How much do you up the price for speed runs? Options

[Emperor Tippy]

My group was playing earlier today and we got approached by Johnson to extract a Trid star from the penthouse of a high class hotel in Seattle. Normally this would be a hundred k nuyen job and we would spend days (and possibly weeks or months) laying the ground work for and planning the run (compromising hotel staff, compromising hotel systems, staging events to get the trid star out of the hotel, investigating what kind of security and connections the trid star has, etc.) but the kicker was that the Johnson needed this run done in 27 hours (it was 7 AM when we did the meet and the Johnson needed the star by 10 AM the next day).

Our price jumped from 100,000 nuyen to 4,000,000 nuyen and it could have easily jumped up to around 10,000,000 nuyen. The Johnson got lucky that one of our gear suppliers happened to have a MIG-67 kitted out for high threat insertions (it cost about 1.75 million nuyen) already on hand and in Seattle and we didn't have to pay for a rush delivery (we have the contacts that we could have gotten what we needed delivered inside of 12 hours but the price would have been three to four times more).

Instead of a meticulously planned and choreographed run we blasted to the target at over 180 mph in a stealth mil spec insertion vehicle, dropped out in full assault armor, used a breaching charge on the roof of the hotel, dropped into the penthouse bedroom, slapped a DMSO patch with Slab onto the trid star, loaded her into a high rating UM Body Bag, went back through our hole in the ceiling, and flew off with our mage casting Improved Invisibility and Silence over the MIG once we were out of the immediate area.

Once out of the city we dropped into a secure warehouse, loaded the Trid star into a warded shipping container, put her in a VR prison environment that she couldn't escape from, and dumped demolisher's over all the gear we had used on the run (including the MIG) before leaving to off load the star to the Johnson.

It was pretty much the antithesis of how we normally do runs and from us boarding the MIG to having the Trid Star in the shipping container we under 20 minutes.

----
So I'm curious, how much do you jack up the price if the Johnson wants a run conducted immediately? In 12 hours? In a day? In 2 days?

[nylanfs]

What is this "planning" that you speak of? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/spin.gif)

[Emperor Tippy]

What is this "planning" that you speak of? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/spin.gif)

The thing the separates the pros from the wannabes and allows you to survive long enough to think that retiring might actually be a realistic possibility at some point in the future. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/nyahnyah.gif)

[Critias]

I don't spike the price into seven digits, I can tell you that much. It sounds like you're playing in a pretty high-karma game, though, so whatever price hike works for your game, works for your game. Glad y'all are havin' fun.

[Fortinbras]

I don't spike the price into seven digits, I can tell you that much. It sounds like you're playing in a pretty high-karma game, though, so whatever price hike works for your game, works for your game. Glad y'all are havin' fun.

Indeed. The other way to look at it is that you are asking for 40 game sessions worth of nuyen in one go. Unless the danger is 40 times higher, I don't think I'd do that.
I usually add about 20% bonus for a secondary objective(such as within a particular time frame) with a Negotiation test adding percentage points on top of that. I'm a big fan of Negotiation Tests for adding money to the run.

[Emperor Tippy]

I don't spike the price into seven digits, I can tell you that much. It sounds like you're playing in a pretty high-karma game, though, so whatever price hike works for your game, works for your game. Glad y'all are havin' fun.

Most of the price spike came from the increased resource requirements. We have a 7 person party and split profits (payment minus run expenses) 8 ways so after the 2 million in expenses we ended up clearing 250,000 nuyen each.

That's nice but it's not retirement money.

[Fortinbras]

Did you get to keep the MIG?

[Emperor Tippy]

Indeed. The other way to look at it is that you are asking for 40 game sessions worth of nuyen in one go. Unless the danger is 40 times higher, I don't think I'd do that.
I usually add about 20% bonus for a secondary objective(such as within a particular time frame) with a Negotiation test adding percentage points on top of that. I'm a big fan of Negotiation Tests for adding money to the run.

The danger was honestly greater than 40 times higher. What 'ware did the trid star have? Was she awakened? Was she a free spirit? Was she a dragon? Was she connected to any major organizations (a mega, organized crime, etc.)? What kind of security does she have on hand? How firm is her schedule (what if she was down stairs getting a massage when we conducted our raid?)?

