Warning: you actually do get banned for playing off-meta heroes

General Discussion
1

Please keep in mind this is a warning, not a complaint
I only got banned for a single day so it’s already expired and not an issue if not for the stacking penalty system.

The short story
Blizzard WILL ban you if you play your favorite off-meta heroes and perform poorly and the support center won’t remove it.

I always believed these whiny types of posts to have been created by ragers or something alike, but apparently that’s not the case.
Blizzard actually bans you for playing an off-meta hero if you get enough reports - they do this despite making their stance very clear + the support center won’t remove a suspension caused by a hero pick.

So my theory of what has happened is:
People get mad because we lost a fight then starts to blame me because I’m not on a meta hero. They then make up a false reasoning and sends a report. Blizzard support center then reads these, but because so many of these false accusations has accumulated, they have no choice but to believe them (my word against a lot of tilted players with a lot of different reasonings). However, in my case, they do not have sufficient proof and thus are unable to provide a valid reasoning, which is why they invented a new one - they did this despite going directly against previous stated company policies. They are obviously doing this in an attempt to ban actual griefers.

The long story
The final reasoning the support center provided me with was:
"Considering the amount of time and the number of reports that are necessary for a suspension, it is clear that something in your behaviour is not bieng accepted positively by other players.
Though sticking to the one Hero in itself is not against the rules, doing so when that particular Hero is of no use to the situation, or possibly detrimental to the team’s success can also be seen as against the co-operative spirit of the game. Refusing to change character to help the situation can be just as disruptive.

Edit: some guy posted the links for easier access in the comments

Link for proof
https: //imgur. com/a/TJIdzZ9

Dafran getting a warning for the exact same thing
https:// clips. twitch. tv/FunSpotlessChamoisYouDontSay

So what support is saying is basically the directly opposite of what has previously been stated by multiple members of the dev team (links below). They have made it very clear that the final choice of which hero to play is your own and not your team’s - and that you shouldn’t be reported unless you are actively trying to lose. This includes not wanting to swap. They have also stated that it isn’t optimal, but not against policy.

https:// us.battle. net/forums/en/overwatch/topic/20760716149#post-10
https:// us.battle. net/forums/en/overwatch/topic/20761616812#post-2
https:// us.forums.blizzard. com/en/overwatch/t/updated-player-experience-tools-for-1-22/42828

Not to mention, “going against the cooperative system of the game” isn’t a valid reasoning. There is inactivity, spam, gameplay sabotage, bad battletag, abusive chat. And before you say anything, I did check the code of conduct and it wasn’t violated in any way.

  • I haven’t been spamming, nor is my battletag “bad” in any kind of way.
    (Although I did use “group up” quite a lot when I was attempting a teleporter team flank)
  • I haven’t been abusive either - a lot of people thinks it’s ok to fight fire with fire, and let me just tell you right now, it’s not. But whenever somebody raged and wanted to report me, I either muted them, or asked them if they were gonna do a false report. Blizzard has confirmed that I haven’t been abusive so this isn’t really the issue either.
  • I absolutely have not been inactive - while I know it’s a popular strategy for griefers to simply switch to torb and hammer your turret in spawn, my stats will show that this is not the case.
  • What support is refering to must be gameplay sabotage, but gameplay sabotage only applies whenever someone actively attempt to disrupt their team’s chances of winning. I haven’t been sabotaging games. Sure, I’ve been doing poorly some games. I’m not a god, I’m not a pro, but I have never wanted to lose a game and I have never actively tried to lose. I have been trying my very best in each and every match. It’s not like I switched mid-match to attempt to lose. I simply picked my hero and were bad in some cases.

So what does all this mean exactly? - That everybody who’s enjoys non-popular heroes can get banned if you simply want them to be. Remember that popular heroes change depending on what is considered the meta.
How is it done? - Simply provide a false believable reasoning and the job is done.
Do I encourage you to do so? - No.
Will it happen? - Yes 100%, since a lot of players hate playing with these heroes.

I can’t go back in time and record these games nor can I provide more proof than I have given. Whether you believe me or not is entirely up to you, this is simply a warning. Either way I’m done with this game. Not because I want to, I love this game, but I would much rather prefer not having to deal with the stress of harrassment from both the support center and the in-game players. And while I’m sure this makes a lot of you happy, I do hope that this message reaches somebody who actually cares about the future of this game.

