| Scamming Tips -
05-22-2008
Dear MMOwned community,
First off I would like to thank you for all the comprehensive guides you have on these forums, they have been of major help.
A few days ago I attempted my first scam, which was succesful. The same day I did a few more scams and together with some more scams yesterday and today there are a few things I noticed and should be quite useful to remember.
So here's a list of things you should keep in mind. Please note I only do gold scams so some list items might only be applicable on gold scams. Also some list items are only applicable to scammers that pretend to be a company.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The List
I and We
Saying either of the two words can make a huge difference compared to the other. Saying 'we' means you are part of a company and saying 'I' might mean you work alone.
Using these words smart is something you should learn, for example if you don't want to give you your company name (because you don't have a solid background) prevent from using the word 'we' too much that they might actually ask: "Who is we?" - I had this yesterday. If you have a website you use as 'your company' then it's less of a problem, but mastering these two words is essential for starters, at least.
Prices are negotiable!
I guess this list item is more applicable to new scammers. What I'm basically trying to say is: "Be happy with what you can get!".
Obviously, if you are charging 1500 gold for a Tiger and he is offering you 200 gold, you do not accept the offer. Find out what a decent price is to lower down to (in per cent preferrably). An example:
When I pull of a gold scam I usually tell them the item was (much) more expensive in the first place, for example 2000g. But due to a gold shortage (or whatever, you can make something up here) you lowered the price to 1500g.
This will often prevent your victim from trying to lower the price much more as they'd think it's already gone down a lot. Use your social skills here to make it sound more believable.
Client is king. Or not?
You need to find a good balance between 'Greed' and 'Patience'. Often you can't wait until you receive the gold and you want it to be done as soon as possible. As many other guides will tell you, do not give in. Patience is key. Always.
I had a few people who weren't interested at first, mainly due to the price, but after a few minutes they crawled back saying they were interested after all. Make them come back for more, they want the items, really!
Let's get personal
Don't discuss personal things, you are a company after all and you are not interested in how he got run over by a car this morning because he's in love with the girl next door.
You're very special
Unless you're some cheesy Chinese gold bot that's programmed to sell gold and at the same time kissing your ass using cheesy lines as 'u r beuatful' followed by a 'want 2 bay gold?' you will want to stay away from sliming and talking about how nice someone's armour is.
You're a businessman, act like it. You're trying to make a deal, don't flatter them unless you think it will give you an edge in the deal you're trying to close.
Your alibi is not valid, sir
For the love of god, do some research before you blindly pick up a name and company to scam under. Generally the moment you can decide whether or not your victim will believe you and purchase your product is when he asks for your site and you link it. A story to explain why the products are not for sale on the website might do well. Be creative but don't go over the top.
Ban and death threats
This is a list item some will agree with and others will not.
If you get a whisper saying 'scammer!' or a death threat to burn your house and shoot you in the face you can do either of the two things:
1. Respond
2. Say nothing
Personally I don't say anything back, because I either don't have the time to respond or because I don't want to respond as I can't be arsed to discuss with a potential exposer.
Regarding point 1 (responding), you can always use the automatic respons and get the person interested. Personal preference I guess.
Wee update: Another way to handle this is to respond and acting 'dumb', apologizing a lot and making the other person feel dominant and smarter, you might even get them to apologise and take back what they said about you! - Thanks to The Other
Keep it cool, yo
Don't ever lose your head. If things go tits up you can always just log out and use one of the means described on the forums to throw Blizzard off in tracking you. If you are good at talking people into things you could always try to talk yourself out of it, and generally get people interested nonetheless.
Insurance
You know a scam is going well if you give people some kind of insurance (for example offering to stay online until you redeemed your item) or the 20% described somewhere too.
Something I noticed: Offering to stay online until they have redeemed their item doesn't mean shit all. Who says you won't just go offline? (Which you will). But funnily enough people fall for this as it makes them feel more safe though it's absolute bollocks.
Practice makes perfect
I can't talk much as I only started a few days ago but practice makes perfect. Improve on your lines, your background story, your prices based on your experience. It helps to evaluate once in a week, to see how much you scammed this week and what went well/wrong, hopefully able to improve your tactics.
You activated 'track victims'
Keep track of who you scam, I have a few documents describing the victims I've scammed. A few things you might want to take up in the list are:
+ Name of the victim
+ Alts of the victim
+ Item scammed
+ Amount of money scammed for
+ Notes
+ Horde/Alliance side
+ Your name used/background/company used in the scam
Expand the list if needed for other things you want to take up in the list.
It may look like much work, but if you fill out a quick list each time you do a scam you won't regret it, especially if the poor git you scammed yesterday is contacting you and calling you a heartless twat and more offensive insults I shan't repeat.
Time is of the essence
Time is of the essence, in more than just one way. If you're doing a thousand-and-one scams in two hours, stop. You want gold, not the entire realm on your arse and eventually the interest of a GM. Take occasional breaks, enjoy the game in a legal way, I heard it works.
/Taps his foot as he waits for you
Do as much as you possibly can to make the victim take his or her sweet time to get the Booty Bay. For example, pick a nice distant spot in Orgrimmar, or go to the Valley of Trials or Razor Hill if you're an Orc/Troll. The Forsaken could choose Brill, but preferrably Deathknell. Or even the Undercity. Blood Elfs .. well just don't. They won't want to travel all the way there. On the subject of taking time, you can also type out the code sloooooow..ly. Gives you enough time to send a mail to another character or whatever, or make necessary preparations to make the money disappear.
References
I've come across a few people who asked for a reference or two, to talk to them about my 'company'. Sure you can provide them with a reference!
Be creative! Your friend could help you for example. What? You don't have friends? Eh. *Awkward situation*
Well, for those that have friends in WoW, be it in-game friends or real life friends who play WoW, you can ask them to play reference, offer them a small per centage of the money, just tip them or something.
What you could also do, is just pretending to be someone else, so 'play' your own references. This does require a combination or all of the following:
+ Multiple MSN/WoW accounts
+ Ability to sound like someone else
+ Know what to say and try not to make it obvious.
I heard schizophrenia works wonders for people trying the latter method of referring.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That was the list, updated to 220508 (22th of May, 2008).
I will update the list, changing some items and adding/removing some depending on my personal experience and/or suggestions from others.
Updates in the list will be marked with green, whereas original post items will be marked with blue.
Thank you to all of the great guides on these forums for the thorough explanations and ideas, your input is appreciated and don't think I'll forget!
I hope you enjoyed the basic list, I'd greatly appreciate all suggestions and criticism. Keep an eye on this thread, there's more coming.
- Thaelarion
Last edited by Viper23rd; 05-23-2008 at 06:22 PM.
Reason: List updates
|
Scamming Tips
