We continue to get survey questions about the reporting system. Blizzard, here’s a hint: GIVE PEOPLE SOME WARNING THAT THEY’VE BEEN REPORTED! I have no idea how many people have reported me, but I never use foul/offensive language in chat but keep getting penalized for supposed “abusive chat” without warning. There is supposedly a “thorough investigation” involved, but I have to wonder, does that include actually reading a record of the chats? Seriously, given the limited resources that Blizzard now has dedicated to this game, am I really supposed to believe that anyone has time to investigate any claims in reports other than a review of the number of times players get dropped for inactivity? I can report people for anything and claim all I want in the report. I’ve heard plenty of people threaten to report for false claims. I’ve seen plenty of people using all manner or crude, vulgar, racist, and foul language. At worst, I sharply criticize teammates for terrible play, but there is never profanity involved, vulgar sexual references or language, death threats/suggestions (yes, I’ve seen people type chats saying other players should kill themselves), or racial slurs, yet, with no warning at all that I’m even in any kind of danger, I get silences or bans.
There are no published standards of how many reports or what kind of reports it takes to get sanctioned, so how am I supposed to know if the system is working if all I see is unfair sanctions against myself, with no supporting evidence from Customer Support other than vague claims? I also have no idea if anyone I’ve ever reported for abusive chat, afk/non-participation, or intentional dying has been in any way penalized, so how can I answer the question about how well something is working if I have no clue about the results of any of my input?
Anything can be reported if the player feels is abuse, is considered by Blizz to be abusive chat. Sarcasm is considered abuse, I read on a friends ticket that asking the team to report a player can be reported as it’s considered a “threat”.
These are the rules for chat basically *from a post I listed below
What is commonly called toxic behavior does not necessarily involve the use of profanity or being vulgar. It can be any of the following behaviors:
• degrading others
• insults
• sarcasm
• patronizing (telling others how they should play)
• trolling
• mobbing/bulling
• threats (statements like “report this player”)
• Real-life threats (statements like “kys”)
The report system works as intended but is so badly designed that it punishes innocent players in the process, it’s really broken cause I’d say the ratio might be something like
65% guilty
35% innocent
at least
from my experience, no source
if you want to know more of it just search these forums and the old ones too :
https://us.battle.net/forums/en/heroes/13267618/
You might found more relevant content on the old forums since it was and era where people talked about it way more.
Learning to play arround it and its 0 tolerance is possible yet balls breaking…
Many of the players it punished were Masters and GM who played more than the average person and often were more passionate about the game. As you said you didn’t have to be toxic to get banned, many people who were shot callers got silenced all time.
It’s not talked about much now as many of those players left, made smurfs with chat disabled and most of us have just come to accept that it won’t change. I know I rarely bother to participate in these kinds of subjects anymore.
I bookmarked this thread on the old forums as it actually shows info given to a player as to what you can be banned for.
It’s really frustrating. I understand, for instance, that they don’t want to give instant notifications of people reporting you, or who did it, to prevent retaliatory reports that are made-up, but seriously, what am I supposed to do when the healer decides to solo all the camps instead of show up for objectives or team fights? Do I just say: “Way to play against the meta; do your own thing in this team-based game”? Maybe I’m too harsh some times, but a heads up that I am in danger of being penalized would be nice.
The real kicker here is that they have the audacity to not only suspend my account for this nonsense, but to claim that there was a “thorough review of the evidence.” That is a total lie, and they know it. There is no way that Blizzard has the manpower set aside to thoroughly review claims made in HotS reports when everyone knows that the game is barely even being supported anymore. I wouldn’t even believe that they have the manpower available to do that for reports in WoW or Diablo. What company could afford to pay people to do that? They’re just trying to make it sound like it’s justified when it’s more than likely just a simple matter of a computer tallying the number of reports until a certain limit is reached.
What’s even worse, reading some of the attached threads, is that many streamers, GM level and former pros alike, will actually tell you to do things that are on the list of hidden rules as a way of helping your team win, especially the shot calling part. How can we even communicate during a draft if making suggestions could be reported as bullying? Blizzard, this is how giant companies like you, EA, Activision, and others get your gamer base to turn against you. Every time I get the survey question about the reporting system, I vote the worst possible, and will continue to do so until these shenanigans change, not that I think anyone at Activion/Blizzard will care until they are nearing bankruptcy, because the bosses don’t care about keeping the player base happy or treating them well, just about how much money they can squeeze out of us.