Or normal runs end up being reasonably safe because we go to fairly insane lengths in our pre-run preparations to make them that way. It's our teams strong suit, finding overlooked vulnerabilities in the system (and they are usually overlooked because they are either very obscure or taking advantage of them is very complex), planning every facet of a run down to the second, practicing the run in VR at the most extreme difficulty settings (things like doubling the expected skill level and number of guards, having Crash 3.0 hit during the run, etc.) until we have every flaw or weakness we can find eliminated or covered, and only then conducting the actual run.

That makes our runs themselves surprisingly safe but it also makes them take (usually) days or weeks of planning, prep-work, and practice before we start the run (and some runs have taken months or even years of in game prep work as they require a number of preparatory runs).

Remove that prep-work and we are really operating outside our comfort zone (both OC and IC).

We also only cleared 25 times our normal run payout (our profits average 10K per runner per run, after expenses are taken into account). As for negotiation tests, they don't much help when the party says "This is our price, if you want us to do this run under these conditions then that is what you will pay us.". It's not like the players (me included) particularly wanted to do this run IC, they only accepted in large part as a favor to the fixer who put the Johnson in contact with them (the fixer has a reputation of always being able to get a mission accomplished and we were the only team that he had available within the time limits in the Seattle area with the required skills to stand a chance of success).

Did you get to keep the MIG?

Nope. Demolisher's ate it. Too risky. This was way too high profile of a run to take chances like that. Every bit of gear we used during the run was turned to dust and the warehouse we used as a base/transfer point was demolished by a construction firm later that afternoon.

It's best not to take chances.

[Critias]

250k each after expenses? That might not be retirement money (in one go), but it's certainly getting into the realm of "but I can take about two years off after this, for damned sure" rates.

*shrugs* You guys are just operating at a higher tier than I'm used to in most of my own games, is all. I think you'll find that's the case with lots of us, when you start a conversation asking if a four million nuyen payday was too little. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) It sounds like y'all are having a good time, though, and if your GM's able to give out those kind of paydays and still keep you challenged and engaged, good on him! Sounds like a fun game.

[Emperor Tippy]

250k each after expenses? That might not be retirement money (in one go), but it's certainly getting into the realm of "but I can take about two years off after this, for damned sure" rates.

Haha, I wish. It's covering a bit of 'ware I've had my eye on for a while in my case. Most of the rest of the party is doing similar things with it; buying ware or specialty pieces of gear that are normally out of our price range except as expenses on a job.

*shrugs* You guys are just operating at a higher tier than I'm used to in most of my own games, is all. I think you'll find that's the case with lots of us, when you start a conversation asking if a four million nuyen payday was too little. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif)

Probably true.

It sounds like y'all are having a good time, though, and if your GM's able to give out those kind of paydays and still keep you challenged and engaged, good on him! Sounds like a fun game.

It is quite fun, but the GM will kill you if you don't play smart. It's very much a Pink Mohawk equals death table.

[lorechaser]

What is this "planning" that you speak of? (IMG:style_emoticons/default/spin.gif)

That's the time when the GM listens to what you're going to do, and comes up with ways to foil it.

That's why I never do it.

[Fortinbras]

The danger was honestly greater than 40 times higher. Or normal runs end up being reasonably safe ...Remove that prep-work and we are really operating outside our comfort zone (both OC and IC)

This is just my opinion, but since you asked for it:
I think you and I disagree about the definition of dangerous. I mean there should have been 40 times the amount of security on her at minimum. Exponentially more dangerous at maximum. You should have been fighting characters with a 16,000BP build.
Every mission should be dangerous. If you aren't afraid you are going to die on a mission, your GM is doing it wrong. The life of a Shadowrunner is danger and oftentimes there is no amount of prep work that should be able to nullify that danger. Things go wrong in plans as half the published adventures of Shadowrun will demonstrate.
In a story game, danger is drama. In a sandbox game, danger is conflict or obstacle.
Prep work is a good thing. A necessary thing. It eats up most of a gaming session, as well it should. But if your players are confident they can waltz through a game without danger, then it's not much of a game. It can be argued that it's collective story telling, but the game part is no longer there. It's why you don't play video games with cheat codes and why you aren't allowed to look at other player's cards in poker. If you know you are going to win, then the fun is gone. Without the danger of a run, you're just collecting nuyen like any other wage slave.
You should always reward planning and creative thinking to overcome danger, but there should always be variables the players can't know. Or, if they do know them, acceptable risks they should be willing to take.
You should also be constantly taking player's out of their comfort zones. Comfort breeds apathy which breeds boredom. It forces them to think in new ways and come up with creative solutions to hitherto unforeseen problems. You push players and they rise to the occasion and the game becomes more fun.

