Wow forums are blowing up again...this time it's win trading...

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Originally Posted by 'Buzzatronic',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63132#p ost63132

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Personally, I just feel slightly bad for the point-buyers, as point-buying isn't against the TOS... but got the hammer based on association.

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I don't feel bad for them in the slightest. They wanted a shortcut to gaining gear/points rather than doing it legitimately and shortcuts always have risk.

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It's akin of buying a really sweet deal on the AH, except whoever posted that sweet deal really botted to get the item, and now you got a nice hefty 72 hour ban and the item taken away from you for botting. Oh, and all the other items you purchased from the auction house that month (since you were "clearly" participating in botting and economy exploitation) are taken away too as an extra measure, regardless of whether or not those items gained were legitimate.

Buying teams was confirmed legitimate by blizzard representatives (I believe I already linked that response), but what the team buyers didn't know is that they'd get slammed if the people they bought from wintraded in the past. Which, really, is something you can't really verify prior to purchase.

The buyers shouldn't be penalized for something they took no part in -- if they bought a team, play the games LEGITIMATELY, and win/lose according to their own skill... then they shouldn't be looking at a 72 hour ban + all gear removed... for the entire SEASON.

Tons of these problems go away when there is a 1-month cooldown on joining a team after having left one. Hell, maybe just even a 2-week cooldown.

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It's akin of buying a really sweet deal on the AH, except whoever posted that sweet deal really botted to get the item, and now you got a nice hefty 72 hour ban and the item taken away from you for botting.

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Not really the same thing but I think you know that already. :)

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The buyers shouldn't be penalized for something they took no part in -- if they bought a team, play the games LEGITIMATELY, and win/lose according to their own skill... then they shouldn't be looking at a 72 hour ban + all gear removed... for the entire SEASON.

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I'm sorry but in my oh so humble opinion, there is nothing "legitimate" about buying a highly ranked team, then playing the minimum amount of games per week to leech as many arena points (resulting in gear) as possible from the purchased ranking before the team rating "rights" itself based on the skill of the players on that team.

Regardless of whether blizzard says it's ban-able, it's certainly not legitimate in my opinion which is why I have little sympathy for those caught up in the fact that it would seem such activities breed cheaters who wish to maximize their own profits.

I think with the changes coming in 2.4.2 it could be assumed that Blizzard doesn't find points gained in such a way "legitimate" either, even if the practice of getting points in such a way is not a ban-able offense.

Again, this is all my opinion ... feel free to have your own. :)

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Originally Posted by 'Vyndree',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63166#post6 3166

if they bought a team, play the games LEGITIMATELY, and win/lose according to their own skill

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Apply this to pve: Someone buys a lv30 and runs Gnomer, according to his(complete lack of) skill; wipes horribly. Gets nothing. Someone buys a lv60 char they have no prior experience playing; runs ramparts according to his skill; dies/wipes, group disbands, gets nothing. Now I'm not saying it's akin to buying chars(not at all), just the first closest example I could think of :p And it's a discussion, not intended as a flame or heated argument lol; personally I believe it boils down to starting off ahead of where you should be, skipping the "boring" early work and ending up with an achievement you didn't earn/don't own. But, that's just what I think and Blizzard has no issue with it(beyond the mass bannings they're doing to those related to win trading which is a different thing we all agree on) so more power to 'em if they want to pay to play the game literally instead of figuratively.

$15/mth to play
500g/week for points where they mostly lose(also feeding undeserving teams at higher lvls)
Watching people get bored when they have everything near-instantly with no work, thus complaining Blizz doesn't give them enough content: Priceless. :P

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Originally Posted by 'Buzzatronic',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63192#p ost63192

I'm sorry but in my oh so humble opinion, there is nothing "legitimate" about buying a highly ranked team, then playing the minimum amount of games per week to leech as many arena points (resulting in gear) as possible from the purchased ranking before the team rating "rights" itself based on the skill of the players on that team.

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That's opinion.

How many games do you think it would take for a 1400's SKILL team to tank a 2k RATED team? ;) They very quickly go where they belong -- so, in essence, they can pay an exorbant amount of money to buy a new team each week, or get their buddies to help them relevel their ratings back up so they oh-just-might-maybe not fail so miserably the next week?

2k rating purchased team comes up against a 1600's team and fails? How many points do you think they'll lose? ;)

In this way, I think it's fair. If they want to spend their money on a higher rated team just so they can tank the ratings each week and maybe come out a few points further than they would have in the 1300's bracket, it's their money. If they deserve to lose, they will.

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Regardless of whether blizzard says it's ban-able, it's certainly not legitimate in my opinion which is why I have little sympathy for those caught up in the fact that it would seem such activities breed cheaters who wish to maximize their own profits.

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This reminds me of... "I don't care if Blizzard says it's ok... multiboxing is cheating"

There is some hurt involved, and I agree. However, I'm hesitant to say that it will go away in 2.4. 2k rated teams are still going to re-make teams and end up with a brand new 1500's rated team that they have to level back up into their appropriate bracket. It's a problem, for sure -- but banning people for wanting to get the most points per week in a LEGITIMATE fashion isn't the right way to do it.

