Is the Retail WoW token change EU only? - FIXED

Community General Discussion
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Being a UK player, I don’t have a fully-paid sub on US realms to check, but Studen Albatross posted a video this morning (and much chatter on WoW Economy Discord channel) to highlight that there’s been an unannounced change to the WoW token in Retail. We can no longer use it to add to Battle Net balance, only to purchase a 6 month sub. The support pages have (yet) to be updated to reflect this change.

Is this region-specific, or has this been implemented in the US too?

Does anyone know the reason for making this change? Is it excessive botting activity/RMT (as the token price is back up to 345K)? Is it a bug?

EDIT: Blizzard Customer Services have confirmed via Twitter that it is indeed a bug

EDIT #2: People on Discord now reporting it has been fixed and European players can once again use a token to add to their Battle Net Balance.

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I’m from the EU, too, but haven’t heard of that… So I dunno, sry. :person_shrugging:

However, I can say that I have also noticed that there are an extremely high number of bots active. I am on a highly populated realm, as it is referred to, but the trade chat is almost exclusively used by bots now.

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I mean you posted the video that has the answer to the question you ask.

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Since it was unannounced my guess is its an EU WoW Bug or EU WoW change only. US is still the same. Blizzard would not make a change like this without some type of announcement. My Money is on Bug. Id also be willing to be the YouTuber KNOWS its a bug but is using it to his advantage to get views and make $$. Nothing Grants views like making people mad/drama

But who knows they could make a post on it today. US is unaffected none the less

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Going to assume bug as its fine here on the U.S. and Oce realms. Wouldn’t surprise me if it was to become a thing though as the conversion to bnet balance is how we RMT inside the blizz tos.

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Same. Like I said above Im also betting Youtuber knows it. Cant blame him for using it to milk views. Thats Free $$

The last wow token change we knew about months in advance. I cant see them making a change like this without an announcement

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Something differant Cooperbrew

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That was back in November. This is happening now, and also impacting players who have paid subs (and got the mount for it).

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See my comment above Coopers. Im 99% sure thats the answer. I dont know EU laws but Im pretty sure since it involves money and an item players can use for currency on their Bnet that Blizzard would HAVE to announce a change like this in advance

The Youtuber is just milking views. So he has to sell it

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Are you at you bnet balance cap?

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More measured response to the situation on Wowhead.
(Studen was the first to bring it to my attention, hence giving him the credit for it).

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The Wowhead author stated its most likely also a bug. But if you read the article you can see that it was clearly written in a way to inflame people and generate views for themselves. Pretty much every outlet is going to milk this to get views before blizzard has a chance to respond. Why wouldn’t they? I mean it’s their job and it generates profit

Like I said I’m pretty sure a change like this they would legally have to announce in advance since it does involve real money. At least in the US they would. I’m not an expert on EU laws and I know next to nothing about them

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Only being able to use it for gametime would drastically tank the value of tokens, they massively spike around releases for other Blizzard games for a reason.

If this were a change designed to be in compliance with EU laws, surely they would have written a statement about it right?

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Nah they can unilaterally decide to switch stuff like that.
Nothing says that they have to give you balance for gold.

This might be temporary if anything but like the token changes in Argentina they could push changes really quick without telling you before. As far as I understand with the value changing for the sub you need 3 token in Argentina to get 30 days of playtime nowadays. They didn’t tell people before it happened so they could couldn’t cash 1 token for 1 sub.

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It may be because microsoft had to make so many concessions in Europe to get the purchase through.

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While it would be nice to hope this is a bug, I’m really thinking this may be a permanent change come maintence today we’ll also get an official announcement. Would love to be wrong as I think this is a particularly nasty change to just drop on players unannounced and wouldn’t be a change I support regardless.

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Pretty neat bug, it even changes the tooltip… yeah doesnt feel like a bug to me. Rip eu folks.

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You’re probably right I tend to by default give the benefit of Doubt but then again I have to realize things are not what they used to be. Companies are going to do what’s in their best interest regardless of how many of their own customers they hurt

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I think it would be okay - I was expecting microsoft to make changes to this. People who want to buy gold though might want to do it before maintenance.