I honestly don't know how anyone can plan a run without danger. I wouldn't know where to begin.

As for negotiation tests, they don't much help when the party says "This is our price, if you want us to do this run under these conditions then that is what you will pay us.".

Ah. The solution to this comes up all the time and is pretty simple. If the players want to walk away, let them walk away. This has to be an option for them, else it's a railroad game and no one likes that. I always have a few adventures prepped for such a situation so I can say "Okay, you pass on this run. A month goes by before you get another call. Everyone pay your monthly expenses." and the new run is offered(which is usually just as dangerous or less dangerous for less money.)
Now this isn't to say that every run scales with the players. that would be equally absurd. The better they get with Karma & gear, the better their reps should be and so higher risk missions for more money should be rolling in. But they shouldn't feel obligated to take them. The lower the Professional Rating of the baddies, the lower the pay and that should be an option. While less risk averse players might be willing to keep fighting gangers for a couple grand a run, but soon players will get bored and want more money, more Karma and more exciting runs.

But 40 times the pay for a run? 40 game sessions worth of gear in one session? Unless that trid star was a Great Dragon guarded by other dragons, I think that scale is a little out of whack.

Again, just my personal opinion. I totally understand that others might disagree.

[LurkerOutThere]

We also only cleared 25 times our normal run payout (our profits average 10K per runner per run, after expenses are taken into account). As for negotiation tests, they don't much help when the party says "This is our price, if you want us to do this run under these conditions then that is what you will pay us.". It's not like the players (me included) particularly wanted to do this run IC, they only accepted in large part as a favor to the fixer who put the Johnson in contact with them (the fixer has a reputation of always

See this is about the only thing I do have an issue with that to me equals failing the negotiation test. The J walks and your rep takes a hit because your basically breaking the framework. I'm not saying that at some point you don't ever get to say that, but saying it without a roll to back it up is just silly. Negotiations isn't just about getting the extra nuyen out of the client, it's about convincing him you need the extra nuyen and are worth the extra nuyen. Personally 4 million for a smash and grab job is patently silly, you didn't need a stealth mig for the op and the J shouldn't have paid you the kind of money to get one and then burn it and I say that as someone who like to pay his runners well and reward good prep and punish stupidity with death. There was a point when the GM should have thought it over and probably gone "no, she's not really worth that to me" and put on a movie. I mean good on you for playing and having fun and all that, but I guess if my players pulled that on me I'd probably have to have the NPC's balk.

Typically the loose framework I use for jobs as both a GM is this. I generally presume that 10k is about a good base pay for most decently established shadowrunners for a weeks worth of their time. Easy runs can pay less, hard runs should pay more.

Rush Jobs double the price if the whole thing will be wrapped up in a day or so. That's not to say every job that needs to start in the next day gets the multiplier but most of the things that have me going against hard targets? Yea I like my prep.
Unprofessional Johnson Fee: 50% increase and half up front mandatory. A Johnson that behaves in an unprofessional manner towards me at the meet is infinitely more likely to try and screw me, and therefore it is paramount that I get a bigger payout up front. A lesser version of this upcharge generally is place for J's who seem to be green rather then disrespectful. In the former case especially the raise in price or the up front fee can be waived if the J is vetted by a fixer I trust because the fixer knows that if the J welches on the job they'll be on the hook. Just like if I screw up a job I know I owe my fixer.
Travel Fee: If i'm not trying to leave town for some reason I generally charge a 10% surcharge for travel more then a few hours out of my area of operations
Hazardous Enviroment/Danger Fee: If the local environment has a tendency to kill people that costs money to send me there. I sometimes waive this for environments I'm intimately familiar with, because it's nice to go home to visit mom while i'm sent to the back end of Salish territory.
Stupid Complication Fee: If the job has some requirement like no one is harmed, or that I must wear blue during the run it tends to cause a fee, because I hate being micromanaged unless the J feels very important about it. Simply put the fastest way to determine if something is important to someone is to make them pay through the nose for it.

