RP outwardly to be totally loyal to your corporation like it was your God.
RP with various nefarious characters without your boss knowing trying to undermine or injure your opposing corporations if your character has the stones for it.
Basically, try to get ahead, treat Mixers like trash, and try to be as flashy and greedy as possible.
I mostly ignore it because it's not something I know how to do or apply to my situation. It's next to impossible to meet people and I just stare at a wall most of the time. "Go RP" isn't very helpful, it's like saying "GO HUSTLE!!!!!!!!" when someone asks how to make money on PubSIC. Wowee, thanks, I didn't think of this!
There is potential for a sort of a guide which could be worthwhile.
Dotton, to get what you want, you have to try something different. Virtually anything, up to and including CP-exiting your current character, since we've heard you say many many times, without revealing IC info, that no change is possible because of their situation. That of course can't possibly be true, it's your willingness that's lacking. Not the opportunities. But still, maybe a re-roll is the only thing which can shake your fetters off.
Sounds drastic? Maybe it is. It's certainly not necessary - you've been given many dozens of small and large ideas about something different you can try.
No matter what you think has painted the current character into the corner you believe they're in, they can do something different. If you're unwilling to risk anything, you are never going to make any progress at all in the direction you want to.
I'm not saying this to be critical, it's just what you need to hear. People get stuck, it's OK. The only thing keeping you stuck is your mind.
Here's another player who was asking for help on bored for doing the same exact thing for too long: https://www.sindome.org/bgbb/open-discussion/anything-really/help---bored--801/
But again I do want to re-state that a certain type of "how to corpie" tutorial isn't a bad idea.
The people who have asked for it are looking for how to understand the theme in order to (okay maybe this gets into strategy) NOT shoot themselves in the foot and be thrown off the skywalks due to the rather unforgiving culture of corporate conformity, while (possibly simultaneously) also perpetrating the sort of backstabs, swindles, ladder-climbing, effective brown-nosing, and manipulation of others which can get them ahead of their dronish peers. Whether it's possible to recover from adversities without falling all the way. Whether one can take advantage of one's corporate employer without being recognized as an abuser of privileges.
This is identical to becoming a mechanic and asking for a guide on how to play a mechanic. It is meta knowledge you gain OOC that your character suddenly knows.
Like with becoming a mechanic, and learning from a well known mechanic what to do, if you become a corporate class citizen and don't know what to do, ask someone else.
There is no 'How do I play right' guide because it is different for players and characters. The answer you want of 'How do I?' Is, 'Like every character currently doing it well that you want to be like. You Learn by Doing.'
That's.. not very viable though, if I asked something along the lines of "How do I be a corpie" to some well-known corporate I'd be so embarassed I probably would never go to work again and show my face out of home, as well as be laughed at. Atleast in my experience.
@Dotton The problem is In Character. Your character doesnt know how to be a corpy, so you the player cant learn that and magically infuse your character with it. You want a shortcut so you don't embarass yourself, get fired, mess up, get shot, look stupid. In other words ALL the mistakes so many dozens of corpies before you made.
You learn In Character. That is the answer, whether you disagree or dislike it.
So the "orientation specialist" is something someone can just up and decide to do, on top of whatever their actual titled responsibilities are, with a very high likelihood of very decent payback for the effort.
But let's not throw away the notion that it's worth it to the game and this community for there to be mentorship for new young corpies (ICly sixteen years old and coming from some fucking IC hellhole) played by new SD players. I understand the argument that "it isn't in a corporation's interest to even give a chance to a candidate who needs grooming," but on one hand even if it were true that's negative to the new-corpie game experience, and for another I fully expect that as a matter of theme megacorps would have a standard practice of grooming complete and utter nobodies, the less sophisticated the better, into competent and loyal production units.
Once you have a significant document, you can circulate it internally and your coworkers can ask you questions about it. If it's a report that could be particularly helpful to the bottom line, talk with your boss about being recognized for it. If it's something negative, decide whether to hide it or not. Maybe someone in your corp leaks it to the Grid or sells it to another corporation. All of a sudden you get a cool plotline that could involve internal investigation for corpies and the exchange of paydata for outsiders.
