Bot Question

[Dawnseven]

So this happened...

Account Action: Suspended until 2019/10/26
Offense: Use of Bots or Third-Party Automation Software

Relax yourself. It wasn't against my account, but rather my 17 year old's. As a parent, I have 2 issues:

1. Of course the kid swears up, down, left and right that he never did any such thing. That's what 95% of botters say, so I give his claim no real weight. That said, the kid hates leveling, plays just one character, has a small group of guild friends that he occasionally PvPs and/or raids with (when they're bored and re-activate their WoW accounts), and otherwise, just logs in to do a warfront if it's up, and will sometimes do a large RP event if someone invites him. I think he has about 70K gold to his name, doesn't grind rep, doesn't go farming, and doesn't play the auction house as those things are horrifically boring (and which lead his general lack of funds, but that's another discussion). In short, he doesn't engage in things that bots are usually FOR as far as *I* know. And with THAT said too, I don't believe Blizzard just pulls this kind of thing out of their ass either. He MUST have done something whether he's willing to admit to it or not or he wouldn't have been suspended.

2. I'd like to make this a teachable moment, but the Blizzard notifications are terribly vague and I can't seem to pry any additional information out of them. As someone who has never even considered using a bot, I don't know anything about them. Is there something I can look for on his machine? Am I looking at all .exe files? Is something have to installed in a WoW directory or something? He barely even uses addons, and the few that he has (a whopping total of like 6) I recognize (DBM, etc.) and know he gets from Curse. Even IF (big if) he's telling the truth and he didn't install something, or he installed something that he's convinced had some other purpose (I don't know what, something RP related maybe -- humor me) how can I make sure his machine is purged of it before he reactivates his account in the fall (IF he does). I wouldn't want Warden to pick up something again (and again, apologies, I don't know how things work) and perma-ban him then simply because he still had whatever it considers offensive.

Any thoughts/wisdom you can provide?

[Onikaroshi]

You can generally find the bot on the computer as it doesn't hide itself to the person, it just tries to hide itself to the application.

[Thage]

Look up the names of popular bot programs, search your kid's PC for it. If he's telling the truth, he should relish the opportunity for an "I told you so." Let him have it if he's right. If it's there, tell him that's the risk he took and needs to learn from it.

[Onikaroshi]

Look up the names of popular bot programs, search your kid's PC for it. If he's telling the truth, he should relish the opportunity for an "I told you so." Let him have it if he's right. If it's there, tell him that's the risk he took and needs to learn from it.

Only issue with him being right is that kids trust in blizzard is out the door.

[Kirnal]

I think blizzard recently did a banwave against popular model editing programs. It may have been one of those.

[Teramelle]

There's been a recent ban-wave for people using modding tools to edit game files, ostensibly for aesthetic purposes. Changing how their character looks, for example, with the overwhelmingly popular use being for... well, nude mods and things along those lines. All these bans, as far as I'm aware, listed botting/third-party automation software as the ban reason, and although the mods aren't really either of those things, it's just that the program one needs is picked up by the system in a similar way and punishments are, therefore, handed out in a similar way. The timing of this ban suggests to me that he isn't using any sort of botting program, but a model-changing one instead, which is similarly against TOS, even though Blizzard haven't really enforced any sort of widespread punishment for their use up until now.

[RaZz0r]

So this happened...

Account Action: Suspended until 2019/10/26
Offense: Use of Bots or Third-Party Automation Software

Relax yourself. It wasn't against my account, but rather my 17 year old's. As a parent, I have 2 issues:

1. Of course the kid swears up, down, left and right that he never did any such thing. That's what 95% of botters say, so I give his claim no real weight. That said, the kid hates leveling, plays just one character, has a small group of guild friends that he occasionally PvPs and/or raids with (when they're bored and re-activate their WoW accounts), and otherwise, just logs in to do a warfront if it's up, and will sometimes do a large RP event if someone invites him. I think he has about 70K gold to his name, doesn't grind rep, doesn't go farming, and doesn't play the auction house as those things are horrifically boring (and which lead his general lack of funds, but that's another discussion). In short, he doesn't engage in things that bots are usually FOR as far as *I* know. And with THAT said too, I don't believe Blizzard just pulls this kind of thing out of their ass either. He MUST have done something whether he's willing to admit to it or not or he wouldn't have been suspended.

2. I'd like to make this a teachable moment, but the Blizzard notifications are terribly vague and I can't seem to pry any additional information out of them. As someone who has never even considered using a bot, I don't know anything about them. Is there something I can look for on his machine? Am I looking at all .exe files? Is something have to installed in a WoW directory or something? He barely even uses addons, and the few that he has (a whopping total of like 6) I recognize (DBM, etc.) and know he gets from Curse. Even IF (big if) he's telling the truth and he didn't install something, or he installed something that he's convinced had some other purpose (I don't know what, something RP related maybe -- humor me) how can I make sure his machine is purged of it before he reactivates his account in the fall (IF he does). I wouldn't want Warden to pick up something again (and again, apologies, I don't know how things work) and perma-ban him then simply because he still had whatever it considers offensive.

Any thoughts/wisdom you can provide?

