Is there a problem with topside?
Anecdotes within

Topside is made for people like her.

If you like to rp getting into subtle traps and feeling like everything you do is checked by other pieces on the proverbial chessboard, then topside is your thing! If you like Amberite plots and constant power struggles, having it all while fending off those coming for you like soldiers aiming for a beachhead, then topside is for you!

The pervasive loneliness and boredom IS a challenge, but it's one that is the trappings of that "perfect" life. The perfection of topside is a lie, and the things you get up to there--betrayal, competition, and secret meetings with your Mixer input--are the grime beneath your seemingly faultless image. The challenge is to seem like you aren't doing anything wrong, yet secretly you have TONS of irons in the fire.

Things like Grunen's, KMB, and Uphoria are intermittent scenes for meeting your friends and foes over drinks, smoothies, and a nice dip in the pool. In other words, it's just a brief respite from the bloodsport.

Topside has lots of spats between all of its corporations, although I cannot reveal what they are here. But! I guarantee you they are there. How do they happen?

People allow their players to be petty, messy, and do sly shit to snipe at someone else. The key word is "sly", which means others may not notice it. You won't see it in the news, but it's happening!

My advice is to take an easy start by picking a corporate citizen (if you're topside) and just start fucking with their life. Then, boom! You've got a rival. More people will jump in and life will be more fun.

If you need suggestions, you can IC'ly ask a coworker how better to serve your company. They might have an errand for you to fulfill.

Ephememaralis, I generally agree with all of your points.

To answer your question, while I do believe there are problems with topside, I do not believe several of the very accurate points you bring up are problems from my personal perspective. And some other things are not problems from the Staff perspective (conjecture of course).

"Topside fosters risk aversion" and "Risk is an unintelligent choice in a topside environment,": For the former I look at it as more of a glass half-full rather than half-empty kind of thing. I think Topside forces players to seek out their own fun and risk, if they want it. For the latter, yes risk is an unintelligent, unoptimized choice. But risk is the fun choice a lot of the times. It depends a lot on the player and circumstance, but I think it's up to the players to seek out that fun, and escape the surface level boredom of topside.

Progression appears to make you continually more isolated: Hadn't thought about this, but the way you describe it makes it sound like another theme-appropriate thing that comes at the cost of the player experience. I think the only way to "fix" this is for it to somehow become more ICly known how isolating Success can feel, and for players to prepare very early for that, because from my very limtied perspective it's possible to mitigate the loneliness with enough planning ahead of time.

A lack of "grand narrative": I think this is true, unfortunate, and intentional. From my limited perspective, everything is going according to keikaku(translator's note, blah blah blah). In my next ridiculous wall of text, I'll go more into conjecture and reasoning for this, but I think the lack of a grand narrative topside is meant to encourage more topside players to get involved with the meat of the game: the grand narratives in the Mix. Down there is the main draw. I believe Topside players are meant to mainly be entities to support and fuel what goes on down there, rather then do their own thing. It makes more sense after all for Staff time to be dedicated to plots that affect the majority of players, and then using different elements of design inherent to the game to coax the minority into participating in that.

I believe two main types of gameplay are what Staff wants out of Topside players: Either fuck with each other, or bankroll mix shenanigans. Like introducing different species of ants to an ant farm, tossing in some tasty sugar, and deriving enjoyment out of watching them kill each other over it.

And yo, whenever you don't want to do either of those, there's always typefucking.

(Just being crass for fun. I personally hope the Topside playerbase increases to the point of there being lots more incentive for GM attention towards things like intricate, grand plots that are somewhat more accessible to topside players as well as mixers.)

But, if Staff feels that a bit more leniency can lead to more game conflict and rp, there are different IC things which could happen to make this leniency a bit more obvious to others.

