Scams

This is not meant to promote scams but to prevent scams. Please note that using these ideas will result in action against the players' account. All of these scams have been noted and acknowledged or submitted to Jagex.

Cheats
The writers of RuneScape are well versed in their game control. In just a few years time they learned the ways of their scripts to make it very difficult for the average player of the game to "cheat the code" used in getting anything. There was a time of finding bugs and gaining skill experience and item duplication with the aid of editing the saved script in your computer, to using 3rd party programs that did the work for you. But as mentioned, the writers have friends too. And they have seen and continue to see most all of these programs. The latest is to change the "detectable colour field" of mining ore to less than 10% of the overall rock colour to prevent automining. (Even though the advent of Rock Golems seemed to slow this cheat down quite a bit.)

The days of game cheats are at an end. Most that are advertised on the world wide web usually are for the old Classic Runescape format and not for RS2. On top of that, those that visit a vast majority of these site are subject to "keyloggers" and hackers that prey on the players that know little enough of the game, let alone the ravages of the web, and have their accounts stolen by giving out their User Names and Passwords or other sensitive data on their computers.

Example: A player macros this advertisement:

"Want to type fast like me? Visit www.somehackingwebsite.com" (The ".com" is usually substituted with something else, due to Jagex's chat censors.)

Those who find "bugs" in the game usually report them now within minutes of any new release in the game. Those exploiting the bugs are found and have their accounts removed only to make a new account and try all over again.

Scamming
"In game" scamming has been going on probably since the game went public. The rephrased phrase of "Scam me once, shame on you... Scam me twice, shame on me." comes to mind. Scams vary and have the same frustrating effect as in all web based games. The extent of damage from a scam is probably more of a threat psychologically, but remember, it's only a game. Scams include but are not limited to the following.

Jagex staff impersonation scam
Unless there is a GOLD Crown in front of their chat screen name, they are NOT JaGex staff. These people have but one thing in mind: stealing your account. Besides, JaGex would NEVER ask for your password, no matter what.

Example: "Hi. I'm with jagex and I can make one (or all or part of) your levels set high. Just give me your password."

Prevention: EVEN if they do have a crown next to their name, DO NOT give them your password and report it to JaGex immediately through the "Report Abuse" button.

Trust scam
Example: "Whoever trades me the highest worth item wins"

Prevention: Do not give him anything and report the scammer.

Password scam
Example: "Look! Jagex won't allow you to type your pass! Mine is *******!".

Status: This scam is declining in popularity, since everyone has heard of it, and almost no one falls for it

Prevention: DO NOT say your password out loud; it DOES NOT get blocked by JaGex's censor. Instead, report him. If you do say your password out loud, change your password ASAP.

Drop scam
Example: "Follow me, now drop your items and press ALT-DOWN-UP or CTRL-W or ALT-F4 to double them" (it closes the window, leaving them to collect your items)

Prevention: CTRL-W and ALT-F4 tell your computer to close the window. By dropping your items and pressing either combination, you are effectively logging yourself out before you can retrieve your (non-duplicated) item(s). Don't drop your items and report the rotten scammer.

Armour trimming
Trimmed armour is a reward from Treasure Trails and normal armor cannot be trimmed by anybody ingame, not player nor NPC. Immediately report anyone offering to trim armour, as they are all scammers trying to steal it.

Status: This scam was extremely popular just after trimmed armor came out, but is now rare to see, since now everyone knows about trimmed armor

Prevention: Never fall for this; and report the scammer.

Trust trades
Trust trades are when you give the supplies required to make an item to a player with the promise that they will give you the final product. For example, a player offering free gem cutting, or offering to make armor for you if you give them bars. While these are not always scams, you should be wary when doing any sort of trust trade. Often, honest players will recognize this, and instead give you a final product in exchange for the supplies, such as swapping cut gems for uncuts, or armor or weapons for bars.

Prevention: Be wary of any trust trades and always ask for the final product in exchange for your supplies. Also, you can trust high level players more than low level, because items involved in trust trades rarely exceed a few thousand coins, too low of an amount to risk getting their accounts banned to get. Note:This is not always true, some high level players will still try to scam you, although there is a better chance that they will not, than with a lower level player.

Account sale
Against Jagex rules, and highly risky, as the recovery questions can be used to grab the account back, even if you change the password.

Prevention: Report the account seller.

False RuneScape website
There are players who copy the runescape webpage and change some details that asking your username and your password.

Prevention: In the real runescape website, they specifically ask for you NEVER to enter your username and password anywhere but at www.runescape.com.

Email scam
Jagex will NEVER send you messages in your email, so any emails claiming to need your password to make your account a moderator, or to confirm that it hasn't been stolen, are frauds.

Prevention: Don't give out your password and report the email to Jagex

Cheat program scam
It is quite possible for some of the unofficial clients, macros, tools, etc. to contain password stealing keyloggers. If this should ever happen to you, use anti-spyware tools to detect and rid of them.

Prevention: Run anti-virus programs like Norton AntiVirus or McAfee VirusScan every few days.

