[Bull]

that will be in the Hotpatch Errata notes once it gets signed off on.

[Ricochet]

First, thanks for getting the FAQ out well in advance of GenCon.  We'll be getting gear sorted and divided this week,

How drastic are Mystic Adept changes?  I made mine partly in the campaign to get changes, but now I'm wondering how much of a remake is required before GenCon.

[DWC]

What happens if someone with a SIN (the negative quality, at any level) doesn't pay their taxes?  For Lifestyle, not making the payment means you spend the next month living Street.

Do you get a tax credit if a run ends up costing money and you don't make any?  Are you taxed on the sales of looted goods?

[Bull]

First, thanks for getting the FAQ out well in advance of GenCon.  We'll be getting gear sorted and divided this week,

How drastic are Mystic Adept changes?  I made mine partly in the campaign to get changes, but now I'm wondering how much of a remake is required before GenCon.

Nerf Crotch Bat drastic.   <grin>

Primarily, it'll be an increase in how much karma it costs.  So you'll likely end up in karmic debt by a fair amount, depending on how many Power Points you bought.  (I posted before that the temporary number is 5 karma instead of 2, and I'm sticking with that as a guess for what the final amount will be.  Other changes will likely be on the back end, dealing with how they progress in power after chargen).

[Bull]

What happens if someone with a SIN (the negative quality, at any level) doesn't pay their taxes?  For Lifestyle, not making the payment means you spend the next month living Street.

Do you get a tax credit if a run ends up costing money and you don't make any?  Are you taxed on the sales of looted goods?

*blink*  taxes??

Yeah...  Ummm...  Not something we really deal with in Shadowrun, since this isn't IRS the RPG  

Short answer is, umm...  Don't miss your payments on lifestyle, and don't worry about atxes. 

Slightly longer answer is, you can't claim shadowrunning as a business expense.   therefore, no tax credits.

Slightly, slightly longer answer...  I can honestly say this is one of the odder questions I've gotten in a long time.

[All4BigGuns]

What happens if someone with a SIN (the negative quality, at any level) doesn't pay their taxes?  For Lifestyle, not making the payment means you spend the next month living Street.

Do you get a tax credit if a run ends up costing money and you don't make any?  Are you taxed on the sales of looted goods?

*blink*  taxes??

Yeah...  Ummm...  Not something we really deal with in Shadowrun, since this isn't IRS the RPG  

Short answer is, umm...  Don't miss your payments on lifestyle, and don't worry about atxes. 

Slightly longer answer is, you can't claim shadowrunning as a business expense.   therefore, no tax credits.

Slightly, slightly longer answer...  I can honestly say this is one of the odder questions I've gotten in a long time.

Not that odd considering a tax was added into the SIN negative qualities. (15% for National and Criminal, 20% for Corporate Limited and 10% for Corporate Born)

[Bull]

Ahhh.  Hrmm, missed that, and I haven't read the final version of SINner then, obviously (I don; think that was in the playtest version.  grrr.)

hrmm.  Gonna have to figure out how the runner handles that then, since obviously they're not claiming Shadowrunning on their taxes, so the taxes shouldn't be based on that.  And the runners need to have a plausible income per month, plus need a forged papertrail.

Yay.  Stuff to think about.

[Bull]

Short answer to this will be that if runners fail to pay their taxes, whatever they end up being.  Failure to do so results in serious financial audits, fines, and possibly jail time.  All of which are BAD for Shadowrunners, because IRS auditors with cyebrdecks are nasty, and they will figure out you have sources of unclaimed income from illegal activities.

[Palladion]

Ahhh.  Hrmm, missed that, and I haven't read the final version of SINner then, obviously (I don; think that was in the playtest version.  grrr.)

hrmm.  Gonna have to figure out how the runner handles that then, since obviously they're not claiming Shadowrunning on their taxes, so the taxes shouldn't be based on that.  And the runners need to have a plausible income per month, plus need a forged papertrail.

Yay.  Stuff to think about.

Tax (all) their Lifestyles?  It is a bit of hand waving at the issue (since most runners go to great lengths to hide their SINs or fall off the grid), but it seems an appropriate measure that is easily calculated.  The extra is the requirement to conform to laws and/or the extra required to pay to hide their background.