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I think with the changes coming in 2.4.2 it could be assumed that Blizzard doesn't find points gained in such a way "legitimate" either, even if the practice of getting points in such a way is not a ban-able offense.

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We'll see when the new rules come out, but as of right now...

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Selling points is currently not against our policies, but please note that they are always subject to change.

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http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...geNo=1&sid=1#3

Lynching a person when, as of right now, they are doing nothing wrong... That's just rather reminiscent of the behavior that we find so offensive from the "lol multibox is teh cheatzor" crowd.

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Again, this is all my opinion ... feel free to have your own. :)

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*nodnods* I do.

I'm on the fence when it comes to this topic. I mainly PvE, with a splash of PvP rarely (about as often as I play other video games). Both sides have their points, but this whole ban-stick topic makes me wonder what stops Blizzard from doing the same to multiboxing PvP or multiboxing WoW in general. Sure, they currently say its ok... but they can reverse it (Forum QQ = Blizzard action?).

As far as Arena goes, I imagine a lot of folks who got hit with the ban stick are just canceling their account and waiting for newer games (Warham, Conan, etc). I know if my 70's got their gear stripped to nothing and suspended by Blizz I'd shut down all my accounts and move on.

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Originally Posted by 'Eteocles',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63197#post 63197

Someone buys a lv60 char they have no prior experience playing; runs ramparts according to his skill; dies/wipes, group disbands, gets nothing. Now I'm not saying it's akin to buying chars(not at all), just the first closest example I could think of :p

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That's exactly what I was getting at, Eteocles. :) Thanks.

Basically a sucky player will continue to suck on a purchased team, and the more they suck the faster the ratings will tank.

Now if they suck and WIN-TRADE to get around their natural level of suck to get more points then they should... Different story.

What I was getting at though is that they should suck their way to that point, not tele-suck to a future point ;p

OH GOD THE INNUENDOS

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That's opinion.

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Exactly but more specifically, it's my "oh so humble opinion" as I originally stated. :)

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How many games do you think it would take for a 1400's SKILL team to tank a 2k RATED team? ;)

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It's hard to know for sure but if you make the assumption that the purchased team is always facing a team of the same rating, then they'll lose 16 points per game or 160 points per week if they lose their minimum 10 games. That would take 'em a few weeks to drop back down to the ~1400 range. In that time they've gained 822 points at the end of the first week (rating now 1840), 548 points at the end of the second week (rating now 1680), and 366 points at the end of the third week (rating now 1520). That's 1736 points "purchased" in 3 weeks assuming they lose 30 games in a row and never lose to higher ranked teams (meaning they lose less points).

At this point they buy another 2K team and start the 3 week cycle all over again with the money they grinded out from dailies since they didn't have to spend much time in the Arena since they already bought their points. :)

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They very quickly go where they belong -- so, in essence, they can pay an exorbant amount of money to buy a new team each week, or get their buddies to help them relevel their ratings back up so they oh-just-might-maybe not fail so miserably the next week?

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Teams don't drop from 2K to 1400 in a week unless they are dumb enough to play more than 10 games (losing them all), it's more like 3 which can earn a 5v5 team a considerable amount of purchased arena points.

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2k rating purchased team comes up against a 1600's team and fails? How many points do you think they'll lose? ;)

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In 5v5 they'll lose 29.09 points in a 2000 vs 1600 game. Worst possible loss of points per game is 32 so if they buy a 2K team they'll lose a maximum of 320 points per week unless they are dumb enough to play more than 10 games. :) So instead of it taking 3-4 weeks to get back down to 1400, it'll take 2. Meanwhile they are still "earning" points they aren't earning at all, but instead purchased.

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In this way, I think it's fair. If they want to spend their money on a higher rated team just so they can tank the ratings each week and maybe come out a few points further than they would have in the 1300's bracket, it's their money. If they deserve to lose, they will.

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The same can be said for people who buy gold .. it's their money, but what happens when it breaks the whole environment? Also it's much more than "a few points" better than 1300's teams.

Also teams have to be built from 1500 to be sold which means there is a lot of 2K+ skilled players in the 1500-2000 brackets to "farm" their teams up with their full S3 gear, just so they can sell the team. How is that fair to the "legitimate" teams trying to actually compete at the ~1650 rating becuase that's where their skill level puts them? It's not and if battlegrounds has tought us anything, being rolled and honor/points farmed is not fun at all and that's what team selling creates, a system where the "legitimate" teams are farmed for the purposes of leveling up a team to sell to others.

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This reminds me of... "I don't care if Blizzard says it's ok... multiboxing is cheating"

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Just like buying a spot in a BT raid doesn't make the gear you got from it "legitimate", so does buying points/teams does not make the gear that results "legitimate".

The problem is people use the PvP gear gained from buying points/teams to hinder others in PvP (since gear still matters as much if not more than skill these days), while the BT epics someone rocks out in Shatt doesn't hurt others enjoyment of the game in the slightest.

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There is some hurt involved, and I agree. However, I'm hesitant to say that it will go away in 2.4. 2k rated teams are still going to re-make teams and end up with a brand new 1500's rated team that they have to level back up into their appropriate bracket.

