Streamers already "buying" gold in forever

[u/Ghunkli]

With the upcoming PVP tournament it's extremely clear that streamers will still be "buying" gold and ruining the economy in forever, unless blizzard actually shows they are serious about the commitment to ban gold buyers

Here are two clips of Ziqo being traded 380 gold and 175 gold from level 1 characters. All while just laughing about it, there is 0% chance that any of that gold was gained legitimately and they know it.

If you can skirt the gold buying rules by just having a lvl 1 character trade it to you what's even the point

https://www.twitch.tv/ziqoftw/clip/ColdbloodedBlazingMonitorRalpherZ-G-kGDsecnPTHCCjQ https://www.twitch.tv/ziqoftw/clip/TemperedBadSalamanderSwiftRage-GtZ7RhtpO-ecnta4

Blizzard needs to show that they actually care if it's already this blatant on the beta then it will be even worse when the game goes live

There is no proof that Ziqo himself bought any of the gold, but whether it's him or his viewers doing the crime on his behalf the effects are the same, and they should both be punished

[u/Jindujun]

I really REALLY hope that Blizzard keeps true to their word and I really REALLY hope that "streamer" does not shield you from consequences.

[u/chAzR89 → u/Jindujun]

Atleast for me personally a banned gold buying streamer is better pro wow marketing than giving them a special treatment and letting it slide. Nothing feels better than simply being blizzards peasant Zahlschwein.

[u/NTufnel11 → u/chAzR89]

It would be an absolute master stroke to ban everyone involved an hour before the event. Leverage the collective publicity of all streamers and the tournament itself to send an unambiguous message that restores confidence in their capability as well as their resolve.

[u/kashy87 → u/NTufnel11]

Blizzard of 08 maybe Blizzard of 26 not so sure they have the balls to do it.

[u/Claris-chang → u/NTufnel11]

Nah do the bans right as the event starts. Right as they have maximum viewers watching. Make a public example.

[u/Jindujun → u/chAzR89]

Same. I'd imagine them going back on their word especially for a streamer will leave a sour taste in the rest of the players

[u/siccoblue → u/Jindujun]

Lol this reminds me so much of some of the early Deadman seasons on osrs

Jagex took a "hard" stand on people being barred from swapping main game gp over. A ton of content creators just essentially said "ok bet" and started taking "random" donations instead.

I'd bet pretty good money that blizz will fuck this up. At least initially. It's a super hard thing to police unless you already have super robust systems in place but they should legit come out swinging against some bigger names that are skirting the lines of what is acceptable. It sends a way clearer message than the occasional random post claiming they did nothing wrong but got punished for it.

[u/Ackooba → u/siccoblue]

Blizzard doesn't even need a reason to ban anyone, it's in the TOS. Some common sense here goes a long way, having someone trade you 10-15g from their main is most likely legit while 200g from a level 1 is probably not. If you're a streamer, you know it's very very likely that is dirty money and so you shouldn't accept it.

[u/Prestigious-Board-62 → u/Jindujun]

Streamers will 100% get a pass. They are an extension of Blizzard's marketing team, just not employed.

[u/DrB00 → u/Prestigious-Board-62]

A streamer showing people that buying gold is an acceptable thing does a huge disservice to the game.

[u/PictureVegetable9522 → u/DrB00]

yes it does but blizzard wants to have their cake and eat it too

[u/cookiesars → u/Prestigious-Board-62]

they just got to make an example out of one or two of em. use them as marketing tools to show they are serious.

[u/Elleden → u/cookiesars]

Even if just for the beta.

A lot less people would dare do it on live, then.

[u/Zavodskoy → u/Elleden]

Peak comedy would be waiting for the morning of the tournament then revoking their beta access for RWT

[u/Imprettystrong → u/Prestigious-Board-62]

Everyone know integrity goes out the window when it comes to good marketing. And no one is a better marketer for Blizz than these streamers.

[u/Bloodshot89 → u/Prestigious-Board-62]

You’re probably right but what bothers me is their double standard. It’s not all streamers. They perma banned reckful’s main account with all his gladiator titles for account sharing one time. That was a different time then but still it’s significant to point out because he was the face of wow and arenas for a very long time. He was depressed about that for years and they never restored it. I watched him for years until he was gone, and he talked about it constantly.

It’s really disappointing what they did to him, seeing what they let a lot of these more “family friendly, more marketable” streamers get away with.

But yeah I do hope they drop the hammer one of them if there is gold buying. More often the case though is their fans just giving them gold.

[u/blade740 → u/Prestigious-Board-62]

Not only that, but streamers DO have a better case for plausible deniability.

If a random account you've never interacted with before buys gold from a bot farmer and then just gives it to you, it's hard to argue that you "didn't know".

But a streamer legitimately might get a "donation" of gold from a viewer. If that turned out to be purchased RMT gold, they could appeal and say "how was I supposed to know, I thought it was just one of my fans donating".

Not that I agree with any of this mind you or think that it's good. But that's how it is.

[u/FeintToParry → u/blade740]

In most cases I would agree with you that it’s hard for a streamer to know if the viewer donating them gold actually farmed it or bought it. But in this particular case Ziqo was traded 380 gold and 175 gold respectively. There is an extremely low chance any of that is legitimately farmed. We are level 20, guys. Even the most diehard fan farming all day would struggle to get 380 gold, right? At what point is it the streamer’s responsibility to not accept gold that was likely purchased? Ziqo is not stupid. That’s probably why he was laughing in the clip.

