When accomplices are employed, they are known as shills. For example, illegal three-card monte and shell-game peddlers are notorious employers of shills. Shills may be employed by salespeople and professional marketing campaigns. Accomplices, also known as shills, help manipulate the mark into accepting the perpetrator's plan. These type of bots would be the equivalent of brick and mortar shills. Through manipulation and sleight-of-hand, the only money "won" went to his shills. A skilled card mechanic can perform this con without shills or assistants. Stylistically, the show consistently broke the fourth wall, using shills, plants, and zany audience-participation gags. Shills, or "potted plants", are sometimes employed in auctions. He then headed down to the pier and fired the shills.