Shadowrun is a game of style, or at least it should be in its ideal form.  But should a MUX charge hard currency for style?

Most places I've played don't require you to spend money on ordinary things.  Food and drinks at hangouts are considered part of lifestyle, and glow in the dark hair or color changing pants are just sort of accepted.  There tends to be a +pay system for small purchases that the GMs don't want to deal with, but precisely because the GMs don't deal with them those things are usually not +paid for.

This kind of system is, I think, intended to encourage the use of style.  If style is free, there's no reason not to be stylistic, right?  But I think it might actually end up doing the opposite.  Since style has no cost, it usually seems to have no value.  In MMO's where the most stylin' gear around often takes hours and hours of time to get, it's incredibly popular, by contrast.  I'm not suggesting that Shadowrun should have some ultra-rare drops inserted () but MMOs are an example of how putting a cost on style actually encourages it.

As such, it seems like a good idea to make people pay for their clothes, food, and drinks.  Meals and the basics are covered by lifestyle, but people with low lifestyle can't say that their novahot clubwear and their booze are covered by their monthly payments.  Making people pay to look cool is also a lot more in-theme for Shadowrun.  Probably the main reason shadowrunners don't tend to make it out of the gutter is that whenever they get nuyen they blow a large chunk of it on recreation.  This is a constant struggle in the shadow world - the fight between fiscal solvency and living like it's your last day.  Hard living is, on the whole, supposed to win out, since it probably is your last day.

How would such a thing be enforced, tear?

If they pose eating nachos, do you report an admin since they didn't PAY to eat nachos? If they @desc themselves with novahot clothing and a glowing mowhawk...do you summon a staffer to re-desc them as plain and naked? If they sit down at a bar and pose ordering a drink, and then it being given to them, what do you do? It seems to me like something that most people wouldn't use, and those that did use it would quickly grow tired of.

I don't like being nickled and dimed.

Clothes, food, and drinks... Why not add a shop function like at a crime mall or dealership, with simple options based on location.  There are examples of simple lifestyle costs based in the source book, if i remember correctly. 

As far as food and drink, that is most likely cheap considering there won't be a 5 star restaurant in the barrens. (Unless someone apps their chef adept =P).  They don't have to be enforced as much, so players could utilize simple cashier commands at their location, or just rp it out if they like.  Even the most gluttonous stuffer shack visit couldn't be too expensive.  Maybe you didn't buy a new club for the price of all those snacks, no big deal.  For super stylin' clothes and the like, I'd hope that would be where npc contacts come into play moreso.  Rival fixers could support different styles, as the fashion wars help mark who knows who.   

WhiteKnight and I agree on something, scary.


Not a 5 star restaurant in the barrens? Where do guests at the luxury class hotel in Touristville/government district eat then? At Bob the rat catcher's?

As much as this sounds good on paper, I just don't think it's feasable in an environment where text is king, and where text is king, people can pose anything they want.

As long as it doesn't involve weapons, armor, or numbers +/-, you can't really enforce it. Therefor the idea is not very practical. Not only that but it would end up negatively impacting people who are trying to RP with the proper feel in mind, because they actually pay nuyen for money and food, while others don't. How many meals a day do you charge for? How many sets of clothes? Charge based on the words per desc?

It sounds a little much if you actually examine it closely.

Oh yea, I forgot about touristville, entirely.  I'd suppose then, based on what i posted before, that place would require 'reservations'.  Then price and whatnot would have to be enforced.

This could be an interesting moment for the face character.  Trying to worm your way into the confidants of some powerful figure?  Why not wine and dine them at Robert RaCachér's Cafe.  You'll have to pay the price along with your charisma rolls, and etiquette at the table could be fun to antagonize. 

Of course, this probably won't fit into the feel of the game, i just use imaginative example.  And yes, you both bring good points; enforcing it is bullyish, even aggravating ( for both sides) and the honor system clearly won't work.  Situationally it could come into play, though.  Legwork isn't always free, and if you don't have contacts you might have to rely on public appearence and fiscal influence.
Find the suit, because you don't have one.  Set up the illusion at the fine cafe.  Pay your way into the trust of the mark.  Kill him.  Or don't.  Maybe you just con him and run away laughing.   Maybe you get a new political or business contact that has his hand in soups other than the local environment. 

