In game communication (/say, /emote/, /yell) not visible to certain players

Support Bug Report
1

Hi.

First of all, I am not sure if this is the correct forum for this. If it’s in the wrong place, that’s not intentional. I’m just trying to figure out what to do.

For the past few weeks, myself and other people have noticed that certain in game communication between certain players is not happening. The testing of myself (based on the reports of many others, and I thank them for that) has shown this:

Assume that there are two players. Vanaelia and friend. Both on the same server. Both with active accounts (these are not trials). Same server, in multiple locations.

  • Vanaelia, can communicate with friend via /say, /emote, and /yell.
  • Friend can use /say, /emote, or /yell. But Vanaelia does not see this displayed on screen. Vanaelia does not even see the animation for friend speaking
  • Vanaelia-alt (level 40s) can communicate with Friend via /say, /emote, and /yell
  • Friend can use /say, /emote, or /yell. Vanaliea-alt can see all of this.

A few people have discovered that if Friend does not have Dragonflight attached to their license? Then that person is unable to be seen by players above a certain level threshold. 61+, I believe…the levels with Dragonflight.

This is obviously a bug. I know some people are a bit skeptical, suggesting that this could be an attempt to get people to purchase the newest expansion. But that doesn’t seem to make sense for a few reasons.

  1. This has not been the case for some…18 years? It makes no sense to start now.
  2. Limiting what people with paid accounts can do without some kind of warning isn’t just low, it feels like it could potentially cause some legal issues down the line.
  3. People can still use freely chat in party, in instances/battlegrounds, and in whispers, and I don’t think Blizzard really wants people to default to whispering strangers. I am on Moon Guard, so…yeah.

I don’t know ‘computers’, but this seems to be tied to WoW: Remix. In the above example, Friend can - and did - level a Remix character to 70. They did this despite not having Dragonflight on their account. I agree with someone’s guess that it had something to do with enabling level 70 for part of an account. Maybe someone forgot to flip a switch, or somethin’.

I have made a few responses to threads in the Bug Report forum, but there’s a reason I’m coming to Customer Support. Which is, honestly, that this feels like something where I’m kind of getting worried. One of the threads about things in the Bug Forum has been open and active since mid May. I haven’t seen any responses there, or anywhere in the bug forums. There was a link to a response in the EU forums, but…I don’t know enough about the differences between how US and EU forums work, in terms of, y’know. Blizzard stuff.

I realize that you guys get a ton of bug reports, and a bunch of things that aren’t really bug reports, and I get it. But for something that’s been going on for this long, I will admit it’s a little bit troubling that I don’t even see any indication that there’s a real awareness of a problem.

I play on an RP realm. Not being able to see /say or /emote isn’t just a small issue, it can be gamebreaking. As I said on another thread, I know at least three people who have multiple accounts that they sometimes use for RP events. They can make a quick character that’s a villian, or a throwaway NPC. I know people do this for larger events. And again, these are not trial accounts.

If people come back to the game (as those other threads mentioned), suddenly finding out that you can’t be heard is the kind of thing that I worry might make them just leave WoW for good. And I hate to see that.

I don’t know what I’m supposed to do, so…I am notifying Customer Support. Thank you.

2

I have seen people talk about this problem in the bug report forum. You are not the only one experiencing this, seems to be that high level/max players can’t see what players without DF say or any emotes they do. I would submit a bug report in-game and maybe post in the thread about it in the bug report forum. Good luck! Hope it gets fixed soon

Edit: here’s the thread I saw

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3

My understanding is that the Bug report forum is often not a 2 way communication forum. They may be working on it but won’t post anything until it can be resolved.

I can imagine that must be very frustrating. You have no idea if anyone is even listening. Personally, I’d something that at least said one of the following ;

We are aware of the problem and are working on it
Or
We are aware of the problem, but do not expect a resolution in the near future.

Or something like that.
Hope it gets fixed soon.

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4

Usually not even then. There’s a reason it’s called the Bug Report forum, and not the Bug Discussion forum.

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5

Oh, absolutely. I’m actually in that linked forum thread.

I agree with this stuff. And normally, I wouldn’t say too much, or worry too much. A small bug is something I’m fine with reporting and just realizing it will likely be handled. Some of my characters hit 45 and can’t use the Dalaran Hearthstone toy, while others can.

