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World of Warcraft: Blizzard Discourages Gold Buying
Szark
News ManagerMember Posts: 4,420
Blizzard has posted a statement reminding players of the negative consequences of buying gold and using power-leveling services.
We would like to make a clear statement here about the negative impact of buying gold and using power-leveling services. Every day, we encounter players who have been negatively affected and targeted by companies offering these services. So, we hope to raise awareness about the practices they engage in and the detrimental effects they have on all players, including their own customers, as well as on the game environment as a whole.
What many people don't realize when buying gold is the large impact it has on the game economy, and also how the companies selling gold obtain it. Our developers, in-game support, and anti-hack teams work diligently to stop the exploits these companies use and help players who have become victims of their services. We regularly track the source of the gold these companies sell, and find that an alarmingly high amount comes from hacked accounts. These are the friends, relatives, and guildmates you may know who have gone through the experience of having characters, gold, and items stripped from them after visiting a website or opening a file containing a trojan virus. Our teams work to educate players and assist them in avoiding account compromise, but the fact remains that the players themselves are often these companies' largest target as a source for gold, which the companies then turn around and sell to other players.
Through our normal support processes and the assistance of players, we also find that many accounts that have been shared with power-leveling services are then hacked into months later, and all of the items on the account are stripped and sold off. Basically, players have paid money to these companies, sometimes large amounts, and they're then targeted by these same companies down the road. We come across stories every week of the aftereffects of players using these services, and some players now have to deal with long-term repercussions -- in addition to consequences such as possible account suspension or closure, in many cases the companies they paid use their personal information to perpetrate identity theft and credit card fraud. These are long-lasting effects on players' personal lives that can take years to recover from.
;)
Read more here.
Comments
I actually give Blizzard a big-ass thumbs up for this effort. I especially love that little banner down the bottom of the page.
I think if a company like Blizzard can help to promote the idea that RMS is a bad thing, make it appear more criminal and seedy, then perhaps they can start a a popular opinion that it is simply uncool or wrong to engage in RMS. Perhaps developing such a culture of thought within the general gaming populace is one step in phasing out this crap. Then again, maybe not...
One reason I stopped playing WoW was because many times I went to mine a node or kill a certain mob, I would find 'RandomBrazilianBot001' camping the nodes on auto-pilot. So yeh, my enjoyment was affected by money-hungry assholes...
I always thought the companies could go after gold sellers themselves for violating the rules, but this post pretty much screams "There is nothing we can do outside of the game, so please don't do it." I seem to remember threats of lawsuits and whatnot towards these gold sellers before, though I am quite possibly mistaken. If its true that Blizzard can't do anything against the gold sellers themselves, the economy is screwed. Hell, the future of the MMO genre is screwed. I always wondered why gold seller sites were so prominent with like no threat of action taken against them. Sad, sad virtual world we live in.
Good announcement by Blizzard.
I like the fact that they imply that these companies are, by their very nature, shady, and you should NEVER share your account information with them.
They are greedy, unethical, and they will rip you off.
There really is nothing Blizzard can do to instil common sense into their customers except by publishing announcements such as this.
Power leveling outfits are so damn lame. They nullify the entire reason to participate in online gaming: to play the game. Power leveled toons are worse than useless in the endgame, because the entire point is that XP is abstract, but ACTUAL EXPERIENCE is needed to play the endgame properly.
CH, Jedi, Commando, Smuggler, BH, Scout, Doctor, Chef, BE...yeah, lots of SWG time invested.
Once a denizen of Ahazi
Why not just make a game that doesn't support/require gold farming?
MMO's Played: 20 , Closed Beta: 9 , Open Beta: 3 , Currently:Warhammer Beta
Guild: Futilez
Anybody ever notice that Bliz never states that actually BUYING gold is against TOA and/or EULA ?
And before you shout out that it does, or this press release states that, please go back and read all three carefully.
Oh come on, most of the gold sellers are hosted in countries where you have no legal ability to stop them. Blizzard does go after those companies it can. Anyone using a powerleveling service is beyond stupid and paying for anything using a credit card is also braindead, services like Paypal are your friends.
