Shadowrun economy, payment Options

[spongeclip]

So as I've said, long time gamer and shadowrun fan, brand new to 4th ed. This question goes out to players and gm's.

I'm curious what typical payments are in your campaign for shadowrunners/missions. 5,000; 50,000. (is there a ascii hotkey for nuyen?)

Obviously this is a scalable concern based on a multitude of factors including but not limited to experience and difficulty but just in general how much can runners expect to be paid?

If there is a source book that has recommendations for average payments that I'm completely oblivious to I'd humbly and graciously accept a redirect to the pertinent document but even then some numbers from other gamers with included notation on career stages of the runners involved would be nice.

That being said my first SR4 campaing is going to start limited to the main book with 'bush league' runners that haven't quite broken into the pro arena yet.

[DireRadiant]

Less then the players want, more then they need.

Ask the players what they want. Talk to them about it and work it out. Make sure to give less so they keep interested for the next score.

Give at least what they need to keep going, living expenses, ammo expenses, replacement gear, the things they need to keep going.

It all depends entirely on your game and players. Really it does. I can tell you a number, but it will be wrong.

[Cergorach]

Really depends on a number of factors:
- Runners, skills, personality, and reputation.
- Mr. Johnson's, skills, personality, and reputation.
- Runs, difficulty, confidentiality, and deadliness.

An example from real life, I worked at a bank (as a wage slave (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) and earned a lot more then folks that didn't work for the bank, but essentially did the same job. A service doesn't have a hard coded 'value'.

You might look at adventures and movies. Also keep in mind what you want your runners to earn, if they can't cover the expenses with the received payment, they won't take the run.

Alt 0165 => ¥
Alt 157 => ¥

[MJBurrage]

In my games (as player or GM) the group agrees ahead of time what level we want to play at, and the average lifestyle the characters will be living at.

In a typical month we expect to get one job with a net payment that covers our lifestyle. In a slow month we have to scrounge or miss a payment, in a good month we get two (or even three runs) and the money can be saved or spent on better toys as each character sees fit.

So if the group want's to play characters living a 5,000¥ a month lifestyle than they generally expect to make that much each on a run.

At the high end, Ghost Cartels (a difficult series of adventures) offers base pay of 1,000¥ per day, with the runners generally buying their own gear.

[arthurfallz]

I'm curious what typical payments are in your campaign for shadowrunners/missions. 5,000; 50,000. (is there a ascii hotkey for nuyen?)

I know on a Mac it is ALT+Y; ¥¥¥¥

[Ancient History]

Wuxbux?

[Blade]

This question is asked every week, and it might even be the second time it comes up this week.
The search function should help you get everything you need. (search for "payment", "payout", "money", "stealing americars")

As for the (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) symbol, you can get it on these boards by writing

CODE

:nuyen:

[nezumi]

I'm running SR3. Pay per month should *generally* be enough to cover lifestyle + additional costs + a little more. I tend to also pay in non-monetary goods, such as hardware upgrades (since they're difficult or impossible to get otherwise).

So with my current group, I paid about $5k/head on the first run, $15k/head on the second, $60k/head on the third (plus 50% discount on programs and somehardware upgrades), $0k/head on the fourth (plus free repair of vehicles) and so on

[arthurfallz]

They way I look at pay, this ain't Dungeons & Dragons. Heck, I don't even really pay attention to the award rate in D&D.

Give them what they deserve. In the economy of the Sixth World, there is a surplus of Shadowrunners, but not such a surplus that they are immediately expendable. Those who have little Rep and training (ie: at or close to chargen levels) are common, but not in demand. This is because, naturally, a lot of people don't actually run out to become Shadowrunners. They are desperate. No SIN, no job (or ability to get one), and a specialized skill set that lends itself well to doing shadow-work. These people aren't Shadowrunners in the strictest set of the word yet. The demand is for the highly skilled and reputable for as cheap as they can get them. That's capitalism. Savvy `Runners try to posture as the über-elite for rock-bottom prices to fool Mr. Johnson into hiring them instead of the more deserving `Runners.

The point here is the Mr. Johnson will pay them as much as s/he thinks it takes to get this lowly bunch to enter danger and feel sufficiently rewarded to come back and deliver the goods/persons/etc. This should always match the difficulty of the event, and in some fashion the value of the asset being sought after or recovered.

