scammers and loop holes

[Thearlygamer]

while also giving scammers the hint that as long as it’s a player made deal and can get away with it then scam all you want for financial gain.

* as long as it's an unofficial and unprotected player-made deal

This is what I mean by using words to loop hole a system, sure lets say it's unofficial, but most players that are scammed most likely don't even know there's an official way of doing these deals that would protect them, let alone post a PMD before every stake every single time.

It's also worth noting that your definition of a scammer is much broader than its common meaning. Normally a scam only refers to forms of organised fraud, and you can bet that if someone was going around systematically trying to con players we would try to put a stop to it. What you call a scammer is anyone who doesn't keep their word. By that definition we are all scammers, because I'm sure we have all failed to keep our word at one point or another (and would have found it eerily totalitarian if the police showed up at our door to intercede).

Again NOBODY expects someone to use the webster dictionary definition to define what a scammer is on OSRS, PkHonor, or any RSPS at that. What 99.99% of players consider a scammer is someone being scummy snake who does wrong to another, if you think I'm the only one who thinks that I wouldn't mind asking around and getting some responses from anyone else.

You're playing a casual game of poker and catch your friend peeking at your cards? OMG SCAMMER, CALL THE POLICE!
You make a bet with someone and they refuse to pay up? SUE THAT CRIMINAL!

You're making it sound exaggerated to say the least.. even a game like Poker has rules and if you catch someone peeking at your hand damn right you're going to be mad, call them out, and have them punished. You assume it's a casual game with a "friend" when in fact its a scumbag trying to cheat you while the same scumbag is the referee of the game. Not to mention a lot of players don't just play this game casually, some spend a lot and I mean A LOT of time and IRL money to enjoy this game, so I think it should be taken very seriously when someone is scammed any amount. Just for reference the 150b if there wasn't public out cry and if it wasn't returned would be equivalant to 50 hours of their time at some of the best money making areas to recoup that, and all to a mod being a snake.

Seriously WTF. Aside from serious formal agreements (i.e. the system we already have), do you really think it's appropriate to insist on authoritarian interdiction in every situation to ensure everyone acts like angels all the time? We don't even do that in real life, why on earth would we do that in a game...

Yes, yes I do, because staff should be there to help and protect players when it's obvious its a scam (again with proper proof like I've mentioned before) and they can use whatever logs possible to back it up, if it doesn't back up then we move on with it, but when there is all this in front of us again we see another scammer go free along with any winnings they made from it (thinking of the Taylor Gang situation specifically on this one).

I'm perfectly willing to accept video evidence for fights instead of having a staff referee, but the deal still needs to be posted beforehand. This is not only a matter of evidence (because again, you can choose which parts of the agreement you include in your video as it suits your interests), but also in large part because both players need to be aware of and acknowledge that they are engaging in a legally binding agreement. The idea that every word you say automatically constitutes a legal contract and staff will police all your interactions to ensure you are nothing but truthful is something I find absolutely dystopian.

You know better than me the % of our players who use the forums let alone bother enough to make an account and post, again no one is going to post every agreement before hand. It's lazy, but it's true I only ask that when it's a blatant scam that staff do something about it other than throw their hands in the air and say even though we have ALL the evidence we can't do anything about it.

I think it’s focused more on then finding a way to avoid being scammed and less on the real issue we’ve brought up that once they’ve been scammed, regardless of how it happened, the person who scammed isn’t only not punished, they’re left with the money or items they scammed and get to keep enjoying their days on the server with no serious repercussions and I think that’s what will drive the drama train and we’ll have another multi page thread on how a scammer scammed without being punished

That might be a necessary (or rather justifiable) evil.

As I see it the comparison is something like this (based on my observations):

tl;dr: the reduction in scamming that results from people engaging in official agreements outweighs the increase in scamming that occurs in the leftover unprotected deals.

[/quote]
In no way whatsoever would I ever agree its necessary nor justifiable to allow a scammer scumbag to do these things and run free with the money and no punishment I don't care what system is in place, this is an issue people have everywhere and this is exactly why people lose faith in the game they play because they know if someone scams them it's possible they receive no punishment and their items are kept by the scammer. I'm not saying the system will ever be 100% perfect and some people might slip through, but you shouldn't allow people to walk free when you have all the evidence just because a system is telling you you can't do anything when youre the ones who created the system. I agree with Patel for cases like these that there should be some plyability when it's so blatantly obvious what happened and now you have a large group of players not only mad at the scammer but also untrustful of the staff team who decided to not speak up and the system that allowed this to go unpunished.

