Larrystooge [2173171] —
Original article
How do you face zero consequences, but still punish your enemies by placing 100's of bounties that won't ever be traced back to you? Welcome to Bounty Depot!
If you don't have the stats but you do have the cash, Torn's bounty system offers players a way to take down their rivals without putting themselves in harm's way. But what if your foe requires some extra special attention? What if this person is so irritating, so worthy of punishment that the maximum ten bounties just wouldn't cut it?
That's when you use a bulk bounty service.
What is a Bulk Bounty Service?
It's exactly what it sounds like. In exchange for a small fee, my team of bounty placers, Bounty Depot, will max out their own bounty limits to ensure that your target receives their fair share and more. Players simply come to us with the name of their target and the cash, and we do the rest.
The best part of this system is that the number of bounties we can place is limited only by your cash reserves. And the second-best reason to use a bulk bounty service is the fact that it is 100% anonymous - unlike anonymous in-person bounties, which can be traced by Cyber Cafe employees.
Oh, and did I mention that it allows you to set bounties while flying?
How Did You Start?
I started Bounty Depot a little more than a year ago when the pandemic was in full swing with no end in sight. At best, vaccines were thought to be months away, possibly years, and I realized I may be stuck inside unable to go anywhere for quite a while. This gave me a lot of time to think about Torn, in particular, a new way of increasing my income.
Torn players are great at finding ways to make money by providing a unique service outside of the game's typical mechanics. I was earning $4 million a day from flying at the time, but I knew that if I could find a niche and work it, I could earn many times this without having to haul myself across the globe.
A light bulb went off in my head when I came across a bounty seller's forum post. This player was selling off their own bounty limit of ten, but this made me realize that there was nobody that could place 100's to 1000's of bounties in one go. I set out to create what the market demanded, but to do that I would first need some customers.
UPDATE: We have been reliably informed that Larrystooge was not the first to sell bulk bounties, and nor is he the only player selling them at the moment. Other similar services are available, like this one provided by Riot.
Finding Clients
I met this challenge initially by cold calling people I found on the bounty pages (both target and placer) offering my services, which was annoying to everyone involved. I received a ton of hate, and rightfully so since I was basically a telemarketer. Nevertheless, it was through cold calling that I began my business, albeit slowly.
I gained dozens of clients through this simple outreach method, and even more enemies, some of whom chose to support my company by using me to place bounties on myself. I accepted their business then and I still do to this day! Thankfully, my cold-calling exploits only lasted a few months, as I eventually gained enough regular clients to be able to earn solidly without having to advertise.
Who Are Your Clients?
Obviously, I would never tell you such a thing. All of my clients are kept completely anonymous, regardless of how much money the target offers. The largest bribe I have ever been presented with was $600 million for one person's name. That may sound like a lot of money, but if I were to leak the name of just one of my clients, my business would die overnight.
What I can share with you is the type of person who uses a bounty service. I mainly serve older players since they have more spending money currently, but I do sometimes get the occasional younger player spending real cash to fuel their need for revenge. Everyone has a different story or agenda, with some players wanting revenge, others trying to make headway in a war, and a few who simply want to annoy somebody.
"Larry is a trusted vendor. He will never give up your identity if you use his services. As far as I know, he began this type of service, and has maintained such a high level of service that others now do the same thing. The highest form of praise is when others start copying you." - Anon client
The one thing that is common to all of my clients is that their targets have always caused them grief in some way or form. Most clients are looking for 50+ bounties, but I do sometimes receive requests for numbers much higher or lower than that. The most bounties I've ever been asked to place was over 1,900, which took me the better part of the day to complete.
"The Bounty Depot has always had as many slots as I have needed. He also gives recommendations on how to best distribute your bounties to keep someone in the hospital, without overkill (thus saving you money). I like that he is a guardian of his customers' money and how best to stretch it out. Lastly he's just a nice guy." - Anon client
How Much Do You Charge?
Your fee for a bounty is obviously determined by the price you wish to set. A normal anonymous bounty will add 50% to your original fee, so a $1 million bounty becomes $1.5 million. With my service, we charge double the bounty plus $200k for anything below $100k (capped at $350k), and double plus $125k for any bounties above $100k. I am considering offering additional discounts for high value bounties in future, if I can figure out a way to scale the price without it being confusing.
My bounty placers are also paid well for their time. The minimum payment they receive is $75k for an open bounty and $50k for an anonymous one. Obviously, this goes up again based on the price of the bounty, with those under $100k hits paying $100k per open bounty.
The Blowback
Performing a service like this is always going to get you attention in a place like Torn. It is quite literally your job to be the focal point of people's hatred in the place of your clients. A consequence of this is that some factions will spend billions to try to make your life miserable, which is what is happening with JFK 2.1 as I write this very article.
