[rant] have you already encountered someone you won't trade with again?

[JKDOS]

Yes. We agreed on a trade, so I mailed them the goods (In game), and they never sent me the payment in return.

 

[marea]

I wanted to add that some mistakes might be because the person is new to AC. I remember in my first trade ever i tried running back to the train station to go back to my town because i thought that was the way for doing it. It did not occure to me that the seller might find my running out of their line of sight rude after the trade was done, or might think i have malicious intents to ruin their towns. I learned the proper way later and started waiting for them to end the session, or just ask them myself if i should go back to the station.

 

[Succulent]

Yes, I have. I opened up my island to 3 people because I had the magical dress at ables. I didn't charge anything and didn't block my island off with any fences because I was sure I could trust people on this forum.

They were all in ables shops as I had to go to dinner, so I just let them know I'd be afk for a bit.
As I returned, all 3 people were gone and so were all my turnips and a piece of furniture that I had dropped randomly. I came back on here on my thread to see that two people had reported the 3rd to me. They tried to stop them from taking my turnips but weren't able to.
I contacted the thief on here, but never heard back, so I gave them a bad rating, hoping that this would happen to nobody else.
I don't want to spread any hate, so I will not link them, but I also don't want anyone to have the same experience, so just be careful when trading with a Leonix user.

This definitely made me lose a lot of trust and I haven't felt comfortable training with strangers since then.

On the bright side, I made a new friend.
https://www.belltreeforums.com/members/chibibunnyx.100625/ helped me by reporting the person and giving me money and even the stolen furniture. They didn't have to, but they did. Which just warmed my heart. <3

 

[JKDOS]

They tried to stop them from taking my turnips but weren't able to.

It's water under the bridge now, but if anyone experiences this kind of behavior in the future, just DC from the game and it will thwart any thief and their plans.

 

[axo]

I've experienced people leaving me hanging on trades, but I think I would probably still trade with them if they asked

 

[Succulent]

It's water under the bridge now, but if anyone experiences this kind of behavior in the future, just DC from the game and it will thwart any thief and their plans.

They actually did, but it didn't work?
Anyway, I do know that this was a lot of my fault too, I shouldn't have been so trusting and carefree.^^'

 

[Selky]

I honestly don't really understand why people get upset when visitors look around their island without asking... I never would have thought to consider it rude, except for I saw tons of people complaining about it here so I now know not to do it.

Of course, this probably has a lot to do with the fact that NH is the first game where I've actually interacted with the online community. I've played AC since I was 7, but in WW and NL I only kept to myself or played with irl friends. In WW and NL, I can DEF understand why people wouldn't want anyone running off, because visitors could do wayy more damage.

In NH, though, I'm genuinely curious... Visitors can't destroy flowers, can't chop trees, can't dig fossils, can't take any items unless they were left lying on the ground... The worst that could happen is plucking flowers, stealing fruit, or buying a limited time item at Nook's Cranny. I guess I'm just wondering, is the panic more of a holdover from the online culture in past games, where visitors could do much more damage? oh and i also have literally no idea why someone would care if a visitor talked to their villagers

of course since i've learned it's a huge faux pas, i wouldn't do it when visiting. and i do understand some of the worry, since the one time i opened my island for free during a meteor shower, someone stole 31 customization kits I forgot I left on the ground :/

I'm honestly VERY grateful about how NH is much friendlier to unknown visitors- with the 'not destroying flowers', no mass holes, not messing up custom paths. But there are a few things that could really mess up the host. Even the 'small' things the previous user mentioned like buying out items from the shop that the host might want, Or shaking fruit trees, or even running/picking flowers can be very detrimental to the island. It may seem small, but some of these things take days to fix if the host doesn't TT. Needless to say, a very upsetting thing to happen.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but if the host is cross-breeding or just breeding in general, even though flowers cant be totally destroyed, the flowers won't breed if they aren't in bloom. So that's already a 3 day wait to attempt any cross-breeding with those flower(s).

Or Even if a villager is moving out- if the random visitor talks to them they could snipe that villager they might be selling or wanting to give to a friend.

Or they could have bell trees... and gosh I know I tried to make a bell tree farm and got totally paranoid anytime someone visited my island.

I've taken large precautions to prevent things like that by checking my shop and buying anything I want beforehand, digging up my important flowers or blocking them off with fences, and the same with bell trees. But it's still a lot of extra work that the host shouldn't have to do when being kind enough to host people.

I'm generally pretty lax with visitors on my island- not caring about where they go or what they do, but I can see why people are very strict on it. it is pretty unfortunate that it is deterring people from trading/visiting other islands though out of fear.

All the points I wanted to mention on this have been mostly made. However, I do want to touch on the part where you said "I honestly don't really understand why people get upset when visitors look around their island without asking...".

Just that, without asking, you do not know the state someone may have their town in even if it's an area you don't see when flying over/around the airport.
I'm one of those people that have had to disconnect because someone just takes off without asking or asks but runs off before getting an answer.
Sometimes I have items I've dropped around other character houses to give to those characters later.
It's not disrespect, you could be a perfectly trustworthy person but you also could not. So, by just taking off and, especially if those items are expensive (elaborate kimono stands for one example) then it puts the host in an awkward place.

