Yes, botters will use the 58 boost

WoW Classic Cataclysm Classic Discussion
21

There are a number of people who truly don’t believe boosting will matter on the botting scene. And some people who question whether it will. I fall into the latter category. I accept the possibility it will matter, but there seems to be more evidence to the contrary.

The argument being made by people who say it won’t matter is that, for the price of a single boost, you could create four accounts and pay gold to mages to boost those four accounts to 58 instead. And that, long-term, it’s the better play.

He’s the math / logic:

If you get mages to boost you to lvl 58, it’ll take approximately 2k gold per character and cost 8 days of RL time (48 hours /played to get boosted to 58, 6 hours of being boosted a day, 8 days).

So, a botter who pay-boosts to 58 effectively gets 8k gold (2k X 4 characters) and 8 days of gold farming over a botter who pays a mage to boost his chars instead. But the one who paid a mage gets 4 accounts instead of just one.

Fast forward to THREE days later. (Eleven days after the accounts were created) The four accounts each got in three days of gold farming. That’s 12 days of gold farming total. (3 days X 4 accounts = 12 days). The guy who boosted to 58 got in 11 days of gold farming total. (The 8 days the other accounts were leveling and the same three days they were all farming).

The account that got boosted to 58 is now an entire day behind in terms of gold farming. But is still up 8k worth of gold. (that paid to the mages) Assuming (As the OP said) a gold farming bot farms gold for 3 hours a day and makes (My guess) 200 gold an hour in TBC. If that’s true, you’re talking 600 gold a day per account. So the boosted character only has a 7400 gold lead now.

Every day that goes on past that point, that gold lead diminishes by 1800. (1 account per botter cancels each other out, the other 3 accounts gain). After another 4.10 days, the two accounts are even.

FIFTEEN DAYS after the accounts are created is the break even point. If botting accounts survive longer than 15 days then it is more advantageous for a botter to create four accounts and pay a mage to boost them then it is to pay for a 58 boost.

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That’s the logic. The one flaw is that it’s being made “in a bubble” so to speak. There may come a point when a botter CANNOT create more accounts (due to hardware limitations). They can only run so many per computer after all. If that’s the case, the 58 boost will get new accounts on the scene quicker.

It also doesn’t factor in botter laziness and assumes they care / understand about maximizing profits in that regard.

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But back to the “It won’t matter” argument. The entire debate is based on a botter leveling up a new account. That’s mostly going to occur when an existing account gets banned. The general consensus is that blizzard doesn’t ban accounts fast enough (I get the impression we’re talking 3-4 months)

If that’s the case, then boosting isn’t going to really matter anyway as the accounts are already 70 for long periods of time.

It’s not like new accounts are going to be created because the boosts exist. So there aren’t going to be any more botters than you had before. If anything you will have faster recovery when an account gets banned but FEWER overall bot accounts.

22

I have no idea what strategies botters use. I know that those strategies change over time, as Blizzard finds a way to block (or detect) some strategies.

A thread like this HELPS botters, by analyzing new features and figuring out ways that botters can successfully take advantage of them. This thread serves no other purpose, does it?

Way to go, everyone!

23

Now keep that math going for say 4 months before they all get banned for botting by Warden.

You will see how far ahead 4 bots are that cost the same amount as 1 boosted toon.

24

What? You can get a new account AND access to TBC for $15? You don’t have to buy the game too?

25

Yes.

You only need an active sub for Classic.

Which is why its not profitable to boost.

You can literally make 4 accounts for the same price as 1 boost.

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26

Yes, but those accounts start at level 1, not level 58…

…oh, you’re talking about botters with large amounts of gamegold, who can level 4 guys all the way to 60 using a 60 mage on another account. Got it.

27

Yes.

So if you buy 1 boost at $60, or with that $60 you could of gotten 4 toons to level by botting or buying a mage boost to 60.

Those 4 toons that leveled will make WAY more gold for you botting by the time they get banned than the 1 boost you buy.

1 Like
28

An extremely informative and, in my opinion, accurate deduction.

I am not against the boost. I am pro-boost, if anything. It will bring players back to the game and anything that draws more players into the classic project is a good thing.