This job comes with other consequences too. You can be fired from jobs, kicked from factions, and be placed permanently on a Hall of Fame faction's hit list. Based on the fees we've quoted, you may think that providing a bounty service sounds like a great way to earn money, and it is. But could you face up to these hardships on a daily basis? Have you got the stomach for it?
The One That Got Away
The toughest assignment I've ever had was when I was hired to place 420 bounties of $69,420 each on the biggest bounty placer in Torn, the infamous Sharkeyfive. At the time, my team of bounty placers mostly consisted mostly of members of The Wolverines, my faction family. We had just fought a massive war against Sharkey's old faction, Phoenix Rising, so this added an extra spicy element to what was already a tough task.
Sharkey did not hold back with his response. He promised that he would return 10 bounties for every 1 that I placed on him, which was roughly 200/420 bounties. The Wolverines leadership did not like the attention I brought to their faction, and sadly, this resulted in me being kicked from the Wolverines. I am sad to say that I could not finish that job as a result, so I gave back what was left of the cash to my client. This failure still haunts me to this day.
War Bounties
My work with Bounty Depot did pay off in the end though, as it helped me find my way into Helvete, who I helped by placing over 1k bounties on Natural Selection and their family during our recent war. It was actually pretty fun to orchestrate mass amounts of bounties while safely tucked away in the hospital, which is how I make most of my money even today!
Of course, I won't be able to do that anymore since Early Discharge killed that off.
Early Discharge doesn't prevent me from posting from the hospital, but from making the bounties worthwhile. Is it really cost effective to spend millions to reduce someones energy by 5 - 25 per bounty? The answer is sadly no, especially with what factions are doing nowadays to negate it further.
False wars are often used to clear 100's of millions of dollars worth of bounties in minutes with no repercussions, since faction wars are basically free at the moment. Sadly, this means that wars are now effectively get out of jail free cards for those with mass bounties. Unless changes are made to the Early Discharge system, I believe bounties are basically dead when it comes to war - or at least not near to the same level they used to be.
The Future
Despite the problems I faced with blowback from angry factions and the sudden impotence of war bounties, my business is still thriving, as I fulfill a niche that wasn't available beforehand. I expect to see an uptick in demand for my services during Elimination, Halloween, with Christmas and Dog Tags also proving busy times of the year for Bounty Depot. To be able to place 100's of bounties within a short amount of time is something many players are willing to pay big bucks for.
And in case you're wondering, my record for 100 bounties is 9 minutes, with the most bounties placed in one day being 1900+.
That's when you use a bulk bounty service.
What is a Bulk Bounty Service?
It's exactly what it sounds like. In exchange for a small fee, my team of bounty placers, Bounty Depot, will max out their own bounty limits to ensure that your target receives their fair share and more. Players simply come to us with the name of their target and the cash, and we do the rest.
The best part of this system is that the number of bounties we can place is limited only by your cash reserves. And the second-best reason to use a bulk bounty service is the fact that it is 100% anonymous - unlike anonymous in-person bounties, which can be traced by Cyber Cafe employees.
Oh, and did I mention that it allows you to set bounties while flying?
How Did You Start?
I started Bounty Depot a little more than a year ago when the pandemic was in full swing with no end in sight. At best, vaccines were thought to be months away, possibly years, and I realized I may be stuck inside unable to go anywhere for quite a while. This gave me a lot of time to think about Torn, in particular, a new way of increasing my income.
Torn players are great at finding ways to make money by providing a unique service outside of the game's typical mechanics. I was earning $4 million a day from flying at the time, but I knew that if I could find a niche and work it, I could earn many times this without having to haul myself across the globe.
A light bulb went off in my head when I came across a bounty seller's forum post. This player was selling off their own bounty limit of ten, but this made me realize that there was nobody that could place 100's to 1000's of bounties in one go. I set out to create what the market demanded, but to do that I would first need some customers.
UPDATE: We have been reliably informed that Larrystooge was not the first to sell bulk bounties, and nor is he the only player selling them at the moment. Other similar services are available, like this one provided by Riot.
Finding Clients
I met this challenge initially by cold calling people I found on the bounty pages (both target and placer) offering my services, which was annoying to everyone involved. I received a ton of hate, and rightfully so since I was basically a telemarketer. Nevertheless, it was through cold calling that I began my business, albeit slowly.
I gained dozens of clients through this simple outreach method, and even more enemies, some of whom chose to support my company by using me to place bounties on myself. I accepted their business then and I still do to this day! Thankfully, my cold-calling exploits only lasted a few months, as I eventually gained enough regular clients to be able to earn solidly without having to advertise.
Who Are Your Clients?
