Power Leveling Sucks

Both power-leveling and buying accounts share similarities. Both allow you to skip the "boring" parts of the game. Most purchasers of these services are usually people who have their own characters and don't want to spend the time. So what should you do? First, let's start with the basics. Who power levels your character? Power leveling companies employ people from third world countries to play games 24/7. Companies that buy and re-sell accounts typically buy from regular gamers who no longer wish to play their account. As a result usally power-leveling is cheaper, although buying accounts isn't too much more expensive as gamers are happy to just make a buck out of a game that they had fun with. The problem now is that because of Blizzard (and other MMO) companies are taking a very aggressive stance against power-leveling and buying accounts, risk factor must be taken into the consideration. Because there is only one way to tell who is playing an account - by IP, this causes powerleveling to be easily detected and as a result makes it VERY risky. On the otherhand, buying accounts also poses a risk. The seller can recall his account after you've paid - which is just as bad as getting banned. However the risk of being caught by IP is slim because switches in the US (even state to state) are common and happen regularly with normal players.Now that powerleveling is out of the question because of IP tracking, what about buying accounts? In order to protect yourself, you MUST be positive you can change the email to your own. This includes making sure the seller has access to the email on the game account and can change it to yours. That way, if something happens, all notifications will go to your email address. If you take the neccessary precautions, you can still buy accounts. But be aware of the risks! Power leveling http://www.ez-gamers.comYou may have power leveled months or even years ago and never have thought twice about it. You ordered the service and you got your character back and it was fine. You might even be thinking of buying another service - but don't. What has changed since then? 9 months ago Blizzard did not have any automated detection methods in place to thwart powerlevelers and gold farmers. In fact I have reason to believe that up until about 3 months ago they were only using manual investigations and bannings because they would need quite a large workforce in order to weed out 100,000 accounts out of 8 million. With the advent of IP-tracking and Warden, currently almost all bannings are automated or semi-automated, at least that's how it seems (seeing as powerlevelers get banned very quickly, while some legit users complain they were unrightfully banned.)Power leveling http://www.ez-gamers.comSo, what is the Warden and what capabilities does it have? First of all, the Warden is meant to detect hackers and exploiters, but it can also view your visit websites, scan your memory, and your hard drives. Here is a quote from the Terms of Use from Blizzard:WHEN RUNNING, THE PROGRAM MAY MONITOR YOUR COMPUTER'S RANDOM ACCESS MEMORY (RAM) AND/OR CPU PROCESSES FOR UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY PROGRAMS RUNNING CONCURRENTLY WITH WORLD OF WARCRAFT. AN "UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY PROGRAM" AS USED HEREIN SHALL BE DEFINED AS ANY THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION ANY "ADDON" OR "MOD," THAT IN BLIZZARD'S SOLE DETERMINATION: (i) ENABLES OR FACILITATES CHEATING OF ANY TYPE; (ii) ALLOWS USERS TO MODIFY OR HACK THE WORLD OF WARCRAFT INTERFACE, ENVIRONMENT, AND/OR EXPERIENCE IN ANY WAY NOT EXPRESSLY AUTHORIZED BY BLIZZARD; OR (iii) INTERCEPTS, "MINES," OR OTHERWISE COLLECTS INFORMATION FROM OR THROUGH THE PROGRAM. IN THE EVENT THAT THE PROGRAM DETECTS AN UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY PROGRAM, BLIZZARD MAY (a) COMMUNICATE INFORMATION BACK TO BLIZZARD, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION YOUR ACCOUNT NAME, DETAILS ABOUT THE UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY PROGRAM DETECTED, AND THE TIME AND DATE THE UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY PROGRAM WAS DETECTED; AND/OR (b) EXERCISE ANY OR ALL OF ITS RIGHTS UNDER SECTION 6 OF THIS AGREEMENT, WITH OR WITHOUT PRIOR NOTICE TO THE USER. Here is another quote from security expert Bruce Schneier (found on TGDaily.com) In the excerpted post, Hoglund discusses having thoroughly examined The Warden, discovering it to be a process that runs every 15 seconds, running the Windows API function GetWindowTextA() to retrieve the title bar contents of all running processes on his computer. Next, he reported, The Warden sniffed out the e-mail addresses of his MSN correspondents, the URLs of all open Web pages in his browser, and the Registry names of all running processes, including minimized programs and toolbar functions.All the collected character strings, Hoglund reports, are passed through a hashing function that generates derivative values, or "hashes," that are compared against other hashes of the titles, brand names, or handles of known 'bot programs. Next, he observed The Warden accessing his e-mail client and his PGP key manager, which is used to encrypt messages and authenticate senders. Hoglund writes: In other words, Warden has access to your entire computer when World of Warcraft is running. Scary, isn't it?The Warden program has come under a lot of heat for is spyware like tendencies, but most gamers say that if it helps protect them, it's okay. Unfortunately, there is nothing we can do about this except be careful. Power leveling http://www.ez-gamers.comPowerleveling Sucks is a website to inform gamers about the unethical nature of power leveling, and the risks of buying power leveling 'services' from game companies. Post your complaints, troubles, and stories on the forums. Powerleveling has become almost as bad as gold farming recently. There is no debate that both players and creators of MMORPGs discourage it. However, this site was created not to discuss whether or not power leveling is ethical, but to inform gamers that placing their accounts in the hands of complete strangers living in 3rd world countries puts them at great risk of having their accounts suspended. Blizzard recently banned 100,000 accounts related to exploits. This includes gold farmers, hackers, but also people who have purchased powerleveling 'services' from Chinese gaming companies. These companies take your money, and after the account is banned, they claim no responsibility. Unfortunately, many gamers are uninformed and do not know the potential risks involved! 1. According to Blizzard's TOS you are not allowed to share or give ANYONE your account information2. Blizzard can ban your account for any or NO reason whatsoever. So how does Blizzard (an other MMO makers) find out you've been power leveling?1. IP - Because these companies use cheap labor from China, Blizzard can easily track and suspend suspicious users in logged in from China.2. Being logged in 24/7 - When your account is logged in farming the same mobs for 24 hours, this is very suspicious.3. Bots - Some power leveling companies use bots such as WoWGlider - these are easily dectectable by Blizzard, as while you play the game they can scan your harddrive, processes, ram, and internet history. Please read about "Warden ". Although other MMORPGs do not actively ban power levelers, you should always check to see if the person or company you are entrusting your account to is reputable. If you have a story to share about a game company having your account banned, please tell us about it!Power leveling http://www.ez-gamers.com

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