If you tag an account with the player’s PC MAC address, it’s easy to track and compare the performance between accounts played in the same PC. Apply statistics methods and you can even say if they are throwing to be low elo or boosting a group.
Families share computers.
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Of course, but so what?
Two brothers could play very differently, one in lowest ranks the other in the highest ranks. So by your logic they would both get flagged for “smurfing”
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Just change your mac address tho
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They don’t know your MAC address, it’s only visible to other devices on your LAN - it’s a layer 2 construct.
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Good try. The only thing I can now think of is make the game cost 15EUR/USD per month
Easily found out if you just give enough permissions.
You cannot use the MAC as it is layer 2, and even if known, there are tools to easily spoof it. I assure you as someone in IT who was at one time a CCNP (Cisco Certified Network Professional), that is not a solution.
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Your a diamond border player, smurfs have little impact on you, in the short term you may lose a game or two because of them, however you have played a lot hence you are a diamond border player, and therefore the short run should not matter enough to try to find solutions to a problem that isn’t actually a problem.
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Border has zero to do with it. Good thing they are being removed in OW 2 to avoid these kinds of misconceptions.
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Using a computer’s HWID would be a better, more permanent, solution. However using a HWID linked to an account is a very heavy handed way of doing things. Then every time the client upgrades a piece of hardware then the ID changes and needs to be reactivated. Ultimately people are going to do whatever they want and no matter the lock there are ways around it.
Keeping bans/suspensions on an account level, something blizzard controls, is the least annoying for the company on a technical level and least impactful on a customer service level.
They just need to keep working on detection for their backend. I don’t believe that player policing is the right decision but that’s what we got; people need to use it for everything.
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Top 500 requires SMS auth… they could easily do that, some games have a paid tier for it to cut down smurfing and cheating and bad behavior. I actually suspect that this may come too with OW 2.
Another way is paid battlepasses for say a quarter at a time for access to cut down on smurfs. People wont pay $5/month for 6 accounts in many cases…
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You underestimate people’s willingness to be garbage.
If they require SMS then I’ll have to dump the game 100%. I’m not willing to pay for a phone plan just to play overwatch.
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Some will sure, but many won’t. Heck, even if it cut Smurfing by 33%, it would be good for the game.
I cannot believe you do not have a phone.
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thats plan wrong, how do you think things such as Apple music or google music work the account links it to hardware mac address, you can choose to clear it later when you want to switch devices. MAC are a layer 2 but that doesnt mean you dont get it in all network traffic
I have a phone, I just don’t have a plan. I’d rather put the $30-60 into my home internet plan since I’m home all the time. When I’m out I use open wifi and if I need to make a call I use Talkatone. However Blizzard does not allow those types of phone numbers to use SMS. (even though I can send texts with the service)
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I believe there are soft phones that will do the same thing depending on the service. A thought.
Those still cost money even if they are disposable phones.
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Well again, I am talking about a tiered service, there would still be “Overwatch for the masses” without SMS.