wow How to Get Rid of Boost Sales Advertising

[Starym 3,800]

 

While advertising boost sales in the chat channels is not against ToS, it is very annoying and by now comprises the majority of all chat that we see in the game. This is without even mentioning the Group Finder spam, which IS against ToS, is constantly being reported, but it's still there, clogging everything up and making legitimate runs harder to find (but has gotten a little better since the ban).

Luckily there's some solutions, none of them perfect, that can help out.

Chat Channel Spam Solutions

There's a very new addon by rowaasr13 called SR13-AntiSpam, which works on the chat channels and using pattern recognition:

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What it does?

It detects and removes spam from all game's built-in channels. Right now it focuses on boosting spam. In addition to removing detected spam, addon also remembers spammers themselves and removes all their messages from channel until logout or reload.

How it is different?

This addon employs patterns specially tailored against boost spam, including usual typos and deliberate evasion tactics. Since those messages are within the rules for the moment, it doesn't reports them, but simply removes spam from the chat.

Then there's EasyFilter, which has a lot of advanced filtering options, but hasn't been updated in quite a while (but still works).

Group Finder

LFGSpamFilter is a relatively simple one as well and also offers very simple reporting options.

The Premade Groups Filter addon may not have been made with this purpose in mind, but it helps! The issue is there's a lot of input needed from the player, as you'll have to enter the filters yourselves, and the sellers tend to use non-standard wording so not everything can be filtered out. You can check out some more details on how to use it here, or try some simple filters like this one suggested by chymmi:

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When searching for group use pre-made groups filter add-on and use filter like "rio>100". Every normal player has atleast 100 rio except sellers and boom they are gone.

Bad Boy

We've talked about this one before and it covers both above categories, is an excellent all-rounder with its Group Finder and chat channel coverage, but it's also been known to miss a lot of entries. But it's definitely worth having, as it's the least fuss and gets at least some stuff out of the way.

 

The only ultimate solution is to install most/all of these and hope they can clean things up enough to make it tolerable, although it seems unlikely we can get rid of all of it, as boosting is a part of WoW now and isn't going anywhere, and whenever there's real money to be made, you can be sure people will push way too far and not go away any time soon.

[Dejo93 1,023]

I'd also like to mention that Raider.io is bullshit

[SidonisAntares 290]

18 minutes ago, Dejo93 said:

I'd also like to mention that Raider.io is bullshit

It's a more accurate check than GearScore was, and you can't really blame players for wanting to know that the person they're inviting has some idea of what they're doing, since server reputation hasn't been a thing for well over a decade now.

p.s. Starym is involved at Raider.IO as well, so you're barking up the wrong tree.

Edited January 27, 2021 by SidonisAntares

[Calorat 78]

21 minutes ago, SidonisAntares said:

It's a more accurate check than GearScore was, and you can't really blame players for wanting to know that the person they're inviting has some idea of what they're doing, since server reputation hasn't been a thing for well over a decade now.

p.s. Starym is involved at Raider.IO as well, so you're barking up the wrong tree.

Except Raider.io doesn't tell you anything about if the player has some idea of what they are doing it just tells you their gear and achievements, which they could have gotten through paid runs or even paying someone else to play their toon.

[Laragon 269]

17 minutes ago, Calorat said:

Except Raider.io doesn't tell you anything about if the player has some idea of what they are doing it just tells you their gear and achievements, which they could have gotten through paid runs or even paying someone else to play their toon.

Sure, of course there is a loop hole and it's not perfect. Even Mythic raids by this point in a content patch can have this same issue where you can carry a single player through them. But it's a better source than being absolutely blind on the selection process.

Just because it's not perfect doesn't mean it's not the best we currently have.

[IVaccount 12]

1 hour ago, SidonisAntares said:

It's a more accurate check than GearScore was, and you can't really blame players for wanting to know that the person they're inviting has some idea of what they're doing, since server reputation hasn't been a thing for well over a decade now.

p.s. Starym is involved at Raider.IO as well, so you're barking up the wrong tree.

