The Mix is too rich
The rent is too damn low

Hello I think there are too many automated hustle options that allow Mixers to make obnoxious amounts of money very quickly. I do not think capable Mixers should be broke, but I do think that certain aspects of the automated economy are generating so much money that it disincentivizes pvp and dirty deals with the corpies who are supposed to have all the money.

This has always been and I suspect will always be an issue to some degree. While playing a corpie in the past I've run into issues with Mixers not really wanting to do take any risks for money because they were already rich. I don't mean big shots, I mean like, pizza delivery people and strippers.

I think there should be much sharper restrictions on certain forms of automated income (in particular those that allow you to go above the automated income cap), especially for characters who have coded jobs. It's currently possible to make more than a senior manager in the Mix without ever talking to a player character and that's absolutely buck wild to me.

As a Mixer, why would I bother trying to hustle other PCs out of their flash if I can make as much as a top level corpie just messing with automated systems? That's way more trouble than it's worth. And if one of those corpies dangled a shiny in front of my face in the hopes I'd rat someone out or something, why take the risk? I can just putter around doing a more complicated version of running crates and make more money than God.

I think all forms of automated income should be scaled back somewhat to encourage Mixers to fight each other more. I'm aware that staff intervenes when they deem it appropriate to take from the mix-rich or people who are exploiting systems, but still.

REPEAT DISCLAIMER FOR THOSE WITH SHORT MEMORIES: DO NOT DISCUSS THESE SYSTEMS OR HOW TO ACCESS THEM OR OTHER IC INFO PLEASE

The Mix shouldn't be Deathmatch 2104 but it also shouldn't be The Busy World of Richard Scarry. People need to at least slightly feel the pinch unless they're in certain major roles or they're just going to take zero-risk NPC work and moosex all day.

These points have started a discussion among the GMs, so stay tuned for possible changes.

I would like to see Gold be more of a free for all where Mixers can struggle to come up in the world. Through that struggle, they can burn through their chy and the gear they purchase with it.

As it is, Gold is perceived as off limits. It has the illusion of being a place where you only do crime if you're REALLY GOOD at it. Otherwise it is going to be an instant fail / futile attempt.

Am I going to speak a bit out of turn here because I was not around "before" there were corporate characters. The sense I have is that while the game was expanded to allow for corporate PCs, the underlying systems weren't carefully examined. What "worked" in the past when EVERYONE was in the Mix probably isn't a good model now that there are characters spread more evenly through the sectors.

There seems to be the sense that once corporate characters make it to Gold, they are some how insulated from the Mix. The way that the WJF and corporate security operate further reinforces that. Mixers simply cannot linger on Gold for any period of time without having a legion of bored corporate / security characters coming down on them.

As Vera alluded to, Conflict Consumes Chyen. From my perspective, Gold needs more conflict. I am not familiar enough with the game to recommend the best ways to foster that conflict. All I can note is a near total absence of it. When it happens, they are one off events. A bombing here. An attack there.

There is no Persistence. Gold needs a persistent, or at least semi-persistent Mixer presence. I challenge for staff is finding the balance where security forces don't just squash it out of hand, and where Mixers don't just spread like the plague.

The end goal (in my opinion) is to create persistent conflict that is supported by the theme. Mixers on Gold reminding the corporations that there are a lot of angry, desperate people around. Corporate security holding the line to make sure that wage slaves can make it work and back without a detour through the vats.

At the same time, it needs to be symbiotic. Corporates profiting off of the economic differences between topside and the Mix. Mixers profiting off of corporates wanting what Mixers have access to. And in support of that, some sort of loosening of the social stigma of corporates dealing with Mixers. Maybe it's okay to do occasional business, but not hang out in bars and clubs, or invite them back to corporate apartments.

I realize that this post has been all over the place. This is a complex subject and there is a lot of room for improvement here. I believe that all the systems are in place and that the world has been built in a thoughtful way. I think that as a community we need to make some adjustments to the "this is how things have always been / have to be" mentality. Those adjustments need to be considered with the ultimate goal of increasing conflict, but doing so in a way that the conflict is sustainable and not simply one side smashing on the other side when they step out of line. In my mind, that conflict needs to happen Gold. Mixers causing problems on Green? Dead Mixers. Corpies strolling around Red? Dead / Maimed Corpies. Mixers and Corpies making a mess of Gold? Excellent (said in my best Mr Burns voice)

I encourage you to make an ideas post about it Hek.

