[Arena] AFK'ing in Arena, allowed? expert opinion needed

[Codam]

arena/charity epics/changes ('http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums/index.php?page=Thread&postID=72422&highlight=#post72422')


In less than an hour of web surfing I'll have gained 4043 arena points, as I do every week.

My question is; Is there anything at all wrong with this? edit for clarity: is this in any way a breach of the ToS or other statements Blizzard have made?

After taking my group into AV for the first time and getting totally owned last night, I'm starting to consider this option, but I just want to make sure this isn't viewed in the same way as BG afk'ing by blizzard.

Of course it seems like a completely different scenario, as noone else is being adversely affected by it. My concern was more that blizzard would see this as "not in the spirit of..." blah blah blah

I am not at all interested in PVP for PVP's sake, and I hate the fact that organised PVP is almost a requirement in order to gear up for PVE. I just want to get a few epic pieces of pvp gear in order to compliment my crafted tailoring items for my group, boost my stam a bit and move on.

[Moxy]

Why would you need to afk to do that?

At least lose as a player. Please don't reflect such laziness upon this community.

[beyond-tec]

afaik u get arena points for damage you've dealt and healing you've done.

so fighting will give you more arena points than just afk'ing

[Millz]

afaik u get arena points for damage you've dealt and healing you've done.

so fighting will give you more arena points than just afk'ingYou get arena points based off your team (and personal if its oer 150 lower than the team) rating.. Not off the damage and healing you do.

[Codam]

Why would you need to afk to do that?

At least lose as a player. Please don't reflect such laziness upon this community.

That's completely beside the point, the question was regarding the legality of it. I highly doubt I'm the first player you've come into contact with who has no respect or fondness whatsoever of the cesspit which is WoW's instanced PVP system. Nor will I be the last. I was also more than clear in my original post that this is not something that I have done (yet). Rather I was inquiring about info another member had previously posted.

To answer your question of why, so the matches would be over faster of course. So I can get back to playing the real game, the MMO I pay for. (ie: PVE and world PVP)


afaik u get arena points for damage you've dealt and healing you've done.

so fighting will give you more arena points than just afk'ing

Aha! a constructive reply :)

So I take that to mean you have abandoned your previous technique which I referred to? Thanks for the info.

Meh, screw it. I think I'd rather farm every normal instance over and over and get the best possible gear set of blues I can for each toon. Should be enough to get me started in heroics, and I need the rep anyhow. I'll leave CS-with-spells to the folks who enjoy that sort of thing.

[vudu]

If blizzard was completely okay with AFKing in the BGs/Arenas they never would have came up with the new report feature in BGs. To me that shows a clear stance on blizzards part...against AFKing. Will they perma ban your account for it? I doubt it - but it's more than definately against the rules.
And, honestly, whether it's against the rules or not, its against moral judgement and common sense. The teams you are going against want to play a game, they want to be challenged and feel the rush of victory, or learn from the shame of defeat. They don't want to wail on some pixels just standing there.
It doesn't make sense simply because you say your main focus is PvE. PvP gear isn't very good for PvE. It's better than random greens/blues, but if you spent a comparable amount of time in PvE as you will be spending AFKing PvP (and the lolamount of arena points you're going to get) you'd have a much better set of gear that is tuned to what you want to do.
I'd feel cheap getting something handed to me for doing nothing, anyway. What would be the point of getting the gear if I did NOTHING to earn it.

[Codam]

If blizzard was completely okay with AFKing in the BGs/Arenas they never would have came up with the new report feature in BGs. To me that shows a clear stance on blizzards part...against AFKing. Will they perma ban your account for it? I doubt it - but it's more than definately against the rules.

As you can see from my original post, I am fully aware that non-participation in BG's is not allowed. This however does not automatically apply by extension to arena. You seem to have missed the point of my question, so I'll phrase it a little more clearly (even though I'm fairly sure I wont be bothering to try this, as I now see that the couple of gear slots which I might want to populate with pvp gear are only available from honor and marks).

rephrased original questionBlizzard have stated that non-participation in battlegrounds is not allowed. Does this also apply to arenas?

