General Why are Players doing the Ship's Accounting?

[atpollard]

I tried that, but Mr. Details kept niggling at me, so in the end I gave up and we do detailed ship's accounts and such like. Well, rather, he does them because I'm not going to.

So when you are playing out one of those great tavern scenes where characters are all interacting and players are all into the action and there are all these interactions with locals … who tracks the credits paid for every round of drinks and the bar snacks on the table and the tip for the waitress?

Then who paid the cab fair to the next location?

It was all the minutiae that was getting lost (or spoiling the flow to bother tracking during a mission with a six figure payday) that convinced me to just deduct percentages to cover “expenses” and move on.

 

[Condottiere]

The patron?

 

[Rupert]

Is he the sort of player who tries to take advantage of every credit he can get his mitts on? I've had a player like that, so it was easier to give him some numbers and let him play around with them, doing all the accounting. Not just detail-oriented, but a little less wholesome. When things were going too well, there was always the option of some sort of repair or replacement chewing up some very handy available funds.

Oh, of course. He also wants to spend ages on check for cargo at every stop, tries to balance up staying longer to look again vs just accepting what's first rolled, and so on. All this and it was not a merchant campaign, was never advertised as one.

This time round, they have no ship, and their patron just handed them a pile of cash and a job. He's already suggested buying freight tonnage and buying a cargo, but accepted that trying this on a major shipping route was unlikely to end well. So he's given up... for now.

 

[Rupert]

So when you are playing out one of those great tavern scenes where characters are all interacting and players are all into the action and there are all these interactions with locals … who tracks the credits paid for every round of drinks and the bar snacks on the table and the tip for the waitress?

Then who paid the cab fair to the next location?

It was all the minutiae that was getting lost (or spoiling the flow to bother tracking during a mission with a six figure payday) that convinced me to just deduct percentages to cover “expenses” and move on.

That I've managed to get people to accept a blanket charge for, covering the day/week.

 

[atpollard]

Here is a detailed example. I like to convert a simple “speculative trade” roll into an adventure. So in the course this hypothetical trade/adventure, the players purchased goods for Cr 20,000 (locating a seller and having an adventure to accomplish the task). They then transported the goods to another location and (after another adventure) sold them for Cr 40,000.

The accounting looks like this:
5% of Cr 20,000 = Cr 1000 buy expenses.
5% of Cr 40,000 = Cr 2000 sell expenses.
Profit = Cr 40,000 - (Cr 23,000) = Cr 17,000.

Assuming a 5 man crew partnership,
each person gets (17000/5) = Cr 3500

I like to reward initiative, luck and participation, so 50% of the expenses are money spent and 50% of expenses are a bonus to the person that closed the deal.
Player A located the seller and negotiated the purchase, so they get a Cr 500 bonus.
Player B located the buyer and negotiated a higher price, so they get a Cr 1000 bonus.

Therefore, nobody worries about cash during the two weeks of adventuring, but at the end I inform the players that …

Player A earns Cr 3500 + Cr 500 bonus
Player B earns Cr 3500 + Cr 1000 bonus
Player C earns Cr 3500
Player D earns Cr 3500
Player E earns Cr 3500
The GROUP spends Cr 1500 on expenses for the 2 weeks.

(This particular adventure took place on a single world).
The point is to just reduce the expenses to a percentage and deduct them between adventures … like once a month.