scammer got me

[Uruare]

ITT: person didn't pay adequate attention, screwed himself, wants to blame others.

 

Nothing to see here. It's a self responsibilty problem.

[CrazyCT]

I love when people over use words - Epic, nerf, OP......and scam. You want a real scam? Go and play EVE. Then complain to CCP and see what they tell you.

 

•CCP is against scams and scam artists of this nature in-general, but so long as people abide by the EULA, funds or assets acquired through what one would term fraud and/or embezzlement in RL are within the context of the game at-large, and thus not actionable by CCP.

 

They didn't break any rules or laws, so it's your own fault.

[HarleysRule]

Not a scam. You agreed to pay a certain amount for a certain item. You got your item for the agreed upon price. I went to a sporting event the other day and paid $6 for a 16 ounce beer. Is that a scam? NO! Is it a rip off? Hell yeah! There's a difference. If it was colored water and not beer, then it would have been a scam.

 

Learn to pay attention to what you're doing. I always sort by unit price when I use the GTN...never paid more than I intended. It's virtually impossible to scam on the GTN in this game. Go play EVE Online, where it's not only encouraged to scam people on the market, but where there are tools and market skills that actually help you scam people.

 

In case you missed BW's official stance on this...not a scam

 

Stay the hell out of Jita.

 

That is all I would like to say.

 

Cry babies in this thread wouldn't last 5 minutes in EVE.

Edited December 1, 2015 by HarleysRule

[aisaelo]

You as a player should always pay attention, there's no excuse for this brain lapse.

[DogMeat]

All I can say is: Buyer Beware.

just as in RL....

[TUXs]

Cry babies in this thread wouldn't last 5 minutes in EVE.

What the hell lol? EVE? The spreadsheet simulator? Yeah, I wouldn't last 2 min in that game...far too ridiculous to me...but that's kinda why I'm posting HERE...cuz I'm playing THIS game. No crying...just common freaking sense tbh.

 

This is clearly a scam - the intent is to trick, by deception, someone into buying your over priced crap. The scammer take advantage of the GTNs decimal display and they conveniently flood the HIGH page to look like the LOW page. Since there are no decimals anywhere other than unit prices on the GTN, and that's the best way to buy multiple units of something, they take advantage of the display.

 

They'll flood the HIGH sort to look something like this:

 

4,400,210

4,966.26

4,877.47

4,788.28

4,699.99

 

The 4XXX items are all listed by other alts to avoid suspicion. Because the GTN is the only place decimals exist, it's easy to confuse ,999 for a .999 because 3 decimal places is quite common in the real world, so it looks natural.

 

The other part of this scam is manipulating the LOW price as well...flood the front page with ten 599.50 priced items so the person sorting sees 599XXX down to 440XXX...it's all about creating the illusion which is the scam.

 

Bioware needs to remove decimals...that's all this would take.

Edited December 1, 2015 by TUXs

[jamyz]

This thread reminds me of my bud before he left drugs.

[Sweetiepies]

Lol this is adorable.

[Keta]

Be prepared for vultures to descend and start mocking you and claiming it isn't a scam But I feel your pain, because this happened to me too. All it takes is being on auto pilot buying mats and misreading a comma for a period and you're screwed..

 

 

This. I've long felt that mmo's all need a system to immediately reverse a sale for just such occasions. And yes, it's a scam.

[Joesixxpack]

Dastardly scheme...

 

Holy crap look at that! TUX I never knew.

 

Gibe moni plos from your illicit proceeds o i report u huehuehue

Edited December 1, 2015 by Joesixxpack

[Theeko]

WoW kind of prevents this type of selling by not giving back the initial deposit and also it costs about 10% of whatever the price you set it at. Harsher listing fee but atleast its a credit sink or gold sink to WoW.

[Jadescythe]

WoW kind of prevents this type of selling by not giving back the initial deposit and also it costs about 10% of whatever the price you set it at. Harsher listing fee but atleast its a credit sink or gold sink to WoW.

 

They obviously already have the deposit money and are selling a material for millions more than they are worth. I don't think BW taking more of that money would stop them...

 

But people should probably read instead of GTNing on autopilot.

[_NovaBlast_]

"my lack of paying attention got me" FIFY Edited December 1, 2015 by _NovaBlast_

[HoloTweed]

Not a scam. You agreed to pay a certain amount for a certain item. You got your item for the agreed upon price. In case you missed BW's official stance on this...not a scam

 

Absolutely, positively, without question or debate IS a scam. The heartless (and, I feel, those who perpetuate these scams) are going WAY out of their way to try to legitimize what is clearly a deceptive practice.