I also tend to increase my fees based on the laws i'm going to have to break. Security/Bodyguard work for a legal entity tends to come cheaper because I have free license to beat up/kill anyone attacking my target. On the other end of the spectrum wetwork tends to cost a lot because you do hard jail time in a no fun sort of prison for that. The kind with a troll cell mate named bubba.

[CanRay]

Whatever the market will bear. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/biggrin.gif)

[Critias]

I'm gonna go off on a bit of a rant, here, so bear with me. Maybe this isn't your intent. Maybe I'm reading too much into it. Maybe your game just works differently than all the games I've seen, and maybe your social dynamic (and not just the power level of your campaign) is different than mine. But oh well. Rant starting:

As for negotiation tests, they don't much help when the party says "This is our price, if you want us to do this run under these conditions then that is what you will pay us.".

Which is, in my opinion, kind of bullshit. Because negotiation tests should matter. You don't get to state your price and be totally inflexible about it, unless the NPCs get to do the same thing (because, realistically, most Mr. Johnson's have a set budget that they can't exceed, right?).

And the problem there is one of...of...well, in-universe greed overtaking the out-of-game social contract. If a GM's taken the time to create an adventure, or spent the money to buy one? It's kind of a dick move, in my opinion, to turn up your nose and refuse to play it because you're not getting offered enough imaginary money. Sure, sure, maybe I'm breaking character or whatever, but when the GM offers me a job -- whether it's a mission in Shadowrun, a quest in D&D, whatever -- I accept that maybe it's a little silly of me, but I say yes. Because sometimes being cool to my friend, the GM, matters more than my imaginary character making a few extra imaginary nuyen or gold pieces.

So sure, I'll make a negotiate test. I'll try to drum up the price as high as I can, in-game. I'll sling a Diplomacy die to try and get the gp needed for my new +1 sword, or I'll toss out a handful of d6's to try and get the nuyen I need for a new Eurocar...but saying "pay me _________ or no adventure?"

Yeah. That? That I don't like. Because it's a form of holding the game hostage, and risking everyone's fun and evening plan. Also? It's a form of bypassing the need for those social skills. While everyone else has to roll a negotiation check, you're just picking a number and telling the GM that your Friday night is out of his hands, and all up to you, and you're not even going to work within the (social) rules of the RPG to say so. He has to pay you your $4,000,000 or the adventure he worked on is scrapped and everyone's stuck playing X-Box, or he has to think up a new adventure, or whatever.

And that makes me frown.

[FuelDrop]

Yeah. That? That I don't like. Because it's a form of holding the game hostage, and risking everyone's fun and evening plan. Also? It's a form of bypassing the need for those social skills. While everyone else has to roll a negotiation check, you're just picking a number and telling the GM that your Friday night is out of his hands, and all up to you, and you're not even going to work within the (social) rules of the RPG to say so. He has to pay you your $4,000,000 or the adventure he worked on is scrapped and everyone's stuck playing X-Box, or he has to think up a new adventure, or whatever.

And that makes me frown.

Assuming, of course, that the GM isn't intentionally undercutting what you'll do the job for because he's prepared the session based on the assumption that you won't work for mr dodgy Johnson. My group's actually walked away from a suspect mission where the Johnson's offer was far too good for the mission type, which in turn stopped us walking into a trap. The majority of the plot arc still happened, but we got to feel clever for not delivering ourselves to the waiting hit team. Being unable to turn down a mission, in spite of dodgy-looking Johnsons or suspicious offers that scream trap merely because it'd be 'holding the game hostage and risking everyone's fun and evening plans' feels like railroading to me, which in turn reduces the fun of the game.