Obviously, I would never tell you such a thing. All of my clients are kept completely anonymous, regardless of how much money the target offers. The largest bribe I have ever been presented with was $600 million for one person's name. That may sound like a lot of money, but if I were to leak the name of just one of my clients, my business would die overnight.
What I can share with you is the type of person who uses a bounty service. I mainly serve older players since they have more spending money currently, but I do sometimes get the occasional younger player spending real cash to fuel their need for revenge. Everyone has a different story or agenda, with some players wanting revenge, others trying to make headway in a war, and a few who simply want to annoy somebody.
"Larry is a trusted vendor. He will never give up your identity if you use his services. As far as I know, he began this type of service, and has maintained such a high level of service that others now do the same thing. The highest form of praise is when others start copying you." - Anon client
The one thing that is common to all of my clients is that their targets have always caused them grief in some way or form. Most clients are looking for 50+ bounties, but I do sometimes receive requests for numbers much higher or lower than that. The most bounties I've ever been asked to place was over 1,900, which took me the better part of the day to complete.
"The Bounty Depot has always had as many slots as I have needed. He also gives recommendations on how to best distribute your bounties to keep someone in the hospital, without overkill (thus saving you money). I like that he is a guardian of his customers' money and how best to stretch it out. Lastly he's just a nice guy." - Anon client
How Much Do You Charge?
Your fee for a bounty is obviously determined by the price you wish to set. A normal anonymous bounty will add 50% to your original fee, so a $1 million bounty becomes $1.5 million. With my service, we charge double the bounty plus $200k for anything below $100k (capped at $350k), and double plus $125k for any bounties above $100k. I am considering offering additional discounts for high value bounties in future, if I can figure out a way to scale the price without it being confusing.
My bounty placers are also paid well for their time. The minimum payment they receive is $75k for an open bounty and $50k for an anonymous one. Obviously, this goes up again based on the price of the bounty, with those under $100k hits paying $100k per open bounty.
The Blowback
Performing a service like this is always going to get you attention in a place like Torn. It is quite literally your job to be the focal point of people's hatred in the place of your clients. A consequence of this is that some factions will spend billions to try to make your life miserable, which is what is happening with JFK 2.1 as I write this very article.
This job comes with other consequences too. You can be fired from jobs, kicked from factions, and be placed permanently on a Hall of Fame faction's hit list. Based on the fees we've quoted, you may think that providing a bounty service sounds like a great way to earn money, and it is. But could you face up to these hardships on a daily basis? Have you got the stomach for it?
The One That Got Away
The toughest assignment I've ever had was when I was hired to place 420 bounties of $69,420 each on the biggest bounty placer in Torn, the infamous Sharkeyfive. At the time, my team of bounty placers mostly consisted mostly of members of The Wolverines, my faction family. We had just fought a massive war against Sharkey's old faction, Phoenix Rising, so this added an extra spicy element to what was already a tough task.
Sharkey did not hold back with his response. He promised that he would return 10 bounties for every 1 that I placed on him, which was roughly 200/420 bounties. The Wolverines leadership did not like the attention I brought to their faction, and sadly, this resulted in me being kicked from the Wolverines. I am sad to say that I could not finish that job as a result, so I gave back what was left of the cash to my client. This failure still haunts me to this day.
War Bounties
My work with Bounty Depot did pay off in the end though, as it helped me find my way into Helvete, who I helped by placing over 1k bounties on Natural Selection and their family during our recent war. It was actually pretty fun to orchestrate mass amounts of bounties while safely tucked away in the hospital, which is how I make most of my money even today!
Of course, I won't be able to do that anymore since Early Discharge killed that off.
Early Discharge doesn't prevent me from posting from the hospital, but from making the bounties worthwhile. Is it really cost effective to spend millions to reduce someones energy by 5 - 25 per bounty? The answer is sadly no, especially with what factions are doing nowadays to negate it further.
False wars are often used to clear 100's of millions of dollars worth of bounties in minutes with no repercussions, since faction wars are basically free at the moment. Sadly, this means that wars are now effectively get out of jail free cards for those with mass bounties. Unless changes are made to the Early Discharge system, I believe bounties are basically dead when it comes to war - or at least not near to the same level they used to be.
The Future
Despite the problems I faced with blowback from angry factions and the sudden impotence of war bounties, my business is still thriving, as I fulfill a niche that wasn't available beforehand. I expect to see an uptick in demand for my services during Elimination, Halloween, with Christmas and Dog Tags also proving busy times of the year for Bounty Depot. To be able to place 100's of bounties within a short amount of time is something many players are willing to pay big bucks for.
And in case you're wondering, my record for 100 bounties is 9 minutes, with the most bounties placed in one day being 1900+.
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