[u/EffectiveSwimming136 → u/Jindujun]

[u/EngineeringNo753 → u/Jindujun]

That's a good joke. Blizzard keeping their words 😂😂

[u/Bloodhoven_aka_Loner → u/Jindujun]

"streamer" doesn't shield you from consequences. "successful streamer with a big enough following" does

[u/radwic → u/Jindujun]

You are kidding yourself if you think streamers will not be treated any differently than an average player.

[u/Various_Necessary_45 → u/Jindujun]

There's not a chance streamers get banned for this. It's a legitimate grey area, because people throw real money at streamers for no reason, ofc the same kind of weirdos will want to do it ingame, and it overlaps with normal people wanting to give gold to friends. Do you put a limit to how much can be given per friend? Streamers will just ask for anything below that. Do you stop people from giving gold to eachother entirely? Mostly real players will suffer.

[u/Todesfaelle]

The market in Forever will be absolutely insane with inflation unless we trust that Blizzard works harder than they ever have on bots as well as gold buyers forever.

I can't imagine things will be better with a mega server either.

I doubt it'll happen.

[u/Admiralsheep8 → u/Todesfaelle]

It’s kind of this double edged problem where a mega server allows for so many more people trading to normalize the economy. ( so we don’t end up with the 2019 classic mafias that were holding entire server auction houses hostage, or just dead AH ) 

But at the same time man ….. mega server puts all these bots in one place . Please do something blizz 

[u/TheFirstBard → u/Todesfaelle]

Turtle WoW did it, if Blizzard doesn't do it is because they don't want to not because is complicated.

[u/goreblaster → u/TheFirstBard]

Turtle gms banned for botting and RMT immediately as soon as they became aware of it. Blizzard's "ban wave" approach allows bots to turn a profit before they have to start over. We can only assume this is by design. Blizzard is just balancing bot sub fees against playerbase aggro to reach the point of maximum profitability.

[u/LulzLookatTheseNoobs → u/TheFirstBard]

We need to dispel the notion that it’s complicated. Too many people out here defending blizzard.

[u/Atheren → u/LulzLookatTheseNoobs]

It's complicated to get to near zero.

It's actually very easy to reduce by ~90+% if they hire like 1-3 guys.

[u/thugbobhoodpants]

I don’t really care what happens outside of my own bubble 99% of the time, but I really don’t understand how guys like Savix(who I like) can have such strong stances when people bring up the unfairness or otherwise iffiness of this kind of thing

I don’t even pvp, I have no idea if random normal players go in and win these tournaments every other week but it just feels so bleh to have big tournaments where it’s like, okay, these guys are already good at this specific thing; they play 24/7; they have all loot handed to them; they’re allowed to buy gold or otherwise have hundreds and thousands of gold handed to them; now go compete

And when it’s brought up, everyone defaults back to “ugh it would be boring content if they had to grind gold!!! I want to see them sleepwalk through level 20 dungeons for the 31st time today instead :<“

self-found or something similar would be so interesting for these streamers who already play dozens of hours a week anyway, have a little badge showing you did it all your own and didn't have it all handed to you, obviously it wouldn't work in wow the same way it does in OSRS, and we've seen streamers who are some of the best players in the world will cheat in something as low stakes as OnlyFangs because putting in half an hour of effort farming herbs is just too much for these people who again, play dozens of hours a week for their full time job

[u/Ancient_Algae64 → u/thugbobhoodpants]

Streamers know that most of them are boring and uninteresting neets. If they couldnt clip farm while being geared by people who do all the farming for them then they would have no audience.

[u/Clernt → u/thugbobhoodpants]

So.. These tournaments are realistically two things, and it's annoying no one really catches onto it; They are a way for streamers to take loot freely without any repercussion (I need this for the duel tournament, I need that for the duel tournament, that might be useful to me in the duel tournament) the second one is more of a "between the lines" thing, but it is just a way for them to justify RMT under the guise that they are getting "donations" ..I know people caught that one, but the way it works "absolves" them of any guilt or consequence (I didn't know this 400g was ill-gotten gains, the guy said it was "all natty" I never paid for this, it was for the duel tournament)

The truth behind these duel tournaments is they are relatively boring and extremely low quality.. But they work consistently to be a way for streamers to get the best items and have viewers mindlessly farm them those items/risk their own accounts (or just use throw aways) to "donate" to their duel tournament.. Almost every duel tournament I have watched has been exceptionally scuffed, griefed by people, and just boring gameplay (there will be a lot of resets/tick eating and walking away.. The final will be priest v priest and it will come down to who gets the most crits with penance/who resists more fears/possibly who gets more blackout procs)

I think that is why they advertise a duel tournament every time something new happens, and they will likely do the same for the launch (But it will be a lvl 60 duel tournament so they can get funneled their bis obviously..)

