Blizzard Recouped My Gold

Support Customer Support
1

Title says it all.

I was recently suspended being accused of purchasing gold. Here is a little back story.

The email that was sent to me, coupled with the explanation from the blue post on these customer support forums leads me to believe that one of several things determine wether or not you get a suspension, as well as if they take your gold. However, none of these points are clear at all on the ToS.

  1. If you do a death roll with any toon who has been associated with the purchasing or selling of gold = account suspended.
  2. If you preform a craft and receive a tip via the in game crafting system with some one who has been associated with the purchasing or selling of gold = account suspension
  3. If you sale anything in trade chat with anyone who has been associated with the purchasing or selling of gold = account suspension.
  4. If you part take in a carry run with someone who has been associated with the purchasing or selling of gold = account suspension.
  5. If someone over pays you for an item this can lead to suspicious activity = account suspended.
  6. If trade any amount of gold to someone under the level of 20 = account suspended

The list goes on but more or less the issue is blizzard has absolutely zero way to prove you did anything wrong other then saying, “hey, we don’t like how you acquired the gold, and because we don’t like it we are going to suspended your account though we can’t prove you did anything wrong.”

Even once that decision is made the customer service all but falls apart by generic responses which make you feel more like you are speaking to someone who doesn’t overly understand the English language, then like a valued customer.

Even once you speak to someone in the 2 days it takes to get to someone, it’s hardly a conversation.

In my example I received an email saying they were suspending my account for purchasing gold ( which I didn’t do ), when I appealed it, the gm said I was in fact not suspended for purchasing gold, but instead i was suspended for illicit activity in a game I have never player, Overwatch.

Now several people I game with said the appeal status ticket is an automated service, however what happened above proves it’s not because a ai or robotic program would have been more clear and correct and not flip flop across totally different games, leave me to question how or why I even got suspended.

Needless to say they closed the appeal ticket and said they would not respond to any further tickets.

That’s customer service for you from Blizzard.

Fast forward my 14 days were up yesterday, I log in to find three of my 6 toons had their gold removed.

The amount removed was grotesque, leaving 3 item level 650+ character with literally 0 gold. I understand they warned me in their email that they would be removing the gold they said I earned through “suspicious” activity.

But you would think as someone who runs 8-10keys, completes all weekly quests on 5 toons once a week, sales the loot I don’t need from the weekly quests to the vendor, also raiding on several of the 5 toons a week and vendors any trash I get, coupled with delves that there is no way they could claim all the gold ON THREE TOONS was achieved suspiciously.

I also buy wow tokens. Heck yesterday I bought 3 just so those toons would have some money to do transmogs. Which means if I interact with anyone via any of the methods above they will suspend my account, take my gold EVEN THOUGH I HAVE THE RECEIPTS TO PROVE I BOUGHT WOW TOKENS. Meanwhile blizzard has zero proof other than they claim something is suspicious.

This is also from someone who buys every transmog on the wow shop, I sometimes gift friends mounts or promotional items. And while sometimes I do gift people items sometime they give me money/gold to pay for things.

While I understand blizzard is providing a service, hurting their customers whom pay not only a monthly sub, but also pay for transmogs, gifts for people, and purchase wow tokens all because they want to see the game be successful is counter productive.

At this point what is done is done. However I would greatly appreciate it if you returned at least some of the gold you stole. If any one that matters reads this and can take a look at my account and truly believe something suspicious was going on then keep that gold, explained to me what I did wrong specifically not generally speaking…… but to just take all the gold even though these characters I have aren’t fresh 80ies they have time dedicated to each of them meaning obviously not all the gold on them was acquired even remotely suspiciously.

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Your previous thread here:

The gold in question is not owned by you but by Blizzard. Becoming a money mule (e.g. through laundering gold) is considered a banworthy offense.

That is correct, an appeal is a means for a new GM to take a fresh look at their evidence against you. If there is no doubt, an upheld template will be sent.

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3

Small change to your title - and yes, yes we did.

If we find someone receiving illicit gold, it’s going to be removed.

You’ve presented a laundry list of things, but what gets our attention is when a player deals directly with an exploitive account. Typically on a very low level character being used to distribute said gold.

This wasn’t a small amount of gold, Thugbug. Certainly not something you shouldn’t have noticed.

Gold sellers ‘make’ their money through hurting players and the game. They steal and strip accounts, they bot, they exploit, they scam, they even steal back from their ‘customers’ if given the opportunity. These outfits have also been known to be heavily involved in credit card and identity theft. They are not safe to deal with.

If there was no demand, they would go away. They aren’t here for anything but the cash they can extract. This isn’t a ‘victimless’ crime, and all too often the victim ends up being the very people doing business with them.

