What you’re talking about is a hypothetical and not looking at the real world.
It costs the botters money and time to compete in this arms race.
This is a finite thing, not an infinite hypothetical.
Who has more money, Blizzard and Microsoft, or these botters?
Who has more technical capability in WoW, Blizzard, or the botters?
Who controls the entire game, the code, the development, the infrastructure, the rules, the payment acceptance, all of it? Blizzard, or the botters?
Both of these entities are businesses that if they don’t make a profit they go out of business period.
You absolutely can force them into a position where it isn’t profitable to continue, even if hypothetically they “could” like you’re claiming.
It’s a cute thing to say, but it’s not true in the real world.
I do 100% agree with you tho about the leniency towards gold buyers, if Blizzard aggressively banned those gold buyers and massively reduced the amount of demand by doing that, it can be yet another factor to drive the botting companies to insolvency.
But they don’t, because it’s a choice, not because it’s impossible.