In order to try and get fulfillment, typically they climb the corporate ladder long enough to start realizing how much of a sham the environment they're in really is. There's a progression to the whole thing. At that tipping point, I feel like you either embrace your position and revel in it or else start getting up to some shady bullshit because you want to be part of the bad kids club. Both are things that involve taking on increased risk, but because life is so sterile, it starts to seem worth it.

That's how corporate characters evolve into influencers, or fall back to the Mix, or both, which drives their stories forward. I've seen lots of characters have their time in the sun, crest, and then end up in the Mix. Someone needs to lose, right? The corporate characters who survive and make a mark are no doubt feeding souls to the underworld. There are also lots of people who just prefer the corporate playstyle because they don't like combat or danger, they just want to RP in peace. Some of them continue on ad infinitum, just enjoying the game, which is fine. Others become victims in the plots of their colleagues and end up in the Mix themselves.

I feel as though GMs do give corporate players leeway when they fuck up in a reasonable manner while trying to do some themely shit, at least in my experience. It's often the victims who get the short end of the stick, but that's why you don't want to be a victim.

When you have a distinct lack of quality interaction that amounts to more than casual bar RP, or hanging around doing run of the mill things with no sort of incentive to do more than that from the big megacorp, you're going to start doing shit just for the hell of doing it. You'll take any kind of meaningful interaction with the rest of the game for the sake of doing it. And when you get to that point, it's hard to try and rein in those terrible habits you've gotten into when you need to for sake of sticking to the theme.

I honestly wish that the corporate world wasn't seen as such a stalemate, but there's only so much a handful of people can do before they feel burnt out and draw back to just idling and eventually disappearing.

I just don't know what to recommend that actually fits within the realm of reasonable expectations on the part of the players and GMs.

If people want to get get management to loosen the purse strings a little, they need to do this by gaining status and that takes time and effort on our parts. It means that we have to do something to drag ourselves up out of the wageslave masses. Getting hired is just the beginning.

According to the theme, the corporations require a steady supply of workers to keep the economy running. In other words, it is cheap "slave" labor provided by mixers without any other option that keep the corporations working. The labor works in the factories and handles all of the other menial jobs that ultimately result in products for the corporations to sell.

The way the game is currently setup does not reflect that dynamic at all. Or if it does, it is limited and not at all overarching in the way that the theme implies that it is. As a player it feels like there are two completely separate MOOs. Or if not completely separate, at least extremely removed from each other.

What I am going to lay out here is a potential system to more closely integrate the economy so that everyone has more reasons to interact and everyone has the ability to affect the economy.

Corporations produce goods. That should be the foundation of the economy. Every "job" that a player has should be tied into the production of goods. Those "goods" can be measured.

The foundation of the system that I am imagining is the basic "work" system that is already implemented at SHI. We all know how it works, so I won't dive into detail. The important thing is that there is a location where players "work", and there is a system to track the work.

Currently, SHI is the only corporation with a work system. In an ideal system, every corporation that employs players should have a work system. Furthermore, the work locations should be in the Mix / Red sector. Why? Because that is where the labor is for one. Two, it provides the most opportunity for roleplay and player engagement.

Fundamentally, each corporation should have a weekly "work" quota. I have no idea what that quota should be, but the admins can probably figure it out. A simple formula might work along the lines of (# number of players times X unit of work = ## work per week). Just for discussion sake, let's say that each player needs to work for 30 minutes a week, and there are 5 players in the corporation. The corporation needs to generate 150 minutes of work per week.

Even this simple system creates RP opportunities. Who is ultimately responsible for the work getting done? The senior employee (Vice President or whatever)? Each individual employee? The buck has to stop somewhere and the work needs to be done.

Why does the work need to be done?

There are so many ways to incentivize and punish here. An obvious one is weekly pay. If the corporation misses their quota, then everyone's pay gets cut by whatever percentage they missed it by. Or it could be more focused where only the senior player gets penalized. After all, they are the "manager" and are responsible for meeting production goals. An incentive might be that if a corporation hits 200% of their quota for three months in a row, everyone gets a bonus. 10K or whatever. There would need to be an upper limit. Enough to incentivize people to work more, but not so much that the payouts get out of control.

