WoW Battle Pet trader “scam” is costing players thousands in Gold

World of Warcraft’s Battle Pets can sit around for ages without any interaction from players, but random approaches in-game to buy them should be met with considerable caution. 

Members of the game’s community can be very generous, helping players out to find items across the vast world inside the MMORPG. However, as is the case with most communities online, there are a select few trying to take advantage of general good faith.

This Holiday season, players have been warning others about rogue traders in the game asking about taking Battle Pets off their hands for very low prices.

For those who aren’t aware, Battle Pets can be used in World of Warcraft to battle others and ultimately collect them. These in-game items can be racked up into collections, or sold for a profit, and some of the most expensive can command fees of up to 400,000-500,000 Gold.

Not all of them will be that expensive, but unsuspecting owners won’t know the difference between a dud and a diamond. That’s where the traders come in and take advantage.

WoW Battle Pet traders stealing thousands from players

On December 20, Reddit user Rhalasong posted to the WoW subreddit page, flagging an interaction they had with one of the people carrying out the scam.

They warned: “CHECK YOUR BATTLEPETS’ VALUE BEFORE SELLING. This person was whispering anyone with rare pets claiming they were to complete their collection, then IMMEDIATELY went to trade to try and flip them.”

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As seen in the interaction, the whisperer wanted to get ahold of as many Battle Pets as they could for just 5,000 Gold.

Players react

This is an issue that’s been raised by a number of other users, since. One replied: “This happened to me too, I figured almost immediately someone was trying to scam me.”

Another said: “Most people have no idea what their Battle Pets are worth since most people don’t interact with the system. But someone PMing you out of the blue asking to buy something you weren’t intending on selling should be an immediate red flag.”

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In this case, the Lanticorn Spawnling alone would be worth 20,000 to 25,000 Gold, meaning that the seller would be scammed out of a hefty profit in the transaction. It just goes to show that, first of all, we should make the relevant price checks before selling Battle Pets, and always be skeptical if it’s a total stranger.

Going along with these scams will be pretty costly, so do remain vigilant.