That’s annoying, but kind of low on the totem pole. That’s like…eh.

This is one that isn’t one of those “I’ll do another aspect of this”. It’s not “this dungeon is buggy, so I’ll do another.” It’s “I can’t queue for dungeons”. It’s a constant thing that is a drain on a community. Already a few stories have been kind of halted. Another friend is actually taking the time to check out remix, which…she also had to stop, because there’s a bug that stops an essential questline.

I submitted a bug in game. I also responded in the forum. But as the problem is still there? I’m turning to Customer Support. I’m not necessarily thinking they’ll get the ball rolling, as I know different departments do different things, but maybe they’ll say something like “We checked, they’re aware and working on it”, or “We passed along the info to Top. Men.”.

I can deal with it, as I have Dragonflight. And I don’t mind partying to RP, or even bringing a lower level character. But I have read about people just getting back to RP, and trying to get their toes wet. Someone else thought they were being ignored during a major event.

These are people who may not know something is happening on a tech end, and they might think ill of their fellow players, or just the game in general. I hate to see that.

6

As an RPer myself, I’ll have to keep this bug in mind. Yowch!

That particular toy requires the Legion quest to go to Dalaran completed. The one where you actually obtain the toy item on that character. No level requirement.

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7

Haha. You’d think so. But I have characters that have never even touched the starting questline who can use it perfectly fine, and others who cannot. It’s pretty random.

But, yeah. That’s why I don’t think it’s intentional. You can talk in party, raids, whispers, and public channels. But if you don’t have Dragonflight on your account, people who are level 61+ can’t see anything you say, emote, or yell.

8

Thing is you wont get a solutio. Here u would be told to post in the bug forums not the customer support forum whichbis a player to player support forum with blue moderation.

9

Is it?

Forgive me, I am not trying to be combative, or contrarian. I freely admit I don’t understand too much about this aspect of the forums. I likely assumed after skimming a few of the topics (as well as the name of the forum) that it might be a good idea to put this here.

Again, I don’t want to sound like I’m saying “No, I know better than other people”. You’ll note the first thing I said is I don’t know if this is the right forum. I don’t like to cause problems.

But I will keep what you said in mind, and thank you for letting me know. I suppose I’ll see what happens.

10

Feedback or bugs wont be heard by the development team or those that collect information. This is the one forum where it wont be heard hence why bugs is more apropriate.

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11

However, they did say they submitted a bug report and have been following that.

With the number of knowledgeable people that frequent this forum, it isn’t unreasonable for them to post here. The OP is being polite and respectful and didn’t demand or ask for anything to be immediately fixed. I can understand being frustrated and reaching out to see if there is anything they missed.

Sometimes people just want to be heard.

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13

I do thank you for the support. And it appears Darthwraith was correct, as this has been moved to the bug forum.

And, yes. I wasn’t trying to demand a response, or anything like that. It just felt like that was the next logical step. It felt more polite to check with a customer support forum than to post ‘this is still happening’ in the bug forum.

I will confess that sometimes, the proper places to navigate on this forum are not as clear as they should be. Don’t get me wrong, I have no problem abiding by the rules, but it’s not always clear exactly what they are. Or even…how to find them, if I’m being candid.

Thank you to everyone who helped correct me. I just hope this issue ends up being resolved.

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14

I just experienced this bug on WRA. I’d suggested the player affected contact Customer Support and file a bug, and me and a few friends even took steps to rule out it was something native to me (like I whisper the player and find out later it’s someone I ignored’s alt etc.). Nice to see this is getting some exposure. I hope it’s fixed soon and you can get back to the RP Vana. I know what you mean about it being game breaking because for Roleplayers it absolutely is.

15

I can hardly take the credit for discovering this. I have Dragonflight, and it was a friend who I first found out was afflicted. We thought perhaps they were lagging, but then realized that they had been trying to participate in an RP event, and getting…nothing.

It’s just mildly annoying for us (I have lower level alts that hear her say/emote with no problem), but I genuinely worry about people who are returning to the game. They have no idea what’s going on, and might just feel like they’re getting ignored. Which, you know.

Sucks.