The reason I put in the subject heading "expert opinion needed" was that I was hoping for a response from someone with enough knowledge of the rules to have a clear answer to this. I dont mean to be condescending but all of these "damages the community" or "how could you live with yourself" type of responses do not answer the question, and to be perfectly frank mean little or nothing to me.

[Drizzit]

I know where you are coming from Codam. I was thinking about doing the same thing when my guys get to 70. If you are always taking a loss you will be in the 1400 - 1300 rank range all the time (I would remake the team every other week so you get get better points if you just want to lose). People at the rank just care about the win more then the thrill i think. I have a 2v2 team and i am in the 1500 rank and all me and my teammate care about is the 10 wins a week. I would love to go against a team 10 times that are afk, that would make my wins and arena time so much faster. I don't think that the other team will report you for AFKing because they just got a free win. Unless you want to report yourself for afk.

This is my 2 cents so agree or disagree.

[Codam]

I guess the easiest way to get a clear answer is to either ask a GM or post on the WoW forums /shudder

Anyhow as stated, I made a mistake and thought I could get bracers and neck from arena. I was wrong and I'll just have to stick to instance gear or spen a weekend in BG's. Annoying that I was lvl 68 for the last AV call to arms.

[cepheus]

IF you dont mind me asking.. Whats really the point of afking in arenas? wouldnt you just lose faster if you just mount into the enemies and gather nice up right besides them for they to aoe you down?

[Codam]

IF you dont mind me asking.. Whats really the point of afking in arenas? wouldnt you just lose faster if you just mount into the enemies and gather nice up right besides them for they to aoe you down?

No idea, never done either way and probably never will. Although I'd guess in the case of beyond-tec's original post whch I linked to, the mounting up and running to the opposing team interfered with his web-surfing :P

[Skrimshaw]

There is no such thing as afking in Arenas... The idea is moronic. Sure you might get in and stand there with a thumb up your butt. In which the other team will kill you uber fast and love you for it. Your not afking, your just being a practice dumby, and it will be over so fast there is nothing away from the keyboard about it, other than you watching your guys die and fast.

[vudu]

As you can see from my original post, I am fully aware that non-participation in BG's is not allowed. This however does not automatically apply by extension to arena. My point was, that if they do not allow it in the BGs, it's a logical conclusion that they do not allow it in the Arena either.
The only difference in BGs and Arena is that in Arena, there are no other people counting on your participation to win. However, you're still getting something for doing nothing by AFKing it...and I think this is what Blizzard has the issues with.
I know it's not specifically spelled out in the ToS or EULA that AFKing the Arenas is not allowed, however I believe it's more than implied.

[Codam]

There is no such thing as afking in Arenas... The idea is moronic. Sure you might get in and stand there with a thumb up your butt. In which the other team will kill you uber fast and love you for it. Your not afking, your just being a practice dumby, and it will be over so fast there is nothing away from the keyboard about it, other than you watching your guys die and fast.

wow, so theres a discrepancy in using the term "afk" when perhaps I should have said "not even trying to win" or something similar. relevance to the discussion = nil



As you can see from my original post, I am fully aware that non-participation in BG's is not allowed. This however does not automatically apply by extension to arena. My point was, that if they do not allow it in the BGs, it's a logical conclusion that they do not allow it in the Arena either.
The only difference in BGs and Arena is that in Arena, there are no other people counting on your participation to win. However, you're still getting something for doing nothing by AFKing it...and I think this is what Blizzard has the issues with.
I know it's not specifically spelled out in the ToS or EULA that AFKing the Arenas is not allowed, however I believe it's more than implied.