Hey Starym, GearScore 2.0 is bullshit.

[Halock 156]

5 hours ago, Calorat said:

Except Raider.io doesn't tell you anything about if the player has some idea of what they are doing it just tells you their gear and achievements, which they could have gotten through paid runs or even paying someone else to play their toon.

What's the advantage over the old 'checking armoury'?

[Wildwitch 108]

Blizzard needs to pay someone to go on every damn server and monitor this crap!

[Starym 3,800]

7 hours ago, IVaccount said:

Hey Starym, GearScore 2.0 is bullshit.

Um, I write articles for Raider.IO and have nothing to do with the addon. Direct your un-constructive and angry comments elsewhere!

[Faelosia 10]

I do not understand people that think Raider.io is useless or toxic.
People requesting a 1500+ score for 10+ keys are toxic, that's a fact, but you cannot say that having a small but clear indicator that the guy has a certains score overall, a certain advancement in a sepcific key, a certain number of timed 10+ and 15+ keys is a huge benefit for the guys really pushing out there ! (which I'm not part of !).

Blizzard doesn't provide good tools, let the community try to compensate ! (it's exactly the same issue with MDT and all the fuss that's been about it last month. If blizzard proposed an integrated gfood tool to allow route planning, there wouldn't be issues about the ones created by community :-).

[Allseye 96]

11 hours ago, Dejo93 said:

I'd also like to mention that Raider.io is bullshit

Raider.io is not "bullshit". The only bullshit is what community does with it. Raider.io gives no information about knowledge of a person. It gives you information about a score. With this score you can try to "guess" a persons knowledge or what he is probably capabale to achiev. In most cases you guess will be okay. In some cases, you guess will be wrong - beacause this person achieved the score through sellruns or friends. Or other way around - this person had make a break and has a low rating but is a great player. This is nothing we have to blame Raider.io for. We have to blame the community to not use their brains and want 1'500k ratings for +8 keys (just as an example).

If you don't like it - make friends and don't use LFG. Otherwise provide a better EASY solution, can you?

[SidonisAntares 290]

10 hours ago, Halock said:

What's the advantage over the old 'checking armoury'?

Convenience when you have a dozen or more DPS applying for your group in the LFG tool. Do you seriously go check each person on the armory before inviting them to you run? Additionally Raider.IO uses the Blizzard API to pull how many 5-9 keys, 10-14, and 15+ keys they've completed, not just the seasonal best available on the web page.

[Ragingwolf 310]

I'll look into getting this addon when I get home from work; may come in handy later for me.  But yeah I've seen more and more listings for selling runs lately which is a bit of a nuisance when looking for select keys.

[WotansRaven 4]

On 1/27/2021 at 9:35 PM, Wildwitch said:

Blizzard needs to pay someone to go on every damn server and monitor this crap!

How much more are you willing to pay for your subscription for this service? I'm just gonna use some estimates, but I wouldn't take less than $25/hr for such a job. That's $200 a day per person, per server, with at least 3.5 employees per server (Three 8 hour shifts. Plus the .5 is the extra to cover illness, time off, etc.). So, at least $700 per server in direct payments 7 days a week, plus all the employer taxes and benefits. Say easily $1,200 a day per server total cost to Blizz. Multiply this by 365. That's over $400k per year per server. Now multiply that by all the servers. There are 246 realms across the world. 246 x $400k = $98M. Let's say they can find a bunch of low skilled people to do it for half what I would. That's still upwards of $50 million bucks a year. Now take 4.5M subscribers and your share of that is $11/month. Even if you just 1099 people it's gonna be absolute minimum 6-7 bucks per person to hire all these people. Ready for your $20-$25/month WoW subscription? I'm sure that would go over like a lead balloon...