[u/thugbobhoodpants → u/Clernt]

the second one is more of a "between the lines" thing, but it is just a way for them to justify RMT under the guise that they are getting "donations" ..I know people caught that one, but the way it works "absolves" them of any guilt or consequence (I didn't know this 400g was ill-gotten gains, the guy said it was "all natty" I never paid for this, it was for the duel tournament)

Other people are mentioning in this thread last week Sodapoppin says he wants to do everything straight and normal and immediately after dude takes money "well now I have to do it"

[u/Clernt → u/thugbobhoodpants]

Yeah.. I fully expect them all to do it, and it's 100% a fabricated domino effect. Oh, Ziqo did it, so now I have to do it, well Sodapoppin did it so we should all be okay to do it.. It's just shitty behavior that shows they can actively get away with things that we never would be able to as average players.

I just wish they were forced to play the same game as me, honestly force self-found on everyone and just are what happens.

[u/Discomidget911]

Report him, hopefully he will get banned for the remainder of the beta. Ziqo is a massive streamer though, I doubt blizzard will do anything permanent to him.

[u/Living-Business-4560]

Buying that for beta is crazy.

[u/Southern_Salary_2253 → u/Living-Business-4560]

I mean it is a 50k prize tournament. Probably more reason to buy Gold now than ever before, if you're participating. :P

[u/Jollypnda → u/Southern_Salary_2253]

All the more reason to punish it now.

[u/Girl_gamer__ → u/Jollypnda]

This. Make a hard example now to set the tone before launch

[u/HollowThief → u/Southern_Salary_2253]

The guy in the clip bought gold to trade it to his fav streamer. This the the true goldbuying endgame.

[u/Wrath_Viking → u/HollowThief]

some severe mental illness

[u/Living-Business-4560 → u/Southern_Salary_2253]

I understand that but it just shows it's OK to do. I'm enjoying the economy being decent right now lol

[u/GroundbreakingAlps2 → u/Southern_Salary_2253]

Apparently 380g on the beta is around 140 USD.

It cant possibly be worth it to be throwing around hundreds for an open bracket duel tournament just for a chance at 50k, where no even know whats good or what is going on.

But maybe im overshooting on how many players there will be playing that are actually competitive.

But I mean if I was streamer id probably do it even if I didnt believe i could win the 50k, since its content. If you're a streamer its literally win win, even if you dont win you get more viewers and ad rev by swiping and essentially getting as far as possible in the tourney.

[u/AlexSoul → u/GroundbreakingAlps2]

Ziqo is good enough to have a shot at winning, and yeah just like you said if he goes far in the tournament that's great publicity for his stream. I kinda doubt Ziqo actually did the swiping himself here but $140 would easily be worth it for him.

[u/FalconGK81 → u/AlexSoul]

that's great publicity for his stream.

Until he gets banned for it. Which he should. Accepting the bought gold is just as bad as buying it. And you can't tell me streamers don't know that the random guy trading them hundreds of gold aren't buying it.

[u/BertDeathStare → u/GroundbreakingAlps2]

But I mean if I was streamer id probably do it even if I didnt believe i could win the 50k, since its content. If you're a streamer its literally win win, even if you dont win you get more viewers and ad rev by swiping and essentially getting as far as possible in the tourney.

Exactly it. It's good content, he'll easily make it back from viewers/ads and he's good enough to have a shot at winning. The prize will likely be split anyway. Maybe $5k for third place.

Tbh it's clearly already an unfair tournament. They should just ban all prof consumables and the incentive to cheat like this would stop. No need for hundreds of pots and iron/mithril grenades anymore. Just your class skills and your gear.

[u/Huge-Atmosphere-8057 → u/GroundbreakingAlps2]

Ziqo is one of the best WoW PvP players on the planet, he's not just some random. No one who isn't in that top echelon of players has a sliver of a hope of beating him in a best of 3 dual. He will absolutely be in contention for that 50k.

[u/DrB00 → u/Huge-Atmosphere-8057]

All the more reason to set an example that cheating isn't allowed.

[u/atatassault47 → u/DrB00]

Blizzard definitely needs to drop Sulfuras, Banhammer of Ragnaros on him.

[u/Emekfl → u/Living-Business-4560]

I dont think ziqo is buying gold, but i think viewers are ans then giving it to their streamer. Pretty much every streamer has been given a lot of gold. Some legit most not do much. Their reasoning is if one streamer accepts gold they have to as well

[u/zazenbr → u/Emekfl]

Don't be disingenuous. This is not a random level 20 character trading him 5g, hell, 50g for that matter. A level 1 character comes out of nowhere and just delivers 385. We all know it's a gold seller. Come on now.

[u/FuzzyStorm → u/Living-Business-4560]

Worst part is to me that grinding for whatever they need would produce content... just grind and chat and people will sub, donate etc.

[u/eulersheep]

It would be hilarious if they did a server reset for the level 30 beta.

[u/Goetia- → u/eulersheep]

They won't, but I wish they would. People are twinked out and have quest turnins stacked so the 20-30 leveling and dungeon experience is going to be unrealistic.

I can see it now - "these dungeons are too easy", said the group of mid 20s with multiple days /played.

[u/Niceromancer → u/Goetia-]

The leveling is way too fast said the people on full bis level 20 blues cracked out with enchants 2 to 3 level bands ahead of them will a full quest log of red quests ready to turn in.

[u/Rush_Banana]

Content creators ruin WoW for me, which is why I don't watch them.

[u/Zerokx]

You know nothing could convince people more that gold buying is off limits than a popular streamer being banned for it. Juuust saaying. Would probably help the image more than hurt it and gain publicity.

