I was buying that 564 stuff off a full server right at the start for below cost - it wouldn’t be below cost now but it sure was then. I have bought some 564s for less than 100g.
And I went and looked at Booty Bay and 3 people there - 2 80s and one 73.
Well, that’s fair, but that was right at the start, which was months ago, and it’s not months ago anymore. And the behavior that I’ve been seeing hasn’t been going on for months, but started only maybe a month and a half ago, after the prices for max level boe crafting gear have dropped substantially.
If somebody scooped up a bunch of crafting gear (and by bunch, I mean a metric ton of it, given what I’ve seen on my server and the number of identical toons I see at Booty Bay) for dirt cheap at the start of the expansion, why would they wait until months into the expansion to flip the stuff when the in game economy has stagnated and prices have fallen to a fraction of their earlier highs? And why would they need multiple accounts to flip the stuff (see my edited post above)?
I just don’t think it can be both ways at once—that, on one hand, a player is savvy enough at the wow economy to know to scoop up tons of underpriced max-level boe crafting equipment at the start of the expansion, but on the other hand, they wait months into the expansion to sell the stuff and when they do, they aren’t savvy enough to pay attention to the prices they are reselling it for. And furthermore, they are doing this on multiple accounts.
Per Occam’s razor, I think the simpler explanation is automation, especially given how much almost every other aspect of the game has been botted.
But don’t take my word for it. Spend a few minutes at the Booty bay auction house between 3pmish and 3amish and tell me what you see.
People who don’t care about gold that much may have bought the stuff and then forgotten they had it. I have gold and gear all over now myself and some of those characters I haven’t logged in for months.
Again, that could be true, but why would you not care about gold enough to sell it on multiple accounts comprised of identical toons who behave in identical ways day in and day out? This just isn’t the way that people who don’t care about making gold behave. But it is the way that people who care about making gold through automation behave.
I am very doubtful someone using automation is going to log in once an hour - that sounds like a player to me.
If it was one toon who logged in once an hour, I would agree, that’s probably not botting, because that’s what I do on my AH toons.
But again, spend some time in Booty Bay between 3pmish and 3amish server (Eastern time for me).
It’s not just one toon that logs in once an hour. It’s a sequence of identical toons from the same four Area-52 guilds who log in following more or less the same sequence, one after the other, for 12-14 hour shifts. And it’s just not one account, its multiple accounts of identical toons who have been following the same pattern for the past month and a half.
And I’m not the only one who has witnessed it. A poster above mentioned seeing the same exact thing.
You keep saying, it could be this or it could be that. And, yes, it could be all of those things. But it could also be automation.
If there are bots then they should be removed from the game.
All add-ons regardless of purpose should be removed. Only add-ons provided by WOW should be allowed. That would give everyone the same options.
AH should be returned to how it was originally designed. If players can’t figure out how to play it then don’t play it. Keep it simple.
I dont have a problem with AH and i made over 1 mil
This is indeed an issue. I don’t play retail atm, but in Classic I have seen at least one for sure. I was selling fish on the AH for 50 gold less than others, and the fish would instantly sell the split second I posted it. This is not a normal reaction speed. No human can buy something that fast. I put up like 15 or 20 stacks of these fish, and this one guy bought over half of it within a fraction of a second.
For everyone saying that they’re just using an add-on, they are very clearly botting. Only an automated program could purchase items off the AH the very millisecond that it’s posted.
I totally get it. It has been frustrating to see bots running rampant for the past few months without any noticeable action being taken. I understand that detecting and dealing with these bots is an ongoing battle, but the lack of visible effort to curb their impact on the game is concerning.
It’s always a “cat and mouse” game, but at this point, it feels like the mouse is winning. I really hope that with the next patch, we see a strong push to address this issue, whether through a ban wave or more proactive anti-bot measures. Bots not only disrupt the economy but also ruin the experience for legitimate players, and it’s important that Blizzard shows they’re actively working to protect the integrity of the game, like they have been with other aspects.
You don’t even have to go this far. Just make it so people can’t cancel so much as they do now.