[GUIDE] Recognize and Preventing Scammer

[DrunkenAngel]

As I said in my post in Questions and Answers section, this topic of mine would eventually move to Guides and Tutorials section as soon as it's ready, and it's ready now. This guide is based on my prior experience, friends' suggestions, and other members on this forum who have posted comments on my prior post. Thank you all, and especial thanks to ieatpasta, Mephala, BloodyBlade, and washikaba's support.
So here we go.

Section 1: Recognizing scammers


<If you are in town>

(1). Strangers who ask to see your sos or offer a good price for your sos are 99% scammers.
Some people will ask you if you want to sell your sos weapon, or anything for a really good price. for example, they will say: "35mil for your sos weapon." DONT EVER trade with random people through EXCHANGE SYSTEM. if you do want to sell your item, OPEN A STALL INSTEAD, and ask the person to come to buy it in your stall. It's SAFE this way. If they dont come to your stall, guess what, they are scammers. cuz during the exchange, they can change the price to a way lower price than how much your item worth while distract you by make friend proposal, etc.

(2). Don't believe anyone who asks if you want 500mil for free. (Tips from DA_CAT)
Seriously...

(3). Be careful with 1 gold item in the stall and un-open stall.
scammers can change 1 gold to a big amount while you r buying it from their stalls. so when you do buy stuff from people's stalls, make sure the stalls are open.

(4). Ignore people who are trying to sell you silk.
500k gold for 250 silk???? you know that you r not lucky enough to get such a good deal.

(5). Never trust anybody who says they can duplicate or plus your items. (Tips from Mephala and washikaba)
I will explain how scammer can duplicate your item later in the ouside the town section.


<If you are outside the town>

(1). Don't trust some of the plvlers.

Pay every half hour. dont join the pt if everybody is in the same guild. dont join the pt with only 2 or 3 people and you can tell they are related by their names (cuz they are probably togehter to scam you). be careful with people say "no 30mins" (7/10 are scammer from my experience).

(2). Don't open a stall outside the town.

If you open a stall outside the town (lots the time, scammers will ask you to do it), the weapon you sell can be "duplicate" from a bug in this game. That's why lots scammers say they can copy your items for you, etc. So, what's "duplicate" really means in here?
Ok, after you open a stall outside the town("open" in here means that you click open in stall network), people whoever in your go to your stall will be able to buy your item. After they buy your item, they will get the actual item for how much they paid for. And you, at the same time, will still "have" the item due to the bug of sro. This is the "duplicate". however, the "item" you "have" in your inventory will not be the actually item since you cant trade it, neither drop it. however, for some reason, if it's a equipment, you can actually equip it, but it won't do anything. To be simple, if you sell stuff outside the town, whatever you sell, people who buy it will get the actually item, you will get the fake one. So dont open a stall outside the town.
Here is a video that BloodyBlade found on Youtube that show you how this happens. http://de.youtube.com/watch?v=AW-zbDjmpPE



Section 2: Tips to Preventing Scammers


1. be really careful when you r in donwhang.

from my experience, donwhang has the most scammers. dont ever trust anybody here who wants a trade, exchange, etc. if you really think they are serious buyers who offering a good deal, set up a STALL and ask them to come to your stall. if they dont come, haha. they are scammers.

2. be really careful to strangers if you r wearing pimp avatar.

avatar is the easiest way to tell other people that you have silk. so does ability pet. watch out when you have pimp items such as sos too. cuz when scammers know you have silk and plenty gold, you become scammers' main target.

3. when you r not in town, open up the chat window to ALL so you can see whats everybody is talking about especially when you r doing taxi.

This is a good way to get info about taxi scammers. people who got scammed by the plvler in your area will always say something in the chat such as "....is a scammer." so you will know that you dont wanna take taxi with this scammer guy.

4. join the guild that you trust.

have you heard about that some guild are scam guild? I heard about it. the whole guild is full with scammers and the purpose of the guild is to scam noobs.