However, I will say that I support and prefer to play on Fresh TBC servers without boost/cash shop options. I’d rather give up the geared toons, the gold to buy epic fliers, transmute mats, bank alts full of profession mats, etc… to play on fresh servers as I, too, fear how much the boost will empower bots which already cripple the economy and ecology of servers.

I feel fresh servers would be made of a community willing to sacrifice the many days invested into classic and therefore would foster less to mage boosting and gold buying. Gold buyers on current servers are likely already vested in their current servers, having spent hundreds or more. With respect to the dead horse I am beating on, the players built of a community willing to give it all up are less likely to engage in gold buying. If there are less gold buyers/demand - then bots themselves become less consequential.

So I do not want the boost removed. It will enliven the player base on some servers.
But I do want an alternative server platform for those of us who would prefer a slightly less monetized version of TBC that arguably feels more genuine to the classic culture. Regardless of the majority feeling on the issue of boosting I feel fresh TBC servers without boosts/cash shops would be extremely popular and they are warranted a place among the server list.
Virtually everyone is happy with this compromise, and blizzard does not have to sacrifice players on either side of the fence in terms of the pro/anti boosters.

29

Also, one more addition- something I feel many people are somehow forgetting about.

Any bots that decide to start and subscribe can easily bot on retail until they make enough money to begin purchasing tokens - which then keep their accounts online for free.
Additionally, there are features that allow players (or bots) to turn in wow tokens for battle.net currency which can be used to purchase items on the cash shop… IE boosts… Some bots - probably many, could potentially boost for free.

Also, at one point - not sure if this is still the case - but South American accounts - or those who utilized a VPN to use a South American IP paid a much smaller premium for subscriptions and cash-shop inventory. IE - bots utilizing a VPN to seem like south american accounts could get a sub for approximately 2-3 dollars… As I said, not sure if this is still a thing - but both of these points are worth considering.

30

I’ve been told (Tho cannot say first hand so it may not be true) that SA accounts now require a SA bank account / credit card as well. Can’t use a US card for a SA account …etc.

31

That would be rough because you can bot for wow tokens but if that account gets banned you lose the shadowlands xpac purchase with it.

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That would make sense. As I stated I am not entirely sure about the status of that point but it is worth considering.

I advocate fresh TBC servers for those who would prefer to play there without cash shop/boosts available.

33

If they did fresh servers they’d have to disable xfers too. Or you could xfer in with up to 52k worth of venderable items from a non-fresh server. (Meaning 52k AFTER vendering)

Personally, i don’t think fresh servers will work out as well as people hope. But I hope you guys can convince blizzard to do them and wish you the best if you succeed.

34

A minor inconvenience for any bot that can farm up 1k gold in a matter of 5 hours or so… According to the sites I just checked (which shall not be named) 1k gold is around 25-30 USD. This is based on classic wow.
So that makes the xpac cost, or for that matter the speculated cost of the boost about 10-11 hours of farming before netting pure profit gains?
A loss of one account seems pretty inconsequential to me - not to mention bots are an industry. I hate to say it but the leaders of this industry are not stupid… They would funnel the gold made to “safe” accounts which are less exposed, do not engage in botting, and less likely to be banned.

35

Not saying you’re wrong overall but just a heads up. That number is misleading. Was as low as $5-7 during peak gameplay. Has steadily gone up since TBC was announced cause too many people buying to stockpile for mounts and such.

The $5-7 really pissed me off cause i actually farm my gold not buy it and it takes me like 5-6 hours to make 1k. I was basically paying myself $1 an hour at the time…lol (Edit for clarity: Compared to somebody who was working and buying gold).

36

Gotcha. I assume, and hope, that I am not in the minority here - but I do not frequent those kinds of websites because I feel like buying gold is cheating - and, to me, cheating ruins the fun of any game…

Learned that in my youth when my mom bought a very eager young gamer his first NES Gameshark at 8 years old (some 30-odd years ago). She thought it was a “bigger game” so it had to be better… It was actually a cartridge you put a game cartridge into then you could select cheats from a list… infinite life etc… that kinda stuff.

