Scammers...

[Limpet]

:cry:

Ok a small rant.. and yes i suppose against my better judgement, i am at fault for this outcome.. however i was hoping that some knowledgeable soul on these boards could offer words of advice.

In short i was scammed.

I handed over my precious mats for a Spellstrike hood to someone i believed could make it for me... he then immediately went 'offline' and has made no attempt to contact me or return either the Hood or Mats (typical scamming behaviour).

Further investigations have proved that Mr Scammer has either 2 chars or is using 2 chars to scam with (screen shots were taken of the subsquent conversation).

Now, ive mailed him in game to to 'ask' for my mats.. ive spoken to the GM's of his guilds (note the Plural... hes apparently been kicked from other guilds for the exact same Behaviour). Needless to say, it would appear that this is a 14yr old D*ckhead that thinks he's very smart... (he got me i know.. but it was the risk i took).

Therefore.. i was wondering/hoping that someone can offer me advice as to how i might get my mats back. Ive done everything legal in game.. ive given him the chance to return the mats.

I dont think given his supposed age that reasoning would go very far.

Would Blizz take heed if i raised a ticket complaining? The screen shots i have ofhis conv with a guildy of mine shows that he 'lent' his Account to a mate (who i actually suspect is one and the same person).. is this not a breach of the CoC? Can i threaten action with this even?

Or am i Screwed?

I wont name his chars here, might get into trouble!? But if you are on my server and want to know so to avoid him.. then PM.
And if ur horde on my realm and would like a small bounty/gankfest on him... then let me know ;)


Any help would be appreciated :(

Cheers

Limpet Dragonmaw EU (Ally).

[satineeftw]

O I wish I could gank the fool on my rogue (I want to bounty hunt! hehe) But in all honesty a GM should be able to see what happened here through your conversation and what was traded, you did open a ticket right?

[IRPander]

I hate idiots who do this sort of thing. They really think they'r'e the smartest people out there. Then, one day, when they try to log in on their account.... they'll know for sure who wins.

[Limpet]

Ticket to be opened.. ive given him a 'chance' to do the right thing and give them me back.. failure to do so will result in a ticket being opened ASAP!

I didnt want to go down that path.. but he leaves me no choice unless i can think of some other way to get my mats back :(

Oh.. and id love ya to Bounty hunt him ;)

Guess ill try for the GM then! Wasnt sure if Blizz cared enuff about this kinda thing?

Fingers crossed they do!

[kodeeak]

I'm of the opinion that "giving him a chance to do the right thing" is useless. He's already done the wrong thing and people going after the expensive mats don't usually have a change of heart.

Open a ticket, put all your fury and anger into getting your mats back with the help of the "hand of Blizzard" and when you do get them back.. the next time he comes on, taunt him feverishly, put him on follow and yell about his wrongdoings so obnoxiously that everyone in the city tells you to QQ.. that's proper payback.

[SLUGFly]

Keep us updated Limpet.

And ye... bounties would be awesome, I wish there was an in-game way to do this.

Deposit a certain amount of cash and an amount of times the player is to be killed. So if you deposit one gold and 10 times then everytime somebody kills the person (if they have the bounty quest) they get 10 silver. Deposit 10 gold and every time someone kills him they get a gold. Would be pretty nifty and would make it worthwhile to try to be a bounty hunter :)

[Sacroth]

To my knowledge, GMs won't do anything, seeing how it isn't violating any policies or game mechanics.
It's like complaining to the president cuz your neighbor kept your lawnmower.

I'd simply tell everybody else through the Trade channel not to trust him with trades. Maybe once a day.

A reputation as such should be punishment enough.

[Stigg]

You won't get your mats back. While morally wrong, there is nothing warranting a ticket to be opened. Nothing said between two players in game is warranting of a "refund". Hence why ninja'd items don't get to other players.

Sorry, but you are screwed. Spread the word around your server about him, and hope he will get no more people with this scam....and keep your expenisve crafting proffesions inside the guild!

[thedirty]

To my knowledge, GMs won't do anything, seeing how it isn't violating any policies or game mechanics.
It's like complaining to the president cuz your neighbor kept your lawnmower.

I'd simply tell everybody else through the Trade channel not to trust him with trades. Maybe once a day.

A reputation as such should be punishment enough.

