We have drafted our first set of rule modifications and will post them later tonight.
As a reminder to all, per the rules:
*As WoW:Forever is still an unsolved game, item/consumable bans may be modified at any time. The TFO team, at its sole discretion, may update, amend, or supplement this document at any time. Competitors are responsible for reading and understanding all of the rules, regulations, and policies dictated in this document.*
As always, there remains the possibility of future changes once level cap is raised as we continue collecting data on this new version of Warcraft. Please remain up to date on the rules at all time.
Separately, we have been made aware of a few suspect instances where competitor gold buying may have potentially taken place. We will be straightforward about this now: any explicitly confirmed instances of gold buying during our events will result in immediate disqualification and lifetime ban from any event we put on. We expect players continue to abide by the rules and Blizzard/Warcraft ToS. If you want to buy gold, open an IRA (not financial advice).”
Source: The Forever PvP Event Discord
There seems to be a chance the event organizers will remove certain streamers from the bracket due to the ongoing conversations around RMT, interested to see if they follow through with any actions.
Separately, we have been made aware of a few suspect instances where competitor gold buying may have potentially taken place. We will be straightforward about this now: any explicitly confirmed instances of gold buying during our events will result in immediate disqualification and lifetime ban from any event we put on.
It's right there in the bolded/italicized. They'll say it wasn't "explicitly confirmed," come up with the best reasoning possible, and move on. Yes, we know it's absurd. But the people who were going to watch the event will still watch (with some small exceptions) and there will be almost no consequences, even for Peyo and his clear admission. The comment sections already have his defenders saying he didn't buy it directly - which is the mob defense from the 1930s and doesn't absolve anyone - and the target audience is the very people who watch Payo et al. in the first place so they obviously have no issues with gold buying in the first place.
It's solicitation, yeah. Bought gold is still bought gold, doesn't matter if you launder it through an intermediary, it's just as damaging to the economy, and just as devaluing to the gold you worked for. It's the principle, and they're making Blizzard look bad.
We have an entire court and jury system IRL to deal with “vague” scenarios like this that don’t technically literally apply to the law as written. I think people are going to be disappointed if they think it’s realistic for Blizz or these event organizers to be as thorough as that.
If they want to ban people based on interpretation that the person used a middle man, they could, but everyone in the comments is trying to act like a jury when that’s not how it works.
We have an entire court and jury system IRL to deal with “vague” scenarios like this that don’t technically literally apply to the law as written. I think people are going to be disappointed if they think it’s realistic for Blizz or these event organizers to be as thorough as that.
That's the brilliant part: they don't have to! The EULA basically says "we can ban you for any reason or no reason at all, get fucked." That means Blizzard can ban people (yes, including your beloved streamers) just because of the uproar they're causing. They don't need to go through a court case to implement consequences, because this isn't a legal matter. They're just refusing to utilize their purposefully empowered EULA all because the cheaters in this instance happen to be popular.
What is your argument here? Of course they can ban you for whatever reason they'd like. I mean I think you should be banned for buying gold too, but as far as I know, he just accepted a large sum of it.
How do you know any of the gold you'll be traded in the future isn't bought? Is it going to be an official rule where you can't accept large sums of gold, or you can, but maybe you'll be banned? This just sounds so childish.
That's the thing that bothers me with these people asking them to be banned, it's a slippery slope. If you ban this person, these streamers specifically, for receiving gold from someone who rmt'd, without actual proof that it was they themselves that purchased it, your setting a precedent that will fuck over everyone.
Someone who rmt's can just, create a burner account, buy 100 gold, send a gold piece to 100 people and now they all get banned because they accepted it..... New players aren't going to know to return it or report suspicious mail or this player is nefarious and instead said he wants to help me with a gold piece. Banning those streamers for vibes and circumstantial evidence will not create an example NOT to buy rmt, it will create a precedent for some to harass and get people banned.
Blizzard is doing the correct thing they stated, ban the rmt account, remove any gold. Better yet, limit the amount traded at once, put a time restraint on trading transactions, suspensions for suspicious activity, there's better alternatives to think of then going rabid and asking for bans.
No one thinks we need a full on court system. Payo literally admitted in on stream and there is video evidence of him discussing the amount of gold he needed (and likely the player that gave it to him is himself a gold seller, but that's not necessary to show a TOS violation). It's not that complicated, and you don't get due process for this.
If I have sex with a prostitute my buddy bought for me, really good chance I get arrested and my name in the paper. I don’t think banning accounts for violating the ToS requires that much evidence. But ultimately it’s just another reason why they need human GM’s back.
Not a single streamer will be banned for accepting RMT gold. This is just a poor attempt at damage control over the situation with various streamers. Also note that they don't say that accepting RMT gold is getting you banned, just buying it yourself.
Literally ten minutes ago, Tips was on a voice call with Payo laughing and cracking jokes on stream about "give me your credit card info next time you buy some gold." Then he pivots straight to Discord, tags thousands of regular players with an announcement, and acts like he is actually doing something.
