I’ve been playing since TBC - off and on over the last few years. But the announcement of SoD lit a fire in me that I hadn’t felt since I was a kid playing this game. I admit that I would stay up for a couple days at a time because I was having so much fun.
As the subject states, I’m being accused of hacking and/or botting. The only programs I ever have running while wow is open are spotify, curse, discord, chrome. Nothing else. I’d send my PC in to prove it if I could. The email says the decision was careflly reviewed. But I’ve reported several bots myself, and I can’t begin to understand how “carefully” my account could have been reviewed if you actually put me in that category of player. I have been playing for 16 years on this account alone. I have never done anything wrong in this game, and it really sucks that you have two decades of data supporting how long people play this game and still manage to accidentally perma ban REAL people and make them beg to come back.
Yeah, I still want to play. But there should be a sense of urgency relative to something like how long an account has been paying your company, either in responses or in making these types of “final” decisions.
Edit: I apologize for the frustration regarding giving veteran players the benefit of the doubt, yeah some people change. But I dont think every scenario should be guilty until proven innocent. When I read:
“Our support staff will not overturn these closures and may not respond to appeals”
I felt pretty betrayed. I’ve invested so much into this game to just be swept under the rug by mistake, and told I’m responsible for my account being banned no matter what it was. Of course I was livid. I understand most of these probably aren’t false but this situation is 100% unfair to me, regardless of interpretation. Thanks to all who gave feedback and sources. Whatever happens - I’ll remember the good times way more than this oversight that’s out of my hands.
I am sorry, but how long someone has played, or how much money they spend, has no bearing on decisions made by the hacks team. If an account is flagged as participating in cheating then the account is actioned the same as any other in accordance with current policy.
Hacking/cheating can be a lot of things. Exploiting a bug in game, automating anything - including skill rotations, multiboxing using any software or hardware to streamline it, actual hands off bots, etc.
If you feel that this was done in error, your only option is to appeal until they tell you they will penalize your Bnet account if you keep going.
One of the things that makes their support department so standout is that no player has any priority over another.
Everyone is treated on the same footing-- new people that started just yesterday will not stay unhelped indefinitely because people that started a week, month, or even year before them keep putting in tickets.
That aside, posting here will not help in any way with appealing the decision. You’ll need to follow the instructions that should have been provided in the email you got.
Okay, but upon review I know for a fact that none of the things you stated are true for my account. I find it very hard to believe that a thorough review was done. But I’m forced to wait days, or longer, to hear what flagged my account. I mentioned the length of my time on this only account as a symbol of good conduct and trust. I didn’t mean to come across as demanding some sort of privelege. It’s very disheartening considering nothing I do is out of the ordinary except for my played time. And that only makes it worse considering it just sounds like I’m being falsely punished for being one of the most passionate players.
Yes, I’ve put in a ticket. But I’m unable to play the game. Nobody has responded to the ticket. This forum says that it’s moderated by customer support at blizzard. I’m going to use every avenue that I can, considering I want to play the game. If nothing else this should be viewed as feedback for whoever is looking at REAL peoples’ accounts and doing this.
The blues here ain’t part of the appeals team, they have no sway or input of what may or may not happened with someone’s account. All you can do, when your ticket is at the front of the line, is wait.
Correct. A banned account can not play the game. That is intentional.
This forum serves as an Information Desk. It helps folks navigate the Support ticket system, find Knowledge Base articles on issues, explain policies, etc. The Blues here are Forum Support Agents, not GMs. They have no role at all in taking tickets, processing appeals, etc.
What can be done here is to make sure you understand the appeals process and have submitted a ticket correctly.
Tickets go into a queue for CS that includes ALL Blizzard games and services. Depending on the number of tickets it can be a few days to get a reply. Sometimes they even have an automated one first directing people to other resources, and a second ticket is needed. Just depends on the volume.
I’ll just reply by reiterating that this should be used as feedback for the review team holding peoples’ accounts hostage over false accusations, if nothing else. You’re right, it doesn’t matter that I’ve invested nearly 2 decades into this game, but it should matter from every players’ perspective and even the people responsible. They should maybe do even more careful reviews or look for something giving a false positive.
Thank you for the clarification though. It’s just disheartening that I’m left at the mercy of a queue over this when I’m seeing similar posts of people who just get ignored and denied an opportunity to speak.
