Mothership economy

The city of Kybele is connected to the orbital station Vanishing Point through a Space Lift. This makes possible for a space GTFO option, but also works the other way around. Ships are still docking at Vanishing Point so the PCs might as well be Kosmonauts enjoying a wild weekend in Kybele after a long trip. Star sailors cause a lot of trouble in Kybele, some kind of drunk mariners in Last Exit to Brooklyn.

But I wanted to talk money! Mothership money. Basically I’m trying to decipher the price points of various items and salaries to see if an organic economy emerges. If it does, I can use it as a blueprint for prices and salaries in Sprawlscape.
Network 23 already has stat-block compatibility with Mosh so this is a further step in that direction.
I think that when the SRD will be released, Mosh will prove itself as a great non-d&d hackable standard.
Disclaimer: I’m not an economist but I played a lot of EVE online back in the days I was tabletop orphan.

So, CREDITS, sweet credits. I’m going to use only Player Survival Guide and A Pound of Flesh.
The PSG economy is quite balanced. Also APOF is balanced. The only problem is that these two products don’t talk to each other.

Let’s dive in!

BASICS

the basic unit of food, the Ready Meal costs 10 cr
a tank with 12 hours of Oxygen costs 50 cr
FLASHLIGHT: 10 cr
On Prospero’s Dream, Oxygen is taxed 10 cr/day, it costs like a Bloody Mary.

MEDS/BOOSTERS

Pain Pills (heal 1d10 -1 stress) cost 75 cr each, sold in blister of 6 for 450 cr. Addictive!
A six-pack of STIMPAKS is 600. (heal 2d10, increase STR and COMBAT for 1d10 hours). Highly addictive!
MEDSCANNER: 150 cr (no need to get your scalpels dirty)

watch out for addiction, it’s pretty heavy and if left untreated your stress will go brrrrr

WEAPONS

Expensive as hell and twice as deadly. I like how most hand weapons can be used for something else (or viceversa). I suspect that fire weapon price is kept artificially high, maybe to discourage their use on spaceships?

CROWBAR 50 cr.
SCALPEL 50 cr. 1d10 damage + bleeding. Gives [+] on medicine tests.
VIBECHETE 75cr. Twice as deadly with 2d10 + a chance to hack off limbs.
HAND WELDER: 250 cr. My fave, hands down. You can do lots of stuff with this: cut through doors, solder things, create junk sculptures.

Ranged weapons get expensive quickly and are an order of magnitude more expensive.
FOAM GUN: 250 cr. Quick hardening foam, fire retardant, can make creatures get stuck! Up to 10 meters (by the way, thanks Mothership for using the metric system).
RIGGING GUNS (350 cr, 2d10 at 100m range,1 shot) and NAIL GUNS (150 cr) 2d10 at 10m), all used for work, are very cheap compared to the basic Revolver (750 cr!!!! 3d10 up to 100m).
A COMBAT SHOTGUN costs 1400 cr
SMART RIFLE is off the chart with its whopping 12k pricetag,
FLAMETHROWER is the second most expensive for 2k cr and the PULSE RIFLE for 1600 does 5d10 and 2x crit.

TECH

Cheap stuff from the PSG. I love how many creative uses these tools have.

The FIELD RECORDER is my favourite item “used to research alien flora and fauna in the field”. Genetic analysis. Only 50 credits. It’s a steal! I want at least 5 of these things. A field recording subculture who share cassette mixtapes with each other between space trips. You can buy xeno-DNA replicas in the Black Market.

RADIO JAMMER with 100km radius go for 175 cr. Clearly designed for space. Need to tune that radius down to fit it the urban environment. With the amount of noise I would set the radius to 3km, the size of a neighbourhood, it also means you need to be near the signal in order to jam it.
The most expensive non-weapon item is the Advanced battle dress for 1500cr.
VACCSUITS are 1000cr.

SHIPS
10 MILLION CR per Hull Point.
Yeah, this is corporation-level kind of money.
Except maybe if you manage to sell the artefacts from Gradient Descent (good luck!)

SALARIES

The starter salary as a space miner is 500 cr/month. Board and lodging included. I guess Unions are not that strong in Mosh universe, That’s why a module like Blue Picket Tango by Ian Yusem is ace and the reason why Haunting of Y has a teamster selling illegal boosters. Look at this:

Miner salary: 500/mo
5 Stimpak: 500cr. (100 each). A miner getting hooked on stimpaks will 100% create some troubles. Plotstorming?

