Scam alert

[Tweedledea]

Hi, I'm not allowed to post personal attacks, so I'll keep it brief and non-specific.

I got talking to someone who claimed to be 247 smithing. I arranged to meet up in FP for 2 Tae Ew shield combines, and we agreed a success fee. We grouped. I gave him all the components (in a coldain tailoring kit, he said he didn't have space) and lent him my geerlok, which he didn't have (he'd stripped the char down.... ok ok the warning signs were there )

Anyway. He asks if I can still pay him if he fails, because he has no money. While I'm typing out my response (something along the lines of 'well I can't pay you full price, but I'll give you a donation towards your time' he says he's failed. Eh? I got no fail message? He insists he failed the combine and offers to do the second combine. Sounds fishy to me. I ask for my geerlok back. He 'takes offense', ungroups, runs off, and supposedly drops my geerlok on the floor.

I've petitioned and /reported. I don't hold out much hope of a successful response, but I thorougly recommend you make fuller checks on your proposed blacksmith than I did.

P.S. If anyone wants to know more, check the gallery section at www.guildhouse.net/veturi.

Edit: Link doesn't seem to work. Need to copy and past for some reason.

[Hopkin]

This is the way to kill the friendship in EQ,
I am talking about the stealer.

Tweedledea, you made a good point to tell us about it, since we all use the help of another 1 day !

Good Luck Tweedledead !

[Denowon]

There are many scammers out there but there are also ways to protect yourself.

1. Talk to people in the guild that have purchased any of the Cultural Armor on your server. In the bazaar you can search for any of the Diety Armor sellers easily who day in and day out leave themselvs logged in and usually selling full suits of armor.

2. Join the Bazaar channel and ask in the channel if anyone has worked with said smith. Chances are you will recieve some feed back from someone who has or at least a recommendation on another smith who is available.

3. If the character is stripped down and is lower than level 30 ask the person who thier main is. Chances are that any serious smith would have no problems telling you the name of thier main. If the said smith is in anonomous and wont tell you the name of thier main account or toon chances are its a scam.

4. Take screen shots of all transactions and ALWAYS keep logs on. Most GM''s cant do a DAM thing on a normal petition but if you have screen shots and the log on you can email that directly to the server GM for action and correspond with the GM in email to make sure that something has come out of your loss.

5. Finally for combines please post here in the tradeskill section of EQTRADERS. Most smiths who are GM have the name of thier toons listed in the GM tradeskill list.

Sorry you took a loss but never ever take anyones word for face value in this game.

Dennis

[KyrosKrane]

The reason the link is failing is that the period at the end of your sentence got incorporated into the link, causing it to break. Here's the correct link:

http://www.guildhouse.net/veturi

[Hyarth]

4. Take screen shots of all transactions and ALWAYS keep logs on. Most GM''s cant do a DAM thing on a normal petition but if you have screen shots and the log on you can email that directly to the server GM for action and correspond with the GM in email to make sure that something has come out of your loss.

GMs can't do anything with screenshots or logs. The only thing they can use to do anything with are /reports. In a case like this, you'd have to romp across several zones to make enough reports to sum up the time of the trade to the time of the guy saying he failed with no message, but it'd capture everything needed in a legitimate fashion. Dunno if the GMs would do anything, but its your best bet.

[Tweedledea]

For the record, GM finally contacted me and returned the temper and geerlok, which was all I cared about really. Oh, and he confirmed the guy was lying

[Lorthien]

Tweedledea, So sorry you got scammed. What interests me most is how did the GM ascertain he was lying about te failed combine. Or was it about his BS skill level?

3. If the character is stripped down and is lower than level 30 ask the person who thier main is. Chances are that any serious smith would have no problems telling you the name of thier main. If the said smith is in anonomous and wont tell you the name of thier main account or toon chances are its a scam.

Dennis

I have run into this problem before when I offered to do a combine for JC. They said I was way to low (level) to be a master JC. I was like lvl 29 at the time. Since Twee isn't my main character I logged my main on to re-assure them and had them ask one of my guildies. I took offense at first but later on I thought it was a good call and really the only way to protect yourself. Once you click that Trade button your stuff is gone and all you got is the WORD of someone else. Scarey.

[Hyarth]

For the record, GM finally contacted me and returned the temper and geerlok, which was all I cared about really. Oh, and he confirmed the guy was lying

Brettan is the man.

[gaack]

I just start to feel really anxious and angry when I hear this kind of thing.

I KNOW I should just know better but it still never ceases to amaze me how low and vile people can be.

I am just glad you got your stuff back.

I hope they were banned by sony...

I hope they fall in a pit....full of Gnolls

Gaack Ranger 54th

[Gilgam]

Well, one quick thing about the level 30 threshold. My main is only 30, but I have high mastered most skills. Granted this is not grandmastery, but for some combines, it might be high enough. I guess I should work at it more, but being a very casual player, the idea of churning through levels doesn't really interest me that much.

Glad you got the items back from the individual.