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But it'll be much harder for people to do this since when they remake a 1500 team after selling their previous 2K team, that 1500 team will be matched against other 2K teams right away since the personal rating of the people who leveled up the first team to sell is still 2K. Leveling up multiple teams each week just to sell will become exponentially harder due to the personal ratings change.

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It's a problem, for sure -- but banning people for wanting to get the most points per week in a LEGITIMATE fashion isn't the right way to do it.

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You feel purchased points are legitimate, I do not. We will agree to disagree on this one. :)

Also if it's "a problem, for sure" and people exploit that problem for their own gain, doesn't that fall under the TOS guidelines of not exploiting a flaw in the game's design? :)

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Originally Posted by 'Dawnstone',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63199#pos t63199

what stops Blizzard from doing the same to multiboxing PvP or multiboxing WoW in general. Sure, they currently say its ok... but they can reverse it (Forum QQ = Blizzard action?).

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I am worried about the same, but there is nothing we can do but just continue to have fun m-boxing =). Its a beautiful sport is it not =P.

I think due to the ammount of posts approving of it may be a notifier that this will not happen, but there is always a possibility.



Qlimax

I was under the impression that blizzard owned all items in wow. So how can someone sell somethng that is wow based and not on the wrong side of the line. Is my logic off base? I'm assuming they paid real money for these points and not gold.

Hm this is an interesting development.

Im glad they are taking action against cheaters, but im one of the "Too Late" camp, I think if they were going to take action on this, they should have started early. If they had stamped it out early, it would have never become as widespread as it is now, and all this "economic exploitation" and what not would never have occurred. Also would have been less "bystanders".

But yeah, all these cheater tears are pretty refreshing. =P

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Originally Posted by 'Gadzooks',index.php?page=Thread&postID=62785#post 62785

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Originally Posted by 'Ellay',index.php?page=Thread&postID=62747#post627 47

Selling points on teams at the very peak on ratings was also very enticing for most who could do so or just smart enough to buy 2 teams themselves (you didn't even need to earn the rating yourself!). It is close to hitting an in-game lottery every week if there was one. If you had 2x 2200 rated 5v5 you could potentially sell 10 slots on each team every week for easily 1000g or more as the demand was huge.

So after win trading 2 teams for 1kg a slot, you'd net 20,000 gold in about an hours worth of work. Not to get too in depth but if you sold the gold (which some did) at $25 per thousand, your looking at $500 an hour real money. It didn't just stop there, this is a renewable source of income every week. With several players having at least 10 lvl 70's to hold teams and sell points it just got out of hand.
Which is what I believe pushed out the ban hammer.
I saw a link floating around of a guy openly selling about 80,000 gold a week and just unloading it. That's crazy stuffz!If someone

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If someone is selling gold, they had better be very careful about who they tell, and they better not be selling it themselves - it only takes one toon who's really a Bliz employee to get yourself sued. That kind of thing is VERY actionable, and we have no idea if they've gone after anyone for this before, or will in the future.

I'm curious what they would do to someone caught transferring gold to a know gold seller account, like one that belongs to IGE. Permaban, most likely, and block that credit card forever. You'd also be at risk of being included in any current or future legal issues with that seller.

Not a smart idea, in the long run. With the amount of data Bliz has on every toon, and my hunch that they are watching the movement of large amounts of gold...the people doing this are just dumb.

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I guess you dont remember the website/freeserver Blizz shut down many years ago. I actually had a link on my PC back in the days after the Beta testing. Blizz sued and won and shut down the website and and feds broke down the door of the location and consficated all the equipment on the premises.

DO NOT MESS WITH BLIZZ !!! they do go after you.

I saw someone on one of the threads in CS say that they are rolling out the S4 points-gain changes (i.e. to prevent points selling, the whole Personal rating requirement within 150 of team rating in order to get points) this tuesday. Can anyone confirm or deny this? It would make sense that they are doing it now, right after cracking down on team-sellers.

Wonder if there are any blue posts on the topic.

Sigh... We really getting into this whole team-selling right or wrong arguement again? What's this make? 4th thread since I joined only a couple of months ago? :huh:

A marriage should be between a man and a ...

A woman shouldn't be able to abort her...

Oh wait. Team-selling. Right...

Just one of those moral questions that no one will ever agree on.

People shouldn't power level. You should have to kill mobs yourself. Anyone who had a 70 power level you should be set back to level 1 and lose all their items and gold, even if it was just to help with one instance or quest. Perma-ban for the leveler if the 70 ever cheated. They ban people who buy characters and this is clearly the same thing.

Ban all auction house users. You should have to kill mobs yourself to get loot. I don't care what blizzard says, buying items is cheating. This is clearly the same as buying gold.

Someone get that multibox qq checklist and rename it for arenas. See how many you can find in this thread.

And this has nothing to do with morals. It has to do with what is cheating and what isn't cheating. Buying an arena team or a spot on an arena team was confirmed to be not cheating and should be treated as such.

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Originally Posted by 'Zaelar',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63376#post63 376

People shouldn't power level. You should have to kill mobs yourself. Anyone who had a 70 power level you should be set back to level 1 and lose all their items and gold, even if it was just to help with one instance or quest. Perma-ban for the leveler if the 70 ever cheated. They ban people who buy characters and this is clearly the same thing.