Sit back and ask yourself the following:
Is a person who is doing things that are this idiotic actually going to be influenced in a positive way by anything I say?
An honest appraisal of the situation will help you realize that nothing you say is going to improve things.
Therefore, it’s not worth the bother of saying them.
Been playing for four years, have had my share of raging and correcting teammates. Have never been muted or silenced. Getting angry is a sign of failure of communication and therefor a sign of bad play in a team game. If you find yourself getting reported and banned often then you should get in a better place in your life before playing this game. If you were playing pickup basketball would you yell at a guy for missing a shot??? No of course you wouldn’t
Overwatch give us a message that our report was a success, but Heroes of the Storm, never dis that, so it just make things harder for the one who report a player if his report was a success or not.
No, I wouldn’t, but I would yell at him if he stands around doing nothing “because you guys suck too much,” passes the ball to the opposing team, shoots for the opposing team’s basket all the time, or generaly refuses to play the game by the rules and in cooperation with his teammates. I’ve been playing for 4 years, too, and only recently had trouble with sanctions. I suggest that you find out more details about a situation before you come in with condescending, self-righteous comments. Cookie-cutter advice that sounds like it came from a motivational speaker tends to enrage hearers more than help them. Btw, read this post in a calm voice, since I am not screaming at you, but proving my very point that well reasoned but sharp criticism is not the same as raging, bullying, or being abusive.
then you probably should get anger management classes if you frequently yell at someone in an activity that has no impact on anything. Also I have admitted to raging in the past as well so its not a self rightious thing. We all have to work on it but if youve been silenced then thats probably a reflection that your anger has come out alot more recently and should figure out why that is.
You ignored everything I said in favor of your preconceived notion of my anger being the problem. Anger management will never get others to listen, cooperate, stop ruining the game for others through afk/non-participation/intentional dying. Did I not say that I was not yelling at you, but proving my point that criticism, though unwelcome, can be done without rage? Isn’t that what you’re supposedly doing to me, saying very unwelcome things that could easily be reported as “abusive” if I so chose to take it that way, and, unless Blizzard actually investigates, which we both know that they do not have the manpower to do, despite their claim in the e-mail, then how would they know that you weren’t being abusive and I was just overreacting?
The larger point about the survey question is still: how can I rate the perceived effectiveness of the reporting system if I have no idea how many reports it takes to get penalized, I have no idea if anyone I reported was ever penalized, and all I really see is that I get penalized unfairly? It’s like ordering food and then being asked how my meal is when it hasn’t been served yet.
See also all the other posts from others in this thread citing problems with the reporting system.
Not really. It’s asking about your perception. To know whether I like the steak, I don’t have to know how the cow was killed or what temperature the grill is. I don’t even have to know how somebody else’s steak tastes to them. All I have to know is whether I liked what I got.
Likewise, it doesn’t matter what happens to other people. Your perception clearly seems to be that you’ve been punished unfairly. Therefore, your perception of the report system is that it does not work correctly.
A Blizzard employee actually stated that they let the community decide what is toxic.
The reporters could be the troll…and many times are.
Note: Please stop assuming people against the reporting system are the problem. Stereotyping people is never the answer. I have never been silenced; however, I have had numerous replies saying I must be bitter and I must be a troublemaker because I can see the flaw to the reporting system.
Is there a source on that? It sounds familiar, but I don’t remember where it’s from.
Reported for wall of text. 
/s
You can find many on Redit.
Here is one:
http://i.imgur.com/3uwMoJb.png
Basically, this says we let the community manage what is appropriate in-game.
BTW: English is not my first language. 
Yes I know, which is just one reason why the reporting system is flawed.
I said nothing of the kind. It’s starting to get annoying, I speak out against the reporting system, but because I don’t say it’s 100% bad, I’m for it as far as people are concerned.
There is zero investigation. You get a certain number of report in a certain amount of time, and you are punished.
That is all.
Yes reviews are complete lies.
You play often, and care, and you WILL be banned.
The only advice I can give you is never never spend money on this game. You may lose your value arbitrarily. Having had an account suspended (somehting they started doing with NO in game warning btw), I will never spend another cent on a blizzard or activision title.
Look, they don’t show stats, or reports, or even any evidence to justify their reveiws BECAUSE reporting is a joke.
At least in old WoW they’d give you a few lines of text to suport their punishments. I think they decided - ban an account, take the value and hope the person pays up again for something.
I am actually kind of shocked no one has every filed a class action v Blizzard for the value of account they’ve taken.