It depends on the GM I think, when I had that happen with fiery mats, nothing happened and I never saw my mats again, but when it happened to my friend with his lifestealing mats, the guy (different guy of course) was kicked from his raiding guild, wasn't online for 3 days, and the GM gave hmy friend the mats back.

After that, we decided that one of us should level enchanting.

thedirty,
325 Enchanting

[Valas Azuviir]

Am afraid, you're probably going to be out of luck on this one.

Best case scenario?

They nail him for account sharing, and they can only do that, if it becomes clear that he actually has shared the account. Meaning IP differences within a timeflow, which make it physically impossible for it to be him. Example, logging off from Boston at say 19:15 and then logging back in in NY at 19:30. You cannot reach NY from Boston within 15 minutes. (Not without having access to a jet aircraft anyway and this is highly unlikely for most folks.)

Thus far, from what I've gathered they don't do a lot against scamming. But I just doublechecked the EU ToS.


9. Participate in any action that, in the sole and absolute opinion of Blizzard Entertainment, results or may result in an authorized user of World of Warcraft being “scammed” or defrauded out of gold, weapons, armor, or any other items that user has earned through authorized game play in World of Warcraft.


Source (http://www.wow-europe.com/en/legal/termsofuse.html).

That would be section B9, if you are filing a GM petition, then be sure to point this out. It might just galvanise the relevant GM to be of assistance in this matter.

Good Luck and good hunting.

[Nysard]

I think as cases like this become more and more frequent the thing that we should be asking for is an improved trade/crafting system.

The one we have now is very basic and one or two improvements spring to mind immediately.

The only thing I can recomend doing when handing over materials is to do a quick check on the armoury and see if that person does actually have the required trade skill to do the craft. It's not fool proof but you could get lucky and save your mats.

[Naedea]

They nail him for account sharing, and they can only do that, if it becomes clear that he actually has shared the account. Meaning IP differences within a timeflow, which make it physically impossible for it to be him. Example, logging off from Boston at say 19:15 and then logging back in in NY at 19:30. You cannot reach NY from Boston within 15 minutes. (Not without having access to a jet aircraft anyway and this is highly unlikely for most folks.)

While your scenario is highly suggestive of account sharing, it is far from conclusive. I could easily be troubleshooting a friend's WoW installation anywhere using Remote Desktop, and appear to log into my account from locations across the planet within seconds of each other.

[Valas Azuviir]

While your scenario is highly suggestive of account sharing, it is far from conclusive. I could easily be troubleshooting a friend's WoW installation anywhere using Remote Desktop, and appear to log into my account from locations across the planet within seconds of each other.

True, but 9 out of 10 times it will be a direct hit. And as we sometimes see on this forum, it is not unheard of for an innocent to get caught in the crossfire, as you would be in the scenario that you describe. Then again, most of the ones, who come here to complain did violate the ToS in one way or another.

Besides, even if this person did not account share.. Considering their activities as described by Limpet.. If indeed true, and I have very little reason not to believe him/her considering their previous activities here... Well.. Would be a delicious irony, imnsho, if they did get banned for account sharing, whereas their actual crime is scamming, which might otherwise only be worth a slap on the wrist. The less miscreants on the servers, the better, imo.

[Torik]

Actually in the past Blizzard has nailed people for the 'take mats and run' scam. People had their mats returned and the scammers were suspended.

In this situation the fact that the OP gave the scammer time to 'do teh right thing' might actually work against him. GMs need to review logs to determine what actually happened and the further back they have to look the harder would be to locate the precise conversation and the following transaction.

[Stigg]

How did account sharing come into this equation?

[Valas Azuviir]

How did account sharing come into this equation?

Limpet mentioned that the scammer tried to weasel his way out of things, by claiming to be the scammer's friend who got lent the account, and who knows nothing about the subject at hand etc etc.

[xDarkDrifterx]

And ye... bounties would be awesome, I wish there was an in-game way to do this.

Yeah they should allow this, it was a part of an old game I played DragonRaja and it was Diablo based 2D in a 3D environ. - you went up to a pole like the poles that offer up quests to kill so and so in WoW.

Would be fun.

[amgyn]

if something like this happens to you note 3 things..

The name of the scammer.
The Mats/items involved.
The timeframe this happened.

you will get your items back. i dont know what happens to the scammer.

