Avoiding Scams

Avoiding Scams

(Issue 6/6)

I enjoyed researching and compiling the tricks and trades of scamming and how to avoid them. Alas everything has to end. The last part of the series include other possible scams that i can't put into a category so i just put them all together in this last discussion.

These are scams that you must be aware because trust is involve. Check out the following scenarios.

Sharing money

Victim shouts in world chat "Buying leopard 1.5m!!"
Scammer sends a private message "I have a leopard."
Scammer invited the victim to a party. Scammer could be far from victim's location.
Scammer then says "How can i be sure that you have the money? What if you'll just scam me?"
Victim assures scammer that he's not a scammer and he has the money.
Scammer then says "Drop your money and pick it up so i'll know that you have the money."
Victim then drops his 1.5m and then picks the yuan up. Since he is in a party, the money gets divided into 2. He was only able to retrieve 750k and not the 1.5m he originally had.
Scammer then leaves the party.

If you are the victim, of course you will try to get the trust of the seller to get him to sell you that item. Unfortunately in any party whether "Free for all" or "Random", money that a party member picks from the floor will be distributed evenly among the party members. If you encounter this kind of scam, just leave the party and buy from someone else.

Credits to OICHI for telling us her story. Kudos to her for not falling for this kind of scam.

Sharing wines

The victim has no dungeon token but needs to kill the monsters inside the Treasure Grotto to be able to get to the pillar behind Lin Yun and finish his esteem quest.
Victim shouts in world chat "Need help dungeon boss, i'll provide the wines.
A scammer, in cohorts with other scammers, invites the victim to their party. The party went inside the dungeon. After the victim used the wines, the scammer then kicks him out of their party.

What happened? The victim was just used by the group of scammers to get his wines. Since wines are kind of expensive, making wines for every round of mold hunt will really put a hole in your pocket. Some scammers trick players into using their wines then kicking the victim out of the party so that all drops would be theirs. Just be careful when doing your dungeon quests. It would be better if you ask help from people you already know than be tricked by unscrupulous players.

Sharing items with clanmates

Scammer joins a clan. Victim is a member of the same clan.
Scammer says "Kuya may i borrow your bloody ghast? I just want to try it. I'll return it after. We're clanmates ater all."
Victim doesn't know the scammer but trusts him because he's a clanmate. Victim gives his bloody ghast.
As soon as the scammer has the ghast, he leaves the clan. Scammer joins another clan and repeats the process.

With 200 members in each clan, some members don't even know their clanmates. They just depend on the clannames to recognize if that person is their clanmate. These clanhopper scammers take advantage of members who don't know all of their clanmates. Another varation of this scam is when the scammer joins a clan and tricks someone from another clan. The victim will think that the clan (the scammer was in) is harboring a scammer. Ouch for that clan's reputation. The lesson? Just don't lend your items to anyone or just lend your items to people you really really really trust. 'Coz even people you know personally can sometimes backstab you.

Sharing time

Scenario 1:

Scammer shouts in world chat "Need yuling 1m per round in Hell. Akin ds."
The victim, a yuling, wants to earn money. The scammer says he'll pay after the rounds.
A few rounds later;
Victim says "Kuya where's my money?"
Scammer doesn't say anything then kicks the yuling out of the party. Scammer then disconnects.

Scenario 2:

Victim shouts in world chat "Need yuling 1m per round in Hell. Akin ds."
The scammer joins the victim's party. The scammer says money upfront first.
After paying;
Scammer leaves the party then disconnects.

As you can see in both scenarios, the scammer basically took advantage of the fact that the victim needed something. If you really want to stay risk-free then my advice would be to party only with people you know or with people you have made friends with. Unfortunately most of us start this game without knowing anyone prior to playing it.

Trust is something that is hard to rebuild once broken. Playing should be fun and stress-free. So why would anyone even want to do something that could be a factor in building up worries in game? This is something i really can't comprehend.

These 6-part series about scams have ended but that doesn't mean that these are the only scams being done inside the game. In summary; we have website scams, trade scams, vend scams, character impersonation scams, real money transaction scams and others. Some players even accuse LU of being a big scammer for making people spend their money for in game promos that LU was not able to deliver properly.

Most lessons are learned the hard way. I have been scammed a few times and i am learning from my mistakes. I want people not to undergo what i went through. So if you don't know how to avoid being scammed, learn from the others who experienced it. Don't let history repeat itself.

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