Yup. Online gambling is HIGHLY regulated for a reason. You can forget patching items, and you’ll need third parties to review your loot generators. Ouch.
As to not being able to pay your WoW subscription - that’s probably the legal issues. The moment it goes outside the D3 sandbox, it becomes “real” money in terms which the taxman should know about. Internal currencies are internal, even if they look like dollars.
You can use it to buy other WoW-related services, including expansion upgrades for your account and stuff like server transfers, just not the subscription.
Thongsy
6543
And transfer it to Paypal if you set it up beforehand. And as far as I know Blizz isn’t going to report any of this to the IRS. I believe the TOS or somewhere else that it would be your responsibility to report it.
Teiman
6544
Banks give credits for more money than have, they just write a big number on your account, dont have that money, is created money. Wen all the banks do the same and everybody do the same, almost all money is created that way. IMHO.
Have you heard of the financial recession and stuff like the housing bubble? :)
I’d say that was magical appearance of money.
Now, they’ve magically disappeared again! Amazing!
Blizzard won’t be reporting my earnings from the AH to the IRS, that is my responsibility, not theirs. But they sure as hell will be reporting their earnings from it.
Moot point at the moment, since the AH is down due to undisclosed problems.
Well that’s it, I am playing “Rock” from now on.
And if you buy one second-hand off Ebay it won’t hurt the rock industry!
Teiman
6550
I like that part of “Life of Brian”.
I think I understand what Diablo3 is about. And theres a single design mistake, only one.
Diablo 3 is about the exciting feel to fight a battle that is harder than what you can really handle, and still finish victorious. So you climb different dificulty levels, learning to play you class and the nuances, then you crash against a wall, and then the game start. You conquer that wall, you farm your way, but you also become a better player, and use more and better the available tools.
The single one design mistake of the game, was not having the dificulty be optional from the start, suggesting most gamers to start in hard or nightmare. Playing Diablo 3 is (for most gamers) like having to finish Doom 2 in “Piece of cake” mode before can play in Normal dificulty. Other than that is a glorious game.
Everyone here is invited to a beer, I pay.
KevinC
6551
Teiman, I disagree on the “you become a better player, and use more and better the available tools”. IMO your skill selection winnows as the difficulty goes up. I’ve already posted my complaints about that so I won’t reiterate beyond that.
Reldan
6552
That really might depend on how much money you are cashing out. Depending on how this income is classified, there are dollar thresholds at which Blizzard would need to issue you a 1099 and report the income to the IRS.
This probably won’t affect most people, but if you managed to make $600 or more I’m pretty sure they would have to report it.
Kyrios
6553
$600 is actually really attainable with the current AH prices - don’t ask me why, I have no clue, but people are really paying some of these amounts - so I’m curious to see how Blizzard handles it.
Teiman
6554
But this is backwards, …perhaps?
Because crowd control abilities are very short duration, you have to pay attention to the “strong attack” or what you are doing.
1 - If the mob is using his “strong attack”, use your “avoid damage”/“save my butt” skill, or move away.
2 - Pay attention what the mobs are doing, where are you. Floor is lava!.
3 - Pay attention what you are doing. Don’t attack the one elite with shield, wen the others are unshielded atm.
I think Diablo3 will be less about player skill and more about character skill if the crowd control abilities where “fire and forget” and lasted 4 minutes with a very small effect in gameplay. But Diablo 3 is a action RPG, and you have to pay attention what you are doing. All players that play long enough will re-discover a skill that have neglected for 60 hours, because will understand what or why make that neglected skill awesome.
I am thinking my lack of understanding of US tax law is at fault. In Australia the entire burden of reporting income such as this (Ebay is another example) is on the person recognising the revenue. The payer is not required to submit any form of notification to tax agencies. In fact we are just about to launch some investigations into persons on public welfare that may be earning unreported income from Ebay stores.
I would be very surprised if some people have not already extracted USD$600 from the RMAH, does that mean Blizzard might find themselves in the position of handing out 1099’s all over the place?
Reldan
6556
The US places the burden of reporting income on both the payer and payee.
What’s interesting to me is that Blizzard doesn’t actually collect the information necessary to file such forms (they’d have to ask your SSN). It’ll be interesting to see how this shakes out. They may have some legal dodge or technicality to hide behind on this one, but it seems pretty straightforward to me.
Do they limit withdrawals during a year to $599.99? That would be classic.
KevinC
6557
Let me give you some examples of what I was referring to then, without trying to derail too much. Keep in mind these are personal examples of my personal experience which have led to my personal opinion on the matter, I’m not claiming to have to Truth of All Things Diablo 3. :)
NOTE: I haven’t played since they hotfixed out the damage multiplier mobs get per player in MP, that may have helped to some degree (I typically played with 3-4 players, never solo).
So on my demon hunter in Normal/Nightmare, I used a lot more variety of skills. I liked being able to plant my feet and lay into a baddy with Rapid Fire, I equipped Fan of Knives in order to shred guys that got too close to me. By the time I hit Inferno, despite trying to get my hands on as much Vitality and Resist as possible, there’s no way I can stand still to use an ability like Rapid Fire - it’s suicide. I need to be a lot more mobile than that. A 60% PBAOE snare (IIRC) on Fan of Knives isn’t going to help me either, given how little snare effects champ/elite packs on that difficulty. If they’re that close… I’m gonna be toast. :) Closer range attacks like grenades and the like also are now out of the question, so I pretty much stuck with Hungering Arrow so I could fire off screen, around corners, etc.
The same problems exist on items a well. % of damage to life was a mod I liked in earlier difficulties, but when it’s penalized by -80% on Inferno and elites are so difficult to kill, that affix as well as things like “Life on kill” are out the window. Ignore that stuff and go straight for Life on Hit.
It’s those sort of things I’m talking about when I saw that I feel like my real selection of skills narrows in the higher difficulties rather than expands. Granted, a lot of this could just be a matter of balancing but regardless, that’s how it’s played out with my Wizard and DH in inferno - fewer realistic choices, not more. My friend who plays a Barbarian complains about the same, he has fewer toys to play with than he did in previous difficulties.
Now as far as your admonition to use “avoid damage” skills and “move out of the fire”… well, obviously. :) That’s why every DH I know equips Smoke Screen. Problem is, you can only fire that about two times, which means you better bring Preparation along with you to combat that Waller/Mortar/Arcane/Invulnerable bastards (or fill in other awful affix combinations). I’m certainly not going to Fan of Knives my way out of that mess. :) So now I find myself down 50% of my utility slots to what I consider “must have” abilities.
What’s interesting to me is that Blizzard doesn’t actually collect the information necessary to file such forms (they’d have to ask your SSN). It’ll be interesting to see how this shakes out. They may have some legal dodge or technicality to hide behind on this one, but it seems pretty straightforward to me.
Is it at all possible Blizzard have not put the required thought into this? I find it hard to believe they would not have hired a massive retinue of tax and economic experts to risk analyse this whole endeavor. I can see the economics not going quite to plan (who would forsee items selling for $100’s of dollars), but the tax implications could not be wholly untested ground, surely?
Not an expert, but my thought is that you aren’t being paid by Blizzard. They are facilitating transactions, but in no case are you receiving money FROM THEM for any service or good so not sure a 1099 would apply.
Yeah, I’m not sure what you guys are on about.
Ebay doesn’t have to deal with tax reporting because Ebay isn’t paying you, your customers are. Same deal here. It’s up to the individual seller to properly report income. God help you if you fail.