[u/Guilty_Turn8903]

they permabanned reckful on christmas because he account shared. a guy who won blizzcon and was one of their biggest content creators at the time and arguably one of the best pvpers in the game at the time. the precedent is all there.

buying gold is a whole category more severe offense that seriously undermines the game's integrity. it should be a slam dunk permaban on current and future accounts.

[u/SkyDefender → u/Guilty_Turn8903]

Apparently one executive really hated reckful he even put a warning over a case such as “never unban”

[u/Throwawaygg66rrff]

unless blizzard actually shows they are serious about the commitment to ban gold buyers

“Hope. It is the quintessential human delusion, simultaneously the source of your greatest strength, and greatest weakness.”

• The Architect

[u/Gumjo123]

So a dude got banned the other day for getting a 1g tip for a summon to sfk, while a lvl1 toon trades 175g and somehow thats legit

[u/trulez]

Blizzard is not in a hurry though, they could just silently gather data about RMT and then ban them all like day before the tourney.

[u/AnhiArk]

unless blizzard actually shows they are serious about the commitment to ban gold buyers

Lmao

[u/Wooden-Gur3537]

Like every other version of WoW, they won't care about RMT.

This has been rampant for 20 years. I repeat, 20 FUCKING years.

[u/ShoulderpadInsurance → u/Wooden-Gur3537]

And if it’s just as bad, then people stop playing. Classic’s economy was ruined in months.

This is supposed to be a perpetual game. They need a harsher stance for people to stick around.

[u/desperateorphan → u/ShoulderpadInsurance]

The problem is people en masse don’t stop playing. Classic anni had a very stable population. TBC did as well until the phases ran too long.

[u/ShoulderpadInsurance → u/desperateorphan]

They can either fix the problem, or hemorrhage players back to the private servers once they pop up again.

The reality is, botting makes weekly raid consumables heavily inflated and wastes a lot of players time.

Botting genuinely wasn’t an issue on the other mainline projects.

Blizz will either fix the issue or people will just go elsewhere, as they’ve historically done. It doesn’t have to be a single ‘en-masse’ boycott to meaningfully affect the bottom line. That’s part of why we have wow forever/classic in the first place.

[u/Unable-Garage593 → u/ShoulderpadInsurance]

For weekly raid consumables, it seems they have taken measures, mainly by capping the gold cost of rare ingredients through a vendor that sells them. There is more I think but I can't really remember

[u/CreamdedCorns → u/ShoulderpadInsurance]

They could just go after the botters instead. After 20+ years they know how to identify and ban botters, but they rely on that revenue stream and put the onus on players... It's like only ever arresting drug users and not dealers.

[u/Rurikar → u/Wooden-Gur3537]

Like every other version of WoW, they won't care about RMT.

Because there is no solution. WoW token WAS the solution. Unless you make trading/auctionhouse basically non existent, there will always be RMT in a game this big.

You cannot moderate this problem away and I have yet to see anyone present any tech/solution that could not be easily circumvented.

[u/bababum007]

Blozz said they want to punish gold buyers as well. Lets see:)

[u/bigtree42069]

Straight up Perma ban him if anyone is trading that much gold in a beta they clear bought it and they shouldn’t act surprised if they get banned that’s a ridiculous amount of gold

[u/isuckatwow9797]

If it's bought gold then ban the buyer and remove the gold from streamer + items they bought with it. If it is legit gold then someone help that individual out, it's a beta. 

[u/yabai-tyo]

RMT in forever will be worse than ever before. Blizzard talks big with every new release but we saw on every new server of every new project that RMT just gets worse and worse. Blizzard knows that a big part of the player base is ok with buying gold.

[u/senpaiofthemists]

ziqos chat is banning anyone asking if he has a stance on gold buying and if he concerned at all that tht 500+g given to him by lvl 1s. he is playing dumb saying he isnt involved but he took all the gold from levels 1s and never attempted to ask how it was acquired.

[u/wiafjskfmsk]

This is exactly why any regular player should not be wasting their time in these tournaments unless you want to lose pretty early on. You’re not going to beat rank 1 players who are being fed gold and can play 16 hours a day. The tournaments are fun to watch but the average player has no chance so just sit back and watch

[u/EL-PSY-KONGROO → u/wiafjskfmsk]

I think it's fine for the average player to join in for fun. Similar to how diamond ranked fgc people enter Evo for the experience. But yeah, I wouldn't suggest investing any serious resources into it.

[u/TheStrongTaint → u/wiafjskfmsk]

Regular players are gonna get smoked either way, buying gold or otherwise

[u/Southern_Salary_2253]

Yeah, it is frustrating.

I was watching Sodapoppin and he was talking about how he didn't want to get hand outs, but then Ziqo (and others) were getting them so he has to take them as well, or just be at a huge disadvantage. It kind of ruins the open bracket nature of the tournament.

The sad thing is Ziqo is good enough to go the distance self founded too.

[u/SylverItsuki → u/Southern_Salary_2253]

Soda was gonna be buying gold any way. He "justifies" it every time.

[u/Colyer → u/SylverItsuki]

I hear you, but I think he did a good job of OnlyFangs 2. He designed a ruleset and an addon specifically to keep gold-buying out of the guild. So reasons to be optimistic here, IMO.

[u/Eyelemon → u/Southern_Salary_2253]

In the same video he also said the streamers know the gold is most likely bought. Accepting it is tantamount to just buying it yourself, with the thinnest veneer of plausible deniability.

