Scam Artist. Beware. Please Read.Follow

Alright let me start from the beginning here. This is mostly a warning to the rest of Bismarck. Apparently a few of you have already heard about a scam artist trying to trade a Cassie Earring as a bone earring. I believe Drebond was the first to discover this and /shout in Jeuno. However, I did not hear of this until a few hours ago. After I was scammed myself. Here is how the situation started.

I seen a shout this morning in Upper Jeuno by a character named Shagha. He was selling a Serket Ring for 4,700,000. I only had 4,500,000 on me. So I asked in /tell if he could possibly sell it for 4,500,000. He then pretended he was JP. And used mostly auto translate. He decided it was fine that I pay him 4,500,000g now as long as I would send 200,000g. Tomorrow. Which I was perfectly content with doing. He met me at the Guide Stone. He initiated a trade. I put 4,500,000 in price. He placed the Serket Ring inside the box. I checked and made sure it was a Serket Ring before pressing ok. This happened three times. And I did not realize until afterwards what an idiotic mistake I had made. Needless to say a fourth try sealed the deal and concluded the scam. Before I could hit ok after checking the Serket Ring he replaced it with a Copper Ring. And just like that, he walked away with 4,500,000 and I walked away with a great ol' copper ring. I was furious. As I'm sure most of you would be. Three months of work literally stolen out of your hands. This is fraud. Of course we all know from this repeated story happening. GM's can and will do absolutely nothing about such instances. So I decided to investigate further. I had a few friends initiate in their own investigations as well. I will not reveal any of their names, as I am putting myself out there. If they choose to, they can reply to this thread.

I reported to a GM. First call, 45 minutes and no response. I had to go.. They left me a message saying to contact them again later. Again, I contact a GM a few hours later. Only 35 minutes htis time.. And of course they are absolutely no use at all.. As I expected. But I wasn't going to sit there and do nothing after losing all of my gil. It just doesn't work that way.

After several hours. Shagha logged back onto his character and remained in Upper Jeuno. Obviously not the best scam artist as he logged back on his character. Well the seemingly JP character wasn't so JP. He ignored me on Ecks. So I switched to a mule in which he communicated with me in perfect English. I demanded he send the item or my gil. He said I can't send you gil or an item
because he is not the account owner. Again, a story we all hear with every scam artist. Oh it wasn't me.. it was my brother.. and the gil is gone.. I don't know what happened to it...

l i e

He said well hold on "Let me get sham" Referring to the owner of the account who was at a McDonalds across the street. (Confirming he is clearly Japanese.) Shagha stopped responding. I logged back on Eckskalibur to find him in Ru'Lude Gardens trying to sell the ring again. My friend confronted him and he stood near the delivery box. And then he had a 'connection lost.' Well within a few minutes another /anon mule came on selling.. You guessed it. A Serket Ring. His name was Arfaj. The friend that had also confronted Shagha attempted to buy the ring off of Arfaj. But for some reason Arfaj kept denying his offers to buy the item. He wasn't concealing anything was he? Perhaps that he was scamming. And if someone possibly new about the scam.. then it clearly wouldn't work. But oddly enough he would sell it to a player named Dante. Who bought the ring off of Arfaj for 5,000,000g. However this is where it gets interesting.

Arfaj would not sell it to anyone who had confronted Shagha. This much I know and is confirmed. However he sold it to Dante. So a few people dug further into this. And took notice that this scam began less than a week ago. And it began with a Cassie Earring. There were /shout throughout Jeuno. Offering a Cassie Earring and 1,500,000g for a Serket Ring. Hm. Wierd to find these both intertwined. Dante purchased a Cassie Earring on 6/29/05. I can not confirm the exact day that this scam began, but I know that it was after this date. And that it has been confirmed that Shagha was attempting to sell a Cassie Earring and switched it repeatedly with Bone Earrings. Wierd how the beginning of this starts with a Cassie Earring. An item that Dante just bought. And ended with a Serket Ring that would only be sold to him.

I confronted Dante on the subject. Seemingly paranoid. He kept explaining his gil making methods. I did not ask once about his gil or anything pertaining to his gil. I asked if he had anything to do with this scam becuase i have heard from several people that he may very well indeed be in on it. I coninued to discuss the subject with him. He replied with several sentences asking why would he commit fraud? Why would he steal? He replied saying he is a 71 PLD in an HNM LS and makes plenty of gil. I've been in plenty of HNM LS.. And trust me.. You dont make that kinda gil.. not quite like this. But thats a completely differnet matter.. He continued.. And openly admitted to both buying gil and then transfering some from a Wow server. He then asked.. why would I steal gil? Well.. if your buying it.. well.. that should be implied.