I'll throw in a couple of examples.
1) A local citizen's group is tired of a gang murdering, raping and killing business in the Sprawl. They hire a group of likely runners to take out the gang, most of which are armed lightly with little armour. While the gang has significant numbers, their hideout is well known and not well defended. The only reason they aren't doing it themselves is they have little combat training and weapons. This is worth about 2000¥, which split between a group of 4 would be about 500¥ a head. Not much? Remember, the gangers might have some credsticks and some gear to take and sell/use.*
2) Mr. Johnson wants the team to infiltrate a medium-sized corporate office and kidnap a senior exec so they can get some vital project information from him. The exec has bodyguards, the facility has good security and armed sec-teams guarding it, but is not expecting an assault. The value of the information alone is worth quite a deal to the Mr. Johnson, so he's more than willing to part with 10,000¥ or more for it. This would give a team of four 2500¥ each, not too much. This is the area where good `Runners can make a living, and bad ones get killed.
3) Mr. Johnson wants a team to assault a heavily armed corp facility and destroy a lab and the files on their mainframes, and to get it done before the corp can send in a heavy security team (the latter detail being simply in the team's best interest). This is a big deal, and Mr. Johnson likely wants to see the lab gone for a good reason. He'll part with 50,000¥ or so to do it, counting on the `Runners to be capable of getting it done. A team of four gets 12,500¥ out of this.

In each of these, the missions is being done for a good reason. The pay scale has less to do with some magical scale of how much the `Runners need each month and more the nature of the mission. A few good provisos on this;
1) Make a pact with the players out-of-character. Every mission they come across is worth taking. It's up to the players to decide why their `Runners take the job. This means you have to make sure the mission does not sound ridiculous or like a loosing deal.
2) Remind the player's that their characters are criminals when they do complain. There is no good deal for criminals, especially Shadowrunners. If you watch heist movies, a team a the best `Runners get together to make a huge heist that will set them up for life. This is a series ender, not the meat of a typical game. Little missions with low pay might not meet their needs, but that's not the Mr. Johnson's problems.
3) Use double-crossing as a dramatic element, not the assumed result. The entire "Mr. Johnson will betray you" schtick is overused. Use it moderately and remember: hiring a group of infiltrators to go in and do illegal things that often involve murder has to have a good chance of not backfiring in order for you, the MJ, to screw them. If the live, they have the skills to track you down and murder you.

Anyways, that's my 2¥ and I'm sure it's not the way everyone feels, so take it as it is.

^{* Heck, they might even ask they do it for free up front, and offer free contacts and whatever loot the ganger's have as pay.}

[Nows7]

3) Use double-crossing as a dramatic element, not the assumed result. The entire "Mr. Johnson will betray you" schtick is overused. Use it moderately and remember: hiring a group of infiltrators to go in and do illegal things that often involve murder has to have a good chance of not backfiring in order for you, the MJ, to screw them. If they live, they have the skills to track you down and murder you.

Quoted for truth.

The J should be reasonably certain that the runners will not live to see another day if he is going to betray them. Plant a bomb in the car they are known for all using all the time. High level corp guards, not the same disposable mooks that the runners just chewed though. Etc....

When the Johnson betrays the runners needlessly, and in such a way that they can simply kill him and get revenge, I find myself wondering: Why would the J just throw his life away like that? He's smart enough to get to a Special Projects manager post at a AAA, but not smart enough to know the highly armed highly dangerous gunmen with a callus disregard for human life he just screwed over wont' find time to drop him in a pot of Ghoul stew?

[cndblank]

The other factor is how much is the runner bringing to the table and risking (if nothing else any thing used to commit a felony can confiscated).


A position at a bank goes south (say a hostile take over destroys the building late one night) and the most physical assets you stand to lose is some desk knicknacks. You should still get a pink slip and the offer to pay to continue your medical insurance.


Players understand that you some times you eat the bear and some times the bear eats you, but ending up materially worse off than when you started at no fault of your own is demoralizing.

[Daylen]

if anything should be a sticky, one of the myriad threads about what to pay runners should be a sticky.

[FriendoftheDork]

They way I look at pay, this ain't Dungeons & Dragons. Heck, I don't even really pay attention to the award rate in D&D.

