This entire story has a LOT more drama to it than I care to explain, but I do feel like putting this out there and getting some form of opinions.

I had a good friend on Maple Story. Let’s call him Thomas. We both played Bera, and both of our main characters on that server are Fire/Poison Wizards. He was the leader of a guild, I was his trusted coleader.

A few months ago, a lot of crap happens between us, much of which I blame him for and much of which he blames me for, and I ended up quitting our guild.

Shortly after I leave the guild, Thomas decides to give up Maple Story, and gives away his godly-scrolled equipment to some people, and when he’s done and gone, one of the people who received a gift (a long-term friend of mine) came and joined up with the guild that I had recently formed.

He ended up selling the item he received from Thomas (supposedly, he got over 10 million for the thing), and after a while, Thomas is suddenly back on Bera and demanding that my friend return his stuff. Well, he obviously couldn’t.

This all happened early last month. Thomas ended up moving to Khaini, then came back to Bera for about 2 days, then quit MS completely for about a day, then went to Khaini when some of his real-life friends started playing there. So all went well for a while, and we were on speaking terms (somewhat), when a mutual friend of ours, as well as several other members of our old guild, gets scammed from over 5 million worth in stuff.

As my current guild is in a sort of “alliance” with my old guild, there was an obligation to help and everything, and I jokingly pointed out that Thomas now wanted our help when he had been against associating with us before. So he got into this whole mess about “knowing how it feels to be scammed,” etc.

Ok, dear. You gave away your earrings. When you click “Trade” in the box, you officially lose ownership of the item. The item can then be subjected to any form of treatment of its new and rightful owner.

At the end of his post (this discussion took place on other forums) he said that he was going to go after my friend once we catch the other scammer. My reply to this was, “Well, I think he’s going to another guild soon, so have fun with Guild Wars.”

I was just…taken aback by how sore he still was over the whole thing. He’s in Khaini now. Why does he want to waste time on a broke character (he apparently gave everything away when he “quit”) to hunt someone who’s not going to get banned anyway because he didn’t, in reality, “scam” anyone?

It’s a game, for crying out loud.

So, before you all get on me, I know the following:
Yes, the items given away were gifts. We should keep gifts. But not everyone is this moral. With all its hopes, dreams, promises, and urban renewal, the world continues to deteriorate. Give up.

Yes, I am a realist.

Yes, he probably is still mad at me for causing all this drama, and I know I hold a lot of the blame, but I apologized and I thought we had moved on. But apparently when Thomas is injured, he stays injured and must have “justice.”

No, I am actually on relatively good terms with everyone else in my former guild. My buddy list is needing expansion because of former guild members wanting to buddy me. XP

And yes, I did try to get my friend to give back some of the money. But he didn’t want to…so yes I should keep trying, but there’s only so much I can do. In my views, he hasn’t done anything wrong.

Hm…yes, I feel much better now.

It’s incredible how much stress and hate a game can create.

“All we need is ice cream and a hug.”