[Halock 156]

10 hours ago, WotansRaven said:

How much more are you willing to pay for your subscription for this service?

I'm not sure this is even the issue. Although I suspect manpower would indeed be the first hurdle to overcome, it could presumably be overcome through better tools and systems.

The problem is that hiring GMs to ban would be dealing with the symptom of the problem and not the root. The bots will be banned, but the bots will just make another account. Yes, it would make it more expensive for them. But kill them? Ehhhhhhh.

Also, the bots would adapt. I've heard it said GMs should patrol starting areas, but then the bots would simply run and gather elsewhere. Watching popular farming places would presumably merit results, but then other places would become popular.

The botting plant will never be uprooted -- I thought the WoW token had killed it, but hey, the economy changed and it became profitable again. But having GMs run around just gives the gits something to actively avoid and learn from, as opposed to the current approach, which occasionally presents the bots with serious (if not, unfortunately, unsurmountable, ) difficulties. 

It would be popular, though. They should livestram a GM doing it or something. It'd produce about the same effects.

[Halock 156]

On 1/28/2021 at 8:05 AM, Allseye said:

If you don't like it - make friends and don't use LFG. Otherwise provide a better EASY solution, can you?

I have no friends and still use LFG, avoiding listings asking for scores because it irks me. Or I make my own group. Which is an excellent solution not nearly enough people take advantage of. Easiest thing in the world. (Seriously, just list it and wait for the applications. Nobody expects you to lead. And if they do -- make it up! That's what everyone else does.)

My solution solves all troubles. *Shrug*

[Allseye 96]

5 hours ago, Halock said:

I have no friends and still use LFG, avoiding listings asking for scores because it irks me. Or I make my own group. Which is an excellent solution not nearly enough people take advantage of. Easiest thing in the world. (Seriously, just list it and wait for the applications. Nobody expects you to lead. And if they do -- make it up! That's what everyone else does.)

My solution solves all troubles. *Shrug*

Of course, this solves the problem if you don't like RIO. However, this doesn't solve the problem how to build a solid group to do higher m+. What do you do to build a solid group for your (lets say) +16 key and try it intime? How are you selecting players? Simply taking highest ilvl? What is your approach without using RIO? Again, you like to have a highest possible chance to pick capable players. 

[Halock 156]

20 hours ago, Allseye said:

Again, you like to have a highest possible chance to pick capable players. 

Iiiii go with luck of the draw, personally, unless there's something else easy to indicate I should take them.  Sometimes you meet a real git, sometimes you meet a friend for life. That's the way it's always been, and for chumps like me, it's good enough.

Again, shrug. It works for me.

[Allseye 96]

4 hours ago, Halock said:

Iiiii go with luck of the draw, personally, unless there's something else easy to indicate I should take them.  Sometimes you meet a real git, sometimes you meet a friend for life. That's the way it's always been, and for chumps like me, it's good enough.

Again, shrug. It works for me.

Your attidute is commendable :-). If everyone would be that relaxed, we would have much less toxic players. 

On the other hand your chance to build a capable group for high keys is based on luck. RIO is still based somehow on luck, but its not that fluctuating. 

Personally, i do use RIO if i'm looking for mates. But if i do a (lets say) +10 key, i rather take a rio 700 player instead of 1500. Why? Because chance to have a toxic player rises the higher RIO get. At least this is my experience. And again, its not necessary to have that high rating for such a keystonelevel. 

Edited January 31, 2021 by Allseye

[IVaccount 12]

On 1/27/2021 at 11:48 PM, Starym said:

Um, I write articles for Raider.IO and have nothing to do with the addon. Direct your un-constructive and angry comments elsewhere!

That's fair. I mainly just wanted to troll for a sec in response to the post I quoted. I honestly don't think Pandora's Box is ever gonna be closed when it comes to add-ons like this, but to be fair the developers can't really do much to prevent people from abusing it's gatekeeping. Never angry at you personally btw.