I guess that'd be more on the hands of Staff-PC scene/legwork Relationship stuffs.

This is pretty silly.  Using the psychology of scarcity in an MMO to try and make it into a free and open creative gathering?  Not exactly gonna work.  The reason why they charge more for the most stylistic things in the MMO is not the order in which Tear seems to indicate.  First, if they weren't cool, to begin with (for whatever reason) then no one would spend the many hours building up to try and get those things.  Second, they are only cool in comparison to the lame counterparts available to them throughout the previous multitude of levels.  And third, you have NOTHING else to do in an MMO but gather up the coolest gear in the game.  So, they want your real money and in exchange they sell you some bragging rights for your time, effort and luck in getting the predetermined stylized gear in the game.

Guess what?  MMO does not equal MUX.

Massively Multiplayer Online games are more akin to MUDs, in which we saw those very same trends.  Hunt for a million years to get x gear.

Multi-User Experience games are based around the idea of creativity and a game system bringing people together.  Certainly there is gear that's cool to have, but they have a system effect that makes them cool.  The rules indicate some information about lifestyle costs, but in general they are an unnecessary part of the game.  If i charged you 20 nuyen to have your hair color changed every time you swapped descs, you'd come up with one desc you like and never change it.  That doesn't foster style, that fosters unchanging dullness.  We want to fight for the things that will make our characters better, and let those who want to be stylized be stylized.  Those who don't shouldn't gain some economic advantage because they are too lame to make anything cool out of their character.

It's kind of funny, but in some form or another it's all about making some orc who plays with drones and hacks seem more "normal" than possible, whether it's through autonomosizing vast information stacks or just paying the bills. I kinda of think so long as I'm making an "actual" life-sized quota so far as money, I'm doing fine... and maybe there's enough adventure in life between episodes to suffice. I think the current system works just fine. Maybe it's just a fact of implementing it/coding it/queueing it on a MUSH/Rhost whatever environment that supports the second nature?

You're right!  Nobody does!  You know what else you don't like?  Living hand to mouth on the fringe of society with only a small team of friends who might still backstab you for a soyburger.  I guess that's why you're not a shadowrunner, huh?    I'm usually the first to fling feces at advocates of realism, but I think putting a price on sytle would be good realism.  It would help inject us further into a dystopian world where you don't just have to survive, you have to look good doing it.  If you can look good by snapping your fingers, where's the adventure in that?

I'm not proposing that things be really expensive.  But I do think that style should be part of the equation somewhere.  I like the idea of choosing between the 500 yen armored jacket and the 550 yen armored jacket with digital pattern shifting and internal stereo.  This whole thing came into my head when I was imagining fun stylized characters.  Like, what if I wanted to have mood hair and clothing like in the movie Ultraviolet?  You might think "hey, just desc it and move on," but such things might actually have a game effect.  For instance, in that very movie, the heroine changes the color of her hair and clothes to get lost in a small crowd and escape her pursuers.  Clearly, things you desc onto yourself for free shouldn't provide game benefits like that, right?  So either you pay some nuyen for the ability to change your appearance at will and hopefully escape the police, or the GM just has to tell you "too bad, you didn't pay for it, no dice pool bonus to your infiltration."

The fact is, the possibilities are endless in SR4 but the gear list is finite.  There is no "armored jacket plus a bajillion acessories" on the gear list.  If I want a jacket with an internal water pouch to keep me hydrated, vibrating patches to massage my tense shoulders, shifting patterns to confuse my adversaries, and a siren I can use to call for help, I can't just buy a regular jacket and desc it in, can I?  Aside from the massagers, those things could all have game effects.  And there is no gear listing for them in the book.  But nobody doubts that such things exist in 2070, do they?  They almost exist today, I'm sure they will in SR4.  But if they're not in the book, and you don't pay for them, it's hard to justify getting any kind of game benefit, which then arbitrarily cuts off a whole avenue of creative gadgetry that could really add to the game.

As for enforcement, I wasn't thinking that staff would hound people.  The idea behind a +pay system is the honor system.  All the MUXes I've played have +pay in case the player wants to charge himself money.  But the official policy always says "officially, you don't have to pay for jack, but you can if you want, welcome to the mean streets chummer!"   The only change necessary would be to go from an official policy that everything is free to an official policy of "use your best judgment how much something should cost."  I don't mean that players should start paying for condoms and shoe shines and sticks of gum and every little tiny thing.  But for the fancy, bitchin' elements of fashion like a disco light emitter + stereo that fits in your pocket, things that might actually have some game effect, there should be a cost associated.

