All trades are final, huge value items in EU and lack of contracts. Should MA change something?

[Kemp]

What a small minded view..

Have you ever been ice skating but didnt have your own skates?
have you ever played paintball but didnt have your own gun?
etc etc?

You had to hire them right?

All people are asking for is a safer way to do this.To be able to experience new things.To bring a bit more of the RL capabilities into the virtual world. Whats so wrong with that?

And what exactly makes people 'F'cking Idiots' for wanting this?

Whats wrong with wanting to enjoy the game on a new level or wanting to experience new things in this universe?


So basically these people are 'stupid F'cking idiots'?

Jesus man wake up.

To say 'oh I'll never own it so I'll never get to experience this' is a pretty sad state of affairs and a pretty defeatist attitude,might as well crawl into a corner huh?


I've borrowed many items from friends and its allowed me to experience things I never would have had the chance too otherwise and I'm very grateful for this,the game would get a little monotonous and boring very quickly without a new experience to spice things up every now and then.

As for lending thing I personally wont lend to anyone without collateral unless I know I can show up on their doorstep to reclaim it in person should something go wrong and I have provided RL details for the loan of a Modfap last year to help out my WoF team.It is do-able in some circumstances.


Open your mind its a big world out there

No need to be harsh right away. Have you considered the fact that hiring definitely isn't the same as lending?!

Hiring is based on a fee you pay and don't get back after returning the hired item. Trusting on 99 people to properly return their ice-skates they hired for $5, thus gaining $495,-. And then number 100 doesn't return the skates worth lets say $75,- Still $420,- profit.

That's something different than lending your car to some one you have spoken to a few times on msn and after getting the keys he takes off with it to some Eastern European country. Never to be seen anymore. (No offense to Eastern European people; It's just that a lot of Western European cars dissapear in that direction).

That also is completely different than lending items worth a couple of $10k to some one in a virtual universe.

I have lended iFF8k, Adj Fap, Shadow/Angel armor, MK-V ME to people in the past. I knew the risk I took. I also knew most of those people very well ingame and some even met outside the game.
But still, it is a risk.

A risk from which I believe MA/FPC doesn't have any obligation towards preventing this risk. And because of the balancing issues they have a good reason not to do it anyway.

Since I read in some post from Rep that something went wrong with the GC, as in "almost the same as giving you login credentials to somebody else".
Well sorry guys, but this seems to be a major fuck up from the lender.

I hope everything will eventually turn out ok. Else it will be a valuable lesson of life.

 

[Mercury]

1) Hacked is the wrong word. The person SUPPOSEDLY gave his login information away to a friend ages ago as far as I heard. This pretty much makes MA/FPC no longer responsible or involved in this matter. There is nothing to prove or disprove that the person didn't pull the scam himself. I'd be inclined to believe he was indeed in on it but that's just me. Before even hearing who was involved, I was able to name that person on my first guess.

2) MA/FPC has repeatedly told us that lending items is at your own risk. I agree with this to a point but I believe that your statement about it being human nature to trust our societies is indeed true. It is good for EU to feel the ability to trust our fellow man. This is greatly hindered by the lack of assistance with the problem should anything go wrong.

Printing ingame in the chatbox text whether the item is for lending with both players agreeing should be just as binding a contract as signing your name IRL. Perhaps that's the way MA/FPC could rectify such situations? Use ingame signatures? I don't know, just throwing that idea out there before my morning coffee.

3) A lending system would indeed influence the balance of things in Entropia. You'd start to have item barons buying up everything just to lend (rent) them out. Item prices may go down but I'd actually forsee them going UP due to the profit potential in the renting market. A mod fap would likely make more on a daily basis than 95% of the Land Areas in EU.

I don't know where I was headed but just figured I'd add those things to the conversation. Back to my coffee and I hope it works out for those who lost their items. :/

 

[FallenAngel]

I suspect that as we are still dealing with a relatively new *cyber* crime that the rules arent completely clear. Would be interested to hear of the outcomes of any successful prosecutions in this area?

i think the word cyber crime is misused here, if anything has a percieved real world value (extreme example toast that looks like jesus), and someone payed over XXX dollars/euro's for it, and other people are willing to pay money for it, and the company that provides for this service claims there is a real world value to these items, and these items are taken without the express permission of the owner or licensee (im pretty sure the EULA has no standing but even if it does you are paying real money for a license to use), then im pretty sure that courts and police in most countries (with some presure maybe) will see this as a felony.

