Friend who bots

[Terahertz]

I simply don't care. It doesn't impact me, and frankly I don't believe it's unethical.

How is it not unethical? A computer program is playing the game and mass floods the AH with cheap products. Meanwhile, those who DO play the game fairly can't make money in those ways anymore BECAUSE of the bots.

If there were no bots, farming cloth yourself would be much more profitable. Now it's just a waste of your bag slot and you'd be better off dropping the cloth for that lvl 60 epic you can vendor for 10g.

[Deleted]

EDIT - People don't seem to be getting the point. I wanted to know whether I, personally, am at risk of getting banned for being associated - NOT whether I should report him or not

You're not.

Reporting bots or suspiscions is NOT your obligation. It is Blizzards responsibility to detect and take care of it through their own means.

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I don't know. The Blizzard TOU's (which everyone agreed to upon installing the game) are fairly clean-cut:

That does not mean TOU is be-all-end-all. Blizz when deciding to provide WoW in other countries must abide by theirs laws there. TOU or not.

[Granyala]

EDIT - People don't seem to be getting the point. I wanted to know whether I, personally, am at risk of getting banned for being associated - NOT whether I should report him or not

As long as you don't profit from the botting (e.g. He giving you 300K Gold or so), no you're not in danger.
I have a friend that bots too (though he'd never talk about it in chat) and nothing ever happened to me.

[slime]

How is it not unethical? A computer program is playing the game and mass floods the AH with cheap products. Meanwhile, those who DO play the game fairly can't make money in those ways anymore BECAUSE of the bots.

If there were no bots, farming cloth yourself would be much more profitable. Now it's just a waste of your bag slot and you'd be better off dropping the cloth for that lvl 60 epic you can vendor for 10g.

True, true. But if the company that runs and profits on the game doesn't care (actually do something serious about it), or their main effort is to ask their paying players to police it - then I'm not gonna give two shits about it. You describe a situation where Blizzard actually does something about bots or how wow was in the beginning. It's been a bot infested world for many years now and I don't think it s gonna change anytime soon. I am actually very sorry that I myself didn't take advantage of this easy way to become a gold millionaire or gain honor - or whatever you bot for.

[Keile]

If they find out that you are working WITH him and are profiting/benefiting from the botting (and are fully aware of it) and he names you if they talk to him about it you may get action against you, but the odds are very slim.

Personally I would cut him off, and report his ass. I work for everything I have, and I'll be damned if I let someone just get a free ride like that.

[dd614]

I'd probably report him because bots ruin WoW in many different ways.

[Deleted]

True, true. But if the company that runs and profits on the game doesn't care (actually do something serious about it), or their main effort is to ask their paying players to police it - then I'm not gonna give two shits about it. You describe a situation where Blizzard actually does something about bots or how wow was in the beginning. It's been a bot infested world for many years now and I don't think it s gonna change anytime soon. I am actually very sorry that I myself didn't take advantage of this easy way to become a gold millionaire or gain honor - or whatever you bot for.

Let me rephrase some of the things you say here, for the sake of clarity:
- Blizzard should be (more) actively doing something to reduce or remove the problem of botting. Correct. I agree. Of course, the botters themselves are even more responsible; but Blizzard should do more than asking players to police their game. It's probably easier said than done, but (much) more resources should be spent on tackling this issue. Especially bots that use specific pathing should be very easy to catch, if they would just dedicate some resources to it.

- It's unethical: you agree. But, if Blizzard doesn't do anything (or not enough) against it, you don't care. This is a normal/common point of view: "it's unethical, but I don't care". Just like we might feel that people attacking certain ex-convicts (like sex offenders) is unethical, but we might not care.
And, you go on, you feel like you should have done it (botting) also. Let me just point out that two wrongs don't make a right. The fact that circumstances apparently enable abuse, and nothing is done to change that, doesn't mean you should join in. If there are riots and people are looting and hoarding people's houses, that's a bad thing. If police doesn't intervene in such a situation (or not on a large enough scale), that shouldn't mean you should therefore join in on the rioting because "f*** it, anything goes". You're still harming other people with those actions, and the same goes for botting (albeit on a whole different scale than actual looting, of course).

