Overrated (WOW guild)
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Overrated is a Horde World of Warcraft guild, based on the US Black Dragonflight Realm. On November 2nd 2006, a majority of the guild members were indefinitely banned from the game for use of (or directly benefiting from) a third-party "wall-hack", used to bypass content within the game. Before being banned, Overrated was the #1 Horde guild in the US, having completed all the pre-expansion WOW instance content before any other guilds in their faction and geographic locale.
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[edit] History
Overrated came about from the merger of two major guilds on the US Shadow Moon Realm, LNC (Late Night Crew) and Bloodsworn. LNC was formed from the most competitive players of two guilds, Morituri Nolumus Mori and Dreamworks Redux, while Bloodsworn had effectively led the Shadow Moon Realm in game progression after cascading Molten Core before the arrival of Blackwing Lair. Once server transfers were allowed by Blizzard, Overrated moved to the Black Dragonflight Realm to avoid some of the hardware issues being experienced by the Shadow Moon Realm.
Overrated rapidly progressed, eventually finishing the latest, most difficult WOW instance, Naxxramas. They were the first US Horde guild to do so.
[edit] Exploit
The exploit in question has been referred to as Patch 5.[1] Patch 5 is a third-party data file that can be inserted into the Data folder in the World of Warcraft folder. It removes or alters certain "physical" geography in the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj (AQ40) instance, allowing game content to be bypassed, giving immediate access to a boss normally well-guarded. Generally, this is known as maphacking or wallhacking.
[edit] Reactions
[edit] Blizzard
Blizzard sytematically banned every account with a RaidID matching either of the two instances spawned where the exploit had been used. When any boss in a spawned instance is killed, players in the instance at that time are locked to that RaidID until such time as the instance resets. All players who participated in either of the raids where the exploit was utilized (whether they had actually installed the Patch 5 exploit or not) had their accounts closed.
Blizzard has made no official comment regarding the incident, but their TOS for World of Warcraft makes it quite clear that the use of (or even directly benefitting from) third party modifications to the WOW client can result in an indefinite, effectively permanent, closure of the account in question.
[edit] Overrated
Generally, Overrated has taken their punishment quite maturely. Some players have moved on from the game, others have already rolled new characters, and others still are waiting for the arrival of Burning Crusade to begin playing again. Some are also attempting to work with Blizzard to have their accounts reinstated.
"Let me explain. We are the only US Horde guild that clears Naxx, been like that for a few weeks. People found that the pre-C'thun trash was so painful, that they decided to install some stupid thing that deletes walls or something, and you can just run there after Skeram. I know, we had it coming, blah blah whatever, we know we deserve it...I'm sure they'll try and get it rescinded because it's kind of a steep punishment with no recourse or whatever." - Pantaloons, Overrated member, on the WOW forums
[edit] Community
The response of the WOW community has been varied, ranging from the denunciation of all cheaters, to those who feel the punishment was too harsh, to others who understand why the exploit was used, claiming that the content bypassed was boring, unnecessary and should be removed. There were also plenty of personal attacks and gloating from other guilds and individuals.
