There are a lot of guides on here - some written poorly, some written with a tinfoil hat equipped - but they all seem to skip some very vital points. A lot of us do want to bot on accounts we care about, for a variety of reasons; injuries (requiring us to use combat rotations), poor reflexes (requiring us to use fishing bots), making time for other activities (such as doing housework) or just laziness. Never, ever, ever talk about botting: every message you send is kept indefinitely (all the way back to March, 2009), according to the the Law Enforcement Guide for Subpoenas in World of Warcraft. Use a program to always keep your World of Warcraft screen on top. My favorite so far is OnTopReplica , since it supports click-through action. You can select which region of a program you'd like to have on top (or, the entire window if you prefer). Always babysit your account. Botting for personal use is a tool to enhance your gameplay. This means you should always be interacting with others: say hello to your guild, keep up personal conversations, update your battle.NET status! And always, always be polite and greet people when you enter a dungeon while using DungeonBuddy. Social interaction is a key difference between a human player and a robotic one, and Blizzard Entertainment uses it in their account reviews. Using a finely tuned combat rotation with Enyo is highly unlikely to get you banned. If you are one of the many users who simply use a combat rotation and no other part of HonorBuddy, rest assured that you are 99% safe. However, never enable auto move or auto face; these will get your account noticed due to the inhuman and rigid movements of your character. Ensure that your automatic interrupts have a random delay (tuneable in most free Combat Rotations). Only bot during the same hours that you would play. According to the aforementioned Law Enforcement Guide, Blizzard Entertainment keeps logs of every time you have connected to a server, and how long you have played for. If you do not usually play for sixteen hours a day, then suddenly you do, your account will be flagged for review. Be excellent to each other. You are less likely to be flagged for review if you are a person who enhances others' experience of the game, rather than hinders it. Many players will simply report users as a bot (or for cheating) out of spite or anger. If you can afford it, pay a six month subscription or more. Some countries have laws which would impede Blizzard in banning you if you have already dolled out the money for an extended service. While this isn't foolproof, it certainly helps. GrindBuddy and other grinding routes are entirely likely to get you flagged (and banned in a future wave). GM's can and will watch you play. You might think that 'they don't have time for that', but Blizzard Entertainment takes their user accounts seriously. They will observe (even if only for a few minutes) a suspected bot 'playing'. Organize your action bars, combat rotation users! A game master can see your action bars, and what 'buttons' are being pushed. If you are using a certain spell but it's not bound on your action bars...you'll be flagged. DND while playing, contrary to popular rumour, will not get you banned or flagged. Many raiders will use DND while completing progression. Use a remote desktop client on an external device. Use it to check Garrisons. Set a DND disturb message, such as 'fishing on my tablet, so replying is slow' or 'playing on my tablet atm, typing is a bit difficult'. Your click-to-move behavior is easily explained, as well as any dodgy character movements (should a game master wish to chat with you). Many game masters or employees of Blizzard Entertainment play this game frequently, too. This goes hand-in-hand with the 'be excellent to each other'; you never know if that guy you raged at for stepping on that mine is someone who might take a quick peek at your account. Set goals for yourself, and space them out. Someone who has grinded 1-700 fishing in a few hours is very likely to be a bot. Instead, grind out 100 levels in fishing every day. Do a bit of archaeology here and there with your bot while you watch an episode, but don't watch The Lord of the Rings trilogy while grinding out Tol'Vir fragments. Remember, the goal is to stay inconspicious! Don't report other bots. When a player reports a bot, a game master will also check out your account. Many users have a history of simply filing reports to fulfill a personal vendetta, or reporting a bunch of inane things in the wrong category. A game master will take a quick look at your account, and if things seem supsicious he will investigate - even if you were not doing anything wrong at the time the report was filed. Use the remote auction house tool (via the WoW Armory App) to post a lot of auctions. It has a built in limiter, and most casual 'users' will use it in lieu of auction house scanning (especially with the anti-DDOS protection for scans on bigger realms). While some of these tips have been repeated, there are a few new ones that I hope users will be able to make use of. Happy botting, and happy hunting, fellow Warcraftians!