If I make so much money that I have everything I want just messing with automated systems, why should I go punch you in the face? Why should I gather data on you and sell it to people? Why should I try to rob your corporation, why should I rat you out to the Jakes?

If you see a Mixer wearing nice clothes or riding a motorcycle that isn't a cheap piece of shit, that should clue you into the fact that they are a very dangerous person who has made some hard compromises, not someone who earned some automated income for a couple of weeks.

All I will say is that I agree with these sentiments. I can't really explain why I do, without revealing IC information. I'm interested to see where staff goes with it.

I don't think we need to be taking any lessons from Cerberus, on any of his views.

If I work hard for months towards earning and developing, I don't need someone to arbitrarily, omnipotently and omnisciently decide I'm not enduring enough hardship and just make my life harder because some players are determined to treat Sindome like post-apocalyptic survival horror with disposable characters.

If you enjoy daily PvP, in the form of ganger gameplay, or CorpSec, or whatever else, that's perfectly fine, but it's one small part, often a very small part from an RP-hours standpoint of the larger Sindome social structure.

This isn't Call of Duty, and if you feel like your gameplay isn't challenging enough, feel free to take on more enemies, spend more recklessly, play to lose ad infinitum, no one is going to interfere with that.

It's jarring to see Mixer PCs flagrantly wealth because they simply follow automated systems. I had a recent interaction where a Mixer offered to do something for no less than 50k because THAT'S their standard now.

It was previously argued that Mix incomes were allowed to be so high because of all the death and loss, which I think everyone who's been around for a while can safely say has diminished over time. The game will always have conflict averse people, but I think the Mix is far more safer than it ever has been before (for better and for worse, of course) but as a result you see people very easily playing all fluff and no grit because corp RP pays less and there's more oversight for RP topside.

The reason people are in those positions is because they're not conflict averse.

That being said, I think that another potential solution is an increased of fines and hammering down by the WJF. I understand that the reason these fines have become more "polite" over time is because it promotes more people doing things, but you also end up getting laughable fines like 10k in a month for established characters for violent crimes, which any Mixer with any know-how can shrug off. Most people could care less with how things are now, free to make money off automated systems unimpeded.

And I'll eat the UJA for this post to make a point ;P

In my day, I ran crates for hours and almost fell over when someone handed me a wallet with 5k for rent.

We are looking into trimming some revenue streams for mixers, but the situation isn't absolutely dire as portrayed.

Most characters with large bank accounts are on the higher end or they have simply grinded out a lot of paycheques over a long period of time.

I certainly don't mean to doomsay or imply a crisis.

The situation's not dire and the game's not going to hell in a handbasket, but some tweaks could create more conflict.

It's a common refrain to see long-time players complaining that things are too easy, or too soft, or whatever else -- because they've learned how to game the system OOCly, and Sindome no longer presents that same challenge to them it once did. You can never go home again, re-live that struggle again, and slowly turning up the heat so you feel yourself sweat again will have the collateral damage of making Sindome even less approachable and hostile to new players than it is.

I don't have an issue with toning down automated income. The hard-coded limit being so easily gamed was silly, just make it an actual hard-coded limit so we're not playing 'fool the system', but I do note this pretty common trend of players who want a certain punishing experience for themselves trying to make that the norm, and I don't necessarily think Sindome needs to be any less accessible than it is.

Work immigration for a few months if you have doubts about how hard it is to integrate new players into the game. I think players take it for granted how much they know, and how much what they consider trivial is anything but.

On to solutions. I think the limit being the limit (No going over it) would be a great simple first step. It's not going to solve the whole issue, though.

You want people to do crimes? Make the ability to recover from the consequences of being caught be a fairly easy process.

ALSO, one huge thing I think is missing from this thread, is that Sindome is an RP game, not a combat game. By reducing automated income sources, you reduce the size of the base of the wealth pyramid. When non-combat characters can't afford to hire combat characters, then combat characters starts accumulating all the wealth. Support characters are disincentivized and thus disappear, dramatically reducing the opportunity for RP.

When people have lest excess to spend they have less to do.

