Blizzard Punishing Griefing On Warcraft III Ladders

Thanks to RPGDot for pointing to a Battle.net forum post, in which Blizzard indicate they will ban Warcraft III teams for 'griefing'. This requires Blizzard acting on in-game tactics, rather than illicit software mods/hacks - they mention: "We have received reports and observed that certain Warcraft III players have deliberately caused their own teams to lose in team games. This goes against the spirit of fair play on Battle.net, and as such, we will take action on a case-by-case basis. In each case, if we determine that griefing is in fact occurring, the griefer's Battle.net account and access to ladder games will be subject to removal."

Comments

Re:Uh oh...

[Kethinov]

I can't wait to see how this is spun into Blizzard being evil.

You need not wait longer! :)

Okay well sort of. I'm not exactly a Blizzard-hater, and I don't even play the game in discussion here. But I have played games where "grief tactics" were considered a bannable offense, and in every case it was a completely utterly fucking retarded policy. As a game developer, you make the game. If there are bugs, you fix them. If people aren't playing the game the way you'd prefer they play it, you change it. You don't go around banning people for "misconduct" and "exploits". Fix it or don't bitch, is what I tell developers.

But of course, the "it's not that simple!" argument comes up. Well to that I say too fucking bad. The EQ developers can't force people to roleplay, so they don't attempt to enforce it. This analogy could be a totally bad example for this Battle.net thing, but even still, with my overwhelming ignorance about the specifics, especially having not read the article, I still suspect the developers are more to blame than the players for this "problem".