“Player Protection & WoW Tokens: A Costly Lesson from In-Game Service Scams”
Hello everyone,
I wanted to share a recent, frustrating experience and offer some constructive feedback on how player protections could be improved for the in-game service economy that Blizzard supports.
Recently, I was scammed out of 2,500,000 gold while trying to purchase a mythic raid carry—a service traded for gold, which is permitted by the rules. I reported the players, and I’m very grateful to the GMs who took swift action against their accounts.
However, my primary concern is the lack of protection for the victim. I was informed that the gold could not be restored, which I understand is the current policy. The issue is that this wasn’t just in-game currency; it represented a significant real-world financial investment through the WoW Token system.
Let’s break down the real cost:
A WoW Token is $20 and converts to roughly 260,000 gold on the auction house.
My loss of 2,500,000 gold equates to over 9 and a half tokens, costing me approximately $190 .
With a monthly subscription costing about $15 , that amount of money could have paid for over a year of game time.
Since Blizzard has created and endorsed a system where players can convert real money into gold to purchase in-game services, there’s an implicit trust that this ecosystem should be safe. When that trust is broken by scammers, the financial and emotional cost to the player is immense. Simply banning the scammer, while necessary, doesn’t address the harm done to the victim who engaged with a sanctioned system in good faith.
I believe there’s a need for a more robust system to protect these transactions. Perhaps an official in-game trading UI for services, similar to the auction house, or a temporary escrow system where gold is held until the service is complete.
I love this game and am happy to support it financially. I just hope Blizzard will consider implementing stronger safeguards to protect the investments of its players.
Since Blizzard does condone buying carries and supports it to a degree by creating a channel to facilitate it, I do think that it would be reasonable for them reimburse players in these situations if there is sufficient evidence and clear proof of what happened, to ensure that players aren’t then scamming the system.
I don’t think Blizzard is obligated to do this, but I think it would be a simple good thing to do on their end since they encourage the activity for their own profit.
I actually really appreciate the thought and effort that went into this post. I mean that sincerely. There was indeed a time where, when confirmed, Blizzard would often return a player’s gold if scammed.
Unfortunately, this seemed to have led to the increase in players using illicit gold to perform the same ‘purchases’. Which is why I’ve selected the section of your post below;
Fact of the matter is that, many players (not implying this is you by any means) still participate in purchasing gold obtained outside of the token system. This means that they’re supporting account thefts and criminal activities from these ‘purchases’.
In the past year or so, Blizzard has moved more towards punishing the scammer(s) and not returning the gold as a way to deter such sales.
I’m not too sure how they would implement a system that punishes those who use illicit gold versus those who use legitimately obtained gold. Note that, even more recently, Blizzard has also started taking action on players who accept illicit gold, knowingly or not, again in an attempt to reduce the volume of people buying or accepting dirty-gold in-game.
I think that your post still provides some great points to think about though and I’m sorry that you fell for a scam.
I also greatly appreciate that you’re taking the high-road here in accepting your own responsibility while providing constructive suggestions instead of raging on the forums about it.
As such, please accept the following free (and fictitious) items: /hands over a fresh barrel of coffee…currently gnome free* /places out a batch of TimBits…with the chocolate glazed ones mysteriously missing
*Note: I take no responsibility for any Gnomes found in the coffee after brewing it
Could a personal transaction tracker solve this problem for players and for Blizzard?
I’m assuming Blizzard already has at least some of this data. It seems to me that a record of exactly where all the gold came from and where it’s going would make it easier to identify the original sources of all the gold.
I’m probably underestimating how monumental a task this would still be to sort through though. Customer service would probably be flooded with requests to identify the source of gold to restore.
My concern would be that if they did agree to hand gold over to people who were scammed, clever and dishonest people could possibly come up with a way to play that system to get free gold. I’m not smart (or devious) enough to figure out how it could be done, but I’d surprised if some evil masterminds out there couldn’t.
What might be an interesting idea is if Tokens were able to be traded between players. If they could be, and they had some form of time delay on them, then it would be much harder for things like the OP’s problem to be done because there would be time for the player to contact a Token hotline and report being scammed. The Token could then be bounced back to the player. A 24 hour delay (similar to what happens when transferring to another bank) would make ingame transactions a lot safer. And it should be against the game rules to trade gold for carries, which would continue to be unsupported as well as against the game rules and which was punishable.
