First multiplayer ban for using DXVK has occured (UPDATE: Don't use/install xdotool!)

5th ban just confirmed.

Also, Forbes article:

Forbes linked the LTT @wendell video too.

For anyone interested: https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/overwatch/t/can-we-get-banned-for-playing-on-linux/70929/5

This is the thread in Overwatch Forums where CS initially confirmed it’s not bannable to play on Linux. I also linked the reddit thread there and asked for some clarification.

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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.

However, someone else (the 2nd person banned) got a different response:

they responded, linked to general Overwatch usage terms (link does not even work) and Battle.net EULA and notified me that they consider this case as closed and they will not respond to any further requests.

Very conflicting messages.

One sounds automated and the other like the are starting to realise it is a problem and attempting to get up to speed with it.

Yeah, i’ve got the same feeling. The second one sounds rather “default” ban reply.

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The first person banned is the creator of Lutris. Of course he might have a better chance of going up the chain of command faster.

I doubt the general “Blizzard ticket First Level”-Supporter has a clue what this is or why they should care. Heck, even i didn’t knew who he was until today. And i live and breath Linux every day.

Worst case scenario, first responder is actually offshore tech support.

That doesn’t automatically means its bad. Almost every major company outsources support these days and it can actually have a positive effect on quality because support centers are specialised on support and not on everything else, they know how it’s done.
Whether the support is good or not depends entirely on their training by the company.

That depends very much how you approach them. If you’re just a random bozo shouting “muh accunt” you’ll get a standard text in most cases.
If you explain and ask technical questions that cannot be answered in first level support you will be forwarded to the appropriate department.

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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.

But automated bans are still ongoing, as a 6th person has been banned:

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Getting reports of people getting unbanned, here [reddit] and on discord.

One casualty of this is that DXVK completely deleted the async compute code in the official code, no questions allowed.

Apparently it was that serious of a liability that the code has to be fully nuked to prevent the project from being sued. No admission of that in the changelog, so they’re stifling the fact it even existed. If there’s no liability in the base code, there’s nothing for people to sue the official DXVK project on.

Meanwhile, the person that insists on keeping Async alive has cloned all the removed code into his patchset. AGAINST Philip’s wishes.

Don’t even try to ask DXVK directly, because Async in Official DXVK is now “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” Removal absolves liability from official DXVK code and now the third party patchset author is solely responsible for liabilities.

Valve’s response for the rationale behind nuking the async pipeline:

even if they don’t detect async hiding walls programmatically, it might not be a bad idea to not change rendering to that extent

if they collect signatures of things, like a lot of anti cheats do, and then manually review what signatures might be cheats or not, you don’t really want to have them look at it or test it and see a bunch of hidden walls

Source: Plagman from Valve

In other words: The rendering pipeline was too dramatically changed by the async code. They’re researching less invasive render pipeline techniques.

Even if a material or wall was invisible for one frame inadvertently, manual inspection of render logs will cause red flags for anti-cheat devs.

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NEW BAN WAS JUST REPORTED:

Update: Person banned used xdotool. Was not a vanilla configuration.

ban was most likely for a mouse macro using xdotool in the menus (not cheating, but still permaban with no warning)

Well, don’t use third-party tools for playing, kids :thinking:

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xdotool: Fake input from the mouse and keyboard very easily.

well that explains it then.

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Usually when stupid human behaviour fits the facts…

more often than not… it’s correct :smiley:

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Occam’s corollary?

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NEW BAN. This user claims xdotool is a dependency of GNS3. The fact it was merely INSTALLED triggered the anti-cheat.

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