I didn't expect Blizzard to do anything, but I expected the tournament organizers to step in.
Unless people get banned for serious amounts of time nobody is going to give a shit what blizzard says or does because everybody knows they are too scared to do anything about it. So RMT and shit will continue to thrive.
Oh no they took away ziqo's gold, 30$ says he gets more off stream and spends it on gear before anyone notices.
When people wind up on the benefiting side of a rules for me not for thee situation is human nature to just rub it in the faces of those who cant benefit from it.
But then streamers won't have that much priviledge in the tournament, and nobody wants to lose all his streamer reputation by getting owned by a random stranger in a duel :)
Bro "explicitly confirmed instances" gets them out of anything when it comes to their streamer friends. "Oh well we can't confirm beyond reasonable doubt. We can't ban him."
Duh but if Blizzard were to maybe punish them (even a slap on the wrist like for 3 days for example) that's enough of a reason. So they're playing the ball to Blizzards court. They will still be able to stream wow but they will be disq from any tournaments by the organizers. So it's a win win for Blizzard and there is no reason to protect them anymore
Accepting gold which you suspect is RMT which Ziqo did is against the rules. It doesn't matter if you didn't buy it. Otherwise you could just middleman your way through this entire thing.
So you cant be banned as long as you slightly launder it through another account.
Got it.
Buying a throw away account on live and buying gold, may as well setup GDKP as well, cant ban me if i run all the math through discord right? Cause i never officially said it was GDKP on blizzard services.
So, if any non streamer is ever banned for buying gold, short of a message where they say “yes I am buying gold now”, we’re going to have a major issue.
Its all PR and optics. Whether it was RMT or not, they had to either remove the gold or ban him because of the publicity of it.
If they said no evidence of RMT was found they would lose all trust from the redditors who dont believe them while claiming it's streamer benefits. Blizzard still loses.
If it was RMT they could have banned Ziqo and received a standing ovation from Reddit, but they didn't.
Taking the gold away and then issuing a public statement to clarify that even suspicion of the gold being RMT can get you banned is the best outcome that will remind everyone to think twice about accepting random gold, and a second "situation" would force their hand to ban someone to maintain those optics going forward.
People did this all the time back in the day and in Classic. It was never against the rules then. Why would it be against the rules now? I'm actually having troubles understanding this. Why would giving your buddy you just got in the game a little gold to get started considered a bad thing?
Still doesn’t mean the streamer bought the gold? Weird stream simpers with too much money on their hands exist you know.
The gold was most likely RMT’d but it don’t mean the streamer was involved in that part, necessarily.
Edit: too many replies I can’t keep up. So let me add this:
How dumb do you think Ziqo is to accept the gold LIVE ON STREAM if he did buy it. He would’ve just hidden it on some alt. Why do I know this? Because in the 2019 dueling tournament he literally hid all of his strategies and items from his stream until after the tournament was over lol. Go look it up on YouTube it’s actually quite impressive
In regards to the Payo whisper incident. Why would they ever use the ingame whisper system to discuss RMT??? That’s like rule 1, you don’t do that. That’s why they have the gold selling website chats or even Discord.
Just think for 2 seconds and you realise how dumb you all sound.
Because it's level ones in a beta with max cap of level 20 and people are handing him 250g+ there's no way anyone with half a brain couldn't figure out it's RMT gold. If he wanted to actually be a member of the community and cared about the game he would have declined it and spoke out about RMT.
Why would they ever use the ingame whisper system to discuss RMT??? That’s like rule 1, you don’t do that. That’s why they have the gold selling website chats or even Discord.
Uhh, RMT sellers use whispers and fuckin shouts and fucking trade chat. The sellers hardly hide what they are doing because they give zero fucks if one account gets banned.
If your job is to stream you know all the parameters. Ya think this is Skyrim grandma? These are edgy too good to work a 9-5 narcissist. Swipehh...smh bro.
He was just a WoW streamer who couldn’t find a niche and was just genuinely obnoxious. WoW community didn’t like his vibe. He ended up moving to behind the scenes stuff now, such as managing events (like this one!) and handling some of the WoW backend for other prominent streamers like Efand, Soda, and Asmongold.
Every once in a while he gets caught up in some controversy like apparently threatening legal action against some of the streamers who work with him, or allegedly fraud, but it all just sorta confirms that he’s still the same guy this community wanted nothing to do with.
He was just a WoW streamer who couldn’t find a niche and was just genuinely obnoxious.
He was also an obvious fake who knew very little about Classic, lied about losing his job to beg for money online, lied about having insider leaks, just an all-around grifter and lowlife.
I vaguely remember something like that, but I don't remember the details and I don't like to accuse people of things I'm not sure about. So probably, yeah.
Tourney shoulda been SSF. Would literally solve every problem lol. If its not SSF then you can 100% assume cheaters (streamers) are going to be given bought gold or hordes of gold from their followers.