Currently people are mad at the server. People were upset with Arrsenic in the last thread but quite a few are upset with the server (its rules & staff) too. 24 pages and ~half of them are directed at the ruling.

This uproar has nothing to do with the question of "only official deals" vs "try to protect all deals". It's simply a matter of what is illegal under our rules. This was an official deal and that is ultimately what protected it (the money was refunded, remember). If we tried to protect all player-made deals the result would've been the same. The current outcry that it should be illegal and punishable, even though it wasn't illegal, is entirely unrelated to the discussion at hand.

To be fair the discussion is only at hand because of the recent out cry. If there was no wrong doing the money should not have been refunded, but we all know it was wrong, and it was so obviously wrong that Arrsenic tried to cover it up in those pms directly to the player by using loop holes to argue his way, look at my freaking signature and the signature of many others for crying out loud. This is not a small 'oops a good staff member dropped the ball' this is a staff member not only messing up with being dishonest, not only trying to loop hole out of it, but also someone who has a history of this and in opportunity showed his true colors.

The whole "it isn't illegal at the time so it goes unpunished" is as much an argument a player will make when they say "well it's not a bug until it's reported so until then it's a feature" while it's a game breaking thing they do.

Nonsense. Rules are rules. You want us to punish someone who didn't break any rules because you don't like what he did. That isn't us selectively enforcing the rules, that's you trying to enforce rules that don't exist. That is justice of the mob, which isn't justice at all.

On this note I personally think I can see where you stand on this whole discussion. If this mindset was kept there would never be progress and people would continue to be angry with the system. It was laws that allowed for some of the most vile things happen in human history, that doesn't mean it's okay or right nor does it mean it shouldn't go unpunished just because there wasn't a law by the time people found out these injustices were happening.

[Patel]

Yes, yes I do, because staff should be there to help and protect players

It really is this simple.

Idk, it seems like these examples are increasingly removed from the context of the situation. I genuinely feel you're just out of touch with what's going on here @Rapsey. I'm not sure there's a string of words I could say to convince you that this was a scam, and you have to operate on that basis to accept any suggestion that's been made on the rule. The only rational reason behind any of this, to me, is that Arrsenic presents some greater value to you and Mike that anyone is aware of. He mentioned something about working with Mike the other day when I was talking to him in SZ. I didn't think anything of it, hell I thought he was lying about it, but it might actually have been a grain of truth

[Ozymandias]

Yes, yes I do, because staff should be there to help and protect players

It really is this simple.

Idk, it seems like these examples are increasingly removed from the context of the situation. I genuinely feel you're just out of touch with what's going on here @Rapsey. I'm not sure there's a string of words I could say to convince you that this was a scam, and you have to operate on that basis to accept any suggestion that's been made on the rule. The only rational reason behind any of this, to me, is that Arrsenic presents some greater value to you and Mike that anyone is aware of. He mentioned something about working with Mike the other day when I was talking to him in SZ. I didn't think anything of it, hell I thought he was lying about it, but it might actually have been a grain of truth

You can't blame Pierre for this though. As I said, Pkhonor is a corporate business that considers this server a product. Pierre probably has less than 20 hours of total playtime since he started working on it. So that's why he's so out of touch and he has no morals. It could've been better if he put the customers as priority instead. What he's basically doing is just asserting dominance with his "status" even though he has no idea what common sense is for the playerbase.
To keep it simple for him if he bothers reading this : It's about time you get to know your community, even though some of us are toxic and you may be scared of us, we are usually humble outside of that and have a better view on what should be allowed and what not.

[Nazuths]

Yes, yes I do, because staff should be there to help and protect players

It really is this simple.

Idk, it seems like these examples are increasingly removed from the context of the situation. I genuinely feel you're just out of touch with what's going on here @Rapsey. I'm not sure there's a string of words I could say to convince you that this was a scam, and you have to operate on that basis to accept any suggestion that's been made on the rule. The only rational reason behind any of this, to me, is that Arrsenic presents some greater value to you and Mike that anyone is aware of. He mentioned something about working with Mike the other day when I was talking to him in SZ. I didn't think anything of it, hell I thought he was lying about it, but it might actually have been a grain of truth

You can't blame Pierre for this though. As I said, Pkhonor is a corporate business that considers this server a product. Pierre probably has less than 20 hours of total playtime since he started working on it. So that's why he's so out of touch and he has no morals. It could've been better if he put the customers as priority instead. What he's basically doing is just asserting dominance with his "status" even though he has no idea what common sense is for the playerbase.
To keep it simple for him if he bothers reading this : It's about time you get to know your community, even though some of us are toxic and you may be scared of us, we are usually humble outside of that and have a better view on what should be allowed and what not.

