I recently made another thread on this, but I realize that I should do more than simply complain. Here is a practical solution that would help to address the smurfing issue.
My logic: Smurfing harms the competitive dynamic of this game, which is a key driver of player retention. It also severely harms the new player experience, which reduces the likelihood that the new players will convert to long-time players. It is good for some of us if the competitive experience is improved, and it is good for all of us if the playerbase increases. Therefore Smurfing (and particularly, Boosting) should be addressed harshly.
1.) Smurfing to boost others is already against the ToS. This is a gray zone, but perhaps also smurfing solo is against the ToS. âExploiting other players is an equally serious offense. Scamming, account sharing, win-trading, and anything else that may degrade the gaming experience for other players will receive harsh penalties.â
2.) Create a âReport Categoryâ for Smurfing and / or Boosting. Let the players do the work. Then check the reports.
3.) After a certain number of reports, compare with logged metrics like winrate, account age / level, solo vs group play, etc.
4.) And hereâs the kicker: donât just penalize the smurf. Administer âharsh penaltiesâ to the players who repeatedly partied with the smurf. Thatâd end things rather quickly.
5.) Any arguments that this would decrease the playerbase are offset by the improved retention of newer players and the improved quality of the competitive experience.
99% of the reports will be fake. A lot of people who are losing will report a player from the enemy team falsely accusing them of this just because they are losing to them.
So every player will be subjected to this? Since that is what will happen due to the volume of reports everyone will receive in this category.
This already seems to be happening with the language report feature resulting in a lot of people getting muted. Many of the people being muted claim they never said bad words and in some cases even claim that they only said greetings like âhiâ. Some people even claim that the issue with smurfs is largely due to such false reporting, as despite it violating ToU, people might be making new accounts to bypass such punishments, forcing them to start ranking again at lower tiers until the system places them back where they used to be .
This would only make things worse. It would be abused even more than the âtoxicityâ category.
And what is the âdefaultâ metric supposed to be? How do you find the difference between a smurf and a new player who is simply experienced in the genre?
What it would end is the playerbase. Even league of legends is smart enough to NOT implement something like this.
New players do not care about smurfs. New players do not even know what smurfing looks like in the games they have just started playing.
I can appreciate the fact that you are coming with solutions to a perceived issue rather than just complain, so you get +1 point there.
However, where in the TOS does it state that players are only allowed 1 single account? Iâm pretty sure that multiple accounts are allowed.
If this wasnât allowed, I think it would be an incredibly hard thing for Blizz to police. How do you prove that a person is smurfing? Multiple people in a household could use the same ip or even same computer. Itâs just not practical for Blizz to waste the resources here, and having a community policing aspect is just ripe for abuse.
There may be other ways to help curb smurfing, like ânew players must complete 10 AI gamesâ before going into the human player pool. This idea isnât perfect though as it may scare away new players as well.. but it is just not an easy thing to solve, and quite frankly there are much bigger issues.
woudlnât be hard to make a system where someone who gets reported enough has a system look at their stats and if they are overperforming just quietly adjust their MMR rather then banning or whatever.
Hereâs my prediction. Every time a player loses a game, they will report their opponents for smurfing.
Also I canât see any way that they could 100% prove that someone is smurfing. Players would just report people based on the fact that they played well.
But MMR is already based on your performace, so what more would be done?
you can register and play on multiple Accounts, you are not allowed to have more than three (3) Accounts with Battle.net Balance.
the maximum value of all transactions using Battle.net Balance is limited to $2,000.00 USD per day. The balance of your Battle.net Balance shall be determined by converting the Battle.net Balance across all of the various currencies in your Battle.net Balance on all Accounts registered to you to the equivalent of US Dollars using the currency conversion formulas posted on the WSJ Market Data Center.
Players can have multiple accounts, but only 3 can are supposed to have a standing balance, and the minx/max expenditure of those accounts is supposed to fall below a maximum amount of spending.
Thereâs also a line in the EULA requiring a multi-form authentication of the b.net balance exceeds a triple digit spending, but the point being is that players:
a) can have multiple accounts
b) should only have up to 3 accounts with a spending balance
c) and the value of that balance may be under further rules.
So, so long as the account doesnât have a âbalanceâ, then a person could have several accounts; HotS doesnât require payment balance to play, so a person âtechnicallyâ could have more than 3 accounts since they donât have to convert currency to USD to play HotS.
This is what I was alluding to. A player might have a level 3000 acct and they might have just started up a level 1 acct. Same skill level. With that in mind, complaints about smurfing are pretty much null and void.
Thatâs the problem with all Blizzard game report systems (and they all share the same one).
There is no cost or risk to just reporting whoever you want for zero valid reason, so people do it even out of spite.
Make it like Valve where you get max. 3 reports a day. If you submit a lot of false reports your report privileges are taken away or you are suspended briefly.
You can report whoever in LoL. They will only punish you if youâre actually smurfing, griefing or whatever. Itâs the age of AI, and being owned by microsoft, they could just implement AI filtering.
You sure can. Riotâs system is just as bad, though it involves more human moderation.
Valve games generally allow only an X amount of reports a day like Counter Strike.
Dota 2 used to allow only 3 reports a week, which is a bit draconian. Currently you can set up dislike flags and other flags about 20x a week until they get ignored (weighed reports).
Sure⌠being notified that a player was punished as soon as match ends = a banwave every decadeâŚ
I managed to make LoL work again on my laptop, had a match where someone afk-ed about 30 seconds under tower while a teamfight was happening. Didnât even have to report him and I was notified he was punished. Match quality gets a lot higher if the devs stop catering to the bottom 1% that starts the game just to waste electricity.
This statement right here is fascinating. In your thesis you assume smurfing is occurring, is harming âthe competitive dynamic of the gameâ, and that this is a âkey driver of player retentionâ.
Iâd like to ask how you came to these conclusions? If thereâs any sources/evidence I think theyâd be a fascinating read. Otherwise at the end of the day smurf or not I play the game with the aim to win, and my opponent doesnât change that.
I do appreciate this post, though i am a frequent smurfer my self.
I do spend my time smurfing though because the QM environment is too chaotic too be fun, and so i have to play ranked to actually have fun in this game.
My friends are not able to climb, and so they are stuck at lower ranks, so to play with them i have to smurf.
Although i do agree that it is hurting the game overall, both the community and the competitive environment, i wonât stop, as i play games too have fun, and too have fun i need to feel competition and i want to play with my friends.
I do also agree with you, though i think you are hyperboleing abit when it comes to player retention, but i agree with that it is hurting our new player flow in everyway possible.
I think the people in this forum are being unjustifiably cruel to you in their replies, rather than look through what you wrote and reply properly, theyâve resorted too just nitpicking points and questioning your⌠mental state? or something of a similar maner.
But i do see the point you are making, although i donât think your solutions are adequate as too fix the issue.
And i donât think punishing the friends of the smurfs is going to help either, if anything i think that might even deter players away from the game.
getting a handful of reports would make the system speed up the process since given the sheer volume of smurfs either there is just a metric ton of them or itâs taking them way too long to get rebalanced.
Either sheer incompetence or the game simply was designed to be a casual moba, with no consideration given about the sweats that will find exploits. Pick your poison.
Either way, the first one canât be fixed, according to Tychus, and the 2nd one would require a lot of changes.
Unranked draft was equally chaotic, itâs not the draft that makes the difference, it is the casual plays.
Zero stakes makes plays that makes zero sense.
It can be fun just for playing, but if you are looking for something that challenges you in any way, it just doesnât do it.
at the end of the day smurf or not I play the game with the aim to win, and my opponent doesnât change that.