[Bull]

It is, but a lifestyle isn't equal to what you earn.  Plus, since at the moment lifestyles have a minimal in game effect, all this would do would encourage people to take low lifestyles except for the diehard RPers.  So even saying "tax rate based on Lifetyle*2 or Lifetyle*3 doesn't work.

the taxman will get really suspicious if you're paying $2,000 a month for rent, and claiming that's all you make in a month, after all.

It will probably just be a flat "yearly" rate, payable by the end of Month 12 of each the Missions calender.  I need to talk with the rest of the writers and stuff though and see what we can figure out.

[Palladion]

It is, but a lifestyle isn't equal to what you earn.  Plus, since at the moment lifestyles have a minimal in game effect, all this would do would encourage people to take low lifestyles except for the diehard RPers.  So even saying "tax rate based on Lifetyle*2 or Lifetyle*3 doesn't work.

the taxman will get really suspicious if you're paying $2,000 a month for rent, and claiming that's all you make in a month, after all.

It will probably just be a flat "yearly" rate, payable by the end of Month 12 of each the Missions calender.  I need to talk with the rest of the writers and stuff though and see what we can figure out.

(As a complete sidebar, people these days tend to spend everything they earn and then some, and they get taxed on everything they purchase.  So paying 2,000 nuyen for your life, not just rent, then getting taxed on it, would be analogous to real life.  However, I agree that it is not even across all characters, I forget about the min/maxing, heh.)

How about based on Karma then?  1 Karma = 2,000 nuyen.  So someone with a National SIN would be required to pay 15% tax of 5 Karma worth of nuyen every month?  Works out something like...

National: (15% of 10,000 nuyen) 1,500 nuyen
Criminal: (15% of 20,000 nuyen) 3,000 nuyen
Corporate Limited: (20% of 30,000 nuyen) 6,000 nuyen
Corporate: (10% of 50,000 nuyen) 5,000 nuyen

I realize that the difference between the 15 Karma and 25 Karma seems broken, but if the "you will be killed if found out" penalty for the Corporate SIN is upheld, that might be a deterrent?

[Ricochet]

First, thanks for getting the FAQ out well in advance of GenCon.  We'll be getting gear sorted and divided this week,

How drastic are Mystic Adept changes?  I made mine partly in the campaign to get changes, but now I'm wondering how much of a remake is required before GenCon.

Nerf Crotch Bat drastic.   <grin>

Primarily, it'll be an increase in how much karma it costs.  So you'll likely end up in karmic debt by a fair amount, depending on how many Power Points you bought.  (I posted before that the temporary number is 5 karma instead of 2, and I'm sticking with that as a guess for what the final amount will be.  Other changes will likely be on the back end, dealing with how they progress in power after chargen).

I actually used 5 karma per power point.  I was looking for how much more it changed beyond that.  If it's just 5 karma per power point, then I see them as still being the obvious choice for magic users.  Making them pay karma for power points (without the free point for raising magic) that should help a bit with bringing them back into balance some.

[lurkeroutthere]

Mystic adepts: the problem with mystic adepts isn't the pp cost ((although that's part of it) it's that they have the benefits of both a Mage and an adept with very few drawbacks. You could make pp 10 or 20 a point and they'd stiil be attractive for that reason but that's a discussion for another place.

RE: taxes why not just do it on an income basis 10 percent goes to either the government or making it look like the gov is getting their due. It simple elegant and what's more in line with the rules. Otherwise the sinner disadvantage isn't much of a disadvantage especially in missions. I say all this as someone who took  it and has dutifully been paying their tithe.

[Michael Chandra]

In SR4 a 20h/week Day Job gave you 2.500/month. You could define that as the minimum accepted monetary income, meaning you can afford a Low Lifestyle legally after taxes. If the runner takes a higher lifestyle on their real SIN, clearly the taxes will come out higher.

[All4BigGuns]

Honestly, the tax tacked onto the SINner qualities is just overkill. An extra money sink and additional crud to keep track of for little to no gain for the game as a whole.