- Blizzard Entertainment says it's monitoring real-money trading (RMT) in World of Warcraft: Forever
- The studio says it has devised penalties for gold buyers that could result in a permanent ban
- Blizzard is "watching very closely" and says "engaging in RMT is not worth putting your account at risk"
Blizzard Entertainment has confirmed that it's actively working to combat botting issues in World of Warcraft: Forever, particularly those related to real-money trading (RMT).
RMT has long been an issue in WoW, in both retail and Classic. Not only does RMT for in-game items and gold violate Blizzard's terms of service, but it also disrupts WoW's economy by inflating prices and essentially turning the MMO into a "pay-to-win" experience for some.
WoW: Forever is currently in beta and slated to launch next month, so there's a good chance that RMT could become an issue in this game as well. However, in an interview with TechRadar Gaming, the WoW: Forever development team acknowledged the ongoing problem and confirmed it's working to mitigate botting issues.
"One big area we’re working on is limiting the class abilities that facilitate bot gold farming," Blizzard said. "To that end, certain Mage talents and abilities have been changed to make it harder for a single player to farm an instance for gold or experience."
In addition, the studio is monitoring RMT and has already devised penalties that, depending on the action, could result in a permanent ban.
"One other area where we plan to apply more pressure to the RMT market is harsher penalties for Gold Buyers," the team said. "We aren’t going to go into specifics about this right now, but we’ve looked at our policies closely and have come up with a set of penalties that progress much more rapidly for this behavior, including potential permanent bans.
"We’ve got a number of new systems in place to support this as well, but it’s a cat and mouse game, so talking too much about our plans here could tip our hand. Suffice to say, we are watching very closely, and engaging in RMT is not worth putting your account at risk."
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