With the basic work system and quotas in place, the potential for corporations to affect each other is created. If the work locations are in the Mix, or to a lesser extent in Gold, corporations (and their contractors) can attack each other. Make it dangerous to go into work. Give those corporate security staff something to do (protect their employees). Make corpies want to work hard to get promoted so that they can work on Gold and not have to risk their lives going to work in the Mix. Make corpies fear getting demoted because by doing so they will have to go back to the Mix. Where do the gangs come down? Do they get hired for security? Do they attack corpies and extract tolls? Do they play both sides?

Work being done, or not, could affect the availability of goods. For example, if Viriisoma employees do not generate enough work quota, players should not be able to buy Viriisoma gear (nanos, etc.) Same goes for Saedor Krupp (cyberware), ZMI (weapons), etc. etc. Create some real reasons to work, and consequences for not working. Just as stores do not get stocked if crates do not get delivered, equipment should not be created by corporations with lazy employees.

Work quota should be able to be banked and "stolen". This mechanic would represent corporate espionage, executive kidnapping, etc. Some of it could be automated by players with the right skill. Maybe a "steal" verb where a decker could deck the system. Or a "kidnap" command for a solo. Maybe "seduce" for charisma based characters to lure employees away. This aspect is complex and probably more of a version 2 or version 3 idea.

Is this worth further discussion and refinement? Is putting corporates to "work" something that would make the MOO better?

Hek,

I like the depth you went into but a short response is: No, I don't think it would.

My longer response?

Working topside is a tricky situation. If you're like me, when you have a character with a topside job you struggle with how much your character should actually physically be in your workplace's spot. I'd always feel guilty if I didn't have my character in at work for hours a day, because I'd think I'd be letting staff down, not performing up to expectations as a player. I'd tell myself it didn't matter what else my character did for their work performance, if I also didn't have them in there at work for set amount of time I was failing and I wasn't doing a good job, I wasn't a good RPer.

So if you add a 'work' component to the equation, I think you're going to find a lot of people going in to work just to do that which takes them away from RP opportunities and RP situations. It'll lead to probably some OOC resentment, I think you'll see less people applying for topside jobs and then if you're either in a corporation that doesn't have many PC employees hired or a corporation that doesn't have many PC employees that have the time to go in to work to type work, you're punishing players who do have time by either making them do more of the lifting or taking away their flash. For the players who don't have a lot of time to play, it'd be forcing them to choose between RPing or.. going in to type work for chyen, essentially. I'd rather those players have RP opportunities for their limited time rather than stressing that they haven't met a mechanical quota.

And I'd expect an employee who's supposed to be doing news to at least have a quota and produce something anyway. I think these are already kind of in effect, just not written down or public -- BUT the only difference is that if you don't achieve them, there doesn't seem to be any major punishment going on (at least from my point of view) other than just a warning. I think demotions and being fired should be a little easier topside if you're not performing well. Because if you don't perform as well as others and occupy that spot, you're basically roleblocking other PCs who could contribute to the game more than you because the spots are full. Maybe then it's time to just try something different if you've been stuck at your current job and obviously haven't done well and have been just stuck in a loop for six months.

I just think punishment should be strict. These are corporations with thousands and thousands of applicants each day. Why would they keep an employee who isn't on par with their coworkers and even the employees of a rival corporation? This has OOC implications too because when good plotters and players are in one corporation. To give one example:

John, James and Jane are part of Corporation X.

Adam, Andy and Amy are part of Corporation Y.

Let's say John, James and Jane are great plotters. They do things constantly, plot, fuck others over, hire people. They get promoted in their selective careers and Corporation X starts to dominate.

