Commoners and Money

[Bestatte]

But this has little to do with unrealistic expectations or goals of independent people. Some people create characters -specifically- to be independent. Not because "it's easy" - because anyone who thinks that is nuts. But because it's their character's background and history. Maybe they're just low-life scum with a gift for embroidery. No self-respecting noble or merchant family house would WANT this guy working for them - because he's a low-life rinthi, or desert elf, or a half-elf, or some gemmed magicker who lives on Wall Road, or whatever.

They're picking independent not because it's easy, but because it DOES make sense for their character to be independent. If there are people who don't do it this way - then I agree wholeheartedly with you Armaddict - they should rethink their character backgrounds and work with the game world in a more "true" way to the world.

The few that don't do this - and I really don't think it's a lot - should not be the cause for people to conclude that clanned employees are getting paid too much, or too little, or have it too easy, or too hard. I don't think it's fair to judge any aspect of the game on the basis of a minority of players who forget or ignore the "reality" of the game world.

[Armaddict]

I don't think the occasional, successful dependent (face it, you don't see it around -that- often as you're making it sound) should be the grounds to vastly change the way the economy is working right now.

[Anonymous]

If the economy is changed it should be changed in such a way that makes clan jobs worth the time and limitations on your freedoms from a monetary standpoint if nothing else.

Seriously, you make way, way, way more as an independent than you do in a clan.  

My first solution would be a drastic increase in food prices sold by NPCs but no increase on their buying prices for food.  This would help funnel non-outdoorsy types into clans.

[Armaddict]

I think employees make plenty of money.  The ones that aren't employees of everyone, have low chances of getting what they need.  The ones who do, make money, because the profit goes to them instead of the house.

Seems completely logical to me.  The last time I saw a filthy rich independent was awhile ago.  Otherwise, things seem fine.  One of them will continually have all the resources they need, while the other will need to spend money and hire people to help them, or risk going into dangerous situations themselves.

[Bestatte]

EXACTLY, Armaddict. Like I said - it all evens out in the end. You won't see "filthy rich" independents. It just isn't an issue. There has been in the past - but that's what, one every 3 RL years, maybe? You also won't see more than that many "filthy rich" employees.

Each method of earning sid comes with its perks and its downsides. The independent risks bad crafting/hunting days where there just isn't any good stuff to find, or kill, or they keep breaking everything they try to make. The independent risks their lives walking out of the gate to find their own material. The employee gives up his freedom and has to abide by a schedule. This gives him less time to hang out with his friends, or find his own stuff, or create his own stuff, or spend all his coins on stuff he wants to buy.

The independent also risks being in the front line when an enemy approaches the city - because he's already outside the city walls facing that enemy head-on. The employee has the risk of being forced by his employer to fight against an enemy he doesn't want to fight against.

The independent risks boredom of repitition - hunt, forage, craft, eat, sleep, socialize until the storm is over, then repeat so he can be sure he has food and water to survive next week. The employee risks boredom of repitition - spar, lunch, spar, supper, spar, socialize for 20 minutes, and if they're lucky - they get to stand next to the table guarding their boss for another hour until it's time to log off.

Risk - reward. It all seems fair to me.

[sjanimal]

I hear a lot of complainst about commoners, but the truth is....

Jobs in noble houses SUCK.  If wages were dropped any, we'd just stop taking those jobs.  I dare you.  Drop them even a penny.  

Don't mistake PCs for peasants.  PCs represent the upper echelon of people.

Even a PC noble is not going to be fat, lazy and ignorant like most nobles.  She's going to be smart, crafty and scheeming.

Similarly, commoner PCs are not going to be unwashed, poor idiots.

If you want to play a peasant...then play a peasant.  Don't expect the rest of us to play peasants.  Don't try to rain on our parade.  We're not the VNPCs, after all.

[Xan]

This is growing faster than I can read it but to address the first post on guards getting too much:

As XD said its all extra.  Also, if you lower it, people would have a hell of a time getting a full set of armor.  The big problem is that lowering pay hurts the starting clanned character alot more than the established one.

And lets be honest about this, anyone in the south with the forage command can make a ton of sid with little danger to themselves if they play it right.  But such independents are also not spending anything on where they live, so isnt that a little unrealistic if someone keeps that up and amasses a fortune but eats travel cakes and sleeps in the Gaj?

[Tlaloc]

Don't mistake PCs for peasants. PCs represent the upper echelon of people.

Not true. The majority of PCs are, indeed, peasants. Indeed, Commoner PCs represent just that: Commoners. IE: PCs represent the average commoner. Some PCs might be more affluent and well off. Others might be dirt poor. But they are all common, and ergo, do not represent the upper echelon of people, but rather the peasantry.