[poopsmcgee]

you should definately open a ticket. i got scammed about a year ago and it was a pretty minor thing. actually it was just the 220 or so thor bars i gave to someone to craft an imperial set for me. they just logged off and put me on ignore. i opened a ticket and after a few hours a gm contacted me and asked me to logoff for a few minutes. when i came back i had my thor bars sitting in my bags. i asked about the guy and what was going to be done about him and he wouldn't give me any info about that, but it didn't matter to me really. i just wanted my bars back. i thought it was cool though that the gm didn't even ask me any questions about what happened. i had been quite detailed in the ticket and i guess he just read thru some logs and saw exactly what happened. also i was never rude or vulgar with the guy. i just asked if he would please give me back my bars.

[Stigg]

Limpet mentioned that the scammer tried to weasel his way out of things, by claiming to be the scammer's friend who got lent the account, and who knows nothing about the subject at hand etc etc.

:thumbsup: :thumbsup:

[meikyo]

Ask them to put a primal nether in not to be traded next time, I know it won't guarantee a safe transaction but meh it's a little better. Armory works too...kinda a shame we have to resort to things like this. And for the rest of you....level 1 gnomes do not have 375 tailoring.

[PlayThemAll]

Yeah they should allow this, it was a part of an old game I played DragonRaja and it was Diablo based 2D in a 3D environ. - you went up to a pole like the poles that offer up quests to kill so and so in WoW.

Would be fun.

I guess I see a bounty system as an easy way to grief people. Without proof that player A did what Player B said he did.

I'd like to see changes made to allow mats to be passed via trade window but not traded until the enchant is complete; an extended do not trade section or something.

I'm scared every time I trade mats with players. Fortunately I've been lucky and have dealt with honest people.

[DraedynLei]

This has happened to friends of mine, and GMs generally help you out. I mean if they will "talk" to players who try to do CoD scams, it only makes sense that they would be able to do something with people who take mats and run. I opened a ticket for multiple people who tried to CoD scam me and my guildmates and the GM informed me that the accounts would be dealt with. That this scamming behavior is not supported and would not be tolerated by blizzard. And apologized to me for them. I know blizz doesn't always get everything right (far from it) but over all they aren't so bad at the whole scam thing. I mean it costs them nothing to fix the problem and it keeps their loyal customers happy.

@OP, let us know if you get your stuff back and anything else that happens to that guy.

[rubberdubbie]

Curious...is it actually against the TOU to rip people off by stealing their mats? If yes, Blizzard needs some sort of non-trade system where the mats all remain in your inventory and you place your gold in a tradeable slot. Once the work is completed, you look at the, press okay and the gold goes to the other person and you get your enchanted item.

[Gekothan]

Someone in my guild got scammed out of 500g or so of mats getting enchants on his twink a while ago. He got all of his mats back and the guy got permabanned for it (assumedly he'd been warned for one or more reason in the past). Personally when I'm getting expensive items crafted I always /who them and make sure they are in a "known" guild, and of course check their armory to see if they actually have the skill. It isn't a total guarantee they are safe to trade with, but on my small server where there are few scammers and most people know eachother it's usually a good indicator.

[DraedynLei]

Someone in my guild got scammed out of 500g or so of mats getting enchants on his twink a while ago. He got all of his mats back and the guy got permabanned for it (assumedly he'd been warned for one or more reason in the past). Personally when I'm getting expensive items crafted I always /who them and make sure they are in a "known" guild, and of course check their armory to see if they actually have the skill. It isn't a total guarantee they are safe to trade with, but on my small server where there are few scammers and most people know eachother it's usually a good indicator.

Sound advice. I also usually ask my guild mates about the potential crafter as most of them have been playing much longer than me and know considerably more people. Luckily I have a whole network of crafters now so I usually never have to get stuff crafted from strangers. But even back when I started out, I was never scammed. Been lucky I guess.

[mesonm]

I wont name his chars here, might get into trouble!?

huh? You won't name a scammer?

Name him.....

And fill out a GM ticket.

[Tanitha]

No, the general policy here is to not name scammers. Simply because anyone can come in here and make any allegation they like without having any proof of it. Limpet, I'm not saying you do that - but the policy is there for that reason.

As to the general thing - Blizzard could solve this easily. Expand the Trade window to have a crafting section in which:

(a) You can see which recipes the crafter have available
(b) Place your item to be enchanted / etc.
(c) Place the materials you are contributing. If they have materials they put it on your side. Those materials go into a "Do not trade" section, but are consumed in the crafting process.
(d) Rest completes as per normal.

