-play servers struggle. It’s disheartening to witness 10-15 bots freely roaming on every layer, especially considering the efforts some players put into leveling up legitimately. Despite claims of actively combating cheaters, it’s frustrating to observe these bots operating for weeks before being banned, only to return with multiple backup accounts. With Blizzard’s inability to fully address this issue, it seems like botting will persist indefinitely. do to stupid deciecions such as 100% xp boosts. Come on now. We are paying for this.

[Fox-nekrosh]

Dude they cannot even hire enough developers, and you are asking for GMs
The only regulation that is realistically possible at this point is community-based one, but I still wouldn’t count on that

[Ogre-ashbringer]

Dont fool yourselves. They dont care classic botting. Thousands of rogues have been farming brd for 3 good years and they did nothing.

They just care your subs.

[Navajoo-crusader-strike]

Well, from my experience, interactions with GMs for Classic Era / SoD is just automated bots or Copy&Paste replies to most issues.

Having worked in Customer Support teams for other industries in my early years, my conclusion is this is a result from the management approach. This includes many factors:

1. What are the KPIs for CS Agents? How is their work measured?
   Probably would be Number of Tickets answered + Average Response Time. Meaning the outcome of the ticket or customer satisfaction are not a major indicator at all.
2. What is the approach of certain cases or the guidelines on handling different topics?
   That is to not conduct any form of investigation. Simply Ctrl+C Cntrl+v.

All that matters is to clear the ticket queue as fast as possible. Resolution or Satisfaction are not their priority at all, which is understandable, considering that Classic Realms in their entirety are low priority compared to retail.

Not the outcome we desire as a community. But sadly is a reality of the corporate world we currently live in, and also the changes in Blizzard over the years have led us where we are today.

[Bralelol-firemaw]

No, thats not the proper analogy, because in restaurant you pay for your food at the end of dining/before you leave the restaurant. So by that logic we should be paying 13$ to Blizzard last day of our subscription and if we didnt like the service we wouldnt pay or if they kicked us out we also wouldnt pay for it. Youre not the smartest guy out there are you?

[Saneko-ragnaros (Saneko)]

@Bralelol-firemaw

because in restaurant you pay for your food at the end of dining/before you leave the restaurant.

Not always, some restaurants ask you to pay up front. You may choose not to and leave then and there though.

For gaming services you always pay up front regardless.

[Bralelol-firemaw]

Im not talking about McDonalds, im talking about actual restaurants. Not sure if you ever ate at one but in 99,9% of them they dont charge you until youre done with your food. Your analogy was completely missed.

[Saneko-ragnaros (Saneko)]

Unfortunately that is not relevant: The point is that you do not get to finish your experience after breaking the in-house rules and can be asked to leave at someone’s private property. No refund will be given for penalties.

Since you’re derailing the thread no further responses will be given.

[Bralelol-firemaw]

In case of your analogy no refund is even needed because i didnt pay for anything yet. Youre trying to derail from the completely missed analogy. Get lost