Corpies are in a unique position to create plot hooks, use that!
Forgive the couple of days it might take, as I'm carefully weighing what to share and how to share it, as not to give people a How-To Guide. More a set of things to encourage and entice RP.
Does this make robot designer in Blade Runner or blade runner 2049 a corpie?
Just throw a bunch of names, im curious to get a good idea
All of the Arasakas and their bodyguards from Cyberpunk 2077.
The bad guy from that terrible Ghost in the Shell live action film.
The entire corporate boardroom from Robocop, but especially Dick Jones.
A much more optimistic corpie could even be Batman from the Arkham games or the Nolan movies.
Speaking of Nolan films, the financier from Inception or the Russian bad guy from Tenet.
There is a general desire to have people have more conflict. 'Go punch someone in the face' is often cited as advice to make things interesting. That's fine and good. There is also a desire to be more themely.
The disconnect is that while in the mix face punching is a little more straightforward (if you want it) and the percentage of people who can simple punch someone is greater.
Why is it a bad idea to give people some ideas on how to sour conflict in a corpoe manner. It doesn't have to be a guide on how to succeed, but certainly a list of suggestions on how to make the game better for those around you can only benefit the game as a whole.
For me it seems that chy is far more easily available mix side (short of a few people and careers). Additionally there are perceived walls about what you should and should not do. They may be incorrect perceptions, but it seems a lot of people follow them. So stirring the pot has large ic barriers in both resources and motivation/sanity.
Something to help people fit in and be working to keep RP interesting would certainly help.
I know it's been said many times, but find a mentor. Reach out to people you wouldn't normally reach out to. Complain about your low salary to anyone who will listen, and ask for ideas on how to advance.
Also, keep in mind that while your chy game is hot, power and influence are the real currencies topside. Start converting your chy into those resources if you really want to get ahead.
All great pieces of advice, and that is some of the things I think that would be great to have in a guide. Because if my anecdotal evidence is correct there is at least a decent amount of people who take substantial paycuts going corp... which exacerbates the ability to stir pots.
Again I agree that getting a post on how to succeed as a widgetmaater would be meta.
However, some things I was told in office hours (thank you so much for having them) would be really good to put in. Things like, you only have to really listen to YOUR direct supervisor to stay employed. Now it may or may not be good to listen to others, but your supervisor is going to be the one that fires you. Also, there is some tolerance built into the system allowing for you to fail at pot stirring without immediately getting fired and suffering a spiral.
For me, those were contrary to what I had experienced... But the game's also changed since I had some of those experiences.
Anyway, some simple suggestions like that I think would go a long way... as would some simple suggestions on theme and how to pot stir would be great to leave for people. Not a how too, more of a... 'did you think of this?'.
Giving people ideas on how to make trouble just makes the game better. At least in my opinion.
One thing that is interesting is that, as a corpie, you have a level of built in protection and support as long as you don't ruin it. This lets you do things like make casual insults or insults covered in a thin layer of professionalism and it's unlikely you will be dead after.
Using the unique advantages that make you a corpie as a shield to be a jerk is great way to drive conflict in a more open manner. Or, you could go the back door rumor monger angle, always meeting with others and whispering things that slowly bends their opinions. There are lots of ways to drive conflict topside but it is rarely going to be a physical confrontation.
And the flash is there. You just need to learn how to access it in a way that supplements your already solid pay. IC mentors can help here if you can get them to trust and care about you. And keep in mind that the first few months as a corpie can be financially rough but that things tend to improve after that in terms of finance.
Again, great advice! Thanks!
Some of these things might seem obvious to people. But maybe they aren't either. Little tips often open up mental paths that when you read them you go... 'oh yeah'. For me, survival in the system has never been the issue. What has, is trying to make things happen... both for me... and those around me. Most of my efforts have been bumbling failures, which sadly were really just bumbling for me and not for too many people around me. Because failed pot stirring can be as good as successful pot stirring if you actually stir the pot.
Failed pot stirring where you don't even get a ripple is just depressing :)
Anyway, I appreciate all this. Maybe I'll try to write a guide and then let people correct me how wrong it is... and poof, real guide is created! Sneaky strategy!