My two nuyen: That Johnson should never have gone to you with that proposal, IC. your groups reputation is built around getting the job done quietly and efficiently, but with loose time constraints. A Johnson rocking up to you and telling you 'get it done within the next 24 hours' probably incurs 'failed to research team' tax... though maybe the blame should go to your fixer for recommending your group for a mission that was obviously outside your normal operational practices and skills. Since he was willing to pay the four million (At least half of which went to one-shot assets which if I'm reading your post right included a full set of new or one-use gear for your entire team), then he'd obviously budgeted for such expenses and it was possible that OOC your GM wanted to force your hand for a more 'Pink Mohawk' style run and give you the chance to use the stealth MIG without have it become a permanent addition to your arsenal.

You really need to have a word with your fixer, though, as this job was really not playing to your group's strengths (of which planning is obviously one).

[Shemhazai]

I would have simply offered 400,000 as a final offer, and if no agreement was reached, then no deal. Plenty of other teams can get people out of hotels.

* makes a bunch of concealed die rolls *

In other news, the trid star jumped from a hotel window at 10 a.m. this morning in an apparent suicide.

[Emperor Tippy]

This is just my opinion, but since you asked for it:
I think you and I disagree about the definition of dangerous. I mean there should have been 40 times the amount of security on her at minimum. Exponentially more dangerous at maximum. You should have been fighting characters with a 16,000BP build.
Every mission should be dangerous. If you aren't afraid you are going to die on a mission, your GM is doing it wrong. The life of a Shadowrunner is danger and oftentimes there is no amount of prep work that should be able to nullify that danger. Things go wrong in plans as half the published adventures of Shadowrun will demonstrate.

Most of the published adventures show frankly terrible planning, if that was the limit of our planning and prep work then we would likely die on every run.

In a story game, danger is drama. In a sandbox game, danger is conflict or obstacle.
Prep work is a good thing. A necessary thing. It eats up most of a gaming session, as well it should. But if your players are confident they can waltz through a game without danger, then it's not much of a game. It can be argued that it's collective story telling, but the game part is no longer there. It's why you don't play video games with cheat codes and why you aren't allowed to look at other player's cards in poker. If you know you are going to win, then the fun is gone. Without the danger of a run, you're just collecting nuyen like any other wage slave.
You should always reward planning and creative thinking to overcome danger, but there should always be variables the players can't know. Or, if they do know them, acceptable risks they should be willing to take.

This is somewhat where we disagree. First, the players aren't confident that they can waltz through the game without danger. They know that the world is a highly deadly and dangerous place and that the only way to generally have a decent chance at survival is to plan everything from runs to a trip to the Stuffer Shack to an extreme degree.

We, the players, are rewarded for creative thinking and overcoming obstacles. That's kinda the primary thing we do. The creative thinking and overcoming obstacles just tends to mostly come before the run it's self.

You should also be constantly taking player's out of their comfort zones. Comfort breeds apathy which breeds boredom. It forces them to think in new ways and come up with creative solutions to hitherto unforeseen problems. You push players and they rise to the occasion and the game becomes more fun.

We are constantly faced with new problems. Every run is different with different enemies, different facilities, different weapons, different objectives, etc. If we want to ensure a good chance of success then we spend the time and effort in game to find those differences and either work around them, minimize them, or capitalize on them.

I honestly don't know how anyone can plan a run without danger. I wouldn't know where to begin.

Learn absolutely everything that you can about the run. Do full background checks on everyone involved. Stealthily coop or raid tertiary targets so that the primary run has a higher chance of success. That's where you start, where you end depends on the specific run and how much time and resources you are willing to expend.

Ah. The solution to this comes up all the time and is pretty simple. If the players want to walk away, let them walk away. This has to be an option for them, else it's a railroad game and no one likes that. I always have a few adventures prepped for such a situation so I can say "Okay, you pass on this run. A month goes by before you get another call. Everyone pay your monthly expenses." and the new run is offered(which is usually just as dangerous or less dangerous for less money.)

The only problem with that is that we just plan our own runs as or more often than we get runs from others. We don't really loose much by refusing to do a run (income wise).