Permission is key and upfront arrangements so that the host has time to plan for it. Don't wait till you land to say hey can I do xyz. Ask when you're arranging your trade so that the host knows to put away whatever items, check their shops first, communicate to you what not to do (pick their breeding flowers) etc.
You can argue to do that before you decide to plan trades, sure...but you could also argue the person should just do what they came to do, trade, and then leave. For the most part I try to do the former...but sometimes you have people horrible about time and communication who lead you on for pickups at multiple different times only to finally be ready during an inconvenient one. And sometimes you just jump on teh chance to be done with that trade already. So, really it's just about communication.

 

[Sheep Villager]

My bad experience was sort of my fault and could have been avoided if I had been more patient. But the other two people involved were also horrible to trade with.

I had a villager crafting a popular recipe so I advertised it on a Discord group Im in. This sort of thing requires a lot of patience as I only let one person in at a time to avoid confusion, but it generally goes smoothly because most people understand and are patient.

Because of the popularity of the recipe I got a lot of people interested and I started off by giving my Dodo code to the first person who reached out to me, Person A, as they had already told me that they were ready.

10 minutes later Person A was still not in my island. So Person B started to get impatient. Because Person B had made me a really good offer, I didn’t want to lose them as a customer so I went and messaged Person A to see if they were still available/willing to go through with the trade. After another 10 minutes of radio silence I decided to give the Dodo Code to Person B.

Person B shows up and immediately after Person A shows up as well. I apologized to the both of them but figured I’d be able to handle having two people in my island at once.

Person B went into Marshal’s house and got the recipe. And then Person A went in to do the same.

At this point Person B attempted to leave, but couldn’t because Person A was in the middle of talking to the villager. They tried a second time right away but Person A was still in the middle of getting the recipe. Instead of waiting for them to get out of dialogue, Person B simply did the thing where he minimized the game and closed it without saving.

I got the message that Person B had left quietly and immediately after got a message from them on Discord saying that the gold ores they had promised me were still in his inventory and that the DIY was no longer in his possession. Then asked if he could come back.

However, leaving without saving it made it so Marshal had stopped crafting.

Person A who was still in my island informed me that the NMT she had brought over were back in her inventory and that she hadn’t been able to get the recipe. Since I had an extra of the recipe I traded with her for the NMT and she thanked me and asked if we could be friends. I said yes.

Since those two were the first I let into my island for that recipe I lost every other customer that was waiting. But the nightmare doesn’t end there.

Remember when I said that Person A had asked to be friends? Well, for the next 4 hours or so she proceeded to send me a bunch of vulgar, nonsense jokes about her genitals and Tom Nook. I ignored all of it but she wouldn’t stop. Had to eventually block her.

If someone ever disconnects in the middle of a villager crafting you can sometimes get the animal to resume crafting by saving and restarting your game! I learned this when I was hosting and someone genuinely had an internet hiccup happen. They told me how to get the animal back crafting and it worked out.

I did have a moment of panic when I realized my villager stopped crafting and I still had a queue. I was also letting people in one at a time so people were already waiting for 20 minutes.

Also just to be more on topic... I gave up on trading on reddit. I had a streak of 3 with people ghosting me for long periods of time (2/3 have not replied to this day). After wasting two whole days trying to trade on there I decided I would only use this forum. I've had zero problems on here. Maybe people on reddit just don't get notifications... or just have bad attention span. I don't know.​

 

[DragonLatios]

I Did a Bonehead Move on a Island i was tradeing with and i saw a Group of DIy. I was looking at them and pick one up and without thinking i hit learn diy. I Did not think anything of it till the island owner say Ya and i stop and in real life say some Bad words to myself for not thinking. I was happy i got catch and learn not everything is free to pick up. I Drop bells like 10000 to repay the owner of the taken DIY Card. I Maybe drop a gold rock if i had one. But i was happy he forgive me for my Brain dead move and greedness.

 

[Carole]

[rant] have you already encountered someone you won't trade with again?

Nope. This is why I am a solitary player. Besides, I am almost 72 years old and descend into "get off my lawn!" mode all too easily. LOL I have lots of fun playing by myself and this is less upsetting both to me and to other people.

 

[Mick]

I either don't leave people unsupervised, or I trust them enough to let them wander as much as they want. There's really no use in getting mad at someone for wanting to look at the way you decorate your island and house, in fact, isn't it like half of the fun to be able to share with others what you have been up to?

 

[Llunavale]

I've been very fortunate to trade with some wonderful people to be honest - but I'm usually very clear on what people can/can't do and if I can, I'll restrict the areas they can visit. I'll only change that if they ask and give me a reason.

I will say...maybe at the expense of sounding a bit harsh, but for your case OP, you really should have been clear with them that they shouldn't wander off. Exploring other people's islands is a big part of the game in my opinion - to me it sounds like you're mainly frustrated because of what they could have been doing, rather than what they actually did. Looking around your island to see what you've done doesn't really seem like something most people would get angry about and if you are the kind of person that doesn't want people doing this, you absolutely should mention that instead of assume people will ask to explore. In my experience, most people don't and will just explore - if they're not on your Best Friends list anyway, there's very little they can do to disrupt your town.

 

[Airen]

All of my trades have been very pleasant but I probably don't trade as much as others do. I fence off my turnips if I have a lot and always communicate my rules before sending the Dodo Code (for example, follow me to Villager's house, half payment up front half payment after, etc). All trades that take place on my island also take place on right off the airport dock. I have a lot of spare DIYs laying around in one area so I definitely wouldn't want them to get stolen.