[u/Jindujun → u/Southern_Salary_2253]

I'd rather be an honorable loser than a piece of shit cheater to be honest.
The fact that he said "yeah but other people..." makes him rock bottom.

[u/Patient-Definition96]

They know it is bought and still accepted it. This is clear as sunshine.

[u/TheAngriestChair]

I've already seen gold seller spam. I reported it just to get the "this feature isn't active" response.

[u/Bitter-Wallaby6639]

Bro you need to tweet this to the Blizzard Guys like Agrend and stuff. There needs to be hype about this. I hope they all get banned. The same dumb shit with Pikaboo dueling for hundreds of gold. And the guy saying „ah don’t worry I make this much a day“. There is literally no way this is not bought gold. So in future, all gold buying will be Duells. You meet duel, guy looses and gives you your gold. This needs to stop. Trading huge amounts of currency to streamers has to stop. This basically is a 2 class society and it sucks balls

[u/therealkami]

u/WarcraftTeam hope you guys are seeing this.

[u/OkInteraction8307 → u/[deleted]]

I'm a big fan of Ziqo too, but he's malding on stream right now because how could anyone POSSIBLY be dumb enough to think that he bought gold.

Totally unbelievable, right?

[u/pilot1337]

ban him to make an example

[u/Truethrowawaychest1]

See that's the downside of the mega server, having to deal with the streamer crowd

[u/zarzer]

Everyone deep down knows that 380g on a beta in 2 weeks is not legit.

Blizzards needs to track the gold, and at least remove it, if it was found to be obtained illigitimately, no matter if it was the guy trading ziqo who bought it or ziqo himself.

They can't ignore instances like this when they publicly wen't out and underlined a harder stance on gold buying.

[u/Jindujun → u/zarzer]

not only 380g on a beta but 380g on a beta locked to lv20.
I'm not saying it is a duck but it sure smells, sounds, looks and walks like a duck.

[u/norielukas → u/zarzer]

Have you seen the TB warlock summoners? Everytime I see a streamer buy a TB summon for a measely 25s there's anywhere from 5 to 15 people in the group.

And they stand there all day summoning, someone in a chat said he asked how much he was making from just summoning people and claimed the highest he made in a day was 230g.

[u/gokuenjoyer69 → u/zarzer]

There was a post like a week ago of a dude with maxxed out professions and 200g in his bags. Don’t underestimate people with no life and unlimited time

[u/Expensive_Middle8271 → u/gokuenjoyer69]

A more recent post of the same guy showed he was past 400g

[u/MeanForest]

If Blizzard can trace the gold to RMT sources then Ziqp should absolutely be banned as well. He knows it's wrong.

[u/The_Dark_Tetrad → u/MeanForest]

If they banned him for 2-4 weeks or possibly longer... man that would send a message to the community. Blizz should do it IMO

[u/Nythoren → u/The_Dark_Tetrad]

Heck, do to him what they did to the folks with really bad names; remove beta access completely.

If they really want to show how serious they are, they could/should also pull his early access. Have his early name reservation access pulled too. It's a small thing but it's time to show that actions, even in a beta, have consequences.

[u/Lille7 → u/The_Dark_Tetrad]

60 day ban minimum so he misses launch.

[u/Rhobodactylos → u/The_Dark_Tetrad]

Aggrend : "Permanent account closure, don't risk your account guys"™

Streamers : Blatantly buying & accepting large sums of illegal gold.

Redditors : 2-4 weeks or beta access removal.

Yeah this game is DOA.

[u/ThePackage → u/The_Dark_Tetrad]

Blizzard knows the real money value of gold. They literally have tokens in retail so the tech is already in place, they should ban players for an equivalent time of gold purchased.

Using retail as an example, if a token is roughly 250k gold, that’s the equivalent of 30 days of game time. Therefore if someone buys 5 million gold, they should be banned for 20 months.

[u/S-192]

Hopefully Blizzard can track the name of the character who gave him that gold. But yes, it's also obviously sketch.

This is your first test, Blizz! Make a stand and an example of this guy.

[u/no_terran → u/S-192]

They can track. But that whole sub and char was probably created. Got the gold from a trader, traded to Ziqo, deleted the char and don't care about the empty sub

[u/Lindzei_]

This is so funny when in a recent clip he was like hating on streamers who act like beggars

[u/torshakle → u/Lindzei_]

I'm pretty sure he's being ironic because the clip I saw had him sarcastically making fun of handout streamers while berating a viewer for not giving him enough iron and heavy stone.

[u/Far_Priority_6305 → u/Lindzei_]

All these idiots are saying "omg the journey" and "slow leveling is the classic experience"

EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM have a guide for classes, leveling, professions, and promote rested xp.

People that watch streamers are the same ones that would join a cult if the opportunity ever arose. 

[u/ShaunPlom]

“There’s no way that’s natty” right before he takes. Ziqo is actually one of my favorites and I still hope he gets banned for this. AT LEAST removes his beta access. Blizz needs to lay down the law or the botting will be just as bad or worse in forever.

Edit: just wanted to add that I don’t blame Ziqo for taking it. He’s competing for $50k and there’s been ZERO punishment in the past for gold buying. He’d be stupid not to, but this where Blizz needs to actually set expectations and prove they meant what they said for once.

