Recent Experiences with DB Haters
Recently, I had the distinct pleasure of reporting not just one; but two different people for harassment. The first was about a week ago, I was on my way to Mana Tombs. When I got down to the bottom of Auchindoun, I ran by the summoning stone and noticed this tauren hunter. I asked him if he needed any help, figured he was waiting on someone to come help summon his group. His response was, "Go away fukkface hacker, gtfo my server." So, I said, "Excuse me? I was just offering to help you summon." Again, harsh retort. "You herd me fukker, gtfo shithed." Honestly, I was momentarily dumbstruck by the mendacity of this little punk. I wished him a good day and headed to Mana Tombs, then I see him bashing me in general chat. I zone in, and away from his abuse. I didn't bother putting him on ignore, because he hadn't whispered me yet. So, I figured I'll leave him alone, he'll leave me alone. Then I receive a whisper, "lulz bai bai fukkface haxor, your ass is goin down!". So, I reported him. Within minutes I was contacted by a GM, asking me what happened. I copied verbatim what the guy had said to me. And the GM said, "Sorry about that, thank you for contacting us. We'll make sure the matter is taken care of." I had added the Tauren to my friends list with a little note reminding me of who he was, a few minutes after speaking to the GM I see the tauren go offline. By the time I'm up to the second boss in MT I get a whisper from some stranger, it turns out it's this Warrior, he's in a pretty respectable PVE guild on the server. He asks me why I got his kid banned. So, I told him exactly what his kid had said, and that I did not appreciate anyone talking to me like that for any reason, least of all when I was simply offering assistance, furthermore I explained that I was not a hacker, exploiter, or botter: simply a dual-boxer. He apologized for his son, and thanked me for my candor. Then assured me it would be taken care of. Then he was offline. I decided to add the warrior to my friends list, just incase. Then ... I get a whisper from a character with a name very similar to the hunter I'd recently spoken to, it was the kid. I could all but hear the sniveling. Turns out, the kid's only 11. His dad was pissed, because he just xfered that hunter off of his account to this new account for his son to play, because he'd proven he was grown up enough to finally have his own account (and I imagine so the dad didn't have to fight with his son to log on). The account had received a temp suspension, and now had a warning attached to it. The kid said he was sorry, that he had no right to talk to me that way. And that he hoped we could be friends when he was ungrounded from WoW, he thought it was cool and was just jealous.
Then my second, most recent (a few minutes ago). First, I must preface by saying that I've been somewhat lucky, I'm in a small guild of RL friends, who are actually supportive of my MB habit. They want me to box in Kara, etc. Today I did ZA for the first time with part of my team. I got a Shield for one of the Shamans, and went to Org to get some mats off of the AH to enchant it. I park the Shamans and run inside with my Pali. I come back and there's a lock talking trash, calls me "fag", "no skill, no life loser". Etc. Now, I hadn't spoken to the guy, I scrolled up ... this was his first comment to me. So, when he asked me if I could talk I said hello on the Paladin, and explained to him that I was in the AH. Normally, when I'm outside of an instance, I heal people, buff them, help them kill a tough encounter (ROB or Durn, I do that a lot actually). So, the guy starts in on me, "So fag, how much have you wasted doing this?" I shrugged at him and reported him. Sometimes, you encounter ignorance and stupidity in the world, and there's no reasoning with it. I put him on ignore and went on ... then I noticed something interesting. A guy said something in trade that seemed related, "Idiot, he's a nice guy. If it wasn't for him my group would've wiped hard on ROB a few days ago." A few others started in, I realized the lock was talking trash in trade, and there were these people defending me based on their experiences with me.
As I was saying, I've been fortunate. Random hate has been at a reasonably minimal amount since I started seriously boxing in WoW. Nine times out of ten I get "WOW, wtf." kinda messages, or "HOLY CRAP, HOW U DO THAT?" (for some reason they like ALL CAPS). I thought for a moment about cancelling my report on the guy, I've only reported people maybe 2-3 times ... since I started playing MMOs way back with UO, AC, and EQ. Then I thought better of it, maybe this guy needs a little wake up call. He, like many children I've encountered as a educator, he needs to understand that randomly blurting out whatever they think is "cool" will eventually end up being heard by someone who won't stand for it, and may infact do them physical harm in response. I'm hopeful that the guy will get a clue, and learn a lesson. But more likely, he won't.
And for those that managed thru that wall of text, I thank you.