5. dont trust anybody too easily that you dont know in real life.

some people will make friends with you in game, and earn your trust. and then, guess what. they will scam you. for example, a lv90 guy gave me powerleveling couple times, and he was really nice. one day, he said he could plvl me for 8 hours straight, and asked me to pay him a huge amount of gold. i trusted him. i gave him the gold. a sec later, he got dc. next time when he log on, i asked for my gold. he deleted me from his friends list and blocked me. it's that simple, isnt it? im not telling you to not trust anybody in the game, cuz there are good and nice people. but you never know, right?


Section 3: If you still get scammed.

(1) Always remember how much gold you have so at least you know the amount you lose from getting scammed. (Tips from Mirosuke)

(2) Share your experience with your friends and the forums and help us to prevent scammers.

(3) You might think you are stupid, but you are really not.

(4) Learn from the lesson, and be careful next time.


Thank for reading and good luck.

[kab00m]

Damn nice guide, here are few tips on how to avoid being scamed at powerlvling + few tips:

- Never EVER pay for more then 1hour ( unless you trust your powerlvler 100% )
- Look at party network maybe there is a party named "thisGUY is scamer don't trust him" or something like this ... it saved me a few times.
- If you are on server for a long time then look at globals

Few tips(avoid being scamed, related ! ):

- When you find good powerlvler go on rev6.com check his nick and see if he have pimped armors/weapon. If you found 85wizard with everything CLEAN then something isn't right ( not always ! )
- Don't be first or second in party ... try find party with 6/7 people already joined. As DrunkenAngel already said, check if their names are somehow connected, or if they are all from the same guild.
- Level doesn't always matters, I've been scamed few times already from 85+

Trust me, you won't feel good when you will pay 1kk to 90wizard and then he will ban you from party:p

And best tip: Once you find fair powerlvler stick with him for as long as possible ... There is so much scamers ... it's really hard to find fair powerlvler ( hardest at ongs, a little easier at penons ).

I've lvled to 60 within few days(with gold ticket), I don't claim to be "master" at powerlvling but I gained some experience and I hope it might help you.

[REBD]

nice guide, might need a little bit of English check, there are a lot of simplifications and stuff, pretty annoying in a guide.
Example: u is written you and ur is your ...

[Mirosuke]

Wheres the section "And when u just got Scammed..." lol

Educative Thread.

[-.-]

not sure of the 30 minute plvl... i dont like it when people offer to pay only 30 minutes., it just bothers plvl speed to keep asking for gold each time and everyone loses time

though if they happen to die since they are afk, i dont feel bad since if they afk on ground too long i'll kick them from pt before time is up anyhow (not scam since i tell them that when they join :S)

[Reaper~17]

scammers suck in all games =/

[DrunkenAngel]

Thank you all for the post reply. I never feel comfortable to pay a plvler who I don't know about a full 60mins fee in taxi for few reasons. First of all, they might be scammers. Second, I never know if the pt is good or not, so if i only pay 30mins, I'm just more flexible. Third, I never know if I would get dc. So for these reasons, I prefer to pay only 30mins each time. Sorry if I slower down the plvler, but it really not gonna take that much time if I pay quick.

[Devilman]

Nice guide, learned some stuff . Luckily i haven't been scammed yet but still, you gotta watch out.

[Ladydas]

^^

[Tig3ress]

Nice guide. But please, PLEASE change 'r' to are.

eg.
1. be really careful when you r in donwhang.
2. be really careful to strangers if you r wearing pimp avatar.

I don't know if its only me but they seem to lower the wow factor of an otherwise great guide!

[Ger_slayer]

makes toatl sense i say STICKY!

