I have a friend who is a girl and the stuff she has had to put up with…like: " a girl is playing mercy, she’s the reason we lost…". Or players saying " switch…to a shield tank…or we report…while these players play whatever they like"…just doesn’t compare to this ops request.
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You’re using your own personal definition of cheating. Jeff, himself, has said that smurfing is NOT reportable and NOT against the rules. Again, if they’re throwing to maintain a lower rating, then that’s reportable. If they’re just at a lower rating than they ought to be, whether it’s their first or 50th account, that’s NOT reportable.
then stop complaining about getting burned
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A high rank player on a low rank account has the same impact on the game regardless of whether they’re a smurf or alt or whatever else you want to call them.
They have an unfair advantage over players actually at those lower ranks, and according to Blizzard anything that gives an unfair advantage is cheating.
No, I’m using Blizzard’s in-game definition of cheating.
That’s NOT what he said at all.
He said he doesn’t think that they’re that much of an issue because they’ll quickly rise to their normal rank; however, he failed to address the impact they have in each and every game they play in until they reach their normal rank.
Fact is, smurfing is against the rules provided in game by Blizzard.
Blizzard disagrees with you as evidenced by their in-game definition of cheating.
If they throw, that’s against the rules. If they’re just a new account that isn’t where they should be, that’s not against the rules. If they’re actually playing the game and not throwing, it’s not reportable. Most people are complaining about getting rolled by “smurfs” and that it’s unfair, not about smurfs throwing their matches. You can’t report a smurf for rolling you. They’re just good at the game.
They’ll just swap to their alt accounts if they are suspended / banned.
you’re advocating the irresponsible use of an automated systems used to stop actual legitimate abuse of players against others…im sorry but i cannot side with this. you do realize you inundate the system…and actual players being discriminated against, cyber bullied…etc. skips below the radar…sorry no…i will not misuse the system.
There is a bit of a conundrum with the debates surrounding smurfs. It’s clear that players had to have thrown their matches when they started their accounts in order to trick the system into placing them in Bronze. In that sense, they did in fact “throw” for several hundred matches in order to be placed into a rank with kids playing their first FPS so they can get a thrill out of stomping them.
I understand your argument that they’re technically not throwing once they get into competitive mode, and decide to go full throttle on lesser skilled players, but the comp system was meant to place players among evenly skilled players to prevent matches from being lopsided.
It’s the same reason why we separate boxers into different classes based on their weight. Smurfs are essentially the heavy-weight boxers that rig the scale in order to trick officials into thinking they weigh less than they actually do, and then thrashing the other boxers once they get into the ring. If a scandal like that ever broke out in professional fighting, the player involved would be permanently barred from competing in the league ever again, and I feel similarly regarding the disciplinary actions that should be taken against smurfs.
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I basically agree here, and I don’t like smurfs. My only point is that flooding the system with a bunch of false reports in the hopes that a good player gets banned is both pointless and also damaging to the report system overall. The efficacy of the system is dependent on how it’s used. Using it to report smurfs who are winning games is an incorrect use of the system, and won’t get them banned anyway. The discussion shouldn’t be “let’s report the smurfs”, it should be centered around how to prevent smurfing in the first place. Abusing the report system isn’t the answer to that. That’s what I have a problem with.
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For sure.
My last comment was criticism, and since you sound like a reasonable guy, I want to give you some credit. I am absolutely opposed to the idea of filing bogus reports for abusive chat because someone is placed in a rank they shouldn’t be in. I’ve seen people like Fuey500 get falsely banned because he wanted to play Torb, and while I’ve never been banned, I did receive a warning after a string of several horrible matches where people demanded I be reported for my choice of Torbjörn.
Part of the problem is identifying who truly is a smurf. Jeff Kaplan even highlighted someone he knew who was falsely accused of smurfing because he plays Overwatch on and off, and does very well despite having a low level account. In another case, we can imagine a new player who has experience in FPS’s have incredibly accurate aim, but is placed in Silver and Gold due to poor game sense of Overwatch’s specific mechanics. This player will likely be accused of smurfing, after people see his incredible aiming skills in death cam replays.