Now this isn't to say that every run scales with the players. that would be equally absurd. The better they get with Karma & gear, the better their reps should be and so higher risk missions for more money should be rolling in. But they shouldn't feel obligated to take them. The lower the Professional Rating of the baddies, the lower the pay and that should be an option. While less risk averse players might be willing to keep fighting gangers for a couple grand a run, but soon players will get bored and want more money, more Karma and more exciting runs.

But 40 times the pay for a run? 40 game sessions worth of gear in one session? Unless that trid star was a Great Dragon guarded by other dragons, I think that scale is a little out of whack.

Again, just my personal opinion. I totally understand that others might disagree.

The 40 times is because that Trid Star could have been a Great Dragon. We had no idea what the risks on this run where so we went with the plan least likely to get us killed and charged a far higher price because of the far lower ability to control our risk.

[Halinn]

They know that the world is a highly deadly and dangerous place and that the only way to generally have a decent chance at survival is to plan everything from runs to a trip to the Stuffer Shack to an extreme degree.

I hope that's hyperbole, because if not, your game seems quite insane.

[Thanee]

I would have simply offered 400,000 as a final offer, and if no agreement was reached, then no deal. Plenty of other teams can get people out of hotels.

Exactly. There are limits to what is reasonable (though this campaign sounds more like Saints Row: The Third, completely ridiculous and over the top, so "reasonable" might not apply there as much as in other campaigns (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wink.gif) ).

In Shadowrun, the runners are the playballs of the Johnsons, not the other way around, usually. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Bye
Thanee

[FuelDrop]

I hope that's hyperbole, because if not, your game seems quite insane.

Not necessarily. Planning for a trip to stuffer shack might be as simple as wearing armoured clothing, making sure your Morrissey Elan is loaded, and check that your conveyance has enough fuel to get you there and back. 99% of the time these will prove to be unnecessary, and then there'll be that one time that you're in the store when some thugs decide to rob the place.

[Emperor Tippy]

See this is about the only thing I do have an issue with that to me equals failing the negotiation test. The J walks and your rep takes a hit because your basically breaking the framework. I'm not saying that at some point you don't ever get to say that, but saying it without a roll to back it up is just silly. Negotiations isn't just about getting the extra nuyen out of the client, it's about convincing him you need the extra nuyen and are worth the extra nuyen.

Negotiation is not mind control. When the Johnson says "This is what I want done." the players said "This is our price if you want us to do it within the time frame you specified, and the only reason it's so low is because mission critical gear happens to already be available and does not need to be rush ordered.". In the end the players can always walk, as can the Johnson, although the consequences of doing so can (potentially) be extreme.

Personally 4 million for a smash and grab job is patently silly, you didn't need a stealth mig for the op and the J shouldn't have paid you the kind of money to get one and then burn it and I say that as someone who like to pay his runners well and reward good prep and punish stupidity with death. There was a point when the GM should have thought it over and probably gone "no, she's not really worth that to me" and put on a movie. I mean good on you for playing and having fun and all that, but I guess if my players pulled that on me I'd probably have to have the NPC's balk.

We (the players) did honestly think the Johnson would balk and basically say that. We would have been happy with that, we didn't particularly want to do this run. It turns out that the Johnson was working for a very powerful crime family and had promised to turn over the Trid star to his bosses by noon the next day. He had hired other runner teams in advance but they had blown the run (which is why she was hiding out in a luxury hotel) and now he was on a very tight time table. So he contacted our fixer (who has a rep of always being able to provide a team that can accomplish the job, whatever it is, wherever it is, whenever it is) and our fixer was in something of a bind; his other high level runner assets were doing other things around the world and we were the only one able to be onsite and accomplish the run within the time allowed so he asked us to talk to the Johnson as a favor to him (normally this kind of run wouldn't be offered to us by our fixer because he knows that we would turn it down flat). If the Johnson turned us down for being too high priced then our fixers rep would stay intact (he provided a team that could do the run, the Johnson just refused to pay) but instead the Johnson accepted our price.

Typically the loose framework I use for jobs as both a GM is this. I generally presume that 10k is about a good base pay for most decently established shadowrunners for a weeks worth of their time. Easy runs can pay less, hard runs should pay more.