[ervinboy]

===ALPS===
The_Shark_ksk (says): [global] WTS SOS Lv42+3 8mil, at samarkand.
Me(From): I buy
The_Shark_ksk (says):Come Samarkand Trader Shop
Me(From): Ok
The_Shark_ksk (says): Show money
( i show him i have 8mil )
Me(From): cheaper pls!
The_Shark_ksk (says): Last Price 7mil
Me(From): Ok
The_Shark_ksk open a stall, put it 70,000,000 SOS Lv42+3, remove it from stall and then change it 700,000 SOS Lv42+3, remove it from stall and finally, put a NPC 42 Staff for 7,000,000
Me (From): You Scammed me 7,000,000! Scammer
The_Shark_ksk (says): I have no gold, so i scam.
Me (From): Can u refund me 4,000,000? 3,000,000 you take, its ok.
The_Shark_ksk (says): No, noob. Bye. I go scam others now.

==ALPS==

For me, 7,000,000, just equal like sell out D9 stone 7 pieces.
I just angry for 10 minutes, and after that, carry on the game without anger. This small money scammer is just like begger in game.
Thanks for this guide, it is really useful.

Regards,
Akmoo_euro

[Tsao_Chang]

I got scammed myself just a few weeks ago. Some guy got me to join his guild, so being the noob I was, I joined. Then he asked for some cash cause the guild needs it. So I gave him 500k gold. Then he asked how my spear has that shine to it, so I told him its SoS. Then he asked to see it, so at first I told him no. But then he threatened to kick me from the guild. I knew how hard it was to join a guild, so I reluctantly said ok. I traded it with him, then he just ran off, kicked me from the guild, and left the town to another one. (you have no idea how frustrating that was to see him run off with my spear and lie to me like that)

Rather than forget about it and go get another spear, I had to go and convince him to bring it back, and I'll pay for it back. The spear was only worth 1.2mil, and I gave him 750k to get it back. It was only then that I realized that hed scammed me for 1.25mil gold. The spear wasnt worth the trouble, cause then I leveled up and got a new spear.

We need to have a list on here of known scammers and scammer guilds so that people watch out.

BTW, is there such thing as paying in installments when you are buying from a stall? Someone just did that to me...I dont know if its a scam or not.

[Fury]

Wow....as if you gave him that spear? If you really need to read a guide on how not to get scammed you must be pretty dumb.

[smizzlete]

===ALPS===
The_Shark_ksk (says): [global] WTS SOS Lv42+3 8mil, at samarkand.
Me(From): I buy
The_Shark_ksk (says):Come Samarkand Trader Shop
Me(From): Ok
The_Shark_ksk (says): Show money
( i show him i have 8mil )
Me(From): cheaper pls!
The_Shark_ksk (says): Last Price 7mil
Me(From): Ok
The_Shark_ksk open a stall, put it 70,000,000 SOS Lv42+3, remove it from stall and then change it 700,000 SOS Lv42+3, remove it from stall and finally, put a NPC 42 Staff for 7,000,000
Me (From): You Scammed me 7,000,000! Scammer
The_Shark_ksk (says): I have no gold, so i scam.
Me (From): Can u refund me 4,000,000? 3,000,000 you take, its ok.
The_Shark_ksk (says): No, noob. Bye. I go scam others now.

==ALPS==

For me, 7,000,000, just equal like sell out D9 stone 7 pieces.
I just angry for 10 minutes, and after that, carry on the game without anger. This small money scammer is just like begger in game.
Thanks for this guide, it is really useful.

Regards,
Akmoo_euro

Umm how did he scam you of 7 mil exactly? Cause he said he price was 7 mil but he changed it 3 times and on the third time it was correct then you bought it....???

[AshuraBlader]

Regards,
Akmoo_euro[/quote]

Umm how did he scam you of 7 mil exactly? Cause he said he price was 7 mil but he changed it 3 times and on the third time it was correct then you bought it....???[/quote]

because 3rd time was a npc staff

[KylieMinogue]

another way of getting scammed is trading characters, my friend wanted to be a Chinese STR character instead of an Eu STR character.

He lost his level 83 Warrior/Cleric trying to trade for a STR Chinese toon.