Larissa (I think) had a good thread on this a while ago. It would solve the problem of these types of scams.

[Sindas]

I stopped reading at 14yr old. Were not all immature little biznitchs. :undecided:



Although i have to admit some are, and i hate them with all my heart, lol.

[mesonm]

As to the general thing - Blizzard could solve this easily. Expand the Trade window to have a crafting section in which:


Of course, players could also:

...make sure the person you are giving the mats to is trustworthy.

1. What guild is he/she with?
2. Does anyone you know also know and vouch for them?

I never give anyone mats I'm worried about losing unless I've previously heard at least one person I know (in game...) vouch for the recipient...

[Valas Azuviir]

Curious...is it actually against the TOU to rip people off by stealing their mats? If yes, Blizzard needs some sort of non-trade system where the mats all remain in your inventory and you place your gold in a tradeable slot. Once the work is completed, you look at the, press okay and the gold goes to the other person and you get your enchanted item.

It is against the EU one anyway, section B9. Can't be bothered to check the US one right now though, :yawn:

*a sleepy Valas*

[larissa]

No, the general policy here is to not name scammers. Simply because anyone can come in here and make any allegation they like without having any proof of it. Limpet, I'm not saying you do that - but the policy is there for that reason.

As to the general thing - Blizzard could solve this easily. Expand the Trade window to have a crafting section in which:

(a) You can see which recipes the crafter have available
(b) Place your item to be enchanted / etc.
(c) Place the materials you are contributing. If they have materials they put it on your side. Those materials go into a "Do not trade" section, but are consumed in the crafting process.
(d) Rest completes as per normal.

Larissa (I think) had a good thread on this a while ago. It would solve the problem of these types of scams.

Hmm, that was a while ago, I believe we came up with the idea of a button or tab that would give you an expanded "Not to be traded" section, with the crafting interface able to scan that section of the trade for purposed of the enchant/crafted item. Pretty much as you describe above already. That way you could bring someone the 3 or 4 different materials needed for a particular enchant, lets them cast and use the materials you brought, and not have to worry about a potential scam.

I would think a similar system could be worked for the actual crafting professions. The only thing is how to determine who gets the finished product. I presume a flag to put it in a 'pick up' slot in the trade window for the non-crafter could work. Would probably need to rework the coding a little so that BoP items couldn't be made this way. But I don't see this being such a major coding issue. You can already interact and modify things through the Trade window with the way Enchanting works already.

~~~Larissa

[Limpet]

Hi all, thx for the replies.. shame not everyone shares your decent sentiments :(


Ok, quick update. Last night i raised a ticket. And in summary from my GM discussion last night....

The bad news

In effect.. im screwed...tbh i expected it. The GM stated that because id entered into the transaction of my 'own free will'... then its my responsibility... which is true, but a little unfair. I agree there should be a better means of recieving the crafted goods rather than this, quite frankly $hitty method (some good suggestions on here tbh!). Granted its 'only mats' but hell.. its taken me about a mth of grind and time to make all them :(
Id prefer a better reponse from them... but hey!
(i did have screen shots of a discussion he had with a guildy of mine where he admitted that it had gone on). Blizz isnt really interested in that apparently.

The good news

He DID say that it would be investigated and "not be surprised if certain scammers 'disappeared' as it were".

I can only hope so. Better than nothing i suppose.

Altho not so sure on the CoD issues, im unsure how they handle other 'scams' per se, i assume that for certain scams, returning the goods is possible?

So, on a side note, the moral is... cover your own backs and ask about within other guilds whether someone is trust worthy before doing business (as ppl have stated here).
However, Its a poor show that someone who is a new crafter who maybe genuinely trying to make money.. and was lucky enough to get a rare recipe might be unable to do business because he isnt in a big / trusted guild... kinda detrimental to the crafting business really... but then Blizz should deal with this imo!!

SIGH! back to griding for me :undecided:

Thx for all the nice support guys.

P.s. Sindas.. i wasnt trying to tar all 14yr olds with the same brush.. i was simply generalising.. i realise that perhaps some of the younger players might feel that this kind of behaviour is something that is 'funny' and they can get away with it..altho im sure there are older players who might try this on... so apologies if i mistreated anyone :S