Adam, Andy and Amy aren't as good as John, James and Jane. They try but they just can't plot as well as the others, leading to Corporation Y dwindling and losing most of it's presence in the game due to employees not being able to achieve anything. In the current state of things, Adam Andy and Amy wouldn't be demoted or fired.

This leads to things getting stale with Corporation X dominating the corporate world all the time, and other PCs who would be better fitting the role get roleblocked and cannot rival Corporation X by working in Corporation Y since Adam, Andy and Amy aren't being punished and are hoarding that role.

Maybe I'm a little bit harsh but I think for the sake of topside not getting stale and to avoid monopolization of corporate power and the corporate scene, employees who can't keep up and are stuck in this loop of failure in their jobs should be replaced with other PCs. Such is topside life. If you're not good enough, you're replaced.

I do like some of the idea's Hek put forth, however, I feel like this type of serious integration would require A LOT of work by Johnny, and though it would be great, I feel like a lot could be accomplished with the system as it is. Some minor tweaks to the existing framework could still add a lot more depth to each role while also bringing more opportunities for people to be caught or framed, etc. Requisitions for example, have the money transferred to the agent first, and allow them to purchase the items from the term, have the items pop out unboxed, allow for Req agent to box said item for delivery. This would give Req agents the opportunity to get out in the world to find this stuff for cheaper, breaking the company rules, making some extra money, and opening themselves up to all kinds of opportunities for RP. They could flat out take the money and run, getting a fat severance while incurring the wrath of whatever corp they work for. Just this system alone would give corpies so many options to abuse and get caught abusing the system. Giving corpies more ways to make more money would imo only help the RP of the theme, by allowing them to take more chances. Sure they could sit in their apartment and collect UE and cash, but they could make a hell of a lot more getting out and doing something.

I would hate to see any more of the 'work' type shit like at SHI. Mind numbingly boring tasks like this should not be used.

As far as quota's based on real in game economy, this would be pretty hard to implement without the entire process being overhauled. However, I think you could get something close with the VP position managing the other employee's by simply having somewhat random goals each week or month. One month they could have a lot of leeway to allow req's and reimburses, while another week they could have to tighten up and operate things carefully.

As far as these NPC's in VP positions currently, maybe what is needed is a slight laxing on the criteria for said positions. Just put someone in there if they have been working for awhile, promote the most senior PR, or top Req or whatever, but get someone in there give other corpies a target, and to get this kind of manipulation going.

* Generate x amount of y quality drug. Experiment with batch on Mixer test subjects to be rounded up by CorpSec.

* Write a new disease $cript and purposefully infect mixers with it under the guise of drug testing.

--- are things that the players can actually do, or at least attempt to. If you're not sure how to go about achieving a goal or taking the first step to doing it, reach out to the GMs and see what you can do.

When you make a corporate character, or decide to make the transition from the Mix to topside, you have to be prepared to shift from being reactionary to an active instigator. Even if you're not the best of planners, figure out what your strong suits are player and character-wise and go for that shit.

Social-loud mouth who can bring people together and network with the best of them, as well as create fun roleplay situations outside of gathering into bars, clubs, and the like? Look for the career paths that actually let you do those things and rewards you for doing them well.

More unobtrusive, detail oriented, and thrive in information gathering? Etc, etc, etc. Stay away from jobs that let you become complacent like bartender jobs, janitorial, and etc. I always considered the Service Mixer positions to be stepping stones to figuring out what you want/need to do. Make it a means to an ends.

And I have no idea why people keep saying that topside characters can't do subterfuge or commit fraud and all that. It is possible. It can and does happen. If you aren't seeing it then maybe you need to start doing it!

And why would anybody do these things? Because it makes the game fun. You having your character do cool things is what makes this less of a bean counting simulator and more of a fun RP experience that results in fun stories.

Subterfuge is happening. Faud is happening. There are PCs up there with a lot of pull. But none of this was handed out. It was achieved by proactive players/characters.