There are examples across the world where courts have affirmed this is the case.

so it seems quite simple to me,
if anyone gains use of a inworld item through theft or fraud or embezzlement, it is that, theft, fraud or embezzlement, and people can dress it up how they like, Mindark can say what it wants about ownership and responsibility and "all trades are final".

but it is theft or fraud or embezzlement.

 

[Oleg]

It is easy enough for MindArk to implement controls and limitations on a lending system that would prevent any individual(s) from monopolizing the market for uber items while at the same time providing an environment where people can safely loan their items to others while also creating an environment that creates new business opportunities for the owners of those items.

How would you prevent monopolisation? Assuming that dropping a dozen Mod Mercs is not an option.

 

[travrevyen]

another post from the suspect/scammer

It seems to me that the scammer has borrowed another avatar and played for him to aern money, but failed to do so, and got pissed and didnt return or sold all the highend markup items to third party/avatar.

"Quote:
Originally Posted by #####
those posts are stupid and ignorant and do in no way show the truth there ARE ppl who live off their EU profits"

Quote: ##### (this is what the scammer is replying in another thread)
"stop posting crap

ignorant? Have you ever had an avatar with level 90+ professional standings and all the best gear in game? Have you even tried anything close to it? Oh right, you havent. I had such an avatar, and there is no way anyone can make money playing the game. Trading, yeah, you can make a little, but hunting, crafting, mining is a money pit for everyone."
Quote end here"


My oppinion:
I think Mindark is able to return your items to the rightfull owner again. Like in real life. If you catch a theif with stolen items the police will give it back to you. And since this is a virtual game MA should be able to locate the stolen items easy.

 

[FallenAngel]

How would you prevent monopolisation? Assuming that dropping a dozen Mod Mercs is not an option.

i fail to see how this is "our" problem,
that is at best Mindarks problem,
"our" problem is stuff gets scammed when stuff is lent,
this is something that would and should be trivial for Mindark to fix with a secure lending system.

 

[JLD]

i think the word cyber crime is misused here..

Sure it is,because, when you tell somebody where do you hide your wallet irl,it is your own fault not changing place after event connected to this is done.

in translation if person A gives logins to person B years ago, because of (insert desired event here) ,and person B find out after many years password is the same it is fault of owner.

 

[Mercury]

If only there was some sort of committee... lol

I also think that the original borrower was involved i this scam we're speaking about. If he wasn't then he still is 100% responsible because he didn't inform the people he borrowed from that he had given out his information to another person.

 

[HardWrath]

How would you prevent monopolisation? Assuming that dropping a dozen Mod Mercs is not an option.

Simple.

Instead of allowing a person to rent out an unlimited amount of items, simply put a limit on it. For example at any given time a person could not loan out more than 15 items at once.

We have all seen the decline the game economy and we have seen how that has negatively affected the entire game to the point in which countless individuals have completely lost faith in EU and cashed out.

By implementing a rental system, people who have the money would deposit large sums into the Entropia Universe for the purpose of buying the high-end items only to rent them out. This is a GOOD thing for every player.

1. More money would be flowing in EU
2. Prices would begin to rise again
3. MindArk would have reason to drop more high-end items in the loot
4. The prospect of being able to loot these items will motivate an incredibly large amount of people to deposit, hunt, improve their avatar, hunt more, improve more, skill up, consume, spend, etc all of which will positively impact every conceivable profession in EU

How much would you pay to be able to hunt with a Mod Merc for a day? How about an Imk2? ...or what about the Terminator? How much would you pay to rent a set of Shadow, Eon, Supremacy, POE for a day? How much would you pay to be able to rent a full set of Eon plus a Mod Fap for a day?

The positive things that a rental system would do for the game are virtually endless.