I know I'm dragging this on for far too long, but I can't let that go unchecked. Stating that something is a logical conclusion does not make it one. For that you need <gasps> logical arguement

The fact that you think that what blizzard has a problem with is getting something for nothing, does not mean that is actually the case. I personally think the crackdown on BG afk'ers would never have come if it hadn't been adversely affecting other's chances of playing/winning the battlegrounds properly. Blizzard's stance as usual is somewhat ambiguous: "we are currently taking steps to ensure fair and enjoyable competition in the Battlegrounds" quoted from http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=2405521620&sid=1

Seriously guys, the responses in this thread have been way below par for dual-boxing.com standards. This is the community which usually takes such pleasure in picking to pieces the illogical and opinionated QQ posts made by multiboxing haters on the WoW forums. I wont stoop so low as to accuse you guys of any kind of stupidity on that level, but ffs I never said I had or would definately do this, I just asked if it was against the rules.

Now, whilst posting in this annoying little thread which I wish I'd never created, I was also reading Blizzard's official statements made in connection with the ban-wave on battlegrounds afk'ers. My own conclusion is that this is way too much of a grey area to be worth the risk. Forget gear and points and everything else for a moment and just think about the game and the enjoyment.

If I was a PVP'er who only played arena for the fun, and came up against some guy with 5 naked belfs just standing there, I'd probably feel like my fun was being interfered with. Seeing as Blizzard gave others enjoyment of the game as one of the reasons for cracking down on battlegrounds afk'ers, theres no reason they wouldnt see it as grounds to make this against the rules too. @ Vudu this underlined bit is an example of a logical conclusion

[Drizzit]

wouldnt you just lose faster if you just mount into the enemies and gather nice up right besides them for they to aoe you down
I might just have fun with them. Just mount up and just keep running in a circle. Team name would be "Can you catch me"

[Skrimshaw]

There is no such thing as afking in Arenas... The idea is moronic. Sure you might get in and stand there with a thumb up your butt. In which the other team will kill you uber fast and love you for it. Your not afking, your just being a practice dumby, and it will be over so fast there is nothing away from the keyboard about it, other than you watching your guys die and fast.

wow, so theres a discrepancy in using the term "afk" when perhaps I should have said "not even trying to win" or something similar. relevance to the discussion = nil



As you can see from my original post, I am fully aware that non-participation in BG's is not allowed. This however does not automatically apply by extension to arena. My point was, that if they do not allow it in the BGs, it's a logical conclusion that they do not allow it in the Arena either.
The only difference in BGs and Arena is that in Arena, there are no other people counting on your participation to win. However, you're still getting something for doing nothing by AFKing it...and I think this is what Blizzard has the issues with.
I know it's not specifically spelled out in the ToS or EULA that AFKing the Arenas is not allowed, however I believe it's more than implied.

I know I'm dragging this on for far too long, but I can't let that go unchecked. Stating that something is a logical conclusion does not make it one. For that you need <gasps> logical arguement

The fact that you think that what blizzard has a problem with is getting something for nothing, does not mean that is actually the case. I personally think the crackdown on BG afk'ers would never have come if it hadn't been adversely affecting other's chances of playing/winning the battlegrounds properly. Blizzard's stance as usual is somewhat ambiguous: "we are currently taking steps to ensure fair and enjoyable competition in the Battlegrounds" quoted from http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=2405521620&sid=1

Seriously guys, the responses in this thread have been way below par for dual-boxing.com standards. This is the community which usually takes such pleasure in picking to pieces the illogical and opinionated QQ posts made by multiboxing haters on the WoW forums. I wont stoop so low as to accuse you guys of any kind of stupidity on that level, but ffs I never said I had or would definately do this, I just asked if it was against the rules.

Now, whilst posting in this annoying little thread which I wish I'd never created, I was also reading Blizzard's official statements made in connection with the ban-wave on battlegrounds afk'ers. My own conclusion is that this is way too much of a grey area to be worth the risk. Forget gear and points and everything else for a moment and just think about the game and the enjoyment.

