Scamming

Scamming involves conversing with potential targets and convincing them to send money for a ruse. Responses are gained through spamming emails to a player's email database, which is grown by farming email addresses.

Once a player has a response, they can begin conversing with the recipient. A number of responses are available, each moving the mark's cursor. Once a mark's cursor has landed in a green reward zone, a player will be able to capitalize and get the mark to send the cash.

Several other zones exist on a mark's bar, including a temptation zone, which will immediately boost towards a reward zone, a concern zone, which a player will be stuck on until they have spent enough nerve resolving the concern, and red zones, which will result in an immediate critical failure, removing the mark from the list.

The phases of scamming can be divided into 4 main sections:

Collecting Email Addresses

There are currently 3 ways in which a player can acquire new email addresses:

Farming Email Addresses

A player can spend eight Nerve to farm email addresses, adding to the total count of emails addresses available to send spam mail to. The more email addresses a player has, the more responses they will receive.

Farming emails can increase the email count by a minimum of 70 and a maximum of 200.

Having money on hand (between $250 and $3,000) may sometimes result in increased emails farmed, between 200 and 700.

Completing the "CMT2130 Web Security and Penetration Testing" education course will unlock the extraction of email addresses through data breaches. This will sometimes result in increased emails farmed, between 700 and 1,200.

Phishing Email Addresses

The Phisher is a tool for scamming unlocked through the "CMT2230 Web Design and Development" education course.

Once unlocked, the phisher must be activated using the "Farm Email Addresses" subcrime. It may take a few attempts to get it running. Once activated, the phisher will passively gather email addresses for the player over the course of 8 to 12 days, collecting between 6,000 and 9,000 emails during that time.

Over time the phisher will eventually disable itself and will need to be restarted

Pictured: Active Phisher

Scraping Email Addresses

The Scraper is a tool for scamming unlocked through the "CMT2131 Automated Data Mining & Processing" education course.

Once unlocked, the scraper will need to be activated through the farm email addresses subcrime. It may take a few attempts to activate the scraper. Once active, the scraper will passively gather email addresses for the player. While active, the scraper can collect about 1000 emails a day.

Over time the scraper will eventually disable itself and will need to be restarted

Pictured: Email farming with active scraper (left) and phisher (right)

Launching a Spam Wave

A player can spend eight Nerve to launch a spam wave of emails to the addresses they have in their database. A spam wave can be based around 11 different scams total; three scams (delivery, family, prize) are available at Scamming skill level one, with more unlocked at levels 20, 40, 60 and 80. Once a spam wave has been sent, responses will start to come in.

After sending out a spam wave, a section with the text "Awaiting responses" may appear. As long as this section is visible, a response will appear after some time. If this section is not visible, no new responses will appear regardless of time passed.

Pictured: Awaiting responses

If a specific scam is used too often, it will result in diminishing responses. This is indicated in the Spam Wave drop down menu with a red arrow pointing downwards on that specific method. Over time this arrow will dissapear.

Scam Types

Scam Type	Crime Skill Required	Min Profit	Max Profit
Delivery	None	$300	$4,050
Family	None	$9,000	$60,750
Prize	None	$6,000	$40,500
Charity	20	$15,000	$121,500
Tech support	20	$22,500	$121,500
Vacation	40	$21,000	$283,500
Tax	40	$33,750	$364,500
Advance-fee	60	$36,000	$486,000
Job	60	$30,000	$405,000
Romance	80	$48,000	$3,240,000
Investment	80	$68,000	$3,042,000

This table is still a work in progress.

Reading a Targets Message

Once a player has a response, they can converse with the mark. Upon choosing to read a mark's message they will be presented with a bar that has several options to reply with.

The different tiles represent different actions or outcomes that can happen and are triggered when a player lands on one. The tiles can be categorized as:

• Neutral: Nothing happens when these tiles are landed on.

• Low Reward: Allows capitalization for a low payout.

• Medium Reward: Allows capitalization for a medium payout.

• High Reward: Allows capitalization for a high payout.

• Temptation: Shifts the cursor to the right. Will skip every pip that's not neutral or reward (It will always land on a safe space).