 

Yes, the "actual" inflated price of items is listed. However, it is presented in such a way that, to the casual observer, it APPEARS to be a lower price. The intent is to deceive and defraud the victim of digital currency. There cannot even be an argument that such is the INTENT - and THAT is what makes it a scam.

 

As in almost every scam, the victim - with proper attentiveness and concentration - could easily avoid falling prey to the scammer. This is also without question. In a game that promotes fast pace, fast decisions, speed runs, etc., the scammer COUNTS on the victim not paying attention.

 

Those who seem to enjoy insulting the victim also cite that Bioware has declared this "not a scam," as if that is somehow a ridiculous endorsement of this underhanded deceit. However, that totally ignores what Bioware's actual point about this is - which is that they don't want accountability for whether or not someone posted a legitimate price. They don't want to be in the "virtual refund" business. HERE is the pertinent quote from the "Bioware says this isn't a scam" post that everyone chooses to ignore:

 

What someone is doing in this scenario is posting something at a higher value than the market would typically have that item listed for. For us, it would be impossible to tell if a user was posting an item at a higher value to try to "scam" another user, or simply because that is what they want to sell it for.

 

That's the real rub, not some tacit endorsement of this scamming behavior. (It also shows that Bioware actually DOES consider that behavior a "scam.") But Bioware doesn't want to have to get involved in hundreds of transactions to determine whether or not something was a scam, a mistake, or just an incredibly good (or bad) deal for someone. Has NOTHING to do with whether this is a scam. (It IS.)

 

This whole scenario could be avoided if Bioware simply stopped showing decimal points on the GTN in an economy that does NOT, in any way, support fractional units of credits. It would prevent scammers from having the ability to post deceitful prices with the intent of having them appear as lower prices and fool victims who aren't paying close enough attention.

 

Can the victims prevent the scam? No. But they can actively NOT FALL FOR IT by paying more attention. However, with the removal of decimal points (and that's a display function so before anyone tries to say "I don't want Devs wasting SO MUCH TIME on something so important... it wouldn't take much time to alter) this becomes a non-issue.

 

Because what the Victim Shamers don't take into consideration is that REGARDLESS of whether a victim could have avoided the scam, once it happens, it can't be undone - and the anger and feeling of wasted time can be so great that some victims will simply quit the game. That's not good for ANY of us. So isn't it the MUCH SMARTER MOVE for EVERYONE to back removal of the ability to post such a scam rather that risk further alienating some players and losing more people?

[TUXs]

Holy crap look at that! TUX I never knew.

 

Gibe moni plos from your illicit proceeds o i report u huehuehue

No no no Joe...my exposure of this illicit activity was done to demonstrate my expert knowledge of how this scheme is done...what I'm doing now is perfectly legal and meant to punish those fraudsters taking advantage of poor little old guys like you...

 

See, I'm starting a Security business...I'm gonna call is SWTOR United Credit Keeper Escrow Repository.

 

It's very similar to a bank...how it works is this - you give me all of your credits, I take those credits and transfer them to a security toon that only I know exists - this step is essential to providing you with the highest level of security. When you need to make a GTN transaction, it'll be just like using your debit card...you send my main toon a whisper, you give me the secret code, and I will make the secure purchase for you, eliminating all risk to yourself.

 

We are here to serve YOU Joe...so what is it...do you wanna stop being the victim? Join me, and you can become a SUCKER today!!!

[HarleysRule]

Hey folks,

 

There has been a lot of chatter this weekend in General Discussion around how players are posting on the GTN, specifically around use of decimals/commas, and whether we feel it is an exploit or not. For starters, we definitely don't want to see any players scammed out of their hard earned credits and we will work to stop those situations wherever possible. Unfortunately, this is not one of those scenarios.

What someone is doing in this scenario is posting something at a higher value than the market would typically have that item listed for. For us, it would be impossible to tell if a user was posting an item at a higher value to try to "scam" another user, or simply because that is what they want to sell it for.

 

When purchasing items on the GTN, aside from the initial sorting and purchase we also have a secondary window pop-up as confirmation of sale. If you feel you are at risk of buying something off of the GTN at an intended value, take your time! Make sure to read over exactly what they are selling it for and then double check that number when you receive the pop-up. Also, we highly recommend using the sorting functions for both total and unit prices to make sure you are paying what you want.

With that in mind, I am going to pass these issues back to the dev team and see if there is anything we can work towards in the future for the GTN to help alleviate these issues. Thanks everyone!