If I was a PVP'er who only played arena for the fun, and came up against some guy with 5 naked belfs just standing there, I'd probably feel like my fun was being interfered with. Seeing as Blizzard gave others enjoyment of the game as one of the reasons for cracking down on battlegrounds afk'ers, theres no reason they wouldnt see it as grounds to make this against the rules too. @ Vudu this underlined bit is an example of a logical conclusion

You can insult the intelligence of the posters, or say that their responses are below par for dual-boxing.com's standards. However, imo your topic is below dual-boxing.com's standards. IMO, the spirit of multiboxing is the challenge. I personally love the challenge of running an instance myself. I enjoyed the work and thought process of making my macros and system. I will enjoy running arenas, and trying to figure out ways to win. I believe that is why most people do multibox, cause it is a new and larger challenge than playing a single char. So your post asking if its ok to do something, and put forth no effort, or accept the challenge so that you can receive your purples imo is an insult to this community and again is below its standards. That is why I said its moronic in my previous post. Of course its your $75 a month, and no team is ever going to report you for not putting up a fight in arena, but don't ask us if its ok to not try, and them hope we give you an applauding yes.

[Mercurio]

I'm the one who posted the message you referenced about doing AFK arenas (not "beyond-tec", as incorrectly attributed to him earlier in this thread). Here is my full post again...

2-38?!!?

OMG, that's a lot better than my 0-120 over the last 6 weeks!

(As I'm typing this I'm in my 14th AFK game in a row - so many 70s I need 2 5v5 teams now)

In less than an hour of web surfing I'll have gained 4043 arena points, as I do every week.

Welfare? Absolutely

Do it? I'd be an idiot not to. Plus all the goodwill of giving away approx 300 points in arena rating to teams that actually prepared, have 5 players, and give a crap.

I always picture the other team on teamspeak, "Dude, queue us up again - FAST! Maybe we'll get that group again! Hurry!" Does my heart good to be nice to folks.

Sure, I'll try when my shammies get some decent gear, but with 40 resiliance and 600 spell damage it would be rather silly at this point.

As to the original question - is it allowed? Fortunately, you are allowed to suck at arena and keep playing. My personal experience is that I've been doing it on a couple of teams for over 6 months and have never had anyone (player or GM) say anything that would make me think it was not.

In response to some of the replies from the community -

"How could you live with yourself" (how can I live with myself trying and going 0-10 every week?)

"not in the spirit of competition" (OK, think of it as trying, just not very hard, and when my wife has walked into the room talking to me and I'm distracted)

"You should at least ride into the middle in a pack to lose faster" (I actually do this about half the time, so I guess I'm not truly AFK)

"You get hardly any points by doing this" (See below)

People just don't seem to understand that even when I've tried (once in a blue moon), with my crap gear I get owned anyway. Fast. I have no outside healer and no one on these forums has done any good at all truly 5-boxing. I'm trying to get points on 13 level 70s with a wide variety of classes that don't mix very well (most in cloth). It is by far the most efficient use of my time to lose 10 games on two teams as fast as possible.

I buy a new 5v5 team every week for 200g so I can get about 320 points on each toon per week. Please understand, arena rating is basically meaningless unless you get above 1500. Under 1500, Blizzard is giving you points for entering the arena, not for skill or rating. They communicate this to the playerbase by how we are rewarded:

5v5 rating Arena Points Notes (My formatting of this table has failed a number of times, so I'm just color-coding the columns - really, it looks better as a table ;) )

1500 344 The points you'd get if you form a decent team, spend some time gearing up, and beat half the teams you face

1375 317 This is my typical rating after losing 10 games (a whopping 27 less points than the average team)

1280 298 This is my typical rating after losing 20 games, and when I usually buy a new team to start at 1500 again

1121 256 Even if you lose all your games for 4 weeks in a row you are still getting decent points - equal to a 1500 rated 2v2

1625 499 Ah, here is where it gets interesting. Note that when 125 below 1500 I get 27 less points, but when 125 above 1500 I get 155 points more.