The entire reason people skill up to hunt high end creatures is because they believe that they will be able to loot something valuable and at some point in the long run their Calypso experience will be profitable. How many of you still believe that to be true today?

 

[Kemp]

If you catch a theif with stolen items the police will give it back to you. And since this is a virtual game MA should be able to locate the stolen items easy.

These aren't stolen. They are handed over voluntarily and with all the knowledge one can have about things that might could go wrong. That's why MA/FPC states that "all sales are final". They cannot and will not police for all the mistakes people make ingame.

If I give my bike to some street kid, because I don't want to pay $5 a day for a guarded bike parking lot. And I will say to him "just drive it around a bit, I'll be back in 2 hours an I want it back then".
What do you think that happens? How much attention do you think that the police will have for my case? Do you really believe that my insurance will pay me for my "loss"?

 

[jod]

No need to be harsh right away. Have you considered the fact that hiring definitely isn't the same as lending?!

In short i gave it as harsh as i read it.

Calling people 'F'cking idiots' for wanting to experience more from this game is not a little harsh wouldnt you say?

As for the lending/hiring its purely symantics it was given as an example of he himself perhaps borrows things in order to experience new things.

The difference between hiring/lending in the context i used it is neither here nor there.

And at no point did I advocate "lending my car to someone I have spoken to once or twice'

As you will see in my post I wont lend without collateral to someone unless I know I can be on their doorstep the next day.there is quite a difference there.

 

[Mercury]

Rental/Lending System:

Pros
Safety - No worries when allowing others to enjoy high end items
Added experience - More people could try the high end gear, possibly leading to them purchasing more skills and gear.
Cashflow POSITIVE - Many microtransactions due to lending.
Trust - A more trusthworthy environment in general for all of EU.

Cons
Item Barons - High end gear would be monopolized by those looking to make money off the less wealthy portion of the player base.
Cashflow NEGATIVE - Players with less money or time would likely not purchase high end gear. They'd feel rental was a better option and wouldn't try to upgrade their gear very often.

I probably overlooked a few but these are the main ones as I see them. I still lean towards having some sort of rental/lending system with a maximum number of items allowed to be leant out per day. It would really solve an age old problem inside Entropia. The trust scam is impossible to stop because these people put in months or even years to try to make 1 big score at the end.

In addition the ITEM LOCK should be placed on items which are dear to people (similar to the equipped item lock). This would prevent MANY easy accidents such as the repeatedly done mistake of medics trading a fap for their decay payment after a medic has finished fapping. I don't think it would be very hard to implement since they have the system in place to lock items on equipping.

 

[FallenAngel]

These aren't stolen. They are handed over voluntarily and with all the knowledge one can have about things that might could go wrong. That's why MA/FPC states that "all sales are final". They cannot and will not police for all the mistakes people make ingame.

If I give my bike to some street kid, because I don't want to pay $5 a day for a guarded bike parking lot. And I will say to him "just drive it around a bit, I'll be back in 2 hours an I want it back then".
What do you think that happens? How much attention do you think that the police will have for my case? Do you really believe that my insurance will pay me for my "loss"?

it is still theft or fraud or embezzlement.

 

[BlackHawk]

A safe lending system can be designed with limitations that prevent people to abuse it.

1. It can have a basic fee of 250 ped, so it will exclude many of the low level items.
2. Items must be full TT. For UL SIB items this hurts.
3. Items can not be traded back until the contract expires.
4. Minimum time for lending is 7 days. That will prevent sharing an item and changing the balance in game as it was said before.
5. You can only lend 10-15 items at a time (as suggested before)
6. Person who lends must put a colateral equal with the full TT of the item and this will be kept by the system while those items are used. That amount is returned when contract is terminated, or only the difference of TT if item is not full TT repaired. That because the return of the item to original owner should be automatic.


Such rules can be made by the balancing manager in order to prevent bad things to happen. They are smart people. I am sure they can come with something better than that. The point is that it can be done.

 

[Smoerble]

"our" problem is stuff gets scammed when stuff is lent,
this is something that would and should be trivial for Mindark to fix with a secure lending system.