SHIT-TIER
PRIESTS get the worse deal: 200/month. they start with no loadout and one (not very useful) skill to choose between Mysticism and Theleology.
Hiring SEA URCHIN (100/moth) cost less than a priest and have arguably better stats.
COURIER: 250/month
SCUM: 200/month. No wonder they’re unreliable.
MARINE GRUNTS: 600/month. In Mothership world, not a good deal! Just hope they don’t get hooked on boosters.

MIDDLE CLASS TIER
PSYCHOLOGIST 1000/month
RESEARCHER 1500/month
MARINE OFFICER 2000/month

TOP TIER
ENGINEER gets 5000/month
ANDROIDS gets 5000/month
DOCTOR: 6000/month
SURGEON: 7000/month
CAPTAIN: 8000/month

CONCLUSION: Space miners and marines are horribly exploited. Think about it next time you run Picket Line Tango (for the records PCs are paid 300 Kcr to break the strike. It takes 50 years of mining to make that kind of money, the company would probably be better off by meeting the workers demand, but I guess they want to give a lesson to all other miners).
Doctors and surgeons are in high demand, the Pathology skill alone of surgeons is worth 1000cr/month!

DUBAI EFFECT: A POUND OF FLESH

A night out at the Stellar Burn: Space bums can get pissed for cheap, cocktails are 10 cr and 3/4 should do the job. Good, marines are happy.
The ECSTASY DANCE FLOOR? Quite exclusive for space standard, rather cheap for Prospero 1% standard: 100 cr to get in
HOURLY RATE for a private room (RAW is an “hour alone”, so I’m not sure it includes any sex worker pay rates, it’s probably on top of the hourly rate?)
OVERNIGHT COMPANIONSHIP: 1.500 cr. Not cheap, caters to Top Tier jobs.
The MDMA-like SYCORAX is better be good cause it costs 750cr a pop! That’s a month of Shit Tier salary. No, there’s no real world drug equivalent, except maybe Warhammer 40crack, and bad wine vintages in shit clubs for oligarchs.

CYBERMODS
The shit is expensive. Some of them requires other Cybermods to function correctly.

SPINAL RIG: this assists heavy lifting and must be standard for certain heavy jobs. 150Kcr means that the company must really believe in you (and they will make sure that the debt is paid back in full).
Adds 10 STR which is a big deal.

EIDETIC MEMORY BACKUP is 10Kcr
The BIG SWITCH for switching primary sex characteristics is 18 kcr.
SLICKSOCKETS are reasonably priced at 1000 cr
The most expensive is the PANZERFIST which is an absolute monster (IT’S A SHIP AUTOCANNON HIDDEN INSIDE A PROSTHETIC, lemme see that killer recoil)

SLEEVES
Are expensive and that’s ok. 100kcr for a Reclamation sleeve (a prisoner) up to Narcissus Luxury Sleeve for 50 mcr.

SLICKWARE
Require the SLICKSOCKET cybermod (1000cr).
LOOKY-LOO picks up transmission on all non-encrypted bands for 550cr.
A SENTINEL SYSTEM doubles effectiveness of Stimpaks, rest and healing and costs
my favourite is the HOLOPET for 75 kcr. An AI pet which runs around you. For the average Captain, it takes one year of savings to buy one.
SKILLSTICKS cost 50kcr for the Trained version up to 4mcr for the master version. Only for tycoons.

CANYON-HEAVY MARKET (hackers’ haven)
These guys must be rich cause except the SOCKETSNAKE for 750cr which is basically a killing joke (go back to page 25 and read it!), these things cost 3kcr and up. In comparison, hackers’ goodies from the Hackers’ Handbook by Luke Gearing are cheaper than this and more in line with PSG prices. (only apply to hacking, though!).
SPLINTERMASKS makes you disappear on cameras for 3kcr
MOEBIUS STRIP makes you loop a security camera for 3,5kcr
SLAVESHOT lets you inject malicious code into a cybermode and allow to remotely control it. very interesting indeed. 15kcr.

