Progamers selling account leveling services - Page 5

On July 16 2012 17:16 pOnarreT wrote:



What about grubby? I think he is not sponsored by anyone

On July 16 2012 17:42 BoxingKangaroo wrote:


The apathy towards it astounds me. People saying ladder doesn't matter anyway, well it certainly won't if we let stuff like this slide.

On July 16 2012 17:03 KawaiiRice wrote:
the problems are that ppl are clogging up gm slots and also ppl that got their accs leveled can use gm as credential to sell coaching to those that don't know any better. its a big issue if you think about that ...

On July 16 2012 17:47 SigmaoctanusIV wrote:


Ladder matter for people that play the game, and if you are "Robbed" of playing against a Weak person posing as GM than I am truly sorry.

The fact is Pros should be able to support themselves by their ability to play the game. How many other people "account share" and this isn't being brought up about them.

Pros use to advertise for this when the game first came out but since it breaks the EULA that was shut down. I am just shocked that someone would care and go through the effort to expose something so unimportant.

On July 16 2012 17:52 Cirqueenflex wrote:
for me it is funny, because this is also (amongst others) a side-effect of the elitist behaviour on TL
when you are bronze-platinum, basically the only thing you are allowed to post on the strategy forum is a thread "help me i don't know why i'm losing" with added replays, and you will always hear that your macro sucks
whenever you want to join in on a discussion you get shut down cold because only masters++ are said to have enough game knowledge to be accepted in any way. Thus making it all the way more appealing to get your account leveled to high masters/GM, so you can start your post with "GM on NA server here". And suddenly people will take your statement seriously

(of course this is not always the case, but most of the time i feel like this)

On July 16 2012 16:29 Doodsmack wrote:
Who cares?

Now you might say, what's the big deal? After all, account leveling is not actually hurting anyone other than the person buying the leveling, because he won't really be able to play 1v1 again or else he'd get stomped. However I do think this is a "big deal", for the following reasons:

- It's against the EULA.

- It IS hurting other people. The semi-pros in high master who are struggling to break into GM, because GM does in fact provide recognition to players. Ideally GM should be the top 200 ladder players, and not littered with leveled accounts. Aspiring semi-pros are being cheated out of potential opportunities by the people selling these leveling services. Moreover, these leveled accounts basically go inactive save for some occasional playing by the leveler to keep the account from falling out of GM.

- The people most likely to buy leveling services are associated with hacking and botting communities. Indeed, many of the ads I mentioned are on hacking sites. These people are already willing to hack and buy new accounts to hack with, so it makes sense that they would pay for leveling. I believe the IMMvp account owner hacks in team games and plays with other hackers. Replay evidence here:

+ Show Spoiler +

- The people buying these services may even advertise coaching once they get into GM and make money off it. NMxBlazinT, for example, is notorious for having his account leveled each season, and he has an account on a prominent hacking site where he has advertised coaching.

- It's possible that the people acting as intermediaries between the pros performing leveling and the people buying the leveling keep a portion of the proceeds, similar to something like Gosucoaching. If this is the case, the proceeds are likely contributing towards the hacking communities and sustaining them further.

On July 16 2012 17:41 Myrddraal wrote:


Well it's a lot different from maphacking in the sense that nobody is getting cheated out of a match unfairly. The pro's still have to play legit to beat all those players.

On July 16 2012 17:58 rd wrote:


- Who cares about the EULA?

- Nothing stops GM players from maintaining multiple accounts in GM, whether it's a smurf account, a shared account, or an account they've been paid to level. What GM signifies to a semi-pro other than recognition is fairly irrelevant when the only tournament GM gets you into are blizzard tournaments. There are tons of problems with GM that supersede the very, very few accounts that people pay hundreds of dollars to get leveled. And I doubt it's what holds back semi-pros from stardom.

- Where do you suggest they advertise their services where they won't be banned/censored? And why do you assume ALL people who pay for/sell account leveling services are hackers? Those sites aren't the only avenue of business, just the most well advertised.

- Go ahead and name the people doing it.

If Naama IS actually leveling accounts for money, who the fuck cares? He wouldn't be the first, he won't be the last. What hes doing is between him, the account owner, and Blizzard. If Blizzard wants to ban him for it, so be it. Don't start another fucking witch hunt. Especially over something as stupid, trivial, and irrelevant as this.

On July 16 2012 17:03 KawaiiRice wrote:
the problems are that ppl are clogging up gm slots and also ppl that got their accs leveled can use gm as credential to sell coaching to those that don't know any better. its a big issue if you think about that ...

On July 16 2012 17:44 Aterons_toss wrote:
Oky, let me put it to you this way:
- The only reason why this happens is because some pros make very little money
- The only reason why this hurt someone is because some people that wish to be pros will be discouraged

So isn't this... good ? If the low tier pros don't make enough money and have to do this kinda of stuff to make more than its obviously not a very good thing to aspire to, thus by doing this the guys are helping some kids that want to get into something they don't know enough about to realize it won't yelled them enough money AND are helping themselves.
They are also taking away money from stupid people that want those accounts, which is a good thing in terms of "morale".

Considering the above, without saying any information in your post is false, I don't believe this is a problem but rather something good.

On July 16 2012 18:06 Yello wrote:


He did already name one and I personally have two guys on spec in the EU ladder. But I won't tell you the names until I know more about it. I don't want to start a witch hunt like in the maphacker thread.

On July 16 2012 18:02 lichter wrote:
I would also like to add that I find it curious that there are so many people who think this is fine (as long as some pros make money, for esports!). I bet if you changed the circumstances from Starcraft to some other real life scenario/sport/game/whatever, there'd be millions of keyboard warriors sermoning about morals and integrity and character and justice and lawfulness and.... you get my point.

Not that I think this is particularly bad (already gave my opinion a few pages ago), I just find it funny how everything is suddenly okay as long as it "supports esports".

On July 16 2012 18:06 xsksc wrote:
What about the hundreds of high level masters that can compete with GM players? They would like a spot in GM.
It's hard enough to get into GM league already, and if GM league starts getting filled with noob accounts that were levelled by players like Naama, I believe that's very unfair on the high-masters players who are trying to make a name for themselves.

Like it or not, being in GM definitely does have advantages to an aspiring player like that.
For instance - if you stream, people are going to want to watch a "Grandmaster zerg" over a "High masters zerg", it's just natural.
Teams/clans are more likely to take note of you.
People will naturally want to be coached by someone in GM over someone in master's.

In short, there are most definitely benefits in getting into Grandmaster's as an unestablished/aspiring pro. It won't make you a better player - but it raises your profile, which IS a big deal.

This is essentially just ladder abuse.
GSL banned choya for ladder abuse, and all he did was play rock-paper-scissors for points. It breaks the rules you agreed on with Blizzard when you bought the game.
If GM has accounts in it that are actually silver level players (and they can stay there for the WHOLE season), it completely delegitimizes the ladder.
It blows my mind that you think this is a good thing.