Okay, but how about the fact that even through fixers, for most if not all archetypes the very basic tool that drives conflict easily costs a weekly limit easily if not double or triple that? Or about artistry characters and other creatives in the game? You really can't have the cake and eat it too.

All that will be achieved is lowering the amount of Chyen in circulation. It WILL depreciate the in game economy. The only people that would benefit from this would be the combat characters with little RP ties with anybody outside of their immediate circle.

However this is a game with a very small community. Often times there aren't any other johnsons or fixers. Let's take a step back and look at it from an OOC angle and if this is really a good experience for anybody.

Beating this constant drum of more misery, more violence, more suffering is just going to drive away the players that are the social lifeblood of the game. Conflict is only desirable when it's fun, and if combat-oriented players are enjoying themselves what's the problem? Does someone else have to suffer for them to have a good time?

There are a ton more players in the mix compared to topside, and that's only counting the consistently returning ones who have some experience under their belts. If you count the casual players, it would certainly dwarf topsiders in comparison.

Lately (I'm mostly talking about the year) there have been very enterprising mixers who really put their backs into expanding their hustle, and they absolutely make a filthy amount of chy compared to the rest of everybody. I've personally interacted with those characters and I can tell you they don't do it by abusing the system. The way their hustle is structured is that they benefit more from more players down in the mix. It's simply built that way.

I know the exact specifics of the abuse you are talking about. I've done it a couple times since I started playing because that's just what everybody did. This is why sometime in May they did a balance pass and nerfed the payout once. I think that's worked fairly well, but one specific item that gets flipped en masse could probably see anouther pass (which I assume they did). Often times though the item is acquired legitimately and usually gets passed around with more and more fees attached, ultimately just netting a couple grands at most to the final seller. So it's nowhere near how much you make it sound bad.

There are maybe one or two problem players I've personally witnessed who 'farm' npcs for this. Believe it or not the staff pays attention to this. Just a week or two ago someone got OOC shouted for doing it.

The staff is in control. You are over-assessing the problem and proposing that everyone gets punished for it. Your proposal is basically a rebranded trickle-down reaganomics proven time and time again doesn't work. All it's going to achieve is lower the amount of cash in circulation, shoo away casual players even more, and the worst aspect of this is that the ones who benefit from cheesing the system will always find a way to squeeze out every last chy out of the game.

I'm really frustrated that we cannot talk about current IC events in a discussion like this. Even the people you think who sit around in a pad all day just writing a paragraph of text to print text get involved with RP and drama. Sometimes weighing so much so that it starts affecting them in real life.

Maybe think of it this way. There are probably people who just deliver crates and sit in their membership pad all day sponging UE, sure. I can get that. But the ones who seemingly have an unending supply of cash down in the mix by only interacting with their bubble, don't you think maybe they somehow carved out a niche in a hostile world?

What could possibly more cyberpunk than that? Case didn't 'win' win. He just fumbled around and got a small victory at the cost of everyone he met in the journey. He won by carving out a niche.

Maybe the ones you perceive as doing nothing for the game has a story of their own going. Story so emotional and so strong that it shapes who they are even in real life. Think about that. And who knows, down the line they could very well bankroll someone for a great conflict for the money they hoarded?

Or, in the game's terms, you can do a lot of roleplay to yourself but if you're not out to earn more for yourself through conflict and adversity, you're kind of just stagnating and distancing yourself from the spirit of the game.

The people I'm talking about aren't Cases.

None of us have any idea who is or can be Case or Molly.

The game is built that way with strict ban on talking about recent IC events and disclosing IC identities (though I assume most vets know who I play from me catastrophic kev months ago). None of us, and I mean none, have even a glmpse of an idea of what anyone is doing, how they are experiencing things, and what they are putting out into the world.

So shit, I don't know, maybe let's all just cut people some slack and avoid pre-emptively punishing people. I honestly think things are fine as is, and from the looks of it the staff adjusted problem areas.

You don't like how someone role-plays? Don't interact with them. It's a pretty simple rubric.

This is a problem that simply doesn't exist, presented in service to solving what should be an IC issue through OOC means.

If you follow the @rules and don't UE sponge, you can RP how you like as long as you keep it themely. You can be a brash, traitorous fighter type or a recluse that does nothing but moosexes. But we will consider what you bring to the game when deciding where to throw opportunities and wealth.