If things take no effort to gain, they have no value.  NES's point about MMOs is well taken, and it's probably not a good analogy.  The idea of value is a basic ecnomic prinicple, though.  If something costs me 0, I value it 0.  If my jacket was free, I don't care if an ork says "Nice jacket, I think I'll take it."  I'll give it to him and shrug.  But if that jacket cost me 50 yen, my eyes will flash thunder and I'll say "Over my bloated, stinking corpse omae."  If I have a super cool glowing mohawk that cost me 0 nuyen and someone shoots a flamethrower near my head, I'll probably say something stupid like "Der, that was a close one, hyuk hyuk."  But if that hair has a cost, and thus a value, I'll scream "Not the hair!" as I dive for cover.  THAT is what I'm going for.  I'm trying to ENHANCE the game, not ruin it.  Making players spend a small amount of currency on style should not have much negative impact on the game, but it could potentially yield good results.  I understand that some people will be frugal in this kind of system, but that's ok!  There are people who refuse to spend money to look good IRL, too.  We call them dorks.  MUXes never typically have dorks, and I think having a bunch of jackasses who are too cheap to buy cool outfits walking around in jeans will add a healthy dose of realism 

...the hell? That movie was crap, comparing crap to goodness is not allowed!

Secondly, this is what staff and player notes are for. If you have clever little gadgets hidden away, you either pay on your best judgment, or don't, what's more important is that they're noted on you so staffers can see them ans you can use them.

Thirdly: If you have to wine and dine a contact, and the contact is an NPC, the NPC will be RP'ed by a storyteller, and it's that STORYTELLER's say how much the fancy lobster and champagne will take a chunk out of your pocket book. Because that's how RP works. If he really wants you making sacrifices, he'll charge you alot, if not, then he won't. That's the way the game works.

Lastly: This is a Mush. Here, creativity is the most important virtue, and entertainment the most valuable commodity. A mush is free, that does not mean I value it zero. Hell, most friendships are free, and even relationships (Unless one person pays ALL the time...) often are to the point where you both pay for enough shit for each other that it mostly evens out. That doesn't mean that they don't have value.

(I've gone out on dates that cost like 50 cents. A long romantic walk, a home cooked meal, and cuddling on the couch watching a DVD I own, doesn't mean I value them Zero.)

If the Ork asks you for your jacket, and you're a good role player, it doesn't matter how much you paid, if it's your character to flip out and beat the shit out of him, you will, if you're a shitty RP'er you'll just give it to him and desc a new one, null sheen, right?

I think what you're talking about is metagaming, I don't have to have paid any resources for something to consider it more or less valuable than it is. If I have a 50 yen knife, it might be my most valuable and inseperable of posessions. In the end, your logic just doesn't work, and I really doubt any staff would be crazy enough to go and implement something like this, especially at the current point in development.

I come from the Storyteller system, and I like it. It doesn't have a monetary system built into the stat system. The most it has is a 'resources' stat that can represent a job or investments, and pay out a steady rate to you of cash per month. Since nothing in the game has prices attached to it, however, it's up to the Storyteller to decide, well, everything. If they don't want to deal with money whatsoever? Cool, done deal. If they do? They can make up their own monetary system and make up prices as they go. Me, I don't count anything that's got less than 2 zeros.

Guns, armor, gear, none of it costs money, the Storyteller deigns all value. Not saying that Shadowrun needs to be changed, the current system is fine. I'm just saying that it doesn't need a money system of nickels and dimes to work. In Storyteller, you can be down and out on the streets, by RP'ing. In Storyteller, you can value a sword that you never paid any money for because it's your most valuable possession. Even if it has the same stats as any sword. You can do that there, and you can do that in Shadowrun.

That's what role playing is.

On another MUSH, we had fashion industry with designers and consumers. A designer would write half of a description (the clothing), and the consumer would buy that description and use it as their own. The description could be adjusted a little; so, it would make sense.
As part of the description it had the designer's brand, the design date, and the design price {Hawk-Apr2071-1250¥}. You could look at someone and instantly know ICly how stylish and expensive their clothes were.
This system worked fairly well for us. You had people who didn't wear designer clothing, and that was okay. You also had people who spent hundreds or thousands to keep up with the latest and most expensive fashions. The system inherently created IC information like, "He was dressed expensively, but in last Fall's style."
The system created an additional fun thing to do (design or shop for clothing), and increased the IC information available for roleplaying.