Sorry, it is not my problem. I don't want to have a lending system in game.

Simply, because it will ruin the game experience.

I magine everyone can get hands on uber gear through renting. But only few uber items are there. A lot ppl will not try to skill up as hard as now. They will wait for their slot to rent the item. In the rest of the time their game experience sucks, they can't hunt uber mobs anymore, loot sucks blabla.

So MA would need to drop more uber items to give everyone a chance to be able to rent it? That's definately NOT what we all want.

 

[HardWrath]

A safe lending system can be designed with limitations that prevent people to abuse it.

1. It can have a basic fee of 250 ped, so it will exclude many of the low level items.
2. Items must be full TT. For UL SIB items this hurts.
3. Items can not be traded back until the contract expires.
4. Minimum time for lending is 7 days. That will prevent sharing an item and changing the balance in game as it was said before.
5. You can only lend 10-15 items at a time (as suggested before)
6. Person who lends must put a colateral equal with the full TT of the item and this will be kept by the system while those items are used. That amount is returned when contract is terminated, or only the difference of TT if item is not full TT repaired. That because the return of the item to original owner should be automatic.


Such rules can be made by the balancing manager in order to prevent bad things to happen. They are smart people. I am sure they can come with something better than that.

Exactly!

The point is that it can be done.

That point needs to be emphasized more

The point is that it can be done.

The point is that it can be done.

The point is that it can be done.

The point is that it can be done.

The point is that it can be done.

 

[Brooklyn]

i fail to see how this is "our" problem,
that is at best Mindarks problem,
"our" problem is stuff gets scammed when stuff is lent,
this is something that would and should be trivial for Mindark to fix with a secure lending system.

No your problem is to follow the sound practical advice that MindArk gives you and not lend stuff to begin with...

This as in all uber schemes has nothing to to about people being scammed or being taken advantage of or making mistakes but everything to do about using this incident as an excuse to create a hire for profit scheme... to make them richer... and trying to mask it as protection for alturistic lending to friends.

It is no accident that the biggest "Cartel Magnate" has jumped in to advocate and extoll the huge benefits of the rich man's scheme. We rich people will invest millions and you will all benefit from our largeness... and self interest. True just like IRL a few will... but everyone else will just be plain exploited.

As far as naming this new profession
and the scams that will develop from it
I think


"Loan Shark"
seems to be to be the term we are looking for.​

PS: BH spending half you life under communism doesn't make you wise to the pitfalls and evils of captialism, alternate or real.

 

[Gos]

Their's already a lending system

MA should just extend the (L) tag to all items and increase drop rate. It is a metter of balance for them. How often does Angel(L) drop?

 

[Kemp]

A safe lending system can be designed with limitations that prevent people to abuse it.

1. It can have a basic fee of 250 ped, so it will exclude many of the low level items.
2. Items must be full TT. For UL SIB items this hurts.
3. Items can not be traded back until the contract expires.
4. Minimum time for lending is 7 days. That will prevent sharing an item and changing the balance in game as it was said before.
5. You can only lend 10-15 items at a time (as suggested before)
6. Person who lends must put a colateral equal with the full TT of the item and this will be kept by the system while those items are used. That amount is returned when contract is terminated, or only the difference of TT if item is not full TT repaired. That because the return of the item to original owner should be automatic.


Such rules can be made by the balancing manager in order to prevent bad things to happen. They are smart people. I am sure they can come with something better than that. The point is that it can be done.

Your points 1,2 and 6 are bogus.
1 isn't fair. Why should some n00b cannot lend a Vigilante armor from some mid lvl player.
2 isn't good because (L) items are excluded. Needs some other solution which i cannot think of fast enough.
6 Collateral isn't needed if item gets returned to the owner automatically.

Sorry, it is not my problem. I don't want to have a lending system in game.

Simply, because it will ruin the game experience.

I magine everyone can get hands on uber gear through renting. But only few uber items are there. A lot ppl will not try to skill up as hard as now. They will wait for their slot to rent the item. In the rest of the time their game experience sucks, they can't hunt uber mobs anymore, loot sucks blabla.