I mean, I caught a Jerome clip somewhere where he openly said "I cleared Black Temple with a GDKP, of course it was all organized on discord". If people want to "sell services", then where's a will there will be a way. Unless Blizzard hires a metric ton of game masters and have them walk among people, act as normal players and "honey pots" for the people who "sell services", essentially "entrapping" them, there will be no end to this miserable state of affairs.
Why do people care about this tournament? Didn’t you watch pilavs video back in the day about tipsout and all of these other grifters ?
Stop giving them attention/money and the problem will disappear
It's a walled garden. Unless your part of the streamer discord where the pillow talk is at. ....Guys everyone is faking it til they make it. They're running wild the iron is hot. You think morals matter? You all drink the Kool aid too much.
I think it's very sad.
Just make it a streamer tournament at this point.
I'd love to see a random wipe the floor with the streamers, but they have:
1. Literally unlimited time to play the game/ no life
2. Flocks of people tunnel them trough dungeons (no waiting time, and no competition on dropps)
3. Tunneling potions, bombs, first aid ...
4. Free gold.
It's not a tournament about skill / knowledge.
It's farming tournament.
That beeing said, I'll watch it. But I wont pretend it's a community event
Edit: Just to be clear, bacuse obviously the people commenting on my post cant fkng READ.
I don't compete in the tournament, I know I would not win in a thousand years, even with same the help the streamers get.
Best thing anyone can do is NOT interact with these people. Don't watch the streams, don't watch their videos, don't comment on things they post. Anyone who watches this tournament or any of these streamers implicitly supports RMT / gold buying
But now how will a nobody compete with sodapoppin or pikaboo who have an army of people to give them gold. What a useless statement to make. Just make the competition SSF if you want any sense of legitimacy
Why are any consumables allowed? The duels should just be raw. The fact that gold can influence any of this is absolutely ridiculous to begin with. Clown show
"Any explicitly confirmed instance" basically means "if we see you type your credit card into a gold purchase website and livestream you getting gold with a message "hey im mark from goldbuying.com and im here to delover the gold you purchaced from us!" And if its not that, they wont do anything. This is just cheap pr talk to pretend they are doing anything.
Why not just have a tournament addon that blocks you from doing trades or opening mails. Or if its difficult to code to block those features just make the addon validate the character is solo self found. All tournaments should be ssf.
Give all the streamers that do it a 2 week ban , proves your point, they miss the tourney , they continue to play on nov 4 cause their income depends on it. Everyone wins
There seems to be a chance the event organizers will remove certain streamers from the bracket due to the ongoing conversations around RMT, interested to see if they follow through with any actions.
They won't because they bring a lot of viewers to their little event.
Or allowing other players who bought gold funnel it to your character either by straight up trading the gold or buying gear/materials to help pump professions.
Just don't watch this bullshit boys and girls. This all ends when you decide to stop giving it your attention. They'll make you think you will miss out but you wont.
they only say confirmed Instances, the only offical instance is Blizzard and if they buy Gold they are banned atleast from the beta in first place or am i missing something?
Extremely weak wording and spineless response, as expected.
any explicitly confirmed instances of gold buying
May as well be "never". Explicit confirmed basically means a streamer facing the camera and going "yes, I have bought gold". And even then they can still claim they're "baiting".
So the only way forward is that there is an absolute boycott of this tournament as a gold buyers tournament. Anyone involved needs to see it as a PR negative to the point that they choose to distance themselves.
Unfortunately it looks like only then might Blizzard do what Blizzard promised they would do.
absolute non-statement and not tackling the issue at all.
any explicitly confirmed instances of gold buying
confirmed by who? blizz? some twitch clip? what about getting traded obvious RMT'd amounts of gold? what about getting traded mats/resources/etc?
all this says is "dont be obvious about it, then its gonna be fine". changes nothing and it remains a streamer tournament and not a community tournament.
I'll belive it when I see it. Blizz is known for being soft on their golden children. Oh no they took his gold. Well shit why isn't he banned? Hmmm....
Nothing will be done, this is pure lip service (most likely on the advice of Blizzard) to attempt to save face.
To see the silver lining in all of this, atleast we know it’s business as usual when it comes to the double standards of enforcement.
I feel bad for Aggrend, I think he legit meant what he said when he said he would more aggressively go after gold buyers.
But streamers drive player retention and bring eyes to the game. OnlyFangs: Forever will be a massive event and Blizzard will do anything to protect that bottom line.
Guess what. They did an SSF tournament back in the day. The same people still won. Right now on the beta the biggest power you can gain through gear and the Legacy System does not require you to RMT. If you think this is what stops some average dad from winning this tournament then you're delusional and dont know what you're talking about
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u/EvadableMoxie 17d ago
Watch them say Peyo and Ziqo don't count because they just accepted gold someone else bought instead of buying it themselves.