Online games would be a lot more fun if it weren’t for cheaters and general toxicity; many cheaters feel as though they ‘belong’ in a higher-skill bracket than they are at, somehow justifying their decision to intentionally skew the results of matches by giving themselves a monumental advantage.
It’s frustrating, it reeks of a lack of empathy and comprehension, and it ruins matches for everyone stuck with the cheaters. Somehow they continue, however, which results in celebrations every time a VAC wave kicks the bad actors out of servers; for the time being, at least.
Yet the most recent ban wave that struck Counter-Strike: Global Offensive held a sizeable number of improper bans.
It’s worth noting that the ban wave hit almost 55,000 accounts, a sizeable portion of gamers in the servers; thus, when we’re discussing those that have the VAC ban overturned after the fact, we’re talking about a relatively low fraction.
[embed]https://twitter.com/33sluzy/status/1293687193278590976?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw[/embed]500 players have, thus far, had their VAC bans overruled after the fact, and more are hopping into forums and explaining that they aren’t entirely sure why they have received a VAC ban.
VAC bans are more than just the inability to hop into VAC-secured servers for various titles; it’s an unremovable stain on your Steam profile that will stay with you for the life of that account, noting to your friends and clan that you have a general lack of integrity. Not something that many would like to display.
So when VAC bans are handed out erroneously, either due to false readings or iffy reports, it’s something that should be taken seriously; as damaging as it is to cheat and have your account marked, it’s exponentially worse to be marked as a cheater when you aren’t.
[embed]https://twitter.com/itsFODDER/status/1256147878327848960?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw[/embed]These statistics are once again brought about by ConVars who can only display accounts that have been reported to them, so note that the numbers are likely far less than what they should be; users are continuing to climb into forums and seek guidance about how to get a VAC ban removed if it was applied unfairly.
As a word of warning, it isn’t easy, and it’s not supposed to be; you can find within the VAC Ban notification that you can offer more information towards Valve regarding your ban and attempt to appeal it there; at the moment there are many who are attempting to do as such.
Bear in mind that Valve isn’t necessarily in the business of forgiveness, and if they can prove that you were cheating you’re likely out of luck; conversely, you may have been affected by the erroneous data that Valve was apparently working with.