Far as I'm concerned, the only issue that matters when it comes to style and fashion is consistency. I hate it when people desc themselves out as being hot and stylish when their sheet says they have a low lifestyle or worse and have spent the minimum on keeping themselves clothed. Perhaps they can still be hot and charismatic, but there's a reason there's a negative dice modifier for not having "the right look", and if your character only gets to shower during assigned rationing periods and doesn't own anything chic, than you shouldn't be surprised to get slapped with it every so often. That goes for wearing fancy threads into Puyallup as well, but generally, I think it'd be easier to slum it than to fake trendiness and hygiene.

Anyway, I kind of like the fashion label idea, at least as an optional thing to have around. For the most part, a Face who wears a few choice signature pieces but otherwise sticks with whatever's the hottest new trend makes more sense than one who goes all out on the wild stuff. While it's always possible someone could be a bit of a trendsetter, often times fashion is all about context and knowing when and when not to conform.

I love that movie, not because it's really good but because it's pure flash.  The music, the visual effects - it's 100% style and no substance.  If I had a Shadowrun game that looked like Ultraviolet, I would consider that mission a success!  We're not in it to write literature, we're here to kick ass, take names, make splosions, and look good.


That's what I'm saying.  It should be the policy that such things are paid for on the player's best judgment.  Principled RPers will pay for their little things; maybe some people won't, but I think it's smart to at least say that they should.  Enforcement is out of the question, it's too small and fiddly for staff to deal with.  But I think that if the MUX takes a position, people will follow it.


That's the way the game works in tabletop.  In a MUX, a lot of things are more self directed.  I don't expect the staff to decide whether I can have mood underwear, that's up to me, and it's probably also up to me how much it costs.  But I think that if I want something neato like that, it should have a cost.


You're correct that I am talking about metagaming, in a sense.  You're correct also that monetary value is not the only value things have.  But I think it's also true that as detached humans roleplaying fictional characters, we don't always get into character.  The things that most readily effect our actions will be the things that show up on our +sheet; I presume everyone is here not just to have some fun RPing, but also to build a good character and accomplish exciting and daring things.  In a perfect world, we'd all step right into our characters' minds, and we'd empathize with them when they ponder whether to buy new shoes or breakfast.  But if new shoes are free, I doubt such close player-PC relationships will develop.  I'm not saying that nobody is capable of getting pissed about a jacket that cost their character 0 yen, but if the jacket didn't cost 0 yen the chances are a little bit greater that we can understand what its loss means to the PC.  Maybe you're perfect, maybe you and your PC are one.  But I don't think that's the case for everyone.  I don't think you can call a reasonable level of deatchment poor RPing, I think you call it normal.  Making everyday things a part of a player's sheet makes us, as players, more connected to the everday fortunes of our PC's.  That's all.


Again, you're assuming that I want to create some kind of "system" that is designed to make the game suck, or something.  Why would you assume that?  I don't want any "system" except to encourage people to pay for the little things, on their own inititiative.  If you're Mr. Perfect World of Darkness Ultimate RPer, you don't need to participate.

Play nice, people. This is all hypothetical discussion, so no need to get too excited. There are no plans in place for a +pay system at this time. No plans for the future, either. For heaven's sake, let me try to get chargen in place at least before you tear yourselves apart over IC payment for condoms and tampons!

Can't remember the movie...but I have to disagree about not being here to write literature...while I don't think anyone is talking about writing a 300 page novel based on the game, part of playing is telling a story not just blowing shit up. Perhaps just my style of playing but I'm a less a Ultraviolet type (apparently) and more a Ronin type of guy when I think of Shadowrun.

As far as paying for style, I'd have to side with WhiteKnight on this and agree Rp it, if you love the jacket so much then RP loving and being very protective of it. If it confers some kinda benefits like changing colors drop a queue to staff about it and see if they wish to charge you for it, if so pay up and note it, if not then just note it. A simple +pay system would have more of potential for abuse unless monitored by staff, while a queue (if we have queues) would already be monitored by staff to begin with.