Ban all auction house users. You should have to kill mobs yourself to get loot. I don't care what blizzard says, buying items is cheating. This is clearly the same as buying gold.

Someone get that multibox qq checklist and rename it for arenas. See how many you can find in this thread.

And this has nothing to do with morals. It has to do with what is cheating and what isn't cheating. Buying an arena team or a spot on an arena team was confirmed to be not cheating and should be treated as such.

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So what was your point? I lost it in your epic exaggeration. I'm hoping it was 'cheaters deserve teh ban.'

That quote is just trying to turn "Playing with friends" into "Zomg skip content"; if it's a NEW player being skipped, then yes it's bad and they should experience it first. If it's someone like us who've been playing since launch, fuck doing the westfall series for the 56th time :p In cases like that, I know my class, I know the game.

The problem with Arenas is the gear. The gear was designed with the original intent to fortify those who've proven themselves at least competant or downright "good", who DO well enough to afford it. Half the people who had it didn't DO anything. In the Raid spot buying example, there's still a difference between going and knowing what to do/how to help and actually contributing, and just going and kinda watching like a dumbass then looting and bragging later.

The Arenas should simply be for bragging rights and seeing who's the best, that's the whole point of the silly duels, but everyone's turned it into "HAY FREE GEAR LETS GO"; they should rename it if it's not going to be what Arenas are supposed to be; fights to death to see the victor, to whom go the spoils, not "Every civilian/non-Gladiator retard and his brother jumps around the ranks and gets special gladiator gear from the Emperor himself"

TL;DR: The idea of Arenas wasn't a bad one; the problem is noone else ingame gives 2 shits and just wants more purplez so their e-peen is the same size as everyone else's.

And the key flaw in that argument regarding it not being cheating, while true, Blizzard said they don't/won't specifically support it, and their actions(the banninations and adding requirements to the gear to keep scrubs who don't deserve it out of it) paint not-quite-opposite, but still not particularly "HAY GUYZ ITS AWWWWWWRIGHT" pictures :p

Different opinions are different, so I'll end with this. :)

If there was nothing wrong in Blizzard's eyes with points/team selling, then they wouldn't be making so many changes to make it much more difficult in today's patch.

We can argue all day about the semantics of what's a ban-able offense and what is not, but the fact remains that Blizzard is making changes to make it much more difficult or next to impossible to effectively buy arena points or teams.

In my opinion, that means they want to actively discourage the practice and since they made the game and the rules, I'll also assume that means they feel is it not a legitimate way to progress through PvP content (just as when they make changes to instances that previously allowed people to bypass PvE content in certain ways. It wasn't ban-able, but it was fixed because it also wasn't legitimate progression.)

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PvP

• Arenas
  • If a character’s personal rating is more than 150 points below the team rating, they will earn points based on their personal rating instead of the team rating.
  • If the average personal rating of the players queuing for a game is more than 150 points below the team’s rating, the team will be queued against an opponent matching or similar to the average personal rating.

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The 150 points difference from the Personal Rating (PR) and Team Rating (TR) would seem to curb point selling in this patch 2.4.2.

Scenario 1:

Suppose a Player_A & Player_B buys a Team_Uber with 2000 TR, Both Player_A and Player_B have 1500 PR.
They run 10 games, losing 10 games match versus 2000 rated teams at a loss of 16 points a game.
At the end of the week, Team_Uber is 1840 TR, but Player_A and Player_B's PR dropped down say 1 point each game to 1484.
According the patch 2.4.2, Plater_A and Player_B's 1500 PR is more than 150 points below 2000 TR; therefore they will only earn points based on 1484 rating?

Scenario 2:

Suppose Player_A is a new 70 with no pvp gear, joins with Player_X and Player_Y both with full S3 gear at 2000 PR. Their Team_Carry is 1500 TR.
They queue, with the average rating of (5500/3) = 1833. This is what's referred to as 2.5 versus 3 arena match.
Team_Carry can still win versus 1833 rated teams (no S3 weapons/shoulders)--those struggling to get 1850; those non-cookie cutter teams?

Team_Carry will gain more than 15 points per game since they start at 1500 and fighting 1830 teams. I think the point gain is around 27 based on the chess tournament formula.
And Player_A will probably as much PR also.

So let's say an average of 20 points gain per game. After 10 games, Team_Carry is at 1700 with Player_A at 1700 PR also?
With the PR rating required to get S4 arena gear, and S4 honor gear, carrying someone to 1700 PR seems quite profitable for 2 players.

With the amount of gold one gets doing 25 daily quest. But let say one does the Island, and a few SSO pack quests. Thats about 200 gold a day from daily quests, do it 5x a week and the player has 1000g to offer to be carried weekly for arena points.

Scenario 1: Yes.
Scenario 2: Points earned based on Player's Personal Rating; will not factor team or teammates' rating. Uber Teammates get huge points, newbie 70 gets poop points and probably causes losses due to one member not being worth shit vs 3 REAL pvpers

Probably a bit against the popular opinion, but as long as you face full s3 teams at 1500 rating, I couldn't care less about wintrading.