I can try and explain a bit more. It really does not matter how long a person played or how much money they spend. Nor should it. If an account is flagged for cheating then paying more money, or playing longer, should not be a “get out of jail free” card.
I know you mean that if you never did anything wrong before why would you start! That a clean account is not likely to start cheating. They understand that, but sadly people do change and sometimes they make very poor decisions about how to play their account.
The other more common thing that happens is that accounts get compromised and the bad guys bot/cheat/sell gold/advertise, etc. This is especially prevalent on older accounts that are inactive and covered in cobwebs. The account holder is not as likely to notice someone is in it. A good reason to always keep an Authenticator on an account and never to use the same password as used on another service!
If an account compromise is proven Blizz does return the account to the account holder and lift the penalty.
SPECULATION AHEAD
Blizzard does not share their detection methods or procedures. However, from what they have publicly posted in the past there are some assumptions that can be made.
They get reports and intel on cheating methods, programs, scripts, etc. They research those to figure out how they work, what the signature characteristics are, etc.
When they have that all figured out, they deploy detection mechanisms. That flags accounts that meet the signature criteria for that ban wave.
Accounts are double checked to verify that the account was flagged and did meet the criteria.
However - if there is an error in the detection criteria it can falsely flag accounts that were not involved in wrong doing. That can take some time for the Hacks team to sort out, and often first line appeals to CS are upheld. Then Hacks realizes where the false flags happened and does a group un-ban on that portion who were falsely flagged. They also send an email and apologize.
Something else that can happen depending on the circumstances, is a perma ban being downgraded to a Suspension when someone appeals. I have no idea what criteria the team uses to make that decision though. Probably case by case basis.
This forum is unique in that absolutely no staff comes to this forum beyond our SFAs. Due to that, that means no GMs come here, no Devs come here, no Community Managers, QA or any other staff - none of them come here. So your feedback is only being seen by us, your fellow players. We obviously cannot do anything with it. And our SFAs don’t relay it along, as there are other proper venues for it.
Since it’s in regards to account/disciplinary actions, it doesn’t belong on the forums at all. It is best given when tickets are marked as resolved, or if you absolutely cannot wait for those, it can be sent through the in-game suggestion and feedback interface. You don’t need a paid account to submit feedback. A free trial account has the same functionality.
I remember vividly sitting on hold for hours to speak to someone regarding a suspension and loss gametime, had 3 days gametime refunded for the name suspension. This took hours… But they did it. This was forever ago though.
Not just Blizzard, but majority of companies moved away from inhouse game/account support via phone. I get technology advances but I work in tele communications for logistics and so far all these companies I see moving away from the human aspect don’t last very long or just end up being a shell of a company ran by AI.
you are right, i spoke to them once when my account was hacked and had to send a photo of my ID years ago to verify. lol the last harasser deleted his comment bc of my reply gg
A template answer does not mean it was a bot. Most businesses use template responses to common questions. It saves time and ensures customers get the same information. An appeal is just to have another person look at the logs, confirm the correct action is taken, uphold/reduce/reverse the account action. Every appeal is done by a different person.
Yes, game time refunds can be done through the phone system. Both then and now. Appeals have never been done through the phone system.
There not gona tell you exactly what triggered it i can garuntee u that they never do its to avoid players trying to lawyer up. And i can gareuntee u none of ur responses were automated despite what bho is claiming is 100% false the only thing thats 100% automated is the squelch.
I know you said that you only use add-ons from Curse.
Some software can ping Warden even if it’s not being used for WoW. AutoHotKey is a familiar culprit, for instance. Some folks use it for work or other means, but it just existing on your computer is enough to trigger the system with it being capable of automating gameplay. Just something else to offer as to what might have triggered the sanction.
Please do keep at it with the appeals - at least until the time comes where you are warned that no more appeals will be accepted.
I will also add - while I absolutely believe gametime compensation should be given automatically for people who end up having sanctions overturned/were incorrectly sanctioned, I’ve yet to come across a situation where someone who has asked for the time lost credited to their account end up being denied it. So if your ban is reversed, by all means. Please do ask for the gametime lost to be credited for the inconvenience.
Unfortunately, that was a large part of why the phone service went away. People were using it for reasons it wasn’t meant for, and that was if you actually got through to a person. I used it once in my years of playing, and that was to help my younger brother get his account unlocked after a hack. I think it took me three or four days of sitting on hold for long periods of time before I actually got a person who could help him get situated.