The static and small 'grid' made up of universal destinations serves it's purpose.  It is easy to navigate, provides a common ground for gathering characters, and makes is easy to find others when seeking public roleplay and interaction.

But each destination and its theme is rather static in nature. The environments are set and stagged by the staff and they are ultimately NPC controled. I'm sure many people would agree that the game would be very dull indeed if only these handfull of destinations comprised the total roleplay environment for people.  Many players want to have a bit more of a mark on the game than floating through the grid...they want to have their own little peice of the public pie.  That is where 'Public Places' come in.  For those destinations in which is it thematicaly appropriate, player will be able to 'rent' a coded room to serve as their own bar, shop, clinic, or other such buisness.  They will be able to run and control their buisness within reasonable amount and fashion.  But when the rent stops being paid for a 'Public Place', it will automatically be removed from the destination it was rented within.

The code for this will work much the same way the current apartment code on Seattle works. Eventually, we may even have vendor code tied into the gear lists that will alow players who run their own buisnesses to stock their shops and sell to other players.

With 'Public Places' we allow players to have their own little temporary peice of the public grid, yet automatically clean up the attrition.

I like this idea.  I think it's pretty neat and sure as hell beats having to wonder or tell newbies that that building is no longer 'staffed'.  Plus, it lets those that want to play almost legal shop keeps do their thing.  Plus, no one should ever bitch that there isn't any place they want to play on the grid.  And it works with the idea of not having many coded places to start with.

One problem I could possibly see coming from this, however, is too many people taking advantage of this.  If everyone can just 'rent' a place instead of having to save up a bunch of cred to 'buy' a place, what's to stop everyone from doing so?  What's going to stop the entire populace idling in their privately owned business and having no one RP?  Granted, the same situation applies for everyone idling in their apartments.  Would it be feasible and logical to limit the amount of types of places?  Like, having only two PC owned Gun Shop Public Spaces at the same time.  Since builders have to set things up first off anyway, there would be the thoughts of being able to do such.  Don't know if it's something you'd want to do in the first place, though.

I think I've rambled on enough now....

The simple responce (one that admitidely is too simplistic as I don't have time at the moment to go over all the possible options, ramifications, and guidelines to produce an good answer) is this:

There is and should be a difference between the shadowrunner and the non-runner.  Shadowrunners make  fairly large sums of money.  Even if a runner manages to score only 5k on a run every 2 months, that would be nearly as much as the average Redmond citizen earns within a year.

The runners run.  They make all that money.  After the run they return to the shadows to hide... to wait and look for their next run... and to spend money.

You want an economy?  Well that only happens when you regulate the resources.  To do that...we'd have to establish all possible money in the system as soft money and have a running total.  This would mean that we'd have to determine how much is in the system as a total.  Then, all chargen resources, all karma2cash, all run payments given out by staff....every influx of cash into the IC world would come out of that total....and every outflux <goods being purchased, rent being paid> would go back into it. 

This would of course mean players need to spend the money they earn. The runners will spend some of their money personal private places.  But after that...they have nothing to spend it on except for legal and illegal goods and services.

 It will be realtively easy enough for someone to start a buisness our of chargen with their resources and be able to afford at least a few months rent.  By allowing people to open shops...competition will be possible.   If people see a need for a service, or the fact that someone has a corner on the market...they may decide to open a shop either as direct competition (ie in the same destinaton) or as an alternative in another destination.  Competition can help ensure the 'spread of the wealth'.  After expending their 'startup' capital....players would need to rely on karma2cash and recieving money from other players for the goods and services they can offer in order to pay the upkeep on their rent.

To much competition (ie to many of the same shop) could result in a self regualtion...if the money destined for those goods and services gets spread to thin, some of those shops may end up closing.

Just a few quick jots.

And when normal market forces fail to put the competetion out of business, you can step up to 21st century corporation style tactics.   

Wow. I'm digging the whole "Business" side of Shadowrun. I've always wanted my own business....

I really, really, really hope this makes it into the new grid. I've dollar signs for pupils right now.

-Hades, opening a franchise in his image.

Kynan, your idea kicks major ass.

Some thoughts, though. Keep in mind as you read this that my major is in Political Science, not Economics...So if I'm pointing something out, it might be very obvious. Or it might be wrong. (Check me.)

1. Unless the admin are willing to take over the functions of banks, loan sharks, and similar financial institutions (legit and otherwise), we could have a significant problem, particularly initially, in "booting up" an economy.

2. I was akways semi-surprised when thinking there was nothing to spend on.

I'm thinking of a few things that could eat cash in a low-pay campaign.

DocWagon (or competitors) payments, for one. DW always seemed like a fairly non-presence on the MUSH.

3. With that said, there's also the issue of hoarding and credit crunches.

4. Monopolies. Not ICly gained monopolies, but monopolies simply through fact that there's nobody OOCly doing it otherwise.

5. The "Gone Fishin'" problem: There's one shop on the grid for X. The owner of the shop is dead/idle/whatever. A great difficulty for, say, a newbie.

6. The Wal-Mart problem: Converse to 4 and 5, where someone's trying to run a shop, but is undercut by admin or a similar Massive Force (like, er, Wal-Mart).

Well, it's about time!

Now, anyone and everyone can set up a business to sell things, a place to arrange meets, or simply a front that looks good when the cops come a'searching.

Two things concern me, however.

1) What if people want to use their own fixers, dealers, or other contacts to aqquire gear? What if, using the Armorer skill and stolen blueprints, they make their own gear? I just worry that, if there isn't enough runs, money will become a commidity hindering RP in NS.

2) Someone can buy public spaces for a small shop, it seems. But what about someone who wants to set up a mechanics area, or simply a warehouse to store their drones (and have you seen how cheap the drones are now?). I can understand we don't need the massive amount's of empty warehoses SRS had, but Rigger need alot of space, none the less!

In any case, I'm sure these problems will be resolved with the same dedication that's going into creating an excellent MUSH.

Here you go Nick: http://shadowrun.dnaco.net/forum/index.php/topic,15.0.html

You know, one of these days, I'm going to learn to inform myself before stating my opinion.


The proposal of such a closed economic system is still on my list of worries, however.

EDIT: One more thing: How big can these public spaces be? Since they seemed to be attached to malls and the like, I suppose they can't be large garages of 'used' vechicles, or anything that larege?

Larger spaces fall under the private spaces which can be acquired in their own right; they are separate from the 'business' spaces you can rent. That clear it up?

I was speaking more along the lines of a large public area, put I suppose a Private Space could be used for such a purpose.

Especially if you're storing illegal or illegally modified vehicles.

Some things to remember regarding an economy: 1) SR4 has scaled back the costs of most things....it's a much smaller econ system 2) the economy can never fully be 'closed' as new PC's bring new money with them <while only a portion of resources comes with them to ICland....resources can be used while in chargen for rental purposes> and the karma2cash option.

With regards to the size of publicly rented spaces: Keep in mind that a publicly rented space can be reached by anyone.  Obviously it needs to be kept thematic. The location of the rentals will have guidelines on this...for instance, you couldn't fit a car lot in a mall shop.  But there are some areas with a little more flexibility <like the Rat's nest and Crash Zone>

It seems to me that we need something along the lines of the old Day Job Flaw. Say the person runs a business, or is employed by someone who does. Depending on what level they took this positive/negative quality at, they?d have some sort of IC restriction to their running careers, but would get a certain lifestyle, capping at Middle. This would be different from a permanent lifestyle because this could only be a temporary relationship: As soon as he quits his job, he loses the lifestyle.