Nobles, Templars, and some Merchant Family members, as well as a few high-ranking commoners (mercenary Lieutenants, guard Captains, high-ranking military, Advisors to Nobles, etc), on the other hand, do.

[Anonymous]

I'm not talking about filthy rich commoners.  If you have the choice between a comfortable life free from restrictions, which is what most indy's be they ranger or merchant can get easy enough, or a comfortable life with restrictions on your movement, what is the average person's inclination going to be?

Jobs in a land like Armageddon should be the stuff everyone wants to get.  When I frst started playing nearly everyone in Allanak wanted a job because, at the time, Kadius and Oash were the only active clans in town.

Look back at the depression in America.  People would do anything for a paying job, yet the land they live on is infinitely more fertile and alive than Amarageddon will be.

Independent PCs are my favorite PCs.  I rarely, if ever, play clanned PCs.  Still the reality remains that jobs in a barren wasteland should be the stuff of dreams.  And it just isn't, the demand for jobs seems unreasonably low to me.

That's a tangent, I guess.  Bringing it back to the topic at hand I'd be glad to see economic changes which made independent life much more of a struggle because it would make clan positions the subject of competition instead of employers begging.

[Larrath]

Being a mindbender mul sucks.  Playing a red-robed templar sucks.  Being a noble sucks.  Being a merchant sucks.

Every position can absolutely rock or absolutely suck, depending on two major factors:

1) What *you* are doing to make the position enjoyable
and
2) Whether you chance and get some really cool people in your clan.

I would be careful saying that "we" would just stop taking these jobs...I don't know about you, but how much money my character will make every month is never even taken into consideration when I plan my apps.


PCs do NOT represent the upper echelon of people.  'Rinthi pickpockets and Red Storm spice sifters and Bynners are hardly the 'upper echelon', and some characters actually are idiots.

A PC noble is not going to be fat and lazy?  Since when?  Ignorant varies, but I doubt that many nobles are truly ignorant.  They might not care, but they are probably tutored fairly well.  Most NPC/VNPC nobles are scheming, by the way; it's just that they're doing that with people you don't know and against people you don't know...and damn straight some commoners are unwashed, poor idiots.  Sure, maybe they're not starving unwashed idiots, but still.

If you want to acquire extra gold as a House Guard, there are lots of things you could do.  You can smuggle equipment from the compound and sell it to a network in the Labyrinth.  You can rob someone.  You can be a secret raider.  You can steal from your employer and say that the elf did it.

Nobody is going to rain on your parade; it's a waste of water.

[Lazloth]

There's a good bit of insight in this thread, and I'll highlight what I find on the mark.

Armageddon is a game and it has a game economy (ie, not much of one).

This weakness applies centrally to this discussion; Arm has a very stale economic model, not limited to but certainly obvious:
* Minimal PC-to-PC interaction and dependence;
* Overproduction with no shifted resource pool;
* Oversupply with no shifted supply curve.

A solution akin to arbitrarily raising the price of silk is inadequate; it would be an exercise with simple results:  I would prefer to see instead a model of dynamic liquidity and pricing become slowly introduced.  If it has to start manually, let it start manually -- duskhorn are systematically slaughtered, let the herds migrate and dwindle in number.  Route traders keep bringing lumber to Allanak?  Demand doesn't hit the floor, but supply increases gradually: pricing drops.  Scale with a trickling week-to-week engine and you have the makings of an open independent economy with repercussions to big money houses.  Fruit crop gets severely impacted by a rogue fire?  Wine prices rocket, and production stagnates as the rebuilding process occurs with the vendor houses impacted.

Can allow for fewer 'mystical' rpts where resources are sought and secured, where house guards and individual actions impact the world (more).

But I digress..

Jobs in a land like Armageddon should be the stuff everyone wants to get.

Agreed, and as mentioned, while economic growth may be restricted, there are other perks.  A good leader will draw players into affiliated clans and ultimately I'm not playing to have the largest bank account.


I always laugh when I hear people have to really struggle to make ends meet to afford food & water though.

[My 2 sids]

Facts like if one is born to a noble or commoner house, a well-known merchant house or to someone's trusted aide, what race one is born into, if one is born into the right city or not, etc. these are what makes up 99% of one's status in game.  This means that birth rank has more to do with status and power than money.  There should be extremely few instances (if ever) a noble is out bid by a commoner for anything, not because the noble is rich, but because the noble is a noble! Some things are just more important than money.  Players must remember that the game is not taking place in a capitalistic society; everything isn't for sale to everyone.  If money is getting too much power in game ICly, I would hope that the nobles and templarate are going to start doing something to defend their rights and privileges (that come from their birth, not money).

[Akaramu]

I still believe the lack of realistic interaction with and among gemmed is more of a problem than this.