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Originally Posted by 'Buzzatronic',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63217#p ost63217

But it'll be much harder for people to do this since when they remake a 1500 team after selling their previous 2K team, that 1500 team will be matched against other 2K teams right away since the personal rating of the people who leveled up the first team to sell is still 2K. Leveling up multiple teams each week just to sell will become exponentially harder due to the personal ratings change.

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This is not true. When you create a new team, everyone's personal ratings start at 1500 along with the team. Personal ratings are tied to teams, If I leave a 2k team, and join another one, then my personal rating for the new team is 1500 as well.

creating new teams and lvling to 2k, is going to be just as easy.

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Originally Posted by Sanctume',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63735#post6 3735][quote][font='arial

PvP [/font]

• Arenas
  • If a character’s personal rating is more than 150 points below the team rating, they will earn points based on their personal rating instead of the team rating.
  • If the average personal rating of the players queuing for a game is more than 150 points below the team’s rating, the team will be queued against an opponent matching or similar to the average personal rating.

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The 150 points difference from the Personal Rating (PR) and Team Rating (TR) would seem to curb point selling in this patch 2.4.2.

Scenario 1:

Suppose a Player_A & Player_B buys a Team_Uber with 2000 TR, Both Player_A and Player_B have 1500 PR.
They run 10 games, losing 10 games match versus 2000 rated teams at a loss of 16 points a game.
At the end of the week, Team_Uber is 1840 TR, but Player_A and Player_B's PR dropped down say 1 point each game to 1484.
According the patch 2.4.2, Plater_A and Player_B's 1500 PR is more than 150 points below 2000 TR; therefore they will only earn points based on 1484 rating?

Scenario 2:

Suppose Player_A is a new 70 with no pvp gear, joins with Player_X and Player_Y both with full S3 gear at 2000 PR. Their Team_Carry is 1500 TR.
They queue, with the average rating of (5500/3) = 1833. This is what's referred to as 2.5 versus 3 arena match.
Team_Carry can still win versus 1833 rated teams (no S3 weapons/shoulders)--those struggling to get 1850; those non-cookie cutter teams?

Team_Carry will gain more than 15 points per game since they start at 1500 and fighting 1830 teams. I think the point gain is around 27 based on the chess tournament formula.
And Player_A will probably as much PR also.

So let's say an average of 20 points gain per game. After 10 games, Team_Carry is at 1700 with Player_A at 1700 PR also?
With the PR rating required to get S4 arena gear, and S4 honor gear, carrying someone to 1700 PR seems quite profitable for 2 players.

With the amount of gold one gets doing 25 daily quest. But let say one does the Island, and a few SSO pack quests. Thats about 200 gold a day from daily quests, do it 5x a week and the player has 1000g to offer to be carried weekly for arena points.[/quote]

Scenario 1 = correct
Scneario 2 = not correct.

When they create teh team, everyone's personal rating is at 1500. Thus you can completly carry a 3rd unskilled person as long as they are in the games winning with you.

Everyone forgets that everytime you change a team, your personal rating resets to 1500.

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Originally Posted by 'Moxy',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63421#post6342 1

So what was your point? I lost it in your epic exaggeration. I'm hoping it was 'cheaters deserve teh ban.'

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I wasn't exaggerating, I was copying ideas and applied them to a different area to create sarcasm. The point wasn't that cheaters deserve to be banned, but that people who don't cheat don't deserve to be banned and that only blizzard gets to decide what is cheating and what isn't.

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Originally Posted by 2.4.2 ptr notes

Hunters

* Boar Charge: This ability will no longer make Growl cast immediately after it generates excessive threat.
* The pet ability Growl will no longer scale with pet Attack Power.

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Obviously blizzard is not ok with people using growl so they are nerfing it. They should just ban hunters that have pets with growl. I don't see any blue posts that specifically say that having a pet with growl isn't a banable offense.

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Originally Posted by 'Suvega',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63802#post63 802

Everyone forgets that everytime you change a team, your personal rating resets to 1500.

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Ahh yep, that's correct ... so the 5/5 S3 rolling of nubs in the 1500 bracket will continue for the sake of team selling. *sigh*.

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Originally Posted by 'Zaelar',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63820#post63 820

Obviously blizzard is not ok with people using growl so they are nerfing it. They should just ban hunters that have pets with growl. I don't see any blue posts that specifically say that having a pet with growl isn't a banable offense.

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Once "Sell arena team" and "Buy arena points" become trainable skills put in the game by Blizzard then changed/tweaked, then I'll agree with your comparison. Until then you're just being silly for the sake of being silly.

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Originally Posted by Sanctume',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63735#post6 3735][quote][font='arial

PvP [/font]

• Arenas
  • If a character’s personal rating is more than 150 points below the team rating, they will earn points based on their personal rating instead of the team rating.
  • If the average personal rating of the players queuing for a game is more than 150 points below the team’s rating, the team will be queued against an opponent matching or similar to the average personal rating.

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The 150 points difference from the Personal Rating (PR) and Team Rating (TR) would seem to curb point selling in this patch 2.4.2.

