Map Editing ilegal?

[frezer748]

Hello guys, i would you ask i Map Editing / DBC Editing ilegal? or it is allowed have heard much about this hope for a lot of answers

[Lowfyr]

What a questions...

Since Blizzard got in their Useragreement that you arent allowed to edit things that are made by Blizzard (baiscly whole World) it is Illegal.
But Blizzard doesnt care about Editing and Modelling as long as you dont get them onto a Server that is big and could be made Profit problems for Blizzard ( xD) . I also heard that you just need to say that you used Blizzard Tiles and Objects and not your own, so that the Copyright of them still exists.

So in full words:

It is illegal, but Blizztard doesnt care

[frezer748]

What a questions...

Since Blizzard got in their Useragreement that you arent allowed to edit things that are made by Blizzard (baiscly whole World) it is Illegal.
But Blizzard doesnt care about Editing and Modelling as long as you dont get them onto a Server that is big and could be made Profit problems for Blizzard ( xD) . I also heard that you just need to say that you used Blizzard Tiles and Objects and not your own, so that the Copyright of them still exists.

So in full words:

It is illegal, but Blizztard doesnt care

also mpq editing is legal when you use only blizzard tiles etc? so when you edit a map or make a new map then is is legal and blizzard don't care about this.So when i make a patcher for my server and the player download the MPQ file it is legal

[Lowfyr]

Well it is still illegal.
But ive never heard of any Judgements from Blizzard for Map Editing. Well, theres always a risk, so i dont say that blizzard does 100% dont care. Sure, they can get you for it, but as i said, ive never heard before.

So its your choice if you wanna take the risk (that seems to be low) and make your own things, or you play normal Blizzlike way^^

[Steff]

There is a difference between illegal and agains blizzards eula.

Illegal is everything that hase to do with copyright law and this alos depends on the land where you life and the law there. If you run a privat server than you give away content that is not created by you and even if you dont take money for it it is ot legal. Its the same if you copy a movie or music and share it over the net.

Blizzard can lose money with it and if they think you are so big you cost them to much they will catch you by ur eggs

If you whould provide a server like Maruum, with new content, story and so on you can have better chances but this is also a very gray thing and depends on Blizzard what they say.

[Eluo]

As you bought the cd , you also bought a account and the client. So the client you have on your computer is yours. You can do with it whatever you want. But! if you give away files that have their origin at the blizzard company and you modified them(like a reskinn of a texture, or as said adt files) then it is illegal, as you broke the copyright and spreaded your outcome. But as alwys theese are the german laws, how that is handeled in uk , usa or somewhere else ... that can be only said by a lawyer who is familliar with that. But either way , the eula is not a law , it is a guideline for the users of a wow account. If you want to keep your account you'll have to stick to the eula or you will lose your account. But you can't be prosecuted if you break the eula.
All this what i said is worthless because you propably live in another country.
So if you really want to know how what and why, then contact a lawyer because no one can give you a reliable answer to your question here

[TheBuG]

If I'm correct the dutch law actually makes you somewhat immune to being charged by blizzard for this (making money from their product is excluded ofc). As the dutch law says you're allowed to anything with a product you've bought. (Such as jailbreaking your iPhone etc)

As far as I know, people haven't been charged for model/map editing, however if you use it on retail you'll have chance of getting banned, though if you use it for private servers (and when you make no profit from it) Blizzard won't care to much (unless you're getting to popular).

[Serifaz]

You are correct Bug, blizzards tos and eula doesn't hold any kind of meaning in other countries were the tos and eula don't exist, they may have a paper here that says they own the company and everything they made, but if you go to Egypt and make a project or pserver, Blizzard can't do anything because there tos doesn't exist world wide...
The law only applies in the US, besides that they can't do anything to you.
On top of that to let you know everything you do weather making a private server exploiting or map building is still wrong, because it is steeling no matter how you look at it.
In the US they passed a law that you are not able to rewrite any program such as a game or photoshop. to your liking.
If you can't deal with doing something wrong and possibly illegal I hate to say it but this site is probably not for you...
I don't have any kind of thoughts about leaving the modding scene and I do live in the US
so blizz could go after me but my project isn't for profit its just for fun and I am not publisising it so they don't care as others said.

I am sorry I am not trying to give you a hard time just trying to sum up a pretty simple answer that has been answered on many other forums and community sites. :lol:

[Jack]

The thing with this discussion is that there is so much bullshit here and everywhere else about WoW modding that nobody knows what's right and what's wrong, they just repeat the same bullshit someone else said on some other place.

Since I don't want to ruin this nice tradition, here's what I've heard mixed with my own thoughts (this is probably true for germany only):

If you make Blizzlike Servers, you're fucked.
If your server is less than 90% of Blizzards Servers, you're okay.
Modding WoW (what this site truely is about, not setting up Private Servers, especially not Blizzlike) is always legal, unless you sell it

And for the selling part, there's always a way: have them pay for account creation, download the client from other servers and your hackpatch should contain a high percentage of custom content (100% and you're absolutely on the cool side) and you're totally fine. It's not only legal, you're able to make money of it.

Although I'm not very sure about the selling part, I am about modding, such as Map Editing, what the thread is about. Think about it. If you create new content in an environment created by Blizzard, this doesn't make it Blizzard's stuff. It's your stuff. You can do with it whatever you like.
Your stuff just won't work without Blizzard's environment but this environment is free to download for all sooo.... :ucheers:

[Steff]

I also think:

Making a new world is unproblematic. U use a free open source server. Create new stuff for it and even if you use models from blizz. As log that they are no part of you patch and loaded form the client the player has bought. Its ok

Making a addon is a problem, Becouse you will need to run a server with blizz content to let your players play it. And this is stealing blizz content ( the DB) so blizz could lose money.

You only will know it full if you ask blizzard what they think and where they see the boundaries.