So MA would need to drop more uber items to give everyone a chance to be able to rent it? That's definately NOT what we all want.

True


The whole issue of a lending system mostly pops up when some "über", and that doesn't necessarily mean über smart, fucks up some of his/her very valuable items.
But it doesn't contribute to general gameplay at all. I'd rather have MA/FPC blowing new/better life in Mindforce/Estate market/general loot/bugfixing/new content etc etc etc...
Not in consuming a lot of resources (our ped that won't return to the lootpool) in order to protect some high end item owners from scrweing up.


Furthermore I still hope everything works out. And of course, the person who did this is an arse!

 

[Bernz]

We all know it's very risky to lend items but peoples do it anyway. I will never understand why in hell they do that.

I agree it would be nice to have a renting system but it will affect the economy for sure except it MA nerf this a lot.



Here is how I would do that to avoid monopoly .....

MA could tag the items that are subject to be monopolized (MM, Mod-FAP ect.) and allow avatars to but only one of them.

If you already have one, you cant buy another one. You can loot another one (good for you if it happen) but you cant buy a second if you already own one.

If you try to buy a 2nd MM (ex.) from auction or in PvP trade, a pop-up would appear telling: "You already own one of this item. One is more than enough. However you are free to loot another one if you are lucky enough."


.

 

[HardWrath]

Rental/Lending System:

Pros
Safety - No worries when allowing others to enjoy high end items
Added experience - More people could try the high end gear, possibly leading to them purchasing more skills and gear.
Cashflow POSITIVE - Many microtransactions due to lending.
Trust - A more trusthworthy environment in general for all of EU.

There are a lot more positives then that

Cons
Item Barons - High end gear would be monopolized by those looking to make money off the less wealthy portion of the player base.

No not off the "less wealthy" portion or any other specific portion... they would try to make money off of the whole player base. There is nothing evil about making money. Don’t forget, it’s why we all "work" in one way or another.

The opportunity to earn money is the primary attraction to the Entropia Universe.

Cashflow NEGATIVE - Players with less money or time would likely not purchase high end gear. They'd feel rental was a better option and wouldn't try to upgrade their gear very often.

No it’s not cash flow negative.

Players with less money don’t buy high end gear anyway simply because they cannot afford it. A rental system would give them access to the items that cost tens of thousands of dollars.

It would be cash flow positive. People with less money would deposit to pay for the cost to rent the items and they would deposit to pay for the ammo needed to use the item... not to mention all of the decay involved.

With a rental system in place these high-end items would come out of storage and actually get some usage in game. Instead with the current system people sit on a lot of these items hoping the price will go up so they can sell them and make a profit.

If anything, the people with "less money" who can scrape together the funds for a high level item would be more inclined to do so because the item is a potential profit center through fees paid by others to use the item. Furthermore, the item is now a more attractive investment because of the earning potential but more importantly the value of the item itself would begin to rise.

On every level, a rental system would encourage more deposits and more game play which fuels the cyclical consumption needed to keep the EU economy healthy.

 

[Smoerble]

Hm, I can out it in other words:

If you want a game with Player vs Player contracts, you need to leave and play "the space MMO". Mindark claimed they will not do it, and I think, they should not.

That's why I play this game and don't play "the other". If people really need it that hard, they need to leave and play a different game.

Obivously they stay at Entropia, so it can't be as bad as you all claim here.

 

[HardWrath]

Hm, I can out it in other words:

If you want a game with Player vs Player contracts, you need to leave and play "the space MMO". Mindark claimed they will not do it, and I think, they should not.

That's why I play this game and don't play "the other". If people really need it that hard, they need to leave and play a different game.

Obivously they stay at Entropia, so it can't be as bad as you all claim here.

If you look at how many people are actually active in the professions in EU compared to what it was 2 years ago then you will see that something needs to change and it needs to change now.

There are about 5,000 people who are active enough in the professions to have gotten at least 1 global in the last 30-days. That’s a pretty small number.

In EU there are about 2300 societies left and in them are approximately 30,000 avatars. We can only guess how many freelancers there are. Of all of those people, only about 5K have globaled once in the last 30 days.