Scenario 1:

Suppose a Player_A & Player_B buys a Team_Uber with 2000 TR, Both Player_A and Player_B have 1500 PR.
They run 10 games, losing 10 games match versus 2000 rated teams at a loss of 16 points a game.
At the end of the week, Team_Uber is 1840 TR, but Player_A and Player_B's PR dropped down say 1 point each game to 1484.
According the patch 2.4.2, Plater_A and Player_B's 1500 PR is more than 150 points below 2000 TR; therefore they will only earn points based on 1484 rating?

Scenario 2:

Suppose Player_A is a new 70 with no pvp gear, joins with Player_X and Player_Y both with full S3 gear at 2000 PR. Their Team_Carry is 1500 TR.
They queue, with the average rating of (5500/3) = 1833. This is what's referred to as 2.5 versus 3 arena match.
Team_Carry can still win versus 1833 rated teams (no S3 weapons/shoulders)--those struggling to get 1850; those non-cookie cutter teams?

Team_Carry will gain more than 15 points per game since they start at 1500 and fighting 1830 teams. I think the point gain is around 27 based on the chess tournament formula.
And Player_A will probably as much PR also.

So let's say an average of 20 points gain per game. After 10 games, Team_Carry is at 1700 with Player_A at 1700 PR also?
With the PR rating required to get S4 arena gear, and S4 honor gear, carrying someone to 1700 PR seems quite profitable for 2 players.

With the amount of gold one gets doing 25 daily quest. But let say one does the Island, and a few SSO pack quests. Thats about 200 gold a day from daily quests, do it 5x a week and the player has 1000g to offer to be carried weekly for arena points.[/quote]

I believe that with scenario 1, the average personal rating is 1500, so they will be matched against 1500 rated teams (not 2k). Their personal rating will drop average of 16 per loss, but the team rating will plummet completely if they lose all 10. Though they might not lose all ten since they are matched against 1500 teams. Thing is, there's no real benefit to buying the team UNLESS they are good players that can get themselves up to 2k anyway. That way, they will get to 2k faster, since it will take less games to get their personal rating to within 150 points of the team rating. But selling teams to people that could just as well get the teams to that rating anyway probably isn't a lucrative business.

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Originally Posted by 'Buzzatronic',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63823#p ost63823

Once "Sell arena team" and "Buy arena points" become trainable skills put in the game by Blizzard then changed/tweaked, then I'll agree with your comparison. Until then you're just being silly for the sake of being silly.

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Once "Invite level 70 to low level instance" and "Buy experience points" become trainable skills then I'll agree with your agreeal. Until then, you're just QQing about using in game currency to buy in game services from other players.

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Originally Posted by 'Zaelar',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63820#post63 820

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Originally Posted by 'Moxy',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63421#post6342 1

So what was your point? I lost it in your epic exaggeration. I'm hoping it was 'cheaters deserve teh ban.'

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I wasn't exaggerating, I was copying ideas and applied them to a different area to create sarcasm. The point wasn't that cheaters deserve to be banned, but that people who don't cheat don't deserve to be banned and that only blizzard gets to decide what is cheating and what isn't.

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Originally Posted by 2.4.2 ptr notes

Hunters

* Boar Charge: This ability will no longer make Growl cast immediately after it generates excessive threat.
* The pet ability Growl will no longer scale with pet Attack Power.

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Obviously blizzard is not ok with people using growl so they are nerfing it. They should just ban hunters that have pets with growl. I don't see any blue posts that specifically say that having a pet with growl isn't a banable offense.

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You're comparing a Bug Fix(I know from experience that Boars were doing too much aggro for a long time) with that? That's just reaching for straws man, let it go :p

Also, you realize the post above this one is describing what powerlvling services do too, right? :p Using an illegal example to make yours sound legit doesn't quite work lol

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Originally Posted by 'Eteocles',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63862#post 63862

Also, you realize the post above this one is describing what powerlvling services do too, right? :p Using an illegal example to make yours sound legit doesn't quite work lol

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The post above this had nothing illegal about it. I imagine you're talking about:

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Originally Posted by 'Eteocles',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63197#post 63197

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Originally Posted by 'Vyndree',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63166#post6 3166

if they bought a team, play the games LEGITIMATELY, and win/lose according to their own skill

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Apply this to pve: Someone buys a lv30 and runs Gnomer, according to his(complete lack of) skill; wipes horribly. Gets nothing. Someone buys a lv60 char they have no prior experience playing; runs ramparts according to his skill; dies/wipes, group disbands, gets nothing. Now I'm not saying it's akin to buying chars(not at all), just the first closest example I could think of :p...

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You're the only one talking about the illegal act of buying with money and not buying with legitimate in game gold. Using an illegal example to make something legit sound illegal doesn't quote work.

Here is an idea.. If they just made personal ratings stick and not reset there may be a way to fix everything.

So if I had a 2v2 and my partner and I had a 2000 personal rating it would be perma rating. What they can do is make the team rating the avg of all players personal rating. If you win games your rating goes up thus making your team rating rise. If you leave a team and join a new one you keep your rating. The new team will be the avg personal rating of its members.

This would stop several side effects of the current rating system.