As you can see, I've done some thinking about this and not trying very hard in arena is the result of my "logical reasoning" on the subject. Blizzard compels us to participate in arena based on the rewards. I do so in as efficient a manner as possible and one that actually rewards people who are trying and lose more than they win. I honestly don't see any downside.

Edit: BTW, thought I'd add... all this becomes moot for me in a few days. After S4 starts I'm going to blow all my honor and arena points on gear, have a shot at actually winning, and do my best.

[Drizzit]

"You should at least ride into the middle in a pack to lose faster" (I actually do this about half the time, so I guess I'm not truly AFK)
The funny thing to see if both teams do this. That would be a youtube moment.

[Codam]

You can insult the intelligence of the posters, or say that their responses are below par for dual-boxing.com's standards. However, imo your topic is below dual-boxing.com's standards. IMO, the spirit of multiboxing is the challenge. I personally love the challenge of running an instance myself. I enjoyed the work and thought process of making my macros and system. I will enjoy running arenas, and trying to figure out ways to win. I believe that is why most people do multibox, cause it is a new and larger challenge than playing a single char. So your post asking if its ok to do something, and put forth no effort, or accept the challenge so that you can receive your purples imo is an insult to this community and again is below its standards. That is why I said its moronic in my previous post. Of course its your $75 a month, and no team is ever going to report you for not putting up a fight in arena, but don't ask us if its ok to not try, and them hope we give you an applauding yes.

You still don't get either what I'm taking issue with here, OR what I originally asked.

Original question: Is it against the rules? NOT Do you personally like it?

Its a simple question which can either be answered by a yes, a no, or an "I don't have a clue". Applause? keep your applause, I never asked for it.

What I'm taking issue with: People who refuse to discuss the original question, and just keep on dragging the discussion back to why the hell I want to know anyhow, or why they personally wouldn't even consider it.

WTF is "The spirit of multiboxing"?..... Please! What's next? the 10 commandments of multiboxing? The Bible of multiboxing?
How far do you think this community would have come if no-one had the guts to ask if things were against the rules for fear of others who just didn't think it was right to be asking the question?

At no stage have I made an attempt to insult the intelligence of the people making replies, but the way your arguments are leaning is incredibly hypocritical coming from a multiboxer. The similarities between your attacks based on your opinion that I'm trying to get stuff for no effort spent, and those of the drooling imbeciles on the WoW general forums who don't think that multiboxers should be allowed to level in a group, or go in an instance whenever they want to are too many for me to even consider that you can't see them. THAT is what I call an insult to the community. If you'd rather consider asking for clarification on a rule as such an insult to the community, then you are too close minded to bother arguing with any more.


Apologies to Mercurio and Beyond-tec for mixing up their names in quoting.

[Skrimshaw]

You were fishing for opinions, you already knew the answer. As for the difference between a drooling single boxer on the wow forums and myself here, is on the wow forums you are arguing with people who are ill informed or don't understand the mechanics and effort. My opinion of getting gear with no effort has no similarities to the ill informed bitching about how easy we have it.

I guess I could be wrong though, you might have actually been looking for the real answer to your question and not fishing for someone to tell you its ok. I guess it could be possible that you know enough about the game to multibox and could put a logical and intelligent argument together without knowing that all afk /reports are friendly fire, or had the thought there is no team in the world that would report someone for not fighting back. Or realized that you will never get banned for ingame tactics or actions without getting reported. If that is the case I surely apologize.

[Mercurio]

As for the mix-up in me and beyond-tec, no problem. Our avatars ARE pretty close. But there is some significance - just remember green = noob (me).

[Codam]

You were fishing for opinions, you already knew the answer.

Well after re-reading my original post, I can almost understand why you made that mistake. Although it was definitely a mistake, and if you look closely I clarified twice that my concern was with how Blizzard would view/react to this.

I still don't know the answer, but rather have found out along the way that the gear I wanted isn't even available via arena, and that even if it was, the risk of Blizzard suddenly deciding that they don't like this outweighs any benefit by far.

