Is the license system good?

But I am genuinely curious, now that it's had time to marinate, do people actually feel like this is a good system? I personally feel it's very arbitrary and pointless for most of them, barring cargo and corpie doctors, and you get punished by trying to do things the 'right way'. But maybe that's the point of it? To encourage you to break laws? I don't know.

Like, really, who is applying for a merchant license to be a topside tailor or an alcohol license? Legitimate question. Why does it seems like tech-based or medical characters (barring CGH) are forced into corporate jobs to even have the idea of a license in their field be something they can get, and even then, 50% change of being told no when they do get that corpie gig?

What do people think? Is it just me?

I am not saying to get rid of them entirely but at some point, it just went too far in my opinion.

Gun license? Sure. And the WJF can be involved even.

Doc licenses (all types)? Sure. But just leave it to the doc to decide. The judges need have zero input in my opinion. Sure, there could be a behind the scenes check between the hall clerks and the doctor sponsoring it to verify but that's plenty. Why complicate it?

Security License? Eh. Seems odd to me. Toss it. And get rid of the main perk having this license grants (if it's still about). Many players don't even know about it and it just floods the game with way too much security gear resulting in going way over rarity sometimes. Don't want to say too much about it but if staff is curious, they are welcome to ask.

Other licenses like the 'biz license'? Generally flush them. I don't think they brought anything to the game besides giving the judges another stick to beat people with. I think it does more harm than good.

Corporate License? I like this one but would change it. You buy this license to gain corporate status for X time period. It's how you have rich fucks who don't work but are just plain rich being corporate. Not a fan at all of how it currently works.

Just my take on these.

I can imagine a few exceptions. But most places and mixers, in my opinion, just think licenses are a joke. Who does that? Crazy corpies...

Could there be a way around the monopoly? There are. You could argue that these ways are difficult, rely on players and factions that might not be active/willing to work with you, but I also think Staff would be willing to facilitate something if you had an idea and worked for it. If you desperately need a license, you might have to make a decision that your character is uncomfortable with: if CGH is how you get a license, then you might have to work with them begrudgingly while following your own agenda deep down. I like the idea of enhancing roleplay but I also think that characters sometimes have to make uncomfortable decisions or have to do things they might not OOCly want, or at least not have the ideal outcome right away.

I genuinely do think there are ways around it. That being said, I understand why at first glance it can feel daunting and very restrictive to undertake those tasks as well as the thought of how getting rid of licenses entirely could improve things.

I'll give a hypothetical though to understand things better: is the thought here that certain things/services locked behind licenses should be allowed for everyone regardless of their job? Should they be dependent on your job? I'm trying to make sure I understand things better here before I comment more as someone who is familiar with the licensing process.

That being said, I hear you on the lack of guidance ICly from the Mix side of PCs who know the truth of things and can help people navigate it. It's something to be worked on by characters for sure.

Helping the player base understand the system and why it exists doesn't make it fun and engaging.

Firearm licensing is basically just an unthematic projection of Johnny's gun control politics.

Freight licensing was a control valve on freight income consuming the whole economy but then it did anyway and licenses just meant some benefited and others couldn't.

The rest are essentially arbitrary choices on whether some items got purchase regulations or not. Roadblocks on advanced medicine and security tech so now there's only ever one or two players at a time willing to put up with the hoops involved.

For a world that's about the dangers of unchecked capitalism run unregulated and amok, Sindome sure does love tight regulations on what capitalism goes on.

You can do most anything you want. But you can't do everything you want easily sometimes. You might want to be a rigger as an unlicensed Mixer, but you might need to go through either shady sources or strike up a relationship with a licensed one to get all the supplies you want.

You might need to do favors, bribe people in positions to either sponsor you or get you one when you normally wouldn't be able. It's something that happens.

If you apply for a license blindly asking around or looking in-game for basic qualifications in most cases (there's IC information that was created to help prevent OOC anger over misunderstandings after it was apparent that was happening), it might not end well for your character. So talk to PCs and NPCs. Ones that know the answers, ones that might be able to give you a little shady help, ones that can help work stuff out for you and give you an idea of how to get what you want. It might take extra steps and extra work.