Edit: it should be mentioned, I have contacted the (eu) support 3x. They all went against company policy.

Edit: I just remembered that I have dc’ed from about 3 games due to bad connection, but the game already punishes me for this. And if this was the issue, support should have simply told me so instead of bending their rules. In the end it basically comes down to eliminating griefers and toxicity, and we can’t do that if we don’t have any form of guidelines (that are final). How are you supposed to improve your behavior when you are being lied to about the issue?

Edit: I fixed some formatting, grammar and spelling mistakes.

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“We have nothing against One Tricks… unless you One Trick a hero that we’ve recently chosen to nerf. Then people might actually report you for that and, y’know, that’s suddenly out of our hands.”

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Well, I just got told off by someone of the forum for telling someone to stop false-reporting people for throwing when they picked any other healer than Mercy…

So, I guess we’re moving towards a “play one of the 8 meta heroes or get banned from playing Overwatch” situation…

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You’re late to the party on this one. Yup due to those players emotional state. You didn’t win for them or they can’t admit their mistakes to adapt. They’ll report you just so they can have some self justice. Overall you created a game where you can play a character and get banned for playing them.

Let’s forget about all the other one trick meta heroes. Off meta heroes aren’t accepted here.

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This just goes to show that the war on toxicity has been a complete failure.

Automated bans are the most ridiculous thing they could have added to combat against toxic people.

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Sadly yes. But the real issue is that they actually don’t have the proof. The support center are lying because they’re so desperate to get real griefers banned. And I can understand that. I can’t find a better solution tbh. But it also means that people like me don’t have a place in this game. I won’t be able to enjoy a match if I’m in constant fear of getting reported.

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fixed the image/links for you!

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thanks
20 characters

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Automated bans just promotes more toxicity, but hey some people think it’s perfectly fine until they get hit by it. Old Blizzard policy was so much better. Hots and WoW still have some dignity in the new policy. Their moderators / game masters are reasonable to chat with.

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If you are unaware of what aspects of your playing is being considered inappropriate, then I recommend you check out available guides for any hero you play so that you can play them effectively and are of help to your team.

This is a combination of banning someone because they were reported for One Tricking, and banning someone because they were reported for “being bad”, which are both things that Blizzard has openly told us they do not ban for. This is ridiculous. They’re not “looking into” these reports, they’re just “justifying” them post-mortem.

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So, the Overwatch team is blatantly lying then? They state that one-tricking is suboptimal but not bannable, but then justify upholding a ban by saying that not switching hero can lead to a ban…

This is so hypocritical, manipulative, disrespectful and disgusting… Shame on you Blizzard!

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careful, they might ban you from the forums for using inappropriate language

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Aye, or simply for talking about this ^^

I’ll check in the morning, i’d say 80-20 odds this is closed or gone :confused:

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Even for silence players you can get a silence for saying cry baby or fool.

Wouldn’t be surprised. Their ruling is very oppressive / obscene.

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watch out.
the mods may get angry with you and they shoot down the thread. (jk, but who knows honestly at this point xDD)

btw, its a shame really :0 off meta is pretty dangerous to pick. ive read that a lot of people have actually quit the game in other media because of this, since gms are often as you posted in your image.
and now they send you emails literally telling you “hey go play comp u hit lvl 25 do it now now now”

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Well, if I allowed myself to bow to the Blizzard regime that rule through fear I would be disrespecting myself…

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You should share it some other place before they take it down then. Will somebody do that for me? I don’t know any other place to post this. This was simply my first thought

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I’ll email you some pizza if it does close. As a guy said on motion pictures. You can’t handle truth!.

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No, they will shut down the thread

As terrible as it is, it’s against the forum CoC to discuss disciplinary actions, and to disclose conversations with GameMasters concerning disciplinary actions. Because you, OP, aren’t a famous streamer or an OWL Pro, this post is against the CoC and they’re gonna shut it down.

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It’s kind of sad and kind of funny, too, because this is Blizzard inadvertently admitting that their ranking system is bad. If a player is One Tricking at a rank, why does Blizzard assume they don’t belong in that rank, exactly?

:thinking:

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