• Concern: Causes a soft fail and forces the player to resolve the target's concern. Resolving concerns costs 3 Nerve per attempt and is likely to fail, requiring multiple attempts. Once resolved, the concern zone will be removed.

• Sensitivity: Causes a soft fail and shifts the cursor to the left. Will skip every pip that's not neutral (It will exclusively land on neutral spaces).

• Hesitation: Causes a soft fail and puts the target on a cooldown, temporarily blocking any further action. The cooldown can last anywhere between 1 and 2 hours. Once finished, the hesitation zone will be removed.

• Fail: Causes a critical failure, losing the target.

Responding to a Target

Players will always have five options to reply with, however the emotions displayed may vary based on the type of scam. How the mark reacts to a player's response depends on many factors including the mark's demographics, previous responses, and their original response. Each reply will cost the player 3 Nerve. Despite the different names these emotions can be categorized into five types:

• Strong Forward: This is the first option in the list. It will allow the player to move the greatest distance, at the cost of accuracy.

• Soft Forward: This is the second option in the list. It does not move the player as far as Strong Forward, however it is much more precise and will allow the player to land in desired squares much more frequently.

• Backward: This is the third option in the list. It is very similar to Soft Forward, but moves the player in the opposite direction. It is also very accurate. It is initially disabled as the player will always start on the left side of the crime.

• Accelerate: This is the fourth option in the list. Rather than moving the slider on its own. accelerate will increase the distance that the next action the player takes will move them. Additionally, it may be stacked with itself up to five times to gain even more distance. Note that increasing stacks provides diminishing increases in distance moved.

• Capitalize: This is the fifth option in the list. It is what ends the crime and gives the player a reward. At the beginning of the scam it is locked and will remain as such until the player lands in a reward zone. Upon using the capitalize option the player will receive a payout and the target will be removed from their list.

The "PSY2132 Interpersonal Dynamics" Education course can be used to unlock range indicators on your scamming responses. This provides the player with a minimum and maximum on where a response type can land them. While not required for easier crimes, they are highly recommended for the more difficult scamming methods.

Concern

Additionally there is a challenge that can appear, known as concern. This is enabled and becomes the only choice available when a player lands on the purple (concern) square.

If a player wishes to continue with the target they must continue to resolve concern until the zone is removed. Resolve concern may require multiple attempts to successfully clear.

Hesitation

Another possible challenge that can appear is known as Hesitation. This is enabled and becomes the only choice available when a player lands on a yellow (hesitation) square.

Once active, a player must wait a random amount of time (usually multiple hours) before being able to continue with the scam.

Suspicion

After sending enough responses the player will begin building up Suspicion. This is signified by red pips appearing on the progression bar, replacing any pips including reward ones.

It will initially begin from the left side and will begin accelerating right. Each additional action at this point will add one more red pip than the last (meaning the first one adds 1 red zone, the second action 2, the third 3 etc), however it can never replace the pip you are currently standing in.

It is also possible for the entire persuasion bar to fill with red zones forcing the player to abandon the target.

(Actions #0, #3, #4, #5 and #11 of a target showing increasing Suspicion.)

Honors

There are two Honor Bars a player can obtain from scamming:

Honor Bar Image	Name	Requirements
	Decepticon	Respond to a victim's Temptation, Sensitivity, Concern, and Hesitation within a single successful scam attempt
	Alpha Mail	Achieve a skill level of 100 in Scamming

References

Many images and details are courtesy of emforus and the guide linked above

Patch History

Released in Patch list #352

[edit history]

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Patch list #363 : 26/11/2024

• Increased Scamming's Romance Scam rewards by 50% and Investment Scam rewards by 30%

Patch list #354 : 27/08/2024

• Changed Scamming's Phishers to produce 6000-9000 emails instead of 1000-2000 (over 8-12 days)

Patch list #353 : 03/09/2024

• Added pulsing to Burglary and Scamming targets when they're 12 hours away from expiring
• Fixed rounding error on reward values appearing within Scamming outcome text
• Fixed Scamming hub issue where the cooldowns and the main timer status were not being properly updated
• Fixed Scamming's scam method dropdown layering under completed scam targets
• Fixed horizontal scrolling glitch in Scamming

Patch list #352 : 27/08/2024

• Released the Scamming crime