[u/WaveOfWinter → u/ShaunPlom]

Yeah I like Ziqo too, but if he really is doing rmt hit him with the perma and don’t look back

[u/ShaunPlom → u/WaveOfWinter]

I dont think he rmt’d the gold himself. Seemed like a fan bought gold and then traded it to him. He was well aware it wasn’t legit gold though. Ban him or remove him from beta. Make it known they are actually serious about gold buying this time.

[u/esuvii → u/ShaunPlom]

He knows this is almost certainly bought gold, and so do his viewers. It's one step removed from buying it himself, and by accepting it with such a large viewership he is effectively condoning it.

[u/dark_vaterX → u/ShaunPlom]

“There’s no way that’s natty” right before he takes.

Even more reason to ban him in my opinion.

[u/ShaunPlom → u/dark_vaterX]

Agreed, he knows. Blizz needs to ban him. I don’t blame him for taking it though, he’s competing for $50k and there’s never been punishments for buying gold in the past.

[u/chibriguy → u/ShaunPlom]

Exactly right. If I'm competing for 50k and Blizzard has let this shit slide in the past, I'm taking it too.

Having said that, I'm so tired of Blizzard giving special privileges to streamers. I like Ziqo too, but ban him for this. How hard is it for Blizzard to apply the same rules to everyone? Small things Blizzard lets slide while all eyes watching will turn into landslides 6 months or a year down the road.

[u/z3phs]

People love to complain and cry a lot…. But for once this is indeed the time to put your money where your mouth is and hammer on this.

He’s also one of blizzard streamer “partners” it’s not some random.

He was casting at blizzcon was he not?

He is not stupid and knows it’s not legit. And example needs to be made to punish both ends

[u/Ok_Bath_1252]

If people are legit getting bans from accepting summoning tips from people that bought the gold used in tipping, then this 1000% should be banned as well.

[u/stewiethegreat → u/Ok_Bath_1252]

People are getting banned for using bots for summoning.

[u/splepage → u/Ok_Bath_1252]

Nobody is getting banned from receiving a 2g tip, you're being lied to.

[u/Rolizei → u/Ok_Bath_1252]

source ? sounds stupidly wrong

[u/Beginning_Green_740]

I also saw clips of other "content creators" being traded absolutely ridiculous amounts of gold already.

They literally stated that buyers will be held accountable. Where is action? Where is public statement, or anything else?

If they do nothing and just let it run - you can sure that RMT gold selling will be live and running directly from day-1.

[u/Obsido]

There's already bots on the beta running around mass farming and probably trying out their systems for the official launch, remember how classic had a massive botting problem with bots literally hacking and Blizzard did nothing about it? That will happen again, and it will keep happening until Blizzard has GMs at botting hotspots, banning them in real time.

The only good thing is that Blizzard has shops with resources as some sort of price control, so they (botters) can't destroy the economy overall, but yeah gold buying and bots will still be major issue in Forever, and streamers accepting handouts of obvious botted/bought gold doesn't help.

[u/Bitter_Hospital_8279]

tbf they shouldve just made the tourney solo self found, but i can understand the difficulty of proving self found

[u/hulltry]

I hope these people gets perma banned if true and all relations to blizzard terminated.

[u/dustyfeet88]

Stop giving streamers gold. They literally don't care about you. 

[u/Grouched → u/dustyfeet88]

For real. Such a weirdo ass culture

[u/Volitar → u/dustyfeet88]

thanks *says name wrong* OMG HE SAID MY NAMEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[u/Clear_South8742]

He should be banned, they should be using the same rules for everyone.

[u/yuritnm]

I fucking hate streamers

[u/Froggo565]

Blizz wont do shit just like they wont do anything to bots

[u/GG2EZ]

Soon they will just "duel" for the gold but the person they're dueling won't actually try

[u/CiaIsMyWaifu]

I invite you to watch a video from the goat On why you should ban people for unfair advantages and protect player economies. If you don't know who Chris Wilson is, he pioneered one of the most successful economy driven RPGs of all time.

[u/YL--]

ziqo has been one of the biggest goldbuyers/rmters for years, frequently sold his retail accounts in the past and pulled them back shortly after. too bad he will never face consequences from blizz due to his connections there

[u/chefao]

Someone made a thread the other day about getting banned after opening a mail with 3 gold and 19 leather, claiming they didn't know this was botted gold or anything.

Everyone in this community instantly 100% skeptic of his claim saying he KNEW and he bought gold and RIP BOZO.

But when a 20 year veteran streamer gets 500gold just like that all of a sudden everyone goes "teeeheee how could he POSSIBLY know?!?!"

[u/tinylittlebabyjesus]

Well here it is. Test number one. The penny has dropped, and now we see if Blizzard is going to take it seriously.

[u/masonostwald]

Ban them. Forever.

[u/SaltSteakServer]

Isnt it just simps simping?

[u/Southern_Salary_2253 → u/SaltSteakServer]

To a degree but 380 gold from 1 character is likely a mass bot funnel or some kind of exploit.

[u/Awesome-SP]

Let's be honest, it's well done :
You need 15g to partipate in the tourney, there are already 2k ish people subscribed, so that's 30000g at least. Just to compete against people that not only are better than you on average, but also who have thousands of golds to buy pots, elixirs, scrolls, all the consumes, AND have their simp army fire camp/rebuff them on cd.