Out of those 5,000 people, only a couple thousand are considered to be "very active" in hunting, mining, or crafting.

Now, how many hundreds of thousands of people have downloaded and installed EU?

 

[mastermesh]

biggest issues...

Here's some of the biggest Issues I see with the ideas of renting out items:

Who flips the bill on the repairs - the "owner" or the renter? What if Renter agrees to pay for repairs but does not have enough cash on them?

What about (L)? Surely you could not "lend" L unless you are somehow making a ton of cash up front off the deal in some way, especially since it's not repairable?

What about stackables? Same problems with (L) stuff. I guess if they paid Markup up front to "rent" a stack or L, and then get back the Markup on only the portion they did not use when item is returned to original owner it would be ok. It would take a pretty complex system to make it work right though I think.

 

[Spin Rep Pitt]

i would like to clear one point:

we or at least me didnt rent for a fee it was free to use for just 5 days while i was on vacation.

all i wanted was to improve my friends gameplay

 

[RickNinjaHunter]

In cases when such scams happen, we need help from MA. And we do not need the help only to help the victims. But to help also the game. How can EU be the safest virtual universe when people can lose huge sums of money in one click because it is no system to protect the value they have?
At this point it seems that all we can do is to treat each other like thieves. Because is good for the balance... How does this sound for any sane person?

Umm yea, all I can say is Shit Happens. Where was you all "Angelic" like when I was being taken for a ride by one of your Army Buddies:"Cold Theif Nightwalker" Or does you memory suddenly fail you? All I can say is well,

What goes around comes back twice as hard... +REP to Karma

Rick

 

[HardWrath]

But it doesn't contribute to general gameplay at all. I'd rather have MA/FPC blowing new/better life in Mindforce/Estate market/general loot/bugfixing/new content etc etc etc...

Even if you never rent an item or make an item available to be rented, a rental system would affect your general game play in a very positive way no matter how uber or how much of a noob you are.

 

[Kemp]

If you look at how many people are actually active in the professions in EU compared to what it was 2 years ago then you will see that something needs to change and it needs to change now.

There are about 5,000 people who are active enough in the professions to have gotten at least 1 global in the last 30-days. That’s a pretty small number.

In EU there are about 2300 societies left and in them are approximately 30,000 avatars. We can only guess how many freelancers there are. Of all of those people, only about 5K have globaled once in the last 30 days.

Out of those 5,000 people, only a couple thousand are considered to be "very active" in hunting, mining, or crafting.

Now, how many hundreds of thousands of people have downloaded and installed EU?

I don't see the link?! You really believe that a lending system WILL bring in those new players?
Not the "spend the developing money on blowing new/better life in Mindforce/Estate market/general loot/bugfixing/new content" part tat I wrote a few posts ago...

I am really sorry for all people involved, but I really think MA has better things to do then preventing people to screw up. They already did a great lot on that by adding the goldcard, by letting people buy back tt-ed items for 1000 ped and by making you confirm twice on all transactions ingame.

 

[Mega]

Three people all loaned expensive items to someone in their society that they trusted. It turns out that the "trusted" person was also allowing a friend to access his avatar. The person who was accessing his avatar took all of the items and transferred them to a brand new avatar.

The one word that occurs to me is

"cousin" ?

I hope that whoever pulled this scam off is unsuccessful in finanically gaining from it and that those who lost items are able to have them returned.

 

[RickNinjaHunter]

i would like to clear one point:

we or at least me didnt rent for a fee it was free to use for just 5 days while i was on vacation.

all i wanted was to improve my friends gameplay

Spin, I am truly sorry for your loss mate.. but maybe you should re-consider "who" your friends truly are... People can be very elegant in written speach, and can make you believe the Moon is made of cheese.. My point is I learnt the hard way who, and who not, to trust in this game.. and it may or may not have cost me as much as your loss, however it's a lesson learnt the hard way.. The parties involved now, appear to be well respected members of the community, and believe in that virtual respect is the first step towards your downfall. Please don't take mey previous post as directed to you, its quite clear who I am calling out of the darkness right now.. or maybe its not so crystal...

Rick