I understand your attitude, but I don't agree with your conclusion. That won't stop you from doing anything, but oh well. It's Blizzards responsibility to create a game that's fun to play, and removing bots is an important part of that. However, if they fail in doing so adequately, becoming a botter yourself is not something that you can justify just by saying that Blizzard failed. You could do it, of course, but it's not suddenly "okay". I believe the correct phrasing in such a situation would be something like "sh** happens". People do what they feel like doing, they might feel like they have reasons for doing it, I might feel like those reasons aren't an adequate justification, but none of that matters a bit. People will still go on and do what they do.

And I think it is unfortunate that people feel the way you do.

[Itisamuh]

I know a guy who botted 96 accounts at once and sold the gold from it, he ended up having to rent out an office building so he could install industrial cooling because having several computers running at full 24/7 was starting to destroy his house.

Anyway, you clearly have no idea what you're talking about and are just yet another person who thinks "HURRR SCREW CHEATERS" so I'm not really going to try to convince you of anything. If you'd try to be reasonable you'd realize that bots actually help the average casual by keeping raiding consumables in high supply and prices down, but whatever, think what you want it doesn't really matter to me.

Hah, what a load. Botting and cheating in general is always bad, no matter what.

[Stormwolf64]

You should report anyone who uses botting programs, but I understand if you don't. Just remember, if we all refuse to report them because they're friends, we'll never stop the bots.

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People who would bot in a game need to seriously rethink their lives.

We can do this forever.

That is certainly true, doesn't have anything to do with the point of my post though. I do hope you grasp what i mean. It would be sad if you didn't..

[Hypasonic]

I'm pretty sure the only people that get held accountable for botting/cheating are the owners of the account of which said action took place, I wouldn't worry about it. Even if he gives you gold from that activity, you're not doing anything wrong...trading is acceptable in game. (If they banned everyone associated with people that botted, I doubt there would be many accounts left.)

But as always, they could ban your account just for shits and giggles if they wanted.

[saintsixx]

Thanks for the replies, guys! Mind is put at ease

[Kaldriss]

dont be friends with people like that

[Violetti]

as if blizz would care about bot-reports

[Santti]

No, they will not ban you.

[Televators]

Okay so, I have a question and I haven't found any answers at all no matter what I google.

I recruited a guy from the official WoW forums, and we've been RaF'ing for a few days now. I recently found out he uses a bot for the dungeon running - not all the time, but when he's going to be AFK for a bit. I also know that he creates new accounts that get banned because he ends up using them to gold sell.

I KNOW it's not morally right or anything not to report him, but I'm extremely broke at the moment (baby on the way, partner has been off sick, rent arrears etc.) - and with all the stress, WoW is the only thing that keeps me sane (my lovely parents have given me my subscription fee for the month during the hard times because they know it helps me) - so it's very helpful to get the free month RaF from him. I'd rather NOT be judged on what actions I'm not taking, but there's my back story anyway.

I was wondering, because he openly talks about it in party chat, to which I just reply a "lol" or don't even acknowledge it, will Blizzard possibly ban me as well for being an accomplice or something? Even if it's just for my benefit of harmlessly RaF'ing without any sole intent to help him after reaching 85? My account means a lot to me and I've had it for around 6 years or so, I'd rather not get it banned.

Anyway, thanks for reading, I know it's long - but thanks for your time

EDIT - People don't seem to be getting the point. I wanted to know whether I, personally, am at risk of getting banned for being associated - NOT whether I should report him or not

Blizz can see all in game chat. You don't have to report anything if he's freely admitted it.

[Deleted]

Report him. If he is a guy you hardly knows report him. Report his botting ass and it will it no way effect you.

that being said, i knew some of my long times friends who did bot, them i did not report because well, it is not worth lossign a good IRL friend over(but do not worry they where all perma banned) but report him.