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That is probably because the TOS is very short and covers only transaction related topics. It does not cover the game rules and has not for over a decade. The main document we agree to is a contract called the End User License Agreement (EULA).

They prohibit ALL real money trading activities. There really is no need to list them separately, any more than “no stealing” needs to list every thing you can’t steal IRL.

Here is the section C. iii. on RMT (bold emphasis mine):

Prohibited Commercial Uses: Exploit, in its entirety or individual components, the Platform for any purpose not expressly authorized by Blizzard, including, without limitation (i) playing the Game(s) at commercial establishments (subject to Section 1.B.v.3.); (ii) gathering in-game currency, items, or resources for sale outside of the Platform or the Game(s); (iii) performing in-game services including, without limitation, account boosting or power-leveling, in exchange for payment;

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If only the gold was taken away, you should consider yourself very lucky. Blizzard is well within their rights to permaban anyone who participates in RMT.

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Take this as a learing life lesson. I will only play version of the game i can buy tokens to get gold. Not worth messing with gold sellers.

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Source

If it’s a one off and obviously something outside of your control in what is STANDARD gameplay interactions? That’s looked into. Something wholly accidental is less likely going to throw up massive flags but repeated contact with the same questionable accounts or involving large amounts of gold? Red flags.

Unsupported, just like the death rolls. It’s a risky venture for everyone. Buyers can be cheated out of the run they paid for, sellers can receive dirty gold and earn themselves a vacation.

That’s bull if done through the AH. The game of selling high, buying low is part of a free market that the AH is. Just veering into hyperbole now.

If you do unsupported activities, you open yourself up to sanctions. You have to be smart of how you deal with things in-game and who you associate with.

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While the AH is generally fine, there are some shenanigans that, coupled with illicit gold, will absolutely get you actioned. Like selling vendor cheese for 2m gold kind of obvious misuse

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Although technically accurate, that isn’t a helpful response to someone inquiring about an account action, primarily because it doesn’t further the player’s understanding of their situation.

It’s really just a tagline that references the fact that Blizzard owns the Battlenet accounts.

EDIT: The post I replied to was removed.

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You are missing the biggest point.

Blizzard zeroed out 3 toons who are accomplished characters meaning they craft, run weeklies, delves, 8 - 10+ mythic keys. You would think some of that gold which you say was gotten suspiciously would have included some of the gold from doing the above activities.

Mythics drop what like 100 gold a run, plus if you get loot, roughly every other key, each piece of loot sales for 70 gold, plus the weeklies and dailies equal what about 2k a week. World boss is like another 300-400 gold. Daily quests range from like 50-100 gold. You can do the math. The point is in no world should all of my gold on three toons been zeroed out period. You took at least some gold which was earned in what you would say is creditable ways.

As far as your response about hacking and the economy and hurting players. Do you mean to argue the cost of the wow token doesn’t inflate value of the gold? Look at all the scripts running on all the websites associated with wow. Wowhead, archongg, Murloc io, raider io……. The list goes on. To say these sights are trust worthy is a stretch, and blizzard clearly sanctions all of the above. They live stream race to world first and condone it.

Meanwhile the people that find exploits largely go unpunished.

I’m getting off topic. The WHOLE POINT is that even in a world where I got the gold in what you say is a suspicious manner, I would not have ended up with zero gold on three toons, because those toons have participated in in games activities which would have earned them gold in some way.

And all of this is proven data look at the last 6 weeks my vaults are full every week, at the end of last season I sold all of my vault tokens, old crest are converted to gold. Now I have zero gold even though I should have a bit more than that just off in-game activities.

Let’s get into specifics.

My shaman was created the end of season 1 dragon flight, I have completed almost the entire main story and side quests on him. I have also for more than a year now filled my vault with keys nearly every week.

My warlock was started towards the end of season 1ish. Same thing on vaults

My warrior was started dragon flight season 4 ( I think ) same thing on vaults.

By the end of season 1 war within most of the characters I play were near max item level which means I sale loot they all get to the vendor.

Had you left me with a couple 100k gold I wouldn’t have posted, but you guys literally took all my gold. Which clearly showed either you guys don’t know how much gold I got suspiciously, or you guys were just wrong just like me playing overwatch.

And thanks for changing the title, but you guys did 100% steal at least some of my gold.

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What they will attempt to remove is what you received.

That is what was done.

Tokens come from the pool of gold players have. It’s not manufactured by multi-billion dollar cartels out of essentially thin air by exploitive means. If it is, those accounts get caught up with as well by other actions.

And yes, receiving 2 million gold from a level 10 is certainly suspicious under the best of circumstances - and this wasn’t the best of circumstances.

Just for those that may find this thread and be curious. Buying gold then spending it, or trying to redistribute it really doesn’t help.

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