Give them what they deserve. In the economy of the Sixth World, there is a surplus of Shadowrunners, but not such a surplus that they are immediately expendable. Those who have little Rep and training (ie: at or close to chargen levels) are common, but not in demand. This is because, naturally, a lot of people don't actually run out to become Shadowrunners. They are desperate. No SIN, no job (or ability to get one), and a specialized skill set that lends itself well to doing shadow-work. These people aren't Shadowrunners in the strictest set of the word yet. The demand is for the highly skilled and reputable for as cheap as they can get them. That's capitalism. Savvy `Runners try to posture as the über-elite for rock-bottom prices to fool Mr. Johnson into hiring them instead of the more deserving `Runners.

The point here is the Mr. Johnson will pay them as much as s/he thinks it takes to get this lowly bunch to enter danger and feel sufficiently rewarded to come back and deliver the goods/persons/etc. This should always match the difficulty of the event, and in some fashion the value of the asset being sought after or recovered.

I'll throw in a couple of examples.
1) A local citizen's group is tired of a gang murdering, raping and killing business in the Sprawl. They hire a group of likely runners to take out the gang, most of which are armed lightly with little armour. While the gang has significant numbers, their hideout is well known and not well defended. The only reason they aren't doing it themselves is they have little combat training and weapons. This is worth about 2000¥, which split between a group of 4 would be about 500¥ a head. Not much? Remember, the gangers might have some credsticks and some gear to take and sell/use.*
2) Mr. Johnson wants the team to infiltrate a medium-sized corporate office and kidnap a senior exec so they can get some vital project information from him. The exec has bodyguards, the facility has good security and armed sec-teams guarding it, but is not expecting an assault. The value of the information alone is worth quite a deal to the Mr. Johnson, so he's more than willing to part with 10,000¥ or more for it. This would give a team of four 2500¥ each, not too much. This is the area where good `Runners can make a living, and bad ones get killed.
3) Mr. Johnson wants a team to assault a heavily armed corp facility and destroy a lab and the files on their mainframes, and to get it done before the corp can send in a heavy security team (the latter detail being simply in the team's best interest). This is a big deal, and Mr. Johnson likely wants to see the lab gone for a good reason. He'll part with 50,000¥ or so to do it, counting on the `Runners to be capable of getting it done. A team of four gets 12,500¥ out of this.

In each of these, the missions is being done for a good reason. The pay scale has less to do with some magical scale of how much the `Runners need each month and more the nature of the mission. A few good provisos on this;
1) Make a pact with the players out-of-character. Every mission they come across is worth taking. It's up to the players to decide why their `Runners take the job. This means you have to make sure the mission does not sound ridiculous or like a loosing deal.
2) Remind the player's that their characters are criminals when they do complain. There is no good deal for criminals, especially Shadowrunners. If you watch heist movies, a team a the best `Runners get together to make a huge heist that will set them up for life. This is a series ender, not the meat of a typical game. Little missions with low pay might not meet their needs, but that's not the Mr. Johnson's problems.
3) Use double-crossing as a dramatic element, not the assumed result. The entire "Mr. Johnson will betray you" schtick is overused. Use it moderately and remember: hiring a group of infiltrators to go in and do illegal things that often involve murder has to have a good chance of not backfiring in order for you, the MJ, to screw them. If the live, they have the skills to track you down and murder you.

Anyways, that's my 2¥ and I'm sure it's not the way everyone feels, so take it as it is.

^{* Heck, they might even ask they do it for free up front, and offer free contacts and whatever loot the ganger's have as pay.}

While I agree with your sentiments and rationales, I do not agree with the pay for those jobs at all.

1) The citizen's group seems to be terrorized by these gangers. Why don't they hire security services to ward them off? Why do they instead hire assassins to kill them all instead? Also I don't really get why such a large gang wouldn't have more resources to begin with.

2000:nuyen: is... very little. Yeah sure for a single wageslave it could be a considerable sum, but for actually killing someone? Maybe in the Barrens. 2000 nuyen is pretty much a month of pay for a single ordinary blue-collar worker, maybe a bit less. In a pinch a single worker could pay the team this amount, and probably for a much less dangerous mission. Few competent runners would accept a job like this unless there were some serious loot involved, that the runners easily could guess.
Doing this mission at all constitutes "hooding." The goal isn't income, but helping out people and making a name for themselves.