[Drizzit]

Could you please take down the picture of the Special Olympics.

Thank you.

[Codam]

Could you please take down the picture of the Special Olympics.

Thank you.

Done, apologies if you found that offensive

[daviddoran]

"You should at least ride into the middle in a pack to lose faster" (I actually do this about half the time, so I guess I'm not truly AFK)
The funny thing to see if both teams do this. That would be a youtube moment.
LOL! Kinda like that south park episode where they were playing baseball in the summer, because their parents made them, but all they wanted to do was play video games (wow?) so they tried to lose, but they somehow made it to the finals, and the other team was so good at losing, they actually hit balls into the mits of the other team, rather than wait for strikeouts/walks... Funny stuff.

I might do the same thing, just to get points to get some type of gear. I don't like how the system is set up. Some people are so crazy good, that you don't have a chance until you at least get a bit geared up. And how do you get geared up? By losing. The game is practically set up for this. lose as fast as possible, get points, repeat. Spend points on better gear, then actually try, and see how you fare then. Other than that, you gotta farm Heroics for badges, as the "epic" gear there doesn't seem worth the trouble otherwise, at least for my healadin, there was nothing that I could really use. Or 10 box kara... lol decent gear in there.

[Vyndree]

Of course it seems like a completely different scenario, as noone else is being adversely affected by it. My concern was more that blizzard would see this as "not in the spirit of..." blah blah blah

I HAVE actually seen a thread about this in the customer service forums. I believe it was answered by Belfaire and was about purposely losing arena.

The response from the blue was that it is OK to lose in arenas -- I mean, honestly... You're allowed to suck.
What you aren't allowed to do is lose against the SAME TEAMS over and over again. They specifically mentioned losing against friends/guildmates in a way that could be considered win trading. If you lose consistently that's fine -- but you shouldn't lose only to the same team.

Any attempt to "fix" the queues or to specifically lose in order to give another team a marked advantage is considered win trading. Losing all games or just sucking at PvP in general is OK. It's your PvP strategy, you just can't make a marked effort to specifically lose to a certain team(s) in order to boost that other team's arena ratings. If you want to not TRY to win games just so you can put your 10 games in without having to expend much time/effort, that's your decision to make. It may not be morally tasteful to some, but it does not break the rules. (Edit: HOWEVER, it is NOT okay to refuse to PARTICIPATE in your losses -- see my GM posts linked in the next post)


I'll try to dig up the actual blue post on the subject but no promises. It happened shortly after the win trader bans and the botter bans.

[Vyndree]

I believe it was answered by Belfaire and was about purposely losing arena.

I was wrong, it was GM Vrakthris.

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=6441212865&postId=65510977102&sid=1#2

It has long been a dream of mine to have an Arena team achieve as low a rating as possible by intentionally losing every game against every opponent we come up against.

Is doing this against the spirit of the game, and in violation of the Win Trading policy? I don't want to cause problems or get into trouble by intentionally losing every game we go into in the Arena.


Please note: we are not queuing up against and only losing to a select group of teams, we are losing against whoever we go up against regardless.

Certainly questionable, Tjourney, but I suppose if you are losing to everyone and you aren't matched against the same team repeatedly we may just think you that you /fail. :D

I certainly don't endorse this practice the Arena as well as the battlegrounds are there to pit ones skill and the skill of your team mates against another team. Purposefully failing goes against the spirit of what they are intended for.


Ah, here's clarification -- while it's OK to lose repeatedly in arenas, it is NOT OKAY to AFK or to not actually participate in your losses.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Q u o t e:
so it is safe for my friends and I to /dance and /train our way to victory/failure?
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I would advise against it, Tjourney, although non-participation mostly is applied to the Battlegrounds it may also serve to cover arena matches. If you wish to lose at the games you are playing you'll have to do it the old fashion way and be worse than your opponents.


There it is. Nail in coffin.

/endthread.

