UPDATE: Blizzard Community Manager Kaivax has posted on the WoW forums reiterating the policy against trading with real money. Blizzard will also implement a warning that will appear in your trading window warning you about accepting large amounts of gold from people you don’t know. The post makes it clear that “our stance on RMT in World of Warcraft is very clear: any account belonging to any player who has participated in the generation, sale, purchase, or receipt of illicit gold is subject to gold deletion, account suspensions, or permanent account closures.” The original story continues below. ORIGINAL STORY: World of Warcraft: Classic has had a gold selling problem for its entire existence, but with Forever, Blizzard seems determined to reverse that trend, and some streamers are getting caught in the act. Before the Forever beta came out, Classic was having big problems with its economy due to the popularity of GDKP. For the uninitiated, that was a system where, in raids, players offered gold to obtain items that dropped from bosses. That, combined with Blizzard’s seemingly lax enforcement of real money trading (RMT), ended up with millions of gold dumped into classic economies. But when Forever came out, Blizzard said they were banning GDKP, which was a great first step in making Classic+ mode much fairer for everyone. The other side of that coin, however, is the RMT. If Blizzard remained lax in enforcing its rules, then people with disposable income could find new ways to distort the economy in their favor. World of Warcraft: Forever Screenshots Fortunately, it looks like Blizzard is cracking down on the Forever beta. Just in the past few days, Blizzard has affected a couple of Classic streamers to varying degrees after RMT was suspected. On Tuesday, WoW commentator N_Tys26 tweeted a clip of WoW streamer Ziqo after Blizzard allegedly claimed a load of gold, leaving him with just 9 silver. That meant he was marooned in the Talonstone Mountains, an area of the Horde, without enough gold to catch a flight back to Stormwind. 𝐆𝐈𝐕𝐄𝐍 𝐓𝐎 𝐙𝐈𝐐𝐎 There has been a lot of conversation recently about WoW streamer @Ziqoftw receiving large sums of gold in the Forever beta. As mentioned above, Ziqo has maintained his innocence and has even come up with some… pic.twitter.com/Vzi5mDQjJO — N_Tys (@N_Tys26) September 29, 2026 But it seems like Ziqo had it easy, as his gold was simply wiped, rather than getting his account banned. However, not all captured streamers have been so lucky. N_Tys26 posted another clip of streamer Payo getting “one of his accounts banned” after promoting the sale of gold on his stream, even though he claims he’s “never bought gold” in his life. However, just the day before that clip was posted, N_Tys26 shared another clip of Payo begging his audience to buy gold from him. I’m pretty sure that counts. But even though that account was banned, Payo already has another account up and running and will be participating in a $100,000 duel tournament. 𝐏𝐀𝐘𝐎 𝐁𝐀𝐍𝐍𝐄𝐃 𝐎𝐍 𝐁𝐄𝐓𝐀 𝐅𝐎𝐑 One of Payo’s beta accounts has been banned for promoting the purchase of gold. @payowow has apologized for promoting gold buying and believes he deserves the ban, as shown by Blizzard taking RMT… pic.twitter.com/kDDUXXDAVh — N_Tys (@N_Tys26) October 1, 2026 It’s possible that since these WoW streamers’ actions are more visible due to, well, streaming, they are being cracked down harder than the average player. I’ve contacted Blizzard for comment on that situation and will update this story when I hear back. But regardless, taking action against streamers who interact with or promote RMT should at least deter players from purchasing gold. Either way, it’s a good sign that Blizzard is cracking down on this behavior now, while World of Warcraft Forever is still in beta. Hopefully, when the game hits its final release on November 4, the economy won’t warp in the same way Classic did, or at least it will take longer. Blizzard has also spent a lot of time making sure the game appeals to Classic players and has also cracked down on misnomers, although with mixed results. Jackie Thomas is IGN’s senior tech editor and the queen of PC components. He’s been covering gaming hardware for over a decade for IGN, TechRadar, Gizmodo, PC Gamer, and more. You can follow her @Jackiecobra