The fact that you can get everyone else buffs and you can pmuch abuse 99% of the consumes in the game is just a no go

Sorry, but those rules are plain dogshit

[u/MountainMeringue3655 → u/Awesome-SP]

It's an event by streamers for streamers. Just like Forever is made with the needs of streamers in mind.

Everyone else at the tournament is just there to give them gold and get farmed for views. The days are over in which Blizzard hosted official tournaments or Arena Tournament servers. No one else has the reach to host such an event so that's just how it is these days.

[u/Ironside29]

People will alway be buying gold,boosting, botting and RMT no matter if its a perma ban, its all about how seriously Blizzard is going to moderate the game.

[u/itsablackhole]

Any duel tournament ever without strict self found rules devolves into that kind of shit. Thats just the nature of wow pvp.

[u/Badbrains8]

Just like when onlyfangs was buying thousands of gold, ain’t shit gonna happen to streamers and everyone knows this lol

[u/Regular_or_Goofy]

Osrs has just started to come down hard on gold buyers along with sellers. Anyone that buys gold now gets banned as well. Blizzard should do the same

[u/blue_at_work]

Of all the lofty promises Blizzard has made about Forever, the one I doubt the most is the one about punishing gold buyers. It was fun lip service for them to pay ahead of time, but if you believe they’re actually going to enforce that, you’re an absolute fool.

[u/Thekingchem]

Make an example of him. Ban his account. It's the perfect opportunity to show the playerbase you mean business. To set expectations early.

[u/Dasquare22]

I like Ziqo I think he’s a great commentator and a good player. And afaik he’s never had any big controversies. He’s also a veteran of this game and a smart person and he must know what he’s doing here… this feels like a game of chicken with Blizz and I really hope that Blizz doesn’t blink. If they want forever to thrive they need to come down hard on this kind of stuff.

Again I like ziqo but he’s setting a precedent here and I’m sure he’s not the only one that’s already buying gold, here’s hoping for a big ban wave right before the 30 bracket opens.

[u/Affectionate-Bake666]

Just ban him ?

There's a point where we are going to have to stop playing dumb and realize that they perfectly know what they are doing and they know they bought that gold and they still took it.

ban. them.

He would have not accepted that gold if he knew he would lose his job as a wow streamer right after.

I'm done with them thinking they are untouchable. Streamers have done a lot of harm to this community and if they cannot behave maybe it's time for them to find a job that does not involve this game.

[u/pokepat460]

I dont think ziqo bought that gold. I think some people have social problems and parasocial relationships with streamers and will be excited to farm gold for them.

Idk how you distinguish between streamers taking gold from fans and gold buying from a system perspective though

[u/Nkxseal → u/pokepat460]

Im sure a gm could trace the gold and tell but who knows

[u/ObiWanIsMyDog → u/pokepat460]

It’d be easy with database access

[u/BlamaeuxPrivateEye]

Gifting streamers large amounts should be just as bannable as buying. These virtual beggars not only beg not Twitch but now in-game to???

[u/Coast_Super → u/BlamaeuxPrivateEye]

Maybe it should be. But its not so no one is getting banned here

[u/FixBlackLotusBlizz]

imagine being a random guy thinking about playing in this tourney

you open up ziqo stream because you wanna find out more info and see whats going on

watch some low lvl trade ziqo 380g

close stream

nahhh dont think I will play in that

[u/Known_Newspaper_9053]

yeah same with all of them. Maybe bar Soda? - Savix dueling for "legit" gold, Xaryu getting "birthday gifts". Its disrespectful to the game and the fact that they cant see they are helping ruin th very game they all cried for, for so so long. Its insanity.

What a shame

[u/Zedrixs]

Remove gold and ban him from the beta and tournament. You banned people from the beta with nono names that paid but the streamer is not getting banned for cheating for what reason?

[u/Muted_Masterpiece535]

Streamers are the main reason others buy gold. They are a huge problem.

[u/Bambambm]

Honestly, I hope Blizzard doesn't ban any of these gold buyers during the beta.. wait to ban them until launch day please.

[u/Thunar13]

This is one of the reasons the token was introduced I have zero faith in blizzards desire to stop this so now there are two groups. Those who break the rules and buy gold and those who are without.

[u/Horriblemidlaner]

I seriously doubt blizzard not having the engineering it takes to automatically ban these players

[u/dknaack1]

They’ll hit you with the “we didn’t buy it, it was a gift” but what’s the difference will still ruin the economy for most

[u/shafty17]

The one thing about forever I am actually concerned about is that the megaservers mean it will not be possible to isolate and avoid the impact of streamers on the game

[u/Accomplished_Ad_9427]

Streamers are cancer

[u/Preinitz]

Can't they track where gold comes from etc? How fucking hard is it really? Just ban everyone who does this shit, they'll buy new accounts and blizzard will make more money.

[u/pfitz6]

The dueling tournament is a trap by Blizzard. They will ban all the streamers who buy gold as a warning to the rest of us, lol JK blizzard dont give a fuccckkkkkk boi.

[u/Maybe_Front]

Mind you they all play offline and have multiple accounts to wash gold

[u/Fun_Mortgage_4033]

Ban him bro

[u/luna_dote]

holy how lame is that shit. ik it doesnt affect me that much its just so fucking lame.