Dungeon death scam
This scam involves luring you into a dungeon where you need a light source or else you are damaged. They give you a candle and a tinderbox and lead you deep into the dungeon. There, they say that they need a tinderbox (yours). They keep the tinderbox and wait for your candle to go out. When your candle does go out, the dungeon goes dark, making it hard to get out, and you are killed by cave bugs. The scammers take your items. There are variants where players lure other players into the wilderness, or have a multi-attack monster follow them so they will also attack an unprepared player or to tricking a monster to attack another player.

Prevention: Do not give out your item if you need it to survive in the dungeon. Teleportation runes, a games necklace, a ring of dueling, or other escape items commonly brought to (all) dungeons and dangerous areas can be a useful failsafe. If you move into an area that you do not know, only take items that you can afford to lose when you inadvertently get killed. Magic teleport tablets offer a guaranteed (not magic level dependant) and very fast (compared to duel rings and so on) escape option.

Trade scam
Another favourite is the changing of items on the "secondary" or "final" trade screen. One should always refrain from pressure to "Just hit the accept trade" button, and carefully review it first. A large majority of scams occur here. The quantity or value is changed (say, from 200,000 coins to 20,000 coins) just a split second before the final accept screen often using some computer program to do the switch and accept operations. The trade partners flies through the trade process, enticing other players to quickly complete an attractive deal. In this haste, people can lose quite a bit. Players often put on the line a noted item and at the last second, as above, they will switch it to another noted item that looks the same (for example, a Rune Scimitar to a Mithril scimitar).

Prevention: Take extra care with noted non-bulk items, move your cursor over the items to view their names, and always check the confirmation screen twice (read it!). '''If scamming does occur it is important to report immediately! do not hesitate and try to bargain your goods back as if the players have not traded recently afterwards the report will not be accepted.'''

Εxtortion scam
Players will at times attempt to extort cash from others. A good example is the pickaxe head scam: when a pickaxe head flies off due to the random event, other players will pick the head up, and demand an absurd price to get it back.

Prevention: Set your character's speed to run (in the game settings window, marked with a wrench), and be aware of what is happening while you are mining.

"Rare" items
Many players try to find items that are not commonly seen, yet not at all difficult to obtain. They go to a popular world and try to pass these items off as rare, taking advantage of the fact that not many people know about these items. This was becoming such a problem that Jagex made the Yin-Yang Amulet (purchasable from the Make-Over-Mage just soutwest of Falador for 100 coins) untradable. Jagex figured that since not many people read the Letters from the Hedge page where it was first mentioned, not many people would know about them. Sure enough, players who had not yet realized that the amulets were untradable were seen selling them for 100,000+ coins.

The rare items that players commonly try to pass off rare, but are actually worthless, are: The actual list is much longer, and with each new update, a new one is potentially added. A good rule of thumb is to never buy anything unless you're sure of it's actual value.
 * Muddy Keys (only worth around 5,000 coins, used to get a small treasure from the muddy chest in lvl 45 Wilderness)
 * Cooking Apples (used in cooking and quests, not rare)
 * Charcoal (worthless except for some members quests)
 * Sliced Bannana (worthless, heals 1 hp)
 * Spinach Rolls (worthless, heals 2 hp)
 * Burnt Bones (worthless, gives the same prayer xp as normal bones)
 * Locust meat (worthless, a members quest item that is for some reason tradable in non member servers)

Advert scam
Many Runscape fansites, even the most reputable, face a perpetual battle with their ad-serving companies to weed out often inappropriate adverts, for things which are likely to get your account banned, or worthless "guides" that rehash the material any good fansite or forum gives you free.

Example:

Service scam
You've probably seen people saying things like "Free gem cutting," "Free smithing," "Identifying herbs." Many people who claim to be offering a free service are honest and will simply do the work for the experience. However whenever you're giving someone something for nothing, even for just a second, there is a risk of being scammed. Here's a few things you can do to keep yourself safe:


 * If possible, check if the high scores to see if the person has the stats to do what they're claiming to do. If someone wants to smith your rune bars for you and they are only level 50 smithing, they're definitely a scammer.
 * Ask the person to trade the finished product for the raw materials. Instead of giving the person 5 rune bars to make you a rune plate body, ask to trade the bars straight up for an already-made plate body.  If they refuse, they might not be a scammer, but it would be risky to give them your materials.
 * Make sure that the finished product is actually worth more than the raw materials. Many people have someone else cut their gems for them because they mistakenly believe that cut gems are worth more than uncuts.

Arbitrage scam
This is a group of two or more people item scamming. They will take a somewhat unknown item such as a spinach roll for the scam. Scammer1: Selling Spinach Roll, 900k Scammer2: Buying Spinach Roll, 1.3 mil

The intent is that someone buys from scammer one with the intent to sell to scammer two and make a profit. When someone buys from scammer one, both scammers put the buyer on ignore and world hop. What you can do to avoid this:


 * Check the street price of the item on a respectable fan-site.
 * If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.
 * Report them both.