We like PCs that create conflict, RP and fun. How they do that can vary. Very much. So focus less on the how and look more at the what. :-)

His second point, maybe the pee-pee smackings for things maybe made the rest of the populace want to refrain from doing much else. I know I've been on the receiving end before and not knowing why, and it's sucked badly when you're not one on either end of the awesome spectrum but just one of the pawns.

Another thing maybe not accounted for is players time they can invest in playing. I've mentioned this before, but not everyone can play all day and yes making chy through PC interaction should be paramount, shutting down the automatic means don't really help to assist players that maybe only have a few hours a day to play. I'd rather them be able to get some decent chy to try to work something then be consistently shut down because they don't "Invest enough time" into playing. As someone who maybe gets a good solid four to play per day (weekly average) with a few small bumps in between.. this shit can be more stressful trying to manage than my real life job.

As for faction dominance/balance, that's less gamewide and probably ought to be looked at on a case by case basis. It's always been a thing to varying degrees as long as I've been around though.

People attempting to break into fixing at this point are going to have a rough time. Sure, there's those certain NPC's that are looking for extremely random items that can pay well, but there's not really much inter-player economy happening there.

I'd also like to point out the super obvious things regarding this change:

-Doesn't touch the actual money makers (as in skills) in the mix.

-NPC's who carry valuable goods are still oblivious to all but the most junior of dips, and still don't take even basic steps to protect their valuable wares, as one might assume a smart NPC would do.

-Some 'mixer' jobs still pay more per week than corporate jobs when you take cost of living into account. Significantly more when you consider running boxes is totally okay as a mixer in -most- mix jobs.

-Penalizes players of certain archetypes significantly more than others.

-Fixing is still a high-risk activity when compared to some other time-tested and proven money makers. People not robbing, extorting or murdering people carrying literal briefcases packed with chyen on supply runs is not a 'fixing' problem, it's a community problem. Again, the same with using runners to move easily stolen products.

Overall, I think the change made was short-sighted and disproportionately impacts certain types of characters, and only lightly impacts others. It's going to create gaps in the playerbase between their respective trickle incomes, and it vastly promotes using some skills over others. I don't support it.

First the payouts went way up to stimulate Mix economy. (maybe last year)

Then the payouts dropped a little to ease back on the faucet (months ago)

Now the payouts dropped a little more to ease back further (new change)

People who are saying that this change is some massively impactful overhaul aren't paying attention to what is going on, or assume that the life they've been living in the Mix is how it has always been and should be. That isn't it. And frankly its a completely IC and realistic thing for big recovery or recessions to happen.

All that changed is less payouts. A little less than the last change, and a little less than the change before that. The change before that was a MASSIVE increase, clearly I can't give numbers, but we're just near the bottom of the slide. Players are upset because we let them live at the top and middle of the slide for a long time.

Times change and money gets tight, this is a recession in the story.

I am a bit baffled that this is how people look at it, cutting down on what I make, would hurt it quite a bit, too.

I do not hoard, I either put my money on gear, vanity or people. People, to build friendships and hoping they may become someone... notable that owes me a favour or two.

It comes at a rate that makes it incredibly difficult to hoard any kind of money at all.

The only reasons I can think of to hoard money as a Mixer would be to either gain a capital to start doing things with, or to buy a business in red... or both. Probably both.

This is something we are considering and watching. But It doesn't matter if it's take from NPC/System then sell to NPC/System or if it's Buy from NPC/System then sell to NPC/System. Both cases lack much in the way of PC involvement. So we will watch and adjust as needed. I certainly don't want any one group of players to suffer more than others. Thank you for the feedback.

Qurion2:

It's not about making all the mixers poor. Not completely; we want you hungry but for a specific reason. It's about adjusting where you get that flash from and how. I can assure you all that there is still a LOT of flash to be gained - it is 100% there. Even for fixers. But we do want to adjust things so that the vast majority of mixer income is not via NPCs and automated systems.

Get smart. Deal with PCs. Figure out the angles. The money didn't go anywhere, it's just not as simple to get.

Just my 2 chy. If you actually offer a service they need, when they need it - You'll be properly compensated.