In a similar mission my Mr. Johnson (a rival gang) offered 10k nuyen total in order to destroy a drug lab. The gangers were fairly dangerous, with some automatic weapons, ok armor etc., but nothing Elite. Also, they didn't have to kill anyone although they did shoot 3 gangers and blew up 3 more, plus 2 scientists and a bunch of children.

2) Vital project information.. and just 10k? The company might make millions, the Johnson alone probably hundreds of thousands, and the ones who actually do the dangerous work... maybe 2500 each.

3) Ok a bit better pay here, but considering the enemy's high security and heavily armed guards, the pay is fairly low. 3-4 times the amount might be appropriate.

Now it's true the pay should reflect the value of the service rendered and the reputation of the team, but remember that income vs costs does matter. The team will want to be able to live off the runs or they won't accept them. If they can work as wage slaves and be better off than when they're risking their lives repeatedly, they'll probably quit shadowrunning very fast. Also, gear costs money, and there may be other expenses involved. Ammo, drones, damage to equipment, bribes, greasing contacts etc.

And then there is the car theft option...


Now I know not every run should be the big heist... then again a retiring job in SR would probably pay millions of nuyen... enough to buy a luxury lifestyle somewhere far away. In the meantime, well paying jobs should be enough to live well (high or maybe some luxury), upgrade equipment/ware etc. They are criminals, but criminals wouldn't do the things they do if it didn't pay up. Crime pays, it's a fact of life and anyone telling you different is just spouting propaganda. The more risk, the more pay. And if the runners think they're being cheated, they can always turn the job down. They became runners probably to avoid being wageslaves where the boss screws you over constantly and there is nothing you can do about it. And if no one will take the job, THEN it becomes Mr. Johnson's problem after all.

And if Johnson finds a team of suckers willing to risk their lives for change, then the team might be interesting in ambushing THEM instead and looting them - after all runners like them can often pack gear worth 50-250k nuyen EACH. Now how's that for a payoff? Sure they're harder to kill than security goons, but with a proper ambush it's doable. And really 250 combats against lots of lightly armed gangers will statistically kill you a lot faster than a single job against an enemy team of well-equipped runners.

[Kraegor]

Too many people forget.. its a RPG.

What is the first rule of D&D? Kill the monsters, take their loot!

Now sure, there are no big piles of gold, but.. there are all those weapons, the body armor, the cool gadgets, the drones, the cars, the VTOL machines..

I mean.. our last run was 8k for 4 of us, but we managed to steal a VTOL and hock it for 18k. (Even though it was worth like 500k+).

Thats how you make your money man. Get hired to break into a museum to steal a painting? Steal a couple of 50k+ vases too!

Remember.. if you kill that souped up street sam.. drag his body back to a cyber doc, and have them harvest his cyber parts. You can make awesome money!

Tons of ways to make money in shadowrun. Most of the time you are doing illegal stuff anyways. Why not profit from it?

[imperialus]

They way I look at pay, this ain't Dungeons & Dragons. Heck, I don't even really pay attention to the award rate in D&D.

Give them what they deserve. *snip*

Woah, slow down. Single most important thing that matters when figuring cash rewards is to map it on to how much Karma are you giving per run.

IME Sams need about 7000 (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) after expenses for every point of karma that the group earns. Otherwise the mages very quickly start outperforming them across the board.

[FriendoftheDork]

Woah, slow down. Single most important thing that matters when figuring cash rewards is to map it on to how much Karma are you giving per run.

IME Sams need about 7000 (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif) after expenses for every point of karma that the group earns. Otherwise the mages very quickly start outperforming them across the board.

Last income thread, I think we ended up with about 2500 per karma guideline. So on an 8 karma mission each runner would get 20k (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nuyen.gif)

Personally I think even that's a bit much for fresh runners, but you're saying most runs should pay 140k per runner? If so they could easily live Luxury lifestyle.

[Valashar]

In my games (as player or GM) the group agrees ahead of time what level we want to play at, and the average lifestyle the characters will be living at.
In a typical month we expect to get one job with a net payment that covers our lifestyle. In a slow month we have to scrounge or miss a payment, in a good month we get two (or even three runs) and the money can be saved or spent on better toys as each character sees fit.
So if the group want's to play characters living a 5,000¥ a month lifestyle than they generally expect to make that much each on a run.

Just adding in my nod that giving runners what they need to cover their monthlies, plus enough extra to keep them hungry (and possibly make them stupid) works well. As has been said, a hard nuyen amount isn't available; you just have to look at the group's expenses. Lifestyle, ammunition, binding materials, and tech mods being four of the most common benchmarks to use.

