Is it agaisnt the rules to pay real money for arena coaching?

I asked a gm who said that he wasn’t sure and that it was a grey area. Some of the these websites offer arena carries, and I know that is probably against the rules, but a few sites offer arena coaching from professional pvp players. So is it against the rules doing unranked and learning to play from professionals. I stepped into an arena on my pally, for the first time ever (been playing off and on for years) got focused down and died. The druid I was paired with told me I was utter trash and should probably stick to questing. I really want better gear on some of my characters but raiding is way too out of my skill level, especially on melee. I do mythic 10s with my guild but its more of a pity carry than anything else.

As long as they aren’t logging in your account and doing stuff for you, or no money changes hands for in-game items, it should be meh.

I see no reason why that would be allowed and selling runs for real money is breaking the terms of service.

I wouldn’t go near it.

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In that instance, you’re paying someone to clear content for you.

This situation seems more like paying for helping them to clear content on their own. There may be a difference.

I wouldn’t think so O.o if it’s just IRL and they’re not carrying you or controlling your character, I don’t see this would be against the rules. It’s like getting lessons for a instrument you’re learning.

Edit: never mind missed the part of them carrying you :joy: yes that would break the rules.

If they’re doing the sort of coaching where they review your videos and tell you what you should do differently, that sounds like it ought to be fine.

I don’t want a carry. I want the arena titles and gear myself from earning it. Also I am not paying real money for carries. You can do carries legally by buying wow tokens, selling them, getting gold and asking for carries for gold. But that is stupid, and is generally what is wrong with this younger generation of gamers. All rewards and no risk.

Most of these “coaching” services are just selfplays for cash, which are definitely against the rules. If you got caught they’d take your achievements (or glad mount if you go that far) at the very least. You might not get hit with the 30 day ban that account sharing does, but it’s still against the rules.

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Yea sending someone a vod to watch should be fine because it’s outside the game. I would still be pretty nervous about that too tbh.

Some general rules of thumb.

Paying gold for anything in-game is fine. Even if that’s something like a Gladiator Carry, or Mythic Azshara carry.

Paying real life money for anything in-game is against the rules. HOWEVER, there is no way for Blizzard to enforce you paying for an out-of-game advantage, like professional coaching.

Carries are explicitly defined as “self-play”, where you play your character, even if you’re just sitting at the entrance or die at the start of the boss encounter and contribute nothing to the kill. If someone plays your account for whatever reason, it is no longer a carry, and is now considered a “pilot” which is explicitly against the rules.

OP’s situation would fall under the second one, in that paying money for a coaching service to learn how to improve their gameplay is fine, though it’s a grey area in that Blizzard can’t and won’t intervene if you get scammed, unlike a white area (like buying a carry for gold) or a black area (like buying a carry for RL cash) in that they will intervene in the former if you get scammed, and intervene in the second one by banning you both.

At the same time, Blizzard isn’t dumb. It is definitely still possible for them to ban you for a selfplay, even if you think it’s untraceable. At least in PvP, anyway.

Yeah, but if we’re operating the assumption that it’s a legit coaching session, in that they don’t play your account and ONLY give you information and coaching on how to improve (like log and vod reviews), that’s perfectly fine.

Blizzard just won’t intervene if you get scammed.

Legit coaching in unrated content is going to be pretty hard to find. Like I said, for PvP most “coaching” is just a set number of hours doing arena with a booster (or 2, for 3s). I’m sure there are some legit places out there that will do what you’re talking about, but I don’t think that is what the OP found tbh.

If you have to ask, then you probably shouldn’t do it.

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Yeah, chances are the person OP found isn’t legit, and I’d recommend simply checking out class discords if you’re interested in improving yourself.

But I do feel like the rules should be clearly elaborated.

Buying any ingame services, including carries, for real life money is actually against the EULA.