I still feel like smurfs should try to be moved out of their ranks quickly as a possible solution, that way they aren’t necessarily being punished, and if they try to legitimately throw to derank, they’ll be reported for throwing.
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Umm…no? High ELO players make up the smallest part of the community. If anything this will bring back the players who aren’t so good and got frustrated by said high level players that had to stroke their e-peens by smurfing.
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If a Master player makes a new account and places Diamond, then they have an unfair advantage over players actually at Diamond level.
According to the game’s own reporting system, that’s cheating.
And, as I noted earlier, Jeff failed to acknowledge the impact such a player has in every match they play in until such time as they reach their usual SR level.
As I’ve also mentioned earlier, it’s not as simple a case as just being good at the game.
Of course a high level player on a low level smurf/alt/whatever is going to be “good” because they’re playing in a rank that they shouldn’t be in. That is the issue at hand here, and that is something that Jeff and Blizzard have failed to address.
Smurfs should only be matched against other smurfs.
It isn’t “cheating” by Blizzard’s definition. That’s the point. If Jeff says it’s not cheating, then it’s not cheating. That’s kind of the end of it. If you want to argue for a system that might prevent smurfing, then I’m all about it. If you’re going to keep saying that Jeff and Blizzard are lying, and they actually do want you to report smurfs, despite the fact that they say they don’t, then I don’t see where this discussion is going.
If you’re just here to argue that smurfs are bad, then I agree with you. If you’re trying to say that Blizzard wants you to report them (specifically for carrying games they shouldn’t be in) then you’re wrong. If you want to do away with smurfs, I’d love to hear how you’d like to accomplish that. Talking about whether or not smurfs should be reported isn’t productive.
To that end, I’ll just talk about your last few points. Ideally, sure, smurfs would be matched against other smurfs. Also ideally, sure, it’s not as simple as “person good at game wins game.” But if we’re being honest here, who’s to say the person on a new account isn’t just dominating because he’s talented? What’s the difference between a Diamond’s alt account placing in Gold and a CS:GO professional’s first account placing in Gold? They’re both going to completely dominate the games they get placed into. Does that mean they’re BOTH cheating? One because he has an alt account, and the other because he’s just as good but learned the skills from a different game? What’s the difference between someone who is good because they played before, and someone who’s good for the first time? What if they’re both playing at a Diamond level? SR isn’t accurate right away. It takes time. Blizzard noted that it took a pro 15 matches before his unranked account was showing the same MMR as his main. I don’t really think that’s particularly unacceptable.
Again, the discussion might be better focused towards: should players be allowed to play on multiple accounts? As of right now, that’s completely allowed. Beyond that, smurfing boils down to throwing to stay low. That’s already against the rules and reportable, so there’s nothing to talk about there.
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Just because Jeff says so doesn’t really mean it’s not cheating. Fact is its cheating in common sense which probably Jeff doesnt have common sense. They make their money by ppl buying new accounts and they just dont care. Me personally I toy with smurfs via chat text in game and make them upset
calm down…
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I cant. Its OVER 9,000!!! 
disagree. once high elo players move on the game will actually die. OW won’t be an “it” game anymore and the 18 and under crowd will play something else. at the end of the day, kids play whatever everyone else is playing, and that won’t be OW if all the streamers are playing the next meta FPS, whatever that ends up being. in case anyone’s wondering, that 's why blizzard is making a “new” OW rather than spending time fixing the original. as everyone on this form is fond of complaining about, the current version of OW, although still popular, has already seen its peak.
What I don’t understand is why the mmr system which seems to evaluate every game…doesn’t seem to take general accuracy and sequential fire accuracy into account. I’m sure by now, they’ve separated accuracy on barriers, accuracy against enemy players, and critical hit accuracy…at each rank there’s a median accuracy to which you can compare players too…if things don’t make sense…why doesn’t it just start matching our " Smurf" with unranked" placement matches?
Unfortunately, until they do something the only tool we have is to work the reporting system.
I find that harassment and abusive chat work best.