Holy crap, I've tried ignoring all the comments you've made recently but you just keep going on with bullshit comments about things you have no clue about.

Really? You guys are usually "Humble" and "have a better view"? If anything, from your comments, the complete opposite is true. I've seen nothing but destructive feedback from you and ad hominem attacks on Rapsey to discredit all the work he has and is doing for PkHonor, which again, you have no clue about. If you're trying to partake in the conversation, come with factual statements and not ridiculous assumptions of how PkHonor is a corporate business led by a tiran who knows nothing about the game.

Honestly prior to even commenting on you, I was told to just ignore you. I probably should have, but anyone who dares bad mouth my daddy Rapsey should at least come with good arguments and not with this bullshit. Put this energy into something you enjoy doing or something that has a better ROI, clearly you're not welcome on PkHonor and it's clear to see why.

Yes, yes I do, because staff should be there to help and protect players

It really is this simple.

Idk, it seems like these examples are increasingly removed from the context of the situation. I genuinely feel you're just out of touch with what's going on here @Rapsey. I'm not sure there's a string of words I could say to convince you that this was a scam, and you have to operate on that basis to accept any suggestion that's been made on the rule. The only rational reason behind any of this, to me, is that Arrsenic presents some greater value to you and Mike that anyone is aware of. He mentioned something about working with Mike the other day when I was talking to him in SZ. I didn't think anything of it, hell I thought he was lying about it, but it might actually have been a grain of truth

Patel, I really like you as a person but I think this comment is absolutely ridiculous.

First of all, this thread was simply created to deal with the current player-made deal situation. I'm unsure why in every thread you have to include the specific Arrsenic situation. Sure he's hot topic now but I feel like he's already had enough shit from everyone, can we maybe stop dragging him through the mud time and time again when he's not even the main subject?

Second of all, I find it a real low blow that you include information from what I know was a private conversation between you and Arrsenic and act as if that part specifically is the ONLY possible rational reason behind any of this... Come on Patel, first of all that is a major lack of respect for privacy and it makes it hard for me personally to trust you with anything. Secondly, there is no way you actually believe this to be true..

Third of all, just because Rapsey has a different outlook on the situation, doesn't mean he's out of touch with what's going on. I play PkHonor every day and I see where he's coming from and I personally prefer the current way of handling it as well. It prevents people from lending out 20 druidic sets to 20 players and then just expect all 20 sets to return safely to the owner. And if they don't get returned, the Staff team will be expected to go through all cases and make sure the set is returned.. I don't think we should be awarding carelessness with our effort in solving the situation. In my opinion, you shouldn't blatanly trust any person you come across. If you're that gullible you should 100% stay away from the G.E on OSRS. There's dozens of scam bots that promise you a great deal but we all know what really happens... Surely no one here would fall for any of these bots. I think the general statement if you don't wanna put in the effort to be careful or take 1 minute to fill out the PMD thread on the Forums, then why should we put all our efforts into resolving your situation.

This is just my personal take on it.

[Isaac]

Ha ha forums goes *BRRT*

[Lykos]

Both sides are taking this to an extreme.

On one side, we have people argue that staff needs to take care of every scam related issue for us since it's their job, demote and punish Arrsenic, redo the entire PMD process to make it more in favor for the community, stop avoiding issues just because it wasn't officiated in a forum post, and to stop loopholing shenanigans in its entirety.

On the other side, we have people argue that this is just the way it is, staff always has this hands-off approach to these situations so it should remain because it has always worked, if you get suckered into a scam or loophole then it is your fault because you should've known better or been more careful, the whole Arrsenic situation was just a misunderstanding, and also everything Rapsey says is final.

Perhaps the only way to calm everyone down and move forward is to find the right mix of both sides and fall in-between.

• Leave the system that we have exactly as is but demote/ban Arrsenic as an example?

• Very clearly change the PMD system to better suite the players needs and prevent issues like this arising again, but keep Arrsenic as a staff member due to the misunderstanding?

• Loopholes are a top priority in terms of rules and will be punished severely no matter the player or status, Arrsenic is demoted, but the PMD process remains the same?

I don't know the right answer? But I believe all people want is a firm front page post deciding what is going to happen from now on so we, as a community, can move on.

[Fungamer]

. I think the general statement if you don't wanna put in the effort to be careful or take 1 minute to fill out the PMD thread on the Forums,

Yes, we can call players lazy and stupid for not making a thread and honestly, we all are. But you know what those people will do? They'll go to any other server because they're allowed to be lazy and stupid over there.
So yeah, at this point, to me, this dependance on the system sounds like we're adding to the list of things why people should not play PKH rather than the list of why people should choose PKH over another server.