3) Use double-crossing as a dramatic element, not the assumed result. The entire "Mr. Johnson will betray you" schtick is overused. Use it moderately and remember: hiring a group of infiltrators to go in and do illegal things that often involve murder has to have a good chance of not backfiring in order for you, the MJ, to screw them. If the live, they have the skills to track you down and murder you.

For this bit, I'd like to point our faithful viewers towards the show Leverage. The pilot episode has it all: Johnson puts a team of solo artists together, then gets them someone to keep them coherent for the run. Team does the job, Johnson tries to screw them over. Team gets wise to the attempt and not only survives but then escapes from the /secondary/ screw-over of getting arrested for living through the first one. Team then stays together for the express purpose of not killing the Johnson, but to make him regret that he didn't simply pay them in the first place. This ends up being the thing that keeps the team together for future runs.

It only gets better from there. Show just capped off their 2nd season and their episodes are available in all the usual places, such as via their main site: Leverage home site w/ links to full episodes. The pilot is The Nigerian Job.

[nezumi]

As an aside, I always make it a rule to pay per head. It discourages inter-party rivalry, allows for easier math, and makes it easier for the Johnson to screw with them (he wasn't at the meet! I'm not paying him. Oh, didn't make it back alive? I guess he doesn't need his cut.)

Nothing like a runner deciding it's cheaper to kill the wounded decker than it is to drag him out and pay for a hospital.

[FriendoftheDork]

As an aside, I always make it a rule to pay per head. It discourages inter-party rivalry, allows for easier math, and makes it easier for the Johnson to screw with them (he wasn't at the meet! I'm not paying him. Oh, didn't make it back alive? I guess he doesn't need his cut.)

Nothing like a runner deciding it's cheaper to kill the wounded decker than it is to drag him out and pay for a hospital.

I'm thinking other way around. If the Johnson pay for the job, he doesn't care how much each runner gets. He doesn't care how many runners there are. If the runners think they can pull it off with 2 runners instead of 5, more power to em.

Otherwise you can see silly situations where the runners come on with fresh recruit (old billy the local drunk). "Well you said 10k nuyen per person.. you didn't ask how many people we are." Now pay up those 500k.

Also if the Johnson insists on not paying people for the job he'll be out of the job fairly quickly - or have a bunch of angry runners out to get him.

[Crusher Bob]

Wouldn't it be easier if we stickied this or something?

1
The marginal utility of karma and nuyen to advance your character depends on your character type. So, for example, a mage or certain adept builds can basically advance quite far in a karma only rewards game; while mundane characters are basically at the top of their (karma) game out of character creation.
A samurai with 6 million still has the firearms skill of 6 he started the game with; a mage with 6 million karma has a magic rating OVER 9000 biggrin.gif. A street sam with 6 million Y has delta-synaptic III (or whatever); a pure mage with 6 million Y has a nice beach house somewhere.
So, there should be a balance between karma and Y rewards that balances the advancement of both mages and mundanes.

2 The costs of living

2a
The fake SIN tax.
Different styles of games require different amounts of disposable equipment. For example, how often do your characters change fake SINs, drop weapons and other equipment, replace damaged armor, etc? Depending on the style of game, there may be none of this, or it may happen every game. Because there is not a default style of play here, the default pay cannot be fixed, but instead must take into account these expenses.

2b
The lifestyle tax.
Just as different games have different levels of expected expenses, different games also have different run frequencies. So a game that generates a run every in game month will 'tax' lifestyle costs less than a game that generates a run only every 3 in-game months.

2c
Since the expected Y rewards listed in part 1 are solely for character advancement (for example, buying new cyberware) the average pay estimates must also include calculations for the cost of living, based on the assumptions of that particular game table.

3
Lastly, what combination of karma and Y seems to equally reward both magical and mundane characters?
The 2,500 Y per karma point is based on the BP conversion:
1 BP = 5,000 Y
1 BP ~~ 2 karma

So payments should look like:
~2,500 Y per point of karma awarded, net deductions for the expenses

If you want to run a street level game, limit BP in character generation and limit both karma and Y rewards. Limiting Y rewards while still handing out the normal amount of karma just leaves mages laughing all the way to the bloody sacrificial altar.