Our team won't meet with a Johnson without a 10K retainer (to cover the security costs of our meeting and our time) and our minimum price for a run is 100K (they are informed of this by our fixer when we are offered for the job) for even the most simple missions (because we will blow 65K of that on expenses and thus only clear 5K a runner).

Rush Jobs double the price if the whole thing will be wrapped up in a day or so. That's not to say every job that needs to start in the next day gets the multiplier but most of the things that have me going against hard targets? Yea I like my prep.
Unprofessional Johnson Fee: 50% increase and half up front mandatory. A Johnson that behaves in an unprofessional manner towards me at the meet is infinitely more likely to try and screw me, and therefore it is paramount that I get a bigger payout up front. A lesser version of this upcharge generally is place for J's who seem to be green rather then disrespectful. In the former case especially the raise in price or the up front fee can be waived if the J is vetted by a fixer I trust because the fixer knows that if the J welches on the job they'll be on the hook. Just like if I screw up a job I know I owe my fixer.
Travel Fee: If i'm not trying to leave town for some reason I generally charge a 10% surcharge for travel more then a few hours out of my area of operations
Hazardous Enviroment/Danger Fee: If the local environment has a tendency to kill people that costs money to send me there. I sometimes waive this for environments I'm intimately familiar with, because it's nice to go home to visit mom while i'm sent to the back end of Salish territory.
Stupid Complication Fee: If the job has some requirement like no one is harmed, or that I must wear blue during the run it tends to cause a fee, because I hate being micromanaged unless the J feels very important about it. Simply put the fastest way to determine if something is important to someone is to make them pay through the nose for it.

I also tend to increase my fees based on the laws i'm going to have to break. Security/Bodyguard work for a legal entity tends to come cheaper because I have free license to beat up/kill anyone attacking my target. On the other end of the spectrum wetwork tends to cost a lot because you do hard jail time in a no fun sort of prison for that. The kind with a troll cell mate named bubba.

Thanks.

[Emperor Tippy]

I'm gonna go off on a bit of a rant, here, so bear with me. Maybe this isn't your intent. Maybe I'm reading too much into it. Maybe your game just works differently than all the games I've seen, and maybe your social dynamic (and not just the power level of your campaign) is different than mine. But oh well. Rant starting:

Which is, in my opinion, kind of bullshit. Because negotiation tests should matter. You don't get to state your price and be totally inflexible about it, unless the NPCs get to do the same thing (because, realistically, most Mr. Johnson's have a set budget that they can't exceed, right?).

And the problem there is one of...of...well, in-universe greed overtaking the out-of-game social contract. If a GM's taken the time to create an adventure, or spent the money to buy one? It's kind of a dick move, in my opinion, to turn up your nose and refuse to play it because you're not getting offered enough imaginary money. Sure, sure, maybe I'm breaking character or whatever, but when the GM offers me a job -- whether it's a mission in Shadowrun, a quest in D&D, whatever -- I accept that maybe it's a little silly of me, but I say yes. Because sometimes being cool to my friend, the GM, matters more than my imaginary character making a few extra imaginary nuyen or gold pieces.

So sure, I'll make a negotiate test. I'll try to drum up the price as high as I can, in-game. I'll sling a Diplomacy die to try and get the gp needed for my new +1 sword, or I'll toss out a handful of d6's to try and get the nuyen I need for a new Eurocar...but saying "pay me _________ or no adventure?"

Yeah. That? That I don't like. Because it's a form of holding the game hostage, and risking everyone's fun and evening plan. Also? It's a form of bypassing the need for those social skills. While everyone else has to roll a negotiation check, you're just picking a number and telling the GM that your Friday night is out of his hands, and all up to you, and you're not even going to work within the (social) rules of the RPG to say so. He has to pay you your $4,000,000 or the adventure he worked on is scrapped and everyone's stuck playing X-Box, or he has to think up a new adventure, or whatever.

And that makes me frown.

Our GM would say "Well your fixer doesn't have any more work for you at the moment. What do you want to do?" and then (when we start looking) provide various plot hooks for other runs.