 

-eric

 

This is clearly a scam - the intent is to trick, by deception, someone into buying your over priced crap. The scammer take advantage of the GTNs decimal display and they conveniently flood the HIGH page to look like the LOW page. Since there are no decimals anywhere other than unit prices on the GTN, and that's the best way to buy multiple units of something, they take advantage of the display.

 

They'll flood the HIGH sort to look something like this:

 

4,400,210

4,966.26

4,877.47

4,788.28

4,699.99

 

The 4XXX items are all listed by other alts to avoid suspicion. Because the GTN is the only place decimals exist, it's easy to confuse ,999 for a .999 because 3 decimal places is quite common in the real world, so it looks natural.

 

BioWare disagrees.

It took me about 0.5 seconds to tell the difference between the items selling for ~5k credits vs the one selling for 4.4M in your example. 3 decimal places on prices are NOT common (in America at least), so that should be an extra hint, even if you fail at math so bad you can't see an extra digit. Learn to pay attention.

Edited December 1, 2015 by HarleysRule

[HoloTweed]

BioWare disagrees.

 

Actually, they do NOT. See post above.

[Joesixxpack]

No no no Joe...my exposure of this illicit activity was done to demonstrate my expert knowledge of how this scheme is done...what I'm doing now is perfectly legal and meant to punish those fraudsters taking advantage of poor little old guys like you...

 

See, I'm starting a Security business...I'm gonna call is SWTOR United Credit Keeper Escrow Repository.

 

It's very similar to a bank...how it works is this - you give me all of your credits, I take those credits and transfer them to a security toon that only I know exists - this step is essential to providing you with the highest level of security. When you need to make a GTN transaction, it'll be just like using your debit card...you send my main toon a whisper, you give me the secret code, and I will make the secure purchase for you, eliminating all risk to yourself.

 

We are here to serve YOU Joe...so what is it...do you wanna stop being the victim? Join me, and you can become a SUCKER today!!!

 

Bahaha! You could sell coal to a solar plant. And it doesn't matter! Yes I want to stop being a victim!

 

Thank The Maker/TUX, every one of us should be signing up for your needed service! Courier char inc. Harb!

[beattlebilly]

I have no idea what you're saying. Removing the decimals would basically remove the scam.

 

1,200.50 lowest

1,200,500 highest

 

Remove the decimals so you'd get 1,200 lowest... what could the highest do to make it look like the lowest price? Nothing.

 

1,200

1,200,500

 

Suddenly there's no comparison, no confusion, no scam.

 

Even with the decimal, there still is no comparison, no confusion between:

1,200.50

1,200,500

 

The high price still looks higher. There's two numbers at the end after the decimal point vs three numbers at the end after the comma. Even if it's

 

10.10

1,010

 

It's still not hard to see which is the higher price.

[HarleysRule]

Actually, they do NOT. See post above.

 

See green highlighted portion of full quote. Not a scam no matter how bad you want it to be.

Edited December 1, 2015 by HarleysRule

[TUXs]

BioWare disagrees.

3 decimal places on prices are NOT common (in America at least)

Bioware is far from infallible. If I were to agree with them on this, we'd both be wrong.

 

And I'm not sure which "America" you come from, but in mine, I factor out cost and pricing per unit, every day, using more than 2 decimal places...even Walmart lists things past 2 decimals when listing out the "per oz" prices.

[beattlebilly]

Bioware is far from infallible. If I were to agree with them on this, we'd both be wrong.

 

And I'm not sure which "America" you come from, but in mine, I factor out cost and pricing per unit, every day, using more than 2 decimal places...even Walmart lists things past 2 decimals when listing out the "per oz" prices.

 

Even if we encounter it everyday, it only takes a few seconds to realize that SWTOR doesn't use that method.

[jamyz]

The only key and answer to not get fooled by that kind of people is common sense. It's super easy to do and you can practice over time to get better. It will take you around 10 seconds in average to look prices, analyze them and realize that something is wrong. It's not that hard tho. For the buyer, it is your mistake to buy it in the first place, and I believe it's a hard thing to swallow in your situation. Accept your errors folks. It will make you a better person. For the seller... you are in an MMO/Internet/Non physical form, you are anonymous, and we the buyers know that there are people that love to screw others, we also know that there are many trolls around this game. Especially around Dround Kaas all day. Almost all the freaking day. I get how those people not get tired of themselves. To the buyer. You need to realize that there will be a ton of people that will try to fool you, at all times. Inside and outside of the game. If you get bland, they will eat you alive if you stop to use your brains. Same with most sellers at the Fleet at prime hour.