-----------
Showing some sample calculations for how the karma and nuyen awards across different game types are computed:

Street level game
Expected lifestyle is low (2000 Y a month)
Average adventure occurs about once every two weeks
Average karma award per adventure is 3 karma (each run typically completed in one short session)
Average necessary expenditure per adventure ~500Y per runner

So we'd expect each runner to be paid around (2,000/2) [lifestyle] + 500 (expenses) + (2,500x3) (actual Y reward) or around 9,000 per job.

Higher powered game
Expected lifestyle is high (10,000 Y a month)
Run occurs every 3 months
Average karma award per run is 12 karma (each run expected to take several actual game sessions)
Average necessary expenditure per runner ~25,000

So we'd get paid around (10,000 X 3) (lifestyle) + 25000 (expenses) + (12 x 2500) (actual Y reward) or around 85,000 per job.

Both games are getting their 'expected' 2500Y per point of karma award, but just quoting the average price per runner would tend to make you think that the higher powered game PCs are making off like bandits. Nope, still getting 2500Y per point of karma


What are necessary expenditures?
Stuff like fake SINS, replacing damaged equipment, cost of stuff dropped/burned because of evidence concerns. Bribes, transportation, fees to sub-contractors, etc.

The level of necessary expenditures depends on both your game style and the run in question.

[FriendoftheDork]

Wouldn't it be easier if we stickied this or something?

Hmm well I don't think everyone agrees with this. And it also contains blatant errors, you cannot start with Firearms 6 at chargen for example. Also, magicians can benefit from money as well - foci, equipment etc. Actually everything except tons of ware. And yes they can use ware as well.

[Ascalaphus]

There's something to be said for a stickied thread on this subject, with the various opinions clearly laid out. Since this topic pops up every other week.

[Endroren]

So as I've said, long time gamer and shadowrun fan, brand new to 4th ed. This question goes out to players and gm's.

I'm curious what typical payments are in your campaign for shadowrunners/missions. 5,000; 50,000. (is there a ascii hotkey for nuyen?)

I have a system I use. Maybe it will help!

Starting with the our world - note that these are all averages:

US Military Pay: About $100/day ($36,500/year)
Blackwater Pay: About $400/day ($146,000/year)
Median Household Income in the US: About $45,000/year

Based on these numbers, your typical Blackwater Contractor makes about 3x the median US income. If we apply this in Shadowrun terms, we're looking at around 500 nuyen per day. ( (Middle Lifestyle x 12)/365)

Now taking into account that I don't believe your typical Blackwater contractor is expected to partake daily in the type of heavy live fire action your Shadowrunner will, let's say we only REALLY expect our shadworunner to REALLY work 2-3 days a month. Throwing in the fact that the Shadowrunner is usually doing something illegal as well, we throw in some additional pay for the risk.

In the end, it strikes me that a relatively experienced Shadowrun, doing a job with a decent chance of physical injury, that takes about 2-3 days, would make around 15,000-20,000 nuyen.

You can then slam it into a grid:

Job Difficulty Pay (Rookie/Typical/Experienced)
Easy 3000/5000/8000
Simple 5000/10000/12000
Average 10000/15000/20000
Tough 12000/20000/25000
Epic 20000/30000/50000

DISCLAIMER: I pretty much tossed these numbers together on the fly with a few google searches. I imagine you could build a much more accurate scale, taking into account things like reimbursement for expenses, and such - plus there may be errors in my calculations - but I think you could pretty easily build a really nice "What a runner gets paid" system.

[LurkerOutThere]

if anything should be a sticky, one of the myriad threads about what to pay runners should be a sticky.

Except for the fact that all we'd do is sticky a thread where no one agrees on what to pay runners. The simple fact is part of why it gets asked so often is because there's no cut and dry answer.

For my part I throw money at my players, I want them to have the cool toys and the good stuff (or at least as good as their contacts are able to find for them). But death is always around the corner and the runs are difficult and time consuming. Honestly if your doing shadowrun right your players won't be motivated by money to run. Their characters might be, but that's all book keeping. Pay them enough to get ahead, you can always take anything that's not nailed down or installed back easily later.

[Daylen]

you can always take anything that's not nailed down or installed back easily later.

I've played in enough games where that was something the DM would try if he gave out too much loot. it basically ended the game because the players made their goal getting more loot so when the DM took something away it wouldnt matter.