ban was most likely for a mouse macro using xdotool in the menus (not cheating, but still permaban with no warning)
However, this person was not using a vanilla configuration.
A 2nd ban for simply having xdotool INSTALLED (and not running) was reported too:
If it’s a dependency, DON’T INSTALL IT.
Old thread content:
RESPONSE FROM BLIZZARD:
Sorry to hear that your account has been banned!
I’m going to escalate your ticket so our team can take a closer look, and hopefully overturn the ban and give you some feedback so we can avoid this happening to other Linux users.
This eventually led to the initial person that was banned has been UNBANNED!
As part of our ongoing effort to combat nonparticipation, abusive behavior, and other in-game violations, Blizzard recently closed an Overwatch license on this Blizzard account.
After performing an additional review of the evidence considered in this action, we determined that this account closure was an error. We are reopening the license for play, and hope you will accept our sincere apologies for the mistake.
Latest quote from Dox:
Getting reports of people getting unbanned, here [reddit] and on discord.
We will have to see if Blizzard Entertainment is going to work for or against Linux gamers using “modified” d3d11 and dxgi DLLs.
In the meantime, GPU Passthrough still works. (also, don’t say that on Reddit or you get downvoted)
Dox was most likely thinking this during his debugging of this. However, the sudden ban after using DXVK for so long could literally mean anything in the way the d3d11 and dxgi alternate DLLs behave can trigger this.
Yeah, I think it’s fair to assume DXVK was responsible, but how do they know it what part? I guess it would make sense if I was invested in the code as the devs…
…since I know I don’t cheat, and have been playing OW on linux since I bought it, with DXVK since it was possible, and only got banned today, after I have been testing async for bugs, it is the current theory.
Well, the QoL async option is nuked right now to be safe rather than sorry.
Also keep in mind even on the PTR build, there is no dev sandbox in cases like this where no one gets special status to see DLL interaction, since Blizzard is assuming everyone has to run Windows.
Some people on the Reddit thread have said that Blizzard bans come in waves, every month or so…
Do you realize how useless this is to a debugger? A timespan of one month could mean ANY element in the Wine/DXVK/Lutris ecosystem can cause a ban, and you wouldn’t know till the next wave…
Well, I sure hope this gets sorted out. I was planning to start playing overwatch when I finally get a new build up so I could use DXVK specifically, since it looks like things have been going well with that and performance has improved. It would kinda suck to end up buying the game and having everything ready only to get banned.
Considering how long public word goes down the chain of command to the coders, this is likely going to take a VERY long time to get fully noticed, cause the frontline are the PR/Marketing people, not the coders.
Well this is shitty, but I’m not at all surprised.
We all knew this was gonna happen. If you modify your dlls, you’re gonna get rekt at some point in a competitive multi-player game.
Modifying d3d11 is how people inject hacks. (shitty ones, that is) blizzard obviously has detections in place for this. And we’ve known this for a long time.
The originating patchset maker for that “hack” added this to the readme:
Dxvk has now disabled the async shader compilation, since using it has reportedly resulted in a ban. This patch restores it again.
Explicitly bypassing it when the dev told people not to, and doing so under people’s noses.
In response, the fork of this changed it’s name, but the originating one just bypassed the disabling of the feature against the dev’s wishes.
Philip:
Having a flag that allows what some games may consider cheating is just not an option. First of all I don’t want to get sued by people who lost their accounts, and it could potentially piss off publishers.
Yet this guy just ignored it and re-enabled it anyways.
Well, now that’s something new (or not?).
I’ve only gotten Overwatch to play decently on Linux 2 weeks ago and have been since. The 2 years before where on Windows. I stick to the Lutris Installer and just change wine/dxvk for their newest version.
I’ll “risk” playing like this for now. First bans normally don’t last too long, and i hope this has something to do with some other mods that where used to make performance better rather than stock wine/dxvk. After all, people have been playing like this for quite some time. If blizzards Anti-Cheat would trigger on the dll changes, there should have been bans earlier. In general, i’m hesitant to judge those things on Reddit reports. There is a tendency of “overselling” those storys there. I’m not accusing anyone of lying here, i’ve just seen many instances of people leaving out the part where they where doing something bannable And blaming “big corporation XY” for unfair treatment.
In the end, i really hope this gets enough attention for Blizzard to make an official statement on Linux Gaming. I don’t expect official support, but a clear statement that playing the game under Linux is not bannable (which they already said, but in a Forum. We need something official here).
How one would go about proving you wheren’t using any hacks is another thing all together.
