wow Recent Actions Against Win-Trading

[Stan 5,240]

Win-trading in Rated Battlegrounds is a violation of WoW's ToS and Blizzard has recently suspended accounts involved in such activity. Mostly seller agency accounts are affected.

A small amount of accounts that haven't engaged in any win-trading at all were also suspended by mistake, only to be unbanned later. The full announcements can be found below.

Blizzard (Source)

We’ve recently taken action against a number of accounts involved in win-trading in Rated Battlegrounds. This is a clear violation of the World of Warcraft Terms of Service, as well as the spirit of competitive play.

When we took these actions, we believed that the accounts being affected were used primarily by seller agencies, who exchange in-game wins for real-world currency, and not for normal gameplay, and so they were issued permanent closures. Once those actions were completed, we started hearing from players whose accounts had been affected but were not affiliated with a seller agency.

We then began an immediate re-investigation of all accounts. That investigation concluded that there were indeed some players caught in this action who should not have been hit with a permanent account closure. Those that were not involved with seller agencies but still found to be purposefully involved in win-trading have had their closures reduced to a suspension, with a duration fitting the severity the win-trading they participated in, and beginning on May 1st (the date we applied the initial closures). For some extremely minor offenses, that duration was short enough that it has already been lifted. Affected players should have received an email that indicates the corrected action.

We also discovered a small number of players whose accounts had been closed but had not engaged in any win-trading at all. We are deeply sorry to have punished those players incorrectly, and in addition to overturning their account closures, we have issued them with 30 days of additional game time as an apology.

We’d like to make it clear that we have fully identified the error that caused this issue to occur, and can be confident in saying that future actions do not make the same mistake. That said, we’d also like to remind players that win-trading in order to earn things like Honor, Artifact Power, or Achievements is still win-trading, and is subject to the same punishments as win-trading in order to gain rating.

Again, we apologize for the inaccuracies of our original actions. While we remain committed to upholding the integrity of rated play, we will take more care to ensure that the correct actions are taken in the future.

[Yridaa 490]

I'd like to clarify to people that win-trading for normal gameplay currency is not against the ToS. As long as it is gold or mounts or anything else obtainable in-game, it is allowed. It still goes against the spirit of competitive play, but this is not a violation.

 

To emphasize, my example falls under the same category as paying gold for getting boosted in Raids or high M+ Dungeons. Blizzard rather has people do the content themselves and together, but will not take action if you take an easy way, as long as there's no real-world currency involved.

[Valks 2,375]

On 5/6/2017 at 3:58 PM, Yridaa said:

I'd like to clarify to people that win-trading for normal gameplay currency is not against the ToS. As long as it is gold or mounts or anything else obtainable in-game, it is allowed. It still goes against the spirit of competitive play, but this is not a violation.

Win trading definitely is against the rules. Boosting for gold is not. You can run a 10-man RBG group and carry people for gold, that's fine. Win trading is against the ToS no matter what it is in exchange for.

[Yridaa 490]

2 hours ago, Blainie said:

Win trading definitely is against the rules. Boosting for gold is not. You can run a 10-man RBG group and carry people for gold, that's fine. Win trading is against the ToS no matter what it is in exchange for.

I will have to take your word for it, as it is not explicitly stated in the ToS. The closest I could find was:

 

The following rules are not meant to be exhaustive, and Blizzard Entertainment reserves the right to determine which conduct it considers to be outside the spirit of the game and to take disciplinary measures in accordance with Article VII of the Terms of Use. 

 

There are, however, a lot of explicitly mentioned violations that are either vague or not upheld, such as using sentences as names "Ilikecake" or communication with players of the opposing factions (Hello btag friends/realid/voice comm)

 

 

I'd like to add that I reviewed the ToS carefully, twice just now. The "real money for in-game gains" is the only thing that I could find that resembled it the most, but again, that part doesn't go against my previous comment.

 

[Valks 2,375]

12 hours ago, Yridaa said:

I will have to take your word for it, as it is not explicitly stated in the ToS. The closest I could find was:

Take a look at this:

https://eu.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/6298132027#6

[Yridaa 490]

13 hours ago, Blainie said:

Take a look at this:

https://eu.battle.net/forums/en/wow/topic/6298132027#6

It is hard to find the context of the win-trading in this case, like if it's done for gold or real money. Let's assume it is for gold and it is still not condoned. I guess Blizzard is still basing this on the blue text I quoted earlier. I'd actually like some real confirmation on this, so I will spend some time tomorrow (1:45 AM here right now) with a ticket for clarification.

 

Then again customer support tickets may not answer that (not their expertise) or escalate it higher up so it may take some time. I'll keep you up to date if I get a response.

[Lithari 194]

On 06/05/2017 at 2:58 PM, Yridaa said:

I'd like to clarify to people that win-trading for normal gameplay currency is not against the ToS. As long as it is gold or mounts or anything else obtainable in-game, it is allowed. It still goes against the spirit of competitive play, but this is not a violation.

 

To emphasize, my example falls under the same category as paying gold for getting boosted in Raids or high M+ Dungeons. Blizzard rather has people do the content themselves and together, but will not take action if you take an easy way, as long as there's no real-world currency involved.

The only reason some things are against the ToS is because they don't get said profits, its like Gold Selling, Blizzard says 'it ruins the realm economy' which it doesn't, i personally haven't bought any Gold that way, just via the WoW Token, which is exactly the same way that original Gold Sellers did it, except Blizzard doesn't get the £14.99 for the wow token, besides that part, getting Gold for the wow token is virtually the same as paying real life money for gold, except Blizzard doesn't get a penny, hence why they are against it.