Hey guys. I don’t know if I’ve missed a post covering this, but I’m still a bit confused by some of the debt mechanics. Why would refusing to pay debt incur more debt? Am I misunderstanding the concept of debt? And how does harming or opposing the faction itself make you more indebted to them? How do we phrase the ‘debt’ when we record it on character sheets? There is no system of lesser or greater debts like injuries or malfunctions, but the text still talks about debts of larger or smaller impacts, which makes sense, but is there an easy way to delineate that?
I apologize If I’ve missed or misunderstood something in the reading of the document.
If you refuse to pay debt in real life, you get charged interest and your debt goes up.
Debt is “someone wants a piece of you”. It can be an explicit or implicit debt, favours owed – or it can be them wanting to punish you for hurting them. And the latter is how debts grow: failure to repay that favour on demand, or refusing a factions very kind offer to let you off the hook if you just do this one little thing for them, deserves punishment. So they’ll want another piece of you as a result.
Debt isn’t really there as currency, but as a plot driver. Its something you can pull on when someone fails a move (“those people who want a piece of you? They’ve just figured out you’re here”). And characters will often run to try and escape debt, so its an easy push in a campaign.
To give a concrete example: in #RustbucketTales Part3, Orcha killed the Nakamoto Horizons hit-squad which had been sent after him. That’s debt: they now want a piece of him for that. And if he’s on a Nakaomoto world in future and fails an appropriate roll, that might just pop up again.
A couple of the characters also owe debt to the Shards of Xa – Kestrel because they helped smuggle her out of trouble at some stage in the past, and Anvil because he sold them some stolen parts that they got caught with. Depending how the story goes, either debt could become relevant in the next session: Anvil could meet a pirate who knows about that debt and want to punish him for it, or the Xa captain could sit Kestrel down and demand her assistance with their agenda in the system (whatever that is).
From a design perspective the primary reason refusing an offer incurs more debt is to make sure declining these offers is costly. You can’t just refuse missions until they send one you like. If a mission is offered that goes against your values or antagonizes another faction you like then the threat of more debt makes this a difficult choice rather than an easy refusal.
The other reason is that it prevents the players from reaching a standstill. Debt is the driving force of the action in UW. If they could just refuse payment at every turn then a little debt wouldn’t even be an issue, and it wouldn’t push them into action. But because debt can increase every time they’re offered an opportunity and either refuse or fail, even a little debt becomes a pressing issue that must be dealt with before it gets worse. If they accept, they interact with the faction in the form of whatever mission, task or request they make. If they continually refuse, eventually they’ll interact with the faction through debt collectors, bounty hunters, attack fleets etc. Thanks to there being multiple factions contesting each other they’ll probably end up dealing with both of these.
The fiction reason is that if someone owes you something and they snub you every time you give them a chance you’d be rightfully pissed off.
I do think the Debt system works a little oddly. I like that it exists, but it’s one of the only elements of the game that 1) is tracked by a number and 2) doesn’t have any concrete guidelines. How is 1 debt different than 3 debt? Or 10 debt?
Why not have Debt work like injuries or damage, where there are concrete levels and guidelines about how each level interacts with the fiction? (Complete with cheatsheet!)
The relationship with “favors” is also really odd. What’s the difference between earning a favor and canceling a debt? Or cashing in a favor vs taking on debt? Favors are not simply negative debt (you can start the game with 1 favor and 3 debt towards a faction).
Thanks for your timely responses. I think I am understanding debt a bit more. How is it recorded on the sheets though? Would it be more like this:
*Debt 3- Arkanian Empire
*Debt 1-Silvertongue Gang
Or like this:
*Retrieve moon sliver fragments in return for services rendered-Arkanian Empire.
*The Silvertongue Gang wants revenge for burning down their headquarters.
Chris Wilson hits the nail right on the head of what makes it so confusing.
Thanks everybody. If Sean Gomes is around, I’d love a response from him as well when he has time.
*Debt 3 ~ Arkanian Empire (for services rendered.)
*Debt 1 ~ Silvertongue Gang (for wreaking their HQ.)
*Favor 1 ~ Kestrel, Anvil, & Orcha Inc. (for smuggling CEO past blockade.)
Keeping it simple, works nicely…
Trade in a favor to drop a debt… sure…
eg. Call in KA&O to negotiate an alternative Silvertongue Gang can’t refuse.
…why not?
I’d seriously consider a limit of 3 Favor or Debt from a single source… 6 at the outside, and use a countdown to and now they just want you dead on sight.
Basically, 4 or more Debt should be considered serious enough they would outsource to other factions to cover recompense… and many other factions know they can effectively extend this leverage over you too. And, accumulating more than 3 Favors from one source is both redundant leverage… and a cause for suspicion and treachery on the part of the indebted party… they’d be in their expected right to just start offering repayment, or demand an even balance be accepted. Yeah, kinda like saying, holding too many outstanding Favors, is it’s own form of Debt.
So. the Arkanian Empire has effectively branded you as renegade pirates, with three counts of delinquency on unpaid fines, one count of avoidance of authorized course corrections, and one count of treason for assaulting an imperial peacekeeper… and now has you on their dead or alive list? Take the deal with us, and you’ll have a safe refuge in all ports under Acnal Basac’s jurisdiction with official rights to fly our flag under privateer charter:- or refuse, and we will see to it that you are escorted out of our trade-lanes… in their direction.
There are reasons wise heads in antiquity, have warned of the folly in being a borrower or lender.