Reset Password
Existing players used to logging in with their character name and moo password must signup for a website account.
- AmenBH2003 40s
- Rillem 17m
- Burgerwolf 28m PRETZELS
- Ralph 1m
- QueenZombean 39s
- adrognik 8m
- Napoleon 12m
- BigLammo 7s youtu.be/NZR4EeTkRqk
- AdamBlue9000 17s Rolling 526d6 damage against both of us.
- Komira 24s
a Mench 9m Doing a bit of everything.
- BitLittle 1m
- zxq 2m
- Ameliorative 1m
And 24 more hiding and/or disguised
Sindomedome logo
a cyberpunk roleplaying game
banner art by amika
Connect to Sindome @ moo.sindome.org:5555 or just Play Now
  • BgBB
  • Ideas
  • Improving ganger "do you need anything?"

Improving ganger "do you need anything?"

Login to post. Membership required.
Jump To
Newest Post
It would be great if there were a way to determine how much a ganger is going to be willing to pay for what they want. After delivering about a dozen different items and either making a little bit of profit, or breaking even, my character got totally screwed over on a transaction.

When he talked to other characters about it, 'everyone' seemed to know that on certain items, gangers will only pay a certain percentage. The only way to 'learn' that seems to be through experience / trial and error. That is great and all, but it isn't very realistic.

Generally when people do business with each other, they know how much they are going to make. That is how they decide whether or not they want to participate in the transaction.

I see two ways to address this with code. One, have a second level option that allows a player to ask an NPC how much they will pay for something. For example, the character asks, "Do you need anything?" and the NPC provides a list. Then the character could ask, "How much for ?" or something similar, "What is worth to you?" maybe. The other option is to adapt the container (table / shelf / etc) code. Currently when a character buys an item, it asks them if they really want to spend the chyen. The same thing could go for the NPC. "NPC is willing to give you $$$ for . Do you accept?"

By Hek at Sep 18, 2018 9:46 AM
I think a lot of people are going to see where you're coming from but to me I don't think it's anything that needs to be changed. They're sketchy transactions on ganger street turfs and it's more themely and realistic to go through a hassle and get shorted for your troubles than it is for every random gang member looking for drugs and weapons to be making your profit their problem. My take on it anyway.
By Azriel at Sep 18, 2018 11:20 AM
My fifty chy on this is that a ganger wouldn't give a fuck about you anyways, and if you don't agree with the payment, you can put up or shut up. That's how I'd assume it'd work. :p
By wiebman at Sep 20, 2018 11:06 AM
We already considered this and a ganger's payout is affected by your faction standing which is an amount that goes up and down based on positive and negative exchanges with NPCs.

So, we want them to screw you out of a good deal, they should pay better if they like you, so it mostly avoids you getting less than you paid. We also don't want people buying items without very good haggling skill from the market and just handing them to gangers.

We had a problem where people would buy from market, sell to ganger at a high profit, steal the object back, sell it back, rinse and repeat. Because people did not see a problem with abusing the game's economy with that, we now have gangers pay terrible prices for "USED" gear, which is likely their own coming back to them. So you really only come out on top if you just happen to come by this stuff or are proficient at haggling prices down with PCs or the market places.

I hope that helps explain why it is the way it is.

By Cerberus at Sep 20, 2018 11:09 AM
There is more to it then you getting paid should you choose to offload your items with a gang member for quick chy.

What that is is something you can figure out yourself, especially if you go the gang route. I don't think there is anything wrong with the system aside from scavenger code caps but that's a different discussion :D

By Grizzly666 at Sep 20, 2018 11:10 AM
and there is cerb with the explanation right before I posted :D
By Grizzly666 at Sep 20, 2018 11:11 AM
Cerberus,

Thanks for the reply.

Did you consider alternative solutions to the stealing problem? For example, you could instantiate a list on the NPC. Once an NPC gets an item, that item is removed from the list. The NPC works through the list until it is empty, and only then does the list get recreated. With a long enough list, a sneaky player would have to steal a whole bunch of objects, and deal with the increased likelihood of getting caught.

Another option is to put a LastOwner attribute on it. If the ganger buys the object, they append their dbref to it. Then they just check, and if ganger.dbref = lastowner.dbref, they get angry and attack the swindler, or refuse the transaction, or whatever.

I'm not following how providing a huge negative payout is any more productive than a net 0 payout. For example, I found out that buying any of a certain type of object and selling them to a ganger nets 0 profit. My character now has no interest in selling the gangers any of those objects, unless he can find a source to get them less expensively.

On the other hand, my character bought a "new" object from a store and sold it to a ganger, and got a negative return. I am assuming that the object is new because it was a "Name Brand" object purchased from the "Name Brand" store. In that instance, the 'used' goods narrative / IC justification does not hold up.

One last observation. It does not make any sense for gangers to rip people off who are providing them with key objects that they need to fight their turf wars. I don't want to go into IC specifics about what those objects are, but suffice to say they are pretty essential to anyone making a living of dishing out violence on other people. If a gang gets a reputation of ripping off everyone who provides those objects to them, word is going to get out that they are extremely ungrateful to people who help them, and nobody is going to help them out. (Maybe that's an intentional IC consequence. But it seems to me more like an unintended consequence of trying to use code to deter a few people from abusing the system.)

By Hek at Sep 20, 2018 1:03 PM
They aren't ripping you off, they're paying street value. If you don't like it then maybe kill them and take your stuff back.
By Vera at Sep 20, 2018 1:05 PM
Hek,

Regarding alternatives to lower payouts, this was discussed in depth back when the change was made:

https://www.sindome.org/bgbb/game-discussion/new-game-features/new-scavenger-code-111/

By Grey0 at Sep 21, 2018 2:33 AM
I want to address another side of this, and that is roleplay.

@Hek you mentioned that after talking to other characters you were able to find out the market value a ganger would pay and what items were the best to sell.

PERFECT.

That's exactly what we want. This is not a 'systems' game, this is a roleplaying game. We want you out there, talking to other characters, gathering information. In a way, our systems are designed to make it more difficult for someone to play Sindome like it's a single player game.

This isn't D&D or an MMO where you can look up stat sheets and payouts and figure out how to 'game' the system and crunch the numbers so you can min/max your experience.

Sindome is like life. It's messy. While what you're suggesting about a ganger telling a character how much they are willing to pay does indeed make sense in some lights, it also isn't likely to be accurate.

Your faction standing might change. The value of the item might change. The ganger's payout might change. All between when you asked, and when you deliver the item. I would rather provide no information than wrong information in cases like that. I would also prefer characters have to seek out information from other characters, as this promotes roleplay.

As an aside, all items in the game and their requisite values are subject to value changes based on their rarity. As an example, if someone is making a TON of v-202 and flooding the game with it, the value of v-202 will go down.

If on the other hand, someone is using ALL the v-202 and no one is making it, the value of v-202 will go up. Supply/Demand.

By Slither at Sep 21, 2018 4:13 PM
Jump To Oldest Post