I’m reminded of a real-world similar example: World of Warcraft loot ninjas.
Background: when a good item drops in a dungeon, each group member is presented with two buttons, a die icon (“need”) and a pile-of-gold icon (“greed”). If one or more people click “need”, the server rolls a random 100-sided die for each player who clicked “need”, and the player with the highest roll wins the item. If no one in the group clicked “need”, then the server rolls dice for everyone in the group. Usually players enter dungeons in the hopes of obtaining items that directly improve their combat effectiveness, but many items can also be sold at the in-game auction house, sometimes for a substantial amount of gold, so that a character can still benefit indirectly even if the item itself has no immediate worth.
As you can imagine, “pick-up groups” (i.e. four random strangers you might never party with again) often suffer from loot ninjas: people who intentionally click on the “need” button to vastly improve their odds of obtaining items, even when the item holds no direct value for themselves but does hold direct value for another party member.
And, indeed, a common loot ninja strategy is to feign ignorance of the “need versus greed” loot roll system (which, to be fair, has legitimately confusing icons) and to use every other possible trick to elicit sympathy, such as feigning bad spelling and grammar, for as long as possible before being booted from the party and forcibly expelled from the dungeon.
Pretending to not understand the game and acting embarrassed in order to defect without social consequences seems like a pretty good strategy to me.
I’m reminded of a real-world similar example: World of Warcraft loot ninjas.
Background: when a good item drops in a dungeon, each group member is presented with two buttons, a die icon (“need”) and a pile-of-gold icon (“greed”). If one or more people click “need”, the server rolls a random 100-sided die for each player who clicked “need”, and the player with the highest roll wins the item. If no one in the group clicked “need”, then the server rolls dice for everyone in the group. Usually players enter dungeons in the hopes of obtaining items that directly improve their combat effectiveness, but many items can also be sold at the in-game auction house, sometimes for a substantial amount of gold, so that a character can still benefit indirectly even if the item itself has no immediate worth.
As you can imagine, “pick-up groups” (i.e. four random strangers you might never party with again) often suffer from loot ninjas: people who intentionally click on the “need” button to vastly improve their odds of obtaining items, even when the item holds no direct value for themselves but does hold direct value for another party member.
And, indeed, a common loot ninja strategy is to feign ignorance of the “need versus greed” loot roll system (which, to be fair, has legitimately confusing icons) and to use every other possible trick to elicit sympathy, such as feigning bad spelling and grammar, for as long as possible before being booted from the party and forcibly expelled from the dungeon.