I dont care about commoners wearing silk, maybe they earned a high position within their house and received permission to dress in silk?

Some people raise to high and trusted positions and might want to reflect this by showing how much their noble appreciates their work. I dont think that any commoner could realistically out-dress a noble, I agree with the "how cute, he tries to imitate me" view.

I do care about commoners openly hireing gemmed without anyone even looking at them funny.

[sjanimal]

Okay, Tllaloc

You're a story teller and I'm a noob, so I'm going to say this is a case of you are right and I am wrong...

But if that is the case, then this is completely different from ANY game I've ever played before.

Also, in that case it's kind of cheezy to have so many people with warrior skill, ranger skills, thief skills, etc.

So, If I'm really just average joe...I should probably have 40 hp due to malnourishment, be afraid to talk in the presence of nobles....be afraid to pick up any weapon larger than a dagger...be afraid to leave the city under any pretext...have a boring job peeling potatoes for someone...in essence, my character would be so boring I wouldn't want to play him.

So, what your proposing is completely against the wisdom of what any other RPG has done in the past 30 years.  

Are you sure about this?  Have you thought this through?  It would pretty much reduce everyone to the status of bad role-players, since I've only met like 2 people who actually played UNWASHED, UNAMBITIOUS peasants.  Also, NONE of the nobles really play the typical redneck noble as I understand them.  So, has this really been thought through?

Keep in mind, I'm not the sort of person who rivals the nobles in salary like some people...but, geez, playing peasants will create severe playability issues.

[Armaddict]

I actually agree with Sjanimal, somewhat, Tlaloc.

I wouldn't call the PC's the 'upper-echelon', but the 'notables'.

What is it about that fella who's playing average joe that makes him stand out?  He's notable.  He's got something different.  And that will be shown when he is one of the relatively few who finds a decent job, begins to make some money, and starts making a more than decent living.

PC's don't represent anyone.  They are sometimes the exceptions, sometimes the most simple basis of what a commoner is.  But it should be agreed, that when you see a PC, they are always just that bit different than the throng of people in the market.  If they weren't...I think I'd be whining and asking for permanent hide for everyone who dressed like an average joe, since he'd blend in with vnpc's.

[jstorrie]

I think everyone's barking up the wrong tree, here.

The problem isn't that Random Joe Commoner can blow twenty-eight thousand obsidian on a leet silk outfit.  It's that Random Bob Rinth Rat can't easily jump him outside the Barrel, stab him to death and sell his clothes for spice-money.

Deal with the super-NPC-guards problem, and I bet commoner PCs will start dressing a bit more according to their class.

[Pantoufle]

I hear a lot of complainst about commoners, but the truth is....

Jobs in noble houses SUCK. If wages were dropped any, we'd just stop taking those jobs. I dare you. Drop them even a penny.

Don't mistake PCs for peasants. PCs represent the upper echelon of people.

Even a PC noble is not going to be fat, lazy and ignorant like most nobles. She's going to be smart, crafty and scheeming.

Similarly, commoner PCs are not going to be unwashed, poor idiots.

If you want to play a peasant...then play a peasant. Don't expect the rest of us to play peasants. Don't try to rain on our parade. We're not the VNPCs, after all.

Just for good measure I felt like reposting what was already said.  This is precisely how I feel.  Sometimes I just think people need to get over the fact that PCs are not NPCs and that's that.  You want to squander the common and beat them into submission so they're all wearing pisspoor clothing like most NPCs are depicted wearing, clad in the one simple grey aba they will ever own their entire life?  That sounds great, except it's incredibly boring for the players involved.  You won't ever find someone play the mundane, impoverished potter who struggles to eek out an existance with the day-to-day grind of hawking his paltry wares.  And if you do, I'm willing to bet (s)he's either a) going to get bored of the role 2 days later and suicide or b) is secretly a mindbender or well-trained assassin or has some other nifty little secret that keeps the role fun.

Nobody wants to be what the NPCs, the mass, the norm, are meant to represent.  And why should they?

[sjanimal]

I was thinking of making a separate post about this....but do people who comment on this kind of stuff have a basic understanding of statistics?

I challenge you all to go to your local DMV.  Sit at the DMV, and watch the people that walk in.  Maybe one out of ten is hot.  Maybe one out of ten has a REALLY good job.  One out of ten owns a sportscar.  One out of ten is appreciatably creative.  These are the common people of your town.  I mean, really go and look at them before you argue with me on this.  Sit there for an hour and people watch.

Want to talk about nobles?  Go to a country club sometime and do some people watching.  Watch the fat.  Watch the lazy.  Watch the jaded and the over-priviledged.  College-educated?  Yes.  Well-read?  No.
Bill Gaites, Donald Trump, and Martha Stewart are not cut out of the same fabric as these schmucks.  