First, it would keep highly rated players playing matches with equal rated players. No more low level players going up against full s3 geared players farming gold. Second, it would keep 2000+ teams from selling and restarting new teams to farm gold. Third, it would keep people from buying arena gear who did not work to earn it. I think buying a 2000+ team is cheating the system. There are many arguments to this and some I agree with. For example, you have to allow teams to add players. With personal ratings that reset to 1500 this causes the problem.

Blizzard has to do something to the people exploiting the system. I am sure their response is not 100% accurate. Some people are getting nailed who should not be. Hopefully those people can get things worked out. At this point of my wow playing I have little interest in arena. Its just a circle jerk of the same a holes. At least they put the past season on honor vendors. It gives people a fighting chance to compete in arena. As you all know the guys who are in full S3 gear will then use that Uber gear to be right back into full S4 gear. Skill helps but the majority of why the same people get geared up again is due to their items. New players fighting their way in the 1400-1800 bracket have a huge up hill fight in order to equal the gear of players who have started S1. I speak from experience when, months ago, my full S1 lock was trying to play games with a new team and losing to full S3 guys. It really sucks losing 16 points a game to some douche bags in full S3 and weapons who are farming gold.

If they made the change above that should solve some problems. I am not sure exactly what the new change has done because my desire to arena is very low. PVE is the only thing keeping me playing right now. I may farm the S2 gear just to do more dps in PVE. Battlegrounds are so boring to me. Playing the same boring battlegrounds over and over that you have played for a few years is not fun. If it was not for multiboxing pve I would quit WoW.

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Originally Posted by 'Zaelar',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63858#post63 858

Once "Invite level 70 to low level instance" and "Buy experience points" become trainable skills then I'll agree with your agreeal. Until then, you're just QQing about using in game currency to buy in game services from other players.

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I see, so either everything is cheating and not within the 'spirit' of the rules or the game or none of it is. Glad everything is so black and white in your world.

For me I see a very distinct difference between something like power leveling a solo character from 0-70 in less than 24 hours /played and circumventing a points and gear distribution system which gives an illegitimate game play advantage to people in the only person vs. person competitive aspect of this game.

Someone power leveling does nothing to my enjoyment of the game, it has no impact on me. However team sellers who farm the 1500-2000's every week in full S3 gear to sell a team to a team buyer do impact my enjoyment of the game and that's why I'm against it. Gold selling hurts the economy (and the player base because it breeds keyloggers and gold spam), team selling hurts the PvPers who are in the meat of the ratings bracket (and breeds win-traders) because they have to be farmed to create the product to sell. Both are bad for the game and I think based on today's patch changes, Blizzard agrees.

You can bring up all the irrational comparisons you want, but in my opinion it's wrong and it's hurtful to the PvPers out there who want to actually earn what we get and I'd like to see even more restrictions on how teams are formed and how players are allowed to move between teams.

My only comment here is that we need to look long and hard into the mirror before we start QQing about people who "skillup" (i.e. the 2.5 vs 3 example) other scrub players by *gasp* actually playing games with them. The amount of time spent by these so-called uber players to very literally CARRY a nublet around is skill within itself. Granted, I don't want to see a 1500's rated team with 2 uber skilled, uber geared players and one scrub in it.... Personally I'd imagine the cost to waste those uber geared players' time would help offset things, since it's not like they can just play their 7 games quickly, roll some peeps, and let the scrubs lose their 3 games. It would actually take time, effort, and ALOT of effort to "pvp powerlevel" these folks.

... but then look at the argument against multiboxing.


"It's cheating" -- see blizz quotes saying it's not
"It's cheating, I don't care what blizzard says" -- hmm... logical argument?
"It's unfair to see multiboxers in BGs just rolling us PuGs" -- see 2 uber SKILLED players leveling up a scrub and rolling the 1500 teams
"It's unfair that multiboxers are more synchronized/powerful than regular players" -- are not 2 uber SKILLED players more skilled than our normally played 3-man? But, then again, the normal players don't carry dead weight

Blizzard has never said that automating behaviors was OK. Blizzard has said that multiboxing was ok -- while at the same time saying "as long as there is not automation".
Blizzard has never said that win trading was OK. Blizzard has said that team/point/spot selling was ok -- while at the same time saying that it would be more difficult with 2.4.2.

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Moral of the story -- I don't like seeing uber geared folks rolling undergeared people either, but before we start calling out arguments we need to take a good long hard look in the mirror to make sure we're not QQing just as bad as the forum trolls QQ about multiboxing. If blizzard says it's ok, and that 2 uber geared s3/s4 folks will roll people in the 1500's until they level back up out of it, then it's ok. Instead of QQ'ing about it, think about how you'd beat a comp like that -- identify the person who gets carried and totally ignore them? Spike one of the uber geared dudes down really quickly? CC which one?


That would actually be a productive discussion. Crying like a baby about blizzard's decisions, or claiming it's cheating "because I said so and I don't like it" really changes nothing. Blizzard will fix it when they get around to fixing it -- and judging by the fixes they implement for the poor dying shaman class (yes, they have major problems when not stacked in 4/5 shammy groups like we do when multiboxing), that won't be anytime soon. Learn to deal with it until policy changes.

