Bannable Offenses

#0 - July 21, 2010, 2:31 p.m.

Out of curiosity, what can get you banned? Why I ask:

Was running some dungeons last night. I saw what I thought was a spell power cloak and rolled need. Oddly, 2 of the melee also rolled need. Turns out, it was attack power and not spell power and I accidentally ninjaed their cloak.

I intended to give it to the second highest roller, but he started cursing me out and yelling at me for being a ninja. I felt disrespected, even though I did apologize as soon as I noticed, so I gave it to the other melee (Who had the lowest roll)

Anywho: the dude that cursed me out started to threaten to report me and said if he harassed the GMs and called Blizzard he could get me banned. I did throw a few wordy comments his way (I lose my cool too sometimes /sorry) and so I am partially a jerk.

My question is, and for anything else that may occur, how bad do you have to be to get banned? Can harassing somebody in game do it, or does it take like exploiting and bots and stuff? I'm sure stuff like this may happen to me in the future and I'd like to be able to know when to worry about being reported (for like if I call somebody stupid) or when I shouldn't worry (if they report me for standing too close to a bank teller)

Aredek

#4 - July 21, 2010, 2:41 p.m.

Good morning, Devilsbane.

Account closure is actually very rare, especially for a single violation. We use an escalated penalty system that is affectionately known as the "Penalty Volcano." The penalty assigned to an account largely depends on the severity of the infraction and the number of times the player has violated other policies. If minor policy violations become excessive, these penalties can add up and ultimately lead to account closer, so please be aware that this penalty is not reserved solely for severe policy violations. For more information, I encourage you to review the following support article:

http://us.blizzard.com/support/article.xml?locale=en_US&articleId=20221

That being said, while the situation you described is unfortunate, rolling out of turn for an item that may not be suited for your class is not in violation of our policies. Such actions may frustrate your fellow players and create a bad group dynamic, so you may want to pay careful attention in the future to avoid this sort of incident. Swearing and verbal harassment may, however, be in violation of our policies. Be sure to pay careful attention to the things you say and the way you treat people to ensure you needn't worry about our penalty system.

If you have any questions, please let us know.

Best wishes.