[Drizzit]

Could you please take down the picture of the Special Olympics.

Thank you.

Done, apologies if you found that offensiveThank you I really appreciate that.

[Mercurio]

Great post Vyndree, that clears things up pretty well. You are always good for that kind of thing and I've learned a lot from your ability to keep track of the blues and quote them at the appropriate time.

Guess I'll go ahead and mount up and ride into the slaughter that awaits me.

[Vyndree]

Great post Vyndree, that clears things up pretty well. You are always good for that kind of thing and I've learned a lot from your ability to keep track of the blues and quote them at the appropriate time.

Guess I'll go ahead and mount up and ride into the slaughter that awaits me.

I just enjoy trolling the customer service forums while at work. It's a great way to kill time.

As always, if you're ever worried about whether something is or isn't against the rules the best course of action would be to post in the customer service forums. While we can help advise you as best we can, we're not the authority on the rules -- Blizzard is. And the GM's in that forum are very helpful. :)

[JoeWunsch]

You are allowed to not play an arena match and let them beat you, or leave for an instant loss.

Just join the game then leave, you will get your loss in about 60 seconds, and the other team gets an insta-win.

Anyway you can also join and just sit there, Arena isn't like BG where you can't control your part ymembers, if the other team members didn't *want* you to afk, they would remove you from the team and you would never be able to play with them again.

I have done this before when I didn't have enough time to play and had to do 10 games real fast at 2 AM on a Monday a few hours before the servers go down. Lazy or not, sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do. I doubt the opponents care, free points.

[twobztwop]

First, I don't see why you wouldn't at least give it the ol' college try. I mean at least give wining a shot. When I first started with crappy gear (still crappy but..) I'd lose all 10 games, but at least I'd give winning a go. It really doesn't take much longer to try than to purposely lose.

Second, I love winning when the other team leaves. It hasn't happened in the last few weeks. But one week I got lucky and kept running into the same 2 teams that would leave the arena before the match started and I'd get an instant win. So nice. Went 8 and 2 that week. So if you happen to be on the reckoning battle group and don't want to win, let me know when you queue up. ;) Oh wait, that isn't allowed is it. (FYI this is sarcasm)

Third, I do all my wow research at work too.

[Vyndree]

You are allowed to not play an arena match and let them beat you, or leave for an instant loss.

Just join the game then leave, you will get your loss in about 60 seconds, and the other team gets an insta-win.

Anyway you can also join and just sit there, Arena isn't like BG where you can't control your part ymembers, if the other team members didn't *want* you to afk, they would remove you from the team and you would never be able to play with them again.

I have done this before when I didn't have enough time to play and had to do 10 games real fast at 2 AM on a Monday a few hours before the servers go down. Lazy or not, sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do. I doubt the opponents care, free points.

Can you provide me with a Blizzard (blue) post confirming this?

Because I believe mine, which is linked a couple posts above yours, contradicts your statements.


http://dual-boxing.com/forums/index.php?page=Thread&postID=77178#post77178

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Q u o t e:
so it is safe for my friends and I to /dance and /train our way to victory/failure?
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I would advise against it, Tjourney, although non-participation mostly is applied to the Battlegrounds it may also serve to cover arena matches. If you wish to lose at the games you are playing you'll have to do it the old fashion way and be worse than your opponents.
(Emphasis mine)


Although /forfeit would seem to be a gray area, considering it's part of the arena system. In which case I still wouldn't ENCOURAGE other players to do this until I started a thread on the Customer Service Forums ('http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/board.html?forumId=11112&sid=1') and got official confirmation that this is ok. Would you want to be responsible for people getting banned thanks to your advice? It's better to be safe than sorry.

Please cite your sources before encouraging other players to do something that is a "gray area" of the rules.

I'm going to close this thread to prevent any further personal suggestions, as I believe GM Vrakthris answered the OP's question appropriately. If you have new information to share about AFKing or not participating in arenas, feel free to start a new thread with links to the new information.