Amount of people who dont bother with PMD threads is far higher than those who do and that wont really change. PKH is the only server that does this AFAIK and it's not a "nice quirk" or selling point that makes PKH unique

why should we put all our efforts into resolving your situation.

Because you're a mod and chose to put effort into the server and its community?????



What happened to being able to trust someone to not scam you without having to do literal paperwork? What happened to regular screenshots?

Jfc, the average PKH player isn't some genius scamming mastermind that'll fake screenshots with photoshop or paint. I was a mod myself for a good while with the "old" system and there weren't any reports made to frame a person. There weren't any people who were ridiculously mad because their screenshots weren't enough because the mods either explained it to the victim and kept the person who was accused under some supervision or they actually investigated the case and talked to people to be able to come to a conclusion alongside the screenshots that weren't 100% sufficient on their own.

I 100% agree with @Patel:

these examples are increasingly removed from the context of the situation.

And as Rapsey said, it's a game. So why are we even pretending like we're making some perfect ethical system based on the works of moral philosophers and linking fuckin' wikipedia articles to logical fallacies?

It all comes down to one thing:
Players want staff to protect them more instead of throwing their hands up because the players didn't do paperwork. They don't want scammers to get away with scams or if we're still gonna be nitpicking on the definition of a scam pick one of these words: Swindling, deceiving, being a rat, being a POS.

And while yes, mob justice isn't the best, at some point mob justice turns into democracy and it should be considered since we're, y'know, the community-driven RSPS.

[Patel]

First of all, this thread was simply created to deal with the current player-made deal situation. I'm unsure why in every thread you have to include the specific Arrsenic situation

How is Arrsenic not related to the current player made deal situation? That's what sparked this whole discussion, and my argument has specifically been against this idea:

- mods can be bystanders in deception between two players while middlemanning.

I've even clarified that was my position like twice. I don't care to see Arrsenic punished, to me it's besides the point now.

Second of all, I find it a real low blow that you include information from what I know was a private conversation between you and Arrsenic and act as if that part specifically is the ONLY possible rational reason behind any of this... Come on Patel, first of all that is a major lack of respect for privacy and it makes it hard for me personally to trust you with anything. Secondly, there is no way you actually believe this to be true..

Ely was 2 squares away 75% of the time. Him and I were chatting and having our own separate conversation while I was talking to Arrsenic. How is that private?

Also you've never trusted me with anything before... Like come on man. We don't actually communicate all that much. I see something amiss and I argue in favor of fixing it. That was the case when people were doxxing a mod way back when, and I thought it was ridiculous that staff could passively watch and do nothing because the evidence was not "from Pkhonor". I never followed up on it but hopefully things were resolved.

Edit: as for it being true... Well is it? I wouldn't bet my life on it but it was a detail that came up.

Edit 2: also man, if you know what that conversation was about you know I haven't violated Arrsenic's trust. He told me plenty about his life and I truly respect it and wouldn't share that with people. But this detail about bugs and Mike? That was a pretty bold claim and seems like something he put into the argument that he made to me, but left out when he made that same argument on the forums. Of course I'm gonna bring that up. It shouldn't have sounded so mysterious or like a conspiracy on my end though.

It's this same passive attitude that I despise when it comes to doing a little extra to watch out for players. I've already clarified that it's not supposed to work 100% of the time, it's just supposed to work when there's evidence available. The current system (or similar to it) where mods middleman and record people's agreement is generally ok. It shouldn't be the limitation of what mods are encouraged to do, and it certainly shouldn't prevent them from protecting players from deception.

[Patel]

As I said, Pkhonor is a corporate business that considers this server a product. Pierre probably has less than 20 hours of total playtime since he started working on it.

I think it's worth mentioning that this is BS. If Pkhonor was run like a business they'd have cashed in on it back in its hayday. There are too many examples of it not being profit-run

Edit: who the heck is Pierre

Edit 2: Well, maybe profit run is the wrong term. I just mean that money is not the priority.

[Fungamer]

As I said, Pkhonor is a corporate business that considers this server a product. Pierre probably has less than 20 hours of total playtime since he started working on it.

I think it's worth mentioning that this is BS. If Pkhonor was run like a business they'd have cashed in on it back in its hayday. There are too many examples of it not being profit driven

Edit: who the heck is Pierre

Pierrot is a stock character of pantomime and commedia dell'arte whose origins are in the late seventeenth-century Italian troupe of players performing in Paris and known as the Comédie-Italienne; the name is a diminutive of Pierre, via the suffix -ot.

TLDR he's basically calling Rapsey a clown, original way to do so, I have to give him that.