Hooked it up to one of my favorite games of that time - got bored within a few minutes. Never played it again.

Decided cheating just isn’t fun as I ruined something special for myself that day.

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37

Sadly i think about 33%-50% of players buy gold. That’s based on conversations i’ve overheard and such. But when somebody told me that it was that low, i had to check to see if they were right.

Let me be clear here, i have NEVER bought gold and NEVER will. I 100% agree with you on the cheating part. I just couldn’t believe it. At the time I had to farm gold for 20 hours to get the same 4k a person could buy after 1 hour of work. It was disgusting and ruins the integrity of the game.

Gameshark style cheating in other games does have it’s purpose, just requires self control. I play Skyrim alot and modded to give myself a 1-hit kill ability. Sometimes a dragon shows up and i’m just not in the mood. (With my mod list a dragon fight is like a 20 minute endeavor if i don’t die).

But i don’t use said ability in the standard dungeon. Cause like you said, you just get bored.

38

I can respect that. When it comes to offline games as long as you are enjoying it then it does not matter how you play. I personally would not use a mod like that because of how I feel about it - once again, to me that would be cheating - but it is an offline game. So who am I to judge? I don’t. If you are enjoying yourself then more power to you… My option would be the run like hell from the dragon - lol.
After all, random events happen in games, for good or for bad. When I played skyrim I did use mods, but they were all aimed to make it harder than legendary in terms of difficulty and add survival aspects of the game (temperate, need for sleep, food, drink etc…)
Dragons were terrifying in my modded version of the game - so yeah, running for dear life and hiding for a while was a real aspect of my gameplay.

Anyway, back to the topic at hand - It is sad but accurate that people buy gold. I’ll never understand that mentality myself… But it does happen. Likewise, there will be plenty of bot industries that use/abuse the boost. Will all bots boost? nah, especially not people who bot for private/personal gain. But the boost is going to empower the bots which already cripple the game economy and ecology.

That is why I opt for fresh TBC servers. I hope Blizzard acknowledges the desire and makes a blue post about it soon. I have quite a few friends on the fence about re-subscribing as they are waiting on a response from Blizzard about fresh TBC servers without cash shop and without boosts.

39

The argument that botters won’t use boosts seems to stem from the misunderstanding that they can choose to boost a character OR pay for extra accounts, when in reality they will just do both.

“They can get 4 accounts for the price of one boost! After X days based on my hypothetical math, 4 accounts is more gold than one boost!” - Okay, and what’s even more gold than that? 4 boosts. You really think they’re going to spare the expense when they could get more gold IMMEDIATELY?

As someone pointed out earlier, which you all conveniently forget when thinking about these botters:

Think they won’t do that with subscriptions and boosts?

Let’s also not forget that not all botters are for-profit. Many are just personal botters. They want things for themselves that they don’t want to spend the time to earn. See: all the people botting Rank 14.

Boosts are bad for the game regardless of botting, and thinking that because it’s more efficient to buy 4 accounts instead of a boost therefore no botter will use the boost is just naivety at its finest.

40

No, botters mostly won’t buy boosts. I’m sure sometimes botters will. The lone wolf botter who only wants to run one bot, or even test only a bot, but here are some simple facts that you’re over looking.

The level boost is likely going to cost between 30-60 dollars. MOST likely, it will be 60, but it may not be. Anyways, Let’s choose the middle value. 45 dollars. 45 dollars is equal to about 3 wow subscriptions.

So let me ask you this OP. Why would a botter buy a boost for 45 dollars, when they could take that same money and create 3 more bot accounts? The answer is obvious. They wouldn’t. Instead of buying the boost, they’d buy 3 more accounts to bot with. Because this will lead to the great amount of gold gained. Even when the values change, the same principle applies.

Every time a botter buys a boost, they lose out on having more accounts. There is no way around this fact. Each boost bought means less operational bots. You may be thinking that they can get more accounts and get more boosts. But it really doesn’t work that way. Every time they buy a boost they lose out on the total number of accounts they can have.

BOTTERS in general, will not buy boosts. It will hurt the amount of gold a botter able to bring in and raise the cost of there overhead.