 

As an example:

 

First: [i see this a lot. Believe it or now. I had know some folks that pay that quantities .______.]

WTS Revan Armor Set 30mil [This without having any of those in the gtn. Which usually sell for 9mil]

 

Second:

Click my ref link and I will give you 2mil [You believe it and that person ended ignoring you after you click his or her ref link.]

 

Third:

You see several postings at the GTN in bulks of something you need. You go full-brains turned off and buy everything without check prices two times. Boom! you just lost 6mil from nowhere. Well, you know it's your fault deep inside.

 

Fourth: [i experimented something like this, but I ended saying. Deez nuts pal. I didn't born yesterday.]

You are buying something at the fleet for example. WTB Satele Shan set. Then a person whispers you and tells you... Seller: Hey, I have that set.

You excited say: Oh maii. I want to buy it, how much?

Seller: It will be 10mil or fair/dumb/unbelievable offer:

You: That's excellent. Lets do it.

Seller: There is a problem tho. The set is still bound until tomorrow.

You: Well, I can wait. In the worst scenario, you are too desperate [Watch out with this!] and the scammer gets you easily.

Seller: I will not be able to do so. I need to travel all week [it may change in here. They are good to lie]. Maybe I will have time tomorrow, but I am not sure. Lets do this... tomorrow at what hours are you on?

You: Tells an hour/hours.

Seller: Figures out an hour in which he or she knows that you will not be awake or online. Tells you the hour. [if he or she fails, they will keep pushing you to an hour in which they succeed.]

You: Damn, I will not be online at that hour. What we can do? [Common sense starts to fail in this part] The scammer totally owns you now.

Seller: I have a super easy solution. Just send me your credits in a mail today or tomorrow when you are online. Then, I will send you the armor set asap as it is unbound and I will connect on X hour to do so. I have around 3 minutes before travel, or whatever he or she invents you.

You: Perfect! Thank you so much. I will send the credits asap. I will be waiting. I am super excited! [Common Sense off - Brains off. Innocence under 9000]. *Sends credits.

Seller: All right! Thank you so much, I will send you the set tomorrow.

 

Then, you connect at the day after tomorrow, because you were supposed to not be at that hour and... no new mail. You try to send mails and he ignored you. You just lost 15mil, but you know deep inside of you that it was your fault. Hard to swallow tho.

 

They may sound like nice and polite people. Educated, and bland sometimes. You need to be careful because that's with the kind of people you are dealing with. It don't happens all the time tho, there is nice people out there, but NEVER SEND CREDITS FIRST. No matter what. Same with people begging, asking for donations or things like that. Be careful pals. Then, always try to record your trades or GTN buying. If you mess up and someone got you. You can share that recordings to support and to the players. To warn them about X person. I know they delete their toons most of the times, but you can point him or her out before do so and the support can track that person easily.

 

I can tell more examples, but I know you folks get the point. I am not telling you that you are dumb or stupid, but just be more careful the next time. No matter who you are, there is someone that knows how to catch you if you let it.

 

Common sense is a super good thing to practice tho. It may sound simple, but you can be fooled super easy if you don't use your brain often. To the buyer. Do not expect those people to change. Those are everywhere in all sizes and forms. They barely learn and just a few of them change. Be more careful the next time and practice your common sense more often. Even outside of the game. There is a saying that is quite famous and says. "Forewarned is forearmed." If you read all this. I thank you so much for doing so. Now, you barely will get scammed or fooled with this information. If still get fooled after read all this. With all the respect of the world... let me spank you so hard! . Just kidding, be careful fellas!

[Medullah]

That one makes no sense...why wouldn't someone just say "That's fine, send it COD."

 

If anyone falls for the last one, they deserve to be parted from their money.

[IslanderRebel]

I just bought 1 permarcrete for over 8mil credits.

My bad.

I knew there are scammers who pray on people's mistakes. I even fought them placing 1 item for 999999999 to have it on top of the list -so that it's red color states clearly this is the highest price. Didn't pay attention today/

 

No one will convince me that these people don't do this counting on honest mistakes.

Well, 8 mil isn't that much to me. I'll get it back selling uni prefabs next week.

Still hurts.

The thought that scumbags share the same entertainment as me: SWTOR

 

 

All I want to know is how in the heck did you "trigger finger" that order when everybody should be looking for the "cheapest" order.

If I'm looking for multiple pieces, i always look for the most at lowest cost.

Seems to me like you were going for that hot date with Kate Upton and ended up with Rosie O' Donnell instead.