CONCLUSION: The stuff in APOF is more powerful and exotic than the equipment found in the PSG. Many things here are for companies or incredibly rich individuals. There’s nothing for a marine to be had in APOF except maybe cheap drinks at the Stellar Burn. I’d go for 10 cr Bloody Marys.
Somehow reminds of D&D market prices for magic items.
On the other hand, prices seems to be tailored upon mission pay-offs on the Prospero’s Dream.

The cybermods are so expensive that it might well be they’re unique hand-crafted items, passed with great care from one owner to the next, each item with a backstory of previous owners.
This is not factory-made pret-a-porter, it’s tailored high fashion.

MISSION PAY-OFFS.

The Dubai effect.
If you get a job with one of the Factions, you’re one of Prospero 1% percenter.
What does it mean? The Factions are exceptionally wealthy and very powerful. The Prospero economy is totally disconnected from PSG economy and salaries.
People would cut (many) throats just to be on any faction payroll.

CANYONHEAVY
Finding and contacting a guy in Doptown nets you 50kcr. Let’s remember that people in Doptown are stuck there cause they were unable to pay the 10 cr/day Oxygen Tax.
Delivering a package to a private booth: 100kcr. (it’s 16+ years of a miner salary)
Locating another guy in Doptown: 100kcr
With the simplest fetch mission you can buy everything listed on the PSG except maybe a ship.

TEMPEST COMPANY
Night circle corridor guard duty: 1kcr. Hey, a marine gains 600/MONTH!
Another mission pays 15 kcr for each corpse.
Transfer accuse prisoner: 15 kcr. Almost 1 year of work as a psychologist.
Delivering a weapon cargo to Orobas Moonbase to fight off insurrection pays 7mcr.

7mcr.
Make it deadly.

I feel that Mothership prices are being used to balance gameplay rather than attempting to build an organic economy, unless the Dubai Effect is what the writers were after (which is kind of in line with what we know about the Mosh expanded universe)
APOF suffered a certain amount of power-inflation.
Or is it terminal capitalism working as intended?

CODA

Few things about the job market that I learned thanks to RPGs:

Day jobs suck pretty hard, almost worse than in real life. Taking odd jobs and questing is ALWAYS a better solution.
Seriously, don’t get a day job.
Crime pays, big time. Hi-tech and magic items are luxury items.
Adventurers make a LOT of money, until they don’t.

Gradient Descent Post Scriptum.
Artifacts in gradient Descent are incredibly expensive and highly situational, truly unique pieces.

the cheapest: 1d10 black marbles. Undiscovered material. Indestructible. No known use. 10kcr each.
This is already a very good Thinking Adventure item.

DATA-DRIVE containing 100% accurate predictions of economics, politics and the movement of (seemingly) random celestial bodies over the next 1d10 years.
300mcr (but dangerous buyers).

and this is my favourite:

The Cultural Analysis Engine. With a month of cultural observation as dictated by the device, the engine generates a Cultural Report detailing the weakest links in the observed society along with instructions on how to exploit them. Acting on the Report always leads to miserable war.
250mcr.

There are few other interesting things to be found in the Artifact list:
Android memories are incredibly expensive, this is what they used on Deckard.
False memory disc. Used to make androids believe they are human. 1.5mcr

Warty black silicon lump. When squeezed releases stupefying audio. Organics must Sanity Save or be entranced for 1d5 rounds. 200kcr.
I want this bio-synth machine, sounds like something out of Cronenberg’s Existenz

and this is fucked-up:

Potent nootropic drug which grants [+] on all Intellect Checks and a sense of connecting to a higher intelligence during a serious body high. This intelligence is Monarch (pg. 8), who has now transformed the user through a hypothetical dimension into an AI-node, allowing Monarch to grow computationally without the need for further materials. Highly addictive. 7mcr.

Omnislick. Slickware containing every Skill. Burns out after use. Lose 1d100 Sanity. 20mcr.
I like how this stuff is not made for humans!

Set of three brass rods, spaced 5″ apart, forming a pyramid. Nothing holds them together but they cannot be separated. Any experiments force the investigator to make a Sanity Save or become obsessed with the pyramid and devote 50% of their wealth to uncovering its secrets. 1d5mcr.

I’ll stop here or i will need to copy/paste all of the items, most artifacts have very cool and frightening consequences. It’s also explained how Ghosts in the Machines are created.

remember: “Don’t be afraid to give these out. Don’t be afraid to play through the consequences.”

Said so, here is the Sprawlscape pricelist, based mostly on the PSG.