The really dumb thing is that gold has gotten so plentiful in these games that only the most extremely lazy players find it hard to get the gold they need.
This problem is not going away so get used to it.
I am not going to comment on the right or wrong of gold selling. That is a whole new thread topic. I will say this about the issue. Games like WoW are heavy in the gold selling and buying for one main reason. The game does not reward for skill or creativity. The basic mechanics of WoW rewards players for time put into the game. It does not really matter how skilled you are the ones who can play the most hours get the rewards. What this means is that players who love the game but can not play endless hours will never achive the items and gold those that can play all day can. So these players buy gold to keep up with the rest of the players. When a game that offers more to the players then rewards purely based on time spent in game, you will see gold buying and selling weaken.
You did not see a lot of gold selling in pre-nge SWG because there were so many ways to find success in that game. I would love to see another game that rewards player creativity and skill over time spent playing. When developers figure this out we will see far less gold selling going on.
I agree with Blizzard on their article..
But
To NOT have so many people buying gold, outside the game, why doesn't Blizzard raise the amount you get per quest.
My god..
When you are very young and work hard to get that quest done, you get ALL of what - 20copper? If you're lucky that is.. And - it goes like this for several lvls.
Pffftt..
This is the only MMO I have played that the quest rewards on money were so slim in the early stages of your adventuring!
"Huntress"
This game does not require as much gold as other games and you can lvl up pretty fast. I agree with this article and I think NCsoft needs to take a look at this.
I agree with this as a way to slow down gold selling. In WoW the prize for many is a mount. So many buy gold to get the mount they want. By either giving better monetary rewards or lowing the cost of the mounts you will see less need to buy gold. The only players this would negatively impact are the show-off players who feel their success is based on having stuff others do not have. It does not matter to me if everyone had an epic mount. As long as I am having fun riding mine I do not care if everyone has one too. However for some the only way to have fun in mmos is by having stuff others do not have.
I think alot of these games bring this activity on by the way they design the games sometimes. I have had guildmates who purchased gold because it was too boring to go spend hours n hours farming up gold to buy them. Epic flying mounts in wow for example cost 5000g. Most people do not know how to earn gold fast by selling what players are demanding and would rather pay a one time fee for it. I never have troble earning gold in a game but there are others who do. Maybe these game developers should look at this and make things that are necessary like mounts to be a little less in price so their players will not feel the need to buy gold. I am not by any means saying make the game easier. Almost everything in wow you can get for almost nothing except for repairs,crafting supplies (which are attainable if you grind for them),and Mounts.
And to train the skills for those early levels costs only a few coppers as well -- same with vendor-purchased equipment. Those levels are behind you within a week, so I really don't see why this matters.
Other games should take after what Blizzard does. Gold-farming is a serious mattter nowadays in MMO's
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In memory of Laura "Taera" Genender. Passed away on Aug/13/08 - Rest In Peace; you will not be forgotten
Although gold and credit selling was not widely advertised like it is now there was still a lot of selling of player credits pre-nge. People used EBAY as a means to sell credits as well as player accounts. I knew of a individual that had 6 accounts who did nothing but craft items for players to buy ingame and turned around and sold credits on EBAY. This person was very upset when the NGE hit as they couldn't make some easy cash off of the players in game as well as out of the game.
I some what agree with some of your points that you have said. But how about instead of rewarding players with higher payouts why not give them a better usuable reward for their current level ? The Burning Crusade expansion did a very good job with giving players usable gear and weapons for their level as a reward for the quests they did.
Wont make much diffrence ppl like to break rules , but i understands blizzards pov..
Buying gold in wow is really not needed way easier than other mmorpg games all together to get gold ingame the proper way.
-Semper ubi sub ubi!
always wear underwear
As others have said, all the time a game is structured round 'grind' those that are cash rich time poor will pay someone to do the mindless repetetive tasks. Its bots largely nowadays, progress I guess. Of course its in Blizzards best interest to catch as many people as they can so they have to keep buying new keys.