[u/Sorrowful_Panda]

I still remember it was Ziqo and Venruki were raid leaders that scammed some random guy out of zg cloak in vanilla years ago right? They changed their SR to get it

[u/mfbridges]

People legitimately do just give gold to
Streamers. No doubt a lot of the gold is bought. Do you ban the streamer or the account that bought it and traded it?

[u/Baladeur → u/mfbridges]

You ban the buyer and delete the gold from the steamer inventory

[u/Clear_South8742 → u/mfbridges]

Ban them both, they didn’t earn that gold.

[u/NeverScream → u/mfbridges]

Both

[u/hotdog2019]

Anyone thinking blizz will or would do anything meaningful against gold buying man do I have a bridge to sell you.

Not trying to be cynical but blizz track record on handling these things speaks for itself. They do a small crack down but it has no teeth and the cycle repeats.

[u/greenegg28]

It’s insane how many people are defending gold buying in the comments.

[u/Mithyqt]

Dosent matter if they bought it or not, the fact is they KNOW its bought, dont give them a slap on the wrist, ban them, show your actual playerbase that the rules and TOS matter, even if youre a streamer

[u/InspectorOld5841]

I like ziqo as a streamer but this is really fucked up on his part....

[u/Sqintal]

Sodapoppin refused gold from a chinese named character. Lvl 1 trades of these kind of amounts = ban. I beg blizzard

[u/Im_Pooping_RN_]

Perma ban him and all his account, just like tryler1 was premabanned in league, even when he made new account and streamed it was banned.

[u/PuchyBach → u/Im_Pooping_RN_]

He's playing league right now

[u/remakeprox → u/PuchyBach]

He got unbanned after a couple of years, but during his ban every acc he’d buy and play got banned

[u/The_Mettwurst]

Big streamers don't have to buy gold. As soon as the character name is public the viewers will swarm them and trade for a second of attention. Same like with other games like Diablo. Ever wondered how big streamers got all those high end perfect roll items so fast? Watch a stream and you will see a countless number of trades.

[u/Coliooo]

Streamers are ruining the event. Period. If they weren’t allowed to participate the event would be a little more “fair” to the non streaming players.

[u/Freds1765 → u/Coliooo]

If streamers weren't allowed to participate the prize would be a total of 5 bucks

[u/TROGDOR_X69]

streamers get different rules then us

they are spoiled golden child

[u/Dargut]

Well i guess the economy is fucked once again.

[u/Ayotha]

So report them

[u/mattjoo → u/Ayotha]

since the reporting system is offline, use the feedback system that shows everytime you log in.

[u/Opening_Tea_9459]

It would make a great example if a few streamers had their accounts perma banned for buying gold. Zero doubt they'll just open a new account and remake all their chars, its how they make their money. That doesn't mean they should be immune to consequences.

[u/derkokolores]

God, I'd love an ironman/SSF ruleset for WoW and escape all this.

I know it's kind of antithetical to the genre, but ironmen hasn't ruined OSRS so it's doesn't seem impossible? Though OSRS is designed to be a lot more solo-able than WoW, so who knows, maybe it's a terrible idea.

At the very least you'd have to increase drop rates considerably and probably disable any time-locking of content.

[u/lokalgymbiff]

This is so fucking sad. Way to set an example. Working for blizz and all casting pvp.

[u/No-Cover4993]

This beta reminds me of season 1 of SoD. I remember GDKP being so bad at the level 25 cap in BFD they banned it afterwards.

Streamers were being really blatant about accepting g2g gold, same as the first OnlyFangs. Blizzard did take action against Soda but it was just an item wipe.

[u/babyduck703]

Losers

[u/google_is_hard_for_u]

In poe streamers chats there are these “vips” who actually think they are actually the streamers friends and spend every single waking moment in their streams. They are like the streamers henchmen tho are simply there for the stresmer when he needs something crafted or tested etc. Shits sad asf and I bet this is one of those situations.

[u/Glupscher]

Remove them from the beta as a warning.

[u/Fit-Food5105]

I do want to see the high ceiling gameplay they'll produce but I agree they need to be shut down and do it right. After all they are getting paid to play this game all day

[u/GreenEyedRascal]

He even says on the first one there is no way that is natty. Dude claims its natty, might be might not be its honestly within the realm of possibility.

You just dont know enough to claim facts about this situation. You would be surprised how many no lifers want to waste all their time for a special moment with their favorite streamer...

Either way blizzard should investigate.

Another thing to keep in mind, big streamers even if there was zero gold buying in the game will get ons of giveaways from their viewers tehy will be rich no matter what. That's just what happens when you got a large following. Learn to deal with it my dude because its not going to change.

[u/Colyer]

Investigate all gold going into these major tourney participants. Ban anyone along the way on the same criteria they promised they're going to use in the Q&A. Zap the gold.

If they can't prove that the streamer solicited the gold or participated in the RMT, that's fine. I don't necessarily need that assumed without proof. But Blizzard has channels to the big name streamers. Tell them that onus is now on them to affirmatively prove any gold or high-value buyables they receive are legitimate, and if they can't do that, return it.

[u/world92]

They banned reckful's main account for logging on a viewer account to play a paladin in arenas, not sure if it stuck though, but just to say, sometimes they do take a stance.

[u/Entrefut]

Streamers laundering their gold through others should be just as steep of a crime. Make them risks their 20 y/o accounts if they take the money.