A good number of support tickets have been sent Blizzard's way in the last 24 hours, with thousands upon thousands of users claiming that they received an unfair six month ban on many of their accounts. However their chances of being reinstated are practically zero, as they were likely banned as part of the big spam and bot crack down that the publishing giant has been taking part in.
All in all, some 100,000 six month bans were handed out to various bot users, many of whom utilised the Honorbuddy system to farm Honor in PvP. Although not everyone using automation to make the game a little easier have been hit, anyone that gives themselves an unfair advantage, especially in PvP, was vulnerable and today, many have found themselves caught out.
"We’re committed to providing an equal and fair playing field for everyone in World of Warcraft, and will continue to take action against those found in violation of our Terms of Use. Cheating of any form will not be tolerated," Blzzard said in a statement.
it also encouraged users to report anyone that it thought looked like they were using a bot.
Although this reduction in player accounts may be slightly noticeable on some servers, much more impactful has been the loss of over three million subscribers since the release of the last expansion, Warlords of Draenor. While it brought back millions of old players ,many of them seem to have moved on again, leaving the game back around the 7 million player mark.
Still a lot, but far from its peak of nearly 13 million several years ago.
Image source: Wallpaperup