I'm getting a little tired of teh "YER JUST LIKE THE ANTIBOXERS" comment...blizz IS actively working to control arena gear. Not just wintrading but who wears it period. Blizz isn't actively working to disable boxers; they're not trying to control how we /follow or target/assist. Posting things like that are only gonna inflame the fire further Vyn, I ask please to avoid using that comparison.

Now keep in mind guys, it IS a strong subject to both sides. But. This is still a DISCUSSION. Heated or not. Let's try not to put each other down in the process of making our views known. :P

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Originally Posted by 'Eteocles',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63902#post 63902

I'm getting a little tired of teh "YER JUST LIKE THE ANTIBOXERS" comment...blizz IS actively working to control arena gear.

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The difference is that blizz is actively working to control arena gear from CHEATING (which was the topic thread -- cheating via win-trading)

Blizz has confirmed that selling teams, points, and/or rating -- provided it is done LEGITIMATELY -- is not cheating. Until that changes, arguing that it's cheating is a moot point regardless of opinion. Blizzard decides. This was the only analogy I was trying to make since we can all sympathize about being on the other end of the stick -- we should have more empathy regardless of opinion because we're in a similar situation. This whole attitude is something that I am very familiar with having trolled the multiboxing trollers, and let me tell you -- I don't want us putting our foot in our mouths by acting the same way towards others.

If we can move past that and deal with "ok, so how do we counter said problem players" would be a much more productive discussion -- at least in my opinion. :)

I have to say, I do agree with the point Vyn is making. If we want to be able to appear to be making solid arguments and points against QQ'ers on the forums regarding multiboxing then we shouldn't be quite willing to go and use their arguments for our own purposes against something we don't like.

Yes, Blizzard have stated that win-trading is against the rules, and multiboxing isn't and no-one is disputing that...what is the issue is when someone here quite freely states "I don't care what Blizzard say, it's immoral/against the spirit" when it comes to points-trading. That argument is used against us time and again on the forums and we always have the correct reply to it so how can it make the community look anything but hypocritical when we start using it about something that is not against the rules but we disagree with? It only takes one smart troll on the forums to work out how to use that against us in a multi-boxing thread and that entire line of reasoning goes down the tubes.

In regards to points-trading, I'm not sure where I sit yet. I know it's annoying as hell lately to be trying to get my 10 games run each week with ~1100 rating and coming up against teams rocking 16k tanks, mages that can blizzard my entire team down to 0 in two casts, lots of s3 gear etc BUT it's also not against the rules so I deal with it and don't take it too seriously. Personally I think that the guys selling the points could be doing more productive things in game to be raising cash (since they are going to gain pretty much the same ammount of points whether they are rated 2000 or 2100 in the week) but that's their choice, and it's the choice of the buyer what they want to spend their money on...neither of which really affect me overall. Yes there is a distinct affect on me for those 10 games, but after that I am not bothered by them again so why should I want to try to regulate the way someone spends their time in game. If we compare this to real sports, in things like Formula 1 (or other motor racing leagues) it's quite common for a driver to actually get their seat in the team not through their ability but because they being with them sponsors...for example, Shinji Nakano replaced a driver in the Super Aguri team last year because the team were having financial difficulties and he brought sponsors with him worth over $10m that would only sign-up if he were driving.

Win-trading however was never going to be let fly by Blizzard and I don't see why people would be so short-sighted as to think it would. Blizzard are trying to position arena's as a competitive and exciting e-sport (never mind they still don't have good spectator functionality in the client to allow people to watch the top matches remotely) and the whole concept of win-trading is analagous to match-fixing in regular sports. I don't know about anyone else, but match-fixing has never gone down well in any sport and I can't see how anyone with an ounce of common sense could not see that the banhammer would be dropped hard on anyone doing it in the arenas...the same as athlete's being suspended or banned for it in real sports.

To me, this revolves around Blizzard wanting arenas to be able to be presented as an e-sport and bring them in another revenue stream without a hint of impropriety around it and they are doing what they have to to get rid of any perceived taint and I agree with them on that, but I don't think they should be classing points-traders with win-traders given the comparisons between the two that can be made with real sports.

OT: How can someone use S3 weapons/shoulders if they form a new team and start at 1500 PR? And if my ratings are at 1100 as they are now can I just fold my team and restart it each week, drop from 1500 to ~1400 points, get points based on that rating rather than just staying as I am and making points on a constantly lowering rating?

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Originally Posted by 'Vyndree',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63910#post6 3910

If we can move past that and deal with "ok, so how do we counter said problem players" would be a much more productive discussion -- at least in my opinion. :)

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"How can we counter said problem players"? That's easy, remove their incentive to maximize their profit for minimal effort by not participating in the economy of bypassing the legitimate gain of arena points to begin with.

I'm sure that's not the answer you're looking for but since none of us are developers or designers for Blizzard, there's not much more "we" can do other than make win trading a zero profit proposition.

:)

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Originally Posted by 'Vyndree',index.php?page=Thread&postID=63890#post6 3890

That would actually be a productive discussion. Crying like a baby about blizzard's decisions ...

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I'm not sure name calling is productive either, but what do I know. :)