I'd rather play a Donald Trump or a Dr. Condoleezza Rice than a Paris Hilton.

Armageddon has a player-base that's smarter than your average person, more competitive than your average gamer,  and more independent.

Expecting us to play peasants, if that truly is the wish of the staff, and keep in mind when I say peasant I don't mean poor person I mean stuppid peasant, if that truly is the wish of the staff, I believe will only cause discrepencies in role-playing as well as alienated player base.

Personally, I'd leave the game if I'm expected to play unambitious, uncreative and stupid.  I'm not saying that as a threat, because I feel sure this can be resolved, but I just want you to see what you're asking.

One more thing...allot of the people that are criticizing the rich commoners don't appreciate how short-lived many of the rich commoners are.  There are many reasons for this.

[Cenghiz]

Hmm. Joining the fray...
No worries... No commoner can outdress a noble.. Because we have the class 'burglar'... Only thing, we don't have enough PC's... Only the furniture stealing ones, and AFAIK those die or get banned from that role quite fast. A few more burglar PC's and most will have to stop buying silk, knowing that it can be stolen quite easy with all those burglars around. Not most of us will be able and be reputable enough to buy a slave who waits in our home when we're offline. (Anyway, I'm wondering how people will react when we do such a thing, leave a NPC slave in the apartment's sitting room, with some food and water which's going to be junked when we get back to the game. He won't auto-attack, anyway...)

[Bestatte]

Facts like if one is born to a noble or commoner house, a well-known merchant house or to someone's trusted aide, what race one is born into, if one is born into the right city or not, etc. these are what makes up 99% of one's status in game.  This means that birth rank has more to do with status and power than money.  There should be extremely few instances (if ever) a noble is out bid by a commoner for anything, not because the noble is rich, but because the noble is a noble! Some things are just more important than money.  Players must remember that the game is not taking place in a capitalistic society; everything isn't for sale to everyone.  If money is getting too much power in game ICly, I would hope that the nobles and templarate are going to start doing something to defend their rights and privileges (that come from their birth, not money).

If nobles don't want to be outbid, they can open their mouths and inform the merchant houses to stop opening auctions to the general public. If the merchant house opens auctions and sales to the public, including commoners, it is because they -expect- to get the highest price for the items they're selling. Why in hell should they take less, simply because a noble shows up and says he wants the uber obsidian plasma lava lamp but is only willing to pay 20 sids for it? If a commoner is there and says he'll pay 20,000 sids, and has the cash to give out, then it is the merchant house's prerogative to accept the bid.

If it bothers the noble houses that much, they can hire their own crafters and never need to buy another Kadian silk lava lamp again. Or - they can sit there and allow the merchant houses to do their business as they see fit - or they can demand otherwise. Can't blame the customer for bidding if he's invited to attend and bid.

[Xan]

My take:

PCs are notables, but dont confuse notable with upper class or priveledged.    Notable can mean a notable beggar, or notable peasant.  You start off as a peasant, dont confuse that.  Your free, but so is the little kid selling rotten fruits around the corner whose starving.  Your background may be better than those under the poverty line for Zalanthas (meaning you get enough food and water to be healthy by relative standards) but yer just a freeborn commoner.

You get noticed, you can get into interesting stuff, you can make a fortune.  Your PC isnt stuck in a rut like most of the Vnpc population but you arent any better than your average commoner status or monettary wise, at least starting off.

[sjanimal]

Xan

Thank you, I think you said what I was trying to say much better.

[spawnloser]

If the economy is changed it should be changed in such a way that makes clan jobs worth the time and limitations on your freedoms from a monetary standpoint if nothing else.

Seriously, you make way, way, way more as an independent than you do in a clan.  

My first solution would be a drastic increase in food prices sold by NPCs but no increase on their buying prices for food.  This would help funnel non-outdoorsy types into clans.

This could funnel outdoorsy people into clans too.  Even better, make water more expensive too.

[Anonymous]

Jobs in a land like Armageddon should be the stuff everyone wants to get.

Agreed, and as mentioned, while economic growth may be restricted, there are other perks.  A good leader will draw players into affiliated clans and ultimately I'm not playing to have the largest bank account.

To clarify what I was getting at wasn't about bank account size but standard of living and security.  Not to mention the resulting sense of superiority over the struggling masses while you wear your house colors.

Clan jobs in Armageddon are now the equivalent of a McJob.  They are always hiring, the wage is drastically lower than what you could earn on your own with some initiative (the shift to a 2 RL week month hurt since clanners now get half as much pay) and you only need to be able to fog up a mirror to get one.  But I keep leading this thread astray.

[sjanimal]

If the prices get tweaked noticeably, that sure won't force me to join any clans.  Might force me to pk a few people to keep enough money...but I guess them's the breaks.