Having said that it dosent seem hard to make money if you do a bit or research.
I think this is good for them to put out. But i think if you want to buy, buy it. You have to spend extra $. And lots of it. While the other guys spend there 15$ a month and thats it (maybe a few guides). So these people are wasting there money on things that lots of players have figured out.
You know I get supider after each time I read another reply to this topic.
CURRENTLY PLAYING SHAIYA
Good for you Blizzard! Amazingly, this article reads like it was a response to my last comment here on MMORPG.
I read recently that these "gold farmers" have stolen over 3.5 billion dollars from the US in fraud. And we paid them to do it. Imagine what the game companies could do with that stolen 3.5 billion dollars. Resist the temptation to buy gold; just say No.
I had a great idea for the next great MMO, someone somewhere needs to create a fun game that doesn't use currency and the only way to log in is with voice and thumb print identification and your account ID is your credit card number.
-They call me Velsha
I believe Ozmodan had the fact correct the first time.
You have to know that MANY MANY countries in the world think US legal system is a joke. For example, in china, a lot of companies dont give a crap about what so called "patent". Why? Because people in its goverment made billions of dollars on bribes from chinesse companies who coppied and mass produced.. lets just say.. tupperware items.
Many small, home based inventors, basically being bullied because they cant pay 2 patent rights on 2 different countries. So their latest invention basically being coppied and mass produced with some company based on, for example.. in guangzo, china.
Although i believe blizzard have a hold on chinesse patent.. They still have their thumb up their arses when they try to hunt down these so called "farmers" because some of these people know someone sits in the goverment.
That just one example.. big example.. Now, imagine if the hacker/ farmer/ botter company based on indonesia.. or iran.. how the hell blizzard be able to pursue these people?
Although i dont like those companies.. the truth is america legal system have no hold whatsoever on another country. Except.. we now living in startrek age of discovery.. when earth just become one.. under one banner.. now that would be completely different story.
I read on one article once where a journalist hunting down some ID theifs.. His journey went as far as Africa and it just stop there.. they talked to someone who must have connection with the thief.. but because the police in that African country dont give a crap about "ID thief".. The journalist had to let the guy go..
I applaud blizzard's effort to at least make a statement.. Many companies dont even bother to do so. Trust me.. Blizzard would love to get those farmers.. because that means more key bought by those farmers.. means more money for blizz in the first place.
One of the thing that I believe could stop the influx of farmers/ botters would be to restrict exclusive US servers only for those who connect from.. guess where.. US. That would stop more than 50% of those farmers.. trust me.. At least then, blizzard wont have any excuse not to follow legal suit against those companies based on US soil.
Last but not least.. US residents need to think a little bit.. who the hell causing these problems? Most of the time.. its those people who kept buying.. If they stop buying.. that guy named Umar from Indonesia will have no revenue from the game.. hence.. he simply could not afford to pay the game.. hence there goes another farmer went off to some other game.
For the gaming world, I see China as the biggest threat. As the previous poster said, their government doesn't care about our legal system. We can stomp, shout, and bang our heads on the table all we want but as long as these companies are providing paying jobs for their citizens they aren't going to do anything about it.
The best thing the game companies can do is educate their players. I'm happy that Blizzard is taking a step in what I see as the right direction.
-They call me Velsha
Ah, a proxy server..
Yes, that too.. Thats why i never actually blame blizzard for saying "theres not a lot we can do about it". All in all, i think i can say "bravo" to blizzard keeping the game as clean as it is right now.. While being the biggest mmorpg out there.
IMO i think Blizzard is trying very hard to abolish gold buying, if you think about it, alot of good gear and other stuff must be faction grinded, BG's Arena's too name a few which do not require money and faction stuff which does not cost that much gold, all the bop and boe. Like some other had mention i think most gold is bought for the big expensive mount, so i say make it a faction grind of some sort.
I'm sure some one will say PLZ NO MORE faction grind, well no matter what you either grind faction or gold, what's the diff. My 2 cents