You kid most likely got banned for using something like the arctium launcher it was a 3rd party launcher used by mainly people who partake in erotic role play on RP servers.
As you have option to change boob size have your character be flat out nude or wear lingerie outfits along with many other things.
It was also used for more milder things such as simply having your character look like another race purely client side or minor cosmetic effects.

But blizzard recently banned people for using that particular bit of software today so it was most likely the case

[Animalhouse]

I am actually seeing lots of posts on fb today about false bans. There are far more than I have ever seen so I think it is a mistake on Blizzards part. They must be using some new auto detection and an algorithm is not quite right.

[BananaHandsB]

He could easily have cleared the bot out of his system since blizzard logged him botting. They tend to ban in waves, not immediately when they catch the person. Blizzard really isn't in the business of banning paying customers without hard evidence, but you can always appeal the ban and have them review their evidence.

I'll say this. I'm a teacher. I've caught some of my most trusted students cheating of tests, copying other student's homework, etc. Every time I give them a chance to admit it to me and 100% of the time, they say they didn't do it. If they were comfortable cheating, they will be comfortable lying. Then I pull out the hard evidence and they always cave. Kids will lie if they think they can get away with it, just like adults. A ban from Blizzard is hard evidence and you should treat it as such. File an appeal and see what happens. They will review their evidence and make sure they are certain. If they were wrong, they will reverse it, if not, it has a punishment built in. It's up to him whether he's going to learn from this. My guess is he will. Leave it at that.

[Lochton]

Only issue with him being right is that kids trust in blizzard is out the door.

Well, the kid accepts the existance of Warden by playing Blizzard games. So if his trust is ruined, then it is due to himself.

[Dawnseven]

Ooooh, this is very helpful. He does a bunch of graphics stuff (skinning race cars and the like) and I've seen him with WoW ModelViewer for example, designing wallpapers and shite like that. Maybe something related to modeling. Knowing what I know about his play, the botting thing, as I knew it, wasn't making a lot of sense, but this does.

[Lochton]

Yep, Blizzard has previously allowed local mods that change game textures - but seem they've changed their stance on this since it was getting exploited - there are some very recent complaints of people getting banned for using mods to mainly "fix" certain parts of female models . Could be that as well.

https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comment...ave_used_bots/
https://www.reddit.com/r/wow/comment...it_in_the_ban/

They haven't allowed editing of models, not even tmorph wass permitted, it was only vaguely ignored.

[Onikaroshi]

Well, the kid accepts the existance of Warden by playing Blizzard games. So if his trust is ruined, then it is due to himself.

No, I mean if he wasn't actually botting. People do get caught up in those bans.

[Tinytalon]

I am actually seeing lots of posts on fb today about false bans. There are far more than I have ever seen so I think it is a mistake on Blizzards part. They must be using some new auto detection and an algorithm is not quite right.

Or a lot of people are ashamed to admit they used that big titty mod or something like that, which got a lot of people banned recently.

[Neverafter]

As you have option to change boob size have your character be flat out nude or wear lingerie outfits along with many other things.
It was also used for more milder things such as simply having your character look like another race purely client side or minor cosmetic effects.

But blizzard recently banned people for using that particular bit of software today so it was most likely the case

Can it make my Alliance toon a Blood Elf? With blue eyes?

[Lochton]

No, I mean if he wasn't actually botting. People do get caught up in those bans.

Ah, that is right but well, sometimes a GM can be kind to have you re-run in Warden - rarely.

[Onikaroshi]

Ah, that is right but well, sometimes a GM can be kind to have you re-run in Warden - rarely.

Could have been the tig bitties though lol, i don't even want to know why these things exist....

[Khallid]

Ooooh, this is very helpful. He does a bunch of graphics stuff (skinning race cars and the like) and I've seen him with WoW ModelViewer for example, designing wallpapers and shite like that. Maybe something related to modeling. Knowing what I know about his play, the botting thing, as I knew it, wasn't making a lot of sense, but this does.

Having used a bot doesn't necessarily mean that he does it all the time, or that it has to match his behavior. I've known people that randomly decided to test using a bot and got banned for a couple of months, even though they clearly didn't need a bot and it didn't make sense for their normal gameplay. All you need is someone to tell you to try out this cool thing and you done fucked.

[Mad_Murdock]

Look up the names of popular bot programs, search your kid's PC for it. If he's telling the truth, he should relish the opportunity for an "I told you so." Let him have it if he's right. If it's there, tell him that's the risk he took and needs to learn from it.

Well, if he\she is a remotely smart kid they would have deleted the bot as soon as they saw they got banned.

@Dawnseven
Any chance he might have loaned out his account to a friend, who then might have done something? Long ago, when my son was playing wow, he shared his account info with his buddy so his buddy could give it a try, his buddy's computer was riddled with viruses and malware and so about a week or so later I noticed his toon was over in Black temple for hours, while he was at school and thus began my process to get his account back. Silly kids

So could be telling the truth, just maybe not the whole truth

[Onikaroshi]

Jeff "Tigole Bitties" Kaplan.

It's no wonder he dropped the last name when he came to Blizzard lol.