Our GM always has multiple extra runs planned and ready with about all that he needs to change being the paydata and a few names. The players decide to raid Corp XYZ which was in the news for having developed a new piece of SOTA gear, well the GM pulls out Corp run #18, pastes on some names and switches the final target a bit, and then let's us go and do the run. If we decided to hit Corp ZYX instead, well it's still Corp run #18 but the names are different.

It's not like our refusal to do a particular run would stop the gaming session.

I hope that's hyperbole, because if not, your game seems quite insane.

Nope. What happens if some 2-bit ganger holds up the Stuffer Shack while you are on site? What happens if the Star stops you for whatever reason? Who is on the extraction team encase things get hot? What is the extraction plan? Has the hacker taken over the Stuffer Shacks nodes yet?

99.9% of the time all of this would be hideously excessive, the other .01% of the time you find yourself in Food Fight or something worse. Proper contingency planning ensures that you walk away from those situations alive, healthy, and without being compromised to the point where you have to burn everything to the ground and start over.

In Shadowrun, the runners are the playballs of the Johnsons, not the other way around, usually. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

Bye
Thanee

Only if the runners let themselves be the playballs. At the end of the day a runner can always find or create work and it's the Johnson who wants something done for him. There are Johnsons who will only give runs to teams that they have thoroughly under their thumbs but they don't tend to go outside those teams to higher runners because their risks are higher (they have less control over the runners).

[LurkerOutThere]

Our team won't meet with a Johnson without a 10K retainer (to cover the security costs of our meeting and our time) and our minimum price for a run is 100K (they are informed of this by our fixer when we are offered for the job) for even the most simple missions (because we will blow 65K of that on expenses and thus only clear 5K a runner).


Thanks.

Then you would not be working in my game, there such a thing as too paranoid and too much up front costs. Comparable quality runners whould be able to do the job for cheaper and they would get the call. There isn't a wrong way to have fun, but at the same time I don't see many J's paying this for regular jobs. If nothing else then the simple fact that even if he was for a powerful crime family he probably doesn't have 4 million sitting around to blow on this sort of op. Nothing about your plan screamed 4 million. And if you decide to start working on your own accord then you start having whole new sets of problems. You have to do all your own planing and you have to arrange all your own fencing and all your own intel and all the enemies you make are your own not your J's. Now i'm not saying because you work as an independent everyone suddenly knows where you live but I do think the deck is stacked somewhat against independant shadowrunners.

Basically your GM sounds like they are a bit overly permissive to the detriment of the setting. Now as long as they are having fun and you are having fun it's not really a problem, but it creates a game world that is so vastly different from the "norm" it's almost pointless to ask others for their advice. I say that that a guy who takes heat because I like to pay runners well for difficult runs by many peoples standards but I honestly have a hard time envisioning what you are blowing 65k worth of expenses on every op. Unless you are literally dumping every piece of gear and every ID you use every time there is no reason to have that kind of expenses.

Basically I firmly believe that as much as the Johnson-Runner arrangement is annoying especially at the upper tier it offers the highest ROI for time and gear and the greatest likely hood you will actually getting paid and then getting to take the next week or weeks off to actually enjoy your spoils while only have to keep one eye on the door.

I do agree with you that not every run needs to be a nail biter, the universe (and more importantly the GM) shouldn't conspire against you to suddenly put obstacles in the way of a good plan just to make sure you feel properly threatened. Part of being good at something, especially something dangerous, is being able to do it with a degree of safety and familiarity. A 'run should seldome be "another day a the office" but a run to extract a scientist from his family reunion his family shouldn't secretly be one big bug hive just to throw the runners a curve ball (although now I kind of want to run that plot now).

[LurkerOutThere]

That's the time when the GM listens to what you're going to do, and comes up with ways to foil it.

That's why I never do it.

I wanted to touch on this briefly: If your GM is doing this Call them on their actions the universe shouldn't re-write itself to block a good or novel plan. On the other end of the spectrum though it really helps as a GM to have a reasonable expectation of what the players are going to do so they can get their head in ahead of time on how the NPC's would react, because just as Shadowrunners might sometimes be better at their jobs then their players are the same goes for the opposition and the GM.