Needless to say this is just skepticism and a thorough investigation.. one that probably isn't concluded. But I thought I should bring this to the server's attention. I do not expect pity or anything of the sort for losing the gil that I have lost. It is months of work down the drain, yes. But it was a lesson that had to be learned I suppose. The mere fact that this is a game is not enough reason to be of good faith. And that maybe everyone should be absolutely paranoid with every aspect of this game. As it is seemingly uncommon for others to steal, commit fraud, and stab each other in the back to get ahead.

I apologize for the long post. And those that read it I hope you spread the word, and advise you avoid business with these characters at all costs. Thank you for your time.

Eckskalibur.

Jesus am I the only one that runs fraps here? Any deals or items I lend out I have documented conversations of.
/clock for date - then fraps
coversations discussing deals- then fraps
/clock for date - then fraps
trade - fraps

Ill be damned if anyone calls me a lier then!

Wow nice job Ecks! Tracking him down and all that.

So this Dante, is he a gilseller or is he a legit player with an HNMLS? if so which?

You should of went outside jeuno to rolenberry and bought it from his bazzar from there. No tax, no trouble. Sorry about losing 4.5 mil in gil. I wonder if the GM ever came at all

Edited, Wed Jul 6 14:19:36 2005 by Daperfectkill

i think the scorpion harness guy was Nuau? i remember his shouts in jeuno yesterday and i immediately thought it was a scam.

pretty sure rolenberry is part of derfland not jeuno

i have sold bazaar on qufim island, and when i checked myself, there is no tax there. i haven't checked rolanberry, but i'm pretty sure it would work too.

Yes I should have gone to the bazaar. But I didn't for some reason I thought that this was a game and we all played for fun. Silly mistake.

And yes Firestarter I believe that is what they do. Oh well, I made a mistake and I paid for it. I would just prefer that it didn't happen to anyone else again. Please continue spreading the word.

Eckskalibur

I'm surprised i beat anyone else to this from our LS. Unfortuanatley Dante may be walking around with an Intensity Pearl.

HE IS NOT A MEMBER. He used to be a long time ago before intensity was rebuilt. We thought he destroyed his pearlsack but it turns out he didn't and apparently gave a pearl to this shagha person. Let me repeat NEITHER OF THESE PEOPLE ARE IN INTENSITY. I think someone was able to boot Shagha but Dante still had sackholder so only Singular can remove him.

If anyone see's one of these 2 wearing an intensity pearl please let Trizzoro, Singular, Leeluu, Bhone or myself know immediatley.

Last i heard he still has the pearlsack, we are trying to fix this.



Edited, Thu Jul 7 08:10:43 2005 by TseTsuo

I can vouch for this story being true as well... Arfaj was in port one morning shouting and selling cassie earing for 2.7 mil and emperors hairpin for 800k. i figured i would buy the hairpin for 800k and make some money on it, but Arfaj was being kinda weird, trying to get more out of me(first mistake... scamming for 800k isnt enough?)... then he finally realized i wasnt going any higher, so told me to meet him at MH. i went, and couldnt trade with him for some reason, he told me to hold on. turns out he was trying to scam tredvolt into buying the cassie earing... what a ******* moron. tred turns to walk away, and he offers me trade. i accept, and then here tred shouting about what had happened. i immediately closed the window and walked away. i mean, scam people who have no influence on this server, and MAYBE youll get away with it... but start scamming the leaders of one of the biggest LSes on this server, and you are just stupid. the sad thing is this guy has probably made about 100 mil off of this scam already, and will continue to make more, as not everyone reads these forums. later that day, i saw him shouting again while i was on my friends character... i /telled him to eat **** and die, then proceeded to follow him from zone to zone, shouting about his scam. the bewn then threated to put me on his **** list, and that i should be on the look out for an MPK sometime soon. then he told me his min character was a high lvl that i was actually friends with... /laugh... anywho, i would bet its some *** like killuminati or hoodlum just trying to scam more people out of their hard earned money. Ecks, im sorry you lost that gil that you worked so hard to get, but take solace in the fact that your only friends on this server arent a bunch of gilsellers and people that everyone hates. like you said, its just a game... what matters is that youve got people out there who like you as a person, and arent gonna dislike you b/c you dont have that serket ring. just gotta move on and know that you are better than those losers. anyways... thats all i had to say. please everyone watch out for scams like this... it may seem nice to get a deal every once in a while, but not many people are on the up and up when they try to sell an item for less than 97% of the auction house price. undercutting a hairpin by 10k would be enough to make it sell instantly... 100k is just suspicious. anyways. thats my 2 cents, for what its worth. also sorry about the length of the post ><.

Ace

I spoke to this scammer in Jeuno and he has the grammer skillz like our friend Dante here.

But hey I'm not trying to point a finger

/point <Dante>