Just going and talking to people, rather than assuming, can really help out. There's a lot of IC and OOC training for several WJF PCs and there is license leeway. Mix-side also isn't generally going to be heavily scrutinized in a majority of cases.

But if you expect to be able to go apply for a license your character might not qualify for, and do so without getting available data first, you're probably going to set yourself up for disappointment.

Like you guys want the firearm permits for everyone. Or that everyone can legally have guns.

So what does that do to the rest of the game? It wouldn't seem like a lot.

But how are price differences between the game's legal firearm providing lease and then the games fixers played out? What about smugglers? What about import access for certain factions? Like it or not, legality adds extra layers there and helps create several roads of roleplay and ecnoomy play.

To illustrate this point, keep the licensing system but put it under WCS purview and watch the same heels dig in for new reasons.

Every time I bring up the fact that a single faction keeps having major systems like freight licensing and vehicle ownership brought under its roof, it's the same refrain of it just makes sense, or it doesn't really matter there's no real power there. But try to suggest it should be some different way and the hit dogs will holler.

There shouldn't be any faction in the game that blurs the lines between where staff powers end and player powers begin, especially one literally run by the senior staff, and also that players can be a part of and that has sole control of some of the most important gameplay systems around.

The WJF has been continually sapping authority and roles and roleplay and gameplay from the Corporations ever since Jack Anderson hit the scene, the corporations who should actually have that authority and making them background characters in the story where they should be the main villains.

Like I know I am a bit over the top with how much of this is a bugbear of mine but it gets pretty old having this faction get crowbarred into so many plots because there is otherwise no option. All these different powers and authority should not be under one roof that players operate within, I don't care how guidance or oversight there is the optics are terrible.

I am not against challenges to overcome. Though I do think it's important to constantly evaluate if the changes made to accomplish this are having the desired effect and to check what side effects come from it. I think that in a lot of cases these things help in some ways and hurt in others. And it's hard to see all the ways they impact the game with our perspectives.

For example, having licenses like medical and security licenses might encourage players to go earn them. However, the most common process of overcoming this challenge feels… boring to me. And while there are other ways, many of them force you onto certain paths or are too much work for the reward. Heck, some are things many players may never even consider!

At the same time, say there were no licenses, you might have other challenges. Maybe people start competing for business. Something that is harder to do when licensing might result in there not really being enough cyberdocs at any one time to compete for patients. So the challenge of competition might have been lessened in exchange for the challenge of getting licensed.

All this to say that it's never simple. I prefer more free form play where players have reason to compete with each other. Being each other's challenges. I'm less in favor of design choices that, often unintentionally, create well worn paths that many players have a hard time seeing past. That limit competition. And I don't think anyone will get these things right the first time. It's an iterative process.

I also respect that, while I prefer a cyperpunk landscape in which the corps exercise more power in many ways similar to what 0x1mm describes, that this might not be the world as staff sees it. Though I will also say that, in the past, staff has supported corporate first pushes.

The last corporate PC I played went out of his way to remind the WJF that they had no authority on his corp's property. He even trained his co-workers on corporate sovereignty and how to push back against the WJF as much as possible. How to handle Judges that were trying to exert authority over them in any way. Worked on ways to even work against WJF authority over his corp's employees when not on their corp's property.

Staff never had a problem with any of what I did at the time. Some even seemed to like it. And I am 90% sure this was after CPI was put in place. Things might have changed but I suspect that WJF power over all isn't as complete as it's commonly perceived and that staff are still open to such pushes.

It reminds me of gangs in the mix. As mixer PCs give authority to gangs by going along with and even spreading practices that are not in fact word of gang law, corporate PCs are often letting the WJF get away with things and thus empowering them even if it's not how the wider world really works. Often they might not have any clue it could be any other way.

Back to licenses though...

I am not saying that they have to go entirely. I wouldn't mind really but I am not going to be all that sad if they stay. I do think, however, that it's a good idea to review them and adjust. Look at how they impact things. Get player feedback to expand the limited perspective staff has (yes, staff too has a limited perspective). Adjust as needed. I think some fair points have been brought up and are worth considering seriously - even if staff comes to the conclusion that things are fine as they are.