As long as Blizzard was able to confirm logs regarding the deal made for the token, it would be easy for them to check. Just one idea.
The system is to trade money for gold. The system is not designed to purchase in game boosts. It’s for players like myself that don’t have the free time to grind good to play the game like for raiding mats and consumables. Or for players who grind good to be able to convert gold to bnet balance and game time.
Blizzard also does not offer in game services like raid carries so you’re not going to have any protections against those going bad.
It’s pretty well known you buy carries at your own risk.
Thank you for articulating that so well. You’ve hit on the key point perfectly.
While you’re right that Blizzard may not be contractually “obligated” to reimburse players, it certainly feels like a moral obligation when they directly profit from the WoW Token sales that enable this entire system. As you said, it would simply be a “good thing to do” and would build a lot of trust with the community.
A policy of reimbursing players with clear proof would be a massive improvement over the current situation. Ideally, a proactive system like a secure trade UI would be even better, as it would prevent the scam from happening in the first place. But your suggestion is an excellent and realistic step in the right direction.
Thank you so much for the kind words and especially for the detailed, sincere reply. The historical context you provided is incredibly valuable and sheds a lot of light on why the current policy exists.
That makes perfect sense, and I completely understand why Blizzard would take a hard-line stance to combat illicit RMT. It’s a huge problem that hurts the game and its players. You’ve actually highlighted something that I think makes the case for a secure trading system even stronger.
An official, in-game UI for services would be the ultimate tool to fight illicit gold in this specific area. It would create a clear, legitimate, and safe channel for these transactions. Players using legitimately obtained gold (from farming or Tokens) would flock to the safe, official system. This would, in turn, isolate the illicit sellers and make their operations much more obvious to Blizzard. It effectively separates the “clean” economy from the “dirty” one.
Right now, the legitimate player and the illicit gold user are both forced into the same unsafe, unsupported gray market. A secure system would give legitimate players the protection they deserve while simultaneously making it harder for those using illicit gold to hide.
Thank you again for the fantastic feedback and for helping me think through the issue on a deeper level. And I’ll gladly take the coffee and Timbits! I’ll be sure to keep an eye out for any gnomes. Cheers!
As long as Blizzard openly endorses services by having an in-game services chat channel, then they absolutely should be stepping in to restore scammed gold. To not do so is very disingenuous and lazy.
I have a HUGE problem with this, to be very honest.
I traded a set piece from LFR for 5k gold last week. If that was illegal gold, I would be banned for literally doing nothing but playing the game normally.
I get the reasoning behind it, as you said to try to stem the amount of illegal gold in the ecosystem, but being punished for literally doing nothing wrong is bunk.
This just tells me that I should not be engaging in trades with any player at all. Also, does that work in the AH? Like if someone buys all my leather that I just spent 5 hours grinding, and I get a few k gold, do I get banned if that gold is illegal, even though I have no onus in who buys said leather?
I very much dislike the idea of buying carries, and find those that sell these services highly cringy. I actually feel bad for the dupes that purchase them; So much desperation, and so little self-respect.
It should be against ToS, imo. The producers of WoW must be making a lot of money from it.
Things sold through the AH are protected. If you traded the item with a level 1 character instead of selling it on the AH…that’s sketchy these days. Yes, in the past it would have been totally normal. Now though…
Personally, I wouldn’t engage in any sort of un-supported trade/service as I value my account…but to each their own.
But the trade function is by definition a supported function. Trading is part and parcel to MMOs, without it, you have Destiny 2.
Nobody should be punished for unknowingly interacting with a gold buyer. Imagine if they did that for boosting? Oh, you grouped with a person that was boosted illegally trough RMT. Sorry, but your banned too.
Well, at least I know the AH is protected against that. I just wont be using the Trade function ever again, which is sad, because I like going around handing stuff out to people. If I trade a battle pet and someone puts in a copper piece, im donzo.
It’s odd to me that they can see you got scammed and action the other persons account, yet don’t restore the gold.
They can see what happened and just choose not to return the gold. This is the main reason I’ve never tried to buy a carry. I don’t want to get scammed and have Blizzard sit there and do nothing about it.
